Latest / Small Ball with Kenny Beecham / Pacers/Knicks THRILLER + Sue Bird joins the show!

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Pacers/Knicks THRILLER + Sue Bird joins the show! · Small Ball with Kenny Beecham

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to a very special episode of Small Ball with Kenny Beachum.
0:03
SPEAKER_00: I'm filming this just what 12 hours after one of the biggest playoff comebacks you will ever see.
0:09
SPEAKER_00: We got to talk about that.
0:10
SPEAKER_00: And later in the episode, we got an absolute legend coming onto the show.
0:14
SPEAKER_00: One of the many icons in the sport of basketball.
0:17
SPEAKER_00: One of my biggest style icons.
0:20
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to talk to her about that.
0:21
SPEAKER_00: Sue Bird is coming on later in the show to talk all things.
0:24
SPEAKER_00: NBA W in her own personal journey.
0:26
SPEAKER_00: It should be a ton of fun.
0:28
SPEAKER_00: You know, she is on my personal Mount Rushmore.
0:30
SPEAKER_00: So it feels weird to have her on the show.
0:32
SPEAKER_00: And it even happened just yet.
0:33
SPEAKER_00: So I'm hoping that I don't crumble under the pressure of having Sue Bird in the Zoom.
0:37
SPEAKER_00: So it should be a lot of fun.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: Leave a like, subscribe.
0:39
SPEAKER_00: I do want to let you know that here at Enjoy Basketball, we did a collaboration with Fanatics in the NBA.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: We called it the Hometown Capsule Collaboration.
0:47
SPEAKER_00: If you are a fan of the Bulls, the Lakers, the Raptors, or the Knicks, I almost forgot you Knicks fans.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry about that.
0:54
SPEAKER_00: Go over to enjoybasketball.com and go pick up a part of the collection.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: You know, it was a long time coming.
0:59
SPEAKER_00: We've been working on it for two years now.
1:01
SPEAKER_00: So um, and we made sure we got the inventory pretty high for y'all fans, and I appreciate it.
1:06
SPEAKER_00: If you just go check it out, even if you don't back, go check it out because we've been working on it for a very, very long time.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: All right, man.
1:12
SPEAKER_00: What a game, what a game, what a game.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: 138, 135 is final score in overtime for the Indiana Pacers.
1:20
SPEAKER_00: Down by eight points with 50 seconds to go.
1:24
SPEAKER_00: Down by 17 with six minutes to go in the game.
1:27
SPEAKER_00: I think Josh Hart said it perfectly in his postgame.
1:30
SPEAKER_00: It felt like they, talking about the Knicks, were playing not to lose instead of playing to win.
1:37
SPEAKER_00: And you felt that.
1:38
SPEAKER_00: That conservative nature on the offensive side of the ball, their conservative nature on the defensive side of the ball, got them to the point where in a game that they should have won for 44 minutes, they were the better team, they walk out of home court and say, hey, we lost.
1:54
SPEAKER_00: And one of the biggest conversations, at least in my head, revolving around this, has to do with home court advantage.
1:59
SPEAKER_00: Because so far in the postseason, for like the third, the fourth year in a row, basically since the bubble, it feels as though home court advantage does not even matter.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: It just doesn't.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: Like I remember, oh, back in my day, um, having the home court advantage really, really mattered.
2:15
SPEAKER_00: The statistics say that 65% of the time the home court team was winning just seven years ago.
2:21
SPEAKER_00: And now that's down to 55%.
2:23
SPEAKER_00: Something is there.
2:24
SPEAKER_00: Master Square Garden was electric.
2:27
SPEAKER_00: Chalamet.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: I gotta bring up Chalamet every episode at this point.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: Uh Chalamet Stiller, the whole Knicks legendary role from La Trail Sweet Wheel to Carmelo Anthony to Patrick Ewing to so on and so forth.
2:38
SPEAKER_00: Everybody is there.
2:40
SPEAKER_00: And they lose.
2:42
SPEAKER_00: Again, if Madison Square Garden home court advantage doesn't mean anything, I don't know what really will be.
2:47
SPEAKER_00: What will matter?
2:48
SPEAKER_00: And this series alone, um, or these two teams, the Pacers have been an amazing road team, the Knicks have been an amazing road team.
2:55
SPEAKER_00: So maybe this is one of them good old classic, the road team wins every single game.
2:59
SPEAKER_00: And that's the case, the Pacers walk out of there in seven.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: It's just something to be on the lookout.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: Because we we talk about how great home court advantage is.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about just optically, right?
3:08
SPEAKER_00: OKC fans all putting on the shirt.
3:10
SPEAKER_00: You got one section that's blue, one section that's white, it's electric.
3:13
SPEAKER_00: They're going crazy.
3:14
SPEAKER_00: And then, of course, New York is going crazy.
3:16
SPEAKER_00: But it hasn't really mattered too much.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: Just something to think about.
3:21
SPEAKER_00: Over the last 27 postseasons, teams were zero in 970 when they trailed about 14 points or more with two minutes and 50 seconds left in regulation.
3:32
SPEAKER_00: And now it's a win on there.
3:35
SPEAKER_00: It's no longer 0-970.
3:36
SPEAKER_00: It is one and 970.
3:38
SPEAKER_00: That is officially from the Pacers' own uh Twitter account.
3:42
SPEAKER_00: One of the more insane comebacks you'll ever really see.
3:45
SPEAKER_00: Like you can tip your cap to so many people.
3:47
SPEAKER_00: You can tip your cap to, of course, Tyrese Halliburton for hitting the shot and immediately, immediately pulling out the Reggie Miller while Reggie Miller's on the call.
3:56
SPEAKER_00: Reggie Miller giving the point, he giving the point.
3:58
SPEAKER_00: Great moment if you're a Pacers fan.
4:00
SPEAKER_00: You can give love to Aaron Eesmith, who probably should be the first name we mentioned because in the fourth quarter he hit five threes, and some of them were the level of difficulty were really high.
4:09
SPEAKER_00: Some of them were just wide open threes because they opted to play some drop coverage on these things.
4:13
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what the hell is going on.
4:14
SPEAKER_00: Instead of switching on a guy that already had four threes in his corner, they still tried to have Josh Hart fight through and he slips and falls and boom, three-pointer for Neesmith.
4:23
SPEAKER_00: We can go a lot of different directions, but I'm gonna start with coaching.
4:26
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, let's start with coaching in this one because I thought, you know, in real time, that bringing in Ben Shepard was a mistake, right?
4:34
SPEAKER_00: You have the five fouls from Nim Hard, you have the five fouls from Neesmith, and you're like, yeah, we got to find somebody else that can go out there and just give Brunson a different look.
4:42
SPEAKER_00: And Ben Shepard happens to be that guy.
4:44
SPEAKER_00: Ben Shepard didn't play for the first three and a half or quarter, like three and a half quarters.
4:48
SPEAKER_00: He didn't play in this game, and he had to come in and guard one of the best clutch players in all the basketball, what top 10 player in the league.
4:55
SPEAKER_00: And I thought that Jalen Brunson ended up dogging him.
4:59
SPEAKER_00: But here's the thing that the Pacers did in this game that may get lost throughout all of it.
5:04
SPEAKER_00: From the very first possession of this, they picked up 94 feet.
5:07
SPEAKER_00: And not only did they pick up 94 feet, they were doing everything in their power to deny Jalen Brunson from getting the ball.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: So many times in this game, we saw Josh Hart being the guy that is bringing the ball up the court.
5:17
SPEAKER_00: They're starting their actions very, very late and getting late shots.
5:21
SPEAKER_00: And their offense was not a problem until it was towards the end of this game.
5:24
SPEAKER_00: But I just thought that them going after Jalen Brunson very early on and getting underneath him and making him play through all of this physicality ended up mattering towards the end.
5:34
SPEAKER_00: There are so many plays in this game where you can tell that the Knicks were absolutely gassed.
5:39
SPEAKER_00: And in overtime, they just ran out completely.
5:41
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the two shots that they took basically at the end of the game, the Jalen Brunson wide open wing three that would have been amazing if it went in.
5:49
SPEAKER_00: Barely touches the rim.
5:50
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe it didn't touch the rim at all.
5:51
SPEAKER_00: They get the offensive rebound.
5:53
SPEAKER_00: Carton and Townshoots a 30-footer.
5:54
SPEAKER_00: Also barely touches the rim, but doesn't touch the rim at all.
5:57
SPEAKER_00: Those legs are really dead.
5:59
SPEAKER_00: And one of the luxuries that the Pacers have is that they can be like, hey, man, we got Mathrin, we got OB, we got TB, who did not look good today.
