Hoops Tonight - Celtics bully Kevin Durant & Suns, Mavericks-Thunder reaction + NBA Mailbag

Sportsbook app and use code hoops that's hoops. New customers can bet five bucks to get one hundred and fifty dollars instantly in bonus bets only at DraftKings Sportsbook with code hoops That's hops. The Crown is yours. Gambling problem called one eight hundred gambler or in West Virginia, visit www dot one eight hundred gambler dot net. In New York call eight seven seven eight hope and why, or text hope and why to four six, seven, three six nine.

In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling called eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven to seven, or visit CCPG dot Org. Please play responsibly on behalf of Boothill Casino and resort in Kansas. Twenty one plus age varies by jurisdiction void in Ontario. Bonus bets expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. See dkg dot com slash b ball for eligibility and deposit restrictions, terms and responsible gaming resources. All right, welcome to hoops

tonight here at the Volume. Happy Friday, everybody. If all of you guys are having an incredible week, we got a jam packed show for you today. We're gonna hit the two TNT games from last night. The Phoenix Suns went into Boston and kind of got their butt kicked a little bit, especially in that third quarter run as the Celtics pulled away and went up by twenty. We're gonna break down that game from the perspecti of both teams.

And then after that Dallas Mavericks without Luka Doncic and then suffering a couple other injuries along the way, went into Oklahoma City and ran into a bit of a buzz saw with the hang tight on the strength of an incredible Kyrie Irving performance thirty six points and twelve assists on just eighteen shots as he kept him close throughout, but the Thunder were able to pull away at the end. So we're gonna break the break down those two games

from the perspective of both teams. After that, I've got four mail bag questions for you guys. We're gonna hit a couple about the Isaiah Thomas, Draymon Green and interviews, specifically some of the revisionist history surrounding the twenty seventeen twenty eighteen Warriors in what would or would not have happened if Katie went there, and then also the perception of Steph Curry as a point guard. So lots of

fun stuff for the mail bag as well. You guys are the Joe fobrig started subscribe to our brand of YouTube channel. I mean a lot to me if you guys would take just a couple of seconds to scroll down and hit that subscribe button. Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever you get your podcast under Hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if you leave a rating in

a review on that front. Don't forget about my Twitter feed at underscore json lt, where I put film threat and show announcements and then also keep dropping mailback questions in the YouTube comments so we can keep hitting them throughout the rest of the season. And then lastly, before we get started, you know, this time of year is the time where we get to my favorite type of live sports event to go to, which is a NCAA

tournament game. If you've ever been to one, there's nothing quite like it because the sheer level of intensity, the intensity that you get from single elimination basketball, obviously getting to the phase where we have the best teams in the country on display, but also when you go to these arenas for an NCUBA tournament game, they are wild fan experiences because there's legitimately thousands of fans from both teams in the arena, and there's this crazy back and

forth vibe. There are a ton of fun I really want you guys to get out and check out an nc DOUBLEA tournament game this year. This is where we're going to talk about game Time, the fastest scoring ticketing app in the United States. Game Time has an amazing user experience. They have an all in pricing options so you can see exactly what you're going to pay before you go to check out. They have an easy two

step process to check out, and you can find out exactly what you're getting yourself into by getting an image of what the view from your seat looks like. Take the guess work out of buying tickets with game Time. Download the game Time app, Create an account and use code hoops. That's hoops for twenty dollars off your first purchase terms apply again. Create an account and redeem code Hoops again. That's Hoops for twenty dollars off. Download Game

Time Today, last minute tickets, lowest price guaranteed. All right, let's talk some basketball. So this Sun Celtics game again, we just saw them play what was it about a week ago in Phoenix, and we got a crazy Kevin Durant performance that kept it close. The first quarter. Really for the first quarter and a half or so kind of felt a little bit like the game in Phoenix, like there was a lot of shot making from Phoenix. Kevin Durant road att hot streak into that first quarter,

came out red hot. Bradley Beal hit some shots in the first quarter. They were able to keep it close, but the Celtics talent advantage just started to take over as they got into that tail end of the second quarter, Tatum hasn't been shooting super well as of Lake kind of got going. He seems to really get invigorated by

the individual matchup with KD. It seemed like every time he had an opportunity in ISO with some space, he was trying to hit KD with dribble combinations and to pull up jump shots, and he was hitting them in Phoenix hit him again here in Boston. He had an incredible game. Jaylen Brown got off to a little bit of a rough start trying to be aggressive in the post, but he really started to get going in that second quarter, attacking Bradley Beal and Devin Booker going to the rim.

But I thought the story of the game was Al Horford and he stepped in with Chris tops porzingis being out. And you know, again, like when we talk about the Suns,

we're gonna dive a little bit deeper into this. But they're just like all the teams that are after the Denver and Boston tier, they're pretty matchup dependent, right, And so one of the things specifically that Phoenix is good with in terms of their interior size is like Nurkic is a big body, so when he can play a drop coverage and kind of hang out by the basket, and when he needs to bang with the other big bodied centers in the league, you know, there's real value there.

