Hoops Tonight - Why Anthony Edwards is set to TAKE OVER the NBA, Timberwolves hot start + Mailbag

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As promised from yesterday, we're gonna be doing a deep dive on one of the most impressive teams here in the early going of the NBA season, the Minnesota Timberwolves, so continue to notch impressive win after impressive win. The only team that has a victory against the two best teams in the league in my opinion through the early going, which is the Boston Celtics and the Denver Nuggets taking care of business against both of them. So we're gonna

do a deep dive into the Minnesota Timberwolves. Then we're gonna do a heavy mail bag at the end of the show. I have eleven mail bag questions that allow us to kind of bounce around the league and hit a bunch of different stuff and get to some of the questions that you guys wanted answered. You guys know the joke before we get started. Subscribe to our brand new YouTube channel as we try to get this thing

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content as well as show announcements. In the last but not least, keep dropping mail bag questions in the comments on YouTube so we can keep hitting them at the end of these shows. All right, let's talk some basketball. So, if you guys remember Timberwolves fans coming into this season, I had a feeling that the Timberwolves were going to play extremely well. They were one of the most impressive teams in my opinion at the tail end of last year,

and there was this recurring theme that kept happening. It was like especially at the end of games, because that would be when Aunt in particular was more defensively engaged. But you saw it through the whole game as well, but particularly at the end of games. You'd see Anthony Edwards and Jade McDaniel's guard the other to the other team's two best perimeter players and just make life a

living hell for them. And then they also have the benefit of being able to be very aggressive because of the incredible back line that is anchored by Rudy Gobert and that unique combination of perimeter defense with interior defense just makes it really difficult to score on them, right, And then even when they go to their bench, it's like here comes Nikhil, Alexander Walker and Kyle Anderson, guys that are lesser versions of Anton Jayden, but guys that

bring a similar one to two punch instead in terms of like a longer athlete that can guard on the perimeter and then a quick guard that can navigate screens and apply physical ball pressure. Right. So, like we saw that over the course of the tail end of last season, they were a huge pain in the ass for the Lakers in the playing game. Then they were a huge pain in the ass for the Denver Nuggets and a

five game gentleman suite. But it was a five game gentlemen sweet that was very competitive where the Timberwolves, you know, had several key moments. There's a game they lost where they went on a big run towards the end and the race to Big League. Then obviously in Game five, Anthony Edwards had a shot to tie it at the end.

It was a competitive series, right, So my theory coming out of that, I remember I put Ant at fifteen in my player rankings, and my thought process was like, this dude is just right on the precipice of ascending to superstardom. And then he went into the tm UOSA camp and was clearly the best player on the team, better than players that a lot of people had previously assumed were better than Ant, and then he just immediately

rose to the top of that pile. Right. It's funny how that kind of that whole Team USA experience just kind of shined a bright light on like how good Ant already is. And then it was kind of a great example for all of the non Lakers fans out there that Austin Reeves is actually a really good player that can play at the highest level. Right, Like the TMUOSA camps always ended up being a great way to kind of learn more about what these players are capable of. Right.

So then we come into the season, and my thought process was pretty simple. They've kind of discovered this defensive formula with their perimeter defense and Rudy Gobert anchoring things on the back line, and Anthony Edwards is poised to become potentially a top ten player in the NBA this year, and I simply thought that if they could combine an all time great defense or all times a strong word,

but like a truly transcendently great defense. With a top ten player that can generate quality shots in the half court, it'll push them over the top. Right. But what those of you guys who did listen back then, you might remember with Ant there was a very specific thing that I was looking to see from him this year, and it was an improvement in his playmaking. Anthony Edwards has a great downhill rim pressuring presence, right, and that naturally

just sucks the defense in. It's actually kind of comical how much defenses react to him because of his downhill athleticism and just how aggressive he is as a score took. I'm gonna be referencing a bunch of plays from the Timberwolves today, and I clipped all these plays and put them on my Twitter feed, put them in a thread, a thread of all these reads that Anthony Edwards makes.

So if you're following a lot at home, following along at home, you might want to go on Twitter and just kind of pull up those videos so you can see what I'm talking about. But there's a screenshot in particular that I grabbed where Aunt came off of a ball screen going to his right hand going to the right wing, and three Pelicans followed him, including strong help out of the strong side corner from brandon Ingram, and he ended up making an easy bounce past to shake

Milton in the corner that he missed the three. But the point there is is like Ant's just drawing a lot of attention, and he's always drawn a lot of attention, but like there's a difference in his approach this year compared to last year. It's actually funny. A complete and total accident. So I log into Synergy this morning and I click on the Timberwolves Pelicans game to watch it.

It was something that I wanted to watch yesterday I didn't get time to I wanted to spend today as like a Timberwolves day, right, So I pull it up and I'm watching and Aunt is just jacking up threes in the first few minutes. I think he got up like four threes in the first three or four minutes, and they weren't great shots, and he was looking to get his teammates involved at all. And then it dawned on me. I'm like, wait a second, CJ. McCollum's out there.

