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to tonight here at the Volume. Happy Sunday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having a great weekend. We got a big piece of NBA news last night as the Mark Williams trade between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Charlotte Hornets fell through, and we also got a couple of interesting games last week night, as Jimmy Butler made his debut for the Warriors as they had some wild second half comeback where they're getting completely blown off the floor and the next thing you know, they're blowing
the bulls off the court. So we're going to break that game down. And then the New York Knicks got another chance to try to demonstrate to the Celtics that they were on their level and just got absolutely annihilated. So we're gonna be breaking down those two games, hitting some Mark Williams stuff off of the top, and then we'll get out of here so you guys can enjoy the Super Bowl. You guys know the joke before we get started. Subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel so
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So the Mark Williams trade, as Ben rescinded, the reporting is just that they found too much in the scans and the physical two justified believing him as a foundational center for the Lakers over the course of this next era. When this news came down last night, I had a
lot of mixed feelings about it. I had kind of sort of been worried about this because it's highly unusual for a trade like that to not be finalized in the timeline that it had been finalized, and I'd been texting with some people behind the scenes and being like, this is weird, right, And then next thing you know, the Mark Williams trade ends up getting rescinded. And on one hand, Mark Williams is a very flawed NBA player, and the playoffs have a remarkable ability to expose flaws.
That's why I talked a lot after the trade about how this team is probably going to go down with small ball lineups. Anyway, when the time comes even after the Mark Williams trade, but I kept landing back on the same simple logical progression that bummed me out, which is that Dalton Connects wasn't going to be in the playoff rotation for this team, and neither was Cam Reddish.
And even with Mark Williams's flaws, he still brings a ton of positives to the team as a screen and roll threat and as a rebounder, And even with his flaws, he almost certainly would have played at least fifteen minutes ish a game in the playoffs. So like, even if you try to find the silver linings, like you get your assets back, you have some more flexibility this summer,
which we'll talk about in a little bit. There's a simple, harsh reality here, which is this trade falling through is a loss of talent for this year's Los Angeles Lakers team. So the first question is where do they go from here? The good news is is that the Lakers are obviously the top destination for the best available center from now to the end of the season. They have a starting spot you can walk right into and you'll just get spoon fed dunks and layups by the Laker offense every
single game. That's the good news. The bad news is that the options aren't great. I want to read to you guys what I deemed to be all the potential options. So first of all, here buyout candidates. This is every tending unrestricted free agent, meaning they're about to be a free agent this summer who makes less than twelve point eight million dollars. So these are guys that could work out buyouts with their team and could sign with the Lakers as a first Apron team because they made less
than twelve point eight million on their last contract. Steven Adams probably not getting bought out by the Rockets, Al Horford definitely not. Kevon Looney definitely not. DeAndre Jordan probably
not available and not a good option. Tristan Thompson not available, Todge Gibson not a good option, Mason plumbly not going to be available, Alex Land already agreed to join a different team, Christian Wood already a Laker and I'm not even sure if he plays basketball anymore, and Luke Cornette not available, Thomas Bryant not available, Jackson Hayes already is your starting center, Charles Bass even you know there's Mamou out of San Antonio. They're not getting rid of him.
Jericho Sims already with the Bucks. Paul Reid maybe right like those are the buyout candidates's that's not that's not anything that's going to be a substantial playoff rotation piece for the Lakers. Right There are some okay options in the currently available centers groups. So these are guys who are currently free agents that can absolutely sign with the Lakers right now, and I do think this is the direction the Lakers will choose to go. There's a guy
like Daniel Tice, whose name has been bounced around. He's a bigger body, which is I guess an advantage for absorbing blows from Jokis, but he's not a vertical spacer. He's technically a stretch big, but he doesn't really make three point shots, so I'm not super high on that as an option. Mobamba is an interesting option. He's probably my favorite option at this point. He's got good length, He's a good above the break three point shooter, which
makes him a pick and pop threat. He's very thin, but at least he can block some shots, but he really isn't a great defender. I think He's probably my favorite option right now because he's like a thirteen and thirteen with three blocks per thirty six minutes kind of guy that's pretty decent production. So I think that's probably the best option. Damian Jones used to be a Laker, not a very good rebounder, which is my main concern, but he is a little bit bigger and stronger than Mobama,
which could be advantageous for a Jokis matchup. Then there's some other guys at Colin Castleton, jaliel Okuefer. I don't think those are real options. So again, I think Mo Bamba is probably your best bet, and that is probably gonna be the kind of guy that they end up getting. Again, I think it'll be either Bomba, Tye or Damian Jones, but I think it'll probably end up being Bomba. So let's just assume that the Lakers sign a guy like Bomba.
