Hoops Tonight - Giannis & Embiid's MVP cases, LeBron's reaction vs Celtics, Luka vs 2008 LeBron

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We are live on AMP. And for those of you guys who are watching on YouTube or listening on the podcast feed, don't forget that the very first place you guys can find these shows is on AMP. Today we are just going to be touching up on two m v P cases. Here come the Milwaukee Bucks and here comes be Honest. So we're gonna talk about the Bucks and Janice's m v P case to start. We talked a lot about Joel Embia yesterday, but I want to touch a little bit deeper on his m v P case,

so we'll touch on that as well. And then I have two quick hitters centering around Lebron. First of all, all of the reaction to his overly dramatic reaction to the missfoul call against the Celtics. I have some thoughts they're involving Lebron's competitiveness. And then there was a lot of talk going around on Twitter the other day over who was better two thousand eight Lebron or this year's Luca don Shitch, and I have some thoughts there as well.

You guys know the drill before we get started. Subscribe to the volumes YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore Jason lt so you guys don't miss any show announcements. And if, for whatever seen you guys miss one of these and you can't get back over to YouTube or to amp, you can find them wherever you get your podcasts. Under Hoops tonight, So the Bucks are in a four game winning streak. They beat the crap out of the Pelicans

last night, won by for their fourth consecutive win. That is their sixth consecutive win when Janice plays. They've also won eight of their last ten when Chris Middleton plays. So here comes the Bucks. You know. One of the things for the people who have followed me for a while or followed the show for a while, and one of the things you'll learn if you're new is that, generally speaking, I don't overreact to regular season trends. I'm

always paying attention to regular season trends. I always consider it as information. But at the end of the day, I'm not going it's gonna take a lot more evidence in a regular season sample to sway me of something compared to what I would see in a postseason environment. I just find postseason basketball to be so much more informative, and you'll see that a lot throughout my analysis is this season. So, for instance, when the Lakers start into

inten I didn't jump off the bandwagon. I was, you know, pointing out some of the issues that would go that we're going on there. But what did I keep saying? Lebron's not playing well. He should, in theory, start playing well, and when he does, that's a massive influx of talent that should cover up for a lot of the issues that they have on the roster. And now Lebron's healthy and inner rhythm. The Lakers are over five hundred because significantly over five dred over the last half of the season,

Lebron's playing like an MVP. Anthony Davis is coming back they've made a trade for the for a real forward. Now the Lakers are starting to enter onto the scene as like a real serious basketball team. So we're not gonna overreact to a two intense start. When the Warriors have struggled this season, I haven't changed them from being my championship favorite. Why Well, for starters, it's been regular season basketball to most of their struggles are on the

road and associated with effort. And three, there are twenty one lineups in the NBA this year that have played at least two hundred minutes, and the Warrior starters are still the best by far. With Kevin Looney, Draymond Green, Clay Thompson, Steph Curry, and Andrew Wiggins on the floor, the Warriors are outscoring teams by nineteen and a half points per one hundred possessions. That's utter destruction, and no

other team is close, not the Nuggets, not anybody. So I'm not I'm not gonna jump off the Warriors even though they're only one game over five hundred, because all they have to do is maybe make a deal for somebody on the bench, get their stuff together as it pertains to their night and night out effort and the talent is still there, and good luck beating those five

guys four times out of seven. And the same thing goes for the Bucks when the Bucks have had down stretches this year, when Janice has had one of the

worst perimeter jump shooting seasons of his prime. I never changed my pick as the Bucks as the team I picked to get out of the Eastern Conference, and I never changed Janice as my m v P pick because they were always, in spite of all that, still within striking distance of being within the top record in the league, which is part of the m v P case, and Janice, as we all know, is capable of hitting the Jets

for a month and putting up ridiculous numbers. Janice is last four games thirty eight points per game, thirteen rebounds, five assists on sixty sixty shooting. He's shooting on four or three point attempts a game in this four game stretch. Last night, on his way to fifty, he was just casually dribbling up the floor and pulling up off the dribble from like ft and just sticking those jumpers. The

Bucks also have a top five defense. In this four game stretch, Janice is still one of the very best defensive players in the world, and the Bucks are now just two and a half games back the first place in the league. So again, if the season ended today, Yokis would be my m v P. But the reason why I haven't changed Joannice is my pick for the season is this is what I kind of saw coming.

