Hoops Tonight - NBA Team Rankings: Can Kevin Durant, Devin Booker & Bradley Beal win Suns a title?

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See Sportsbook dot Draft, Kings dot com, slash Football terms for eligibility terms and responsible gambling resources. Bonus bets expire seven days after inch issuance. Eligibility and deposit restrictions apply. All right, welcome to Hoop tonight here at the Volume, Happy Saturday, everybody hopeful, all of you guys are having a great weekend so far. We are also live on AMP, so if you're watching on youtube're listening on the podcast feeds, don't forget that AMP is the very first place that

you guys can get these shows. We're continuing our power rankings finally today for a break to go over some preseason stuff and to have our special interview with Yovan Booha, which, by the way, Lakers fans, if you missed that, yesterday we recorded about forty minutes or so with Yovan Booja went all over the Lakers training camp, first week of practice, and a bunch of specific questions surrounding the team. So

make sure you guys check that show out. But we're back to our power rankings today with number five the Phoenix Suns. I've got a full season preview on Phoenix, and then I've got three mail bag questions for the end of show as well. You guys know the drope before we get started. Subscribe to the YouTube channel. Don't forget about our podcast feed under Hoops tonight. Follow me on Twitter at Underscore Jason lt and I need more mail back questions, so keep dropping those in the YouTube comments.

All right, So a quick offseason recap. They lost Deandrayton, Darius Basley, a lot of roster turnover here, lost Bismack Biambo, Tory Craig, Jack Landale, Chris Paul, Cameron Payne, Terrence Ross, Lander Shammant, and TJ. Warren. And hang with me here, I'm gonna give really quick breakdowns on you guy that they brought in Grayson Allen, starting two guard for the Bucks the last two years. Outstanding spotted player last year one point twenty six points per possession on two hundred

and thirty possessions. Out of one hundred and twenty six players to log at least two hundred spotted possesions, Grayson Allen ranked second in efficiency there seventy one percent effective field goal percentage on unguarded catch and shoot jump shots. So a guy you just can't really leave open. The nice thing with Grayson Allen is he can really stretch

it out to like twenty six twenty seven feet. So like there's guys that can space to the corners, and then there's guys that can space above the break, and then there are guys that can space outside the above the break line. Remember Ryan Anderson was one of those guys back in the day for the Rockets. But the ability to consistently knock down shots a few feet behind the NBA line on the above the break line is super valuable because it prevents that defensive player from being

able to dig down to the nail. You guys have probably heard that before, where you see a guy icing isolating a defender around the top of the key and you hear the announcers say, like, you know, there's a guy hanging out at the nail. That means is the guy who's guarding the guy on the wing is sagging way off of him, down almost to where the free throw line is, which is where the little nail is that's stabbed into the the hardwood right in front of

the free throw line. Right. So, like one of the best ways to beat nail help is to have a guy who can consistently catch and shoot threes on the wing above the break. But the further you stretch him out behind the line, the harder it is for that guy to make that rotation. And that makes it so that you have all sorts of driving a lane going to that side. So Grayson, now that's where the that's where Grayson Allen brings his best value as a pro

at this point. Keita Bates Job He's a forward who started about half the season for the Spurs last year. He also shot thirty nine percent from three. Bo Bull a seven foot two inch center. He started thirty three games for the Magic last year. On a per thirty six minute basis, fifteen points, ten rebounds, and two blocks against. That's that's per thirty six super talented, is still learning how to play the game at this point in his career.

Juey you Banks super athletic backup center for the Blazers last year. He is undersized first position though he's only about six foot nine, but he did make half of his jump shots. Last year he only took thirty, but he made fifteen of them. I think he's going to be an interesting option for the Suns when they go into more of a switching type of scheme, which we'll talk about later. Jordan Goodwin a bench guard for the Wizards last year. I don't think he'll crack the rotation

this year. Eric Gordon I thought this was an underrated pickup. Eric shot well for the Clippers last year in the regular season, struggled a little bit in the postseason, but again, their shot creation tank t when Kawhi Leonard got hurt and Paul George was out, so you're not getting as quality spot up attempts, if that makes sense. Still a versatile fire hydrant of a defender. I like him better in a switching scheme because he can guard up a position.