6:07
SPEAKER_00: But they got TB, they got TJ McConnell, they got Ben Shepard in this one.
6:11
SPEAKER_00: We have five guys off of our bench that can play somewhere between 10 to 20 minutes.
6:16
SPEAKER_00: Well, on the other side of things, that's not the case for them.
6:20
SPEAKER_00: The Knicks guys, Mikhail Bridges played a 46-minute game.
6:24
SPEAKER_00: Jalen Brunson played 37 minutes.
6:26
SPEAKER_00: Now promise you would have been more if he didn't have he wasn't in foul trouble.
6:29
SPEAKER_00: So when you when you get down to it and you don't close out in regulation and the other team has better legs because they had their second unit come in and hold the fort down for a little bit, it mattered.
6:40
SPEAKER_00: And then we get to the point where, yeah, shots are short.
6:44
SPEAKER_00: They're having mental miss mental mistakes defensively, which I still don't understand how they can happen three and a half, four quarters into a game, not recognizing what type of coverage we're going to run on this Tyrese Halliburton pick and roll.
6:55
SPEAKER_00: So I'm going to start off with Coach of Rick Carlisle because again, the Ben Shepherd move felt like the wrong thing in real time, but it ended up being a blessing in disguise because once Nimhar comes back into this game, I thought his defense on uh Jalen Brunson was pretty damn good.
7:07
SPEAKER_00: And that's saying something because Jalen Brunson was pretty pretty phenomenal tonight or last night.
7:12
SPEAKER_00: Obi Toppin ends up playing a huge part in this game.
7:15
SPEAKER_00: Two of the biggest plays outside of the knees threes and then the foot on the line, Tyrese Halliburton and long two, Obi Toppin has the putback dunk from the left baseline.
7:26
SPEAKER_00: You have Obi Toppin splitting the pick and roll and getting the dunk that should have been an and one as well.
7:31
SPEAKER_00: I think that was Mikel Bridges.
7:33
SPEAKER_00: He played a huge part in this one.
7:34
SPEAKER_00: And then you look at him like, man, Mouse Turner has such a good first half.
7:39
SPEAKER_00: He was unstoppable.
7:41
SPEAKER_00: He hit pretty much every single shot he put up on the board.
7:43
SPEAKER_00: And then down the stretch, he's struggling to even touch the floor.
7:46
SPEAKER_00: What is that about?
7:47
SPEAKER_00: He was getting absolutely destroyed defensively between Carnthony Towns and Jalen Bronson.
7:52
SPEAKER_00: So Rick Carlisle's like, hey, we're gonna try something else out.
7:54
SPEAKER_00: Thomas Bryant, what you got?
7:55
SPEAKER_00: The answer was a game number one.
7:57
SPEAKER_00: Thomas Bryant didn't have a lot.
7:58
SPEAKER_00: God damn, it was a real, really bad 12-minute stretch, if you ask me.
8:02
SPEAKER_00: But then he found out that, hey, we can go small here.
8:05
SPEAKER_00: Because as good as the Knicks rebounding was throughout this and their physicality was throughout this, again, throughout the course of the game in waiver.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: That first stretch where Mitchell Robinson comes in in that first half, he changed the dynamic of the entire game, the whole momentum shift.
8:18
SPEAKER_00: You got a seven for seven team from the field in the Indiana Pacers.
8:21
SPEAKER_00: Mitchell Robinson comes in, and the very first shot the Knicks take, they miss, and Mitchell Robinson gets an offensive rebound and draws a foul.
8:27
SPEAKER_00: That's that swings the entire flow of the game.
8:29
SPEAKER_00: But at the course of it, they're like, hey, we can't really run a ton of Mitchell Robinson.
8:33
SPEAKER_00: They're already tired.
8:34
SPEAKER_00: They're not going to crash the offensive glass as much as they did in this first half when they had their legs.
8:38
SPEAKER_00: So let's go with an Obi Toppin and let's run this smaller lineup.
8:41
SPEAKER_00: And it ended up being beneficial down the stretch.
8:43
SPEAKER_00: So this was ultimately just one of the most phenomenal games you'll ever see.
8:47
SPEAKER_00: And then you look at it, and again, I do my post-game recaps, go to the Kenny Frill channel on YouTube if you want to hear those.
8:53
SPEAKER_00: I thought the Knicks played a really good game until obviously they didn't.
8:58
SPEAKER_00: Jalen Brunson was as good as he could ever really, really be.
9:03
SPEAKER_00: If there's any silver lining for Knicks fans, and it's it's unfortunate that you still have to win four games after winning basically the majority of this game.
9:11
SPEAKER_00: If there's any silver lining, as of right now, there's really no answer for Jalen Brunson.
9:15
SPEAKER_00: The only answer for Jalen Brunson is getting him in foul trouble or getting him really tired.
9:19
SPEAKER_00: But like there's not an individual coverage.
9:21
SPEAKER_00: There's not an individual player on the pacers that can really hold their own against this guy, Jalen Brunson.
9:26
SPEAKER_00: And I thought that one of the best things about it that ended up being the factor that played Carl Anthony Towns off the court, or I'm sorry, played Miles Turner off the court was Carl Anthony Towns bringing his jump shooting today.
9:38
SPEAKER_00: He shot 50% for three on eight attempts.
9:40
SPEAKER_00: Um, one of those attempts again is the end of the game there.
9:42
SPEAKER_00: But the coverage that the Pacers wanted to run doesn't really work if Carlton Towns is hitting that long ball.
9:49
SPEAKER_00: So then they opted to go small, and then Carlton Towns absolutely destroyed Pascal Siakum on the defensive side of the ball.
9:54
SPEAKER_00: So there are a lot of things.
9:55
SPEAKER_00: If you're a Knicks fan, you could walk away and say, yes, we did this, we did this.
9:58
SPEAKER_00: I thought Mikhail Bridge and Ojinanobi did a pretty damn good job defensively, again, until they did it.
10:03
SPEAKER_00: So you could walk out of there and say, hey, yeah, we're down 0-1.
10:07
SPEAKER_00: But also I recognize that there are two other teams sitting at home right now that the Pacers saw that probably had that same sentiment.
10:17
SPEAKER_00: That probably felt like, yeah, we're down and this, but like at game two versus the Bucs, or I'm sorry, game two versus the Cavs, you're like, yeah, we're down right now, but man, we were so very close.
10:28
SPEAKER_00: And if we just do this, this, and this, and this, then we'll be good.
10:30
SPEAKER_00: Those teams end up being good.
10:33
SPEAKER_00: There's something to be said about the lack of quit with this Pacer team.
10:38
SPEAKER_00: Again, I don't know what ends up happening.
10:40
SPEAKER_00: If they win this series, they go on to the finals and they win the finals or they lose right now.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: But this team, I said it in my Kenny Freel video.
10:48
SPEAKER_00: I think I'm gonna remember the 2025 Indiana Pacers as the we don't quit team.
10:53
SPEAKER_00: There's no way in hell you should be down by 14 points with two minutes or some change to go and you win.
10:59
SPEAKER_00: And for that to be the case, or something very similar to be the case, three times in one playoff run.
11:04
SPEAKER_00: Are you kidding me?
11:06
SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about Tyree Halliburton.
11:07
SPEAKER_00: I feel like I already did the deep dive to Tyree Halliburton last series when he did a very similar thing where his team was down by a bunch of points and he came out and he scored a bunch and they end up winning.
11:16
SPEAKER_00: They asked last episode, who are the point guards you're taking over Tyree Halliburton?
11:20
SPEAKER_00: And I gave Luca, I gave Shea, shout out to MVP Shea, I gave Curry, and I gave Brunson as my fourth.
11:27
SPEAKER_00: And after that, I ain't trying to really hear much.
11:31
SPEAKER_00: And I'm just thinking, I'm just thinking aloud, just thinking aloud, just thinking aloud.
11:34
SPEAKER_00: What would it take for him to surpass some of those dudes?
11:37
SPEAKER_00: And one of the main clips, um, the one of the main comment sections on that clip was like on TikTok or on Instagram was like, you got me with the top three, in whatever order, it'd be in Shea, Luca, and Curry.
11:47
SPEAKER_00: There's a world where you can view Tyrese Halliburton as better than Jalen Brunson.
11:52
SPEAKER_00: Obviously, Jalen Brunson is a higher volume score.
11:55
SPEAKER_00: Um, he's a clutch player of the year, but damn it, Tyrese Halliburton, you saw his clutch moments in this playoff run.
12:01
SPEAKER_00: So I can hear it.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: I can hear it.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: I think I still go Brunson as of right now.
