Come on, come.
On this episode of the Heat Check. We've got a big, humongous, monumentous updates, enormous, gargantuan update on Zion Williamson, and let me tell you, it is going to get spicy. Did someone say spicy? I love spicy chicken sandwiches myself, extra pickles, maybe some mayonnaise anyway down in the Bayou. Did someone say, by you, I love gumbo? My god, I love some gumbo. No one seems to be going on and knowing what the hell is going on with Zion's injury or his
future plans, and things are getting tense, tense. We check in on the Phoenix Suns, who got some bad news this past week and finally, very sad end of an era at Madison Square Garden. I hate talking about them, but more news just keeps coming out, Brock, So drop that beat, right, it's update, they update. Just a little news around the league as we wrap things up. No big stories, Well, one big story. Let's talk about the elephant in the room or the elephant hiding in Beaverton,
Oregon at the Nike campus away from his entirety. I'm pushing pee, pushing pee, folks, I'm sorry, I kid, I kids. Sometimes the jokes just right themselves, you know what I mean. Just I'm pushing pie, he says, I'm pushing pie. Somebody's pushing pie on tie stop. Since is how bad things have gotten in New Orleans. Zion Williamson, nowhere to be found, has dominated post All Star break, which is ironic because last year he was dominating in the post during the
All Star Game. How far we've come? Things have gone off the rails. What an absolute force he was last year and now he is just crickets nowhere. No one sees him, no one knows what's going on. Definitely not on the floor. But not good for the Pelicans, not good for the NBA, and damn sure not good for Zion because he is dominating the news in the worst possible way. So let's give a quick timeline, quickly update on what happened? Shall we? Randomly? After the last game
before the All Star breaks. CJ McCollum, former Portland Trailblazer New New Orleans Pelicans, was answering questions about his new team when someone asked him, Hey, so, like, however, your conversation's been with Zion? And uh He's like, oh, uh, I haven't talked to Zion yet. Nope, not a peep nothing from Zion. And he goes, They go, do you know, uh when he's gonna come back? And CJ goes, Nope, I know about as much as you do. Right now, we have not connected. But I am going to get
to the bottom of it. Pause pause, hold on, let me take a drink and get my popcorn out. Because, first of all, CJ. McCollum is not your normal, everyday teammate. Besides the fact that he gets paid thirty months million dollars. CJ. McCollum. For folks who don't remember this, because these aren't things that just come up to the top of the forefront of your Sarahbellam. He is the head of the NBA Players Association.
CJ. McCollum is the.
New Chris Paul excuse me, And you haven't spoken to the NBPA president yet. And your new teammate who they forced the trade, are not forced to trade, but they made a trade in a way that people are a little suss on. Just to pair you with someone who's
a dominant scorer. You haven't spoken out to him. No, Literally, the most important teammates Ion might ever have indication how fractured Boom since he's fractured his metatarsal, how fractured his relationship is with the Pels that he wouldn't even reach out and say, Yo, what's up, Welcome to New Orleans. Let me show you my favorite creole spots, Smoothie King Arena, let me show you are all the smoothies. And that's
just the beginning. Because JJ Reddick, who has an active grind with the Pelicans, went on ESPN and then was like, I'm gonna throw some gasoline on this. This is what he said.
I want to get across is how abnormal it is for a player to not text or reach out to an incoming player, And not just because it was CJ. McCollum, who is a great player. You do that for any teammate. You do that when you sign a two way player, you just do that. I said this earlier on First Take, and this is this is the point I really want to hammer home here. When you're a professional athlete that is playing a team sport, you have to be fully invested.
You have to be fully invested in your body, your work, and most importantly your teammates.
That's part of the job description.
When I saw this over the weekend, to me, this was like the most cringey thing all weekend.
I thought the dunk contest was going to be it. This was it. When you say this, which part of it?
So much to unpacked? There? When you've got JJ Reddick, who shares an agent with Zion Williamson, Zion's been on his podcast at least once sharing personal details of his vulnerability in his life. They're friends, they're friendly. This is not someone who has an extra grind with Zion. And when JJ Reddick, one of the nicest dudes in the league who was Zion's teammate, says, I can personally describe Zion as a detached teammate. You have to say alert, alert,
red alert. This is not a test sealing the alarms, break the glass. Something is wrong. He then says, Zion's not even on the season ticket pamphlet email What excuse me? All right? Then he goes on later on first take and says this.
