Latest / The Chuck ToddCast / The Chris Mullin Interview: Run TMC, The Dream Team and Steph Curry

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The Chris Mullin Interview: Run TMC, The Dream Team and Steph Curry · The Chuck ToddCast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to our bonus episode on the Philadelphia Last Golden
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: State San Francisco Warriors, all different monikers they've had throughout
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: their existence. In the first episode, Chuck Todd and I
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: told the fascinating history of the Warriors, from wil Chamberlain
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: to Run TMC Era to We Believe to the Step
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Hurry Revolutionists, a franchise that really we can say has
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: changed the way the game of basketball is played today.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: We're going to interview the player who was the See
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: and Run TMC and later on as an executive, was
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: an architect of the We Believe teams two great eras.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Jay of course is talking about none other than
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: Chris Mullen, NBA Hall of Famer, five time All Star
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: and I know ja, you call him Mulley, right, Helly
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: scored over seventeen thousand career points, most of it with
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: the Warriors. Start on the ninety two Dream Team basically
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: the Dream Team, no offense to the Redeemed Team and
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: all of those other that ninety.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: One said there's only one dream team. The rest are
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: duplicates that, and he is so.
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: Chris Mullen was on the original one gold There as
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: an executive in two thousand and five. He arguably, you know,
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: if you talk about the bricks of this dynastic moment
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: for the Warriors, well that you know, you could argue
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: Chris Mullen as GM laid some bricks there. It's an
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: executive and five the engineer to trade for Baron Davis
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: drafted Monte Ellis out of high school. Both were key
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: pieces of the we Believe teams and I know Jay,
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: you believe that we believe teams playing at the Seeds
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: for the Splash Brothers.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: More importantly, as Chris Mullen told us us in the interview,
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: that they rewakened the fan base. They've had great fans
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: there for a long time, but they didn't have any
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: reason to really come out and cheer them. And it
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: showed just how passionate that fan base can be, and
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: that fan base played an important role in giving the
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: Warriors a dominant home court advantage during Steph curry Dynastic run.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Before we get to the interview, I just want to
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: remind you to follow us on social media at Dynastic Pod,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: and to follow, like, and review us wherever you listen
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: to your podcasts, and to make sure to check us
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: out on the YouTube channel as well.
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: We're going to bring in Jay and myself interviewed Chris
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: Mullen a little bit of go. Like I said, this
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: is a guy he averaged eighteen over eighteen points a
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: game for his career, scored twenty five or more points
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: in a game for five straight seasons, and as a
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: Warrior average twenty points per game was fifth all time
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: in franchise history, behind Will Chamberlain, Steph Curry, Rickberry, and
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: Paul Erson.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Chris, thanks for being here. And Chris, we started our
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: main episode on the Warriors with the night your jersey
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: was retired, which quickly took a turn when Joe Laka
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: was introduced and the booze came down, and I just
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: wonder your memories of that night and when you felt
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: it may be starting to slip away a little bit.
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: Nice to meet with you, guys, My pleasure to be
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: with you yet that night. Look, we've had several jersey
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: retirements with the Golden State Warriors, and all take on
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: their own identity. Mine might be the most memorable. I'm
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: not say it's the best, but might be the most memorable. Yeah,
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: it was. It was a time of transition, right and uh,
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: I think there was some dynamic. You know, Monteals had
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: been traded, who was a fan favorite, so there was
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: a lot of dynamics going on, a lot of motions,
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: and Joe Lacap, being the confident person that he is,
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: you know, the Warriors had not won the championships since
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: seventy five, proclaimed that, you know, they were going to win.
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: So looking back, it actually turned out pretty well for
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: Joe Lacup. But that night. That night was kind of awkward,
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: you know. And it's funny because when you're on the
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: floor and you're underneath that score, but you don't hear
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: it as much. So I really wasn't that aware of
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: the intensity. To my wife like bump me, she goes,
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: go get that, mic go go get it. I'm like
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: because I was kind of like like I didn't really
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: hear it, and then all of a sudden I got
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: from under there. So, like I said, very memorable, a
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: tough evening in the moment, but looking back, it's kind
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: of cool the way it all worked out. So yeah,
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: I mean, just one of those unpredicted That's why sports
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: are great, right, whether it be the game, something's gonna
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: unfold and you don't know what to do, What's going
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: to happen and you have to react.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: Hey, Chris, your career as a player going into being
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: in the front office. I'm looking at it from the outside,
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: and and you got Steph Curry who transforms, who basically
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: helps lead the charts to transform the role of the
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: three point line in the game itself. And I think
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: about your career. Look, I was a Big East junkie
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: first man before following you to the Warriors and those
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: those years in the Big East. But I mean, you
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: tell me, did you start looking back now? Can you
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: say you saw where this where the NBA went by
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: the time of Steph and the Warriors, that you saw
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: those seeds planted in that Big East you were competing
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: in the late eighties.
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's funny you talk about the Big East, those rivalries,
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: and you look, the ACC was an incredible probably the
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: best conference longevity wise in basketball, but the Big East
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: had an incredible run those years I played. There was
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: no three point lines.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: Okay, so fat you left just before.
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but if you think about it, you know, if
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: you yeah, sort of right right, he it was like
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: eighty seven I think when you had I think around there,
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: But really, it really came from the Aby, but it
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: got skipped over for a bunch of years because there
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: was no three point line. I don't know if you
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: guys saw that documenting Soul Power that's out on I
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: think it's on Prime video, so it's phenomenal document on
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: the A B A. So that's really I think with
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: the style of play that we're seeing now came from
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: you know, when the three point line was not there.
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: It gives you a whole different strategy. Offensively, coaches are
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: not trying to shoot deep shots because you're not getting
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: any credit for it. So it really was exclusively inside out.
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: There's a huge emphasis on drawing fouls to get into
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: the bonus, you know, so you know Steph his look.
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: Coaches have always been about shots selection, but they never
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: questioned a shot that goes in. So you know, there's
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: there's that great clip of Steve Kerr his head like
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: this and then goes in no no, no, no, yes yes,
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: and all of a sudden, it'starting to run plays for
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: shots like that. So if you can make them, you
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: should take them. The only influenced Steph has had negatively
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: is everyone wants to do it and that's where Yeah.
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: I mean, I joked Mike By now nineteen year old,
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: when he started playing youth basketball at seven, What do
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: you think all of them wanted to do in twenty
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: fourteen in youth basketball, Chris just launch it from half court.
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: They walk in the gym and first shot is a
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: half court shot, no question.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but that's where analytics should take over more. It's like, okay, listen,
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: if you're thirty percent, let's tone it down a little
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: bit out there.
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: So you know, the three point shot comes in the
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: NBA in seventy nine eighty season, and yet like it
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: was a rare thing, like Larry Bird would take three
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: per game, you know, like Steph's taking double digits. As
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: you come into the league in the eighties, what was
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: the approach to tho three point shot? Why do you
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: think it was kind of slow to really come in
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: and dominate the league.
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think one there was still, like I said,
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: the philosophy had not evolved yet. It was more of
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: a weapon. You know, if you were down and you
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: had to get back.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: In the game.
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: That's kind of when you used it more as a
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: tactic to try and cut a lead quickly. I think
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: the fact that there was still a lot of big
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: time centers playing, it was a more high percentage shot,
• 8:30
  Speaker 3: and it just took some time for people to, you know,
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: I think embrace analytics. Also. It's not like, you know,
• 8:40
  Speaker 3: I'm not saying, you know, basketball people would be players,
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: coaches and gyms are geniuses. But we did know free
• 8:45
  Speaker 3: was more than two. We did know that. It just
• 8:48
  Speaker 3: took a longer time to implement into their offensive strategy.
