Hoops Tonight - What Lakers must UPGRADE, Warriors HOT start, Nuggets still king + Tatum MVP?

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a great week so far. We had no NBA games last night, so I figured today would be a great day to take a step back and hit five biggest takeaways from the early stretch of the NBA season. And then after that we're gonna do a deep dive on the Dallas Mavericks, who are shockingly off to a six and one start. And then last but not least, we have five mail bag questions for the end of the show as well. You guys are the Joe Before we

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Five biggest early season takeaways from a highly entertaining start to the NBA season. First, the Lakers and the Bucks both will eventually need a backcourt upgrade to contend for a championship this season, in my opinion, when you have a offensive folkrum in the back court that has shortcomings in terms of size and athleticism, in this case, Damian Lillard for the Bucks. Austin Reeves for the Lakers. Obviously a much much, much lesser version, but he is basically

the primary backcourt ball handler for the Lakers outside of Lebron. Right, when you have something like that, the guy flanking him can't also be a undersized athlete that's going to struggle to contend defensively and on the glass. And we've seen

we saw that for the Lakers. Come to roost with the Angelo Russell and the Nuggets series, right, it was like one of those things where they played a backcourt that wasn't over lee athletic in the Warrior series and they got away with it, right, And then in general with the Grizzlies, they were able to pack the paint

enough to kind of make up for it. But when they ran into a Nuggets team that presented the ability to both space them out and attack them with athleticism, they had severe issues in the backcourt at the point of attack. Right. Then we go over to the Bucks and early in the season, I mean, they've got a couple wins in a row. They're four and two. It certainly is not a catastrophe by any stretch of the imagination.

But even over the course of this most recent two game stretch, since they switched up their pick and roll coverages to drop being Brook Lopez back further, they're still giving up way too many points on the defensive end even in those two wins. So like for both of these teams, these are teams that elsewhere on the roster

check all the boxes. The Lakers have an incredible depth in the front court between different types of forwards like thinner, perimeter oriented forwards on the defensive end like Jared Vanderbilt and Ruey hot excuse me, Jared Vanderbilt and Torrian Prince and Cam Reddish, and then they've got a bigger size up forwards guys like Lebron James and Ruy Hatchamura, even Christian Wood, and then obviously Anthony Davis and Jackson Hayes

at the center position. They're stacked there. Lebron James looks way better than he did last year, particularly as a shot creator and as a late game kind of initiator. That's all good. The Austin Reeves has kind of got it going in the last few days. There's a lot of stuff to get excited about with the Lakers, but with Ruey Hachimura being out, with Jared Vanderbilt being out, it's shined a really bright light on their life act of backcourt athleticism, and it's been a legitimate problem for

them to start this year. And quite frankly, they're just not playing very good basketball right now at three and four. So for both of these teams, they're kind of one tweak away there from being what they could potentially be if you upgrade that Pat connottan Malik Beasley spot to a player that can contend at the point of attack and help you on the glass. And the same sort of thing with that D'Angelo Russell spot for the Lakers.

That could go a long way towards kind of patching the biggest hole in otherwise very dangerous rosters for both of those teams. Both those teams obviously have to play better elsewhere as well. The Bucks have to get better defensively. Dame still isn't quite where he needs to be in terms of his pull up shot making. God knows, the Lakers have seventeen different issues, but those are issues that should rectify as the season goes along, just as guys

start playing better. But then there's big picture roster shortcomings that will not get better even as you start to play better. And to me that back court athleticism is a big one. So look for both of those teams to be really aggressive at the deadline to try to

find a good role player in the backcourt. Number two, never underestimate the value of compatible role players to a basketball team, And in here I'm referencing the Warriors in the MAVs, these are two teams that had incredibly disappointing seasons last year relative to expectations. Right, Warriors win the championship, then they go have this weird, funky year. Draymond Green says, it's not even fun to go to work. They're terrible on the road. They end up losing in the second

round to the Lakers. Right, the Mavericks go to the conference finals and end up losing Jylen Brunson replacing him with Kyrie Irving in the ensuing trade, losing most of their athleticism and having issues defensively and on the glass as they miss the playoffs. Right, So both of those teams kind of went into the summer with a lot of pessimism surrounding them. Right, Like, I was higher on