Doesn't navigate screens as well as he used to, but he still is a useful perimeter defender. He's really good at being physical without fouling and disrupting guys on their base so that they don't get lyft into their shots. I think he's a good option to have as the fifth guy in any lineup, especially in closing groups. They might need to eventually upgrade. That we'll talk about in a minute, but I like him right now as an option and certainly as a value pick up. Keon Johnson

a bench guard. He came over eight and dale. Don't expect him to play much either. Mess here little. This is a team that's thin at forward, so I wouldn't be surprised if he plays more than you'd expect. A versatile bench Ford has a surprising amount of polished attacking closeouts, can actually put the ball on the floor a little bit,

and can shoot a little bit. He was fifty four percent in effective field goal percentage on catch and shoot jumpers last year, fifty one percent EFFECTI field goal percentage ump pull up jump shots. He actually made thirty five off the dribble jump shots at over a point per possession. That's really impressive. Chimezi Metu, a bench big who played ten minutes a game for the Kings last year, seventeen points and ten rebounds per thirty six minutes. You do

want Navii, a six nine forward for the Nets. Last year. One of the best catch and shoot guys in the league. Last year shot sixty nine percent in effective field goal percentage on catch and shoot jumpers, seventy five percent when he was unguarded, just deadly when he's open. He converted spot at possions at one point two to three points per possession, which is off the charts. Good. They're two major acquisitions or Usuf Nurkic starting center for the Blazers

the last seven years. Believe it or not, usif Durkicic is only twenty nine years old. He just turned twenty nine. That was kind of a shock to me because it feels like he's been in the league forever. And then Bradley Beal. So what I want to do at this point is I want to take a deeper scout on both of those two players, because obviously we're looking at

this as Katie and Devin Booker. This third starter that's going to play the three that that will see you who that ends up being or I guess just it could technically be a four, but I would imagine it will be a three, someone who's more of a primitive defender. And then it's going to be essentially use of Nurkicchen Bradley Beal bracketing all of that. So let's talk about

those two guys for a little bit now. After the use of nurkis trade, there was a lot of pushback and mainly just from a talent perspective, taking a player who was more consistently available and DeAndre and who was a better defensive player like that, that's the angle that everyone's like, what are you guys doing? But if you if you zoom zoom in on it a little bit.

As I started asking people around the league who are more well connected to me, more well connected than me, I should say, most of them were saying the same thing that the Sons are basically looking this, looking at this as a as an upgrade in the form of

short role passing. So again, if you look at the if you look at the Phoenix Suns with Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal, they just because of how dynamic all three of those guys are as pull up shooters and his scorers in general, you're gonna see a lot of really aggressive pick and roll coverages. What does

that mean? That means that when you run your two man game and you bring the guy up to set the screen, or if there's a Nurkic drible handoff or whatever it might be, chances are the screen defender is going to have to show high on every single one of those, meaning the screen defender is gonna have to come out to the three point line to dissuade the

pull up three. And in a lot of cases, you're gonna see teams straight out blitz, meaning they're gonna aggressively show on the pick and roll and double team and try to get the ball out of KD or Devin

Booker or Bradley Bill's hand. So what happens when you do that, It opens up four on three opportunities, not just that, but we're gonna talk a little bit about it in a little bit, But in drible handoff situations, there are four and threes that can materialize too when the screen defender shows If Nurkic hangs onto the ball right in those four on three situations, you just have to be really quick processing the floor and making a decision. It's if you beat it quickly, you can get an

easy basket. If you're just a step slow, they might be able to rotate out of it. Now, one of the things I'm doing this year for all of you guys is it'll be on TikTok and on Instagram, So you can follow me on Twitter at underscore jsonlt That's where I usually talk the game, so to speak, and

I'll tweet out links and show announcements and stuff. Instagram, I've been trying to use for more footage stuff, and I've been doing the same for TikTok as well, So look up Jason timf on Instagram or on TikTok and you'll see some examples. But this morning I put out over a minute of clips of use of Nurkic making plays out of the short role, and he just is he's He's just got like a kind of a knack

for it. He had really good chemistry hitting the cutter out of the weekside corner for lobs and for drop off passes. Even when you'd see the rotation or the defense would rotate to the guy in the corner, he would identify that and make the read to the wing instead, really high level stuff. He's just better at it than DeAndre Ayton, and so I really do think it's gonna make them harder to guard. The other thing I noticed too, is you know, in switches, there were and I put

a couple examples of this as well. You'll see in that same clip, but there are examples where teams would switch. The Damian Lillard use of nirkis pick and roll. He just quickly dives down to the post, makes himself available almost every time he gets double team because he's going against a smaller guard, and then he just makes the kickout pass to whoever's open. He's just really really good at it. And then you know, I went back and