But as I'm moving forward and I'm talking through this, when you hear the name Bomba, it doesn't really matter whether it's Bomba or Tys or Damian Jones. It's still the same kind of issue that it presents. Where does that leave the Lakers for this season? They still have a remarkably good small ball group. In the last five games that the Lakers have played without Anthony Davis, they're
five and zero. They beat the Nixon Madison Square Garden, they beat the Clippers in Inglewood, they beat the Warriors and the Pacers at home, including beating the Pacers without Lebron, So they've looked good in that span. They're second in offense and fourth in defense. They've been guarding with that group. It's a big thing I've been trying to hit on this show, Like, the Lakers have been a really good defense since Jared Vanderbilt got healthy and since Doryan Finney
Smith joined the team. They are also twelve in rebounding percentage in that five game span, which, like for a small ball group, is actually really solid. I think the approach for the rest of this season needs to be lean as much as possible into perfecting small ball. Originally, I talked a lot about how Mark Williams would present
just a different look for the Lakers. They could have these lineups out there where it's Luca and Mark Williams and you know, any combination of three of their core seven players that are the core seven rotation players.
That are still there, and.
That group should be able to score the shit out of the ball. So like, at least for twenty minutes a night, you could have a unit with like a one to twenty two to one to twenty three offensive rating and a one to twenty defensive rating that stays positive, that eats up innings in the regular season. You probably don't lean on it much in the postseason, but that's there.
That's not there anymore.
That that group is not going to be as effective offensively because you're not going to have the screen in role threat, right So, like now, I think you almost have to lean into as much small ball as possible and just perfect that. Here's why I feel that way, because even if you do get a guy like Mobamba, it was probably the best of all the guys that we listed, he's just not one of your best players
for the Lakers after that deal. You always want to have your best players on the court together as much as possible to try to win basketball games. I know it's a really, you know, a brave thing to say, but who are the Lakers' best players right now? It's Luca, it's Lebron, it's Austin Ruey, Dorian Finney, Smith, Jared Vanderbilt, gave Vincent. That's that's your core seven. There's a huge
dropoff in reliability to the next group of players. Shake Milton Jackson, Hayes, Mobamba in this case, or whoever it is that the get as a center, even Dalton within the playoff context, I view as a huge drop off from those top seven guys. You don't want to play
Mobamba twenty plus minutes a game. Maybe in the regular season eat innings, but definitely not in the postseason, not at the of those top seven guys in their minutes, not unless you absolutely have to, even within the context of a Denver matchup, and by the way, they're gonna play Denver here in less than two weeks. I'd lean into finding ways to beat them with small ball. Those are your best basketball players. You don't want to put a center out there just for the sake of having
a center out there. If that center is not very good, Bomba or whoever you get, he'll be there in case you need him. And you definitely want to try some of those looks on Jokic in the regular season and just see how it looks. But I now look at this team as completely committed to small ball rather than as a group that will have multiple elite looks. Another thing to keep an eye on is Maxic Kliba's recovery
from this foot injury. If he could somehow come back and be healthy in time for the playoffs, he then becomes super valuable. But foot injuries are sketchy, and the eight week timeline stretches basically to the first couple of weeks before the playoffs, so like, I don't necessarily think
you can depend on Maxi being available. So the big question is can the Lakers win the title out a legit starting center, And the answer is, of course they can, But the reality is that it's never been done before. Let's just go back to recent NBA history. These are the starting centers in the last like roughly fifteen to twenty NBA champions Chris Hops Porzingis and Al Horford, Nicole Jokic, Draymond Green, Brook Lopez, Anthony Davis, Mark Gasol, Draymond Green,
Draymond Green, Kevin Love, and Tristan Thompson. With the Cavs, those are two starting quality centers. Draymond Green, Tim Duncan, Chris Bosh, Chris Bosh Tyson Chandler. That's probably the weakest guy in that list, and he was awesome as a rim protector and lob threat with that team. Pow Gasol Po Gasol again, Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan. You can go on and on and on, and it's Shaquille O'Neal in two thousand and six, Ben Wallace, like it just it just continues.
