Hoops Tonight - NBA Team Rankings: Is Donovan Mitchell good enough to lead Cavaliers to Finals?

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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 tonight here at the Volume. Happy Thursday, everybody. I hopeful if you guys are having a great week so far. We are live on AMPS, so if you're watching on YouTube or listening on the podcast feeds, don't forget that AMP is the very first place that you can get

these shows. We're continuing our Power Rankings today, covering the Cleveland Cavaliers with a full season preview. And then I've got two mailback questions, and then I want to kind of follow up on my Damian Lillard take from the other day. You guys know the Joe Porta. Get started.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel, follow me on Twitter at Underscore Jason lt don't forget about our podcast feed under Hoops tonight, and I need mailback questions, so drop those in the YouTube comments for us to hit at the end of our shows. All right, let's talk some basketball, so really quick before I go up front. I don't know how this happened, but they got switched. I had the Knicks at fourteen and the Calves at thirteen. That

should be reversed. I intended for the Knicks to be above the Calves, So consider the Calves at fourteenth on my list, and consider the Knicks at thirteen. But I could care less about the order for all intents and purposes. I'd rather just dive into the teams and talk about some basketball. So let's do that today. So obviously, the Calves had a lot of roster turnover this summer, specifically designed to address their biggest roster weakness, which was shooting.

But I want to take a second differentiate between what was the biggest weakness on paper or in process during the regular season versus why they lost to the Knicks, because I think they're very different, and I think that if you move only to address that big picture flaw in weakness, you could overlook the real reason why they were losing, and those reasons are reasons that are not gonna go away just because you brought in some guys

that can knock down some threes. Because here's the thing, shooting is definitely their biggest weakness in the big in the big picture. But that's not why they lost to the Knicks. In fact, they made thirty seven percent of their catch and shoot threes in that series. That's perfectly fine. There were nine playoff teams, nine of the sixteen teams that shot worse in their spot up situations. The Cavs converted spot up possessions in the Knick series at one

point two points per possession. That's not just good, that's off the charts good. That was the second best mark out of any of the sixteen playoff teams last year. So hitting open guys and them not being able to make shots, that's not why you lost to the Knicks. Bringing in Max Struce and George's kneeang as guys that can make threes is not going to fix that problem. They lost this series in five games. Three of the

four losses didn't even involve a clutch situation. I mean, they couldn't even get it within five points with five minutes left. They got smacked. So why why did they get smacked? That's the important thing that needs to be diagnosed here. I had three main reasons that I put down, and I talked about all three of these during the series, but I actually went back and watched a bunch of

the series this morning and they stood out to me again. Now, reason number one by far the biggest reason why the Knicks kicked the Cavs ass last year, and I bet you Cavs fans can probably guess this. They're bigs. Evan Mobley and Jared Allen got their ass kicked. Mitchell Robinson absolutely obliterated them on the glass. He had twenty nine

offensive rebounds in five games. To give you an idea, Evan Mobley and Jared Allen combined between the two of them to get already offensive rebounds, so Mitchell Robinson almost had as many offensive rebounds by himself. And then, as I predicted before the series, Evan Mobley struggled a little bit with the physicality of Julius Randall because he's just so much bigger than him that he can dislodge him when he beats him to spots. Isaiah Hartenstein killed him

on the glass two. As a team, the Knicks had seventy five offensive rebounds in five games. That's unheard of. That is unbelievably good. But here's the problem. We're just talking about the glass here. It actually got worse because the Cavs were a excellent pick and roll team in the regular season, as we know, we're gonna talk about that a lot today, but as we pointed out, when they kicked it out to shooters in this series, they

actually made shots. And you know, part of the kind of plot line in that series was like, oh, we know the Knicks are gonna ignore Isaacacorro and they're gonna ignore Lamar Stevens, and they're gonna force them into taking, you know, a tough shots in pick and roll. Right. Well, the biggest problem was actually the role men. The Calves as a team logged thirty seven roleman possessions in the series, and they converted them into just eighteen points. That's zero

point four to nine points per possession. Here's how bad that was. Twelve of the sixteen playoff teams last year were over a point per possession in rollman possessions. Minnesota, Brooklyn and the Clippers were the only three teams that were below a point, and all three of them were over zero points seventy five points over three quarters of a point. The Calves were less than half of a point. Evan Mobley by himself had thirteen rollman possessions that he

converted into one point a free throw. He was zero for ten from the field. And this is where the actual kind of organization of the team got screwed up, because what was happening was is Julius Randall's guarding Evan Mobley. You're on a pick and roll with Darius Garland or Donovan Mitchell. Julius Randall is showing high to stop the pull up jump shot, and so the slip is wide open, and they're throwing that pass over the top to Evan Mobley, who's catching the ball wide open in the middle of

