Hoops Tonight - LeBron & Russ show up to Summer League, Chet & Paolo impressions, Lillard cashes in

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I literally just walked in the door home after a weekend in Las Vegas, and what an incredible weekend it was. I had never been to NBA Summer League. I had always heard great things. I had always wanted to go, and the stars aligned for me to get to go this year, and I had super high expectations and they completely everything, completely lived up to those expectations. It was an amazing weekend. I'm super excited to share everything about

it with you guys. I'm gonna give you guys a little bit of my impressions of what the summer League experience is like for those of you guys who have never been, I want to talk about that whole thing two nights ago with Kyrie and Russ and Lebron are more specifically Russ and Lebron in the arena sitting on opposite sides some of the stuff I heard involving the Kyrie Irving trade. I'm gonna give you guys my breakdown of the top five players um in the draft that

I saw there yesterday. I literally sat ten rows up and watched game after game. Bear didn't leave my scene unless I absolutely had to. To watch Paolo and Chet and Jabari and Jade and Ivy and Keegan Murray all one after the other up close and personal and learned a ton. I'm excited to share my thoughts about that

with you guys. And then after that, I'm gonna give a quick, uh my quick thoughts on Dame and his recent press tour trying to proclaim himself as I don't know, some sort of morally superior NBA player to his peers around the league. And then a little bit about James Harden and him potentially taking a discount to stay with

the Philadelphia seventy sixers. But I want to start with the the the overall Summer League experience for just a minute, because it really is amazing for those of you guys who have never been, and I highly recommend you go check it out, even if you can just get out there for a day, if you're not into the Vegas thing. Like my big takeaways, I probably won't go for his long next time, just because Vegas is a lot to deal with. But basketball is almost secondary, which is weird.

Like I my favorite part of the trip was the basketball, but that's because I'm a basketball junkie. But like, it's weird the event the basketball is almost secondary. Everyone who is someone in the NBA in any capacity is there. Every member of the media that you can think of is making an appearance. Every player around the league of significance is making an appearance. And if they aren't, it's because of some scheduling conflict, or they're coming later in

the week, or they're coming next weekend. The the there's just a train of of former NBA players, current NBA players, young aspiring NBA players and media members. It's just it's just an unbelievable, overwhelming experience that is the NBA. And then you combine that with Vegas, which is just something else. Like, first of all, it's outrageously expensive. I probably spent a hundred dollars on water bottles while I was there, just trying to stay hydrated in in the Vegas heat and

just nothing. Nothing. It's kind of a remarkably set up city. I've been there several times in my life, obviously, but every time I go, I'm always blown away at just how wild that experiences in that city. A couple other quick takeaways. The basketball is super intense. It's as high urgency as you'll find anywhere outside of the NBA playoffs, because literally these guys are fighting and scratching and clawing

for their NBA dreams. The level of defense and physicality. Actually, you know, I complained about the refs a lot on Twitter for blowing the whistle too much. One thing I'll say in their defense is, like these guys who are fighting for their NBA careers, they're playing super physical defense and it does get difficult to uh to officiate. Um. But all in all, it's an amazing way to evaluate talent.

Like I said earlier, I got to sit up close and personal, just one after the other in watch all of the top picks in a super intense environment going against defenses that are completely locked in in a pressure environment. Like you guys, don't think Jabari Smith is feeling pressure, you know, being the third overall pick after having some hype, is potentially being a number one pick, and his weakness is being put on display for the world to see.

There's a lot of pressure there, and so in a lot of ways, it is a great way to learn a lot about basketball players, and being in person it's always the best way because you can watch their demeanor during commercial breaks, while they're in the huddle, the little

details that the camera doesn't always pick up. I you know, as long as I hum have the you know, as long as I have the capability, I'll try to make it out there each year, at least for a sequence like yesterday's games, because it's just a great way to learn about those draft picks and get a better impression of what they're good at, what they're bad at, what

their personalities are. Like. Um, we are going to go through the top five players in this draftic and I'm gonna give you guys all of my thoughts on what I saw from them this weekend. Couple of guys that really blew me away, people that I'm a little disappointed in. We'll get into all of that, but before we get into that, I wanted to get into this Russell Lebron fiasco because it was kind of crazy because I didn't

know he's coming. Nobody knows he's coming. It's not like he said, uh, you know, announcing these things, but you know, you're getting ready for the Lakers game. There's a Warrior's game before it, earlier in the night, so the arena is packed for the Warriors game. Jonathan Comeda and James Wise excuse me, Jonathan Comedica and Moses Moody both played in that game. Warriors fans tonight, James Wiseman is allegedly

going to play. I am going to watch that game in its entirety on tape and sift through the plays a little by little as best as I can through the film, and I'm gonna tomorrow do a video that kind of just focuses on the Warriors summer league guys. Since they're all NBA guys that are allegedly going to be hopefully going to be in their rotation next year. I'll go over those guys with uh, with all of you. Then. I'm not gonna get into them today though, because I

