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NBA Offseason Takes I Wish I Had Back · Small Ball with Kenny Beecham

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back to another episode of Small Ball with Kenny Beecham.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: We're about a week into the NBA season.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: And guess what I want?
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: I want some of my offseason takes back.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: I know it's kind of crazy.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: Just a week into the season, some teams have only played one game as I record today's episode.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: But some takes I want to have back.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: You got to think about where I'm coming from.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't take any breaks this entire offseason.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: We talk about the other shows that I co-host numbers on the board, right?
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: So you're talking about even in the dead of the offseason, five hours a week of NBA talk.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I got a lot of takes.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Some of those takes I want back.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: The timing may be a bit weird.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um, going into last season, one of my biggest takes, one of my most wrong takes of my professional career, is that I believe that the Phoenix Suns were going to be a regular season juggernaut.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: They started off like eight and one.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think about it, I I thought I was right about that at this point in time last season.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: So it might be too early to bring some takes backs, but but I still want to do it because there's one team that I was pretty down on going into the season that has surprised me heavily.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm probably the only person that was surprised, let's be honest.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: And one team that I was semi-high on that has been the exact opposite.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: They've been they've been pretty, pretty bad.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm taking these takes back.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: The team that I'm gonna start off with is the Golden State Warriors.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: Now, before the season started, we did an episode of Numbers on the Board where we were buying and selling stocks in different NBA players and different NBA teams.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: Teams in the Western Conference that I bought stock on ended up being the San Antonio Spurs.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, pretty much everybody bought stock.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: They have women yama on their team.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, the Portland Trailblazers, who played 500 basketball for the second half of the season last year.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: I thought they can build on some of that.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: And the Denver Nuggets, who everybody also bought stock on because they had an amazing offseason.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: They got the best player in the world.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: Then in the episode, as we ran through the Western Conference, the Golden State Warriors came up.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: And not only did I not buy stock in the Golden State Warriors, I sold it.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: Me, Kenny Beachum, sold stock in a Steph Curry-led team.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: What was I thinking?
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: When I sold stock, I cited that I couldn't really put my finger on why I wasn't really comfortable and confident with this team for this upcoming season.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was the advanced age of their four players that I thought in that moment in time would mean the most between Curry, Green, Butler, and Al Horford.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was the late offseason where, you know, we got to like a couple weeks before training camp and they still hadn't done a single thing.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was the uncertainty of Jonathan Kaminga.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I sold that stock.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Is that like a buffer period?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: Can I get that stock back at the exact value in which I sold it?
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I'm late to the part.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: Through the first two games of the season, I have been extremely impressed.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: And that's even with their uh loss against the Portland Trailblazes, which I'm just gonna call a scheduled loss.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: No disrespect to the Blazes.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: They played one hell of a game, um, played exactly like the team I want to see them play like for the majority of the season.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_01: But three games for night, second night of a back-to-back coming off a game where you went into overtime for this aging team.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Again, not taking anything away from the Portland Trailblazes, but that is the definition of a scheduled loss.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: You win a game in OT, and then you don't even go home.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: You had your bags packed for a road trip when you fly up to Portland.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: And then anyway, with that being said, I've really loved all the things I've seen so far.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I want to start off with, yeah, maybe the biggest question mark for this team, which was Jonathan Kaminga.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: Jonathan Kaminga wanted so much money.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: He wanted to go to a new team.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: It felt like the marriage between him and the Golden State Warriors was over.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the big questions I had going into this for Jonathan Kaminga is what would it look like for him this year?
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: Was it gonna be a season where they're trying to showcase to the world that this guy is decent and you know, up his trade value, or will it be a good old-fashioned Steve Kerr?
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: Like, ah, he's not really my type of guy.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna give him a spot minutes, but ultimately we're not gonna trust him.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: With the first three games of the season, he's been all letting a bag of chips.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: He's averaging 15.7 points per game, 7.3 rebounds, and four assists per game.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: The shooting splits are unrealistic.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: It was it's 55% from the field, 50% from three.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: Again, super unrealistic.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: But the thing that's the most intriguing to me is that those assist numbers, if they stand, would be double his career average.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think Steph Curry said it best in his uh at the end of the game a couple nights ago, he said Jonathan is playing decisive basketball, which is just two words that you've never really heard alongside Jonathan Kaminga's name.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: Decisive basketball.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: Which is basically what Steve Kerr has been asking him to do for the entirety of his career.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: But I can understand you got to think about who who JK was before he was drafted.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know, he's one of the highly talented people coming into his draft class, you know, he goes and plays for a team before he gets to the Warriors where everybody that was in that system ended up, it's a bit weird.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: So to go to a place that, you know, as a lottery pick, a high lottery pick, if that, you know, a top 10 pick, a lot of times the teams that you go to don't necessarily have a system.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of the teams that you go to don't have championship pedigree.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: They have that he went to a team that basically, from the start of his career, had real expectations.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: There was no room for error.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: It was no real room for growth.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: So he never really bought in.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: It felt like, at least until this season.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: He's been involved in knowing sets, which is something that Steph Curry said.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: One of the biggest things for John Thickaminga is just to know the sets and run them correctly.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: But he's been such a great screener.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: He's been cutting with good time and good tempo, and those are things we've all just kind of wanted from John Thickaminga.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I saw that, you know, before the first game of the season, when they announced that he was a starter, I was intrigued, but I didn't think he was going to look this good.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: You got to think about, again, the advanced age of the three other starters that was in his lineup with him, between Curry, Draymond, and Jimmy Butler.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: Having a guy with his level athleticism and let's say defensive potential is really intriguing.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: And he's lived up to that.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: In the Denver game, they had a lineup out there of Steph Curry, Jimmy Butler, Jonathan Kaminga, Draymond Green, and Al Hoffer.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: That lineup, I don't know the stats.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: Again, all the stats right now are kind of weird, right?
