Part 1: Detroit’s Comeback, Philly’s Resurrection, and Celtics Questions With Zach Lowe

Join The Ringer's Bill Simmons and Zach Lowe LIVE on Netflix to react to the Pistons taking the deciding Game 7 against the Magic, and to break down how the Celtics lost the series against the 76ers (0:31). Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Zach Lowe Producers: Chia Hao Tat, Eduardo Ocampo, and Chris Wohlers https://michelobultra.com/courtside MICHELOB ULTRA® COURTSIDE ’25 to ’26. No Purchase Necessary. Open to US residents 21 plus. Begins on October 1, 2025 and ends on June 30, 2026 Multiple entry periods. See Official Rules at https://michelobultra.com/courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes, and details. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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• 0:00Speaker 00

  I'm pro football Hall of Famer Brian Dawkins, and I lived for a long time with something I did not know the name of: major depressive disorder. I carried sadness and anger because I thought I could handle it alone, but I couldn't. Now I want to make sure others know that that support is out there. If you're experiencing similar symptoms, talk to a healthcare professional. Visit mddallies.com to watch my story.

• 0:25Speaker 01

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  Ask your doctor about Caplyta. Learn more at caplyta.com or call 888-252-4824.

• 2:02Bill Simmons?

  The Bill Simmons Podcast, we are live on Netflix. Zach Lowe is here. Zach Lowe doing double duty this weekend. He did a little brief podcast after game seven. Not game seven. Game seven. Game seven. Celtics Sixers.

• 2:16Speaker 04

  Yeah, the Celtics season is over. You know that, right? That was game seven.

• 2:19Bill Simmons?

  It felt like game nine. Um, wait, before we start, wanted to mention new rewatchables coming tomorrow. It is Netflix is a joke month, so we're doing some comedies. We did There's Something About Mary. Ooh. It's gonna be running tomorrow. And uh, let's see, what do they have on the service this month? Slapshot, Fletch, 48 Hours, Mrs. Doubtfire, Meet the Parents, Long Cane, Polly. We've done episodes on all of those already that are on Netflix. Ghostbusters, Kindergarten Cop, we just did. Tropic Thunder, Tootsie, Splash, and Borat. Wow, that is a- All available. Heavy hitters. Wonder what's gonna happen. Anyway. Orlando, Detroit just happened. It did. Not a lot of comedy in this series unless you like tragic comedy?

• 3:03Bill Simmons?

  Tragic comedy? Yeah, that's a, that's a phrase. Detroit wins going away. Uh, we have two teams that came back from 3-1 in a round one. Um, I'm just gonna throw a bunch of stuff for you. Things that happened just in the last five days. Okay. Joker got bounced by McDaniel's, Gobert, Shannon, and Zombie, Mike Conley. That was the thing that happened. Atlanta fell behind 72 to 22 in a do or die home game. Orlando blew a 24-point lead in a game six. Clincher for them with a 19-point second half. LeBron, at age 41, was the best guy in a playoff series. Embiid won a game seven.

• 3:45Bill Simmons?

  Paul George outplayed Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown in a playoff series. I think they, debatable, but I'm gonna throw it in there. Cade and Maxey have now jumped A-level. Up into some, getting near the final level of levels. Uh, the Brown-Tatum era, for all we know, could be over. We'll talk about that later. Wow. And then two teams came back from 3-1. Just some of the things that have happened. Uh, Orlando, Detroit, Friday night is the weirdest thing that happened all playoffs, though. Just bizarre. 19 points in the, in the second half in a must-win game.

• 4:20Speaker 04

  So I watched that game and obviously you're digesting as it happens that the Magic have not made a basket in quite a long time. Another miss, another miss, another miss. For some reason, I didn't realize until after the game had ended that they had only scored 19 points in an entire half of basketball. Like I just didn't put to do the math in real time. And I looked at the box score and I just stared at it like, like the Mona Lisa had appeared in my house. I just sat there in silence for like 30 seconds, looking at 11-8 next to each other and being like, is that even possible? And look, if not for a late run of full court press and Detroit comedy turnovers

• 5:00Speaker 04

  at the end of this game, we would have been looking at like 105 points combined over six quarters of basketball for an NBA playoff team. And it ended up being, I think, 113 instead. But still, I mean, like 113 points in six quarters is kind of a problem. I know Franz Wagner is out. That's a big deal, but not great.

• 5:22Bill Simmons?

  I screenshotted the second half box score of Orlando, and I think I'm just going to keep it in my Apple cloud for the rest of my life. Four for 37, 108 was the field goal percentage. They were two for 18 from three. They had 17 rebounds and Detroit had 34. Said half as many. Seven turnovers. Palo and Bain combined were two for 20. Suggs was 0 for 6. And Bain was minus 39 and a half. And just one half, minus 39. It's really, really special. The fact that they didn't cover or even cover like a double digit spread. They lost by 14. They were up 24 early in the

• 6:07Bill Simmons?

  third quarter. It was, and at home, it was an amazing collapse.

• 6:10Speaker 04

  They were laughing at the Pistons. Like, I mean, literally, like Duncan Robinson, remember, I think he threw an inbound pass out of bounds all the way to the other sideline. And Desmond Bain grinned in his face, like cackled in his face. Wendell Carter Jr. Was laughing. They were mocking the Pistons up 24. Or in that game and then they missed. I don't remember. It was like two dozen shots in a row. They just could not make any baskets for a team that's been a horrendous offensive team now for a long time. Absolute. It's funny. Like, how would you regard this, right? Like, it was a disaster season, disaster season. Everyone's hurt all the time. It doesn't gel. It doesn't gel. Then it gels and they blitzed the Hornets in the play in tournament.

• 6:51Speaker 04

  The team that like all of the NBA world outside of Orlando was rooting for the Hornets to get into the playoffs. They go up 3-1 against the number one seed. And it's like, all right, this is the team. 50 and a half over under. They got their mojo back. Maybe the Bowles, Lee, Bencaro thing is fine. Wow. And then they lose the next three games in increasingly dispirited fashion. And do you look at this like, well, we lost to the number one seed in seven games without our best or second best. I guess after this Palo game, I would say second best player.

• 7:22Bill Simmons?

  He's second best. Yeah.

• 7:24Speaker 04

  That's not, that's not so bad. Or is it so bad? It's a, it's a, it seems very bad right now in the moment.

• 7:33Bill Simmons?

  Well, think about a week ago. So I remember talking to my dad after the Celtics were up 3-1 and just being like, see, I told you we, we wanted to play Philly over Orlando. That was the consensus, right? That was seven days ago. So many things flipped in eight days, like the Knicks. All their fans were in complete panic when they were down 2-1. They have this must win game, game four in Atlanta. And it feels like if this game goes wrong, we could just see the Knicks completely blow everything up. Now they're the favorites to win the East, like pretty convincingly. And then Orlando and Philly basically switched places. I had, before we get into game seven, I had some big picture stuff. And you brought up Franz. Does Orlando win the series if he doesn't get hurt?

• 8:18Bill Simmons?

  Because I, I feel like they win game six. I do feel like they had figured out at least something with him defending Cade. That made it reasonable to shut down Detroit offensively at least a little bit. Once Franz was out, Cade went basically ape shit.

• 8:37Speaker 04

  Up 3-1, you would say they probably do, I think, but I don't really care, honestly. Like, he gets injured and the entire team, other than Bencaro, and Bain was good for the bulk of the series and okay today, got some points late when it was out of hand.

• 8:57Bill Simmons?

  He was okay.

• 8:58Speaker 04

  He was okay.

• 8:58Bill Simmons?

  I'm gonna give him okay. I'm not gonna give him four first-round picks. Good.

• 9:02Speaker 04

  Well, I mean, that's the bigger picture is that, yeah, Franz goes out and he's defending Cade pretty well. He's a well-rounded offensive player. The fit with Bencaro has never been great, but the talent is the talent. And then they just cease to function as an offensive basketball team. And they're paying Jalen Suggs $32 million next year. He has four more years left on his contract. He can't make a shot. Anthony.

• 9:25Bill Simmons?

  Not only can he not make a shot, his shots are going left, right, long, short. You almost don't know which direction they're going. It's like a compass.

