174. Lakers fight, but fall short again versus Timberwolves

download the fandel Sports Book app to get started. Now sign up with promo code Jason T so they know I sent you twenty one plus in president Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Indiana, Louisiana, permitted parishes only, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Tennessee, Virginia or West Virginia. First online real money wager only. Refund issued as non withdrawable site credit that expires in fourteen days. Restrictions apply see terms at sports book dot FanDuel dot com.

Gambling problem called one eight hundred, next step or text next step to five three three four two in Arizona one eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven or visit CCPG dot org slash chat in Connecticut one eight hundred gambler or visit FanDuel dot com slash RG in Colorado, Indiana, New Jersey, in Virginia one eight seven seven seven seven zero stop in Louisiana one eight hundred to seven zero seven one one seven for confidential

help in Michigan one eight seven seven eight Hope and Why or text hope and Why to four six seven three six nine in New York. In Tennessee redline dial one eight hundred eight eight nine nine seven eight nine in Tennessee. Visit www one dot one eight hundred gambler dot net in West Virginia. All right, welcome to Lakers Tonight, presented by FanDuel. Here on the volume, I am Jason Tim Happy Wednesday, everybody. I hope you're all having a

great week. We finally got a competitive ish Lakers game, like there was at least a stretch of the game where it seemed like two NBA teams were playing against each other. That's a good sign. We're gonna get to everything that happened in that game. I want to talk about that incredible thriller in Brooklyn between Luca and k D and the MAVs and the Nets, and some of the interesting things that I noticed in that game, and then I've been doing a lot of deep dive into

the film of the Sixers. As of late, they had another somewhat lackluster win on the road against the shorthanded Cleveland Cavaliers tonight. They haven't looked great in the last weeks. I wanted to dive in is some of the reasons why that is the case, in my opinion, So stick around for the end for that. But let's start with some Lakers. So you know, as a commonly said over the course of this season, leadership involves so many different things as it pertains to the way it can't impact

your team. And I have said on the record on this show that even though I Lebron is my favorite player, he's always been my favorite player, and I think he is probably the number one guy i'd take for a playoff series right now if I needed him, and I very well think he could be the greatest basketball player

of all time. But he's one of the worst guys that you could possibly have to lead a team that doesn't have a real chance to win a championship, because while Lebron is psychotically competitive when things are when he has a chance, when he can smell blood in the water. He's kind of the exact opposite when he can tell that the team has no real chance. And over the course of this last stretch of game, since the star break, he struggled with having consistent effort, particularly on the defensive

end of the ball. And when you have a team like this that has a lot of veteran players, guys that are established in this league, guys who have a lottery background, and there's a bunch of guys like that on the team Stanley Johnson, Karmelo Anthony, Dwight Howard. These are all guys that were lottery picks at various points, and at various points in their careers were considered the future of a franchise or even a superstar in the league. And so those kinds of guys are not chip on

their shoulder like self starter type of guys. They're gonna follow their leader. And I think that's been a big part of how the defense for the Lakers have struggled so much in recent weeks. But tonight, in the first few possessions of the game, Lebron made a couple of key defensive rotations. There was a pick and roll with Karl Anthony Towns in D'Angel Russell. Where as Cat was rolling down the lane, Lebron put his body on the line and took a charge, and almost immediately it's set

a different tone for the entire game. Now, the Lakers still had extended stretches of sloppy defense throughout the game, but the overall tone of the game was more serious. The Lakers actually made an attempt to try to win, and at the end of the day, even though they lost and when they lost it got ugly, at least it was a respectable product for the most part that

they put on the court. Now, after the effort comes all of the scheme, After the effort comes all of the habits, after the effort comes all of the talent. And those are three areas where the Lakers are extremely weak, so they're gonna lose games. This is a good Minnesota Timberwolves team. This is not the Minnesota Timberwolves teams of the previous decade that we're kind of the laughing stock of the NBA. This is a team that has a good amount of size and athleticism, especially on the wing.

Guys like Jada McDaniels and Jared Vanderbilt, don't get enough credit all the McDaniels. McDaniels is hurt right now, but they're very athletic, they're big. The Patrick Beverley has done a really good job of transitioning the culture of that team from a team that was less competitive and less serious in a team that was more serious in their home crowd. Is a lot to deal with, and obviously Karl Anthony Towns say what you want about the guy.

