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All right, welcome to Hoops Today, here at the Volume. Happy Wednesday, everybody. This NBA Finals Game three Instant Reaction was brought to you by Chase Freedom Unlimited. How do you cash back as usual. We've got Colin Coward here to break it all down. Kind of a funky game.
Poor zingis out to start, a lot of attacking the rim for Dallas, getting easier shots around the basket, but that classic Boston driving kick attack and excellent defense gets a big What was whether they were up twenty one in the early fourth quarter, A little bit of a classic Boston meltdown, a bunch of bad isolation possessions. Dallas gets going a little bit, but at the end Luca
fouls out. Boston just seeming It kind of reminded me of that Pacers series where they just kind of took control of the game late with a few good defensive possessions and a few quality driving kicks, and all of a sudden, the Celtics are up three to zero in the final. So Colin, what's your biggest takeaway after Game three tonight?
Yeah, well, I mean, you can't be a lobsided team and thempletely lobsided. When Shaq and Kobe were winning championships, or Michael and Scottie, there were a lot of helpers. I mean, good God, you could go to Ron Harper could drop twenty and coup coach and Kerr and Packson. You know, there were just other guys that could contribute. I mean the first half, it was fifty one fifty at half, and it was Boston against Luca and Kyrie. So you just I think you just can't be that lobsided.
And I also think it's to your point. So my first takeaway is it's just too much. I thought I wrote this down on the fourth quarter. Luca looked cooked, and he's not a good defensive player, but you know he's He's just he doesn't slide quick enough, he doesn't get in great position, and he can complain a couple of times in the first half, he complained so much
that he got behind on defense and got burned. But I think what we're finding out is Dallas had the things that they did against Minnesota, they just can't do against Boston. We saw him beat an old team, a big team. They don't have the personnel to match up on either end of the floor.
They just don't.
This is just a mismatch, and I think it starts begging the question is what do we do with Boston. This is one of the great runs by a team ever. Is it an Eastern Conference that's weak, or have we undervalued just how good their seven person rotation. You know, if Porzingis and Horford are off the bench, that's a pretty good seven, right.
Yeah.
I think Boston's really really good, and I think a couple of underrated elements they have, with exception of some brief stretches. They had an ugly stretch in the middle of Game one, they had an ugly stretch obviously in the early fourth quarter here in Game three. But they've been playing a lot of grown up basketball, which is something they were a little bit inconsistent with. Over the
course of the regular season. Both Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum have understood their job, which is get the defense in rotation just so that everyone can play with an advantage. And then a big part of it, too is Jalen Brown's rise. We you know, there's been so much talk about Tatum, and there's no doubt that, like I think the fact that his jumper has been so often he's
having like a really bad jump shooting playoff run. I pulled this out on my show the other day, but this is the fourth consecutive season where we've seen a decline year over year from on his jump shooting, and so he's kind of just like going through something with his jump shot that's messing with parts of this game. But I think the major story is less about like Tatum being lower, but more about Jalen's rising into that tier.
I think you could, like if you it used to be for me that Jalen Brown was in that third tier of stars. He wasn't one of the best guys in the league. He wasn't in that list of like
all the flawed superstars. He was something beneath that. And basically the entire second half of the season, in this entire playoff run, he's been playing at Jason Tatum's level right up there as one of those that second tier of stars in the league, and that just is another infusion of talent that just makes it that much harder
to deal with. And like again, like I do want to talk about Lucas defense, and I think it's an important kind of discussion about his personal development, But I want to start by just kind of just pointing out that Boston is optimizing themselves. They're playing to the best that they are capable of with this group, and that's
what makes them so difficult to beat. I do think you made a good point about the matchups though, Like Dallas did get an old injured Clippers team, a Thunder team, which, by the way, pushed them pretty damn hard, but they're young and that some of their younger players really struggled
on the offensive end. And then Minnesota, as we discussed that nauseum was just a nightmare matchup, Dallas was a nightmare matchup for them because they could protect the rim, and that's a huge weakness for a team in Minnesota that was literally seventeenth on offense in the regular season. So they finally ran into a team that could actually
push their specific weaknesses. And I think that's probably one of my biggest takeaways from this entire postseason run, is like, you have to be able to win different ways, you have to be able to play different ways, you have to be able to beat different types of teams. And Dallas was good enough to beat the matchups that got out out in the West, but they were not good enough to beat a team that could really spread them out and test their perimeter defense.
