Hoops Tonight - NBA Reaction: Nikola Jokic's HISTORIC START w/ Nuggets, Bucks-Nets + Power Rankings

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and eligibility varies by jurisdiction void in Ontario. Bet must win to receive award. Bonus Bets expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. For additional terms and responsible gaming resources to dkang dot co. Slash b ball. All right, old coon hoops and I here at the volume heavy Monday. Everybody'll ball if you guys had a great weekend and then you're having a great start to your week at

a jampackshow for you. Today, we're gonna hit a game reaction off the top between the Milwaukee Bucks and the Brooklyn that's interesting game. The Nets had them against the Ropes, but the Bucks fought back and got a big win thanks to Giannis who kind of got them going in the late third quarter and they rode that to the finish. Some interesting stuff in crunch time in that game too.

After that, I want to talk a little bit about Nicole and the level he's hitting offensively right now and where it ranks for me all time, and especially some specific kind of schematic stuff that's helping to unlock it all in a little bit of his partnership with Russell Westbrook. And then at the tail end of the show, as we do every Monday, Power Ranking is going to hit the top ten teams in the league, talk a little bit about each of them. You guys are the job.

Before we get started, subscribe to the Hoops to Night YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore JSNLTC. You guys, don't miss you announcements. Sont forget about our podcast feed 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. We also have brand new social media feeds on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook that are for the Hoops Tonight channel where we're releasing more contents to make sure you follow us there, and last but not least, keep dropping mail back questions in the YouTube comments. We have a really small slate tonight. I think it's just Raptors at NICK. So tomorrow morning, we're probably just going to do a brief kind of like preview of the

n season tournament. Obviously, it's single elimination, so anything can happen, but I'll give you guys a prediction anyway, And then at the tail end of that show, we're just going to answer some mailback QUI questions to kill some time before we get to the games that evening, and then we'll be breaking them down obviously as we get further into the week. All right, let's talk some basketball. So Bucks Nets was an interesting game to me on a

bunch of different levels. First of all, the nets and just what makes them so scrappy, and the simple fact that they just have a lot of players that are good at things that are mandatory to succeed in the modern NBA in terms of covering ground on the perimeter, pressuring the ball to make an offense feel uncomfortable, being able to chase people off of the three point line into lower percentage shots that are contested twos. They've got a lot of guys that can do that at a

pretty high level. And like, again, this is a team that I'd keep an eye on in the trade market. There's just a lot of guys there that can help really good teams around the league, and I'm I'm curious to see where some of these guys end up over the course of the next few months. But they have the Bucks on the rope. On the ropes, they're defending Dame extremely well. Dennis Schroeder's applying a lot of ball pressure.

It's got good quickness to stay in front of Dame, but also the length to contest his pull up jump shot. They were defending really well, and it kind of looked like things were kind of looked like things were teetering for the Bucks a little bit there in the late third quarter as the Nets kept making runs. I think they went up by as much as eleven in that kind of late third quarter stretch. But then Yannis just refused to let them lose that game and completely took

things over. He was doing a lot of work in the post, hitting that little hook shot over his left shoulder. And again, this is something I've been dying for Giannis to build out over the course of the last few years, because I just think it's a more reliable over the top shot. Like, what is the purpose of the over

the top shot. It's for when you're fatigued or when you run into an elite defender that takes away the easy stuff that you can get at the rim as a power player, right, Like, there's a certain amount of like through schematic approach and just through Jannis's indomitable will, that he's going to be able to get to the basket a certain amount of the time. But when you run into certain types of defenders that can slide their feet, absorb contact and make you shoot over the top, that's

where it brings value. To have something that you can make over the top, it just has to be a high enough percentage shot to be valuable. And that's where, like when Giannis was taking a lot of off the dribble jump shots, and a lot of them were threes, he was not able to hit enough of them to justify it even in the large volume, let alone the

small volume. But now because he's gotten pretty decent at that little pull up elbow jump shot, and because he's starting to really turn to that left shoulder hook and hit it at a higher percentage, he's got something that he can go to to both make things easier for him in terms of fatigue, but also something he can go to when the team needs a bucket. And it turned into a situation where in crunch time, the Nets really had no choice but to start double teaming Giannis.

