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Minnesota Timberwolves: Trade Deadline, Season Overview, Playoff Chances? · The Rope A Dope Radio Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Minnesota basketball fans. Welcome back to the Living in Louserville Podcast.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: I'm your host, Chris Carlson. We are back for another season.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: I think it was twenty eighteen if I remember correctly,
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: maybe seventeen eighteen, maybe eighteen nineteen. We've been doing it
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: for a while now, and I say we. Aaron will
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: be joining the show from time to time, but life
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: just kind of got in the way and he's not
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: able to do it on a regular basis, So I
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: will be going solo for many of these episodes. I
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: may have some other folks in along with Aaron, So
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: if you're wondering, that's that. Just like we talked about
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: on our Life Last Vikings podcast, he will be doing
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: maybe every two weeks or something like that, he said,
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: from time to time doing the Purple People Leaders podcast stuff,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: off season stuff, draft stuff, free agency stuff, so you know,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: keep an eye on that on the uh Living in
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: Loserville spricker page and also on Spotify Purple People Leaders podcast. Anyway,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: and by the way, every year I kind of go
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: over this like the Living in Loserville dude, it is
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: what it is, man. We're not just some kind of
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: negative only negative podcast or something. It's just you know, shit,
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: it's it's you know, when's the last time that the
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Minnesota Timberwolves got to the finals? Did you remember that time?
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Because I don't, right, So it's just it's it's a
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: fun thing, okay, because we are living in Louisville right now. Hey,
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: it's a great place to live. I'm not I'm not
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: bitching about that anyway. Today's episode, first episode of the
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: year after the Viking season. This season is done, it'll
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: be you know, we'll catch up on last night's game,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: right which was very very yet last two games have
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: been great. We'll just kind of give a season overview.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: I keep saying we it's just going to be me tonight,
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: so bear with me. I'm not used to it, so
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: it'd be kind of a season overview around the halfway point. Obviously,
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: the trade deadline is staring right at us, so of
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: course we gotta trade, we gotta talk trade talk, but
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: it's not just deadline. And obviously Julius Randall is going
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: to be the topic there, whether we trade them in
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: a handful of days, whether we trade them draft night
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: or post you know, or maybe sometime in the summer
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: if he opts in or whatever. So we'll talk a
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: little bit about that and just just talk about the
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: team as a whole. You know, how it started when
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: the trade kind of shocked all of us. As far
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: as the timing right before camp open, training camp open,
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: that obviously wasn't the most ideal timing, right, and I'm
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: sure it had to do with the Knicks adding Evincenzo
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: to the deal or something like that where it's like, oh, okay,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: now we can really talk, you know, that type of thing.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: So it wasn't by design to have random not you know,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: be able to really do much for a week or whatever,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: because it took like a week to finalize the damn deal,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: and a lot of that is the second apron stuff
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: where you just gotta add another team to do this
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: and that and you know all that good stuff. So yeah,
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: we'll talk about that, We'll talk about where we're at.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: We'll talk about individual players, what kind of season they're having,
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: whether it started out pretty poor, Rudy McDaniels calmly, and
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: some of the improvements they've made. They obviously made a
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: tweak to the starting lineup, which a lot of people
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: were calling for. It wasn't necessarily the exact person in
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: and out of the lineup. Obviously, most people you know,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: wanted not and I mean in the media, fans, whatever,
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: most people wanted Nas in for for Randall. But it
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: was Donze DiVincenzo in for Commley. And you know that
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: makes sense on a variety of levels. Conley is the
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: type of guy that can see the positive in it.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: And he even said, you know, hey, man, if I'm
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: sitting there running from corner to corner and I'm not
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: really doing much point guarding, then why don't I help
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: the second unit and where we blend the second unit
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: in the first unit together and and help organize that
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: and get back to doing well more point guarding. Right.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: And then a guy who can knock down the three,
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: who can move a lot, who can get his buckets
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: in a lot of different ways. His pace the pace
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: that de Vincenzo says, and defensively, the guy can hustle anything.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: He's you know, any kind of shortcoming physically or whatever,
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: he makes up for it. The guy moves his feet,
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: he's he hustles, you know. So unfortunately, you know, we
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: we only got what six games of that or something
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: like that small sample size. It looked damn good. But
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: it's still you know, he got hurt, and that is
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: our first I would say key injury, major injury or whatever,
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: because we've been lucky. Knock on wood, we've been we've
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: been lucky in that department, and we actually kind of
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: got lucky based off what we thought about the injury
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: or what was reported about the injury and now him
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: not you know, apparently having to have surgery. So it
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: does appear that he will return this year and it
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: won't be any kind of three or four or five
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: month thing. So that is good news and you know,
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: maybe a blessed seeing in disguise, all of this is
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: other people having to step up, people having to contribute
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: in different ways that we're already in the lineup, some
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: people like you know, Dillingham getting more minutes and whatnot.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: So and then you know, like I said, recap recent
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: action and then also preview some action coming up. Obviously
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: we're on a back to back, so they do have
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: a game in Utah. If they win, they will be
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: in a position in the standings that you don't want
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: to get too excited about. But I also think that
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: some folks in the media didn't even think we were
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: capable of getting this far, and we'll see, you know,
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: we'll see. So yeah, we're gonna just kind of talk
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: it all the way through. We're gonna talk playoffs and
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: seating though, we'll talk a little bit about the standings
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: and just the realistic what to think of whether we
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: make the train or not. What is realistic as far
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: as to finish this season, so what we'll see. Anyway,
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: if this is your first time listening to the timberwel
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: Slash Gophers who have improved of late. Now, whether that's
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: enough improvement to keep Ben Johnson here, that'll be decided
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: at the end of the regular season. But hey, you know,
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: hopefully we can at least make the Big Ten tournament,
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: because for a second there it felt like this we
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: might not even make that. But if this is your
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: first time listening to The Living and Lose a real podcast, welcome.
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: It streams live. Actually it doesn't stream live at blogtock.
• 7:42
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• 7:46
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• 7:50
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• 7:54
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• 7:58
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• 8:02
  Speaker 1: the near future. So yeah, just google it. While you're
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: at it, head on over to the gruelingtoot dot com
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: and Sports News twenty four and one more thing from
• 8:11
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• 8:55
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• 8:57
  Speaker 1: at the Entertainment Package eighty six ninety nine per month.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: The Choice Package does include Fan Duel, which is a big,
• 9:05
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• 9:13
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• 9:18
  Speaker 1: per month. Okay, before we get into the big picture,
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: let's start last night. You know, the Suns were playing
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: pretty damn good there. You know, they got the lead
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: to probably around eleven, maybe somewhere in there. I don't
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: know if it went above that, I don't think, so
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: let me actually look at it. I don't think it
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: went above that, but slowly but surely down the stretch,
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: maybe midway through that second quarter, the kind of chop
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: down the tree, they meaning the timberwolves chop down that tree,
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: and you know, I thought, hey, this is this is
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: a really good quarter. You know, it's now we're only
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: down by four. You know, we're looking pretty good here.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: You know. They did jump out and get it back
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: to ten fairly quickly. In fact, I'm looking at it
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: right now. I think they got it to Did they
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: get it to twelve or ten? Something like that. They
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: extended the lead, but it didn't last long, and then
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: pretty much that whole quarter was just grinded out back
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: and forth, you know, hoops. It was fun to watch.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: But the Timbrels did overtake the lead and they started
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: playing really really well on both sides of the ball,
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: and man like that defense. That's somewhere probably December, you
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: could see it. Maybe I think there was a stat
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: and analytic a stat out there that sends Thanksgiving type
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: thing where the defense roof last night was another example
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: of physsessions where you're like, dude, it just so happened.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: It came against Phoenix, but you're just looking at it
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: and wherever the ball moves, someone's filling the gap. Someone's there,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: someone you know, and it just it's a thing of beauty.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: Remember that. I think it was in a I don't
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: know what quarter. I want to say the fourth quarter,
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: deep in the fourth quarter actually in that Sun's close
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: out game last year in the playoffs, where the rotation
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: on defense was just like defense one on one defense,
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: rotation one on one, you know, and it was just
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: like that dude went, that dude went, you know, and
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: it went went, and I think it was a cross
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: court from left to right past that McDaniels ended up stealing.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: And then I think that's the play where Ant brought
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: it up and dunked because they they left you know,
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: they left the rim open. Not that they have a
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: lot of deterrent at the rim last year, but it
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: was just a thing of beauty to see that defense,
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: and that's something we have seen. I think that if
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: you're gonna see some improvement that the tim Wolves have made.