When I was watching Sunday Night and they announced the starters Joe El Embiid fifth straight All Star Game, start think about the rear view. Now, how long ago it seems that there was all these injury concerns and now he's just been a complete dominant force for five seasons. Zion can get to that, But like I said, you have to be fully invested in.
All those areas and body starts.
That's where's Lebron famously spends a million dollars a year on his body.
Kobe is flying all over the world to prolong his career. Right you think Zion quickly has played his last game in New Orleans. No, I don't.
I don't, and I'm even more optimistic.
There's a responsibility that you have as an athlete when you play a sport to be fully invested, fully invested in your body. You'd notice he said that first, the body part. He did say that the body part first. He said that for a reason fully invested in your body, fully invested in your work, and fully invested in your teammate. That is your responsibility. And we have not seen that
from Zion. You can damn well know that that is a shot at Zion's lack of conditioning, his locker room demeanor, and he admitted he had to call out Zion in front of the entire team his rookie year. Yes, he's been amazing when he's been on the court, one hundred percent, He's amazing to watch. There's no one that can do what he does on a basketball court. But as a teammate, there's a pattern of behavior, as a fully invested individual
in New Orleans, there's a pattern of behavior. This is worrisome. I'm worried. I'm worried. Are you worried? I've been worried, folks. I've been worried since August. I've been worried since whenever they're a little media availability, when they slid in that Zion had a random surgery that they didn't know about, like ever since then, I'm like yours preaking up, brouh Scooby, Does anybody else see this?
No?
And here we are. He hasn't played a goddamn game yet. And then that's when shit literally hit the fan. Everybody began to weigh in boom on the Zion drama, many of them seemingly shocked about the incredible, incredible disconnect between Zion and the Pels front office and his teammates. Of course, I could point out I've been talking about this since the beginning of the season, but that would be unseemly.
That would be that would be rude. I could even say that I predicted he wouldn't play a single game season, but that would be uncouth. That would be very uncouth. It would also be what's that word, the truth? It would also be the truth. But you know, we're not here to talk about all the things that I predicted that nobody agreed with me on, and now here we are in the brink of disaster. But it's okay. It's fine. Like it's just me yelling at clouds all by myself
until the world falls down around me. It's okay. No worries. Peace after peace now breaking on the piciun Tribune paywall that I took a lot of time getting passed without paying the NOLA took a lot of time getting past that article's paywall as well. Today for you listeners, for you, I'm not paying a dollar for these guys. I just will not headlines like report Zion Williamson's detachment from Pelicans stems from lack of trust quote unquote lack of trust.
We can't even trust Zion on on the off season to be by himself alone with a plate of doughnuts, Like the lack of trust goes both ways. Here, it goes both ways. Listen, like, I promise you that's be I didn't say that, but that is what sources tell me. Things are saying being said that right now trust we can't trust. The trust is wait. Listen, he had a surgery without telling the team. The trust issues go both ways.
Here they go both ways. Even Pelicans podcast hosts can't even confidently say that they think Zion will be in a Pelicans jersey next year. He's not on an expiring deal right now. And you can't tell me whether by you know, October of twenty twenty two, whether Zion's gonna be rocking Apelicans Jersey or naw, you think maybe or not that's how bad it is, or no Lean's or no Lens. And everybody is calling him out, being like, no, hey, Zion, we need you to pledge your allegiance to the New
Orleans Flag. We need that. Their speculation is Zion looking for real estate in New York City. Maybe he already has an apartment on the Upper West Side. So what's actually happening? That's the question one. Zion's injury has made his future very, very stressful for as a subject matter
for the Pelicans organization, but also stressful in general. If Zion's out for the year, which it certainly seems like he will be, he will have played Just here we go stick with me here because it's gonna get kind of ugly when we do this math Zion will have played eighty five games total in his first three seasons. Do you know who else was drafted number one overall and played eighty two games in his first three years?