I was looking with the way that synergy works. In order to track down a rollman possessions, I kind of have to go through assists. So it's filtering through basically every assist that use of Nirkic had last year. And as I was looking through, I came across a ton of dribble handoff stuff and he just kind of has a knack for identifying with dribble handoffs materializing kickout situations.

So like if he happens to catch on the wing because Dame works in pick and roll and kicks it back out to him, he'll just catch and then quick go into a dribble handoff with Anthony Simon's on the other side of the floor or vice versa. Right, It's kind of like that Draymond rain dribble handoff type of thing, and he just kind of has an act for it. He's a really good screener, and that can also materialize

in four on threes. Not only does because again I've talked about this with the dribble handoff before, but the dribble handoff is a lot harder to guard than the pick and roll when you have an offensively skilled big because it's much harder for the screen defender to show because the screen defender might be able to show and recover back to the role man if the rollman's not super offensively gifted and is slow to make decisions, right,

but in a dribble handoff situation, he's already got the ball, so like it can be even harder to get back into the picture, like fake the dribble handoff, go to the rim. If my screen defender is showing when I go,

I'm just right past him downhill. It's like it's like a four on three with skipping the pocket pass, which just buys you even more time to make that read, and so I think you're gonna see a lot of use of Nurkic dribble handoff stuff as a way to kind of like facilitate easier opportunities for both the ball handlers and for Nurkic as self himself. Also a much better spot up threat than DeAndre Ayton was. He was up over a point per possession one point zero three,

which is above average. Ayton was below a point per possession on super low volume, and Nurkic I think logged well over one hundred spot up possessions. So like he's just a guy who can actually space the floor a little bit when he doesn't have the ball in any capacity or is not setting a screen, and so I think that brings value. He actually took two point three threes per game last year, which was a career high, and made over thirty six percent of them. So I

look at it just as a big offensive upgrade. Like obviously defensively he's a step down for Ayitan, but on the offensive end of the floor, it's gonna make Phoenix

much harder to guard. And we're gonna talk about this later when we get to the mail back, because there's a mail back question surrounding the Lakers and what type of player they should target in the trade market, And I'm gonna have a similar take there in the sense that like, identify what you're good at and lean into that, because what you want to do is be better at that than anybody you face and have that be the

thing that gets you over the top. Right, if you try to play someone else at their game, you're probably gonna lose if you're not as good at it as they are. And so I like the idea of leaning into offense speak truly and completely unguardable. Frank Vogel is gonna find a way to get you to guard well enough, and maybe that's your best ceiling. And so again, like I was critical of the eight and trade initially when it happened, now having done more research, I understand it better.

I'm still kind of on the fence about it just from a talent perspective with Ayton, but I can see the thought process, and I really do want to see it in practice and actually see it on the floor in these games before we actually take a real hard stance on it. And again, Vogel is a defensive genius. I was so impressed by Vogel as a defensive coach when he was with the Lakers. I think Suns fans are really gonna like him on that end. His weakness

is offensive organization. But you've got so much offensive IQ on the floor just with those four guys that I don't think that's gonna be an issue. So it's kind of the perfect coach for this particular situation. It's kind of similar to having Tom Brady essentially being the brains of your offense while you know Bill Belichick focuses on the defensive end. It's kind of like a smart pairing

in that sense. And you gotta look at the personnel here because, like Frank Vogel is traditionally like a drop coverage coach who prefers to guard actions two on two, meaning when there's a ball screen, Vogel does not want to help if he can avoid it, and he wants to try to get the guard to chase over the top and funnel downhill into the rim protector. But typically that requires a great rim protector, and Frank Vogel's had great rim protectors in his career, Guys like Roy Hibbert,

guys like Anthony Davis. You get the point. So, like, obviously this team is different, and so I'll be really interested to see how Vogel changes his schematic approach with this particular team, because the way I look at it,