He has defensive shortcomings. He's a bit of a ship talker, but when he's got to go, and he's one of the best players in the league, and he could be very difficult to handle, especially for those small Laker lineups that are so limited in their ability to handle real interior presence is just like we saw the other day with DeAndre But the Lakers have an obvious personnel issue that was gonna be a problem in in any of

these matchups against good teams. I think ten of their last four teen games are against teams over five hundred. The Lakers are gonna be in a personnel disadvantage in just about every single one of those games. You know, the we talked about habits, right like at the end of that game, the Lakers get back within I think they got within five. You get back into the game, you're right there, and then it's a couple of miss defensive rotations. There was a play I'm not trying to

pick on Russ here. There's a play I shared on my Twitter feed where Rust gets beat back door because he's just standing in a non defensive stance, just airing at the ball, and as his man gets beat back door and he's late to understand that, Lebron's like screaming at him to switch out to the corner. But he does it, and the Lakers gave up a wide open three that ended up being the dagger that put Minnesota

back up by ten. And as it was, when you have sloppy habits and you have a scheme that doesn't work with your specific set of talent, and you don't have talent, then yeah, even effort cannot be enough. And just like in that first quarter when the Lakers were trying so hard on defense, I think they were down fifteen at the end of the first quarter. So I understand why this team has let go of the rope. I understand why Lebron doesn't feel like it's worth it.

He just sees the writing on the wall. Why why would you try harder to just get blown out by less than you would have gotten blown out by anyway? And I get why that's frustrating for me. It's all about establishing something that you can build on for next season. Like for instance, like I'm really having a hard time watching Russell Westbrook continue in you the flounder the way he is when he's not going to be a Laker

next year. He clearly is distancing himself from the lockerman, from the coaching staff, and he's clearly gone through something mentally, which again you have to sympathize with him and the struggles he's had this season. But he's not going to be a Laker next year. So at a certain point, what came you gain and what I think is important is you have guys coming back. Taylor Horton Tucker is under contract next year. He's coming back. Austin Reeves is

under contract next year. You have Stanley Johnson under a team control deal. I would lean as much as you can into guys that could potentially come back next year, so at least you can get a look at that and get a feel for what's usable and what's not. For instance, Taylor Horton Tucker over the course of the next stretch of games has an opportunity to get a lot of on ball reps. He's struggling mightily off the ball.

I tweeted out earlier today, he's shooting below on wide open threes this year with the defender at least six ft away. That's not a functional off ball threat. That's a real problem. So a th HD is kind of more of an on ball player. Get him lots of on ball reps, have him build out that part of his game, and then maybe it'll raise his value to a point where he's either usable as an onball threat next year for a title contender, or someone that you can trade to a team that has a more future focus.

But at a certain point here, what you saw tonight was the best effort from the Lakers in the last week, and they still got rolled. So read the writing on the wall, understand the reality of your predicament, and try to play into things that are gonna be translatable to the future, things that are gonna be usable for next

year's team. I had one last thing that I wanted to touch on with the Lakers before we move on, and it just has to do with what I think is the most important lesson that the Lakers have to learn from this year when it comes to roster building, and it has to do with the fact that you're operating in the veteran minimum market, so you when you are capped out, when you're over the cap, you basically have three ways to sign guys for over a veteran minimum.

You can use bird rights, so if you already have a player under contract, you can sign him for more than that amount the next year based on how many years he's been with the team. You can use a mid level exception at a varying level depending on whether or not you're in a hardcap your team that lets you pay basically double what a veteran minimum contract is

up to about ten million. If you're willing to hardcap yourself, and then you have the veteran minimum markets, you're highly limited in what you can do around your superstars when you have a hundred and twenty million dollars tied up in your three stars in the Lakers this year went out of their way to try to bring in shooting

with those veteran minimum contracts. These guys like Carmelo Anthony, guys like Molik Monk, guys like Wayne Ellington, And they did this as a reaction to what happened in the Phoenix series. You guys remember in the Phoenix series, after Anthony Davis went down, Phoenix was absolutely abandoning everybody to load up in the paint, and both Dennis Shrewder and Lebron James were struggling to get to the bast gate,

which turned them both into jump shooters. And Lebron's a good jump shooter, but denishooter is a bad jump shooter, and it didn't go well right, So they reacted to that by trying to bring in shooting. The problem is this season, Frank Vogel has noticed, and all of us have noticed, you can't run a functional NBA lineup with guys that can't guard. When you have multiple guys on the floor that can't guard, and all of these shooters

