Why Brunson Is Top 50 All Time, a Finals Mega-Mailbag, and NBA Fake Trade Season With Joe House

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons and Joe House talk about their favorite early-offseason NBA story lines, including draft changes and trade moves. Then, they discuss Jalen Brunson’s greatness in the NBA Finals before comparing him to some other all-time greats. Finally, Bill and Joe answer some mailbag questions from the listeners. (0:00) Intro (3:15) Favorite offseason NBA story lines (25:50) Is Jalen Brunson a top-50 all-time player? (54:21) Mailbag Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Joe House Producers: Chia Hao Tat and Eduardo Ocampo Brought to you by PayPal. Learn more at paypal.com Get 30% off snacks and groceries on Uber Eats. https://www.ubereats.com/feeds/wfootball_2026_us The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 1:06Bill Simmons?

  The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by PayPal. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where on the rewatchables, it is From Hell Month. We have done Single Way Female. We just put up The Hand That Rocks The Cradle, and then we have Domestic Disturbance and The Good Son coming later this month. Domestic Disturbance, John Travolta, Vince Vaughn. That's going to be Monday's movie. That is one of the funnier unintentional comedy movies of the 2000s. Netflix has all of these movies, if you missed them, including Pacific Heights, which they just added in mid-June, which we are definitely doing over the next few episodes. Love that movie. So check all of that out. Don't forget about The Beautiful Pod with Adam Friedland.

• 1:49Bill Simmons?

  That's on his Adam Friedland feed. Little special World Cup analysis and all kinds of stuff. Chris Ryan, the original C.R., has been joining him as well. And then we had a bunch of Ringer basketball podcasts. If you didn't get nearly enough about the Knicks winning, we're all over the place with the Ringer NBA Show. The mismatch, Max and Rich on Game Over, Ringer Gambling Show, it just keeps going and going. So we have the draft coming up. I'm going to try to hit, I think I might do three podcasts this week. We might be going Monday, Wednesday, Friday this week. And at least one of those will have a bunch of draft stuff. But today I wanted to have Joe House on.

• 2:32Bill Simmons?

  This has been the guy I've argued about with about historical basketball stuff the most over the past almost 40 years of my life. But we got to talk about Jalen Brunson, big picture. I have great mailbag questions. I'm trying to figure out what the hell happened over these last two and a half months and how the NBA shifted. And, uh, and House is going to be my mailbag slash pyramid sounding board because we got to figure out where Jalen Brunson goes in the pyramid. So I'm excited. It's all next. Can't wait. We're going to bring in Pearl Jam right after we take this break. Pearl Jam. This episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by PayPal. You know a clutch move when you see one? A no look pass, a buzzer beater, a big steal?

• 3:14Bill Simmons?

  Well, imagine if your wallet could pull off moves like that. That, my friends, is PayPal. Right now you can find offers from hundreds of brands like Sony, Allbirds and Viator. And save offers before you check out, earn unlimited rewards. Plus you can add those rewards on top of credit card points. Now that is clutch. Download the PayPal app today. Save those offers. Start scoring rewards. Terms and exclusions apply. See paypal.com/rewards terms. Credit card points subject to issuer's terms and conditions.

• 4:15Bill Simmons?

  It is Monday morning, 9 o'clock Pacific time. My longtime buddy Joe House is here. We're gonna do a mailbag. We're gonna talk a lot of historical NBA pyramid stuff, which is the real reason you're here. We're gonna talk US Open near the end because you have a lot of thoughts and picks. We are coming off an awesome sports weekend. The Knicks and probably win the NBA title in five games and spurn a bunch of narratives. Spurn? Spur? Spur. Spur. No pun intended. Spur a bunch of, uh, a bunch of big narratives. That happened. Uh, there's been a lot of draft buzz. There's been a bunch of Yana stuff now. It feels like this Yana's thing is in full gear. We had Darren Peterson

• 4:57Bill Simmons?