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: I even read the the traditional stats from Jonathan Kaminga.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: Take that with Grandis Saul.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, if I if I reference any advanced stats, it's more to prove a point in dramatic change rather than being like, hey, this is what this advanced stats gonna look like.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: Either way, it felt like that big lineup at the end of that that fourth quarter when they went on that run, it felt like they gave up zero points.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: They did give up some points, but it felt like they gave up zero points.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: It felt like they gave up zero post touches to a team that had Nikola Jokic on it.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's pretty interesting.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: There's just so much defensive IQ with that lineup between Jimmy and Draymond and Al Warford.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, how do you plan on scoring?
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, Steph Curry, too, he's got the defensive IQ, even if the stature and the size doesn't allow him to be a really plus defensive player.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's pretty interesting.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: Last year, Jimmy Butler got traded to the Golden State Warriors.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: He played a total of 30 games.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: And in those 30 games, him and Jonathan Kaminga and Draymond Green only played a total of 38 minutes.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: Steve Kerr talking about how the lack of spacing is really troubling for that lineup to exist.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_01: And it makes sense.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: In those 38 minutes, small sample size, they had a negative net rating of a minus 24.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: A minus 24.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: We are three games into the season for them this year.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: That same three-man lineup of Kaminga, Draymond Green, and Jimmy Butler has played 47 minutes, which is again more in just three games time, and is a plus 27.2.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: Now, again, we're not expecting those numbers to stay the same, but it's more to prove the point that things have shifted.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: Jimmy Butler has looked like the same player.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: Draymond Green has looked like the same player.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: The thing that has changed has been Jonathan Gaminga.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: And that's fun.
• 7:47
  unknown: Right?
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: I still don't know if he's going to be on the team February 15th, right?
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have any idea, but for what is worth right now, having this version of Jonathan Gaminga, and we're assuming that he won't revert back to his old ways is nothing but a positive for this team that has had some of their other young players kind of like Brandon Paszybsky has not looked good so far.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: Quentin Post got the spot start because they were going against a bigger team in the Portland Trailblazers, but you know, there's a lot to be desired there.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: So the fact that this young player is able to come in and, you know, in that first game of the season, even though Luca gave him the works, he was he had the defensive assignment on Luka Donces and he did as good as you could probably expect somebody to do.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Luka Donce is just a different kind of NBA player.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm just really impressed with Jonathan so far.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: I I really um like that there was a possession in the game against the Portland Triblers.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: Again, it's a game that they end up losing.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: I think he still looked good in this one, where Kaminga had a couple uh a really bad-looking turnover.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I just, I don't know, I'm somebody that really looks into body language at least a little bit.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember when Jonathan did anything wrong.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: You can look at the bench and Steve Kerr and them guys be like, oh my goodness.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: He made a he committed a turnover, Steve Kerr just gave him a little clap.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: Let's go.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, that's that's pretty fun.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: Seemed like he's earning the trust.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, that's just one part of it.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: The other part, Steph Curry still exists.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: And at 37 years old, he's still one of the best players in the world.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: The heater that he went on in that Denver game, uh, I think it was um, I don't remember if it was Trey Kirby, Jay E.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: Skeets, or or um, or Tas Mellis that mentioned it, that the shot that he hit against the Denver Nuggets is probably the best shot for somebody else.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: Like the entire career of this random player is probably the best shot they would ever hit.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: But for Steph Curry, it's just a game.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's just a moment.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: And he does this time and time again.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: Jimmy Butler started off the season, the first game.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: He looked ridiculously um aggressive.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: 16, I think, was the exact number, uh, free throws.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: Game two, he looked okay.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: And then game three, he looked very pedestrian.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, time will tell, you know, Jimmy Butler feels like one of those dudes that will always kind of feel out the game and, you know, the three games of Fortnite things is different.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: So I want my stock back in the Golden State Warriors.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: I still don't know if I'm saying that they're a team that I think could compete with OKC in the seven game series, but I'm I feel more confident in them now than I did, you know, uh a month and a half ago when we were doing the selling and buying stocks.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: When we come back from this break, I want to talk about the team that I was high on.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm ready to sell on.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Stay tuned.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I was not one of those people that looked at the on-paper roster of the Dallas Mavericks and believed that that is a sneaky contender.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know how many times I saw the word sneaky contender attached to the Dallas Mavericks this offseason?
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: Again, everybody's just bored at the end of the day.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: I was not one of those people, right?
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: But I am a guy that took the Dallas Mavericks over in our over-under podcast.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: Not only did I take the over, I was I didn't do it.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: Luckily, I didn't do it.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: I was this close to locking it.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna say it again.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: This team does not look good to their first couple games.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: I was this close to locking their over.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: And the idea behind it was, um, because I was also skeptical at the beginning of the offseason, but I kind of talked myself into it.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: That's the that's the reality of having a long offseason.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: You start off feeling really bad about a team.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, actually, it's not that I thought that the defense would be enough for them to grind out games.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: Anthony Davis, Cooper Flag is one of the best competitors we've seen from an incoming rookie um between PJ Washington.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, we can go on and on.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: Derek Liveland back in, Daniel Gaffer was yet to play, but like those guys are plus defensive players.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna be hard to score on all of those wings.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the defense has not lived up to that through the first couple games of the season, but not only that, the offense has not even been close to like again, me being relatively uh warm, lukewarm on that offense has they've been way worse than even that.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: So I did take their over.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I just don't see that no more.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: I just don't, I just don't see it no more.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: And again, we're only talking about the first couple games of the season.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_01: But here is why I say that.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: The first game of the year, they got blitzed by a San Antonio Spurs team.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: They're like, in real time, nobody thought about the Dallas Mavericks and watching a game.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: We were all just infatuated with what Wimbenyama had done on that game, where he looked at Anthony Davis in his eyes, uh, guy that will go down as one of the best defensive players ever, one of the best defensive players to never win a DPOY award.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um a guy that has made multiple defensive player of the year or got defensive player of the year votes and all defensive teams.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then another big fella and Derek Lively and looked them right in their eyes and said, Y'all can't guard me.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: Send two is not gonna be enough.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: The guy had a performance where he had what felt like a gazillion points, only ended up with three blocks, which feels weird.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: We need to look at that scorecard again.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: And zero turnover, send two, it don't matter.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: I can play make as well.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: So the whole world was we were talking about the alien that is Wimbayama, not necessarily about the badness of the Dallas Mavericks.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: And this is Cooper Flag's debut.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's it's a it's a new looking team.