do want to get to James Wiseman. But after the Warriors game, you know, everyone's kind of, you know, going to the bathroom, getting food, getting a beer or whatever it is that they're doing and getting ready for the Lakers game. And you know, I kind of walked into the concourse. I got to see my guy Raj. You guys remember Rage from State of the Lakers. Was my first time getting to see him in person. I've met

him right before the Lakers game started. And we walk into the arena and there's kind of like this buzz and a buzz that wasn't there the rest of the day, and everyone's standing in the arena and I'm like, what's going on? And everyone's standing with their phones out looking down towards one of the baskets, and I looked down and there's Lebron James, you know, and like I I've

been in the arena with Lebron three times in my life. Um, you know, once in two thousand and sixteen, the year they won the title, and then once the year after that. And you know, I I've never seen and I know there are other players like this in the league, namely Steph or Kevin Durant. Like, I've never seen a person that has the fame aura that Lebron James has. And every time that I see him in person, that's always

the biggest thing that stands out to me. There's just everybody stops what they're doing and stairs It's it's just it's a wild thing. Um. But you know, so Lebron is sitting down and then I hear that Russ is there, but I can't find him. So I'm like looking around all over the place and I'm trying to use Twitter to to locate where Russ is. And then I noticed he's all the way on the opposite end of the court.

I was sitting just about like maybe ten rows up from where Lebron was on the um, on that side of the gym, and I'm like zooming in with my cellphone camera trying to get a look, and I see

him over there sitting by the Lakers bench. I'm like, Okay, that's interesting, but you know, you're never you're not gonna read too much into it, right, But then everyone starts coming by to say hi to Lebron, and it's just one after the other, like here comes Rich Paul, Like here comes Damon Jones, like here here comes you know, Rob Polinka, here comes Darvin Ham, here comes all of this line of other m b A players and personnel and people that are friends with Lebron, and it's just

kind of like a train of people coming to say hi. Except for us. There's none of that going on with Russ. Nobody, you know, No, none of the Lakers personnel that I could tell went up to us other than Rob Polinka was the one that I saw. And then Russ never came up to see Lebron. Now do I think Russe and Lebron aren't friends anymore? No, I don't think that's the issue here. But the point is it's awkward. It's awkward, and you know, everything is, especially with Lebron, who's so calculated.

You know, there's just kind of a weird vibe going on there. But one of the things that I that I that I that was so what that I thought was so bizarre about that whole situation was Russ. You know, it's kind of strange that he subjects himself to this, Like you know the rumors and you know what everyone's saying, and you know what's about to have been, Like the

vast majority of people. We're gonna get to this in a minute, think that Kyrie Irving is gonna be traded for you, and you're sitting by the Lakers bench, you know, not going to say hi to Lebron or whatever, which that's partially his fault too, right, But then you're also getting into the Lakers huddle and you're like coaching up Lakers players and like kind of acting like you're a

part of everything, and and you are. But it's like I almost felt bad for him, But at the same time, I'm like, but why did you do that to yourself? Like he kind of became the butt of the joke on Twitter that night, right, Like everyone's just kind of talking about Russ being at the game, not being with

Lebron and hanging out with the Lakers guys. And from a certain standpoint, I want to be like, dude, like you you don't have to do that to yourself, But like, this is the greatest example of why it's so important to move on from the Russ experience. Like, yes, Russ is toxic and he brings a lot of this on himself, but the Laker fan base is also extremely loud, and some elements of the Laker fan base can be toxic. And I mean, obviously a lot of Lakers media is

sick and tired of him, including myself. I covered the team last year and it was like one of the hardest players that I've ever had to cover, and like arguably the most offensive basketball player that I've ever watched. Like, I just he's offensive to me as a basketball fan, as I always tell you guys, And it's just a lot for him to be under that all the time.

And I'm ready for Russ to go somewhere else where he can be in a low stakes, low pressure situation with a fan base that will love him because they don't have the insane title aspirations that Laker fans always do, and there he can kind of fall into the background a little bit and be Russ because it's like, as much as I know he brings this on himself, I just it's sad. It's starting to get sad and and I'm just ready for this whole fiasco to be over.

