Well, well, well, the n b A dropped a new all star format format on us. Uh NBA Cup Action will have concluded, and we don't know what happened, but that's just uh, that's just our luck. That's how we how we do things around here. But by the time you hear this, you know more than we do. But we're gonna uh still talk about the NBA. We're gonna tap in with the latest Celtics and league news with NBA writer Noah Dalzo on today's episode.
I'm Jack O'Brien and I'm producing in for Miles and.
This is Miles Sometimes sorry gud luka.
Dog hitches okav driving.
Spinning number eighteen that's been stored the Celtics or NBA champions over the give us the show time. Yes, welcome Noah to Miles and Jack and sometimes you already got my boosties. How are you doing, I'm good, Thanks for having me. You are uh c LNS and Celtics blog reporter. You're the lead w n b A writer for SB Nation and the host of You Got Boston podcast, uh, which I'm told can be found on YouTube. Is that correct?
Yes, yeah, YouTube, Spotify, all the usuals.
You started covering the Celtics professionally last year, How I forget? How did they do it? Was it a good for them?
It was a good first year on the VITA. I have to say. Told me that it was not to get too not to get too comfortable. That's how the job is.
That's such a Boston thing to say, don't get too comfortable. Well it was. I was.
Actually it was everybody's first championship, so the entirebet. Nobody had been there for two thousand and eight. So yeah, I had all these questions about the parade and you know, the banner raising, but nobody actually knew, so we all kind of figured it out together.
I'm just picturing Bob Ryan running up to you in the locker room as champagne is being spread, being like, don't get too comfortable, you look too happy. That's cool. Our listeners know this. But I root for everyone except the Celtics. I root for the field, which gives me is like, yeah, exactly, I feel like that. I just anybody but the Celtics. I'm a not a huge Luca fan until last year's finals, at which time I'm like,
come on, man, you're my guy. Luke always have been but it does feel like there's an inevitability about them. They feel as locked in as a defending champ has. How's it looking from where you're sitting. Do you feel supremely confident and what's making it so or not?
Yeah?
I would say I never feel like any one team is the obvious they're going to win the championship. We may as well pack it up and call it. Even the Warriors, I think if you go back to you know, Game seven versus the Rockets, like they they everybody I think, and when you go back and you think about that Dynasties, like, obviously they were going to win those championships, but they came a couple, you know, a couple of shots may be away from actually not repeating as champions. So I
don't feel like there's an inevitability about this team. That being said, I will definitely pick them as my top choice, and just being around the Celtics every day, like there's a supreme level of confidence and trust in one another and what they're doing and the system in Missoula that I just don't that you have in most teams right now across the league, just because it's really really hard to have that level of continuity and to have that
level of you know, I mean, literally everybody came back from last season, so it's it's a pretty unusual situation.
Yeah. Yeah, what's very frustrating.
What's the feeling around porzingis because I saw that he lift Sunday's game, you know, with some right heel pain.
Yeah, so, great hater question, Jabari, by the way, great great hater question. No, No, he sounds so confident. Have you did you are you aware?
My well a couple you know. My follow up is, I mean Boston, maybe Boston may be the one team that they can sit back and let him just fully heal, Like they don't need to rust him back for any for anything, I think.
I mean, they could have him not play the whole season and they probably be the number one or two seeds in the East. To Still, the point is less about that to me, Like, I'm not worried about this heel injury. He'll be back whether he missed his two games or zero games or four games kind of irrelevant.
My concern is that he seems to really get hurt like every couple of games that he plays, and last year he actually had a pretty good stretch during the regular season that he was available to play and he really didn't miss much time, and then in the playoffs, obviously strained his calf, missed the entire playoffs, came back in the finals literally two games later, had a season ending injury that required you know, surgery in six months of rehab, and then comes back this year he's already
sprained ankle. Now he is this heel thing. So it just I'm more concerned about his ability to withstand an entire playoff run than this particular thing, which seems pretty negligible. It's just his build, is his style of play, you know, it's his length. It's just unnatural to be that size. You know, he's always the lower leg injuries with him. So I wonder can they go through another playoff run without him, because I did feel very confident last season
that they could. But you know, as a year older, other teams are better, other teams are potentially going to be healthier. Like that's the biggest concern.