The Bucks would start to get healthy, Chris Middleton back in the line up, Joe Ingles back in the lineup, Johanna is starting to get kick into gear as he ramps up for the playoffs. They're gonna rip off some wins and Janice is gonna put up numbers. And that's what's happening. Looking at his m v P case, I

think he's the best player in the world. So remember my three criteria are are you in the conversation for the best player in the world, are you on the best team in the league, And how valuable are you to your team's success? Those three categories are the way that I measure m v P. I think he's the best player in the world, so solid on that spot. The Bucks are seven points per one hund possessions better when Janice is on versus when he's off, so he's

incredibly valuable. The Bucks are getting outscored by one point per possession when Janice is off the floor in their thirty three and seventeen, so you can do the math on that. So if they finished with the best record in the league, which fig is that important section, they're best team in the league. If they finished with the best record in the league, which is completely on the table,

then he checks all the boxes. He's the best player in the world on the best team in the league and putting up up third numbers and his team struggles without him. That's textbook m v P case. So if he goes over, if he goes out and averages thirty five and fifteen over the last thirty two games of the season, it will not be It will be impossible not to give him the award, And so keep an eye on fan duel look at those janis odds in terms of staying healthy, giving nightly effort, the talent for

his team to be able to win games. He's just a safe bet and that's why I picked him. That doesn't mean he's going to win. The m v P odds are he's not. Look at vanduel. But the reason why that was my pick is because of all those things that just laid out, and I'm sticking with that pick for right now. A couple of caveats. He needs to stay healthy. He's already missed eleven games this year.

I don't think he can miss more than fifteen without it being a differentiator he can't overcome, so he'll you know, we can miss maybe two or three games the rest of the season, and he eats his role players to stay healthy. A big part of this recent surges Chris Middleton and Joe Ingles being in the lineup to give you an idea of just how important spacing is to

be honest. This is a very small sample size for the record, but when Joe Ingles and Chris Middleton are on the floor with the honest this year, the Bucks are scoring a hundred and forty eight point four points

per one hundred possessions. That's what happens when you put real spot up shooting and ball handling and shooting around Janice as an offensive folk grow so all in order from my preseason prediction to come true, all I need is be honest average something like thirty five and fifteen the rest of the way, don't miss more than two or three games and finish above the of Boston in the standings. It's good to see the Bucks starting around

into form just in time for the playoffs. Um, all right, So I wanted to talk about Joel and beats m v P case for a second now. We talked a lot about him yesterday in the Weeds, and so I'm not gonna dive any further into that and beat fans Sixers fans, if you're looking for that. I talked about it a lot yesterday as we broke down his showdown and as kicking of Nicola Yokit on National TV. But I did want to take a quick look at his MVP case because we did not do that yesterday. Again.

Three factors. Best player in the world, best team in the league, Most valuable player in the league. Um, definitely in the conversation for best player in the world. This season, He's averaging ten and four on a career high sixty percent for shooting, which is outrageous. He's also having an outstanding jump shooting season. I wanted to give you, guys. I've been talking a lot about this this season, but I wanted to give you some numbers to give you

guys some perspective. So Joel Embiad is having what would be considered a league average, middle of the pack jump shooting season for a high volume guard, not for a center. So, for instance, there are seventy one NBA players this year that have taken at least three d jump shots, and the vast majority of them are perimeter players, and Beats averaging one point zero four points per possession on jump shots, which ranks forty one out. So that's again that doesn't

seem super impressive, but that's a center. So out of any one guards and wings that are taking tons of jump shots, and Beat is performing the middle of the pack as those guys on the same volume, and I think that's incredibly impressive for a gigantic center. He's also been outstanding defensively in the half court. He's definitely good on the best player in the world side of things. The Sixers are eleven points per one hundred possessions better with a meat on the floor versus when he's off.

Anything over ten on that front is like outstanding, bona fide MVP stuff. The Sixers are negative two point for net in a hundred per one hundred possessions with and beat off the floor, and again two and a half games back in the best record in the league. The Sixers are on a seven game win streak, which is something I predicted back in December, based on them getting healthy and all the talent they have on the roster. I had a feeling that they would go on to

run into in January. That's what's happening, and just like Milwaukee, they are now just two and a half games back in the best record in basketball. So similarly, the honest he's missed twelve games, so he needs to play the rest of the season, can't miss more than two or three more, and the Sixers need to finish in first place again. The reason why I'm hammering those specific points home is this particular m v P case is going to be one of the most tightly contested MVP races

in the history of the league. There's too many good players that deserve to win the award, so little talking points are gonna be big differentiators. Being able to say my team had the best record is going to be a big differentiator. Being able to say I played more games is going to be a big differentiator, especially with

all the different archetypes. We're gonna be comparing a scoring center like in Bid to a playmaking center like Ki to a playmaking wing like Luca, to a scoring wing like Jayson Tatum to a scoring, playmaking wing like Kevin Durant. It's all super convoluted and different. So these clear cut markers are gonna be big differentiators for people. So keep an eye on the standings the rest of the season. You're not just playing for home court advantage. You're playing

