Hoops Tonight - Warriors Media Day Reaction: Steph Curry, Draymond locked in + free agency recap

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hundred gambler dot net in West Virginia. All right, Welcome to Hoops Tonight, presented by fan Duel here at the volume. Happy Tuesday, everybody. I hope all of you guys are having a great start to your weeks. We're gonna be doing two videos today this morning. We're gonna be covering Warriors Media Day, and then this evening we're gonna be continuing with our power rankings. We are moving into the

top tier of contenders. We have four teams left, the Clippers, the Bucks, the Warriors, and the Celtics, not in that order. We're gonna be doing deep dives into all four of those teams, everything they did this offseason, everything they do offensively and defensively. Uns of Basketball analysis today through Friday in the evening, so keep an eye on your feeds

for that. One other quick note, I was looking at the comments from yesterday's media day video and there's a lot of like anti Lakers stuff, not so much anti Lakers, but just people complaining that we talked about the Lakers. I want to do address that really quick because it's really pretty simple. First of all, we we talked about the Lakers for three reasons. Okay, First of all, you guys care about the Lakers. Guests which one of our

power rankings videos has done the most views? The Lakers one. That's just smart business too. I used to cover the Lakers, so I know a ton about them. I have a lot of friends who are big fans of the team and who cover the team. Their team that I'm invested in, so I like to talk about them. And then, last, but not least, they have Lebron James and Anthony Davis. Yes, last year was a dumpster fire. There's also a chance

that this year could be a dumpster fire. But the reality of the situation is they have a high ceiling. Yes they do. They are involved in the landscape of the league. But make no mistake, as this year progresses, we are going to focus on the good teams that play good basketball. So if the Lakers start a flounder and they start ten and twenty, we're not going to talk about them anymore. We're talking about them now because they are relevant. If you're pretending like they're not relevant,

you're not being honest. They have Lebron James and Anthony Davis. If they are healthy, they are at least a threat. Even if they are a lower level threat, there at the very least a threat. But at the end of the day, we're gonna follow what you guys want and where the good basketball is and then usually they're correlated. Guess what our Lakers videos in March and April last year did not do well. You know why because the Lakers sucked in the entire Laker fan base spot out

of the team. But this year, the Lakers optimism is back and it's just good business. It's the same reason we're doing Warriors right now. We have a lot of Warriors fans who are fans of the show, so we're going to be doing a media day video about the Warriors. I just wanted to explain that really quick so people understand. And then just to set the expectation that, look, we're not gonna over the Lakers if they turn out to be a dumpster fire. We're gonna follow the good basketball

around the league. You guys know the drill before we get started. Subscribe to the Volumes YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at Underscore Jason lt so you guys don't miss any show announcements. Plus, once we get into the season, that's where I put all my film breakdown. Since we have some rules with YouTube that don't allow us to use NBA footage, I put the NBA footage stuff on Twitter,

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let's talk some basketball. So there are three things that I found interesting in Warriors Media Day that I wanted to touch on, and we're gonna start with Janice and a quote that he had from his media day in a response that Steph had so, Janice said, quote two years ago when we did that, Yeah, when I was sleeping in my bed, I was like, yeah, maybe I'm the best player in the world, you know, But now no. In my opinion, the way I view at the winner is the best. The guy who wins is the best.

I believe that the best player in the world is Steph Curry until the next player end quote. Steph responded at his media day quote, I would say the same thing when you're facing the champions that's part of the nature of the league. We all want to win the championship and when you look at the team, that's the last team standing. I was thinking the same thing about him last year coming off their run. So first of all, when it comes to player rankings, everyone's got different criteria.