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: I do think it was just tradition, you know, But
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: you think about it. Some of the greatest players of
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: all time, Jerry West, Oscar Robertson elegid ballet, they never
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: played a single basketball game with the three point line,
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: so that takes time to kind of get away from
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: those habits. But I do think, look, if you have
• 9:11
  Speaker 3: Kareem in the post and you have an a three
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: point shooter where you give it to Kareem, that's automatic,
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: So percentage of wise, it was still a better play,
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: you know. I think, you know, Nelly, Doug Mo, Paul
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: West had those philosophies came in, but they didn't win.
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: They didn't win championships. So you won a championship, it
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: wasn't really validated. You could always find the negative of
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: that style. But now again, like you know, Nelly, Doug
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: mo whoever those coaches were that had that that philosophy,
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: when the Warriors won and validated it, and then you
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: throw in analytics, you're throwing these all these different dynamics
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: that all of a sudden, you know, were added to
• 9:58
  Speaker 3: the NBA. That shot became the number one shot. You're
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: looking for.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: Someone to go back to. When you were drafted by
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: the Warriors in the mid eighties, so obviously you come
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: from the other side of the country from them, and
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: they didn't have much of a national profile. Like what
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: were the Warriors? What was your understanding of what the
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: Warriors were when you got drafted by them?
• 10:20
  Speaker 3: Well, I knew of the Warriors through Rick Barry. My
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: college coach, Luke Carna Seca head coached Rick in the
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: ABA with the nets. So when I was a kid,
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: a lot of coaches lectures and storytelling was about Rick Barry.
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: So I knew of the Warriors. Rick Barry won a
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: championship here.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: You know, did you meet Rick Berry a lot because
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: of Carna.
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: Sacs No, I did not just heard stories about him
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: at camps. I did not meet him till later on.
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: But then obviously they won the championship in seventy five,
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: so there was you know, we heard about them, not
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: like you would now as far as TV coverage, and
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: then through high school and college, you know, look to
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: grow up in New York, I was Walt Frasier, Willis Reid,
• 11:04
  Speaker 3: Bill Bradley, Earl Monroe. So yes, I didn't have a
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: great understanding of the Warriors franchise and and the history
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: of the franchise. But when I when I've got out here,
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: it still took a little while, but one of the
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: one of the great franchises in the NBA. Uh tremendous
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: longevity and incredible players, incredible history.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: Talk about Oakland versus San Francisco. We not like your
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: ex but how did the two cities view the Warriors?
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: In your opinion, A very very unique situation here because
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: there's only one team. So the Warriors is the Bay
• 11:51
  Speaker 3: Aries team. It always has been, even when Al Addams
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: and Rick Btth they would play different places just because
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: they had to. They play at the Cow Palace, they
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: paid they played.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: Can you imagine during the playoffs, you being in the
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: playoffs and you had to go to different home arenas. Yeah, so,
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: which is what they did in this evenden.
• 12:10
  Speaker 3: And that might not by design, but because of all
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: those dynamics they they've always been the Bay Areas team.
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: They draw from the East Bay, from the South Bay,
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: from San Francisco. I think that the move was natural.
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: It is a little different dynamics. I would I always
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: uh equate it to Brooklyn and Manhattan. It's very similar
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: dynamics geographically, I think there's a similarity there between Oakland
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: being Brooklyn, San Francisco being Manhattan. But but it's worked
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: out really well for the Warriors because because of those
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: things we talked about that they did bounce around the
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: Bay Area even when they weren't when it wasn't planned,
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: that was it was a smooth transition. And I mean
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: that Chase Center is just I mean, it is a
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: beautiful building. I can't think of a nicer building that
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: I've ever been.
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: In Chris for as beloved as the run TMC era was,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: but it didn't last that long, right, a couple of years.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: How are you guys able to gel so quickly when
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: that trio was formed?
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: That was just strictly skill, the compliments, the complement of
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: the complement of skills. So Tim's strengths were my weaknesses.
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: Mitch's strengths were Tim's weaknesses. We were very different players,
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: we had very different personalities, but because of that, we
• 13:45
  Speaker 3: meshed immediately and it was all in the gym. You know,
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: when when when Mitch came on board, he was a
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: pro first day, he looked like he was in the
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: league five six years already, Rookie of the Year average
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: twenty a game, physically showed up and was able to
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: play in the NBA from day one. Tim was very
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: similar because of his incredible confidence, is incredible ball handling,
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: his speed, getting by his man at will. From day one.
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: Wasn't ready to play in the NBA, but we just
• 14:19
  Speaker 3: love to be in the gym together. When Tim had
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: his press conference, we happened all be in town and
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: we went to watch his press conference and we're like,
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: what do you want to do? You want to go
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: get some lunch. He's like, now I want to go
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: to the gym. I want to play. I want to hoop,
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: and that's the first thing we did. We went and
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: played three on three. So that's that's where all our
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: bonding happened and that's where we became closer just and
• 14:42
  Speaker 3: while we're doing that, it was this healthy competition of
• 14:46
  Speaker 3: pushing each other, and that was invaluable. You know, you
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: think about if we're in the gym together, I'm trying
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: to guard Tim Hardaway. That's an incredibly impossible task for me.
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: But when I had a guard, a guard not as
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: quick and helped my defense. And I was not a
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: good defender, but me playing one on one with Tim
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: Hardaway exposed me and made me understand I, you know,
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: some little different tricks to try and keep a guard
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: in front of me. H. So, as you said, Jay,
• 15:16
  Speaker 3: we only played I think two seasons together, which is
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: hard to believe. If that happened now, we'd have an uprun.
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: Is that you know?
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: I think Tim is twenty five or not even I
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: think I was twenty seven, twenty eight, so we were
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: young too.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: So just get into your primes, which.
• 15:33
  Speaker 3: It still pisses us off.
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: But you know, well, what would GM how about this?
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: What would GM Chris Mullen do for that trio to
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: take to help you guys go one more rung up
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: that ladder?
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: You guys were just missing one more thing. What do
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: you think that thing was.
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: I think at that point in time, it was a
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: big man.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: And that's what I was gonna say.
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: It was a big man. Whether it be a power
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: forward or center obviously hard to come by. But our
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: whole thing, all three of us, was it was just
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: too take a few swings at it, you know, tinker
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: around the outside till you have to come inside. But again,
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: you know, that's it's something that we don't talk a
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: lot about, but you know, when you see these guys
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: staying together, like I appreciate, that kind of pisses me
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: off a little bit because I wish that would have
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: happened for us. But I appreciate when teams keep their
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: core together and really trying and try and make that
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: thing work on the outside. But that didn't happen for us.
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: So that's history.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: So to me, the Run teamc ERA both peaked and
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: ended on the same night, and that was in the
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: playoffs when you had run DMC, the actual run DMC
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: come out and do the pregame intros and it pissed
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: off the Lakers to no end. What's the story that night?
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: From from your end?
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: I mean, that was a great marketing campaign because it
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: still lives on today, you know, after to so so
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: that that was a great marketing campaign. I mean, the
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: Lakers got pissed up. I don't think they need to
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: be pissed off to beat us. They're they're pretty good.
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: They're pretty good tee. We we got them in game
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: two there, Uh, and they came back. We woke them up. Uh.