the Lakers signed can't guard. So they brought in this shooting to try to give space for Lebron to feel comfortable going to the basket, for Russ to feel comfortable going to the basket, for Anthony Davis to feel comfortable going to the basket, and it hasn't worked out because they haven't been able to have their shooting on the floor because of the obvious defensive shortcomings that's come from that. And then this is a separate topic, but the Russ

problem has been there too. You have shooters on the floor, but when RUSS is a complete waste of an off ball thread, it kind of puts you in the same predicament you'd have if you didn't have shooting on the floor anyway. But what's interesting is you what you need is guys that can shoot and play defense. Right, But if you can shoot and play defense, you're not making a veteran minimum contract. You're not making the mid level exception.

You're not available. If you can shoot and play defense, you're making over ten million a year in this league. That's what Danny Green got when he came to the Lakers. That's what guys like Mikhail Bridges are getting right now. That's what guys that Cam Johnson are getting. Right If you can play two ways and shoot the ball, you're too valuable to be someone that the Lakers can target on the fringe. So you have to pick between guys

that can defend and guys that can shoot. And I think the most valuable lesson the Lakers have learned this year is you can't take the guys that can shoot because the problem because it becomes athletically, you can't hang in this five out n b A. I've talked about

this a lot on the show. When when these teams go five out and it's all dribble, drive and attack, you have to have guys that can contain on the perimeter, Guys that can move their feet and keep their man in front, and if they give up a drive, they have to be willing to do the necessary work to

rotate and recover on the back end. I'm gonna get to that in a little bit here with the Dallas Mavericks, this team has been utterly lacking in that area, and you're better off bringing I'll give you an example, guy like Wesley Matthews. Wesley Matthews played for the Lakers last year.

Didn't shoot well after shooting pretty well in previous seasons with the Milwaukee Bucks, but he was still a very productive player because the Lakers understood that he was doing the job defensively that they needed him to do in relative So let's say Wesley Matthews shoots thirty five on wide open threes, but a guy like Malik Monk can

shoot on him. It's easier to make up for that difference in shooting on the offensive end than it is to make up for what Wesley Matthews can bring as a defensive player as a cog in a system, especially alongside players as defensively talented as Lebron and Anthony Davis. So it's been an interesting lesson for the Lakers, and

I hope this next offseason. They addressed that when you're looking for discounted players on the market, favor discounted players that can play defense over discount of players that can play offense. And to be clear, I was more optimistic about this past offseason coming into the year. This is a lesson that I've had to learn as well. The league is changing. You can't operate without good perimeter defensive

players anymore. It's okay, you you learned a lesson. You messed up with Russ, you messed up on some of these other signings on the periphery, Learn your lesson. Move on. Just don't make the same mistake again this summer. Bring in defensive players, Try to recreate that culture that you had in with Lebron and a D make another run at it next year, and I like their chances. Start your bracket with a bang. Right now, Fandal Sports Book is giving new customers a one hundred and fifty dollar

instant bonus guaranteed. That's right. You'll get one and fifty dollars in bonus site credit and all you have to do is place your first bet of five dollars or more. How you bet the bracket is up to you. You can choose from the money line, totals, prop bets, and so much more. I'm gonna be all over Arizona from Tucson. They have NBA size and athleticism. I think their defense

is going to carry them. Plus with the cash out, the balls in your court so you can close out your bet whenever you want before the game is even over. Joined FanDuel today with promo code Jason T. Then you can place your five dollar bet to score one hundred and fifty dollars in bonus site credit guaranteed. That's promo code Jason T on the Fandel Sports Book app twenty

one plus in President Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Indiana Louisiana. Permitted parishes only, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Tennessee, Virginia or West Virginia. First online real money wager only. Refund issued as non withdrawable site credit that expires in fourteen days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sports book, dot fan duel

dot com. Gambling problem called one eight hundred next step or text next step to five three three four two in Arizona one eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven, or visit CCPG dot org slash chat in Connecticut one eight hundred gambler or visit FanDuel dot

com slash rg in Colorado, Indiana, New Jersey. In Virginia one eight seven seven seven seven zero stop in Louisiana one eight hundred to seven zero seven one one seven for confidential help in Michigan one eight seven seven eight hope and why or text hope and why to four six seven three six nine in New York. In tennessee redline dial one eight hundred eight eight nine nine seven eight nine In Tennessee visit www one dot one eight

hundred gambler dot net in West Virginia. For those of you are just joining us, this is Lakers Tonight, presented by Fandel Here at the Volume. I want to move on from the Lakers to talk about that nets Maps game, which was incredible. This is the second absolutely giant gay Antick win in a super competitive, hostile road environment for the Dallas Mavericks. On Sunday they had that huge way over the Boston Celtics, and then tonight they went at

the buzzer against Brooklyn. These are two massive wins for this team, and I think it's super interesting to see how they're doing this because they're doing it on the defensive end. I know they gave up a lot of points tonight, but in the fourth quarter when things really got grinded to a halt, the Mavericks defended extremely well.

