Part 1: NBA Trade Deadline Reactions With Rob Mahoney and Wosny Lambre

In Part 1 of our NBA trade deadline special, The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Rob Mahoney and Wosny Lambre to break down the early trades of the day and other updates, including De’Andre Hunter to the Cavaliers, Jusuf Nurkic to the Hornets, the new-look Mavericks roster (1:44), Jimmy Butler to the Warriors, the Kyle Kuzma–Khris Middleton trade, the CBA’s impact on NBA trades, the Raptors' trade for Brandon Ingram (22:31), why the Kevin Durant trade fell through, lingering thoughts from the De’Aaron Fox trade, teams that probably should have made a trade, listener questions (55:09), and more! Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Rob Mahoney and Wosny Lambre Producer: Kyle Crichton The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Bill Simmons?

  Coming up, part one of our special live trade deadline extravaganza next. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything. And whether it's a flea flicker or a tush push, you need a plan that fits your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you. So they can help personalize coverage for your life and for your budget. Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. This episode is brought to you by Expedia. You know how at the end of the season, your team goes to Cancun? Sometimes earlier than expected? Sometimes after blowing a 3-1 series lead? But what if you went to Cancun? With Expedia, save up to 30% when you bundle and save. You can book the flight or the hotel now, then book the rest later.

• 0:44Bill Simmons?

  In all fairness, though, hopefully your team doesn't go to Cancun. 1-2-3 Cancun. Or if they do, you go with them. Expedia, the one place you go to go places. Sign in to save, savings vary. We're also brought to you by The Ringer Podcast Network. Put up a new rewatchables on Monday night. We did Before Sunset, the sequel to Before Sunrise. It was four of us, me, Sean, Chris, Mallory. You can watch it on Ringer Movies YouTube channel. You could also watch, Sean and Chris and I did a trailer reaction to the new Jurassic Park movie, which I think is called Jurassic Park Money Bag. So you can watch that on YouTube as well. You can watch all the videos and clips from this podcast on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel.

• 1:27Bill Simmons?

  That's where we went live and we did a part one and a part two heading into the trade deadline. This is the part one that we started at 1:45 ET, heading into the 75 minutes right up to the trade deadline. We recapped a bunch of stuff that already happened, tried to anticipate stuff. So when you listen to it, keep an ear for that. And then part two is coming a little bit later. That is everything right after 3:00 PM, the official trade deadline and our final thoughts. Plus, my million dollar picks for the Super Bowl, which we barely talked about this week. Sorry, sometimes basketball wins. I hate to break it to everybody. Anyway, here is me, Rob Mahoney and Big Wise talking NBA trade deadline, part one.

• 2:12Bill Simmons?

  Let's go.

• 2:34Bill Simmons?

  I don't know what my camera is, but this is the Bill Simmons Podcast YouTube Live, presented by Michelob Ultra Superior Light Beer, the official beer sponsor of the NBA. That's Rob Mahoney, that's Big Waz. So, we're about to go live here and a big trade happened. Cleveland gets De'Andre Hunter for Levert Niang, two second round picks, second round picks, giant commodity, Waz, and then, uh, two first round swaps, we don't know what they are. I like this trade more than Rob, because I like De'Andre Hunter, and you're like, go ahead, do your thing.

• 3:06Speaker 01

  I'm a skeptic. I'm a De'Andre Hunter skeptic. Um, I like players who will, on occasion, pass. De'Andre Hunter doesn't really do that. And now, he's granted, while not passing, had the best season of his career by far, has scored and shot in a way that he never has before. That's all well and good. But when I'm imagining the Cleveland freewheeling offense, I want somebody who's gonna move the ball, who knows how to play and flow, and that's not really what De'Andre Hunter does to the point.

• 3:29Bill Simmons?

  Is that Levert, though? I mean, Levert's a little ball stopper.

• 3:32Speaker 01

  This year, it has been, right? Like, he's actually been like a good soldier within that context. And I take your point, but I think he's actually done a pretty good job of that exact thing this year.

• 3:41Bill Simmons?

  Waz, you love the Hawks.

• 3:42Speaker 02

  I did.

• 3:43Bill Simmons?

  That's one of your surrogate teams.

• 3:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, for sure, especially when Jalen Johnson wasn't injured. But Hunter, I think this year has most often looked like the version of him that's been sold to us, basically, since he's been drafted, right? Like, this big, physical guy who, you know, is really toolsy, but every now and again will make a shot and even create his own shot.

• 4:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:04Speaker 02

  Which, you know, takes him past the three and D sort of element. The D has been hit or miss his whole career, and even his shooting has been sort of hit or miss. But this year, he's actually making shots, and I think-

• 4:16Bill Simmons?

  Thirty-nine percent from three.

• 4:17Speaker 02

  That's what I think attracted him to the Cavaliers.

• 4:21Bill Simmons?

  Did you guys see the Cavs sell the game the other night?

• 4:23Speaker 01

  Uh, it caught half.

• 4:24Speaker 02

  I did.

• 4:26Bill Simmons?

  I think this is a trade for a Celtics series where you're thinking we gotta go against Tatum and Brown for two weeks potentially. Yeah. We need a wing with size. We're not totally fired up about this Levert and Yang situation. Can Hunter be the guy? And I don't know, I like the trade. I don't care about swaps. Cleveland's gonna be good the whole decade. Niang and Levert, whatever. Second round picks, whatever. Like the, and Hunter's on a great deal. I think he's making like 17. Yeah.

• 4:52Speaker 01

  It's not too bad.

• 4:53Speaker 02

  This is the first year that it's felt like a great deal, though. That's the crazy thing.

• 4:57Bill Simmons?

  I think anytime you can get somebody under 20 who could play in the last five minutes of a round two playoff game, that's a pretty good deal.

• 5:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think Hunter's another one of those guys like, like, uh, Rui who looks the part where it's like, oh, he's this big, physical guy and we could get him to guard Tatum and Brown, but like in practice, he's just an offensive player. He's never been a defensive force at any point. Maybe in moments and possessions at a time, you'd be like, wow, if he could just tap into that always. And so that's why I feel like he's available for, you know, a Karis Levert in second round picks where famously, you know, great guys get picked.

• 5:34Speaker 01

  I also like Cleveland going for it a little bit, you know, pushing in in a way that there are certain non-negotiables on their roster like Darius Garland, Jared Allen. Those guys are only going to play one position, but otherwise you want a little lineup flexibility. You want the ability to play, you know, Struce here or Dean Wade there or now De'Andre Hunter at the three, four. Like there's, there's some options for Cleveland that I think are pretty appealing, not just for a Celtics matchup, but really just getting through the Eastern Conference alive.

• 5:58Bill Simmons?

  It's risky to make a trade when you're doing really well, to just mess with the chemistry and the vibes of what you have. But going back to the Boston thing, like I'm looking at Hunter's last season, cause I remember him just playing well against the Celtics, my favorite team. And they had, they played them four times last year in the regular season and he was good in three of the games. Um, and then they played in the playoffs. I can't remember what he did against the playoffs, but, um, I don't know. I'm sure they're they're trying to figure out Tatum and Brown. That's the mountain. Who's out there that's had some success against those guys? And then they're, you know, they're studying these center things. I just don't really understand it from a Hawks perspective.

• 6:41Bill Simmons?

  Like, because they don't, they don't have their first round pick unless it's like, what is it? Like, top 10 protected?

• 6:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 6:47Bill Simmons?

  Something like that?

• 6:48Speaker 02

  I think it's the, I think.

• 6:49Bill Simmons?

  So is this, is the tank in motion now, Wes?

• 6:51Speaker 02

  Of course. And I think the tank has been in motion. Once they decided that, like.

• 6:56Speaker 01

  When, when Jalen Johnson got hurt.

• 6:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 6:58Speaker 01

  They really have not been able to function without him.

• 7:00Speaker 02

  For the season. And, you know, Hunter's been there for so long, you know? He's been there long enough to get a rookie extension. Like, he's, he's not new. So in, in, in a certain sense, like, he's a known commodity for them. So I can understand them being like, look, this thing has run its course. Let's get at least something out of this. And we're not the type of team where we're winning so much and he helps as this sort of ancillary part that will, you know, help us out fill in the blanks rotation wise. It's just like, let's get something for him. We're going in this.

• 7:33Bill Simmons?

  But so I just looked it up. They, that, that pick's unprotected that the Spurs have.

• 7:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, the one for 2025.

• 7:38Bill Simmons?

  So it's not, you can't even call it a tank trade because what are they tanking for? To give San Antonio a better pick?

• 7:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:43Bill Simmons?

  And by the way, that pick, I, the, the Darren Fox thing, the more I think about it, unconscionable that Sacramento doesn't get that pick.

• 7:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:51Bill Simmons?

  But they got two picks and they get this flimsy Charlotte pick that really turns into two seconds.

• 7:56Speaker 01

  Not real.

• 7:56Bill Simmons?

  I'm just not, you watched the Aaron Fox last night. I'm just not trading him unless I get that Atlanta pick. Especially after Jalen Johnson goes out. It's like, that might be, you know, somewhere between seven and 10. You're giving me that pick if I'm trading Darren Fox. Somehow San Antonio keeps it.

• 8:10Speaker 01

  But that's a team that they just dug themselves out of the absolute nadira vibes in Sacramento. Like, it got so weird and so bad for their season and they finally get this momentum with Doug Christie. They finally have some things with their roster sorted out. I don't know that it's realistic to expect the Kings to just sit on a couple of months of De'Aaron Fox pouting, if that's what it would have been.

• 8:31Speaker 02

  Yeah, and to what end, right? Like, I guess, yeah, the Hawks pick would is definitely valuable. Like, I could see it landing, what are they, probably like in the 10 range or something like that. Which, you know, of course, is a valuable pick. But at the same time, when the guy says that he wants to go to San Antonio, and San Antonio is clearly positioned to sign the guy outright if and when they need to or have to, and it's like, the closer he gets to his free agency, the less valuable he becomes. I do wonder how much leverage they have in a situation to be like, screw that, you're giving me this, because the Spurs' season was going fine. Like, they could make the argument that, like, look, we don't need to bring Fox in right now. We like the way our young guys are coalescing around Wemby.

• 9:16Speaker 02

  The Chris Paul thing has worked out, knock on wood, he hasn't even been hurt. And so there's no rush on our end, so they definitely could credibly say, we could walk away from the table.

• 9:25Bill Simmons?

  But then you see what happened last night, and you're like, this is why you get De'Aaron Fox.

• 9:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:28Bill Simmons?

  You have this guy who's this really special, potentially generational player, he's in year two. We've seen the timetable of some of these guys goes way faster than we expect.

• 9:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:37Bill Simmons?

  Now you have Fox. So Hunter, it was the 2023 playoffs when he played Boston, and he basically put up 17 and 6, 37%. But I always felt like, I'm not saying he shut down Tatum or Brown or anything like that, but I always felt like, you know, he, it's the 6'8" guys that are the guys that you want against those. So from a Cleveland standpoint, I just wonder like what that, if that game changed their mindset at all. But I like, I like the trade for them.

• 10:04Bill Simmons?

  Big picture. So Butler happens yesterday, not quite worthy of an emergency trade. Emergency trade pot.

• 10:10Speaker 02

  Who, who? It was worthy until Saturday happened. I think without Saturday, we definitely treat it as a monumental trade. Jimmy Butler's teaming up with Steph Curry and Draymond, like that whole saga ends. It's, it's, it's a story. It's a jolt to the Warriors season. It's just after Luka Doncic.

• 10:32Bill Simmons?

  We're, we're broken. Our, the meter is broken. Well, Tuesday night, when it seemed like Durant might go to the Warriors and it was a three teamer with Butler going to Phoenix and whatever going to, I, that was emergency trade worthy. I was ready for that one. Yesterday with Butler after he sulked for four months and didn't want to go to Golden State. And then it was like, well, can we frame it as it's a two year extension, but it's really a one year extension because he was already in a contract. So he made an extra, I don't know, 60, 61 million bucks, maybe 69 million bucks, whatever it is, to basically torpedo this Miami situation.

