Hoops Tonight - NBA Power Rankings: Warriors TOP 5, Lakers & Suns FAST STARTS, Cavaliers ON FIRE

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I got a dampackshow for you today. We're doing our first edition of Power Rankings today as we rank the top ten teams in the league and dig a little bit into each one of the those teams. And then at the tail of the show, I got a mail bag. We're gonna hit a couple of different teams that we're not in the Power Rankings.

more content. And then, last minute least keep dropping mail bag questions and those YouTube comments so we can keep hitting them throughout the remainder of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So with power rankings, I think it's very important every time I do a list to kind of lay out criteria for you guys. I intend to use our weekly Monday power rankings as an opportunity

to talk about who's been playing well as of late. Okay, so this is not our contender's list, the contenders list. It would take a lot of information for me to change how I feel about it.

sized types of changes. We'll check in on our contender rankings periodically throughout the season, especially when something changes, right. But I want Power Rankings to be an opportunity for us to shine a light on teams that are playing well as of late. So obviously, this first edition is going to cover the entire season, but as we get deeper into the season, the Power Rankings are gonna kind to focus more on who's playing well in the last.

structure those power rankings. So if we're like a couple months into it, and there's like a team that's like five hundred, but they go five and one over a two week span and have a bunch of impressive wins, even though I might not necessarily think they're one of the ten best teams in the league, they might crack into the top ten of our top ten of our power rankings, so that we have an opportunity to shout

them out. Hopefully that makes some sense. One other note on this week's rankings, seven of my ten teams ended up being from the Western Conference. The gap between the East and the West is a parent right away. To start this year, the West has eleven teams that are five hundred or better. The East has five teams that

are five hundred or better. Now that should level out a little bit, but also the West is fifty and forty three head to head against the Eastern Conference, which is actually an even higher win percentage cross conference than they had last year. So only three Eastern Conference teams made the Power rankings this week. However, there's one team in particular, the Bucks, that I wanted to touch briefly on today that will hit in the mail bag. All right,

without any further ado, let's get to the rankings. Number ten, the Houston Rockets. They're off to a three and three start, but they've had some impressive wins. They blew out a full strength Grizzly squad. They went into Dallas and controlled the game from wire to wire. Dallas never took a lead in that game. Dallas did an incredible job defending Luca and Kyrie in that game, just making things difficult. They still got the numbers, but they didn't overhelp. They

kept them playing a lot of isoball. Dallas only generated eight wide open threes in the entire game, per NBA dot Com, and that's well down from what you expect from that Dallas offense. They forced them into a bunch of tough, contested jumpers. Ball pressure is the strength of

this Houston Rockets team. I've talked a lot about this concept in the early part of the season, but I find ball pressure to be one of the most underappreciated traits of a good basketball player, and an underappreciated like ability that a team has to change the pace of basketball games. Get up into the ball handler's jersey, make it so that it's difficult for him to get across half court. Pressure off the ball, to fighting guys off

of spots. Think of it like this. A team runs a horn set, they're used to everyone, you know, getting to where they want to get to the ball handler,

getting to the middle of the floor. You know whatever that cross screen that you're running around the elbows before you flow into whatever action, you're running out of horns, if you can like disrupt that by pressuring the ball and like fighting guys off a spot so that if he catches at the high post instead of catching at the elbow, he catches like extended out or in a different spot. You blow up a screening action with physical pressure. You do that kind of stuff. It gets the other

team out of their offense. It makes them uncomfortable, it makes them play a way that they don't want to play. And so I am always going to be kind of keeping an eye out for teams that can really pressure the ball, and like Houston can really pressure the ball.

The Warriors game, then a game gets the Warriors of the weekend that the Warriors won in overtime where the Warriors took a big lead early and the Rockets crawled all the way back actually took a brief lead in the fourth quarter and ended up sending the game to overtime. But in large part because of their ball pressure, they

are picking up full court causing issues. Tarr Easton at one point had like back to back pick sixes, and he's like literally on his back, hyperventilating on the ground after getting the second one while they're playing five on four the other way. Because they're just playing so hard and they're so young, and they're so athletic, and they leverage that to make the games kind of messy, right Like their offense can bog down from time to time.