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: We're not gonna stress too much about it.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's cool.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_01: They got a bounce back game.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: The Washington Wizards.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: This team is young, they're trash.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: They also got blitzed by that Wizards team, where Keyshawn George like an all-star.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Alex Sarr, who's had a wishy-washy start to his NBA career, real life looked like a really good defensive anchor and also look great on the offensive side of the ball.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's not necessarily good.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, Jason Kidd said this is the exact place he wants to be offensively, and they are the worst offense in the league by a wide margin.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: It is it is awful.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I think a lot of that, not all of it, a lot of that boils down to the lack of point guard play.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: If there's any defense I could give them, and this is the only defense I'm gonna get in the entirety of this segment, is that Kyrie Irvin is injured.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: We knew Carrie Irvin was gonna be injured, by the way.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um he got injured during last year's season, so we knew that he wasn't gonna be back.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, they tried to remedy that by putting D'Angelo Russell on the team.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, Nico Harrison was so excited to bring him onto the roster.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: And in the second game against a young Washington Wizards team, the guy didn't play a single minute in the second half.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: So he's obviously not the answer to point guard.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: So they said, hey, Cooper Flag ran this hybrid point guard, point forward thing last year in college.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna bring him over to this NBA team.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna ask him to be our sole initiator because the rest of the roster, even though we have good decision makers, we don't have good people that could put the ball on the floor.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm so tired of seeing franchises do this to young players and franchises thinking that because a guy is a dynamic offensive player, that he can just be a point guard.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: It takes time.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: And and he's getting these reps right now, but this is not what Nico Harrison was thinking when he made the trade.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: Either way, it's gonna take time and for a team and for an organization to tell you that, oh, we're trying to compete, they don't have the time, if you will.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: Cooper Flag, I have no doubt in my mind, he's gonna be a phenomenal ball player.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: And at one point, he's going to be good enough to really contain and maintain a good offensive team as being an engine.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: That is not him as of today.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: And if he was on other teams, you know, if he if they didn't win a lottery, he was a part of that Washington Wizards team that just beat them, we wouldn't care about him having these uh moments where he's struggling as a playmaker if that is even the case.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: But because he's going to a team that told us that they're trying to win championships and their window is the next couple of years, and then it matters.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: There are too many teams across hoop that that can just roll the balls out with no point guard play and think it's going to work.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: Tatum has been one of the most dynamic wings we've had in the game of basketball.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: It even took Jason Tatum like five, four, three to five years before we felt really good about him bringing the ball up the court.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe you say Cooper Flag his generational.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe he is.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: It is too damn early.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: No point guard play is the reason why the offense has been a struggle.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: Anthony Davis would look better if he had somebody that could help him get to his spots.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think Cooper Flag would look better.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: And he has not looked bad.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: Don't get me wrong.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna talk about rookies later in the episode.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: He has he hasn't looked bad, but he would look better if he had somebody to help him out as a point guard.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: The other, this is also some Jason Kid stuff because um they had a lineup the other night where they ran their three point guards, and none of them are like very good, don't get me wrong.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: Or like three guards, and like Jaden Hardy, it was Brandon uh Williams, and it was like uh D'Anzo Russell.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, no, no, no, no, it wasn't D'Anzo Russ, it was Ryan Nimhard.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: They ran those three guards together with no centers when they also have a surplus of centers.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's weird.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's getting stripping out here.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_01: But their lack of point guard play has been one of the reasons why their offense has been trash.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: Their lack of spacing is the other, because not only do they not have the spacing around the perimeter, they no longer have the vertical spacing that made them really good the last couple seasons.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, they don't have Luca too.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: I forgot about that.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: But the no vertical spacing thing has been trash.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: Derek Lively is a good ball player.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: I think he's going to still have a success.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not one of those people that think, oh, Luca's gone, so he can't have a good career.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: I still believe he's going to be a really good ball player.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: But his vertical threat, him being a vertical threat was one of the reasons why the Dallas Mavericks offense worked so well the last couple seasons with Luka Doncic.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: And now without having a point guard, he's not that much of a vertical threat.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: You will see some Anthony Davis throws up to him because Anthony Davis can play make a little bit, but for the most part, we kind of nullified some of the superpowers that were Derek Lively.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: Anthony Davis came into this season overweight.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: He says that he always does this, but AD, we've watched you for almost 15 years, brother.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: You ain't never looked this out of shape.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: And that Washington Wizards game, there were so many bad defensive possessions that, like, I'm I'm only comparing Anthony Davis to himself, right?
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'm only comparing him to the guy that I just saw him be a great defensive player just last season.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: And there were so many times in this Wizards game where I'm like, y'all can't let Keyshawn George do this.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: Keyshawn George saw a screen at the top of the key, and Anthony Davis didn't play any drop.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: He didn't show, he didn't do anything.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: It was so bad that Najee Marsh was trying to fight around the screen.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: He gets caught.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: And Keyshawn George is so wide open.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, so wide open, he like takes a second to think about the shot.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: He catches it.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: The transition defense of this team has been awful.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: There's a possession that if you want to summarize the first couple games for Dallas, the Dallas Mavericks as a team, this is the fourth quarter against the Wizards, and they're making a run because the Wizards are a young team, and holding leads if you're a young team is tough.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: They're going against the Wizards here.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: Cooper Flag has that monster dunk that you may have seen on social media if you weren't watching the game where he does like uh NBA Street uh game breaker, put the foot on the rim because he's just is it's a powerful dunk at home uh in Dallas.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: And they give up an and one in about 4.3 seconds to Corey Kispert, not to De'Ar Fox, not to Prime Russell Westbrook, not to some super fast ball player, to Corey Kispert off a make.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: It took four point something seconds.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: And not only did they give up this and one, do you want to know the person that fouled him?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: It was Cooper Flag.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: Cooper Flag is doing the Spider-Man upside down meme on the rim, and he's still the first person back on defense.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: Shout out to the rookie.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: That is that is inexcusable.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: Transition defense, AD not looking good, bad point guard play, no spacing, and a front office general manager that looked us all in our face and told us we were stupid.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: And the fact that he heard or we heard as as uh basketball fans heard the fire Nico chance in game two of the season tells you a lot.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because on that same night on national TV, the guy that they traded away, Luka Donchinch, dropped 49 in a win.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: And we can't win against the Wizards.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: I got a buddy, his name is Reese.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: Shout out to my boy Reese.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: He denounced his uh his fandom to the Mavericks when the Luka Donchis trade happened.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: He announced that he was back like four days ago.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: I should text him and figure out is he does he wanna go out again?
