Hoops Tonight - OKC Thunder are PERFECTLY set up to be NBA's next great DYNASTY | NBA Mailbag

to carry their team to the chip? Try placing a bet on your personal MVP to drop thirty, forty or maybe even over fifty. Ready to place your own bet, download the DraftKings sports Book app, lock in your bets and finish the season as a winner. Here's something special for first timers. New DraftKings customers. Bet five dollars to get three hundred dollars in bonus bets if your bet wins. Don't miss your last chance to bet on the NBA this season. Download the DraftKings sports Book app and use

code hoops that's hoop. That's code hoops for new customers to get three hundred dollars in bonus bets if your bet wins. When you bet five bucks only on DraftKings, the Crown is yours. Gambling problem called one hundred gambler In New York call eight seven seven eight hope and why, or text hope and Why to four six seven three sixty nine and Connecticut help is available for problem gambling Call eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven

seven or visit CCPG dot org. Please play responsibly on behalf of Boothill Casino and Resort in Kansas twenty one plus. Age and eligibility varies by jurisdiction void in Ontario. Bet must win to receive reward. Minimum minus five hundred odds required. Bonus bets expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. For additional terms and responsible gaming resources, see dkang dot co slash audio.

picture basketball stuff. We might even go into some different sports down at the tail end of the mail bag where we're gonna hit all of the NBA Finals related stuff off the top. You guys know the drill before we get started. Subscribe to the Hoops and I YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore JSNLT so you guys don't miss show announcements. Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever we

get you podcast on Hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if you leave a rating and review on that front. Jackson's doing great work on our social media feeds on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Make sure you guys follow us there, and then, last but not least, keep dropping mail bag questions in the chats that we can get to them in our mail bags at the tail end of our live streams.

All right, let's talk some basketball. So our first question is kind of a big picture question surrounding the thunder in their future. Do you pay J dub and Chet the Supermax if they qualify next year. Now, in terms of the details surrounding the super Max, it obviously depends on you know, whether or not Chet mix and all

NBA team next year, things along those lines. But I'm gonna try to reframe this question around the idea of let's just say max contracts in theory, if you're building a roster, as we've seen around the NBA, it can get a little tough once you have three max contract players to fill the rest of the roster, and like even just in the big picture, it's about whether or

not they can continue to surround these guys with enough talent. Now, I am generally of the belief that it's not so much whether or not you can build a roster around three max players, it's are these three players the kinds of max players that are good enough to justify that type of resource distribution? And the short answer is yes,

I absolutely think they are. When we talk about team build, I tend to focus on these different archetypes at each position group, right, and when I look at everything in a vacuum, like irrespective of stars, because stars bring kind of unicorn traits to the table right Like Jokis doesn't look like any other center around the league. Steph Curry doesn't look like any other point guard around the league. Jana Santena Kumpo or Luka Doncic. These guys don't look

like traditional players. Even Shay in and of himself as like an old school mid range scoring two guard is very rare around the NBA. But one of the concepts that I always talk about is like, ideally I want to have like a skill guard, a guard that is an excellent passer, shot creator, floor general, all that kind of stuff. An athlete guard, a guard that can guard the other team's best guard but also can drive close outs and bring you know, some more of the power

element to that position group. And then at the forward spots, I like having like a big, physical forward, and then I'll having more of a slender, wiry, perimeter oriented forward. And then you want to big that can defend in

multiple coverages, a big that brings defensive versatility. And so as I go down the list, if Shay and Jadab and chet are my core, I think all three of those don't just fit into those groups but legitimately bring more to the table, like Shay is very much the pro typical skill guard in that he is a guy

that can be the offensive engine for a team. We saw him have one of his best offensive engine types of games of his career in Game two of the Finals, right, But Shay also brings legitimate athletic traits to the table. Shay is a very good defensive player when he's engaged, right, so like he doesn't bring a lot of the shortcomings that typically come with skill guards. Jadub think of him as like a combination of a bunch of different things.