And this is where it turned into what I thought was a really gutsy call from Doc Rivers and what I thought was the right decision under the circumstances. Dennis Schroeder was giving them a ton of issues, so they closed with Andre Jackson on the ball. You would think in a lot of cases, depending on the matchup, maybe you'd want a better offensive player there. But I thought it was the right call, especially with how successful Dennis

Schroeder was kind of getting to his spots. And then the second piece of it was, even though brook Lopez can shoot, he was not having a confident game if I remember correctly, didn't even hit a three in this particular game. But Bobby Portis was feeling good and comfortable on those above the break threes, especially at the wing.

And so when you're double teaming out of the post, there are a couple of like simple reads that come out of it, right, Like the first read is the guy who makes the pass right, so the guy makes the post entry. He's sitting one pass away, but he usually has to be pretty far away. It's got to be like a twenty five twenty six footer. Bobby hit one of those off of a basic double team off the left block. Giannis is dribbling, Here comes the guy digging down into the post, whip it back out. Bobby

knocks down the shot. But then there's also the swing passes that come out of that. But what it ended up being was above the breakthrees on the wings a little bit further out, but that were moderately contested, and so you needed someone that could confidently step into a shot. You needed somebody that wasn't going to to you know, because if you catch at twenty six feet and the guy's closing out at you and you pump fake and you swing it, it might not be open anymore and

the advantage could be gone. It wasn't gonna get It wasn't gonna end in some sort of completely wide open, uncontested three. They needed somebody to step up and knock down moderately contested threes off of those Giannis double teams. And Bobby just got hot and he made three after three, after three, Chris Middleton made one in that stretch as well, and on the other end of the floor. To Bobby's credit,

the nets we're picking on him quite a bit. It was a kind of a steady stream of like Cam Johnson and Dennis Schroeder just picking on Bobby in switches, and Cam hit like a pretty tough side stepping three above the break, and then Dennis just barely turned the

corner on Bobby. It kind of took a bump and knocked down a little bank shot and it looked like, oh, this could get a little ugly here with the nets attacking Bobby, but he sat in a stance and he got some big stops down the stretch, forced Cam Johnson into a really ugly miss flat out just blocked Dennis Schroeder on driving floater. So Bobby ended up being kind of the hero in this game with the key stops

down the stretches. The nets were trying to hunt him and hitting those big above the break threes off of those Jannis double teams. But I really want to zoom in on on Giannis for as second, because what he did in that game is something that I've been harping at harping on for a while, which is like, there is a certain amount of there's a certain amount of

malaise that is inherent in the NBA regular season. I mean, the Bucks just ran into it in that Hawks game in particular, where they just got ran off the floor in transition and it's like, clearly, you're just not engaged. You're not running, you're not sprinting, you're not picking up the ball, you're not defending the basket. It's a little basic details in transition defense, and you end up taking a loss. Right, But like, that's part of the NBA season.

It's long, it drags on. And so this is where like well Yannis did in that third quarter when things were teetering, he is the guy who has the ability to change the tenor of a game and get his teammates reinvested in a way where you can then follow that through to a win. This is where I was being so critical with Lebron James and Anthony Davis last week. There's no doubt that there were some injuries, right, Austin Reeves is out of the lineup. You got you know,

Jared Vanderbilts hurt. You're dealing with some guys out and it makes things tougher, right, But that's exactly when you need your superstar players to leverage their gifts even more because the more you leverage your gifts, the easier you make things for your teammates. Then they start to succeed, and then the whole team starts to take off. It's the rising tide that lifts all boats, right, It's like

you're seeing this with Nikole Jokic all season two. And that's the thing, Like Giannis, He's playing at an insanely high level right now. That was another MVP level performance yesterday. He's at thirty three twelve and six on the season at sixty three percent true shooting. That's just completely outrageous and might not even be enough with how well Nikole

Jokic is playing right now. But like, I just thought that was such a great reminder last night, but from Yannis of like what you expect from the real top tier guys in the league, which is like no matter what night, what night of the season, it is, no matter what the schedule has been looking like maybe you're co star and older guy like Dame just doesn't have

it going. Things are just looking a little bit bleak, and to have a guy that can just step up and just kind of gain control of the situation and turn a loss into a win is the differentiator in a lot of cases. And most importantly, it comes down to establishing habits. The teams that let games like that slip and just go, ah, screw. It's an eighty two game season. It's marathon, not a sprint. We'll make it up when we need to. And you know whatever, seating

doesn't really matter. We can go beat anybody if we have to. And it's like, yeah, theoretically all of those concepts are true, Like, yeah, the season is long, and as long as you feel like you can beat any of the teams in your conference, it doesn't really matter who you play first or where you go play him.