Greg Odin? Yep, it is guess who else went number one overall and played one hundred and nineteen games in his first three years? Sam Bowie? Yeah, yeah, him. So it's not outrageous to make those kind of comparisons, you know, those bust comparisons that people like me have made possibly in the past and got ripped up by Richard Jefferson.
It's no problem. But like those comparisons are in fact valid because both Blowe and Booie and Odin, had they remained healthy, almost certainly would have been All star guys. There was nobody who's debating or questioning their skill level,
athleticism or their potential. But the reason that they went down, the reason that they were bused was mostly because of genetics, micro fractures for odin strength and power, and torque on his body and his knees because of his size really and issues in the case of Sambuie that went for a long long time timespan. The difference with Zion, though, is that Zion is in control. A lot of these issues are self inflicted, especially those that revolve around his weight.
He's showing up way too heavy and that is on him. As Christian Clark at the NOLA behind that paywall I told you about noted Williamson frequently showed up late to rehab work during his rookie season pause red flag. His unique body type makes it imperative for him to diet and train rigorously, which he has failed to do since being drafted by the organization. He showed up to training camp in September well above three hundred pounds sources to
say ideally. One team source says Williamson should or would play games at two a n than sixty five pounds. That's that's not good. Some reports stay that Williamson weighed as much as three hundred and thirty pounds during his rehab mascol Mascol mascool. So two sixty five carry the one three hundred and thirty. That's fifty five pounds overweight here. And we're not talking just muscle, right. I don't think it's just muscle, right, we know that. And I'm not
fat shaming. We do not, we do not. We do not fat shame or muscle shame on the heat check, I will not. But Zion is a big guy, huge, powerful human being when he's completely healthy. And as Skip Bayliss was told, this is a guy who loves nothing more Zions. I mean, this is obvious logic, but I'm just gonna give you the quote anyway. Zion is a guy who loves nothing more than quote eating whole pizzas
washed down with high sugar soft drinks. This is a guy who would be is like if Embiid was unhinged, right, if unb Embiid decided, you know what, goodbye cruel world. It's just me and my Shirley Temples. You know that's Zion right now. And to make matters worse, one of the reasons cited for the rift between the Pel's front office and the Zion camp is really how cautious the Pelican's front office and training staff has been with his rehab from the bubble to last year to the most
recent foot issues. Apparently a lot of trust has broken down between them because of that thing. Can you fucking blame them? Excuse me? You're always heavy, overweight, You're always getting hurt and then you never slim down and get healthy again. So why wouldn't we be cautiously pessimistic? I don't know, Like honestly, it's like, listen, this is a problem here. Zion's distrust of David Griffin is also apparently playing a role, with Nola reporting that Williamson in his
camp don't trust Griffin to be truthful. From throwing Alvin I mean he's not He's not, but that's I mean, neither are you. From throwing Alvin Gentry under the bus, to hiring stan Van Gundy, a coach so unpopular in New Orleans, Josh Hart said that playing for him destroyed
his love for basketball. Yes to screwing over JJ Reddick and saying he was going to send him to either Brooklyn or New York or Philly so that he could be closer to his family, and then he sent him to Dallas who shares a night agent with Zion, as I earlier mentioned, and there are all of those things, a lot of reasons not to trust Griffin and the Pels if you're Zion. Plus the fact that routine ly this front office, this ownership group doesn't like to pay
into Wow. I mean, they've never paid the luxury tax, so we don't really know what their level of commitment is to winning. Just when the Zion news was reaching a boiling point, Zion speaks Zion finally speaks out. Yes, folks, but it was on an Instagram group chat with random strangers that then ended up getting posted on the internet to protect and defend Zion. That's completely irrelevant. Just keep that in mind. Though he said this quote, I don't
know why everyone thinks that I'm leaving. Everyone that knows me knows I love the city of New Orleans. I'll be back soon in due time. Blackfast Devil Emoji mentioned it. Noticed that he did not mention the actual New Orleans Pelicans. He did not whatsoever, which is probably a shot at the team for sending out I don't know those season ticket renewal emails featuring Brandon ingram Yonis Valanciuna is CJ McCollum and chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp, No Zion, no Zion,
not even a mention of Zion. Imagine the Portland Trailblazers putting out season ticket emails. Hey, twenty three season tickets are here. It's time down in the Row City. It's Yusef Nurkic and Anthronice Simon's nasre little and no one And there's like no mention of Dame. That would be absolutely bonkers. They took this man number one overall? Uh yeah, do we mention Nurkic and Rik? Yeah? Also Cody Zeller here, We've got Cody Zeller. Anybody wants season tickets? So how
does it work out? That's the question, Like what do we make of all of this? When Pelicans insiders can't decipher whether Zion is going to be there in a Pella's uniform next year. We've got four big questions on our hands. One, what's the status of Zion's health? We don't know. We gotta figure that out. That needs to be seen, that needs to be deciphered, that needs to happen now. Is the relationship between the Pelicans and Zion fixable? Is it actually fractured. All things we need to find out.
