Hoops Tonight - NBA Media Day Reaction: Warriors new look, Lakers SKY-HIGH vibes, Nuggets & Russ fit

a game. Go to DraftKings Sportsbook app and make your pick. The game I have in my eye on this week is Ravens Cowboys. I think both teams need that game badly. I'm a Cowboys fan. To very predictable start to the season for the Cowboys, but I'm really really excited for this weekend. Ready to do a touchdown dance of your own. New Draft Kings customers bet five dollars to get two hundred dollars in bonus bets. Instantly score big with Draft

Kings Sportsbook, the number one place to bet touchdowns. Down the DraftKings Sportsbook app and use code hoops. That's h oops, that's code hoops. For new customers to get two hundred dollars in bonus bets when you bet just five bucks only on DraftKings. The crown is yours. Gambling problem called one eight hundred gambler In New York call eight seven seven eight hope en why or text hope n why to four six seven three six nine. In Connecticut, help

is available for problem gambling. Call eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven or visit CCPG dot org. Please play responsibly on behalf of Boothill Casino and Resort in Kansas twenty one plus. Age and eligibility varies by jurisdiction. Void in Ontario. Bonus bets expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. For additional terms and responsible gaming resources, see DKNNG dot co slash ft ball. All right, welcome

to HOOPSADI. You're at the volume heavy Wednesday, everybody, Oh PA. If you guys are having a great week so far, we got a jam packed show for you today. NBA Media Day was Monday, and we've assembled quotes from eight different teams that we're going to bounce around the league.

Talk a little bit about some of the stuff we heard in the season opening press conferences, and then at the tail end of the show, we're continuing our season preview series power Ranking style with number seven the Minnesota Timberwolves, so deep dive on the Timberwolves, and then eight additional teams in Media Day quotes off the top. You guys know the drill. Before we get started, subscribe to Hoops Tonight YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos.

Follow me on Twitter at underscore JSNLT so you guys don't miss you announcements, don't forget about our podcast few wherever you get your podcast under Hoops Tonight, don't forget. It's also helpful if you leave a rating and a review on that front. And last but not least, keep dropping mailbag questions in the YouTube comments. We will be doing a mailbag on Friday that centers around the media day all of the quotes and stuff that we're floating

around from media Day. So if you have anything related to a specific quote that you saw that you thought was interesting, or maybe just some notes from the first few days of training camp, drop them into comments and we'll get to those on Friday. And then, last but not least, before we get started, I want to talk to you guys about game Time. We're heading into like the golden era of live sports because we've got the Major League Baseball playoffs that just started yesterday. The NBA

season starts with preseason games on Friday. The NFL is in full swing right now. College football is in full swing right now. Obviously, we still have concerts and comedy shows all around the country. This is where I want to talk to you guys about game Time an excellent ticket buying experience. I personally use them several times over the course of the past couple of years and routinely have gotten the best deal shopping on that specific app.

It's just in great experience. They've got all in pricings. You know exactly what you're paying for before you go to check out. You get a view of your seat within the apps, you know what you're getting for your money, and it's an easy process. Can check out in as few as two taps. Also, game Time has a new feature called game Time Picks, which will help you filter

out all of anything that's not an incredible deal. So at least when you're looking within any specific event, you're looking at the best opportunities to get seats for your money. You don't have to waste as much time searching through thousands and thousands of tickets. It is an excellent experience. I want you guys to check it out. Take the guess work out of buying tickets with game Time. Download

the game Time app. Created an account, use code Hoops for twenty dollars off your first purchase terms apply again, create an account, Redeem code Hoops. That's Hoops for twenty dollars off. Download Game Time today. What time is it? Game time? All right, let's talk some basketball. So eight different teams were hitting with media Day quotes. I wanted to start with the Golden State Warriors. So there's two different things I want to hit on. Both actually involved Draymond.

The first was Draymond and what Kyle Anderson said Draymond has been saying to him behind the scenes, which is that Kyle anders is a five now, meaning at the center position. So there was a little bit of a hoopla there from Warriors fans semming around the fact that they kind of view themselves as too small at this point and the idea of Kyle Anderson playing center not being a great idea right now. It remains to be seen how often Kyle and Anderson will actually play center.

I didn't interpret that as like, oh, Kyle Anderson is going to be playing the majority of his minutes at center. I think Trace Jackson Davis is going to play a lot of center. I think Kavon Looney is going to play a lot of center. Draymond Green obviously is going to play a lot of center. I would imagine all three of those guys will play a lot more center

than Kyle Anderson. I looked at it more as like the way that I've always viewed Golden State's offensive system is basically three guys who run action and two guys that are dribble handoff fulcrums are screening fulcrums from the perimeter. This is a kind of a concept within five out that we talk a lot about, right Like, if you imagine, let's say on the strong side of the floor in years past, you got let's say it's Kay Thompson. Actually,

let's just look forward to this year. So let's say it's Steph coming out of the corner, and you've got let's say, Andrew Wiggins screening down for him. As Steph comes off into a dribble hand off with Draymond right. What ends up happening is Draymond throws the dribble hand off,

then he kind of rolls into open space, right. But if Steph comes off that action and nothing's open, like he can't get a three, he's not getting downhill into the lane, or maybe he gets a little bit downhill but doesn't get too much in the way of dribble penetration. Draymond's rolling, he's not open. The next read there, Kyle Anderson.