We know that they're kind of inconsistent shooting the ball, but they make you uncomfortable and they can make these games messy, and that is where they can find opportunities to get wins. Their metrics right now, they're eleventh in offense eleventh and defense ninth, and net rating second, offensive rebounding kind of an intriguing staff for them, eleventh and overall rebounding. Jalen Green is off to an intriguing start, He's taking ten threes a game and hitting thirty nine

percent of them. In the Dallas Luca hits a step back three, cuts it to three, and Jalen Green ends up hitting a massive step back three kind of off the dribble combination three on the left wing.

stacked Western Conference. But really really like what I'm seeing in terms of their ball pressure on the perimeter right now. Number nine, the Memphis Grizzlies. They're off to a four and three start. There are two losses. They had two ugly losses in there to the Bulls and Nets. But it was kind of weird if you look at the context, Like John Morant misses the Bulls game, Marcus Smart and Desmond Bane both get hurt early in the Nets game.

They have a couple of really impressive wins surrounding that. That's why I'm kind of looking at them as a team that's a little better than their record. They blew out a full strength Orlando Magic team. They beat that shit out of the Bucks without Desmond Bain or Marcus Smart on the floor. Just ran them off the floor and transition all day long in that game. They also defended Dame really well in that game. Shout out to Scotti Pippen Junior, who has been an exciting kind of

piece that's popping for them this year. Then they went into Philly and blew out the Sixers, albeit without Joel Embiid and Paul George. They're metrics right now. They are eighth in offense, fourteenth in defense, tenth and net rating fifth and rebounding. The injuries to Baine and Marcus Smart especially are like discouraging, just because they're such an important part of what makes this team tick on both ends

of the floor. Obviously, Desmond Bain, who can really run action off the ball next to Job, but also take over the offense when jaws off the floor. Marcus Smart is this important connective piece. He gives them another way to get the defense in rotation by posting up. He's both Bain and Smart, in my opinion, are two really good physical perimeter defenders. And it's just discouraging because Marcus mart just hasn't been able to stay on the floor for this team, and I kind of just want to

see what it looks like in a larger sample. But this team is really deep and they have a lot of guys that are stepping up. The rookie Jalen Wells has popped right away. Is a guy who can provide aggressive off ball scoring, which is super valuable with John Morant, like just doesn't need a ton of space and is super aggressive in catch and shoot situations, which kind of makes him a useful off ball offensive player. Santi al Dama is hooping career highs in scoring volume and efficiency.

He's got great chemistry with John Morant as a baseline cutter, as a transition runner and relocating around the three point line as a shooter. They've taken a couple of guys that the Lakers' front office saw no value in in Scottie Pippen Junior and Jay Huff, and they've turned him into useful rotation players. Both have looked flat out good at different parts this year. Jaren Jackson's off to a great start this year. He's averaging twenty points per game

on sixty five percent true shooting. So depth has helped carry them, But the story of their success to this point in the season has been John Morant's playmaking, and I wanted to take a second to put a light on that. He is third in the league and assists

per game, behind Trey Young and James Harden. The way he's getting his assist reminds me a lot of prime Russell Westbrook, like way back like twenty sixteen, seven Team twenty eighteen, where it's like he starts to mix with the ball and all eyes are on him and there's a lot of guys sneaking along the baseline. He's hitting cutters along the baseline a lot. He's hitting corner three

point shooters a lot. So he's kind of like gearing everybody towards him and finding those openings on the back line. But he's also doing some super advanced stuff in ball screens.

Talked about this the other day, but he's doing a really good job using his eyes to manipulate the lowman, which is the guy who's guarding the shooter in the weak side corner who typically comes over to help on the roll right, And he's doing a good job of manipulating that guy and finding openings to either skip the pass to that shooter or to hit the role man. But he's making that read based on how he can manipulate the defense with his eyes. Jaws off to a

great start. I'm not sure how much more injury luck the injury bad luck. I should say that the Grizzlies can handle. But the Grizzlies are off to a good start. Number eight the New York Knicks. After the catastrophe on opening night against Boston, they've won three out of four. Had a decent second half lead against Cleveland in the game they lost, but they had pretty bad stretch And shout out to the Cleveland Cavaliers are playing good basketball.

They played really well in the late third, early fourth. They ended up taking that game from them. They had a blowout win against the Pacers that was impressive. A blowout win against the Pistons that was impressive. They had a big second half comeback against the Miami Heat in Miami where Karl Anthony Towns went bonkers. Was doing a ton of work in the post, was just cooking Nikola Yovich and then did some damage one on one to

Bam and crunch time. They were spamming pick and pop where Kat just kept catching at the top key and either shooting at three or driving the close out. Did a lot of damage there. His best game of the season. Their metrics so far their third in offense, sixteenth in defense, but a one oh six defensive rating. If you take out the Boston game. Now, you can't take out the Boston game. It's part of the deal. But the point is is they've defended well since that Boston game. Their

fifth in net rating and eighth in rebounding. Although they are not the offensive rebounding force that they were last year. It's a different type of team. Mckal bridges all the concern about his shooting, it's been okay. He's been forty two percent from three since the Boston game, averaging eighteen points a game.