But the bottom line is the teams that win multiple playoff rounds, the teams that play the level of basketball necessary to go through that grind in the postseason, tend to be the teams that find themselves in a tough game in the third order against the team that they should beat and fight and get the win rather than

roll over and lose. And I thought that that was just a great justa position of Jannis compared to some of the other players around the league, and just the way you're supposed to attack things in the middle of December when you have the types of big picture goals that the Milwaukee Bucks have. So shout out to Jannis and Tennkople. Let's talk about Yokic for a minute, though.

So he goes for fifty six in Washington, probably the worst loss of any team in the NBA this season, as the Nuggets lose to the two win Wizards at that point, but Jokic goes for fifty six. He goes for forty eight in Atlanta, when for thirty eight last week in Golden State. So his last four games, Yokic is averaging forty two points, fifteen rebounds, and eight assists on fifty six percent from the field, fifty percent from three, and seventy eight percent from the free throw line. He's

also averaging three steals per game over that span. There's a couple of specific things that are driving this. Obviously, I've talked a lot about Yokic's jump shot, and I don't need to get too far into that. Didn't shoot the ball super well last year, started to hurt him with teams leaving him open on pops and in spot up situations. We won't get any further into that. He is shooting extremely well this season one point three five

points per jump shot. Among all players in the NBA that have attempted at least one hundred jump shots this year, that one point three to five points per shot mark ranks second in the entire league. That's how good Yoki just shooting the basketball. Anybody want to guess who's number one? Aj Green from the Milwaukee Bucks was number one front players who have attempted at least one hundred shots, but

just obviously shooting the ball extremely well. He's especially shooting the ball well as of late in face up situations. This has been a big part of both the Atlanta game and the Washington game. Whether it's like catching at the elbow and just turning and facing up, coming off of screening actions and kind of like flowing into ISOs around that like foul line area. But all he does is he just kind of jabs and just leans back

and just shoots right over the top. He's shooting seventy eight percent so far here on those face up jump shots, according to Synergy that's been a big thing that's boosted his scoring. Again. Like when you can accentuate your scoring with jump shooting, that's when you can hit some really high scoring numbers because it's easier to counter, you know, like crazy paint scoring with health defense than it is to deal with the guy who's just shooting over the

top of you every single time. He scored over ten points on jump shots in four of the last five games. It's been a huge part of his success. And then he's just absolutely crushing teams rolling in ball screens, and this is something that was not really working for the Nuggets in the early part of the season. I want

to dive into that concept a little bit. He didn't have a single game all season before this weekend where he had over ten points in a single game in rollman possessions, meaning like catching the ball in a ball screen in the pocket and scoring out of those situations, not a single game with over ten. He had twenty seven points on rollman possessions in the Washington and Atlanta game games combined. This is where I want to shout out Rush Westbrook. So think of it like this, what

opens up the pocket in a ball screen? So like if Jamal's dribbling at the top of the key, or if he's coming off of a dribble handoff, whatever you want to call it, that two man game and his defender is chasing over the top and Yo Kicic's defender is defending in you know, kind of a typical ball screen coverage where he's kind of splitting the difference between

both guys. What's going to get the opening for Yo Kitchen the pocket on ball defenders behind whoever's the ball handler, screen defender is splitting the difference usually like that no roller behind coverage, Right, how do you get Yokic open there? That screen defender has to lean towards the ball handler. If he doesn't lean towards the ball handler, the pocket's not open. If the pocket's not open, Yo kich isn't

going to get his opportunities to score there. Jamal Murray when he was at his best, and what made this so effective was Jamal was cooking teams coming off of these scoring acts, these screening actions, whether it was with curling and getting into floater range and making shots there. If he's coming off and shooting pull up jump shots, right, Jamal hasn't been as good this year, so it's been

harder to unlock that part of the game. Russell Westbrook has been getting downhill in these ball screens, and it's become such a problem for teams that he's either engaging the screen defender and getting that pocket, or they're trying to meet Jim. They're trying to meet Russ at the screen to stop him from turning the corner, because once he gets ahead of Steam he can be such a

problem there. And so Russ's ability to engage the screen defender by actually getting downhill in those screens is forcing Jokic's defender to account for us, which is leaving Yokic with all these super easy opportunities in the short range where he's so deadly with that floater or quick isolation moves on the catch where can just spin over one of his shoulders and knock down a shot. It is completely unlocked, something that was missing during the early part