For instance, like people who weigh the regular season heavily. Most of those people have yokis either near the top or at the top, right. You know, player teams that are people that value playoff basketball more have some the traditional guys up there like I did, like Janice k D, Steph Lebron, guys who have actually won NBA championships, led teams to NBA championships, and then there's everything in between,

the entire gamut of different approaches to ranking players. Now, what's funny is I used to deal with this particular problem by having like two separate conversations and since then I've kind of merged them into what I used for our player rankings during the summer, which is a combination of both philosophies. But those two philosophies are who is the best basketball player alive and who deserves to be

called the best? And the main difference there is the appropriate respect that we pay towards the Larry O'Brien Trophy. You know, I talked about this a lot when ESPN came out with Steph at five in their player rankings, which I thought was outrageous, especially coming off of what he did in that playoff run. But When that ranking came out that day, I was complaining that I don't think enough respect is paid these days to how difficult

it is to get the Larity O'Brien Trophy. Like I've seen c J. McCollum, Who's a player that I really like and a player that I think is great for young basketball players to emulate because of how skilled he is despite not being that great of an athlete. I saw c J. McCollum single handedly destroy the Denver Nuggets in a playoff series, including going off in Game seven on their home floor to steal a game that they should have lost. That's a playoff success from a player.

Why don't we all think c J. McCollum is a top ten player because he struggled in the first round series that year and then he struggled in the conference finals that year. Dominating a regular season is one thing. Dominating a playoff series is one thing. Dominating two playoff series is one thing. I saw Nicola Yokitch, I'll play Kawhi Leonard in the conference semifinals after a great first round series, after a great regular season, But then what happened?

He ran into a different matchup. Anthony Davis one of the best defensive players the league. He got out played by Anthony Davis. They lost the series. That's it's hard to lead a team through a regular season, to lead a team through a first round series, a second round series, a third round series on the NBA Final stage, different matchups, encountering better defenses, maybe a specific defensive matchup that's gonna

give you problems facing real adversity. You know, this was a relatively low adversity a season or playoff run for the Warriors, and still they were down to one in the finals to the Celtics against the team that I thought was actually a little bit more talented. Steph Curry sprained his foot in the regular season and came off the bench to start the playoffs, you know, Clay Thompson

coming back from his injury, Draymond Grain's back injury. This was a season filled adversity that ended with them finally getting the Larry O'Brien Trophy. That process and that result is nowhere near valued enough by people, in my opinion, by people who evaluate basketball players. There it is not it is. Anybody can have one good game or one good series, maybe even two good series, or a great regular season. It is an entirely different animal to do

the whole thing. And when you see that adversity come through, come to fruition, when they hoist the trophy, it's a special moment, and I think we have to acknowledge that. So that's why I used to split those debates into two completely separate topics. Who's the best player in the world. Who's the guy who went through all the adversity and hoisted the trophy? Like I never actually thought Kawhi Leonard was the best player in the world in two thousand nineteen.

I don't think any of you guys would agree with I would disagree with that. However, he hoisted the trophy at the end and went through the grind, did all of the things you know, uh In, lamented himself with an entirely new group of people, an entirely new situation, and made it to the finish line. I understood that people were willing to say Kauai was the best player in the world at that point, and that's kind of my thing, Like in my rankings, I have your honest

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official sports betting partner of the NFL. I have your Honest number one because I think he's the best defensive player alive and a top five offensive player. I think physically he's completely incapable of being handled by any team in the league. That Boston Celtics team was the one team that should have been able to do it, and even they couldn't handle him. He's incredible. I have him at number one, But I totally understand why Janice would

want to consider stuff the best I understand. I even would agree that if you're talking about like holding the crown, so to speak, the proverbial like theoretical crown that you give to the person who's last man standing, I would agree with give ing it to Steph. My rankings, my player rankings were a combination of the two, So I had johannest one and I had Steph two, but I

didn't disagree with either. If you would have swapped those on my list, I would have been fine with it, because I do understand those two different ideologies, and I think it's cool that Steph and Janice kind of played off of each other there. Jr. Honest is saying, like, hey, Steph gets bragging rights this year. Cool. I agree he should get bragging rights. Now do I think Joannice is better at basketball than him right now? Yeah? Barely. I

think Steph's the best offensive player in the world. I think Johannice is the best defensive player in the world and a bet in the top five offensive player. That gives him an edge to me, and I think a lot of Warriors fans would agree. I don't think that's disrespectful. I don't think that's like saying Katie's better than him or something like that. But the reality is is Steph gets bragging rights this year, and like Steph said, Janice

had bragging rights last year. That's that proverbial crown. That's that level of respect. Who deserves to be called the best first? Who actually is the best? I thought that was an interesting little moment from media day yesterday. Um, the second little concept I wanted to talk about from media day was continuity. This is a big focus among