He has a collapse slung. Trey Murphy's out there, He's in, And then it dawned on me. I'd accidentally clicked on the twenty twenty two to twenty twenty three Pelicans Timberwolves game that happened at the very end of last year, and like Synergy lists the games by most recent, so I clicked on it because I thought it was the one from the other night, but it ended up being the one from last year, and I was like, oh, no, wonder,

like I've watched this game before. So I quickly back out of it, and I go to the twenty twenty four game, and I get the right game. There were completely different jerseys. Obviously, it's a totally different Pelican squad. They're dealing with a lot of injuries right now. Zion Williamson's out too, Trey Murphy's out, CJ mccom's out, so

it's kind of skeleton crew for the Pelicans. But so I start watching that game and and Ant is just picking the Pelicans apart with his passing through the first half, and it's like it's it was. It was an accidental juxtaposition of two different versions of the same player. Literally, just what six or seven months apart, right, And that's the thing, because like Ant's scoring is off the charge good. Twenty eight points per game, that's a career high. Six

point one rebounds per game, that's a career high. Sixty one percent true shooting percentage, that's a career high. He's shooting outrageously well. He's taken sixty seven pull up jumpers so far this year and he's made thirty four of them.

That's insane. He is making pull up jump shots at the same efficiency that Steph Curry did last year, when Steph was the best player in the league at that specific shot, and Anthony Edwards pull up jump shot this season has been worth one point two to two points per possession. That's insane. He's been good in catch and shoot situations as well. Fifty four percent in effective field goal percentage, seventy two percent in the restricted area, which

is outrageous. Three point three mix per game, which is perfectly fine, especially when you factor in some of the spacing limitations of that roster. Right. Oh, that's great, but that was all stuff that we knew Anthony Edwards was capable of. I think I think the one thing that's been a real revelation in terms of the scoring side of things for ant for me and I started to notice this with Team USA, mostly in the scrimmage clips, but you saw a little bit of it in the

games as well. But is kind of like become a very polished and nimble, good footwork move, counter move type of score in the short to mid range. And ironically, as someone who's been compared to Michael Jordan over the years, he kind of has a lot of that MJ kind of scoring like versatility in that short to mid range. He had another play against the Pelicans in that game where he kind of did a reverse pivot into a pump fake and then stepped through and made a bank

shot like that. That was the classic MJ was the fake fade away into the step through right, And so like he's got a lot of that stuff and that's been a surprise. But more or less, like we've known that he's been a capable pull up jump shuter he's done in the playoffs the last two years. We've known he's a good downhill rim presence. But the problem was is like he just never really weaponized that downhill rim

presence to generate quality looks for his teammates. Well, his assists are up this year to a career high five point three assists per game. He has a career high one point four to seven assists to turnover ratio. And he's been one of the best pick and roll players in the league. And I want to zoom in on this pick and roll play making piece for a minute. So he's averaging one point two to two points per possession in pick and roll including passes. Now, that's outstanding.

To give you an idea. Out of the thirty five players in the league to run at least seventy five pick and roll so far this year, he ranks third inefficiency out of those thirty five players. So he's been one of the very best and most efficient pick and roll shot creators in the league so far this year. Now, to me, it comes down to he when it comes

to pick and roll. Most young pick and roll ball handlers only see their two man game, meaning like they're reading the screen defender and like, if they have an opportunity to take to make the pocket pass, they'll throw

the pocket pass. And then if the biggest sagging back and they get enough separation, they'll take some kind of you know, pull up jump shot in the mid range, but they really struggle to see anything outside of just their two man game, right, And one of the advances you'll see in a pick and roll shot creator is when they start to look past the screen defender and start to pay attention to the lowman, because the lowman really is the key indicator of what's going to be open.

Because again, like when it comes to working downhill, if you're too late to identify that the lowman came over and you throw the pocket pass, the lowman can kind of blow that play up, right, So like you have to hit the pocket pass in the sweet spot where where the rollman or the lowman is on his way to come tag the roller but isn't quite there yet.

That way the pass can get through and the guy has enough time to kind of like make that decision to kick to the corner or identify that the lowman's going to be too slow as he goes to the rim. So like it's a really delicate read because if the lowman jumps the roleman, meaning he comes over quickly, then the pocket path isn't there and you have to throw

the skip pass over the top. And like in this particular game, the new Orleans Pelicans game, and I clipped a bunch of examples and the Pelicans actually offered low man help out of both sides of the floor. They helped out the weak side and at a strong side at different points during this During this game, and Ant just perpetually kept making the right read. It was like help out of the left corner on a right wing pick and roll, so a weak side corner low man help.

This is the first clip in the thread that I put out there. He identifies that Brandon Ingram's coming over immediately and just rifles a pass across the court that hits Mike Conley right in the shooting pocket as he

knocks down a three. Then there's another one where he runs the pick and roll out of the left side of the floor and as he's working towards his right, the low man comes out of the strong side corner and he just whips it across his body like this, and it's a tougher pass and Carl Towns had to kind of come over to grab it and then set his feet, but he was so damn open because he timed it perfectly. As Jeremiah Robinson Earl was coming over that he was able to give Carl Towns enough time

to set his feet knock down the shot right. Then there was another one later on. This is in that same thread where he's working in pick and roll and he identifies that the lowman hasn't come over yet but is about to, but he already sees the pocket pass. So instead of throwing the pass to the corner, which would have been an easy rotation, I think it was Jordan Hawkins in this case, Jordan Hawkins could have easily

made the rotation. Instead, he throws the ball to go Bear on the pocket pass, and Go Bear then activates or kind of like grabs the attention of Jordan Hawkins, and then he makes the kickout pass to the corner for someone I think it was Shake Milton this time to knock down with three. So like again, these are like it is getting really good now and looking past the two man game and seeing the lowman on either side of the floor and basically identifying where his passing

reads are. And then it goes down to like just simple driving kick stuff. A play where he did a little kind of give and go action with with Gobert at the top of the key where he pump faked and on the pump fake brandon Ingram left his shoes, just took a hard dribble into the basket. Jonas Falatunas stepped over Boom, easy swing pass to the corner to nas Reed for a wide open three. And so again, like what's really intense, Like I should say, exciting is

the right expression. What's really exciting about that, as it pertains to Aunt is like these are easy, easy, easy passes for him to make because he does such a good job of engaging the defense. A lot of the better pick and roll playmakers in the league, it's not about their ability to make the read or make the pass.