But when it comes to defending on the perimeter, especially against a team like Boston that picks and pops a lot, that puts them in a predicament where Nurkic can struggle to defend in space. And so from the opening tip of this game it became a problem for Phoenix. Started with Horford hitting threes in the first half, a couple of early ones, spacing the floor and in picking pop situations.

Then they come out in the third quarter and Frank Vogel tries to address the problem by putting Devin Booker on al Horford and then putting use of Nurkic and Drew Holliday. I'm assuming making it an easier rotation so we can kind of help. And Drew Holiday typically spaces to the corner because he's been such a good corner three point shooter this year, and so he can maybe take an easier couple of steps out to offer a contest. I'm guessing that was the rationale behind it. But Horford,

you know, He's had experience as an on ball guy in the post a lot in the Atlanta Hawks phase of his career. Right like, He's went to work and did some damage on the offensive Glass got a couple of big offensive rebounds in that third quarter, and then there was a play where he just like deep sealed on Devin Booker early in an offensive possession, created an easy passing angle, got to the foul line, so he just started punishing the smaller players for being switched on

to him. From there, Vogel ends up pulling the plug on that, going back to Nurkic John Horford, and then he just goes right back to hitting threes and he just completely lit up Phoenix and that was the big problem, and there was just nothing that Phoenix could do to overcome it at that point. And then in the third quarter they started to get hot from three again. Jalen

Brown hit a couple, Sam Houser hit a couple. There was another Horford play where he got Devin Booker on his top side and created a passing angle at the foul line, and Jason Tatum made a really nice kind of over the top feed as soon as he caught it. They had no choice. I think it was Royce O'Neil covering Sam Hauser in the corner. He had no choice but to step over and help. Horford made the extra pass. Horf Hawser was wide open in the corner, knocked it down.

Howser got a little bit of rhythm from that, came flying off of a screening action on the right side of the floor and came off and hit a three. Broke the game open from there, went up by twenty and never looked back. It was just an absurd jump shooting game from Boston. They took twenty five threes and made fifty percent of them, so twenty five for fifty

from the field. They took forty eight jump shots overall, made seventy or excuse me, scored seventy points on the forty eight jump shots one point four to six points per shot, which is completely insane. Twenty five points on eighteen pull up jumpers two, so they were deadly on

off the dribble jump shots. They converted ISOs at one point twenty nine points per possession, so like just all their sheer talent stuff shining through in this game, one point zero nine points per ISO and post up combined, they converted spot up possessions at one point seventy five points per possession. Just a completely ridiculous demonstration of skill

from the Boston Celtics in this game. I was on the sport I was on Fox Sports Radio and Phoenix this morning, and one of the Benjamin, the guy who's hosting the show this morning, asked me. He goes like, hey, like like what can the Suns do? Like what was it that they were unable to match in this particular game from from Boston? And one of the things I said to him was like, like, there's two ways to

look at it. There's the matchup element, like Phoenix is, you know, Boston's kind of a tough matchup for Phoenix. But there's also just the absurdity of Boston ceiling, which is something we've glossed over a lot when we talk about the Celtics in general, in terms of the way I see the Celtics discussed around the league, Like do they have some issues, of course, just like every team in the league does, right, But like their issues rear their ugly head rarely and more often than not, they

make the shots they take. They shoot, you know, you know, a c fifty something jumpers and convert them at almost a damn near point and a half per shot, and they kick everyone's ass. And that's always on the table

as an outcome with this team. And that's why, despite the fact that I view Denver as the safe bet to win the title, I view Boston on the same tier as them, because you can't count out the idea that potentially they might just out talent everybody, like they have the ability to take eighteen pull up jump shots in a game and make twenty five or score twenty five points on them, Like they have the ability to just get so damn red hot that there's nothing you

can do defensively to cover for it. Like that's the thing, especially when it comes to Horford and porzingis when they're hitting the pick and pop threes and the spacing threes, it just completely wrecks any defense because if you're gonna have any hope to deal with these rangey wings and guards that they have, you're gonna have to have backside help.