• 11:08Speaker 02

  So that's.

• 11:09Bill Simmons?

  Is that worth it? Would you do that for, would you do that for $69 million wise? Would you just completely torpedo a situation?

• 11:16Speaker 02

  So.

• 11:16Bill Simmons?

  Probably yes. He would do it for less.

• 11:17Speaker 02

  So here's the thing.

• 11:19Bill Simmons?

  How about $6.9 million?

• 11:21Speaker 02

  So here's the thing. The Suns had agreed in principle to give him two extra years on top of what he already had in the bank.

• 11:29Bill Simmons?

  But was, that would be tampering if they did that.

• 11:31Speaker 02

  What do you mean?

• 11:32Bill Simmons?

  You're not allowed to do that.

• 11:33Speaker 02

  Well, all of these reports about tell Golden State no, or tell this person to go away or whatever. It's like holding out hope that Phoenix could somehow, by some miracle, get Bradley Beal out of there so they could bring Jimmy in and actually give him that extra year. Once that became not a possibility, it's like, all right, it's cool. We'll settle for Golden State. I want to get the hell out of Miami. It's only one year added. My agent's framing it as 120. It's really like 111, but whatever. You know, I think he was just really holding out for that extra year that Phoenix had promised him.

• 12:04Bill Simmons?

  Can I give you, um, can I do a performance theater of how the Miami Phoenix trade talks went? We would love it. Just every couple of days?

• 12:14Bill Simmons?

  What about Beal for Butler? No, Durant we would do. Okay, we'll call you back three days later. Hey, Beal maybe for Butler?

• 12:24Speaker 01

  This is a perverse take on the Julie Delpy before sunrise fake phone call.

• 12:31Bill Simmons?

  And I think it just went on and on. And every time Miami is like, no, Durant. We're not taking Bradley Beal. Nobody wants Bradley Beal. And then they're telling Butler, we're not taking Bradley Beal. And Butler's like, well, I'm gonna act like even a bigger dick. Like, fine. We can, we can just keep doing this. We're not trading you for Bradley Beal.

• 12:51Speaker 02

  Bradley Beal, it's just, it's just like at a certain point, Jimmy, it's worth it to take this to the summer. If Bradley Beal, who has a no trade clause, okay? It's not even just like, all right, we get Bradley Beal. And it's like, if something comes up, we could use this guy to move or whatever. He's still a good player. He's not worth the fifth highest salary in the NBA, but he's still somebody who can play, who can help a team. It's not the end of the world. Bradley Beal, where he gets to dictate terms to the team that he gets traded to? It just makes absolutely no sense.

• 13:22Bill Simmons?

  Without the no trade clause, is he more tradable to you?

• 13:24Speaker 01

  He's gone. He's gone. But I, I think it is the signature hang up of, it's not just like, oh, could you trade him to Miami or whatnot? It's, there would be a taker on the market.

• 13:34Bill Simmons?

  Because you think like you get him this season, you have next season, you can trade him as an expiring. But with the no trade, you're stuck with him for three years.

• 13:40Speaker 02

  You literally can't trade him.

• 13:42Speaker 01

  Honestly cannot.

• 13:43Bill Simmons?

  I, one of my many hot takes of this two-part trade deadline podcast. I think Bradley Beal's playing kind of well for the Suns. Have you watched him lately? Like, he's actually playing defense and he's playing hard and seems dedicated. But I just don't want to pay him $50 million. But it's not like he's a disaster.

• 14:01Speaker 02

  No, he's still somebody who contributes. Um, and I would say he could contribute to winning. It's just when you're paying somebody like that, you would hope he's like your on-ball guy, your shot creator.

• 14:11Bill Simmons?

  I know, but what do we say when they made the trade? We were like, this is stupid. This is too much money. Why are you doing this? We said it when Washington gave him the contract in the first place. Why are you doing this? This is too much money. Why'd you put the no? Trade clause in, this was a comedy of errors. And now Phoenix, so they made a trade, they did a, they finally dumped Nurkic.

• 14:29Speaker 01

  Congratulations to them.

• 14:31Bill Simmons?

  Nurkic, they used one of those three picks they got from that stupid trade they made with the 2031 first that they gave up that they're gonna regret. And they got back, what was it, one of the Martins? They got back Mitic.

• 14:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:42Bill Simmons?

  Who just moves around every year.

• 14:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:45Bill Simmons?

  They got back a couple of seconds because everyone loves seconds now.

• 14:47Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 14:48Bill Simmons?

  Gotta get those seconds, get that one in 20 chance, you might have gotten a player.

• 14:52Speaker 02

  It looks good in the.

• 14:53Bill Simmons?

  Oh, one in 18 chance, we maybe got a rotation guy.

• 14:58Speaker 01

  I have, I have a very bad feeling, we're gonna look at the total math of that breaking up the one pick into three, and it's gonna be three deals that are basically like this. Like, basically use a first to dump Yusuf Nurkic.

• 15:08Bill Simmons?

  To dump a dumb decision you made.

• 15:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, to, to try to rebate another bad decision. The other ones, we'll see what happens, maybe they pull a rabbit out of their hat this summer, maybe there's even time left for them to figure something out here. I just, I, I think that was a blunder in itself.

• 15:23Bill Simmons?

  The Suns are like, somebody who remodeled their whole house and then built like a giant movie theater in the house, and then six months later, we're like, why did we do this movie theater? We should have done, wait, bring the contractor back, we've gotta change that.

• 15:36Speaker 01

  Who was the movie theater in this, in this metaphor?

• 15:39Bill Simmons?

  That was the Nurkic, the whatever that, that complicated Deandre Ayton trade where they're like, we don't, we gotta get out of the Chris Paul business. If we turn him and Deandre Ayton into Nurkic and Beal, and we do all these swaps that kill all of our leverage, we'll be fine. And then six months later, they're like, oh, fuck, now what do we do? And they're just constantly working on their house, and they've just destroyed their house. Their house has no value left. They paid 10, 10 million and put in 10 million for a house that's now worth 7 million.

• 16:09Speaker 02

  Is destruction, you know, a ninth seed in the play-in or potentially an eighth? Is, is that destruction?

• 16:15Speaker 01

  Are we sure anymore that that's where they're gonna end up? I think it's, it's striking, looking at the rest of the bubble teams, all teams that are making moves right now.

• 16:23Bill Simmons?

  Let's talk about this, yeah, because this is part of the Butler conversation.

• 16:26Speaker 01

  Definitely.

• 16:26Bill Simmons?

  So if you look at the West, OKC, Memphis, Houston, Denver, and the Lakers, who we're gonna talk about.

• 16:33Bill Simmons?

  The Lakers are 29 and 19, and I think arrow pointing up, I think all five of those teams are in the playoffs, right? So there's one playoff non-play-in spot left. We have the Clippers at 29 and 22, looking a little creaky.

• 16:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:47Bill Simmons?

  Minnesota 28 and 23. They've looked creaky the whole time. We have four teams with 25 losses, Dallas, Sacramento, Phoenix, Golden State. So now that's 11. And then we have San Antonio at 22 and 26 with some good vibes. There's 12 teams that have a chance. Four of those teams are not going to make the playoffs. And I can stare at that list forever. And it's like, what would your, who would your four be? Like, who's your number one? Would you have San Antonio as your number one pick for not making the playoffs?

• 17:15Speaker 01

  I, I think they might be, just, just because they're a little further behind.

• 17:18Bill Simmons?

  They're too far behind?

• 17:19Speaker 01

  I mean, too far behind with two games back, sounds insane, but it's more that there are too many teams in front of them.

• 17:24Bill Simmons?

  They're one loss back.

• 17:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:24Bill Simmons?

  So if they went on like a five game winning streak, they'd be in the ballpark.

• 17:28Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 17:28Bill Simmons?

  So that'd be, would you agree with that?

• 17:30Speaker 02

  I would say the Spurs are the first ones out for sure.

• 17:32Bill Simmons?

  Okay, so now it gets fun. Who's your number two pick for, sorry, the West is too loaded, you're not making the playoffs?

• 17:40Speaker 01

  I think it might be the Suns.

• 17:41Bill Simmons?

  I think it is.

• 17:42Speaker 01

  I think it might be the Suns. And I will say-

• 17:43Speaker 02

  Probably go Sacramento, but I understand the Suns skeptic skepticism for sure.

• 17:51Bill Simmons?

  Well, can I give you the Fanduel odds? Now, see, this is cheating. Spurs plus 370 has the highest odds not to make the playoffs. So they agree with us on that.

• 18:04Speaker 01

  Who do they have second?

• 18:05Bill Simmons?

  And say, I ruined my own draft. I should have looked at this after. Uh, Sacramento plus 290.

• 18:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:11Speaker 02

  Yeah. Sacramento to me is the clear second pick.

• 18:14Speaker 01

  I feel like that's a little bit of Zach Levine disrespect. You know?

• 18:17Speaker 02

  Is it?

• 18:18Speaker 01

  I think the Malik Monk, Zach Levine, Sabonis thing is gonna be pretty decent. They brought in Jonas Valanciunas, which is not nothing.

• 18:26Bill Simmons?

  They basically have thrown away the point guard position. But when you watch them, especially in crunch time, it kind of makes sense with Malik like running stuff and it's not that crazy. And then I, when they did the Valanciunas trade, I was like, what the fuck is that? That makes no sense to me. You can't play him and Sabonis at the same time. And I was like, wait a second. And I started getting like flashbacks to bad Phoebe games. And I'm like, oh, those guys were teammates. And then you go read it and those guys are boys. They've played, they've figured out how to weirdly either play with each other or not, and they got them for free. And they just have all these professional veteran basketball players. I would put Phoenix over them. Phoenix is plus 198 on FanDuel to make the playoffs.

• 19:07Bill Simmons?

  I think the Phoenix thing, like that, the, the stuff you hear like through the grapevine about like the locker room.

• 19:15Speaker 02

  Shocking.

• 19:16Bill Simmons?

  Our guy, Coach Bud, maybe a little Donnie Nelson on the Knicks-ish where it's just like not working out at all. You're not gonna believe this was, but it seems like KD might be on another unhappy team. There's been no track record of that over the years.

• 19:30Speaker 02

  That's never happened, literally.

• 19:32Bill Simmons?

  Booker looks just miserable at all times.

• 19:35Speaker 01

  Weird year for him.

• 19:36Bill Simmons?

  And, uh, and then Beal is getting heckled at home games. So, um, I would have them second and Sacramento third. You, what do you have? What's your order for the top three?

• 19:44Speaker 01

  I would say about the same. I want to put this out there, not because I want it to happen, but because I fear it could happen. If the Dallas Mavericks do not make the playoffs, as a son of Dallas, I would like to be able to go home again, and I fear that the city would be raised to the fucking ground.

• 19:59Bill Simmons?

  So Dallas is minus 110 and Golden State is plus 126. And I gotta be honest, I would bet on Golden State to make the playoffs over Dallas. I think this Dallas thing could go bad. We haven't had the three-week Kyrie injury. I don't trust AD's health. The team's weird. There, there's big three stuff going on, but Klay's in the big three. It's like, we're done. 2020's Klay and the big three is out. And also the fanbase is so angry.

• 20:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:27Bill Simmons?

  And so hostile. And the vibes are just so brutal that I could see it tail spinning. I really could.

• 20:35Speaker 02

  I think the theory that you replace Luca's production or lack of production because he's not on the floor with AD who's like, you know, played at an all-star starter level damn near the whole year and you become this defensive juggernaut. I think the theory is sound there, specifically in the regular season. If they're just like, you know, a really hard nose, like we grind out games defensively.

• 21:00Speaker 02

  Team in the regular season, that I don't buy it as a playoff.

• 21:03Bill Simmons?

  They did get the better Martin brother.

• 21:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 21:06Bill Simmons?

  You know, they won something.

• 21:08Speaker 02

  Martin, unfortunately, Boston doesn't play in this conference, so I don't know how good Caleb Martin can be. I just think.