So um, I don't want to jump to any extraordinarily extraordinary conclusions, because there was a lot of intel in two thousand nineteen in the summer that was pointing to Kauai going to the Lakers. It was like everything looked like kauaiet the Lakers, and then it just didn't happen. And people within the Lakers thought Kauai was going to be a Laker and then it just didn't happen. Right, But there's a similar feel from the Kyrie stuff that

everything appears to be kind of pointing that way. From what I heard from people who would know, including people that are involved with the team, they think he's coming. The Miles Turner stuff and Buddy Healds stuff is not it's not fake. It's kind of like a backup plan, but they think Kyrie's coming, right, So, like everything's kind of pointing in that direction. I still believe it's going

to happen. There was the night the night before Kyrie showed up, he was at I believe a w NBA event or something like that, and someone yelled at him, you know, when are you're gonna be a Laker, and he said soon soon or something like that. So Kyrie

seems to believe it's happening as well. The one thing I was hoping would happen that would just just just for the sake of the Twitter moment, is it would have been cool to see Lebron come into the arena last night too and just go sitting next to Kyrie just to get everybody, just to whip everybody up into frenzy. Um. But I mean, I I it's never over till it's over, and especially after what happened with that Kyrie stuff. You never know, excuse me, the Kauai stuff, you never know.

But everything is pointing towards uh, Kyrie being a Laker, and from what I understand, people with the Lakers also believe that's going to be the case. Um, And there was I believe it was Chris Haynes if I remember correctly, but someone straight up came out and reported yesterday that Lebron is not even going to sign his extension unless correct Kyrie's a Laker, So I would I would count on that happening in all likelihood. Um, Let's get to the basketball though, because you know I had a lot

of fun. I met a lot of people this weekend. I got to meet a couple of people on the Lakers coaching staff. I um, you know, I got to meet a ton of my friends in the industry. Like I said, I got to meet raj Um And that was all great and I loved that, and that is important and it's a big part of why I went.

But my favorite moment of the trip was yesterday when I got down there early and I showed up, uh enough to get a decent seat, ten rose up the middle of the court, and I just watched basketball and for three games, for six hours, longer than that because of the double ot game early on, I just I only got up if I absolutely had to. And at one point, at like halftime of a game, I got up to get some food, just so I wouldn't uh die of hunger. But I sat there and I just

soaked in the basketball. And the first game I got to see Keegan Murray versus Palapontaro. Then the second game, I got to see Jade and Ivy, and then in the third game, I got to see Chad Holmgren versus Jabari Smith Jr. And I just keyed in on them and tried to learn as much as I can, and it was by far. I actually texted my wife in that while I was sitting there because I was having like a little moment. I'm like, this is cool. The summer league stuff is great, all the the the extracurriculars,

but this is my favorite part. This will always be my favorite part. I love the basketball the most and it was so cool to get to to just sit there and and evaluate basketball players for a couple of hours. And in some alternate universe, I would have loved to have been a scout just to see what that is like to do that for a living. But anyway, so let's start with Palo because I want to work through the top five and I just want to tell you guys my thoughts from what I learned. So I came

into Summer League already high on Palo. You guys knew that. You watched my pre draft special. You guys watched my post draft special. I thought he was a clear cut number one. I'm even higher on him now than I was then. His combination of size, he's so like first night on Thursday Night, it was Palo versus Jabari. He is so much bigger than Jabari. It's not even funny, and an entirely different level of presence in terms of

his physical presence. His combination of size and body control, how nimble he is gives him so much capability to get to his spots. We're gonna talk about this with Jabari Smith Jr. Here In a minute. But he can't dribble the basketball right now. Palo is not much better at dribbling the BASKETBA. He's a little bit but not much better better. But he has the ability with his body to protect the basketball and that kind of allows him to, even though he's a somewhat weak ball handler,

to get to his spots. You guys probably noticed in that game yesterday that he missed a lot of fade aways, and I understand that, But what I was looking at there was how he was able to get to his spots and comfortably get a fade away off. In general, he didn't shoot well yesterday. His shot has a long way to go. The big thing with him for his ultimate ceiling will be his ability to shoot the basketball. I don't think that's going to be a problem. Though

his form is more than good enough. I was impressed by his ability against great defensive players and um in super intense settings. Like I said, it's such a great way to evaluate because the players on the floor are fighting for their NBA lives and they take if they can lock up Paolo, that looks great for them and their attempts to get a job in this in this league, right, And Paulo was just comfortably getting wherever he needed to on the floor, and that was the most impressive part

of his game. He almost has like a little bit of a Lebron Janice type of thing, where like he I believe he shot fifteen free throws yesterday twenty overall through through the two games that I saw. He once he kind of gets buy you off the dribble and starts going downhill. He's so damn big that like everybody doesn't really have much of a choice but to foul him.