I would say, don't look now, but the seventy six ers are eight and sixteen, and Joel MB's orbital fracture, I'm told might heal pretty quickly. So that's probably I know, that's something that's in the back of your mind as a Celtics person. You know what about the seventy six.
Ers, that was my number one concern going into the year seventy years.
I don't know how anybody could have foreseen it being this bad other than yeah, I don't know bad.
But all the Celtics people said when I picked seventies at Philadelphia is like, if you look at history, like, it literally never works out this way. So I just feel like every year it's gonna it has to be their year at some point. That's my perspective at least.
Yeah, it turns out it doesn't. It never has to be their year. I know. I always every time like, YESBN loves to do the like, well, historically this franchise has like, you know, a terrible record against this franchise, and I'm always like that means absolutely nothing, like none of these people were on the team for like half of those games at least, And then yeah, it does end up bearing out a lot of the time, which drives me crazy as a man of science.
And no, no, I feel guilty because every year I go into the year like messing with Jack but not even mess with. I'm saying, like, hey, you know what, this could be it. They've got to break that curse at some point, this could be it. And yeah, for each of the last three seasons at least, it's been it's been brutal.
Good news is I'd never get carried away with myself. I'm always pretty pretty certain that it's going to be doom as far as the eye can see. So something that I wasn't fully aware of until Jabari put it into the doc today is how much Peyton Pritchard has stepped up this year. Like I saw, I can't every time I would check in on the Celtics, I'd be like, man, they're playing Peyton Pritchard a lot, Like I feel like that has to be a bad sign for the Celtics.
Maybe.
No, it just turns out he's like gotten much better. He's putting up sixteen point five points a game right now and shooting forty three point five percent on almost three three attempts a night, which is wild. What do you see what has changed there?
Yeah, So I'm I'm a massive Peyton Pritchard fan. I think that he you know, he's he's actually been kind of ready for an increased role for a while, and he's just been behind a logjam of really talented guards on this team. There has not been a shortage of talented guards recent years. But he's just somebody that everybody, no matter who you ask, he'll tell you. He's an incredibly,
incredibly hard worker. He works on all aspects of his game, and he's always you know, I know that's like what a lot of NBA players get, but you can tell it's different when people are talking about his work ethic, and you know, he's if not the best three point shooter of the team, he's you know, the top two, top three. And this season he's been shooting lights out. I think he's like forty three percent from three on really high volume. You know, he's second in the league
on three pointers made this season. And so did I see this type of leap coming this season. I can't say that I did, But I've famously tweeted last year that I thought that he eventually had also our potential, and I think at the time it was kind of a wild take, and.
That is a wild last years.
Yeah, but I think just looking at his game, you know, honestly, he's the best ball handler on the team. He's a he's an excellent shooter, and he's really a three level score and that's when he started to see flashes of last season, and now you're seeing it in much higher samples. But and then also, this is a turnover ratio. There are a few guards last year that had as good of an Assistan turn over ratio as he did limited time,
but he performed in those minutes. And now you're seeing what happens when you give him the reins and a lot of these games, guys are out, guys are resting. He's been one of the primary scoring options and he's produced. So I think we're seeing an upward progression of you know, several years and probably another league will happen next season.
Yeah, I feel like so sup producer Jabari pointed out, like as recently as a couple of days ago, I think it was uh, he was plus six thousand to be most improved player. He is now plus four thousand, So I get I guess those odds are moving quickly,
but that still feels like really good value. I feel like the reason this is not a bigger, like more popular bet is just because people don't realize how many points he's putting up, Like I could not believe that he's putting up sixteen point five points a game like I would. I would, Guys, we don't offer We're not like big gambling people, but like I would hop on this if I lived in a place where I could
easily gamble. Like that's uh that that seems like a good bet because like that it's very unexpected just from like a narrative, just from like what he looks like perspective, It's not what you expect, So I'd hop on it.