both than most. Like, I kept the Mavericks pretty high in my power rankings relative to where they were last year. I said the Warriors were a top tier contender. Those are two of the predictions that I've actually been somewhat on the point a bit with I've been wrong about a bunch of other stuff, as is always the case. But like when it comes to the general consensus of public opinion, most people did not include the Warriors in

that list of top tier contenders. Most people thought the Mavericks would more or less be like what they were at the end of the year last year. But what happened small tweaks on the margins. Just finding more compatible role players to what your stars bring to the table can go a long way to turning the fortunes of

a basketball team. For the Warriors, getting rid of a super super you know, I would just call him like volatile guard and Jordan Poole meaning like really high hides but also really low lows and that inconsistency being a problem, especially with the other youth in that lineup. Going from him to a grown ass adult in Chris Paul has gone a long way to kind of orienting their bench lineups right. And then Darium Saraz just as like another big.

Remember last year was like, are we gonna play Jamichael Green? It's like, okay, we can't play Kevon Looney Andre Montgreen. At the same time, Okay, now we're trying Gary Payton

basically as a big man. In these looks, they needed a big that could shoot as a counter to teams that caused those sorts of problems sagging off of their non shooters in the paint, and he's been primarily used as a bench option so far this season, but don't be surprised if you see him used in playoff series as a chess piece to try to generate more spacing

for that team. But just the CP three trade getting rid of a malcontent and Jordan Poole bringing in someone that can help kind of steady the ship without Steph on the floor, and then bringing in a quality, compatible role player as a bench big, and Dario Sarrez has gone a long way towards transforming the Warriors to back closer to what they were in the year that they won the title. On the mass front, they drafted a rim runner, a legitimate drop coverage big that could also

catch lobs rolling to the basket. JaVale McGee just wasn't very good at that for them last year, and Derek Lively has been better than you could ever hope from

a rookie in that respect so far this year. And then the sign and trade for Grant Williams, just using the tools that are available with you for you and the CBA to go target a good front court player that can do a lot of dirty work things that was undervalued with the Celtics and bringing him in has gone a long way towards bolstering the front court with a two way player, and then hitting on veteran minimums.

You always have to hit if you're going to succeed when you don't have the ability to go out and free agency and sign expensive players, you have to hit on veteran minimum contracts. And the Derek Jones junior pick in particular, I shouldn't say pick. The Derek Jones Jr. Signing at the minimum contract has been a home run for the Mavericks this year. They're getting legitimate point of

attack defense. He's helping them on the glass and is knocking down a respectable amount of three pointers, and is slashing off of catch and shoot opportunities as well to generate openings. And so hitting on all three of those, hitting on a draft pick, hitting on a sign and trade, hitting on a veteran minimum signing has transformed what was an overmatched physical roster to a roster that suddenly can

compete in these games. And as a result, the Warriors are six and two and the MAVs are six and one. So it goes to show you like as long as you have the foundational pieces, you can make slight tweaks

that end up pushing things in the right direction. If that should be a piece of optimism for the Bucks and the Lakers who have struggled a little bit in those areas to start the season, to know that, like, hey, it doesn't need to be a great player, but if you bring in a compatible player into that two guard spot, it could go a long way towards fixing your problems, all right. Number three, Jason Tatum looks poised to take

the final leap into bona fide, top tier superstardom. It's kind of been a crescendo of two different factors over the last several years that have kind of come to fruition this year, and what looks like a very dominant Celtics team to start the year. They have made smart tweaks to the roster that made it the best group of supporting role players in the league right now in

my opinion. And then Jason Tatum appears to have taken a leap in some key areas that I think translate well to him in the playoffs, because again, no matter what happens with the Celtics in this roster. We know that they have issues in slow down, half court playoff environments.

