On this episode of this League. It's the conference finals. We're here.
They are electric for very very different reasons. Out in the West, the Suns are rolling, and in the East the Hawks are for real, for real, like for really, really very real. We also look around the league and find that Alex Cruz, so the Goat, has been arrested, Kyle Kuzma has might be on the move, and the Pacers and the Celtics have brand new coaches. So we're gonna dig into all that. But beforehand, let's drop the beat.
Take care and you'll be waiting. Plan of the plan, and let me go. When we reach the.
Conference finals, are here, we could not have three better games, Marty.
To start things off, Let's start in the West, where Marty's Phoenix Sun have won their.
Ninth ninth in a row, pretend.
Consecutive game in the row.
Tonight, I will have Phoenix minus one and a half. I don't want to mush it, but I feel like that's a lock. With Chris Paul coming back.
I like it it's a bet on Monty Williams basically because this is a classic letdown spot, especially with CP coming back, and there may be problems and there's of course the factor that the Clippers have come back from two h twice already in the playoffs. But just Monty's been great at this all year. I've I can't bet on it because I don't. I just can't bring myself to bet a Sun's playoff game. But I like, I like Suns today, so do I.
It is like the entire first round was trash, and then we all all of a sudden in the second round, and now in the conference finals just have like really really really exciting basketball. Like the first round was awful and now it's it's amazing hoops, like amazing hoops.
Suns. Clippers had pretty much every single thing you could want in a game.
Tight back and forth, lots of fireworks, bodies on the floor, bodies, oh yeah, George, Paul George reverting to Paul George for I mean, DeAndre Ayton emerges as a superstar. Both those two things together for me great. I like paulge I'm so bad. I like Paul George failing.
I think it's more fun for.
The league when Paul George fails in when he succeeds, it's just more funny.
It was very It was very funny. Playing well in the series. That's the other funny part.
If you're looking for comedy. Paul George missing two free throws down the stretch, it's funny. It is. It is. It's like, ah, there you are, we found you.
I mean, if he just made one, they would.
Have gone O T. Yeah, it would have gone out T.
It's like when that chick in Wedding Crashers is like, I'll find you. And then of course we get the pass earlier in the in the season, earlier in the playoffs, and now we have the Valley oop. All right, so let's kind of go into it first. I want to get your thoughts all the way through this. This like sort of sequence. Final ninety seconds of Game two took thirty three minutes of real time.
Yeah, I don't know if you could quite call it a sequence.
Yeah, exactly.
The last nine point two seconds took twenty two minutes. So if you're a casual NBA fan, you're like, this is fucking awful, Like what am I doing here? It's late, this is in the West Coast, Like what is happening?
Oh yeah, if you're a casual, you're tuning out in two.
Seconds, two seconds, five buckets five reviews.
Also, Scott Foster, if you're are you do you believe me?
Now?
Do you believe me? Are you starting to come around? To my point?
I was never against the idea that Scott Foster's trash, He's.
Up to some tomfoolery.
Yeah. I think the only thing for sure I can say is that when you see Scott Foster is refereeing a basketball game in the playoffs, bet the under. Just bet the under every single time, and max bet the under because it's that certain. It's not a hot take to say that it appears that the refs did everything that they could to get the Clippers to win that game, because that's how it felt to me.
And I'm not a Sun's fan like you.
Uh, it seemed a little like that. But the funny thing is, like everyone, everyone who's a Clippers fan and Clippers Twitter all are convinced that it was all come on for the Suns to win. And I just, yeah, no, I just I don't know. Some of the calls like that that Booker offensive foul, that it was a little weird they stopped the play.
First of all, Devin Booker had three offensive fouls. They should have been zero.
The one I actually sort of agreed with at the very end, the one that we're talking about was being reviewed, but it was weird one. Yeah, but it was weird that they like stopped the play without even calling a foul and all that. Yeah, it was just strange. And then that out of bounds call on Pat Beverly. They
actually called a similar thing. I think it involved Pat Beverly against Lebron on Christmas this year, where it's just okay, he it may have gone off his booker's fingers, but like Beverly hit it out.
Yeah, I think we should change that rule.
I think so too.
So I'm not going to refresh the cospiracy theories again about like how Chris Paul zero for eleven in his
last games. That Foster is refed in the playoffs and suspiciously wasn't playing in games one in game two, but the Lee is doing itself zero favors when they put Scott Foster in these situations, because like they always seem to be suspicious and they always seem to have them attached to them, and the league just needs to say, listen, Scott, like we love you in all, but you can't be a part of these games.
You just can't because.
If I suck at my job here, I'm gonna get fired, absolutely.
And like if you have come up short in huge moments to the point where you have tarnished the league or tarnished this company as a result of your performance, they're not gonna put you in the biggest moments in the brightest spots, like fuck, no, you're gonna go over there to whatever, like cut some random snapchat stories like okay, it felt like one hundred percent this was steal it before CP three gets back.
Oh yeah, no, first.
Long reviews, overturn of calls, but.
