Hoops Tonight - Top 5 NBA Offseasons: Mavericks revenge + Knicks, Bucks & 76ers chasing Celtics

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Slash Baseball all right, wellcome to you tonight. You're at the volume. Happy Friday, everybody, hope all if you guys have had an incredible week. We are going to do a mail bag today, but I want to mix it up a little bit from the mailbags we've been doing on every Friday. I want to start by going over the top five off seasons that I've seen so far

around the NBA. So we're gonna talk a little bit about the teams that really hit home runs over the summer to try to step up their chances to win or at least compete for the Larry O'Brian Trophy next year. And then we're gonna do a mail bag that bounces all around the league. You guys know the joke before we get started. Subscribe to the Hoops to Night YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter, underscore JSNLTS, you guys, don't miss

show announcements. Don't forget about a podcast feed wherever you get your podcasts under Hoops Tonight, and then keep dropping mail bag questions in those YouTube comments that we keep hitting them throughout the rest of the summer. All right, let's talk some basketball. So before we actually get into the top five, the five teams that I put on that list are all teams that are in contention, teams that are at least close to competing for the Lario

Brian Trophy. But I wanted to take a chance to shout out two other off seasons that are for teams that are not necessarily contending for Larry O'Brian, but teams that I think did a nice job revamping things and at least moving in that general direction despite being far away this summer. So the first of those two teams

is the San Antonio Spurps. You know, obviously last year they just had this dreadful lack of ball handling, which made it really difficult to even get a good feel for what Victor Wembinyama is capable of playing on a real basketball team with real ball in player movement, with a real understanding of how to play alongside each other.

And I think adding Harrison Barnes and Chris Paul to that roster, putting some legit shooting in the front court as well as a guy that can just kind of orchestrate things on the offensive end of the floor, I

think that's super exciting. And then especially in light of what we saw over the course of FIBA, and obviously it's still going on, but in the Olympics, a lot of the stuff that Victor webbin Yama has been doing running four or five pick and rolls, where he's been running pick and rolls with another big I'm really interested to see him doing some of that inverted with Harrison Barnes. You can imagine with his shooting ability, that could be

a really interesting action. I just like what the direction they moved in. It's just gonna make them entertaining in the short term, while also flexible in the long run

to see what else you're gonna get out of these guys, guys like Devin Vessel, for instance, in the long run. I thought it was a really smart offseason approach from the San Antonio Spurs. Secondly the Atlanta Hawks. So first of all, getting Zachary Risache in the draft, so we're talking about essentially a three and D wing, a guy who specializes in off ball defense, a guy with a lot of length, a guy that can shoot the basketball. I really like him as a complimentary fit alongside Jalen Johnson.

I do think it's gonna be interesting to see which of those two guys prioritizes playing on the perimeter, because again, like remember when you have a three and a four, there's basically two different roles there. There's the guy who's

gonna guard the better offensive forward. That guy's job is tip if it's a wing player, to chase and navigate around screens to a certain extent, right, whereas the other of the two that's guarding the lesser offensive player is probably going to operate more as a low man, right, And so that's a guy that's going to be responsible for breaking up lob passes and pick and roll and

closing out to the weak side shooter. Right. So like, those two roles are pretty different, and Jalen Johnson and Zachary Rissoschet have some similar skill sets there, So one of those two guys is going to have to develop into a little bit more of a screen navigating kind of perimeter chase guy, and I'm really curious to see which one of those two guys ends up doing that. However, I really like the offensive fit as kind of like

that Jalen Johnson downhill, freaky athleticism transition attack. And then Zachary Rissasche a guy who likes to take and make and actively hunt three point shots off the catch and is a guy that has a lot of skill attacking closeouts and so I like that fit. And then I thought they nailed the Dejonte Murray trade. Obviously, as a Lakers fan, I really wanted him in LA, but I thought the Pelicans offer was really good. I mean, when

you really dig into it. He hit the two first round picks, which obviously are on the table if you do the Laker deal. Now, I would argue the first round picks from the Lakers are probably a little more valuable just because of the incompetence of that franchise, and once Lebron James retires, I just have a hard time believing they're going to be competent. We'll see, but I thought the actual players that got back in the deal

were better. So like, obviously you're gonna get one of those You're gonna get a one way guy back from the Lakers, Like you're gonna get somebody like a Gabe Vincent or a like a Jared Vanderbilt type of guy. They got Dyson Daniels from New Orleans. He's a really interesting defensive two guard, and specifically an interesting guy to have next to Trey Young if we think of the typical kind of orientation of having a skill guard next to an athlete guard. Dejonte Murray was an athlete guard,

but didn't focus as much on those details. Obviously is a more offensive minded player at this phase in his career, and Dyson Daniels slots really nicely in there is just like a traditional kind of three and D two guard, And so I thought that was really interesting. Larry Nants Junior, this is a type of big that Atlanta hasn't had yet. You know, obviously with Capella and Yakakongu. It's a lot of rebounding, it's a lot of athleticism, and Larry Nants

brings athleticism to the table. But Larry Nants can shoot the ball a little bit. You can shoot the ball a little bit. He can drive close outs a little bit. He is a kind of a more quintessential modern kind of perimeter oriented big and has some ability to defend in switches. And obviously, like I just think you're getting two really high quality role players, guys that can help you on both ends of the floor, and you get

the two draft picks that you were hoping for. So, like all things considered for the Hawks this summer, man, that's a pretty nice little turnaround there to get a really high quality role player in the draft, two more high quality role players in the trade, to bolster your draft compensation if you wanted to jump on a particular

type of deal. Else, like if you're let's say you find yourself in a situation where Zachary Risache and Jalen Johnson can't really play together because they're both fours, for instance, as an example, and then Brandon Ingram becomes available and you want to jump in and make a deal, or if you want to go after a different star around the league, just that becomes available at some point, you're more well equipped to jump on that type of opportunity.