Right well, Jason Tatum so far this year thirty one points and nine rebounds, just an astonishing sixty seven percent true shooting percentage, seventy one percent effective field goal percentage on catch and shoot jump shots, fifty six percent effective field goal percentage on pull up jump shots, seventy eight percent in the restricted area on five point three makes

per game, that is sixth in the entire league. Jason Tatum is finishing in the paint more than everybody in the league except for five players, and going back to last year, he ranked seventeenth on that list and shot nine percent worse in the restricted area. So he's knocking down his pull up jump shot at a significantly higher rate. He's getting into the paint and finishing there at a significantly higher rate, not just compared to himself, but compared

to the vast majority of the league. And then, last, but not least, he's added a legitimate post up in ISO attack that has been devastating. He's been the best ISO player in the league so far this year. There are thirteen players in the NBA that have run at least thirty ISOs is one point two to two points per possession including passes, ranks first out of those thirteen players, and he's posting up about twice as often as he

did last year and has been very efficient there. That sort of like static creating a shot against the defense loaded up on you is something that Jason Tatum has struggled with in the past, and that is a good indicator that he could potentially take a leap in this postseason. I do not have them as my championship favorite right now.

I don't think they've demonstrated enough to take that specific spot, but I think they could be trending in the direction to be that pick potentially when we get down the line. Very very very good start for the Celtics and Jason Tatum. You know, Sam Vassini said when I went on his show, he views him as a top three MVP candidate. I

had him as a top four MVP candidate. I included Steph curR in that list because I think he's been incredible as well, But it's basically Steph Tatum, Jokich and Luca those have been the four best players in the league to start the year. Tatum's like just on that tier. Now. That's what we're seeing from him as a player. All right. Number four, the Denver Nuggets are still the best team in basketball. Here's a simple stat to demonstrate that the

Nuggets are still the best team in the league. The Nuggets have played the seventh toughest schedule in the NBA based on opponent winning percentage to start this year. The other nine teams in the top ten for strength of schedule difficulty have combined to lose twenty nine games, none of them fewer than two, in an average of three point two losses. Okay, that's what you're seeing from the rest of the teams in the league that have had

a tough schedule to start the year. The Nuggets are seven and one, and they're the only team in that top ten to only have one loss. So they've played an incredibly tough schedule and they've been dominant in that schedule. Of those seven wins, only two of them required crunch time, meaning the score was within five with less than five minutes left, so they've been dominating in their wins as well.

They're playing the best defense we've seen out of this team in a regular season so far in the Jokic Murray Porter era, they're allowing just one hundred and seven point five points per one hundred possessions so far this year. They were at one thirteen point five for the season last year, one fifteen point seven in October last year, which was through seven games, So even just within the window of starting the season out of camp, they're defending

at a significantly higher level. They were at one eleven point five in twenty twenty two, one eleven point five in twenty twenty one, one ten point four in twenty twenty So this one oh seven point five to start this season, especially when you factor in the difficulty of their schedule, is a very clear indicator. In addition to

everything else this team has going for it. Best offense in the league in my opinion when it comes to slow down playoff basketball, best player in the league in my opinion in Nikola Jokic Jamal Murray is sending to become a top fifteen player in the league. Aaron Gordon legitimately being one of the most versatile defensive do everything Swiss Army Knife forwards in basketball, Contavious Cup of Pope

and Michael Porter Junior and what they bring to the table. Legitimately, in addition to all of that, they are now defending better than they've ever defended, and that, to me is a really really strong indicator that this team is at least starting to check the boxes that you want to see checked for a team to repeat one of the most common things you'll see from a team that has won a championship as they'll come into the next season and there's a significant dip in defense and rebounding and

you know, transition defense. Clear indicators that they're just not quite as locked in on the details because their motivation is not as high as some of the other teams. Being that they're at the mountaintop. We're not seeing any of that from the Nuggets so far this season. They're still the most unguardable offense in basketball. Jokic is the best basketball player live. Here's an insane stat for you.

Nikola Jokich is seventeen for eighteen ono shots in sixteen for twenty on floaters, so he's thirty three for thirty eight on all of those little short range pop shots in the lane. That's eighty seven percent. It was already insane when he was making two thirds of them, and now he's making literally almost ninety percent of them. It's unbelievable. Their defense has been excellent in clutch situations. They have an eighty defensive rating in the final five minutes of

games that are within five points. Again, only two games like that, but their defense has been very good there. They're just clearly the best team in the league in my opinion, at least from the same point of what we can expect from them in the playoffs until further notice. I think they deserve that spot. I think we'd have to see a significant change in the circumstances to feel

differently about them. Also, Julian strawther career high twenty one the other night against the Pals, got hot and catch and shoot situations in the first half, then started to get aggressive with the ball in his hands in the second half. He's been an incredibly exciting player through preseason, the clear guy that could kind of slot into that If you look at the starters that are all kids except for kcpkcp's kind of the old elder statesman in