the floor. And every single time you've got Jared Allen standing there in the dunker spot ready to go up. Mitchell Robinson would just hang back and kind of bait Evan Mobley into come in into him, and then as he would jump, he would time it perfectly meet him up top and force him into a tough floater over

the top, which he literally could not make. He too frequently missed that lob pass to Jared Allen or couldn't figure out a way to bait Mitchell Robinson into committing so that he could make that pass, and then when they would dig down from the weak side too often he missed the kickout pass. So the math from there

is pretty simple. You can put it together. So if you're allowing the other team to show high on ball screens but not punishing them on the short roll, like literally not ever scoring in the short role, then you're gonna get killed and pick and roll offensively right like you're you're gonna take what was one of the most effective pick and roll offenses in the league in the regular season, and it's gonna completely fall apart the way

it did against the Knicks. And so that was the first big reason and by far the biggest reason why they lost that series. Their bigs got their ass kicked on the offensive glass, and their bigs couldn't do enough to be a threat and pick and roll in the dunker spot and as a role man. So that's reason number one. The other two reasons came down to the guards. Both Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell I thought missed too many of those kickout opportunities. Donovan Mitchell in particular had

a rough series in this regard. When I was watching the tape this morning, it's crazy how many reads he missed, not just like skip passes the shooters, but like he straight up missed Jared Allen for dunks a bunch of times in that series underneath the basket, and like tried to force something up over Mitchell Robinson that he would miss. And you know, again, like we talked about, they had one point two points per possession and spot up situations.

That's great, but they didn't get as many of those possessions as they should have because the reads weren't being made. And part of that's frustration. I really think that it's a common thing that basketball players will do. A really really good basketball player, when they're frustrated by something that's happening around them that's out of their control, they'll respond

by forcing the issue. And both of them took a lot of really tough shots that they probably didn't need to take over the course of that series, and so offensive process was kind of the second reason and then the third reason was the defensive entry points. And a lot of people are gonna want to say Cheddy Osmond, and don't get me wrong, Cheddy Osmond was an issue. Jalen Brunston picked on him relentlessly and then whatever was you think he played like nineteen minutes a game in

that series, But it wasn't just him. The reality is is that every single time a Cleveland Cavalier ball handler looked up and saw Darius Garland on them, their eyes lit up. It'd be like, you know, Jalen Brunson seeing that he's got Darius Garland on him and immediately taking him to work, or you know r J. Barrett would catch on the left wing or in the left corner and be like, oh shit, Darius Garland's on me. Hard

ripped through the left easy layup like that. That's an entry point that's gonna be a problem when you have two small guards, one of which is bad defensively and the other is average at best. It's kind of a roster alignment issue. And so again, like it's important to differentiate between what their big picture issues were in the regular season and why they lost to the Knicks. The reason why they lost to the Knicks had very little

to do with their role players. It's easy to focus on role players because it allows you to avoid big picture conversations. Right, And let's look at this Cavs offseason. They went and got a bunch of shooting, right, It's clear that they view the role players as the reason why things went the way they did. And that is the easier solution, because it's much harder to sit down as a front office and be like, Hey, do you know why Evan Mobley had to contend with Mitchell Robinson

every single time he caught on the short role. Oh, we're running a two big offense in twenty twenty three. And for the record, they have to right now, right because Jared Allen is your only guy that can play starting center, because Evan Mobley right now is a little too thin and not quite ready for that type of physical responsibility, right, and Evan Mobley is a limited offensive player at this point. Let's just put it straight up. So for the record, Evan Mobley was the very worst

spot up player in the entire NBA last year. There were one hundred and eighty two players who attempted at least one hundred and fifty spot up possessions. Last year, Evan Mobley scored zero point six to one points per possession in those situations, which was dead last in that group. So at a low volume limit one hundred and fifty reps, almost half the league had that many, one hundred and

eighty two players, he was dead last. So you can't put him in the corner and have Jared Allen run screens because you don't have to guard him out there. And so as a result, you have to run this Jankee system or Evan Mobley set in the ball screens and he rolls hard to the rim and Jared Allen is waiting in the dunker spot and you hope Evan Mobley can make plays. Here's the problem. In the regular season that works pretty well, but you're run into a

good playoff defense. And here's the thing. The Knicks were not even that good of a defense. I think there were nineteenth in defensive rating last year. Now it's about matchups because the Cavs are are typically not a good spot up team, even though they were in that series. And so Tom Thibodeaux is allowed to and able to kind of pack the paint in a certain way and yeah, maybe there's a matchup they could have caught somewhere along the way where they would have fared better in pick

and roll. But I would argue, if your intention is to get out of the Eastern Conference and have a chance to win the championship, you're not ever going to do that when you've got two guys on the floor that are non threats offensively. And I'm again, I'm a huge believer in Evan Mobley in the long run. I'm not trying to sit here and be super critical of Evan Moble hes he just finished his second season as

a pro. But like, now you're starting to see some of the imbalances, right because you have this system built around two small guards and two bigs. That's the other Like, that's another big picture question that you'd have to have.