The most important question that we don't even know yet is do the Pelicans actually want to re sign on an extension? A guy who's three hundred and twenty pounds, who won't communicate with the front office, who will not get in shape, who will not take his rehab seriously, who won't play defense, is standoff ise to new teammates and has been this way since his rookie season. I don't know if that's a risk I'm willing to take.
If I'm a very cheap ownership group who's never overspent in the history of the history, like you're talking about a group that treated Chris Paul fowl, and Chris Paul was a consummate pro I get this, Zion Ding, I don't know. I don't know. And then four, if New Orleans won't do it, or if Zion doesn't want to be there, because that's also a big question mark. Does Zion actually want to be in New Orleans? If it's not New Orleans, who's going to roll the dice for Zion?
I've got a final word to anyone living in New York City who might be thinking about pushing play on that world wide West. From the top of your Dracoff tower, word to the wise, to worldwide West.
Proceed sir, to spoil you come against Sun.
We turn Suns a big news, tough news, terrible news. Chris Paul is going to be out for the remainder of the season with a right thumb evulsion fracture on his shooting hand. That that is what we call crushing, tough, awful stuff. But do not panic. We have good news. The Suns have a six and a half game cushion over Golden State and an eight game lead over Memphis with twenty four games left, so probably not enough space
for anybody to catch up. Folks. This is it. They have locked up the one seed based around how dominant they've been all year. They're backups and really just time. Even if let's just go into it like if you want to go doomsday situation. So say Phoenix goes five hundred in the next twenty four games in CP three's absence, which they won't. We know that they will not go five hundred in these last twenty four games, but say
that they do. Golden State has to finish the rest of the year with five losses or less without Draymond Green. Just to be clear, us to tie, just to tie. That's where we're at. No one's catching up. It's done.
The race is over. That's not going to happen. So Phoenix is gonna be the one seed heading into the playoffs, and I'll have a little cushion of time to watch the play in tournament, get guys healthy, rest up before facing a team like I don't know, the Pelicans with no Zion of course, or a very hobbled Lakers team with Anthony Davis, a Disney what they call them bones of glass, skin of steel or paper or something, mister glass, and that would be a buzzsaw. That would be an
absolute buzzsaw. Lakers Night Night sleep mask. Bad news. Is this slightly concerning if you're a Suns fan to have the engine behind your offense out for two months, because not only does he aspect he impacts every aspect of the team in these major ways, from team defense to the structure of the offensive flow. He also has to get back to that place two months and then he's able to get back into the game flow. I mean, Chris Paul is the Captain America of the Suns. The
lynchpin upon the rest of the team is built. Here's an example of how crucial Chris Paul is to the team's success. When CP three is on the floor, Phoenix averages one hundred and fifteen point nine points per one hundred possessions. When he's off the floor, the number drops to one hundred and four point nine. Yikes. CP three's net rating is plus ten and a half, which is good for third in the entire league among players averaging thirty minutes per game. Or more so, consider this also
in clutch time. At thirty six years old, Chris Paul is the best in the entire league. I'll say it again, Chris Paul is the most dominant player in crunch time clutch time in the league period. For those who don't know what that is, clutch time is any time during the fourth quarter or overtime when the scores within five. CP three leaves the NBA and clutch plus minus at
plus ninety nine. He's shooting fifty six percent during clutch time, and more importantly, the Suns are an NBA best twenty four and three in clutch time this season thanks to Chris Paul. Sheesh, that is bonkers. So of course, losing CP three and having him to get back fully conditioned. He can't shoot the ball like this. He won't be able to have his feel back. It's almost like a golfer who has to get back into putting and chipping. It's a feel thing as a shooter that's gonna take time.