So that over that review or that that overturning like you said, where Pat Beverley hit it off of Devin Booker and then all of a sudden, now instead of the Sons having the ball, Clippers have the ball.
They're up one with eight point second eight point two seconds left, Paul George is on the free throw line.
PG had just hit along three with twenty two seconds left, ninety free throw shooter, Son's ice cold.
Right at that moment, I texted Marty right row. It was something to.
That effect like oh no, this is so bad, or like wow, and Marty's response was the most confident, almost like I thought you were minutes ahead of me. Like I was like, am I on really bad delay? Because you were like, We're still going to win?
Yep.
And it was just like, oh, okay, I.
Just had a weird feeling. I don't know, I don't know what it is about it. I mean, I also stay remarkably optimistic throughout the course of a game, so I'm the it's probably not but yeah.
I'm the exact opposite. And of course all I wanted to say is like you are tripping tripping, you know.
But I was like, you know what, positive vibes only for Marty, Like I'm a pseudo Suns fan.
Now the Blazers are out positive vibes only.
And then Paul Clifton George missed them fucking both badly, too badly.
When you saw that, what were you thinking?
Uh?
I mean, I was just going nuts to the fact that he missed, but like I was just praying for Obviously in that situation, you just wanted to miss one. You don't even get to the point in your head where you're thinking missed too. And then when he did, I'm just then it's like okay, like we're a Devin Booker jump shot away from winning now, like okay.
Yeah, yeah, I mean to me, it was like, oh no, PG.
Worst case scenario for pg sons get the ball, plenty of time, they get to call time out, set up a play, get a sas snazzy two pass sequence to mchel Bridges for an open corner three and.
Then clink and then all of a sudden, now there is a.
Another out of bound, another out of bounds call, which I was worried about this one.
Actually, I'm like, what's gonna happen with this?
Is it gonna just be nothing? And now Mannie Williams has a chance to just call something up point nine seconds, we know the ball is going to eight, and that's the only thing that can happen. Is I was thinking, no way that Devin Booker has enough time to get a jumper, and you know that they're gonna probably swarm him. So Devin Booker is the decoy, that's the screen that he sets on Zulac like a grown ass man making
Zubac his bitch, which people thought was like illegal. I think to a degree they thought there was something up with that.
People thought that ate and like tugged his jersey a little bit, which that happens every single place, every single time.
And then Jay Crowder.
With the Pass of the Century over DeMarcus Cousins at an angle, at a weird spot on the floor, like almost impossible.
It was like that far from the backboard, like the window that he had to fit that in was so.
Small tight, And for DeAndre Ayten then to go up Alipa Don't took point two seconds fucking insane.
That was the most cathartic sports watching moment I think I've ever had, because I mean I've talked about it before, but I mean we drafted him three years ago over Luca. It's been highly criticized. He's been highly criticized for it. The big things that we get on him for is that he's not aggressive, he doesn't dunk, he's not he doesn't assert himself in big moments. And then he just it was like three years of just basketball, like existential, just dread like left my body in one instance, it
was it was complete, it was it was completely for you. Yeah, I think I just said out loud like you were the right pick, like and it felt really fucking good and.
It's like this.
This is the reason, And truthfully, the Phoenix Suns would be in a very different spot if they didn't have a big man like DeAndre eight in this offense would not run the same. We talk about Michel Bridges being a massively undervalued trade, amazing trade, but DeAndre Ayton at number one, finally coming to fruition in a way where.
These other guys are besides Trey.
Like Luca's not in the playoffs anymore, and you don't need another guard you had Devin Booker.
It was the right pick.
Takes centers a long time to develop, and holy shit, I'm telling you he's gonna be a top three big, especially two way big seventy percent from from field goal or field goal percentage all the way through the playoffs. Like I didn't put some respect on his name.
Absolutely, I think there's an argument that he's the second best, like pure five.
Yeah, yeah, who's number one in your mind? Embeied, Yeah, Embid yeah, absolutely, But.
Well A Jokic is there? Never mind, I'm not I'm not trying to approach that, but yeah.
I would say he's top three, and I would say at some point, depending on yoga or MB's health. He might end up being two very soon, like in the next three to five years. And now we get tonight or yeah, yesterday, depending on how you want to look at it, because the episode is coming out tomorrow morning. We've got masked Booker tonight, ye, which Kobe was masked, Bron was masked, Kawhi was masked.
I am very much looking.
Forward to Kobe reignited to another level with a mask on.
I hope it's purple. I hope it's fucking purple.
Didn't they get mad at Lebron for wearing a black one though a few years ago?
Yeah, but somebody else did too, I think Kawhi somebody else.
Right, Yeah, it's weird. I want it to be purple, yeah, or like.
Purple and yellow or gold or whatever. Yeah, Sons keep rising. I am here for it. I have Sons winning by seven tonight. You know, because of all the free throwes and shit, man, the Hawks had to have been one of the most slept on teams coming into this game. They were eight and a half points underdogs at the opening line. I mean when you saw that, were you feasting, Marty? I was feasting a little bit.