Are you gonna sit down in the front office and be like, is there, uh, is it a good idea to have our two best shot creators, the two guys we lean on most offensively that we have to play together a lot, be two small guards, one of which is a bad defender and the other is average at best and most of the time bad. Like that's that's that's a big That's a tough conversation because how do

those conversations end. Those conversations end with Like, if we give Evan Mobley the center position, we're not going to be as good for a while as Evan Mobley learns how to play center in the NBA and has to bulk up. Right if we if we address the guard issue, then that means we have to trade one of them. And like, that's a tough conversation to have. And so what ends up happening is instead it's like, hey, well

let's blame the role players. Let's blame Chetti Osmon and Isaac Kora, right, and and so then you go out and you get and George' kneeaning and you run it back. But what's gonna end up happening is you're gonna be in the exact same predicament this summer or this this coming summer when you get to April, May June, when

you have the exact same roster imbalances. Like ideally in the modern MBA, you want to have your roster dispersed among the three core star archetypes, right, Like you want some sort of shot creating guard that can run, pick and roll and pick defenses apart. You want some sort of like power playmaking forward, and then you want a

defensive anchor at the center position. And then slotted between those three spots, you want versatile like a versatile guard and a versatile forward that can defend and can shoot and play off the ball. That's ideally how you want to orient a team. The only teams that get away with not following that structure are teams that have all

time great offensive unicorns. Like, yeah, if you've got Steph Curry or Nikola Jokic, you might be able to get away with a little bit of a funky lineup, right, Like Jokic is the first the Denver Nuggets are the first team to win the title without a dominant defensive front court. Yeah, that's true, but they've got Nikola Jokic, the potentially the best offensive player of all time when it's all said and done. Like that's the potential he has.

It's like, okay, the Warriors, they they won with small ball. Yeah, you're right, but they've got Steph freakin Curry. And again, like Donovan Mitchell and Darius Garland are really good players,

they're not Steph Curry and they're not Nicola Jokich. And so when you run into roster and balances and you don't have the superhuman offensive production that allows you to kind of like mitigate some of those issues, you're gonna run into problems you don't have, Like you're your best athletic forward is Evan Mobley, who right now is several seasons away from being ready offensively to be a perimeter player and more than likely in the perfect world operates

as like a Kevin Garnett esque center for you ideally in the long run, right, So that means you need a forward. Who's your dynamic forward. You don't have one, So you're running two bigs and two small guards, and yeah you can JB. Bicker Staff has done an amazing job getting these dudes to play hard. We're gona talk about their defense in a little bit. They did a lot of things really well defensively last year. There's best defense in the league. You can fake it in the

regular season a certain amount. That's been a big theme on the show. We just talked about it in the Knixt Show yesterday, Like, yeah, you can get away with a lot in the regular season. How many times are we going to see a Calves, a Knicks or not excuse me, Calves, a King's or a Memphis Grizzlies team win a shit ton of regular season games and then lose to a middle of the pack veteran team. Like

we've seen this too many times. You can't be swayed by regular season results now unless you have a different end game in mind. If your goal is to win fifty regular season games every year and just be interesting while you lose in the first or second round, then by all means, this is the way to go. But if that's the case, then, like why did you trade for Donovan Mitchell? Then? Because he's on a different timeline.

He's a little bit older, right Evan Mobley's. By the time Evan Mobley enters his prime, Donovan Mitchell could be thirty and not be the same athlete that he is now. So like that's where I struggle to understand, like the kind of like big picture direction that this is going

the big picture discussions are are we oriented properly? And the answer to that is probably no. But those conversations are really hard to have for Kobe Altman in that front office, and so instead they target off ball players, which they did and so again for the purpose of this preview that we're gonna focus on what they are and what they're going to be. But I do think it's important to acknowledge that they did not lose because

of their role players. They lost because the Mitchell Garland Allen Mobley quad, whatever you want to call it, that foursome is misaligned. On the same basketball team. You've got two dominant pick and role players playing the hardest brand of pick and roll you can possibly play, which is the rim protector sitting right under the rim and doesn't even have to play drop coverage like that. That's just a really difficult way to play basketball. And they've signed

up for this for the immediate future. All right, So quick little offseason recap. They lost Andy Green, Robin Lopez, Roal Metto, Cheti Osman, Lamar Stevens, and Dylan Windler. Again, there's lots of roster turnover this year. They added shooting again. They were twentieth in the regular season in spot up efficiency last year was significant problem. During the regular season. They went out and got several good shooters. Max Strews, he was a light at lights out spot up guy

last year. One point one to eight points per possession on three hundred and fifty reps. Remember that one hundred and eighty two players spot up list that I said that Evan Mobley was dead last on. Max was thirty first on that list, so much higher on that list. And if you trim it down to the high volume guys, there were sixteen players in the league who got at least two hundred excuse me, at least three hundred and fifty spot up looks. Max was second on that list.