Yeah.
I mean, I think one of the reasons I always considered Jalen sort of a second tier guy, not a third. But I think it's a little like d Wade is that d Wade could score twenty five. It was never beautiful, a lot of mid range playing, way bigger. You know, he punched way above his weight physically. Most of the great scorers Michael and Byrd Kareem though not pretty dominant. They either have one or two go to shots or
they're pretty I mean Carmelo was pretty offensively Steph. Historically, the great scorers have just either been unique or they just can do something nobody else can. D Wade and Jalen Brown are very strong, can be a little streaky, play both ends, highly resourceful. But it's not aesthetic beautiful. It's a tough, physical twenty seven. You know, they just bang into people. They're on the floor and we punish people.
If you know James Harden, it's just Kobe, it's just, oh, this is like it does I've never seen anything like it. And I think Jaylen Brown to me's a little d Wade where you look up and you're like, man, that guy. That guy plays big, that guy's tough, that guy's strong, that guy's physical. You know, d Wade was not always the best player on his team. He played with Shack, he played with Lebron, but there were nights d Wade was the best player on the floor. And that's how
I feel with Jalen Brown. I think it's just one of those things that Jalen Brown deserves credit for his game. He has worked at his craft, you know what I mean, Like he's like a radio star with a bad voice, Like like he just worked outwork people. Because that jumper initially in the league, you know, he I out of cal I told you he looked like a football player. I was just like, God, this guy is strong. He
has worked his butt off. I mean d Wade went to Little Marquette, he goes to cow These are guys. These are not like guys that are going to UNC at a high school or UCLA. So I think Jalen is and and frankly aggressive as we say, matters and he's really aggressive that dunk. I wrote it down here somewhere that that dunk, by god, God, that's like epic, you know ESPN Classic, you know that's like, okay, that's an all time YouTube play.
Yeah, I would I would attribute Jalen Brown's kind of increased you know, like just just the rise that he's taken in the season down to three things. First of all, he's defending at an insanely insane insane He hasn't guarded like this since the twenty twenty two season, except for he's smarter and a little bit bigger now, so he's
even better at it. The second piece of it is understanding his best advantage, which is is just a better athlete than everybody, so doing things like crashing the offensive glass, had a huge offensive rebound put back in crunch time, just beating people off the dribble. Remember in Game two, it was that drive pass Maxi Kleba for the left handed finish.
That was a huge play in that game.
And then the third piece of it, and this, I think this is one of my favorite things about the game of basketball, is that pursuit of adding something to your game and seeing it come to fruition on the
biggest stage. Jalen Brown worked really hard over the last couple of years to become a mid range, post up fadeaway jump shooter, and he paid his dues behind the scenes by himself of one on one work, and here in this season he was actually the best post up fadeaway jump shooter in the league based on points per shot attempt, and I thought it was really cool to see a game here where Dallas gets it down to
one after Kyrie made that floater. I think it was ninety three to ninety two, and he hit two massive post up fadeaway jump what was out of the post and one was kind of like a step back. But he had two massive pull up mid range jump shots to close that game out. And I guarantee you there was a moment there for him where he kind of looked in was like, this is why I put in all that work.
It paid off. He put in the.