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know that's how bad it really has been.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: I took the over on this team and I now I kind of wish I locked the under.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: Because there's no save and grace right now about that offense.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: I do think the defense can be better, right?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: They still do have the people on the roster to make that defense better.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: I just don't know if they're gonna have the offense to do it.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: I ain't even mentioned Klay Thompson's name because I don't want to talk bad about my legendary guy, Klay Thompson, but he ain't looked good so far.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: When we come back, we will check in on all rookies.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: I cannot wait.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: Stay tuned.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much to our sponsor, DraftKings.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: DraftKings Pick Six is where you can pick more or less on different player stats for the upcoming game.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: Just pick two or more different players into your pick set and decide more or less on different stats.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: Sit back, watch the games, and figure out if you made the right decisions.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: Going into tonight's games, I'd put together a little pick set, you let me know what you think.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: Starting off with Kay Cunningham and the Detroit Pistons versus Evan Mobley.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I said it.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: Not Donovan Mitchell in the Cleveland Cavaliers, but Evan Mobley in the Cleveland Cavaliers.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I went more on Kay Cunningham's assist.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: The reason why is that if you watch the first couple games of the season for the Detroit Pistons, who just had a really good uh win against the uh not tanking, but tanking a Boston Celtics, Kay Cunningham has the ball in the sands more than like any other guy in the association, not named Lamello Ball.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it makes sense.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_01: They don't have any other real initiators outside of like Harris LeVert sometimes.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: So he has the ball a ton.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_01: And as long as Jalen Duren stays out of foul trouble, they have some of the best two-man game in all of basketball with lob after lob.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Jalen Durin just had like a 20, almost 20-20 game against the Celtics.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I don't know if he's gonna be able to do that against the front court of the Cleveland Cavaliers, but I do believe he's good for a few lobs at the bare minimum.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: And Kay Cunningham uh spraying out to other shooters across the team, a Duncan Robinson and Asar Thompson, not a shooter, but an Asar Thompson cut.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: I feel pretty good about the more on assists.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: In that same game, like I said, Evan Mobley in the Cleveland Cavaliers.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going more on the rebounds for Evan Mobley.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: I do think this is going to be one of them games where they continue to split the minutes between Jared Allen and Evan Mobley.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that he can maximize his rebounding against sometimes a unit in the Detroit Pistons that play tough as nail.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: There's a tough team, but sometimes I feel like they can get kind of flimsy on the offensive glass or the defensive.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Glass themselves allowing other teams to get offensive rebounds.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: It's just a matter of whether or not we see Evan Mobley play closer to the rim versus over the last couple games of the season.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: First couple games of the season, he's been definitely more perimeter-centric, but I do still feel good about my boy Emobe going out there and getting more on his boards.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: Going to another nasty televised games here on uh Peacock, we got Anthony Atwards Moore.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: He has been on points.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: He has been a madman.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: The three-point shot is still there.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I was a little bit afraid for Ant-Man, and maybe I shouldn't have done this, been skeptical of his three-point shooting last year where he led the league in total three-point makes, but it was so dramatic of a change to go from a guy that's like a solid shooter to like, oh, snap, he's one of the top five shooters in ball.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I was a little bit wishy-wash on whether or not he'd be able to sustain that level of shooting.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: Guess what he's done throughout the first couple games of the season?
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: Hit shots.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: And this team, maybe let me give it another week.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: Let me give it another week before I really talk about what I'm seeing from the Timberwolves.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_01: But if they want to be competitive in this game against the Nuggets, we do need an Anthony Edwards explosion of an offensive game as far as scoring goes.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: And because of that, I went more.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: And they got some more defensive pieces over there in Denver.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if any of them is really stopping Anthony Edwards.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: Lastly, in my pick set, I went more on Aaron Gordon's rebounds.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: So far throughout the season, he has not been grabbing a ton of boards.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, over the last couple years, you know, since he got to Denver, it's been more of a yoke it show when it comes to rebounding.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: But I've I've kind of liked how aggressive he has been going to the glass this season.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that against this team in the Minnesota Timbulls, he can have more opportunity to grab a few extra boards and get that more.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: Talk to me.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: What are you thinking?
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I try to sprinkle in some role players here there.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'll always just like to go after the superstar players, even though three of the four, because again, I'm counting Evan Mobile as a superstar.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: You catching my drift, I'm an Evan Mobley super fan.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I like sprinkling in those role players because I do believe that they're essential to the success of their team.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel good about this pick set.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: You know, so far on the season, I have been uh, you know, we do we're doing a little leaderboard thing or numbers on the board where we're all trying to compete to see who can put together the best pick sets for the month.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: And out of the four people, right now, I am currently in third.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: Not where I want to be, but it's where I am at this moment in time.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there's a few other things up there.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: I I did think about Jared Allen also for their rebounding, but I went with Evan Mobley just because I think that if there was a moment in time where they're not closing with both bigs, which is something that Kenny Axon does do occasionally, that Evan Mobley is more likely to be the guy on the court to close out a game.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: I thought about some Julius Randles things because of the matchup, but I was like, nah, let's just go in and have Anthony Edwards.
• 24:45
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• 24:51
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• 24:56
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• 25:02
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• 25:06
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• 25:08
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• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: The rookies that we love and know and love have all played two to three different games.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I kind of want to talk about some of the things that I've seen that I've loved and that I hated.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: Again, Cooper Flag, I know that the last semi with the Dallas Mavericks was very um pessimistic, if that's the word, very down on them as an organization.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: But I I've been really intrigued with Cooper Flag so far.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, he has not shot the ball as well as maybe you wanted him to through the first couple games of his career.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_01: But that fourth quarter of the Wizards game did show you the type of player that Cooper Flag can develop into.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_01: I still think that it's amazing that when there's a loose ball, he's the first person on the floor.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: Some of those things you cannot value as far as statistics go.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm not one of those people that think that this is um, you know, not the greatest star for Cooper Flag.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_01: Could it be better?