He is a guy that can do some of that athletic guard stuff in terms of guarding elite guards and bringing more power to that position. But at the same time he can be a lot like what we see from a lot of four men in terms of bringing like power ball handling to the table. I even think there's a lot of big picture potential for JDub as like kind of a bully ball matchup attacker that he's still just barely scratching the surface of what he's capable

of being. And then Chet he is the prototypical big man that can defend and low drop defend and high drop defendant. Switches defend in zone. His defending in switches was a huge part of Oklahoma City's defensive success in Game two against the Pacers. But also Chet brings the ability to be a legitimate perimeter offensive weapon while still being the same vertical spacing threat that so many of his peers are at the center position. So, to make a long story short, I think Shay, J, Dub and

Chet compliment each other extremely well. They're all on the same age timeline. All three of them have traits that extend out from what you would expect from their specific position group. I absolutely think that you can commit long term money to all three of those guys and still

will build a championship roster around him. Again, when you have players that play the way that these guys do and that check all the boxes that these guys check, it actually just makes for smaller and more achievable roles down the roster for your teammates, and that just makes the general manager's job that much easier. Next question. After Game two, you talked about how SGA did a much better job of playing the floor game. He invested in his own teammates, which allowed for people like Chet to

get going. Do you expect Shaye to keep that good floor game going as they go to Indiana. Love the show. So, first of all, this has been a subject of some of the debate after the first two games, right we in. I noticed some of you guys disagreed after my Game two instant reaction for the way I characterized Shay's Game one. Kevin O'Connor came on the show yesterday and similarly said the same thing. And I want to clarify in the sense that I shouldn't be saying Shaye played bad in

game one. He didn't play bad in game one. That's over dramatic. That said, I did think the box score was not necessarily a very accurate reflection of the way that he played like. I did think Shae played substantially better in game two, and he had thirty eight points in game one. But the big giveaway to me is we talked about in that show. If you remember, off the top, I discussed the concept of floor game being a job that a ball handler does, or that ball

handler has. The responsibility he has that extends beyond assists and extends beyond points and goes to your the engine of the offense. You are responsible for the rhythm and flow of your team's offense as the primary ball handler, right, and the Thunder scored twenty more points per one hundred possessions in the half court in game two than they did in Game one. Does variants play a role in that?

jump shots early in the clock. In game two, I thought he made the appropriate investments in rhythm and flow early and it manifested in better ball movement, better rhythm and flow for his offense, and twenty more points per one hundred half court possessions. And so again, I just wanted to clarify that because I did use the word he played bad in game two, and that's just dumb. He didn't play bad, he just compared on the range of potential outcomes for Shay games, I thought that trended

more towards the low end. And before you tell me, oh, well, he had thirty eight points. You go look at his scoring totals. He always gets He's one of the most reliable, high volume scorers in the league. But there are differing outcomes for Shae in terms of his floor game, in terms of just the way he manages the way his offense is flowing. And I did think that Shaye played substantially better in Game two. Now do I expect Shaye

to keep that going? Yes, Shae, you know, is a little bit more old, is a little bit older and more experienced than people think. I talked about this concept last night. The thing with young basketball players is they struggle to identify failures and minimize them, and they struggle to identify successes and repeat them. Right, But with each passing series, with each passing moment, for this Oklahoma City team, they seem to be growing and to be learning from

their mistakes. And I do think that Shaye learned quickly after Game one that that's not the way that he needs to attack, and I think he made that adjustment, and I expect him to attack Game three in a very similar manner. Now that said, Indiana's really good and they could go up by twelve fifteen points at some point during Game three, and it's possible that at that point Shay reverts back to some hero ball, but that's

just part of his archetype as a scoring guard. I think overall, I think I can expect or we can expect his floor game to more closely mimic Game two moving forward in the series. Next question with jaris Walker out. Do you think Rick Carlisle? Who do you think Rick Carlisle turns to as the next opportunity to give them something. I don't think this is a dig deeper in the

bench type of series. I think this is on the guys that are playing right now, and a lot of it with the bench guys is about making better decisions. You know, Obi Toppin not as good a game in Game two, some aggressive forces in traffic against rim protection instead of moving the ball. Ben matherin several examples of plays where he got into the teeth of the defense instead of taking easy reads that were available to him.