I think they should be trying to mimic Denver. I think that they should try to use their pick and roll defense similar to the way Denver does by bringing Nurkic higher in ball screens because you gotta identify, like with the offensive minded guys like Brad Bleil, Devin Booker, and Kevin Durant, they probably aren't gonna chase over screens

super well. Obviously Frank's gonna ask him to. I think I would imagine he's aware that he's not gonna get the same type of commitment fighting over the top of screens that he did from Dennis Schroeder and Alex Crusoe when he was with the Lakers, Right, So, like, my guess is he's gonna offer more high help, so he's gonna have Nurkic come up high. This is what the

Nuggets do with Jokic for the most part. They also ran some deeper drop but for the most part, the Nuggets ran throughout last season a high drop with Nikola Jokic. Then they ask Aaron Gordon to help out of the weakside corner basically as the low man, meaning like he's keeping tabs on the guy on the weakside corner, but also offering help at the rim as an athlete. That's a role that Kevin Durant can excel in. So that's kind of the way I'd like to see them kind

of set up. Their defense is basically against bad pull up jump shooting teams. And this now Denver got away with it, Like Denver ran their deep drop against the Lakers and against the Timberwolves and against the a Heat because of the fact that they didn't have high level pull up jump shooting, right, But then against Phoenix they were bringing Jokic up higher. Right. That's the kind of

decision that that Vogel's gonna make. He's gonna look at the situation like I, Okay, this particular matchup, they don't have great pull up shooting. We can sit in a deeper drop guard these actions two on two stay at a rotation. Okay, now we're playing you know, Steph Curry or one of the other great pull up jump shooters

in the league. Okay, we're bringing Nurkic up high, we're sitting in, we're kind of showing or in a high drop in these situations and asking Kevin Durayt to kind of help on the backside defending the action three on two. I think that's kind of the way that they're gonna try to defend and then essentially just have really smart

rotations on the back end. And that's where accountability is going to become a big deal, especially with the stars on the roster, and lastly with the with the Nurkic thing, He's just much more willing to buy into a role on a team than DeAndre Ayton is. And so again, like even if we look at the relative ceilings, who's more likely to reach their relative ceiling with this team Probably Nurkish And so I think that's another potential upside here.

Bradley Beild, Yeah, average twenty three points, four rebounds, five assists and fifty games for the Wizards last year. Fifty nine percent true shooting, which is the third highest mark of his career, shot over fifty percent from the field. It was a big indicator there. Six hundred and sixty eight points on six hundred and fifty nine pick and rolls. That's only one point zero one points per possession, or the sixty second percentile. We'll talk about efficiency in a minute,

because I have a theory there. Forty seven points on forty five post ups, he's a good post up guard. One point zero four points per possession. That's fifty seven percent tile two hundred and ten points on two hundred and thirty eight ISOs that's zero point eighty eight points per possession, which is in the thirty ninth percentile. Now, when we're looking at efficiency there, again, you gotta remember

it's a bad team. He's taking a lot of shots, he's getting the brunt of the defensive game planning, and he's passing to lesser players than some of the better teams that you see in the league. So just keep that in mind, excuse me. I expect Bradley Beal to be a very efficient scorer and shot creator for the Suns. This year. He was an excellent spot up player, one

point one to six points per possession. He shot fifty seven percent in effective field goal percentage on catch and shoot jump shots, forty nine percent effective field goal percentage on pull up jump shots. Again, that's not great. That's good, not great, but again you got a factor in the type of shots that he had to take with this particular team, he was one of the best rim finishing guards in the league. And this is an exciting thing

for the Suns. Three point five restricted area makes per game, which is awesome, and then seventy two percent shooting in the restricted area, which is like unbelievably good. That's like lebron Giannis territory, not quite a bit close. In that territory, those guys are around seventy five percent. For a guard to be up over seventy percent is basically unheard of.