They're all good.
So like this will certainly be the greatest small ball group that's ever been assembled. And so if there was a group that would do it, it would be a group that's got Luca and Lebron and a bunch of rangey forwards. It would be a group like this. But I'm skeptical for a variety of reasons. Big ones yoks having to beat Jokich in a series when you literally don't have a player that can come remotely close to hanging with them physically is hard for me to envision,
even for a guy like Lebron. Like Lebron, I've seen Lebron do it in the he did an amazing job on Jokich in the fourth quarter of a gold medal game. It's one thing to do it for a five to ten minute spurt. It's an entirely different thing to have Lebron guard Jokic for two straight weeks, especially when what he does on offense would be a vital part of you actually winning that series if you were to manage it. But let's take that out of the equation. Let's just
say somehow the Nuggets get upset by someone else. So let's say the Lakers fight up and they pass the Nuggets in the standings, and they get to the three seed and they end up in the two to three matchup in the semi finals, but the Nuggets end up getting Okac, and it's a one to four matchup between Oklahoma's city in Denver and Chet and Isaiah Hardenstein and all those guys. They just do a number on the Nuggets and they somehow eliminate them, and so suddenly you
don't have the Jokic problem. Even within that context. Small ball is hard on the body. It requires so much flying around, so much fighting for contested rebounds. Lebron is
forty Daurrian Finney Smith is in his thirties. Luca has been banged up all year and is not the most mobile dud dude in the world like, it is a lot to ask for those guys to hold up from now February ninth, all the way through a late May potential conference finals series or a June final series against the Boston Celtics or Cleveland, whoever comes out of the East. My injury concerns for this group skyrocket now because of just how much you'll have to lean on small ball
and how hard small ball is on the body. Mark Williams would have given them a much better chance to eat up innings with conventional look, not just in the regular season, but even for fifteen to twenty minutes a night in the postseason. And that's just not an option anymore, not a viable option. So in short, like this isn't a death sentence for the Lakers, but it puts them on a path that has actually never been accomplished before, and that makes it entirely theoretical. Right, we don't have
anything to point to there. I had something to point to before this fell through, in terms of what the twenty twenty three nuggets were, which is like, what if we just get good enough on defense because we have good defenders mixed in with our limited defenders. The limited defenders buy in and do their job. We get enough stops and then we have this utterly unguardable offense which Denver had that was the pathway, and now it just feels that much thinner they can do it. But it's
a lot to ask. It's important context to go over the silver lining of the future for the Lakers after this. Rob was put in a tough spot at the deadline after the Luka Doncic deal went through. He had less than a week to solve the center problem at that point. Now we don't know the story with the hornets. One
of two things happened. Either Rob didn't properly vet this beforehand with the research and just digging around, or he did and everything looked fine, but then something completely new that just happened recently showed up on a scan and that this is just bad luck. If Rob didn't vet this properly, he deserves a ton of criticism for batching this. But we just don't know what happened yet, so I don't want to go down that road yet. We'll approach
that when we have more information. I would imagine within the next couple of days we will The silver lining here is Mark Williams was expensive. The Lakers got a bunch of assets back here. They now have a first round pick this summer to trade when they did it. They now have Dalton Connect this summer to trade when they didn't. Dalton Connect is worth more than a first round pick. It's probably or about the same as a first round pick in terms of it as a trade asset.