from there, You've got all of this talent. Really really like the dimension and the variety that we're seeing in that New York Knicks offense.

teams that they've played against. So they lost to Phoenix in Phoenix. They beat Minnesota in Minnesota, classic way that they always dominate Minnesota, but they had a really ugly performance at home against the Houston Rockets where they never took a lead and trailed by as many as twenty

three in the second half. Didn't move the ball well in that game, and that's going to be kind of one of the things that we talk about over the course of the season is they clearly, through what I've seen on film, implemented a lot more variety in their offense, but they still have a tendency sometimes to start spamming stuff and like really really get into some like old fashioned lack of ball and player movement type of offense. And again it's really early and they're still figuring some

shit out and it'll take some time. But they didn't move the ball well in that Houston game. They only generated eight wide open threes, which again that's their bread and butter, is like getting a ball moving, getting all their skill involved generating high quality catch and shoot situations. But still, again it's a lot of new players, it's a lot of new stuff that they're running. It's and Lucas not in peak shape right now, so like, give it some time, they'll be fine.

The only real red flag right now is are twenty third in rebounding, but I think that'll stabilize over the course of the season. And again, the defense stuff is super encouraging and Luca is going to continue to get better in time. And new system, new players always give it time to get their footing. Wait till that offense gets cooking. When that offense gets cooking, they're gonna start racking up some wins. And they're already four and two.

Number six, the Los Angeles Lakers played the toughest schedule in the NBA to start the season. Their opponent win percentage so far as sixty seven percent. But they've done pretty well. They're four and two out the gates. They beat three straight teams to start the season that are all in the Western Conference. Playoff mix. They beat the they beat the Minnesota Timberwolves, kind of controlled that game

from start to finish. Really impressive come from behind win against the Phoenix Suns, and then another impressive win against the Kings where they kind of fell behind in a third quarter run where their athleticism started to rise to the surface as an issue, and then Lebron pulled that game out. Then they lost a tough crunch time game in Phoenix, and then they laid an absolute egg in Cleveland. It just got ran off the floor and that one

was not pretty at all. They did right the ship in Toronto, but there were some athleticism issues that kind of started to rise to the surface in that game as well. And so more or less, the Lakers are kind of exactly what I thought they would be to this point. Like I think they're a good team that's a good offense, which is what they have been. Their starting lineup is awesome. They're seventy five minutes of Austin di Lo Ruie Lebron ad they're plus ten net rating

in those seventy five minutes. Again, against the toughest schedule in the league. They've been good on both ends of the floor. That lineup is crushing people in the glass. They're grabbing fifty seven percent of available rebounds. But as we've seen, when they're starting, their starting lineup is so big and so skilled that they can kind of make up for their perimeter athleticism weaknesses. But as soon as they start to mingle the bench group with the starting lineup,

they get smaller. And when they get smaller and less skilled, then all of a sudden, the off their perimeter athleticism issues rise to the surface. You guys have seen it, and again we've talked about ball pressure and how it's valuable, but this team doesn't handle it well. Like look at the Minnesota game, Dante DiVincenzo to kill Alexander Walker to super athletic guards, they start picking up full court and causing problems for the Laker guards. The offense bogs down

for a little bit. The King's game, late third quarter, again, it's always like, right when that starting lineup comes out in that late part of the third quarter, when they're a little bit more tired, they've been playing for a while, the lineups are smaller, less skilled. That's when the athleticism

comes to the surface as an issue. The Kings cause problems for them there, even that Raptors game, Like they're young and they're athletic, and they started playing really hard because they're down and they're trying to work their way back into the game, and the Lakers just kind of struggle in those environments. So again, like they're fine, they're

a good team. They're gonna win lots of games. They're going to be as long as Lebron and Ad stay relatively healthy, I think they'll be above the play in. That's all good, But this perimeter athleticism issue is a real problem that they're going to have to address this this year. There's two main ways that it's showing up. One transition defense. This is one stat for you guys to drive home just how bad the Lakers transition defense

has been. The Lakers are eleventh in half court defensive rating, so according to Cleaning the Glass, they've been the eleventh best half court defense, but in overall defense defensive rating for all possessions regardless of where they take place, the Lakers are twenty seventh in defensive rating, so they are the fourth worst defense in the NBA despite being the eleventh best half court defense. And it's because they're getting absolutely shredded in transition. Lebron and Ad are not running

the floor well enough to start the year. That is a huge problem. And then two, they do not have athletes in the back court that can make up for the fact that they're constantly in the these disadvantage situations with their guards back in transition. It's a real problem. It's gonna take better commitment from Lebron and Ad and

it's gonna take an upgrade in perimeter athleticism. The second place where you're seeing that issue pop is where other teams leverage their athleticism, which is what I talked about earlier, what the Kings did, what the Wolves did, what the what the Toronto Raptors did in the second half of their game. Like, when teams really start to leverage their athleticism is when the Lakers start to have those issues.