• 9:34Speaker 04

  Anthony Black is extension-eligible, and I don't even know where to begin with negotiating that contract. I know where I'd begin with if I were his agent. They are paying Bain, Bencaro, and Wagner like $135 million combined next year.

• 9:51Bill Simmons?

  They're in the tax, right? Next year, no matter what happens.

• 9:54Speaker 04

  They're way into the jet.

• 9:55Bill Simmons?

  There might be double tax.

• 9:56Speaker 04

  Jett Howard, they declined his fourth-year option for next season. He was a fairly important first-round pick. Jace Richardson, now he's the 25th pick, couldn't get on the floor. Tristan De Silva, like, kind of role got scrunched a little bit toward the end of the series. Like, there's, it's, and then if Suggs is just, if Suggs is going to be the $32 million glue guy, elite-level glue guy, like the Derrick White, we'll talk about Derrick White's series, the Derrick White of the Magic, once every three weeks for two games, then that contract is a borderline disaster. And his shooting in this series was like, it's just not acceptable for a guy in that role. I'm sorry.

• 10:38Bill Simmons?

  He didn't used to be nearly as bad of, I don't know what happened to him in this series. Like I almost, the shots were so bad, it made you wonder was he hurt? Yeah. So you talk, they just started Palo kicks in next year, the five for 240, whatever that is. And then Franz year two, he's got four for 184 left. Bane's at 39, 42, 45 brutal. And then you mentioned the Suggs, they also have Carter at 18 and 19, and they have Batase at seven and a half next year. So they have really no outs to get under the tax unless, you know, you do like you trade Suggs and get a $4 million guy back, something like that. They are also missing all their picks. They have 27, they have 31. And in 2029, they can swap with Memphis, but it's Memphis's call.

• 11:23Bill Simmons?

  And that's all they have for picks because of the Bain trade. I, do you think, I still want to dive into this game seven, but do you think that the, after Bain and Bridges, these trades are just done now? This was like this thinking outside the box zag. We're close, we, these picks aren't going to matter anyway. This is a way for us to elevate our team and go to another level, but we're not getting an all NBA player, maybe not even an All-Star?

• 11:50Speaker 04

  I mean, it's not a coincidence. I don't think that both those teams are in the East, right? And the East sort of has this, this openness to it that convinces these teams who have not really done anything. I mean, Orlando has not really done anything in the, they have won a playoff series with this group of guys like, and it convinces them that like, we can jump all the way from that to, if you're trading for first round picks for an in his prime late twenties veteran, you're saying like, we think we can make the finals right now. I thought that trade was fine for them because I, I liked it for them, to be honest with you, because I just didn't know what other direction, what other player were they going to get that fit everything that they needed? We all knew that they had overpaid, but it was the sort of, but then you look at the opportunity cost, they're stuck now. Like they don't have a lot of outs other than trading.

• 12:34Speaker 04

  You never want to be in a position where your out is trading one of your best players from a position of like, we don't really have anything else to do. And that's kind of where they are.

• 12:44Bill Simmons?

  I want to say, I like the Bain trade when it happened.

• 12:48Speaker 04

  I did too.

• 12:48Bill Simmons?

  Because I thought.

• 12:51Bill Simmons?

  I hate putting it this way, but I honestly thought he was better. Like even what you saw with Franz out, I thought, I thought there were moments, remember there was that stretch he had in Memphis where he was like running their offense and scoring 25, 27 a game? I actually wanted to see what that would look like on this team with those two guys. And then they had, it was a classic, not enough, uh, not enough plates at the table for everybody's situation sometimes. And you could see him kind of step back, he'd step up, he'd step back. I thought this would be like, okay, Franz is out, it's Desmond Bain time. And it's just, well, maybe he's not that guy. I don't know. What do you see?

• 13:27Speaker 04

  It's not only not enough plates, it's like, um, everyone is trying to get the same food or food is being tossed. It's like the main guys just don't fit very well together. And Paolo is a classic, like, he has the game and style of a number one offensive player because he doesn't have the game and style of a number two offensive player because of the shooting liabilities, but he's just not good enough at the number one offense. Despite a brilliant game today when no one else is with him, he's just not at that level as a number one guy yet. Maybe he'll get there someday. And so you just don't, the, the whole team's offense just feels amorphous, unformed, lack of identity, lack of cohesion,

• 14:11Speaker 04

  lack of understanding on a lot of possessions of like what they want to do. And all of that just coalesced into that second half of game six where they just did all the wrong things, attacked all the wrong matchups, missed all the wrong shots and just had no plan B on any possession after one action. And that's just, it's just a weird mix of guys. And you want to keep saying, well, if they're healthy, if they're healthy, if they're healthy. It's just even when they've been healthy, it just hasn't worked well enough on offense.

• 14:42Bill Simmons?

  Game six, second half was a good example of it's nice to have an old school guard on your team that can be like, come on, guys, calm down. And the guy, it could be zombie by Conley, it could be anybody, but I think they're probably expecting Black, who I think had some moments this year, and even in this playoff series, had a couple of moments, but I think for where they needed him to be, he just couldn't get there.

• 15:04Speaker 04

  But he's

• 15:04Bill Simmons?

  It's a weird team.

• 15:05Speaker 04

  He's the same issue as Palo, just many tiers down the league hierarchy in that he is like an on ball creator kind of player, but just not good enough to do that a lot at a high level and doesn't have the jump shot yet. I mean, he shot it much better this year, but he's never going to shoot it at volume, or he hasn't yet to be an off ball. Like it just, there are just a lot of pieces that don't fit together to add up to more than the sum of their parts, which we knew like this is the, this has not been a good offensive team ever in this era.

• 15:38Bill Simmons?

  Sometimes you gotta rise to the challenge. Like me today, I'm incredibly hungover.

• 15:42Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 15:43Bill Simmons?

  I can't even tell you what happened yesterday, but there were a lot of drinks and it was bad. And, and I'm fighting through it today and maybe the audience barely knows, except for the nine times I stammered and when I could remember it was a game seven yesterday in Boston.

• 15:58Speaker 04

  I just, I chalk that one up to you're having a tough emotional time. That's, that's, I just, I, I gave you, I give you some grace on that one.

• 16:05Bill Simmons?

  Well, it was my daughter's 21st birthday yesterday and we decided to go to a bar in Manhattan Beach and watch the Celtic game and drinks ensued and, and then the game was tense and

• 16:20Bill Simmons?

  we're going to talk about that later.

• 16:21Speaker 04

  Her first, Zoe's first drink ever?

• 16:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 16:23Speaker 04

  On the 21st birthday?

• 16:24Bill Simmons?

  Well, midnight, midnight Friday night was the first official legal in a bar, here's my ID drink, which is always fun. Always nice to be there for those. Um, big picture for Detroit because they were great today. They finally got an awesome Tobias Harris game in a, in a must win situation.

• 16:39Speaker 04

  Love it.

• 16:39Bill Simmons?

  I was thinking about Doc Rivers because I think his two favorite players he's probably coached in the last 15 years were Maxey and Harris, and both of those guys were awesome. Maxey, we'll talk about later.

• 16:51Speaker 04

  Hey, look, I, I don't want to get too far ahead and I, I don't know that this outcome is particularly likely, but we are one round away from a entire city of Philadelphia versus Tobias Harris conference final matchup.

• 17:05Bill Simmons?

  Oh my God, it is possible. Well, he was great. He had 17 the second quarter. They had a 40 points second quarter and uh and it was basically Tobias and Cade. Dern was at least rebounding. I don't know what's happened to him offensively. Again, I voted for him second team all NBA and he's just completely lost his confidence with like the little quick jump hooks and uh I I don't know and it's beyond like, oh, Orlando's doing something. He just seems spooked to me and that would be the biggest red flag I would have. We don't know who they're playing yet in the next round, but the fact that he's just a complete mess from four to eight feet around the rim. I don't really fully understand. What happened to him?

• 17:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, part of it is what Orlando has been doing since game one, which is we're gonna go under every Cade pick and switch and at the same time and take away your rolls to the rim. And every roll to the rim felt like um like just, oh, my God, that that's what the whole regular season looked like and we haven't seen it. And then like one would happen per game. You'd be like, oh, my God, it's like an alien landed in my backyard. Jalen Dern got a free roll to the rim. But you're right that I think that got into his head and it just feels like every time he gets the ball with a smidgen of an opening in the paint, he's just almost throwing it up there, like rushing it up there.