In this case, the second big would be flashing to the high post so that he can catch a swing pass from Steph and then flow into a dribble handoff on the other side of the floor, right, and it's gonna work back and forth. And this is been of basically what the Warriors have done offensively for years, whether it's Draymond and Kevon Looni, whether it's Draymond and Andrew Boget, whether it's Draymon and JaVale McGee, whether it's Draymond even

with Andre Guidala out there sometimes back in the day. Right. So, like Golden State's system is kind of typically built around two non shooters who are more dribble handoff Folkrum's and then three guys that are typically more aggressive shooters that

are looking to score coming off of these actions. So the way I interpreted that is like, yeah, Kyle Anderson, guess what like you're slotting into when you're playing next to Draymond, What Kevin Looney did, what Trace Jackson Davis did, what Andrew Bogat did, which is functioning as a center on offense. That was more the way that I looked

at it. That said, I do think that Kyle Anderson will see some minutes at the five, and it's something that he's done periodically through his career and done a good job of why. He's a very vocal communicator on defense and just general, very smart defensive player, and so like if he's calling out coverages and dictating when to help or when to stay home, he's typically pretty good at that sort of thing. He's a good rebounder for his position. Kyle Anderson's just a good basketball player, and

so like, I didn't read too much into that. I think, like, trust me, guys like the Warriors are still going to be looking if they can see a decent option to upgrade somebody at the center position. I still think you're going to see a lot of Trace Jackson Davis. I still think you're gonna see a lot Kavon Loney. There's a rumor that Trace Jackson Davis has grown an inch

that came out of camp. Now I shouldn't say rumor was directly mentioned in interviews, but like you always got to take some of that stuff with the grain of salt, like the I lost a bunch of weight, or I gained a bunch of weight, or I got taller, like all that kind of stuff I'm always a little bit skeptical of. But like, I'm not necessarily worried about the center position as much for the Golden State Warriors as

I am. Just who's going to be the primary second, I should say, the secondary shot creator whenever STEP's not trying to create offense. That's really where I see issues on this particular team. But I'm not worried about Kylie Anderson in his fit, and he does function as a center in the offensive system that Golden State wants to run. The second thing was that heated interaction that Draymond had with that reporter, And basically I'm not gonna get too

far into it. Basically the reporter was kind of beating around the bush to confront Draymond on the idea of his availability, which has been not related to injury. It's been related to his behavior, right, And like last year it was an issue they Draymond missing as much time as he did hurt the basketball team, and so Draymond got kind of defensive and got a little snippy with the reporter. Some of this I think, like I think like athletes struggle to understand, like like that's his job,

you know, like that specifically is that reporter's job? Now, do some reporters go too far in the way that they try to manipulate questions or try to bait guys

into saying something, Yeah, you're right about that. But at the end of the day, like if like in the same way that my job is to break down games and give my opinions on the teams, for those beat reporters, in many cases, they're going into that like they're they're going into that press conference with the job of trying to get a quote, okay, and typically they're going to try to get quotes that are centered around the biggest stories of the team, and like it or not, One

of the stories surrounding the Golden State Warriors in the last year was Draymond's availability, in large part because of his inability to control his emotions when he's on the floor, and so, like my thing. In Draymond's response, he was like, I'm here. I've been here for thirteen years now, been here pretty much every night for thirteen years, and you're right. For the most part. Over the course of his career, he has been available, but in big spots he's been unavailable.

Right twenty sixteen makes himself unavailable for Game five of the NBA Finals. Obviously last year misses substantial chunks of time. And so my thing is, like, it's fair, Draymond, for reporters and for your teammates and for coaching people in the coaching staff to be like, hey, like, dude, are you going to be professional on a night in a night out basis this year so we don't have to worry about whether or not you're gonna be available to play.

I think it's a reasonable question. This isn't like I

can't remember what her name is. The female reporter who like questioned Dejona Carrington about like a celebration that she had with one of her teammates and like trying to insinuate that it was like mimicking her poking Caitlin Clark in the eye, which, in addition to just being wrong, was like a blatant false attempt to try to like bait Dejeona Carrington into saying something that was damaging that to me has like crossed the line, right, But like

questioning Draymond on his ability to be available for his team, I think is completely fair and quite frankly, he should have expected as he went into that press conference that that was something that was going to be asked of him. And you know what, it wouldn't hurt to just sit there and be like, yeah, you know what, I let my team down last year. This year, it's not going to happen. You guys can count on me. Boom. End

of story. There's a quote for you. It's a quote that everyone takes to the article and it makes you look like a self aware and dedicated teammate. So, like, I was a little disappointed in that, but at the end of the day, I do think Draymond gets it. Even if that even if that interaction with the reporter was a little nasty, I do think Draymond gets it, Like I think he knows that he can't do what he did last year, that this team isn't talented enough

to compete when he's not there. Moving on to the Philadelphia seventy six ers, a quote from Joel Embiide, I think me, Daryl will tell you this. As soon as we lost last year, I texted him. Embiid said, I was like, we got to do whatever it takes to make sure I'm in the postseason healthy. This year, there's no agenda, no All Star, there's no All MBA, there's none of that. There's whatever it takes to make sure that I get to that point and that I'm ready

to go. Embid also insinuated that he has lost somewhere between twenty five and thirty pounds. Now, as I mentioned earlier, the weight loss, the weight gain that I put on muscle, the I grew taller stuff. I'm always a little bit

skeptical of that. But let's just say for the sake of argument, that this is Embiid's approach, that he's improved his physical conditioning, and that his order of operations in terms of what he've used as important within this season is just simply get to the postseason healthy rather than pursuing regular season accolades. That's exactly what their approach should be. The team is built in a way that kind of

managed that right. Like Andre Drummond is one of the better backup center options that you have in the league. He's a guy that could certainly start thirty forty games at center if you needed him to. You've got tons of shock creation with Paul George and Tyrese Maxi. You

hit on some veteran minimum signings that I liked. That team is built to be able to withstand and be missing games and for them to float around five hundred, which is all you really need in the Eastern Conference to be a team that's above the play in And so if that's the approach and they combine that with himb being in better physical conditioning from the start, I think that makes it more likely that he is ready

to go when he gets to the postseason. And there's like everything's theoretical with Embiid, Like Embiid's always struggled in the postseason, but it's been a combination of like injuries and some of his shortcomings and his approach right relying on the jump shot, relying on foul drifting right, not having too much of a physical aggressive play towards the basket, right,