So among the high high volume spot up guys, there were sixteen of them, he finished second. That's significant, and I think he's a really good fit Defensively. He's six foot five, two hundred and fifteen pounds, he's got good size, He competes, and he'll help you with the dirty work. George Sneeing even more efficient in spot up situations than

Max Strews one point two zero points per possession. He shot sixty two percent in effective field goal percentage on catch and shoot jumpers seventy one percent when he's unguarded. He's one of the few I cannot leave him open guys that we have in the league. And what I really like about that too, is both of those shooters

kind of play different positions. Those are you know, Kneang kind of slots as a four next to a rim protecting five, and Max Strews kind of ideally operates as a two or a three right, and so that kind

of makes sense in terms of the alignment. And now the Cavs are gonna be able to throw at a lineups where they have like, you know, Darius Garland and Karris Lavert with Max Strew's, George's Kneeing and Jared Allen, like, they're gonna have some flexibility to run lineups like that, which they did not last year because they simply did

not have the shooting. And that's where it gets exciting, because now you're talking about legitimately running spread pick and roll with three great shooters off the ball that you can't leave open, so that Darius Garland has the room to really work downhill. Even when they ran one big lineups last year, they just didn't have the shooting to

properly really generate the spacing lanes that they needed. They also drafted em many baits baits when the second round and so it kind of went under the radar, but he played really well at summer League. Very very good shooter. He's got a lot of other limitations. He's super super thin. Obviously, he's got to learn how to play off the ball.

He does most of his work on the ball. But in the long run, I think he's an interesting option as somebody who could potentially be that kind of swing forward if he learns how to do the dirty work and learns how to play off the ball. I don't think he's going to play much this year, but he's an interesting pickup. They also added Damian Jones, who was a decent backup center. I covered him with the Lakers. Nothing exceptional there, but he's a fine backup option. Tristan

Thompson another backup big. He played very sparingly for the Lakers at the end of the Nuggets series and had some moments, but again just a backup big. Ty Jerome a backup ball handler from the Golden State Warriors last year. I actually really liked this pickup. He ran one hundred and sixty nine picking rolls last year, leading to one hundred and eighty six points. That was in the eighty eighth percentile. He's got a really nice pull up three points shot and a really nice floater he's got. He

made fifty two percent of his floaters last year. Nice high arc on it can get it over rim protectors. I actually think he makes a lot of sense as a backup shot creater on this particular team. I'm actually shocked he didn't play more than he did for the Warriors, but again they were kind of guard heavy, but he had some moments when Steph was out with injury for the war Actually like that pick up a lot, and

I think Cavs fans are gonna like him. So again, if we picked the direction that they could go, which is fundamentally alter the structure of the team or fix the role player shooting issue. Excepting that we chose to fix the role player shooting issue, they did a good job. They did a good job addressing that issue. I thought they picked up some good shooting at good value. I

liked that summer for the Cavs from that standpoint. Depth chart at guard Darius Garland, Donovan Mitchell, Karris Lavert, and Ti Drome. At forward Evan Mobley, Max drew some kind of considering him forward here, although he could be technically considered a guard. Isaac Accorro georgi' Kniang, Dean Wade, and Emny Bates. I actually think Emy Bates has a decent

chance to make the opening day roster. We'll see the bigs Jared Allen, Damien Jones, and Tristan Thompson, and obviously Evan Mobley is capable of playing some backup big as well. On offense, this is a pick and roll team. The vast majority of Caves offensive possessions will involve a ball screen. They ran forty pick and rolls per game last year, which was the sixth most in the NBA. They scored one point zero four points per possession in pick and

roll last year, which was seventh most in the NBA. Now, you gotta remember that's with all of those misalignment issues that I was talking about, which is why I've been pushing so much for this, because just imagine a universe where Donovan Mitchell is able to run you know this many pick and rolls in true four out one in spacing with a good role man like it could be really dynamic if that were to happen. The Cavs do a much better job than most teams at complicating their

pick and roll. And remember we talked about this yesterday, But complications are just like actions you run to get into it pick and roll, or actions that you run during pick and roll to keep things busy, right, so it occupies defenders and makes the point of attack job harder.

So they'll run like a dribble handoff flowing into pick and rolls or like a pistol action for instance, again making those two defensive guards either navigate a switch or fight through a screen before they flow into the pick and roll. They'll do like they'll run Karis laverdaf of a couple of wide pin downs like a double wide screen, and then he'll come up and then immediately flow into a pick and roll off of the second screener right.