of this season. Again, twenty seven rollman points in two games after not having a single game over ten points to start the season. Russell Westbrook with twenty three assists in the last two games. Fourteen of those assists or to Nikolea Jokich. It's been a really interesting partnership. And again, like a simple basketball concept, a two man game requires two threats, and it's not going to be as effective

if one of the guys is not a threat. And say what you want about Russell Westbrook and some of his weaknesses at this point in his career, he's still a great athlete that can turn the corner and get downhill and wreck ha havoc for a defense, and he's done a lot to help Nikole Jokic get going in the role area, that short roll area on the floor. This brings me to something I was talking about or thinking about I should say when I was watching Jokics

this weekend. I don't know that Jokic will ever be able to reach Lebron's two way peak because Lebron for over a decade was a top three defender in the league, maybe not in terms of regular season awards, but like especially in playoff settings from the mid two thousands to the mid twenty tens, and really it's still in spurts up until twenty twenty, was able to leverage himself as an athlete on the floor in transition and on defense in a way that Jokic never will be able to do.

And overall, Lebron and Jokic are just so different as players that there's just a huge subjectivity element. And this is probably something that we'll just argue about forever, but I will say this, I have never seen a basketball player more easily generate offense for his team than Nikole Jokic is doing right now. Not Lebron, not Kobe, not kd not Steph. It may not have the aesthetic flair that some of those guys do, it may not look the same as some of the great offensive players of old,

but it is brutally effective. There isn't a soul in the league that can guard him one on one. He's the best passer in the league. There's very little variance in his game compared to his peers. Again, he's an elite shooter, but he doesn't take a lot of jump shots. He's not depend on whether or not jump shots go in or don't go in. His short range scoring has

sky high field goal percentage. Another way to put it is like this, a Jokic iso or a ball screen or a post up has a score percentage, meaning percentage of possessions that end in points have his score percentage well over fifty percent, so in late game situations, they have the safest bet to generate points out of anybody in the league, which is another part of why they've been a top five clutch offense this year. Here's another basic stat to explain just how effective Jokich has been

as an offensive player to start this year. In Jokic's minutes this year, the Nuggets have a one twenty four offensive rating despite not having a single teammate that can reliably provide twenty points a game on the offensive end of the floor. We got to call it like we see it. Nobody has ever been this effective on the offensive end of the floor in the history of basketball.

This is unprecedented. Again, I'm a big Lebron fan, I'm a big step fan, and Steph's had some really special moments, and Lebron was a really damn good offensive player at his peak, pretty close to this, but I don't think he was this good on the offensive end even at his absolute peak. Thirty two points fourteen rebounds tennisis per game on sixty five percent tru shooting so far to start this year. It's just completely ridiculous. I don't know what else to say. I just can't. We can't lie

about what we're seeing right now. No one's ever done this. This is unprecedented in terms of offensive production on the at the NBA level. All right, let's get into our power rankings, and again, all of our odds that I go over today are provided by our partner DraftKings, in case you're interested in jumping on any of these teams. In terms of futures, starting with number ten, the Miami Heat, they've won three in a row, seven other last ten

some quality wins in there too. They beat the Caves, they beat the Lakers, the Suns, and the MAVs all over that ten game span. In this last ten games, they are eleventh in offense, ninth in defense, sixth and net rating, and ninth in rebounding. Tyler Harrow has been hooping. He was unreal during the win against Cleveland yesterday. Really was the primary offensive initiator. A lot of action where they were looking to attack Garland, going through him, shooting

over the top of him, that sort of thing. Thirty four points, six rebounds, and seven assists for Tyler Harrow in the win. He's also averaging twenty four, six and five in this seven and three stretch. Also little known fact, Tyler Harrow has been the best pull up jump shooter in the league this year. Remember that was something that was kind of a weakness for him in the early part of his career, where he was like capable of getting hot as a pull up shooter, he just was

never consistent with it. But he's been getting one point two to three points per pull up jump shot this year, number one in the league among the thirty six players that have attempted at least one hundred pull up jump shots. Jimmy Butler came back from his injury. They've started playing through him more and he's found a really nice rhythm.