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm not really feeling no type of way about his overall ceiling based on two games.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: But I do want to talk about some people that I've been really impressed with.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Dylan Harper just had a game against the the uh Brooklyn Nets.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: And now I've watched the Brooklyn Nets three times, and it feels like something interesting happens in every single one of their games where I'm like, I have to try to temper my expectations and temper the results that I just saw because it is the Brooklyn Nets at the same time.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: Like, yeah, this guy just had an amazing game, but it was against the Brooklyn Nets.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: But in this game against the Brooklyn Nets, I I mean, I'm gonna say this right up front for the people that are new to the show and new to who I am as a person.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: I am not somebody that spends a ton of time on college basketball.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: This year, I definitely spent more time um after the tourney kind of learning about these draft prospects because we did a draft show and um with a big network back then.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so I've known about Dylan Harper's game quite a bit from his record days.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: Today showcase a lot.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: In this game, the final box score for him was 20 points, eight for 11 from the field.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: He ended up with eight assists and six rebounds, which is insane.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: One thing that I love about Dylan Harper, and I can't say that, like this this feels easy to say, and it feels like every other young rookie should understand this.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: But as somebody that watched a ton of Victor Wimbanyama last season, it is such a breath of fresh air to see Dylan Harper recognize hey, I have a 7-4 alien on my team.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: I can just kind of throw it the ball up, and he can probably go get in the score for me.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I just I admire that because it took a little while for Stephon Castle to recognize that.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: I think in year two, he's been great at that.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: It felt like last year with the Spurs, the only person that recognized that Wimby's height and greatness was like Chris Paul.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: He was the only person that would him and Harrison Barnes were the only two people that would just say, go get it, Wimby.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: And Dylan Harper's already figured that out.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: He is so poised in the paint.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_01: And if this is what he looks like a year, I mean uh game three into his NBA career.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: I have the expectations for him, I've already really high on him.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: The expectations have grown to a whole new level for him to translate some of that stuff from Rutgers to an NBA front court or into an NBA paint.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I can't wait to see what he continues to grow on because sometimes he's getting two feet in, and the immediate idea is to just go up, maybe draw some contact, maybe draw a foul or so.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: He is using those 2.9 seconds sometimes when he gets into the paint to really probe around and figure out what there is to be done.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it was kicking out to the corner, sometimes literally is a lob up to Wimbayama, sometimes it's a step through for the easy finish.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: I've loved Dylan Harper.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: People have gone a little bit too far, though, talking about well, I don't know if they need De'Aaron Fox.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if they need De'Aaron Fox.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: I just I don't anyway.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: You what we're learning in 2025 when it comes to team building is having good rookie scale contracts can open your window earlier than what you thought.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: So to have a max player, I love De'Aaron Fox, by the way, to have a max player in the position that the rookie scale contracts are in, instead of that max contract being somebody somewhere else on the roster, just makes things a little bit difficult.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait to see De'Aaron Fox come back.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: I'm rooting for you, big fella.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: Next, we got VJ, who has just spent all that in the bag of chips.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: His rookie uh debut is one of the greatest debuts of any rookie ever.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_01: Retire like um love uh Lamar Odom when it comes to points in a debut, and it was amazing.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: And I mentioned this on numbers where I just love how often they allow him to have the ball, right?
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: It he does not, I mean, he physically looks like a rookie because he's he's like babyfacing everything, but they're not treating him on the offense side of the ball as if he is a rookie, right?
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: He has the ball a ton alongside with Tyrese Maxie, and you know, um, they've been able to close out some really important games.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: He is already one of the best athletes in all of basketball this early into his career.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: The three-point shooting has dropped so far.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_01: I know last game it wasn't as good as his first game, but like pretty intriguing stuff from VJ.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, next, I'm gonna go to Khan Kanipple, who I just I don't want to play into the stereotypes, but he just makes my right decisions, right?
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: Summerly or preseason, he struggled to shoot from behind the arc so far through his three games.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: He's hit his shots.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: He had three threes in the first two games of his NBA career, and they were very close.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: This close.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_01: They were one actually one shot away from him from winning a game um a few nights ago.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I've I've been impressed with him.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I guess Cockbrenner, um James, who was my second round sleeper, he is a real ball player.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_01: I've been telling people that they should not be sleep on Sion Zion, I don't know how to pronounce his first name.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: So is he one of my guys?
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: I've heard it as Sion.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: I've heard it as Sion.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't know.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_01: Sion James, he's a a bodybuilder that plays basketball.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: He's been really good as a rookie, and Koch Brenner has been as well.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I thought that the Charlotte Hornets had a good draft in real time when we were doing a draft show.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so far through the first three games of their career, it feels like that.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: Ace Bailey has not got the burn we expected.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, at the start of his NBA career, he was dealing with some type of injury and a sickness.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm not thinking about it too much.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: Trey Johnson, I made a tweet that was a um a picture of Michael Jordan and Michael Jordan when he did that one commercial where Jamal Crawford was his body double and they were playing one-on-one.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um saying that that was Trey Johnson and Keyshawn George.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_01: I've love Trey Johnson's game.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_01: He is silky smooth.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I just need him to continue to make them shots and everything else will fall into place.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: Jeremiah Fierce is a guy that coming into the draft, I was skeptical about, you know, a little bit.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so far through the first couple games, he's been better than I could have ever anticipated.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_01: He is averaging 15 points per game without even hitting a three-point shot just yet, getting downhill, using that speed and athleticism to uh to get to the basket and make some decisions there.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: Just like most rookie um guards in the league, he's gonna struggle a little bit when it comes to not turning the ball over.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: But like that that comes with being a rookie point guard at the end of the day.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I can't say I have too much of an opinion about Jaeger Demon.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_01: My apologies.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: I a lot of the shots that he took through the first couple games of his career was just three pointers, and some of that felt like he would be you know struggling to break his man off the dribble when he transitioned to NBA athletes and stuff, but he had a play a couple nights ago where in that game where he did break down his man, he did a Steve Nash dribble, which I also call the Kirk Hyron dribble, and found an open shooter and cashed out.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was Michael Porter Jr.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: cashing out.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: So up and up, I guess.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um Cedric Coward.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'm not going in order, I'm just going with guys now because I have no opinions on Murray Boyles because he has not played just yet.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_01: I have no opinion about Norwich Senge, my Chicago Bull player, because he has not played just yet in his first couple games of his career.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_01: But Cedric Coward.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you watch that draft show, the Bulls had picked 12.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_01: And the guys kept asking, you know, my team was the only one that was in the lottery of everybody else on the panel, and they kept asking, who is the guy that you want to see fall to 12?