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: But you know, run dmc. Ironically, I was I was
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: classmates with with Daryl McDaniel. He went to Saint John's,
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: we went to school together. So I didn't really think
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: it was that detrimental. But I wasn't in a lake
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: of huddle though. Looking down there, I thought it was
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: pretty cool. We had fun. They came in the day
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: of too early. We had lunch and you know, did
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: some photo shoots and things like that. But again, think
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: about that and we only played two years together, and
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: that that name has stuck all these years. It's pretty amazing.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: Uh.
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: That's social media, no doubt, imagine with a little viral
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: social media. Yeah, hey, Chris. I saw an interview with
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: Paul Gasol about a month ago who said the biggest
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: difference between being a player and being in the front
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: office for him was it was monumental because he goes
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: I didn't realize how much I didn't know. As a player,
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: do you do you have the would you is he
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: onto something? Is that the same experience you would call it?
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: How would you describe being a player? Front office? And
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: with these what the what do you think the player
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: doesn't fully appreciate that you finally get after being in
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: the front.
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: Office Probably the number one thing. There's a lot of
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: things that are not in your control. Much like when
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: you're playing, right, playing you probably control more when you
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: get in the front office. There's a lot of different
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: dynamics that are going into this, decisions that are made,
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: and a lot of times it's not your You don't
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: have the final say. There's gonna be something that overrules
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: that usually money, right, and then I think your job
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: is to make that thing as best as you can,
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: even if you don't agree with so you know they
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: have they have those sayings about you your greed to disagree.
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: Look this today's today's franchising. Hear the word collaboration a lot, right,
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: We're going to collaborate on everything. So what that means
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: is you don't really know where it's coming from. That
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: final decision but I always felt like I was a
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: GM for four years. I always felt like my strength
• 19:51
  Speaker 3: was I was able to use my experience to understand
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: if something I didn't necessarily agree with and I had
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: to had to do something, I could be pretty honest
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: with the players. That's all I ever wanted. That's all
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: I wanted. I think you always hear players say, you know,
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: when they get traded, and hear from somebody that that,
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: to me is overrate because sometimes the team doesn't even
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: know what they're doing. But if on a daily basis
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: you can be honest and forthright as much as possible,
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: then when something big goes down, you've already established your
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: daily how you treat them on a daily basis. It's
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: not a whole lot different than being a teammate. You know,
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: you get a scattering report on yourself as a teammate
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: with your hard worker on time. All the things that
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: you do on a daily basis becomes who you are.
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: I think that's really what you have to do in
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: any role. But as a GM, you know, obviously it's
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: a totally different role now, and all of a sudden
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: you got do these things within four players. But I
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: always felt like if I'm upfront with the guys. I
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: don't really have to put a mask on. Now, you
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: can't ship everything. But again, I think people that you
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: work with can get a feel on how you treat
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: them on a daily basis. So when the big decision
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: does come down or something happens, I think it's more
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: who you are as opposed to what, because business is
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: business sometimes and you don't control everything.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: Now, as GM, you put that we believe team together,
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: drafting Monte Ellis later and he outperformed his draft position,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: traded for Stephen Jackson after running into some trouble in Indiana.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: What was your philosophy in assembling that team.
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, So when I took over, much like when I
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: came here as a player in eighty five, Warriors have
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: been in the playoffs in I don't know, twelve or
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: thirteen years. It was a struggling franchise. I had left
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: to go to Indiana because of the same reasons, you know,
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: because we're just stuck in mud kind of. So I
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: had inside information based on how the franchise was viewed
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: around the league why I left. So when I came
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: back was basically trying to trying to change the perception
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: and the daily flow of the organization to where it was.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: What was what was that perception? By the way, at
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: the time from the.
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: Outside losing franchise, That's what it was. But why you know,
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: win lost records one thing. Twenty and sixty two is
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: one thing. But why And it's the daily habit. Just
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: like I said earlier, how you conduct yourself on a
• 22:49
  Speaker 3: daily basis, not the press releases, not the interviews. What's
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: happened in that building from practice to game, from game
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: to the bus, from bus to the hotel. How's the
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: flow of your day? And we had some success when
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: I was here as a player, and I saw the
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: total difference in that as opposed to when it's not right. Look,
• 23:17
  Speaker 3: you guys been around long enough. You can walk into
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: an NBA locker room and you can feel it. You
• 23:23
  Speaker 3: can feel it now. It's not one thing, it's everything.
• 23:30
  Speaker 3: So when I came back, they had that, They had
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: a pretty good draft class with Gilbert and Troy Murphy
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: and Jason. Then they got Troy, Troy Murphy, Mike de Leedy.
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: So initially it was like, let's build these young guys,
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: try and keep these young guys together. When we traded
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: for Baron Davis. That changed everything. Baron was one of
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: the most gifted players in the league at that point
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: in time, and as soon as I got Barren, I'm like,
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: he's basically Tim Hardaway, similar to it. And then Nelly
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: was available and we got him back. The Indiana trade
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: came about. Obviously, they had that incident in Detroit and
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: Donnie Walsh and the patients were looking to move those guys.
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: We had Troy and Mike de' leevy on contracts that
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: were attractable to them, so we did that deal. It
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: was the perfect fit. All of a sudden, We went
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: from a building franchise with a team that was, you know,
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: a playoff team.
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: How much that having played in Indiana with Donny Welsh
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: as a GM helped facilitate that trade. For you.
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: We had a good relationship Donnia nine. We had a
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: very good relationship and Donnie obviously he's looking for a deal,
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: but he also was interesting send them guys somewhere. He
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: thought that they would do okay. And I don't know
• 24:57
  Speaker 3: if it was a compliment or not, he said, they'll
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: do good with you, so and it worked out. It
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: worked out really well for both for both for the
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: team and for those players because they got a new
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: star that those guys energized the franchise. Again short lived,
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: but I do think that those group of players, Steven Jackson,
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: Baron Davis, monte Al Harrington, all those guys that you mentioned,
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: really re energized the Bay Area and the Warriors fan base.
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: And there was a few more down years after that,
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: and then Stephan them kind of obviously took a whole
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: different level, but you had that sense that it was
• 25:39
  Speaker 3: kind of people had a little bit better feeling about
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: the Warriors doing that. Doing that, we believe wrung like, Okay,
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: they're back in the NBA.
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: Now, we haven't asked your dream team question. And I
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: know we've seen all the docks and a lot of
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: people have seen stuff, but that's that is. There's never
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: going to be another dream team like that, right. Hard
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: to imagine, at least in our lifetimes, that there's never
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: And look, there was a unique circumstance for that. We
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: the rest of the world caught up to us and
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: we couldn't just do it with amateurs anymore. We're like,
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: all right, wait a minute, let's if you're gonna use
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: pros we're going to use our pros in here. But
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: how I mean, you hear these stories about how important
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: Olympic basketball has become for the development of superstars as leaders.
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: What is it about the Olympic experience that seems to
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: then translate to most everybody taking taking something away and
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: making their own team better once they get back into
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: the league.
• 26:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's just such a unique Platform's it
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: stands alone in your career. You know, most guys have
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: their college careers and NBA careers. If you're fortunate enough
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: to be an Olympic player, that totally stands alone. It's
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: it's such a unique experience as so many so few
• 26:59
  Speaker 3: people get to participate. And I think you bought up
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: pal gasol earlier. You know, I've heard pow Derrick. A
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: lot of these international players say that was the first
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: time they felt a little closer to their dream. You know,
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: you know when you're growing up. I know, me growing
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: up in New York always felt like it was Bernard King,
• 27:21
  Speaker 3: Ernie Grunfeld, Albert King, guys from my neighborhood that made it.
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: It feels like it's not that impossible if someone close
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: to you can make it that dreams a little closer.