• 21:17Bill Simmons?

  Not what they needed, by the way.

• 21:18Speaker 02

  I just think a motivated Jimmy actually fitting a Golden State need, meaning somebody who can do something off the dribble that isn't Steph Curry. And, you know, can play defense, even though he's not what he used to be at all. He used to be an ace defender. He's not that, but he's way more than competent. And just the motivational factor, I think the FU Jimmy factor is going to be at a very high level. And, you know, Draymond, super competitive guy. I, I understand why the odds are such.

• 21:45Bill Simmons?

  Golden State 25 and 24, Dallas 26 and 24, and my guess is you gotta get to maybe 46 wins.

• 21:54Bill Simmons?

  To be, it's not just about being one of the six playoff teams, but you want to be seven or eight. You don't want to have to win the two road games in a row. I want to talk about the Jimmy FU factor. We're going to take a break for the podcast.

• 22:07Bill Simmons?

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• 22:49Bill Simmons?

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• 23:20Bill Simmons?

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• 23:53Speaker 01

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• 23:56Bill Simmons?

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• 24:30Bill Simmons?

  So, and I've said this before and I feel really strongly about it. I actually thought that was a great trade for Golden State. I don't think they gave up really anything. I know they loved Andrew Wiggins, but just fundamentally, it was an NBA 2K trade where you're just cheating the system and you're basically just turning Wiggins into Butler.

• 24:50Speaker 01

  Keeping Kuminga out of this thing.

• 24:52Bill Simmons?

  Keeping a Kuminga is amazing. The protected pick, whatever.

• 24:57Bill Simmons?

  The key to me would be if you're looking at it going, is Butler still good? Can he still be that guy? Because we didn't see it last year. He kept missing games, missed the playoffs. This year was spotty. And I think I talked about this part on a pod, but like five, six weeks ago, he had a game in Detroit. When he was just awesome.

• 25:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 25:18Bill Simmons?

  And that was, you can go back, you can watch it on League Pass. That's all you need to see. This was not one of those, oh, Jimmy made some threes and had a good game. Like, he was fucking awesome. He was pissed off. I think he was mad at Miami. I think this was his like trade value audition tape. And he just ran amok in this game. And I just think that's what he's gonna do in Golden State. I don't know if it's gonna last two months. I don't know if it's gonna last a year and two months. I think two years from now, it could be a catastrophe for them. Where they're just like, oh, my God, we have Draymond and this guy. What the hell? But short term with Curry's window, you gotta do it.

• 25:52Speaker 02

  Two, a couple of things that I love about the deal. One, it pays deference to the end of the Steph era. So Jimmy's deal basically coincides with, you know, Steph's deal. Two, Jimmy Butler is a maniac. He's going to be extremely motivated. And he's an upgrade to what Andrew, you can say whatever you want. He is a clear talent upgrade to Andrew Wiggins, sort of sometimes here, sometimes there, whatever. And then third, I like that it just clarifies the Kaminga stuff, cuz with these young guys, we see it all the time. When they're in these trade rumors for an entire season, it's like, alright, that's now been clarified.

• 26:32Speaker 02

  You're gonna be here. This is what the team looks like. Let's go. I'm really high on this for Golden State.

• 26:38Bill Simmons?

  Unless Kaminga is traded the next hour.

• 26:40Speaker 01

  Which he might be, but even preserving him to potentially include him in another deal is important. And I think the Jimmy Wiggins comp, like Andrew Wiggins has had a perfectly fine season. I don't mean to diminish it, but Jimmy is a totally different level of creator. And most importantly, he is a go-to scorer, as we've discussed, but also a point trigger man for a lot of the Steph Curry off-ball stuff in a way that Wiggins is just not comfortable doing. And so now you have another person who can do that in addition to Draymond, in addition to Pajemski, if you have him in that role. Like, you have someone who can actually make some plays for the way Golden State wants to play.

• 27:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, there's the crunch time piece, but there's also the every four games, he's just gonna be awesome in a game. Right now, this Warriors team, unless Steph is awesome, you saw it last night against Utah, they can just suck for five minutes and all of a sudden blow a game. They've blown a lot of uncharacteristically close games. You know, I'm gonna say this, not gonna, I love Steph. He's at a different point of his career.

• 27:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:35Bill Simmons?

  He can still hit the heights, but he can't do it nearly as consistently.

• 27:38Speaker 02

  He can't put a team on his back.

• 27:40Bill Simmons?

  No, it's not 2022 finals. Steph is not, he's at a different point of his career. He just is. Uh, but I still think he could be a really great piece of a good team. With Butler, the question for me is, that Detroit thing that he did that I saw, is that like a once every two weeks thing? Could he dial that up? Could he carry them? Cause they're gonna kinda need to jump on his back. And then when Kamiga comes back, if they keep him, and now they have some scoring off the bench.

• 28:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:09Bill Simmons?

  They have less guys in the team, which I think was a weird thing for them too. They had like 12, 13 guys that needed to play. Now that, now they've got the numbers down. But I, I just thought fundamentally it was an awesome trade. I still don't feel great about it as a basketball fan, but I, I just think that's, we just have these moments where, where this guy who's making 52 and then 52 next year, it's not even the final year of his deal. He has a contract next year with a player option he can opt into. And he's just decided, I don't like my situation anymore. I'm gonna torpedo it.

• 28:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:39Bill Simmons?

  I really feel like whenever the next CBA comes up, how do they figure out a wrinkle for this? Cause if you're like a Miami fan, you just could be like, what, what the fuck just happened? We just turned Jimmy Butler into Andrew Wiggins.

• 28:54Speaker 02

  I mean, how do you, it's like if you're playing a game of chicken against a guy who's willing to die, like, how do you win?

• 29:00Bill Simmons?

  Right?

• 29:01Speaker 02

  Like, I, I just don't know.

• 29:02Bill Simmons?

  He's Dom Toretto.

• 29:06Speaker 02

  He's willing to do it. So like, how do you win versus that? And, you know, and again, I, I personally wouldn't have carried it the way Jimmy did. Um, the way he's obviously looking at it, it's like, this is literally his last payday ever.

• 29:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 29:19Speaker 02

  In the NBA, major payday. And he's looking at it like, I have to do whatever I have to do to make sure I secure that win. Um, and unfortunately it got ugly. And I can understand feeling entitled.

• 29:34Bill Simmons?

  It was like got disfiguring.

• 29:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was, it was bad.

• 29:37Bill Simmons?

  It was like Vanilla Sky Tom Cruise face level ugly.

• 29:40Speaker 02

  And I've been, I've been carrying Jimmy water, just in the sense that he's overachieved. He was an A plus player for Miami for what they did when they got him. What the expectation was and what he actually delivered. And for him to feel like, yo, like, why won't you place faith in me? That I'm going to over deliver again as I've done my entire tenure year. So like him being like, yo, this is a slap in the face.

• 30:00Bill Simmons?

  That's a tough one to say though, when you're just missing games left and right last year. That, which I think was Miami's problem. It's like, dude, we're not, first of all, you're under contract for this year and next year. And play more, but then Riley did the old guy thing.

• 30:14Speaker 02

  That was.

• 30:15Speaker 01

  That's what he does though.

• 30:16Bill Simmons?

  He did it to LeBron, two, two days before LeBron left. And LeBron took it personally. I kind of love every time he does it, but the question is, do you need an old crazy guy running your basketball franchise? Cause he clearly doesn't, he gives no shits anymore.

• 30:30Speaker 01

  He does not, but it's also not a coincidence that like every star leaves Miami kind of feeling like this.

• 30:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 30:36Speaker 01

  You know, like at, by the end, it's always ugly. There's no peaceful transitions of power.

• 30:40Bill Simmons?

  Even Hassan Whiteside, he's like, I'm fucking, I just wish it ended better. So they also got Golden State's first, which is top 10 protected for two years around, then unprotected. I'm not scared. I still have Steph during that home run.

• 30:53Bill Simmons?

  Poor Dennis Schroder. Can the guy just find, can he just find a house to live in?

• 30:58Speaker 02

  Remarks about trade culture.

• 31:00Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Because last time I checked, every professional sport has trades.

• 31:05Speaker 02

  Oh my God, yeah.

• 31:06Bill Simmons?

  But I, he's kind of stuck in this new rule with the apron. Where if you're over 12.8 million, nobody who's over a certain apron can buy you out.

• 31:17Speaker 01

  I think it's if you're over any apron at all, first or second, you can't sign a buyout guy over the mid level.

• 31:22Bill Simmons?

  12.8 million level too, for like certain, so there's like eight teams he just can't even get bought out and go to.

• 31:27Speaker 01

  Basically, if your contract is just over the non taxpayer full mid level, which his is like by a hair. Like just barely, then you can't sign over any, sign with any apron team. It's a buyout guy.

• 31:37Bill Simmons?

  One thing I didn't get with Miami, cause I actually, there was a world where they just get Wiggins, Kyle Anderson and Schroder for, for.

• 31:44Speaker 01

  It feels like they basically just said, we don't want.

• 31:47Bill Simmons?

  We'd rather have cap space.

• 31:49Speaker 01

  But it's telling when a team like the Heat who say what you will about their personality management.

• 31:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 31:54Speaker 01

  They're pretty good talent evaluators and they have just decided, thanks, but no thanks on Dennis Schroder.

• 31:59Bill Simmons?

  Well, I'll just tell you, my dad and I talking last night, Miami just has a slew of guys who killed the Celtics. And Dennis Schroder kills the Celtics for some reason. Wiggins had a lot of success against them in 22. Kyle Anderson's just weird in general. And we were like, I hope they don't keep all these dudes. Cause if we see them in like a two, seven series.

• 32:19Speaker 02

  You really worried about this version of the Heat?

• 32:21Bill Simmons?

  I'm always worried about Miami. I'm always worried about them. Never not worried about the Heat.

• 32:26Speaker 01

  So right now, the Heat are three games out of the fourth seed in the East.

• 32:30Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 32:31Speaker 01

  And this, this is their new rotation. They got Tyler Hero and Terry Rozier, more or less running point.

• 32:36Bill Simmons?

  Scary Terry.

• 32:37Speaker 01

  Duncan Robinson, they brought in Davion Mitchell from the Raptors.

• 32:40Bill Simmons?

  Another guy who I've always kind of liked. I wanted to see him on a decent team.

• 32:44Speaker 01

  Andrew Wiggins, of course, Haywood Highsmith, Jaime Jaquez, Bam's been playing the four with Kalil Ware, Nikola Jovic.

• 32:50Bill Simmons?

  Ware's been good for like a month.

• 32:51Speaker 01

  Been quite good.

• 32:52Speaker 02

  Ware is very good.

• 32:53Speaker 01

  And Kyle Anderson. Tell me that is not the most Miami Heat ass team you've ever heard.

• 32:58Bill Simmons?

  Kyle Anderson's one of the most Miami Heat guys ever.

• 33:00Speaker 02

  Definitely gonna be an annoying team to play against. I just think this version of Boston is just.

• 33:05Speaker 01

  Oh, I'm not worried about them for Boston. Yeah.

• 33:07Bill Simmons?

  Okay, that makes, that makes two of you. I don't want to play Miami. They fucking pulled Jedi mind trick shit against Boston.

• 33:15Speaker 02

  They definitely have a bunch of solid rotation guys. It's just like, who individually are you scared of in a series?

• 33:24Bill Simmons?

  Who do you think, what do you think Terry Rozier would bet on? Too soon? Come on. He was absolved. Stop it.

• 33:30Speaker 01

  This segment is sponsored by FanDuel.

• 33:33Bill Simmons?

  The Miami has cap space now. They're under the tax. They have a trade exception. And maybe they'll do one more thing before, um, before the 45 minutes from now deadline. I don't know, man. The way Hero's playing. Bam's been playing better.

• 33:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:48Bill Simmons?

