All right.
The Madness of March continues tonight with more Sweet sixteen action. After four really good games last night, We're live today at Tim Dolly Infinity at forty five ninety four South Stage Street. We are giving away tickets to see Kevin Hart, who's coming to Salt Lake on.
April the eighteenth.
All you have to do is coming out like our guy Joe just did, and fill out a little inter to win form and put it in the inter to win box, and we're gonna draw a name prior to us getting out of here at about six o'clock Mountain time at forty five ninety four South Stage Street.
Our first guest on a Friday afternoon, our.
Guy Howard Beck from the Ringer Howard, Happy Friday, Sir.
How are you all right? Spence?
How are you?
I'm good man, I'm good.
So the NBA is wild this year because once upon a time it was like, hey, if you're an elite generational player, you won't get traded, and if you're a really good coach, you're probably not gonna get fired. Taylor Jenkins fired today after nearly six seasons with Memphis. Howard this week says one of those like we'll find out out more later on, But what's your reaction to the news, and if you have any information as to why they made this decision.
I'm all ears man.
Well, when Luca got traded, I said many times in the days and weeks that followed, there's gotten me more. We'll find out eventually, and we still don't know anymore. So we're just in very strange times in the NBA. But I like you, and trust me, you and I are not the only ones thinking this way. Anybody I've texted with this afternoon around the league, everybody was shocked to various degrees, and everybody kind of felt like there's
something else here. It can't be just basketball, because you don't fire the coach of a playoff bound team with nine games left in the regular season. Like if you didn't like where things were going with him, where you had a philosophical disagreement or whatever, you either fire him a month or two ago or a month or two from now. You don't do it nine before the playoffs. And so where's the urgency or the necessity of doing it on March twenty eighth, Like this just doesn't make
a lick of sense. And there's not much precedent for it, certainly in recent decades. I'm on a thread with some people where they were trying to find other examples of playoff bound teams firing their coach this late in the season, and you've got to go back decades. So it's very strange. It is. I would say, I don't mean to be
overly provocative here, but it is kind of suspicious. And among the other things that I immediately heard from people, you know again texting folks around the league, was he's going to get snapped up in a heartbeat this summer, you know wherever. I don't know where the next openings are going to be, but anybody looking for a coach this summer, Taylor Jenkins is going to be the top of their list because he's that good and he's got that great of a rep. So I don't know what's
going on. And if I had a knee intel, I would try to share it now, but I am in the dark as well.
Toomas I. Sallo is the interim coach. He was the lead assistant for coach Jenkins. Taylor Jenkins in Memphis. I don't know much about him other than what I've read any inside as to who this guy is who's now leading the Memphis program.
Nope, right, yeah, I mean this is this.
Is not somebody who like was at the on the tip of everybody's tongue or in the NBA circles. I don't think. I'm sure in coaching circles, like hardcore coaching circles, there's a familiarity. But no, I was not aware of him.
So I mean kind of reading around a little bit and digging into what Memphis has done as of late, because I you know, everybody likes to watch Memphis. They've got one of the most exciting players in the league when he's you know, not suspended or not heard in John Moran. They're zero to nine and their last nine against winning teams. The defense is kind of taken a
couple of steps backwards. I don't know, man, I'm just trying to make sense of this, Like, who do you think they are in the lands, Like as far as their peers and the teams around them. I don't think anybody believes they're winning the West this year, but I think they had shown enough that they could probably win around right, Like, so who are they now?
With the Western Conference?
It's a weird year in the West as it is, right. I mean, look, the Rockets are going to finish in the top two or three, and they're really young, and they're the team that other teams in the West were thinking like, I want to I want them in the first round, and then it was I want Memphis in the first round. The Grizzlies are certainly struggling of late, there's no question, but you know, per usual, they've had injury issues, and per usual, John Morant has been primary
among them. They also change up their offense this year, and it kind of de emphasized jaw to an extent. It became more kind of like it was a better, more dynamic offense overall, in the sense of it being less predictable and less just pick and roll dependent. But you know, one possibility here is that maybe maybe players and maybe front office word all the way that thrilled
with the changes to the offense. You know, Jared Jackson junior is having a breakout season, and they once again are having some really nice, uh you know, unexpected contributions from you know, uh, you know, guys like Jalen Wells, a rookie who has been you know, kind of in the fringes of the Rookie of the Year race and Scotty Pippen Jr. Has been around for years, but it's popped with them specifically, like they've done a really good job of building a roster and a program, and I
just this, this is such a weird signal to send up at this stage of the season.