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: It started with defense. Now the offense is coming around,
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: but the offense was bumping. I mean, eight minutes left
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: to go in the game, Alexander Roker, who had a
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: great game, I think he was five to ten from three,
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: extended it to ten points. I mean we got to
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: the point where he got it up to like fourteen points. Now.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: It was kind of back and forth down the stretch,
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: even what one O six ninety four after a Bradley
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: bill three with like four minutes left. They did tighten
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: it up enough, but never to the point. It was
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: kind of surprising because I'm looking at it. I'm looking
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: at Julius Ramble two forty five, Landol not Ramble. Maybe
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: I'm rambling two forty five Mark. We're up one twelve
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: to ninety seven and one fourteen to one hundred, so
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: we're up by fourteen with two fourteen left, and I
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: guess you could say it got a little funky all
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: things considered, But I never felt like, oh shit, are
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: we gonna lose this game? You know, So you know,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: five games over five, twenty six and twenty one. Like
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: I said, we're a little past a little past the
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: halfway mark. But basically that Randall had twenty eight points,
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: got to the free throw line ten times, hit eight
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: of them, three steals six of this had a really
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: good game. McDaniel was very solid defensively, he was doing
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: his thing. He had to, Uh, he had to. I
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: believe that. I don't know when, but they they definitely,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: you know, switched them to Durrant Edwards thirty three points,
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: four blocks. Did have seven turnovers though, but got to
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: nine times and really got his game going. Like I said,
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: you know, Dillingham had a nice spurt, did get eight
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: points and three assists off the bench. But twenty three
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: points eight to fourteen five ten from Alexander Walker. Man,
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: I love that, dude, I just love I just think
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: you need him on the team. And that'll be interesting
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: to see when we talk about trade deadline. If you
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: don't think you're going to resign him, which I hope
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: they do, then you you probably need to trade him. Unfortunately,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: And wouldn't that be shocking if that was the true
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: Not shocking, but if that was the trade that that
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: went down, But I doubt it just because he produced,
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: He's more of a guy you'd throw in a trade
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: because he's a bang for the current buck, Like he's
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: gonna make way more money. And I'm not saying he's
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: someone's gonna pay him twenty five million, you know a
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: year or something like that. But he's gonna make more money,
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: that's for sure. So so you know, it was a
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: struggle to get what was that stat There was a
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: stat of being three or four games I think it
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: was four games over five hundred and now you know,
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: I think it was sixty something or seventy something games
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: where we were I think it was seventy four games.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: Last year they were at least four games over five hundred.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: And obviously they had that great start, went on that
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: long winning streak. But you know, in recent time, before
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: we get into the overview of the whole season, you know,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: four in a row Dallas, Denver, Atlanta, Phoenix before that,
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: really close games against Memphis and Cleveland and a loss
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: beat the Knicks. But you know, they didn't have cap
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: right there with Golden State, and really both Memphis games
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: were winnable. You know, so things do tend to be
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: they look like they're trending upwards. Obviously, you know, in
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: that New York game, Nas went off six for six
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: from three and went off as well thirty six points,
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: thirteen boards, seven assists. He did have a fair amount
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: of turnovers, but that was great, you know, the Dallas game.
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: You know, there's really no excuses in these games. You
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: gotta win it, you know, And it was an ugly
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: finish if you really look at it, how much we
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: were up and how they almost shrunk the damn game.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: We had a really slow start down twenty one to
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: seventeen in the first quarter in that Dallas game, second
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: quarter thirty eight in thirty one. You know, like I said,
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: had a nice lead, but almost gave it up. And
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: when there's no Luca and no Lively, it's a killed
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: on us too. All five starters were in double figures,
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: commonly hit some free throws late. He had eighteen points,
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: eight assists, the free throws overall thirty four, thirty to
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: thirty four, just eight turnovers. McDaniels, great game, twenty seven points,
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: eight boards for steals. And that's someone who's really improved
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: this last chunk of time here. And but you know,
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: you can also look at certain games, you know, like
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: I said, the Memphis and Cleveland game, we failed to
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: close out those games. No, maybe you're not gonna close
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: both of them up, but one of them. The fourth
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: quarter versus Memphis thirty seven to thirty, we were up.
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: You know, nine points is not a death sentence. It
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: was seven minutes left. Obviously you're not you don't have
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: it in the bag. But you see Ant forcing threes,
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: Nas late turnovers. Now, Aunt did get to the line
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: eighteen times. He was thirteen to eighteen. Nas went off
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: again in that game five to ten from three. Dillingham
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: had like fifteen points. So at thirty two points and
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: eighteen free throws is awesome, but thirteen to eighteen is
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: not gonna get done. And like I said, he was
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: just forcing stuff the third quarter against Cleveland twenty nine
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: to nineteen, Mitchell and Garland just going off on us,
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: you know. So I don't know, you know, it's it's
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: it's been a bad kind of back and forth, even
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: the Atlanta game, which you know they don't have their guy,
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: and that it wasn't just that, you know, there was
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: I I wrote a little note that damn horn from
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: the speaker falling on the court. Holy shit, dude, did
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: everybody see that? That was crazy? I don't know, like
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: at half, you're up big, closed on like a twenty
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: twenty to eight run, sixty to forty three. Aunt struggling
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: a little bit. He did have eleven points at half,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: but one of six and three. Rudy somewhat recently in
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: this game against Atlanta, was fairly active again in this game, passing,
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: finishing McDaniels. At that time, I think it was the
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: seventh or eighth straight double digit scoring in a row.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: And you know, at the end of the third though
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: it was eighty seventy four. Atlanta did you know, did
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: make a run, but they were able to close it out.
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: Ran to hit a three in the fourth quarter and
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: an offensive rebound and one. Speaking of offensive rebounds, we're
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: not getting them and we're giving them up. It feels
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: like the year before Rudy a came remember that in
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: that in that Memphis series. Oh man, that was killing me.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: That was killing the Denver game though, man, Rudy very
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: active early in that game, seven points, like three or
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: four assists. Jokic was getting his end two but forty
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: to thirty one, you know that that was crazy. Ant
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: found Rudy with a great pass dealing him had like
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: ten points in the first half. I'm not going to
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: say defensively we were just phenomenal that game, but our
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: offense was just humming, little sloppy down the stretch of
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: the second quarter. But seventy one points at half, most
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: that we had all year, twenty one assists. Randall had
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: like fourteen points. Points in the paint was forty six
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: to thirty six. Jokic, you know, jokicch and Murray were
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: doing their thing. But third quarter, you know, Rudy had
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: a bob dunk and a push floater or whatever the
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: hell you want to call it. Ant was spreading the
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: ball nicely. The ball just in general was moving around. Decisive,
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: people were being decisive pretty much everyone was. And h
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: And had another great game. And so, like I said, overall,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: there has been you know, fair amount of positivity, no doubt.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: But you know even that the way you know both
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: Memphis is game, just just finish one of those games,
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: you know that That's what I'd probably asked for, you know,
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: and with a couple of seconds left, you know, air
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: ball and missed the freak though when he was followed
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: late in the game. You know, just just random stuff
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: like that, not random, just just silly stuff. Really. I
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: mean that that's what it comes down to. So you know, overall,
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: though you can see that they haven't improved, Like I said,
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: four in a row, they lost those back to but
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: you know, if you back it up to say the
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: Washington win, you know that that's a good stretch there.