Really liked the off season from the Atlanta Hawks. All right, let's get to our top five off seasons for our contenders. At number five, I have the Philadelphia seventy six Ers adding Paul George, Andre Drummond, Caleb Martin, Eric Gordon, and Reggie Jackson, losing Nick Patom, Buddy Heel, d Anthony Melton, and Paul Reid. Now, obviously losing to Anthony Melton is one of those things where like when he's healthy, that's

a substantial loss. I think d Anthony Melton is a quality starting two guard in this league, but there was health question there, and obviously they wanted to direct their cap space in other directions. I thought, you know, getting Caleb Martin is kind of that athletic wing to kind of play in that type of role at a discount

was a nice move. Giving yourself Andre Drummond for the eighty two is going to be vitally important because again, I think you got to keep Joel and Beat around, you know, fifty games, and that's going to require a pretty substantial load management schedule throughout the season. And in order to do that, you just have to have an

excellent backup center. And Andre Drummond's as good a backup center as you'll find around the league right now, and at least at the at the bare minimum, just eats up a lot of rebounds and just kind of takes those takes all that physical contact underneath the basket. I think he's a perfect fit there. Obviously, having Tyrese Maxi and Paul George as offensive initiators gives you a better chance.

Like to put it simply, if you put a lineup out there with Tyrese Maxi, Caleb and Paul George, you know,

Kelly u Bray and Andre Drummond, you give yourself a solid chance to win an NBA regular season game, Like you can go five hundred with that group without EMBIID And if you go five hundred without EMBIID and then you win, you know, seventy five percent of your games. With Embiid, you can be a top seeded team while resting your superstar for a third of the season. And so here's the thing. They took on some risk taking on Paul George long term at that number. There's some

real risk there. However, you're not in a position where you can be risk averse having Joel Embiid, with his health history at his age, after a couple of disappointing seasons, you had no choice but to be aggressive. And I thought Darryl Mory did a nice job being aggressive. This is an interesting team that he has put together. I have the seventy six ers at number five, number four,

the Dallas Mavericks. After getting Spencer Dinwoodie too recently, they have now added a considerable amount of ball handling and movement shooting. So Klay Thompson obviously the signing of the summer, you get Quinton Grimes as well. Those are two movement shooters, particularly two movement shooters that Klay Thompson has a history of being able to defend. We'll see if he can

still defend at this phase in his career. And I think Quinton Grimes is a pretty solid athletic perimeter defender, did a lot of work for the next two years ago in the playoffs as their primary point of attack guy that they would put on the other team's best player. And so you get two movement shooters that theoretically can defend, and then you add two additional guys that are really high quality ball handler. Spencer Dinwoody can handle the ball

run action. Naji Marshall can handle the ball run action. And so two additional ball handlers, two additional movement shooters. You're losing Josh Green, who's a guy that struggled to put the ball on the floor and make plays. Derek Jones Junior, a guy who was not a great ball handler. And then Tim Hardaway Junior, who is a decent upside type of offensive player but a lot of ups and down is not a very good defensive player and just

quite frankly, didn't make enough shots. Right, So what you did is you took some specialists and you turn them into some more versatile guys. There's some downsides, right, like Spencer Dinwoodie a pretty bad catch and shoot guy. That's something that can be an issue, right, So you got to make sure the ball is in his hands, right Klay Thompson. At his age, obviously a little bit of

defensive decline is to be expected. However, I like the two movement shooters and the two guys that can dribble. That to me is a clear sign from the Dallas front office that they want to lean into more ball

in player movement. We talked a lot about this after the playoffs last year, but there's a certain ceiling to four out offense that's helio centric and centered around a star, especially in the modern MBA with how much groundcoverage these teams have, with the schematic approach that teams take the new strategy of just putting a forward on your opposing big man so you can switch ball screens and force

lesser shooters to take above the break threes. That four out thing just it's a little easy to guard at this point, and so putting yourself in a position where you have more ball handling, you have guys that can come flying off a screen and shooting that just gives you more offensive resilience. It gives you a better chance of holding up in more matchups. Yes, it worked great in certain matchups, worked really really well against Minnesota, not

so much against Oklahoma City. There are some struggles there. Right. As soon as you have multiple high quality perimeter defenders that can make your guys work really hard, it gets tough. But when there's lots of ball in player movement, you get the defense in rotation more, you have more opportunities to play with an advantage than those elite perimeter defenders

can be mitigated to a certain extent. And so I just thought it was a really smart, kind of like philosophical approach from Dallas this summer to try to improve the overall offensive skill of the roster. Number three I have the Milwaukee Bucks, And again this is about grading on a curve, because there's nothing overly exciting here. The Bucks additorium prints, Gary Trent, junior Delon Wright, and they lost Maleague Beasley. Nothing like super exciting to talk about there.