They now have access to two second round picks this summer and act to four pick swaps this summer, and they'll have a bunch of expiring salary trade. So to put it simply, if the Mark Williams deal goes through, you're basically locked in for the future. Now you have a good amount of flexibility this summer, and you won't be put into like a less than a week we got to figure this out right now kind of thing. You'll have more options. That bodes well. There's a lot
of upside this summer. But I keep coming back to the same thing. Lebron is forty and for the last couple of weeks has been playing like one of the top tier superstars in this league. It is really hard for me to imagine him doing this again next year. Maybe he will, but this could end up being your last great chance to win with Lebron and Luca both at a top five level.
And you just took a huge punch to the gut on that front.
It's not over, but your chance has just got a lot more slim I was definitely bummed out to see that news last night. All Right, let's talk about some games that actually took place yesterday, starting with the Celtics and the Knicks. Once again a clear demonstration that the Celtics are just an awful matchup for the Knicks because of their ability to attack Jalen Brunson and Karl Anthony Towns.
And it was all night long.
With that second possession of the game, Jason Tatum ball screen versus Karl Anthony Towns and just hits him with a nasty in.
And out dribble.
Cat buckles off to his right side and Tatum just goes in and absolutely mashes a slam over precious Achua and it's like they're just getting easy stuff whenever they want. Tatum hits who pull up threes early against Carl Anthony Towns and drop Jalen Brown, posting Jalen Brunson a lot, drawing multiple defenders and kicking out for threes from guys
like Al Horford. They built an early lead. Even in the start of the second quarter, they were just consistently doing the or started the third quarter, excuse me, they were just doing the exact same thing every single time. Down the floor. Get a screen to get Brunson onto Tatum, then attack Karl Anthony Town so that you're attacking Brunson and Kat in the same action. And they were just getting dunk and layup and dunk and wide open three.
Even when the Knicks cut the lead down to three with their little run that they had in the third quarter, they got going to transition, they made some shots, they cut it down to three. Tatum just promptly started spamming this action where they would have instead of the getting Brunson onto him first, they just started setting ram screens so that Cat would have to close out to the level. A ram screen is just a basic pick and roll concept.
Just imagine ball handler at the top of the key screeners down here, but you have a third player run down and scream Cat so that he is trailing as the screener goes up right, Kat's man is running up into a ball screen as he runs up into the ball.
Screen.
Kat needs to be there with him so he can meet Tatum at the level and contain the ball. But if you set a screen on Kat, all of a sudden, there's a delay and a gap that forms between the screener and where Cat is. So now when Tatum comes off, he's coming off with Cat sprinting at him at the same time, instead of him coming off.
With Kat already there right.
And so because of that gap and because Kat is closing out, Tatum started just coming off the screen hard and then snatching a crossover back to the left and just beating Kat off the dribble there and relentlessly getting downhill for dunks, drop off for Derek White in the dunker spot, kick out pass, kickout pass, there's Derek White White open three on the right wing. And then at that point Tatum gets in this crazy hot rhythm. Now he's hitting sidestep threes over McHale bridges. He just had
every part of his game going at that point. It was just a really nice example of methodical shot creation from Jason Tatum to get great shots instead of settling. And like I've talked about this all season a long with the Celtics, it really comes down to how deliberate
they are on offense. When they are deliberate on offense, to when they take the time to set the screen that gets the primary defender that you then want to bring into the ball screen with the weakest defender, so that you're not just getting an okay shot, but instead you're constantly getting Tatum screaming downhill or we're gonna Kat already sucks at guarding Tatum in space, Let's make it even harder for him by making him navigate a screen before he comes up to the level to try to
contain Jason Tatum. That sort of deliberate approach to advantage creation is what greases the wheels for the Celtics offense. Again, Tatum is an excellent fadeaway jump shot maker, or Tatum is a great you know, step back, pull up three point shot maker. Jalen Brown is a great post up, fade away jump shot maker. Like those guys can do that, and in the postseason there will be times when they have to lean on that shot making and it will
carry them through a signi stretches of games. But it is the deliberate shot creation that is the nuts and bolts, the meat and potatoes of what makes this Celtics offense so good, and especially against teams like the Knicks, when they have these clearly defined entry points, they can just spam that stuff and continue to get fantastic shots. And I thought Tatum was absolutely brilliant in this game. He
had forty the scoring, the advantage creation. He was just very clearly the best player on the floor by a wide margin. Last night. I thought Luke Cornett had a great game too, just his rim protection, that you're setting great screens for Tatum in these ball screens and like getting separation, rolling into space and clearing out of help and rim protection like he's Martin Gortat, like he just Marcine Gortat. I should say he was just he was
just excellent in this game. Luke Cornett was really really impressive win for the Celtics to continue to kind of oscillate back and forth between embarrassing performances and here we are where the Champs performances in this phase of the season.