He's at twenty two, six and five on sixty three percent from the field and fifty eight percent from three over this ten game stretch, and they're getting some really nice contributions down the roster. They moved Terry Rozier to the bench, and he's been shooting the ball better because he can just come in and be aggressive without fear of stepping on other guys toes. Drew Smith has been giving them good minutes off the bench too. He's just

an athletic guard who plays super hard. He slides his feet, guards the ball well, he completes competes on the glass, and he's been shooting the ball well as well. And they're just that usual pesky Miami Heat type of defense, mixing up scheme, randomly picking up full court, randomly going zone. They were doing a really good job yesterday of bogging down the Cavs pick and roll attack by digging down on the rollman and causing some issues there. They held

Cleveland to just eight points on rollman possessions yesterday. They are the fourth best team in the league at scoring on rollman possessions and had double figures in three straight games on rollman possessions, and the Heat held them to eight just by digging down, slapping at the ball, disrupting the rhythm of those guys on the catch. They defended Donovan Mitchell really well. Good mix of Jimmy Butler and

Hayward Highsmith there. The biggest thing for them by far, though, is they're getting consistent offensive production on two fronts now with Jimmy getting going. If you remember, to start the year was all Tyler, Harrow and Jimmy and Bam were floundering and a lot of bad body language, a lot of weird shots selection and now Jimmy and Tyler have it going and they look more like a good team. And if you believe in the heat right now, they are plus forty five hundred to win the title and

plus sixteen hundred to win the Eastern Conference. Number nine the Golden State Warriors a two and two week los's a tough one to Denver. They were up eight with four and a half minutes left, but then Jokic walked them down, and then the Nuggets got a couple of good defensive possessions against Steph where they denied him. The basketball got some stops. Nuggets got that win. But then the Warriors bounced back by beating Houston without Stephan Draymond,

one of the biggest wins for them this season. Johnavicamingo went off in that game. Really impressive defensive effort from the whole group. Just found money to win a game like that against a really good Western Conference team without your two best players. They split a two game home

set against Minnesota to very different games. Like Draymond came off the bench in the first game and then Wiggins was out for the second game, and it was all basically to facilitate a return for Jonathan Kaminga to the

starting lineup. And the idea here is they desperately need someone that can become that consistent secondary score next to Steph, and statistically, in theory, it's doing that, and his four games that he started here consecutively started all of these last four games, it's averaging twenty one points on forty nine percent from the field and thirty eight percent from three. But it is inconsistent, like he was unbelievably good in the Houston game and then pretty uneven in the Minnesota games.

And so I think part of it is to try to drive some rhythm for Kaminga, to try to get him going so that they get some more consistent scoring next next to Steph. But I also think it serves a second purpose, and that is there have been a lot of reports going around that the Warriors are looking for a second start to pair with Steph. Not a big shock. This has been one of the biggest talking

points surrounding this team to start this season. But changes in value you can go a long way to facilitate that. So even if someone like me doesn't think Jonathan Kaminga is ready to be of secondary scoring option on a championship level team. He can certainly do it during the regular season for a middle of the pack Western Conference team, and then in the process he can increase his trade value. Then on the other end, like for instance, we talked

about Brandon Ingram a lot in the mail bag. If Brandon Ingram has a series ankle injury like this, that could affect his trade value. So maybe something like Kaminga's value going up in Ingram's value going down could facilitate something like that. Or if it's not brandon Ingram, maybe

it's someone else. But I think that's a big part of it too, Just trying to drive rhythm, trying to provide some secondary scoring for Steph, and trying to increase Jonathan Kaminga's trade value by getting him as much opportunity as possible. Last thing I wanted to hit before we move on, there's a really funny moment at the end of the second Timberwolves game. Everyone's seeing the highlight of Dreymond Green getting that dunk and then doing the night

Night celebration as he runs down the floor. But there was a really funny a basketball concept at play there because they ran an inverted ball screen. Was Steph screening for Draymond as he was getting downhill. And it's kind of genius if you think about it, because we all know I should say I shouldn't say genius. It's kind of like diabolical and evil to do this, but that's what's so funny about it. So Draymond obviously doesn't like