And it's not any one thing or the other. Like, I do believe that Embiide has consistently dealt with injuries and that that would certainly be a benefit to him if he could get to April and be ready to rock and roll. Right. But the flip side of that is, like, there are some legitimate shortcomings for him in the postseason, but step one is he's got to get their healthy, and that's something that we haven't seen in the last

couple of years. So I did think that that was an encouraging sign of Philly's approach coming into the season, even if it was the obvious direction that they needed to go. On the Lakers front, there was kind of a weird a bunch of interesting stuff. I wanted to talk a little bit about D'Angel Russell off the top, and then we'll talk a little bit more about some

of the other quotes that we saw. So quote from dlo I think for me, honestly, I think I really wanted to apologize in the sense of showing a lack of professionalism at times, showing a lack of team first perception at times. So for me, I think just kind of keeping that maturity in that professionalism throughout the year, no matter the ups and downs. I guess I appreciate that Delo wants to be better, But like I didn't think a lack of professionalism was an issue for dl

last year. Like I thought, you know, I said before the season last year, and I was wrong. But I said before the season last year, I thought the safest bet in the NBA was that Delo would get traded. I just like I still feel like a Delo trade is coming down the pipeline simply because he's not a part of the big picture for the Lakers. He's a large expiring salary, but most importantly him and us and

or redundant. It's a matter of like you need to pair Austin with somebody that actually compliments his skill set more than he actually does. It's a lot of people talk about the you know I have I have comments still to this day from people are like, why you sit down on Delo? Why so down on Dela? I my opinion of de Lo has skyrocketed since he joined the Lakers. I do. I think that he has major shortcomings that consistently show up in the postseason. Yeah, but

the dude is a good leader. He is. He absolutely handled it with professionalism last year. As I said, I said it was a safe bet that he got traded all year long, he was in trade rumors, and he kind of just handled that like a champ and just handled it like a professional. So like I didn't see that as being an issue. And then as far as Dela as a player, I still think he's a very very good regular season player, a very useful regular season player. Spaces the floor, can run action, can kind of be

an offensive hub for stretches if you want. In general, just a very very good off ball player with really with a knack for like screening and cutting and slipping and all those little different read and react things that make a good basketball player. My opinion of Dlo as skyrocket, And as far as the trade thing goes, I don't even necessarily think Dlo needs to be traded this year.

I just think his spot or Rui's spot needs a massive upgrade, Like if one of those two becomes a supreme athlete who can play on both ends of the floor. That makes the Lakers demonstrably better. So if it's like Austin Dilo and then a massive upgrade at the three and then Lebron and Ad, I think that can work. If it's Austin Ruey, Lebron and Ad and then a massive upgrade of Delo spot, I think that could work.

But like all of my talk about trading Dlo, has nothing to do with who Dilo is as a player. It has everything to do with just finding more roster balance within the Lakers. I am a huge fan of d Lo. I'm excited to watch him this year. He's a big part of why I'm optimistic about the Lakers to start this season. I think the Lakers are going to be a good team right away this year. In A big part of that is the continuity and the offensive firepower, of which a big chunk is D'Angelo Russ.

Do I have issues with them as a potential team that could win four playoff rounds? Yeah, And one of the pathways to fix that is via d Loo. But I don't think he needs to apologize. I don't think he needs to do anything different. If he came out and had the exact same season he had last year.

I would be pleased. Obviously, it would help for him to be a little bit better on the defensive end, a little bit more attentive, fewer mistakes, and I think he will have a better defensive season on the strength of some of the structure that JJ Reddick is putting in. But like I thought, dlo is a little too hard on himself with the way that he approached that specific concept. A couple other just notes from Laker media Day, there's a lot of positivity coming around, just the vibes. Yovann Bouja.

You guys know, he comes on the show quite a bit. We're actually looking at potentially having him back on here in the next couple of weeks. But Yovan is an example, said that he's been covering the team for five years and that it was the best like kind of vibes and positivity that he had seen in his time covering the team. That's encouraging, right, talk about structure, a lot of talk about systems being put in, a lot of talks about productivity and their practice approach, a lot of

talk about emphasizing shooting more threes. A lot of really encouraging stuff out of Lakers camp. I'm really really excited to watch that team start playing some games. The Celtics. Jason Tatum had an interesting quote. He said, I just always feel like, overall, I can still get better. You haven't seen the best version of Jason Tatum, and you shouldn't, right, I'm only twenty six. I should continue to keep getting better.

I one hundred percent agree with him. I generally am of the opinion that a basketball player hits their peak

between age thirty and thirty two. I think that's the sweet spot, where like their physical gifts are still like ninety ninety five five percent of what they were when they were young, but they have a decade of experience playing professional basketball and now just their overall understanding of how to read and react at the NBA level, little details about how to win basketball games, all of the ups and downs of losing to a team that's a

bad matchup, or experiencing the highs and the lows. The I talk about that scar tissue of losing, Like Tatum's just seen so much already, all the big games that he's been in, and I think Tatum will hit his ceiling a little earlier just because he's been playing in really big games for so long, So for Tatum, it's probably more like twenty eight to thirty. But I do think there's a better version of Jason Tatum in there. There's a Jason Tatum in there that takes fewer bad shots.

I think Jason Tatum has clearly made a commitment to becoming a good pull up shooter. He is not a good pull up shooter. But eventually, just by process of repetition, there's a good chance that by the time he's twenty eight to thirty that eventually he'll come around and at least become a little bit better. Will he ever become the type of pull up shooter that some of his small forward piers around the leagues are around the league are? I don't know, Probably not, but like he certainly will

be able to come. I think there's still a considerable amount of improvement that he can show there, just by virtue of the fact that he's working so hard at it. Like you know, he's working hard at he's taken so many every single game, the repetition will eventually lead to improvement, and then just again, like the by age twenty eight age thirty, he's going to have a decade of NBA experience and just he's gonna have been in so many wars. Hell,

he's already been in so many wars. I do think Jason Tatum will be a better basketball player in the next you know, three four years. Will he ever be the best player in the league. I don't think that is really in the potential outcome for him. I think the players at the top are just they have like just these true super like superpowers that kind of reach

a level that that Tatum can't reach. But I do think that Jason Tatum will continue to improve over the next several years, and that is scary for a Boston Celtics team that I believe has by far the most talent in the NBA. Denver Nuggets a lot of interesting stuff surrounding Russell Westbrook. Mike Malone had some quotes. He said, russ was in the gym yesterday and there was just

a different energy. I can't explain it. His voice, his leadership, his competitive spirit are all things that are not only going to help this team, but they're really going to help individual players achieve their potential and push them to be the best that they can be. I love that he's here. I love guys that bring it every single night, and that's what he's done every single game he's ever played.