  basically saying he would only work out with your Washington Wizards and that's it. We're gonna talk about that. We had the Stanley Cup Finals, Carolina won, El Chepo. El Chepo carrying the cup. We had, uh, this UFC White House event that, uh, everybody was pretty bummed out about and yet it had two of the most, uh, kind of shocking fights in a row that I can ever remember in UFC where we had Pereira and Toporia both lost. Two of the best three fighters in the world. Pereira got his ass kicked and then Toporia looked like he was in a car accident by the end of the fight. It was, that was great. And then we had a bunch of World Cup. Um, are you betting World Cup? Are you, are you, are we in danger zone here post NBA finals where you're just sprinkling

• 5:42Bill Simmons?

  stuff everywhere?

• 5:43Speaker 02

  I mean, obviously, yes. Uh, the biggest lesson with the World Cup is any team that starts with the T, not betting them. We were, we're really relying on Tony Tokens. Every morning of this World Cup, we wake up, we hit up our guy, the Bundo. Tony Tokens, what are we doing today with the World Cup? So far, the biggest losers have been Turkey and Tunisia.

• 6:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 6:06Speaker 02

  Two, two, that's, it's hit my bank account in the wrong direction. So I'm not betting any more countries that begin with the letter T.

• 6:12Bill Simmons?

  The T is, is, stands for taking it in the, in the.

• 6:16Speaker 02

  Take my money.

• 6:17Bill Simmons?

  Slammer. Take my money.

• 6:20Bill Simmons?

  We, we were talking about these, uh, these top four NBA draft odds too, which has been fun. Like in the prediction market where, and Fanduel has some stuff too, but there, it's all over the place. It keeps moving around. And then Peterson happened today where he basically said, I only want to work out for Washington, but we're both convinced that Washington is going to take AJ to Bantsa with the first pick. And this, this to me is a situation now worth watching because if Utah takes Boozer second, I could honestly see Peterson being like, I'm not playing for Memphis. You guys are going to have to figure this out. It's not happening.

• 6:53Speaker 02

  Wow. Why?

• 6:55Bill Simmons?

  We haven't seen that in a long time.

• 6:56Speaker 02

  We have not. I mean, Steve Francis, uh, is, is famous and.

• 7:01Bill Simmons?

  2000, what was that? 1999 or 2000? Somewhere in there. Yeah. And then, uh, maybe he tried to go to the Bulls. I don't know, but I'm prepared for just about anything there. Then you have Acuff, who seems like the most popular pick, but the Clippers had the fifth pick right after the top four and they don't need a point guard, but everybody's in love with Acuff. So that pick feels like it's for sale. There was, uh, a trade rumor going around the internets today about, uh, if, if there was going to be a third team for this Yanis Boston trade, which I've been talking about on this podcast for a week. And there, I think would have to be a third team if Jalen's in it because what is, what's Milwaukee into a Jalen? Um, could the Clips, I'd heard this too during the weekend. Could the Clips with

• 7:45Bill Simmons?

  the fifth pick move in there and be the third team? And then the second piece of this,

• 7:51Bill Simmons?

  would they then send Kawhi to Miami as a consolation prize? And you're basically replacing Kawhi with Jalen, use the fifth pick. The real story here is I'm not sure the Clippers have anyone they love with the fifth pick. So we have basically a little over a week here with a bunch of crazy storylines in play. What's your team doing? Where, what's Utah doing at two? Where's Peterson actually going? And does he want to go there? What happens from fifth pick on? Uh, my favorite storyline, can the Warriors get somebody good at 11? Cause it's basically a nine square draft with Maran and Amen as like the wild cards that could go higher and push people down. Uh, is OKC going to try to trade a center? This is about as fun as we've had for the eight days. So what's your favorite storyline?

• 8:35Speaker 02

  AJ to the Washington Wizards, of course, the number one overall pick is the only thing that I care about. It will be fascinating to see what what happens behind. I do really put some faith in the idea of Boozer to Utah. It just makes too much sense. And when some smart folks on the internets have started doing some, here's how the chemistry would work. And for sure, the relationship between the Boozer family and the organization, that all, we've all, we're all familiar with that narrative aspect of it. But but the fit, who Hardy is, like, the first time, this is the first time we're gonna see Will Hardy, um, you know, be allowed to

• 9:15Bill Simmons?