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: You got six and three. If you back it up
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: after that other Memphis loss, you have three in a row.
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: But if you keep backing it up as three in
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: a row loss, So it's about consistency obviously. That is
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: something that has taken a while to you know, to
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: find itself, which you know it is. It is kind
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: of it makes sense being that we made such a
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: big trade there. We are the Timberol seventh seed as
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: of right now, twenty six and twenty one, eleven and
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: a half games out of five hundred or out of
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: five hundred Jesus out of first place. That I'm not
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: even thinking about first place obviously, I think realistically, you know,
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: looking at around fourth place and a maybe third place whatever.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: But it's not crazy that Memphis game, we split one
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: with them. We're a little bit close sort of them.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: You know, they're six and a half games away sitting
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: at third place Denver fourth twenty eight nineteen, they're nine
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: and a half games. We're only two games behind them,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: you know, that type of thing. So even the Lakers,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: you know, twenty six and nineteen, we're only a game back.
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: One of the things that stand out to me is
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: twelve and ten at home in fourteen and eleven on
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: the road. What kind of shit is that? You know,
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: I'm not not a big fan of that. That that's
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: pretty funky. I think that's really horrendous if we're being honest. Yeah,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: I mean it's just even that Atlanta game, I don't
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: think I finished it out. I mean, Randall had a turnover,
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: missed the jumper that was pretty close, struggling on offense
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: and draws a fall. But you know, Atlanta was in
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: the penalty, but he missed the break though, just struggling
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: on offense, keeping in Atlanta within reach. A very ugly Yeah,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: you got the win, but it was ugly. I mean
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: it was really really ugly. And I'm glad that Finch,
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: you know, let him have it because they deserved it,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: you know. And even you know, in this last game,
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: after Aunt was talking about how because in this you know,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: last night's game, Finch got thrown out of the game.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: Someone was saying was that that was his first time
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: getting up thrown out of the game. I thought he
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: got thrown out of a game before. It's the first
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: this season. I think maybe I'm wrong, Maybe that was
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: his first first time ever getting thrown out of a game.
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: But you know, just they a couple of them said
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: he chose violence. He woke up today and show's violence.
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: He I guess he showed him like extended clips of
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: them just being am I on. Okay, I don't know
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: how long that was out. I'm not sure what happened there. God,
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: I hope it wasn't out for long. Maybe maybe it
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: just froze and nothing happened. I really don't know. Shoot, man,
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: I wonder how long that was out, And like I said,
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: unless something just froze. But it didn't seem like I
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: was like the mic was on. So I hope that
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: didn't ruin this episode. Oh boy, I don't know. I
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: don't know what to tell you. Hopefully there's not a
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: big gap in there. Shit, I have no way of
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: knowing right now. Anyway, where was I Oh, just the
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: sloppiness of that Atlantic game down the stretch, and it
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: does sound where was I. I got a little nervous there.
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: I couldn't see the audio working, So where was I? Oh, yeah, Finch.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: So it sounds like based off what Aunt was saying
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: that he showed them a bunch of clips of them
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: being lackadaisical on the court, especially defensively, and he questioned,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: which I love this? He questioned their love of the game.
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: How can you say you love the game when we
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: show you these clips and if your aunt's you know,
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: thoughts on that. This is exactly why I love the kid,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: because he's like, there's nothing you could really say part
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: of me. As a young adult. You want to say
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: something back. You think maybe he's trying to test you,
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: or he's you know, doing it for the wrong reasons
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: or whatever. But he's like, it wasn't that case at all.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: Like I'm glad I didn't saying back to him, because
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: what could I say when he you know, you can
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: say it all you want when you show the play.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: You know, the players lackadaisical on defense and an off
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: ball offense and defense sometimes and could just be really bad.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: I mean, not all that long ago. Remember when Aunt
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: would join us on offense, you know, like, hey, you're
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: gonna join us on offense and you see the screen
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: and Ant still hasn't gotten on the offensive side of
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: the ball. You know, there are times where Ant, like
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: I said, is demeanor is just lackadaisical, like he's tired.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: But maybe it's mentally, maybe it's physically, maybe it's both.
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: I don't know, but there's times where if you're a
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: big guard box somebody out, don't just stand there, you know,
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: defensively when it's one on one in ISO, even with Randall, Right,
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: if you look at the top two players or whatever,
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: one and two, and I'm sure people would say, well,
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: he's not the second best player, Randall whatever. But I'm
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: just saying, if you look at one on one he
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: at times Randall could do really good. It's the other
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: parts when you're on a partial break or it's three
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: on three and you just you just don't see that
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: that's your guy, or even if it wasn't your guy,
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: you got to make up for somebody then and you're
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: just like, he'll just get lost. And same with Ant.
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: Sometimes maneuvering screens is an issue on defense, you know.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: So but I am glad that they did that and
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: hopefully they respond from that, because there are times where
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: you're just like, dude, and this is the thing, this
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: isn't like to pick on ant all day long. For
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: his age. He's a great player, right, and let's hope
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: that the basketball IQ on both sides of the ball
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: in the want to keeps improving. Right. We can only
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: ask him so much to be a playmaker if you're
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: just not, if it's not something you've done a whole
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: lot of throughout your career, you know, will and ever
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: be seven and a half eight eight and a half assist?
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: I don't know. There are times on offense and this
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: kind of gets in the overview of everyone of the
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: team and player by player or whatever or some of
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: some of them. I'm not going to break down the
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: fifteenth guy in the bench or whatever, But I don't know.
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: There's just times where it's like he wants to be
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: James Harden, but he's nowhere near James Harden in the
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: ISO scenario. You know, he just isn't. And you can
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: not want your team to play that way the way
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: Harden played and all that. I get it, I get it,
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: but go look at his assist numbers. You know what
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: I mean. And then it's just night and day when
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: it comes to being a playmaker, So we can't ask
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: him to be a playmaker night in and night out,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: and just getting off the ball early cutting. I remember
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: talking about this summer. He was talking to Curry saying, man,
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: how do you get so many shots off where you're
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: open or like just being able to get your shot off,
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: And he's like moving, you know, And you can say it,
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: you can say, oh, moving, I gotta move, I gotta
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: do this, but it's hard to do it if you don't,
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: if you haven't been doing it. It is actually taxing
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: mentally and physically. And and there's times where when he
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: knows exactly what he wants to do, want to play,
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: and he's decisive, much like Randall, you know, and when
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: he's figured out what the team's trying to do to him.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: And now people are now teams are doing very similar things.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: They're just it seems like they're doing a few things
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: and they keep they'll mix it up on them, so
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: that he's having problems with that, you know. There there
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: was that report that he asked Michael Jordan how to
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: deal with all the coverage he's getting So I'm not
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: saying it's easy, right, but there's just times where he
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: just has to be more decisive man and to get
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: the ball, get easier buckets. And that goes for a
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: lot of players too. I'm just individually talking about. But
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: before we talk about we use scoring, and we use
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: the three point record for the team and all that.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: If we're gonna use scoring, in say, Ant's better better
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: than Kevin Garnett just based off scoring, which is if
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: if if if Kevin shot more, he would score more,
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: but we wouldn't have won as many games with him.