But this was a team that was in a tough spot. They kind of needed to run it back, but they needed to make some slight tweaks to the roster, particularly in guys that can play both ends of the floor. Right, And here's the deal. You're in that situation basically handcuffed to the mid level exception and veteran minimum deals, so you're not in a situation where you can really go out and be overly aggressive and bring in a high

quality starter. That's that's not an option for you, right, But what you did is you turn Malik Beasley into a much better version of him and Gary Trent Junior at a veteran minimum contract that is a home run ten times out of ten. Gary Trent Junior last year's shot catch and shoot jump shots just as well as Malik Beasley did, except for he's a much better ball handler and he's more active with his hands at the point of attack, even though he leaves a lot to

be desired on that end. Gary Trent Junior is capable of being a better perimeter defender than Malik Beasley and is at least going to be more disruptive. If Gary Trann Junior is a guy that gets a lot of deflections, a lot of strips at the point of attack, and so I just think that's an upgrade. Is Gary Trn Junior a perfect player? No. If he was, he'd be making a lot more than the three million a year or whatever he's gonna make next year. But at that number,

you cannot do better. Than that substantial of an upgrade going from a league Beasley to Gary Tran junior Delon Wright, a professional point of attack defender. That's why he's in the league. A little older now, but that comes with better shooting as well. He shot the ball really well last year. If his body can hold up and if he can defend like he's capable of when he was younger,

that's a really nice pickup. And then Torrian Prince, again I've said two Bucks fans, you don't want him starting in the moments when Chris Middleton is out of the lineup with an injury and Toring Prince has to start. He will leave some to be desired in the sense that like he struggles to hang athletically with starting forwards. But he's a good catch and shoot guy, a good closeout attacker, a good NBA player, And if he's in your rotation, as in a bench player who starts when

he has to, you're good. If he use them the way the Lakers did is a full time starter, that's where it can get disappointing. And so as long as they use Tori imprints the way that I hope they will as a bench forward, which mainly is going to rely on Chris Middleton's health. That's three substantial rotation spot upgrades executed within the confines of a really tough situation with their cap. So I just got to say that's

a damn good offseason. I have the Bucks at number three, number two, the New York Knicks, you had Michale Bridges. You lose Isaiah Hartenstein, a couple of bench guys, namely Alec Burkson, boy and mcdonovich. So here's the thing. The Hartenstein piece sucks. But a lot of this just has to do and we're going to talk about this when we get into the mailbag. A lot of this just has to do with the reality of the center market. Nick Claxton got twenty five million a year. Isaiah Hardenstein

gets twenty seven million a year. Jared Allen, who's a what somewhere around the eighth to twelfth best starting center in the NBA, just got thirty one million a year in an extension. And so the market on centers is, if you're a starting center that is one of the top fifteen to twenty starting centers in the league, you're

getting twenty five million. And so unfortunately the Knicks were kind of in a predicament where it was gonna be really difficult for them to retain Hertenstein under any circumstances. So that's not something I'm going to necessarily hold them accountable to. They got Michale Bridges. Did they give up a lot? Yes, But this is not going after Paul George. You're going after and in his prime, incredibly durable two

way wing. So like anytime you're doing something like that, a guy who's in his late twenties notoriously available to play, and a guy that plays both ends of the floor, if you're gonna overpay, you're gonna overpay for a guy like that. Mainly, we can see now that the Knicks are stocking up on guys that can play both ends of the floor. Right, Dante DiVincenzo can play both ends of the floor. Kale Bridges can play both ends of

the floor. O Jananobi can play both ends of the floor. Deuce McBride can play both ends of the floor. That that is a really solid foundation when you need to get out of the Eastern Conference against the Boston Celtics team that specifically targets weak points for you on the defensive end of the floor. We saw it with Dallas. It's like they got Derek Lively out there, he's sliding his feet. They got Derek Jones out there, he sliding his feet. They got PJ. Washington out there, he's sliding

his feet. They got you know, Kyrie Irving out there, he's sliding his feet. But they just went after Luca, right, And that's the thing. Like Jalen Brunson is a guy that at least competes and does his job and he throws. He'll throw a hedge and recover if he needs to. Surrounding him with a bunch of guys that can play both ends of the floor gives you a solid chance to contain that Boston dribble penetration, keep your defense out of rotation, and have a better chance of holding up.

I like the move, and again like the you're setup specifically for a bunch of different looks. You've got a Julius Randall at center. Look where you can go small and just play literally five good two way players. You've got a bench or a big group where you've got Mitchell Robinson at the five. You held down a precious to Chua as an An additional kind of like kind of hybrid look where Precious can switch onto some guards. They've got a lot of different looks they can go to.

They've got a trade to make still because they've got Julius Randall. If he's an awkward fit. There's gonna be someone out there that will take advantage of what Julius Randall brings to the table, especially teams that are looking for size in the front court. So like they're in a really good spot, they're gonna be immediately good and they've got moves to make, like where the Knicks are at.

But right now you can put all that intel to the test by bringing those patterns directly into a mock draft and make your mock draft feel like the real thing. Check out fantasypros dot com slash volume today to get an edge over your league mates right now and forever.