Guys just have to play better and then as a group, the pacers kind of in this series have a tug of war in terms of their offensive execution. When they take care of the ball and they get the ball to the floor, quickly, and they run multiple actions on the same possession. They break Oklahoma City's defense down incrementally, and they get good looks. When they get stagnant, when they start turning the ball over, things start to fall apart for them. And so I don't think this is

like a dig deeper in the roster. We need a different player to solve our problems. I think it's on the group to just play better. Next question, do you think Pascal comes out more aggressive to score tonight? Obviously, I'm assuming you mean Wednesday night. They need him playing like he did in the next series, and it feels like he's just gotten off to slow starts this far. I do think that we'll see an aggressive Pascal in

game three. I think in general, the Pacers kind of got away from some of the success they had in Game one hunting size mismatches with their bigs in the post, and I thought it just was a lack of intentionality in terms of the way that they were hunting shots. I thought that they were a little too quick to take early clock decent reason. I'm not opposed to those shots.

We all know the Pacers can make those shots, but I didn't think they did enough of a job establishing the post early and often in game two, and Pascal is just the obvious pathway to make that happen. And so I do think that we will see a more aggressive Pascal, a more aggressive turner, a lot more damage being done in the paint in game three. You've talked about how Okay Okac's offense isn't really the main force

of this team. My question is is the Pacers defense able to make some significant adjustments to take game to take one or two games at home. So I'm really curious to see how Rick Carlisle comes out to guard in game three. We talked about this concept in depth with Kevin O'Connor yesterday, so I won't go into too much detail today. If you guys haven't had a chance to check that pot out, I highly recommend it. Kevin was fantastic and we got into a bunch of the

details in the series. But I'm really curious to see how they come out and guard. I thought that the at the level coverages for the Pacers didn't want work very well through the first two games. Again, like they're not going up to the level to take away the pull up jump shot. They're not worried about Shae coming off and rising up from three doesn't make enough of them for that really to be the issue. They're bringing the man up to the level to try to stop

Shae from getting ahead of steam. But what ends up happening is when you come up to the level of the screen, you pick a side. So in a drop coverage, imagine this like as Shaye's coming off of a screen. If you're in a drop coverage, you're sitting lower, and if he comes off the screen this way, you're ready. If he rejects the screen and goes off the other way, you're ready, right, But if you're up at the level, you're picking a side of the screen that you're coming

up to the level to show. And so if you come up to the level and then Shae decides to drive the opposite direction, suddenly, if he beats that man, there's nobody behind in that two on two right now, all of a sudden, you're in rotation. You've now put yourself into a four on three, and it was a lot of rejecting screens, and all of a sudden, no one's there to help coming off the screen and splitting the action. So if you come up to the level and you show and shake, but he just splits right

in between you two. Same sort of thing. It's a four on three. You come up to the level and the screener slips, you pitch it over the top, same

thing four on three. I just thought that the Thunder were operating in a four on three far too often in that game, and so I'm really curious to see if for Carlisle makes the adjustment of either doing some more soft switching, meaning like have the defender that switches switch a little bit further back to try to bait them into some early pull up threes, or in more of a deeper drop coverage in ball screen so that when Shay comes off, Like this is the way I

look at it. If Shane's gonna get downhill anyway, Like, if you're gonna get beat anyway, then you might as well have a fourth defender in the action rather than have three defenders in the action trying to rotate out of that situation. Right, So, like we'll see I think I think we could see Carlisle come out with the same coverage to start game three and just banking on the crowd and the intensity and the urgency kind of just bringing a better on ball effort from the Pacers,