And if you're gonna have backside help, you're typically gonna do that from the center position, whether it's in pick and roll or even just in off ball situations, and most teams you can live with that because they don't have the the plethora of shooting at the center position that Boston has. But Boston just has a ton of shooting at the center position. Like again, this Porzingis didn't even play tonight and they torched them with pick and

pop bass. So like at the end of the day, like we're going to talk about Phoenix in the matchup here a little bit more deep, but like the reality is is sometimes with Boston you just get to lose sometimes when like Jalen Brown's playing like a top ten player as of late. He's averaging thirty points and six rebounds in his last nine games, two point eighty three assist to turnover ratio over that Spansho's taking care of the basketball, making good plays. He just did an unbelievable

job on the ball on Devin Booker last night. He's playing legitimately like a superstar over the course of the last few weeks. And you're combining that with Jason Tatum, who's been a top ten player forever, right, and you're combining that with Derek White and Drew Holliday, these amazing

two way guards. You're combining that with what Al Horford and Christops Porzinks bring at the center position and what Sam Houser brings and shooting off the bench, it is just an absurdity of talent and when it's clicking on all cylinders, there's literally nothing you can do. All you can do is try to play them into their worst tendencies and pray that they start getting cold and they

start to kind of fall apart from there. But again, there's a certain amount of that that you can't control, just with the sheer amount of talent on the floor. And it's hard enough to guard any team in the NBA when they spread you out, let alone a team that has this kind of talent as far as the matchup goes for Phoenix, you know, I've talked a lot about this specific concept over the last month since the All Star breaks. We've been diving deeper into the playoff

teams and their strengths and weaknesses. In my opinion, once you get past Boston and Denver, every team beyond that, Minnesota, Milwaukee, the Clippers, the Suns, all those teams, all of them have flaws, right, and they have strengths as well. All those teams have like absurd strengths. Right, Like, if we talk about the Knicks, it's like they just have a

really physically imposing team one through five when they're healthy. Right, You're not going to find a more like like like stout, physical, strong, you know, bully ball on both ends of the four type of lineup than Jalen Bronson, Dante DiVincenzo with og and Andobi, Julius Randall and Mitchell Robbins when they're healthy, right, Giannis and Dame for the Bucks. You know, the insane amount of shot creation for the Clippers, the insane amount

of shock creation for the Suns. All those teams have strengths, but they also have weaknesses. And what that means is who they play is going to play a massive factor and who ends up advancing in this playoff run. And that's why we're going to continue to build that concept out, the matchup strengths and weaknesses of both teams as we head into mid April, because once we get to those first round series and we start doing our series previews, that's going to be a big thing that helps determine

which teams I picked to advance. It's going to have to have a lot to do with matchups. So, for instance, we've talked about like teams like Sacramento giving the Lakers issues with perimeter speed. Well, they've also struggled with the Nuggets because of their interior size. Right, Nicole Jokich can bury Anthony Davis under the rim, Sobonus can bury Anthony

Davis under the rim. Well, Nurkic is actually one of the bigger bodied centers in the league, and he can hold up really well against that sort of thing, and so he can actually make the game a little bit tougher for Yokich than a lot of other centers can.

And so in that specific dynamic, and especially this season, because Jokic's jump shot is continued to trend down, He's down to zero point nine to nine points per jump shot, so he's below a point per jump shot this year, when he was at one point one seven points per

jump shot last year. So they're not as much of a pick and pop team as they showed in the postseason last year because Jokich is just one of those guys now where you don't necessarily have to close out as hard on him, at least with the way that he's been shooting as of lake, maybe that changes when we get to the postseason. So for Phoenix, Nurkic can drop back in ball screens, right, they can put speed on the ball, like whether that's Bradley Beehler or Royce

O'Neil or Grayson Allen. Right, they could dig down off the on the perimeter because they have the speed in rotation. It's a matchup that works well for Phoenix. By the way, I'd picked Denver to beat Phoenix in a series. But that's why I look at Phoenix as a team that's a legitimate threat to knock off Denver. It's a good

matchup there. Now we go to Boston. Boston is this interesting team because they have a not only do they have a signific better Arsenal perimeter defenders to throw at Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal in terms of just the like Jalen Brown, Jason Tatum, Derek White, jew Holiday, and just the level of perimeter defense talent compared to KCP and Aaron Gordon, who are two really good players in that regard. Cacp's gonna make an All Defense team

this year. But there's a certain amount of like they just have so much more that they have to do, and they don't have continuing options down the roster to keep throwing at KD and Bradley Beal on Devin Booker. Right, So Boston has these perimeter advantages, but also they are a five out team that plays a lot of pick and pop basketball, and so that makes it so that Nurkic is not gaining the advantage of being able to

body a bigger center. Nurkic this year has been capable of scoring in the post against mismatches, but it also can get ugly too. How many times you see last night Nurkics try to, you know, bully his way underneath the basket, and he just exposes the basketball too much and guys cannot get away from him. He tends to either mishots or turn it over down there quite a bit. So like you're not getting as much of the benefit

of Nurkic being out there. And then on the other end of the floor, they can just continually uh uh, put him in space and put them in pick and pop situations and pick them apart from the three point line, and so like that that it's just a tough matchup. They're they're they're they're gonna make the Suns make a ton of pull up jump shots against a team that's

gonna be really good at defending them. And and yeah, so like that that that specific issue is something I'm gonna continue to dive in as we get into the next month. But like, this is the kind of team that Phoenix is gonna struggle with, a real pick and pop team. Oklahoma City there's another great example. Like, uh, one of the things that kind of reared its ugly head in that second half of the Suns is a lot of the same stuff that they struggled with all season.