All Right, Howard, I hate that we're about to do this, but we're about to do it, don't I don't, I know, man, But I've just here's here's what I'm going to say.
Okay, I've had more than a few people over the years.
You know, I'm basically twenty years doing this job in this market, and because we are an NBA market, and because my background is what it is, I cover the NBA, not just the Jazz. I covered the league. And I love the game. I've talked about this before. I think when the best athletes and players in the world care about their craft and show up and play hard, basketball
is a beautiful thing to watch. But I've had more than a few over the years compare it to WWE and say that its scripted and talk about conspiracies and Patrick Ewing and frozen envelope and all the things right, and I'm not a conspiracy theorist, not on or off air, not basketball or politics, because well, you know, let's not go there today.
However, when Lebron James goes on.
An ESPN talk show, namely the Pad McAfee Show to crack on an ESPN personality, and then five minutes after the ESPN personality is cracked on, he releases his YouTube video responding, and then he goes on his show and then takes a bunch of cheap shots and does get
personal while trying to say he's not getting personal. And then there's this media personality chiming in and that it feels like it WWE And there's nothing that I can say to combat the people that claim that this is now a total bleep show that is centered upon the worldwide leader that is one of the NBA's major media partners. And I don't know what to say about it. Man, Like you've been doing this a long long time. I don't want to do it either.
But here we are.
What do you make of this this clown show where we find ourselves in with Lebron and all of the subplots and characters surrounding.
Him, oh boy. I'm gonna keep this brief. I will just say one one. I don't quite buy the WWE aspect of it. I mean, there's a theatrical element to this that I understand why that might feel analogous to people, But that is a scripted sport. The NBA is not scripted, So I don't even want to go there because it conflates things, and then people think that any of this, this outside drama somehow reflects on the product itself, and these are these are separate things, and they're completely in
the hands of the people who are doing it. This is not Adam Silver trust me is not you know, suggesting or backing any of this. ESPN is not smart enough to create this on their own. This is a bunch of people. This This is a not a bunch of people. This is two people. This is really just two people. And why it's gone this far this long is beyond me. Unfortunately, there's an entire ecosystem around it of other media outlets and other networks who are all
feeding off of it and dissecting it. And I'm not going to contribute to it.
I don't care.
I don't either, but I will ask you why do you think Lebron Like Lebron James doesn't have to say anything to anybody about anything. He's ever accomplished, and he is this generation's that guy. I don't really get into the whole like who's the greatest of all time? But whatever, and his resume is.
Is unapproachable, it's unassailable.
He was put on a magazine cover at the age of seventeen and we all said to him, you're next, and he was Why does he wade into.
The crap with all these bad actors? That's my question to you.
I don't know. I don't know. I would just say that my good friend Bill Orm, who spent some time in your market, wrote a great piece for the He wrote a great column for The Oregonian that people should go check out porter book.
Bill Orm on the show next week. Will you good? Thanks pal?
All right, moving on, moving on, how about we talk Tanka Palooza twenty twenty five because that's where we find ourselves. I know you don't watch college basketball. I know you don't fill out a bracket, but let me ask you, based off of people you talk about, as to whether or not Cooper Flagg is going to be worth it? For fan bases like hours here in Salt Lake that simply continue to suffer.
I mean, by all accounts, he will be worth it, but I do think that there's some disagreement or just some I don't know, caution from some from some folks about the kind of player he'll be. Right like, I
think as you know, and I've watched some of him. Obviously, I have been pretty glib about the fact that I don't really watch college basketball, but I have a sense of what Cooper Flag is about, and from folks I talk to, it seems to me that he's going to be an incredibly valuable player who can do a lot
of different things for your team. I don't know if he is going to be like your prototypical like you know, Perennial MVP, top ten, top fifteen type player, Perennial all MBA, you know, scoring leader type, or or you know, is he going to put up you know, twenty five twenty five point triple doubles all the time? I don't know if you want to go that far. There's a lot that he can do for a team in terms of both scoring and playmaking. And you know, he's got size,
and he's got length. I don't know if he's absolutely positively a guy that you're building a playoff team around, Like is he a franchise savior type by himself or is he merely you know, a guy who's best is like you're, you know, a one bee type, right, which is not terrible by the way, Like I have referred constantly to, for instance, Kyrie Irving and Anthony Davis, who are now playing together as basically better as one bees. Right. Both of them want championships with Lebron, but they can't
really carry team on their own. So I don't know if Cooper Flag is going to be in that top top tier or the one B tier or the secondary tier. We never do know, by the way. You know, there's a few guys who have come into the league where everybody was certain from day one that they were going to be absolutely just franchise changing talents, and most years we think somebody is, and then you know there's something a little bit less. So I don't know. Scouts can't see the future, neither can I.