It's about actually engaging the lowman. And the only way you're going to engage the lowman is if you're dangerous enough as a score and as a rim pressuring threat to actually pull defenders towards like in your direction essentially your gravity right and so like has always had the gravity in terms of his ability to bring people over. It's even more dramatic now with his pull up shooting and how accurate he's been, and when you add to that his ability to make the reads, it makes him

a very dangerous player. Here's a crazy stat for you guys. There are in seven games so far this year, Anthony Edwards has four games with at least seven assists. It took him twenty six games last year to notch four seven assist games. That gives you an idea of just how far ahead of last year he is as a playmaker. Had two games this year where he had one assist that kind of pulled him down, and they were early in the season. He's been passing the ball better as

of late. I think that's a really strong indicator, and it looks like he's sending his superstardom in our eyes, right before our eyes. I want to hit on a couple of other offensive players for Minnesota. Carl Town's not shooting the ball super well this year. He's twelve for thirty six on catch and shoot threes, but his post up attack has been a nice entry point for their offense.

He's shooting sixty three percent on hook shots this season, and a Carl Towns post up is good for one point zero nine points per possession, middle of the pack for his volume. Fourteen players in the League of run at least thirty and he's sixth place inefficiency, so that's kind of turned into a decent little entry point for their offense. Jaden McDaniels has been really good attacking, with an advantage one point two to three points per possession

in spot up situations. Obviously, he's hitting his catch and shoot three this year, but a big part of it is like he's got that like catch on the left wing, ripped to his left, and then he'll shoot these like drifting pull up jump shots that are pretty close to the rim, like in that ten to twelve foot range. He banked in one against New Orleans the other day. He's shooting eight for fifteen this year on pull up jump shots. Mike Conley has thirty assists with one turnover.

There are sixty seven players in the NBA so far this year that have at least thirty assists, and Conley has one turnover. Second fewest turnovers on that list is Chris paul Is seven. So kind of a you know, completely unique strike of high level play making while taking care of the basketball from Mike Conley. And then the last guy I wanted to shout out was Nas Red. It has been unbelievable attacking closeouts. He's actually been their

third leading score coming off the bench. He's given them fifteen points per game off the bench, and part of it's the catch and shot jumper, and he'shooting really well. He's ten for twenty two on catch and shoot jump shots when he's spotting up so far this year. But

he's driving the closeouts really well. And he has a little bit of slow mo in him in the sense that he just slows down and kind of meanders into the lane, and he's so much bigger than whoever's guarding him that he's able to kind of just like get close and then shoot little push shots off the glass. He actually had a driving bank shot out of the right corner attacking a close out in the first half

against New Orleans. He is four for five from the field this year when he shoots driving out of a closeout, fifteen points per game on sixty nine percent for shooting. Can't do much better off the bench than Nasried is doing. Again, on the defensive end, we did a deep dive into some of the defense metrics last week, so I won't get into the metrics. They are number one in defensive rating and number one and half court defense, but they're

just good at everything they do. They kind of have like different pick and roll coverages for go Beart and for Cat. So like with Carl Towns, he's sitting more in a deeper drop with Carl excuse me, with Rudy Gobert, he's sitting in a deeper drop. With Carl Towns, he's coming higher into the ball screen because he's obviously not much of a rim protector, so they're using him to

kind of get rid of the basketball. And then what they'll do is Rudy Gobert is typically guarding a non shooter well essentially come over as the low man and operate as that drop coverage big as the ball is coming downhill in a pocket pass or anything like that. And then basically as soon as the ball advances past Carl Towns, Carl Towns just sprints and rotates to Rudy Gobert's man. And that's been kind of working for them because it allows Carl Towns to basically force the ball

handler to get rid of the ball. Rudy Gobert can kind of just contain that pocket pass action. And then Kat's been really good about getting back into the play so that they don't give up an offensive rebound in the process, But it's just a steady diet of perimeter defense. It's Jaden and Ant to start the game, and then it's Nikhil, Alexander Walker and Kyle Anderson coming off the

bench and bringing that intensity. Even their weaker perimeter defenders, guys like Shake Milton and Mike Conley are just competing and doing their job. They're doing a good job of leaving the right shooters open. Because again, like a lot of people are saying, oh, teams aren't shooting well against

the Timberwolves, and it's true. The Timberwolves have the league best opponent three point percentage they're giving up I want to say, like the fifteenth or sixteenth most threes in the league, So they're pretty middle of the pack in terms of giving up threes. But teams are shooting a really low percentage on them. And like, again, I tend to think that process is a part of it. Like it's always a little bit of both, right, Like, will

teams shoot thirty one percent against the Timberwolves all year? No, But this is an example of what elite defense can do in a small sample size. Like I do think that your physical point of attack defense, throwing people out of rhythm helps. I do think that just in general, the length and athleticism you have in rotation and the effect that Jada McDaniels and Edwards can have offering late contests as freak athletes the way that they are, I think that that stuff plays a role. We've talked about

this with the Lakers. It's like, do their guards need to make shots? Yeah, but I think what'll actually help them make shots is that they get better quality shots, right, Like, I do think these things are are very intricately related. Right, So, perimeter defense, solid rotations, excellent rimp protection. That's a recipe