the interviewer questions on media day. So, first of all, we've heard that in the first couple of days of practice for the Warriors that the starters have been absolutely destroying the second unit. And that's kind of what started the continuity discussion was he Steph Curry was asked about that, he said, quote, it's supposed to be like that. We

know what we're doing, we have good chemistry. We are just coming off of playing in the finals three months ago and also setting the tone of what it means to play for this team the way that we do. Steve Kerr piggybacked on that and said, I think organizational stability is a huge factor in pro sports, but I think especially in the NBA, especially today, because of the player movement, we have a really stable, solid organization, a

very successful one. We have worked together well, and when you throw all that together with this talented core, there's a end of an institutional knowledge that allows you to kind of push forward quicker then if everybody is brand new. We really look at that as one of our advantages. Now,

there's no doubt that continuity is a huge advantage. But I wanted to spend a couple of minutes today talking about the actual basketball and personality and locker room advantages that take place as a result of continuity, just so that we can kind of like understand it a little bit more on a on a kind of like a line by line basis, So I wanted to look at

it first from the standpoint of non basketball. So, first of all, when you have continuity, the personalities that are in the locker room, they understand their fit, they understand the dynamic. Right, there's a clear power like hierarchy in the in the warrior's locker room. Like everyone knows step as the leader. Everyone knows Draymond is like the emotional leader, right.

You know, everybody understands the role that Clay's personality has in that locker room, what Andrea Guadala's personality does in that locker room. It's an under standing of roles and the important detail there is. Then when you bring in new players, the new players know not to mess with that. You know, if there's lots of turnover every year, a free agent, whether it's a mid level exception or a decently paid role player or star, they can come in and they can be like, hey, I got just as

much right to move and shaken here as anybody else does. Right, But no NBA player in their right mind is going to walk into a locker room that Steph Curry, Draymond Green, Steve Kirklay Thompson, and Andrea Gudala have ran for a decade and go like I'm here to stir the pot. They'll get you out of there so fast you wouldn't even dare try. Because of the established nature of that locker room. I think that's a big advantage when you are mixing in the occasional new players. A first round

draft pick here, a guy like in Andrew Wiggins. You know when you bring in or like the James Wiseman, Jonathan Cominga, you know, Moses mood types. They know what they know what they can and can't do in that locker room because of the established norms in there. Also, they that group has a lot of experience with the

highs and lows of an NBA season. If they go out on Opening Night and they lose to the Lakers, you know, if the Lakers lose that game, even though they have some continuity with Lebron and n d if the Lakers lose that game, there's gonna be a little bit of a shaking confidence in that locker room, especially if they get dominated. If the Warriors lose that game, even if they get blown out by twenty, there's going to be an understanding in that locker room of the

dynamic of the regular season. I think it was after the two thousand I can't remember what year it was, might have been after the two thousand seventeen season, but I think there was an early season game where the Spurs came in and just beat the ship out of the Warriors in an early season game. Those guys weren't worried. Those guys aren't scared about that. They understand that's a normal dynamic in the NBA regular season. The same thing

goes in reverse. They started what fifteen in one last year, or fourteen in one or something like that. In their first fifteen games. They knew. Stephen, Draymond, and Clay knew even in that moment that there would be lulls. They had a stretch later in the season where Steph went really cold, Draymond got hurt, Clay Thompson took some time to get his legs underneath him. Steph missed a stretch of games before the playoffs. They understood before that season

that that was the natural flow of a season. They will understand that even further now. Those are the emotional, non basketball advantages that come from continuity on the basketball court. It's about understanding your teammates basketball personalities, right like there are some I was always the kind of player when I was playing in college that I liked tough love. I liked when my coaches really got on me. I liked when my teammates would cuss me out or demand

more out of me. But there were other types of players that if you did that too, they would shrink into themselves, lose confidence, and it would be a problem. When you have good continuity, everybody understands how they like to be communicated with. They understand boundaries. They understand where the line is and they can't cross it, or when they need to approach that line to get a point across. That's an advantage of understanding your personalities in your locker room.