Like they had some turnovers. They had five turnovers in the third quarter, Bradley Beal had three. H Drew Holliday kept like poking the ball away as dudes were trying to snake and pick and roll, just with this relentless back pressure and stuff like that. Like the Thunder do that too. The Thunder our team that's really aggressive on the ball. They're way better at forcing turnovers than Boston is.

Austin's actually not all that good at forcing turnovers. Right, So, like Ogoma City is playing passing lanes and being super aggressive. We've seen what they can do to Phoenix, and same sort of thing with chet Holmgren as a pick and pop guy, and you know of putting Nurkicchen too a predictament. Now, Nurgiic can do a lot of damage on the glass in that matchup, but he struggles defensively, and then obviously it's a bad matchup for the Sun's perimeter players for

all the reasons we just talked about. So like again, I like, I'm a big believer in Phoenix. I think they have a real chance to get out of the Western Conference. I would say I'm I was originally on the Clippers in this regard, but they continue to play some relatively mediocre basketball. So like, I'm kind of on the fence between Phoenix and and the Clippers as that number two team in the West behind Denver, But I'm

tempted to pick Phoenix. It just once again, like all these teams, it's gonna come down to their matchups and who they face along the way. All right, moving on a mass thunder, So obviously the Maser down Luka Doncics in this game, Dante exem got hurt in the second half when kind of a gnarly play Josh Green twisted

his ankle at the start of the game. So like obviously, not a whole lot you can take from the MAVs, Kyrie did just play a magnificent game as an offensive initiator to keep him in it, thirty six points on just eighteen shots, twelve assists. The thunder throwing everything at him too. In the third quarter, they started just sending straight up double teams when Kyrie was just ribbling thirty feet from the basket and single coverage, not even in a ball screen. They were just sending a double team.

They started blitzing him in ball screens, helping hard on his drives. But it didn't matter because Kyrie's Kyrie and he's incredible, and we'll get a little bit further into that,

but that kept the game close. But a monster game from Jalen Williams on the Oklahoma City Thunderside at twenty seven excuse me, at twenty seven points, thirteenth time the season he scored at least twenty five in a game, had everything going, Several nice driving finishes and scoop shots, including a nasty one against Daniel Gafford in the fourth quarter where gafferd went straight straight vertical it got into

his body and finished on the side of him. He had his catching shoot three going those bump off pull up jumpers that he hits where like he just drives really hard to the right and then like hits you and then squares up mid air and hits that like little twelve footer. Jalen Williams actually is up to one point one four points per pull up jump shot and Harden has gone down a little bit level, So Jaalen Williams is now the best high volume pull up shooter

in the league this year. How crazy is that forty players have attempted at least two hundred and fifty of them, Jalen Williams is one point one four points per possession, ranks first in that group. But it's even bizarre just watching it on tape because like he's a twenty two year old and he's like bodying grown men in the NBA.

There's a play where he bodied Dante xhim and took like a little fade away, and like Dante Xim is a pretty big and strong guard who was like healthy into his career like a grown man and in his prime athletically, and and Jalen Williams just bullied him to get to his spot and then like his competitiveness just screams off the screen. He had this block on a one on one break with Derek Jones Junior, where he

blocked him and just screamed to the crowd. He had I missed the three with just under a minute left in the fourth quarter and there was an offensive rebound. He cut down the lane that went back door, just dunked it and screamed to the crowd, And like that was something that stood out to me when I saw him in Summer League. But like Jalen Williams, to me, the work ethic and the competitiveness combined with the natural gifts that he has, the dude's just going to be

a star. And last night was just another little sneak peak of what it's going to be like nightly when we get a couple of years further in his career. Josh Giddy, the Dallas was really ignoring him all night on the three point line of coverage he's seen a lot this season, but he did hit two huge ones in the second half when he finally found a stroke. Shay Gibs Alexander put in an a fish in thirty one like clockwork, like he always does. But I want

to focus on Oklahoma City's defense. They forced Dallas in nineteen turnovers. They scored thirty four points on those turnovers. They leave the league in turnover turnovers. And this concept we've talked about a lot this year. But like they ball pressure and then they have a ton of perimeter speed, so they're really aggressive in passing lanes. Now there's a

downside to that. When you get aggressive in passing lanes and you miss the basketball, you can leave openings and they do give up a lot of three point shots as a result. They give up nineteen wide open threes per gaming the defenders at least six feet away. That's the eleventh most in the NBA. They give up thirty six three point attempts to which is eighth most in

the NBA. But the flip side of that is because they're playing the passing lanes and they're so aggressive in their coverages, they just force so many turnovers and they get out and transition so much that more often than not,

that transition, that tradeoff works in their favor. Like even in k Kyrie had a great game right twelve assists, but he had four turnovers, and there were a couple ones that he had there in the second half that were just pick sixes, where like, here comes the blitz and he just throws some looping pass over the top that has no chance. Somebody shoots in underneath that sends it out the other way, and they're running right like

they just they they play that trade off game. They're gonna give up some offensive rebounds, they're gonna give up some wide open threes because of their aggression. But the flip side is they just get out in transition. That's thirty six points off of tur or thirty four points off of turnovers. That's a significant swing in this particular game.