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: So my point is, it's like, don't start having an
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: aunt go above KG as a basketball player until he
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: fixed it. How many times do you see KG look
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: like a day's go on a court? Now? If you
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: if you're a team, if the terminals are on offense
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: and Garnet's missing from the frame of the television pitcher, right,
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: it's like he'd probably be in a fight or something
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: like that, you know what I mean. So I think,
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: and I'm not trying to do the get off my lawn.
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: I'm I'm old, and I'm old school and way back
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: in my day and all that shit. It's just common
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: shit though, And I do think this kind of video
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: game microwave society, we you know, everyone wants to fire
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: this person or anoint somebody. The guy's a great young
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: player man, and in the playoffs he steps it up
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: even more. He just has to bring it every night,
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: whether he's shooting bad or not, he just has to
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: bring it every night. That's my biggest critique from him.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: But the thing about what I'd like about Ann is
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: sometimes he'll say something to the media. Every year he
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: said a couple of things where you're like, really, dude,
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: that sounds like an excuse. You know, there's reasons and excuses.
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: Now sometimes it's sometimes it can be right in between that,
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: but there's generally excuses or reasons for stuff right. And
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: sometimes he'll say something like, for instance, this year, right
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: when he said I don't want to play that way,
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: I don't really want to play that way. But he'll
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: also follow it up and say, you know, that was bullshit,
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: you know, And just like this last little bit, you know,
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: with Finn showing them all the lack of days ago
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: stuff that he don't love the game, and how you
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: to tell me you love the game when I'm showing
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: you these clips to you, you know, and yeah, I'm
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: sure when they're watching film. You know, back in the day,
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: they used to watch game film like like us watching
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: it at TV, you know, like that that's that's what
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: they had to work off of. And now it's just
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: clipped up. And it's been this way for a while.
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: But you know, it's clipped up, and it's either things
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: you got to work on, things we did last time
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: during a team game plan and all that the negative, positive, whatever,
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: And but they're not watching like the full games, say
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: as a team usually anyway, right, maybe players are whatever.
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: And I do think, you know, he works extremely hard
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: in the off season now the last few years, even
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: Durant said, when I saw him working three days in
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: it or three times in a day and doing something,
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: he's got work ethic. But I do think that watching film,
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: you know, is gonna need to be it's gonna need
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: to to increase, I would have say, But just in general,
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: what I love about the kid is he'll turn right
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: around and be like, you know what, that's bullshit. I
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: made an excuse. I don't like the way that sounded.
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: I'm not I'm that's not me, you know, And he
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: admits it. And just like here, he said, I was
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: talking to my buddy. And by the way, Aunt's been
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: in Minnesota a long time. If he's calling his friend's buddy,
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: so I'm just saying he's a Midwest kid. Now he's
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: not from Atlantic. I'm just playing. But him saying, you know,
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: like Finch got on me, dude, you know, like really
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: like a lot, and honestly, sometimes on the court it's
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: it's very deservant to be honest. But he also said,
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: I can't he's not trying to do anything you're saying
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: to me, like he said, as a young adult, sometimes
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: he get lost in that. And he just said, now
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: he was right, dude, he was right. And I had
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: to I had to wake up, you know. And so
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: and there are times when you get close to the
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: All Star break where you do get mentally and physically
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: trained in that little chunk of time really helps you. Now,
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: guys like Aunt, he'll do a lot of media stuff
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: when he's there, and so it is kind of go,
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: go go. We'll see his effort in this game compared
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: to last year's game. But overall, AT's a special player
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: and you know, he is a phenomenal talent, dude, and
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: he for the most part, he's had these little stretches
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: where he hasn't played that great or he hasn't you know,
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: he's been a little like i'd say, right now, the
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: end of games is a major problem. But that's for
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: everybody on our team almost, it feels like, and that's
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: our team too, Randall. You know, it's been up and
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: down for him too. Less and less. We're seeing him
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: in the paint surrounded by people and you're like, dude,
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: fuck whatever, call of time out. I don't know, Just
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: don't do what you're doing past the ball, is what
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: you want to say. But then he gets to a
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: place and like I said, it's happening a lot less
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: where you can't even pass out of it. Sometimes because
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: you're just surrounded, you'll try to a spin move and
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: it's usually a turnover, right. So, and we knew when
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: we made the trade, we knew there's times when Kat
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: holds the ball, so it was it wasn't going to
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: be way different from Randall holding the ball sometimes, right
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: Obviously offensively, they both can do different stuff. Right now,
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: you could say Kat spreading the floor, especially later in
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: the season, and at times we mentioned that Phoenix season,
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: that Phoenix series. At times he got he was actually
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: spreading the floor as well, and they used him sometimes
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: as just a spacer, you know. So it did feel
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: like we were figuring things out offensively, but not not enough, right.
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: And remember this trade was supposed to be help the offense,
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: and up until like January, it's sure it sure wasn't
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: helping it. It didn't improve it. It actually at times
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: you could say it was worse. But Randall is just
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: it's it's similar tant where it's like, dude, just when
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: you see a certain type of defender on you take
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: advantage of it. When you see a little space, take
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: advantage of it. Because I love his physicality going to
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: the rack. Still got to try to space and shoot
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: him when they're there, but just be decisive when he's decisive.
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: He is a pretty good player, man. He does do
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: things that especially against the more athletic defender. And that
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: was the problem with power Forward when it comes to Kat, Yeah,
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: Rudy's in the paint. We get that. That's very true.
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: And the year before Rudy got here, when or when
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: Kat was at center, which he's playing in, you know
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: center in New York right now. He led the league
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: in end ones for centers, you know, so I wouldn't
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: doubt if he's doing that right now. I don't know
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: the analytical stat but there are some things that, like
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: I said, one on one, in driving to the hole
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: an offensive rebound, like even if you miss a shot
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: or you're going for an offensive rebound, there's a lot
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: of times he'll get fouled rather than committing the bad
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: flailing fall. So as a power forward, using the physicality
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: and being the big team and taking advantage of it,
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: he can do that better when he picks the time
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: to do it the correct time to do it. So
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: he's been up and down, but not nearly as as
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: bad as I thought some folks you know thought in
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: the media. But there's just times where you're like, dude,
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: what are you doing past the damn ball? You know,
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: and then you know, Rudy lately he's been a little
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: better man, you know, rebounding this year he struggled. You know,
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: it could be him wearing down. Dane Moore was just
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: talking about on this podcast that you know, if you
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: look at the difference when he first got here in
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: what he was doing in the summer when it comes
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: to playing you know, Olympic basketball, right for France, and
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: then when you have lesser of lesser games, and I
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: guess you could say meaningful games too. How he came
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: in fresher and then you know, maybe he's just getting
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: worn down and maybe that break is really going to
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: help him coming up the All Star break. You know,
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: I could see that. But as far as being more
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: decisive in punishing teams, this goes for Randall and Rudy
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: punishing you know, you got it. If you're gonna be big,
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: you gotta punish it when it's the time. And that's
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: the thing about Rudy is when there's a smaller guy
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: on you, you know, don't post up. Big dudes, don't try
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: to seal off because it's probably not gonna work. But
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: when you have a smaller guy, like the time where
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: he had somebody sealed off, he was in great position
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: and Randall didn't even look at his ass, you know,
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: and that's when they got in that little fight or whatever,
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: you know, and it got ugly and Rudy stubborn ass
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: stayed in the lane no matter what. And then on
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: the other side, I think it was the next possession
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: right where on defense he got to follow and it's
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: just all frustration. Right, So, and that goes for the overview,
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: I mean the overview of this team. You know, trading
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: right before camp started was a rough timing. I mean
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: there was a point where we were six and three
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: and then three losses, two wins in a row, four losses,
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: four wins in a row, loss, win, win, three losses
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: in a row, three wins, three losses, three wins, loss win, lost, win, lost, lost,
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: you know, consistency. But making that trade, we knew it
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: was gonna take a while. And even going back to
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: when I started at the pot, you know, saying at
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: the start of the podcast that when we started it,
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: it was the year we traded Jimmy early in the season,
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: and since then we've made a ton of trades, both
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: small and big and whatever. Right, So I knew this
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: is gonna take a while. And generally speaking, you know,
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: it takes a little while. And Finches said this multiple
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: times the last couple of years for the offense to click.