that group. Straw there could be that shoe and fit into that two guard spot in the future, which just makes that team even more exciting in the big picture. All right, last takeaway from the early part of the season, we are just about guaranteed to get a very active

trade deadline. The ingredients you need for an active trade deadline, in my opinion, are a wide open field, meaning a lot of teams thinking they can win the title, Teams that had high expectations coming out the gates struggling, right. That's why I look at teams like the Bucks and the Lakers as teams that are like not where they need to be, clearly from the standpoint of personnel, but both clearly will view anything other than a championship as

a failure. That's a good indicator classic teams that would be targeting stars. So teams like the Philadelphia seventy six ers who moved hard and basically for draft capital and if one and will definitely want to put another star next to Tyrese Max and Joel Embiid, they're going to be a candidate for that. The Miami Heat are almost guaranteed to make a strong push for a star at some point during the season. That's a strong indicator of

a busy trade deadline. And then, lastly, teams that are close to being willing to blow it up a little bit right Like the Chicago Bulls. They're off to another mediocre start. DeMar derozen Zach Lavine, and Nikola Vucevic could all potentially be trade targets this year. The Toronto Raptors Scottie Barnes looks incredible, but the rest of the team and the fit doesn't make a ton of sense because they don't have a lot of shooting around him and

he's a big room pressuring forward. So like, don't be surprised if guys like Pascal Siakam and og In Andobi become available for trades during the season. So I think we're gonna get a really active trade deadline this year, which is a big reason why there's just a lot still up in the air in terms of the finish line. In sports, the scoreboard doesn't tell the full story, but

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all into fans. All right, we are going to do a deep dive on the Dallas Mavericks, who are off to a six and one start. I clipped some stuff from my film this morning and uploaded to my Twitter feed, so you'll want to check that out as well. Continue throughout the season doing that as well, because every time I cover a game, I will clip stuff and put

him on six and one start. Now, to be clear, five of the seven teams they played are currently below five hundred and they're five to oh in those games. So they are benefiting a little bit from a from an easy schedule to start the year. But to be clear, they were fifteen and sixteen, so they were below five hundred last year against teams that were below five hundred, So going five to oh in those games to me

is a strong indicator of a good basketball team. The offense has predictably been awesome right They're one hundred and twenty points per one hundred possessions, fourth best in the NBA second and half court offense according to Cleaning the Glass. Lucas playing like an MVP forty three percent on step back jump shots this year or step back three's excuse me this year, which is insane. He's made twenty three of them already, which is the most in the league.

That's been a huge boost to their offense, especially late in games. Kyrie Irving has been a little off to start the year, but it's mostly his jump shot. He's just not hitting his pull up jump shot at the rate that we're customed to seeing with Kyrie. But he still looks explosive, he still has these crazy acrobatic finishes. He's still getting to his spots, and his playmaking has been off the charts, so to me, the SHOT's going to come and it's going to be fine. I'm encouraged

on the Kyrie irving front. And then they're getting great contributions from their role players. Grant Williams is shooting fifty four percent from three. Tim Hardaway is shooting thirty nine percent from three on nine point three attempts per game. He's been great in spot of situations and just really aggressive pull up shooting to just kind of boost the offense a little bit, especially with bench groups. Josh Green is shooting forty percent from three, and then even Derek

Jones Junior, particularly in his above the break threes. He did make a corner three against the Magic the other day, but he's been struggling a little bit from the corner. But Derek Jones has had enough success knocking down threes and driving closeouts to be kind of a spacing threat in and of himself, which is important because he's been their best point of attack defender to start the year.