for one of the best defenses of this era. And when you combine that with the ascendants, with the assent to superstart him from Anthony Edwards and the solid contributions they're getting around him, you have yourself a damn good basketball team. Again, like this early in the season, to already have wins against Boston and Denver, who have pretty much looked dominant against everybody else. Can't do much better than that to start the year. All right, eleven mail

bag questions before we get out of here today. So, first one, you mentioned how you can't bet on the Celtics, with Tatum as their number one option, with which I agree with. What would be the path for a team like that who has a good enough supporting cast win but just don't seem like they ever will with their

current number one guy. Should Boston try and do what Toronto did with the Kawhi trade and trade Tatum for someone who can actually lead them, pray for good circumstances and push like the MAVs did with Dirk, or just accept that, regardless of overall talent, with Tatum as the number one, championship won't be really feasible in the current

era basketball. So there are three teams right now that I look at that are kind of in the middle of this sort of predicament, and it's the Celtics, the Hawks, and the Sixers. The difference is is like each team is kind of in a different situation. Like I genuinely believe Tatum will be good enough one day, So I have advocated that patience is the appropriate strategy for the Celtics. They should wait see if Tatum develops. Trey Young to me,

it's pretty clear that he's not. Like, if Trey Young is the best player on your team, I just don't think you can win a championship. Trey Young's awesome made another incredibly high level pass in pick and roll fading out of bounds last night, that hook pass to the corner to Dejonta Murray that basically ended up being the

game winner last night against the Magic God knows. I respect and believe in what Trey Young can do as a basketball player, but strictly within the context of the championship goal, I think if he's your best player, there's a limitation there. So as a franchise, you either need to accept that as long as he's there, that's not really an option and kind of adjust your expectations or

try to go get one of those guys. Now. To be clear, like when you really look down down the league, like in NBA history, there's always one of those guys leading the way, right, you absolutely have to have that guy. So again, to me, it's about the expectations of your franchise. If you're just trying to be good, then a guy like Trey Young's fine, and you can keep him forever and you'll have some fun playoff runs and you'll never get the trophy, right, But if you're if you're the

Boston Celtics, and that's clearly a failure for you. You need to make a decis about your star. But again, I think Tatum's going to be that guy. I think there's enough information there just from what we've seen He's eventually going to be that guy. Joel Embiid is like,

it's a question. My thing would be if he goes into the playoffs again this year and he again has some sort of nagging injury, and he again seems to get stonewalled by a decent, big foard defender in the playoffs, and again he can't trust his jump shot, and again his scoring craters into the low twenties. As a franchise, you got to ask yourself, like, do we want to

be the next Houston Rockets that are really good? But every time we run into another one of the top tier superstars, our James hard and Joel Embiid, whoever it is, ends up coming up short to a better player, right, And that's the thing, Like, I think the Sixers are

our right to keep trying. But if after this season it happens again, now you've got to look back and be like, man, that's three consecutive seasons in the heart of Joel Embiid's prime where he completely fell apart in the playoffs, and you'd have to have a conversation with yourself, right. Same thing goes with Trey Young. But as far as Jason Tatum goes, I think it's pretty clear that he's going to be one of those guys. Here's a Lakers question.

Since four out was working so well last season, why the did they implement the five out this season? Obviously they don't have the personnel to run five out and it's shown just eight games in historically the worst first quarter team through eight games last and three point percentage twenty ninth in mid threes per game. So we talked a little bit about this at the end of the show yesterday, but again a quick refresher for those who don't realize, like a five out offenses is like what

the Golden State Warriors run. And we talked about this a lot on this show when we talked about the Warriors. But basically, it's like it's a motion offense, a steady diet of wide pinned downs, dribble handoffs, ball screens and everything mixed around, like consistent motion from five players on the perimeter. Right and even when a defender or when an offensive player rolls to the rim or cuts to the rim, they immediately relocate back out to the perimeter.

And the idea is the Again, like if you look at the teams that run five out offense teams like you know Sacramento and Golden State or just a couple of examples, they are they have really high level shot makers and they have guards that are super quick that can get downhill and make kickout reads. Right, So like you have Malik Munk and Deer and Fox who can consistently beat people off the dribble and they're kicking out to guys like Kevin Herder and and a Keegan Murray.

You are excellent spot up shooters, right, although Kevin Herder struggling to shoot this year. Then then in addition to that, like Keegan Murray and Kevin Herder are guys that like to come off of screens and dribble handoffs and rise and fire. So it works right. For Golden State, it's a little different. It's less about their the quickness of their guards and it's more about just the outrageous shooting. Like Stephan Klay are just so damn good at shooting.

That they constantly can get slips to the rim for their other players as defenses overreact to them, and then even when it comes to dribble penetration, it's easier for them because they're such outstanding shooters. The Lakers are in an awkward position where their guards on the wing that are playing let's just look at their their their one,

two three. So if we look at Reeves Dlo Torrian Prince, Reeves is a good shot maker, not a great shot maker, and he's an average athlete that's not going to toast people off the dribble. D Lo good shot maker, not great shot shot maker, decent athlete or like an average athlete that's going to struggle to beat people off the dribble. Torrian Prince, he's a good off ball player, good catch and shoot player, but when it comes to taking tougher

shots off the move, he's only okay at it. He's good at it, but he's not great at it, right, And he's another guy who's not an outstanding athlete who can beat people off the dribble. So, like part of the issue for me with the with the five out approach for the for the Lakers is simply that they are not good enough at making tough contested shots or off the move, off the dribble shots, and they're not good enough at beating people off the dribble to actually