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_01: Who do you want at 12?
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, in the perfect world, we have Cedric Coward.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_01: I knew people were going to be turned off by the fact that he played just six games in D1 college before he had, I think he had a shoulder torn, uh, his shoulder torn.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, twins, um, he played D2 and he was really good.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: But like, if we don't see this D2 player turn into an NBA player with just six games of D1 basketball, uh, I was hoping and praying that he was gonna fall.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then we get to the 11th overall pick, and the Portland Trailblazers are on the clock and they said they traded it to the Grizzlies.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_01: I said, he's the perfect Grizzly player.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_01: There's no doubt in my mind they're taking him.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: And they did.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: And he just had a breakout performance where there's nothing about what he has done so far in his NBA career that makes me think that he won't be able to continue to do that.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_01: The jump shooting is real, the defense is real, the decision making is real.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: He is a real ball player.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things I say, if you are not in the top five, or maybe you should do this in the top five too, if you are at the back end of the lottery, it is beneficial to take guys that you know are going to be in the league for 10 plus years.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: As long as Cedric Howard is healthy, I have no doubt in my mind he's gonna get that uh 10-year pension.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_01: He's that good, he's that good of a role player, and maybe he has a ceiling to be a lot more than that because he does move a little bit like another guy whose name I would not say.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: Because last time somebody got compared to that brother, he ended up being the bust.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_01: But he moves like a certain wing that defends well and has a very robotic move.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_01: I ain't gonna say the name.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_01: So I was one pick away.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_01: Instead, we got Noah and Senge, and Noah, guess what?
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'm rooted for you, brother.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_01: Have not played a single second of NBA ball just yet.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm rooted for you.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: Ace Newell had a double-double in like his first real PT as an NBA player as the Atlanta Hawks were beat up.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I was impressed.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_01: A couple uh corner three-point shots failed.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, oh, okay.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_01: Jace Richardson played his first NBA game against the Bulls the other night.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_01: He had a couple big possessions and steals and stuff like that.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: So that's been cool.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_01: Need Clifford started in the game, and that was real fun.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_01: So so far, oh uh, uh, Hugo Gonzalez had a game a couple nights ago where he had like six points, five rebounds, two assists, but an impactful player overall.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: So, so far, this draft class has been miles ahead of what the 2024 draft class gave us.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and I'm excited about it.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: Even like Brooks, uh Brooks Barnhouser, who plays in OKC, end up taking the minutes away from a guy like Uzman Zheng, who was drafted a pick before J Dub, who's an all-NBA player.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a great class.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm excited to see how they continue to grow.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I need to know insane gate or who when we come back from this break.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: We got our favorite segment, AskKB.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_00: You bet not leave.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: Ask KB is my favorite segment because I get to hear from you and answer your questions.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_01: All you got to do is hit us up on Instagram, on Twitter, use the hashtag AskKB if you want.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes y'all don't do that.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: But we'll find your questions and I'll try my very best to answer some of the cool ones.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_01: The first one comes from Bebo, who says, What are your realistic thoughts on the Spurs?
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_01: Can we expect this long-term uh, especially since Fox, Olinic, and such are coming back from injury, or is there a flash in the pan type of performance?
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I initially thought that maybe there was a chance that this was flash in a pan, but again, it's against the Brooklyn Nets.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe temper this expectation just a little bit.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: But the way they've been able to close out these last two games, the one against the Pelicans, where Wimbenyama fouls out in overtime and they have to figure out how to win without him on the court, and they were successful in doing that.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_01: Between that and the um Brooklyn Nets having the Cam John uh Cam Thomas experience where he uh goes off for 40 and they take the lead at one point for them to be as poised as they were during that stretch and win that game makes me feel like this is not a flash in the pan.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: Granted, it has not been the toughest of schedules, with it being the Mavericks and the Pelicans and the Brooklyn Nets.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: But I do believe that one of the big signs of a jump happening is being able to beat the teams you're supposed to beat.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I I think that the Mavericks went into uh actually I'm not sure.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_01: I don't even want to say that because I'm not completely sure.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I part of me believes that there that the Mavericks were favored going into the first game of the season.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_01: Again, I could be wrong there.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but there was some hype against the with the Mavericks.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: So beating up on the teams that you should win is a big sign of progression.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes we see a team beat up on those teams and then maybe look not so good against the good teams and still end up being like a top six C because by the time we get to Nov uh, let's say December, January, February, they're gonna be more bad teams.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_01: They're gonna be more teams that are not really out there competing.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_01: Because have you seen AJ DeBonza?
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Have you seen the Boosier kid?
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_01: Have you seen Darren Peterson?