• 18:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's like these quick shots.

• 18:20Speaker 04

  There's no touch on it, but I will give him credit. Like, he pounded the offensive glass today, which if you're gonna switch against him, he has to do. And his rim protection was pretty goddamn solid the entire series to the point that the outcry among some Pistons fans for more Isaiah Stewart, less Jalen Dern, even start Isaiah Stewart, kind of petered out. And so does Isaiah Stewart's minutes. And we got more Paul Reed and we got, look, we all like Isaiah Stewart's a fun NBA character. We all enjoy him.

• 18:47Bill Simmons?

  Seven minutes today.

• 18:48Speaker 04

  I mean, these fouls where he's just throwing people to the ground and running them over is just, you're hurting your team. I understand it's like your it's your identity. It's the role you play on the team, but there's a way to do that without and Mo Wagner is a good actor, probably exaggerated, but like you just can't play like that. And I think even JB Bickerstaff is like, dude, come on.

• 19:07Bill Simmons?

  Well, then you have Cade who in game five has 45 and just single handedly drags them through that game. Game six in the second half, 24 points, nine rebounds, four steals, nine of 10 from the free throw line, and then 32 and nine today. So this goes from, hey, do you think he'll be 100% for this, for this Orlando series to, hey, this is why he probably would have been number four or number five for MVP. He would have been an absolute first two more NBA guy. And I just thought he was incredible. I mean, that's everything. Him and Maxey, everything you would want from your best guy in a playoff series.

• 19:46Speaker 04

  He was great. He hit threes and teams are going to dare him to shoot threes and he knows that. And he hit enough of them in this series. Defensively, he guards Palo now and then, like he'll guard up, he'll guard down. He plays hard. He makes plays at the rim. He plays really, occasionally, like any star player, he'll get a little bit unfocused away from the ball and try to rest a little bit, but he plays really hard on both ends of the floor. And the other guy, the sort of pendulum of referendums on this type of player is so interesting because it's hard to be a non-shooting perimeter player in the playoffs. We all know that. We all know what happens to them.

• 20:22Bill Simmons?

  Need a name for those guys.

• 20:23Speaker 04

  I feel like the Thompson twins. I, I, I feel like a Sar Thompson fought through that and was undeniably a major asset for the Pistons, coming back and winning this series. Just unbelievable defensively, flying everywhere. And they started using him more in the offense as a screener, as a cutter, as a DHO guy. And I think that's what you have to do when teams ignore them and you're, and he's this spectacular of an athlete. It looked after two or three games like, oh, another non-shooter is going to be like kind of exposed in the playoffs. And Asar Thompson fought through that and like he was plus 12 today. I think he was plus 13 or 14 coming into the series. Like he was a big part of their comeback.

• 21:03Bill Simmons?

  You know, I looked up before, so what were they? So they're 16 for 33 today in threes, Detroit. Heading into this, I looked at the basketball reference where they have the series stats and they have everybody ranked in different categories on the, on their playoff page. Detroit was 16th in three-point percentage heading into today, 29.7. So they finally had a game where they hit some threes. And what's interesting is Duncan Robinson felt like he missed like six wide open ones. So it really could have been like a 22 for 33. So.

• 21:36Bill Simmons?

  Good game for them. Not sure if it was an aberration three-point shooting game because I don't, other than Duncan Robinson and even like Cade's been a little spotty. I don't know how many people I trust in big moments. We will see. It's still an amazing, amazing, amazing comeback for them. And then for Orlando, is it fair to say Mosley has completed the, uh, definitely getting fired and probably has saved his job, definitely getting fired, triple axel? We don't see this very often.

• 22:06Speaker 04

  I was thinking about that in game six and game seven and if you were Orlando's front office and you had been leaning toward firing him before the play in tournament and everything like that, I think you'd have to lean that way again because the offense is just so rudderless and without any cohesion at all. And it just, at some point, something has to change. And I, I, I am, I think their pivot is one of the more interesting stories of the offseason and it has to go beyond a coaching change, if that happens. Um, and I just don't know, I don't know what it is. I don't know what, what their move is to, to shake this roster up in a way that makes it more functional.

• 22:47Bill Simmons?

  Well, you know what does it make sense is trading Yanis for Palo.

• 22:50Speaker 04

  Who does it not make sense for?

• 22:52Bill Simmons?

  Orlando. Cause it doesn't get them any closer to being anywhere.

• 22:56Speaker 04

  Yeah, you look.

• 22:57Bill Simmons?

  I'd rather just keep Palo and see how this plays out.

• 23:00Speaker 04

  You, you look at their roster around Palo slash Yanis and I, it's undeniable that you would kind of feel there's just not enough shooting. And, you know, I, who knows what.

• 23:09Bill Simmons?

  And I'd also have to probably put more stuff in that. So that was a really fun fake trade during the season, but I think that one has now expired.

• 23:16Speaker 04

  And I got not much other stuff to, to put in it, right? Like my picks went out in the Bain trade. My young guys aren't playing much. Like I don't, other than Anthony Black, I don't know what else I got.

• 23:26Bill Simmons?

  No, your move this year is we like this team. We're going to change coaches. We're going to see how this goes. Palo is no longer a poison pill guy. We want to see what this looks like for the first half of the year and then we'll figure it out. But I, I think, and by the way, is Billy Donovan?

• 23:46Bill Simmons?

  No inside info, but this is the kind of team I would want to coach if I was Billy Donovan and I wanted to keep coaching in the NBA. Right? A lot of young assets. It's almost like a grad, like an older college team.

• 23:57Speaker 04

  Well, he's certainly been linked.

• 23:58Bill Simmons?

  There's an identity.

• 23:59Speaker 04

  The rumor mill has certainly linked him to this job potentially. Obviously, there's the Florida connection. Don't you think Billy Donovan, when he thinks of what time, what type of team he'd like to coach if he stayed in the NBA, is it just like anything but the Bulls? It's just like, I just, it's just any, just anything's gonna feel great. Just any other jobs you feel fantastic.

• 24:19Bill Simmons?

  Or he probably looks at all the guys he had on the roster the last couple of years and wonders, maybe we should have made a run. Kobe White and Io, all these dudes.

• 24:29Speaker 04

  Let's not, let's not do, let's not even do it.

• 24:31Bill Simmons?

  We're gonna take a break. I have a very important, big picture question for you about the league and then we're gonna rehash sadly Celtics Sixers. Ooh. The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. It's been a wild playoff run, not over yet. FanDuel wants to bring you closer to the court to make all of that action come to life for you, the basketball fan. FanDuel, the best place to bet the teams, players, plays during NBA postseason. Build a same game parlay for a shot at a bigger payout or try live betting and jump into the action right after tip off, whatever you want. That's the whole point of live betting. Download the FanDuel Sportsbook app right now and play your game. 21 plus select states are 18

• 25:15Bill Simmons?

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• 25:58Bill Simmons?

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• 26:40Bill Simmons?

  for free entry, entry deadlines, and prizes and details. All right, we're gonna talk Celtics Sixers, but I have a big picture question for you because we saw, we almost saw Orlando, they just taking care of business in the second half, an eight seed would have won. And then a seven seed would have won, which they did with Philadelphia. And then a six seed won with Minnesota, even though they lost multiple people. It's, and I, listen, this isn't the first time this topic has brought up about regular season versus playoffs. And we know they're two different sports. I think the thing that has changed for me is wondering like if I was in charge of a team, how much value would I even put in the regular season anymore? And would my only goal be to have everybody healthy in April?

• 27:24Bill Simmons?

  And would I not care about seeds at all? Right? Because even when you talk about Denver, Minnesota, it's like, shit, they won. They, if they had lost, they could have played Lakers-Houston, and that was where seeds matter. I think you could look at this season and be like, you know what? None of the seeds really mattered at all. Except, who's gonna have game seven, Thunder Spurs? Because that's gonna be the only series that really ultimately matters, right? Other than that, put anyone in any seed, and we probably would have had competitive series with any of the other 14 teams for the most part. And I'm just wondering, like, the Celtics, if they had to do this over again. How much of the stuff would they have done differently, knowing what they know now?