Jokic said, I know who he is a little bit outside of the court, great teammate, vocal leadership, the guy you want to listen to, the leader you want to follow in the gym. So one additional I have two additional Westbrook kind of topics that I want to get to, but before we move forward, I want to just hit

touch on these really quick. Is the energy piece is always the thing that people are initially drawn to with Russ, and anybody who's actually covered Russ very closely or rooted for him on a team that he was actually playing for, you know that like Russ does every single night have moments where he gets very emotionally worked up and brings a lot of energy. And so that consistency can lead to a reputation of being a guy who plays hard

every single game that he's played in. Right, Like Mike Malone said, but the issue with Russ isn't about whether or not he can get to that level every night. It's whether or not he can get to that level

every possession. Russ has a tendency to float on defense off the ball, he'll kind of drift into the paint to hunt defensive rebounds, consistently loses a track of shooters, consistently falls asleep within the game plan discipline, and it can be damaging because there are always like there will be dozens and dozens and dozens and dozens of highlights this year, I should say low lights of Russell Westbrook where like he's standing out of the defensive stands, not

paying attention and a dude just swoops right behind him and gets an offensive rebound or backcuts him for a or like he's guarding the ball and he just isn't paying attention to the guy just drives right around him, or like just in general, like a lack of attention to detail. There's we're gonna talk about Russ's defense in a minute. Russ is still when he's trying, not just a good point of attack defender, like a devastatingly good point of attack defender. And that's the real upside here.

We're gonna get to that in a minute. But in terms of like this idea of like I'm just trying to warn Denver fans, like if you're under the impression that Russ is going to play hard every single possession and avoid mistakes. That is not who he is. It just never has been. He is a guy that brings emotion every night, that comes in waves, but he has actually really poor possession to possession focus and it will drive you crazy. I'm just saying that from experience. Talk

to Clippers fans will say the same thing. Talk to Rockets fans will say the same thing. Talk to thunder fans will say the same thing. Talk to Wizards fans, they'll tell you the same thing. It's a consistent thing, and and he's been in the league for so long now. I just don't see it as something that he's going to dramatically change at this point in his career. A specific quote from Westbrook talking about previous teams. To be honest, it was unique. They just didn't put me in position

to make it unique. I was in a position where I was not playing my position. Being able to be here and Coach Malone allowing me to be able to use my speed, use my transition skill to be able to make other guys better, makes the game easy for everybody surrounding me. And that's what I love to do best. The idea that the Lakers and Clippers didn't give Russell Westbrook opportunities to be Russell Westbrook is completely asinine. Both teams, at extended stretches gave Russ the keys. Both teams also

asked Russ to do things off the ball. Those were a struggle. The on ball reps with Russ are a mixed bag. You'll have stretches where it looks great. You'll have games where it looks great, but in the large sample, there's just as many mistakes as there are productive plays, and it doesn't really net out to a quality offensive hub. Not at this point in his career. He's lost a little bit of a step. His rim finishing is atrocious,

and he can't shoot the basketball. He's a very gifted playmaker still at this point in his career, and you will have stretches where it looks really good. But the idea that the Lakers and Clippers didn't give Russ an opportunity is completely asinine. He will be asked to do the exact same stuff with Denver that he was asked to do with the Lakers and Clippers, and his success and efficiency in those situations I expect to look roughly

the same. So let's look at one other quote and let's talk a little bit about the upside with Russell Westbrook. Michael Lohan said, it's funny. I think when people talk about Russell Westbrook, no one really mentions defense. When we went back and watched as a staff as defense last year with the Clippers, end of games, he was on the opposing team's best player every night. So you have

a guy that you can close games with. You have a guy that you can close games with, Russell Westbrook, who knows the league, knows personnel, and has the respective officials, and has competitive I'm going to get in your mindset that I love. So again, as we talked about, it's all about making sure that Russ is on the right

type of matchup. Russ at this point in his career is still a devastatingly good on ball defender, especially against players that have athletic traits, because he's got really quick feet and he's got a low center of gravity and he's super strong, so he will beat you to spots and disrupt your base as well as anybody in the league.

He's excellent guarding forwards. He's excellent in his back pressure to Mike Malone's point when I watched Russ's playoff footage from both of the last two years with the Clippers, the on ball defense is legitimately terrifyingly good, Like that is legitimately real. But everything I said about him off the ball is also real. His attention to detail within

the defensive game plan, the lapses, they are damaging. And so have you asked me, like, what does it look like for Russell Westbrook within Denver for everything to work, work and to come together. It is about on the offensive end, when he's playing with the starters. I want to kind of like shelve that for a second, Okay, but it's about just within those bench units when he gets handed the keys, making fewer mistakes, having the good

plays outweigh the bad plays. And then on the defensive end of the floor, it's about unleashing him in an on ball roll because when he is on the ball, he makes fewer mistakes and he leverages his athletics gifts at a higher level. Russ like takes it personal, and so he gets very very focused on a possession by possession basis when he's on the ball. But if you put him on an off ball roll to track a shooter. That's where you're going to start to get some of

the negative plays that come with Russell Westbrook. Let's zoom in on Russ with the starters though, because this is the other thing, Like to Russ's point about like playing his style and being allowed to be unique, you can't do that with the starters. When it's Aaron Gordon and nikoliokicch and Michael Porter Jr. And Jamal Murray. He's not

going to be playing Russell Westbrook basketball. He's going to be sliding into the KCP role or the Christian Brown role, right and in that specific role, it is so much about off ball read and react, meaning like screening for a guy like Michael Porter Junior, or screening for a guy like Jamal Murray, reading where the defenders are going

and slipping to the basket. Over the course of the last three seasons with the Lakers and the Clippers, there was a lot of moments where where Russ when he was off the ball, teams were like both of those teams, the Lakers and the Clippers, were trying and begging Russ to function more as an off ball screener and cutter and he simply would not do it. He didn't do it with the Lakers, he didn't do it with the Clippers.