Work, he got better, He gave his team a better chance to win the title. End of story. I want to shift to the Luca thing for a second, because, like I sympathize with this play to a certain extent, I have all the offensive responsibilities, so obviously I can't just just be an all world defensive player. But we're not asking Luca to be an all world defensive player. There's a certain like baseline level of effort that you need just to have your teams be able to function
as a defense. And like so many people have made it about Luca versus Tatum, and like Ohill Tatum struggling to guard Luca too. That's fine, but that's not what this issue is. The issue is Dallas can't beat Boston unless Luca plays better defense. And you saw the stat that was going around. Luca got blown by more times in Game two of the NBA Finals than any player had in over ten years tonight, just like falling asleep on Sam Houser, He's literally guarding one of their best
shooters in the corner, one pass away. He's not even looking at him. He's like five steps away, not even looking at him. There's a play where Drew Holliday's just running in circles around him, getting offensive rebounds as Lucas not paying attention on the defensive glass, not sprinting back in transition, complaining at the referees. Even like that last play, you know you have five fouls and Jalen Brown's trying to drive past you, and you're throwing your body in
front of him and knocking him over. Even if you think that that's a charge, you put the whistle in the ref's mouth like you made him make a call. I'm just so disappointed in his performance in those areas in this series.
And all I heard all year is and I watched him in the regular season, and I did think he played better defense. Playoff basketball, you start getting the conference finals and finals, it's a whole different ball again. First of all, you're fatigued. Now you're now into one hundred games. You're now tired. Also, the games are more intense. It becomes really possession basketball, so you can't take plays off. So it's a great example when I hear people say, well,
Luca's defense, it was a lot better this year. He committed in the regular season, But this league's getting younger. Younger players are less refined. You don't have to be a great defensive player in the regular season against about seventy percent of this league. But Boston completely exposes you defensively. Like everybody can score. I mean they're big shoot, everybody can shoot. They're bench guys. So it's it does show you the gap between you know, the conference finals and
the finals and everything else you are. It's a different level. I mean Michael Jordan, and I've said this before, Michael Jordan's legacy is you know, if Michael would have played in the Western Conference not the Eastern, he you know, he doesn't go six for six, right, he would have faced the Pistons and the Celtics, perhaps in the finals. So his legacy is built on six for six. We just say he's the best player. Even though Russell won eleven.
Lebron does everything better. He's the so it does. Your legacy is largely framed by finals. In Western Conference finals, this has been This is gonna stick to him like he was atrocious defensively in these finals, and that's gonna stick. That's why I say my comp to him is he's a better Carmelo Anthony. I don't think he's in great shape. I don't think he's easy to play with. I don't think he's committed on the defensive end. The difference is he can shoot the three Carmelo refuse to. And he's
better than Carmelo. But Carmelo was an elegant scorer. He was a beautiful offensive player. But you know he was threatened by Jeremy Lynn. So I'll stick by this. It's not a perfect comp but this is gonna stick. I mean, if we're gonna bang on Tatum and he's gonna win the finals, then we've got to bang on Luke. Who's gonna get swept and is atrocious defensively.
Well, and it was specifically one of the major issues for why they couldn't guard Boston. And that's the thing to the point that I made earlier in the show, Like when I talk about being able to win different ways, I'm mainly talking about the defensive end.
You have to be able to guard different teams.
Like, because guess what, you are gonna face a Yo Kitchen one round that is like this bizarre kind of like post up force, and then you might face the Warriors in the second round. It's gonna be Steph Curry flying around screen and he's gonna be shooting all these threes and they're gonna be inverting and running a lot of four on threes with Draymond rolling down the middle of the floor right, And it's like, all of a sudden, you play Minnesota, here's Anthony Edwards, this old school two guard,
and then you play a team like Boston. It's like no true superstar, but five great offensive players that are gonna spread you out, right. So it's like there, you do have to be able to guard in different ways. It doesn't matter if you can play a role in the regular season. You have to be able to beat four playoff teams. And again, as I mentioned earlier, I understand the offensive responsibility angle. Here's where I disagree with that as an excuse. This is the way your team
is built. Your team is constructed so that you and Kyrie do everything offensively. You can't ask PJ. Washington to create offense. You can't ask Derek Lively, Daniel Gafford, Josh Green, Derek Jones Junior.
That's not their job.
They are play finishers who play defense, and so by design, this team needs you to do a bunch offensively. So if you're going to get to the Promised Land, your goal of winning the title, you have to find a way to do that and guard. And this is again something I love about NBA history. Every superstar we've seen has encountered their greatest weakness, their greatest vice. Right MJ and Kobe, it was are they willing to trust their teammates when it matters?
Right?