Rudy Gobert. Not a big shock. He's openly put him in a headlock on national television and then he if you guys remember in the Western Conference Finals last year, in Game two, he's like throwing a party in the stands as he's covering the Luka Doncic game winner over Rudy Gobert to put the MAVs up two zero in that series. So not exactly a big shock that Draymond doesn't like Rudy Gobert. That said, though, this was the

perfect way to try to humiliate him. So again, like what do we always talk about with inverted ball screens? The big guy who's guarding the ball doesn't have a lot of experience navigating screens because he's usually the screen defender, not the guy fighting through the screen. Right then you've got a shooter screening for Draymon, in this case, the best shooter in the world. So Jad McDaniels, who's guarding Steph, is not going to want to help off of Steph

to stop Draymond Green driving to the basket. So it's a genius play design because all Draymond has to do and you could see he saw the coming the whole time. He's high stepping up the four, just starting to get his groove going before he even starts attacking. And then as he starts driving, all Steph has to do is hit go bear with a good screen. Jada McDaniels is not going to help, and Draymond just turns the corner, goes up there and jackhammers it with one hand and

goes down the floor doing the Night Night. Just hilarious because, like again, this is the type of pettiness that we all live for, right as a beef between two players, a play design specifically to humiliate that player, and then Draymond gets to take his victory lap on Rudy Gobert. If you're looking to bet on the Warriors futures right now, they're plus eighteen hundred to win the title, plus nine

hundred to win the Western Conference. Number eight. The Milwaukee Buck's not gonna spend too much time on him because we just talked about them at the top of the show. But two and two this week blew out the Pistons in Detroit. Then they got ran off the floor against Atlanta, just a really sloppy game for their transition defense that just got ran by all night long by Jalen Johnson. Then they lost a tough game in Boston, and that one was disappointing because they were in that game really

until late and then just made some execution errors. Dame tried to like grift a foul and a three point shot against Jalen Brown on the ensuing miss, Giannis like gambled in the backcourt. Boston scored in transition. I thought Giannis took two really bad pull up jump shots down the stretch of that game that he didn't need to take. I just got tay him out played him both down

the stretch in that game. So a little bit disappointing there, But then they got to bounce back win against Brooklyn that we talked about off the top, which was a really impressive game, and really impressive show of fight from that team. Bucks right now plus seventeen hundred to win the title, plus eight hundred to win the Eastern Conference.

Number seven the Orlando Magic two and two week, a couple of losses in New York and Philly, got some really a couple losses in New York and Philly, and then they won in Philly, and then they got to win at home against the Suns. Got some really bad news on the fran Franz Wagner front. He torez oblique.

Kind of crazy because I've never even I can't even remember the previous time I heard of that injury happening to an NBA player, and now it's happened to two of the best players on the same team, like a month apart, So that's really strange. But they still have a super high floor because they still have a ton of perimeter speed and a lot of guys who can guard the ball at multiple positions. And they already won their first game without Franz coming back to beat the

Suns yesterday. Jalen Suggs really took over the creation load in that game. He's hit four threes in three consecutive games, a lot of really impressive footwork from Jalen Suggs in that game, a lot of like again, it's always interesting when you see guys get hurt and guys step into larger roles, you get to learn more about some of

their more advanced skill development. And Jalen Suggs a lot of like nifty like step throughs and pivots and like pump bakes leading into to counters and just a lot of really impressive scoring chops that he showed in the short to mid range in that game against the Suns. But unfortunately, this Franz Wagner injury comes at the worst possible time because Orlando's next six games are at Milwaukee and then a home stand, but a home stand against OKCE, Miami, Boston,

Miami again, and the New York Knicks. So Mike drop some games here in the standings. It'll be really interesting to see with the high floor I'm talking about at home, playing in front of their home crowd, if they could just somehow eke out two or three of those wins, they could be in pretty good shape moving forward. The magic right now plus forty five hundred to win the title, plus fifteen hundred to win the Eastern Conference Number six.

The Houston Rockets one and two week for them, they lost on the road in Sacramento, and then they suffered a bad loss to Golden State in San Francisco. Without Steph or Draymond playing, offense really bogged down in that one. That's one of the big things I've noticed with Houston this year is the inconsistency of Jalen Green and Fred

Van Vliet. When those two guys are like good, bad and everything in between on any given night, it just is really difficult for them to have like steady offensive production, and like when both of them struggle, they can lose to anyone. That Warriors game, Jalen Green and Fred Van Vliet combined to go nine for thirty two from the

field for just twenty seven points. And again I went over some examples last week, but whenever those two struggle, it's like a guaranteed loss, regardless of who they're playing, just because of their offensive limitations. But Ema Udoka jumped on them after that game and basically called them soft, and then they had a nice little bounce back win

against the Clippers, who are missing James Harden. The Rockets right now are plus five thousand to win the NBA title and plus two thousand to win the Western Conference. Number five the Memphis Grizzlies. They've won three in a row and now nine out of ten. Should have beat Dallas too. They were up big in the fourth quarter, but they really lost their composure in that game, committed several silly fouls, and then they lost Spencer Dinwoody twice