And so again, like this is my last kind of thing on the Russell Westbrook stuff, there is a version of this that works. There is a version of this where Russ with the core lineups, works hard as an off ball screener and cutter. Make sure that he only takes wide open corner threes instead of above the breakthrees, and doesn't hunt them but looks more to take really really high quality ones. You focus him on an on ball defensive role, and you get a positive outcome out

of Russell Westbrook. But his personal history tells us that he doesn't want to do that stuff. And so let's just put it this way. If it worked, and this is the one I'm just saying this in defense of the Lakers and Clippers. If it does work out with Russell Westbrook this season in Denver, it will be because Russell Westbrook changed who he was as a basketball player and became more focused on the things that Denver specifically

needed him to do. It is not because Denver finally unleashed Russ when the Lakers and the Clippers and the Rockets and all these other teams couldn't. That's not what it is. It like both of those teams. Like as much as you want to talk about Darvin Ham and some of his limitations as a coach, tylou is one

of the best coaches in the league. That team needed a point guard and it still had all of the same issues that you saw with the Lakers, and like, and I even thought it fit a little better with the Clippers within the Lakers because they needed his specific position group, but it still had all of those same specific issues. So again, like, maybe it works, but stop blaming everybody else for the issues that have perpetually plagued you over the course of the tail end of your career.

Russ needs to change in order for things to work in Denver. We have three more teams win him pretty quickly. The Milwaukee Bucks quote from Lillard. When I look back at last year, I was just trying to get through the year. My teammates, my coaches, they're going through the real They're going to get the real version of me.

I definitely feel more on the same page with him now than I did last year regarding the honest So that was one of the big stories from last year, Damian Lillard obviously going through a bunch of stuff in his personal life, substantial decreases in scoring volume and efficiency, him getting back to form and looking like the real me, as he mentions, that would be a big swing factor for the Bucks. So hopefully those aren't just words and that's the reality of what the Bucks get to get

out of Dame this year. Several quotes about the Bucks being overlooked. Doc said, well, we all pay attention to it. On the Bucks being overlooked in the East, Giannis said, I think we've always been overlooked. Look, here's the thing, guys, Like, if you win forty nine games in the in the Weak Eastern Conference, with dam and Giannis both playing seventy three games, like, it's going to affect the way teams project.

I should say people in the like fan bases, media, they're going to project you based on the basketball that they saw. And last year you had plenty of opportunity to make sure that people didn't overlook you and you were a mediocre team. So like again, like I understand why internally they may feel like they're better than their reputation.

I think they're probably a little better than their reputation, but they don't don't have the pedigree with this group, not the past, they don't have the pedigree with this group in recent play. To justify being lumped in with the top tier contenders in the NBA, Clippers, James Harden said aggressive, aggressive on his mentality entering this season. We tried last year to where I'm trying to figure out

guys the roles. It was kind of difficult when you get that high caliber of players or Hall of famers and basically the same position with everybody trying to figure out the roles. It was pretty difficult. But this year for me, I got a clear space on what I need to be doing on fitting in with Kawhi and Russ. Last year, I got a clear space on what I need to be doing. End quote that was relating to his fit with Kawhi and Russ last year. I'm excited about having an opportunity to be who I am again.

I'm going to tell you one thing. It is definitely going to involve a lot of me, not just because I can create a shot and get guys involved. There's always going to be tough. There was talk when I was in Houston when I was doing what I was doing. You can't win like that. You just seen a guy last season make it to the Finals playing the exact same way that I play. So there is a way. Your team has to be constructed very well, and you've got to have a little bit of luck and make

sure that you are healthy. So this is interesting because, like I actually see upside with this approach for the regular season. If you build the offense around James Harden and you have the type of perimeter defense personnel that the Clippers have and a rock solid starting center like i Vikazubats, I think that they're gonna win a lot

of basketball games. I've said this before, but like I think if they get just like kind of like baseline health out of James Harden and Kawhi, like even just like fifty games out of Kuhi and sixty five games out of James Harden, I think that they're going to stay out of the plane. I think that James Harden's just a really good kind of baseline offensive engine, and I think they're just a scrappy, athletic young team on the perimeter, and I think that that's going to drive

a lot for them. Right. However, there's a huge difference between James Harden and Luka Doncic, and like, there is a reason why that the Harden style hasn't worked at the highest level of the NBA playoffs, And there's a reason why people say you can't win like that in respect to James Harden in a different way than they say with Luka Doncic. And this is a take that I've had many times on this show, But there is

a huge difference between Luca and James Harden's attack. Luca has so much variety in his offensive attack and can score from so many different places on the floor, with so many different types of shots that he has more resilience to different types of defenders and defensive coverages. James Harden is a step back jumper, almost always going to his right, or a hard dribble drive to the left, or a crossover to the right, an occasional floater. Everything

else is at the rim. It is nowhere near the level of variety that Luca has, and that is why James Harden has the reputation that he has. So even though I was encouraged by that in the sense that that's the right way for the Clippers to go about this regular season in order to rack up wins and

just pray that Kawhi's healthy come April. I thought it was all also kind of an interesting little example of a lack of self awareness for James Harden in realizing what makes him different from a guy like Luka Dawcic. Last one the Spurs, Greg Popovich talking about there was kind of like a little bit of a difference between some of the ways the players were talking about their

expectations versus the coaching staff. So Popovich says, our expectations are the same as they've been from the first year that I coached. We want to be the best possible team that we can be. That's individually, as far as development goes, that's obviously been a big factor of the last couple of years. Then team wide learning how to play and what it takes to win. So Popovich is a little bit more reserved, a little bit more talk about development, a little bit talk about this being a process.