For Lebron, it was the jumper. He had to literally have Greg Popovich ignore him at the three point line in two thousand and eight and then again in twenty thirteen before he conquered those demons and became the basketball player that he needed to be like, even like Steph Curry and NICOLEA. Jokic had to learn how to be
better defensively. Luka Doncic has to take better care of his body so that he can hold up better physically over the course of an eighty two game regular season in playoff run, so that he can do his job on offense while also being at the very least a functional part of the defense. He does not need to be all world, he just needs to be better than this.
All right, we are really really close to crowning an NBA champ. I like the Celtics, by the way, especially in Game one. How about you sign up for DraftKings Sportsbook, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. They'll cover it every step of the way. It takes in ninety seconds to download the thing. They got same game parlays live betting odds boosts. I like doing my parlays two and three team parlays. We've actually had a really good
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This is what happens if you look at most of the great players, Kobe and Duncan and Michael and you can go back in the history of time, any of them Lebron were great defensive players in their prime. Others Bird and Steph Curry weren't, but they worked at it. They were good team defenders, right like that, You cannot find an NBA champion with your best player as an awful defender, Like, I don't know if one exists. I mean,
Yannis defends. I mean, look at the Jokis, by the way, I think you know Jokic gets a bad rap, but his girth creates he you know, he bangs on a lot of people. He may not move his feet as well as you'd like. I don't think he's a bad defensive player.
I don't.
I think I think he's He's okay. But again, Gordon's excellent porter. Can defend, you can't. You're not gonna win a championship. By the way, Kyrie people say he's excellent defender, he doesn't look as great in this series.
Again, he's been bad in this series. Yeah.
So it's almost like in the NFL, we fall in love when quarterbacks run around, but eventually against better defenses and better defensive coordinators. You have to do most of your work in the pocket. Mahomes will run every Super Bowl fourth quarter because he can, but he understands it. But we fall in love with running quarterbacks because it's so damn exciting. I love Jared Goff. It's not exciting Lamar Jackson. I like watching him play. It's the same here.
We fall in love with offense because it does win in the regular season and it does win championships. But at some point you're going to face a roster that's going to expose you. And so whether it's running around as a quarterback or scoring these points ball usage, there's a price. Harden worn out Luca. I mean, let's be honest about Luca. BEYONDI he looks gassed, he looks tired, he looks you know. So I don't want to pick on him because he's obviously a gifted player. But this
is the difference. When Jokic lost that series of the Minnesota there was nothing to really pick on, right, Like you're like, well, they led by twenty, Like there's a reason we're picking on Luca. There's a reason we're tough on Tatum. And let's let's let's move to Tatum. I think to your point, I do think he's he This is a confidence thing, like he doesn't you know, he had a couple of big baskets late. But it is interesting.
It does create an interesting scenario is you're watching your teammate crush he's got a better matchup, right, and you're saying, and you're sitting there thinking, well, his matchup's better. It's kind of fun. I'm conserving energy. And the truth is we have huge leads. How often do they need me?
Now?
In the fourth to night he had a dunk at the rim, He had a couple of big shots, so they did need him and he delivered. But you can see, you know in these mismatches early Jason, he's sitting around. You know, these stars, Lebron does it. They can serve. They're like I can concern.
They haven't needed him.
They needed him in the fourth quarter a couple of big baskets and he delivered a night.
Yeah, we've talked about this before, but like I it really dawned on me about two thirds of the way through this season or I was thinking for all the flaws that Tatum has as a like tonight, it was kind of infuriating to watch him just repeatedly settle for that pull up three points shot, even though he literally hasn't been able to make it for like three years.
But it's like, he's kind of the perfect guy for this group because you need someone that's absolutely willing to feel out whether like he will not grab the reins unless everyone else is falling apart, right Like, if someone else has it going, he'll just keep going to that guy. And like, and so he's kind of in a weird way, like for this particular group, he's the type of superstar that kind of actually.
Does float all the boats higher.
