Hoops Tonight - Jimmy Butler makes Steph Curry & Golden State Warriors LEGIT NBA title contenders

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see dkang, dot co slash b ball. All right, welcome to Hootsindai. Here at the volume heavy Tuesday.

media feeds on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. We're releasing content throughout the year and then, last but not least, keep dropping mail bag questions in the YouTube comments that we keep get to them on Fridays throughout the remainder of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So on the Warriors front, I'm talking a lot with respect to Lebron about the concept of right, Like, playing championship level basketball is really hard and takes a pretty desperate commitment

to work. That's not even necessarily fun. It's fun in the context of winning, but playing championship basketball includes a lot of really difficult things to do on the court, a certain level of exertion that is difficult, And so if you don't actually think you're gonna get rewarded for it by actually believing there's an opportunity to accomplish something, it's going to be difficult even for the best players in the world to really get invested in that context.

About four games ago, early last week, it became abundantly clear that the Warriors were going to trade for somebody. I don't know if it was just the humiliation of missing out on Kevin Durant or what the deal was, but it became clear that they were going to get somebody.

In the four games since then, since that Intel came down Steph is averaging thirty five points, five rebounds, and five assists per game in the two games since Jiman Butler actually started playing and making life easier for Steph. He just logged back to back games with at least thirty points on at least fifty percent shooting for the first time since the Dallas and Oklahoma City wins. Way back in early November, I talked about how the thing

I was most excited about this deal. I do think that this Warriors team has a small window to maybe capitalize on an opportunity to win a championship here. But more than anything, it went from a team that was most likely not going to play any meaningful basketball, Like without a trade, that team is probably going to lose

in the play in just like last year. But with Jimmy Butler in the mix, they're almost certainly going to get out of that mess and get into a first round series, which means we're going to get another opportunity to watch Steph Curry play meaningful basketball. That's what I'm

excited about, Steph said after the game. We've got an opportunity to do something pretty special considering where we've been this season, and he's right, there are lineups that they can put together now that have Steph, that have Jimmy, that have Draymond, to have Jonathan Kaminga when he comes back, and it looks like he's probably gonna be coming back after the All Star Break, where they have enough talent now to actually present some problems to some of these teams.

And that's like when it comes to the playoffs, so much of it comes down to, like, what do we do that the other team sucks at? What do they do that we suck at? What can they capitalize on in terms of weaknesses and vice versa, And just bringing in a weapon like Jimmy Butler just puts them in a situation where they're gonna be a more precarious type

of matchup to deal with. And like, God, if we can get if the Warriors end up matching up with somebody like the two seed, if they end up getting a Memphis, that's a matchup that they're capable of winning. And how great would it be if we got to see another month of high level playoff basketball out of Steph Curry, even with an opportunity to potentially do more.

Like I said, it's not guaranteed there could be injuries, there could be things that go wrong, they could miss the playoffs, right, But by virtue of me making this deal, I find it far more likely than not that they're going to make it out of the play in tournament and get into a legitimate playoff series and give me Steph, Jimmy and Draymond in a playoff series, and I think that that's going to be a fascinating couple of weeks.

And if they win, we could get to see another extended playoff runt from one of the greatest players in the history of the game. And that's why I'm excited. It's about belief. Like Steph looks engaged, he doesn't say that after the game unless he believes that this team can do something. Jimmy Butler, I think has been an amazing fit right away. I wasn't worried about it. I know there were some Warriors fans that were. I just think Jimmy's too smart of a basketball player that brings

too many complimentary traits to what Steph Curry does. I want to talk a little bit about middle of the floor processing. This is something that I've talked a lot about on this show with respect to like mediocre playmakers in the sense that when you're in the middle of the floor, there's just you can only see, you know, maybe one fourth of what's happening around you. Uh, there's always like a lot of moving parts that can get confusing in the middle of the floor.