12:05
SPEAKER_00: But if this series goes a certain way, I think I might revise that.
12:09
SPEAKER_00: You know, there's something to be said for a guy who never makes mistakes, man.
12:17
SPEAKER_00: Who never, ever, ever makes mistakes.
12:20
SPEAKER_00: He has two turnovers in this game.
12:21
SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
12:22
SPEAKER_00: One of them turnovers was with 0.2 seconds left on the clock in overtime where he just gave the ball to uh to Carnthony Towns.
12:30
SPEAKER_00: Here, there's nothing you can do.
12:31
SPEAKER_00: The game is over.
12:31
SPEAKER_00: Here, you got 0.2 seconds.
12:32
SPEAKER_00: I'm not even gonna try to inbound into my team.
12:34
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna give it to you.
12:35
SPEAKER_00: There's something to be said about a point guard that doesn't make mistakes.
12:41
SPEAKER_00: As good as he was in this game, and the shot that he hit and the finish that he had in overtime, one of my favorite moments is when he's breaking down his defender and from the top right wing, we get a cut from Nimhart and he just blasts Nimhart the ball for a finish.
12:57
SPEAKER_00: Just making the right read is so underappreciated in our sport.
13:02
SPEAKER_00: Because you talk about high usage player, you just kind of bake in the fact, oh, Luca Dontice has the ball a lot, which means that Luka Doncic will end up with five turnovers occasionally.
13:12
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna end up with seven turnovers occasionally.
13:13
SPEAKER_00: That's the game you play because he's so dynamic with the ball.
13:17
SPEAKER_00: You know, Luca Donci's teams historically, um, and I don't even know if this carried the case for his Lakers tenure.
13:23
SPEAKER_00: Luca might average four to, I don't even know what the numbers are.
13:25
SPEAKER_00: Let's say Luka Doncic might average four turnovers himself, and that's a lot, but his teams don't turn the ball over much because he is the offense.
13:34
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, in his heyday, which that feels crazy to say because he's fucking Luca Donces and he still can average 28 points, but like the highest he's ever uh averaged in uh turnovers per game is four and a half.
13:43
SPEAKER_00: But it's like, yeah, that's a lot, but also he has the ball so much that it's not a lot at the same time.
13:47
SPEAKER_00: Tarry Talliburton has the ball so much and still never ends possessions with turnovers, which means that his team rarely ends possessions with live ball turnovers.
14:00
SPEAKER_00: This team has such mental toughness that when the the Knicks are up by 17 points or whatever, ended up him.
14:06
SPEAKER_00: And then by 17 points, I thought it was wrapped.
14:09
SPEAKER_00: I put the pin down.
14:11
SPEAKER_00: They had fouled two three-point shooters on back-to-back possessions, inexcusable stuff.
14:17
SPEAKER_00: And it's like, nah, this game ain't over.
14:19
SPEAKER_00: Huh?
14:20
SPEAKER_00: This game ain't over.
14:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I just again people be thinking that because me and Halliburton are like friends, that a lot of the conversations I have around him are biased.
14:31
SPEAKER_00: I just don't think I have a lot of people in the NBA that I'm friends with.
14:35
SPEAKER_00: You don't hear me talk like this.
14:37
SPEAKER_00: They're not doing this.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: And go back to the beginning of the season, go watch those episodes we dropped the numbers on the board or even on this show when he wasn't good for the first six weeks or four weeks of the season.
14:47
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna call it as it is.
14:49
SPEAKER_00: And that's what he would, that's what he wants, that's what he wants.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: You don't want me to be scratching backs, but in the playoffs right now, let me see if I can get these stats.
14:56
SPEAKER_00: Terry Taliburton has a 26.7 usage rate.
14:59
SPEAKER_00: 26.7 usage rate.
15:01
SPEAKER_00: That is nuts for him to only be averaging so-and-so turnovers.
15:06
SPEAKER_00: He's always, always, this this regular season, he's in a 95 percentile and turnover percentage.
15:13
SPEAKER_00: How often a player turns the ball over when using a possession.
15:16
SPEAKER_00: I don't know why it's for using a possession, you get what I'm saying.
15:19
SPEAKER_00: 8.7, 8.4% of the time.
15:22
SPEAKER_00: It is impossible to be that efficient.
15:25
SPEAKER_00: And when the guy that's holding the ball for the majority of the game is that efficient with the ball, then guess what?
15:31
SPEAKER_00: As a team, our offense is gonna be great because we're rarely turning the ball over as a squad.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: We're rarely getting bad looks.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: And that is what the pace are gonna do.
15:40
SPEAKER_00: They're gonna get good looks at the rim, they're gonna hit shots, and they're gonna try to wear you down defensively because as a team, they don't have a ton of defensive-oriented wings that can be 6'7 and long arms and so on and so forth.
15:52
SPEAKER_00: So they got to get it how they live defensively.
15:54
SPEAKER_00: Come on, we pick you up 94 feet, and we're gonna wear you down.
15:58
SPEAKER_00: And we watched them wear down teams in every single postseason series they've had so far.
16:04
SPEAKER_00: They've been successful.
16:05
SPEAKER_00: This was the hardest series for me to predict.
16:08
SPEAKER_00: This was the hardest series for me to predict that I originally went Pacers in seven, and then at the very last minute, like the day before game number one happened, I was like, I think I'm going, I think I'm going Knicks in seven.
16:19
SPEAKER_00: Thinking about the physicality that the Knicks can bring, and who knows what ends up happening.
16:23
SPEAKER_00: But I I've almost never in my lifetime flip a prediction.
16:28
SPEAKER_00: And that's how much respect I have for both of these teams.
16:31
SPEAKER_00: Um, so I'm excited to see what game two brings.
16:34
SPEAKER_00: Um again, I'm recording this Thursday, the 22nd, and you know, as y'all are watching game number two of Minnesota versus OKC has already happened.
16:43
SPEAKER_00: So I don't want to go too much into game number one, but I'll give you just my overall thoughts.
16:49
SPEAKER_00: I I think OKC is the best team in the league.
16:52
SPEAKER_00: I think they have been the best team in the league since the beginning of the season, and I think they were finished as the best team of the league.
16:59
SPEAKER_00: I think it's that simple.
17:00
SPEAKER_00: Got a lot of respect and love for Minnesota, but I just think OKC is the better team, especially if like my boy Nas Reed is not performing well.
17:09
SPEAKER_00: So far in the playoffs, Nas Reed has just not been the guy that we've accustomed to seeing.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: And if they don't have that extra oomph off that bench, it's gonna be pretty tough for them.
17:19
SPEAKER_00: Um, I think that if I'm going to predict game two, and again, you watched it already, so you can see if I'm right or wrong here.
17:27
SPEAKER_00: I think that game number two, the Minnesota Timbows will come out and be ultra aggressive at trying to get to the basket.
17:33
SPEAKER_00: As good of a defensive team as OKC is, and they clog up so many uh lanes and they get their hand in so many cookie jars and so on and so forth, the Minnesota Timbulls just opted not to get to the basket.
17:44
SPEAKER_00: And again, there's so much stuff going on there.
17:46
SPEAKER_00: But I remember in game number four versus the Lakers, this was coming off the game where Anthony Edwards had zero free throws.
17:53
SPEAKER_00: He had zero free throws in the playoff game, which is so hard to even think about right now.
17:57
SPEAKER_00: The very next game, he said, Fuck it, I'm Anthony Edwards, and I'm gonna get to the basket no matter who's there, and I'm gonna get fouled.
18:02
SPEAKER_00: I think he shot 14 free throws in that game.
18:04
SPEAKER_00: I need to see an Anthony Edwards version, that type of version of Anthony Edwards tonight.
18:10
SPEAKER_00: Because OKC is a team that's going to be hella physical.
18:14
SPEAKER_00: Think about how the three games that the Denver Nuggets won, a lot of those games, other than game number one, they won by matching that physicality as far as them trying to get downhill, whether it be Christian Brown, whether it be Jokic just being a big ass body drawing a bunch of fouls.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: You need to get some dudes in foul trouble.
18:30
SPEAKER_00: So get to that line.
18:31
SPEAKER_00: Get to the paint.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: You know, and the six, they had seven turnovers in the first quarter last game.
18:37
SPEAKER_00: Six of those were then when they got paint pressure and they opted to do some bullshit.
18:42
SPEAKER_00: Try to kick it, spray it out to the shooters.
18:44
SPEAKER_00: Oh no, Caruso with another steal.
18:47
SPEAKER_00: Oh no, I'm spinning, and boom, somebody's on this backside to get the steal.