run that offense. What they have, that's what they have that's really good is they have two backcourt pick and roll guys who, when they're given space to operate, are pretty solid throughout the course of the regular season at generating quality shots, meaning like they can get to a mid range pull up jump shot, they can hit the pocket pass, they can make kickout reads on the weak side right they're both pretty good at that when they have space. And again, just imagine a cleared side pick

and roll. So I've got a shooter in the corner wing kind of like elbow extended to the top of the key, and I'm running like a Reeves Anthony Davis pick and roll on the right side. There's just a ton of space to operate. And Austin's really shifty, and he's good at drawing fouls, and he's good at making shots when he's getting fouled, and when you get ad a pocket pass when there's lots of space, he can

have some success there. But when it's like a cluster fuck for lack of a better term, and you're running a ball screen or dribble handoff, and you've got guys just equally spread out along the perimeter. They're all the space is underneath the basket. And what's hard about that is in order to take advantage of that, you have to be good at beating people off the dribble, and Austin Reeves and D'Angelo Russell are not straight line athletes.

Even Anthony Davis is not a straight line athlete, and so like that's why they've been so good with Lebron James on the floor offensively, is he's one of the guys that can kind of actually generate that rim pressure.

So like, for me, it makes more sense with this team to spread the floor in a four out concept, So shooters in the corners, shooters on the wings, and then come run that pick and roll with Anthony Davis so that they have the entire side of the floor to work with, or maybe even clear the side entirely by moving that corner shooter over to the other side and let those guys work two man game. Like we've talked about this a lot. The idea of a brute

force offense versus like a system offense. Right, And to me, the five out teams that succeed, they are teams that actually have the the talent to run that kind of system offense. But like to me, the Lakers are very much a brute force offense. They have a couple of guys who are really good as long as the circumstances favor them in terms of spacing. Right, like Lebron James still to this day, if you let him post up,

he's gonna get a quality shot. Right, Anthony Davis has been well over a point per possession and post up each of the last post ups each of the last two years. So like those two guys screening and rolling to the rim and a spread floor, operating in a post up situation in the spread floor, that's great even now imagine the off ball situation. Dangel Russell and Austin

Reeves excellent catch and shoot players. Dangel Russell and Austin Reeves average pull up jump shooters, So like lean into them getting more catch and shoot opportunities by operating off the ball in a spread floor pick and roll situation rather than doing this read and react five out thing where none of them are particularly good at the things you need to be good at in order to make that work. That's kind of where I'm at with the

with the Lakers offense at this point. We'll continue to kind of flush out that concept as we get further into the season. Next meil By question, I wanted to ask why core players tend to play a significant amount of minutes in the third and fourth quarter even if their team is leading by a big market margin, for example, twenty plus points. For example, I watched the timber Wolves as Pelicans today. Anthony Edwards and Gobert still played the third and fourth and both ended up playing thirty two

minutes for the whole game. I feel to Norman the NBA, but why core players don't take more rest even if a game is already decided. They usually do towards the tail end of the year. To me, this is related to the start of the year. I think most NBA teams right now are pushing minutes a little bit higher, even when they don't necessarily need to, as a result of just trying to get guys into NBA season shape. Remember, we've seen a lot of guys Julius Randall Jalen Brunson,

Damian Lillard. These are all guys that came into the season and now they're playing their way into shape. And when they're not practicing, they don't literally have an opportunity to work on these things except for within games, and so I think that's why they're pushing their minute right now. Next mail back questions from Malcolm. Hey, Jason, what do you think of Asar Thompson's potential? He didn't get as much attention as a men on Overtime, Elite or in

the draft. I think he can be a better version of a men, and I think I think he can be better than a man, and think he can be a better version of Iguadala on the Warriors. What do you think? So, I obviously haven't watched the Pistons as closely as I've watched some other teams that I've watched two games of them so far this year, and then I watched their preseason games because we scouted Asar over the preseason. We did a whole video on that, and

then I scouted him this summer. To put it simply, he's not a very good basketball player right now, just because he's so limited on the offensive end as a shot maker and as a decision maker, there's still like there was a random play at the end of the Bucks game where he just try to transition push at the end of the game and challenged a rim protector, and it's like, dude, calm down, right, you know, But when it comes to young players, you almost want to

put the bad aside and just focus on the good because most of the bad stuff is just typical for all young basketball players and can be flushed out over time. Right he's averaging four offensive rebounds and two blocks per game thirty two minutes. I think he's probably the best perimeter defender prospect I personally have scouted in the last

few years. Mind you, I haven't done this very long, but in the time that I've been doing this, I can't remember seeing a perimeter defender that showed a better combination of like lateral quickness, first and second jump ability meaning like to contest shots either under the basket or after being broken down off of a move, the ability

to navigate screens, natural length like that. There was a play at the end of the Bucks game where Damian Lillard is on a freaking heater, like he's just going and he hits Asar Thompson with a hard dribble to his left step back jump shot does like another one of those like slide steps like the hard and step back. After he does the step back gets all the way to the three point line in a SAR blocked the

damn shot. A SAR blocked it. And like like, there are some clips of him navigating screens or blocking perimeter players that are truly jarring for it for his position.

So again, like it's gonna be what kind of person he becomes player he becomes in the big picture will come come down to his offensive development, but his his perimeter defense potential is off the charts, and that's super super exciting, especially when you really a factor in the team, right And like, I don't know if it's gonna be Jaden Ivy or Killian Hayes that flanks k Cunningham over the years, but if Arsar Thompson can take primary point

of attack assignments and do it well, you know, that's just a huge asset for your team to have. It allows you to you know, kind of conserve some energy in your backcourt, so to speak. Which new coach do you think has had the best impact on their new team. I think this one's pretty obviously email Udoka here in the early going, as the Rockets have looked really good, he had a he's just an excellent motivator. That was the big story coming out of the Celtics when he

was there. He just basically made them tough. He said after the Lakers game that he basically went up to Jalen Green and was like, hey, dude, you were on the Select team. Austin Reeves was on the on Team USA, and like, like, why don't you go show that you're better than him? Right? And like, is Austin Reeves better than Jalen Green. I'm not even gonna answer that question, but like he managed to piss off Jalen Green because he went out in that game and he kicked Austin's ass.