Yeah, I mean Milwaukee is.
Great at home, as we know, but Atlanta has won two consecutive first games in the playoffs so far, and Trey Young is his confidence is only rising.
Yeah.
No.
When I saw it at eight and a half, I was just like, who's making it?
It was?
It was Lock, it was Locke City. I had eight and a half, and then I had the money line.
I was like, I feel it was so good about this.
I feel really really good about eight and a half. Well, I feel really really good about the moneyline, and I feel like this is a no brainer situation.
At eight and a half, I took eight and a half and I took John Collins over twenty four and a half points, rebounds, assist, and that was over quickly as well.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and Trey Young what a day.
Bucks opened at minus five hundred to advance to the finals. I think the main thing, because I don't want to break everything down, but like the main point or main moment that stuck out to me was that shimmy, Like, yeah, Trey Young just absolutely cooking everyone cooking Drew, and I know what that was.
Obviously.
It was like Drew trying to cheat over the screen and then all of a sudden he crossed his back, so disrespectful, But why the fuck so much time? He had seconds of time to just stand there, shimmey it off, shake off the rust and shoot it three. What are these dudes doing? Why are they not coming up to defend Trey Young?
He should not have had time to do that and get the shot off clean.
Joannis apparently pissed. He said he got all his team at a dead ball and was like, what are we doing? Like we're supposed to be shutting this tray young guy down. He has forty eight points on us, Like he's not only shooting threes, and he was cold. I had a lot of like I think he was what three four for thirteen from three, so he wasn't even fantastic, but he was getting floaters. He was doing all kinds of shit,
and they gave him anything he wanted. If he had two more threes, his games blowout, like Hawk shot twenty five from three, missing open looks everywhere.
No way they continue to do that, right, like they're gonna get hot.
Yeah, they're not gonna yeah, you know, they're not going to continue to shoot that low. He was bricking a lot of thirty footers though he was just weird. I mean like like he obviously had forty eighty, had a great game. We're not gonna take away from it.
But yeah, yeah, Bogdanovich one for six, Kevon Herder one for one for six from three as well. I also have a new conspiracy I'd like to talk about. Okay, finn Serve Arena, what's going on there? Have you noticed that there's something on the rims where uh, the visiting visiting team.
Just seems to have a hard time making threes?
Like have you?
I would have to look at stats. I mean, it is a bad don't don't worry about it.
I've got you teams with the plethoram of sharpshooters, Nets, Hawks heat, all ice cold in Milwaukee, open looks, clink, clink, not even getting highly defended where the c is getting into it. Nets shot twenty eight percent in Milwaukee from three, Hawk shot twenty five percent last night from three, Brooklyn forty percent from three all year, Atlanta thirty seven percent
from three all year. Net shot better than their season average at home against the Bucks and the playoffs at forty one percent.
So this is not a defense thing. This is a finn Serve Arena thing.
This is like when you go to March Madness, right and it's like the Elite eight Final four and they have it inside of like a football stadium.
Yeah, and then the optics of it all are.
Fucked up, perception changes and you're like sunking in and all of a sudden you have a hard time making threes. That there's or maybe it's the humidity. Maybe it's like Lake Michigan. Is it like Michigan? Yeah, Lake Michigan.
Yep, like the.
Mountain effect on a golf course. There's something going on there. Just keep an eye tomorrow.
Humidity.
There's something because these teams should not be missing as much as they are, And I'm like.
What the fuck? It'ds something to watch out for, something to watch out for.
Also another piece of news, if you would have bet early on the Hawks to get to the finals at one point, you could have gotten it for twelve thousand plus twelve thousand, five hundred to get it into the finals. Yeah, one one hundred and twenty five to one.
One guy, I guess.
Put one hundred and one, one hundred to one and also forty to one. So if the Hawks make it to the finals. This guy makes like one point two million dollars.
They just have to make it.
They don't have to win it all.
What a ticket, What a fucking ticket. It's looking good for him. I'm rooting for him.
You've got to You've got a hedge a little bit there. If you're gonna make a million, you got to hedge a little bit.
Yeah. What do you think he's hedged with?
I don't know. It would have to present itself, I know.
I mean, maybe he's just a huge Hawks fan.
Yeah maybe.
I mean, you can't just put up that much money just rocket. I mean, that's not responsible, that's not respond onstible gambling. No, I just bet the Suns and the and the Hawks to both go to the finals. Plus two fifty on the Suns plus six to fifty on the Hawks. I know one of them will hit. I know one of them will hit.
Looking forward, I think more of the same.
The one thing that I think is weird is like people haven't watched the Hawks all year. They haven't for some reason, their test or their scouting report on the Hawks is wrong. Like I was talking to a friend who's a Milwaukee Bucks fan. He's like, oh, I'm not worried. Vegas isn't worried.
I'm not worried.
Like, you know, this is a one dimensional team, Like the Hawks aren't a one dimensional team.
What do you mean? Like they might be one of the most balanced teams in the NBA.