18:52
SPEAKER_00: I think they have to be more intentional about their movements.
18:56
SPEAKER_00: And if they do that, then maybe they can win game two and maybe they can win the win part of the series.
19:00
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I honestly just think OKC is just a little bit too much.
19:04
SPEAKER_00: Speaking of that, if you go to FanDuel Sportsbook, now that we're down to our final four, we can look at NBA Finals odds.
19:10
SPEAKER_00: And I mentioned that OKC has been the best team, is the best team.
19:13
SPEAKER_00: They are the heavy favorite of a my at a minus 230 to win it all.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: After that, game number one with the Pacers, they are second with a plus 500.
19:21
SPEAKER_00: The Knicks are behind them at a plus 750, and the Minnesota Timbows are at the back end at a plus 1,000 because they're going against the Thunder.
19:28
SPEAKER_00: They got to get through the Thunder to get to the finals.
19:30
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
19:31
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I can't believe that we're down to these last four teams.
19:34
SPEAKER_00: I wanna, I wish I can go back and look and see what were the odds before the season started.
19:38
SPEAKER_00: I know the Celtics would have been there.
19:39
SPEAKER_00: I know the Thunder probably would have been there.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: Um, maybe the Nuggets.
19:43
SPEAKER_00: I don't know who the top four would have been, but I promise you this is not the way they thought it was gonna be.
19:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, man.
19:48
SPEAKER_00: Insane stuff.
19:49
SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's enough of me talking about basketball solo.
19:54
SPEAKER_00: We got a special guest, and I cannot wait to talk to her, Suber.
20:04
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21:36
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm joined by a true basketball icon with two NTAA titles, four WNBA championships, five Olympic gold medals, and a basketball IQ that rivals any player, any person to ever touch a basketball.
21:49
SPEAKER_00: Now she brings that same vision and leadership to the broadcast booth and podcast studio that makes one of her the greatest floor generals in basketball history.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: Her new podcast, Bird's Eye View.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Is your courts side to the WNBA?
22:02
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the show.
22:04
SPEAKER_00: Super.
22:05
SPEAKER_00: Man, what an intro.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
22:07
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
22:07
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for coming on.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: I want to tell you just a quick story.
22:10
SPEAKER_00: You are one of my icons, like just full on Mount Rushmore.
22:15
SPEAKER_00: I used to work for Turner.
22:16
SPEAKER_00: And we were doing these shoots where you've probably been here before.
22:19
SPEAKER_00: You can't wear logos, you can't do this.
22:21
SPEAKER_00: And we had a stylist.
22:22
SPEAKER_00: Her name was Woody.
22:25
SPEAKER_00: Can everybody send me three people that you really like their facts?
22:30
SPEAKER_00: And I said super.
22:32
SPEAKER_00: You're the first name.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: You can't tell now, but like you were the first.
22:36
SPEAKER_00: Absolute icon, man.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: I can't I can't explain how excited I am to have you on the show.
22:40
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
22:41
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate that.
22:42
SPEAKER_01: I love it.
22:42
SPEAKER_01: You got to add that to the intro next time.
22:46
SPEAKER_00: So I think my first thing I want to ask you with the W going on, are you having um your own show, which is um episode one just dropped last week and I thought it was amazing.
22:54
SPEAKER_00: How much of the NBA are you keeping up with now that you have so many different things going on?
22:58
SPEAKER_01: Man, bad timing.
23:00
SPEAKER_01: I'm a Knicks fan.
23:01
SPEAKER_00: So okay.
23:01
SPEAKER_00: There we go.
23:02
SPEAKER_01: It's been a tough what, like 12 or so hours.
23:06
SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, honestly, there's only so much basketball you can watch.
23:10
SPEAKER_01: And I am like really deep into the WNBA season right now, but it's the playoffs.
23:15
SPEAKER_01: So I haven't really missed many games.
23:17
SPEAKER_01: The only time I miss them is if like I have, you know, dinner or planned or something like that.
23:20
SPEAKER_01: But then I end up waking up the next day.
23:22
SPEAKER_01: Luckily I have Synergy, so I can just go to Synergy and rewatch all the games.
23:26
SPEAKER_01: I can watch them in like 30 minutes.
23:27
SPEAKER_01: So it's perfect.
23:28
SPEAKER_00: We just got our Synergy account yesterday.
23:31
SPEAKER_00: And it was like, shout out to the team at Synergy because they hooked us up.
23:34
SPEAKER_00: And um, we have a team of like four guys that also do a podcast with me, and everybody's just in love.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: And we didn't even recognize how in depth that program really is.
23:45
SPEAKER_00: Uh like some of the we want to see just the dribble handoffs with Jalen Bronson for all season long.
23:50
SPEAKER_00: And it's like it makes no sense to have that level of depth.
23:53
SPEAKER_00: So uh yes, energy is.
23:55
SPEAKER_01: Oh, you just got you just got like hours of your life back.
23:58
SPEAKER_00: Seriously.
23:59
SPEAKER_01: Not having to figure that out on your own.
24:00
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
24:01
SPEAKER_00: The NBA draft is coming up and it also does like Hollett stuff.
24:04
SPEAKER_00: So we're we're really excited about that.
24:06
SPEAKER_00: Um so yeah, last last night was an interesting one for Knicks fans for sure.
24:09
SPEAKER_01: Uh, oh my God.
24:12
SPEAKER_01: I feel bad.
24:13
SPEAKER_00: What do you think?
24:13
SPEAKER_00: What do you think happened from your perspective on that one?
24:16
SPEAKER_01: Um, I think like human nature is human nature sometimes.
24:20
SPEAKER_01: And at the end of regulation, like what, three, four minutes left.
24:23
SPEAKER_01: I don't remember the exact time and score, but three, four minutes left, up double digits.
24:27
SPEAKER_01: There was just like the tiniest bit, the tiniest bit of relaxation that hit the Knicks.
24:34
SPEAKER_01: Like, not even like I'm talking like 0.1%.
24:37
SPEAKER_01: But the pacers obviously didn't quit.
24:40
SPEAKER_01: And so when you have that happen, it's it can swing a game.
24:43
SPEAKER_01: And we saw it.
24:43
SPEAKER_01: I mean, the pacers hit every shot they need to hit.
24:46
SPEAKER_01: The Knicks, I don't know, missed a couple free throws here and there.
24:49
SPEAKER_01: But to me, it was just like this little bit of relaxation that happened at the end of regulation.
24:54
SPEAKER_00: As a player, is that relaxation easy to happen?
24:57
SPEAKER_00: Like you're up by 12 points with two minutes to go.
25:00
SPEAKER_00: Is it easy to kind of take your foot off the gas?
25:03
SPEAKER_01: Um, I don't know if the easy is the way I would describe it.
25:06
SPEAKER_01: I really think it's just like a human nature thing.
25:08
SPEAKER_01: You have to fight it a little bit.
25:10
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, there's also like you you probably had to exert so much energy just to be in that position.
25:16
SPEAKER_01: Where when you look up and you're like, all right, minute and a half, we're up 11, like we're good.
25:22
SPEAKER_01: Like I said, it's not much.
25:24
SPEAKER_01: I think people think like you hear the word relax and it's like, oh, they gave up, or oh, they stopped playing hard.
25:29
SPEAKER_01: Nah, it's like a percentage point difference.
25:31
SPEAKER_01: But that difference can make or break a game.
25:34
SPEAKER_01: And again, I mean, everything had to go right for the pacers.
25:37
SPEAKER_01: Credit to them.
25:38
SPEAKER_01: But everything had to go right.
25:40
SPEAKER_01: It was a uh just a terrible combination of events.
25:43
SPEAKER_01: Terrible.
25:44
SPEAKER_00: I think a forgotten piece of your journey um attached to the NBA is in 2018 you held a front office position with the Nuggets.
25:53
SPEAKER_00: And what did what did that entail?
25:55
SPEAKER_00: How did that happen?
25:56
SPEAKER_00: It's just such an interesting part because you were an active player as well while doing everything.
26:01
SPEAKER_00: And as we can see now, even in your post-plan career, you're you're a busy, busy person.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: So how did you manage everything?
26:07
SPEAKER_01: Um, it was great.
26:08
SPEAKER_01: It was great.
26:09
SPEAKER_01: So basically, long story short, we my the my WNBA team, Seattle Storm, we won in 2018.
26:15
SPEAKER_01: So we're like fresh off that.
26:16
SPEAKER_01: It's the fall of 2018.
26:18
SPEAKER_01: And Tim Connolly, who at the time was the president of the Nuggets, we have a mutual friend in Karan Butler.