Devin Vessel said, playoffs, that's it, That's all I see, and Chris Paul said, I'm going to be away from my family, then I want it to be meaningful. I want to play and compete. This was the best opportunity to do that, and I feel like this would be the best fit. So I don't read too much into popovich comments because I think he's just being realistic. And I obviously think that Greg Popovic's approach is going to

be a try to win every single game. As far as the overall idea about like the Spurs and going for it at this phase, I never think there's a bad reason to try to win every game, Like, can you potentially stunt development to some degree when you don't give guys opportunities even though it might not be the best thing for the team. Yeah, there's some diminishing returns

that you can get there. However, the counter is you have to you have to account for the fact that like actually playing winning basketball, actually teaching young players winning concepts, and everything built around the idea of like a hatred of losing and losing attitudes and losing behaviors being unacceptable to me is a rock solid foundation to build an organization on, and so like, even if the Spurs internally don't think that they have championship potential, approaching it as

though that you're going to try to make a playoff run is the right way to go because it's about character building, and when you're in this kind of like fledgling state of a franchise, as you're getting ready to move into an era of contention with Victor wiman Yama, it's very important. It's very important for you to build that character in this particular phase. All right, Let's get

into our season preview from Minnesota Timberwolves. So they lost Kyle Anderson, Jordan McLaughlin, Monty Morris, and Karl Anthony Towns. They added Rob Dillingham, who's a scoring guard that the guy with the eighth overall pick, Joe Ingles, Dante DiVincenzo, and Julius Randall as the returns in the Karl Anthony

Towns trade. I also found out that Key Debates Job is coming over as well, a guy that I'm not sure will play that much, but he does play at the forward position, which is probably the area that they're least deep, so there's some value there, but I'm not sure how much of an NBA rotation player he is. Let's take a look at the Cat trade real quick. So, as I talked about a little bit on the Monday Show,

I understand why they did it. Julius Randall has a player option after this year for thirty one million dollars that he will most likely decline and try to work out some sort of long term deal a new deal. Right. Carl Anthony Towns has a sixty one million dollar player option in twenty twenty seven that he will almost certainly pick up. So Kat's contract is three additional years longer and almost twice as expensive. That is just really difficult

to deal with financially, right. Dante DiVincenzo at twelve million a year is just a more manageable salary as well to work with, So there's substantially more financial flexibility in the next few years after this deal. Let's look at the payroll real quick, even without Carl Anthony Towns. If Gobert picks up his player option, that's forty seven million dollars on the book books next year. If he doesn't

pick up the player option and you resign him. Judging by what Jared Allen got this summer and what Isaiah Hartenstein got the summer, Isaiah Hartenstein got almost thirty million. Jared Allen got more than thirty million. Rudy Gobert even I personally would rather have Jared Allen as my center than Rudy Gobert, but because he's just more functional as an offensive piece. But like Rudy Gobert in terms of reputation, is considered by many to be a better player than

both of those guys. So you're looking at like thirty five million to forty million a year in some sort of four year deal for Rudy Gobert after this season, So like that's expensive. Anthony Edwards makes forty six million dollars next year. Jaden McDaniels makes twenty five million dollars next year. Mike Conley is on the books for ten million dollars next year. Nas Reed is doing a new deal.

So it was a sacrifice. You sacrifice to run a chance to run it back with a Western Conference finals team and a young superstar that will improve year over year for long term flexibility. I personally don't like the Julius rand. We'll go into more detail about that later, but most star trades don't bring back a star, so to get real long term flexibility comparatively to your other situation,

also have the potential upside. Again, I don't like the fit, but there's potential upside because he's a star of Julius Randall and then depth with Dante DiVincenzo. If there was some sort of directive from ownership to shed money, get out of the second apron, build long term flexibility. If that was a directive from ownership, this is about as good as you can do because you've got a star back, you got a depth piece back, and you built in

that flexibility. So even if we don't necessarily like the fit of the star, if you were in the same position where you were asked to trade a star for financial flexibility, it's difficult to do much better than Tim Connolly did. Right. So now from that perspective, let's look at the basketball. So Julius Randall, the upside is what he can do on the ball. And I told you guys, I promised i'd get into more detail in the season previous. So let's talk a little bit about some of these

specifics with Julius Randall on the ball. The last time Julius Randall was healthy for a whole season was twenty twenty three. Played seventy seven games. He averaged twenty five points, ten rebounds, and four assists on fifty eight percent for shooting, which is obviously very good. He made the All Star team and he was third team All NBA. He was also an efficient, high volume shot creator over at point per possession on pick and rolls, ISOs and post ups

including passes. To give you an example of the difference in volume and efficiency, Karl Anthony Towns ran five hundred and twenty four pick and rolls, ISOs and post ups last year for five hundred and thirteen points including passes. That's just zero point nine to eight points per possession. Julius Randall in that twenty twenty three season, ran nine hundred and ninety six pick and rolls, ISOs and post ups including passes, got one thousand and thirty eight points,

which is one point zero four points per possession. So Julius in his last time healthy season basically did twice the volume of shot creation that Kat did last year and was considerably more efficient. So like Julius is just a much better on ball shot creator than Karl Anthony Towns is. He's a deadly face up player. On like face up jabstep jump shots, he got over a point per possession. He shot sixty four percent at the rim

he shot fifty six percent on floaters and hooks. He's got like a really efficient little left shoulder fade when he's posting up on that left block and he kind of gets into the middle of the floor, And that specific type of on ball shot creation beyond Ant is something that Minnesota didn't have last year, and it's a big part of why they struggled offensively. If you look at the numbers, when Ant was on the floor, the Timberwolves had a one to eighteen offensive rating. That's very good.