As long as he's strong with the basketball. They just start kind of wrapping him up, and it's like, yeah, they're ticky, like if some of them were ticky tack But it's like he's getting found as he's rolling downhill towards the lane. There were a lot of player where're like, oh, they're gonna blow the whistle. Here he's going downhill and everybody's grabbing him, and and that that camp again. I think I attribute it to the combination of size and

body control. Like the body controls is crucial for the back to the basket stuff. He's so good at getting you on his back side, feeling which shoulder you're on, and then spinning the other way. Generally speaking, when a player puts his back into you and start to back you down, you have to push back on him to hold your ground. I mean, some people can pull the chair,

but you have to try to hold your ground. When you hold your ground, chances are you're gonna be leaning on one of his shoulders and he'll feel where you're at and he'll spin off of that shoulder. He's got all of the he does kind of like that Lebron full court post up thing where he'll be working from the top of the key with the dribble. He'll push hard to the elbow you'll get you'll cut him off, and then he'll spin back to the middle. He got bothered a little bit by help there at that spot

on the floor. He had some turnovers that were sloppy there. But that stuff that will come in time as he gets better at seeing the floor. Overall, though, I was really really impressed by his ability to get two spots and to get quality shots, even though he wasn't overly efficient. That stuff will come in time. His passing ability was

the revelation of this tournament. So obviously, when you're a taller player, the advantage there is you can see over the defense, and his ability to catch the ball at the top of the key. Operated out of the top of the key almost exclusively, and when he was operating at the top of the key, he could see cutters and hit them consistently. When he does that spin move in the middle of the lane, he carries the ball high and he keeps his head up and he'll hit

guys cutting back door. He makes the extra pass, he keeps the ball moving. They were a handful of stretches, which is typical when you're in that environment when you're playing well, where he got a little shot happy, especially with the fade away, but for the most part, he kept the ball moving, he kept the offense flowing. He consistently made good reads, and if he can pass the ball that well, that's where he can potentially be an

even better player than Carmelo Anthony. Like I explained, Carmelo is kind of like the player that he reminds me of the most, as the big forward that can score from all three levels. Like that's if Paullo can get that, if Pallo can get the passing ability, and in his defense, which we're gonna talk about in a minute, even if he doesn't reach the ultimate offensive ceiling that Carmelo had, he can be a better player overall. With his defense.

He makes plays with his length, which is to be expected because he's a little bit big and a little bit heavy, doesn't have overlea a feat. He did get beat on closeouts a bunch. He does give up dribble penetration that's to be expected. But overall, with his overall impact as a shot blocker, and there was a play in the second half of that game where he was on the right block and there was a skip pass to the opposite wing and he closed out from underneath

the basket to block a three pointer. A lot of you guys probably remember the play in overtime where uh, I can't remember who it was for Sacramento, but someone drove to the basket and and had a wide open layup and Paulo made an extra effort play from out of the play to come over and block the shot from behind. He got called for foul, but they reviewed

it and they overturned it. He made a lot of plays defensively just with his length, and that's awesome because his instincts will get better, his foot speed will get better as he becomes an elite NBA athlete. In terms of taking care of his body, he will get better at that stuff. So to see him already making plays with his length is super impressive. And last but not least, his demeanor. And this is the kind of thing you only notice when you're there in person. This dude is

a This dude is a competitor. He's angry when he makes mistakes, but he doesn't sulk. He um lifts, lifts up his teammates, he makes the right play. He won the game making a pass when they went to sudden death, by the way, incredible game moment of moment of the entire Summer League. Uh there's a there. Uh Um. The Magic are up by six with like ten seconds left and the Kings go down and make a three forced to steal on the inbounds and Keegan Murray actually patiently

pump fakes and knocks down this three. The arena completely explodes. It was awesome. Then they go into overtime. It's this epic play where where Palo ends up blocking the dude at the end to to save the game, and then the half court shot almost goes in, and then it's sudden death overtime. But in sudden death overtime, the crowd is egging Polo on to take one of his fade aways to try to win the game. But he just made the right play. He saw Um, his big man

cutting underneath the basket and hit him. They made the lay up and the game was over. My friend Ruth Williams, who covers the Houston Rockets, was down in the square um and he asked um Um. He asked Palo about his fade away and he said it's something that he's been working on a lot, but that he doesn't want to fall in love with. Just says all the right things.

Super smart kid is already savvy with the media. I thought he was a clear number one, and I thought he I thought he had a super super impressive start to summer league. Um moving on, to Chet. So Chet had twelve blocks through three Summer League games, which is the most that you've seen in Summer League in five years. His blocks were impressive to me because of his uh, the second efforts that he was making in the out

of area plays. It's not like he's just the low man, you know, underneath the basket and guys are driving right into him and he's getting a block, or he's guarding a player and the players driving into him and he's you know, absorbing contact and blocking the shots. In a lot of these situations, he's completely out of the play either in transition or his two passes away, and he's making extra efforts to come over in block shots, which is what you have to do to get twelve blocks

in three Summer of the games. No one's stupid enough to just repeatedly drive right at Chet home grin and try to take try to take layups. That would be a suicide mission. Right. Chet was making these plays out of area, which I was super super impressed by. First of all, his handle was uh probably better than Paolo and uh Jabari. Maybe not quite Paalo, but he's at that level. He handles the ball really well in space