26:24
SPEAKER_01: So I just get this text from Karan, hey, can I connect you with Tim?
26:27
SPEAKER_01: Like he's interested in talking to you.
26:28
SPEAKER_01: Cool, cool, cool.
26:29
SPEAKER_01: I was like, yeah, sure.
26:30
SPEAKER_01: Get on the phone.
26:31
SPEAKER_01: And he kind of is just like, hey, why don't you just come out here, see what you think?
26:35
SPEAKER_01: We don't have like, it wasn't like there was like a role they were trying to fill.
26:40
SPEAKER_01: Or um, I honestly, I didn't I didn't really even have ambition of working in a front office.
26:45
SPEAKER_01: It was just kind of like, do you want to come check this out and see if you like it?
26:48
SPEAKER_01: He was like, okay.
26:49
SPEAKER_01: So I flew out there, loved everybody, loved the organization, and really viewed it as an opportunity to just um try something new to hopefully learn.
26:59
SPEAKER_01: Um, I don't even remember exactly what my title was.
27:01
SPEAKER_01: It was a total make em up.
27:03
SPEAKER_01: It was like, I don't even know, like something, something basketball operations.
27:06
SPEAKER_01: But Tim and and really everybody there.
27:09
SPEAKER_01: Um, Calvin Booth was there at the time too.
27:12
SPEAKER_01: Artoris was there at the time.
27:13
SPEAKER_01: They were just like, do like check out whatever you want to check out.
27:16
SPEAKER_01: I ended up doing a lot more of like the front office GMing stuff.
27:20
SPEAKER_01: So I would sit in all those meetings.
27:22
SPEAKER_01: I felt like basketball would have been cool to like work with the coaches, but I that I know, right?
27:28
SPEAKER_01: On some level, I know basketball.
27:29
SPEAKER_01: So I was like, let me do something that I never have access to.
27:32
SPEAKER_01: And it was amazing.
27:33
SPEAKER_01: I learned so much.
27:34
SPEAKER_01: Um, I would evaluate players from time to time if they were trying to like bring a guy out of the G League.
27:39
SPEAKER_01: But really, more than anything, I ended up learning like the things that I learned, I ended up taking with me to Seattle.
27:46
SPEAKER_01: I was like, yo, an NBA this, or yo, they do it this way.
27:49
SPEAKER_01: Because the difference in the WNBA is we just don't have the resources or the manpower at times.
27:53
SPEAKER_01: So anything you can like, any kind of like ideology you can bring with you, it's gonna, it's gonna hit.
27:58
SPEAKER_01: It's gonna be new, it's gonna be different.
27:59
SPEAKER_01: So that was the best part for me.
28:01
SPEAKER_00: How much of that is going into now your new role as a managing director of USA women's national, the women's national team?
28:11
SPEAKER_01: You know, it actually there's one thing that Tim, because the other best part was I could just like go to dinner, grab drinks.
28:18
SPEAKER_01: Like it was, I would, I would go to Denver like once a month for about like a week.
28:22
SPEAKER_01: And so I just had all this time to pick their brains.
28:25
SPEAKER_01: And I remember talking to Tim, and you know, if if you go back into the Nuggets draft history, of course, everybody talks about Jokic and how they, you know, found him in the second round at pick whatever, and how that's like one of the, you know, it's gonna go down as one of the greatest deals of all time.
28:39
SPEAKER_01: But he told me stories of, you know, they could have drafted Donovan Mitchell.
28:43
SPEAKER_01: They didn't.
28:44
SPEAKER_01: There was at the time, I think, a trade where it could they could have had Gobert maybe, but instead they had Trey Lyles, it didn't work out as well as they had hoped.
28:52
SPEAKER_01: Anyways, he talked a lot about his misses.
28:55
SPEAKER_01: And he basically was just, yeah, he just had a conversation with me about how like it's a serious job and you're trying to do your best, but you you can't take it too seriously where you're afraid, right?
29:06
SPEAKER_01: You can't be worried about the misses that you don't pull the trigger on something.
29:09
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
29:10
SPEAKER_01: So I think with that, really what the message is is like when you see something and you have a feeling and a gut, you have to trust yourself and trust like your experience and why you're feeling that and not get too caught up in making a mistake and being afraid.
29:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's interesting because Tim, like you mentioned, yeah, they drafted Donovan Mitchell, traded him on draft night.
29:26
SPEAKER_00: They drafted Rudy Gobert, traded him on draft night.
29:29
SPEAKER_00: But ultimately it led to the part where they won a championship under Tim's leadership.
29:33
SPEAKER_00: And then now his other team, Minnesota, is in the conference final.
29:36
SPEAKER_00: So it's very interesting to hear him say, yeah, don't take it too seriously, as he is widely renowned as one of the best guys to do this thing.
29:42
SPEAKER_00: So that's pretty dope.
29:43
SPEAKER_00: That's pretty dope.
29:44
SPEAKER_00: Um I kind of want to get to uh you personally.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: Uh um, I think your story's amazing of how everything starts because nowadays kids fall in love with the game of basketball or sports in general, and they immediately say, I'm going to the league, right?
29:58
SPEAKER_00: Uh all this time and effort.
30:00
SPEAKER_00: But you, when you're finding your love for the game, there is no W, right?
30:06
SPEAKER_00: So how do you stay poised or or stay in love with the game, knowing that maybe there's a hard ceiling to what this can turn into?
30:14
SPEAKER_00: And also what was the moment like?
30:16
SPEAKER_00: You're like, oh, actually now I can do this professionally.
30:20
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so there is a moment, and I'll get to that.
30:22
SPEAKER_01: Um, so yeah, so growing up, it wasn't I did not have dreams of playing in the WNBA, it didn't exist.
30:28
SPEAKER_01: I didn't have dreams of even being professional, like being a professional player, because you know, let's let's say I'm 13, 14 years old, and I'm starting to watch the NCAA tournament, right?
30:39
SPEAKER_01: Like Final Floors are on TV at that time.
30:41
SPEAKER_01: So I'm starting to understand college basketball and like the idea that I could get a scholarship, and that became a little bit of a North Star.
30:47
SPEAKER_01: I was like, oh, I could get this paid for.
30:49
SPEAKER_01: This is amazing.
30:50
SPEAKER_01: But when you start to hear stories of beyond that and people having to go overseas to make money, you know, you're 13, 14, you're not even trying to hear that.
30:57
SPEAKER_01: So it wasn't like professional basketball was ever a thing.
31:01
SPEAKER_01: But the Olympic team in 95, and then ultimately when they played in the Olympics in 96, now I'm like 14, 15 years old.
31:09
SPEAKER_01: I'm starting to get recruited by colleges.
31:11
SPEAKER_01: And so even though I didn't have like a professional league in the WMBA to give me that North Star, I did have the Olympics.
31:19
SPEAKER_00: Gotcha.
31:19
SPEAKER_01: And that then became like a little bit of a that was like my ambition.
31:23
SPEAKER_01: It it felt lofty.
31:24
SPEAKER_01: I had no idea if I would get there.
31:26
SPEAKER_01: But it was one of those things where it was, it was there, but I didn't think about it daily either.
31:30
SPEAKER_01: I just kind of did my thing.
31:31
SPEAKER_01: But then I get to college.
31:33
SPEAKER_01: Now the WMBA is in its like first couple years, and two things happened.
31:38
SPEAKER_01: One, we had like Nikisha Sales at the time, who I didn't play with.
31:42
SPEAKER_01: She had graduated, but she's getting drafted, you know, she's playing the WMBA, she's coming back and you know, talking to us about it.
31:48
SPEAKER_01: So it's becoming like real, right?
31:50
SPEAKER_01: It's like, oh, this player who played at UConn just got drafted.
31:53
SPEAKER_01: Like this is a path now.
31:54
SPEAKER_01: So that happened.
31:55
SPEAKER_01: But really, what what really happened was um Koach Oriama was an assistant for the 2000 Olympic team.
32:03
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
32:03
SPEAKER_01: So he goes to Sydney with them, he comes back, and we're having one of our meetings, you know, where he's sitting you down as a player and kind of talking about some stuff.
32:11
SPEAKER_01: And he basically says to me, he's like, I just spent like a month with these players.
32:15
SPEAKER_01: Like, if this is what you want to do, like if this is really what your ambitions are, like you you can do it.
32:21
SPEAKER_01: And that was like that everything clicked for me in that moment where it was like, it all became real.
32:25
SPEAKER_01: The WNBA became real, the Olympics became real, and now I'm like on a path to something.