And so Bradley Beal, I think that's going to be an interesting way for him to impact winning on this team is to apply rim pressure, which is something that the team can struggle with. Outside of Devin Booker. Let's talk about the concept of diminishing returns for a minute. So those of you guys have been listening to the show for a while, I've heard me say this about many different teams, but it's a consistent talking point I

brought up with this particular Suns roster. When you have responsibilities that have to be filled on the floor, stars take up huge chunks of those responsibilities. So let's look at the offensive end and look at like shot creation responsibilities, play finishing responsibilities out of like the short role, pick and roll type stuff, pick and pop type and stuff, and then like spot up play, like attacking closeouts, you know, driving kick basketball. There's all these responsibilities to have to

get filled. And so when you drop a and I'm not even talking about the defensive end yet, when you drop a star into the equation, he takes up so much of the shot creation responsibilities, which is great, But then you add a second guy in there, and now it's like, great, Okay, now we have two great guys that can create shots. Okay, now we're adding a third dude who can create shots. That's awesome, But like how good are we in play finishing and how good are

we in spot up situations? Right? And then the defensive end of the floor, Like a lot of times a guy, an offensive player will take a smaller role offensively, right, like I'm only going to operate in spot up situations off the ball, or I'm only going to operate in the short role. But on the defensive end, I'm like your best point of attack defender I'm your best pick and roll screen defender or whatever it is, Like, you

have bigger responsibilities on that end. And if Devin Booker, Kevin Durant, and Bradley Beal just focus on shot creation, you're gonna see a lot of responsibilities on the floor that don't get filled. And so again, like this team, I'm gonna talk about this more when we get later, but like it gets to the end of the show. But like when we talk about the big picture, but this team does have a wide range of potential outcomes based on just the level of commit from these guys.

So like, if Bradley Beal commits to defense and operates off the ball a lot and attacks the rim a lot with force, then he can massively raise the ceiling by filling areas of the of the of the responsibilities on the floor that need to be filled. Right. If KD becomes one of the best help defenders in the league, like I talked about, that could be the difference between them having a functional defense and not having a functional defense.

Kd's rebounding has been down recent years. Obviously you're gonna need KD to rebound a lot. You know, these are things that are are gonna be worth watching over the course of the season. Devin Booker like he's a He's turned himself into a slightly above average point of attack defender. He might have to go up a level from there potentially, right, especially if you end up going offense at the three

instead of going with someone like Joshakog. So like, each of the stars has to view the depth of star talent as a means with which to devote resources to dirty work. And if they do those things, I think they're gonna hit the high end of their probability. All right, let's look at the depth chart really quick. At guard Devin Booker, Bradley Beal, Grayson Allen, Eric Gordon, Damian Lee, Jordan Goodwinning, Keon Johnson. Really deep there, that's like five playable,

legitimately playable guards, four of which are very good. At the forward position, a little thing. Kevin Durant, you know, obviously one of the best players in the league. But after that, it's all bench forwards. It's Nazier, little Josha Kogi. You to want nab and Key debates job at center, use of Nurkics, Drew u Banks and Bull Bull that's a decent rotation right there, the clear week point of

the roster is at forward. You don't have a starting caliber player that you can slot between Bradley Beal and Devin Booker and Katie and Yusef Nurkic. And there's a bunch of options there, right, Like, you can go with Josha Kogi as a point of attack guy. He's one of the better point of attack defenders in the league. Right, you can go with Eric Gordon for shooting and then kind of lean more in a switching scheme because Eric

Gordon can switch on to forwards. You can go Grayson Allen for that above the break shooting that I was referencing earlier. You do want Nabby is deadly, especially out of the corner, so you can go with him too. But each of those guys has a red flag. Each of those guys has a weakness, right, Like a Kog is a extremely limited spot up threat. Eric Gordon is older at this phase and not as good defensively as it used to be. Grayson Allen obviously is undersized and

has some limitations there. You do want Nabby, you know, is a little upright and can struggle to defend on the perimeter. So each of those guys has kind of like a big red flag. And so don't be surprised if, over the course of the season, if the Suns are one of the teams that gets mentioned a lot in conversations for a versatile like point of attack defender that can shoot, just keep an eye on that over the

course of the season. So on offense, and we've already talked a lot about this with the Nurkics thing, but you know, I know this is not exactly a hot take, but I think the Suns are gonna score shit ton of points. It's not just that they have three shot creators. They have three highly versatile shots. All three of them Bradley Beal, Devin Booker, and Kevin Durant can all run pick and roll. They can all torch bigs on switches on perimeter. ISOs right, They all can punish smaller guards

in the post. They all can play off ball, they all can pass. The basketball use of Nurkic as that dribble handoff folk room we talked about earlier, and with his ability to pass, and with his ability to punish switches in the post and his ability to space the floor like they're just going to be really, really difficult