He's not going to be able to use his hand on a ball for the next probably six to eight weeks. Scary considering that this is a team that absolutely needs Chris Paul to win a championship. They cannot do it any other way. We saw how it was when he was gone in the in the playoffs last year and into the finals, when he looked like absolute trash because he was injured, not because of anything else, but when he's not playing at his best and he's not fully healthy,
this team is atrocious. Atrocious, so pretty lucky that the Suns ended up with Aaron Holiday for cash for cool rand shurritos. Aaron Holliday is now the backup point guard of this team. He was just on the Wizards like two days ago. Wizards considered him Bradley Beal considered him to be the number one defender on the team and now this guy is going to a backup campaign who's coming
back from injury. As well, the question how the fuck did the NBA allow Aaron Holliday, who is twenty two eight and six per forty minutes, like he's averaging twenty two to eight and six per forty How did they allow him to end up in Phoenix for cash? Considering it's beyond me considering he's a good locker room guy in a winning culture, of course, not in a trash culture like the Wizards. He's a tough defensive presence and he can and still score. Bradley Beale, like I said,
said he was the best defender on the team. He's a holiday. It's in his DNA. He is locking up Drew when he's a young kid. That's the kind of like one on one games they did in the backyard. It's wild he ended up in Phoenix when teams like Boston, New York, Philly would kill for a twenty minutes or more point guard who can do all those things, Like could you imagine New York right now with Aaron Holliday. I mean he's I would say he's probably better than
Alec Burks. So I don't know So will Chris Paul be gone? Being gone hurt the Suns for sure? They are absolutely worse when he's not on the floor. Did the Sun see this coming? I mean they had to have. They got Aaron Holliday for cash. There's only one reason you do that. You know that this is necessary. Either you think Chris Paul might get injured because he always does, or he already he was injured and then you just admitted that he was. But fortunately, I think he'll be
back in time for the playoffs. Getting that number one seed is huge because it gives them time to get his groove back. He could probably not even play the first round of the playoffs, depending on who they play, so that's gonna be really interesting. He won't have any other bumps and bruises too, because the injury will allow him to stay in shape without the grind of this stretch run to wear him down. It's actually kind of chess,
not checkers, you know what I mean. Like, you're basically load managing Chris Paul for the last twenty four games of the season, plus the play in time, plus the first round. You might get him healthy for like three months almost. That's wild. Also, you're gonna need to think about it as a team, how you want to move on and how you want to function now that Chris Paul's not there, How the offense will change in his absence, how you exploit the things you already do well to
do that. Let's look at what the Suns do best. This is something that I just saw today that was blowing me away, something that I think will kill other teams in the playoffs, something that the Suns will absolutely need to continue to expand on. If I asked you who the number three pick and roll man is in the NBA in terms of the roller, who would you guess that is? DeAndre Ayton? DeAndre Ayton third best roller
in the NBA. And of course, like you would think that might be might be a son considered when we're talking about the Suns, not a shock since they use the pick and roll a ton in Phoenix, like Ayton is very effective in the high pick and roll. How effective seventy three percent of his shots are from the
high pick. Wow. Given how good Chris Paul and Devin Book are in the mid range, it makes it almost impossible to slack off of them and roll with DA like DA's just getting an easy shot after easy shot period. Seventy five percent his pick and roll plays come through Chris Paul. So that's gonna need to get filled. That gap is gonna need to get filled. But here's something that I am reasonably sure you probably don't know. Do you know who the number one pick and roller is
in the NBA? The number one roller I'm not even gonna make a guess is Javeail McGee. Are are we serious? That is an embarrassment of riches. Javail McGee left to die out in the streets of Denver, just sitting on couches going from place to place. Number one roller in the NBA. This year the Sons have two of the best three rollers in the league. What a damn pickup
getting Javail McGee was. Anybody could had him, anybody. And the thing is that the pick and roll works because Chris Paul and Devin Booker are so incredible, but mostly Chris Paul. In this particular example, seventy five percent of all pick and roll plays, like I said, come through Chris Paul, but sixty five percent come with JaVale McGee. The athletic Zach Harper wrote this where McGee truly excels is in the fundamentals of what you want a big