in transition. That was That was the most impressive part probably that I saw from Chet was just when he gets the rebound and he leads the break. He had a couple of really nice dishes in transition, including one for a layup at the start of the game, just confidently dribbling the ball off the floor with his head up keeping keeping himself aware of the options that he

had around him. He The one thing I did notice though, is that when the he handled the ball well in space, but when he was pressured he struggled, which is typical for tall guys. Think of it like this. A short player, the distance that the ball has to travel to get to the ground is significantly less. A tall player, the ball is is moving a lot more from higher off the ground, There's just more room for people to get

in there. That was where um uh, That was where Jabari Smith was most important in the first game on Thursday night. He definitely let Palo get way too comfortable giving him space. In this game, he was getting up into Chet every time he had an opportunity, and he actually forced a lot of turnovers taking the ball away from him. The best example I could think of to kind of explain this concept to you, guys, is like

what happened with Jalen Brown in the finals. When you're dribbling the ball in traffic and people are allowed to kind of hit at your arms. It's hard to dribble no matter how good you are ball handling, because it's not like you like if you if your brain is planning for the ball to be in one place and some dude hits your arm, you're you're just you're not gonna get the basketball. So where Palo has this figured out is he turns his back to you and he

protects the basketball with his body. That's what you have to do as a tall guy. So both Jabari Smith and Chet will have to learn, especially even as they get better as ball handlers, to use their body to protect the basketball because they're never gonna be able to just mix up in front of people because of how tall they are. His defensive presence is real. Like I mentioned earlier, there were a handful of plays where guys drove right at him, but most people aren't actually challenging

him if they can't avoid it. His motor is real, out of area plays, extra efforts. He is running up and down the floor and transition that he doesn't look like one of those classic big guys that hates basketball. He's a competitor. You can see it in his demeanor. He like a similar stuff to Paolo, like angry when he makes mistakes, cheers on his teammates, has all of that positive, infectious energy. I was definitely a fan. He didn't necessarily blow the roof off of that place with

his skill. Didn't shoot the ball well. A struggled, like I said, handling the ball around Jabari, but you can see you can see the tools there, especially on the defensive end. Um he had this screen and roll with Josh Josh Kiddy that was really effective yesterday. Now Josh Kiddy ended up looking like the star in this particular play and he don't get me wrong, Josh Kiddy was the best play are on the floor. But a lot of it has to do with the way teams guarded

the pick and roll. And it was exciting because you're gonna see this pick and roll a ton over the course of the next few years. Josh Giddy with chat Homegren. So usually you'll see you'll see when teams are guarding a pick and roll, they're usually prioritize one over the other they'll either bracket the ball handler, meaning like the big man will come over to the ball handler and a drop and the guard will chase over the top and they will kind of bracket and try to corral

the ball handler, or they'll prioritize the role man. The guy who's guarding the screener will stay with the rollman to take away the role, in which case the guard has to do a lot more work to get over

the screen. Well, because of Chet and his ability to basically be, you know, already a great elite vertical spacer in the NBA, the screen defenders were prioritizing Chet as the role man, and so as a result, Josh Giddy's man was getting caught on the screen and Josh Giddy kept getting right into the lane and getting fantastic looks in the short range to that right at the basket. That's gonna be really interesting to see because now a lot of this is gonna be on Josh Kiddy. He

has to stay a scoring threat. I was really impressed by Josh Kiddy, but like he's his shooting is not there right now. He's got an awful hitch. He doesn't dip his legs the way he's supposed to looks very rigid while he's shooting, So he's gonna have to work some stuff out on that front, because if he can get the defense two key in on him as the screen and roll guy, that's where Chet will have openings as the in pocket passes and in lab passes up

around the basket. One last note on Josh Giddy. Obviously his passing is amazing. You guys all know that the specific type of passing that he does that I think is super interesting are these baseball skip passes. And I think I tweeted about this yesterday, but it's such a great way to combat help defense because if you've got the ball on the left wing, and you know the defender guarding the guy in the week side corner has a foot in the paint or a foot by the block.

You know what makes it hard to do things on the strong side of the floor draw I having to the basket running screen and roll because that defenders in there. But if you throw a skip pass like usually, the guy has time to close out because it's such a large chunk of the floor that the ball has to cover. But Lebron made this famous over the years. But Josh