Or Darius Garland's really good at like this give and go thing where he'll kind of dribble up the left side of the floor and he'll the Jared Allen or Evan Mobley will come up to set the screen and instead of like dribbling into it, he'll like look over to the left and like throw a high post entry and then just sprint off like a dribble handoff. Then as soon as he gets a dribble hand off, he'll rip back to the left and Evan Wibi will reverse the screen and he'll come off towards the left side.

Like they do a nice job of making it so it's not just stagnant dribble to ball up the floor and run pick and roll type of offense, And I credit JB. Bickerstaff for that, And I really think it's one of the biggest areas of for opportunity in offense around the NBA is like we've almost become a little bit too brute force, especially during the regular season, and I'd like to see more teams do that. But the

Cavs do a really nice job. Donovan Mitchell was awesome in pick and roll last year, one point one zero points per possession. Remember our high volume pick and roll list, there are fifteen players in the league who ran at least a thousand. Donovan Mitchell came in third on that list, so he's one of the best. Darius Garland was a level below that, one point zero three points per possession. He was eleventh in our high volume pick and roll list.

Karris Lavert one point zero one points per possession on four hundred and seventy one reps. It's basically average attacking in ISO. Darius Garland had a rough year zero point eighty seven points per possession, but both Donovan Mitchell and Karis Lavert were good well over a point per possession. They have no post up attack. They scored just three hundred and twenty points out of the post all season. That was twenty fifth in the NBA, and they were

twenty ninth in efficiency out of the post. But the real area for opportunity here is trying to avoid the two big spacing issues as much as possible, Like, yeah, you were eighth in offensive rating last year, and it's easy to be like, oh, we're good on offense, but you were twentieth in clutch offensive ratings. So when the game really slowed down at the end of games, you couldn't score relative to your peers. And then you got to the postseason, he ran into a league average defense

and couldn't score. So I think it's important to identify that ceiling there that needs to be addressed, and I think a couple of ways you can address it in the short term is just staggering out Mobile and Allen more like cutting Jared Allen's minutes a little bit and running more Evan Mobley at the five. I think George is kneeing slots really nicely as a four next to him, and so you could find more opportunities for one big

lineups to make things easier. Or you know, here's the thing, like you can pay the price with some regular season struggles by giving Mobiley more reps at the five, knowing he's not gonna do great at it, and maybe you pay the price in the regular season, but over the course of the season he improves at it, and you have that as a look when you get to the postseason.

But really, I don't think they're gonna be able to reach their ultimate offensive potential until they reorient themselves on defense. They were the best defense in the league last year. They were the only team in the NBA to allow fewer than one hundred and ten points per possessions points per one hundred possesions excuse me. They were the sixth best paint defense and the fifth best three point defense.

They allowed just eleven point six made threes per game, so one of the few teams in the league that did a really nice job of taking away the two most efficient shots in the game, which is the ram and the three point line to JB. Bickerstaff and his staff for building a really good modern defense. I don't think it's a coincidence that they were the best defense

in the league as a result. One weakness in their defense is they were twentieth and rebounding, So not a big shock to see why New York caused him so many problems there. Most of that's just a couple of things. Two small guards. You're going to struggle to secure long rebounds with two small guards, and then Evan Mobley just being a little thin, something that he'll get better at in the long run. And then they do have entry

points like we talked about in the postseason. Again, it's easy to talk about Cheddy Osmond, but wasn't just Chetty Osman. And the problem is their best point of attack defender last year was Isaac Cacorro, but he was a bad spot up player, only zero point nine to seven points per possession, and so as a result, when they got to the postseason, they only played him fifteen minutes a game, and so they had to play a lot more Chetty

Osmen and he did get attacked a lot. But again it's not just him, it's Also, it's also the Darius Garland issue. Donovan Mitchell doesn't so much get picked on because he's a great athlete, but he does struggle just in of his overall defensive awareness. I do think Max Strus is gonna help here, though, I think Max Strews is a better combination of like offensive threat and defensive

capable point of attack defender. Like I think that he's a better combination of those two things than really anybody who played on the wing last year for the Kavs, And so I think Max Stus is really gonna help them there, but it's still gonna be a fundamental issue with the ability to attack their guards when they get

to the postseason. So again, like accepting the simple fact that the Caves front office probably will not move off of the Garland Mitchell Mobiley Allen core for at least one more season, if not more, that leaves us with two harsh truths about the Caves defense, Like Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell have to find a way to hold up defensively, and Evan Mobley and Jared Allen have to

find a way to hold up on the glass. They're just going to have to if they're gonna have any chance to reach their ultimate potential for this season, I expect the Cavs to finish around the four to five spot again and to lose in the first round unless they catch a really favorable matchup. I really think this team has some defense are some playoff flaws that are going to be difficult to overcome in the short term.