in crunch time for threes. Somewhat discouraging because they had won six in a row against some bad teams and that could have been like that legitimizing win. But then they got their legitimizing win against Boston. They bounced back, first of all beating the Kings, then they beat the Celtics in Boston. John Morangoes for thirty two to nine and nine has one of the best highlights I've seen in the last few years. That double hump reverse dunk. Like he's been putting on a show every night and

he's just becoming musty television. But I watched that dunk, that driving baseline dunk, like twenty times that night. It's legitimately, legitimately one of the best highlights I've seen in recent years, and just goes to show the incredible show that John

Moran is. And then Jared Jackson Junior, he put on an absolute show, a fundamentally great basketball in that second half, just carrying the Memphis offense for stretches, hitting threes, He's putting every Boston wing in the blender and just pivoting over both shoulders for spinning hook shots and just a clinic of post moves. He had three steals and four blocks.

He's been playing really, really well for this team, and it just him giving them like real balance to their scoring because again, like Bain provides like screening action scoring right, like shooting coming off of screens. The guy can get downhill on curls, stuff like that. John Moran's just kind of a unicorn, right, But like Jared Jackson brings the bully ball, he brings the big mismatch attacking forward to beat switches with size, and again that just rounds everything

out for them offensively. That's their third in offense overall over this ten game span, seventh in defense over this ten game span. They're fast on the perimeter, they have rim protection, they're defending the three point line incredibly well. In the streak They're allowing fewer than twelve mad threes per game, which is third best in the NBA over this ten game span. They're also ten top ten enforcing

turnovers and scoring on turnovers over this span. The only weird thing is the Marcus smart fit has looked a little odd as of Lady's been coming off the bench. He's taken some funky shots, his rotation minutes seemed to be shrinking a little bit. It's not as good defensively as he used to be. He was the culprit of a lot of those bad fouls at the end against Dallas. Just something I'm keeping an eye on because I wonder if he ends up getting moved before the end of

this year. The Grizzlies are plus three thousand to win the title, plus fourteen hundred to win the Western Conference. Number four. The Dallas Mavericks quickly becoming one of the teams that I'm highest on here around the NBA. They've won seven in row and eleven out of twelve. They have the best record in the league over the last

twelve games for any team. Third in offense, seventh and defense second net rating, first in rebounding and since returning from injury, Luca has looked more like Luca thirty one eleven to ten on fifty one percent from the field in forty three percent from three, basically the MVP level Luca that we all knew Luca could be, but that he wasn't being to start this year. I wasn't particularly worried about. I figured it would just takes some time,

and it seems to be that he's coming around. And then after going nineteen for thirty from the field over the last two games, Kyrie Irving is now up to sixty three percent true shooting on the season. Remember how we talked about Tyler Harrow in his pull up jump shooting. Kyrie Irving's been the third best pull up jump shooter in the league to start this year. Thirty six players have attempted at least one hundred Kyrie is getting one point one to nine points per attempt, which ranks third.

They're also super deep. They have a half dozen different role players that can be a star on any given night as star in their role I mean, and then they're versatile. They're huge on the front line, fast on the perimeter. I was a little concerned about their perimeter speed to start the year, but then a couple guys popped, like Quintin Grimes has pop, Spencer Dinwitodi has popped, and like getting two athletic guards that basically were considered fringe

rotation guys to start the year. That's really alleviated that concern for me. I feel like they have a ton of matchup flexibility. They have a lot more ball handling and shooting than last year. Again, I believe that Luca and Kyrie will play better in the postseason this year than they did last year. I think they're the third most likely championship contending team in the league this year.

I think they have a favorable schedule for the rest of this month, so like I'd be looking out for Boston or for Dallas, excuse me, to potentially be the number one seed in the West going into the new year, especially if they can win in Oklahoma City tomorrow night and gain a game on them heading into that stretch.

So if you believe in the Maps plus eleven hundred right now to win the title according to DraftKings, plus five point fifty to win the Western Conference number three the Oklahoma City Thunder, really easy schedule for them this week, just the Jazz, the Raptors, and Pelicans. They went three to zero. Put on an offensive masterclass in the first half against Orlando as Shay and Jalen combined for thirty

nine points on eighteen shots to start that game. Alex Cruso got off to a rough start to start this Year's hit multiple threes in backback games for the first time this season, so that's a good sign. Much more fun week for the Oklahoma City Thunder coming up with the n Season Tournament starting with Dallas tomorrow night. Will be covering that game in the Wednesday morning show The Thunder Right Now. Plus three to eighty to win the NBA title, plus one ninety five to win the Western Conference.