make sense last year. You turned him into a guy that can step in and immediately contribute on both ends with four and Alex Crusoe, and you addressed your biggest individual weakness as a team last year, which was your ability to hold up under physicality in the front court, including dealing with bigger bodied players and most importantly, defensive rebounding, as the Thunder one of the worst defensive rebounding teams

in the league last year. Isaiah Hartenstein is a human wrecking ball and he's going to help so much in those areas. But most importantly, Isaiah Hartenstein is a player that is a wheel greaser so to speak, in five out offense. I talked about this a lot with Team USA as it pertains to Joel Embiid, But the five spot is the most important spot to have a guy who can make quick decisions and get the ball from

side to side in five out. If you have a guy that struggles with that specifically, it comes things up for everybody because the center is the bridge to both sides of the floor in five out offense. He's the guy that, like when you run action on the right side and you throw the dribble handoff and then you short roll and you catch and nothing's open. He's the guy that's got to turn and go to a dribble handoff on the other side of the floor. He's the guy that's got to get up and down the floor

and transition. He's the guy that's got to set those screens and the dribble handoffs, roll hard, but then also get back out for the next sequence. It is a motor position. It is a decision making position. It is a position where you can't have hesitation. You've got to be quick, and Isaiah Hartenstein is really really good at that. He can make all the back door passes, he can set good screens, he can make those floaters. Love the fit there. I think the thunder immediately addressed a couple

of their biggest weaknesses. And they were already the one seed that already had an impressive second round showing that came this close to making it to the Western Conference finals, and they made themselves substantially better. And that didn't even count for the fact that all of their young stars have a lot more experience now after having two rounds of playoff basketball underneath their belt. Really really excited about

the Thunder next season. I thought they had the best offseason. Small, simple, to the point, and addressed their needs. All right, let's get to the mailbag. Why is Jason Tatum not considered a top five player despite being selected First Team All NBA three years in a row. Had a bunch of Celtics fans bring this up to me. First of all, First Team All NBA is an award. It's something that is voted on and it typically has a lot more

to do with team success than anything else. And so, as a result, like we commonly will see situations where First Team All NBA does not represent the top five players in the NBA. Like just a couple quick examples. Twenty twenty two, Devin Booker made First Team All NBA. I didn't think he was the top five player in the league. Last year, Nikola Jokic didn't make First Team All NBA. He was very clearly the first team in the best player in the NBA. That was back in

That was twenty twenty three, not twenty twenty four. So like the first Team All NBA is not just a

clear ranking of the top five players in the league. Secondly, anybody who followed me on the show knows I've been consistent ever since twenty twenty two, literally before the finals even started with Golden State, when I picked the Warriors to win that series, I still said I think Boston has the most talented roster in the league, that they had the most talented roster in the league in twenty twenty three, and then I thought they had by far

the most talented roster in the league in twenty twenty four. Boston has the most talent. They just do. They've had the most talent three years in a row now. And what ends up happening is when you have a lot

of talent, you win a lot of games. When you win a lot of games, especially in a weak Eastern Conference, you're gonna have a lot of really favorable metrics, right, because those metrics are fed by the results that are taking place on the floor and a good percentage of the NBA voting pool, they legitimately make decisions based on numerical evidence over what they're seeing on their TV screens, which is something I personally disagree with. But I literally

had voters tell me that. I've had voters tell me that they believe that numbers are less fallible. And I'm not talking about like count raw counting stats. I have talked to voters who believe that catch all metrics are more reliable than what we see on our TV screens, which is something I personally very much disagree with. I

think catch all metrics are incredibly flawed. And so the point is Jason Tatum, while I do believe he's a top ten player, has benefited from being on the most talented rosters in the league, which has led to incredible team results, which has led to incredible individual metrics, which has led to him getting a lot of voting support in the all NBA voting. In my opinion, he is not one of the top five players in the NBA. He's not a good enough offensive engine in the half

court to be that. I do think Tatum is underrated by a lot of his haters. And by the way, this is something that I understand where Celtics fans are coming from. I am one of those guys that, like I personally, very much value the offensive engine archetype. I think it's the most valuable skill a player can bring to the team. That's why a guy like Shay Gilders Alexander, for example, is better in my opinion, than adjacent Tatum.

If I need a guy to lead my team for four playoff rounds while surrounded with a bunch of talent to just generate quality shots, give me Shay over Tatum every single time. Right. That's just my personal view of

the game. Too often, and I know this is especially from Laker fans, and God knows that we've got a lot of Laker fans that we deal with on the show, because I am a Laker fan myself when we cover the Lakers very closely, and we got a lot of Lakers fans that follow me on Twitter and a lot of Lakers fans that are in the comments, and so I understand that there can be a lot of Tatum negativity, But like I just want to have an honest conversation

about it. I think he's an underrated defensive player. I think his size and strength, even though it's led to some drawbacks, but his jump shot has allowed him to become one of the most versatile front court defenders in the league. His ability to guard a post centers was a huge part of what made Boston's defensive schemes work during their two month playoff run. I'm a huge believer in Jason Tatum. I think his offensive kind of like approach worked really well with this Celtics group that had

so much talent. Big Jason Tatum fan, but he is just not the He is not the offensive force that the top players in the league are. That to me puts him below that top tier of superstars. And I do not think he's a top five player. That said,

he's going to continue to make first team All NBA because he's on the most talented roster in the league. He'll make first team All NBA again next year, and I'm probably not going to think he's a top five player. And so again that's just my take. I know you Celtics fans disagree, doesn't mean you're wrong. Doesn't mean I'm wrong. These are just our opinions. That's why we're hashing him out. This was a direct message I got from Kevin. Hey Jason,

longtime fan of listener, Please more Devin Booker. Love man. He's been so good defensively considering his skill set. He has been at the top of Team USA and play minus since the beginning of Camp. I want some Jason tim flove from a man the book. So the Devin Booker thing has been really fascinating to me. I actually was talking with the Spears n Aali. They're a local radio station here in Tucson. Actually I was on the

on there this morning and we were talking. They specifically asked me, like, with the play of Devin Booker and Kevin Durant and the play of Anthony Davis and Lebron James, should Lakers fans and Suns fans be excited? And my answer was they should be annoyed. And the reason why they should be annoyed is the reason why the Sons and Lakers struggle is because outside of their stars, they don't have starting caliber NBA players that play both ends