  Where out of nowhere feels like they have a little bit more of an identity. They have some shooting. We'll see if they can get more from Rozier, who's been really bad ever since they made that trade. But just as a sneaky, you're down 2-1 in the series against them, wondering what happened. I still feel like they're on the radar for me. Nobody else in the East is. That's the only team, once you get past the four seed, that's the only team I'd be like a little worried about in a series. Do you have anybody else?

• 34:15Speaker 01

  I think the Bucks are still interesting enough, and I think the Magic, if they ever get their shit together, are still interesting enough. They've got a lot to figure out offensively, though.

• 34:22Bill Simmons?

  I guess the Bucks, now that they got Kuzma, because he was red hot. I mean, he was playing great this season.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  Can we talk about that?

• 34:29Bill Simmons?

  He was doing great this season.

• 34:31Speaker 01

  What does the apology sound like these days?

• 34:33Bill Simmons?

  I'd never seen plus minuses that could get to like minus 59.

• 34:36Speaker 02

  He hasn't played on an actual NBA team for five years. This is year five in NBA Siberia.

• 34:44Speaker 01

  He had his choi- that was his choice. He had options to leave and play for competitive teams, for example.

• 34:50Speaker 02

  Fair. Maybe he was looking out for a better championship situation. I just think in 2020 on the Lakers, he was the ultimate role guy.

• 34:58Bill Simmons?

  Is he really doing this?

• 34:59Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 34:59Speaker 01

  It's 2020.

• 35:00Speaker 02

  He was the ultimate role guy. Again, the, the last two good players he played with were Brad Beal and who?

• 35:09Bill Simmons?

  Is this?

• 35:09Speaker 01

  Who's? Bob Carrington?

• 35:11Bill Simmons?

  Rob, is this happening right now?

• 35:12Speaker 02

  Listen.

• 35:13Speaker 01

  At this point.

• 35:13Bill Simmons?

  It's a defensive Kyle Kuzma monologue.

• 35:16Speaker 02

  Great cutter, not a great shooter, but can make open shots when called upon, okay?

• 35:22Bill Simmons?

  How about terrible shooter? He's shooting like 27% from three this year.

• 35:26Speaker 02

  I would say the shot quality has been horrible on a team that's going nowhere.

• 35:30Bill Simmons?

  He has shown no professional pride whatsoever this season.

• 35:33Speaker 01

  He's been actively bad.

• 35:34Bill Simmons?

  He, he looks like.

• 35:36Speaker 01

  Actively bad.

• 35:36Bill Simmons?

  He looks like he is on autopilot.

• 35:38Speaker 02

  I just think it's different when you play on a team that's actually playing for something.

• 35:42Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 35:43Bill Simmons?

  I think he's in the running for worst player of the season.

• 35:45Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 35:46Bill Simmons?

  If we were doing LVP, if you've actually watched Wizards games, I think he's one of the worst players I've seen this season. Can he just flip the switch and put it back? I don't know.

• 35:54Speaker 01

  I mean, it's hard to be that inefficient, that passive aggressive, and that much just straight chilling all the time. Like, it's really a rare skill.

• 36:01Speaker 02

  The Wizards basketball situation is hell.

• 36:04Bill Simmons?

  It's bad.

• 36:05Speaker 02

  It's horrible.

• 36:06Bill Simmons?

  Isn't that bad? Like they have a bunch of young guys. They have Jordan Poole playing actually pretty well this year. I don't know. Isn't that bad? You're a veteran on the team. You wanted, you didn't want them to trade you last year. They're trying to trade you to Dallas. You're like, I want to be here.

• 36:18Speaker 01

  So I'll put it this way, like this wouldn't be a problem if what the Bucks weren't giving up is a player who was very important to their team and Chris Middleton, who just can't do it at that level that they need him to do anymore.

• 36:29Speaker 02

  He can't move. He's got bad, he's got two bad ankles.

• 36:31Speaker 01

  But what they needed was somebody who could do some Chris Middleton adjacent things. And Kyle Kuzma is closer to Torian Prince than he is to healthy Chris Middleton. That is a, that's a big problem for a trade like this.

• 36:43Speaker 02

  Chris Middleton-esque guy out there.

• 36:45Speaker 01

  No, and not, not in trading Chris in his current form, but that's the quandary that the Bucks found themselves in.

• 36:50Speaker 02

  Guys has been a non-entity.

• 36:53Speaker 01

  It's been an occasional entity.

• 36:54Bill Simmons?

  There was a stretch two weeks ago when he had zero points in two of three games, like goose eggs.

• 36:59Speaker 01

  It was a lot of alternating.

• 37:00Bill Simmons?

  But somehow he's shooting like 45% from three or some crazy.

• 37:03Speaker 02

  Kuzma can play four for these guys next to Giannis or next to Brook if you need him to. And again, like, I think that role play junkyard dog guy is still in there.

• 37:13Bill Simmons?

  Was, we're recording this.

• 37:15Speaker 02

  One last thing, because I think the Kuzma thing is gonna work. When Team USA was assembled last summer, Kuzma, who's like an outspoken Twitter guy, he's like, yo, these guys are big NBA players and names, but somebody's gonna have to fill a role. Somebody's gonna have to do these dirty work things. And Devin Booker like famously said, I will or whatever, quote, whatever. This Kuzma explains to you, like, I understand what it means to be on a team that's trying to do something meaningful.

• 37:39Bill Simmons?

  It was five years ago. Dwight Howard was on that team.

• 37:41Speaker 02

  Look.

• 37:42Bill Simmons?

  Rajon Rondo was on that team. Covid, Covid, it just happened.

• 37:47Speaker 02

  I think, I think Doc as a coach.

• 37:49Bill Simmons?

  Joe Biden was alive.

• 37:51Speaker 02

  Is the kind of guy who will curse you out for not doing the right thing in terms of playing your role. Playing next to Yannis.

• 37:57Bill Simmons?

  I'll go the other way. I think Doc's gonna hate Kyle Kuzma.

• 38:00Speaker 02

  I think he's gonna like him.

• 38:01Bill Simmons?

  I think he's gonna be like, I can't believe we traded for this guy. What did my scouts tell me?

• 38:04Speaker 02

  And in three, four weeks, when this thing is actually working.

• 38:07Bill Simmons?

  So we disagree. Rob, you get the tiebreaker vote.

• 38:10Speaker 01

  Uh, it's not gonna go well.

• 38:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 38:11Speaker 01

  He's Kyle Kuzma.

• 38:12Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 38:13Speaker 01

  Here, here's the thing. When you approach a trade of this magnitude, and this is a huge trade for the Bucks. They've been waiting to either trade Chris Middleton or Brook Lopez for the right move that came along. This is not the right move.

• 38:23Bill Simmons?

  I'm going in our YouTube chat. Thanks to everybody who's sending questions. Uh, Rap Stallion says, hey, if it weren't for Kuzma, we might not have the nickname Dinshitty.

• 38:36Bill Simmons?

  I forgot about that. I forgot about the Kuzma Dinwiddie feud. So, um, people want to know if they can trade Jordan Poole.

• 38:47Bill Simmons?

  He's playing pretty well this year.

• 38:48Speaker 01

  He's also their, I want to say the elder statesman of their rotation right now.

• 38:52Speaker 02

  So is, is Jordan Poole a Orlando Magic candidate?

• 38:56Speaker 01

  I don't think he's an Orlando Magic player personally, but you know.

• 38:59Bill Simmons?

  Does Orlando know they're allowed to make trades?

• 39:01Speaker 01

  Well, we're gonna soon find out.

• 39:03Bill Simmons?

  I think they, they did the Vucevic trade and they're just like, mic trap. No more trades for us. We did it.

• 39:09Speaker 01

  They probably should be a little bit more desperate in terms of getting some offense together.

• 39:12Speaker 02

  They fall in love with their young guys. So it's not that surprising that they still think, you know, all of these guys are gonna come through in a major way. Jalen Suggs going down, I think is just underrated in how.

• 39:24Bill Simmons?

  It's really hard to love. It turns out he was their MVP. Who knew? I thought it was Pala.

• 39:27Speaker 01

  Super important to their team.

• 39:28Bill Simmons?

  So with the Milwaukee, uh, that Kuzma trade, which is really a money trade. They have to waste their first round pick they took last year. A.J. Johnson, um, got under the apron. Um, which raises the question, why did the CBA suck so much? How did the league just turn into just people trying to get under the apron? Make financial moves, save tax money. How did they? I know it's like on the one hand, you have. The NBA, the owners, Adam Silver, probably the smartest lawyers on the planet. And then on the other side, you have like a couple of players, some dude who took the job because they thought it'd be cool to get a picture with LeBron. And they just, they get worked every time. But this is disgusting.

• 40:10Speaker 02

  It's two things, it's two things.

• 40:11Bill Simmons?

  It's terrible.

• 40:12Speaker 02

  So, nobody's gonna convince me that this doesn't cost players money. Um, people say, well, no, the basketball revenue is guaranteed and teams have to spend to a floor and like.

• 40:21Speaker 01

  But those are literal facts, though.

• 40:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, that's cool, but like teams going beyond, above and beyond.

• 40:27Speaker 01

  Sure, sure.

• 40:27Speaker 02

  What is called for is more money in the player pool. And now teams will just say, we don't have that option.

• 40:33Speaker 01

  I see what you're saying.

• 40:34Speaker 02

  Because of these things. And the reason why the players agree to it is that the new CBA kicked in and they two X the money. So when you're making all this money, it's like, why are we going to bat for this? We're richer than we've ever been by two and a half times X. And so that situation converts to let the owners get this. And it's literally so that Joe Lacob could forever just be like, you know, he, he, his first five, six years, just always spending way over the cap and always going into luxury tax. Now he could go to his fan base without any retribution and say, guys, second apron out.

• 41:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, my hands are tied.

• 41:09Speaker 02

  My hands are tied.

• 41:11Speaker 01

  What can a guy do?

• 41:12Speaker 02

  The owners just literally like, oh, God, we're never gonna have to do this again. Oh, my goodness.

• 41:17Speaker 01

  That's the thing, like, ultimately what you're describing is in some way, this way the league has been for a long time. It was just, they were mostly trying to dodge the tax. Now, even if you are above the tax, there are more lines to dodge and harsher penalties.

• 41:30Bill Simmons?

  I've never seen it be the number one reason for this many trades before. We've always had like financial implications and stuff, but this is different. You have eight, nine, 10 teams that are just like, we're doing this because it gets us under apron one, apron two, apron three. I also think the fans don't wanna take the time to understand it. They don't care. It's confusing. And it turns into this have, have not of basketball conversation.

• 41:53Speaker 02

  And nobody can explain to me what problem it was solving. What was solved by this in terms of selling it?

• 42:00Bill Simmons?

  Well, it seems like they were, so I talked about this, we, we talked about this, about the Zach Levine thing, where. It's harder to trade Zach Levine. So Zach Levine then goes, all right, I guess I'll roll my sleeves up and I'm gonna have an awesome season for Chicago. It's not like I can go anywhere. But for every Zach Levine, there's been 10 other ways that this went wrong. And it just seems like there's more player movement. There's more guys getting bought out. There's more roster turnover. We had another trade, by the way.

• 42:26Speaker 01

  What do we get?

• 42:27Bill Simmons?

  The Clippers have traded Terrence Mann, a beloved Clipper guy forever, who always had the T-Man game, and Bones Highland, who couldn't have been more available, for Bogdan Bogdanovich and three second round picks. Now we're talking. The Clips needed like a, like a heat checky, off the bench kind of guy like this. I, I was really hoping Denver would get Bogdanovich because he has the, you know, the Jokic thing, but as you know, Denver's not allowed to make trades or spend money. I think they're a zero apron team.

• 42:59Speaker 02

  Look, first week of the season, the Strather talk, even the Christian Brown stuff, I was like, Zeke Najee, I was like, Zeke Najee made a couple of threes the other day. And I was like, what the hell is going on? Like, I was just like, guys, like, I get it. You love your young guys and whatever.

• 43:14Speaker 01

  You say this like you're not talking up Julian Strather in the group chat.