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: So for those European players, for the farm players, when
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: the dream team was closer to them, we're in Spain,
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: all of a sudden that dream is closer to them.
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: They can almost they can feel it, they can touch it,
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: they can dream a little closer to them. So I
• 27:46
  Speaker 3: think that was and that was David Stern's idea globalizing
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: the NBA obviously worked to perfection, but I think if
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: you talk to those European players of Pawer Gasol's age,
• 28:02
  Speaker 3: I think that's when they really felt a little closer
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: to the NBA dream could be a reality for them.
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: Now lo and behold, I think over third of our
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: leagues far and board players globally probably you know, just
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: second to soccer as far as participation and the most
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: popular sport in the world. So it's been an amazing transformation.
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: But what's really amazing to me was that was the plan.
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: The plan was to globalize the game, get out there
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: and market it. Yeah, it sure did, it really did.
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: It's amazing.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: So I want to take it back to the night
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: of your Jersey retirement, because both you and Rick Berry,
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: in trying to settle the crowd down, said you know
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: this ownership group, Joe Lekab and company are going to
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: do great things. You believed in them, You believed it
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: was coming. What gave you that belief? What did you
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: see that made you think that much better? Times around
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: the way.
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: The first thing that I remember that night because I
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: looked over to the bench and Mark Jackson was there.
• 29:06
  Speaker 3: You know, and I have known Mark since he was
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: a sophomore in high school. So I felt like, first
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: of all, they've got they've got a great coach. I
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: know Mark for forever since we were kids. I'd been
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: over to some of their practices. I'd watched Stephen Clay
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: before they became the Splash Brothers. I saw uh an
• 29:26
  Speaker 3: energy kind of college atmosphere in the gym, once again,
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: getting back to what's really matters, like not. I was
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: in the in the practice gym, and I just saw
• 29:35
  Speaker 3: something that was like it was, It was genuine, it
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: was real. So and look, change has changed, man, you
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: got to move on. So it was it was wasn't
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: like I knew anything, but I knew Joe Laker was
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: was a new owner. He was going to do his
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: best to put the best product on the floor. I
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: think Rick felt the same way. Rick had more impact
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: than maybe because Rick was a champion, so Rick knows
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: and Rick doesn't hold back, so that you know, like
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: I said earlier, that all worked out beautifully with four championships,
• 30:14
  Speaker 3: six straight trips in the NBA finals. But again, sports
• 30:19
  Speaker 3: is all about change. We've we've talked about the three
• 30:21
  Speaker 3: point shot evolution. That's what it's all about. Most people
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: don't like change, but when it happens, it might be uncomfortable.
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: But most times it's better to change than to stay
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: the same.
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: I know there's a little you know, you you've you've
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: worked more on the business side of of of pros.
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: But speaking of change, college basketball is changing quite a bit.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: N I l and sort of the professional lizing of it.
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: And you're when you're in one of the you were
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: in college in one of those periods where players stayed
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: three or four years before you jumped, just before the
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: one and done's and everything that evolved, and then the
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: sort of the prominence of high school players and now
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: we're kind of potentially going back where we'll see guys
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: stay in college three or four years. You just said
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: something interesting with hey changes. Nobody likes it, but eventually
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: it leads to something. What's your sense of where this
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: is headed? And is it going to make the NBA
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: better or is it going to make the jobs of
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: gms harder?
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah? I think both. Actually, I look at this transition
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: period with NIL and the transfer portal, and there's a
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: lot of a lot of things that are volative right now.
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: But I always tell people, Yeah, for me, it's it
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: doesn't seem to be, you know, something I would endorse,
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: but but I'd look at it. Let's say twenty five
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: years from now, people grow up with it. It's going
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: to be natural for them, you know. So it's so
• 32:00
  Speaker 3: again it's change. It's gonna take a little time. I
• 32:03
  Speaker 3: think they've got to obviously come together on a collective
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: agreement on some type of UH guard rails and bounds.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: Interesting you went there, That's my guess. Collective bargaining feels
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: like the answer.
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, because look, for all intentsive purposes, and they've said it,
• 32:18
  Speaker 3: it's a pro league. Now, that's what it is. So
• 32:20
  Speaker 3: the pro league. You need to collective body agreement. So
• 32:22
  Speaker 3: that's what needs to get done. And then I think
• 32:26
  Speaker 3: people feel I think better about the because look, NBA,
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: NHL NFL. It's all about the competitive landscape being Even
• 32:37
  Speaker 3: if you don't have that, you have problems because then
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: you're questioning is everyone playing on the same with the
• 32:44
  Speaker 3: same rules. So that has to get figured out. But again,
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: kids that grow up with it in thirty years I
• 32:51
  Speaker 3: wouldn't even be a discussion that's going to be natural
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: for them. So it's gonna take time. But in the
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: meantime they do have to come together and for the
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: fans and people like us, so we understand is every
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: team the same or is it just do whatever you want?
• 33:05
  Speaker 3: And so that's where it's at now. They called the
• 33:07
  Speaker 3: wild Wild West, I guess. But in the meantime, I'm
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: sure it's a headache for coaches and athletic directors and
• 33:15
  Speaker 3: all those people because no one knows what the rules are.
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: That's that's never a good thing.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: So while you're looking ahead, I'm going to ask you
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: to play future historian. This will be the final question
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: for me. How will history look back on this era
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: of the Warriors? Is Steph Curry, Steve Kerr, Draymond Green
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: you know will include Clay right because he was there
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: for all four the championship. Of course, Slay Thompson, you know,
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: and we've seen now, yeah, we've seen his victim, Wembin
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: Yama shooting threes, and we've seen just collectively how many
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: threes teams get up per game. To the point that
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: the Warriors aren't so extraordinary anymore. Right, They've kind of
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: been brought to the pack where once they were way
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: out ahead. So how sustainable is this? How how will
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: we look back on how much and how permanently or
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: how lasting the changes that the Warriors brought about will be.
• 34:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great question. I think it will live
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: to test the time and the main reason. And look,
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: when you have a great team and championship dynasty, you
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: always have so many different players and coaches and owners.
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: Everyone contributes in different uh, in different ways, in different levels.
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: But I always look back at the Larry Bird Celtics,
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: Magic Johnson, Lakers, Michael Jordan's Bulls, for instance, for those three.
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: Now they had Pip and they had all the players,
• 34:47
  Speaker 3: but really the main guy, so to me, with the
• 34:50
  Speaker 3: Warriors with total respect, J two, Steve Kerr, Joe Laka,
• 34:55
  Speaker 3: Clay who I love, Draymond, Kevin durant All, Andrea Goadala
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: up and down, the line, it's Steph Curry, and because
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: of Steph's unique ability to play without the basketball, that's
• 35:12
  Speaker 3: what has set the Warriors apart. I don't know the
• 35:15
  Speaker 3: percentage or the three point percentage, but in my mind,
• 35:19
  Speaker 3: watching what the Warriors did during their dynasty years, those
• 35:26
  Speaker 3: six years to the finals and then probably a ten
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: year of stretch where they were so great, I feel
• 35:31
  Speaker 3: like the way they created three point shots were different
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: than what we're seeing now. They people getting forty three
• 35:39
  Speaker 3: point shots up. Let's say both teams get forty three
• 35:42
  Speaker 3: point shots up. I felt like the Warriors, because of Steph,
• 35:47
  Speaker 3: generated higher quality shots more consistently. I could be wrong,
• 35:53
  Speaker 3: you know, I don't. I don't know the exact percentages,
• 35:56
  Speaker 3: but I felt like the way they did it was
• 36:00
  Speaker 3: much tougher to guard, much more unpredictable, which is what
• 36:06
  Speaker 3: offensive basketball is all about, the being unpredictable. People have
• 36:10
  Speaker 3: tried to emulate that with the spread, but they don't
• 36:13
  Speaker 3: have Steph Curry. And Steph's not only his physical stamina
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: to be able to run old, but his incredible change
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: of pace, set a screen, come off a screen. All
• 36:26
  Speaker 3: those different things he did opened up so many opportunities
• 36:30
  Speaker 3: I just felt like that was what set them apart.