So they're off to a good start four and two, again, four and two with the toughest schedule in the league. You had to take that ten times out of ten if you're a Laker fan. But there definitely are some issues that they're gonna have to address in the long run. They're also getting into an easier part of their schedule.

They're at Detroit tonight, at Memphis, Philly, Toronto, Memphis at home, than at San Antonio, at New Orleans, and then home for Utah, and then they have Orlando without Palo most likely, so like then things get tougher again. So like I think there's a good chance to go seven to two in that stretch. I think that they'll drop one of

the Memphis games. They'll probably lose in Memphis, and they'll probably beat mem at home, and then I don't know if it'll be the game at New Orleans, although Lakers have always had their number, the game at New Orleans or one of these other teams that's younger an athletic might just get them on a game when they're being lazy. But I think they'd probably go seven to two in that stretch, and so we could be looking at an eleven and four Lakers team in two weeks, which would

unquestionably be a very good start for that team. Number five, the Golden State Warriors easily the biggest surprise out in the Western Conference. There's two big surprises this year, Cleveland Cavaliers at the top of the East and the Golden State Warriors again, if you look at the tail end of last year, they were bad against teams that were five hundred or better. Steph didn't look like a top

ten player anymore. At the tail end of last year, they again huge high leverage games, like gotta beat the Pelicans at home, and then they lose, like here we are, we're in Sacramento, we have a chance to get a playoff spot, and they get their butts kicked like. It looked bleak for the Warriors after last season, so bleak that you could argue that it wasn't even worth really investing in them in terms of a trade. They have completely flipped the script to start this year. Just a

couple of key signings, much better. Buying a training camp seems to have worked wonders for like setting roles for all these guys. They're super deep, they're super fast. This is a crazy staff for you. They have just fifty five points scored by Steph Curry through six games in they're five and one. That's awesome. Now, they've played a very light schedule out of the gates, but they when you factor in the fact that Steph is out, it's

still pretty impressive. To beat the Pelicans twice without Steph and without Wiggins and without the Anthony Melton, that's impressive. To beat the Rockets without Steph, without the Anthony Melton, that's super impressive. And that was a fun game too, Like the Rockets are a good team. They jumped them early, but the Rockets are a good team. They battled back. They got back in the game with ball pressure, and it was really cool to see the way different Warriors

step up at different parts in the game. In crunch time in regulation, Buddy Healed and Brandon Pazemski made like created shots in one on one situations against good defenders and scored, you know, like that like really high level schock creation from them. And then in overtime, Jonathan Kaminga had like just three jaw dropping plays. He had a left shoulder fade away that was like a tough, like

Kobe style fadeaway that he hit. He had like two ridiculously athletic drives to the basket where he got buckets of one in transition where he was like shot out of a cannon. It was unbelievable. They end up getting a big win, But the story of this team is depth. They don't have a single player aside from Steph Curry that anyone would rank among the top fifty players in

the NBA. But they have thirteen players that are all good NBA rotation players and specifically as an athletic trait, they have an incredible amount of speed on the perimeter. Andrew Wiggins is fast, Jonathan Minga is fast, Moses Moody is fast, Brandon Pazemski's fast as bigs, Tray Jackson Davis is fast, Draymond Green is fast, Lindy Waters is, Gary Payton is fast. They have a lot of fast guys. They have a lot of speed. And then the other thing too is many of those guys can run action.

They have a liked Anthony Melton, who I didn't mention it. He's fast as well. He can run action. Brandon Pajemski can run action. Lindy Waters can come off of a screen and hit a shot. Moses Moody can come off of a screen and hit a shot. Like these guys are they all can shoot on the move, dribble over these actions and make reads like that. They just are really really talented on the back end of their roster, makes them very deep and gives them a very very

high floor. This has allowed Steve Kerr to do what he does best, which is apply structure to a situation. They're running a super structured offense, especially with Steph out of the lineup, and then on the defensive end of the floor, they're playing Steve's Steve's preferred style. Remember Steve wants to switch, contain, play passing lanes. That's like Steve Kurr's bread and butter on the defensive end of the floor.