in the middle of the floor. Draymond's man steps up closer to Jimmy, and now there's a two on one that's for with Draymond underneath the basket, Buddy Healed on the wing with Damian Lillard kind of splitting the difference between the two. Jimmy just calmly turns in pivots and looks at Buddy Healed. When he turns and pivots and looks at Buddy Healed, there goes Dame running out to go to Buddy because he's biting on that headfake or

pass fake whatever. You just just Jimmy acknowledging Buddy's presence gets Dame to jump out. Then he just pivots again and looks and there's Draymond boot bounced past easy layup right under underneath the basket. He just looks so calm and comfortable operating there. Here's why that's important. Last night, you actually saw it in some zone. Looks got to get the ball in the middle of the zone, and

the Warriors consistently got it to Jimmy there. They scored eight points on four zone possessions in that game, and the Bucks just stopped stop trying it. You can't can't run his zone if they're getting two points per possession. So that's part of it. But the biggest part, the most meaningful part within the playoff context, is the Steph Jimmy two man game. When you run the Steph Jimmy two man game, it's going to create advantages in three

different ways. One is, like that sequence I just told you about, Jimmy sets a screen, both guys run with Steph. Now Jimmy's the role man, and it's a four on three where Draymond is absolutely an offensive threat in the dunker spot. Jimmy is a threat to score in the middle of the floor and to play make.

of his opportunity and he's crushing. But like you get into those four on threes, if they put two on the ball with Steph, that's where Jimmy can operate in the middle of the floor. The second thing that will happen with the Steph Jimmy two main game is inside position ceiling on switches. So imagine a guy's guarding Steph one on one faced up with him and Jimmy.

four on three. So like if you screen for Steph and your defender runs out onto Steph, but now you've got Steph's defender sealed on your top side and you get a catch over the top, it is an identical four on three because when you catch, all of a sudden, your defender's behind you so you can just go right to the rim, which is going to force somebody to

step up. There's your four on three. Now you have a three on two on the backside once that guy steps up to you after you catch on that inside seal. So you can get four on threes out of getting two onto Steph and just slipping out of it. You can get four on threes out of inside seals on switches. Now, what about when they well execute a switch, so they switch, but the guy who's guarding Steph just quickly dives around with some good swim move or something and gets behind Jimmy. Well,

who's the guard that's quick enough to guard Steph? Now he's gonna guard Jimmy in the post? Wait until Jonathan Kaminga's back out there, and again it looks like he's gonna be coming back sometime shortly after the All Star break, Jonathan Kamenka comes back. Where are the athletes at? Where are you putting your athletes? Well, if you put your best forward athlete on Jimmy, that means your second best forward athlete is now guarding Jonathan Kaminga. Who's gonna just

be a massive athletic mismatch. That you can attack if you have the best forward athlete on Jonathan Kminga. Now you got your third best perimeter defender overall guarding Jimmy Butler, Like, that's gonna put you in a bind in terms of matchups. That's gonna make that Steph Jimmy two man game even

harder to account for. But again, what unlocks all of it is anytime they put two on the ball, anytime they botch a switch or they get sealed top side on Jimmy, He's going to be able to operate out of the middle of the floor better than any other player on this roster could. Draymond could do all the playmaking out of that position, but he couldn't bring the

scoring out of that position. There are going to be times where Jimmy catches on the roll and everyone stays home and he's going to have to attack the rim and maybe finish in a little bit of traffic or hit something there in the middle of the floor. He can do that. He can do that at a really

high rate. But I think the early returns from this have been beautiful in terms of just demonstrating the simple fact that Jimmy is not only a very complimentary athlete to Steph, but he also represents a gaping hole in the roster that was there before the deal, which is just having a really high level dribble a guy who can dribble, shoot, and pass on the floor that just greases the wheels for everything that you try to do

on offense. Before we get done with the Warriors, I wanted to just share some lineup data from the early going here. So the starting group from last night that was Steph Curry, Jimmy Butler, Draymond Green with Buddy Held and Moses Moody, which again, Moses Moody continues to just be fantastic with that group. They've played thirteen minutes. They've struggled to guard so far as a smaller group, but they have a one to fifty seven offensive rating with

that group. That's really impressive. Then there's this lineup that they've been using with Jimmy Butler on the floor and Steph Curry off the floor. This is Jimmy Butler with Draymond, which I think has been interesting because Raymond has almost always been partnered with Steph, but now they're partnering him with Draymond just to kind of operate as like a guy who can feed the post and help that like make post entry passes and help that group defensively. Jimmy, Draymond,