Yeah, I think the one challenge with the most improved is that it typically goes to an All Star. I don't think he's going to be an All Star this season, but generally speaking, like he really has, Like this is
what the award should be. I think, not just somebody who's a first time All Star because they were a rookie who obviously wasn't gonna be an All Star and then in their second or third year they make that normal leap, like he's actually doing it, and like with the intention of the award is that other great candidates as well. He'll probably win sixthn OO of the Year.
I don't think we'll give them both so but generally speaking, yeah, I think he's made one of those leaps that I think he's probably getting some attention just because it's Boston. But uh, you know, if you haven't covered him or wa washed room night in a night night out, it might just look at a points thing. It's really more than that. It's the defense, it's the you know, ballpre sure, it's all those other things as well.
Yeah, I mean that's just to put it in perspective. The odds on favorite so far, like just in descending order, Jalen Williams, Tyler Herro, Jalen Johnson, Dyson Daniels, Franz Wagner, Franz Wagner, Norman Powell, Evan Mobley, R J. Barrett, Kate Cunningham, Jalen Suggs, Lamello Ball, and then Peyton Pritchard. So there's
a lot of people ahead of him. I'm just saying I feel like people should give that a look because I also think once people recognize what he's doing, it is going to have the same response that I just had, which is like Peyton Pritchard, he's that guy who like hits full court shots like he's you know, nobody's nobody except you. Noah is looking for this from him, So I feel like, yeah, I don't know, people should just
keep an eye on that one. Although yeah, it's a point well taken that he might be the sixth man.
But and also to you know, to do his point, you know, which is an excellent point. I would hope at some point that award starts, you know, going to players like this, you know what I mean, you know, players that have been ready for you know, like as you mentioned, been ready for a larger role, get that opportunity, show that, you know, show their improvement, show their all
around game. And this isn't a knock against anybody that has recently wonted, but you know, to a certain degree it's been high draft picks that maybe had you know, an injury their first year or maybe had a slow first year, but then certainly just made the what you would expect to be the natural progression. I would like to see the league find a way to start, you know, rewarding more of these type of guys.
The person directly after him in the odds is Victor Webbingell, which I don't see that happen. That seems that seems like a stretch. All right, let's uh, let's take a quick break so I can go find out why my son just broke into my studio. He just got home from school and pointed at his eye. So we're going to find out what happened to his eye, and then
we'll be back with more. We'll talk about the NBA Cup and some ideas they're trying out for the All Star Game and any ideas we think they should give a shot too as well. We'll be right back and we're back, by the way, the Celtics are plus two hundred, which means that they have the odds. They have thirty three percent odds of winning the championship, according to Vegas, which is pretty crazy for a team that won it last year.
And it is interesting, but it's like thirty three percent still means they're most likely not going to win, you know, so that's what I always.
Yeah, it doesn't feel like that to me personally. I mean I did this last year that like it. I was saying from pretty early on last year that it was like the Celtics versus the field, and I thought the Celtics had a better chance of winning than the field did. And I think the odds kind of reflected that. Last year maybe not, but certainly they were statistically unprecedentedly good and this season less so. But it also just feels like they're hanging back and then when they need
to they will be dominant. I guess I do. I also want to just ask, as somebody who's kind of watching all their games, who is the team that you feel like has given them the most trouble? Who do you think last.
Year it was definitely Denver, and Denver beat them both times, and I felt like with Jokisch, that's just, I mean, a nightmare matchup for anybody, But I didn't feel like they had a great answer for him. But hard to pick Denver now because they're just not seeming like the same formidable throughout they were last year. Nobody that they have faced so far have I thought like, Okay, this team, I actually would be concerned in a seven game series
because they haven't really gone out west yet. I think Oklahoma City is a team that's really impressed me. I'd be curious to see how they matched up. I'll be in Oklahoma City next month, so we'll see how that you know that looks. But outside of that, I mean, they've played like the Cavs a couple of times. I don't. I know, they've had a great season, but I don't really see them posing like a serious challenge in a
seven game series. Milwaukee. I don't feel that way about either, So I think it would be a Western Conference scene that they actually haven't faced so far this season.