It's not elite, it's not like the best teams in the league, but it's very good. When Ant was off the floor, they had a one to eleven point four offensive rating that's very bad. So improved secondary shot creator. An improved secondary shot creator like Julius Randall, will one give you a better chance of scoring when Ant's off the floor, and will two, when Ant is off the ball, give you a better opportunity to create quality shots. So

I think Julius two and two man game like. He's not going to be the pick and pop player that Cat was, But when they face any sort of switching, Julius is a better matchup attacker in terms of using his size to bullie smaller defenders. I like that fit in terms of Julius as an on ball creator. The downside of this particular fit is when Ant has the ball. Last year, even with Kat in the lineup, the Wolves

struggled to space the floor for Ant. Jada McDaniel's converted spot up possessions at just zero point ninety nine points per possession. Teams were comfortable helping off of Jaden and just throwing a late close out at him. Rudy Gobert, as I've said so many times on the show, everyone talks about him on the defensive end of the floor and low lights of him getting scored on in isolation. That's not the issue with Rudy. I still think he's

an awesome defensive player. The issue with Rudy is he basically has to be completely open to finish around the basket anything that's in traffic. He's so bad at catching and finishing surrounded by bodies in the middle of the floor. That's the real reason Rudy deserves criticism. That's the real reason that France benched him with the Olympics. That's the real reason why at stretches it seems like, oh man like,

this doesn't work offensively with Rudy on the floor. It comes down to him being able to catch and finish in traffic, and so with Jaden Kat and Rudy it already was kind of janky. Now you're subbing in cat, subbing out cat for Julius Randall, and he's just not a good off ball player on the offensive end of the floor. His spot of efficiency has been way below

average basically every season of his career. He did peak in the twenty twenty three season at one point zero seven points per possession, which is slightly above average, but he dipped right back down to the thirty third percentile last year to zero point nine to three points per possession, and in all of the previous seasons he was well below a point per possession. So he's not a good point like spot up guy. He's basically a one point

per possession catch and shoot guy. He shoots about thirty eight percent when he's unguarded on jump shots, but he shoots poorly when he's guarded. He scores on a cut maybe once every two games. He's in the twenty fifth percentile for frequency, so he's never been a high volume cutter. He did some pick and popping with Brunson. He had a decent pick and pop season in twenty twenty three, but it wasn't as effective last year. So, like, there's some issues there with how you can make use of

Julius Randall off the ball. It's not going to be easy for Anthony Edwards. His development is a pull up shooter, which really came to the surface in the postseason last year. That's going to be huge for this team's potential and hopefully that translates forward into this season. But again, like that fits specifically, having Jaden, Julius, and Rudy all on the floor at the same time, that could be an absolute disaster for spacing, and so I'm a little bit

concerned about that. Health is also an issue for Julius. He's a rhythm player, so when he gets out of the lineup for a while, it takes some time to get back to form. In addition to missing a bunch of time this year, if you go back to the previous year, he missed some time right before the playoffs, and then when he came back, he just didn't look

like Julius Randall. He looked really bad. But then At the same time, I don't really view that as a factor in this trade because Karl Anthony Towns has a lot of the same health question marks that Julius Randall did. Dante DiVincenzo I think he's just a rock solid starting NBA guard and he may not even start on this particular team. He's a very good athlete at the guard position. He's six ' four, he's strong, he runs and jumps well. He's very good on ball defender. He's got a great motor.

He always plays hard. He gets good physical ball pressure on the ball handler, and then he turned into one of the best shooters in the league. He shot over forty nine to three point attempts per game last year. He was one of only three players in the entire NBA to attempt at least eight threes per game and to hit at least forty percent of them, him Steph Curry and CJ. McCollum. He converted spot up possessions at

one point two to three points per possession. Thirty seven players in the NBA logged at least thirty three hundred spot up possessions. Dante ranked fourth on that list. He's just a very, very good offensive off ball guard. He's an absolute gamer, plays both ends of the floor, plays hard leverages, athletic gifts. I think Wolves fans are going to love him. I think he's a better player than Nikhil Alexander Walker, for instance. Like I think that's a

legitimate upgrade. So in summary, looking at the trade, very rarely can you trade a star and get a star back while also getting a legit depth piece and get the financial flexibility, Like if you were under this directive, it's about as good as you can do. My concerns about this trade mostly center around fit. Again, kat is a much better offensive fit with Anthony Edwards off the ball, but there is upside to the Randall fit with his on ball creation. Right, add that starting two way caliber

guard in starting caliber two a guard in Dante DiVincenzo. Right, So like it's about as I would have preferred if the Timberwolves ran it back, because you got a really bad matchup in the conference finals. Anthony Edwards is ascending, You've got this beautiful front court to fight against the

against the Nicole Jokic problem. I would have preferred if they run it back, And I'm sure some Wolves fans feel the same, but I understand why they did it, and they did about as good a job of doing it as you could do under that type of directive. Let's talk about ants development, because this is a huge piece of the Wolves this year. The postseason leap last year was real. He entered into that like bona fide

top tier superstar territory. In the playoff run, he averaged twenty eight seven and seven on sixty percent Troy shooting, which is insane. Took his team in the Western Conference finals. Really special stuff right. What facilitated that rise his combination of jump shooting and playmaking. He took seven threes of games a game in the playoffs and made forty percent of them. He shot forty three percent on pull up jump shots, getting one point zero eight points per shot,

which is great. Did a really nice job though, in the playmaking front, driving and kicking to generate advantage opportunities for a season, averaging six and a half assists per game in a playoff run that's three rounds long. That's a legitimate playmaking leap from Anthony Edwards. Now, the question is how much of that was real? I believe most of it was, But the reality is they're going to need it to be real. Teams are going to consistently pack the paint on him and force him to hit

shots over the top of the defense. That's going to be an important counter for him. So that jump shot development, that being real goes a long way to confronting some of the spacing issues. Because this is a clunky fit. It's going to be a challenging season for Ant on the offensive end of the floor. How much is he up to that challenge because if he can overcome a lot of that, that's where you can get the upside of Julius Randall when he's on the ball. And I'm

not worried about Ant off the ball at all. He's just turned into too good of a shooter. At this point. I have one last little kind of like a point that I want to hit before we get into more of a big picture summary the backup forward spot. The Wolves bench got better with the addition of Dante DiVincenzo. You're actually really deep at bench guard, right, Like given Nakil Alexander Walker, you have Dante DiVincenzo, Rob Dillingham, he's top ten picks. You gotta find minutes for him there,

right you actually have five guards in the rotation. That's something that I think will be interesting to watch the rest of the season. You have an excellent backup center nas Reads, about as good as you can do in the backup center's position in the NBA. But with the loss of Kyle Anderson, you're now looking at Joe Ingles, Luca Garza, and Keida Bates job basically as your backup forwards, and none of those are great options. Right. So, like,