Quentin Post, Buddy Heald, and Brandon Pajemski. That group has played nine minutes in the last two games. They have a one to seventy five offensive rating and a fifty nine defensive rating. Again, but that's one hundred and sixteen net rating. They are plus eighteen points in nine minutes. They have been blowing out the opponent in nine minutes

of action, just completely dominating. Then there's this group that they've been going to because Draymond's off the floor with Steph, so it's a group with Steph, but Jimmy and Draymond both off. It's Steph Curry with Kevon Looney, Gary Payton, Moses Moody and Brandon Pazemski. So three really scrappy wings, a bruising five, and Steph. They're plus three so far in seven minutes. The defense has struggled, but they've scored the ball super well because Steph is playing so incredibly well.

And again it's been so abundantly clear to me that Steph just has a pep in his step. You could tell his life is easier now. You could tell he believes now, and he's playing his best basketball since the beginning of the season. I think it's super exciting. And one last note on the Warriors. I just wanted to shout out Quinton Post. He took a three on the

right wing last night that put the Warriors up. I can't I think it put him up fourteen if I remember correctly, in the early fourth quarter, but it was like nineteen on the shot So he took a contested three on the right wing, like a hand in the face, not open, just like I'm hot. I know this thing is going in. I'm taking it. Literally, before the ball even went through the net, I'm watching the game live,

Quinton shoots it. I immediately looked down at the scoreboard and I'm like, how much time is on the shot clock? It was nineteen seconds. There were nineteen seconds on the shot clock, and Quinton Post took a contested three on the right wing and just swished it. He's nine for sixteen from three in the last three games. He's basically snatched that job from Tray Jackson Davis and brings an interesting dynamic to this team with his ability to legitimately

stretch the floor from the five spot. Really exciting stuff for the Warriors out of the early games with Jimmy Butler on the Milwaukee Bucks, and I'm gonna be talking a lot about a couple of games that they played recently. I did a full deep dive on their game with the Philadelphia Seventies the other night. I did like a forty clip film thread on my Twitter feeds. You can go to my twitter feed at underscore Jason LT and see a bunch of video examples of some of the

stuff I'm going to be talking about. We have three games since Kyle ku'sma trade, No yoh Honis, but I'm already completely sold on the fit. It's abundant. It's abundantly clear to me in the early returns that he is committed to playing winning basketball, which was the biggest question mark surrounding that trade. He's been in Washington, he's been playing in a bad team, some unserious basketball. How quickly will he be able to kind of like snap back into the player that he was at the end with

the Lakers, which was a really good role player. I think it's been obvious to me that he's been committed to playing winning basketball. He's grabbing rebounds at the highest rate for him since twenty twenty two. He's grabbing eight rebounds per thirty six minutes. He's really competing on defense. I thought he was great in the Philly game. He was winning battles with Embiid, like beating Embiid to contested rebound. Again. I have videos of a lot of this stuff on

my Twitter feed. You guys can see beating and beat to contested rebounds. He had a play where I got switched on to Himbiad and fronted the post and got low and was like backing them beat down, and when the pass came, he like battled and went up and got the pass and forced a turnover. He had this crazy recovery block on Tyrese Maxey where they're running stack, pick and roll, which again is where you have a guy backscreen for the role man as you're running a ball screen.

So Kuzm's man sets a great screen right on brook Lopez, and brook Lopez just dies on the screen, and so Tyrese Maxey's screaming downhill for a left handed layup. Kuzma gets a little caught off guard by it, but just drop steps and jumps and blocks Tyrese Maxey off the glass, just like a really rangy and athletic defensive play. And like it's just so clear to me that he is a much more dynamic athlete than Chris Middleton is at this point in their careers. I am particularly excited about

layering that with Jannis and Brook. Again, like everything's got to be looked at through the context of Yannis, because again, it hasn't been pretty. They're what one and two in the three games that Kuzma's played without without Yanis, the net ratings haven't looked good. Kuzma has had to do a little bit more offensively where he's been inefficient, there have been It hasn't exactly been like some sort of

amazing sort of display. But I'm trying to pick out the specifics that Kyle Kuzma has been bringing and how they fit within the context of Yannis. Like Brook's been looking a little rough on defense this year, if you flank him with two rangey forwards like Yannis and Kyle Kuzma, you make his life easier. That group is going to be a dominant defensive, rebounding group. That group is going to be able to protect the rim at an extremely high level.