of the flour like Austin Reeves. Is the third best Laker. He's a very good offensive player, and he tries on defense, but because of his limitations, he's an average to slight lee above average defensive player. D'Angelo Russell very good offensive player, very bad defensive player. Ruey hat Chimura very good offensive player, very bad defensive player. Jared Vanderbilt very good defensive player,

very bad offensive player. Gay Vincent decent offensive player or a defense A decent defensive player, pretty bad offensive player. As you can see, they got these one way guys, and so the Lakers are full of holes and they've had a bunch of issues, which is why I've been preaching they need upgrades at the two and three now for two years. Right, look at the Suns, same sort of thing. Beyond Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal, it's a bunch of guys who play one end of

the floor. Usif Nurkic is a really useful five out folkrum Becoseet's good screens, that's good, dribble handoffs, can finish under the basket, can get offensive rebounds, can occasionally knock down in three and I. While I was impressed by his effort defensively, last year, he's limited. There. You know, Eric Gordon at this phase in his career not exactly a dominant two way player, right, Josha Kogi really good

defense player, limited offensively. We can go on and on, but the reality is is the Suns and the Lakers are struggling because from the front office down and for the Suns it has more to do with their constraints after making the deals that they made. For the Lakers,

it has more to do with organizational incompetence. But those teams are struggling because as we saw, having the Derek Whites, having the Drew Holidays, having the Al Horfords, having the role players that play both ends of the floor is what wins you an NBA championship. You've got to have superstar talent plus two way role players. And the Lakers and Sons have the superstar talent, they don't have the two way role players. And this is taking it back

to the Jason Tatum thing. This is why that kind of conversation is stupid. I think Kevin Durant, Lebron James Anthony Davis are all better than Jason Tatum right now. I think they all are, but especially with Jason Tatum in this miserable shooting slump. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because their team has these limitations. Tatum's playing alongside good two way role players. His team's winning a shit

ton of games and winning the title. Anthony Davis and Lebron and Kevin Durant, Devin Booker, they're playing against playing alongside one way role players. Their team is really struggling. Basketball is a team sport at the end of the day. And by the way, when I say Lebron, Anthony Davis and Katie are better than Tatum, I'm mainly talking in a playoff context. I think for eighty two games, you still take Tatum over most guys just because of his durability.

Lebron turns forty next year. But the point is is like, we did get a healthy Lebron in AD last year and they still underachieved. And a lot of people are going like, well, if Lebron and AD are that good, why aren't they winning more? And it's like, because it is better to win games to have the Drus and the Derek Whites and the al Horford's than it is to have the Ruby Hatcher, Muraz the D'Angelo Russells and the Jared Vanderbilts. It just is, it just is like

two way role players win titles. That is what happens. And so I hope that we can kind of like see pass that as far as the Devin Booker part goes, and I want to take it back to the mailbag for a second. The fascinating thing to me is that those four guys have played well. If you were to rank the top five players with Team USA so far, it's gonna be Lebron and Ad Booker and KD and it's probably Bam as the fifth guy. And I think that's really fascinating. Ad and Bam. Why have they succeeded?

They are two traditional five out bigs, really good at flowing from side to side, multiple dribble handoffs in the same possession, the ability to be a scoring threat on the role while also being able to get up and down the floor and transition and defend in multiple ways. That's obviously why they've worked. Why has Kevin Durant and Devin Booker worked so well. Kevin Durant Devin Booker have worked so well because they are the quintessential plug in

play guys. Devin Booker has been asked to be Klay Thompson on this team, to guard on the perimeter, to chase over the top of screens, and to operate with an advantage created by others. He's done a masterful job of that, and then Kevin Durant the exact same thing. Obviously from the forward position he's benefiting from the attention of other guys are getting knocking down a ton of these perimeter jump shots, which are so valuable in FOBA

with the defensive three second rule. And just one of the big reasons why book and Kdie in particular I have played so well is quick decision making. They are just guys that catch and quickly read the floor, make a read, keep it moving. That is really easy to

play alongside. When you go play pick up and you're playing with a guy that you know what he's gonna do, it's easy because when you throw him that pass, if you know he's gonna shoot when he's open, or he's gonna drive when he's guarded, and he's gonna always make the right play out of it, it's easy to play when you throw it to the guy who catches and holds and jab steps and you don't know if he's gonna shoot, or if he's gonna randomly decide to io,

or if he's gonna randomly decide to do something else. It's frustrating and difficult to play with the flip side of that coin. Why has a guy like Joel Embiid really struggled in the setting? He's a struggle. He's going to struggle to play five out basketball, flowing from side to side, getting up and down the floor, playing alongside

other stars, quick decision making. I find that fascinating. And what Devin Booker and Kevin Durant are telling you is they are professional basketball players, meaning they can play many different styles of basketball. It's like a session guitarist who like plays blues for one guy, a little bit of classic rock for another guy, country lines for another guy. He's a professional. His job is what does the band need. The band needs me to do this, I'll do that right.