to guard. The biggest question mark offensively is going to be that fifth starter, because the ECoG problem is is like, if you keep him on the floor, your defense goes up a big level, right, because Joshakogi is such an outstanding point of attack defender. But the downside is is he's so weak as a spot up player that you allow other teams to defend your actions three on two. And I don't care how good Devin Booker, Bradley Beal,

and Kevin Durant are. They become infinitely more guardable when you can sacrifice a third defender into that action and not have to worry about giving up much at all of anything on the weak side. And so that to me is going to be something to keep an eye on over the course of the season. I would probably go all in on offense again, like referencing that idea that we talked about earlier and being like kind of

leaning into your strengths. This has the potential to be one of the great offensive teams of all time, and so I would probably go with Eric Gordon as the starting three. I consider you to want not be if you're having issues with rebounding. I'm sure they'll try a bunch of different guys in that position, and like I said, I wouldn't be surprised if they try to upgrade it over the course of the season. Again, look out for

use of Nurkic az a folkrum. Look Out for more dribble handoffs than you're used to seeing from the Suns. And again, like he just is a really good screener in scoring threat. So I think that's gonna make their ball screen game more dynamic. One last thing to watch offensively, hunting mid range shots. It's fine, it's the identity of this team as long as you're making them in the

regular season. Last year, Katie shot over sixty percent from the field on mid range pull up jump shots, just from the mid range, over sixty percent, and that's including the nets and the Suns regular season reps. Like, that's over one point two points per possession. That's awesome and that works. The problem is is as a team, the Suns shot just forty six percent on pull up twos against Denver. That's zero point ninety two points per shot.

You see the difference. What's the difference between a one to twenty offensive rating and a ninety two offensive rating, completely untenable. The defense has to do something. We can live with that shit, that's the difference, right. KD himself was only forty two percent on pull up twos in the playoff or in the Denver series. That's zero point eighty four points per shot. The coaches are just gonna live with that. As a result, the Sun's not just a one to ten point six offensive rating in the

series against the Nuggets. That's just not close to good enough, especially when you fancy yourself an offensive juggernaut. So one of two things needs to happen, Like either KD needs to start making those shots in the playoffs, which we've had two postseasons in a row where he hasn't, So he either needs to just start making it because those are fluky series. Or as a team, they got to adjust their shot selection and try to identify things that are going to be more efficient on a per possession

basis in the postseason. More pull up threes, right, More attacking the rim and trying to draw foul so you can set your defense. That sort of thing. On the defensive end, again, we talked about it earlier, but the Denver scheme is something I'd consider, so like bringing Nurkic high end drop against better pull up jump shooters, offering a lot of weak side help with Kevin Durant when Drew Eubanks is out there because he's a better athlete.

I wouldn't be surprised if you saw them do more switching. You can imagine a lineup with Booker Beal and kd in U Banks and then like Eric Gordon, and then that just being like five guys that you feel generally comfortable switching with as long as you help on the weak side and rotate out of it. So that's something I'd look for. And then defensive rebounding is just going to be a key all season, like how well as a team do they work on tracking down and hunting

rebounds down. They got absolutely murdered on the glass by Denver, and that's just something you got to be able to contend with if you're gonna get out of the Western Conference. In summary, I think this team has the widest range of outcomes between like the worst case scenario and the best case scenario. Even if we factor in good health. There's a version of this story where they're healthy all year and they lose in the first or second round

and hover around the bottom half of the standings. There's a version of this where they kick everyone's ass and win the title. And it really just comes down to whether or not the Stars are dedicated to the dirty work, which I believe they will be, so I lean more towards the high end of that, which is why I have them as high as I do. But again, like it's gonna come down to the little things, and I talked about this earlier, but with parody in the league. Like, again,

all these teams are really good for different reasons. The Suns have all this offensive firepower. The Lakers have the best defense in the league, in my opinion, best defensive player in Anthony Davis. Obviously, I think they have some wrinkles they got to sort out in their playoff defense. The Denver Nuggets have the best playoff offense in the league. Like they're just unguardable on the offensive end in the playoffs. The Milwaukee Bucks had this new dame Yiannis thing, but

they're weak in point of attack defense. You know. The Boston Celtic are poised to be a truly elite defense, but they still struggle with top end shot creation. So each team in that list has strengths and weaknesses, right, Like, and it's gonna come down to the little things, Like it's not just Phoenix's offense versus the Lakers defense, it's are the Lakers deeply committed to those details? Is Darvin