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: I remember, you know, a chunk of years back when
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: you know bus in the Celtics, like past January were
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: like the best two offensive teams like it does take
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: a little while, and also playing with Rudy and taking
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: advantage activating him on offense at the proper times. And
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: I remember when we got calmly he said, hey, it
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: takes like a half a year a year to get
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: used to playing with him. And that does suck, right,
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: no doubt about it. But if it wasn't that way,
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: we probably wouldn't have been able to make that trade.
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: You know, they wouldn't have traded him either if he
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: was like a guy who could average eighteen or twenty
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: a night or something like that. So it's up to
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: Rudy to do something when he's like in the middle
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: of the frintro line, you know, Like I think a
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: couple of people have clipped up, not just Dan Moore,
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: but a couple of people have done a really good
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: job of clipping up things that he does. Were or
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: whether it's the push shot, whether it's driving on a
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: smaller guy, whether it's ceiling, whether it's just moving the ball,
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: just just do whatever it is. Just be decisive. Just
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: be decisive and sometimes if you're aggressive, cool, as long
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: as it was decisive and it was the right thing
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: to do. Conley, you know, I didn't realize that he
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: barely touched the ball in the offseason, and once I
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: heard that early on, when he was real it turns
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: out to be a lot of rust. You know, maybe
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: a lot of people say he's just washed. I don't
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: think he's washed, but he's definitely it feels like taking
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: a step back him. Rudy and McDaniels for a while
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: weren't as effective as they were and Conley not shooting much.
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: That was going to be an issue trying to get
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: the rust off right. But then it turned out where
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: we're focusing so much on the new parts, where if
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: it forget about the old stuff that works. And that's
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: kind of the idea of moving calmly out of the
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: starting lineup, because it's like, well, dude, if you're not
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: really being point guard, you're not setting up stuff, then
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: you might as well not be there. Like I was saying,
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: he might as well come off the bench. Now he's
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: starting again. But obviously because you know, Dante's hurt, but
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: he just came out shooting from three and that you know,
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: obviously last year he was lights out. So it's it's
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: it's shocking, how you know how long it took him
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: to get his stuff together when it when it came
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: to that. But when I find out that his off season,
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: you know, because of a ongoing wrist injury, you know,
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: his off season the way it was, it's kind of like, oh, okay,
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: you know. But as it stands, you know, he's averaging
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: eight points four and a half assists. He's shooting now,
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: he's up to almost thirty nine percent from the three.
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: He's shooting under forty percent thirty six point eight from
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: the field. That's bad. That's really bad. It's not efficient.
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: He's usually a very efficient player. So yeah, that that's
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: a little that's shaky. That a little that's shaky. He's
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: had some really good games here and there. Atlanta he
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: was one of nine, Memphis he was one of six.
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: But other than that, he started to tighten up a
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: little bit. He did shoot. Is that what I did?
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: Is that how I commuted it? I don't think so. Man,
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: my computer is freezing. I hope this is gonna be
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: okay anyway, So that that was a surprise, you know,
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: and maybe this is just calmly for the next two years.
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: We just got to deal with it, and we will
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: see Dillingham play more and whatnot. But yeah, there for
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: a while, Uh, just talking about mc daniels. He struggled, man,
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: he was struggling really, really bad. The last ten games.
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: He's shooting forty percent from the three. He's averaging seven
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: rebounds seven point three, fifty five percent from the field.
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: You know, regular season only thirty four percent from three.
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: But he's really starting to tighten up, man, And a
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: lot of it is not just the corner of three.
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: Hey it's falling, you know. A lot of it is
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: him going out there and figuring it out and moving around.
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: And it kind of goes with the theme, you know,
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: of the team. You know, I don't know, like I
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: have seen a lot from him lately though, and we
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: know his quarter three you know, analytics are really really rough,
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: but like above the break and others, spots are way better.
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: But I just like the aggressiveness I've seen. You know,
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: they challenged him to go rebound. He's rebounding way better.
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: You know, he's just he's moving, he's getting it, you know,
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: cutting to the basket. He's just being active and you
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: can see the improvement. You could definitely see the improvement
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: Alexander Walker. For the most part, it's been pretty solid.
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: I mean, shit, he's shooting forty right, and he brings
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: that hustle and defense and all that. Nas, especially of late,
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: it feels like, you know, has gotten the shooting regular
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: season shooting forty one point two, you know, from three
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: and in the last ten sixty one. You know, now
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: a lot of it. A lot of people want him
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: in the starting lineup, and I understand we got a
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: preview of that last year, especially not as much of
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: the year before because Kyle Anderson was in that spot,
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: but h and Devincenzo. It's funny because when you so
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: Nas is doing his thing, you know for a while
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: there or it's probably a really small sample size, but
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: early having Randall in Nas in the same lineup was
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: just horrendous. Defensively, It's getting better now just as a
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: as a pairing, and we've seen it more closing games
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: and Rudy has been on the bench or sometimes we've
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: seen Randall be on the bench a lot less though,
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: but yeah, finding more minutes for Nas. In general, he's
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: averaging twenty five. You know, you'd like to see that
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: go up obviously. Oh, but he's been doing his thing.
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: He's been doing things. He literally hasn't started one game though,
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: so Devincenzo though, it's funny because when he was those
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: preseason get in its preseason, right, But when you watched
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: him in the preseason, it felt like, dude, this dude's
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: gonna fit. Man, this is exactly what we need. And
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: then he just couldn't shoot to start the gear. I
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: mean as a whole we didn't shoot well, but I
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: mean he was just it was bad. And then he
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: got a shit together and you know, they put him
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: in the starting lineup and so hopefully, you know, hopefully
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: he can return. You know, this was from about six
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: days ago. He will not undergo the surgery. He knows
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: he needs excuse me, or he needed, we thought for
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: the turf toe injury. And he will miss at least
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: three weeks for the Timberwolves. You know, that's when they're
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: gonna reevaluate him. So in about two give or take
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: a little over two weeks, they're going to reevaluate him.
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: So I do believe he'll he'll be back, and he
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: is a key piece. But like I said, Dillingham, you know,
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: if this is what forced him to get more minutes
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: and maybe he wasn't ready for those extended minutes, and
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: we you know, we weren't seeing in practice, we weren't
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: seeing him in other ways, and because a lot of
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: people are like, where the hell is he? You know,
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: I mean if you look at like December, he played
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: in four games, you know, so I understand some of that,
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: you know, getting getting mad, like what the hell? You know?