and maybe that's what he ends up doing. But I also think that it's the cards that Carlisle's gonna have to tweak the coverage to deeper drop coverage, softer switching, something more of a contain the ball approach to try to keep things in front. Might even see some zone as well. I'll be curious to see how they guard now on the other end of the floor, the Pacers defense in there, or excuse me, with the on that

end of the floor. Just in general for the Pacers, Oklahoma City has shown a little bit of like a ricketiness on offense in this postseason, where they can get knocked off of their foundation, and so in terms of their ability to take the two games at home, it does come down to their defense in the sense that if they get enough stops, if they force enough long jumpers and long rebounds, and they can play in transition, they're gonna score enough points, especially at home. But the

defense is the job. If they can slow down Oklahoma City's offense enough in these two games, that is their best pathway forward in the series. By knocking Oklahoma City off of their offensive foundation, getting out in transition, in getting the easy ones avoiding the loaded up thunder defence.

sports programs only on Vice TV. Go to vicetv dot com to find your cable channel.

first round again the Minnesota Timberwolves. But this idea of like, Okay, the Lakers have some realities in terms of the future surrounding Luca and Lebron being a very very expensive old player that still plays at a level that's deserving of the money, but comes with some realities in terms of when he does hail off, he'll present a barrier between, you know, in terms of roster allocation, between what the Lakers are going to be and what they are now.

Right Similarly, he's you know, going to be forty one next year by the time they make it to the postseason, and it's just going to be really difficult for uh. It's going to be really difficult for him to you know, find an extended runway to try to make something happen. So if he goes anywhere, it have to be a win now type of situation. Seen lots of things thrown around, and when I start to dig into it, it's like, Okay, let's say let's say he got traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers.

I've seen versions of aids thrown around with like Darius Garland and Jared Allen for instance, for Lebron. So let's say it's Lebron and Evan Mobley and Donovan Mitchell and you know, obviously that deep core of good role players in Cleveland, Like that's a good team, right, How much better is that than him? Next to Luka Doncic in a revenge campaign. Right, Let's say he goes to Golden State. If they if they were to pull some sort of magic along those lines, like Lebron, Stephan Draymond, it's a

really good team. I think Lebron would be such an amazing natural basketball fit in the Golden State system. But do I think that, you know, old Lebron and old Steph with Draymond is a better chance to win the title than Lebron James and Luka Doncic in a revenge campaign. You start to like poke around to different options. Oh what if he goes to the Knicks. Okay, So it's Lebron and Ogn and Obi and McHale Bridges and Jalen Brunson. It's a really good team, really fun team, open Eastern Conference.

There's a lot of like kind of elements involving the East that make that somewhat interesting. But is it better than Lebron with a Luka Doncic on a revenge campaign? Is what I keep coming back to. I talked about this a little bit last night. Luca did not have a good postseason, never really got fully back into rhythm after his injury. This year looked in pretty poor condition

in that first round series. But I really do think we're going to get a very very engaged version of Luca next year, and a very well conditioned version of Luca next year. And when Luka Doncic is healthy and in rhythm, he's one of the very best players in this league last year. If you guys remember in our like Who's got the Belt video after the season, I literally said that it was Luca after beating the guy that beat the guy and being more or less the

most impressive player in the postseason last year. So as I look at it, I keep coming back to this idea that like, give me Luka Doncicic in a season where he's supremely motivated next to you know, this deep roster of well, not as deep as it needs to be, and they'll need to make some changes this year, but they've got some high level players. Ruy Hachimura is a high level player. Austin Reeves is a high level player.

Dorian Phinney Smith is a good role player. Jared Vanderbilt is capable of being a good role player, right Like, they've got you know, they've got guys, and so they've got to make some changes. They gotta find a center, they might have to seriously consider moving a guy like a Austin Reeves or Ruyatamura. That is a redundancy, but that's a vehicle with which to bring in additional talent.