Ham gonna be able to make the necessary adjustments? Is Frank Vogel gonna be able to make the necessary adjustments? Like these are the kinds of things over the course of the playoffs that are gonna make the difference between teams that are relatively close, Like I have the Suns at five, but they're not demonstrably worse than the number one team, Like they're not like they're all on the

same tier. Like I'm splitting hairs with these rankings. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Phoenix feat all four of them, like Golden State is clearly a little level below these guys. The other five are all on the same tier. In my opinion, I just have the Suns at five based on basically my concern over whether or not they're gonna be willing to win in rock fights, which we will find out. I think there's a lot of Again, I've seen a lot of Suns fans like, oh,

we took two games off of the Nuggets. Yeah you did, but you got your ass kicked in the other four games, Like literally got your ass kicked worse than any of the other teams. And in the two games you want, it required like all time great shooting from Devin Booker, like two of the greatest shooting performances you'll ever see in the NBA playoffs to barely scrape out two wins before you got your ass kicked in the other four games.

So I think they're further away than people think, at least they were last year, and we'll see this year how committed they are to those details. All, let's move on to the mailbag. I saw in the Yovan Booja video that a lot of people were complaining about us talking about the Lakers. Again, I kind of give a

speech like this every year. But a couple things. Obviously, I have a job to do, and that is to generate revenue, otherwise I don't get a job right, and so I have a certain obligation to cover the teams that have the largest fan bases. So it's gonna be a lot of Lakers, it's gonna be a lot of Warriors, it's gonna be a lot of Celtics, it's gonna be a lot of knicks and heat and things along those lines, right. But the reality is, like I go five or six days a week, like we we do over three hours

of NBA content every single week. And so even if an hour and a half of it is Lakers and Warriors, which it won't be, but like, let's just say a third of it is Lakers and Warriors, and let's say the Lakers and the Warriors are in a lot of the titles and thumbnails and stuff, that doesn't mean that that's all we're doing. I cover the entire league, like those of you guys who follow the show more diligently

on a daily basis know that. And so one of the couple things one of the things we're gonna be doing this year is we're gonna use We're gonna put out multiple videos. So for instance, like if I have a show in the regular season that covers five games, we'll have the full show, but then we'll break off the portions of it that are the other teams so

that you guys can find it more easily. But again, like you gotta remember, like most of the days, most of the NBA shows don't go daily, like they'll hit all the teams, but they'll go two or three times a week. Right, That's the advantage of going as often as we go is I can cover the super popular teams very diligently, but still offer pretty well rounded coverage of the rest of the league. So just stay to

stay glued to the feeds. You'll see it parsed out better if you If you go to the YouTube channel and you see a thirty minute video and it's got Lebron's face on it, or it's got Steph Curry's face on it, chances are I'm not talking Lebron or Steph for thirty minutes. It's probably Lebron or staph for ten minutes, and then twenty minutes on the rest of the league. So again, like there there's there's a there's a business

reality to the way this show is organized. But I do truly take it seriously that we cover the entire NBA, and I'm going to put in an enormous amount of work this year to make sure these other teams get covered. You just gotta understand that We have a marketing plan which is going to market to large fan bases because that's where the money is. But we are going to try to do a better job of making sure that the videos are are easier to find for the other

teams as well. All Right, three mail back questions. What's up Jay dig the show big time when ring culture? With ring culture being such a huge swing factor in players legacies, how and where will Dane be placed if he wins a chip with Giannis Katie's chips are somewhat still in question to some because it wasn't his team. I'm curious how it will be viewed and what a

chip could mean to his overall place in history. I don't think he's ever going to move, you know, into serious conversations with any of the guys that we think of as best players in this era. I mean, he's made one first team All NBA's that's a huge gap between him and some of his peers. He's kind of always just been considered a fringe All star, like a superstar, Like he's a superstar, but like in the bottom end of that tier. And so I mean, obviously becoming a

champion would greatly improve for Yorlans all time. But I think he's a long long way away from being into any serious conversations with the guys at the top of the league. But like also a lot of it has to do with how it goes down, Like if Dame shoots forty two percent in the postseason and struggles and they barely get it done, and Giannis is a superhero, it's not gonna look as good as if he makes a ton of big shots and puts the team on his back and crunch time and kind of is clearly