That's what KD and Devin Booker are doing. They are slotting in two roles on this team because they are professional basketball players. Whereas a guy like Joel Embiid force of nature and by a literal definition of professional basketball player, but he needs to play a certain style and if I ask Himbiid to do something that's a little out of his comfort zone, he's going to struggle. And I find that to be fascinating. And again, and I said this on the radio this morning, like that, to me

is what's so fascinating about basketball. It's more art than science. You don't just add talent and get talent benefit. You add talent and you get what's complimentary out of it. And Devin Booker and Kevin Durant have incredibly complimentary play styles that can fit alongside other good basketball players. For the mailbag, why does the media hate Bam? I don't think the media hate hates Bam. I think there's a certain limitation there offensively that has been baked in for

a long time. And the three point shooting is exciting, right, and that is something that kind of changes the equation with Bam. Right, everyone's always been a huge fan of Bam on the defensive end of the forourd obviously everything he's capable of there, one of the probably the best switching big in the league, if not one of the best switching bigs in the league. He's a guy that is a really good passer on the short roll, a guy who's been a really good dribble handoff guy in

five out offense. But there have been some limitations for him offensively in his career, namely last year guys for Miami. Last season, Bam shot below fifty percent on layups. That was a huge issue in the finals two years ago against Denver, his ability to make those short shots right by the basket. And so the reality is, is Bam as good as he is, there's still just a little bit of like an offensive limitation there that prevents him from getting to the next level. Right, But I still

think Bam is incredibly valuable. I think he's underrated. I think he's showing what he can do at this level. I think, and here's the thing, if he's going to struggle to make layups, his ability to knock down three point shots would be an excellent counter to that. But, like I mean, I don't think I think hate is the wrong word. Bam flies under the radar because he has offensive limitations. That's really all it is. But like anybody who watches Bam and understands the game knows that

he brings so much good to the table. And if he can mitigate some of his issues around the basket by knocking down three point shots. That goes a long way to incre raising his value. And he shot the ball really damn well in these FEBA games. And like one of the specific things that I've also liked, I'm pulling up BAM's jump shot numbers so i can show

you guys real quick. But one of the other things that I've appreciated with Bam too is you're getting a good look at what it's like when he plays alongside another big, when he's been with Anthony Davis, And that's fascinating because one of the things we talk about is when you have to use your big to defend ball screens, it gets a little bit tougher for your smaller players

on the back line to make the lowman rotations. Right, So that's the guy that has to step over on the ball screen to deflect lobs when Bam is up at the level, and then the guy gets back to the shooter when the ball gets worked to the opposite side. Right. Well, if you have another big in the equation, there's more opportunities for Bam to actually be in that situation. And we've seen more of that with Anthony Davis and so I think it'd be really cool just to get more

opportunity to see Bam in that type of role. Bam has taken twelve catch and shoot jump shots so far with Team USA, and it's got fifteen points out of them. That's one point twenty five points per shot. That's really really quality shooting from Bam Adebayo.

they new Warrior basketball, hence the signings Clever move. I like them because they fit kind of traditional Golden State Warrior rolesd Anthony Melton is, in my opinion, like a poor man's version of KCP but he's a better ball handler than KCPKCP is more of a movement shooter type of archetype. Melton's got a little bit more off the dribble bounce like pop to be able to make plays on his own on the bounce. Kyle Anderson fits the

other half of that Golden State Warriors mold. The Golden State five out mold typically kind of feeds around two folkrums and then three decision makers. Right, So, whether that's Draymond and Andrew Boget back in the day, or Draymond and Looney a couple of years ago, or if it's Draymon and Kaminga now, they have these two guys that function primarily as the guys that are set throwing the dribble handoffs while the other three guys are running action

around them. And so you need three guys that can run action, that can all dribble and pass and make quick decisions, and then you need the guys that can set those screens into space flow into the next driple handoff, all that classic stuff for the Warrior offense. Kyle Anderson to me, fits wonderfully into one of those folkrum spots.

He's a guy who's really good at operating with an advantage on the catch in that short area where he can make those little floaters and stuff like ten feet from the rim, he can make passes out of there, set good screens while also being a very very good defensive player on the other end of the flour And then d Anthony Meltin because of his ability to put the ball in the four, gives you another guy who can run action while also defending on the other end

of the four. You added two two way guys that pretty seamlessly fit into the Golden State Warrior offense. I thought they were really nice additions. Can you briefly discuss how elite Derek White is at basketball? Where does he

rank in the NBA on the impact value scale? So I don't have any real like impact lists for Derek White, but I do want to talk about his impact for a minute, because I talked a lot about Derek White when I went on with Ethan Strauss about we could go and we were discussing just kind of like what makes a winning basketball player, and we were discussing some tam Usa stuff, and one of the things that I found find really fascinating about Derek White, because Derek White

made another game saving play the other day, and he's made plenty of him in his life right. He famously last year in Eastern Conference Finals gave the Celtics a chance to win in Game seven by stealing Game six in Miami with the offensive rebound put back right and against South Sudan, not in the Olympics, but in the exhibition. On the final possession, there's a play where Carlic Jones is working against Drew Holliday makes a really nice right to left move and kind of like ditches Drew and

goes into a floater. Anthony Davis has no choice but to abandon his man and step up and try to block it, which forces Karlake to shoot a really high floater which goes way over the backside of the room and Anthony Edwards does not peel off of his man in back box. Anthony Davis's man out, Anthony Edwards makes a mistake. It's become something that could be an issue.

When Yan Gabriel goes up, gets two hands on the basketball and is right there to tip dunk it in, Derek White comes flying in from out of the play, barely gets a piece of it and causes one Yan Gabriel to throw it into the front of the rim and Tmusa wins. And it's an example of what makes Derek White such an elite role player. The motor never stops. And I was talking about this with Ethan because the Anthony Edwards Corolary on that same possession as he as

he doesn't make that extra play. Is stars are always in the energy conservation business. They're trying to make sure they got the legs they need to make plays down the line. Role Players are always in the energy expending business. They know that their role is to constantly point and shoot their effort in all of these areas, knowing there's another guy that can step in and do their job when they're tired, and vice versa. And their job is to never leave any of that meat on the bone.