If you go on my Twitter feed and you scroll down on the videos, I did a video three or four days ago after that Sunday game where where I broke down just how Dallas is getting these stops, and it really comes down to doubling and recovering if you have personnel like they're the opposite of Boston. Boston has all these good defensive players. I just released a video about them today for the volume. They always have five really good defensive players on the floor, so they don't

have to double. They switch everything, and it's hey, pick your poison. Do you want to guard a guy like Marcus Smart who's short but that's a bulldog and keep you in front and is super physical, Or do you want to attack a taller, slower guy you know, uh, but have struggles because he's athletic and can cover ground with his link. You know, we've seen that a lot with Robert Williams, who's doing a really nice job in their switching scheme. They're gonna man you up most of

the time. A team like Dallas doesn't have that defensive personnel. Tha Spencer did what. He's not a great defensive player. Jalen Brunson is not a great defensive player. Luca don Che is not a great defensive player. Maxine Kleiba is not a great defensive player. But they're getting stops with that group because instead of operating in one on one situations, they are doubling the other team's best player every time down the floor. They doubled Tatum the entire fourth quarter

in Boston on Sunday. They doubled Kevin Durant on almost every single possession in the fourth quarter tonight. And what they've done is they've gotten their rotations on the back end down to a science, and it's really just about effort and focus in communication. My high school team, we do this drill to practice this where we basically play four on three and the three guys on defense as the guys on the offense are swinging the ball around,

it's chaos. And as I'm coaching the kids, I tell them, like, this is supposed to be chaos. There's no exact science, there's no place you're supposed to go. You just have to talk and play extremely hard and you can make up for that ground. And then they do other little things like as soon as Tatum will pick up his dribble or as soon as Kevin Durant will pick up his dribble, one of the guy that guys that's double teaming will pre rotate and leave and start rotating around

to get ahead of that first past. They've done that to beat a lot of those first passes out of the double team. But I've been really impressed in general with the way that Dallas has manufactured a basically what amounts to a fake defense, meaning they're achieved. They're massively overachieving defensively over what their personnel should be able to do. It's a massive credit to Jason Kidd. You know, I was talking about this with my father in law earlier.

You know, the the Jason Kidd had a really rough time in Milwaukee and it formed this really nasty reputation around him. And it's really not fair because if you think throughout sports history, almost every coach in their first stint doesn't do well. Bill Belichick didn't do well in his first coaching stint in the NFL. Even you know, look at Ty Lou. He got fired from the Calves.

It wasn't a great fit after Lebron left. You have to learn as a coach, you have to you have to fall on your face to become more adaptable, to become more malleable. And Jason Kidd, who was a bad coach in Milwaukee and had some bad ideas and kind of nuked his reputation a bit, has become a very good coach in Dallas, and I think it's a valuable lesson for us to learn there. And then lastly, just a credit to the players. It's a lot of work to constantly be double teaming and rotating. It's a lot

of sprinting, a lot of cutting. It's exhausting, and those guys have just bought in and they're just doing it and it's working. And then on the other end of the floor, it's all about Luca with that extra threat. In the early fourth quarter, Jalen Brunson did what Jalen Brunson does, creates offense while lucas off the floor. That is very similar to what they had in previous years. But Spencer did what he just gives them one more guy who might be able to attack a matchup, who

has the confidence to make shots when they matter. On that last possession, the nets double Luca Doncheons at the top of the key. They actually did a really nice job. As soon as Katie rotated up to double on Luca, Gore and Dragice came out of the corner off of Dorrian Phinney Smith and was right at Spencer Dinwoodie as

the past was there. It was perfectly defended. Spencer didn't what he should have swung it one more time, but because of the way they timed their double team, even if Dorian Phinney Smith caught it and shot it out of the corner, they might not have had time to get it off. So it's a really smartly designed double team.