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_01: I got to work early two nights ago, two uh mornings ago.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: A shift that we we shoot early in the morning.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: I got here early to sit in this exact chair to watch college basketball because they said Darren Peterson was like that, and damn it, they didn't lie.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: So there's gonna be more teams out there.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_01: What I'm saying is gonna be more teams out there going to tank, and winning against those tanking teams is really important.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_01: Again, we don't necessarily know what the De'Aaron Fox Wimbenyama thing will look like.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: They had such a small sample size last season.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was like six total games, which is ridiculously low.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: So we're not completely sure.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: But between Wimbenyama, Harper, who we already mentioned, Kelden Johnson, who at least in the game against the Brooklyn Nets, was a monster on the glass as a 6'5 power forward, if you will.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_01: Lou Cornett being everything as advertised in some, he is such a good ball player.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, if you watch the Celtics, which I'm sure you have because they won a championship just two years ago, you recognize that Lou Cornett is one of the best backup centers in all the ball.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_01: But right now, you know, they're running the both of the bigs together.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_01: He has been somewhat switchable in some cases.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, he's definitely a guy that you prefer to play drop coverage with, but he has switched on a perimeter and and looked decent.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_01: I remember when he was a player on my favorite team, we had uh the worst coach in Bulls history, which is saying a lot, Jim Boylan.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_01: And Jim Boylan said that Lou Cornette reminded him of Robert Ori.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna say that one more time.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_01: The guy with so many rings that I forgot the number.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: He said that Lou Cornette was and he's not, he's not uh that was back when Lou Cornette actually shot threes.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_01: Lou Cornette won't even think about taking a three no more, which is a great progression for him.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_01: He's the he's the anti-Brick Lopez.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um but he's such a good role player, he's such a good backup, and and also can make up for when Wimedyama is out with fouling out or he is into foul trouble.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I would say this is more realistic that they are good and not a flash in the pan.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for the question.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_01: Next one comes from Ivan.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_01: Ivan Pacheco is just three games ellipses, but the magic look improved yet worse somehow.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_01: What is your take on them so far, and what do they need to do to have a good season?
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, Ivan.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_01: I would agree that they looked improved and also and also worse.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um the offense there's a lot on the plate for that for their offense, for the offensive unit in general.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_01: Desmond Bain has not hit his shots just yet.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_01: You know, he had the big shot against the the open tonight game was against the um Miami Heat.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_01: He had a big shot in the corner and a big shot on the left wing that you know ended up helping them win that game.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_01: But since then, he's been struggling to shoot, right?
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_01: I just watched him again in full detail against the Chicago Bulls, where like whenever he was open, of course, I was like, oh, but I was like, oh, okay, we cool.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, they made the change to bring him in, and the hopes was that just Desmond Bain's gravity and Desmond Bain's shooting would be enough to open the court up a little bit.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: And and I I am all in on Orlando Magic, even three games in where they have not looked amazing, but I did think it was kind of fluky to think that one man can change that much.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_01: And because he's not he's not Steph Curry, and it's not like they added Steph Curry or Clay Thompson, they added Desmond Bain, who's really great, but he's not those type of type of shooters, or he does not have that off-ball gravity as those other other guys.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_01: And they were also relying on some other dudes to take steps.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_01: Anthony Black, who we mentioned a few episodes ago, as being one of the most intriguing players this season, or Trishina Silva, who has been able to step up as an off-the-bench guy.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: But there's still a lot to be desired with that offense.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I guess it's a good moment in time to kind of talk about the Palo Benquero thing, where right now, if you if you looked up Palo Bencaro on NBA Twitter, there are a lot of opinions about Palo.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I have been pretty public about, you know, my frustration with Palo Ben Caro as a ball player.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I obviously recognize his talents.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you I don't do the hate watching type of things, and ball we trust, we love basketball around here, but I get very frustrated with players that are physically gifted, that don't use those physical gifts as often as they should.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's unrealistic when we ask LeBron James and his prime, why don't you just run to the rim and dunk every single time?
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's unrealistic to have those levels of expectations for these guys that are, you know, 150 pounds of pure muscle, like Palo Ben Carroll uh or LeBron James is, but Palo has not been able to balance the I want to be Carmelo Anthony versus I want to be the LeBron James.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: There's a possession in their first game of the season where he's being guarded on the right block by Davion Mitchell and shout out to off night, he's a really good defensive player, but Palo Ben Caro got at least seven inches of height above him, and then also I don't know, 70 pounds, 50 to 70 pounds stronger than him.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_01: And Palo Bancaro took a turnaround mid-range jumper that missed.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: And if you go back and watch specific Palo possessions, which I did after this game, he did not have a good game.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: He ended up with like 24 points, 11 rebounds.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: He got to the foul line, which is great.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_01: All of his misses, now I'm not kidding you, all of the misses that he had in that first game was him taking the shots that people dislike that I dislike.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_01: Those heavily contested twos, the turnaround mid-range jumpers.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_01: There's a time and a place for those because he is at least okay at them.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_01: But when you have it so that all of your makes are at the rim and all of your misses are the are the turnaround middies.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_01: In my mind, if I'm on the coaching staff, if I'm in the film room with them, I'm like Palo.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_01: See, these are the good ones and these are the bad ones.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that has hurt their offense offensive game in the half court, right?
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_01: Feeling the need that because he is such a talented one-on-one player, that he should dribble the ball out for 17 seconds before getting the shot up.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a lot to be done here.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_01: I can't say I've I've loved what Jamal Mosley has done through these first three games.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, again, we're talking about a three-game sample size, but I was expecting just a little bit more fluidity, if you will, right?
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_01: And some of that's like Jalen Suggs is gonna miss some games because he's still recovering from injury.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so they still don't have like a great point guard.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_01: Tyus Jones is supposed to be that, but I fell for the Tyes Jones hype too many times in his career.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_01: I ain't really thinking about it like that.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: But I was hoping for now that they have at least more spacing, in theory, that there will be a little bit more creativity on the offensive end.
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_01: And it has not happened just yet.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: I think they've looked their best on the offensive end when they've been able to get uh Franz Wagner cut or run in and transition a little bit or seeing Trishan Da Silva hit some three pointers or here and there.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_01: So uh yeah, it has not looked great.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so far, uh their defense, at least optically, because it's too.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_01: Early to be like, oh, they're the third best defense of basketball.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, their defense has not lived up to what it had been over the last couple years.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_01: They were just in a dog fight with the Bulls.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_01: You never want to be in a dog fight with the Bulls.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's an indication of your team being bad versus the Bulls being good, which is what I keep having to explain to people.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah, they're oof.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_01: If their offense is second worst in the league.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_01: Again, just through through three games, you don't want to overreact too much.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but through through three games, just second worst only to the team we talked about earlier in the Dallas Mavericks.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_01: So it has not been amazing.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_01: But you obviously see that there's something still there.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_01: There's something still left on the play, there's something still left on the bone that they can open up.