• 43:18Speaker 02

  No, I'm like, damn. I'm like, damn, Strather's kind of better than I thought he was. So maybe they will be vindicated, but you're right, Bill. I would have loved to see them do something like a bogey thing. I was excited when they were in the Zach Levine sweepstakes allegedly. Like, I, I was happy for that kind of guy.

• 43:36Bill Simmons?

  This happened in the Celtics five years ago, where they either have giant contracts or small contracts and no in-between. And you can't get the 16 to 20 million dollar guy because you, you literally can't put the contracts together.

• 43:47Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 43:47Bill Simmons?

  Bogdanovich and the Clippers.

• 43:49Speaker 01

  I mean, love to pick up for them. It is a buy low thing, and we need to acknowledge that Bogey's having the worst season of maybe his entire professional life, including pre-NBA, just has not had it in the way that you would expect.

• 44:00Bill Simmons?

  He's been an underrated post-Olympics slowdown guy.

• 44:02Speaker 01

  Almost everybody who went to the Olympics has been a little slow, a little step slow this season. It's been a thing for sure. So I would love to see him recapture some parts of his game, surrounding him with high, like, high leverage defensive personnel with the Clippers. That's a team that is so desperate for shot making. Depending on what's going on with Harden, how he's being pressured that night, where Kawhi is in terms of his health on a day to day basis. They need what Bogdanovich can provide. And so if this is the cost, absolutely, why not?

• 44:28Bill Simmons?

  Can I read you his stats?

• 44:29Speaker 01

  I'm a little, I'm a little worried to even hear them.

• 44:32Bill Simmons?

  10 points a game?

• 44:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, the, the, the shooting percentages are bad.

• 44:35Bill Simmons?

  Well, you know how normally 50, 40, 90 is the standard for percentages? He's a 37, 30, 88 guy.

• 44:42Speaker 01

  Not what you want.

• 44:43Bill Simmons?

  7.6 PR. It's like nearing Bronny James level of, uh, sorry, Was.

• 44:52Bill Simmons?

  But last year, 17 a game.

• 44:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:54Bill Simmons?

  And, uh,

• 44:56Speaker 01

  I feel okay being a bogey apologist, not a

• 44:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I, I always feel with him like, first of all, Atlanta could not have been more of a wrong team for him. I don't know if Trey Young is the catalyst for him. I want to see him on a team that's like, you're coming in, you play eight minutes. We're going to run plays for you.

• 45:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 45:12Bill Simmons?

  We're going to run you off picks.

• 45:13Speaker 02

  Green light.

• 45:14Bill Simmons?

  Go nuts, do your thing. And then, uh, for the Hawks, Terrence Mann, another, another long swing guy.

• 45:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:20Bill Simmons?

  There's some Clipper fans in my life who are like, when are they going to unleash this guy?

• 45:25Speaker 01

  Never really happened. Never really got off the ground.

• 45:26Speaker 02

  Bones.

• 45:29Bill Simmons?

  Bones? What about him?

• 45:30Speaker 01

  He is a, a player in the NBA, that's for sure.

• 45:33Bill Simmons?

  He's a player that made a lot more sense 30 years ago.

• 45:35Speaker 02

  Back when I was just, again, applauding everything the Nuggets did, I, I just swore Bones was going to be a

• 45:40Speaker 01

  He was the truth.

• 45:41Speaker 02

  A person.

• 45:41Bill Simmons?

  But then he failed an IQ test. He wasn't happy playing with Nikola Jokic, which is like the number one IQ test.

• 45:47Speaker 02

  He was complaining that he wasn't getting enough tick on a team that like

• 45:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:51Speaker 02

  That had Nikola Jokic.

• 45:52Speaker 01

  He thought he was better than Jamal Murray.

• 45:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 45:54Speaker 02

  Tough. And now he's about to be on his third team.

• 45:58Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 45:58Bill Simmons?

  Almost borderline, we could replace D N Waiters and the rewatchables with the Bones Thailand heat check. It's almost like a personality heat check. Um, all right. So Atlanta.

• 46:12Speaker 01

  They're really gutting this thing. I guess, you know, it makes sense in the way that the future of their team is more Jalen Johnson, Zachary Risachay oriented, right?

• 46:23Speaker 02

  Like Risachay.

• 46:23Speaker 01

  I think, I think there's something there that works. Do you have to do all of this housekeeping right now? I don't exactly know why it would need to happen right now.

• 46:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, I, I get the, I guess the idea that they're not keeping their pick. It's like, why are you losing and giving them a better pick? It's like, that's gone. It's out the door. Like, we got to do what's right for our team.

• 46:42Bill Simmons?

  I've heard this. Yeah, it's like, we already lost the pick. What do we care if it's four, 12, 15? I would personally care. I would be like, oh my God.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  The spite piece. Yeah, stick it to them.

• 46:53Bill Simmons?

  We've seen this happen in the past. Like, I remember the Clippers, that one year when they, they traded their number one to get rid of Baron Davis's contract. Yeah, we're just gonna eat it. And then it turned into Kyrie Irving. Like, you just never know. I just wouldn't wanna, wouldn't wanna find out. Speaking of teams that we don't know what the hell they're doing, Toronto traded for Brandon Ingram?

• 47:13Speaker 01

  What is this?

• 47:14Bill Simmons?

  I had a, I did the, I did a tweet where I did the power rankings of teams that I don't know what you're doing. And I didn't put Toronto in the top five because I haven't known what they're doing for like, over a year. They just, every year, trade their pick. They get a guy who's kinda likable. He doesn't seem to make sense with any of the other players they have. And I have no idea why you would trade Bruce Brown, Kelly Olynyk, and a pretty mediocre first. That's Indiana's pick.

• 47:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:39Bill Simmons?

  For, to then pay Brandon Ingram when you're already overpaying Scotty Barnes, you're overpaying quickly. RJ Barrett's making a shitload. I just don't understand their team.

• 47:49Speaker 02

  I, it's tough. I remember when Masai was, you know, he was like a GM free agent. And it was like, is he going to New York? Is he going to do this?

• 47:57Bill Simmons?

  Could've stayed the Knicks.

• 47:58Speaker 02

  And, you know, there was rumors that he got equity in the Raptors and all of this stuff. And like, to use all of that cachet and literal equity and goodwill to do this with the Raptors, since he resigned with them, it's just so rudderless and directionless. And I get it. Brandon Ingram's a good player. I understand why you would want him on his team. But like, what is the idea or the theory of the Raptors?

• 48:28Speaker 01

  Like I genuinely don't like they're a team that wants to play a very loose freewheeling like democratic style.

• 48:35Bill Simmons?

  That's not Brandon.

• 48:36Speaker 01

  That is not how Brandon Ingram plays basketball. If you did want a big forward to put next to Scotty Barnes, why did you trade the better one in Pascal Siakam and like the Siakam comparison is inevitable because they're giving up that Indiana pick, they're giving up Bruce Brown, they're giving up Kelly Olynyk, who I want to say was involved like tangentially in that deal in a follow up with Utah. And so now you traded Pascal Siakam for an expiring Brandon Ingram. Uh, Oshai Abaji was in that deal. Who else? Oh, Jacob, the pick that became Jacoby Walter, that's your Pascal Siakam haul. Why didn't you just keep Pascal Siakam if that's where you were going to end up?

• 49:10Bill Simmons?

  And Brandon Ingram's been available since June, like back in the days when we had video stores and you would just stroll by the new release section, you'd be like, huh, domestic disturbance with John Travolta and Vince Vaughn. I don't think so. And then you'd walk around for 15 more minutes and then you'd pick up the, the VHS tape again. Ah, Travolta and Vince Vaughn. And then you'd stroll around again, like that's Brandon Ingram. People were just strolling by the new release aisle for him for nine months.

• 49:38Speaker 02

  So here's the justification. It's like, you know, Brandon Ingram is going to feel a way about New Orleans not paying him because he feels like he's accomplished stuff there and there's like.

• 49:49Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. I mean, so much stuff.

• 49:51Speaker 02

  There's a sort of entitlement there, but then, you know, you go a whole year and a half, basically where nobody wants you. I think he comes into that contract negotiation with the Raptors with a little bit more humility. I'm sure that's probably what they're banking on where he doesn't think he's a five year maximum contract player.

• 50:08Speaker 01

  I think it'll probably be a shorter term deal.

• 50:11Speaker 02

  It'd probably be like a three year.

• 50:12Speaker 01

  But are you telling like, I'm just seeing a future where they pay him upwards of $40 million a season. And to do what? He is a

• 50:20Speaker 02

  Dynamic duo, him and Scotty Barnes.

• 50:22Speaker 01

  He doesn't fit with Barnes. He's hurt all the time.

• 50:25Speaker 02

  Him and RJ, they occupy the same area of the court.

• 50:29Speaker 01

  I'm already frustrated.

• 50:30Bill Simmons?

  He is a top five body of like, oh man, you're gonna get hurt. Just when you see him in person, he's like, he's so skinny.

• 50:37Speaker 02

  Does his space.

• 50:38Speaker 01

  No.

• 50:39Speaker 02

  Which the Raptors need.

• 50:40Speaker 01

  He will occasionally talk himself into taking spot up threes.

• 50:43Bill Simmons?

  Occasionally. Here's the red flag for me beyond all the other red flags. So you had Golden State, who was definitely strolling around that new release video store over and over again. Steve Kerr, who coached Brandon Ingram on one of those FIBA teams.

• 50:56Speaker 01

  No shot.

• 50:56Bill Simmons?

  And by the end, Brandon Ingram's like, he's sick. He can't play in the last two games because he was just out of the rotation. And Golden State, who desperately needed anything. And this was like the layup trade of all time. Give up nothing for Brandon Ingram. And they were like, we're good. We're not doing that. Then Miami, they're sitting there too. Hey, we could turn whatever. Maybe we'll take, and Miami's like, we're also good. And then you have Toronto, who's like, we don't think we can get free agents ever. So this is how we get free agents. And then they talked themselves into it. I don't like it.

• 51:26Speaker 01

  I don't like it at all.

• 51:27Speaker 02

  The talent doesn't fit at all. Um, but you know, again, another lanky, rangy guy who they love, but it's never been, he's never used his tools for good.

• 51:37Speaker 01

  It's fake size and he doesn't guard.

• 51:39Speaker 02

  Never, ever.

• 51:40Bill Simmons?

  And he's a, he's ball stoppery too.

• 51:42Speaker 01

  He absolutely is ball stoppery.

• 51:43Speaker 02

  Ball stoppiest.

• 51:44Bill Simmons?

  Would there be a worse team to be like the fifth guy?

• 51:47Speaker 01

  Than this one?

• 51:48Speaker 02

  Meaning you'd never get the ball passed to you?

• 51:49Bill Simmons?

  It's like, you're like the, you're the, like Agbaji. You're like, fuck. Oh my God. I'm just gonna be in the corner over here, guys.

• 51:56Speaker 01

  Agbaji seems like he has a good head on his shoulders. He seems well adjusted.

• 51:59Bill Simmons?

  He's having a good year. I was wondering if he was like a, like a sneaky trade deadline piece.

• 52:03Speaker 01

  Lately, especially on D, like they've guarded really well.

• 52:06Bill Simmons?

  Well, their fans are frisky. They're, they're like always taking everything personally. I mean, they did win the title in 2019.

• 52:11Speaker 01

  Personally, you know, there's, there's reasons to boo the national anthem right now.

• 52:14Bill Simmons?

  Right. Uh, 2019, they won the title. And since then, my, my size has just been on a heater.

• 52:22Bill Simmons?

  It's like, it's like when Obama finished the presidency, he's like, I'm opening a production company and I'm playing golf. Besides like, I'm gonna trade for Brandon Ingram.

• 52:31Speaker 01

  Shout out to our colleague Danny Chow, who flagged, this is now four consecutive trade deadlines where the Raptors have traded a first for a guy who's about to be a free agent.

• 52:39Bill Simmons?

  Because they feel like they can't sign a free agent?

• 52:42Speaker 01

  I guess.

• 52:43Bill Simmons?