• 36:32
  Speaker 3: The three point the amount of threes. That kind of
• 36:36
  Speaker 3: is what it is. Right everyone's shooting forty now. But
• 36:38
  Speaker 3: I still look back, I think they did it more
• 36:43
  Speaker 3: unique and better than what I've seen since then. That's
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: just my personal opinion. So they'll stand to test the
• 36:52
  Speaker 3: time and that group obviously for the Warriors the greatest
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: of all time, that that unique four championships. But I
• 37:00
  Speaker 3: do think, especially like those Kevin Durant years, I think
• 37:04
  Speaker 3: they're underrated. So I think when you look back, that
• 37:08
  Speaker 3: might be that the year they won with Kevin might
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: be the greatest team of all time. They got to
• 37:15
  Speaker 3: be in the conversation.
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: In my mind, they're in the tournament, that's for sure.
• 37:18
  Speaker 3: They got to be in there. I mean that team.
• 37:20
  Speaker 3: I was in New York then too. I wasn't here.
• 37:23
  Speaker 3: I remember sitting up. I was coaching Saint John. I
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: remember going going home. I'm just gonna watch the first
• 37:29
  Speaker 3: half because I don't want to stay up too late.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: Man.
• 37:31
  Speaker 3: I couldn't turn that game off. I was up every
• 37:34
  Speaker 3: night till two thirty three, Like damn, I wanted to
• 37:37
  Speaker 3: go to sleep. I couldn't turn it off. I couldn't
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: leave it. They was so I remember watching them, They're
• 37:41
  Speaker 3: down twenty, I'm like, they're gonna win by fifteen, like what?
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: But I knew it they were that good. So I,
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: like you said, I think they've definitely that team to me,
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: when you look back, is going to be right up
• 37:53
  Speaker 3: there with one, you know, maybe the greatest of all time.
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: Chris Mallin. This was great. Appreciate all the all the
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: time and the stories.
• 38:02
  Speaker 3: My pleasure. Thank you guys, always a pleasure.
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: Awesome, great scenior, Chris, my pleasure. Got it, man. I
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: could have talked ball with Chris Mullen all day that
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: that was fascinating. But also the the the geographic perspective,
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: maybe you could say that having a New Yorker the
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: way he framed uh, Oakland and San Francisco is being
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: basically the West Coast version.
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: How do you think Bay Area people would would take that?
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: I thought that was interesting and I bought it, But
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: I'm curious what what what somebody in the West Coast
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: would think of that description.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: I think it holds up as as someone who you
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: spend a lot of time. My grandparents lived in the Bay,
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: so I spent a lot of time up there, and
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: I think it's true that the you know, the San
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: Francisco and Manhattan get all the glory and there there's
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: there's a little bit of envy right on on on
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: the eastern side, a.
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: Little bit of a chip, right the Brooklyn chip, the
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: Oakland chip. Yeah, there's similar chips. Yeah, I thought I
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: thought that there.
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: And just you know, the conversation about the role of
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: the three pointers I thought was fascinating too.
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: You know, he we have full disclosure. We interviewed him
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: the day after Game three of the NBA Finals, which
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: I think he signposted once. But you know, look, look
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna I want to out us here a little bit. JA.
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: This entire episode has been taped as we've been watching
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: Wemby make his way through the playoffs now he's in
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: the finals. I cannot help because we're talking about a
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: guy like Steph Curry who completely transformed the league and
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: changed the league. And as we're talking about this, as
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: we're diving into this history, we keep talking about Wemby
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: and you and I can't help it, and Chris Mullin
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: couldn't help it. And it, I mean, it is fascinating
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: to know that we're making this about one transformational period
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: in the NBA in a at a time where we
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: may be in the middle of another one.
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: And again we don't know the outcome of the finals
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: as we were as we're talking, but one thing we
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: can't say definitively is that Victor wembin Yama has already
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: managed to do something that two transformational figures Shaquille O'Neal
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: and Lebron James, could not do in their maiden voyage
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: in the NBA finals, and that's win a game. Both
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: the Shaq and Lebron got swept the first time they
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: went to the finals. So again, someone that's young isn't
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: supposed to be doing these type of things. And again,
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: regardless if they lose in five or winning seven, he's
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: already done something that these other you know, arguably the
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: players of their eras, were not able to do the
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: first time that they got to the finals.
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: So we can well, it's amazing and feel like every
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: time every time he does something at one of these
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: they flash the screen and it's like not since and
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: it's magic in nineteen eighty or Kobe the first time
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: he made it, absolutely that's a that's an impressive company.
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about some of the greatest games in Warriors history,
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: bringing it back to Warriors Grounds in this same and
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: we'll talk the games that define a franchise. Chuck, I
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: think I know where you're going to start with when
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: we talk Warriors.
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: Well, I think you can't. You're going to talk about
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: the greatest games. It's just like when we were mailed
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: in our Mount Rushmore. I mean, you gotta have Wilt
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: in one hundred, right, It's it's look, we we dove
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: into it big time. I mean, there's so many unique
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: aspects to it, so many oddities to the game. That
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: it was in Hershey, Pennsylvania for one thing, right, the
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: fact that it wasn't even in one of the three
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: cities the Warriors called home. The no footage of it
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: it is. It is one of those it's not word
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: of mouth. We know it exists, we know there's some audio,
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: and there's it is just in some ways the game
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: is so important because of how hard it's been to
• 41:56
  Speaker 2: preserve the game right in order to have keep evidence
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: that the game existed. In fact, I think it's fascinating
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: that journalists at that time as we told the story.
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: We're so worried about proving this game happened, that they
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: had him hold up that piece of paper, right, the
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: famous piece of paper, right, like it's you know, we're
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: historians at the end of the day, as journalists, right,
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: and we're just desperate to preserve the existence of this game.
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: So yeah, I'm want.
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: To put that on the documentation, right, the rough first
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: draft of history. And that's literally a rough draft and
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: you write out on a piece of paper the back.
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: I think of a box scorer one hundred and just
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: one of the all time images in the NBA, I've
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: got two. One would be Game six of the twenty
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: sixteen Western Conference Finals, which was the birth of Game six.
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: Clay he became known for his great performances in Game six,
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: and in this one, the OG one forty one points,
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: eleven three pointers and basically saves the Warriors and enabled
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: them to keep that quest alive. That was in the
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: midst of the coming off to a seventy three game season,
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: seventy three win season, and of course they lost in
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: the finals and they blew the three to one lead.