Really smart adjustment to In the fourth quarter from Mark Dageneld, there was a moment where Jaydon Hardy started going and pick and roll was really getting downhill and getting to

the rim and finishing. There's actually kind of a fun back and forth between j dub and and I've lost my train of thought for there for so Jaden Hardy, sorry, there was a fun little back and forth between Jaydeen Hardy and Jalen Williams in that early fourth quarter stretch Dagenald made an adjustment though, Like again, when you're running pick and roll, it's a main and man type of action, and he was getting downhill in it just baked in

with the way the coverage was set up. So by going zone and they run like this like kind of one two two matchup zone kind of thing. Matchup zone meaning like you're in charge of an area, but when a guy comes into your area, you guard him like he's man to man. Then when he leaves your area you pass him off basically right. But by doing that it essentially shut down that pick and roll action and cooled Jayden Hardy off and they were able to kind

of regain control of the game. Just a really good win broke Glahoma City against the team again like a Kyrie Irving with all those guys out, it'd be one thing to take them lightly and to go light into

that game, but Hirie threw a great punch. Uh. There was a lot of good for Dallas in this game, which we're gonna get to in a minute, and they overcame it. They got a big win on the mass front. Not too much to take away other than it just feels like injuries are stacking up again, which is really unfortunate. Obviously, Luca's hamstring, Josh Green turned his ankle, Dante Exam took a shot in the second half. Always going to be hard to win a road game against a really good

team when you're down that many guys. But there are four silver linings that I want to hit for Dallas. One Kyrie erving is just incredible. This has been a reminder of why you make this trade last year, and it's why I looked at it so much as this year being the year for Dallas to be a threat because they actually had the time to surround them with

the necessary pieces that they need. But Kyrie's just demonstrating that, like when it comes to that skill guard role, the ability to score and the ability to play make out of ball screens and to just run an offense. He's still one of the top fifteen to twenty guys in the league that can do that, and it's just a rare asset to have on your team. Tim Hardaway Junior, he had been in a shooting slump. He got his three point shot going. That's encouraging. Talked about Jaydon Hardy's

rim pressure in the fourth quarter. I thought that was a really nice mix up for them and something that I think is encouraging in the big picture because obviously, like that downhill speed is something that Luca and Kyrie don't bring a ton and so jaydon Hardy I thought that was an impressive strike from him. And then lastly, Derek Glively. There's a play, so you guys might remember. It was kind of a broken play transition play for

Oklahoma City. I think Shay or somebody tried to throw a skip ahead pass and maxic Leebould jumped up and knocked it with his hand, so it's kind of like a transition chaos possession. And on the play, Derek Lively ended up kiss On Wallace on him, so they were on a quick ball screen with Kyrie and Kasson Wallace like shows high and Chet's or excuse me, Derek Lively slips, and when Derek Glives slips, Kyrie hits him over the top. But Chet is the low man in this possession and

he comes over and he meets Derek Lively right. So Lively's got the ball deep post position, but he's got a player right behind him, and he just patiently worked into a drop step, a drop step hook over his left shoulder with his right hand and he knocked it

down and I was like a member. If you guys, remember I was talking about how I think Derek Lively has the potential to be kind of like a Tyson Chandler, and like one of the things that I think can help him really raise his impact overall at the center position is just being able to make a quick left shoulder, right handed hook over a switch, let alone against another center when you have that deep a position. He's up to sixteen for thirty on hook shots this year. That's

fifty three percent for a rookie. That's pretty impressive, albeit low volume. And he does have the touch in the patience there, which I think is super encouraging. So again, tough one for the MAVs. Not too much to take away from it considering the circumstances, but some silver linings there for you guys. All right, let's move on to our mailbag. We have four questions today, have them on

my phone today. First one offensively, what does Jonathan Kminga need to work on in the off season besides ball handling and three point shooting to become a legit number two option. So again to become a legit number two option. Offensively, it's a lot more complicated than just one specific skill, right, Like ball handling and shooting are vague concepts too, Like shooting could mean just catching shoot shooting. Shooting could mean movement, shooting.