All right, before we get out of here, I've got I want to talk about the Damian Lillard situation for just a second, and then we'll take two mail back questions. So I've got a lot of backlash today over my Damian Lillard position on social media, and I wanted to address two counterpoints that I've heard that I don't understand. So one of the most common refrains I'll hear when I've had this position that I've taken is people will say things like he signed a contract, like all they

owe him is the money that's in the contract. And I think there's a couple things that we got to separate there. First of all, like this is not this is not an employer type of situation where like you just like this is a salary that you collect, and like the company is choosing to pay you that this is a revenue share. The league generates a certain amount of revenue and the players get half of it. So like, though, I don't look at it as like Portland gave Dame money.

Dame got his share of the revenue. Portland just happens to be the vehicle with which he's enjoying that revenue. I don't think. I don't think Portland should get bonus points for paying Damian Lillard max contracts when all thirty NBA teams would pay him max contracts. Like, I don't understand that philosophy. Also, the second side of that is like people will say things like, he signed a contract, if he wanted to leave, why doesn't he just not sign the contract, become a free agent, and then go

sign wherever he wants. And that sounds great on the surface, right, that sounds super logical, But it's not that simple because Dame wants to leave because he wants an opportunity to contend for a championship. How often does a championship team have max cap space a team that can win a championship Almost never. One of the few times it happened recently was in twenty sixteen and it literally generated the

greatest team ever assembled. Who were the teams with cap space this summer, the San Antonio Spurs and the Houston Rockets. So yeah, Dame should have gotten out of his contract so he can sign with one of the worst teams in the league. Cap space is not very valuable anymore because stars don't sign in free agency through that method. So, as a result, if Dame wants to at this phase in his career, go to Miami. This is the only way.

If you are an NBA star and you want to go play for one of the ten best teams in the league, the only way you can do it is sign a long term deal with your team in request to trade. So again, it sounds great to be like, don't sign the deal, you could be a free agent. You signed up for this, You took away your own freedom. No, he just made a decision based on the way the league works. He wanted to go to Miami. His only way to get there was to stay with Portland and

request a trade. Like, let's not like, there are takes that I appreciate and I understand, but like that one I really struggle with. I don't I don't get it. Like every star that has changed teams over the last five years. It's been through it's been through trades like that's just how it's done these days. I wish I had a I wish I mean, we can argue about the system all we want, but this is what the

system is. The second thing I don't understand is when they say they owe it to the fans, and like, again, I'm not trying to to to to shit on Portland fans here. That's not what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to point out the dichotomy or the reality of the situation. I should say there is a three way relationship here. It's not just the I should say it's

a four way relationship. There's the revenue is being split between the players and the and the owners, right, But the actual dynamic, the living organ that is the NBA has four factions and arguably more, but four main factions. You've got the organizations and you've got the players, but you also have the fans in the media, and all four are incredibly important. The media is responsible for marketing

the league. It's what makes the league digestible. Like that they're these these media companies from the big guys at ESPN, to the smaller media companies like the volume, to the individual team specific podcast out there, all of them, all down the line, to the beat writers, to to to the former players that just talk big picture stuff with their buddies in the on a couch somewhere. All of

that helps market the league, which helps everybody. It helps the owners make money, it helps the players make money, it helps members of the media make money. That's that, right. Then there's the fans, and their trade off is simple. They get a entertainment product and they get to root for their team, and we market to them, right. I shouldn't say we, but the advertisers do, right, So like

that's the trade off. Right. It's like you get to see this game, but you have to watch these ads, right, Or if you want to watch your favorite team on League Pass, you've got to pay the NBA, right your League Pass subscription. But it's all intricately related. So like yeah, like like does Portland owe it to the fans to do what's best for the franchise? Yes, but they also owe something to day You can pretend that this is just a business relationship and oh, you only have to

fulfill the terms of your contract. That's not how it works. Any of you guys who listen to the show that run your own business in some way, shape or form, whether you run a small business in town, whether you've got a side hustle, whether you sell real estate, whether whether you're an uber driver. I don't care what it is you do. If you have a ten ninety nine and you run your own kind of personal business, how you treat people matters. You can pretend it doesn't matter,

but it does. And if you take a guy who devoted eleven years of his career, they're probably a few years more than he should have what like like you do have to do right by him, and if you do wrong by him, that will come back to bite you. I firmly believe that. And so you've got to appease all parties involved. Yes, Portland owes it to their fans, but they also owe it to their players to take

care of them. And the other side of that is I'd be like, where was that sense of obligation from Portland fans to do what's best for the team when the Portland front office was screwing off and wasting the Dame era like that? That doesn't make any sense to me. The one real opinion that I understand, the one that I've seen that like, I'm like, okay, I see where

you're coming from. Is when people say, hey, Dame should have given them like three teams instead of one team, so at least they could pit them against each other and get a better offer. Again, that makes sense in a vacuum, and I do respect that opinion, But even then I'd point out, like, does anybody really have three that they want or is it one that they want?