He does kind of just seem to buy virtue of his willingness to kind of just disappear into different roles based on what that game needs. It's made it so that this team, because again my fear with Boston was will they be able to do this? Will they be able to play drive and kick basketball and trust each other and avoid the bad ISO threes and play defense the way they need to? And they have And I mean again, like I feel like everything comes back to,
like what conversation we're having. If we're having the conversation is Tatum one of the best, like two or three players in the world. Then yeah, it's like we got to be a little bit more nitpicky. That's why we're talking about Luca. You're wondering what you said. You don't want to pick on Luca. This is a pretty low bar that we're asking here, Like we're not saying you need to be all world. You just can't be like highlight real bad on the defensive end of the floor
like that. That's what we're talking about. And so again, within the context of where Tatum is in this league, I think he's done a beautiful job leading this team.
You can't roll through the playoffs like this. I mean they were twenty three and seven against the West. I think if you count the playoffs, forty four and eleven against the East, and they're just a hot knife through Marger and then the playoffs, you do have to have a conversation like have we sort of undervalued just how good they are? And I was thinking tonight when Horford had a big I think a defensive player or rebound late and I'm like, dude, he's like they're seventh, they're games.
I mean, it's like stop on Tyrie.
Yeah, it's like this team's got a lot of It reminds me a little bit when Andre Iguidala was the MVP and the Warriors. Finally, you're like, you're a pretty deep team. When you're bench guy. They aren't as electric or aesthetically pleasing as the Warriors, but I'm telling you they they have more good shooters than the Warriors. The Warriors just had the best shooter on the planet and the best catch and shoot. The Warriors probably had three
of the four better shooters if they match. But if you're going seven deep, I just don't think NBA teams, Jason, this is a younger league they're not equipped to beat. It's almost like the league got caught flat footed when they added Drew and Porzingis, and even without him tonight, you're like, it's just it's a young league. People don't have that many wing defenders, you know. And by the way, wing defenders has been for about three years. What the
league wants, well, nobody's trading when they get them. Nobody's giving them up. So it's like, there are excellent wing defenders in the league. Boston just happens to have like four, and they have seven shooters. So I do feel like the Celtics to some degree, kind of have caught the league flat footed by upgrading at the Marcus Smart position, upgrading at Porzingis, who didn't play, so Dallas scored low tonight. A couple of lobs returned. But we got to be
honest about this. It's a moment in time. The league can't defend this team. They're just when they're playing ball movement Celtic basketball like that second quarter. Nobody's stopping this team. Nobody.
Yeah, I think the this is probably the first NBA team I've ever seen that can credibly run a full rotation, like a literally a full eight man rotation, where every single player can dribble, shoot, and pass well everyone like it's it's It's truly a unique combination. And so to your point that I don't think NBA teams are jet prepared for.
That, They're not.
Now I've been I've I've been.
Thinking a lot about where I would rank Boston among other champions over the course of the last couple of days.
And it's complicated because I.
Do think this team appears more dominant than they actually are, in the sense that the bottom of the East was extraordinarily weak, so they racked up a ton of wins there to The Eastern Conference had five good teams, four of them ended up on the other side of the bracket, so they only had to play one of them, and that team was injured. Those teams all beat the heck out of each other. The Celtics had two easy first
round opponents. Also, I think you and I would both agree that Minnesota and Denver would have presented more issues to Boston more than doubt, Like Minnesota has the personnel to contain on the perimeter, which is like literally what you have to do to beat Boston. So I do think, like when I was thinking about it, like there are teams that are somewhat more limited in recent champions like that Warriors team with Steph. I didn't think that was
a great roster. I thought that was just Steph literally just like just hit the peak of his play there in that game for and obviously a deserving champion, But Steph was that team that was not a super talented team. The twenty twenty one Bucks that was the COVID year. A bunch of good teams and good players were out. But I think I think like I think Boston has a case to be better than that, like Denver Lakers Raptors tier that we have in the last last few years.
My one pushback on that would be those were awesome teams that also had the undisputed best player in the world on them at that time. Because in twenty nineteen Lebron was hurt. You could make the case Kawhi was that guy, right like Jokic last year probably still the best player in the world. Lebron in twenty twenty I thought was the best player in the world. So that's a one thing that complicates that discussion. That's it to your point in terms of the league being flat footed.