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: Blah blah blah. I guess they'll say care hearing about
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: that stuff, but it wouldn't have even had the opportunity
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: to play in the finals, and maybe Joe Laker's perspective
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: more importantly, that game was worth like forty or fifty
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: million dollars to the Warriors because Tim Kawakami did the
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: math back then when he was still writing for the
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: San Jose Mercury News, I believe, and he wrote about
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: the fact that or he might have been at the
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: Athletic by that, but he that game was worth like
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: ten million dollars just for bringing a Game seven. That's
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: what that was worth. And then the fact that you
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: wouldn't have had those finals games, which were worth another
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: probably ten to fifteen million each, you know, and they
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: got the maximum number of finals games, four finals games,
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: so just adding extension, yeah yeah, I mean he literally
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: paid for that extension like with that game and all
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: the money that they made subsequently from that. And then
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: for me, and this is on my personal list of
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: games I wish I'd been at that I didn't get
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: to cover. I covered a lot of great ones, including
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: at the Game seven of that twenty sixteen Cleveland series,
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: but Game four at Boston, they're down to one and
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: you know, Curry his legacy. I don't want to use
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: that word, but you know, the way we think of
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: him was at Stake and he digs deep, comes up
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: with four to three points, ten rebounds, just wills his team.
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: From the early moments of that game, like he's yelling
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: at the Boston crowd, like you can see he was like,
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: I'm here, I'm in this, I'm about to win this
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: game for us and tie this series. And of course
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: the Celtics never won another game in that series. I
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: think the defining performance of Stephen Curry's career.
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: You know, there was always the Stephan right, Kobe had
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: the Kobe and Shack, and then he got one without Shack,
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: and I would hear all the commentary. I remember at
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: the time saying, now, he doesn't need it for his legacy.
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: But then why did you bring it up? Because it
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: did seem like the entire basketball community really wanted to
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: make sure Stuff had it so that there wouldn't be
• 45:07
  Speaker 2: this debate of whether.
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: Stuff it seemed like it's a him because he broke
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: down in tears. He didn't cry after the first three
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: championships that they won. He cried after that one because
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: it meant that much to him.
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: Nominate one other game, and I only do it because
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: I think I'm just going to expose my age a
• 45:25
  Speaker 2: little bit. But what I think of individual amazing games
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: and Warriors history for me is Sleepy Floyd game. Oh yeah,
• 45:34
  Speaker 2: And I went to relook it back up just to
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: make sure I remember, and look, it's what was remarkable
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: is that game. He scored fifty one points. He got
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: twenty nine in the fourth quarter. It was a playoff game.
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: It was Western Conference semifinals. They were down three out
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: of the Lakers. It was a way to force the
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: game five. But the fact they made it to the
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: second round was in itself an upset. They actually only
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: won forty two games. That's they were barely over five hundred.
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: They knock off Utah and they get into that second round.
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: But what made that game that I just remember the
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: fifth You're like fifty one points in the playoffs, and
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: it wasn't by a guy that you automatically thought was
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: a Hall of Famer. Now, for me, I knew Sleepy
• 46:18
  Speaker 2: Floyd was because I love those Big East teams. He
• 46:21
  Speaker 2: was part of the Georgetown he played with.
• 46:24
  Speaker 3: You.
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but there was always like that until the Warriors
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: became a bigger franchise. That was one of the bigger
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: games in their history.
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: That about all they had, yeah, for a series that
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: they wound up losing. Just that that one brief moment
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: on one scintillating quarter that he did. I want to
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: get into something that we actually cut out of the episode.
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: Well disclosed it there. You know, we had the trim
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: the episode down, and we had we got into a
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: conversation about the meaning of the regular season and how
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: you know, it was prompted by I was saddened that
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: because the Warriors didn't complete that seventy three one season
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: with the championship, that that season has kind of been
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: tossed aside and the incentive to for anyone to try
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: to break that record was lost, and as a result,
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: we'll never see another regular season that had as much
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: meaning and significance day in and down. That led to
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: a discussion about just the overall value of the regular season,
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: and in the indroom, I went to a couple games
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: of the NBA Finals and Mike Brown said something that
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: sort of validated me and that he said he really
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: uses the regular season. This was his first year coaching
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: the team, because the regular season makes you, it forms
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: the habits, and he welcomes the adversity that you might
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: encounter because you're gonna definitely see adversity in the playoffs.
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: You know, this next team that made it to the
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: finals was down two one to Atlanta in the first round,
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: and by testing out that adversity, by doing a dry
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: run of adversity in the regular season, I think the
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: Knicks got off to a two and three start to
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: this regular season. You got a new coach and a
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: lot of questions, and obviously they pulled things together. But
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: Mike Brown kind of kind of repeatedly throughout these NBA
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: Finals has talked about the importance of the regular season,
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: how you develop it, and he said he was curious,
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: like how would the players react, how would the owner react,
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: how would his boss, the you know, the executive, Leon
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: Rose react when the team had adversity. So he really
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: he's someone who values the regular season, even if a
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: lot of the fans don't anymore.
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: But you can what you just said there, you can
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: value the regular season but still not prioritize winning a
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: specific game, right, And I think that's the dilemma, right,
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: which is no doubt Mike Brown is using the regular
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: season to figure how deep can I go on my bench?
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: What do I do in this situation? I can do this?
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: So it's certainly it's a way to do real time
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: simulations and experiments and all of that stuff. But what
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: do you do if prioritizing winning that game is not
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: the priority?
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: Right? And but even Phil Jackson was someone who would
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: be willing to lose a game or two here and
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: there if it meant if it meant learning lessons for
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: the long term. But Phil Jackson is also the coach
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: of a team that won seventy two games in the
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: regular season that the record.
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: That that was an era of players that just wanted
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: to play.
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: And yeah, it helps that Michael Jordan and Steph Curry
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: shares that with Michael. You know, we don't compare to
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: Michael Jordan a lot, but clearly he had that desire
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: every single night, bring it, just like Michael Jordan did.
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: By the way, it reminds me of one other thing
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: from the Mullen interview that stuck with me. When you
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: were asking about how did you get your chemistry and
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: it was just like we just went to the gym.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, was that awesome that after the press conference. Hey, yeah,
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: Tim Hardiber, what do you want to do? I want
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: to get something that No, man, let's go who.
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: Let's go right, like you know, and how do you
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: get to know somebody better than doing that? Probably it
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: makes a ton of sense to me.
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: Know, great interview. I love We'll just go on.
• 50:04
  Speaker 2: Hey, before we get to questions, we you know, we
• 50:07
  Speaker 2: thought we would update something based on a previous episode,
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: so obviously our first episode with the Dodgers, and we
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: made a you know, we've we've talked about and we
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: do it very Look, we're not we're not here to
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: to to linger on the warts, as we've called them.
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: When it comes to these franchises. These are celebrations, but
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: they're serious dives. They we we we definitely are striving
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: for accuracy, not mythology here. And one of the warts
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: of the Dodgers had to do with certainly with gay
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: rights in particular, but there was a specific player, Glenn Burke,
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: who frankly just wasn't treated well by the team and
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: the ownership back in the seventies. Well, uh, this came
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: across our our our transit over the last couple of days,
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: and we thought we'd share with you that did Dodgers
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: decide to unveil a tribute to LGBTQ trailblazers Billy Bean
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: and Glenn Burke. They both played for LA They were
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: among the first professional athletes to identify publicly as gay.
• 51:10
  Speaker 2: And they're not going to be a permanent display housed
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: in the center field plaza that features pictures and memorabilia
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: from their careers and explaining their contributions to Major League
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: Baseball and professional sports. So ja, what do you think, you.
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: Know, the Dodgers, Yeah, it's just good to see them
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: address this. You know, as we said, they do have
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: a kind of a checkered past in history when it comes.
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: To notable they're doing this in June Pride month.