Yeah, that makes sense, and that's great bulletin board material for the for the Calves, a lot of it. I mean, the Calves do continue to, you know, play really well, and they're still in first in the East, but it's close all right around the league. We got a new format for the twenty twenty five NBA All Star Game, and it's interesting, complicated, we got all right, So I'm just gonna run through this. It's like a mini tournament with four teams, three games, and the games are to forty.
So it's twenty four NBA All Star selections divided evenly into three eight player teams, and then there's a fourth team that is the Rising Stars Champion. So the red I don't know how is the Rising Stars being played is just the same way that it always is with the rookies versus the sophomores. I believe so, unless and then whoever wins that is, win that game then comes and plays as the fourth team in this tournament. There's three gms, now four gms. Barkley Jack, Kenny Smith and
Kandas Parker and Barkley, O'Neill and Kenny. The Jet draft their teams from a pool of twenty four NBA All Star selections. I do love that they're just like, these these guys are like the best thing that we have going in the league, so leaning into that. And then Kandas Parker is GM of the Rising Stars Champion. I feel like that kind of sucks. They should that's just
probably I don't know. I feel I feel like they should have figured out who got which team and like picked draft order live like that would have been more fun. And it feels weird that Kandas Parker gets just the Rising Stars Champion, Like doesn't that just feel like why not?
Yeah you get that?
Yeah? Why not just like make it a thing where you, like, you know, have have some way to determine like draft order, and you know what one of the picks could be, like, oh, I'm going to take the Rising Stars Champion, which nobody, you know, that would be the thing that goes to the last pick. But all right, two teams meet in one semi final game one, the remaining two teams meet in the other semifinal game two, and then the winning
teams from game one and game two. You're never going to guess this advance to phase each other in the championship, which is game three. The winner of each game is the first team to reach or surpass forty points, which is very interesting. We've been talking about this in the context of what was the game that where the last like thirty seconds lasted thirty minutes?
Was that?
I feel like that was Celtic's Cavs.
Right, I think so, a bunch of fouls at the enda.
Yeah, yeah, just like a long and people will say after that game, like we need to do there's like some acronym, right for the thing where with four minutes left, the team that's in the lead, you just like put eleven points more than they have as the winning scorer, and like, you guys play to that. So this idea of playing to a fixed number of points has been
in the air this season. I'm interested in it. My one experience with it in an NBA context was that All Star game where they did it, and it was a lot of fun. People played really hard, and they're just like, I don't know. I don't know if it was just that it was something different at that time or what it was, but people were laying so hard, So I think this is interesting for sure. I don't know, like if it's so interesting that like people are like, it's gonna get a number of a bunch of people
to like tune in. People are speculating that's what the hope is because viewership has been you know, between four point five and seven point five million over the past decade, and in the nineties and early offs it was you know, in the teens. But it's certainly like an interesting idea. I don't know, I'm all for it. What do you guys think? I think?
I don't know. I mean, first of all, it's really just about whether the players are going to be competitive. And the only player I heard commenting about it today was Kevin Durant, who said he hated it so it started again, you know it just if they're going to play hard, it'll be fun to watch. I think you go watch watch these Hall of Famers play pick up to no score, and it would be entertaining if they were playing one. I don't know if this format incentivizes that.
Maybe people will just tune in just because they're curious because it's something different, But that's not sustainable, right. You just want to foster a more competitive environment, and I'm not sure why this format would foster that. I'm not sure what the rationale is of why a torch tournament versus a game would you know, foster more competitiveness. But among the players, that's really what the question is, right.
I mean, we had Obama calling out Tyre's Halliburton about this, so everybody's on board that they want to see a more competitive All Star game. I think it's just I'm not sure that this incentivizes that as much as.
Some other ideas piggybacking on that. I think that's where it is. Specifically, it's the competition, and in a weird way, even though it's a little bit funky throwing the rising stars in there, I think that's going to jump start at least more competition than we've seen because the young guys are going to come out and try to play, and at least and try to prove and what happens if, for you know, for example, they actually win their first game.