Kiddy has this as well. If you can lull the defense to sleep by keeping your attention focused on one side, but then hurl a quick baseball pass that's on a rope that hits the shooter in the pocket, that will make Not only will it generate an open look and he got three assists early in the game with those baseball passes, but it also causes that help defender to

think twice about coming that far over. And if you're always paranoid about a Lebron or a Josh Kiddy making that baseball skip pass, it pulls that defender an extra step closer to that week side corner, which opens everything up for you on the strong side to run your actions. Um, but I really impressed by Josh Kiddy. He did. He did a great job of like getting into the lane and initiating contact and using his size to euro over the top to make plays scoring and and dropping off

to chat. He had one, uh, he had one in the first half of that game where he did that eurostep and Chet got a dunk on it. But he definitely has to work out something with his shooting. And it's not just his jump shot, it's also his touch. He missed a lot of floaters and hook shots in that like five to ten foot range. Guys. That's what makes Luca so deadly is when he gets to that those spots on the floor as a big point guard,

he's so good at making those short range shots. Josh Kiddy has the potential to do some of that stuff. He just needs to work on that touch in that spot on the floor. Um uh. With Chet. One last note with him. The Kenny Lofton game which was in it was I believe it was in Utah. Everybody saw that Kenny, you know, chat Holmrea has this incredible first game and then Kenny Lofton just bullies him, and everyone goes like, Oh, this is what's gonna happen to him

when he gets into the league. He's just gonna get bullied. And I don't worry about that at all. And there's a couple of reasons why how many players in the league play like Kenny Lofton, Like maybe Julius randall right, maybe, And not to say that there are guys that play bullyball, but not like that. They don't. And there's tons of film from when I was studying Chet of guys attempting to bully him and him still blocking them because because

of his unique you know, combination of physical tools. So I wouldn't overreact to the Kenny Lofton thing. Kenny Lofton is a very unique player, and he's gonna make that Memphis roster. I don't know they'll be in the rotation because what I worry about with Kenny Lofton is his foot speed and his ability to cover on defense in a five out system, just because I don't think he's

fast enough. But Kenny Lofton is gonna bully people out of the post at the NBA level regardless of I mean, there's there's only gonna be a handful of guys that can actually check him physically, so that I wouldn't overreact to that. For for Chet, I Chet is an immediate impact player right now in the NBA as a stretch five. He has a ridiculously high ceiling of things break right. I was impressed with him even though he didn't play

exceptionally well. Um Jabari Smith Jr. So on offense right now, the only thing he can do is rise and fire. He's tall, he's long, and he's got a good shot, so he can just elevate over the top of most people. That's the only way you can get to a shot. Right now, though can't dribble at all and doesn't have that ability to protect the basketball that I was talking about where he turns his back to the defender. Now,

the rise and fire thing is a good foundation. It's a great place to start, especially with how well he can shoot the basketball, but it's just a foundation. He has so much more that he has to build around that. And the problem was is you could tell his inability to get to spots so that he could generate easy shots. That started to affect his confidence. So then even when he was rising and firing, he wasn't hitting. And I I can't remember what he finished with yesterday, but I

think he was. He was like three for sixteen from the field at one point, and he was he had missed some makeable shots. But that's what happens when you don't have a way to generate easy shots on a night like that, it starts to get in your head. Now you're rising up for those jumpers and you're like, it's just not my night, and it becomes even more likely that you'll miss, and it just it just starts

to it's like a compounding effect. So where I'd like to see him kind of improved there is to get a little bit more of a back to the basket game, work on fighting for position closer to the rim and get that fade away down over both shoulders so that he can get a little closer and start making stuff at about ten ft because that's a shot that he'll

be able to make a much higher percentage. So on a night when he's not shooting particularly well, he can fight closer to the rim, and that's where when he gets his ball handling worked out, it'll be even easier for him because that's where he can start to get two spots closer with finishing getting to the rim as uh you know, and finishing over the top of defenders with his length around the rim, or like I was talking about earlier turnaround jump shots that are closer to

the basket. He has to round that stuff out so that he doesn't get so down on himself when his shot isn't falling. Because he is absolutely a better shooter than he showed this weekend. His form is great, he's got good arc, everything looks good. Just didn't shoot well because he's not confident, because he's got some big holes in his game. Um. In the first game, the confidence really started to show in his demeanor, and you could

tell because he wasn't being overly aggressive. At least in the second game, you could tell he was carrying himself more confidently and that was showing in his shot selection. He did not go quietly into the night. He was firing, He was emptying the clip and doing everything he could to try to get him self going. The defensive stuff is real. He was really really bothering Chet by getting

up into his handle. There were several plays or Chet tried to bury him under the basket and he disrupted him and forced him to either miss layups or blocked shots, which is difficult to do against a player as tall as Chet. Everything with the defense is real, which Bari Smith. That should get you excited if you're a Rockets fan. But he's got a long long way to go. If we redrafted, I think I'd take him forth like that. That's my big takeaway from the weekend I did. I

think Ivy is just significantly better than him right now. Um, but you know it's not It's not a disaster. It's not like he's a bust. He just has a long way to go and it's going to be a process. But fortunately for Houston, you've got lots of time to figure that out. Um, Jada and Ivy. If we did a redraft, I'd take him second. I was absolutely blown away by him. Now you guys already knew I was high on him. I would have taken him forth over

Keegan Murray. I thought that was a disaster from the Kings, but watching it in person, it was even more of a disaster. I talked about this a little bit my pre draft video. But there's different kinds of athleticism. You know, if you watch a Jonathan cominga you think, oh my gosh, freak athlete because you just see the dude putting his head above the rim and jackhammer smashing everything that he gets a chance, right, But that just one type of athleticism.