You gotta beat Boston to win the title, so you better have guys that can guard on the perimeter, and even your weak links better be able to at least do something within the scheme like funnel to the right spot,
like compete on the glass, get back in transition. And so I think that if there's something that Dallas has to learn from this, and Luca specifically, if you're going to like Boston's probably gonna be heavily favored to win the East again next year easily, and so that so that means if you're gonna encounter this team again, you better be ready for this challenge. And I think that's
gonna be something they're gonna have to look into again, Luca. Individually, all these teams, like teams like the Lakers that have like always they're always playing two or three bad perimeter defenders. That could be a nightmare if you ran into Boston
for whatever reason, team teams like Denver. Like Denver, even I would have been interested to see this matchup because of seeing Jokic garden space, seeing Jamal Murray garden space, seeing Michael Porter junior garden space, and so all of these teams I think are gonna be looking at it and like, we got to get more athletic on the perimeter.
Yeah, so let's talk a little Jerry West eighty six years old. By now, everybody has seen the stories. One of the things that really jumped out to me this week was how badly the Lakers have butchered their coaching search. And I thought they sort of butchered the death of Jerry West. They were very late on sending out something like four to five hours late. I had a discussion with somebody yesterday and they said you know, to preserve the Bus Jerry Buss legacy. Genie may want to consider selling.
She can't compete financially. It's not an elite front office, you know, the clipper's office, the executive suite has far more people, far richer owner going into a new arena. It's they're just not I look at the Lakers, very petty with Jerry West. Come on, he's the logo. And I never faulted them. When Phil Jackson and Jerry West, you know they you know, there's reports that's not who Jerry would have hired. They were never built to get along right. That was never going to work.
I get it.
But I thought between this coaching search, which has been embarrassing, I mean, when you go after a college coach and you can't bid more than Kentucky does. I mean, this is the California is the largest economy in the country. Los Angeles, I think is the biggest single city economy, maybe at San Francisco with Silicon Valley. But I thought that was embarrassing, and I thought they handled the Jerry
West thing poorly. And I will say this, I reached out to a couple of people today because it happened right before I went on the show, so I didn't get text during the show. But I mean what people really said was is that if you think of how long Jerry West was in basketball, it's like it's like eight to eighty six, Like you know, it's eight years old to eighty six.
In that.
All those the tough childhood, the brutal childhood, lost his brother, his dad verbally and physically abusive.
That kind of.
Isolates you, like you feel like you're on an island. You don't trust dad, and there's loss of life in the family. Jerry became a great friend and a great listener and a great ally to players, and I don't think that ever left him. I mean, I think to the very end, it's pretty remarkable when an eighty year old man is revered by twenty three year old men, that's really rare. I mean, it's one thing if you're like, you know, you landed on the moon, you're an astronaut.
You know, we all have these iconic figures, but for people in your industry to still like, hey, let's get Jerry West on the phone. And I think Jerry's rough childhood created this sort of metal and steel, you know, he said a lot of people say they're dogs. He goes, I was a wolf. I eight dogs. There's a toughness with Jerry, and I wouldn't want to go his past to get it, but I mean he he The word I got from two people today was like he was relentless.
If Jerry wanted something, you know that movie. Rick Buker said today he was called the logo and El Loco like he like they were both nicknamed. So but I guess going back to my point with the Lakers, I thought they were really petty on his death, right, Like you can beat petty in life. Don't be petty when somebody dies, Like tell your ex wife, your ex husband, if they pass, that's the day that you show some grace and class, right, even if you've had acrimony in a relationship.
Yeah, again, it's a low bar. It's a low bar. It's the day that he died. You're expecting more than that. I you know, obviously, obviously Jerry was one of the original psycho competitors, the guys that are just wired a certain way that obviously led to their success. I you know what fascinates me with him too, is he's just one of the most respected basketball minds that ever came into the league, and he's got his fingerprints on all
of these weird turning points in NBA history. For instance, he was basically the guy that put Kobe and Shack together. I don't know if you remember this, but he was the guy that stopped the Warriors from trading Klay Thompson for Kevin Love.
Oh no, he said he would resign.
Yeah, Like that.