There's a another concept of rhythm. I think that Steph, Draymond, and Clay have a really good understanding of when the other needs the basketball. When we might need to run a fake dribble handoff for Draymond to get something at the basket to get his confidence going offensively, when Steph needs to hunt for Clay because he's feeling like he's not involved in the offense enough, or when Steph needs to go through a stretch in the third quarter, or

he's shooting every time down the floor. That balance of touches, that power dynamic in controlling the basketball is something that the Warriors have great understanding of in their locker room. Through continuity, it also helps with natural basketball reads. I have the basketball, I dribble to the elbow, and I pick up my dribble and I'm looking at you in the corner. You might relocate, you might stay, you might cut back door. A lot of times with new basketball players,

you'll misinterpret those situations. Either you'll think he's gonna cut and you'll throw it out of bounds, or he does cut and you miss him because you weren't expecting it. Or the player in the corner won't know when to cut, or when to relocate or when to stay put. There's a natural chemistry, kind of like a seeing things before they happen type of deal that happens with continuity. Any of you guys out there who have buddies that you go play pick up basketball with two or three times

a week, I have guys. I've been running a men's league here in Tucson for half a decade now, for my in my team, I have guys on that team that I've been playing with literally for the better part of a decade. Those guys, like, when I go play basketball with them, it's just a natural fit because I've been doing the same thing with them for so long. That is a that is a huge benefit that comes

from from continuity. And then, last, but not least, is understand ending the offense, especially complicated offenses like the Warriors, which we're gonna cover later this week in our Power rankings. The Warriors offense has so many different facets, there's so many sets, there's so much movement that it can take time to learn, not just learning the actual plays themselves in terms of the xs and ohs, but also the reads because the Warrior system is very read and react.

It's very loose, and it allows you to freelance in various ways based on what the defense does. When you've spent a lot of time around an offense, you understand those things, but it does take time for new players that come into the Warrior system to learn that stuff. So it's very beneficial when your core players, your core five players Wiggins Iguadala, you know, six, even with Jordan Poole,

Steph Curry, Clay Thompson, Draymond Green. When those guys have a very firm understanding the offense, it gives them an advantage over other teams. As many of you guys know, we've been following the show for a while, I coach high school basket ball. I do it in an assistant capacity since I obviously don't have my evenings available with this job. But my primary role as I coached practices in the morning. We go every Monday and Friday morning, and when I'm working with those guys, you know, it's

been really interesting. This is my second season doing this. It's been interesting to see the difference between these two seasons because of COVID. When COVID happened, they shut down the lower levels of the team for obvious reasons. It was really difficult to run the season. They didn't want to have as much exposure. They just ran varsity that year. That group won the state championship, but nine seniors left

the program. Last year was a very challenging year because we had all of these new young players who were not involved with the previous season. Not only that they didn't even have a season because of freshman in JV basketball being canceled as a result of COVID. During that season, especially in the first few months, it was a slog trying to teach them our offense and get them to understand the way that we wanted to play the year.

We're in our preseason practices, and like, for instance, yesterday, I was late for practice because I had another engagement, and I just texted the guys to get started without me. When I showed up, I walked in and they were already running our offense from last year, without me even having to tell them. They just walked in the gym. They knew what I wanted, They knew the kinds of sets that we were working on, and they were playing

five on five working on their sets. And I remember sitting there thinking, like, man, we are at such a

huge advantage this year, just compared to last year. In one year, because of continuity, we returned almost our entire starting lineup from last year, and because the kids already know the offense and we have, you know, a couple of different things we're working on, like red and react five out stuff, and then actual sets that involved running actions and they and just to see how much better they are in those two areas just compared to last

year is monumental. So you can imagine at the NBA level over a decade, just how firm of an understanding a team like the Warriors had of their offense. And

imagine the Lakers by comparison. They're sitting with Darvin Ham today, learning a brand new system from scratch with what three players that returned from last year that actually were in the rotation, you know, maybe four if you count when in Gabriel like, that team is at a disadvantage with their system and execution compared to a team like the Warriors, and almost every team in the NBA is in a similar predicament, at least in some to some extent compared

to the Warriors, con duty is a legitimate basketball weapon. The Warriors were not the most talented team in the league last year, and they won't be the most talented