• 28:05Speaker 04

  Well, what's what stuff like just lighten the load on Derrick White? So he's not whatever happened, worn out or whatever the hell happened to him in this?

• 28:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I'm talking Derrick White, 10 less games, 300 less minutes. Jalen, eight less games, 400 less minutes. Tatum, 30 minute max the entire time. And that's, I mean, I've been saying this on the pod for weeks now. I had the, the, putting the minutes on Tatum like they did. I feel like that that caused the injury. I'm always going to feel that way. It made no sense to me as they were doing it. Him playing 43 minutes in one game and 40 in another in the playoffs. I just thought was insane.

• 28:40Speaker 04

  Don't you think part of that, there had to have been some sports science behind that. If like, if we're going to actually ramp him up for big playoff minutes, we got to ramp them up. Like in the regular season, we have to sort of give him heavier minutes, loads of the new.

• 28:52Bill Simmons?

  I mean, like, But did you see his quotes today, though?

• 28:55Speaker 04

  About?

• 28:55Bill Simmons?

  His quotes today were basically like, yeah, my right leg's not as strong as my left leg yet. You figured this was gonna happen? Like he had, there was one quote in there that made me wonder like, damn. This is what he said. It was just unfortunate timing, but I guess a little bit to be expected, right? I was away for 10 and a half months and then I came back and I'm playing every other day. I was playing 36 to 40 minutes, so it's not unusual that something would come up.

• 29:22Bill Simmons?

  It was inevitable at some point I was going to have to deal with something. It kind of came at the worst possible time. Was it inevitable?

• 29:28Bill Simmons?

  Shouldn't they have just played this 20, 30 minutes? Like, look at how the Spurs have treated Wemba Yama, basically his whole career, but especially this year. Like, they've been adamant about not trying to put too many miles on him. And conversely, like I look at Denver, and I know Joker had to make the all NBA run, which probably in retrospect was a bad idea. But they're just putting all, all these miles on Jokic and Murray, who immediately, you know, looked like they ran out of gas in the first round. So would you rethink how you, how you treat the playoffs versus the regular season? Just holistically, from what we're watching right now?

• 30:02Speaker 04

  First of all, this entire conversation is music to Adam Silver's ears. How can we make the regular season matter even less and seem less relevant for like an unending? Log of six months of games like

• 30:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 30:13Speaker 04

  Please, let's have more teams think this way. There need to be fewer games. We know there need to be fewer games. Everybody knows and agrees there need to be fewer.

• 30:20Bill Simmons?

  But we know that we know that's not happening.

• 30:22Speaker 04

  No, but no, no one is actually willing to make whatever sacrifices necessary to do that. So then we're stuck in this situation where, yeah, the playoffs are a completely different game than the regular season. Different types of players have different kinds of playoff experiences than in the regular season. Like the 16 game versus 82 kind of players that Draymond Green famously said a few years ago. And the gap is getting bigger. Kirk Kirk Goseberry wrote about this for The Ringer last week. The the the gap in style between the regular season and the playoffs is just getting wider and wider to the point that they are the same sport, but very different versions of it.

• 30:55Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 30:56Speaker 04

  And I mean, sure, ideally, you would, if you could just know, I'm going to be a top six seed, so at least I'm not in the play in tournament. Because you can't risk that, no matter what you can't.

• 31:08Bill Simmons?

  I don't know. Philly risked it. Philly Philly got what 30 30 games out of Embiid? How many did he actually play? He played.

• 31:16Speaker 04

  Some amount of Embiid games.

• 31:18Bill Simmons?

  38 games. They Paul George took a 25 month suspension vacation for whatever he did and came back and looked better than ever and looked like 2021 Paul George. The only people they put real minutes on the whole season were Maxey and Edgecombe. Maxey played a lot of minutes. He ended up only playing 70 games, but he played 38 minutes a game. He led the league. Vijay was a rookie, played 35, but that's young legs. But none of it mattered because for five games of the playoffs, they had their team.

• 31:48Speaker 04

  It's it's really just shocking how quickly Philly just materialized. Like, oh, this is the dream Philadelphia 76ers team that we never thought we would see. And like, oh, my God, here it is. Like Joel Embiid is firing behind the back passes to Kelly Oubre, who's dunking and everyone's going crazy. And Tyrese Maxey is roasting everyone.

• 32:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but even in even in real time, people still weren't believing it when it was happening. The Celtics were, I think, minus 2200 after game four. And even after they lost game five, they were minus 1100, which House and I were both like, whoa, that seems crazy. And then in game seven, without Tatum, they were six and a half point favorites, the Celtics. I thought that was gonna be a 50 50 game. I didn't think anybody should be favored. I was shocked by that, but nobody believed in Philly until they did it.

• 32:36Speaker 04

  I, I mean, we all have Philly fans in our lives. We have some at, at The Ringer and Spotify. I have just random, I've had random Philly fans that I have not heard from in months reach out in the last 48 hours. They're just as shocked as everybody else. The ones that are reaching out to me are like, I can't, I'm just walking around with a big grin on my face. I can't even believe what's just happened. I'm in shock is a word that multiple of them use. They just, they even, they are like, this, this happened? Like this team just suddenly clicked into place like this? I can't believe it.

• 33:05Bill Simmons?

  It was incredible to watch as it was happening. Game two, I just thought the Celtics played like crap and Philly made some threes. That wasn't alarming. But game five, I was alarmed and talked about it in the pod after. Game six was equally alarming. You look at the last second half of game five, game six, game seven, Philly basically dominated those three games. I mean, they were up, I think 15 plus in all the games. The Celtics never really had a lead ever. Always felt like they were playing come from behind basketball. And there's a few things I'm shocked by. One, um, one was just how kind of competent Embiid looked. Like he, he wasn't doing,

• 33:48Bill Simmons?

  we've seen him come back from not playing and he falls down a lot. And you always think like the next one, like he was, I thought, pretty good. That was about as, as good as you're gonna get from him. Defensively, like protecting the glass, some of his passing. I thought, I just thought he played well. I was really surprised by that, right?

• 34:05Speaker 04

  He was outstanding on both, on both, offensively especially. Defensively, it can come and go for him a little bit, but he was moving around a lot very well in games five and six. Game seven was good enough and offensively, he was absolutely brilliant in that game.

• 34:17Bill Simmons?

  And Paul George, you know, who I guess was sick in game seven, but Paul George.

• 34:23Bill Simmons?

  Just was the equal of of Brown and Tatum on a lot of these minutes and quarters, you know, game seven, maybe not as much, but that one was shocking. Kelly Oubre's defense, which I was like, ah, he's, he's not bad. He gives a honest effort like he was invaluable. Um, and, and then, you know, just riding Maxey. The one thing you could have predicted, and we did our most intriguing players draft, and I think I took Maxey as my leap guy because I was like, this is fits the profile of if somebody was going to make the massive leap, it's, he kind of checks a lot of those boxes. He was awesome. And, and he, if you think about like the next series, them versus the Knicks, if they win,

• 35:06Bill Simmons?

  it'll be because he's the best player in the series, which sounds like stupid and cliche, but that's usually the best player usually wins the series. And they would need him to just go nuts in the series. I think, I think the Knicks can throw some stuff at Embiid. I don't know if Paul George can do that again. Edgecombe, one game, you had that stat. What was he 0 for 16 in the losses from threes?

• 35:26Speaker 04

  I, that wasn't me, but yeah, it was, it's, it's, it's swings hard with Vijay's three point shot.

• 35:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, he's trick or treat from three, which is fine.

• 35:33Speaker 04

  But I'll tell you what's never trick or true with him. Absolutely fearless and is just unafraid of any of these big moments. Wants the ball and in, in transition, for a guard who's not huge, he has just meteorically risen into like, he's one of the five most terrifying players in transition in the entire league. You just, it doesn't even matter if somebody's back, if that guy's bigger than him, if he's got a head of steam, he's going to finish over you and there's just nothing you can do about it.

• 35:59Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. It reminds me of some of the, some of the all time great transition guards we've had that you knew in the first year, like Rose and Westbrook were both like this. Westbrook just taken over like, Jesus, he's like shot out like a cannon. Um, I thought Nick Nurse was awesome in this series and conversely, I thought Missoula was bad and we can talk about that now or later.