But Spencer Dinwoodie is a very confident offensive player. He always he's one of those guys that he probably he thinks he's one of the best players on the floor, and he just rose up over that contest and elevated like, I know I'm gonna make this ship. And that's the advantage of having those types of alpha dog egos on the floor alongside your superstar, so that he has somebody

that he can count on in those biggest moments. This team is dangerous, extremely dangerous because of what they can do defensively, the stuff that translates to the postseason, and their ability to attack matchups there at the end of that game, the shots Luco is getting attacking Gore on Drawgice out of those switches, those are fantastic looks and those are the kind of looks that they're gonna be able to get in any postseason series. That is very

reliable stuff. I'm a big believer in Dallas. They are dangerous. I wanted to talk about the Brooklyn Nets for just a second before we move on. We had this really weird report come out today saying that every time Ben Simmons has attempted to ramp up right in that first or second day, he's experiencing inflammation in his spine. That's really scary. He got an epidural shot, that's really scary. He's allegedly not going to come back until there's a

few games left in the regular season. To me, it doesn't necessarily make it so that the Nets can't win the title, but it is a little bit more of a concern. As I've talked about in my film studies with the Nets, they are struggling a little bit with that Bruce Brown, Andre Drummond, Nick Claxton role. When they have one or two of those guys on the floor, there's a little bit of an offensive limitation. Ben Simmons is a better defensive player than any of those guys,

and he's a much, much, much better offensive player. Even though we like to slander him, even though we make fun of him for not shooting, he is a much better offensive player than those guys. So being able to get him on the court and use him this year is a significant ceiling raiser for them. So if he's not available. Of course, that lessens their chances. But look at how good Kevin Durant looked tonight. I thought he missed a couple of easy shots that he normally makes.

There's a little one legged fade away he shot from the left elbow that he left just barely short. That's a really good shot for k D that he's gonna make eight times out of ten. He had another fade away going to the right along the base line that he always makes that he misses. He missed a layup right at the rim in the middle of the fourth quarter. So Katie didn't even make shots that he normally made. But he still did enough to win that game, had that huge three to take the lead late. They just

Spencer didn't what he made a huge shot. But I'm never gonna write off k D. I think he's the best player in the world. I would not write off this team. But the lack of Ben Simmons is definitely a concern, and it's something that absolutely lowers that ceiling. And like I always talked about the difference between these teams when you get to that top tier, when we're splitting the difference between Milwaukee and Brooklyn and Philly and

Phoenix and Golden State. When you're with that group, nobody's gonna beat anybody in a sweep there. No one's gonna run rush shot over any of those teams. Those teams are gonna go down in a battle of a playoff series and it's gonna be very close. And so having every single advantage available is important to giving yourself the best chance to win those matchups. And if Ben Simmons

can't go that lessons those chances all right. Before we get out of here, I wanted to do a little bit of a deep dive into the Philadelphia seventy sixers. I've been watching a lot of film with them late of late, uh tomorrow, keep an eye on my Twitter feed. I have a video video coming out that's gonna break down the Yokich and beat battle and some of the

lessons that I learned from watching Dad. But Philly stopped playing good basketball now, which is ironic because they came out game busters in that first week after the trade.

They lost to Brooklyn ugly. They blew that lead to Denver, that that they had Denver dead to rights and blew that game and then uh they took overtime to win in Orlando, and they were trailing much of the third of with quarter tonight against Cleveland, without Jared Allen, and with Philly's defense and with Cleveland's lack of offensive creation, they should have been able to win that game by

a lot and they didn't. Billy doesn't look great right now, and there's a couple of reasons why, and I wanted to get to those really quick. First, to me is James Harden being a lesser version of himself. When James Harden is at his best, he's primarily trying to get to the rim. He is relentless in his rim pressure, and everything else plays off of that. His passing plays off of that, his floater game plays off of that,

and his step back plays off of that. But there's this alter ego of James Harden when he's not putting that kind of pressure on the rim, where it seems like he's trying to get to his step back and defenders will overplay up into his step back and he still won't drive past them, or when he does drive past them, either in isolation or out of a pick and roll, instead of aggressively attacking the rim, he starts to kind of slowly meander into the paint, and he's

just to pack if he's not applying enough rim pressure. And as a result to that, their offense has stilted a little bit, especially in big moments. This and the only way this is gonna work out, the only way Philly is gonna be able to win it all is if you get two thousand eighteen James Harden. And the only way that's gonna happen is if he gets into shape and starts putting his head down and going to the basket again. That's something to keep an eye on.