But we knew this team would score. The most impressive element is they've made a little bit of improvement they needed to make in their ability to hang in the physicality areas of the game, so particularly defense and rebounding. Right last year post Kyrie trade, they were twenty seventh in defensive rating, twenty ninth in defensive or in rebound percentage. This year so far, nineteenth in defensive rating, twenty sixth

in rebound percentage, so just a marginal improvement there. They went from being the one of the worst defenses in the league to a middle of the pack defense. And they went from being a team that basically grabbed forty six percent of available rebounds to grabbing about forty eight percent of available rebounds, which can make a significant different difference. Now again not great, still want to see them improve a little bit rebounding. They started the year super well,

but they've declined a little bit there. But they needed to make a little bit of an improvement to give themselves a fighting chance for their offense to push over the top, and it's worked now. To be clear, they have some good defensive personnel here, like Derek Jones has been a good perimeter defender to start the year. Josh

Green is good, but there's some other guys. Again, like in order to get a respectable defense from limited defensive personnel, you need buy in and that means even guys that have been inconsistent perimeter defenders in their career have to

play to their ceiling. Like Kyrie. Irving is known as being a bad defensive player, but in the twenty sixteen playoff run with the Cavs, he was actually their best defender on Steph Curry whenever he would go to the bench, and like Emon Shumpert would come into the game, they would actually Even though Emon Shrumpert was considered a better perimeter defender in terms of reputation, he struggled to guard

Steph in a way that Kyrie did not. Because Kyrie is capable of that, He's a very good defensive playmaker. There were a couple of plays against the Magic where like you'd see him come from off ball to sniff a play out. There was a Cole Anthony spinning fade away right in the middle of the floor where Kyrie just made an extra effort because he knew Cole wasn't going to throw the pass and just bailed out and got a late contest and forced an air ball on

the shot. There was another one where he was guarding in the left corner and he sniffed out a back door cut and jumped it and poked the ball free. Because he does have good anticipation, he does have quickness in good hands. He is capable of being an impact defensive player. You got to get that from those guys.

Tim Hardaway, Jun Your The same thing. Kind of reminds me a lot of j. R. Smith in the sense that, like he had a reputation as being a bad defender, but in that twenty sixteen season, he was a good defender. In this season he's had stretches of really good perimeter defense, and especially in that third quarter run. I encourage you

guys if you haven't done so yet. They're in that third quarter run against the Magic, he did a really nice job staying glued and applying ball pressure, navigating screens. As a team, they have better commitment on the glass and help and recover situations. Luka Doncic has flashed a lot in that area compared to where he was last year. And then they just have that little bit of rim protection from Derek Lively in the minutes that he's on

the floor. There was a play in the first half of the Magic game where Pala Boncaro just got going downhill right at Derek Lively and Derek just like has really good instincts and he backed up and instead of trying to vertical, which Palow would have gone right around him, he kind of like leaned back and anticipated and reached back and blocked him at the top of the square. Derek Lively provides just that little bit of extra rim protection when they go into that look, and so as

a result, they're capable of making defensive runs. They allowed just seventeen points in the third quarter against the Magic and just nineteen in the fourth. They contained the ball,

they forced tough jumpers. I thought Grant Williams did a really nice job avoiding screens on Palo because one of the things they were doing is just running early screens in the possession to get Palo switched on to a smaller defender and just have him post up until he got the defense into rotation and then they'd play out

of that. Well, Grant Williams in the third quarter was like, screw that, I'm not getting screened, and he just stayed on Palo the whole time, stayed in front of him, forced him into a bunch of tough shots, and their defense just completely took over that game and then down the stretch, it's just the steady diet of Kyrie and Luca making plays. Now when the schedule does get tougher, and it will in their next ten games, Raptors, that's a relatively easy game, although they're going to face a

lot of physical mismatches in that game. But Clippers, that's tough Pelicans. Pelicans, those are tough Wizards. That's an easier game. Kings are excuse me, Bucks, that's tough Kings, Tough Lakers, tough Clippers, tough Rockets. They're playing some better basketball as of late as well. So it's gonna get a little tougher here in the next two and a half weeks

or so. In order for them to win over that stretch, they're going to need Kyrie to get his jump shot going, and they're going to need to rebound the ball better than they have been. But great start for the MAVs through seven games. I don't think you can be more satisfied considering where they were at the end of the year last year. All right, before we get out of here for the day, we're going to do our five mail bag questions. First one, Jason Love your breakdowns question.