They hit threes, they hit mid range floaters, they hit mid range runners, they slash, they kick out, they throw lobs, Like what does this team not do?
Yeah, and Collins is good for like one or two like offensive rebound put backs a game as well, So they've got a lot of ways to score for sure.
Tons of weapons, tons of weapons.
And then he was like, oh, well this trade this team goes as far as Trey goes. Well, Trey Young, if I had to remember and remind him, he was two for eleven from three to five for twenty three overall.
Game seven, who won that game?
Again?
Hawks won that game?
Also Game four, Trey was three for eleven from three, eight for twenty six from the fields, eighteen assists.
Dub doesn't matter, Trey Young can change.
That's just a dumb thing.
Though.
Yeah, you're gonna live and die by your best player. I mean, that's gonna happen.
But like that's like being like, you know, if Chris Paul and Devin Booker don't have good games and sons are gonna be fucking trashy.
Yeah, it'll be tough.
You know, it will be tough to win if our number one scoring option doesn't score, but.
Trey Young with like damn your twenty assists? God damn.
But yeah, I think like people haven't been watching because the Hawks weren't good all year. They were like one of these surprise teams because of the change in Nate McMillan and that one point they were like twelfth in the East. I remember it being like, yikes, we were not thinking things gonna be good. So, yeah, don't sleep on this roster prediction time. I have Hawks and seven. Yeah, I just I think that they are. You know, it's weird, like as as a side road, Jannie is such a
different human when he's at Fencer versus anywhere else. Yeah, Like he is so much more aggressive at home. Not to say that this doesn't counter like isnt a counter to my thought that the Hawks would win at home or win on the road in seven, But like Yannis.
It could be it could be Hawks and six. I don't know.
Because Jannis looks like a whole other vibe mentally when he's on the road and people aren't aren't cheering for him.
I'm excited for it. I'm excited for it.
Do you notice that though?
Yeah? For sure.
Yeah, a couple of pieces of news.
Let's move on one I must discuss in detail, all right. So Brad Stevens, brand new GM hires eme Udoka.
Great pick. Everybody knows he's a good pick. I think he's like one of the.
Sleeper head coaching candidates that should have gotten looked for.
It looks for a while now me too. And then our favorite ESPN analyst Jay Williams.
Comes out of the box with a tweet congratulating em Udoka, and he says, my lord, man, I tell you what the first head coach of color for the Boston Celtics. Brown fist emoji with the with the fingers out and uh even and dot dot dot ampersand this is important, dot dot dot am persand even more importantly, ellipses again he has one talented dude who has paid his dues. Three dark I guess medium skin dark clapping emojis. Jay Williams, Uh,
he's not even close. To the first coach of color at all, Like you've got mL car Bill Russell, Casey Jones, Doc Rivers, all coaches of color. Tough, tough look for Jay Williams.
So did he come clean?
No?
Say he did not say, Hey, that was really bad tweet.
I wasn't even thinking. I just have been thinking about Brad Stevens for so long. No.
No, here's what he did.
Like a couple of hours later, he let it sit for hours, which was wild, right, Like this tweet was out there for like one hundred and twenty minutes, which is a long time in twitterland. Like they screencapped your tweets in forty five seconds at this company. This is what he says as it relates to the Boston Celtics tweet that came from my account a couple of hours ago.
Dot dot dot.
I did not post that ampersand my past code has now been changed, same ellipses and the ampersand so the hacker, according to Jay Williams, uses the exact same type of context and symbols in his tweets.
Is Jay Williams, which is you know, very very good hacking.
Big Cat tweeted, Oh my god, he actually went this route incredible and then Twitter gets involved like Twitter does, which I thought was actually the best part.
God, they were funny. Did you read some of umh.
One of them was like, dude, I finally hacked into a celebrities Twitter.
Holy shit, dude, what are you gonna do?
First congratulate the Celtics new coach inaccurately? It will be hysterical it trust me and that I'm gonna immediately delete it after tweeting it.
But why would you do it?
I know what I'm doing, but like, you'll send another tweet?
Right, Nah?
Why would I? I guess you do you another thread? Hey everyone, I want to just say that I did this. I dedicated the last three years of my life to hacking Jay William's Twitter account just so that I could post one embarrassingly wrong tweet from his account about the
coaching history of the Boston Celtics. I appreciate it, and then the guy responds, I appreciate you that you made it embarrassingly wrong, but then you didn't go too far over the top to make sure that people would disbelieve the hacking explanation, which of course is completely true.
Really threaded the needle there.
I appreciate a hacker with class hacked it, made a congratulatory tweet and then logged out.
A true gentleman in hacking.
Very considerate of you to spend all that time hacking, but leaving his password the same so that he could get back in and change it. See you in another three years. You have work to do, man. So I guess to me, the only person besides Jay Williams responsible for this tweet. They say that murder and love really happened between strangers. I think the same thing could happen for Twitter hacking, and I would say the only one
Twitter hacker exists that would make sense. Very close to jaywill as Jay will has said, like they are friends for a long time, has a long standing grudge with jaywill Is active and knowledgeable about Twitter and how works has fallen victims to the platform once before. Has a very singular goal as it relates it relates to Jay Williams. His only goal is to destroy Jay Williams's reputation in very small, very minute, subtle minor ways, eroding the people's
confidence about his credibility about the game of basketball. It's Kevin Durant.