And because they have so much defensive talent, they can keep waves in waves of that style regardless of which lineup is on the floor, and that's allowing them to force a ton of turnovers, and that's allowing them to do a ton of damage with their speed in transition.

home for Dallas. So I think at that point Warriors fans will see a little bit more of my point as it pertains to their offensive ceiling and the fact that they'll need to add more firepower to contend with the top of the league. But it's hard not to be excited about their start. Their fourth and offense, second, defense, tenth and rebounding, and our number one net rating team through this Monday, November fourth, I should say through Sunday, because it's not counting Monday's games.

I'm not saying they shouldn't take pull up jump shots, but if they rely on that too much, it puts a certain ceiling on them. If they become a drive and kick team like Boston and they generate high quality three point attempts off the catch, that's where their true offensive ceiling is. And like that, to me, that seventy one percent indicator or assists percentage is a really strong indicator that they're playing the right style. They're also the

second big stat that's positive coming out of Phoenix. Last year they were nineteenth in three pointers made per one hundred possessions. This year they're sixth, generating a lot more high quality three point attempts off of that drive and kickball. Now here's the thing. Statistically, the offense hasn't even really taken off yet, but it's a strong indicator that it will because they're moving the ball and they're generating threes

and when it does. I think they'll be able to reach a higher ceiling than they were in years past. I'm seeing some of the most beautiful driving kick possessions in the modern MBA coming out of this Phoenix Sun's offense because of how talented their perimeter players are, and I'm really really excited to see where they can get to by the.

rate of nine attempts per thirty six minutes. Like that, that's like that's like high usage player type of stuff that you're seeing at Like, that's like, I'm a knockdown, aggressive, green light shooter type of aggressive shooting that we're seeing out of Ryan Dunn, and he's making them in forty five minutes of Devin Booker, Kevin Durant, and Bryan Dunn sharing the floor together, they have a one to seventeen offensive rating in a one hundred defensive rating. That's plus

seventeen per one hundred possessions. Mike Budenolzer is a better offensive coach than Frank Vogel. He has stabilized them on that end of the floor, and they've actually defended in a very analytically sound way. Again, they're chasing teams off the three point line. They're never going to be an elite paint defense because they don't really have a legitimate rim protector, but they're doing a decent job there and they're guarding the three point line well, they're forcing teams

into mid range jump shots. They're forcing over ten opponent mid range attempts per game. That's top five in the NBA right now. They just look like a sharper better version of last year's team, Number three, the Oklahoma City Thunder. They're six and zero out of the gates, although they've played a somewhat light schedule, but they're undefeated and there's a Nass kicking and the Nuggets in there. So I don't want to make two light of it. But a

lot of the same trends from last year. They're forcing a lot of turnovers, They're playing in transition, a lot two major changes. I'm noticing. Chet is playing at an insanely high level and is getting more usage. His usage rate is up. He's blocking well over three shots per game.

He's having an incredible defensive start to the season. And again, like when you increase, he's increased his scoring volume and usage with a dip or without a dip, excuse me, in his efficiency, Like that's tough to do, especially for a young player. To do more while also maintaining your efficiency is like the challenge of a young player developing, and he's doing that well. And then both Jalen Williams and Shake Kilvis Alexander are working extensively to change their

shot profile. They're both taking about double the pull up three point shots that they took last year, and shay In particularly struggling a little bit with it. They're investing time and repetition in getting those guys to the point where they're more comfortable shooting from three off the dribble, just trying to increase their efficiency, which I admire, and playing against this light schedule, this is the time to do it. But they are heading into a tougher stretch of their schedule.

more impressive. They erased a twenty one point fourth quarter lead to send that game to overtime. Jason Tatum hit a ridiculous step back three at the top that sent that game to overtime, but then Pascal Siakam ends up hitting a couple more shots than the Celtics do in ot and the Pacers end up getting that win. But they're six and one first and offense again, thirteenth in defense, which we'll talk about in a minute, their fourth and net rating in fourteen and rebounding, which again we'll talk

about a minute. So with the defense and rebounding stuff, they're also struggling to protect the paint a little bit, like they're nineteenth and opponent paint points allowed.