  Did Danny Chow like this trade?

• 52:44Speaker 01

  I, I can't imagine. I can't imagine.

• 52:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I'm gonna say Brandon Ingram is not a Danny Chow type of player.

• 52:50Speaker 01

  Doesn't strike me as one.

• 52:51Bill Simmons?

  And then the New Orleans side of that trade, just quickly. So, they're down to, as assets, Trey Murphy, the best player on the team, who I think is their only untouchable.

• 53:02Speaker 01

  He's been really good.

• 53:03Bill Simmons?

  Zion Williamson, wild card, could get traded next half hour. CJ McCollum, always in trade rumors. Herb Jones, Hawkins, Missy, Alvarado, and Dejounte Murray, who will not be playing for at least a year.

• 53:18Speaker 02

  Torn Achilles.

• 53:19Speaker 01

  That's brutal.

• 53:20Bill Simmons?

  And their first round picks are fine, but not, they're whatever.

• 53:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:25Bill Simmons?

  They used to have like, oh, look at all those first round picks. They've kind of taken all of them. But you go back to that AD trade.

• 53:30Speaker 02

  Dude, I go back to 2019 all the time.

• 53:33Bill Simmons?

  Well, this, but look at all the people in this trade. De'Andre Hunter, Brandon Ingram, Lonzo Ball, who I think was way more of an asset back then than, you know, he got hurt. Josh Hart, Mo Wagner.

• 53:45Speaker 01

  I forgot Mo Wagner was.

• 53:47Bill Simmons?

  22 first, which became Dyson Daniels. The 23 swapped in the pie, and then the 25 first pick. It was a lot. When you look back at like, they did get a lot of players.

• 53:56Speaker 02

  Lonzo, Josh Hart, Brandon Ingram?

• 53:58Bill Simmons?

  Yes, that's the.

• 54:00Speaker 02

  None of them. I just, and I've said this a couple of times. I remember it's being at summer league in 2019, after they traded AD, draft Zion, who looks like he's gonna be the next LeBron James.

• 54:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:13Speaker 02

  And I remember seeing Griff at summer league, and there was an aura emanating from him. Everybody wanted to bend this guy's, it was like, my god. Griff, he's done it.

• 54:23Bill Simmons?

  Zion and a million picks.

• 54:25Speaker 02

  They are on their way. They got all these picks and their young guys are cost control and blah and this and there's so much versatility and oh my, New Orleans is it? And what's come of this AD trade? One frisky first round series.

• 54:39Bill Simmons?

  Assets that look awesome on paper, but no longer play it in the team.

• 54:42Speaker 01

  Didn't quite work out.

• 54:43Bill Simmons?

  And the Lonzo thing was the thing that I think hurt them the most because I actually really think Lonzo, and we're seeing it like we're seeing this diminished version of him in Chicago who's still like a really additive player.

• 54:52Speaker 01

  And he's got an extension, two years, $20 million, which is nice, nice little turnaround for him.

• 54:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but going forward, I don't know what this team is. I don't know how long they're going to be in New Orleans. I don't know how long Zion's going to be in the team. I don't know what the plan would be going forward with this roster. And the Murray trade is catastrophic. Um, I would have traded him already.

• 55:11Speaker 02

  Same.

• 55:12Bill Simmons?

  But I don't think it's ever happening in New Orleans. So you just have to accept that. It's like, like we all said how Jimmy Butler for Wiggins is a trade that makes no sense on paper, but if you're Miami, you don't have Jimmy Butler anymore. You have the ghost, you have zombie Jimmy Butler who's not an asset. So now you're turning him into a guy who can play defense and rebound and hit some threes.

• 55:29Speaker 01

  I think that's where you get into really tough places when you don't actually have the ideal version of the player anymore. And the Pelicans have not had the ideal version of Brandon Ingram for quite some time, mostly because of injury. But they held on to him too long in the same way that the Raptors held on to Siakam too long. Like you can see this chain of events of some of these teams that are feeling pinched, where they don't move their guys when they need to move them.

• 55:49Speaker 02

  And then the, the perils of the max contract era is that when you have your own guy and he's clearly one of your best players, there's a pressure to pay him a max deal, which he'll be in the same pay grade as guys that are just clearly much better. Bonafide All-Stars and Ingram and even Siakam, like these are high quality players. Are they max players? But the way the system is set up, like you have to pay these guys in accordance to this freaking pay scale.

• 56:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:23Bill Simmons?

  Well, think about this. We knew somebody was going to suck in the West, heading into the season. We're like, there's just too many good teams. There's too much talent. Who is going to be the out of nowhere, this team sucks team? New Orleans has played 15 games and won 12.

• 56:39Bill Simmons?

  That would not have been on my bingo card.

• 56:40Speaker 02

  No.

• 56:41Bill Simmons?

  Like, they have so much talent.

• 56:42Speaker 02

  We thought they were like-

• 56:43Bill Simmons?

  You can feel something stinky maybe with them, the way they're handling the Trey Murphy thing. Zion, you never know, but this is 12 wins is nuts.

• 56:49Speaker 02

  We thought they were clearly gonna be above playing range. Like, they'd be in the sixth, maybe even fifth range.

• 56:54Bill Simmons?

  Their over under was like 45 and a half. Yeah. So, it is lower now.

• 56:58Speaker 02

  Like, it is idiots on New Orleans coming into this year.

• 57:01Bill Simmons?

  We are gonna take a break for the podcast.

• 57:07Bill Simmons?

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• 57:52Bill Simmons?

  No handoffs, no homework. That means more time for the work that actually matters, which for me is talking about whether the 86 Celtics can beat the 96 Bulls, which they could. To learn how to put AI to work for people, visit servicenow.com. This episode is brought to you by Viori. When it comes to clothes that score high in both comfort and style, Viori is my MVP. Sunday performance joggers, oh yeah. They have the perfect, I could watch a game and then go out to dinner vibe. And the Meta Pant, that's my number one, I need to look like I tried option. Get 20% off your first purchase at viori.com/simmons and discover the versatility of Viori clothing. Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. So, Phoenix going forward.

• 58:37Bill Simmons?

  The Durant piece of the Butler trade, which we did not discuss.

• 58:42Bill Simmons?

  What did you think of him being like, I'm shutting this down. I don't want to go to Golden State. If you trade for me, I'm going to be unhappy because that's confirmed. I heard all the same stuff everybody else had. It seemed like on Tuesday, that was going to be a three-way trade. I think it was really close and it basically came down to, are we sure KD is on board with this? And the feedback was, he's not. He doesn't want to go back. So Rob, you're in the Bay. Why didn't he want to go back?

• 59:09Speaker 01

  I can't imagine a single reason why he might not want to run back that experience again.

• 59:14Speaker 02

  A Draymond thing.

• 59:15Speaker 01

  I could imagine that being a potential holdup.

• 59:18Bill Simmons?

  A Steve Kerr piece, the Draymond piece, the this will be bad for my legacy of.

• 59:23Speaker 01

  No. I think him coming back to the Bay, if there ever was like a full circle moment for that, it would require Kevin Durant to have a dramatic reimagining of who he is as a player and a person, and the way he fits into the basketball universe. And I give Kevin Durant credit for this in a way. Like, he has a very firm and fixed understanding of who he is.

• 59:42Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 59:42Speaker 01

  And it is not the guy who needs to go crawling back to the Warriors to win again. And that leads you to some places like Phoenix with this particular roster sometimes. But I just, it didn't really fit with the KD that we know, that he would want to do something like that.

• 59:55Speaker 02

  And it doesn't fit because it would have made sense basketball-wise, which is just generally not what KD does. He doesn't do the basketball thing, except for Golden State. Like, that's been the only time that he put the thing on the floor first. And he didn't really care for the results in terms of his own personal happiness, as he said previously.

• 1:00:16Bill Simmons?

  I went back and looked at his 2019 game log splits because he was really good to start the year. And then after the Draymond thing, I forgot, like, he was like 21 a game, 33% from three. And then in the playoffs, he ran back up and he was awesome. But it was damaging for months. And I just, you know, that's what's so funny when you see these stuff now, these podcasts, or these guys do these fake things together. And it's like, Draymond and KD, no, no, we're good. It's like, there's no way they're good. Like, KD's never forgiving whatever happened, whatever was said.

• 1:00:47Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:00:48Bill Simmons?

  And there's that piece, there's probably a Steve Kerr piece. But from a basketball standpoint, if I was him, I would have rather been on Golden State. I just, just like, it's a no brainer. I don't want to be in this Phoenix team.

• 1:01:00Speaker 02

  And it's like.

• 1:01:00Bill Simmons?

  Crazy owner, no picks.

• 1:01:01Speaker 02

  It's almost, you fit the thing like a glove. Like, obviously KD's good enough to do all the ball movement stuff, but that's not what Golden State would be asking him to do.

• 1:01:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:10Speaker 02

  They'd be asking him to be KD.

• 1:01:12Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 1:01:12Speaker 02

  Again, just get the ball and cook people and Steph and everybody else will work around it. But again, I can understand not wanting to go back and do the same thing and wanting to maybe, if Phoenix isn't what you ultimately end up doing in terms of signing an extension with, exploring some different option that makes you, you know, a lot happier. And I think Phoenix's whole thing has always been with like trading all these picks and this and the future's done. Like, if we want to, we'll do a fire sale for KD and Booker. Try to get a bunch of picks back and just move on with our lives. That's what it feels like the Phoenix thing is.

• 1:01:46Speaker 01

  It felt like this could have been the first time in Kevin Durant's life where he didn't really get to pick. And maybe he just would have gotten moved somewhere. But then when he was so vocal and made it so clear he didn't want to play for Golden State, I, I think it changed the math a little bit. Ultimately, I think the only way it would have worked for KD as a Warrior again, is if it was also a more elaborate LeBron going to Golden State thing.

• 1:02:07Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:02:08Speaker 01

  That would probably have to happen over some. Where it's, and even it's, it's not.

• 1:02:11Bill Simmons?

  Honestly, just put a bullet in my head.

• 1:02:15Bill Simmons?

  I just, I just wouldn't be able to handle it.

• 1:02:17Speaker 01

  Well, I think you're, I think you're probably bailed out on that just because the timelines were so different.

• 1:02:21Bill Simmons?

  Let's talk about these old guys some more.

• 1:02:25Bill Simmons?

  Can we bring in Conspiracy Bill for a second?

• 1:02:27Speaker 02

  Let's do it.

• 1:02:28Speaker 01

  I thought he was already in the room with us.

• 1:02:29Bill Simmons?

  No, we bring him in.

• 1:02:30Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:02:31Bill Simmons?

  I'll put a, I'll put a hoodie on. Conspiracy Bill is here.

• 1:02:36Bill Simmons?

  Are we sure there's that lingering bitterness with KD for the Achilles injury? And maybe how that was handled by the team?

• 1:02:42Speaker 01

  In which direction? Like him towards the, toward Golden State?

• 1:02:45Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:46Speaker 02

  People don't remember this, Bill. That's why you're Bill Simmons.

• 1:02:50Bill Simmons?

  I'm not Bill Simmons. I'm Conspiracy Bill. Conspiracy Bill is here.

• 1:02:53Speaker 02

  But that's why.

• 1:02:54Bill Simmons?

  I'm just asking. I have no inside information. Please don't aggregate this. I just always thought it was a little weird. He hurt his calf, came back and blew out his Achilles.

• 1:03:01Speaker 02

  People don't remember, and I was like, at the time, there was a bit of a whisper campaign.

• 1:03:06Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:03:06Speaker 02

  Of, what's up with KD? What's taking him so long?

• 1:03:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:09Speaker 02

  He should be back already. Like, he looks good when we see him in practice, when we see him in the gym, blah, blah, blah.

• 1:03:14Bill Simmons?

  He's going to be a free agent. He doesn't want to risk it.

• 1:03:16Speaker 02

  And it was a whisper campaign and he came back. And then tore his freaking Achilles and Bob Myers crying at the news conference and all of that. And I always thought that was like, man, damn, we did kind of say he was, you know, loafing and taking too long.