Shooting can mean off the dribble shooting right. Ball handling that could mean attacking closeouts, that could mean working in ISO and post up situations. That could also mean running ball screens. Right. A big one too for Golden State,

which is an important part of this discussion. We got into this in the mail bag yesterday, But just the difference in the different kinds of offenses, right, So like the kinds of skills you need in a four out one in offense versus from a role player versus the kinds of skills you need in a five out offense, right, and just all the players on the perimeter. So in the I out offense specifically, the way Golden State plays read and react is a huge part of the skill development.

What that means is like the ability to quickly interpret what's happening in front of you and make these decisions. So it's kind of like option routes in the NFL. So like if you remember in the NFL, like you might have a guy that reads the linebacker out of the tight end spot, and if the linebackers here, he

quick turns for a hitch. If the linebacker's there, he might run a five yard out instead, right, Like, these these are read and react plays for the tight end where he's coming off the line, reading what the linebacker's doing and then making a decision. It's the same kind of thing five out basketball, Like you're setting up for this screening action, but it's very read and react in the sense that like if your guys top locking, you

you backdoor. If your guys trailing, you want to curl, right, Like if your guys ducking under the pick, you want to flare. Like there's all these different things that you're reading, and especially in three man actions, you might, you know, change your mind on who's coming out of the screen right, or you might slip out of it entirely. There's so many different things that you do read and react basketball in five out basketball, and so some of that is

not even skill development, it's just reps. And like Jonathan Kminga just needs lots and lots of reps playing alongside Steph in this five out system to just kind of learn how to be better at reading and reacting. But like if I had to put it simply to be a legitimate second side creator, or I should say, a second option on a championship team, you have to be truly transcendently great at something. Now. To me, for Jonathan Minga,

that's gonna be an isopost thing. His best skill right now is he is so freaky athletic at his size that most of the players that are big enough to handle him too slow and that are fast enough to handle him or too small right, and so he can get defenders out of position, he can draw fouls, he can get baskets. He's a good on an island score. There's real value there now. To push it to the elite level where he needs to get, he needs to

be a great playmaker in those situations. So again, the ability to read the floor identify where the help is coming from. A lot of teams bring late help on Kaminga after he puts the ball on the floor. But once he can read those things, he can be a truly elite isolation and post up player because you can run that action ten to fifteen or like you know, five ten times a game, and in those five ten possessions, you're going to get consistent, great production regardless of the

coverage that he faces. Right, But in addition to that, he also has to be able to play in the flow of the offense. That's one of the big things for cominga right now is he's good on an island, not so great in the flow, and so that's going to be where his areas of improvement are from there, It's going to be about like ball handling, specifically ball

handling in traffic, ball handling in ball screens. So being able to what that means is like, let's say he brings his man up the floor, but he's got a good perimeter defender on it. As before he comes off a ball screen, he needs to set him up, meaning like he needs to make a move to one side of the screen and then do a retreat dribble to get the defender into a trailing position on that side

before he goes and uses the ball screen. That's an intricate part of ball handling that I'll have to figure out. Right Then, once he's coming off the screen, making those reads, Okay, the defender's in a deep drop. I want to get a head of steam going to the basket. Okay, Oh, the defender's a little bit higher and the on ball guy is trailing behind me. I need to use my size to put the defender in jail, keep him trapped

behind me. Start working slowly down the floor until something develops in front of me and the developing part that's making the reads reading the low man. Okay, I brought the screen defender up, which means the guy in the dunker spots open hit him, or I brought the screen defender up and they rotated out of the corner. I

got to make this skip pass. Right. All these reads that he has to get used to making, those are reads that if he wants to be in the five out coming off of those dhos and coming up off of those impromptu ball screens, that he's going to have

to get better at. Right, But again, to me, to be the legit number two, he needs to be the best possible version of the isopost up player that he is, which primarily is a play a playmaking thing at this point, and then to be able to function normally in their five out offense so that he can maintain his impact when he's not being super aggressive on the ball, and then from there just you know, making the defensive improvements that we know he needs to write like, he's a

good on ball guy right now, but he can be a little unfocused off ball. So like, there's lots of areas of improvement for a player this young, but to become a legit number two, that's just kind of a little breakdown of what he needs to do offensively, all right, Next question Cavs fan here. I obviously know there's a defined second round seiling with them, assuming this happens, what

do you think they should do this offseason? Personally, I think making mobilely bulk up and move to the five and replacing Allen with the wing who can shoot and move his feet is a good start. So one of the things I really find this interesting because it actually falls very similarly to some of the issues that I've

been dealing with as a Laker. Right So, Evan Mobley is in this awkward position right now, where like, to play the four, he needs to make a significant improvement offensively, right just in terms of his skill, ball handling, shooting, all that stuff. But to play the five, he might have some issues in terms of his overall physical bulk. Right, even if he puts on muscle, he might run into

similar issues to Anthony Davis. Now, Anthony Davis, when he was at the four and had some success with the Lakers in the twenty twenty and twenty twenty one seasons, he was a much better offensive skill player, right, a guy you could throw the ball to on the block and he was gonna iso score and hit a bunch of jump shots and all this kind of stuff. Right then,