And so again, like he's just an excellent motivator. I think he's done a really good job kind of rebuilding the culture in Houston and they look like a winner right now. Next question from Dalvin Jason. This was funny. This isn't really a question. It was just someone talking shit, but I wanted to address it. From Dalvin Jason. While I love and appreciate your glowing praise of the best player in the league, Jokic and the ragning champions Nuggets.

I cannot help but remember all the instances you shot on them in the last two years. Didn't lose me as a fan or subscriber, but I didn't forget and I didn't appreciate. So this is actually one of my biggest pet peeves. And don't take this personally, Dalvin. I'm just this is something that I've that's annoyed me for a while, and I just want to kind of give my take on it. Why is it that anytime anybody doesn't heap praise on somebody, they're now shitting on them.

Because I don't remember ever saying that I thought Jokic was a bad basketball player. I don't remember saying that the Nuggets can't win the championship. I said two things consistently, as it pertains to Jokic himself. I always said, in the modern era, I'm concerned about centers like plotting centers because of the way they can get spread out, in the way they can struggle in transition. I ended up being wrong about that. But the best indicator of future

performance is past performance. And we were literally seeing in every playoff run, every slow flooted center get it played off the floor. It was happening every single playoff run. Jokic is just so damn good. He was able to overcome that couple of particular ways. One, he's an excellent transition player, so like literally he has just by sheer force of habit and will, he sprints up and down the floor so well in transition that he never struggles there.

In fact, he actually beats more athletic centers up and down the floor in transition. Looking at the defensive end and spreading him out. He's shown that he can be a good enough defender that it isn't a problem. So again, like I was making a like, all I said was Jokich is a superstar. I just have other superstars above him because I leaned towards perimeter players because of their playoff versatility. That's all I said. Then we move on

to the Nuggets piece. What did I say? NBA history tells us that you do not win the championship unless you are a top ten defense, unless you're the defending champions. The Rockets in the mid nineties, the Lakers in the early two thousands, and then the Warriors in twenty eighteen. They were all defending champions, and they were the only

three champions that weren't top ten defenses. And again the clear indicator there was they were top ten defenses before and in that following season they were classic trying to repeat, a little less motivated, a little less locked in, but then they got to the playoffs and then they re locked in. Right, So again I'm gonna repeat the same thing. I just said, the best indicator of future performance is past performance. I was making a prediction based on actual

NBA historical data. Just because Jokics broke the mold for centers and the Nuggets broke the mold for championship teams doesn't mean that I shit on the Nuggets. That's just that's completely ridiculous. If I shit on the Nuggets, I would have said the Nuggets suck, they can't win. Never said that. Going into the playoffs last year, I said

they can win. I'm just skeptical because of NBA history, right when Jokic, When I had Jokics ranked below the other superstars, I literally had him and MB down there and I said, I it's just because of my philosophy, my overarching basketball philosophy surrounding slower footed centers as it pertains to the perimeter oriented stars at the top of the league. Now I've and like and again all all I will promise to do, which is the truth, Like this is this is the way that I make predictions.

I take previous data and I use that to inform my my my predictions. Right, But when new data comes in and the new data goes crosswise with what the old data was, I'm always willing to embrace that as

a potential change. And that's the thing. Now I see, now that Jokic has the trophy, I'm i I can like see all of these specific reasons why he was able to kind of flip the mold, right, And again, you have to you have to think of it really simply, like what about what have I always said were my kind of rules, like with my player rankings, like get the trophy and I'll defend you forever. But before you have the trophy, I'm always going to revert to the

guys with the trophy. That's just my approach. You're either you're either the guy who's trying to jump on the bandwagon as soon as possible, or you're the guy that gets on the bandwagon a little later, and I'd always rather be a guy who gets on the bandwagon a little late as a homage or respect towards the guys who've already done it. That that, to me, is just my personal approach. Had nothing to do with disliking the Nuggets. And again, like I want to push back on that.

In general, if I say something that is somewhat critical of your favorite team or player, it does not mean that I hate your favorite team or player and that I think they're incapable of achieving anything. I'm just putting basketball analysis out there, and my analysis always changes based on new information. If you have a good team out there and you guys start playing great basketball, I'm never going to overlook that because I hate your team. It's just it's just it's just not an emotion that I

am capable of experiencing. For whatever I love, I just I love basketball so much that like, I pretty much find things that I love in every team. Like Dylan Brooks I find to be mostly reprehensible, but I have so much appreciation for what he can do as a basketball player that I still kind of like him. You kind of get the point, is what I'm talking about here. I mean, Harden and Bea are great examples of that too, Jason, when you describe Dylan Brooks, if I wasn't listening, all

those points could be made about Draymond. If anything, Dylan never kicks someone in the nuts or in the stomach or punch teammate. If you're saying things with a straight face about Dylan but pretend to ignore what Draymond has been doing for years, that's a lack of integrity. Not that I expected it from you, who's a lebron Draymond will skip over the expletive, but still it's painful to listen to delusion and agenda. So this is not the first person who's said this and just put it simply.