• 36:22Speaker 04

  I was gonna say, but I've been waiting to hear you weigh in on whatever.

• 36:25Bill Simmons?

  I thought Missoula was incredible in the regular season. It was honestly, I voted for him for coach of the year. I thought he was incredible.

• 36:31Speaker 04

  I would have too.

• 36:33Bill Simmons?

  And I don't know what they were thinking with this playoffs. I have so many questions. And look,

• 36:41Bill Simmons?

  Did Philly win this series or did Boston blow it? I think the answer is both.

• 36:48Bill Simmons?

  They went back to their 2024 style without the same players is my biggest issue. They slowed it down, they didn't put pace, they gave up on their bench. And I was saying it on the podcast at the time, I didn't really understand it. It was interesting, Jalen after the game yesterday was like, I actually liked how we played. I thought we looked like us, like that's, that's who we were all season. That's kind of how I felt.

• 37:09Speaker 04

  So this team. They gave up on the bench until they started half of it in the most important game of the season.

• 37:15Bill Simmons?

  I know. Well, that almost seemed like symbolic for Joe, like just to say, I screwed up. I did this wrong, but the problem is, so you have two different problems. One is you do the Simons for Vucevic trade to get under the luxury tax, which I get. And I understand all the benefits for that. But my dad, who is the most bitter I've ever heard him after a playoff series loss. I was going to have him on the podcast today and he's so mad about the series that I decided not to have him. Cause he's just furious at everybody. And after the game, he was like, I was going to go up to Chisholm and congratulate him for getting under the luxury tax. Like just furious because not only do you not have Simons, who I think would have had at least a couple of real moments in this series and would have mattered.

• 37:58Speaker 04

  He got injured, but who knows what would have happened.

• 38:00Bill Simmons?

  Well, did he get injured? I don't know. He had like a lottery injury, but, um, but then you bring Vucevic in. So you have that swing and I just felt, this is my honest feeling. I think Missoula treated this series like, let's figure out what we have for when we play the Knicks and the Pistons and whoever comes out of the West. We're going to, I'm going to use this as my litmus test series. I'm going to see what I have with Vucevic. I'm going to shorten my rotations. I'm going to try to do the 2024 thing again. And they just got away from what, what succeeded for them. The bench was the superpower of this team. It was guys like Hugo and Walsh coming in and being maniacs for five, six minutes. And he just punted on it. And then in a game seven, it's like, hey, Shireman, can you go back to being awesome like you were the last two months of the season?

• 38:44Bill Simmons?

  It's like, you've been yanking me around. Of course he, he went in zero points in game seven. This guy was a real asset down the stretch. So I just, I really think Missoula screwed the series up, but I'm always going to think that.

• 38:57Speaker 04

  I was gonna say, if he was in the lab experimenting in preparation for the next rounds, what, what was the game seven experiment? Was that like me melting things on the Bunsen burner in ninth grade chemistry class? Just like throwing a pen cap on, oh, look, it's melting. What, what experiment was taking place?

• 39:13Bill Simmons?

  That was, that was an admission of, I screwed up. I need to ride with my bench guys in the crowd. I, listen, Garza starting is totally explainable to me because they're trying not to get Kaden in foul trouble, right? And they're trying to move Kade, more of Kade's minutes against Drummond. Like, I get it. Hopefully Garza can hit. He was great on those threes at the top of the arc. Missed a couple and we never saw him again. Um, and Shireman should have started for Tatum and even though he was getting yanked around all series, and so I thought was gonna start. The Ron Harper thing did catch my attention.

• 39:46Bill Simmons?

  That one was like, huh, because he just hadn't played.

• 39:50Speaker 04

  That is a fantastic.

• 39:52Bill Simmons?

  Against it. I wasn't against it, but I was like, oh, okay. And I think they put him in an unfair spot, which is another thing you have to think about. Um, I probably would have just started Walsh and been okay. But this is, goes to the bigger thing of like, you're playing Tatum and Brown, these big minutes in the first six games, and you're not giving those minutes to the bench guys. So then when you actually need the bench guys, that you're basically throwing them in cold. I just don't get it.

• 40:19Speaker 04

  Walsh playing only five minutes is pretty surprising. And I know he's, you know, he's not going to be guarded on the perimeter, although he shot okay this year. But defensively, he was far and away their best option on Maxey from the start of the season until now. And I just like, if you're gonna play, if you're gonna juggle it up and play all these random dudes, like, it seems weird to me that, you know, falling through the cracks is the one guy who's actually guarding Maxey pretty well. And Jalen Brown.

• 40:44Bill Simmons?

  Who done a great job against him during the season, like really, really effective.

• 40:47Speaker 04

  And Jalen Brown took the assignment in, in game seven and was like, fine, but there was just nothing that they, I mean, in the end, maybe it wouldn't have mattered. He's, Maxey was just too brilliant and too multifaceted and offensive player for whatever they threw at him. But I just, the whole game was just, starting with Tatum being not on the injury report to questionable to out. To the starting five, to them falling behind early, coming back late. And the whole game was just very weird.

• 41:14Speaker 00

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• 41:39Speaker 01

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• 42:44Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by Carhartt. We spend a lot of time talking about football, the players, the coaches, the big plays, but there's a whole other team we rarely think about, the people who make the game possible. The workers building stadiums, paving parking lots, growing the grass, welding the goalposts, even making the footballs. They're committed to their craft and they're doing the work long before kickoff. Carhartt is proud to outfit those crews. So next time you're watching a game, take a second to appreciate the people behind it. Learn more at carhartt.com/jointhetrades.

• 43:15Bill Simmons?

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• 43:58Bill Simmons?

  You could tell he was hurt and they weren't going to mess with it. And it was the other leg. And this is what always happens when these people have these traumatic injuries to one leg. You know, favoring the other leg. And it's always a concern because you're putting more stress on it and they played him too many minutes. I mean, the big thing for me is I don't think they were beating San Antonio or OKC. So it's not like, oh, we blew the title. It's more like, I just know if we did this, if you just reset button this and went back two weeks. And you basically have to win those first two games. He had a feeling Embiid was going to come back midway through the series. But the way they played game two with all the threes, just letting Maxey and Edgecombe do whatever they wanted.

• 44:41Bill Simmons?

  And then game five was, you know, even worse. But I just, I know they would have tried to mix that up. Used a bigger bench. Like even what Minnesota did against Murray. Let's put some miles on Murray. Let's make him dribble the ball up 94 feet. You know, I know Maxey is the minutes leader in the league, but at least like they, they just made it so easy for him. I felt like he was going downhill like a running back for two straight weeks, right?

• 45:04Speaker 04

  I, by the way, I don't know how much we're going to talk about it because it starts tomorrow. But Anthony Edwards was just upgraded to questionable for game one of that series. You mentioned Minnesota and cleared the, Timbrow said he's cleared for all basketball activities, on-court activities and upgraded to questionable. The DiVincenzo injury is heartbreaking. It's always sucks and he's a big part of their team. I can't wait for that series. If Ant is like a full go and is, you know, the last couple of games he played against Denver, he did not look like himself. He was not assertive. He was not explosive. But if he's closer to himself, I mean, he's already had a 50-point game against them this year. The idea of him trying to dunk on Wemby by itself is just beyond intoxicating. You got the French center battled. Like, there's

• 45:47Speaker 04

  a lot to love about this matchup that we haven't really gotten to sink our teeth into because it was just, we just didn't know who was going to be left of the Minnesota Timberwolves. And by the way, kudos for the Minnesota Timberwolves, you've talked about already, for finding a way to win that series against the Nuggets without so many guys. That was an awesome, awesome effort by them.

• 46:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, and that's the thing. They figured it out. They zagged a little bit. They tried to do some different things. Like, the Terrence Shannon thing was incredible. Like, not only just playing him, but unleashing him and just saying, "Go attack Jamal Murray. His legs are dead." And conversely, with the Celts, Missoula was so good during the season, and I just didn't see the ingenuity in the same way. It really felt like he was trying to replicate 24. And I can't say this strongly enough. This was not the same, this was always supposed to be a transition year into next year, get under the tax. And instead of Porzingis, Drew Holiday, and Horford, you have guys that just aren't as good and aren't as experienced on the team, and you weren't going to be able to replicate it. So I think that superpower

• 46:50Bill Simmons?

  for this team was the bench and the unpredictability and the wild card nature of just these guys that would have these weird heat checks. It was happening all year, and they just they went away from it.