what happened was is he had an offensive decline. And as that offensive decline happened in twenty twenty one twenty twenty two, all of a sudden it became untenable to run Anthony Davis next to a five, because if you ran him next to a five, you were physically imposing, but you did and have the skill you needed at the four spot to make it work, right, that was the issue they'd have because you'd have like a d who can't shoot next to some other shooter center who

couldn't shoot right. And like, even when they did have a center who cold shoot, a guy like a you know, guys like Thomas Bryant. Briefly there with the Russell Westbrook team or like a Marcus Sool. They weren't teams that like there weren't guys that teams were like really guarding out there, right, And so the issue is, if you're

gonna play Evan Mobley at the four, you're gonna deal much better physically with teams because mobile at the four, next to a legitimate center like Jared Allen, you're gonna be really physically imposing at times. Although they did get a little bit overwhelmed by the Knicks last year, but that only works if Evan Mobley makes the strides offensively.

And what ended up killing them wasn't just the physical stuff that they dealt with Mitchell Robinson, but their inability to score and pick and roll because of Jared Allen and Evan Mobley operating in the short role and out of the dunker spot. They just couldn't score effectively out of there. I want to say, Evan Mobley was like zero for ten shooting out of the role last year

in that series. Right, So, like offensive skill is a prerequisite to play the four now, but if you play the five, you're gonna run into a lot of issues in terms of his overall physical books bulk, Right, So that's really the turning point for the Calves is like, is Evan Mobley gonna develop offensively or is he the next to Anthony Davis, the guy that like has offensive moments but for whatever reason just never develops in terms of his skill set the way that he needs to.

And that's up to Evan for the record, Like I mean, I even feel like with Anthony Davis, like from what I've heard behind the scenes, like the dude just out of the season just takes like two straight months off, and like that's one of those things where like skill

development in particular is literally a lifestyle. Skill development is a twelve month thing, and so like it is a like it is something that like Evan Mobley would have to commit to and really spend the time to make those improvements to be good enough from from an offensive standpoint at the four. If not, if you slide him to the five, then your four has to be super physically posing. You're gonna need somebody of Aaron Gordon's ilk at the four to put next to Evan Mobley because

of his size limitations. Right, That's what makes the lebron ad frontline still functional defensively, against most matchups. Albeit he's had his issues against those big bodied centers like we've talked about, but it's Lebron James. He's a really big center, and so when Lebron is really engaged defensively, the two of them make for really physically imposing four to five. So, like, that's the way I look at it. The crossroads is

Evan Mobley's offensive development. If he becomes a gifted offensive player, you keep him at the four. If he doesn't, you have to put him at the five, and you have to put some sort of big bodied four next to him. All right, next more, we have two questions and then we're done. Now, Jason, we need you to address Zeke disrespecting Steph Curry on Draymond's pod. Love the Show, by the way, thank you for supporting the show. So there's two things that I wanted to hit from the Draymond

Green Isaiah Thomas interview. First, the idea that like Kevin Durant saved them when he went in twenty seventeen. Here's the thing, I think if Kevin Durant did not sign with the Warriors in the summer of twenty seventeen, that the that the Warriors still repeat and go and win back to back titles in twenty seventeen twenty eighteen. No, I don't think they repeat, but they were still one

of the very best teams in the league. They would have been every They would have been every bit as likely to win the title as the Cavs in twenty seventeen. Like I, my best guess is that if you play that same set up again without Kevin Durant going to the Warriors, the Cavs split it. They probably get one more and the Warriors probably get one more in the

twenty seventeen twenty eighteen stretch. So like, yeah, Kevin Durant put them over the top to being completely unbeatable and they won two titles, But that doesn't mean that that Warriors team wasn't good. That's ridiculous. They won seventy three games the year before. It required absolute heroic basketball from Kyrie Irving and Lebron James to barely squeak out a seven game win in Golden State in twenty sixteen. So like pretending as though they weren't a championship contender without KD,

that's just something I completely disagree with. Like Kaiti doesn't sign with Golden State, goes somewhere else. The Warriors win one of those two titles in twenty seventeen or twenty eighteen. In my opinion, that's just how good they were. So like, I don't really buy into that revisionist history. Like even when we evaluate Steph like no KD, I still think we look at him as a three time champion and probably a two times finals MVP and should have been

a three time finals MVP. So like, I don't really buy into that line of thinking. On the point guard front, this is something that I find incredibly silly because everyone wants to associate point guard with one specific style of play, which is like the guy who brings the ball up the floor and makes all the decisions. But like that is really a dying breed these days, you don't really

see that very much in the NBA in general. As a matter of fact, the guys who bring the ball up the floor and make all the decisions now are the James Hard James Harden in twenty twenty, twenty twenty one kind of y eighteen twenty nineteen, I mean, kind of stretch. And then it's like Luka Doncic and like Trey Young, And it's like that's not even like a positional thing, that's like a heliocentric play style kind of thing.