If that, if that takes place, I think the championship game winds up being a competitive game as well. At the very least, I think it's an acknowledgement by the league that they had to try something. So while I don't think it's perfect or I don't know that it's perfect, and i'm I'm I'm interested to see how it turns out. I do get the idea. I get the idea of wanting to you know, you know, you know, heighten the you know, heighten the sense of competition in some way.
What are some other kind of ideas wrinkles that you guys think could could work, could be interesting to try out.
Well, I'll throw one out there for you, you know me, Because it's a it's a you know, it's an exhibition game, I say, go full ridiculous, bring bring in the rock and jocks, you know, let drop down a twenty foot basket at some point. I know they're not going to do that, but the one thing I will say is let me get a four point let me get a four point square or if you know, like maybe it's you know from the logo from something like that into
the mix, it's gimmicky. Some people would definitely say it's silly. But for me, because I don't take the game all that seriously to begin with, you know, I would be up for it just for the ridiculousness of it.
Yeah, maybe they should play on ice and on ice skates too.
So the w n b A has a four point shot in the All Star Game, and I think, you know, it's cool, they don't. They don't make or take a whole bunch of them. Actually they take, they take some, but I don't think they've made made a whole bunch in the All Star Game. But certainly something that people have talked about with the NBA, with you know, players range extending, like it would it could be a cool time to just try out different things that like I think it's called the MDAL finish or whatever.
Yeah, that's yeah.
But I think that's the same idea of like let's just workshop and things that maybe one day that day will want to adopt. But again, I think it's less about the gimmicks and it's more about getting player bying, and obviously they haven't been able to get that.
I don't know why.
I guess said I was just alarmed because I'm like, have a Duran has been really the face of or one of the faces of they All Star Game over the last decade, So why he wouldn't be in the room or engage like that's what That's why I guess what my concern was a little bit more. But I would love to just see there may be being some incentives for the actual for your actual team for the regular season. Like I've been thinking about this with the
NBA Cup as well. It seems like the only thing that players care about, you know, if we're coming from these competitive, you know, playoff teams, is they're seating and what's they're going to have, whether they'll have homecourt advantage and the playoffs, and so is there a way that if you're on the team that wins the All Star Game, then maybe you come back and it gives you half a spot up in the seating. I don't know, but I just think like the more gimmicky that it gets,
the less of Foster's competition. And so it's on one hand, it's like entertaining, but really what people want to see is just guys playing hard because that'll be entertaining up on its own. I don't really understand why they can't just play hard for one game. I really don't. I'm all about like player empowerment. I'm pro player everything. This is the one issue that I don't really understand. So
but I guess. I mean, they've asked nicely, and you know, it hasn't really happened, so it's obviously a bigger question than just asking.
I think they should have to like put up the you know how in uh Fast and Furious, they're like put up your papers, like the pink paper. They should just have to like play for their favorite car, you know, their favorite the pink slip of their favorite car, because that gets uh it'll never happen because it'd probably be illegal, but if it did, it would get like a per because then you don't everybody be like talking about the
players cars. You know, they'd be like, oh, like he did such a thick car.
Devin Booker Outstar Game MVP for the next six years then because he's like the one guy.
Car guy. Yeah. Yeah, Like I feel like that would be fun, Like you play for something of value and also like get to cover some aspect of some like weird little quirk of their personality. I want to see
them start messing with like alternate three point lines. I think that's that's an idea that, like I've always thought is in true if different stadiums had different three point lines based on just I don't know what they wanted to do when they when they built the court the way, the same way that like baseball has different shaped fields. You know, that's an idea that's been thrown out, especially now the three point shooting is like so bonkers.
The other one that probably wouldn't work is for the WNBA. They have their All Star Game is great, and they have you know, this past year they had the US Olympic team versus the world right versus the rest of the All Star field, and it's a much less globalized game,
so it is mostly the American players. But even just I'm thinking of a team with Donovan Mitchell and Jalen Brown and Jalen Brunson and all these guys that didn't make the Olympic team go up against Lastery's Olympic team like in some capacity, right, that would be fun, Like let's have some story that would be so fun than just planted assignments and Chack and Charles Barkley. I love
I love them. They're entertaining, but I think in a way it makes it adds to the gimmicky feel because it's like, you know, it's all for laughter, and yeah, this is true.