32:36
SPEAKER_00: I remember um when I when I was a kid, um, there was a maybe it was Sports Illustrated.
32:43
SPEAKER_00: I remember some I don't remember what magazine it was talking about Gino and his style of being a coach and how he's pretty tough on like his top players.
32:52
SPEAKER_00: Uh did you did you get to exper get to experience that with him?
32:55
SPEAKER_01: Did I?
32:56
SPEAKER_01: Um yeah.
32:59
SPEAKER_01: He's definitely he's just like the classic, if the coach isn't yelling at you, you should be alarmed.
33:05
SPEAKER_01: Like you should feel thankful that he's yelling at you.
33:09
SPEAKER_01: Um, but it's not easy.
33:10
SPEAKER_01: I was on the other side of a, you know, a couple doozies, and it's not easy.
33:15
SPEAKER_01: But it it does.
33:16
SPEAKER_01: It it pushes you.
33:18
SPEAKER_01: You definitely develop like a character, a mindset.
33:22
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, in practice, if you can beat him every day in practice, the games are gonna be easy.
33:27
SPEAKER_00: Right.
33:28
SPEAKER_00: It do you think he has evolved since then?
33:31
SPEAKER_00: Because I know like you you think about parenting, they always say like the first kid always has to strict this, and then by the third or fourth kid, they have so much freedom.
33:38
SPEAKER_00: And now Gino's been doing this for so long.
33:41
SPEAKER_00: Do you think that like his last year's team got to experience his hard-headedness with their star players?
33:48
SPEAKER_01: I think yes, but he's evolved.
33:50
SPEAKER_01: You have to, you have to adapt.
33:52
SPEAKER_01: I think um, similar to what you're saying about the parents, you know, when I already mentioned when Rebecca Lobo would come back, Nikisha Sales would come back, they'd be like, oh, you guys have it so much easier, right?
34:03
SPEAKER_01: And so now when I see how he is with kids today, with his teams today, I'm like, oh, you guys have it so much easier.
34:08
SPEAKER_01: But to his credit, you have to like generations are different.
34:11
SPEAKER_01: Like how we grew up is different.
34:13
SPEAKER_01: What we grew up surrounded by is different.
34:16
SPEAKER_01: Like today's players, they grew up with social media.
34:19
SPEAKER_01: They grew up with like all that's happening, you know, in that world.
34:22
SPEAKER_01: So he kind of you have to adapt.
34:25
SPEAKER_01: So I give him credit for that.
34:26
SPEAKER_01: He's definitely softer, but I think he had to be.
34:29
SPEAKER_00: If you Google greatest uh college women's basketball team of all time, there's a bunch of articles and a bunch of lists.
34:37
SPEAKER_00: And the 2001-2002 UConn team is number one on every single list.
34:44
SPEAKER_00: In real time, did y'all feel like y'all were like the best team ever?
34:49
SPEAKER_01: Um you know what's funny about you asking that question?
34:54
SPEAKER_01: I think if you asked me like two weeks ago, I would have said no.
34:57
SPEAKER_01: I would have said, which is also true.
35:00
SPEAKER_01: We had lost in the final four the year before.
35:02
SPEAKER_01: So we were just like literal blinders, like a little bit of a redemption, revenge situation.
35:08
SPEAKER_01: So we weren't really thinking about that.
35:10
SPEAKER_01: But someone sent me this clip and it's like an interview.
35:15
SPEAKER_01: I'm on the court, so it's my senior year.
35:17
SPEAKER_01: We've just won.
35:18
SPEAKER_01: I'm on the court, and and whatever you know, the sideline reporter asks me, I kind of have this moment where I'm like, well, we're the greatest team.
35:24
SPEAKER_01: I mean, we're one of the greatest teams of all time.
35:27
SPEAKER_01: And when I saw that, I was like, man, I must have been thinking it.
35:30
SPEAKER_01: I must have been thinking it.
35:31
SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah, I mean, it's really hard to argue when you look at like the backward of me and D.
35:38
SPEAKER_01: Then you look at the the front court that we had, Tamika Asia, Swin.
35:42
SPEAKER_01: It's funny because we ran the triangle offense.
35:44
SPEAKER_01: That was like our go-to.
35:46
SPEAKER_01: So it was a lot of read and react.
35:47
SPEAKER_01: And in a sense, we were kind of positionless.
35:49
SPEAKER_01: Not really me as as much, but the other four, they were kind of positionless.
35:54
SPEAKER_01: Um, we didn't shoot a ton of threes.
35:55
SPEAKER_01: It was really just me and D doing that.
35:57
SPEAKER_01: So that's kind of where you could make an argument, but man, you look at at that starting five, and then you look at we had like three, four WNB players on the bench.
36:05
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
36:05
SPEAKER_01: Um, it's hard to argue.
36:06
SPEAKER_01: And then you see the, you know, what all of our careers, you have Olympians, multi, multi-time Olympians on that.
36:11
SPEAKER_01: So it's up there.
36:12
SPEAKER_00: For the people at home, I do have the number.
36:14
SPEAKER_00: Um, seven.
36:15
SPEAKER_00: You guys had seven W players uh from that team get drafted.
36:19
SPEAKER_00: That's just is an insane number.
36:21
SPEAKER_00: Um I in mind the game with Steve Nash and LeBron, they talked about the evolution of the game through their 20 years of playing.
36:29
SPEAKER_00: How have you seen an evolution happen from when you started in the W to now in 2025?
36:34
SPEAKER_01: Oh my God.
36:35
SPEAKER_01: It's it's beyond.
36:37
SPEAKER_01: So when I first got into the league, it was only in its like, I don't even know, fourth or fifth year, fifth year maybe.
36:43
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, so what was what hadn't happened yet was when the league was first started, they had to go get players.
36:51
SPEAKER_01: So it wasn't like a young person's league yet.
36:54
SPEAKER_01: Now, what it was was like vets.
36:56
SPEAKER_01: Like you look at Cynthia Cooper's story.
36:58
SPEAKER_01: She didn't keep she didn't come into the WMBA until I think she was in her late 20s or probably her 30s, even.
37:03
SPEAKER_01: So the older vets were really dominating the league when I first got in there.
37:07
SPEAKER_01: And so, first and foremost, like in my 20 years, what happened was with each draft class, there weren't that many retirements, but with each draft class, it was just it became survival of the fittest.
37:17
SPEAKER_01: And eventually it became a young person's league, which I think is what you're seeing now.
37:21
SPEAKER_01: So that was really different from my first couple years to my last couple years.
37:25
SPEAKER_01: But honestly, another big part was just like the rule changes.
37:29
SPEAKER_01: Like we didn't we didn't move the three-point line back.
37:32
SPEAKER_01: Um actually, let me start over.
37:34
SPEAKER_01: When I first got in the league, I can't remember if it was year one or two, they just had switched to a 24-second shot clock.
37:42
SPEAKER_01: When I first got into the league, I was shooting from the high school three-point line.
37:46
SPEAKER_01: Like legit.
37:48
SPEAKER_01: So the shot clock, um, the quarters, going to quarters, um, moving the three-point line back, defensive three seconds, like all of these things happen in my 20 years.
37:58
SPEAKER_01: So the naturally the game just changed over time.
38:02
SPEAKER_01: Um, I think defensive three seconds probably played one of the biggest roles though, for sure.
38:07
SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
38:07
SPEAKER_00: Why do you think that is?
38:09
SPEAKER_01: Because our league got real, our league was really, I mean, you think it's physical now.
38:15
SPEAKER_01: It was it, I mean, I can't even tell you.
38:17
SPEAKER_01: It was just it was it was a fight every day.
38:21
SPEAKER_01: And I think defensive three seconds, when you can pack it in, it allows for a lot of physicality because you're just everything's jammed up in there.
38:29
SPEAKER_01: Um, and so once that hit and it kind of spread the game out, um, I think it honestly, you know what it did?
38:35
SPEAKER_01: It let refs see the physicality because the floor was so spread.
38:39
SPEAKER_01: When it gets moshpity, it's hard for the refs to make those calls.
38:42
SPEAKER_01: So it just ends up being a physical game.
38:44
SPEAKER_01: So now that it got a little more spread out, the refs can call a little more fair and it's not quite as physical.
38:49
SPEAKER_00: In your uh first episode of Bird's Eye View, you were talking to Sabrina, and one piece of advice you gave her that I thought was really interesting was about not going through the same thing you went through last year that got you the championship and recognizing that you have to change some things up.
39:06
SPEAKER_00: Um if you could go back and talk to your younger self, would you give that same advice after your first championship?