the one that puts him over the top. And so really that question has a bunch of layers to it, but the short version is, no matter what happens, he's not going to enter into any really serious conversations with the championship this year. Next question, funny enough, it's a more pointed version of the question you asked Jovan in regards to the Lakers need for a shot maker and or elite perimeter defender. Let's say the Bulls blow it up this year, should the Lakers pursue Zach Levine as

a shot maker or Alex Cruso as an elite perimeter defender? Also, what other players do you think the Lakers should keep an eye on. So basically I talked about this with yo Von, But like, if you can get a shot maker that's a true top tier shot maker, someone like

Kyrie Irving, then yeah, you gotta go for it. Like if the Mavericks just completely bottom out this year and Kyrie asked for a trade and the Lakers have the assets to make it happen, then you do something like that obviously because it just he's such a top tier shot creator. It would alleviate all of the Lakers issues on that end and make them a much more versatile team, right,

No different than Dame joining the Milwaukee Bucks. Right, But if it's anybody less than that, I think you run the risk of shifting towards an identity that you're not gonna be as good at as the best teams in the league. So, like, given the choice between Levine and Caruso,

I take Caruso. Why Because this is a Lakers team that desperately needs a perimeter defender that is a functional offensive player and that's what Alex Cruso is, And like that could put the Lakers over the top into being a truly elite, top tier defense Whereas right now they're capable of that, but they're missing some of the top you know, perimeter talent that they need to make that happen,

right especially with the loss of Dennis Schroeder. So you know, given the choice between those two guys, like that's that's kind of like a perfect example of what I'm talking about at the deadline. If the Lakers have access to a top tier shot creator, you go get them. But if you can't, then I would go after an elite perimeter defender that rounds out your starting lineup. Uh, last mail back question. I hear a lot of players and coaches talk about. One of the main things they place

an emphasis on is accountability. Are they talking about getting star players to buy in or what do they mean by that? Accountability is basically just like everybody in the entire locker room being bought in to what the expectations

are from the staff. So like usually in a training camp, I mean, obviously I haven't been through an NBA training camp, but I've been through the college basketball version of training camp, and you know, like the serious programs that you go to, like you, like the last school I played out, like you you literally go up into classroom and they hand out binders, and the binders have like a clear breakdown of what expectations are off the court, a clear breakdown

of expectations in terms of showing up to practice on time and what you know, like specific team rules, and then like you go through it and it's like then there's five or six things that the coach wants to set as like essentially your your core principles, and then like then it has all your plays in it, like as a playbook, and your base defensive concepts and like essentially that there's there's expectations laid out from day one, and then from there it's about holding people accountable to

those expectations. Famously that that last year that I was playing at ACU, and when the coach handed out all that stuff, we had another meeting two days later in the same class classroom to go over one of our defensive concepts, and like half the players forgot to bring their binder and we immediately just went down to the floor and ran all day like like like because that was an example of him like trying to from day one set an expectation for what the rules are and

make sure that the team understands that if they don't live up to those expectations, then there's going to be repercussions. That is accountability. Accountability is making sure that people understand if they do not obey whatever the rules are, whatever the expectations are, that there are consequences, whether that's getting called out in front of your team, whether that's having to run, whether that's a suspension or fine, like whatever that is. And at the pro level it's probably different

than it was in college. But like, accountability is making sure that everybody in the roster sticks to those principles. So for instance, like let's say Frank Vogel wants to set you know, a defensive identity from day one in SUNS camp, like he can't make Josha Kog run over screens and scream at him every time he dies on the screen. But then let Bradley Bealll get away with it.

It's got to be down the line accountability. Otherwise it sets a culture that the stars don't have to obey, which is gonna, you know, kind of foam in a bunch of other issues. So again, accountability is a vitally important part of any championship journey because if you don't have expectations and you don't stick to them, you're never gonna achieve your full potential as a bad basketball team. All right, guys, That is all I have for today

is always I sincerely appreciate you supporting the show. We're gonna be back on Monday with a breakdown of the preseason games from this weekend, and then we'll get back to number four on the season previews on Tuesday, and then we'll do some more preseason breakdown on Wednesday. I appreciate you, guys, and I will see you on Monday. The volume