That's a good idea.
That's a great idea, especially like this year, with like everybody feeling like this was, you know, the last hurrah for the Olympic team. There was all the like, you know, questions about are they the world champions or is the NBA team the World champions.
I feel like hockey used to do this. I don't think they do it anymore, but I feel like that was that was the All Star setup for hockey years ago.
Like North America versus the World?
Is that something like that? But like, yeah, I'd absolutely be here for it because quite frankly, while yes, I mean it, you know, the NBA is an American game and we still have plenty of great American players. That matchup would be pretty good. You know, given the fact that you know, right off the bat, the top five guys that are in the MVP conversation, no disrespect to Jason Tatum, five of the top sixties guys that are in the MVP conversation probably are on the world on the world side.
So yeah, you could also in my rules where you could so you could play for your you can play for like a chain that is worth more than your car, or you could play for your Olympic gold medal like the and it would be your opponents. It would be your opponent's decision on like which of those you're playing for. Yeah, just rip your chain off your neck.
Let me get that all right.
In terms of the NBA Cup Championship, you know Janie and the Bucks, this has been kind of they've come on suddenly and looked really good, and it's kind of coincided with the Cup. I doubt that they were like, all right, guys, this is the NBA Cup, We've got to play for real now. I think they were trying the whole time, and they started to figure everything out and put it together around the time. Yeah, started to
get healthy around the time of the Cup. But you know, Yannis put up thirty two, fourteen and nine as they beat the Hawks to get to the finals, and then the Thunder pretty convincingly beat the Rockets one eleven to ninety six behind thirty two eight assis, five steals from Shay. So it's gonna be a good matchup that you guys have already watched. But I don't know, Okay, see, Like
it's interesting. So I understand why the Bucks are, like, you know, really focused and locked in right now because they had such a tough start to the season and everybody was doubting them right out of the gate. It's kind of cool to see, okay see locked in at this level for the NBA Cup though, you know, the n season tournament. It's I feel like they are not messing around. They're not messing around crew to quote the TNT version of heat. But what what do you expect
to see? And have you have you guys been enjoying the Cup?
Yeah, I would say I I actually think either you know, I can really see you going either way. I love Oklahoma City being in this. I loved how last year it was kind of a platform for a player like Tyre's Halberden and the Pacers to kind of ascend on the national stage. And you know, he was doing kind of a whole media tour. I hope, you know, the
Thunder are kind of getting that same boot. Bos and it's honestly more fun to see those kinds of up and coming teams that haven't had big playoff omens we have. We haven't seen this thundercore in a big you know, you know, really significant playoff moments. And I'd rather see them there than seeing Golden State there, as much as Golden State's fun to watch and certainly would be good for the ratings and everything. But yeah, I think, you know, the group the group stage, like the pool play games
were kind of tough to watch. I don't love the courts. I think that some of it is kind of gets lost, like people don't really does not that much hype around, like the Tuesday games.
And all that.
But I will say I felt like once you were in bracket play, like you could tell the players approach those games with a lot of intensity. They can say they care about it or they don't, but we know from watching them whether or not they're bought into something. And I did feel like all of those uh bracket play games actually were super competitive and really fun watches.
So in that sense, like the league got some really exciting games in November December that probably otherwise wouldn't have happened.
NBA Cup would be a good a good time to introduce some of the stuff we were talking, like try out the weird three point lines or I mean, they're already messing with weird courts, why not mess with a weird misshape three point line. I'm just saying.
And since we know the league, you know, listens to every episode, literally listens to every episode. Yeah, yeah, feel free, feel free. This this is our blessing to you.
Yeah. Just put your lawyers in touch with mine and we'll work it out. I won't too much money. Yeah, any points on that, Yeah, I got you points on the back end. All right, let's take one more break. We'll come back for the rapid fire round of questioning to close out. We'll be right back and we're back. And before we get to the rapid fire out of questioning, Noah, we do like to pick a game of the week. We didn't do it this past week because we didn't know what the matchups were going to be at the
time we recorded due to the NBA Cup. But we're trying to choose game for all of us to watch with our listeners this week and talk about next week. For some reason, the Celtics keep showing up on this list. But all right, So Friday we got Bucks at Calves that is on NBA TV, folks. Saturday we got a couple options. We've got Warriors at Wolves or Clippers at MAVs, and then Monday we got Celtics at Magic. Which of those do you think we should be checking for.