And that's what makes Derek White the quintessential role player. He's got the tools, he's athletic, he's got long arms. He's a useful offensive player, very quick, accurate three point shot, release, makes quick reads, can play driving kick, can offensive rebound. But he's also but most importantly, he directs his six to six long armed frame into just constant effort and energy on the details, active as a rebounder, one of the best shot blocking guards in the league, a guy

that fights over the top of screens consistently. That is what makes a good role player. It's having athletic gifts, but also being relentless in your attention to detail, in your effort and energy on every single possession, which is something that you can't expect out of stars, and that's what makes a really good role player. All Right, three more, Hi, Jason Bigfan. I really enjoy listening to you talk about

the game. The situation with Jason Tatum's jump shot got me thinking, how do players get into these slumps where the mechanics are all out of whack. I imagine these guys are shooting hundreds of shots today, it's surprising that they all of a sudden lose rhythm in mechanics. So usually when you go work on your shot, you're you are working on some sort of mechanic thing. Right, A huge one for me is footwork. I rep footwork every single day because that's the part of my shot that

I choose to focus on. But even with my release, like I have a specific thing that happens to me every once in a while where like every once in a while, my hand will drift a little bit in front of my face instead of getting my elbow tuck.

It's just something that happens when I play for months and months, like there'll be a stretch where just my form gets a little out of whack and I gotta take time to go into the gym and like make sure I'm getting that elbow tuck so that I'm getting a good straight release every single time, right, Like everybody works on those those little details. I've listened to Kyrie Irving talk about how he tweaks it, goes into the

gym and works on his form. Steph Curry shoots form shooting, does form shooting for several minutes before he even gets into his shooting drill. So he I'll just shoot little five foot jumper until his form feels right. Like when you go work on your shot, you work on your form. And I think in a lot of cases, when you enter into a bad slump, it can cause you to over tinker with it. And it's very clear that because

here's the thing. When you like just take that example I talked about with getting your elbow underneath so like, if you're like really hyper focused on getting that elbow in, you might start to exaggerate it and like add a little hitch into your shot. And you never want to do that because you want to have good energy transfer, You want to have good flow from the bottom of

your shot to the top of your shot. And so, in all likelihood, my guess is that Jason just wasn't shooting well and it started to get to him mentally a little bit, and so he started to tinker with it. And now he's over tinkering with it, and now he's got some issues, is what happened. Anthony Davis, Like his release on his jump shot is way slower now than it was in the bubble, But he's probably tinkering with it a lot more because he just hasn't shot well

in a long time. And so Tatum just needs to get out of this Olympic setting and he needs to get in the gym all day summer and polish that shit up and make sure it's ready for training camp. Two more Jason. If the Lakers got Jeremy Grant in a trade and couldn't get an athletic guard at the two,

who would be the fifth starter? At the two for you, Max Christy, since you said for Max to start, you need an awesome wing at the three, or Jared Vanderbilt to increase the length and size of the team, which would most likely most likely be a switching group. I think that we are going to see Max Christy do some starting this year, especially if they end up trading d'

angelo Russell. The thing with Max Christy that makes it really hard for me is I just haven't seen him play a substantial NBA role for a large sample size. There's a lot of stuff I'm really excited about. He's a very good athlete. I was actually watching some random footage of the Laker Warrior game earlier this year, is the one that went to double overtime and Lebron had

like thirty six twenty and twelve. It was like one of his crazy games this season, and he hit all those pull up jump shots in overtime to win the game.

But in that game, there was a play where like Max Christie said a quick pick on Lebron and then slipped into open space and Lebron like hit him with a perfect bounce pass and Max like caught in traffic and like elevated off to two feet and dunked on Draymond Green, and I was like, man Like, Max has like such great natural athletic gifts, excellent frame, excellent foot speed, competes at the point of attack, navigates screens well, active

with his hands, absorbs contact, he's put on muscle, shoots the ball really well. My main concern with him is driving and kicking, Like how good is he at just like making decisions when he has to put the ball on the floor. But again, like I just got to see it, and I need to see a lot of it. And I hope that he gets a substantial role all season so that we just get a lot of time to see what Max Christy has. But bottom line, NBA history tells us young players struggle to contribute in the

later rounds of the playoffs. And so if you're counting on Max to be your starting too, I think you'd have to be really good at the other four spots. And it's a lot. It's a lot to ask with where the Lakers are at at this point, and so we'll see, Like even Jeremy Grant like that. I like Jeremy Grant. The thing that I like about Jeremy Grant is just the athletic waves. Jeremy is big and freaky athletic, and if you put him next to Lebron and Ad that's just a lot of a lot of size and athleticism.