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betting partner of the NBA. All right, I have two quick hitters before we get out of here today. First, Lebron's reaction to the missed foul call against Boston. I did a full episode on this that you guys can find on the feed, uh, yesterday about that game. Uh. The reason why I wanted to talk about this game is Bossman Colining Cowherd tweeted this yesterday and it hit home for me because it's something that I feel very

passionately about. He said, yeah, he said quote. Yes, Lebron was dramatic, but he cares absolutely love his passion for the game and the Celtics games have always felt bigger for Lebron. Refs blew a late call that changed the result he was pissed about a regular season outcome all these years later, explain why he's still king Emoji bossman calling coward from the top rope with some knowledge for everybody. Look, here's the deal. Lebron is corny. I've consistently said this.

Lebron's off court persona is bizarre. He's corny, he's dramatic, he always plays to the cameras. He's a unique type of personality in that regard. But I hate it when people draw that line as some sort of indicator of

his competitiveness. And the problem that what's driven this particular stupid narrative is Kobe fans and Michael Jordan fans then pushing this idea that in order to be a competitor, you've got to be an asshole, that you have to be laser focused all the time, that you have to be serious, almost mythological with the scope of your psycho competitiveness. That became basically the blueprint for what we accepted as

the competitor. Call it Mamba mentality, call it, you know, just the general you know, Jordan's greatness that we saw in the last dance. But that became the only acceptable view of the competitor, and I've never seen it that way. I think you can have a overarching personality but have top tier competitiveness underneath it. For instance, Kobe and MJ are that kind of psycho asshole competitor, but like Steph Curry and Tim Duncan are more quiet, more nice. Step

is like super religious. Those two guys want to murder you figuratively on a basketball court. Steph, one of my good friends, is a big Warriors fan, calls him Bundy. Like the serial Killers, Steff is a serial killer under the guys of a nice guy and a quiet guy. Tim Duncan was a serial killer under the guys of a guy that would be incredibly nice to you on the basketball court. Those guys are top tier competitors that aren't wired like Kobe and MJ. And the same goes

for Lebron or Magic Johnson. There that class clown, overly boisterous, dramatic, play to the crowd type of personality. They are freak high end competitors. They all care about winning the same amount, which is more than everyone else. Kobe and MJ are role models. They present one way to be that type of competitor, but not the only version of what a competitor looks like. Lebron reacted hilariously to a no call and made kind of a fool out of himself national TV.

But why because he poured his heart and soul into a game, a game that his team didn't need to win, but that could have been monumentally important to changing the outlook of their season, and at the end of the game, he made a play that should have won the game, and the rest took it away from him. Behind the ridiculous performance and all the dramatics of it and theatrics of it, was authentic pain from a competitor that wanted to win the damn basketball game and something out of

his control took it away from him. As a fan of Lebron over the years, one of the things that I've enjoyed the most about rooting for him is that when there's been an environment like that, some sort of big game, whether it's a key nationally televised game during the regular season or a play of game. As someone who rooted for Lebron a lot, especially when I was younger, I never ever had a doubt as to whether or not he would bring it competitively. Now did the jump

shot go in or not. That depended on the night. Did he take care care of the basketball? Some nights he was sloppier than others, But when it came to the things he could control in a big game, Lebron was the most dependable guy in the league, especially because of the things he could do defensively, and so like, Yes, Lebron is corny, Lebron is dramatic all of those things. Some of it's objectively unlikable, which I think is a

big part of why he's so polarizing. But make no mistake, the dude is a savage competitor that cares about winning above all else, and those two things are not related to each other. Him being dramatic doesn't affect his competitiveness or vice versa. I just wanted to point that out all right quickly before we get out of year. The debate that was raging around Twitter the other day as to who's better Luca now or Lebron in two thousand

and eight. And the reason why I wanted to talk about this particularly is this, to me, represents one of the key foundational principles I use when comparing players all time, and the main idea there is basketball changes from decade to decade, from era to era, from player to player, and it's not fair to compare any player to any specific player in another era based solely on what they do on the basketball court, because what impacts winning is