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: So but he but he has been playing pretty consistently
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: to an extent anyway. Obviously fifteen minutes eleven, twenty nine, seventeen,
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: eighteen thirteen, that's in January, and for January, he's averaging
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: eight points. He's shooting the lights out from three small
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: sample size because he's only shooting about two point three
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: a game. But he's just been he's been pretty good. Man.
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: He's had a game where he had ten points and
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: four assists, back to back games of twelve and fifteen,
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: knocking down some threes, got you know, went three or
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: four in a game two of four to a two.
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: He's just got a lot of energy, a lot of speed,
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: not afraid to take a shot. You know, he just
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: turned twenty. So in a weird way, maybe him getting
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: this many minutes and him getting comfortable and then bringing
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: Dante back to have Dante Dyllingham and commonly, you know,
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: for the stretch run. Hopefully this really, you know, really
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: pays off. And I did like how they didn't necessarily
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: just start going for next season, like a fair amount
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: of people thought to do, like this season is done,
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: we have no chance, and who knows, maybe we get
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: the sixth seed or shit, let's say we get the
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: fourth seed, right, maybe we lose the first round. You
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: never know, you know, but just in general, you know,
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: like I don't know, I did coming down to the
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: trade talk stuff, that would be kind of what I
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: close with here, besides kind of previewing what's what's coming up,
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: including the games, right, you know, Randall, a lot of
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: people say trade at the deadline, like there's no putting
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: nas in trade them at the deadline. You gotta looked
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: into the future. And it's not the trading him part
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: that I disagree with, you know, but I remember, and
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: this doesn't this this isn't a be all, end all scenario,
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: but this was a significant trade. You traded cat, right,
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: You added to be to the team one in the
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: starring lineup and getting used to everybody getting used to
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: how they want, how they want Randall to play getting
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: used to playing with Rudy, right, being so like if
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: a good chunk of your the last few years, like
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: you got to score. This is what we need out
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: of you, you know, being programmed like that and then
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: trying to deprogram some of that. It's not easy. And
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: like I said, we've seen it takes a while, because
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: I remember two years ago people were saying in the
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: summer we have to trade Cat. The two big thing
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: doesn't work, you know. I even heard like Mackie say,
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: like you're just getting if you keep him on the team,
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: you're basically fueling mediocracy. He brought up the word mediocre,
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: like if you want to be mediocre, keep Cat on
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: your team type thing, right, And to his credit, he
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: didn't delete that text. A lot of people last year
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: deleted their textas about Cat from the summer before. Okay,
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: so credit damn for not doing that, but a lot
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: of I mean the fast, I don't know many. I'm
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: trying to think who in the media said you have
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: to keep Cat two summers ago. Not many. And my
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: thing was, and I'm not oh I told you so
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: or something like that, but my thing was, once again,
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: this isn't a video game. You can't just be like,
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: let's just shut it off, restart the season. Man, screw this.
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: You know, like, when you make that big of a trade,
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: you have to see it through. And I would say that,
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: and I get pushed back saying, post you want to
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: wait blah bah blah this many years. I'm like, no,
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: I just want to at least get to the trade
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: deadline of last year, so that would at least be
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: a full season of seeing it on the fucking court.
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: That's all I'm saying. When I say see it through,
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: you gotta at least see it. You gotta at least
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: see it. And you know, because he missed fifty three
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: games two years ago, that's a lot of fucking games.
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: But we did find some things out even when he
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: was gone. We found some things out, just like last
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: year when he's gone for way less games obviously, cat
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: but and then we make a run to the conference final.
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: And and you know when when Aaron and I did
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: the trade show, when we traded cap, like I did
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: think I would like, I thought we should have waited
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: one more year to see it through. I get the
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: second Apron thing from I mean the second Apron thing
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: already hit that we weren't gonna bring Kyle Anderson back
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: or even the backup point guard back Morris, you know,
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: because we just couldn't do it. So the second apron
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: thing is real. And if we kept Cat for the
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: next few years, Niles ain't gonna be here. Alexander Roker
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: wouldn't be here, you know. So, but I would have
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: preferred them to wait one year. Now, I know, as
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: salary goes up, and when you're on the second you know,
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: over the second apron, you know what is it? Is
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: it ten or fifteen or twelve percent something like that,
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: I can't remember, but you have to be somewhat in
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: the ballpark. I think it used to be fifteen percent.
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: Don't quote me on that, but you have to be
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: someone in the ballpark when you make trades in the NBA,
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: right salary capitalized, and when you're over the second apron,
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: it's even worse because if anyone's going to take back
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: more money, it has to be the Timberwolves in the trade.
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: And so if you if you're a repeat offender and
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: you're over the second apron twice, right, you can't even
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: trade a first round pick like there, you can't, you, right,
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: now we don't have the mid level exemption, you know,
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: so I understand why they made the trade, and we
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: are starting to see the that's coming around somewhere in
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: I think thank post Thanksgiving. Sometime in December, our defense
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: started to turn up, and it was like, okay, if
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: we can get be a top five defense or something
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: like that, we know it travels right, we can keep
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: you engaged all that stuff, right, And then in January
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: the offense has gotten better. Now will it continue to
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: get better and we find our way into the top
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: ten or top twelve or whatever? Maybe I hope, you know,
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: and I think if we're going to finish strong and
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: try to get out of the first round, it has to,
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: you know. So I have to admit back then I
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: thought we should have just went one more year than
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: make the trade. Now, if this trade ends up working
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: that we did make, that they did make, then the
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: odds are extremely low that we would have been able
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: to make this trade this next offseason coming up, because Randall,
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: if you were gonna sign, like you'd have to sign
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: to extension right away before even seeing him on your team,
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: you know, like, because he has the option to op
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: out of his you know, out of his player option,
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: So we probably weren't gonna be able to make that trade.
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: And if we were, we would have had to make
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: we would have had to sign him for like a
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: four year deal, probably without seeing him on the team,
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: which that's not cool either, right, And maybe you know,
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: everyone keeps talking about this trade deadline, but when you
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: make such a big trade once again, you probably have
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: to see it through unless you get a deal that
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: you love, an absolute love, just as much as you
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: did for Cat right. And so my guess is they're
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: not going to trade Randall at at especially when we've
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: seen some improvement, like improvement too. And now I'm not
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: going over the top of that, Like I said, I'm
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: not saying, oh dude, they're gonna be third seed, you know,
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: but it's in range, like that fourth spot home court
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: advantage is still within range. There's no doubt about that.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: It's just that consistency. But as far as trading Randall,
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: you know, trading Randall for expiring contracts, you know, maybe
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: getting to the off season. You know, if you wait
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: to the off season all the way to the off season, yeah,
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: it does put you out a little bit of a risk.
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: You know, we don't have a lot of leverage right now.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: The thing is Kat already had a contract. He was
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: starting a four year his four year extension this year,
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: so it did give us some leverage on that because
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: you get a player and you know you have him
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: under contract at least, whereas this someone's gonna get him
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: for the last chunk of the year and then hope
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: that he resigns like someone someone would probably want to extend, well,
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: give him a new deal, because you can't. You're not
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: going to really extend him. I don't think, well, no,
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: you could give him extension right now, I think unlike NOAs.