But Jeremy hasn't defended super well since he left left Denver. He's notoriously a guy that cares more about just making his money and playing chill basketball somewhere than playing a hard job for a winning team. That was kind of the story on him when he went to Detroit. And so like, I don't I don't know that we're gonna I don't know what Jeremy Grant we get. Like if we get the Jeremy Grant from the bubble who was really competing and guarding the other team's best player like that,

that that's interesting to me. But I'm curious to see if that's what that's what we get if that deal ends up getting done. And obviously there's no guarantee that deal ends up getting done, and so we'll see. Like the Lakers are in a tough spot. I mean, here's the thing. There's been a lot of talk about gave Vincent, Max Christie and Jared Vanderbilt just kind of being the defense and athleticism that joins the team, by Max actually getting playing time without Darvin Hamm in the picture, and

by Jared Vanderbilt and gave Vincent being healthy. I'm okay with the approach that you wait till the deadline at this point, because you already missed out on de Jontay Murray, and it looks like you weren't getting to de Jontay Murray unless you included Austin Reeves, which is a difficult decision to make. Right outside of that, I haven't seen like Donovan Mitchell was not a realistic target, So there's

not really a great option out there right now. And so while I would like them to upgrade the role player spots, I'm okay with you at least taking it into camp and seeing what Max can do, seeing what Jared Vanderbilt looks like from a health standpoint, seeing how

Vincent looks. But come hell or high water, if it doesn't look right, you got to make a move at some point, because Lebron and eight are two good and you owe these guys a legitimate final chance, and I think you owe them the use of those two first round draft picks. To try to make that happen all right. Last one, Hi, Jason, I'm curious to hear your thoughts on the future of centers in relation to the new

CBA and cap management. Obviously, the tier one guys Jokic, mbtn AD deserve the max and I'd assume if you didn't have one of those three guys, you'd want a basic rim protector or runner like a Lively, Jalen, Durant, etc. Or a genuine Stretch five if you were lucky like Matt Miles Turner or Christops porzingis The issue arises if you're someone like Sabonis or Bam, who are clearly more skilled than average centers, but aren't close to the Tier one guys, and when they are on max steals, both

the ceiling for Miami and Sacramento are limited. If you were a GM looking for a center, would you just want them to simply rebound, slash, protect the rim, slash catch lobs or try to find the next Tier one center. Having that genuine Tier one center gives you a true advantage come playoff time, but the numbers suggest that this is way harder to find compared to a Tier one winger guard thanks as always for your content. Looking forward

to disagreeing with your player rankings. So this got really fast for me after the Jared Allen deal because if you look at it, Jared Allen is probably a slightly above average starting center in the NBA, and he got over thirty million a year on his extension. Isaiah Hartenstein is an average starting center in this league twenty seven million a year. Nick Klaxton average starting center in this

league twenty five million a year. And that's not even close to the top tier guys that you mentioned where you're getting into Jokic, embiid, Anthony Davis, bam Adebayo, you know you mentioned Sabonis, Like, there's so many of these guys too, Like what about Zubach, what about Cheded Holmgren, Like, like we can go on and on. There are so many of these like quality centers, and if the running rate on them is twenty five million a year at

a minimum, a couple of things are interesting there. First of all, it's fascinating that it's fascinating that the league is telling us that that center position is so damn valuable now, which is telling you with the problem that Jokic, n Embid and Anthony Davis and all these guys present. You gotta have interior size. The second thing that's fascinating about it is, Okay, what do you do if you're a GM then And this is where I look at, like,

who is it that Jalen Smith went to? Let me check real quick, but Jalen Smith, I saw, I went for like nine million a year? That bulls who went to the bulls? So like, that's where it gets difficult, Like would you be better off paying nine million a year for a guy like a Jalen Smith or you're thirty million a year or twenty seven million a year for a guy like Isaiah Hartenstein. And those are tough decisions to make. And that's where it comes down to

what the rest of your roster looks like. Right. So if you're a team that doesn't have the ability from the same point of the cap to go after a higher level center, then you got to look at that lower tier, right, And it's just all about resource management. And so from there, I think it just depends on what your predicament is. Cleveland had to resign Jared Allen. Evan Mobley's not big enough to play center. They had to appease Donovan Mitchell. They're in a little bit of

a win now type of predicament, right the thunder. That's an interesting example, spending twenty seven million a year on a center when you already have Chet Holmgren on the roster. But they lined it up so that Isaiah Hartenstein's option is at the same time as Chet Holmgren's deal, so they can at least address that when they get into

the future. My guess is that when they max Chet, they probably won't don't retain Isaiah Hartenstide at that point, they probably will go after a bigger forward, right, And so these are it's all about resource management. But the thing that's been fascinating to me is, just to put it simply, the centers in the league just costs a lot of money now, and I don't think there's such like if you on an average starting center, you're paying twenty five million a year and that that's just that's

just a lot. That's a lot to deal with with the cap now. The one flip side there is when the new TV deal kicks in, twenty five million is kind of like the new fifteen million, you know what

I mean. And so again like it might be one of those deals where when we get into the future, the teams that got in guys, the teams that locked up Claxton and Jared Allen and and and all these guys in that in that twenty five to thirty million range, they might be really happy a couple of years from now on the new CBA, or sorry, not the new CBA, the new TV deal, because that might be the new discount. A starting center might go for thirty five million a year in a few years, and so and so. Again,

we're in a little bit of a transition period. But I do think it's really fascinating how much the league is valuing those guys. All right, guys, that is all I have for today and for the weekend. We're gonna take the rest of this weekend off. Probably gonna take Monday off too, because Team USA plays on Tuesday. In all likelihood, we'll do an episode on Tuesday that covers

the quarterfinal game. From now to Tuesday, I'm gonna keep working on player ranking stuff because I'm gonna have that player I go out of town next Thursday, and I'm gonna have I'm gonna have player ranking stuff that's gonna be releasing while I'm out of town, so I'll be working on that, but our next new episode will be on Tuesday. As always, as sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me in the show. I'll see you guys.