different from era to era. What you're allowed to do is different from era to era. For instance, heliocentric Lebron, like we saw towards the end of the Miami Heat era and the basically the second half of his career, that wasn't a thing to start when he came into the into the NBA, Paul Silis had him running off of floppy action and under the basket as an off ball player. Luca came right into the league and played heliocentric point forward. See the difference there. And so here's

the deal. I do think Luca is a better basketball player right now than Lebron in two thousand eight. If I picked those two players up and I dropped them into a playoff series, I think Luca as that top of the key point forward type of guy right now, I would have more success than Lebron from two thousand

eight right now. But that's not the rules. Lebron didn't have access to the knowledge of where the game was going back in two thousand eight, and so he was playing off the ball a lot more, and so he wasn't working on his jump shot as much. It was a completely different era. Here's what I do know, compared to today's players, Lucas, what the fourth or fifth best player in the league in two thousand eight? It was Lebron and Kobe and no one else was close. And

you can make the case for Lebron. I thought Kobe was still better then, but Lebron was the second best player in the league at worst unassailably in two thousand and eight. Why does that matter, Because as a basketball player, you should be held accountable to what was going on in your era, and you should be gauged based on how you performed against your competition in your era. One of the biggest things that bothers me from Lebron fans when we're talking Lebron verse MJ is Lebron fans will

say things like MJ played against plumbers. Go look at the nineties. The types of players he was playing against weren't as good as the guys Lebron is playing against now. And that's true. Lebron has to compete right now against Steph Curry and Kevin Durant and Jana Santana Coumbo and Nicola Yokich and Luca don Ship and Joel Embiide and Jayson Tatum and Kawhi Leonard at the top of the

league right now is insane. But differentiating yourself from that is different than differentiating yourself or than than being in the middle of the pack. So, for instance, MJ, what makes MJ's nineties dominance so impressive to me is that he was so much better than everybody in that era. It was m J huge gap everyone else in that era. He was the best. That's what he had to go against. That was who was pushing him motivationally on a day

to day basis, and he elevated to that height anyway. So, even though I think Luca right now in two thousand three is a better player than Lebron was in two thousand and eight, by some small amount, Lebron into Thou the eight deserves credit for being the better basketball player then Luca now because Lebron was the second best player in the NBA at worst, if not the best player in the NBA in two thousand eight against what was available in that era against the players that were in

that era, with the knowledge of the game that was in that era, in the play style that was in that era. If I took Lebron the same Lebron from two thousand three and I got him drafted at the same time Luca got drafted and whatever it was two thousand nineteen or whatever, he would immediately come into the league with the ball in his hands. Top of the key,

spread floor is shooting, don't make plays. He would have developed that stuff earlier, and by the time he reached his two thousand eight whatever that is, age age twenty three season, he'd be a better ball handler, he'd be a better shooter, he'd be a better half court surgeon.

Luca has the benefit of all of that. Now see the difference, So that that that's kind of the way I look at it when I'm evaluating basketball players, when we're taking a look, when it's all said and done and we look back and Janice is retired, I want to look at what Janice did in Janice's MBA and compare it to what Lebron did in Lebron's NBA, and compare it to what MJ did in MJ's m b A not compare what Janice did statistically and from a

skill aptitude standpoint to exactly what Lebron did statistically and from a skill aptitude standpoint in a different sport, because basketball in two thousand and eight doesn't look remotely similar to basketball today. Just go look at league average in three point attempts. I don't have the data in front of me, but I bet you that are taken three times as many threes now, So we I just I just want to set that as an expectation, especially as

we move forward with the show. We get into this offseason, gonna do more all time stuff. You should know. The way that I look at this is based on what you do in your era, with your set of circumstances. How dominant are you now, because Luca is not dominant now, he's very much one of the guys at the top of the league. If somebody in this pack separates themselves

kind of like Janice is starting to do. But we'll see over the next couple of years, that's when we're starting to enter into that conversation with the all time grades again because you're seeing that separation within your era. The way that Lebron separated in his era in the way that MJ did in his era. All right, that is all I have for today. As always, I sincerely

appreciate you guys support. We were gonna be doing UH instant reaction on uh AMP immediately after Lakers Nick's tomorrow Wednesday. It's either gonna be after Net Celtics or Warriors Wolves, depending on if the Warrior Starters play UH. If the Warrior Starters play, will push it back about a half hour um Thursday night. We'll see. I've got I'm heading out of town on Friday morning, so I've got a

bunch of stuff going on that particular evening. So depending on how things work, we might have a reaction to Nuggets Warriors or we might not. I'll keep you guys posted. Again, I appreciate you guys, and I'll see you tomorrow night. The volume