Maybe you can mail bag this, But how do you watch the games with breakdowns and positional slash types of plays on offense? You isolate pick and roll plays and stuff. I know you talked about Synergy and the Cleaning the Glass app, but looking to just find out what you use to make these breakdowns. So I do use a tool called Synergy. It's extremely expensive. It is an analytics platform that NBA teams use, that college teams use, that even high school teams use, and so it's incredibly in

depth play clip sorting and things like that. I am very, very lucky to have access to that platform. It makes my job a whole lot easier, but it is not easy to get access to. Cleaning the Glass is a lot easier. It's like, I think it's like five bucks a month, and they have great lineup data. They sort for half court sets, They with each individual team. They have a lot of really interesting metrics that you can dig into. I find that to be a useful platform,

and then learn how to use the NBA site. The NBA site, if you really take some time to sort through, you can get lineup data there as well. It's hard to do on off stuff on there, but you can at least put piece together two three, four five man lineups. You can track play types there as well, so you can actually go look up pick and roll, ball handler, pick and roll roll man, off screen actions, that kind of stuff. That all you can't get the video and the sorting from it, but you can at least see

the data. So if you want to at least kind of see points per possession in pick and roll or in post ups or ISOs, you can still get that for free on the NBA website. They do miscellaneous stats so like second chance points, you know, points in the paint allowed per possession, defensive rebounding percentage, offensive, Like, there's literally hundreds of useful pieces of data that are that

is available for free on the NBA site. So like again, Synergy, I don't think is a cost effective way for any fan to to get the you know, NBA data, But you can get most of the same data without the footage on the NBA website. So again, like I think, I think think there's plenty out there that's affordable to kind of learn more about the league without having to get too crazy. Second mail back question from Shane would bringing del off the bench fix the guard's skill set

redundancy problem. So obviously, if you could bring Delo off the bench with another athlete. So if it was like if you had Austin in an athlete in the back court with the starters, and then you had Dlo and Max Christy off the bench, I think that could work. But then it becomes a problem with the delineation of resources,

or I should say the disbursement of resources. So like if you're if you're gonna have a contract circa twenty million a year for a player that you know you can't play alongside you're starting, you know, better point guard in Austin Reeves, who's going to play thirty five minutes a night, then there's only thirteen minutes available there without

having to play them together, which presents those problems. So it's not so much like like whether or not Dlo would be successful with this Lakers team coming off the bench, because of course you would. It's a redundancy problem and it's a misuse of resources, and so you're actually better off trading D'Angelo Russell, having Gabe Vincent be essentially the skill guard in your bench groups who plays more limited minutes, and when you have the ability to play two guard

line or two small guards against specific matchups. Then you could play Gabe and Austin together, but you need to bring in an athletic guard to slot next to d'angela Russell. Alright, Third mail by question. Hey, Jason, here's a mail back question.

I've recently started playing basketball by myself again, not with people, sadly, ever since my asthma started and I've been unable to sprint up and down the court, and I started working on my pull up mid range, and I wanted to hear your thoughts about the way about the correct way to set your feet. Is it better to do a jump stop or to step into the shot? So jump stop shooting again? So, like, just imagine if I am running into a shot. Let's just say off the catch

or off the bounce. But for the sake of this, I make this easier. Let's say off the catch. Okay. So I'm running the right wing and the ball is on the left wing, and I'm wide open trailing the play and the guy throws me the pass as I'm running into a three point shot. And I know you specifically mentioned mid range shooting, but this is the exact

same footwork. So we'll get to that. So if I can say I'm running and I run off my left foot and then I just land on both feet at the same time and rise into a shot, that's like a jump stop into a three point shot, doing a split, a footwork, or call it a one. I refer to it as a one to two. And what I mean by that is like you plant your one foot first and then you bring your other foot around and plant,

and that's the one you actually stop yourself with. And you can do that left right or you can do it right left. And generally speaking, if you're moving to the right, you want to do it left right, and if you're moving to the left, you want to do it right left. So essentially, as I'm running into a shot on the wing, instead of doing a jump stop, I would chot my feet a little bit and basically plant left right on the catch and elevate and shoot it.

So generally speaking, I think it's easier to go from moving full speed to stopping and elevating with a one two than it is a jump stop. It doesn't mean you can't do a jump stop. It doesn't mean there's no place for it. I do occasionally do it, but I find that in order to actually get separation, doing a left right or right left one two takeoff is the easiest way to get separation on the move. Now imagine it you a pull up jump shooting situation. So like I've come off of a ball screen, I've got

a little bit of separation, but there's back pressure. So I want to get one more escape dribble to get to the right elbow to elevate for a shot. In that case, I want to do that hard push ahead dribble, plant left and right and elevate and get a bunch of lift as I'm taking that shot right. And if I do a jump stop, I'm probably gonna slow myself down and probably not be as balanced when I go up. So again, you want to be able to do both.