rebounding and defense woes are somewhat to be expected. Their transition defense has also been pretty bad, which usually Boston's transition defense is really good, So I think part of that is a lot of these games have been blowouts, so these games are loose a lot of the time. But again, I let's just put it this way, I'm

zero percent worried about Boston's defense. I when I watch them, anytime they want to tighten the screws, I feel like they can and in clutch situations, although they've only been in two of them this year, they have an eighty six defensive rating, which is excellent, So I have no doubt that Boston's going to be able to get the stop that they need when they need to get them. Jalen Brown is slumping a little bit, but I'm not worried about it. The biggest thing I'm watching is Tatum

and is shooting. Like if Tatum goes up a level, then I think this Boston team becomes unbeatable. They're already a favorite with Tatum kind of status quo. But if Jason Tatum can go up a level and just reach that next level of reliable three level scoring, if he can get to that point, that's where I think this team becomes legitimately unbeatable. He started the season super well.

But now we're seven games in and Jason Tatum's getting one point zero three points per jump shot and he's shooting thirty six percent overall, which is actually a tiny bit down from where he was last year. In the regular season, he was at one point zero four points per jump shot, and that was with him lighting the world on fire against the Knicks in the first game. So, like,

I'm just curious to see where that stabilizes. My guess is it'll stabilize slightly above where it was last year, because I do think he's a better shooter than he was last year. But we'll see in the larger sample, and if it ends up well above where it was last year, that's when we all need to, you know, start being really scared that this could end ugly for everybody as Boston runs away.

for a small guard. He just looks better and that's he got another talent boost for an already stacked Boston roster.

change under Kenny Atkinson. One, they're doing more switching and containing and staying home off the ball, which is allowing them to force turnal. Remember Kenny Akinson came from working with the Golden State Warriors for the last several seasons, so he's bringing over some of that Steve Kurs style of defense, switching and forcing more turnovers. Basic stats for you guys. They were thirteenth and opponent turnover rate last year. This year they're fourth, they were eleventh last year, and

scoring off of turnovers. This year they're number one in the NBA and scoring off of turnovers, which leads to our next biggest change. They're playing much much faster, as we talked about, they're scoring off of turnovers, but they're also fifth in transition points scored per game. Last year they were seventeenth, so that's a substantial improvement. They're just actually playing to the strengths of this roster. Garland's fast, Mitchell's fast, whether it's Struser, Dan Wade, whoever it is,

they played the three, they have a speed there. Mobile is one of the most mobile bigs in the league. Jared Allen is a very mobile big. They should be running and they are running now, So shout out to Kenny Atkinson. He's maximizing what this roster is bringing to the table. They're staying out of the half court whenever they can, and they're making life easier on their stars as a result. The third biggest change is a lot more Evan Mobley on the ball. His usage rate is

up about four percent. It's averaging eighteen points per game on sixty two percent for shooting, running a lot of inverted action. There's stretches of the game where Donovan Mitchell's out and they're just like playing him with same Maryl and just having Merrill like they've run like a horn set, where like Merrill will set like a screen for Mobley at the left elbow and he'll come off and Maryll will pop and they'll just play driving kick basketball out

of that. They're getting a lot of really good stuff out of it. In all of this, the transition scoring, the improvement of Evan Mobley and his usage, that's making it so that Donovan Mitchell can pick his spots more. So as a result, his minutes are lower because they're beating people by more. His efficiency is up because he can pick his spots more. Yeah, his scoring volume is down a little bit, but who cares. You're winning. It's all just making life easier for Donovan Mitchell and the Calves.

This is just a really damn good basketball team and they've got a favorable schedule coming up. I think they're going to beat the Bucks tonight at home. They go to New Orleans, then they're home for Golden State in Brooklyn to Chicago, Philly, back for Chicago Charlotte to Boston back for the Pelicans, the Raptors and the Hawks than to Atlanta. I think they got a chance to go nine and.

he shouldn't have been helping. The lawn wright who's a career good defender at the guard position, botched a switch and gave up a layup. Like they're just not sharp

as a team, And that screams coaching to me. It screams to me that, like from day one of training camp, there's not a lot of accountability and there's not a lot of attention to detail because that thing sort of thing becomes contagious and it leads to good habits and it trickles down guys like there are a lot of teams out there, like the Lakers defense is twenty seventh in the league, but they're eleventh and half court defense even though they have a ton of bad defenders because

they're at least like trying hard. They're locked in right. Denver put together a championship level defense with Michael Porter Junior and Jamal Murray and like in Nicole okicch like coaching is huge part of constructing a viable defense. You've got to take your talented defensive players and you've got to direct them into like large things that make life easier so you can construct these small, achievable defensive roles for the players around them. Again, it's going to be difficult.