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: I don't think NOAs you have to wait for him
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: to decide. But either way, you know, when a player
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: only has a little time on their contract left and
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: it's not the beginning year where they could see in
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: a full year, I don't know. You know that is
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: not great leverage. Now. A lot of people say, yeah,
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: but if he walks then you get nothing for him.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: Well that's fair too. And if he were to opt
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: into his contract, which I guess we can't completely although
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: we can't completely outrule it, right I like to take
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: it all in and and and be honest with it
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: and be like, yeah, I guess that's that's something he
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: could do. Well, we could trade him after, you know.
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: Bottom line is, if we're gonna trade Randall, you'd want
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: to get at least one expiring contract, right, and maybe
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: you get two and maybe it really like maybe it's
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: like Alexander Walker or somebody like Conley or something where
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: you're just like, not not those exact players, but like
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: maybe two players for him, and they both come off
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: the bench. You put nas in the styring lineup, right,
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: and so because you got to make up for nos obviously,
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: and you know, maybe maybe you do just get one
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: player that you do end up because you have their
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: bird rights, you give them money. That's a little exception
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: in there where you can still Now someone can outbid you,
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: of course, but you could you could sign the player
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: that you really like, and then if you're under the
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: second apron, then you could use the mid level exception
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: and sign someone. You know, some of these trades that
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: I've seen, it doesn't really make sense if you look
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: at the next year or even two years under contract
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: because you're not really freeing up money. So you know,
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: and then obviously, if you do sign Randall, here, or
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: I guess it'd be option in for his last year
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: or whatever. Nas is probably gonna walk, you know, So
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: you know, I think we go for Randall. We could
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: probably get two solid players. And some of this is
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: kind of like, what do you like in the free
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: agency coming up? Are there players at the mid level
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: that you think, hey, dude, or you know, in that
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: realm whatever, maybe one's making twenty one and maybe one's
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: making ten or you know whatever, what do you like?
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: You know, what do you like in the free agency?
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: And maybe they can find a trade that they can
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: they could get back. And it's almost like Dallas a
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: couple of years ago where they got role players and
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: it made them better at defense. You know, they've done
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: it twice now where they bring in role players and
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: it's made them better at defense. Now, I'm that we
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: obviously have to get better at offense right and maintain
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: our defense. But I don't know, to be honest with you,
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: I would wait until the draft. If I were the
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: Timberwolves and I wanted to trade Randall, I would wait
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: until the draft night. That's what I would do. But yeah,
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: the whole expiring contract thing and in the bird rights
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: thing and how it helps you. Maybe you sign one
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: of those players, then you sign a free agent. I
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: could see all that, you know, I could see all that.
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: And like I said earlier about Alexander Walker, love him
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: to death, but if you're not able to keep them,
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: if you think there's no there's probably no way he's
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: probably gonna walk, then you might want to trade him
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: right now then. And I hate to say that, but
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: it's true. You know it's true. But yeah, it'll be interesting,
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: you see, man, Because like I said, we've seen a
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: decent sample size, not a major one, but a decent
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: one with Nas in the starting lineup last year, and
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: it was pretty good offensively, it was better defensively, was
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: good enough. Now, I thought some of that got a
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: little overblown, and a lot of it had to do
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: with more like oh he's better than Cat or whatever,
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: or just highlighting things in a positive way and forgetting that, well,
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: those that team that we beat they didn't even have
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: their top two players. That there were some things in
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: there where I was like, well, hold on, dude, hold on, Yeah,
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: we beat that team, but they like I think we
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: played Cleveland twice, we beat him once because you know,
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: freaking uh ant hit his head on the rim blocking
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: the shot. But I think we lost to him. In
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: neither time did we face Mitchell, So I thought some
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: of that was a little overblown. But you could see
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: the offense, the offense that the coach wants to run
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: and the one that is probably best for us as
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: a team. NAS fit better than Kat and I think
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: fits better than Randall, and ultimately, you know, I don't
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: know if Randall will fit here, but you have to
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: at least see it through, and especially the fact that
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: you can make a trade. You know, you can make it. Shit,
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: you can make a trade. Like I said, if you
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: op's in, or if you sign them a deal, or
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: if you sign them to a deal, then NAS is gone.
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: I assume, you know. So I don't know. I just
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: don't think it's an end all be all that they
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: have to trade them in a handful of days. And
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: I've seen people say that there's just no reason why
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: to keep them right now and just kind of, you know,
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: just throwing this year out. You know, I've heard plenty
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: of people just say, pump this year. A month ago,
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: people were saying that longer than a month ago. Some
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: of those same people are now looking at the standings
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: and being like, hang on, wait a second. The point
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: is we're we're a better team overall than we were
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: even a handful of weeks ago. And it's obvious. Now
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: where is the top of that? I don't know. I
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: don't know where the ceiling is, but you have to
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: see it through. That was my whole point. And like
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: I said two summers ago, you got to just play
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: this out to the deadline. Obviously, once you got to
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: the deadline you were doing so good. Of course you
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: we're gonna trade him, and we saw what happened. So
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: and I'm not saying we're gonna get the commence final,
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: you know. And I've always said I wish they would
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: have waited one more year because you know, a lot
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: of it was our offense needing to improve. But I
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: think we would have hit the ground running at the
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: beginning of the year way better than we would have
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: in the regular season, and we'd be in a lot
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: better spot right now. Now. How much would that offense
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: and that team improve, I don't know. You know, I'm
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: not saying they would have made a trip to the finals.
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: I'm not saying they would have been able to beat
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: Dallas but who knows, who knows where Dallas is gonna be.
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: You know, that was my point too, Like we may
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: never see Dallas in the playoffs for the next four years.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: You know, Luka may come back again, banged up again,
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: Kyrie by the time May comes, he may be hurt.
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: You never know, so someone could knock them off and
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: we match up better with you know, so some of
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: it I am still hanging on to. Man. I wish
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: we wouldn't. I wish we would have waited a year,
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: but you know, this trade can lead to another trade
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: and we could be ultimately better for the next three
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: to five years, you know, And that's really what the
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: trade was about. I don't think we'll know what the
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: trade if if we'll get a full answer of what
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: the trade was. Some people, especially in the national media,
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: said they're cutting salary for a reason and they're gonna
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: go Well, if they're gonna cut salary, then they're probably
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: not gonna bring Nos back either, you know. If this
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: is all about getting way below stuff, they're probably not
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: gonna bring Nos back either then. So we will see
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: just what this trade was about this offseason, or I
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: guess you could say, maybe have the trade deadline. But anyway,
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: I'm rambling, I'm rambling. They do have the do have
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: you know, at Utah tonight, then Washington, then Sack then Chicago, Houston, Portland, Cleveland, Milwaukee,
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: and Okay see, and then we got a break from Thursday,
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: February thirteenth all the way to Friday the twenty first.
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: They got off. But man, do they hit the ground
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: run and shit even Cleveland, Milwaukee, Oklahoma City, excuse me, Houston,
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma City Lakers. Like we play Oklahoma City
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: three out of four games, you know, so it's it's
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: gonna get real here, you know what I mean. But
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: we have played a lot of games in a short
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: amount of time and that does lighten up a little
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: bit too. And some of the schedule you look at
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: it and you're like, huh, I mean, you may get
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: lucky with some injuries or people resting or whatever too.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: That's that's possible. That's really possible. But and it does
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: sound like by the way, Conley has a I think
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: it was his right thumb spring, so you know, it
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: does sound like Nas is going to be back though,
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: so that's good. Hopefully this spring is nothing crazy. Al
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: Horton here in Minnesota looks for a season high five
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: straight wins. They played tonight Utah. Like I mentioned, the
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: Wolves are two and four on zero days rest. So
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: but yeah, we played a hell of a stretch against
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: some top flight teams, so we have to remember parts
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: of this second part of the season. It's gonna be
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 1: a little lighter now. We gotta, you know, we gotta
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: like take it serious the whole time. But yeah, I mean,
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm not saying it's an easy schedule, right,
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: But I don't know, man, I I ship, I don't
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: I think that we can, you know, I think we
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: can get this ship together and make a nice little
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: run down the stretch of the season where it leads us.