Like if I told you guys you had to you know, if you're a hooper and you had to you wanted to get a new pair of basketball shoes, and you're a huge believer in the Kobe's and you can get a Kobe, or you can get the PGS, or you can get the the Kyries, Like and yeah, those are your top three, but like, which one are you getting?

If you if you if you have your own choice, you're gonna take Kobe's, right, if you're a Kobe fan, or if you like the Kobe shoes better, Like it sounds fancy in theory to be like, oh, yeah, here's my list of three teams, but like, by the way I want Miami. Like, sure, I'll go to Toronto, OKC or Miami. Cool, But you don't think him and his agent are still gonna tell the Heat that they want he wants to go there first. You don't think Dame's gonna let those other teams know like, yeah, by the way,

I prefer Miami. Like again, my criticism of Damian Lillard is just the overall way he's handled it. I think him and his agent have been way too aggressive behind this. We get it, bro, you want to go to Miami. That's been clear since you made the trade request. No one is no one is not clear on what your intentions are. You want to go to Miami. The way you've behaved behind the scenes, it's made you look bad,

there's no doubt. But fundamentally, here, I've got an organization that a player has been remarkably loyal to, way more loyal than most stars have in this era. Most stars in this era would have gotten the year six or seven in Portland and been like, actually, this isn't really working out for me. I would like to go somewhere else. We've seen that time and time again. Instead, Dame said, no, I will try to make this work with you again. I will try to make this work with you again.

He gave them much more margin for error than they deserved. I think they should do right by him. But like again, like he signed a contract, he gets half the revenue. That's how it works. And the only way you can go anywhere in free agency these days in terms of a good team is via trade. So like saying that a player requesting a trade is dishonoring a contract is total bullshit. Because you have free agency is not free

agency anymore. Free agency is I get to pick from one of like maybe maybe if I'm lucky in a good summer, a half dozen teams that have available cap space, and they probably all suck. So like, don't say he should have gone to free agency when free agency doesn't exist anymore. That's dishonest. But again, I I'm just ready for this to be over. I thankfully I have the Heat pretty high on my list anyway, so we'll get to them, and hopefully by the time we get their

Dame's already there. Because you know what I want to do. I want to talk about basketball, and I want to get back to talking about how Damian Lillard with BAM Adebayo is a super interesting duo and what Eric Spolscher can do to bring the best out of him offense or defense. Right, Like, that's the kind of stuff that

I want to talk about. But the saga needs to end, and it's dragging out because Portland's concerned with getting what's absolutely best for them instead of acknowledging the realities of their relationship with Damian Lillard over a decade. All Right, two mail back questions. First one is from Jacob. If the Sun's elite jump shooting continued and they somehow beat Denver, who would you have taken in a Sun's Lakers Western Conference Finals and why? The answer to this is pretty simple.

Are we accepting that that elite jump shooting continues into the next round? Because Yeah, if Devin Booker makes seventy percent of his pull up jump shots, they're beating everybody,

including the Lakers. But the reality is, like they do rely a lot on pull up jump shooting, and they didn't have a single player that could actually physically hang with Lebron and Anthony Davis has kicked DeAndre Ayton's ass all over the place forever, right, And so as I look at that if they played like the Suns did. For the most part, I think the Lakers win the series. But yeah, in the world where the Suns continue to shoot the lights out, I would have picked the Suns

to win. That series certainly would have been a lot closer. I certainly think the Suns would have had a very good chance to be the Lakers, but I would have picked the Lakers. Last mail back question. Been watching your podcast since the twenty twenty two season and really enjoy the insight you bring. My question is do you believe you could ever be a GM or a coach at the NBA level, and if not, what qualifications do you think one needs to get such a position. So, first

of all, like, uh, it's in terms of qualifications. Coaching is a really interesting thing because I remember when I first got out of when I first got done playing, I wanted to coach, And for the record, like I love what I do right now, But the one thing that I would stop doing this for is to coach, and only in the NBA because I'm not interested in doing it at the college level because I don't want

to recruit. But the main reason why it is because I missed the locker room like I miss the camaraderie, I miss the team goal, Like I get a lot that with the volume, Like the volume has grown so much since I've been here, and we've added all these big names. We added Channon Sharp the other day. That's awesome, right, Like we've added some big name NFL guys. We added Daniel Cormier is one of the biggest UFC media members

in the world. We have a huge announcement for an NBA guy that we have a partnership with that that's coming next week that I'm excited for you guys to hear about. Like I've enjoyed the growth of the volume and I'm stoked about that. And but like at the end of the day, this is kind of a solo deal, right, Like I work by myself. I have my producer and some other producers behind the scene that I work with.