And I keep coming down to if you give me a group of athletes that can do that are versatile enough to do the dribble, shoot, pass, defend stuff that they'll need to do off of Lebron and Luca. Give me Luca and Lebron, and I think he got a better chance than some of these other situations that have

been pitched around the league. So I've thought through a lot, and I've seen a bunch of stuff get pitched, And I keep coming back to if Lebron gets a fifth ring, which obviously is a supreme long shot at this point, I think it happens alongside Luca. And so with that being the case, I think that in all likelihood, Lebron sees that too, and I think Lebron will be a Laker when it's all said and done. Do you believe

trading a guard from the Calves will unlock mobily? So this is complicated because obviously Evan Mobley, I think has developed as an offensive player we saw a lot of like the inverted ball screen action with guys like Sam Marilyn, Darius Garland slipping out of action with him this year, Donovan Mitchell slipping out of action with him this year becoming a kind of like a worthwhile action for the Calves. We saw him in general just become a better driving

kick player when he gets downhill. He's developed a three point shot that is semi reliable. Like Evan Mobley, He's developed a lot, But I don't think Evan Mobley is about to go, you know, pull a Palo Bancaro and become this like super high volume on ballplayer, at least not anytime soon. I think he's years away from developing that sort of game. To me, trading a guard for

the Cavs is about resource allocation. If you're going to have two high volume on ball guards, then you need to reap the rewards of having two high volume on ball guards. And every year Darius Garland has been banged up and lacking a little bit of that quickness, and even when he's been healthy, he's struggled to be super effective in the postseason setting. It just hasn't really materialized.

And it comes with the downsides of like when he's injured all of a sudden, you're just down a like a very expensive contract slot that you're not getting anything out of, or when he's being attacked on defense because of his size limitations, Like there's a certain amount of like when Darius Garland is not at his peak, it

doesn't look like a championship roster. And so if you believe that Darius is going to like come together and put it all together and be healthy and be the best version of himself when it matters, then yeah, it's

we're sticking with it. But like at a certain point, you've got to read the room and be like, Okay, this guy's just kind of struggled to hold up physically, and maybe this doesn't ever come to fruition, right, And so what trading a guard would do is not so much to me about unlocking Evan Mobley as like some sort of super high powered offensive weapon. It would be about trading Darius Garland for just a much more reliable

fifth guy. Right when you started to dig into it this year, it was like, oh man, Jared Allen didn't really materialize into a reliable playoff player this year. Neither did DeAndre Hunter, neither did Ty Jerome like, and all of a sudden you zoomed out from that playoff run and it was like man, Donovan Mitchell and Max Strus and Evan Mobley were like the only three calves that

you felt really good about throughout that postseason run. And so bringing in another wing, a guy that is basically like a really really high level starting version of a DeAndre Hunter that can slot Max Strus at the two and give yourself a little bit more, you know, just reliable ceiling when you get to the postseason would be something worth exploring. But again it's all about that doesn't mean you just trade Darius Garland for the sake of

trading Darius Garland. It's just something that I would consider if the right opportunity came up for a really really high level player at the small forward position. What would be your ideal play style for a relatively small ish point guard to be one of your StarMax players on a championship team. What play style would you choose as a building block? Not Curry obviously, because he's one of one.

This is an interesting question, and I think the Pacers are honestly a really, really smart kind of like like like model for how to do this. So, first of all, I don't think the Thunder count because all their guards are great defenders. But when you've got a smallest point guard who's not an elite defender, what kind of play style do you need to play? I think it's all about being fast. You got to lean into the strength. Right, what is that smallest point guard going to be great at?

He's going to be great at being fast. How has Indiana's defense managed to be still serviceable despite having Tyre Saliburton out there? Well, he throws really aggressive hedges, and he recovers fast in rotation, and as a team, they're just great in rotation. They run and sprint around and they cover ground. I don't think you could have a

small guard and then also be a slow team. I think you have to be fast, and so Indiana, to me, is the model of how you would build around a like Let's say that you're the Heat and you've got Tyler Harrow, or you're you know, the Hornets and you've got LaMelo Ball, or you're the Wizards and you've got Jordan Poole, like just a small but fast like skill