And there's a really simple drill that you can do that kind of trains your body to balance yourself as you're doing this. And this is a drill I do with my high school players all the time. So start at the free throw line, spin the ball out to yourself at the top of the key so you're facing away from the basket when you roll it out to yourself. Jump stop with both feet facing away from the basket.

Then reverse pivot and shoot a jump shot. So keep your left foot pivot foot, swing that right foot around the inside, rise up and take a shot. Do that till you make two of them. Then do a reverse pivot with your right foot. So now you're in that jump stop. Bring your left foot back towards the basket as you square for a shot. Do that till you make it twice. Then do two over the top pivots. So jump stop start with my left foot is my pivot. Bring my right foot away from the basket, swing it

around and shoot. Do that till I make it twice. Same thing, left foot around away from the basket until I shoot. Then I do jump stops, so flip it out to myself, catch it with a jump stop facing away from the basket, then jump and spin in mid air and land facing the basket on two feet. Shoot a three. Do it till you make it twice, then

jump spin the other way. That's like a really easy way to train your body from the standpoint of balance when you're doing weird footwork into shots, because you'll notice each way you go your body has a tendency to try to lean one way or the other. It'll force you to keep a wide base and get really strong lift into the shot as you're rising up. Okay, two more.

What do you think of the Lakers reaching out to the NBA League office to complain about officiating in the Lakers Heat game and the Lebron tweet in reply to the conclusion that there were no wrong calls in the last two minutes. Are the Lakers Lebron's concerns legitimate or was that another case of you always say loser mentality when it comes to complaints about officiating. I literally thought

it was super lame. Logan, who's our ahead of content here at the volume, is also a big Lakers fan, and we both texted each other immediately after, and we're like, what the like, what are these guys like? Come on, like, you're playing like shit and under no circumstances should you have lost that game, even with any of the circumstances surrounding injuries and things like that, Like, the Heat just aren't playing very good basketball and the Lakers are just

better than them. They should have won that game. The Lakers are playing bad basketball and blaming it on officiating, to me is very much a loser mentality. So I agree with you Lebron tweeting it out like he's right, Like, I don't think they were referring necessarily to the last two minutes. I didn't think when I go through the possessions at the end of the game, I didn't think there was a foul that should have been called. Like the Kyle Lowry play, technically is still a charge. I

hate that play. I hate when a dude just falls down when a guy's running full speed. I think it's bad for the game. I wish they'd get rid of it. But by the book, that's a good call. So like, I don't think I think what Lebron was saying it was more of a big picture issue as far as Lebron and in the way he's officiated. Lebron doesn't get a lot of calls, that's true, but he also commits more uncalled offensive fouls than most players do. He uses a lot of off arm, he initiates a ton of contact.

I'm one of those guys that's like, I want Lebron to be able to do that. So I'm okay if he doesn't get as many calls at the rim, and so to me, Lebron's always been officiated more or less fairly because he is a bully ball player that also gets fouled and most of it goes uncalled, which is the way it should be in my opinion. Last mail back question the same quote the Lakers lost, but they'll figure it out, and quote narrative is tiresome. They're not

winning the championship this season. This isn't really a male bad question. It's more just someone talking shit in the comments. But this happens every single day and I wanted to address it, so I I don't think, as currently constructed, the Lakers will win the championship. I agree with you.

The only thing within the roster that would potentially fix the problem is if Jared Vanderbilt turned out to be a good offensive player this year, Like if he just lived in the gym all summer, shooting corner threes and improving his hands and finishing around the basket, and all of a sudden he was playable, then they can win the championship because Jared Vanderbilt solves so many of their problems in terms of perimeter defense and crashing the defensive

glass from the perimeter, and it honestly would potentially allow you to get away with having D'Angelo Russell, even though I still think they should trade him. But like, at the end of the day, like I expect the Lakers to make a deal. They're equipped for it. They have two perfect salaries in Dangel Russell, who doesn't fit with Austin Reeves, and in Ruey Hatchamura, who plays the same position as Lebron And so those two guys are good players that have some value around the league, that are

in fair contract numbers. Dlo Is literally gonna be expiring next year, so like they're gonna be tradable contracts, and then they have two first round picks that they have access to to trade at the deadline this year. So like, do I think the Lakers are like done? No, but they're certainly in a worse position than I expected them to be at this point. And you're absolutely right. I don't think they're gonna win the title as currently constructed.