• 1:03:31Bill Simmons?

  Another great appearance from Conspiracy Bill. That was, it's a great, what a cameo by him.

• 1:03:36Speaker 02

  Something to it.

• 1:03:37Bill Simmons?

  I wonder what the people think on the chat. I'm gonna look in the chat for this. Um, oh, man, that really got the chat going. People want a 90 minute Conspiracy Bill. So maybe I just put on the hood every time.

• 1:03:50Speaker 02

  I'm sure you've gotten a few of the conspiracies with the Luca situation.

• 1:03:54Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:03:56Speaker 02

  It's out of control.

• 1:03:57Bill Simmons?

  We're saving all Luca Laker stuff for part two.

• 1:03:59Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:04:00Bill Simmons?

  We're still, we're on trade deadline watch. We have Cody Zeller and Houston's 2028 second round pick going to the Rockets. So Atlanta can get under the luxury tax. Um, oh, sources tell Free P, Free Sports that Dennis Schroder will end up with the Pistons. It's part of the massive Jimmy Butler deal.

• 1:04:25Speaker 02

  Love that.

• 1:04:26Bill Simmons?

  If I'm the Pistons, I'm just getting a little frisky.

• 1:04:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:28Bill Simmons?

  Could I get the sixth seed? I have an awesome player. I have a team that is like tough and likes playing with each other and that gets, gets a little aggro in some of these games.

• 1:04:38Speaker 02

  They're not afraid to get chippy with guys.

• 1:04:39Bill Simmons?

  I have the scariest guy in the league in beef stew. Why not?

• 1:04:44Speaker 01

  They also ended up with, who did they get in the Butler deal? I want to see if it was Lindy, Lindy Waters and Josh Richardson. I want to say end up with.

• 1:04:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, Josh Richardson.

• 1:04:51Speaker 01

  Maybe, maybe not players that have been important for them. Lindy Waters, I could see actually giving them some minutes and some stretch at times. I could see him giving them some decent minutes.

• 1:04:58Bill Simmons?

  Oh, here's a fun one. In the Bogdan Bogdanovich trade, the Clippers got three second round picks back, including their own pick.

• 1:05:05Speaker 01

  We love a pick return.

• 1:05:06Bill Simmons?

  We're trading so many second round picks, teams are now reacquiring their own picks.

• 1:05:10Speaker 01

  You just don't, you don't love any pick like your own pick.

• 1:05:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, we finally got it back. They should do the welcome home jumbo, jumbo thing. Do you think we should have third round picks? Should we have third round picks?

• 1:05:22Speaker 01

  Who are we drafting in the third round?

• 1:05:24Bill Simmons?

  I don't know. Like they, these teams love trading these picks. Then they could just put like, they've acquired four third round picks and a second round pick.

• 1:05:31Speaker 02

  More bites at the apple, Bill.

• 1:05:35Bill Simmons?

  What uh, so if we say the Lakers things for part two.

• 1:05:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:39Bill Simmons?

  What else jumped from the trade deadline for you?

• 1:05:41Speaker 02

  I mean, the Fox thing, I think was, was cool in a couple of ways because a lot of people felt like the Spurs should hold out for a better superstar. But, and I said this on our podcast, it's almost like your friend who like is addicted to Tinder and is like a nice girl who wants him and wants to settle with him, but he's like, yeah, but I got these five other hot chicks on Tinder that might want to mess with me. It's like, no, get with the girl that's like a nice girl, good looking girl, wants to be with you. Settle up with that one.

• 1:06:09Speaker 01

  Do you think the Waz of 10 years ago would have made this take?

• 1:06:13Speaker 02

  Of course not.

• 1:06:13Speaker 01

  No. This is personal development.

• 1:06:17Speaker 02

  Of course not.

• 1:06:18Bill Simmons?

  Very mature version of Waz.

• 1:06:19Speaker 01

  You're very bummed today. You got the cardigan on?

• 1:06:22Speaker 02

  The Spurs locking in on not just De'Aaron Fox as a talent, but like temperamentally, he's a Spurs kind of player in terms of his headspace, his approach to the game, his, you know, he's not like, he's just not an NBA diva. He's, he's about the right things and I thought they were smart to just be like, you know what? It's not going to cost us a ton to bring this guy in. Yes, some people might look at the extension like, are you going to pay him $48 million?

• 1:06:46Bill Simmons?

  I would. I think he's a top 30 guy.

• 1:06:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm okay with it.

• 1:06:49Speaker 02

  To me, I'm looking.

• 1:06:50Bill Simmons?

  Also, he wanted to be in a small market Texas team, which is pretty rare.

• 1:06:54Speaker 02

  Go get him and I'm happy they did that.

• 1:06:56Bill Simmons?

  I, I thought it was like, the more I stared at it, it was like 62 cents on the dollar for what they paid. I can't believe Sohan or Vassell were not in the trade and I don't know what the Bulls, the more I stared at the Bulls part of it.

• 1:07:11Speaker 01

  Their part of it is the most confusing.

• 1:07:12Bill Simmons?

  Every time they make a trade, you're always like, wait, what are they getting? It just seems like now it's like, cool, we get Zach Collins for two years and like, I, I just don't get them at all.

• 1:07:22Speaker 01

  Another team that just like held on to Zach Levine for too long, waiting for the perfect deal to materialize and it never did.

• 1:07:27Speaker 02

  And do we know that better deals were?

• 1:07:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:07:30Speaker 02

  Available earlier than this?

• 1:07:31Speaker 01

  Better than this?

• 1:07:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:32Bill Simmons?

  I think Golden State was trying to get him before they went down the Butler Road, but I, I, I think that was sitting there. I thought he was the sneaky trade piece of this whole thing. His contract's bad, but it's not that bad. It's this year, next year, and then it's an expiring, he was playing great.

• 1:07:51Bill Simmons?

  I think, I'd said this before, but he, he plays well against good teams, which I think matters. And, uh, I don't know what to make of that Sacramento team. We talked about it earlier, but I just. You can tell me they're gonna win 10 of their next 12. You can tell me they're gonna lose 12 in a row. I don't, it's, it's a weird team.

• 1:08:09Speaker 02

  I mean, their owner just doesn't like the idea of a complete teardown and rebuild. And so other people might have been like, look, Fox has been our franchise player for how long? We built everything around him. We moved Halliburton out of here because of him. Um, and our belief in him and he no longer wants to be here. All right, let's start all over. Um, see if we can get some Sabonis offers out there. Let's, let's start all over, do something different.

• 1:08:35Speaker 01

  Wow, they've made the playoffs one time in 20 years, 20 years.

• 1:08:39Speaker 02

  I get it. I get it.

• 1:08:40Speaker 01

  Like, that's the thing. It's like, in theory, sure, from an asset standpoint, maybe there's an argument for a teardown. Sabonis has been probably a little too good as, at least as a regular season player for that.

• 1:08:51Speaker 02

  And Sabonis, like, who trades for Sabonis? I feel like he's way more valuable to them than he would be to some other team.

• 1:08:57Speaker 01

  That could be true. That could be true.

• 1:09:00Bill Simmons?

  A wise GM told me once, you always want to have six or seven dumb teams that you can trade with at any time in a 30-team league. Sacramento has just always managed to be one of those teams.

• 1:09:10Speaker 01

  This has been a big deadline for potentially dumb teams. I always think, I know we're not dipping too much into the Lakers part of this yet, but the Luca trade has made me feel young again. It is, it is hearkening back to a time of our youth where there just haven't been like that many old-fashioned, absolute dog shit, like David Kahn-style trades.

• 1:09:28Speaker 02

  I was literally about to scream it, Bill.

• 1:09:30Speaker 01

  That's like, that's what it.

• 1:09:31Bill Simmons?

  Kahn's running a team in France right now.

• 1:09:35Bill Simmons?

  We have, uh, 12 minutes left in the deadline. And so far, it's, we're in Cody Zeller, Dennis Schroder land. Is there a team that you are surprised hasn't done anything yet?

• 1:09:46Speaker 02

  Definitely the Magic most surprised, cuz they're so rudderless right now. And the idea that you wouldn't try to spruce that thing up is tough. I think the Knicks are really counting on Mitchell Robinson coming back and being that anchor.

• 1:09:59Speaker 01

  It's a big roll of dice. But the, the big man market has also dried up pretty fast on them.

• 1:10:04Speaker 02

  Okay, so.

• 1:10:05Bill Simmons?

  With Nick Quexton and Cam Johnson still sitting there. And I don't know, the Nets, are they trying to stink or not?

• 1:10:11Speaker 02

  Why is nobody going to scoop Clint Capella? Is this an injury history thing?

• 1:10:15Speaker 01

  He's currently injured, I want to say.

• 1:10:17Bill Simmons?

  I think it's a, it's a Swiss thing.

• 1:10:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, Magic should have probably tried to do something. I, I get it. They can be patient. Their guys are still young and, and all of that stuff and they feel like they're building towards something. But the Magic should have done something. I'm always going to think the Denver Nuggets should have upgraded.

• 1:10:35Bill Simmons?

  So that's, Denver's my number one. I don't know what apron Denver's in, but they seem perfectly content to stay in that apron and not do anything. I was even wondering, like when Middleton got moved to Washington, would they try to make a move with Porter? And use that Middleton contract, get one other, try to do like a, a three for one, something like that, and maybe jump on the chance to dump Porter somewhere. But Porter's actually been playing pretty well lately.

• 1:11:02Speaker 01

  And Michael Mullin was like quite definitive.

• 1:11:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:05Speaker 01

  They are not going to trade Michael Porter.

• 1:11:06Bill Simmons?

  So it seems like he's there. Murray, they're already all in on. Jokic obviously isn't going anywhere. Gordon, they extended. And they just don't really have the flexibility. But if they do like the Zeke Najee with Saric, some swaps, second, third and fourth round picks, and just, I don't know, could you get, what could you get for that?

• 1:11:26Speaker 01

  They're, they are actually close. Like they, they feel like one even kind of minor role player addition could tick them up a couple percentage points in the title race. Yeah.

• 1:11:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think so. And also, just related to that.

• 1:11:39Bill Simmons?

  Especially in the West.

• 1:11:40Speaker 02

  Why has nobody made a move for Jeremy Grant? Um, I know the Bucks were kicking the tires.

• 1:11:45Bill Simmons?

  Cause they have league pass?

• 1:11:47Speaker 02

  We're kicking the tires on it.

• 1:11:51Bill Simmons?

  Cause he makes 35 billion a year or whatever, 32?

• 1:11:54Speaker 02

  And he's already 30. Uh, but I just.

• 1:11:57Bill Simmons?

  I think he's on trade about that number.

• 1:11:58Speaker 02

  It's one of those things where guys on bad teams, I feel like you get in the right situation that's actually playing for something. You can change the contours of what you do on a night to night basis, if, if it's for some greater good.

• 1:12:11Bill Simmons?

  A couple YouTube chat questions as we wait for a trade. Daniel wants to know if we can discuss Butler's jersey retirement in Miami and whether that would happen.

• 1:12:22Speaker 02

  What's what's hide over there?

• 1:12:23Bill Simmons?

  I'm already on the record is after Vince Carter's number got retired in New Jersey in Toronto, I think everyone is eligible now.

• 1:12:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:12:31Bill Simmons?

  Especially Vince in Toronto. If that can happen, I'm fully prepared for Jimmy Butler in Miami. I think that should happen, but we'll see. It'll probably be after Pat Riley's dead, maybe like 15 years from now.

• 1:12:44Speaker 02

  Probably. He's definitely one of the greatest Heat ever.

• 1:12:49Bill Simmons?

  Russell Martin says Sacramento turning into the Bulls is so sad.

• 1:12:53Speaker 01

  This is disrespectful to Demontas Sabonis.

• 1:12:55Speaker 02

  It's not.

• 1:12:56Bill Simmons?

  They're better than the Bulls.

• 1:12:58Speaker 02

  They're better than the Bulls.

• 1:12:59Bill Simmons?