guard who's like the foundational player for your offense. I think you've got to surround that dude with a lot of athletics, like a let it like, kind of versatile, do everything. Guys that can play fast exist in rotation and just cover ground behind what that player does, and then it also accentuates what they do offensively, because most fast guards like to play fast. Two more questions, what are some of the top traits you look for in a non big role player. Things like perimeter speed you've

mentioned in the past look to be dead on. So yeah, I think perimeter speed is a big one, just because inevitably you've got to do a certain amount of existing in rotation. In the NBA, I also think in general, the game has existed more in transition. So as the game exists more in transition, you got to have guys that can get up and down the floor, not just running the floor on offense for buckets, but also getting back in your transition defense. Right, I think from there

it's the Big four. It's dribble, shoot, pass, and defend. Right, What that means is you've got a star somewhere on the roster. It doesn't matter where that is. It doesn't matter if it's a point guard, two guard, three, four five right. Wherever that star is, he's going to create advantages. Once you have that advantage, if you're wide open, you need a guy who can knock down the three if he's got to, he's got to be able to attack the close out. Once he attacks that close out, he's

got to be able to make the reads. Right, So that's the dribble in pass element. There's the shooting element, there's the dribble in pass element, the defend. I'm gonna tie all of these things up into athleticism, right, So like the athleticism to drive a close out and finish at the rim, the athleticism to fly up and down the floor in transition, the athleticism to guard the ball.

All of that SEMs around that defense concept. So like, if you have a role player that's playing off of a star, you need him to be able to play with an advantage, which means knock down shots, drive closeouts, make reads, and then you need to be able to have him exist within what you're trying to do defensively. The only other thing that I would add there is just overall competitiveness and motor. I think this is one of the most underrated things in the league right now.

If you're gonna build out a real championship character in your team, where guys are always in the right spots and they always do the right thing, and you pay attention to detail and just be more like the Pacers for lack of a better way, you gotta have some competitive dudes that hate losing and that are willing to do the things that suck to win basketball games. And so I think the personality trade is a big part of it as well. Last question, saw your baseball tweet

the other day. Any secret baseball fandom you're willing to share? So, Like most kids, I grew up watching all sports, and I've always been a fan of all sports. I grew up watching a ton of hockey. My dad's from Detroit, right I grew up playing litle league baseball. I used to watch every single Arizona Diamondbacks game growing up. I am a huge football fan. I used to watch the NFL very closely and consume a lot of NFL content.

I haven't done nearly as much of that obviously since I started doing this for a living, just because this takes so much of my time and attention but I still love the NFL, and every year in September, I pretend I'm going to follow it more closely, and then by like week seven or eight, I'm just completely invested in the NBA. But I I have always loved sports, all sports. I love watching golf. I still put golf on a lot on the weekends, and I love to play golf, and I just, you know, it's the way

that my job is currently structured. I'm very basketball focused. I can't promise that I'll always be the case, but maybe it will. Maybe I'll always just do basketball stuff. But I do have a love for all sports, baseball in particular. I grew up in a family that was

very baseball oriented. We all played baseball growing up, and I when the d Backs made their World Series run a couple of years ago, that was when I kind of had that love reinvigorated for me, where I was like watching every single postseason game and getting super super invested just because that was something that was such a big part of my life when I was younger. But yeah, like basketball is the thing that has given me everything that I have in my life and the thing that

I love the most. But I have always had a love and appreciation for other sports and it just isn't something that we get to talk too much about on the show. But who knows, maybe some point in the future that'll be something we explore more. All right, guys, that's all we have for today. As always, a sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me and supporting the show. We will be back on Wednesday night after the final buzzer of Game three. Colin Coward should be there this time.

He had a flight get delayed last night. That's where on Sunday night. That's why we didn't get him for game two, but we should have him for Game three. We'll be breaking down everything after that game. We will see you guys then. So guys, as always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting OOPS tonight. They would actually be really helpful for us if you guys would take a second and leave a rating and a review.

As always, I appreciate you guys supporting us, but if you could take a minute to do that, I really appreciate it.