Kevin Durant happed into Jay Williams's Twitter.
He probably asked him for his passco and Jay Williams gave it to him.
That would be the best if that, if that's action what happen, That would be so fucking funny genius move.
And Kevin Durant would be the one to study, like how he tweets, like using his types of emojis.
He would do it right for sure, Yeah my god, yep.
So anyway, another coaching hire was the Indiana Pacers. Poor Nate bjorkrin smeared cost him his job. The rumored favorite was Terry Stotts, but instead who we.
Got was Rick Carlyle, Rick Carlile.
Things are strange, Things are very very strange with this hire.
Back to Indy.
Back to Indy.
What did they say there was like things that were relevant in two thousand and six and are now relevant again in twenty twenty one.
And the first one.
Was it was Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez and now Rick Carlile in the Pacers. They signed him four years, twenty nine million, and now he gets to keep the fourteen million from Dallas too. I thought that was odd that Dallas would allow someone who quit his job with two years left and gets to keep fourteen million dollars. To me, that's like slightly strange, you know, Tim McMahon said, Mark Cuban does not want to complicate Carlile's quest for
a new opportunity. Something strange, Like Mark Cuban is not like the most generous guy in the world in terms of like he being keeping allowing guys to keep money.
So I think something's going on there. What do you think is going on there?
Honestly, like, I don't know. This is my first time really thinking about it. I mean, there could be a lot of stuff. I'm not really sure.
So I did a little searching.
I thought at first that meant that there was some stink on Dallas, which they're probably still is stink on Dallas, meaning they're not going to fuck with Rick Carlisle because Carlisle knows too much. But I texted my friend, I was like, Hey, what's up with Dallas?
What's up with Rick Carlisle? And the response was he never quit.
Dallas fired him, yep, and they're just protecting him, being like, oh yeah, he totally left on his own.
So interesting. Interesting. Interesting.
The only thing that I have to say is like what's happening with Luca. Luca's now got to sign a two hundred and one million dollars super max extension five years.
He said he was going to do it at the end of the season, and now nothing. Chirp, chirp, chirp.
I still expect him to sign, but that is bizarre.
He said. He was upset about Donnie Nelson being fired.
He's known him since he was a kid, and it was Nelson who ended up being the one responsible.
For drafting him.
I don't make the decisions, he said, in a way that can be seen as either truthful or ominous.
I don't know.
The longer though, that he goes without signing, the more suspicious and nervous.
I think everyone will get Yes, I don't know. I don't know.
Tuesday Night maybe one of the most boring NBA related shows of all time, the NBA Draft Lotter.
Yes, yeah, no, I mean it's I mean, it's never really that awesome. It's just when your team's in it, it's the most stressful thing in the entire universe. I'll tell you that much. But yeah, no, just this is my first time watching it like without like an active you know, rooting interest and yeah, pretty boring.
I missed the ping pong balls.
It's better when they're all there in the same room too.
It was weird.
I mean, I miss Patrick Ewing, like hovering over that nineteen fifties bingo machine, waiting for this orange ball to declare that once again, the Sacramento Kings are getting the lottery pick. With David Stern and conspiracy theories and these frozen envelopes and like crowd anybody booing every time the Knicks ever, their knicks name is ever mentioned. But we've got instead, We've got like envelopes and like Mark Tatum. Mark Tatum is maybe the boringest guy to ever announce names.
He said it like, I was like, is this from prior years?
I thought I thought it was like highlights of the NBA Draft Lottery, the way that they just rushed through it.
Yeah, I mean it just was like bing boom boom boom boom.
Yeah. Well that's how the first like ten picks typically go. They do that really quickly, and then they drag out the final four final it's final four now. But uh yeah, Now, I think Mark Tatum seems like a nice guy.
Actually, he is a nice guy, and that does not mean he's electric on the mic.
You can be really nice. I've met him, very nice guy.
I have nothing bad to say about the NBA or Mark Tatum. However, I have an idea. I'm planning on calling the NBA League office and saying I have someone who would be much better.
And his name is Dave Portnoy.
Dave would be incredible reading off the names, it could be an event.
It would be sold. I don't know who would want.
To advertise with that, but I bet it would be a lot of people, Like could you imagine the NBA hiring Dave and and like you've got former and current players sitting in those leather chairs waiting for him to announce in an envelope, and he's just trolling about how like you tanked all year long and you thought you were getting the number two pick and you're actually getting the number fourteen pick, and like, imagine it's like Dan and at Chicago getting fourteen, Like could you imagine.
It would set NBA Twitter on fire?