I think the initial setup is fine. I think having Jada McDaniels, Julius Randall, Rudy Gobert, nas Red, I think you're you got enough there to fill most of the front court minutes. It's more of a depth issue. If one of those four guys goes down with injury, that's where you could be looking at twenty plus minutes a night for guys like Joe Ingles, Luca Gar's key debates job. That's where it could get a little bit tricky. Right, So,

there's two ways to confront that. One is a balancing trade, Like, you have five guards that are all really good rotation players. If you could turn one of them, let's say the worst one, like Nikhail Alexander Walker, if you could turn him into a full word, that balances things a little bit right. Another direction they could go is look to build out some three guard looks. Dante plays bigger than he is. He rebounds really well for a guard, and he's strong and is a good center of gravity, so

he could slide his feet well. So like, I think you could like kind of account for the fact that he plays a little bigger than he is. And then Anthony Edwards is one of the most physically imposing guards in the league. So like, I actually think in Anthony Edwards, Mike Conley, Dante DiVincenzo lineup with Gobert and one of Julius Randall or JD. McDaniels could work. So like keep an eye on the backward of the backup forward spot.

But one of the ways they could confront that outside of a trade is just trying to build out some more three guard looks. All right, segment, why don't you have Minnesota with the top tier contenders. I have Minnesota in the if things go right tier. I'm a huge ant fan. I'm rooting for this team to succeed. So this is not about any sort of like personal Vendetta. I actually really like Anthony Edwards. I think he might

be my favorite player of this next era. Right, but they have some gaping holes and specific matchup weaknesses that could get them beat, specifically teams that do a really good job of protecting the rim. We saw this in the Dallas series. Right. In the Denver series, Anthony Edwards attempted seven point one restricted area shots per game and shot seventy four percent there. In the Dallas series, he attempted just five point eight restricted area shots per game

and shot just fifty five percent there. So, going from a guy who is having a bad rim protection postseason run in Jokic to legit rim protection and Gafford and Lively completely changed Minnesota's ability to get into the basket, specifically with ants. Then it also extended into the regular season.

The top eight opponent point in the paint team. So let's call that rim protection teams the top eight rim protection teams, not counting Minnesota in the league, where the Chicago Bulls, the Miami Heat, Cleveland Cavaliers, the New Orleans Pelicans, the New York Knicks, the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Orlando Magic, in the Boston Celtics. The Timberwolves went ten to ten against that group, and they went forty six and sixteen

against everyone else. So that's like a pretty substantial sample size that demonstrates that the teams that can really pack the paint and protect the rim are going to bog down this Minnesota offense and cause them to be vulnerable in a real way. So like now we can kind of exacerbate that concept by swapping in Julius Randall for

Karl Anthony Towns. So like that, that to me is like a legitimate matchup weakness that could get them into some trouble there are like they if they run into teams that can really protect the rim, they could end up getting beat in the playoffs. Teams that I look got there, Like if they faced Dallas again, I think they'd lose. If they face Oklahoma City, I think they'd lose. Even some of the lower teams in the West, like a team like the Lakers that has Anthony Davis on

that front line. That's a team that could really pack the paint against Minnesota and cost some issues for their defense. The Lakers struggled to guard on the perimeter, but they have guys in Minnesota that don't necessarily need to be accounted for on the perimeter that they can stash bad defensive players on. So like, I think that's a significant weakness. The second big weakness that I want to talk about

is trapping ant. This was something we saw towards the tail end of the Denver series and then a lot in the Dallas series. It's copycat league, right. Denver showed it, Dallas copied it and kind of perfected it with rim protection. Ant got blitzed in ball screens twenty two times in the playoffs. The Wolves scored just ten points on those possessions, and they shot just three for sixteen from the field.

It is. It is a copycat league. Teams will all of the good coaching staffs in the league, when they're game planning for Minnesota will watch that footage and go, man, just put two on an There's nothing they can do, So what is your game plan for that. I'm a huge believer in their defense. Yes, they struggled in the Luca matchup, but there's really only a small handful of guys in the league that can really make Luca uncomfortable.

But there are a lot of ways that this offense can be really bogged down by packing the paint, by trapping Ant in his ball screens, and it could potentially be worse now that Cat is gone, and so like that's something that they got to have a game plan for. Whether that's aligning things so that you have a good playmaker as the first read for Ant when he gets into the trap, whether that's just a lot of internal improvement for guys like Jaden McDaniels, whether that's Julius Randall

improving as a spot up player. They've got to find a way to convert those four on threes into easy shots. Because the book is out. With Minnesota pack the paint, trap Ant, you can bog down their offense. So in summary, I think this team is built to win regular season games. They've got young, energetic talent. I think they will likely end up in the three or the four seed this year, but I think they need to catch some matchup luck

in order to win four playoff rounds. As I mentioned earlier, there are some teams in the Western Conference that I think would just beat them because of their ability to protect the rim. So that puts them in the mix with all of these teams below the top tier for me. I'm not worried about Ant. I think he's ready to do this. I just think the rest of the roster has some holes that are tough to account for. All right, guys, That is all I have for today is always is

sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting the show. We'll see for Friday. We might have some preseason reaction depending on what happens in that Denver Boston game. If not, we will have another season preview as well as a mailbag. I will see you guys then the volume. What's up guys. As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting OOPS tonight. They 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.