They're just not athletic enough. They have serious personnel shortcum. But like at the end of the day, like I hate early season victory laps for anybody, and that's why you won't see me take early season victory laps because it's seven damn games, guys, Like, did you know that the Nuggets who won the title last year lost four

out of seven four different times last year. So like again, we have a tendency to take a small window of games at the beginning of an eighty two game season and define a team based on that when the reality is it's an eighty two game grind and like a lot of the like, every single team that got off to a great start this year will have several stretches this year where they look bad. That's called NBA basketball.

That's how it works. The best team in the league last year that beat everyone's ass in the playoffs had four stretches identical to this Laker stretch. What usually happens when team goes and loses four out of seven when they're good, it's usually injuries and some tough games on your schedule, And that's literally what it's been for the Lakers. Two of their four losses were to the two teams

that played in the NBA Finals last year. Right then they lost to a Sacramento Kings team that is difficult to beat in Sacramento, and that went to overtime, and then they lost to an Orlando Magic team on the road when they were missing all their forwards. They're injured, they're playing a tougher stretch of their schedule, and they're

also not playing good basketball. That's what happens. Good teams usually also have good stretches in toughest parts of their schedule, where they rip off for four wins in five tries against all playoff teams or something like that. Right now, in the big picture, if we get to fifty games and the Lakers are, you know, a twenty three and twenty seven, then yeah, we can have a larger conversation

about whether or not it's over. I had like a half dozen of you guys in the comments talking about how like, oh, like Jason's gonna go down with the Lakers to the dirty end. It's like, dude, it's been

seven games. It's been seven games, guys, And I like, as much as I am a fan of the Lakers, I'm always going to call it the way I see it and what I see right now as a team that can't win the title is currently constructed but as well positioned to make a mid season trade and really only need to fix one massive flaw in order to fix most of their problems. So again, like I feel like I'm pretty clear with this show. Is in terms of my motivations and my biases, I try to fight

them actively. Lakers fans. Like for those of you guys who are not Lakers fans, which is most of you, obviously Laker fans, a lot of them dislike me because I'm not a propagandist, because I won't just sit there and talk about how great they are. I will talk mostly about the things that they have to get better at because I think like a coach, right, That's just my approach to the game. And so I look at the Lakers is like, these are the things they need

to fix in order to reach the promised Land. I would imagine most of you guys think the same way about your teams. I I haven't been up here saying that the Lakers are are gonna run away with the championship this season. I never said that. I you know, I literally said they'd lose to the Nuggets if they

played again in a playoff series. I said that in preseason, saying it again now like I I. But at the same time, like guys, this is a team that went eighteen and eight post deadline without Lebron James, with Austin Reeves and D'Angel Russell in the backcourt. This is a team that went to the conference finals and beat the defending champs and beat the two seed in the Western

Conference without home court advantage in both series. So like that matters more than seven games in October, when Ruey Hachimura is out, when Jared Vanderbilts out, when Gabe Vincent is out, when Jackson Hayes is out. Like, I'm sorry, it's just it's just the truth. So no, you're not gonna get me to write an obituary about how the season is over for the Lakers. That's not how it works. But again, I understand it's fun and it's you know,

talking basketball is fun, Talking shit is fun. Taking victory lapse is fun. I'm not hating on you guys. I'm just going to explain my position, and my position is the Lakers suck right now, but I don't think they're gonna suck when they get healthy, and then I think they could be really, really good if they make the right mid season trade. And I feel like that's a pretty fair take. The surrounding what that Laker team is capable of. All right, guys, that is all I have

for today. We were playing it on going tonight after Nuggets Warriors, but we're actually gonna put that off and go Thursday morning. My house is getting painted and so I can't get into my studio right now, and so as a result of that, like this room it's nice and lit up right now, but it very much won't be at eleven pm local time, so I can't record in here at night, but I will be able to on Friday when we cover the late night slate. So tonight's slate we're gonna hit Thursday morning. I will see

you guys. Then the volume