It's tough, you know, obviously I have a Celtics bias, but the Magic are missing their two best players.
Right now, so yeah, yeah, I guess we can't choose that one.
Pablo's back practicing, but he's not quite back in the line.
Yeah, I mean that Bucks at the Crows is kind of looking good to me. That's also an NBA TV game, so all our listeners could watch it.
That might be the one. Honestly, I do feel like the Bucks have their turnaround has been pretty fun to watch, and obviously the Calves are The Calves are really having a dominant season so far. I don't want to say it's going under the radar because everybody knows about their seventeen oh star, but I feel like it's a little bit going under the radar how dominant they've been, so yeah, an opportunity to check them out versus another good Eastern Conference team. Seems like a good game.
All right, that was a warm up and you got it right. So congratulations on answering that one correct. And now you are in the rapid fire round of questioning. You're in the hot seat. You're in the hot zone. This is just the fastest question answer segment in podcasting. Sports are Otherwise, we're gonna fire a question to you. We just want you to wrap rapid fire round it back to us. No thought. We are idiots. We might, we might accidentally distract you, but you can't. You got
to stay on focus. You got to stay on topic.
Yeah, it's and if we dolly deli, it's literally your responsibility to keep us on track.
So dilly and or dally, it's it's on you, all right, Uh, Brian the claw there we go. All right, thank you for in the editor. Okay, Jabar, you want to start, I will jump us off.
Okay, all right, Noah, give us your ultimate NBA JAM combination and you can mix old school with current if you want NBA jam.
Yeah, this is a generational thing. I just realized there was.
I already have some challenges here.
So there was a that was the right answer at the NBA Jam.
Yeah, you mean played basketball, No, white man shout out to white Mankanjo. Another old reference, Olden wats reference. But basically, there was an NBA video game that we all played growing up in the nineties, two on two. Two on two. They generally would pick the two best players on like on the roster, but for our game, you can pick past and prison players.
At the time, I believe the Celtics had d Brown and Dino Raja. Yes, it was, it was D Brown and it was It was not a It's not the glory days of the Celtics. So if you could pick any two on two team for your NBA Jam combination across the history of the.
Celtics, I'm just picking two players.
Two players that you that you would want in your two tournament.
Yeah, okay, I'm gonna go with Paul Pierce and Bill Russell.
A Paul Pierce and Bill Russell is a great That is answer. That is a great answer.
Wrong answer, thinking about like Bill just of a two and two game.
But I just you know what you're so something that you didn't consciously know but unconsciously anticipated, is that you can goaltend in NBA Jam. Yes, and it would make Bill Russell would be unstoppable, Like he would be the greatest NBA JAM player of all time as long as he had somebody who was good and could both dunk, which is an important part of it, and also shoot threes. And you. Yeah, so you've actually nailed that one. Unfortunately,
I was really rooting against you. Some of the stuff you've said about the Celtics has really, uh, I broke to my heart. But unfortunately you got that one right. But let's see what you do with this. This is a segment that Jabari added to the doc called We're Sorry for jack Son. We are for real. I believe it's supposed to be We're sorry for Jackson, we are
for real. Brian, Oh, that's Brian, Brian the edit. Anyways, just a couple of things that happened to my sixers this week that I just wanted for people who aren't paying attention. Joel Embiid broke his orbital bone again. And for context, there have been sixteen such fractures in fifteen thousand seasons of basketball played by players in the NBA. There's been sixteen total. Three of those have been Joel embiid. So this man just has a very breakable orbital bone.