Was a huge Like that was a huge turning point in the history of the NBA had they made that deal. Because I mean, as I think, Kevin Love is a little underrated in NBA history, but he wouldn't Clay, and Clay obviously was a natural fit with that team. Say what you want about the Clippers. Their failures have primarily had to do with health. But like I mean, if the Clippers ever could stay healthy and together with Kawhi at the top of his game, they would have just
been a better version of the Celtics team. And like he he's how rare is it too to see an older guy who's been around the league that long, who's that who's got that much of his finger on the pulse of where the game of basketball is heading? Because that's so unique because usually it's the older guys that are, you know, still running eye formation and it's still stubborn, and they're stubborn, Yeah, exactly, and he's he was the guy that was just kind of ahead of the curve
in all of those different ways. And like, that's what I'll always remember about Jerry West is if you're right in the short list of the guys that that were the basketball geniuses in the history of the league, He's just on the short list there.
Yeah, there there was a humility about him. You know, it's it's weird to say, but you can be really confident and simultaneously humble. You can't be arrogant and humble, but you could be confident in humble and he straddled that line where and again, his childhood probably had a lot to do with that. You know, you're very grateful when you kind of feel like you escape tough times, and you know, it's it's like when they you know,
I was a child of divorce. Not to bring it back to me, but when you're a child of divorce, it doesn't matter how much you make. You remember not being able to afford like cleats in high school and having to borrow with friends, like you remember having to wear like ripped shorts and pe glass because your mom and dad were divorced. Like, I don't care if you're seventy. That shit doesn't go away like that. Tom Brady to this day has a chip on his shoulder because he
went in the sixth round. You win in thirty Super Bowls, it just doesn't matter. So it's sometimes really bad parenting and bad situations create jet fuel and humility and gratefulness. And I think Jerry had all of those things. And yeah, well he won't have to watch the Celtics hoisted trophy. I guess they're Jerry. I know he didn't like that. Boston has had a great deal of success. The Red
Sox don't feel like they're in that stratosphere. But between New England and the Celtics, you know, I said this before the series. The Celtics were too good not to win one. They're too weird to win four. And this thing will eventually break up Porzingis's health, Derek Wide will get paid for by somebody. They're just too good not to win. And in this NBA, you know, I watched them tonight when they are moving the ball, like the second quarter.
I mean my notepad I was. I'm watching it with my daughter.
I'm like, this is insane, this is like, this is like I mean, this is like if you're in a gym and a bunch of college guys come in and start playing against non players and you're like, God, everybody's everybody's great.
Like, there was a.
Point You're like, this could be a forty point game. This is Dallas. The crowd just went quiet. I think Boston's too good, too good not to win a title.
Yeah, And we were on that over the last couple of years. They were gonna get one.
Yeah, this is group.
As soon as they made the poor Zincis draw Holiday t it just felt like inevitable that once in the next three years, Yeah, they were going to get Well, it's just a question of when and like and you know, I think I again, I think that. I think that it really came down to all season long. It was whether or not Boston was going to play to their
strengths when it mattered, and they did that. We were were we going to get the Jalen Brown that fell apart against Miami last year, or were we going to get the Jalen Brown that we know he's capable of being. He's been the Jalen Brown that we know he's capable of being. Like Drew Holliday, was he going to be a clunky fit or was he going to be a
natural fit. He's a natural fit by the way, watching Drew Holiday guard Kyrie Irving down the stretch of that game, just like there's so many highlights now in NBA Finals history from the last few years of just Drue just putting the clamps on people.
Hey, by the way, I thought of this. You know, you know, pigs get fed, hogs get slaughtered, don't get greedy. Is this a moment in time? In a weird way for Dallas, this is sort of a hey, be careful about Kyrie. You got to the finals. This was wonderful. But Jason he had like he's had eight bad playoff games like this, Like every third game it's bad, and it was atrocious defensively. If there's anything out of this series that you go, okay, it's you know, if Kyrie
comes out of this thing. You know, we've seen this with Andrew Wiggins contract here gets to the finals. It's the minute he got the bag he's never been the same player, Like this is a reminder. Kyrie's not good defensively. He can be streaky, He's very hot and cold. He can fall in those Boston games. In Boston he gets very iso, very quickly. Just you know, again, he got to the finals with him. As I was watching this, I thought there were times tonight I'm like, this isn't
the worst thing for Dallas. This isn't And now you'd say, well, porzingis Brunson, Kyrie can't.