Number two the Boston Celtics. It started the week three to zero, including an impressive win over the Bucks where I just thought they out executed him down the stretch. Tatum continues to just do a really nice job executing in the half court. I thought his second half against Milwaukee was one of his best that he's played in a long time. Continues to show just a ton of growth as that surgeon in the half court decision making. When things really slowed down, they dropped a tough one

of the Memphis Grizzlies where they just got outshot. It was a super funky game. They stuck Jaron Jackson and Drew Holiday and just completely ignored him and Drew Holiday like shot sixty percent on corner threes last year, but he's just having a weird year with corner threes this year and down to thirty one percent, obviously a huge drop off from last year, but he just kind of struggled. They kind of threw them out a rhythm as a team, and the Celtics went eighteen for sixty from three in

that game. The Grizzlies only made three fewer threes on twenty seven fewer attempts. I had a lot of people send me questions on Twitter like are you concerned at all with the Celtics and their number in the three point volume that they're taking, And I'm just not. I just I've They've just shown too often that they can rain things in and get the right shots when they need to. This is again like slippage and execution happens

for every single team in the league. For super talented teams like Boston, It's not going to look like it did for the Lakers. It's not going to look like them quitting in Miami and getting blown out by forty. For them, it's going to be like, yeah, they settle a little bit more than they should, maybe they don't defend as sharp as they should, and things get a little funky. But like that's the equivalent of a funk for the Celtics team. Like, I'm not concerned about their

shots selection. They've shown a pretty extended sample to me of them getting that under control when they need to. Tatum again, is just playing at the highest level I've seen him play in the half courts, So to be honest, I'm more confident in the Celtics as a championship favorite than ever. I think they're just better than last year. Again, Tatum is substantially better than last year, both statistically and in his overall feel for the game. Peyton Pritchard has

become arguably the best backup guard in the league. Sam Hauser as of late, is shooting the ball as confidently and effectively as anyone in the league. He's at forty six percent from three on six attempts per game in just twenty three minutes per game over his last eight games, and it's like full on green light, like if he gets any space, it's going up type of stuff, and he's just hitting him at a crazy high rate. Like these are just influxes of talent. Howser getting better, Pritchard

getting better, Tatum getting better. These already make a team that is was the best team in the league talent wise into an even more talented team. And again, I've seen people complaining about Drew and about Jalen and some of their struggles that they're having. I'm just not worried about them. In the big picture. They're gonna be fine. And so I'm just having a hard time conceptualizing any

team beating Boston four times in two weeks. If you agree with me, the Celtics right now are plus two to sixty five to win the title, plus one twenty to win the Eastern Conference, and the number one the Cleveland Cavaliers. They won three straight to start the week, including just eviscerating the Nuggets and picking Rowledge couldn't guard

him in ball screens. Then they dropped a really tough one on the road in Miami, some similar stuff to what we've seen of late, like Miami just attacking Garland a lot in ball screens and in ISO's and then the offensive glass, which is something that has periodically popped up for this team over the years. But they started really good on the defensive glass at the beginning of the season, like they were top ten defensive rebounding team to start the season in the first month or so.

In the last month, though, they've been a bottom ten defensive rebounding team. They give up ten offensive rebounds to Miami in nineteen second chance points. It was basically the difference in the game. And if you remember going back even to the to the Knick series in the first round last or two years ago, this has been something that's popped up for them a little bit periodically as their ability to defensive rebounds. Something to keep an eye

on the Cavaliers right now. Or plus fourteen hundred to win the title and plus six hundred to win the Eastern Conference. All odds are provided by our partner Draft Kings, and that will do it for today's power rankings, and that will do it for today's show. As always, as sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me and supporting Oops tonight. We'll be back tomorrow with a little bit of an end season tournament preview as well as well as a mailbag.

Make sure you get those questions dropped in the comments. I'll see you guys, then the volume. What's up guys. As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting hoops tonight. It would actually be really helpful for us if you guys would take a second and leave a rating and a review. As always, I appreciate you guys supporting us, but if you could take a minute to do that, I'd really appreciate it.