But like in terms of this show, like it's it's it's not very much of like the basketball team type of vibe. And also like the nature of this job involves criticism, Like I have to talk about basketball players not playing particularly well, or a coach doing something that I disagree with, which doesn't really sit right with me. Why because like, who am I to sit here and criticize Donovan Mitchell, an NBA player, an NBA All Star, an All NBA player about his you know, missing reads

and pick and roll. I'm Jason fucking Timpf. I'm sitting in my guest bedroom in Tucson, Arizona. Like that doesn't sit right with me, right, Like me talking about Tom Thibodeaux overhelping on drives, Like Tom Thibodeau is a is a proven NBA coach, Like who am I to criticize Tom Thibodeau. But at the end of the day, Like that's the overly rational way of looking at it. The reality is, this is sports media and my job is

to give my opinion, and I do. I put in a lot of work to try to legitimize those opinions, right, Like you guys know that I'd never say anything on the show unless I've seen overwhelming evidence that makes me feel that way about it, right, So, like that you got to separate the reality of what this job is versus what kind of about being an amateur criticizing a professional, right, Like Draymond Green talks about this a lot with the idea of the new media and it's an interesting idea.

But like I, if I ever get to interview an NBA player, which I'm sure it will eventually happen, this will be one of the questions I ask, Like, what's it like understanding that the media has a job to do, but being criticized by non professionals, Like what's that like? Because I'm curious because I know if I was a player, I'd be like, who the fuck is this guy? You know what I mean? Like I would be that guy

if I was playing in the NBA. Right, So, Like it's a super super interesting dynamic, and that's one of the drawbacks of this job that I don't particularly like. And so what's beautiful about working for a team is like it's camaraderie. It's it's part of that ultimate goal. It's weaponizing my competitiveness towards trying to get the Larry O'Brien trophy versus doing what I do now, which is try to produce a successful NBA show, right, And like,

obviously I'd love to do that. Obviously that would be ideal. I would never have to be critical of another team or coach except for in private, you know, in conversations, right, Like I wouldn't have to publicly come out and criticize a player or coach, right, So like that I certainly would like to do that. That would be the dream, right, I'd love to work for an NBA team, specifically in the coaching staff. I'm not as interested in potentially working in a front office, but I'd be lying if I

said I wouldn't consider it. But the reality is is like the there's a pathway there. There's a pathway to

get to those jobs. And like I remember when I got out of college, I wanted to coach, and like when I looked into it, it was like, wait, wait, I need to go be like a graduate assistant at some school and like just do a bunch of like shitty work for some old dinosaur of a college basketball coach for fifteen years, just in hopes that maybe I'll get an assistant gig where I can handle recruiting for some dude forever before I finally maybe get some chance

to maybe go coach at some mid major somewhere. And then at that point, I'm already forty eight years old, and like, like that path just didn't interest me. It's basketball coaching is much less of a meritocracy from the standpoint of like grinding up through the ranks than actual play actually playing the sport is And in the NBA

it's kind of similar. It's like it's so many former players that are coaching in different positions, right, and like it's like, okay, or you can maybe work in a film room like Eric Spolshra and grind away and maybe get that chance. And it's like, obviously I can't do that.

I can't quit my job here at the volume to go work a film room somewhere, right, So, like the reality is is like the only way it would work is if somebody just offered me a job, and that's not going to happen because I'm not qualified, so to speak. I like, obviously I take very much pride in my work. I I hope you guys have seen that in this show, Like how hard I work to make these to take these positions and to provide this analysis. And like I

am obviously confident in my abilities. I believe that I know the game well and I believe that I can offer something as a basketball mind, but like that's not something I can write on a resume, Like at the end of the day, like They're gonna take some dude who was, you know, a former player or an assistant

at some other organization before they'd consider me. And I'm fine with that, and I'm at peace with that, And like, if I do this for the rest of my life, I'd be thrilled, Like how fortunate am I to get to talk about the game of basketball every day? Like I was actually thinking about this. I was talking about it with my wife the other night. But like, I

had a really good day on Monday. I well, I like played in my men's league on Sunday, and then I came home and then I woke up on Monday morning and I trained my high school team, and then I came home and I did my video on I think it was the Minnesota Timberwolves that day, and then like I did a really good basketball workout, like a really good wait session, and then I went and did a shooting workout, and I told my wife, I'm like, I feel so blessed that, like I do basketball every day,

like every day in some form or fashion, I am around the game of basketball, and I feel very fortunate for that. And so like I don't want to sit there and complain about my position, that's not what I'm doing. I love what I do, and if I do this forever, I will be thrilled. But at the end of the day, like i'd be lying to you if I said I wouldn't love the opportunity to be a part of a team and their journey to trying to win an NBA championship,

I would love to do that one day. And who knows, maybe if I ever got to do that, maybe I'd still get to do this anyway, at least in some capacity. But very good question. And again like, I don't think that'll ever happen, and I think there are a lot of people that are more qualified than me that deserve it, and I'm at peace with that. But it is an interesting question. All right, guys. That is all I have

for today is always I sincerely appreciate your support. We will be back tomorrow with number twelve and I will see you guys then. And for some more male bad questions. The volume