man to do. Here, set a good pick, time your roll out of the pick, move in rhythm with the guard, catch the ball, keep it high, finish at the rim. Most guys don't keep it high. Most guys bring it down where they can get stripped or foul. And McGee does that better than anybody in the NBA this season. And that is why he's shooting an absurd almost seventy seven percent from the field. That is crazy. You got a big man who is left out on the street
to die shooting seventy seven percent from the field. And then, okay, okay, he's a seven footer. You can just dunk, well, stop him, then stop him from dunking. Okay, And thirty seven percent of those plays have been run through Chris Paul. And on those thirty seven percent, McGee has scored seventy points on forty three plays. Third, okay, let me break that down. Thirty five of forty three times they've ran that play, McGee has scored Wow, thirty five of forty three. That
is unbelievable. And that means to me, more responsibility falls on the shoulders of Devin Booker and campaign and probably now Aaron Holliday. But all you know is this, you got two big men that can roll and roll a lot. All you gotta do is be effective in the mid range enough that they cannot over move and roll with javail Nda. So yeah, CP three going down, huge deal. But also don't sleep on the fact that Money Williams knows this as well. Minney Williams knows what he has.
He knows that he's got the number one and number three rollers in the NBA. Are you kidding me? He's the best coach period in the NBA right now. He's gonna win Coach of the Year if I know it. He for sure knows it. And the Suns probably, like I said, are not giving up their cushion in the West, so they're not gonna have to rush. Hep back. Things are gonna be fine. It's gonna be interesting, but things
are gonna be fine. And that is a luxury, and we can use that luxury that makes a disastrous, potential seismic injury way way less impactful. The question is how impactful would this injury be. I don't know Chris Paul's been injured for pretty much every single postseason in his entire career since he was like twenty four and up. We'll see how this plays out like Hammy's hands, wrists, snacks, abdominal's feet. I don't know. It's like everything with Chris.
So I am really hoping that his secret stuff in the bottle and his time to load manage keeps him one hundred percent healthy for the playoffs, because a fully healthy Chris Paul with the Suns is an absolute nightmare for opponents and the league is better off when we see Chris Paul and Scott Foster basically bickering and getting into the media and making fireworks. So prayers up to Chris Paul and uh, I can't wait to see him back suit. But I think this might be a blessing.
Cruising down a street, all white, next Sis, driving so slow, but bk is from Texas.
Me A'm on that bed stop.
Let's give a little update. It's said, it so said. I wanted it to work. You guys wanted it to work. We've already talked about this. It's like it's it's it's the end for Kemball Walker in New York for sure, it's happening. Kemball Walker has shut himself down for the duration of this year. The team did not aggressively pursue trading him before the deadline, which means they believe that they are going to get more for him in the summer,
and his time in a Knick's uniform is up. Apparently it's a mutual decision, which I get, of course, But damn, damn sad ending it was supposed to be a fairy tale. It was supposed to be you know, this like amazing, beautiful, touching moment that we never get in the NBA, like hometown kid comes back, makes right, re emerges his career. No, but it is not. It is not. I love Kimba, but this was a As we've talked about before, this was a bad, bad fit from the beginning. We talked
about this on Monday Show. He's not a TIBs guy. We knew this was never gonna work. We knew that this was for optics. We knew his defensive rating is one hundred and twelve point five on twenty six minutes. A game that is I cannot properly express to you how bad that is, Like that is really, really, really bottom of the barrel stuff. He's that's already one strike.
That's fully healthy, Kimba. And now the fact like his knees swollen at all times, like he's literally having to get drainage and he's packing his knee up with ice, and apparently he's walking around all like quote unquote uncomfortable limping in between games. You add those injuries in ooh, he was playing apparently. Ian Begley said he was playing through a lot of pain all season long, just completely not healthy for the entire stretch. He lied to us,
they said he was back healthy. That was a lie. He was inconsistent offensively all year and consistently getting cooked defensively all year as well. Like that, that's why TIBs was like, yo, you got the go. You cannot be playing any more minutes. And so to me, it was only a matter of time. Like if TIBs could have shut him down for the entire year, he would have.