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and last thing on them people always say that those two guys, the Palo and Franz, should be broken up.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and people are calling for that right now based on the starts of the season.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's hard for me to say it one way or another when those two guys aren't used together in different actions, right?
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_01: Like they're not screening for each other, they're not playing off each other, and I think that really hurts.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_01: When we come back, we gotta talk about week two of the NBA season and what I'm looking forward to most.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_00: Stay tuned.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: This week, just like every week in the NBA season, we have great games lined up, and I want to talk about some of the games I'm most excited about.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: Starting off on tonight's slate of games, um, here on Peacock, we do have Cavs versus Pistons.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_01: The Pistons, after a uh loss against Chicago Bulls a season opener, has rattled together two good wins, I would say.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a win against the Houston Rockets who have struggled so far this season and a win against the Boston Celtics who struggled so far this season.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I think that this Cavs game versus them is gonna be really like some it's so early in the regular season, so it's hard to say.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I can't expect both coaches to try to play chess on game four of the game three of the NBA season, but they match up so interestingly that like it feels like if there was going to be a matchup where like JB tries to make some adjustments or the Pistons try to make some adjustments, try to counteract some of that big size in the front court of the Cleveland Cavaliers.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_01: This is the game to do, but maybe it's just too early.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe they see each other in the postseason.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: Then we'll try to see those teams try to tinker with it a little bit and play a little bit of uh chess.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_01: Also on tonight's games, we have two matchups of two teams with zero wins.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_01: Somebody, somebody is gonna win a basketball game.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_01: The Nets go against the Rockets.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of know why I would lean towards, but it's basketball at the end of the day.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: Anything can happen in any given night.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then the Celtics versus the Pelicans.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_01: The Celtics are a team that I mentioned before, a snake uh tanking team.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_01: I think these teams that are trying to go into the season with no center play are just telling us without telling us that they have an agenda to lose games.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because you're gonna give up a lot of offensive boards.
• 46:44
  SPEAKER_01: The first game of the season, I thought they did a pretty good job on the glass.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_01: The last couple, not so much the case.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I've really, really enjoyed what we've seen so far with the Warriors, as you know.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_01: And they got the Clippers on Tuesday night.
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_01: It is a super late tip off.
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_01: Why is it a 10 p.m.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_01: Central tip?
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_01: Be sure to tune in.
• 47:02
  SPEAKER_01: That is also on Peacock.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_01: Tune in, tune in, tune in.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_01: But I can't wait to see that one because the Clippers had the first game of the year where they lost by a gazillion.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_01: And second game of the year, they uh ended up winning against a not so great team.
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_01: And now they're going against a team.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_01: Two of the oldest teams of basketball going back and forth.
• 47:15
  SPEAKER_01: The geriatric, geriatric jump jumbo jam is what they're calling it.
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_01: Wednesday night, my game of the night, will have to be a I was I was gonna say Pacers Mavericks, but then I strolled down and somehow I look past this one.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_01: Blazers Jazz has potential to be sneaky fun.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's like that's like deep into league pass type things.
• 47:40
  SPEAKER_01: You have to be like locked into the NBA to care about that game.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_01: But I think that has a potential to be sneaky fun because the Utah Jazz have been running their triple seven foot lineup between Walker Kessler, Larry Market, and Flip Lapowski.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_01: They call them flip on the broadcast.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_01: I'm calling them flip now on.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_01: Kyle Filipowski going against a pretty jumbo lineup in himself and the Trailblazers, but the length and size of the Trailblazers is not in the front court necessarily.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's everywhere else between the two Monty Kamara, a a Jeremy Grant, a um Denny Abdia.
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_01: So super big front court versus super big wings.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_01: One of them we have expectations from, one of them we don't, and Bryce Centerball is a good basketball player.
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_01: On Thursday night, we have the first game of the day, and I love when the first game of the day is the most anticipated game for me.
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_01: That is the Orlando Magic versus the Charlotte Hornets, who have been in nothing but great games so far.
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_01: If you have not been tuning into the Charlotte Hornets, you gotta watch.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_01: Watching, I just jinxed it.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_01: I just jinxed it.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_01: They about to get blown out in like every single game for the Fulsiobi future.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_01: Then we have Halloween night, and it is the start of the Emirates NBA Cup.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_01: Cool courts, cool everything.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_01: I'm one of those people that are that buys into the cup.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not one of those people that would just act like it's nothing.
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_01: I because if my team won the cup, I would act like no, I'm not gonna act like we won the championship, but I would feel really good about it, you know.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so the start of NBA Cup is always so many great games.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_01: So the Knicks versus Bulls, of course, you know I'm locked into that.
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_01: I'm probably gonna do a little bit of a uh a handshake type of who wins the game, my boy Pierre, who's a Knicks fan.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_01: You even got Pacers versus Hawks, even though the Pacers got zero ball players on their roster right now that can dribble.
• 49:12
  SPEAKER_01: I'm excited for it.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the Celtics versus the 76ers, the Celtics are three games in, they're getting closer and closer to my do not watch lists.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_01: Do not watch live lists.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry, because I will watch, but like, am I gonna turn off another game to watch the Celtics right now?
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_01: It ain't been that cool.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_01: The Raptors have a lot of great defenders and they go against the Cleveland Cavaliers.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's a fun game.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_01: I would love to act like there's a Luka Doncic game here, but Luka Donches is out with an injury, so I can't act like the Lakers are much CTV, even though I do remember there was a time where Anthony Davis was out and LeBron James was out, and Austin Reeves dropped like 44 points.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, yeah, he can do that.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_01: And now he gets an opportunity to go out there and showcase to the front office how much money he might be worth on the market.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_01: So that's interesting.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_01: But like for Lakers fans, to have two all-NBA players be out, it's not the greatest of things.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_01: That has been another hopefully great episode of Small Ball with Kenny Beecham.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_01: If you did enjoy it, be sure to come back at the same time tomorrow.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_01: If you're watching on YouTube, leave a like, subscribe.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_01: I will see y'all next week.