Also on the defensive end of the floor, you know, against the Knicks and against the Timberwolves and some of those weaker opponents that they played right after the trade, Harden can kind of float around. But when you're playing against these better offensive teams like Denver and like Brooklyn, you need to get more out of James Harden. Defensively. They were consistently attacking him in screening actions. He always

dies on every screen. There were some examples in the film that I'll show you guys tomorrow where a guy wouldn't even run off the screen. He'd run like three ft to the left of the screen and instead of just chasing him around I've seen hard and just run into the screen because it's almost like it gives you an excuse to be like, oh, well, I'm not in

the play. I can't guard him, and they're gonna need more out of James Harden defensively if they're gonna really have a chance to get the trophy at the end of the day. And then uh, moving on to mbiad for a quick second, he is really really struggling with handling double teams. He does okay when they're one pass away. There was a huge play at the end of the game tonight where Lori Markenham was guarding him Beat at

the high post. They were only up by one. I think there's about a minute and a half left, and the Calves doubled one pass away from the direction and Bead was facing and be just through a basic swing pass to Tyrese Maxie and Tyrese Maxie made the dagger that ended up being the shot that kind of ended the game, that kind of thing, and Beat desfined with

I thought it was a poor scheme there. You guys know me, I always say, if you're gonna double one pass away, then you have to pre rotate take away that first pass so that they you have to make the guy who's getting double through across the court because that allows you to apply ball pressure and gives you

a better chance to rotate in those situations. And I'll show this in the film tomorrow when you guys see the video and Beat is really struggling seeing the open man two passes away, especially in the week side corner, and it's really limiting them in a lot of these scenarios. There are a lot of and be double teams that are just getting swung back out to the perimeter and reset as opposed to ending in open shots, which is

what they need to do. The reason why that's so important is again, when you're playing the very best teams. We were talking about this with Yokis. Yokis did fantastic tonight against the Washington Wizard's a horrible defensive team, but he struggled like crazy against the Philly defense and against the Golden State defense. He struggles against the length. That's

where he has issues. And Bet it's a similar thing when you are in a playoff series against the Miami Heat or the Boston Celtics, you're going to face so much length and athleticism defensively that there's not gonna be a lot of openings, and you're going to have to be able to make those reads. It's what's made Lebron

the greatest basketball player potentially of all time. It's why I've always leaned towards high end playmakers when I'm evaluating players, because in a postseason series, they don't let you operate in one on one a lot. It's a lot of double teams, it's a lot of help defenses, a lot of help defense. And the guys that can read that and identify the cracks in the defense and make you pay for sending help, those are the guys that succeed

at the highest level. That's a big part of why I think k D has been so much better as of late. He's taken leaps and bounds as a passer out of double teams and out of drives to the rim, and that's open things up for him all over the floor. Last little note on the Sixers. They are really struggling with Tyrese Maxie and Tobias Harris finding out where they fit in the offense. There are a lot of possessions where Tobias is like, I think it's my turn. I'm

just gonna go. There are a lot of possessions where James Harden wants the ball to run a screening action, but Tyrese Maxie just kind of goes and does his own thing. Those kinds of things take time to iron out, and over time that offensive fit will make sense. Those are two guys that are massively, massively overqualified for the offensive role they're playing right now. Tyrese Maxie is a great perimeter initiator and a great ball handler out of

pick and roll, He's gonna get fewer opportunities. That's that's something you have to work around. That's something he's gotta have to learn. He's gotta learn how to be a better off ball player because on this team, that's what he's gonna need. Saying goes with Tobias Hairs. Hey man, you don't get to just break off of the offense and do seventeen and do seven post ups every game, because it's bad for their offense. With all the talent they have on the floor, over time they'll sort that out.

But those are the big things. Harden's gotta get better on defense, Hardon's gotta start getting down to the rim again, and Bead's gotta pass better out of these double teams, and Tobias Harris and Tyrese Maxy have to do a better job figuring out where they fit in the offense. There trending down right now. I still have them as a top tier contender. They just gotta get their ship together, all right, guys. That is all I have for tonight. I sincerely appreciate your support. As always, we have to

show Friday and Saturday this weekend. I hope you guys will join us then. As always, I appreciate your support and we will see you in a couple of days. The volume m