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: You know, I don't know. I really don't know exactly
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: where that's gonna lead us, but hopefully good things happen.
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: Where is it. So there's this stat that is just
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: it's just crazy about you know, the games we've played,
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: and you know, it's it's it's crazy, it's it's it's
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: it's nuts. And like I said, it's gonna it's gonna
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 1: like nut, you know. Charlie Walton, I wanna I want
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: to mention he's really great. On Twitter, he mentioned the
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: stat the Timberwolves are five and one this season when
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: Conny makes five or more ds eighteen and sixteen when
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: he makes less. That's pretty crazy. He's been doing a
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: great job, not just this year, but just in general.
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: I did want to bring this up. Jace Frederick Anthony
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: Edwards shooting this season with Randall on the floor forty
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: from three to forty six from the field. Without Randall
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: on the floor, drastically changing free it's thirty six percent.
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: It's about thirty eight percent from the field. So Randal
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: isn't and I'm not just using that one stat, but
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: Randall isn't. This just horrendous player. Like a lot of people,
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: you know, act like he is. You know, you can
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: look at net rating and stuff like that. You know
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: he's not as bad as as people want to act
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: like he is. You know, I think, like I said,
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: I think some of that is just overreacting. Here we go,
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: this is al hort after night team games, and this
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: is like a maybe like a a week ago or something.
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: After nineteen games in the last thirty five days, the
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: Wolves had two days between games, so the first time
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: in five weeks and two consecutive home games for the
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: first time in five weeks. You know that means something.
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: That's that is a telling stat. Chris Heine had this
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: stat where he said, this is and this is once
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: again about a week ago. This is the Timbrels twenty
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: fourth road game of the season. Nobody in the Western
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: Conference has played more road games so far this season.
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: You know, so that stuff does. You know, stuff does
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: on the back end if you're playing your best ball,
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: which it feels like the are. And something I didn't
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: mention the close you know, closing out games. This is
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: from a little while ago, like games decided by three
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: points or less. Most of this season we had at
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: the time of the stat, it was thirteen of them.
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: I think it's fourteen or fifteen now. All last season
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 1: we had thirteen. We know the clutch minutes, right, the
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 1: clutch games, bad record in it. I think we still
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: have the most of them. I'd assume we still have
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: the most of them. But it's bad, dude, Like we
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: need to close out those clutch minutes. And people that
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: don't know clutch minutes, it means the clutch minutes is
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: the last five minutes of the game within five that's
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: what that's what it is. So you can beat someone
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: by seventeen and it still counts for that. Oh but
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: Conley also mentioned how Randall is starting to really turn
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: the corner and find his rhythm and you know, and
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: you're starting to see just everybody being able to figure
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: each other out more. And hopefully it lasts, you know,
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: hopefully it lasts. But yeah, if you look at Conley
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: and Gobert's seasons a year ago and now, it is like,
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 1: whoa what it's it's it's it's pretty drastic. It's a
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: pretty drastic difference, all right. So I just want to
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 1: finish with the Gophers. Man, they have it's been bad.
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: It's been bad, and they just got their ass kicked
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: by Michigan State. But they had one three in a row,
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: two against ranked teams. Like I said before, I really
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: don't think that's gonna help them. Like it's gonna help them,
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: I shouldn't say that. But as far as like saving
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: Ben Johnson's job, I don't. I don't really think it's
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: gonna it's gonna help too much, you know. And he's
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: been what I believe, a great recruiter who just hasn't
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: been able to you know, keep his players and hopefully
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: the new money coming in and I'm not talking about
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: an AI, but the new money coming in hopefully that helps.
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: But when they hired an inexperienced coach, you could tell
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: because pretty much everybody left, right, So that first year
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: he was you know, PJ Flex said, you're a zero.
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: You could probably say it was like when he first
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 1: came here, it was like, you're negative too, you know,
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: like it was bad, and he found a way to
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: get enough people on there to be okay, whatever, pretty
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: bad but whatever. Then it looked like he had a
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 1: squad that, man if he could return the next year,
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: and you know, like it's just but the before NLI
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: kicked in, those players left because they didn't believe in
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 1: the coach. And then since then there's been players that
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 1: left financially, you know, so I get that part, and
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 1: that's obviously not fully Ben Johnson's fault. Obviously, the close
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: loss to Wichita State, to Wake to Texas early this year,
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: it just it was it really hurt, you know what
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: I mean. It was like, man, I don't I don't know, man.
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: You know, in some of the games, like the Ohio
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: State game, ended up going double overtime. That was a
• 1:18:43
  Speaker 1: winnable game, the Maryland game, but that overtime game against
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 1: Michigan beaten the ranked team for the first time. Ben
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 1: Johnson's career as a coach here anyway, in as an era,
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: this is what his fourth year. Beaten Iowa and then
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 1: beaten Oregon, another right team that was big. Now they
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 1: got their ass kicked, but they do have Washington, Penn State, Illinois,
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 1: tough usc Ukuala, Okay, Northwestern Penn State, Nebraska at Rutgers
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: is gonna be tough. Wisconsin. They've been looking a little
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: shaky lately, but they're better. My point is, we do
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: have we do have a favorable schedule, but can we
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: even go five hundred in that one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine,
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: ten games left? Can we go five to five? It's
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 1: tough to say that, it really is. And Garcia has
• 1:19:41
  Speaker 1: been awesome. Mitchell, you know, hurt Not having Mitchell earlier
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 1: did hurt us. Patterson's been pretty solid. Man. Fox is
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: doing what Fox does. The Femi dude, that uh not
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 1: the transfer. You know, I like what I see out
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: of him, I really do. I like what I see
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: out of him. And the Isaac dude. Assuma that dude.
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 1: He's a true freshman, I believe, Yeah, a true freshman.
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: I like what I see out of him, you know,
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 1: I just I don't know. I mean, how many players
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: would even be able to come back like eligibility wise,
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: I just don't. I hate to be just negative. I
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: don't think it's really being all that negative. I just
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: don't see Ben Johnson coming back here and having the
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 1: transfer portal. If you went out and got an experience coach,
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: I think it could help you in the transfer portal.
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: You know, you can you can lose your team pretty
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: quick in the transferportal, but you can also, you know,
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: you can also gain something pretty quick too, So I
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: think that's part of it, you know. I think that
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: we gotta remember that part. So yeah, I like the
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: way they've not quit on the coach, but it is
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 1: hard to be all that positive. Anyway, I'm gonna get
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: out of here long winded for the first show. These
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 1: are not going to be this long. Hopefully it's not
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 1: even longer when you can hear me, I don't know
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 1: how long that went, Hopefully not long. But anyway, I'm
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 1: gonna get out here, enjoy the games. I'll be back.
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know exactly when I'm gonna be back, whether
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: it's in five days or seven or ten, but I'm
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 1: gonna jump in instead of doing it every Monday or whatever,
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: like when there's live games going on and all that.
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: I'm kind of tweaking that. So but I'll be back,
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 1: but enjoy the game's coming up, and let's hope both
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: squads can get some dubs. Anyway, I'm out, Beast