The truth of the matter is is like the positions in the NBA more have to do with who you can guard, right Like can you guard a guard? Can you guard a six ' five two guard? Can you guard a lanky wing who scores on the perimeter like a Paul George. Can you guard a power wing like an Aaron Gordon or Lebron James or Ruy Hatchamur or whatever. In the front court? Can you guard a big bodied center? Can you guard a skinny skilled center? Those are the positions.

But like saying Steph Curry's not a point guard is not fair because there's like not that many point guards in the NBA by the traditional mold, like what Isaiah Thomas was anyway, And by the way, just go back and look at why that position archetype was a thing.

Back then, the vast majority forwards couldn't dribble in most hubs or centers and forwards, so you needed a ball handling point guard that could bring the ball up against pressure and make a post entry pass or if it's a wing scorer if they run an action to get that wingscore position somewhere on the floor, you needed the

point guard to get the ball to him. Nowadays, the level of ball handling that we get down the roster, including at the forward position, is so insane that you no longer need a point guard to make a post entry pass. And so as a result of that, like that point guard position is actually better to have, like a guy who can run pick and roll and score right or do more high level playmaking. But like the high level playmaking at a pick and roll piece, we

literally see every position do that, including centers. Now we see Giannis and Nikole Yoki's running inverted pick and roll all the time now, so like to me, that conversation is completely pointless. The bottom line is at it's Steph's archetype, which is like your prime Marry offensive hub guard, which is more or less what the point guard is now in the modern NBA. He's been the best at it in this era. No one's done it better at the guard position. So like the fact that he's off ball

more than most players is irrelevant to me. And by the way, if you ran a spread pick and roll four out one end system and you just spammed ball screens with Steph like Trey Young, he would just be a better version of Trey Young. Steph can do that too. If you let Steph play the way that Tray Young plays, he'd average thirty five and twelve, but the Warriors wouldn't be as good. Steph embraces five out off ball basketball the way he does because it makes the Warriors a

better team, it makes them more versatile. And then what ends up happening is when push comes to shove, what does he do? He runs pick and roll? When they when the Warriors pushed the Lakers to six games last year, they were the lesser team and a lot of guys who weren't playing as well as they did last year,

and so everything fell on Steph. Lakers were playing the best basketball they played since they won in the Bubble, and they were playing incredible defensive basketball, and the only reason the Warriors had any chance to win that series was Steph with the ball in his hands, barbecuing them in pick and roll. I rewatched every game in that series over the summer, and like it was appalling going back, just how helpless the Lakers were dealing with him in

pick and roll. That's all point guard, bring the ball up the floor and make decision stuff. He can do that. He chooses to play in this five out system off ball because it makes the Warriors more versatile. If they can run that thirty minutes in a playoff game and he only has to spam ball screens for the other fifteen minutes, it gives him a better chance of holding up physically, It gives him a better chance of not

being repetitive and easy to guard. So like, yeah, I disagree vehemently with both of those opinions from Isaiah Thomas from that interview. Last question in your opinion, and how do you think teams adjusting the playoff pressure will affect their play and what major teams do you think will be playoff risers or chokers, whether due to game plan or roster assembly. Do you think of any playoff chokers

that can overcome their weaknesses in an extended series. So I'm not gonna get into specific teams and players in this particular part just because it's a mailbag. We will get into that when we get into our playoff previews in early April. But the main kind of theme behind it is in my opinion, experience tends to be more resilient in the playoffs. Strength and the ability to hold up under physicality tends to be more resilient in the playoffs. Teams that score a lot in the paint that's resilient

in the playoffs. And then a diversity of shot creation. What that means is if your team that relies solely on ball screens to run your offense, you're going to run into issues. Look at the Cavs last year. The only way they could score was their Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell ball screens. And when they had issues scoring out of the role, their entire offense fell apart. Right, But when you have versatility, right, Like, that's the thing.

Like the Knicks, like Jalen Brunson just is an incredible mismatch attacking switch iso guy, right, Julius Randall in theory when he's healthy, can do that kind of thing, right. So, Like, if you have a versatility in your shot creation, if you have the ability to be like, hey, this isn't working, let's try this instead, that to me is something that makes a team more resilient when we get into postseason.

We will when we get to our playoff previews, talk about which teams and players I expect to play better and worse when we get to that Pointge didn't want to hit it in today's mail bag. All right, guys, that's all we have for today. As always, a sincerely appreciate you guys supporting the show. I have a scheduling conflicts, and we're no no longer going live after Lakers Warriors tomorrow night, but I will be breaking that game down

on Sunday morning. Uh. Probably gonna hit Nix Kings as well on Sunday morning, so keep an eye on the feeds. I will see you guys. Then the volume