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it was definitely a big part of Pride Month,
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: but it had actually already done some things to honor
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: them in prior Pride months. But this is something that
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: you know, this display is like right next to Fernando
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: Mania display, So they're really elevating these pioneers. And again
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: Glenn Burke, the inventor of the high five, he gets
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: credited with that, and so just em braceon What was
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: cool was that, you know, the sad part is neither
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: Glenn nor Billy Bean or are still with us. But
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: Glen Burke's sister was there, Billy Bean's husband was there,
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: so they at least got to see, you know, their
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: their loved ones honored in this way, and future visitors
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: to Dodger Stadium will see them acknowledged and and and honored.
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: And again, you can't undo the mistakes of the past,
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: but you can make things right in the present and
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: looking forward to the future. I always say there's never
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: a wrong time to do the right thing, and I
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: want to commend the Dodgers for doing the right thing here.
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: I commend that it's not just a press release in
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: a day, that it turned into a permanent display. And
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: I do think that that that that that fits the
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: Dodger that is the Dodger story. The Dodgers want to
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: tell right that they've always been one that broke and
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: that tried to help others break barriers.
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: If you want that as part of your part of
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: your narrative, you better live by it everywhere.
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: And the Dodgers have been a universal and inclusive community
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: and a center point of a community, and this just
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: makes them more inclusive and broadens the range of the
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: people that can feel invested in and represented by the Dodgers.
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: Sous kudos.
• 53:28
  Speaker 2: Like you said, it's never too late to do the
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: right thing, but this was late. Let's not beat around
• 53:33
  Speaker 2: the bush.
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: We'll wrap up today's episode with the fan mail segment.
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: We'll take questions from the listeners and Tuck. Our first
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: question is from Brett from New Hope, Pennsylvania, who says,
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: I read once that Will Chamberlain actually started his professional
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: career with the Harlem Globe Trotters. Why did do that
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: rather than go directly to the NBA. Anything playing for
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: the Globetrotters helped or hurt his NBA career.
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: Well, let's go to the facts. He kind of he
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: had no choice, it turns out Ice I guess he
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: had choice, but he that was back when the NBA,
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: you know, he he couldn't join until his entire graduating
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: class in college could be eligible for the NBA, So
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: he had a one year. He took a gap year
• 54:16
  Speaker 2: with the Globe Trotters.
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: Basically, JA travel Like, if you do a gap year,
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: you should travel the globe, right or trot the globe?
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: Well, he didn't just trot the Globe. He got to
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: go to the Globe Chrotters to Moscow in nineteen fifty
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: nine and he had an audience with Kruse Chef, or
• 54:32
  Speaker 2: at least the whole Globetrotters did.
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: That had to be something. Give me crew Chef looking
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: up at Will in terms of it help you wonder
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: if it hurt in that at a time where he
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: could have been honing his competitive juices, he was playing
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: in these games and you know, the knock on Will
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: was that he wasn't the winner that Russell was. And
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: I don't know to what extends.
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: You know, it's not fair, but is there something to
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: be symbolic?
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: Like Wilt's been this great showman and he would have had
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: all these great statistics but he wasn't. But he, you know,
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: he was always chasing Russell and in some ways Russell's
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: you know it, it's not fair, but in some ways
• 55:16
  Speaker 2: that like Wilt being part of a show business basketball
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: team actually makes a lot of sense when you think
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: about his career.
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: Right explains it?
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: He Hey, by the ways, good money. NBA was paying
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: nine grand a year and he on average and the
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: Globetritters gave him fifty.
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: Well, underrated businessman by the way, you know, when he
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: gets to Las, an entrepreneur, and so that entrepreneurial spirit
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: kicking in early on Graham.
• 55:43
  Speaker 2: All right, I'll read the next one here, Lenny from
• 55:45
  Speaker 2: Nashaua in New Hampshire. Some rivals like Chris Evert and
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: Martinez Avertilova became close friends. What was the off the
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: court relationship like between Wilt and Bill Russell JA, I
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: know you've got an anecdote on this.
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: Yes, So in the nineteen ninety six ninety seven season,
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: as the NBA celebrated its fiftieth anniversary, they kicked off
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: that whole celebration with just an afternoon of Wilt and
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: Bill Russell in I think it was a hotel ballroom
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: in New York. I wasn't there. My colleague Michael Wilbon
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: at the Washington Post went up and covered it, and
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: it's just the two of them sharing stories, and they
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: talked about how close they actually were despite being known
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: as this fierce rivalry. They would have dinner at each
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: other's houses before games, you know, like Wilt was up
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: in Boston to play the Celtics. They'd have dinner the
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: night before the game and then go out and give
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: each other hell the next night, and they would get
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: together for Thanksgiving with each other's families, things like that.
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: So they actually did have this warm relationship. I'll tell
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: the story. They tell the story of a Frand Blindbear,
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: the writer who was on the panel for the fifty
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: Greatest players at that fiftieth anniversary celebration at the All
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: Star Game that year.
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: And.
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: Fran had gotten his book as a panelist to select
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: the fifty Greatest. He got invited to the reception where
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: all the Greatest assembled, all the living ones, and they
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: were almost all there, and they're all signing each other's books.
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: But Bill Russell, who had a no autograph policy except
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: for his peers, didn't sign his book. So day after
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: All Star weekend, they're at the airport lounge and Francies
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: will say, how was your weekend? It's great, except the
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: only thing I didn't get was will to sign or
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: Bill Russell to sign my book. He said, really, okay,
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: he's right around the corner here, hold on, and he
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: brings him around and Bill, whyouldn't you sign Fran's book?
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: And you know, I don't sign books autographs for people,
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: And Shamela says William Pelton, Russell, you signed for the many.
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: He gets out and signs the book. So the fact
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: that he could be rates bill Our into signing an
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: autograph speaks to their relationship.
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: But j let me ask you this as someone covered
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: the league as closely as you did and have one
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: of the common things you'll hear from guys of Barkley's
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: generation or of Magic's generation is that, yeah, they were friendly,
• 58:35
  Speaker 2: but there wasn't an you know that today's players are
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: too friendly. And yet here you're just describing this incredible
• 58:43
  Speaker 2: friendship that's supposedly two of the greatest rivals, you know,
• 58:46
  Speaker 2: one of the greatest rivalries in all of sports, Russell
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: versus will that they were also friends. So is this
• 58:54
  Speaker 2: just bs stuff that that ex players say about current players.
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: Everything in nostalgia gets tinged a little bit, right, But
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: I do think there was, you know, more of a
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: willingness to shut off that friendship. And you know, I
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: mean a great example is that Magic and Isaiah were
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: super tight, right like they were boys, and Mark Mark
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: McGuire was part of that trio. And then they face
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: each other in the finals and a few hard hits
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: here and there, and elbows and some bloodshed, and like
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: they weren't on speaking terms for a while after that, Right,
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: So there is something to the fact that even if
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: they could be that close, but then the competitive juices
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: on the court would flow faster. And I don't know
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: how many close friendships have been. Like what's wild to
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: me is that, you know, Lebron James and Draymond Green
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: had that incident in the middle of the twenty sixteen finals.
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: You could argue that the course of NBA history was
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: altered dramatically. No longer mad as much because Draymond couldn't resist,
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: you know, reaching up and and punching Lebron James and
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: the groin as Lebron walked over him. But they're tied,
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: like they do each other's podcasts and and you know
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: they're they're really close afterwards. So I mean, if you
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: want them to be mortal enemies for life or how
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: you prefer it, I don't know. So it's it's never
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: quite the way it's remembered in the past, but I
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: do think there was a little bit more of an
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: edge to it that you would see reflected on the court. Yeah,
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: all right, all right, I'll take one from Jim from Carmel, California.
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 2: By the way, is Carmel Carmel away?
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I should say Carmel, I should know better.
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 2: No, I mean it's just only the best place on
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: earth to go.