• 47:00Speaker 04

  I said it last night on my reaction pod with Pina. It just felt like the Sixers and the Celtics swapped arcs in astonishingly fast fashion, and that the Sixers became the team that they were always able to be on paper, but never would be in reality. And then they became it. And the Celtics became the team that I was low on before the season. It looked so foolish for being low on because they had shed so much talent, because there was so much uncertainty about their big man rotation, and all those concerns just were completely invalid until they were immediately valid at the most pressing possible time. I wish you're, how many years is your dad been a season ticket holder?

• 47:44Bill Simmons?

  Fifty-four.

• 47:45Speaker 04

  If you're a fifty-

• 47:46Bill Simmons?

  Absolutely furious.

• 47:48Speaker 04

  You, if you've been a season ticket holder for fifty-four years, you can absolutely go up to Bill Chisholm and sarcastically congratulate him on ducking the, all the aprons. You can give him, you can gift him an apron. You should have bought him an apron with like, congratulations, we lost in the first round. Here's your apron. Go barbecue with this.

• 48:06Bill Simmons?

  Well, so, the only way to defend it is, did they know Tatum was gonna look like he did? They hoped he was gonna look a lot like it, but they didn't know when they did that move because they also didn't have to do it. Um, they thought Tatum was gonna replace the Simons minutes, but they really miscouted Vucevic, it seems like. Cause they, he just was done. You could see it. The moment he showed up on the team, didn't look right. Got hurt, came back, didn't look right. Came in the playoffs, was clearly a disaster matchup. Um, against any, any Philadelphia big man, basically. But especially when Embiid came back, they had to see two more games that that wasn't gonna work with him versus Embiid. And that was their big move. You know, they, they could have,

• 48:48Bill Simmons?

  I guess that if you're gonna criticize him, then they maybe could have flipped Vucevic for something else, but you know, I think they thought he was, I think they thought he was gonna help, like, I really do. And it was just a misfire.

• 48:59Speaker 04

  And the Tatum, you mentioned the Tatum comments today about, you know, it was inevitable something would happen. I remember saying like, I'm a little hesitant to crown Boston as the favorites because I just, I, I remember making this gesture of ups and downs. There's gonna be ups and downs with Tatum recovering from this injury. And there just weren't any. And I just sort of let myself believe, and I think everybody else did, that there would, there, I guess there's, this is just a medical marvel. There are not gonna be any downs. He's playing a ton of minutes. He's playing awesome. They've been the best team in the East. And then at the worst possible time there was, we don't really even know what happened, when it happened, what the injury is, but-

• 49:38Bill Simmons?

  I don't, I just don't believe it was the knee either. I know they had to say that, but it was during the game, you could see it was his calf and they had the stuff on his, the wrapped around his calf. And, you know, I think he, it was unclear whether he was cleared to play or not. I thought his, his words were interesting about him and his trainer decided not to play. So clearly, um, they didn't feel comfortable with it and I don't think they should have. I don't think it was worth it. They weren't going to win the title this year. Let him go. But to find out after the season that his right leg was only 85% of his left leg or whatever, or that like didn't have the, he's not going to be able to build the calf up fully until, you know, the summer. So that's, well, why were you playing 42 minutes a game then?

• 50:18Speaker 04

  The whole thing is a little bit, a little bit strange, but Philly went and took the series from them and, and, and this is, I mean, the conversation I really want to have with you is like, so what now? Like you're not like, like, I don't know. I, I just would say, what, what now? For the Celtics.

• 50:36Bill Simmons?

  Well, first they have to go to the doctor and see if they can find a cure for we got great looks disease. Cause that's been three of the last four playoffs of losing a game and then talking about how great the looks were after. And by the way, the looks were great because they were coming back at the end. They got four straight awesome shots and they missed all of them. And that's why they lost.

• 50:57Speaker 04

  So this was always my, and, and I would go back and forth playfully with Mike Budenholzer about it. It was my thing with every Budenholzer team that would be eliminated from the playoffs. It was like, well, we just, the shooting luck went against us. And it was why I would always make fun of the Celtics. Like, well, congratulations. You can hang the banner for like, expected, effective field goal percentage champions of 2026.

• 51:16Bill Simmons?

  This is Daryl Morey with the Rockets too. Same thing.

• 51:19Speaker 04

  You have four, this, it's great that you had an unbelievable expected effective field goal percentage. It's awesome. That's a wonderful process. And yeah, you just missed. Well, all you gotta do is just miss three times in seven games and then have another game where the team outplays you substantially or whatever. And then your season is over. You don't, this, it's not a hundred game series. It's like a very finite amount of time. And if this thing isn't working, the right answer isn't always just keep doing the thing until it works. You gotta have some other thing. I mean, this has been my thing with Boston forever. It doesn't, it's, they won a title. The fact is they won a title. They have a great core. I'm not sure what, if anything, they can really do in the off season.

• 52:00Bill Simmons?

  Pritchard let them down in this series too, other than his one game four.

• 52:03Speaker 04

  So great game four.

• 52:05Bill Simmons?

  Great game four, and other than that, I don't, I forget. Hold on, I'm gonna queue up his stats. He just, he just wasn't good enough in this series. And the shot that killed me, Jalen missed a couple, Hauser had one around the rim, but the one that killed me was, two minutes left, Cade makes a great play at the rim, comes back down. Cade is running the floor and Bead's jogging back. Cade is outrunning him. Brown, it would have been a tough pass to him. There's some Celtic fans today that were like, oh, Jalen missed, missed Cade. It's, the ball ended up in the right spot. It was Pritchard in the corner, wide open to take a lead, and he missed it. And I would take that shot 100 times out of 100. And if they, if he makes that shot, I honestly think they win.

• 52:47Bill Simmons?

  Did the crowd, my dad said the crowd was as loud as any crowd they've had for a playoff game during the, during the comeback. Like, he was like, the energy was electric. It was, we could not get over the hump, and all we needed was that one shot, and it just never went in. But I would have taken my chances with that shot. You know, I would have bet my life he was gonna make that shot.

• 53:07Speaker 04

  That's why sports are so cool. And I know it's not a great day for Boston fans, but I've seen that game so many times in my head and in my life. And what happens is, that shot goes in, the crowd goes bananas, and a team on the other end with a history of postseason letdowns and hiccups just sort of melts down a little bit, and the game peters out and the Celtics win. In, in your soul, in my soul, like, when that shot goes up, that's what I'm envisioning, and it went completely the other way. Not only did the shot miss, but Philly and Maxi in particular.

• 53:44Bill Simmons?

  Three-point play, yeah.

• 53:45Speaker 04

  He, he like rose up under that kind of pressure in a hostile environment and put the game to bed. And that, it was just like a very against script kind of ending.

• 53:54Bill Simmons?

  Even in the bar, it was a, oh, it was like one of those, I can't even imagine what it was like to be there.

• 54:02Bill Simmons?

  Well, PJ, PJ and Maxey from three were 45 for 95.

• 54:11Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 54:11Bill Simmons?

  I don't know if that's replicable against the Knicks. And the Knicks, I mean, there's a whole bunch of reasons the Knicks are a better matchup than the Celtics were. Embiid in those four games was, in the game seven, he was 28, nine and seven.

• 54:27Bill Simmons?

  He missed 150 regular season games in the last three years. And magically turned back into Joel Embiid at the worst possible time for the Celtics. I was thinking about it. I saw the Sixers play two games during the season. That I thought made them intriguing as a dark horse. One was against the Celtics and then Embiid got hurt right after that, I think. Then there was another one. I want to say it was against maybe the Knicks on a Saturday. Or maybe the game, somewhere around that range when they played the Knicks. And we're really going toe to toe with them. And I was just like, man, there really is a ceiling with this team.

• 55:01Speaker 04

  But we all do that, right? Like we, this is-

• 55:03Bill Simmons?

  I know, but think about it. They played six good games all year, probably. And they're in round two now.