he can hit some tough ones too. He had a contested catch and shoot three late in the clock on the left wing against Philly where it was like a twenty seven footer hand right in his face end of the clock. Like his like kind of audacious scoring ability will rescue possessions for the Bucks. It will lead to extra points. But the most important part is even though he's inefficient. We talked about this right after the trade,

watch the way he's guarded. I trimmed like a half dozen examples of this in that Twitter feed that I'm telling you guys about where Kyle Kuzma is just like showing the ball on the perimeter and dudes are flying at him and he's getting to the basket. Because of the way teams react to him, teams respect him as a high level scorer because they know he is a threat to be a high level scorer, even though he's not necessarily very efficient. He's had some decent on ball reps.

He like posted Tyres Maxi on a switch and hit a short little fade whil He's made some nice ball screen reads he's run. He's had six ball screens where he's passed out of it that have led to six points, some nice kickouts to three point shooters that have gone well. The biggest thing that's been exciting to me though, with him on offense is him as a screener. He's done a really nice job with Dame reading when to slip

out of screens. There's a very thing, there's a very specific thing you want to do when you're reading when to slip out of a screen. So, like, what's the purpose of a screen? The purpose of a screen is if I hit the guy that's guarding the ball handler and no one helps he, my ball handler is just gonna drive to the basket.

yourself available. Kusma's been doing a brilliant job of getting out of those screens as soon as he sees his man leave and quickly making himself available. He's had finishes in traffic with the left hand. He's had multiple high quality short roll reads. He had one where he like did a head fake to the guy on the wing and then hit the corner and he was wide open. Another one where the head fake didn't go and the guy kind of stayed and he still made the right

pass to the wing. He's going to be a very useful screening threat on this team. Again, I keep thinking about all of this in the context of Yannis being out there with those guys.

and Brooke together. You're not getting offensive rebounds and you're not getting to the rim when all those guys are together, And that's gonna be a real problem for teams, especially when they run into teams in the postseason that are questionable jump shooting teams. Like if Milwaukee were to run into an Orlando, for instance, in a playoff series, is Orlando gonna be able to make nearly enough jump shots to win that kind of series? I don't think so.

That's part of the physical element that you've added to this team by bringing in Kyle Kuzma a couple other quick ones. Gary, Trent and Dame have been playing really well together lately. They've been playing a lot more together and Gary's really gotten his three point shot going, and they even scoring the shit out of the ball. In the last eleven games, the Gary Tren Junior Dame duo has a one to twenty offensive rating. And then lastly,

I just wanted to shout out Bobby Portis. I was watching him in that Philly game and Nick Nurse, who always has kind of an aggressive defensive philosophy and it's been like that ever since the Toronto days, but he was basically double teaming Bobby Portis every single time he caught the ball in the post, and he scored over double teams twice by just driving away from the double team.

He made great passes out of the double team. Late in the game, Nurse had to bail on the double team and leave him one on one and he just little jabstep.

incredible dribble penetration. There's this thing that happens with Tyrese Maxi where everybody in the world knows he wants to drive to the basket, and there's still absolutely nothing you can.

can hang with. So for like Luka and Jokic. Its size. Right with Shay, it's ballham and shooting in his quick first step. Right with Tyree Masey, it's just that downhill speed, like no one can keep him in front. There is a play where he came sprinting into a catch off of a post split right. I think it was I think it was Embeedd who caught on the post and they ran just a typical split cut action.

knock down the shot. Like he's an elite movement shooter now. So you've got to stay attached as he's sprinting into these catches. Andre Jackson sprints into it, gets there. Tyree's just and rips back to the right, gets past Andre Jackson, Brook Lopez abandons, Joel Embian goes over to help, and Max he just gets right into the lane and brings out this big, sweeping scoop shot in the lane that goes in and I'm like, you quite literally cannot defend that any better than he did. And he still got

to the rim. And even though you contested him at the rim, He's still made a difficult shot over everybody. It's just a ridiculously talented player. But him getting that movement shooting piece to help him counter ball pressure, to make it so that he can operate off the ball while also having his dominant on ball ability as a pull up shooter and a is a guy who can get downhill to the rim. He's just been a rare bright spot and a sixers team that has looked lost