We saw he benched him. It became a thing. And then of course, like Cambus shot twenty eight percent from the field during his final couple of games, So that's that's also not good. And now here's the kicker, which is kind of really really sad. This is the really sad part. Ken's not even gonna be around the team moving forward. He's a big locker room guy. Young guys loved him, and Nope, Apparently Ian Begley's like, yeah, he's just gonna just gonna maybe take some time away from
the squad. We might not even see him from here on out. That's sad. Apparently, guys like RJ Alec Burks that gravitated to Kemba. He's his demeanor, his local presence. He's a good dude, high character. R J. Barrett even was like, he's one of the best humans I've ever met. Just sad stuff. But all of that to say, Kemba Walker experience in New York is just it's a rap.
It's a rap, and it might also possibly be a rap for TIBs or Guy TIBs, like we talked about as everyone is speculating, which we said maybe six weeks ago, that the blame the guillotine might fall on someone and that's someone it looks like might be him. It was reported worldwide Westy was secretly blaming TIBs for his awful, horrible season last week to James Dolan, how did a reporter get that news. Do you wonder a personal one on one conversation getting publicly put out into the headlines.
How could that even be possible, you wonder. But Tibbs, like the man of honor that he is, was crickets for a while until he said the following, I talk to Wes all the time. I do not respond to rumors or any of that stuff. I know the drill here. Pause When he says I know the drill here, it means I've been publicly sullied and guillotined and scapegoaded many times before. I know how it is when a team's not performing and they look at me. I know what
this is. Just watch your mouth. I've been here before, so I don't worry about any of that stuff. And that's a lie. He one hundred percent is worried that Worldwide West is talking smack about him to the owner
behind his back. If you know, if you're not concerned about that report, if you're a human being in a job and you hear that the guy who tabbed you picked you, he's hands selected you, that you had this amazing relationship with and in the headlines it comes out that he is not only not trusting you, he has completely pulled a one to eighty on you and is blaming all of your lack of organizational success on you
to the person who owns said company. If you're not worried about that, man, there's some there's some little screws that aren't quite like screwed in there, because that's something every single human being should be concerned about, our livelihood, our job security. Unless he's like, yo, I got a five year deal. I'm not whatever. Fire me. I'm all set. I'm seventy years old. How this. Let's look, he's not a kid. Sixty four Okay, so there's another three years left,
sixty seven. I'm good until I'm sixty seven years old. I can ride out this paycheck all the way through lots of money to sit on the couch. I'm all good. I'm all good. When the Knicks hired Thibodeaux, they preached that he in the front office, led by his former agent president team president Leon Rose, were in lockstep. Doesn't feel like they're in lockstep now. I just want to say I talked to Leon every day. He said. I talked to Wes every day. Thibodeaux said, so that doesn't change.
This was what he said to Greg Joyce of The New York Post. I don't believe that, do you guys believe that? All I know is that there's this is just more news that leads us to the same conclusion with Kemba and with this worldwide West drama and the TIBs issues, et cetera, et cetera, or as my mom would ask me to pronounce correctly at etc. Etc. She won't even hear this because she doesn't listen to the pod.
But here you go. The wheels. All of that to say, the wheels have fallen off in New York and they're just driving on rims. It's just driving on rims for the rest of the season. Sparks fucking flying everywhere, passers by being like, oh shit, stay away from that car. That's a dangerous fucker. He could be running me off the road at any time. Stay away. Hang on tight, folks, I promise you with this Nick shit, there is more to come. That's all the time that we have for
the heat Check. We'll be back Friday with a new episode. Do not forget to download, subscribe, tell all your friends. Episode might come out late Friday. Tell all your friends. Maybe it won't every damn. Actually it's Monday. We'll be back Monday. Let me do this again. It's Monday. Today's Friday or my Friday. Monday. Today is my Friday. I don't work Tomorrow. Tomorrow is the right Friday. This episode comes out tomorrow, so this is the episode for this Friday.
So the next episode is Monday. I'll do it again. That's all the time that we have for the Heat Check. We'll be back Monday with a new episode. Please do not forget to download, subscribe and tell all your friends. Follow us on heat Check, at at this heat Check, and at Tristan Creek on TikTok.
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