  He would actually coach for wins.

• 9:16Speaker 02

  Coach a team to wins, right? I think Boozer is a great fit there. So that that creates this jump ball situation. And the thread this morning was moving, our little thread, our draft expertise.

• 9:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 9:29Speaker 02

  I love the notion of Peterson to Chicago. It makes a ton of sense.

• 9:34Bill Simmons?

  Me too.

• 9:35Speaker 02

  And and for sure, Memphis, I think Wilson fits what Memphis wants. He kind of immediately fills the triple J role, doesn't he? Like, there's a whole bunch of reasons why that makes sense. But we don't have great precedent for teams swapping draft position without there being some kind of compensation. But the fit for both Chicago and Memphis, you know, those respective players make sense if they swap positions. So couldn't they do something where it's like, I wondered, what if Chicago offers Memphis a year's worth of Giordano's deep dish? What are like, you know, something? Because it's like,

• 10:14Bill Simmons?

  I think it's like, it would have to be three years. Or maybe they open up a Giordano's satellite, uh, deep dish place in downtown Memphis.

• 10:22Speaker 02

  Fine.

• 10:22Bill Simmons?

  I have an easier trade for you. What if they just give them the 15th pick?

• 10:26Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 10:27Bill Simmons?

  Four and 15 for three.

• 10:29Speaker 02

  Fine.

• 10:29Bill Simmons?

  We'll solve your Darren Peterson issue, and Memphis can get four and 15 and just take Caleb Wilson, who might end up being a better player anyway. I like that for both sides.

• 10:37Speaker 02

  So do I.

• 10:38Bill Simmons?

  The most fun NBA scenario is you guys take AJ, Utah takes Boozer, um, Peterson ends up in Chicago, Memphis gets four and 15, takes Caleb Wilson, and then Utah calls San Antonio.

• 10:56Bill Simmons?

  And they say, heard you have a Darren Fox problem.

• 11:02Bill Simmons?

  We have a matching salary in Lori Marketing, but you're gonna have to wet our beak. Hmm.

• 11:09Bill Simmons?

  How about you tossing Carter, Carter Bryant?

• 11:12Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 11:13Bill Simmons?

  Maybe one of your future protected picks. And let's call it a day.

• 11:18Speaker 02

  Bill Simmons, the files ended and you were immediately in the trade machine. What time Saturday night were you in the trade machine? Be honest. It was after you, the game finished at what time, uh, West Coast nine? Oh, you and Zach had to do the pod.

• 11:32Bill Simmons?

  No, we finished the pod and then Fox trade started pouring out of me. Like, like the pus from open source.

• 11:39Speaker 02

  Oh, that's, I mean, I'm ready to roll. Direction. I, I, I thought it was other bodily fluids, but it all makes sense.

• 11:45Bill Simmons?

  Would Lori Marketing have solved some of the, uh, some of the San Antonio's problems in that 2026 finals?

• 11:51Speaker 02

  It, it, look, here's the problem that we're gonna have for a little while. Um, it is overreaction of the moment. All of the recency bias. I think quite a bit of the, the, the Fox as the, in the crosshairs kind of, of concept is, is really emblematic of who this Spurs team is and that the fact that they arrived a year early. They just weren't ready. They weren't ready from top to bottom. No, they weren't ready conceptually. They weren't ready schematically. They weren't ready for, in terms of the coaching. They weren't ready in terms of the personnel. They happened to run into the one team in the entire NBA where they're youthful, uh, the, the speed,

• 12:33Speaker 02

  uh, Wemby's force, their, their, their, um, defensive intensity. They only ran, there was only one team in the NBA, um, that, that could match them. Because New York, to their credit, they showed up healthy. This was the single biggest underrated storyline because they swept the two previous, uh, teams that they faced in the East. They had so much time to get the very best version of themselves, ready for the, for these playoffs. Remember Fox was missing games in these playoffs. It's not fair to me to be, you know, pinpointing Fox and certain, now for sure, we can look at the moments where he was not up to the. Task and you say this, he's supposed to be on this team. He's supposed to be the calming

• 13:14Speaker 02

  influence. He's supposed to be the guy that makes the intelligent, high IQ basketball play at the end of these games and every one of these games that are so close.