I'm not expecting you to turn Bobby Portis into a lockdown defensive player. But like Doc Rivers has this team legitimately bad in so many different ways on the defensive end of the floor right now that this was a stat I checked like two days ago, but they're giving up the highest efficiency to pick and roll ball handlers in the entire league right now. Like these you went and got Gary Trent Junior and Delon Wright to try to improve things at the point of attack, and somehow

you got worse Like this is. I think a lot of this ends up coming back to Doc Rivers, and I think he's got to do a better job coaching these guys up on a possession by possession basis, because right now they're just not sharp they don't look like a serious basketball team, and I think that extends beyond personnel. Even though we can all agree that there are some major personnel weaknesses on this team, What are some legitimate moves you can see the Nuggets making to strengthen their bench.

They are the main reason I don't see them making it out of the conference, But it feels like they

don't have enough trading power to fix it. So for me, like, I actually think Denver kind of falls into that category where it's less about finding like super high end players and it's more about finding functional role players because they're a team that's going to stagger their bench, right Like, this is a team that everything in terms of their talent equity is invested in their starting lineup, right, Like, that's the core of this team, and most of their

issues come down to the starter's not playing well enough, right Like Jamal Murray is not playing like Jamal Murray yet, Michael Porter Junior is not playing like Michael Porter junior yet. I think they will in time. Okay, then you stagger them with those bench groups, right, and so Jamal is going to be the guy who's determining a lot of those possessions. When yokiches off the floor, Michael Porter Junior is going to be determining a lot of those possessions.

What you need are useful role players that have some veteran experience and that just know how to play alongside other good basketball players.

to build consistency there. But eventually the Nuggets starters will play better. Eventually they'll be able to piece together at least again with the Nuggets pinch, it's not about being positive. It's about not completely combusting every single time Nikole Jokic steps off the floor all these previous years where the Nuggets, when the Nuggets won the championship. Even they typically lose the non Jokic minutes by about eleven points per one

hundred possessions. This year, they're getting absolutely shredded when Yokic is off the floor. They've got to find a way to even that out a little bit. Had a lot of questions about from Warriors fans regarding this is the never ending debate we have about whether or not the Warriors should make a trade at some point this season. It's like the most common mail bad question I get. Right now, I'll read a couple of them, and I'll just kind of give some thoughts and then we'll move

on the first one. Dubs need to stand pat. They just learned a lot from the Houston game. It's about the defensive end understack, which understack will improve. Houston attempted to emulate the Clippers. Curve made some mistakes with regard to the fourth quarter lineup. Should have won there, and in the future there will be less success with what Houston did and what the Clippers are. The d will get better and then their offense is sufficient. A different

mail back question. All these analysts spend their off season disrespecting the Warriors, saying that they won't make it to the playoffs. But now they see the Warriors are actually clicking, even winning games without Steph. All of a sudden, the talk has shifted to the Warriors need to make a trade for them to compete. Spare the Warriors, please admit you were wrong and analyze the game that are pestering

us with the trade talks. Twenty twenty two is a case study, but you never learn, so, guys, Like, here's the thing. I tried not to be two results based, right, Like, for instance, like I'm a Lakers fan. You guys know that I don't hide from that on this show. I'm a Lakers fan. And the Lakers have played the toughest schedule in the league and they're four and two. There's a lot of reason to be excited if you're a Lakers fan. There are a lot of Lakers fans that

are starting to talk reckless a little bit, right. I have through it all, looked at the games and been like, okay, yeah, they're wins here, like there's a win against Minnesota. But in the win against Minnesota, there was a long stretch in the second half where Dante DiVincenzo and Nikile Alexander Walker started really ball pressuring, and the Laker offense kind of fell apart because the guards aren't very athletic. And then it happened again in the Kings game, and then

it happened again in the Raptors game. And so I'm looking at it and I'm going, Okay, yeah, four and two good. This is great for the standings. It's great, great start for the standings. They are heading into an easier stretch of their schedule. Now, I think the Lakers have a chance to be eleven and four after fifteen games, like that'd be you gotta be thrilled if you're a

Lakers fan about that. But I also know that if you're gonna get out of the Western Conference, you gotta beat in Oklahoma City, you gotta beat a couple of these teams from that other tier like Memphis and Denver in Minnesota and Dallas and all these different teams, right Like, it's just tough. And then should you get out of the conference, Boston's probably gonna be waiting for you on

the other side. And so I look at it and I go, like, gues is good start for the Lakers, But I don't think they're athletic enough in the backcourt to really cause problems at the highest level of the game. I have to look beyond what their results have been to this point and look into the depth behind the results. That's kind of how I feel about the Warriors. The