39:12
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
39:13
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
39:14
SPEAKER_01: I think it's again back to human nature.
39:16
SPEAKER_01: It's like when you do something and you have success and you win, first of all, there's a tendency to look back and really forget how hard it was.
39:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
39:25
SPEAKER_01: You know, you just it's just natural.
39:27
SPEAKER_01: Like you look back and and and yeah, maybe you won the game on a less second shot, but you're like, yeah, we won the game.
39:32
SPEAKER_01: And you have a little bit of like, of course we won the game, kind of a vibe to you.
39:35
SPEAKER_01: So when it comes to repeating, especially if you have like a core group that's the same, there's just this tendency to be like, um, like I said, you look back and you want to repeat at the same time when because every season is gonna have like the liberty, let's use them, like they're gonna lose some games.
39:53
SPEAKER_01: They might even lose like two, three in a row.
39:55
SPEAKER_01: Like it's it's bound to happen.
39:56
SPEAKER_01: And I think in those moments, that's really when people start to go, guys, but last year we did it this way.
40:02
SPEAKER_01: Yeah and it's like you have to throw last year out.
40:05
SPEAKER_01: Like last year is last year.
40:06
SPEAKER_01: You can't, if you catch anybody saying that or doing that, you gotta, you gotta squash it right away.
40:11
SPEAKER_01: Um, so that was something that I feel like early in my career I experienced.
40:16
SPEAKER_01: Um, and I had to learn the hard way that that if you fall into that trap, you'll just never, you'll never live up to last year because it's a new year.
40:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's fair.
40:25
SPEAKER_00: Uh, because when you said that, I immediately thought about the Boston Celtics of last year going through that championship and basically watch them play the same style of basketball and make the same mistakes, but the margin of error was so much different in this year versus last year that I thought it was pretty interesting.
40:40
SPEAKER_00: All right.
40:40
SPEAKER_00: I I do want to talk about your post-plan career because uh you mentioned that uh throughout playing basketball, you find this flow state.
40:50
SPEAKER_00: Have you found that flow state in your post-plan career?
40:52
SPEAKER_00: Because you you have so many things between the the Simocast and now you hosting two different podcasts and so on and so forth.
40:59
SPEAKER_00: Uh, have you found that flow state?
41:01
SPEAKER_01: Great question.
41:03
SPEAKER_01: Um, not yet.
41:06
SPEAKER_01: Not yet.
41:07
SPEAKER_01: I'm getting closer though.
41:08
SPEAKER_01: I'm getting closer.
41:09
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because um, I think when I first started doing, you know, A Touch More with Megan, the other podcast that I have, it didn't, it felt a little bit like work because it was new.
41:20
SPEAKER_01: And so I was like, oh, like I gotta, you know, research this or go find that, or what are we gonna talk about?
41:24
SPEAKER_01: How we wanna talk about it.
41:25
SPEAKER_01: And what I'm slowly starting to realize, and honestly, even with Bird's Eye View, the new podcast, I've already noticed it.
41:31
SPEAKER_01: I've already noticed I'm only a week in, I already noticed it doesn't feel like work.
41:35
SPEAKER_01: I am starting to find like a flow, I have an understanding.
41:38
SPEAKER_01: So I'm getting there.
41:39
SPEAKER_01: It only took me, you know, I retired in 2022, so it only took me three years, but I'm getting there.
41:44
SPEAKER_00: That's not too bad.
41:44
SPEAKER_00: That's not bad, honestly, because I remember um Richard Jefferson ended his NBA plan career and he was trying to get into broadcasting, and he was basically accepting every gig that he could get.
41:54
SPEAKER_00: And I recognized that, and I sent him a DM like, hey, I I host a podcast, you want to do it?
41:59
SPEAKER_00: And you know, he just had to get a bunch of reps under him, and then now, of course, he's broadcasting some of the most important games and he's amazing at it.
42:06
SPEAKER_00: So uh taking three years to find a flow state that's not that bad because yeah, a lot of people go so long before they find it.
42:12
SPEAKER_00: Um I want to switch it over to the W now.
42:15
SPEAKER_00: Um, we do this thing on our show called Ask KP where we ask the audience to uh give us questions they want to hear us talk about.
42:21
SPEAKER_00: So I told the audience, hey, we got the legendary Sue on the show.
42:24
SPEAKER_00: If you have any questions for me or Sue, uh throw them out here.
42:27
SPEAKER_00: So this one is from Rob.
42:29
SPEAKER_00: For Stuber, do you believe all publicity is good publicity for the WNBA?
42:34
SPEAKER_00: A lot of media surrounding the W is negative right now, but it is it a really good thing to get that attention to the game?
42:40
SPEAKER_00: What are your thoughts?
42:42
SPEAKER_01: Um, I think this is a a really nuanced topic.
42:46
SPEAKER_01: I I do believe that having people talk about the game, having people have different favorite players, and having the GOAT debate and things like that are great for the game.
42:56
SPEAKER_01: I think rivalries are great for the game.
42:57
SPEAKER_01: What we're seeing in women's basketball, though, is like sometimes, a lot of times, sadly, it's crossing a line.
43:03
SPEAKER_01: It's going like a little too far.
43:05
SPEAKER_01: So, no, you don't want apathy in a league.
43:09
SPEAKER_01: You want people to feel things.
43:10
SPEAKER_01: You want people to like get hype up about hyped up about their favorite players, their favorite teams.
43:14
SPEAKER_01: But what we're seeing is it's it starts to trend into some bad areas, right?
43:19
SPEAKER_01: Obviously the racism part is is front and center.
43:22
SPEAKER_01: Um, people will take, by people, sadly, I think I'm talking about like Twitter bots and trolls.
43:28
SPEAKER_01: That's neither here nor there.
43:30
SPEAKER_01: They will take, you know, a physical game or a physical moment and turn it into one of those narratives.
43:36
SPEAKER_01: Um, and then mainstream media, because women's sports hasn't been in the mainstream media the way it is now, especially basketball, they pick it up and they treat it as real.
43:44
SPEAKER_01: So, yes, I think there's a line that's been crossed from time to time, but simultaneously, like, no, you don't you want to have like people feel passionately about these things.
43:53
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
43:54
SPEAKER_00: Um this next one comes from Dylan.
43:58
SPEAKER_00: Dylan said, on a touch more, you spend The minute talking about how there is a possibility of you and Diana teaming up.
44:05
SPEAKER_00: Is there more to that story, or is that all we get?
44:09
SPEAKER_01: Um, that's that's pretty much the story.
44:13
SPEAKER_01: That's pretty much the story.
44:14
SPEAKER_01: Dee's trying to say, like, act like she doesn't really remember it as well.
44:18
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, bro.
44:19
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, we were literally texting our agent.
44:21
SPEAKER_01: But that's pretty much the story.
44:22
unknown: Okay.
44:23
SPEAKER_01: It didn't go much further than that night.
44:25
SPEAKER_00: Uh, next one comes from um Drib.
44:29
SPEAKER_00: What players currently in the WNBA remind you of yourself the most?
44:33
SPEAKER_01: Ooh, good question.
44:36
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know what I love about what I'm seeing?
44:38
SPEAKER_01: Well, first of all, I would say like a Courtney Vandersloot, of course, is gonna, but you know, she's now an old head, which is crazy for me to see.
44:45
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know what I love about what I'm seeing in point guards?
44:49
SPEAKER_01: I would say myself, I would say Lindsay Whalen, and then I would maybe even put Becky Hammond in there, although she was more of a scorer than a point guard, I would say.
45:00
SPEAKER_01: But I would say myself, Lindsay Whalen, we really started, and Becky, we really started this in the in the world of women's basketball, like a scoring point guard, right?
45:09
SPEAKER_01: Like not just pass first, like you had to guard us everywhere.
45:13
SPEAKER_01: And there's been other ones, but I feel like we're a generation where that was really became the norm in the WNBA.
45:18
SPEAKER_01: And what we're seeing now, right, is whether it's a Caitlin Clark, a page Beckers, what you're seeing now, Sabrina, a great example, is like they've taken the scoring part to another level.
45:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
45:30
SPEAKER_01: So they're doing the point guard thing, but now the scoring is going to another, even more of a level than what Lindsay and I were doing.
45:36
SPEAKER_01: So um it's hard, it's hard to really compare.
45:40
SPEAKER_01: It's it's hard.
45:40
SPEAKER_01: They're they're doing it different.
45:42
SPEAKER_00: Do you think that there is a comp cross leagues?
45:46
SPEAKER_00: Like, is there somebody in NBA history that you like?
45:48
SPEAKER_01: Oh, NBA history?