On the Knicks front. I've been saying this all season, but I want to harp on this because there was a sequence there in that third quarter where They had run that ram screen to get Cat in space a bunch of times in a row, and I'm like the fourth or fifth time in a row they got to stop. And the way they got to stop was Kat saw the ram screen coming and fought through it with physicality and stayed attached to the screener so that when he came up to the level, Tatum couldn't turn the corner
fast with speed. Instead, Tatum came off a little passive and Mikhale Bridges was able to fight over the top of the screen. Then they Tatum had to pull the ball out and they had to run offense again from there, and I think if I remember correctly settled for a pull jump shot missed it. Point being like, yeah, like, there are going to be times Cat where you do
get screened good and you get beat. There are going to be times, Jalen Brunson where you're guarding Derek White and you die on a screen a little bit and Derek White hits a pull up three on the left wing. That's going to happen from time to time. But those aren't battles that take place during a game when you're getting hunted dozens of times over the course of a game. You can't lose that battle eighty eighty five percent of the time. It's got to be closer to like fifty
percent of the time. It's got to turn into a situation where we're attacking Brunson and Cat because that's our best chance. But we're not just cutting them up. The Celtics were cutting them up. That's a problem. There is a certain amount of fight and like, again, they can do it. They are capable of doing better. I have seen Kat navigate screens and contain the ball at the level. I've also seen Kat be a step slow, get hit by the screen, be slow up to the level, and then get crossed over in.
Space and get dunked on.
So like it's a simple matter of Like a lot of times when we're talking about this stuff, it's not about big picture roster weaknesses. Frankly, you're married to this Brunton Cat pairing. Now, this is the future of the Knicks. So you've got to find a way to win with this group. And to win with this group, you got
to get through Boston. And if you're gonna get through Boston, Brunson and Cat are gonna have to find a way to offer at least a little bit more resistance at the point of attack at the in those ball screens, at the level, there has to be more resistance there. Now, Again, there's there's context here, right, Like Drew Holliday was out, but so is so is og and Andobi oj And Andobiy is more important to the Knicks than Drew Holliday
is to the Celtics. There were kickout passes where the ball ends up Imprecious to chew his hands and he's just claying in threes off the side of the rim.
Like I there's obviously a personnel limitation there when ogn Andobi is out on the line out of the lineup, but that that might give you a little bit of an offensive boost, but it doesn't change the fact that you're gonna have to do a better job because yeah, you're right, like they were hiding Luke Cornett on Precious to Chua, But like Luke Cornett's probably not gonna play in that series. If you play them in the in the Eastern Conference, Semis, it's gonna be Horford, it's gonna
be Porzingis. So like the way I look at it, I thought it was a pretty discouraging performance from the Knicks, just simply in terms of the fact that you were going against lower level Celtics players.
Celtics looks that.
Are should be easier for them to attack, and they were just still having the same problems that they had in their previous season opening matchup against the Celtics.
Pretty discouraging on that front. All right, Let's move on to the Warriors.
Bulls looked like it was gonna be an ugly start for the Jimmy Butler era era.
The Bulls were red hot in this game.
They were up by twenty four in about like a few minutes into the third quarter. But Steph Curry has the first heater that he has of the season, his first twenty point quarter of the season. He has twenty four points by himself in the third quarter as the Warriors going a crazy around the Bulls, I think twenty five by themselves, So he almost single handedly outscored the Bulls.