There's foot speed coordination. You know Steph Curry for instance, with coordination, that's a form of athleticism. Just about everybody playing in the Summer League was a better athlete in terms of size, strength and speed than staph But that hand eye coordination, that that conditioning, those are all parts of athleticism. With Ja Nivey, it's starting and stopping, the ability to go from full speed to a stop to back to full speed, and the ability to change direction

while going full speed. And this is what reminds me so much of Dwyane Wade. We've had a couple of players that have been mentioned with Dwyane Wade in the past. Everybody mentions Donovan Mitchell. I don't really see that John Morant, He's not like Dwyane Wade. But there's a similar impact on officiating where people can't keep him in front and he's flying into the lane and he gets like knocked over and he falls all the time, and you just

are waiting for the whistle to blow. But neither of those players really really fit the actual physical profile and feel of a Dwyane Wade. Jade and Ivy is the first player I've seen in the last god knows how many years that moves the way that Dwyane Wade does. He got yesterday. He only played like six minutes before he checked out of the game with an ankle sprain, which he tweeted out this morning that he thinks is fine, but like he was just confidently working up the floor

and just dusting dudes off the dribble. But then comes the next step of the athleticism. Here comes the help. While going at full speed, he can just veer off to the right to get around people and then veer back towards the rin. There was a play that he drew a foul on on like the first drive of the game. I encourage you guys to go watch the film of it because it was ridiculous. First player believe it was the first play the game where he got to the free throw line, he missed the lay up.

The entire defense collapsed on him, and he just weaved through all of him, all of them, and went up and under damn near made an end one lay up every trip down on the floor. Nobody had a snowball's chance in hell at keeping him in front. It was truly remarkable to see He hit a three on the left wing as well. He drew a foul on at three at the top of the key, was getting to the rain, was dropping off passes in transition. Just an

unbelievably impressive performance from Jade and Ivy. I think I think he's going to be so incredibly good almost right away especially in NBA spacing. They got him a real vertical spacing threat and Jalen dur and that's gonna actually help loosen things up around the rim. I was just blown away a couple of nitpicky things. His shot is still a little too slow and set, you know, ver very it's not a hitch, but it's just very slow

and set. But at the same time, Dwyane Wade's shot was slow and set, but because he was so incredibly athletic and teams were so paranoid about his slashing ability, they played off of him, so it might not end up mattering. But that was the one. If I had to be really nitpicky, I would go. I would say that his shot needs to be a little quicker, a little more fluid um. But he was arguably the most impressive,

most impressive player I saw an actual play overall. I'm most impressed with Palo is a player in the sense that like he will project to be a better player in the long run because of his other physical tools with his size, But Jade and Ivy in terms of actual on court play, was the best player I saw this weekend, and and by a decent margin. It just it just looked out of place, like he didn't even belong there. Just incredibly impressive. Keegan Murray shot looks good.

It's a little flat, but it's accurate. Goes in. You'll need to add a little bit of arc there. Probably another guy kind of like Chet, where he's got a smooth handle when he has an advantage. But he really struggled with the upticking athleticism. Had a bunch of turnovers yesterday. I think he had a half dozen turnovers. But when he was like a really operating in space, his fluidity is it stands out, and that's to be expected he's

a little bit older. But when he was actually in isolation, meaning when defenders were up in his airspace, he really struggled. He got bullied on post ups, which was disappointing because when I was scouting him, I really liked his back to the basket game. I thought he was uniquely equipped with the back to the basket game that you don't

see often from players at his position. But they're they're they're like I saw him posting up and getting pushed off of his spots, which was disappointing by smaller players. The uptick and athleticism in that setting clearly bothered him a little bit, which was, you know, to be expected that that's not his strength. His athleticism is not his strength. He did make a massive shot to send that game to o T, which I thought was the moment of

the weekend, really really cool moment for him. But like I like Kegan Murray, I think he's gonna help the King's. I think he's gonna have a productive, long NBA career. I could totally see him being like an auto Porter junior type of player. But this was a catastrophic mistake for the Kings. Jade and Ivy was right there for him. I think Jade and Ivy might be the second best player in this draft. I thought he was the best

player this weekend that I saw. He was the guy that stood out the most in terms of his incredible ability, and he was right there and the Kings did it again. The King's willingly passed on the better player for whatever the hell reason it was. I have no idea how they keep landing on these decisions. But I mean, I feel bad for Kings fans because Keegan Murray's gonna be fine, but Jade and Ivy is gonna be a star and