Warriors have five wins. That's great, five and one with Steph Curry playing three games scoring fifty five total points this season, and you're five and one, that is a huge cause for celebration. But let's take a closer look. Three of those wins are against teams that completely missed

the play in picture last year. Were against the Pelicans, who were the eight seed in the West last year, and they just traded two of their good role players for de Jontay Murray, who is now hurt, so like, and they don't know what to do with the center position right now. They're kind of a mess. The Pelicans are kind of a mess. They just lost to Atlanta at home, and they lost to the Blazers earlier this year,

so like, look, it's still all very exciting. Last year they had Steph out of the lineup for eight games, they went three to five. You've won more. You've won the same amount of games without Steph already this year as you did the entire season last year. That is super exciting. It's they're clearly demonstrating that they have a much higher floor than they did last year. I would even go as far as to say that this team

is cooking up something kind of special. Everyone seems to be buying into their roles, which was not the case last year. Johnathan Kaminga, it seems to be taking well to his bench role. He's been playing better since he went to the bench. The basketball character of this team is through the roof like. They're resilient, they're selfless, they're hard working, they're coachable. It's all coming together. These are

the ingredients of a special basketball team. Even further, and I talked about this earlier in the show, you could argue last year after they had a rough end of the season again like they start. They went twenty two to thirty one against teams that were five hundred or better last year. Steph didn't look like a top ten

player over the final third of the season. And then at the end of the season they had two really big games that they had to win at home against the Pelicans, they lost on the road in Sacramento with a chance to go to the second playing game. They got their butts kicked. Coming out of last season, there was a lot of people arguing, like, this team's not worth making a trade for this team. The core isn't good enough to justify really and really investing in. Now

it's like, hell, yeah, they're worth investing in. They've completely turned it around. Now they seem close. They didn't seem close last year. Now they seem close. That makes it worth the aggression. It's all together a positive trend. It's a reason to be excited. I'm now just looking at it beyond that. Okay, now we have an exciting team. We have a five and one team, we have a real team. Let's take a look at the roster. Let's take a look at what their strengths and weaknesses are.

Let's be honest. Okay, against the best defenses in the league, Steph is the only guy I trust on this team to create his own shot against the best defenses in the league, against the highest levels, like I was talking about earlier with the Lakers, That's what I'm fact focusing on here. The best indicator of future performance is past performance. People were kind of down on the Warriors because in

the past they didn't look as good. So that's what like, I always think it's funny when people get upset about media underrating or overrating their teams. All of us are just trying to make predictions, and last year it didn't look like this team was in there. This has been a surprise. This in the Calves. These are the two biggest surprises of the season. Nobody was picking the Calves to go seven and oh. Did any of you Warriors fans pick the Calves to go seven and oh this year?

let's just be honest. I really like Jonathan Kaminga is an exciting young player. The plays he made in overtime of the Houston game. They're freakiously talented type of plays. Yannis, at twenty two years old, average twenty three to nine with four stocks per game, finished seventh in MVP voting, made the All Star team and was second team All NBA and average twenty five to ten in the playoffs.

Anthony Ewards, his age twenty two season, was just last year, seventh in MVP voting, All Star, Second Team All NBA. Averaged twenty eight seven and seven on sixty percent true shooting as a number one option for a Western.

found there's no championship foundation. There you go lokot NBA history. You don't win a championship unless you have a top ten player. So again, like, it's not about and I'm not even necessarily saying you have to trade one of the young guys.

is legitimately a bad defensive player. Van Doh and Gabe are the only two guys that I kind of trust in the Lakers' rotation. So if the Lakers have to trade guys and they have to give up two rotation pieces to get somebody back. I'm worried that they won't be deep enough anymore. You guys, the Warriors have like seven different configurations of trades they could make that send out two or three players to bring back somebody high powered, where they still are deep, where they still are talented,

where they still have everything they need to contend. You're in a great spot. It's not about talking about how you don't have enough just for the sake of being negative. It's just the realistic kind of nature of looking at what the NBA landscape is. Last question, Jason, I love you and your content, but man, it is too soon to know which team is and isn't a contender. Guys, it's my job to have an opinion on the season.

It'd be boring if I came out here every single day and was like, yeah, none of this matters.

I'm going to come out with power rankings, I'm gonna come out with contender rankings, I'm gonna come out with player rankings, even though technically we don't really know what any of this shit looks like until we get further into the season, but that's just kind of the nature of how this goes. All right, guys, it's all I have for today is always I sincerely appreciate.