By the way, before I even get into this, like I talked a lot about belief and like the invigoration I've seen in Lebron James as of late, I don't think it's a coincidence that Steph Curry had his first twenty plus point game in the first game that Jimmy.
Butler played in.
That will light a fire under a star player one he sees an opportunity. I do think that those things are connected. He was torching one on ones. You'd got vooch on a switch hit a three in his face. Ye had a really nice driving lay up against Patrick Williams. One of the most athletic, one of the most athletic plays that I saw Steph make all season was that driving lay up there towards the end of the third
quarter run against Patrick Williams. He was hitting shots flying off of screens like on the move for an He had a four point play coming off of a movement screen on the left side of the floor. He was hitting shots in the mid range and ball screens. He was sitting shots off of the chaos of offensive rebounds. By the way, shout out to Gi Santos and Kevon Looney who both just absolutely dominated the offensive glass in that in that third quarter stretch.
But here's the thing.
They go on this run and Steph checks out of the game right to start the fourth quarter, and they had come back. They had erase the twenty four point deficit. They'd actually taken a three point lead. But now it's a close game and Steph Curry is off the floor. But instead of a unit led by Pat Spencer and Brandon Pajemski like it was against the Lakers, the Warriors were able to put out a unit led by Jimmy Butler.
I also thought Steve Kerr made a really smart adjustment with that group to start the fourth quarter by leaving Draymond Green. It a lot of times Kerr will like pair Draymond and Steph together because of their fit, but he put Draymond in, and Draymond's just a really good post entry passer and just in general, like a passer above the key, and a lot of the best work that Jimmy Butler was doing in this game started off the ball. It wasn't like Jimmy was running a ton
of spread ball screens. He was operating a ton in this game as a screener, which is something that we knew would be the case coming into this partnership. But one of the things that stood out to me immediately is just how amazing Jimmy Butler is at ceiling and creating a passing and then high pointing the basketball in traffic and then once he gets it, going back up quickly for buckets and for free throws. I talk a lot about this concept of inside ceiling as a method
with which to beat switching defenses. A lot of times teams will switch screens with Steph Curry with the intention of making sure that when he comes off the screen there's someone there waiting for him. Now, a lot of times teams will chase in those cases as well, but that usually involves with the center, because you don't want to switch your center onto Steph, because Steph is going to do what he did to Vusovich and just hit
a jumper in his face, right. But a lot of times, like off ball screens that don't involve or any sort of screening action that doesn't involve the center with Steph, like a lot of teams are going to switch those actions. So as you can imagine, if Jimmy Butler walks up to Steph's man and he sets a screen, that guy is now going to Jimmy's defender is now going to go out onto Steph. So Jimmy, the guy he he's screening,
is now suddenly the guy that's going to be guarding Jimmy. Well, Jimmy's fantastic at and this is what's going to be so effective in the Warriors two man game. He'll screen the backside of that player, put his forearm into his back, and just create this passing angle over the top. Now, what ends up happening there is there's traffic on the backside, the helpers coming from behind.
Right.
This is that bracket that we always talked about in fronting the post. When you have a guy effectively posting up, which is what Jimmy's doing. When he's inside ceiling on a switch, there's usually a help on the backside, so you have to high point the basketball. There's a small window there that you're throwing the ball into, and Jimmy's just skying in and grabbing the ball. And then he's such a good second leaper, even at this phase in his career, that he just comes down with it and
goes right back up and he can finish. But then at the same time, it's like you're throwing the ball on the block when STEP's out of the game on the left side and it's a clear side, he just beats his man off the dribble to the baseline throws a beautiful kickout pass to the corner for a wide open three. He can create shots without having the without needing the support of Steph Curry, and that is the
key addition that changes the dynamic of this team. I thought I had written the numbers in my notes, but I accidentally forget to put him in there. But I believe he ran thirteen pick and rolls, ISOs and post ups last night, and I think he generated sixteen points. It's like close to what one point two points per possession. That's incredible shot creation. Again, small sample, but like especially in ISOs and post ups, he was just absolutely killing.