It was, and then you'd have him like taking shots at Lebron James when the Lakers aren't anywhere near the lottery at all. I had like seven Lebron ricochet shots about how he was responsible for whoever not getting the number one spot, like or he comes out of the gate and he's just shit talking potential players that are gonna get drafted by that organization, Like good luck with Kaid Cunningham. He lost me two and a half units and fucking last year's Mark mannis he's trash, He's gone awful.
He stinks that guy stinks you better not take kid cunning.
Him at what Yeah, you'd go after Cave. There's no doubt about that.
No joke.
Speaking of which I was asking this before we started recording, like, do you think that there exists in the NBA the face of a bust?
I do I associate it more with NFL players than NBA, though I can't think of an NBA guy that I've thought that about.
I thought that about James Wiseman because he looks kind of lost, like he looks sort of like a deer in headlights.
I've talked about that before. I think Kate has a face of a bust.
I like Kate. I think he's gonna be really good.
I do like him as well, but I think he's got the face of a bust.
I'm not saying he will be. I'm just saying that his face give him him bust fives.
I'm not saying that his play does. I'm not saying that anything else besides his face.
I can sort of see it.
It's kind of like Marvin Backley had the face of a bust.
Do you see where I'm going with this?
Where their eyes aren't fully like there's no You look at them and it's almost like there's nothing, like the lights are on and no one's home.
And maybe it's just nerves.
I don't know, but I see a lot of videos of Kate and I'm like, hello.
Is this thing on? I don't know. He's uh good luck, I don't know. I don't know.
So here's the here's how the numbers shook out. Number fourteen Warriors, thirteen Pacers, twelve Spurs, eleven Hornets, ten Pelicans, nine Kings.
Tough for the Kings, Yeah, tough for the Kings. Magic eight Warriors end up getting seven. Could be better, could.
Be worse, of course. Uh ok se gets six. Yeah it's tough too, Magic gets five. Cannot believe the Raptor squeaked out four. That is fucking crazy.
They that's sick for them.
Also tough for the Pelicans, and all of a sudden they got Zion.
Zion.
They don't need it, but they defied all odds to get Zion. They can fuck off.
Cleveland Cavaliers A three. I swore there was gonna there were gonna be one. I knew.
I just I hate them too. They suck Rockets at two. At least it wasn't seventeen for the Rockets, like there was a chance for them to have seventeen. Also, people very mad at me that I called the number two slot like the dead zone of the draft.
I mean, you still would rather be there than seventeen, no doubt about it. Yeah, I mean there's been there's been some classic busts at two, but that's not a reason to not want the two pick.
No, I mean not in this draft. But tough Pistons. God damn thank god.
I love this for the Piston he too, they need it.
Troy weaver Man, I swear like the Pistons won twenty games, but they were one of the best twenty game win winning teams I've ever seen.
Yeah, no, they would have good night. It's no doubt about it. Yeah, No, I mean I'm bullish on the Pistons future.
They had seven of those games that they won seven out of twenty of those games were against playoff teams Boston twice, Phoenix once, Miami once, Philly once, Lakers once, Nets once. Vacant ball, vacant ball. Troy Weaver is killing anyone who gambled on the Pistons knew they were double digit underdogs a lot not we like, I know, we can't say free money, but it was like kind of like free money.
I know, it's like not what I was supposed to say.
Uh.
Weaver said that he The thing that I thought was interesting is that Weaver said he values g leigue guys differently than he does college guys.
Yeah.
Rut Row, rut Row.
I don't know.
I think there's a possibility that Piston's trade out of that spot.
You can't trade the number one. When was the last time that happened?
Isn't that what happened with.
But like that was but that was a weird situation with Lebron, Like you don't trade the number one pick.
You shouldn't. But what do you think the chances are that they take Jalen Green? At one slim slim? Yeah, do you think they.
Take k I think Kate's that good.
Did you hear that kid said he's not going to work out for anyone but the Pistons fuck him.
That's a bust face move.
That's a busted Yeah.
But like I like Aiden. Aiden did not have a bust face. He had a great smiley locked in, very engaged.
Face, very old looking face. He looks very old.
I have a friend who looks like him.
Other interesting tidbit is that the Calves are looking to actively trade out of three. So I guess that means they just don't want Jalen Suggs. Yeah, I mean, I mean they have too many guards.
Yeah, Kobe Altman playing smart.
I guess I think if they draft is being reported that they're going to take Mobile, and then that means Jared Allen is on his way out.
I don't hate that, But Mobley he could easily second.
He could easily.
So what are you gonna do then on that You can't plan for Mobili No, I mean they're gonna get fucked.
I love that. I love that.
Yeah, No, it's a bad spot.
I mean three is like the the like if you have two point guards on your team and you're drafting third, which is where the Cleveland Cavaliers are, You're fucked.
You lose your options at that point.
Yep, I guess they go get Jalen Green.
Yeah, but who.
Knows he ish No.
Yeah, well, I mean it's tough to say that, like they're fuck but I mean they also took a Koro But I mean you're still I mean, you're.
Too many multiple pieces of the same Yeah, Like they just literally like the same guys over and over. Also, Collin Sexton apparently wants max money and no one is willing to do a signing trade for him. Some executives said he is Lou Williams off the bench at best. Yikes, that's maybe the most disrespectful thing. The number what was he five or six?