Well, it doesn't.
He got to the finals.
Did you ever ever?
I mean, did you ever?
I don't know.
I'm the game tonight and I'm thinking, I'm trying to think of positives for Dallas, and my positive is, well, they're not going to sign Kyrie to a massive extension in a year, right.
Yeah.
I think I think that Kyrie has been a lot more good than bad in this postseason run. I also think he was pretty good tonight for the most part. Again, the defense hasn't been good enough, but that.
He scored a lot in the first half, Yeah, yeah, he did.
He was a big part of how they got that early lead. Yeah, But there's he had two absolute stinkers in Boston and there's just no way around it. And like the hard part too, is that it looked like the crowd got to him a little bit. My bigger fear with Dallas. And this is, by the way, this is not this is not just emotion speaking. This is just what NBA history has told us. There hasn't been a since since Katie left the Warriors, there hasn't been a team in the West that's even made it twice.
So like it's a different team every year. It's like, oh, here's the Lakers, here's Phoenix, you know. Oh here's Golden State. Oh here's Denver, Here's Dallas. Like next year Memphis has come, John Moran's coming back, Jared Jackson and Desmond Bayner getting better, They're gonna be right there in the mix with everybody. Oklahoma City wouldn't be surprised if they were the one seed again next year. Not to mention they have a trade to make. The Lakers are probably gonna do something
to go all in. Who knows what the Clippers are gonna do heading into their new arena. There's so many good teams in the Western Conference, And like you trick yourself into thinking like, oh, We're just gonna be there every year. Like I would be shocked if Dallas made it back to the finals next year, would you absolutely?
First of all, Denver is already favored, and Denver will make They'll make an addition. And Denver led by twenty in Game seven against Minnesota and matches up much better with Boston. Also with Boston, we have to be honest. Porzingis's health is a real issue. This is not a new thing like this is this is who he is. Also, it's different after you win. It is hard. You know, people take a little off season, you know, make a little longer off season. That's just the reality it is.
I mean Aalen Brown signed of Max played great, you know, it's he may not equal that. So Also I think the Knicks will get another player, and I think the Knicks can be physical enough. Could be a real pain in the ass for Boston in the playoffs the way they play, if they can stay healthy and be physical. So Philadelphia's got cap space, Milwaukee Dame Jannis probably both don't get hurt. And I think everybody in the West getting better. I mean, o case, he is interesting. They
they have enough draft capital, they're good. They could get great with the right edition, like like like that. So yeah, I think I think listen, I had Boston in six. It looks like Boston in four. But this this NBA, which is more international and more parody.
I'm here for it.
You know. I sat there tonight and I'm like, if Dallas comes back and wins, you got to be kidding me. Like, for for two and a half quarters, I'm like, God, Boston is this is this is warrior, like with Katie, this is a machine. And then they just got into this awful ISO like bad. I I'm talking like old Boston. I'm talking like twelve and or fourteen shots. You're like that fallaways Like like I'm like, missoula time out, get
a set play, what do we do? And then you know Tatum had a couple, Jalen Horford a big defensive play. But I mean, I think this turned out sort of how we thought. It's just been quicker.
Well it should have been more competitive, but we all knew this would happen. You're right, And like again, my all eyes for me are on Luca. I if he comes into camp next year and looks physically different, that'll tell me a lot about what he's learned about his game and what.
He needs to do.
If he's serious about getting to the promised line, I'll be excited to see that. All right, guys, that's all we have for tonight. This NBA Finals Game three Instant Reaction was brought to you by Chase Freedom Unlimited Unlimited one point five percent cash back is just the cash back. Three percent on dining including takeout, three percent at drug stores, five percent on Chase Travel, and one point five percent on everything else. How do you cash back? All right, everybody,
have a good night. We'll be back tomorrow morning to get a little bit further into this game.
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