So I've been asking our guests this week the following question, and I want to be clear, I'm not leading the witness, but I am going to make you, Howard Beck, either Cooper Flag's father or his agents, somebody that is in his ear, And I'm going to ask you and prevent and present the following options. The New Orleans Pelicans, the
Utah Jazz, the Washington Wizards, and the Charlotte Hornets. Now, there are at least eight teams trying to lose intentionally right now, and maybe ten, but those are the four that have the best chance of landing the number one overall pick. If you were Cooper Flag's agent, if you were Cooper Flag's father, who are you hoping to see once that envelope has opened up in May? Charlotte, Washington, New Orleans or Utah?
Oh? Interesting, Definitely not Charlotte. Definitely not Charlotte. They're just that franchise has just had such a terrible run in recent and it's through different ownership groups and different front offices. But I just don't trust the Hornets and their trajectory. New Orleans is interesting because they've had a lot of talent, and I think they've actually done a really good job overall of putting together rosters, and they just can't stay healthy.
But I do think of those four teams New Orleans would be the most attractive by purely the fact that that they are stacked, They've got veterans, they've got and you know, Dian has actually been pretty good this season. Would I would like my son to go to a team where he doesn't have to be the savior on day one. I would like him to go somewhere that's ready to win, where he can, you know, get his sea legs in the NBA, figure out how to be a pro and and not have it all on him
from day one. And the problem with Utah and Washington is that they're both so far from competing now washing that has I guess in both situations. They both have assembled some decent veteran talent and they have not spun off everything. So there's some basis there. But the Pelicans should have been a playoff team this year if not for injuries, and so of those four, I think that's the place you can go and succeed the soonest with the least pressure on your shoulders. Does that make sense?
It does?
And you know, my case for the Jazz is simply the development history of the front office. And I do think Will it's a really bright young coach Now, after the Jazz got trounced by Memphis the other night, Will lost it on his players. He lost it in the postgame press conference, and I am curious as to because well as two years left on his deal. They were both options, and the Jazz picked both of them up. And I don't know the interesting storyline, and I guess
I'll say narrative, although I hate that term. Now it's kind of taking place out here, and I think I've talked to you about this. The Jazz are now propagating a message through some media outlets that they are not rebuilding yet because they've been tearing down for three.
Years, to which I roll my eyes mightily.
Okay, And so ultimately you land on Cooper Flag if you're if you're Cooper Flag, and if you're his reps, do you want him surrounded by Lowry Marketing is a really good player, Walker Kestler is a very young big
or uh you know. The other direction the Jazz claimed to be considering is Okay, now we have our cornerstone, Now we have our center piece, and the rebuild starts right now, and they just get rid of everybody, including market and including Kestler, and they start their quote unquote rebuild after their quote unquote teardown for three years.
If they land Cooper Flag coming up in.
The draft, it would be interesting because they really could go either direction. They could say Cooper Flag's a missing piece and we want marketing and Kessler here because we we you know, we've got veterans who again, like same case I was making for New Orleans, I think I would say this in almost every single case. I don't care how high the ceiling is on the superstar, the
projected superstar you're getting in the draft. Every single one of them, and I would even put you know, back in two thousand and three included in this and he didn't make the playoffs this first year, every single one of them is better off coming to a team that has other guys who can do some things at a high level, you know, not necessarily superstars themselves, but you don't want to join a naked roster and have to go through all the pain of you know, losing, and
of having it all on your shoulders and you're taking all the hits. So my guess is, you know, and I haven't talked anybody about this, but I my thought would be if the Jazz got Cooper Flag. It's not suddenly let's blow up the rest of the roster. They've got all these picks still that they can deal, They've got all these other ways that they can start adding immediately. And I would guess if you've got a player of his caliber, that's what you do. You started building up
around him. You're not. I don't think you're tearing down further.
I think if they don't get him, and if they don't like the draft physician they ended up in, and if the guy that they got is not somebody who's going to change their trajectory, that would be an argument to further tear down, as opposed to turning the corner trying to build, and as we've discussed before, unless you're about to be in a position where you can hit the gas and start winning again, I don't see why you're holding on a marketing anymore.
I agree, Howard. I didn't mean to make you grumpy.
I'm gonna let you go so you can go grab a flat white in Brooklyn, chill out, take some grass, and go find some more intelligent conversation on a Friday.
Will you.
Always a pleasure to Spence. We'll talk to you next week.
Man.
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