• 55:09Speaker 04

  There's a reason that we just never thought we would see the apex version of this team for any prolonged period of time. And by the way, we still have to see it for a prolonged period of time because now it gets every other day, you know, for the rest of the way. And obviously this is a pretty soft travel schedule for them. Philly, New York is an easy trip and all that. But the stat I will keep just hammering about, always Maxey, always Maxey. And in this series, Embiid is, those two combined for all the heavy lifting they do on offense, 3.3 combined turnovers per game, two per game for Embiid, who's had a history of like bad turnover games in the playoffs. And 1.3 for Maxey. And Maxey never turns the ball over. It's one of his secret superpowers. He just never turns it over. And like, that's a, that's astonishingly low number for those two guys combined.

• 55:53Bill Simmons?

  All right, quick break. This episode is brought to you by Fire TV. You ever sit down, ready to watch the game, only to search and scroll endlessly? If so, you need Fire TV. It shows your live games from your favorite teams all in one place, right on the home screen. No more searching. Just sit down and turn on Fire TV. Separate subscriptions may be required. Feature and content availability may vary.

• 56:36Speaker 05

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• 57:02Bill Simmons?

  Where, where is Maxey for you now on the best players in the league list? I'm just gonna read you the best players.

• 57:08Speaker 04

  Well, I had him on, I had him on all NBA, third team all NBA.

• 57:11Bill Simmons?

  Well, I'm gonna read you right now.

• 57:13Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 57:14Bill Simmons?

  You wouldn't put him against, you wouldn't put him over Joker, S.J. or Wemby? So let's cross them off.

• 57:20Speaker 04

  Feels premature.

• 57:22Bill Simmons?

  No, I mean, right now.

• 57:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, I know. No, yeah, it would feel premature to put him over those guys.

• 57:27Bill Simmons?

  You wouldn't put him over Luca?

• 57:29Speaker 04

  No.

• 57:33Bill Simmons?

  Would you put him over Ant, healthy?

• 57:35Speaker 04

  No.

• 57:36Bill Simmons?

  Alright, so there's six. Would you put him over Cade? Now that's kind of an argument.

• 57:41Speaker 04

  Yeah, you get into this morass of like Brunson, Mitchell, Cade, you know, Curry is still in there, and, and it's just a bunch of guards that are just depending on your taste, depending on the week.

• 57:53Bill Simmons?

  He might have a case, yeah. So he might have a case to be the number one guy in that. So that's the seven spot unless you want to put Giannis over all of those guys.

• 58:01Speaker 04

  I think Giannis still belongs over all those guys. And, and I definitely remember Ringer 100 doing it every month. There were, there was a, he was around like 10, 11, 12 a lot for me during the season. I don't know where I had him on my latest one, but I definitely remember one in particular when I moved him up like very early in the season from like 19 to 11, and it felt like, yeah, he's, that's about where he is right now.

• 58:24Bill Simmons?

  So this goes back to one of my favorite dumb topics. The all-time aberration 2020 COVID draft.

• 58:35Bill Simmons?

  Just zooms and maybe some illegal workouts with guys wearing masks on where Edwards goes first. And then Wiseman goes second off of three college games. LaMelo third. It goes Patrick Williams, Isaac Okoro, four, five, Killian Hayes is seven. Denny is nine.

• 58:55Speaker 04

  It's a great pick.

• 58:56Bill Simmons?

  Halliburton is 12.

• 58:58Speaker 04

  Denny must be doing great for the Wizards these days. They're a great pick by the Wizards at number nine.

• 59:02Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they get credit for that. Your guy Poku is 17.

• 59:05Speaker 04

  Wait a second. My guy Poku.

• 59:08Bill Simmons?

  Your guy Poku.

• 59:09Speaker 04

  How did that happen?

• 59:10Bill Simmons?

  And then listen to this, the twenties.

• 59:12Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 59:13Bill Simmons?

  Tyrese Maxey, 21.

• 59:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 59:15Bill Simmons?

  Quickly 25, Pritchard 26, Jaden McDaniels 28, Bain 30. We're gonna have to do a redraft of this draft this summer for fun.

• 59:24Speaker 04

  It sounds great.

• 59:25Bill Simmons?

  This is a fucking bonkers draft. Like, how does this happen?

• 59:28Speaker 04

  Well, you're just leaving out so many guys who are in the twenties. Leandro Bolmaro, I literally don't even remember him.

• 59:36Bill Simmons?

  It seems like he played 49 games, whoever he was.

• 59:39Speaker 04

  He played four, I, I just have no memory of him doing anything in the NBA, not one thing. Uh, and all Raptors fans know this draft well because they picked Malachi Flynn one spot ahead of Desmond Bain.

• 59:51Bill Simmons?

  Oof, well, that, a pick traded by the Boston Celtics. Um, and then the second round is just pretty much a train wreck. It's Sam Merrill at 60 and, and, uh.

• 1:00:02Speaker 04

  Well, I didn't know, I forgot Sam, Sam Merrill was Mr. Irrelevant. That's right. Isaiah Joe's in there.

• 1:00:07Bill Simmons?

  Vic Cratchit. Uh, but yeah, just the twenties of that draft, getting Tyrese Maxey. So this, you know, my guy Daryl. I think not only saved his job with the series, but I think you gotta look back at like Maxey, the edge cone pick. The Paul George, even though Embiid and Paul George were one and two in the worst contracts draft. Now that's looking better. I think Daryl sticks around now.

• 1:00:33Speaker 04

  Oh, I that's one of the ripple effects I meant to mention last night is I think Nurse and Maury both are.

• 1:00:39Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:00:40Speaker 04

  But the crazy thing about Maxey and Edgecombe is the Sixers were like very, very close to getting neither of those guys. It took a Mike Muscala avalanche of threes on the last day of the season to flip that Maxey pick into Philadelphia's possession.

• 1:00:56Bill Simmons?

  Forgot about that.

• 1:00:57Speaker 04

  And then at the lottery last year, it looked like they were not they they were going to give their pick to Oklahoma City and then they moved up shoot up to number three and got Edgecombe. So like this is what this this is what it turns on sometimes. It's like it's a multiple sliding doors within sliding doors.

• 1:01:13Bill Simmons?

  Well, as we discussed those sliding doors.

• 1:01:19Bill Simmons?

  Is Jalen on the Celtics next year?

• 1:01:22Speaker 04

  Why did it take you so long to get here? This is the most exciting moment of the podcast.

• 1:01:26Bill Simmons?

  This is we're going to wrap up here and then go watch this other game and come back for part two.

• 1:01:33Speaker 04

  So tell us, tell me the ration, tell me, tell me the rationale. Do you want if if if are you trading him to just reset the finances, restock the assets and go to Jason Tatum and Derrick White and be like, I know we just won 57 games or whatever? That was supposed to be the gap year. This is going to signal to you that this might actually be the gap year. Or are you trying for some sort of three for one that fits better, one for one that fits better and like.

• 1:02:04Bill Simmons?

  Can you get younger in the trade with a cheaper guy in the spot?

• 1:02:07Speaker 04

  Are you are you going for it next year or are you taking a step back next year?

• 1:02:11Bill Simmons?

  Oh, I think you're going for it next year.

• 1:02:13Speaker 04

  So then I don't know what.

• 1:02:14Bill Simmons?

  I'm on the record as I want Jalen Brown to play his entire career with the Celtics. I get in arguments about him. I hate the stupid plus minus thing that goes around with him and look at the moment he comes out, they're way better. It would have been happened yesterday. I just like Jalen Brown and I think he plays hard and he's durable and I think he's aged. About as well as you could expect from a 10-year forward in the league. This would be the time to trade him right now because 57, 61, and 65, the next three years money-wise. Tatum's 58, 62, and 67. And if you're gonna make a case to trade him, it's like, can you just afford two guys making that much money?

• 1:02:51Speaker 04

  So I've, I have not-

• 1:02:53Bill Simmons?

  And you've won a title with them.

• 1:02:54Speaker 04

  I have not sat and played around with the Jalen Brown trade machine. I suspect that you have, and you might have some ideas. I don't know, though. I mean-

• 1:03:01Bill Simmons?