  They're the Bulls with Demontas Sabonis.

• 1:13:00Speaker 01

  Yeah. That's a, that's a meaningful difference. That's a different thing.

• 1:13:04Speaker 02

  The Bulls basically had, what was it, 30 games in Lonzo's first year?

• 1:13:09Speaker 01

  But what a beautiful, what a beautiful 23 games they were.

• 1:13:12Speaker 02

  And Sacramento's been that good. Capella's not, I don't know, like if you need big man help.

• 1:13:17Speaker 01

  He's been, he might be day to day, it might be a minor.

• 1:13:19Speaker 02

  If you need big man help, why are you breaking the bank to me? And I know we're saving it for the second half for Mark Williams.

• 1:13:27Bill Simmons?

  Save it for the second half.

• 1:13:28Speaker 02

  Where you could do something for Clint Capella, just for this year.

• 1:13:33Bill Simmons?

  A couple of people are asking about KD. KD to the Spurs, KD to the Grizzlies, KD to the Rockets.

• 1:13:41Speaker 02

  KD to the Grizzlies is a KD move.

• 1:13:43Bill Simmons?

  What's the most interesting of those three?

• 1:13:45Speaker 02

  KD to the Grizzlies is a KD move because they have the stars already. So he won't feel like the burden is all on him.

• 1:13:53Bill Simmons?

  I was wondering how you're gonna make this insulting for a second.

• 1:13:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, the burden is.

• 1:13:56Bill Simmons?

  I thought you were like, I thought you were complimenting him and I was like, I was confused.

• 1:14:00Speaker 02

  No, he's gonna recognize the burden will not be all on him. And so he can go in and just do KD things. Just come in.

• 1:14:09Bill Simmons?

  Plus he can take over the offense in the two out of every five games when Ja doesn't play for some reason.

• 1:14:14Speaker 02

  Is Ja not playing today?

• 1:14:16Bill Simmons?

  No, he's got bronchitis.

• 1:14:17Speaker 01

  Listen, it also would be very bittersweet.

• 1:14:18Speaker 02

  Ja's just trying to save himself for the playoffs.

• 1:14:20Bill Simmons?

  Has Ja played four games in a row?

• 1:14:23Speaker 02

  I don't think so yet, but he's they're being very cautious.

• 1:14:26Bill Simmons?

  Should I be surprised when I put the Grizzlies on League Pass and it's like, here's Ja Morant, he's playing tonight. He's like him and Joel Embiid or the I can't I can't believe you're on my TV.

• 1:14:35Speaker 02

  Perfect compliment. I could play the Grizzlies and I get it. I'm in the tank for them.

• 1:14:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:39Speaker 02

  Even when Ja's not playing, I still want to watch that team.

• 1:14:42Speaker 01

  Well, yeah, the Jaren Jackson Jr. Agenda is strong.

• 1:14:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I my biggest regret is not voting for him as an All-Star starter. I didn't have the balls. I wasn't strong enough. And then Russillo, of course, did it. And then I was super jealous of it. Because when you watch him, like, there's definitely an aggro Jaren Jackson this year, especially in crunch time. And they're like, they'll run offense like Bam Adebayo style, like he'll he'll bring the ball over midcourt and like, be telling people where to go.

• 1:15:08Speaker 02

  Drive at people too.

• 1:15:09Speaker 01

  That would be the the kick of the potential Kevin Durant trade would be that the Grizzlies spent all this time cultivating this very elaborate, interwoven offense. And it's like, ah, let's just get the ball to Kevin Durant.

• 1:15:21Bill Simmons?

  So if the Rockets traded, um, I'm trying to think what what the KD trade would be, but I think Van Vliet would have to be in it.

• 1:15:29Speaker 01

  Probably so.

• 1:15:29Bill Simmons?

  They can't trade. But if it was like.

• 1:15:32Speaker 02

  Damn, who's playing point guard for them?

• 1:15:33Bill Simmons?

  If it was like Van Vliet, Terry's and

• 1:15:39Bill Simmons?

  a bunch of picks and Phoenix just gets a reboot and then they get out from under, you know, the money stuff next year.

• 1:15:48Bill Simmons?

  I just, I wouldn't do, I I'm not wavering from my, I wouldn't do anything if I'm the Rockets this year because I don't think they're winning the title. And I want to, I want to move into the summer and make a move with Jalen Green or Shingun potentially.

• 1:16:00Speaker 02

  If you're gonna do that, man, get somebody who's in their twenties, even if it's their late twenties, get somebody in there. Don't get a 38 year old, man.

• 1:16:08Bill Simmons?

  Come on, you're adding years to him. He's like 36, 35. Mahoney, where do you stand on KD right now as an impact guy?

• 1:16:15Speaker 01

  Really, he's he's really good.

• 1:16:16Bill Simmons?

  Cause his stats.

• 1:16:17Speaker 02

  Oh, his stats are insane.

• 1:16:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I was actually looking at this. I did a little, uh, actually did some homework for this pod. Because it's my job. I was looking at KD this year versus KD career. So his last 15 years from 2010 to this year, he's 28 a game. This year he's 27. He was seven rebounds for those 15 years. He's six this year. It's five assists. He's four this year. For those 15 years, 51%. He's 52 this year. 39% for three, 40 this year. 7.6 free throw attempts for those 15 years. 6.1 this year.

• 1:16:54Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:16:55Bill Simmons?

  He's 91% of what he normally is. And the only slippage I really see is when I watch. Cause he just looks a little creakier, stiffer than he used to be. He used to be like such a.

• 1:17:09Speaker 01

  One of the smoothest players in the league.

• 1:17:11Bill Simmons?

  So smooth. He's not. He's still smooth, but he's not like that. Is there anything else you've noticed?

• 1:17:16Speaker 01

  I mean, he is by far their most reliable creator this year. He is the only reason their defense has ever remotely worked, which it mostly does not. But he's the only thing kind of papering over most of their mistakes and the like lack of ball pressure on the perimeter. He's, there's a reason why when he's out, they look like a totally different team. They just, they don't know how to work without him in Phoenix.

• 1:17:35Speaker 02

  Only thing he doesn't do anymore is turn the corner on guys. He's not getting to the cup the way like prime KD, like that was what made it unstoppable.

• 1:17:43Bill Simmons?

  But he still gets to his spots and he can elevate. Hey, we have a trade.

• 1:17:47Speaker 02

  Sir.

• 1:17:48Bill Simmons?

  Shams yet again, Shams just dancing in Woj's wake. Just having a great time. The Grizzlies trading Marcus Smart and a 25 first round pick to the Wizards in a multi-team trade that sends a couple of second round picks to Memphis. Memphis creates roster flexibility and cap stuff with the move. We also have Shams saying Kevin Porter Jr. To the Bucks for Marjan Bochamp. I've gone a couple of Kevin Porter games where you watch and like this guy's pretty good.

• 1:18:19Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:18:20Bill Simmons?

  And then you have to calm yourself down. No, he gets to the basket, man.

• 1:18:23Speaker 02

  Moments where he looks like an above average NBA athlete. Like where it's like, man, this guy has some physical like gifts in terms of quickness and all of that, but.

• 1:18:33Bill Simmons?

  Can we, can we talk about the smart thing though? Yeah. So they trade smart, two first round picks.

• 1:18:40Bill Simmons?

  They trade two first round picks and basically Porzingis for Smart is the trade, right? And Smart shows up and he's been banged up the entire time, which I think is, I tried to say this delicately when the trade happened. I think the Celtics felt like this car has a lot of miles on it.

• 1:18:56Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:18:57Bill Simmons?

  Let's sell a year too high than a year too late. And I wonder is, because he's an expiring this year or next year? Can't remember.

• 1:19:05Speaker 01

  Let's find out.

• 1:19:06Bill Simmons?

  But he still feels like a playoff guy for me. And I remember the Lakers tried to get him a year ago, and I wonder if that ends, if that ends up being a Laker possibility would be my guess. I'll find out as you guys talk. Marcus Smart, anything left in the tank?

• 1:19:19Speaker 01

  I mean, this is a player over 25 for the Washington Wizards, which does not fit their timeline.

• 1:19:24Bill Simmons?

  With Middleton, two adults.

• 1:19:25Speaker 01

  I guess that's true. They do have Chris Middleton now. What a weird roster. What a weird way for Marcus Smart's Grizzlies tenure to end.

• 1:19:32Bill Simmons?

  Next year is his last year, $21 million.

• 1:19:36Speaker 01

  $21 million for Marcus Smart.

• 1:19:38Bill Simmons?

  So, yeah, I don't know what's left.

• 1:19:42Speaker 01

  Well, now that they have Marcus Smart, the Wizards have waived Reggie Jackson, so.

• 1:19:45Bill Simmons?

  Oh, Reggie.

• 1:19:46Speaker 01

  Shout out to Reggie Jackson's brief Wizards career.

• 1:19:49Bill Simmons?

  So, yeah, with Marcus, whether there's anything left in the tank or not, as somebody who watched a lot of his career, most of his games that he played, just, just those, that style of play, you're just not aging nicely. All the fucking abuse that his body took, all the charges he took, all the big guys he had to go against. And I don't know. I, I just want to get to the world where he's retired and he's the lead analyst with Drew Carter on Celtic games. Maybe with Scal. We can keep Scal. But I think Marcus Smart will be an incredible post-career local Celtic guy would be my hope.

• 1:20:24Speaker 01

  I'm trying to figure out what Memphis is doing because the reporting from Shams around the Marcus Smart trade is that it's creating roster flexibility. And Memphis just, it appears.

• 1:20:33Bill Simmons?

  So there's some trade coming.

• 1:20:33Speaker 01

  Dumped Jake Laravia, who can, who can actually play.

• 1:20:37Bill Simmons?

  Rotation guy.

• 1:20:38Speaker 01

  To the Sacramento Kings. Nice little pickup for them.

• 1:20:41Bill Simmons?

  So they did that weird thing with Laravia where they didn't extend his option. So he was a free agent after the year and then he started playing really well.

• 1:20:49Speaker 01

  He did.

• 1:20:49Bill Simmons?

  And they kind of fucked it up. So the Kings got Laravia.

• 1:20:52Speaker 01

  They got Laravia.

• 1:20:53Bill Simmons?

  I like him. I was hoping the Celtics would get him.

• 1:20:54Speaker 01

  So what are, yeah, what are the Grizzlies gonna do here?

• 1:20:57Bill Simmons?

  I wonder if there's, now I'm starting to wonder if there's some KD potential.

• 1:21:04Speaker 01

  It'll be very exciting.

• 1:21:07Speaker 01

  Although I was, when, when the KD era in Phoenix appeared that it might be coming to a close, I was trying to reflect and see like, okay, what, what have we done here? About two years as a son so far, obviously hasn't had the playoff run this year. A six and nine record in the playoffs with Phoenix. One playoff series win, series win.

• 1:21:27Bill Simmons?

  But that awesome two games with Booker where they scored like

• 1:21:30Speaker 01

  That was sick.

• 1:21:31Bill Simmons?

  90 points each game together.

• 1:21:33Speaker 01

  And it was like, holy shit.

• 1:21:34Speaker 02

  Down two zip to the Nuggets and came back and tied the series up.

• 1:21:37Bill Simmons?

  Hey guys, we have to end part one of the podcast, but we're staying on YouTube. Don't leave. We're just ending part one of the podcast, which will go up pretty shortly.

• 1:21:48Bill Simmons?

  All right. That's it for part one of the BS podcast. Remember part two is coming pretty soon. Right after the trade deadline. Thanks to Kyle Crichton, Gahal and Sarudy for producing. As always, you can watch all the clips and videos from this podcast on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. See you for part two.

• 1:22:30Bill Simmons?

  Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas and affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in DC. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. Call 1-887-897777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplineMA.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24/7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-8778-HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York. This episode is brought to you by Searchlight Pictures, WildHorse9, John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell. I like those guys. Star in the sharp rated comedy thriller from Academy Award winner.

• 1:23:15Bill Simmons?

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