• 13:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 13:22Speaker 02

  It's crunch time and he's a previous crunch time winner. He's a guy who's with a demonstrated track record of success. But I think when we sort of start, start taking some steps back, there is yet still a version of this Spurs team where we say we're a little more gracious about it. Like, can we be generous and say that Mitch Johnson and De'Aaron Fox will get on the same page with the benefit of what they learned from that series and, and all of the assets that the Spurs possess coming into the next season. There's a version of this Spurs team. Like, what do you think their over under will open up at in terms of regular season wins?

• 14:00Bill Simmons?

  Well, they're the favorites.

• 14:01Speaker 02

  In the 60s.

• 14:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they'll be in the 60s. You know, I, I didn't really realize this until Sunday as I was going through all the clips and stuff and watching the post game interviews. It does feel like the fundamental issue with the Spurs. And by the way, all the stuff you said about the Spurs about, hey, if they just, I said that on Saturday, if they just lost game seven in OKC, we don't have any of this stuff and we're fine with the Spurs and it's a successful season. I do want to point out you were very mean about the New England Patriots who made the Super Bowl and it was the same scenario. And, and I don't remember you making that defense for my Patriots.

• 14:36Speaker 02

  Oh, I don't, I don't understand. It's a radically different sport and I was on the correct side of.

• 14:42Bill Simmons?

  It's a young team that got to the Super Bowl and maybe would have been better off losing in the AFC title game, which I said, but you didn't want to hear it. You're just, you.

• 14:49Speaker 02

  I just wanted to win.

• 14:50Bill Simmons?

  You bought into Cousin Sal's Drake May jokes.

• 14:52Speaker 02

  All I did was win money. I liked betting against the Patriots. I like winning money.

• 14:57Bill Simmons?

  But watching all the stuff the next day and then thinking about the series more, looking at the minutes, I do think the fundamental issue with this Spurs, they had two issues. One is Wemby is a 30 minute a game guy who cannot play 40. I think we've learned that in the playoffs. He's gonna have to figure that out.

• 15:14Speaker 02

  That's who he is right now.

• 15:16Bill Simmons?

  That's who he is right now. He's gonna have to figure that out over the next five years.

• 15:19Speaker 02

  Right, right.

• 15:20Bill Simmons?

  How can I handle being on the court more than 29 to 30 minutes a game? That's one issue. The other is the Harper issue. And you saw it in game five. Who got the car keys near the end of game five? It was Harper. It was the first time you saw them do that all the series where he got the, he brought it up. They're running stuff through him. And I just think they were afraid to do that the whole series. Fox played more minutes than him. Fox played 36 minutes, 12 points a game. All his stats were terrible. And then had a couple of big brain farts. I think he was afraid to shoot by the end of the series. Like he couldn't hit threes. Harper wasn't much better on threes, but at least wasn't afraid to take them. And I think fundamentally that was almost a bigger issue than the Wemby thing is that they had this issue.

• 16:05Bill Simmons?

  But did you hear what Vassell said about it?

• 16:08Speaker 02

  What did he say?

• 16:08Bill Simmons?

  He, he, he talked about Harper. He was like, this is a tough year for him. He had to go down to the G league at one point. You know, he was.

• 16:15Speaker 02

  He did.

• 16:15Bill Simmons?

  He was not happy about his minutes. It was the first time he was kind of like, yeah, Harper wanted to play more and was ready to be this guy. Harper's attitude during that finals was, I'm here. I'm ready. I'm ready for all of this. And Mitch Johnson just was afraid to kind of tell Fox to go sit in the passenger seat. And that was a big issue for them.