team in the league this year. They actually lost a little bit of talent, losing Gary Payton second and losing out of Porter Jr. But they're every bit as big of a threat to win the title this year as they were last year when they actually want it, and a huge part of that is how smart they are as a team, but also how much conton nuwity they have. And I do think it's important that it's discussed. The last Warriors thing that I wanted to touch on was, uh,

the extensions and free agency. So Andrew Wiggins his deal expires next summer um. I believe he might be a restricted free agent. I'm not certain about that. And then Draymond Green has a player option this summer. Now, ideally you keep both and then the issues, you know, goes away. But it gets even more complicated when you factor in the Jordan Pool is going to need to get paid.

And at the end of the day. We actually heard Joe Lake about after the season when he was addressing the Auto Port the second or Auto Porter Junior and Gary Payton the second UH leaving the team. He talked about how the it was just unrealistic for him to be able to pay everybody. So there's some difficult decisions coming up for the Warriors. And you know, in the past, it might have been the easiest decision in the world to prioritize Draymond over Andrew Wiggins, but now it's kind

of a tough call. And I honestly don't know which one they should favor, because Andrew Wiggins has turned himself into a vitally important part of this team. He's what I would call a three in D star because he fills the role of three and D right spotting up and knocking down three point shots, you know, defending on the wing on the other end of the floor, but

he's unbelievably good at both. So, for instance, defensively, Andrew Wiggins is on the short list of players in the running for best perimeter defender Alive, which is an insane bit of progress from a player and Andrew Wiggins, who was a bad defensive player in Minnesota. The job he did on Luca don Chich, the job he did on Jayson Tatum was a job that only a handful of players in the league are capable of. Guys like Jayson Tatum,

maybe a Ben Simmons, maybe a Michaal Bridges. There's only a small handful of players who can do what Andrew Wiggins did in those two series. That's how much of a star he is defensively, and then on the offensive end of the floor. It's not just shooting spot up three's or attacking closeouts. He has legitimate scoring punch. He draws weaker matchups because of the other other players on the floor for Golden State, and you can toss him the basketball and he can go create his own shot. Obviously,

he's a little bit more inconsistent in that role. You don't want to rely on him as a lead scorer. But that capability to provide real scoring punch, in combination with him being a defensive star, like an impact defensive player, that makes him a three and D star. You could make the case he was the second best player on

the Warriors last year. It's a tough call. Some of that is Clay Thompson was coming, excuse me, trying to get his rhythm back, coming back from injury, and Draymond Green didn't have a great playoff run, although he had a lot of really big games, and he helps you a lot in specific matchups like the Denver Nuggets game. And then I'm really glad he had that good moment there in Game six of the NBA Finals to just

kind of remind everybody what he's capable of. But you know, it's it's always been the joint effort in Golden State, and when the ESPN came out with their player ranks. You know, Jordan Pool, Clay Thompson, Draymond Green, Andrew Wiggins. They were all in that like I think Dyed a fifty right or thirty to sixty range or whatever, And that was kind of the best way to describe that roster. They were not top heavy. They were not a you know,

Lebron James Anthony Davis type of team. They were not a you know, Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving type of team. It's Steph the bona fide star, and then four players who might not be stars, but are very close to that and are absolutely stars in their roles. And when you have four guys who are stars in their roles next to a guy who's in conversation to be the best basketball player alive, that is enough talent to contend for a title. It's a very interesting dynamic on that team.

But I'm really curious to see what they decided to do next summer. And I would not be surprised if they prioritized Andrew Wiggins due to his age and the impact he has on this team. And it's gonna be unfortunate if the Warriors end up losing Draymond and it will change. It will fundamentally change the dynamic of that entire team. But it's just the reality of the predicament. He's getting older, Jordan Pool needs to get paid, he's younger.

Andrew Wiggins needs get paid, he's younger. Obviously, you've got other rookies in the pipeline. It's just eventually going to become untenable to pay all these guys. It'll be really interesting to see who ends up taking the first hint. Alright, guys, that is all I have for right now. Like I said, later this evening, we'll be continuing with their power rankings with number four. I will see you guys later tonight. The volume