Got picked up? Six?
Yeah?
Ugh. Draft is Thursday, July twenty ninth. We're gonna do an episode that before that before it drops me and Mary.
You're gonna make some mock predictions Marty.
This is the first year that Marty doesn't give a fuck about the draft because his team has no relevance in sight. Mine doesn't really have any We never have any picks. We traded our pick for Robert fucking Covington. So I don't care about the draft. You don't care about the draft. I'm still excited for Well, we'll get excited, We'll get excited. I'm excited for Jalen Suggs. I'm excited for Jalen Green. I'm not excited about about Evan Mobley.
I don't like big men mostly. I'll say, we'll see, we'll see.
Lot popping around the league right now. Lakers in the news again. God damn Texas. Why do they do this?
Like?
Why?
Why?
I don't understand.
Tuesday night, Texas and M University police arrested Alex Cruso, which was technically on a M property at the university the Airport College Station in the College Station Airport UH and he ended up having to pay a cash bond of thirty five hundred and fifty two dollars. What are university police trying to act like their fucking federals over here?
Like this is.
Alex Crusoe with some weed ground up in an herb grinder?
Like what are we fucking doing here?
Now? Try to fly with that stuff? I mean, it's risky business. You know, we all know that.
What he needed was someone like me because he's still young, to let him know that there is a trick. It's called deodorant. You put it in you put the weed inside of the stick of deodorant.
Have you heard of this?
No?
No, it's okay. So you open here we go.
Okay, So you unscrew the deodorant, pull out the tube of the like the stick, and then you put the weed inside and then you put the deodorant back in one. The deodorant like removes all odor of weed, right, and the X ray nothing.
Yeah.
I like that.
Yeah, So now you know if you're ever flying with weed across state lines. Marty's going to Arizona soon, folks, which is definitely still federal crime.
I think it's like, oh, is it so?
Anyway?
You used to be a felony for a long time, but now you know, now you know deodorant. That's the move. I don't know was Alex cruzzl on campus at that point.
I don't really know what the deal was. But that's such a bad whether it was at the airport or not, that's such a bad look to get taken down by your campus police. Set age twenty seven, Like like if lsupd got me like, if I was just back there for like a game, that would be so embarrassing.
You're an NBA champion, twenty seven years old, rocking the head band, back on campus, hanging out with the co ed's, smoking some weed in your herb grinder.
This shit is sus I tell you what it's like.
Ninth year senior tight behavior and this dude plays for the LA Lakers.
I kind of like it.
I do like it, but it's also kind of scuzzy. It's a scuzzy thing. It's summertime. You're in fucking Texas and m campus summertime, twenty seven after getting bounced out of.
The first round after the year before winning an NBA championship. I don't know. I don't know.
Apparently, in the state of Texas, possession of less than two ounces is a Class B misdemeanor. The possession of the drug paraphernalia is a Class C misdemeanor. He can result in a fine of five hundred dollars but no jail time.
Boy boy boy uh.
Second piece of Laker news, Kyle Kuzma removed Lakers from his ig profile. Man Also, Mark Spears reports that Kyle Kuzma has been in this LA bubble. He's behind Lebron. He's ready for a new start and a bigger opportunity. He's only started thirty two games this year.
We had a fluff piece about him earlier where I was like.
Oh, he's embracing this role role player, fell handy, blah blah blah.
It was a lie. That was a lie. I got finessed. I got finessed. Kyle Kuzma's trash.
I've always thought he stinks.
He stinks. It's all about him.
I wanted to like him when he changed his hair from cisco back to a grown man. I wanted to think he had changed things. He's not changed. He's all about Kyle.
Well about him. What I always said, I was like, if he played in Sacramento, no one would know his name, no one. Yeah, he is who.
Lou Williams said, there are guys in the league right now that shouldn't be in the league.
That's Kyle Kuzma, that's Kyle Kuzman.
He said there's guys overseas that should be in the NBA still, but because of politics, and there's guys in.
The NBA that shouldn't be in the NBA. That's Kyle Kuzma.
A hot rumor is though, that Kuzma mantras Harrol on the number twenty two pick for Lowry on a sign in trade. I mean, I like it only for the Lakers. I only like it for the Lakers. I don't really like it for the Raptors. It does allow kuz to start, but I just.
Don't see that working with Nick Nurse. No, don't see that. Hate it for the Raptors, hate it for the Raptors.
Also, another news news piece and lost in the hubbub about Ben Simmons was this piece that went under the radar from Doris Burke. It was on a podcast, and you know, like when people talk on a podcast, no one fucking really like takes notes and transcribes and puts it out under the ether unless like someone flags it. This is me right here flagging it because I blogged it yesterday too.
Doris Burke just buried Ben Simmons, Yeah, buried him. She called him and I've.
Never seen her do this, Like she's one of the nicest people, one of the most measured journalists I've seen. She called him shattered, simply not good enough, defiant, borderline, arrogant, hard to watch, and unconfident.