for large portions of this year. This is where I want to talk about me not understanding what the hell they're doing. I don't think Joel Ebid's been very good when he's played. They've been getting smashed when he's on the floor as of late. A couple big things that are standing out to me, like in space, like when he has to defend in ball screens up at the level, he just looks lost. He'll jump to the wrong side of the screen and a guy will just reject the

screen and go the other way. Sometimes he just gets tired and lazy and doesn't even go up to the level. He'll just like kind of recklessly pursue the basketball and just give up dribble penetration going right around him. He'll like botch rotations where he ends up in the wrong spot. He's been really, really bad on defense. He's been almost exclusively popping and pick and roll instead of like working

closer to the basket. And when he's popping and pick and roll, like teams like the Bucks will just rotate to him from off ball, and like he won't make just the simple passing read like, if they rotate to you off ball, just swing the damn ball to the next guy he's open. It'll start the defense. In rotation. He had to play against the Bucks where he picked him popped caught at the top of the key, there's

a wide open swing pass to the left. Instead he ripped right into all the tracks and just ran over a dude and picked up an offensive foul and here's the thing. I know, Embiid's better than this. Even though Embiid has always struggled to guard in space and to garden transition, he's better than this. Even though he can struggle in space and in transition, he's elite at the rim and he can be very impactful there. He's better

than this. Even on offense, he's better than this. And so this is where I'm wondering, like what the hell is he doing? Because I see a quote where it's like Joel Embiid believes or report that says Joel Embiid believes he's gonna need another surgery in this offseason. Just give him the surgery. What's the point of having him play on a knee that needs another surgery while he's playing bad basketball, while the team is getting thrashed while

he's on the floor. And realistically, there's not a version of this that comes together and leads to a championship this season. Get embad the surgery. I mean, I heard Darren or say, like, we still believe that there's a championship ceiling here. I don't necessarily disagree, but it's not gonna be with this version of him. Beat get whatever he needs to get to one hundred percent by October.

Then you go through a whole camp with him and with Paul and with Tyree's all healthy, another summer to bring in another piece or two, and then you go for it. But what are you gonna do, like where Embiid's knee down worse by having him play on a knee that needs to be surgically repaired so that you can crawl into the playoffs in a bad seed and end up having to play an elite team in every round and just and just probably end up losing and

doing more damage in the process. I just I just don't really see what the goal is here, even when I'm watching Paul George. Like we've been a lot of people have been giving Paul George shit for not producing this year, myself included, But like he's also mostly uninvolved on offense. He's competing on defense, he's playing lanes, he's doing his job, but like he's mostly uninvolved on offense. And it's like, why did you pay that kind of money two hundred million to Paul George if you weren't

gonna like actually make use of his talents. It just and again, some of it's on Paul to be clear, he needs to demand the basketball more, he needs to be more effective. But they also don't seem to be really trying to get him going either. I just wonder what the Sixers are trying to accomplish. It all seems to me like there's a lack of self awareness here in the sense that this season is lost. You're not

gonna get anything done this year. There's no point in doing something that's just gonna further risk your chances in seasons in the future. I will say I did I do like seeing Quentin Grimes there. Love Quentin Grimes. He came in and was just attacking Gary Trent, attacking Dame Lillard, just bringing that kind of like athleticism in a little bit of score. I think he's gonna be useful player for them in the long run. Again, I'm not gonna sit here and pretend like they don't have a chance

in the future. But their chance isn't gonna be this season, and they just need to read the tea leaves here and be more honest about their predicament. Shut him, beat down, get him the surgery he needs, have him. This is

the beauty of this kind of timeline, it's February. If you shut him bead now and you get him and beat down now, and you get him the surgery, maybe he's recovered by July and then he can have a full summer to getting great cardiophysical shape so that he comes into the season with really low body fat, really good cardio conditioning, and then when you start to ramp him up really heavily into regular season shape, he's just ready for it.

supporting me and supporting the show. I believe tonight I'm going on with Colin cow Hurt, so you'll get a little bit around the league kind of big picture stuff with that, and then we'll be back tomorrow with some more game breakdowns, talking about some other debuts for other players after the trade deadline. I will see you guys.