45:49
SPEAKER_01: I didn't think about that.
45:50
SPEAKER_01: You know what?
45:51
SPEAKER_01: I forgot one name.
45:52
SPEAKER_01: I forgot one name, Chelsea Gray.
45:54
SPEAKER_00: Chelsea Gray.
45:54
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
45:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the similarity there is like when you're, you know, well, I I was I played with her with USA basketball, so have, you know, I got to experience her um as a teammate.
46:05
SPEAKER_01: She's thinking the game in in ways that I feel like I was thinking the game.
46:09
SPEAKER_01: So even though our games are different and like how we go about doing it, although you'd say like we're both great passers, we're both great scorers, we're doing it differently.
46:16
SPEAKER_01: The the thinking of the game, I think, is really, really similar.
46:19
SPEAKER_01: But in fairness, I haven't been in a locker room with Caitlin, Page, Sabrina, some of those players that I named.
46:25
SPEAKER_01: MBA, I don't know.
46:27
SPEAKER_01: Someone once said John Wall.
46:29
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I see that though.
46:30
SPEAKER_00: John Wall, wow.
46:31
SPEAKER_01: It's probably like a Jason Kidd vibe.
46:34
SPEAKER_00: I could see that too.
46:35
SPEAKER_01: Um I'm gonna go Jason Kidd.
46:36
SPEAKER_01: I asked um I don't see the John Wall one, by the way.
46:39
SPEAKER_01: Somebody else said that.
46:41
SPEAKER_00: I asked a buddy of mine who um I'm I'm tapped into the W, but he's tapped in a lot more than I am, like asking that exact same question for you.
46:49
SPEAKER_00: And he he struggled with it as well.
46:51
SPEAKER_00: Um, Kidd was a name he mentioned, and then he was saying nowadays, um, like Tyrese, how you guys control the ball so much and like just continue to put together high-powered offenses as the primary person, uh dribbling the ball and everything.
47:04
SPEAKER_00: And um, I was like, oh, yeah.
47:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's a great one.
47:07
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, fun fact um Jenny Busek is an assistant coach for the Pacers.
47:12
SPEAKER_01: So if you watch Pacer Games, she's the women front bench for all those that don't know.
47:16
SPEAKER_01: She worked with Rick Carl, she's been working with Rick for like years, like in Dallas, then went with him to Indiana.
47:22
SPEAKER_01: But prior to Dallas, she always had a good relationship with him and would like tap into his training camps and go watch and learn.
47:30
SPEAKER_01: But that's when she was the head coach of the Seattle Storm.
47:33
SPEAKER_01: So I actually played in a version of the Rick Carlisle offense, which has since evolved, obviously, but a high pace nature of it, how they wear teams down with their pace.
47:44
SPEAKER_01: Um, and then Tyrese and the way he controls the game, like you just said, that was me.
47:48
SPEAKER_01: That was me with the Seattle Storm.
47:49
SPEAKER_01: So I actually really do like that comparison.
47:51
SPEAKER_00: Uh, last one that we have from the audience customer Thomas Lee, what were the biggest culture shocks from going from Northeast in New York to the Pacific Northwest in Seattle?
48:02
SPEAKER_01: Man, it's still it shocks me to this day.
48:04
SPEAKER_01: Um it's just much slower there.
48:08
SPEAKER_01: Like everything's slow.
48:10
SPEAKER_01: They don't, you know, an example, like they don't jaywalk.
48:14
SPEAKER_01: It could be three in the morning.
48:16
SPEAKER_01: If they're on that corner and it says don't walk, they do not walk.
48:19
SPEAKER_01: They're not aggressive in that way.
48:21
SPEAKER_01: But then simultaneously, what you learn about uh the Pacific Northwest really quick is they have like a little bit of a passive aggressiveness to them.
48:29
SPEAKER_01: They love a citizen's arrest.
48:31
SPEAKER_01: They will you'll be walking on the street.
48:33
SPEAKER_01: If you yeah, do something sideways, they will be they're the first ones to be like, excuse me, you just dropped that litter.
48:39
SPEAKER_01: Like, okay, my bad, I didn't even notice.
48:41
SPEAKER_01: Like they will, you just drop that little litter.
48:44
SPEAKER_01: You just drop that garbage.
48:45
SPEAKER_01: They are the first ones to check you.
48:47
SPEAKER_01: There's like a passive aggressiveness there.
48:49
SPEAKER_01: It's kind of interesting.
48:50
SPEAKER_00: A last one we have is not from the audience, but it's from our producer, Greg.
48:54
SPEAKER_00: Um, we've had this conversation a lot since we started working together.
48:59
SPEAKER_00: Um, I am good friends with Tommy Alter.
49:01
SPEAKER_00: Obviously, you have a relationship with Tommy as well.
49:05
SPEAKER_00: I can't even explain Tommy to people that don't know Tommy.
49:09
SPEAKER_01: What does Tommy do?
49:10
SPEAKER_01: Is that the question?
49:11
SPEAKER_00: What does Tommy do is the question.
49:14
SPEAKER_01: Oh my God.
49:15
SPEAKER_01: I know.
49:15
SPEAKER_01: It's impossible.
49:17
SPEAKER_01: He is, he's listen, on paper, right?
49:21
SPEAKER_01: You would say, like, he's a producer.
49:24
SPEAKER_01: He's worked on the shop.
49:26
SPEAKER_01: He obviously has, you know, the production, um, I guess it's a production company, the podcast company with JJ, old man the three, all those things.
49:33
SPEAKER_01: And then yeah, when people see him in like Taylor Swift's box at the Chief Game, you're like, what?
49:38
SPEAKER_01: I don't understand Tommy.
49:40
SPEAKER_01: But honestly, the producing part, again, he has all these credits.
49:43
SPEAKER_01: I would say what Tommy is, like at his core, is just like one of the best connectors of all time.
49:49
SPEAKER_01: The man just like connects.
49:51
SPEAKER_01: He connects with people, he connects people with people.
49:54
SPEAKER_01: And that's like, I don't know, that's how he lives his life.
49:57
SPEAKER_01: So I don't know.
49:58
SPEAKER_01: Somewhere in there is like a job description.
50:00
SPEAKER_01: We're all we're all still trying to find it.
50:02
SPEAKER_00: It's so weird because I don't remember my first how I became friends with Tommy.
50:06
SPEAKER_00: He just ended up being one of my friends.
50:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
50:09
SPEAKER_00: And then he asked me to do this, it was the day before JJ retired from the NBA.
50:14
SPEAKER_00: He's like, we're doing a live show in New York.
50:16
SPEAKER_00: I would love for you to come out there and just do a little segment with us.
50:18
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, great.
50:19
SPEAKER_00: And I'm on my flight to New York, and I get the notification that JJ Redick just retired from the NBA.
50:25
SPEAKER_00: And I text Tommy, like, you don't want to tell me that like I'm on my way to like a congratulatory um ceremony for his NBA career.
50:32
SPEAKER_00: And he's like, I didn't, I didn't really know either.
50:34
SPEAKER_00: But every time he turns Chicago, he hits me, like, can we shoot something?
50:38
SPEAKER_00: Can we go out to dinner?
50:38
SPEAKER_00: It's just a connector is the perfect way to describe him.
50:42
SPEAKER_00: Because uh I now have more friends in this business because Tommy just connected me with them.
50:48
SPEAKER_00: So there you go, Greg.
50:49
SPEAKER_00: That that's how we would explain Tommy Alter to the people at home.
50:54
SPEAKER_00: All right, so I don't want to take any more of your time.
50:58
SPEAKER_00: I really do truly appreciate you taking um the time to talk to us.
51:01
SPEAKER_00: For the people at home, check out Bird's Eye View.
51:04
SPEAKER_00: Um, because the first episode was great.
51:06
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what what is episode two looking like?
51:07
SPEAKER_00: Can we can we can we spoil that?
51:09
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we can spoil it.
51:10
SPEAKER_01: Um episode two comes out tomorrow.
51:12
SPEAKER_01: It's with Jewel Lloyd.
51:13
SPEAKER_00: Jewel Lloyd.
51:14
SPEAKER_00: Okay, all right.
51:16
SPEAKER_00: Give it a listen.
51:17
SPEAKER_00: Um, also a touch more still going on as well.
51:20
SPEAKER_00: You know, you're you're doing a you're doing a lot of different things.
51:22
SPEAKER_00: That that one is also great.
51:24
SPEAKER_00: Stu, again, thank you.
51:25
SPEAKER_00: Um hopefully we can have you back at a future day.
51:28
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
51:28
SPEAKER_01: Anytime, let me know.