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And the former mayor of Clint Eastwood, you know, yeah,
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: do me with a forty four magnum for miss Bonasa, uh,
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: he says, I'll. Adams, Don Nelson, and Steep Kerr are
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: generally regarded as the best Warriors head coaches. In what
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: order would you rank them? And why? Well, I think you.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: Got to have a ring, right, So Kurr's got more
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 2: than one, Adams has one, and I don't think Delly
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: has one.
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: When Nelly has though, is the most regular season victories
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: of them all, I think of all time actually, but
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: everybody's the stigma of never having coached the team into
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: the NBA finals. So Nelly probably the most innovative, that's
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: probably the most outside the box thinker of all them.
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: But we're results oriented league, right, So.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: It's also why Nelly's career has spanned so many I mean,
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 2: he adapted to multiple generations of players because of the
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 2: way he thought, right.
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And we talk about legacy, so like the
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: point forward, which is something he instituted in Milwaukee with
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: Marcus Johnson Paul Pressey. You know, so it something you
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: might see Kevin Garnett when Kevin Garnett would bring the
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: ball up for the Timberwolves, right, you know, that's kind
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: of a Nelly legacy. Like I don't know if we'll
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: see the legacy to the degree from the other guys.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: But now he doesn't have the hardware, doesn't have the
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: rings and the championships as a coach. One one as
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: a player with the Celtics, but yeah, as a coach,
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: So he's got to be third on that list to me.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: Last question comes from Russell from New York City. Joe Lacup,
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: the majority owner of the Warriors, made his billions in
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: Silicon Valley as a partner in the legendary venture capital
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 2: firm Kleiner Perkins. How do you think his background has
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: influenced his philosophy and decisions as head of the team. Boy,
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 2: I've thought a lot about this, ja because I think
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: I do believe the owner mattered here that without sort
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 2: of somebody with Frankly, the patience and the impatience of
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 2: a venture capitalist weirdly creates a creates a culture of
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: innovation and accountability that I can't help but think had
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: a huge impact. I mean, there's a reason why so
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: many other Warriors owners didn't have the success that lakopad.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: So I think the specific venture capital experience actually is
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: a good mindset for a sports owner because guess what,
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: in venture capitalism, just like with drafting player capital, you're
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: not going to have one hundred percent hit right. In fact,
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: you only have to have about a thirty percent hit
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 2: right to be really successful. So I think it's almost
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: it's an ideal background for an NBA owner.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: Well, you could argue that that mentality helped the success
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: be the success, right, So the willingness to spend and
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: to get Kevin Durant and to take on a salary,
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: so it's like another Max guy to go with Curry, right, Uh,
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: you know, the willingness to go into the aprons. But
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: you wonder sometimes if it hindered them, such as the
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: famed or the infamous two timelines philosophy where they thought
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: they could straddle the fence and keep competing for championships
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: in Steph Curry's prime or his extended prime and developed
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: the younger players that came along. You know, they kind
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: of blooped into having some high draft picks because you
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: have injuries after the after that championship run, that initial
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: championship run, and so you get stocked with like number
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: two picks and these high picks that are hard to
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: come by for successful teams these days. But they didn't
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: hit on the draft picks, and they kind of got handcuffed,
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: and you saw sometimes trying to have it both ways,
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: you know, bit them and so like they let Gary
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: Payton go to uh, you know, to try to have
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: some flexibility and maneuverability. And then they're like, oh, wait
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: a minute, we kind of need Gary Payton back because
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: we need that Gary Payton. Second, we need that we
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: need that perimeter defender. And so now it costs you
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: even more to get him back, you know, and you
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: lost what you got in trading him. I think they
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: had to send a couple of draft picks away. So
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: it's hit or miss again. Just like when we're ranking
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: the coaches, we have to rank the results. And this
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: he's an ownership that is accounted for like what over
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: half of the championships and Warriors history. So he has
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: to rank as by far the greatest owner, and he
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: has to rank as someone whose philosophy you know, was
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: beneficial to the team, but it did have his drawbacks.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: Well look, you know, and what I would award a
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 2: warning to mister lake Up. Let me tell Let me
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: tell you the story of John Henry, the current owner
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: of the Red Sox, who was beloved for bringing four
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 2: World Series championships to Boston and the what have you
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 2: done for me lately? Fans now hate him now, can't
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 2: stand venture capitalists now have people like screaming about, oh
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 2: this has been private equity has been terrible for the
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 2: Red Sox. In fact that it showed up at a
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 2: political ad believe it or not in New England recently,
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 2: uh in a candidate was attacking private equity and it's
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 2: even been bad for a beloved Red Sox, you know.
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: So that would be my holy warning to mister Lakeup.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: He's better keep it going because fans have a they
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 2: have a long memory and and very little patience.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: And I hope he listens to my interview with Chris
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: Mullen because Chris Mullen made it clear that eras are
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: really about the guy, not the players. But Magic Bird
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: Jordan's Steph Curry.
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 2: Well, that's going to be their their next challenge. I mean, look,
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 2: by the time people listen to this conversation, there's going
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 2: to be a lot of talk about what are the
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 2: Warriors gonna do next season? Are they gonna are they
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 2: gonna you know, are are pow? Bill Simmons has this,
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 2: like all the old guys just get together on the Warriors,
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 2: uh plan right, put lebron s deaf and a D
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: and and and put together this sort of I think
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 2: he called him the whatever, comparing it to those Arnold
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 2: Schwarzenegger Slice to Alone movies whatever that old where like
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 2: these old guys get together to you know, make a
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 2: movie essentially that that's what they do. I just don't
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 2: know how the Warriors put a winner together that can
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 2: compete against either Okac or San Antonio in the next
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 2: two years. And let's be realistic, you basically have what
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 2: a two year two year window max with staff.
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: Now, yeah, the problem is they'll be paying them probably
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: for four right. Uh, they'll be paying him.
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 2: For thirty and I should I mean, I mean he's
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 2: gonna be worth it, right as as sort.
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: Of an ambassador season tickets and camp sweets right to
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: catch the end of the step run. And he's owed
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: the money for those years he was underpaid right on
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: that contract that we talked about in our last episode, Jock,
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: what's coming up in our next episode, Well, let's.
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 2: Give you a little hint here before. For our next
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 2: two episodes, we're going to change things up a bit.
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 2: We're moving from a dynastic team to one of the
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 2: most dynastic tournaments in all of sports, Wimbledon. When you
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 2: think of July sporting events, I think there's no other
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 2: one that jumps out more than Wimbledon. In the first episode,
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 2: Jay and I will chronicle the history of the tournament,
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 2: which goes back to eighteen seventy seven, and we're going
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 2: to do a deep dive into some of the great rivalries.
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: Just like the question brought up, you got Chris Evered
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 2: to Martine Navratilova, Macenroe Borg spoiler alert, I was like
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 2: the lone kid rotten for Borg in America. Apparently Federer, Nadal,
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 2: you name it, Arthur Ash, Billy Jan King. I mean,
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 2: there have been some huge people. Yeah, And in the
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 2: second episode, we'll of course interview one of the iconic
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 2: figures from Wimbledon's past.
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: Before we say goodbye today, we want to thank Steve Hull,
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: our partner and executive producer, Andrew Sampson, the head of
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: programming and our production partner at Showboat Media, KEM Kennedy,
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: our producer, and Meredith Boli, our researcher. Please send us
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: your questions for future episodes through our social media channels
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: at Dynastic Pod or through our YouTube channel, and please
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: follow and review us. Thank you so much for listening
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: and watching Dynastic. We'll see you next time.