Was just I think he had eleven points on five ISOs and post ups last night, including passes like that. That's over two points per possession. That there's the playmaking piece, the ability to get to the foul line. Look at how often last night Jimmy Butler was able to slow the game down get to the foul line. I talked about the playmaking piece. Jimmy Butler had more seven assist games year for the Miami Heat than Andrew Wiggins has
had in his entire career. An entirely different level of playmaker and again, like I keep coming back to this idea of I keep coming back to this idea of belief. Steph has the craziest hot streak that he's had. You end up having this massive comeback on the road where the team just looks completely reinvigorated. This Warriors defense put up an eighty four defensive rating in the second half. That came on really strong in the second half, same
way they did in that Lakers game. Just a ton of ball pressure, a ton of physicality, starting to force misses. If you let guys get good looks, you're hoping they miss. If you make guys uncomfortable, they will miss. That's how you can regain a control of the game defensively. And that's why I was such a big believer in this movie. Look, I'm not trying to sit here and take a victory lap. I don't think the Warriors are suddenly a top tier contender.
I don't think the Warriors are suddenly gonna crawl all the way up to the fourth or fifth seed and just have this magical season. I mean, I'm not gonna
say it's not a potential outcome. But we haven't seen enough from last night to just say, Okay, the Warriors are here now, but there is somewhat of a proof of concept in the sense that, like, you were able to massively continue a run without Steph Curry because you had a star play, a bona fide star player on the floor, a guy that can score twenty five points, a guy that can make plays for his teammates, a guy that can rebound in traffic, a guy that can
make big defensive plays. That makes life easier for Steph, makes Steph believe in what this team can do more. That allows you to score the basketball more effectively. When you score the ball more effectively, your defense is set more often you have a top ten defense. If you want to weaponize that top ten defense, you've got to be able to consistently pay it off on the other end of the floor to start that momentum. You want to know why basketball games have momentum, because every part
of the game is attached. You start going on a run by hitting a couple of shots, You start setting your defense. You start getting more stops and forcing more turnovers. You start getting out in transition more. That makes offense even easier. When your offense is even easier, you score even more, which makes it even easier for you to set your defense. It's like a momentous snowball effect, and
it can reverse. You have a couple like it literally could have turned negatively in the fourth quarter, right, it could have been a Pods led group. You don't score the basketball, Chicago ends up turning a three point deficit into a five or six point lead. You check back into the game. Now the Bulls are fired up. Now they're defending in the half court. Now you're climbing uphill as you're trying to regain control of things. Like it
is a snowball effect. And like Jimmy Butler wasn't just a super talented piece, He's a super talented piece that fits a very specific.
Need on this roster.
And like again in just one example here, and we need to see a lot more before we can determine what this team is truly capable of. We saw an example of what that return looks like. I'm excited I was when I saw Jimmy get that dunk. I think it was in transition, might have been offensive rebound, but he got that like dunk, and he hung on the rim and was yelling and the group was.
All just stoked.
I was like, it looks like they're just invigorated again, and I'm excited to watch some Warriors basketball over the course of the rest of the season. All right, guys, it's all I have for today. Is always, as sincerely, appreciate you guys for supporting me and for supporting the show.
The super Bowl is tonight. I'm not sure if we're gonna go tomorrow.
We might do power rankings tomorrow, we might wait for the evening and just cover the Luca's debut. We might just wait till Tuesday. I'm not one hundred percent sure yet. I got to clear that with my staff, But keep an eye on my Twitter feed at Underscore, Jason LT and I will tweet out an announcement in the morning once we make up our mind. But again, I appreciate you guys enjoying the game tonight and we'll see you either tomorrow or Tuesday the volume. What's up?
Guys.
As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting OOPS tonight. It would actually be really helpful for us if you guys would take a second and leave a rating and a review. As always, I appreciate you guys.
Supporting us. But if you could take a minute to do that, I'd really appreciate it.