you absolutely could have had that guy. A couple of really quick special shoutouts from some other players that I saw Aaron Wiggins for the Thunder, the six eight three and d wing Um. I don't know how they got this guy. He's under contract to for the next three seasons on team options and non guaranteed deal, so it's basically he's just under team control. And and like I'm sitting there thinking, I'm like, the Lakers can't get a guy who's over six six that can guard multiple positions

and shoot the three. And here, okay, see just has another one. And Aaron Wiggins. I was really really impressed with him. Yesterday, another guy for the Thunder, Jalen Williams, had uh ten points by the time that I left the game, but loud points, freaky athleticism, had a really nice up and under, had a really nice dunk driving baseline, and then had a cut out of the week's at Corner where he like went up and under and reversed it on the other side of the room. I tweeted

out the video of it. Really really impressive athleticism from him. Most of the biggest thing that stood out to him is you know stood out to me from about him was his ability to cut. Um. Everybody thinks of like spotting up as like shooting, but it's not the only

way to spot up. If you catch your defender in help and you cut, and you time it right and you have a head of steam, you can elevate over everybody because you have the momentum because you're cutting, And it's another way to punish people for helping off of you in a shooting position. And last, but not least,

Thai Tai Washington and the Rockets. I was really pressed with his ability to get separation again in this setting, with how intense everybody was playing, with how physical the defense was, It's just not easy to get to your spots. And so when you see a player that noticeably is getting separation from this level of athleticism, in this level of defensive focus, it's it's really really impressive. So I

was impressed by thy Ti Washington. A couple of quick things before we get out of here, Damian Lillard in this weird more morality play. So you guys all, you guys all saw the quotes, I'm sure, but he basically said that, um that he's hoping he can set an example to the future generations that you can be loyal to your team and play for the name on the

front of the jersey instead of the name on the back. Now, to be clear, I think it's cool that Dame's staying in Portland, and I do wish more players would stay. I talked about this with Colin after the finals, but I think it's a big part of the future health of the league. But make no mistake, here's what's actually happening here. This is one gigantic attempt to control the narrative, and Dame frames leaving as taking the easy way out, and in a literal sense, it is because basketball is

easier when you play with more talent. But it's also the easy way out to do what Dame is doing in the sense that he's taking all the pressure off of himself. If you stay in Portland and everybody in the league knows you don't have as much talent as the other top teams in the league. If you win, you're the hero who brought Portland to title. If you lose,

it's you were supposed to. And again, I can't speak for Dame, but I like to think that I'm pretty sure that's a factor here, and that's why I don't like the morality play. It's dope that you're staying. I'm happy for you, I'm happy for Portland's fans. It's great for the league, but it also makes sense for you

to stay because it relieves pressure. And at the end of the day, if you never win a title in Portland, no one will judge you because of the fact that you never really had that much talent there that and I know Dame is aware of that, and that's why he's releasing these quotes. He's not releasing these quotes to try to set a trend for what future stars will do. He's releasing these quotes to protect himself and protect the narrative of his time in Portland. And and I just again,

let's just call it what it is. It's great that you're staying, but we know we we know that this is a part of that story. And that's why you keep pumping these quotes out in the NBA Twitter. And the last but not least James harden Um until it's still working on a deal, but untel is he's gonna

take a discount. Hey, man, Like I I have been really critical of James Harden that someone who's distracted and who doesn't put the team first, if he takes a discount to help the Sixers round out this roster and put together a contender. Tip of the cap to James Harden that that that demonstrate demonstrates a willingness to commit and a willingness to try to to to achieve the ultimate goal just winning. So so kudos to James Harden. They're also there. There was some intel in the tweets.

I was saying that like the team is essentially pushing James Harden to take his conditioning more seriously. We're gonna find out if that's the case at the start of next season. Um. Alright, that's all I have for today, guys. A couple of quick shoutouts. Um Um, it was several of you came up and saw me in Vegas and and talked about how much you guys enjoyed the show. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate that. It was great to get to meet some of you guys.

Special shout out to Nigel who went at one of the days I went up to uh you and l V to the rec center to play some basketball. Um. And guy walks up, really friendly dude, and he goes like, hey, man, I was just listening to your show on the way to the gym. And that was such a cool moment for me because, you know, it was funny. He he wasn't on Twitter, It wasn't didn't see us there, just happened to find our show on YouTube and and has

been following. And you know what, him and I guarded each other, played a little bit of basketball, which was a cool moment, and I it was really great to meet you, Nigel. Was really it to meet all of you guys that I met there this weekend, And as always, I appreciate you guys supporting the show. That it's all I have for today. Remember tomorrow I will have something focused on the Warriors in Summer League. I will see you guys. Then the volume