So that was bad. And then soon after we learned that rookie Jared McCain has torn his meniscus and is out, and definitely I saw a fellow Sixers fan respond to that with the onion meme. Man who thought he'd lost all hope loses last additional bit of hope he didn't even know he still had. And that is exactly what
that news felt like to me. My question to you, Noah, somebody who pays attention to a winning team whose success sometimes feels inevitable, and you know, as somebody who roots for a team that has the opposite of that, is it tank in time? Is it tanky time for the seventy six or should they just be like ah, embead's orbital fracture worse than we thought and just go in
for Cooper flag? What do you think? I will add an additional detail that if their pick is anywhere outside of the top six, it goes to Oka se Sorry I just started crying there for a second, it goes to Oka sEH.
I say no, no to the tank because it is still early on. If I had information that Dwell and Beid is not going to be able to have a healthy season here. If the situation with his knee is worse than we know, then maybe you do. But at the end of the day, you have Paul George, Tires, Maxie, and Dwell Embiid all on the same team in a
really weak Eastern Conference. And as much as things have sucked so far, like Milwaukee looked terrible a month ago, and things look a lot better for them and this, I actually picked Philadelphia as the number one thread to Boston in the Eastern Conference, and I still think I still understand why I did. Obviously they've had a bad
shake at things. But if you don't want to tank when you have that much talent on your roster, especially with the ages that they have, like they're just paying too much money for guys like Paul George Well Embiid like to just wash the season this early on, I would say it's premature. And Jared McCain, I love Jared McCain. It sucks that this happened, but he wasn't initially going to be a major contributor this year, so I think he got to maybe make some tradesmen figure it out.
But I wouldn't. I wouldn't go in that just with the fan perspective, like it's just it's bad basketball karma to do it so often.
And maybe we're finding that out right now.
Yeah, if everyone can tell you, it would be them. Yeah, all right, one more for you. If we're in town for one night for a game and need to grab a bike, give us one spot they have to check out in the Boston area. Your entire reputation as a region is pending on this. On this choice.
I'm quite literally probably the worst person you could ask because I'm vegan. So I'm now like, okay, p one of like my vegan restaurants and give them a little bit of a platform. Okay, So I would say my Tie Cafe if you're if you're a curious person's close to ted Garden. It's where I go sometimes before it's really good Asian food. And then thinking something that's a little bit more mainstream.
Quiz nos okay, cool, And I've never I've.
Literally i've never paused before a question until you guys said it was rapid fire now only every time.
No, it's a power play, and I appreciate it.
It is.
No, it's it's not that it's it's you know, it's when they tell you that's the painting, and then you just feel like you have to. I mean, there's like a right next to the City Garden, there's like a food hall, so that.
Would be the food hall at the td gad all right, is there a legal seafood in there? Is there illegal seafood in there?
Right there?
But that would be my local ad for the food hall me as sean pen outside of the food hall? Is there a legal seafood in there? Very dark reference, very no, that's probably before your time. But anyways, Uh Noah, I'm just getting word from our judges that you got every one of those answers exactly right. So congratulations. It was wonderful having you on Miles of Jack and sometimes to got my boosties. Where can people find you? Follow you, read you all that good stuff?
Yeah, you can find me on Twitter x blu Sky all that just my name, no one else, el and then and all my writing is on Espnation, espimation dot com, and I have a podcast on YouTube Pologue by Boston. We also have a postgame show after every Celtic scheme on Seal on US Media. So pretty much. If you find me on Twitter, I spam everything else over there.
There you go, all right, Well, thank you so much for joining us. You can find me at Jack Underscore O Brian on Twitter and Jack ob One on Blue Sky. Miles is at Miles of Gray on Twitter and Blue Sky Jabari. Where can people find you on Twitter?
Jabori A. Davis and on Blue Sky where I hang out most of the time. Jabori Davis NBA.
And hashtag Matt Boosties for show links and updates, and be sure to join the conversation on our discord up which you can. You can also find the link for when you search hashtag Mat Boosties. And that's another one in the book. Wow, switch did it from way downtown. We did it. Did it? We did it. They said we couldn't do it, and we did it. That's right. Uh. We'll be back with special holiday year end episodes for the next couple of weeks and then back in the
new year. I hope everybody has a great, safe holiday and that all of your team's still undefeated. We'll talk to y'all all in twenty twenty five.
Bye bye,