  I haven't either, and I haven't really wanted to do it. And also, the loss just happened yesterday. But I, in my head, it's something like, well, there's, is the Giannis move, which I think they would be one of the contenders for Giannis. And I think Jalen has an asset that either goes back to Milwaukee or goes to a third team, and then that team gives their stuff to Milwaukee would be how that trade goes. Like a team like Atlanta, where he's from. A team that controls this Milwaukee situation with their pick this year. So it's something like that. They could get super creative because they have this 27.7 million trade exception, where you could take somebody back

• 1:03:45Bill Simmons?

  on a team that has cap space, like a Dyson Daniels, where you just take that back with Atlanta's pick, put Daniels into the trade exception, trade Jalen, and now you have a max player trade exception. They'd have like the biggest trade exception of all time. And see what you can do with that. Or you look at a team like New Orleans, and could you just go Trey Murphy, Herb Jones at a contract, Trey Murphy, Jordan Poole and a pick, like, something like that where you're carrying the Poole contract for a year. It's expiring, but you've reset around a cheaper Jalen Brown, basically. That would be the mindset. I hope they keep them together. I'm just gonna say that again, and I'm gonna keep saying it. But I would understand if these are the kind of discussions they're having in dark, depressing rooms right now.

• 1:04:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, I, again, having not gone through it, those two teams, just, I'm looking at the standings over here, just jumped in, jumped into my head. I mean, I was trying to think like Rockets, flame out, is there something there? But I don't know what the trade would be.

• 1:04:41Speaker 04

  You know, I didn't think, I didn't think of the Pelicans, actually. They kind of surprised me with that one in terms of like, but it's interesting.

• 1:04:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, there's a lot. And I'm sure this will be a podcast topic at some point, but Utah's another one.

• 1:04:56Bill Simmons?

  Like Utah.

• 1:04:57Speaker 04

  They just did a lot of stuff, though. They just, they just made some big, some big moves.

• 1:05:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. But.

• 1:05:04Speaker 04

  What about, I mean.

• 1:05:06Bill Simmons?

  Well, how about, can I give you another version of this scenario?

• 1:05:08Speaker 04

  Sure.

• 1:05:10Bill Simmons?

  What if Jalen Brown goes to the team and says, it's time, I want my own team?

• 1:05:15Speaker 04

  Why, wow, is it, this is just, are you, is that, are you coping? Is this coping?

• 1:05:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, this is coping. It's, it's been a 24 hours.

• 1:05:22Speaker 04

  Then I applaud your, you know.

• 1:05:24Bill Simmons?

  We've seen weirder things in the NBA than Jalen Brown deciding, I'd like my own team now.

• 1:05:28Speaker 04

  You know, I just, something just popped, a, a team that just popped in my head and we're about to go watch their game is like, if it's just a disaster Cleveland loss in this game, you know, this is a team that just hasn't been able to fill a wing spot with a player like that, but he just, it's just hard. His contract is so big and I don't know.

• 1:05:45Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:46Speaker 04

  What they'll be thinking, but we'll see, we, we get maybe Cleveland win by 30 and then would they be favored in the next round over Detroit? I have no idea, but that would be, that series is going to be wild either way, whoever it is.

• 1:05:59Bill Simmons?

  I vote for keeping them together because we've already seen them win a title.

• 1:06:02Speaker 04

  It did happen.

• 1:06:03Bill Simmons?

  Um, and I think that they can improve around the edges with this team, especially with the trade exception. I think Hauser probably, like if we're going realistic, I think Hauser gets traded because you can, he's 10, 11 and 12. You can, I think a lot of teams could use somebody like him and you could just move Shireman and Hugo into those minutes. Right? And then that 27.7, I think you can get somebody good with that. And I think they'd want to bring Simons back. Simons is a free agent. They have their mid level to use. I could see him coming back. I thought they were a guard short this whole season anyway.

• 1:06:37Bill Simmons?

  So I think getting a guard and figure out another big man to put with Kada would be the two things I would look at, but who knows? This is the NBA, we're prepared for anything at all times. And if Giannis is actually on the table and says at some point, like, I'd love to go to Boston and play with Jason Tatum. I'm like, they're going to try to have conversations about that.

• 1:07:00Bill Simmons?

  They just lost in round one. I feel the same way about Denver. Like they like Shams said today on ESPN, everyone's on the table for Denver except Jokic. They're accepting calls and like that's how they should feel. They lost in round one with one of the best players of this century and they should be thinking that way.

• 1:07:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, that was kind of a no shit moment, but yeah, yeah, obviously, but um.

• 1:07:22Bill Simmons?

  No, but that's significant that they said every player's on the table.

• 1:07:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, because what's.

• 1:07:26Bill Simmons?

  That means Jamal Murray's on the table and Aaron Gordon's on the table.

• 1:07:29Speaker 04

  What's unsaid is Jamal Murray. I mean, Aaron Gordon, the Aaron Gordon thing is just, we've unfortunately reached a point at which I, I, if I'm building the Nuggets, I have to now, if I were building Nuggets, I would see all the medical records. I would know everything. But from the outside looking in, I just can't assume he'll stay healthy for an entire playoffs ever, ever again. The leg stuff just crops up over and over again. I don't really know what to do with that because they're just not close to the same team without him.

• 1:07:57Bill Simmons?

  It goes back to what I asked you 20 minutes ago. Maybe your goal is just to get him healthy in April, May, June. And you're treating him like a car in the garage that you just take out for a spin once a week.

• 1:08:08Speaker 04

  But can you even do that? Like you, you.

• 1:08:10Bill Simmons?

  I don't know.

• 1:08:11Speaker 04

  You can find the sports science people on lots of teams. I know a lot of them who will tell you like that actually. There, there are sports science guys who will say the players aren't playing enough because it does them a disservice to try to, to try to ramp them up. To like, okay, now you, we've been treating you with kid gloves all season. The playoffs, you're here, you're going to play 42, super hard minutes every single game for the rest of the way.

• 1:08:34Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:08:35Speaker 04

  Even if you did that with Aaron Gordon, like I don't know that he would be able to stay healthy for a month straight. Even if you treated the regular season like a big, a big nothing. But anyway, we're far afield and we have a game seven to another game seven coming up.

• 1:08:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. So this is the end of part one. We're going to come back after Toronto, Cleveland, a game that I think already has had two shots. And maybe a gin and tonic before it even started. I am prepared for anything in this game.

• 1:09:00Speaker 04

  You opened this podcast by saying all the crazy stuff that has happened over the last five days. And we forgot the RJ Barrett shot that hit the ceiling on the same goddamn rim of the Kawhi shot from seven years ago. Like that was.

• 1:09:13Speaker 04

  Up there for a long, long time and just whoop. It was Halliburton shot, but in Toronto and in game six.

• 1:09:20Bill Simmons?

  Don't forget the play that led up to RJ Barrett. Evan Mobley, for some reason, being thrown the ball, even though he was the worst free throw shooter out there and seemed like got body checked from behind. I didn't, we never saw the best possible replay of that, but all of a sudden the ball's out of bounds and it's Toronto's ball and RJ Barrett.

• 1:09:40Bill Simmons?

  I didn't think it was going in, did you?

• 1:09:43Speaker 04

  Uh. I did not. When it bounced straight up at this point.

• 1:09:46Bill Simmons?

  I'm just saying, when he was releasing it, did you think it was going in?

• 1:09:49Speaker 04

  No, but when it bounced on the rim, I'm now conditioned to be like, it could be perfect. It could be going right up and right down. So I was actually not surprised when it went in, but yes, when Scotty Barnes sort of stumbles in there and kicks it out, you're like, it's not really what they were looking for down one and hey, boom, it goes in and here we are, game seven.

• 1:10:06Bill Simmons?

  All right, we're gonna watch game seven. And then we're gonna come back for a part two. That'll be a little shorter than this podcast. Thanks for letting me talk out the Celtics. Apologies to my dad for pissing out my.

• 1:10:17Speaker 04

  We just scratched the surface. I think there's more.

• 1:10:19Bill Simmons?

  Well, fortunately, we have many more podcasts coming. Thanks to Gahan Eduardo as well. And we will be back on Netflix, ironically, right after game seven. See you in a little bit.

• 1:10:37Bill Simmons?

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• 1:11:15Bill Simmons?

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