They're not the same. Draymond is really physical. He fouls a lot. He does occasionally commit hard fouls. Here's what I've never seen Draymond do. I have never seen Draymond attack a defenseless player going up for a layup in transition by clotheslining him over the neck and breaking his freaking elbow. I've never seen Draymond do that. Here's another

thing I've never seen Draymond do. I have never seen Raymond Green on the ground deliver do a dramatic barrel roll into another player's legs and nearly hurt the player's ankle and knee. Dylan Brooks did that to Donovan Mitchell. Dylan Brooks engages in deeply dangerous behaviors that can injure basketball players. That is not the same as being like overly physical, because I would agree Draymond's overly physical. He's also very emotional. And I literally came out after he punched.

He works from our damn company, and I came out after he punched Dylan Jordan Poole and said it was bad leadership, straight up came out and said that I was very critical of Draymond Green after the punch. Okay, so like again, like this is this is not this does not take a lot of critical thinking. Here find the If I'm wrong, If there is some clip of Draymond Green deliberately doing something that could severely injure a player, send it to me and then I will come up

here and I'll apologize. But as far as I'm concerned, there is a line, and the line is like there are a lot of players in the NBA that play a physical brand of basketball, that grab and and and pull jerseys and and hit guys and do all these different things, but they're not hurting people. There's a difference.

The difference is they're hurting and like Dylan Brooks on multiple occasions has done deliberate things that had the potential hurt I remember watching that that Donovan Mitchell play, and I'm like, oh my god, he did that on purpose. He literally did a full barrel role multiple times into

Donovan Mitchell's legs, and thankfully Donovan didn't get hurt. So again, like, let's let let's cut the shit here and let's let's let's draw a clear line in the sand between a physical basketball player and a guy who's actually made attempts to hurt people in the past. And actually like he actually removed Gary Payton from the playoffs, actually removed him, and he like saw him, like saw him and was like, yeah, I'm I'm gonna closeline this dude in the head in

the middle of a playoff game. Like that's the kind of person he is, And I have a huge problem with it. I don't know what else to tell you, all right, next mail back question, what do you think, other than getting a Lonzo back, could the Bulls do to make the team better? Is there a trade that can be made, like Levine for ojnnob or Damar or excuse me, Levine for Ojana Andobi or Damar for Austin Reeves.

So I lean towards a full rebuild for the Chicago Bulls, And the main reason is this, they don't have a single player on the roster who projects to even maybe be a true superstar in the future. Do I like Patrick Williams, Yeah, good player, not a superstar. Do I like Zach Levine, Yeah, very good player, not a superstar.

Demarto Rosen is literally in his thirties, Like he is what he is at this point, you know, so like and like they have some interesting young players, right, like Kobe White's interesting Io dessume was interesting, Like Alex Cruso is one of the best role players in the league in my opinion. But they simply do not have a single player on the roster that even projects to maybe be a superstar. So like, at some point you've got

to kind of identify that. And before you say, like, oh, it's a small market, we don't have the ability to get those types of players. That's not true either. Oklahoma City small market, they have Sha Shae Giljas Alexander projects to be a bonafide superstar. Minnesota Timberwolves if Anthony Edwards projects to be a bonafide superstar, Sacramento as Deer and Fox at least might be a bonafide superstar. Right Cleveland as Donovan Mitchell at least might be a bonafide superstar.

Denver has Jokic best player in the world, Milwaukee is Jiannis second best player in the world. Memphis Grizzlies have John Moran projects to be a bonafide superstar. So again, like these are all small markets that have that guy. So if you don't have one of those guys, everything you do needs to be geared around getting one of those guys. Now is has a Chicago ever demonstrated a you know, Miami heat esque or you know the Lakers

have been good at this over the years too. But like finding star level players are very very very good players in the margin, No, Chicago is not one of those teams. So, like to me, you really need to be making all your moves geared around trying to find who that guy is, so I would be just trying to bring in as much draft capital as possible. So I lean full rebuild for Chicago. That's what makes the

most sense to me. If you had to do a soft rebuild, rebuild around Levine, flip DeRozan, flip Vusvich, get dominant defensive front court personnel, and see if Levine can kind of push you enough offensively over the top. But whatever their current strategy is, I simply don't understand. All right, we have three more mailback questions. Do you think gms should willingly one more note on the the bulls thing.

Once you do find one of those guys, that's when you start trying to build the roster around the margins, right, And it's about what that player's strengths and weaknesses are. So you gotta find out who your guy is, and then what is your guy good at and bad at? What does he need around it? It's like Luca, Like they know they need shooting around Luca, and they need good role man around Luca. So that's the kind of player that they target, right, Like that, that's just what

makes the most sense. Right, if you're Anthony Davis, what if the Lakers tried to do give them a bunch of pick and roll ball handlers because they know Anthony Davis can't run his own offense. So like, you have to identify strengths and weaknesses based around your star, all right. This question is kind of related to that. Do you think gms should willingly give up more talent in return for players who are less talented or have less potential but fit their team better instead of seeking the best

talent potential when making moves. For example, Jordan Poole is definitely more talented than Chris Paul at this stage of his career. The trade seems to have paid off, but the Warriors definitely gave up way more talent than they received. Again,

depends on the window. So like, the Warriors are in a very tight championship window based on Steph Curry being thirty five years old, right, That's why it makes sense for them to give up long term potential for a player who might fit them better right now, right, But it just depends, and you've got to make that decision based on like, for instance, if you're the Thunder, your windows way longer, So it would be terrible to like, let's say that the Thunder went and like, I don't know,

found some way to piece salaries together and they were like, we want to upgrade, you know, Jalen Williams into a veteran forward that can play next to Chet, and so they trade for Jeremy Grant. That'd be stupid because the Thunder have a much wider timeline and like, there's a version of this two years from now where Jalen Williams is better than Jeremy Grant. You know, it might not even take that long for him to get there, because