That is a cocktail of slanderous.
Statements, not untrue, so I guess they're not slanderous, but Jesus Christ like arrogant, defiant, shattered.
What do you think about that, Marty?
When Doris Burke is basically putting the nail in your coffin, are you dead?
It's a bad person to hear it from. Yeah, Yeah, one of those people that she doesn't insult people very often, so what she does.
Yeah, And she was really really strong and effusive in the way she said it. She said it like she was in pain, saying it like she's been thinking it for a long ass time. And she's just like he anytime anyone asked him whether he was good enough, he just like basically was so defensive and define about it that he's not willing to really change, especially given that after that game he was like, I am who I am?
It is what it is. She talked about this, and this is the.
Part she pointed out that I thought was interesting, which was the most she said. Tough to watch apparently her, him and Joel were in transition in Game seven. They're both at half court they've got pace. All he has to do, in her opinion, is go behind his back, gain a little separation from Joel.
If Joel rim runs to the front of the room, something's good and good to happen.
But instead Ben's like, yo, you take the ball, you figure out what to do with it. Uh to a guy that's seven feet tall, two hundred and forty pounds with like very little spacing, And it's like, I don't want to.
Deal with this anymore, Like this is your shit.
And she was like, and she said, I was in my hotel and I'm like, oh my god, where have we gotten in terms of where he is mentally? That was really hard to watch. And now she says she's not sure what his real trade value is anymore. And the news new new news is that Rich Paul is out there lying saying the Sixers are committed to him for the long term.
That's not true. We know that's not true.
No way, he said, the Sixers remain committed to Ben as a central piece of their franchise.
I know we're reaching the point of Ben Simmons fatigue.
I am, but like the news just keeps coming out, news just keeps coming out. Kemba Walker got traded to the Oka See Thunder and we didn't really have enough time to talk about it in depth, but I want to say I love this for Kemba. I love this for Sam Presty. I think Sam Presty is now going to be like the Property Brothers. He's like, I take dilapidated properties, I fix them up, and I flip them. I take Chris Paul, shine him up, shine him up, ship him out the door.
He goes to a contender. I think that's what he's gonna do with Keimba.
Already, we have a league source saying a Kemba Walker trade is already imminent.
Holy shit.
It is unclear whether the trade will occur before or after the beginning of the twenty twenty one twenty twenty two season.
Holy fuck dude.
Like I said, my suspicion is that they're going to try to get him in LA and if Oka Se can get the number twenty two pick and the number sixteen pick to rent Kemba for two months, I mean, is that maybe the greatest fleecing you've ever seen in your life.
That'd be nice. That'd be a nice pickup.
Okay, see and they got rid of Horford, you get right, yeah, you.
Get sixteen twenty two, you get rid of a bad contract, and all you have to do is rent this guy.
I don't know. I don't know. No one complains about the Okac Thunder.
They're just like, maybe one of the best respected front offices.
In the league.
No.
Yeah, But at the same time, these picks have to cultivated, and they got six last night, so they did.
They did.
Reminds me to ask a question, who are the top five executives to you, Marty and myself in the NBA. The criteria is they must be an executive like a GM or president of operations, or they can be somebody behind the scenes like Jerry West or Darrel Moury.
Okay, well there, I mean you got to put Presty up there right now, Massi, James Jones, Executive of the Year, James Jones, and then yeah, I'll go Maury and who am I rounding out with? Jerry West? Yeah?
Love that My top five, Sam, Presty, James Jones, Executive of the Year.
It's a tough between three and four.
I've got Massi, I've got Worldwide West and Leon Rose.
Okay, yeah, I wasn't thinking about.
Them, and five underrated Travis Schlank from Atlanta.
Okay, fleecing bogged On was huge. Yeah, the getting stealing him from Milwaukee. Milwaukee would love him, I promise you right now, Holy fuckt Dante DiVincenzo. They would have ran through the nets given the way that Bogdon has been also some of the some of the drafts that he's had. Getting DeAndre Hunter was really impressive, Like no one really had him high. Some people even in the tournament didn't know how good DeAndre Hunter was going to translate to the next level.
Yeah, it was a bit of a reach. It's a he was gonna go top ten, but.
Yeah, correct underrated RC Buford, pat Riley, Zach Climbing from Memphis, Scott Perry from the Knicks. I guess you could put him with Worldwide West and Leon Rose and Troy Weaver from the Pistons, stealing fucking Jeremy Grant making him the centerpiece and still go ahead and getting some pieces that are contributing right away, and they have the number one pick now, which will be really interesting.
That's all the time that we have for this lead podcast, Me and Marty.
Next week are going to Phoenix, so we're gonna be on the road after Thursday Friday's episode. Please subscribe, Please rate, Please review on Apple Podcasts and on Spotify. We have This League playoff merch on sale in the barstool Spore. We have Suns in for merch which I have being sent to the Phoenix Airbnb right the second. I will be wearing it all weekend or week or how long we're there, because I think the Suns are going to be in the finals.
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