Jalen Williams is really good. So maybe that's a bad example, but the point is is like your timeline dictates how much your urgency, how much urgency you have, and your urgency dictates how much long term potential you'd be willing to give up. Hey, Jason bigfan, can you talk about the Celtics and how they seem to be using Drew Holliday to start the season. This is now the third time that they've used him that they've started him out guarding a bigger star. It starts guarding Julius Randall the

whole game. Then against the Wolves he straight up started on Carl Towns and then yesterday against the Sixers, they started hit him on Embiid for several possessions. Haven't really heard anybody talk about it in detail at all, but I find it super interesting that they're playing like they would like they would Marcus Smart who although both elite defenders,

are both different kinds of defenders with different strengths. So we did talk about Drew Holliday guarding Embiid and yesterday's show, but we can dive into it a little bit more in depth, because, like, what sticks out to you the most about those three names that you said? So I have Embiid who is a power post player. I have Julius Randall, who more or less is a wing that or power forward but operates kind of more from the wing, but is more or less a power player. And then

Carl Towns who's a power player. But what else is interesting about all three of them? All three of them are bad passers. Joel Embiid notoriously struggles to deal with double teams. Carl Towns has more turnovers than assists this year. Julius Randall the same kind of thing, a little bit of a tunnel vision guy that kind of barrels his way downhill. So the reason why it works in these matchups is they're already expecting to send help. So Drew is a great disruptor. He's good at fronting the post.

He's good at attacking the basketball, attacking your base, and attacking your shooting pocket. He's not trying to bother these guys up top. He's trying to bother them down low, right.

And so if you're already planning on sending help because of the fact that there's literally a much easier time rotating on the back end because these guys aren't great passers, might as well have your primary defender be a guy that can disrupt down low, who can front the post, who can disrupt the shooting pocket, because he's going to even if they manage to get up around Drew down low, they're going to come up into that help defender who's

probably going to be a bigger player because everybody else on the floor is bigger than Drew Holliday, right, So that is the interesting element to it. I would be really curious to see if they could do it against better passing bigs, So like when we see the Celtics play the Nuggets, I'd be really curious to see if they try Drew Holiday on Jokich. My guess is they won't because they'll probably try to end up putting Porzingis

on him. Right, but for that simple purpose of like, they're gonna try to be able to rotate quickly on the back end because he's a great passer. So I think it's an interesting combination of like of taking advantage of the fact that these guys aren't good passers and Drew's ability to disrupt them down low as they try to power their way to the basket. All right, last mail back question. I just listened to your most recent Star Wars podcast about Luke Skywalker in the Imperial Remnant.

It led to a topic about you guys in wemby ranking Star Wars movies and your surprising take on Rogue One. My mail back question is what's your Star Wars movie's ranking? So this was on my Star Wars podcast that it's not really a Star Wars podcast, it's Everything podcast, but we also cover Star Wars. It's called Two Suns podcasts.

It's you could see the little logo thing right here, but we do videos about once a week on YouTube and on the podcast feed and we just talked about everything right now, going through some Star Wars books, but we'll be covering the basically every major movie release slash you know, like Game of Thrones or House of the Dragon, I should say, you know, the last of us Star Wars or big Star Wars fans. We do a lot of Star Wars stuff. We basically do everything Star Wars

in terms of like the exded extended universe. So anyway, we were talking about how Victor Weben Yama is also a diehard Star Wars fan who also completely disowns the sequel trilogy, just like I do, and just like my buddy Luke does. And he ranked his favorite Star Wars movies and I'm going to give you the exact same three. So Wemby said his three favorite were Revenge of the Sith, Attack of the Clones, and Empire Strikes Back. And I

literally agree perfectly. The reason why I love Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith is like, in my opinion, the coolest Star Wars story in the entire lore is what's called the Sith Grand Plan, which starts with Darth Baine a thousand years before Palpatine and basely goes all the way through all these Sith lords, and it goes to Darth Plagis, who is Darth Ciitius Palpatine's master, and it culminates in Order sixty six, right, and in

them basically overthrowing the Republic. Right. But it actually is like an incredibly intricate plan, very well thought out by George Lucas or conceptualized by George Lucas. And Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith are really fun to go back and rewatch and just look at all the little bits and pieces of manipulation that Palpatine is using to kind of like overthrow everything. So those two

movies I've always loved for that reason. Empire Strikes Back is just is just it's it basically takes what was because A New Hope was very much like a very rudimentary movie. There's not a whole lot that happens in it. Right. They Luke finds Han Solo and Obi Wan and they leave, They go to the Death Star, they escape the Death Star with the with Lea, then they go to yav and then they have the battle for they blow up

the down. That's literally the movie. It's very very basic right, Empire strikes back, introduces the Emperor, introduces Yoda, dives into like Jedi lore. There, it's very dark and disturbing. There's twists and turns, there's tragedy in it, like just it's it's just It's to me is like the peak of of of Star Wars content. So a good question though, And again if you're looking for basically me talking about anything that's not basketball, that's the place to check out

the show right now. Again, we're doing some books, so it's less frequent and a little more slow, but uh, but we get up. We will get a lot busier as as time goes along. All right, guys, that is all I have for today. We are actually going to be coming back later tonight to break down the Friday night slate of games after Lakers Sun, So I will see you guys later this evening. The volume