• 16:36Speaker 02

  Sure. And you know what? Everything you just said, that's fine. That's, that's great. All of that is part of the maturation process, the growing up process. Like you, you, the, the minutes thing, um, you know, Zach Lowe and Sean Fantasy and extraordinary podcast Saturday, Sunday night that I enjoyed listening to very much. It's up right now on the Ringer Podcast Network. Um, you know, made the point about the, the, um, capacity of the Knicks to play all 48 minutes and that that was an advantage that they possessed over the Spurs. Well, the, the Spurs losing steam in the second half, and especially in the fourth quarter, running out of energy. That's a skill.

• 17:21Speaker 02

  That's not about like the conditioning of the Spurs versus the conditioning of the Knicks. It's a skill. You have to learn it. You have to learn, uh, through these kinds of playoff reps, how to allocate that, that energy, where to save energy. And I thought, you know, we saw an experiment happening in real time. In quite a bit of the strategizing that the Spurs undertook, that Mitch Johnson undertook. We saw it in game five. He took Wemby out with five minutes left in the basketball game. For Christ sakes, how is that pot? What are we doing? Like, we know what the Cornet minutes produced, but look, this was, um, to me, a giant success for the Spurs.

• 17:59Speaker 02

  Like, you know, like they have nothing to, to, to really resent or regret other than like, we're just quite not ready. And there's really only one team in the NBA that could, could, um, you know, really take advantage of it.

• 18:16Bill Simmons?

  I never think it's a giant success if you could actually win the title and you didn't. Well, the Patriots were, had no chance to win the Super Bowl against the Seahawks. Right. And that put me in that mode of, ah, man, I just wish we'd lost in Denver. San Antonio, they led for, I think, what was it? 72% of the series? They led by double digits in all five games.

• 18:35Speaker 02

  So what?

• 18:36Bill Simmons?

  They led in the last two minutes of every game.

• 18:39Speaker 02

  Hang a banner with all those stats on it. Doesn't matter.

• 18:42Bill Simmons?

  I have good mailbag questions about this, but one of them I'm going to read now. This is from Timothy. My closest friend was supremely confident in every juncture of the NBA Finals about the Spurs losing. He said in the first quarter of game five, the Spurs are like drunk teenagers who eventually blackout. Lot of early stamina.

• 19:02Bill Simmons?

  And it's totally true. Hey, you want to do Jägermeister shots? Yeah, wow, wow, let's go. And then by 11 o'clock, people were throwing up in the bushes. That was the Spurs.

• 19:12Speaker 02

  That wasn't Timothy Chalamet.

• 19:13Bill Simmons?

  No, it was not Timothy Chalamet.

• 19:15Speaker 02

  Okay, just checking.

• 19:16Bill Simmons?

  No, it was the spelling. He ended the spelling with a Y.

• 19:19Speaker 02

  Okay, good.

• 19:20Bill Simmons?

  So I think you're right in the sense of, hey, let's not overreact. But I do think this Harper thing, I think he has to start next year and I think he needs to drive the car. And if I'm them, I'm looking at getting out of this Fox thing if I can. Cause the other trade, and people were sending a bunch of different trades and you could do like, oh, we'll get Randall for a year and different kinds of like, there's all kinds of whatevers. Porter from the Nets as an expiring for Fox.

• 19:52Bill Simmons?

  Was one that got sent to me a few times and that one made me go huh. Cause you have the Nets who, you know, I don't think they want to be rebuilding for the rest of the 2020s. They just had the entire city got officially taken away from them. They're irrelevant. And, you know, could you, could you do that trade and then, trade the six pick for a star and just try to be like, we're here, we have good players now.

• 20:17Speaker 02

  My, my only pushback on that is that the Porter expiring should be more valuable than the next five years of Fox at 55 to 60.

• 20:27Bill Simmons?

  Or you say you're buying low on Fox, a guy who two years ago was averaging 25 points a game.

• 20:32Speaker 02

  And are you, are you buying low on him?

• 20:33Bill Simmons?

  Maybe he was just on the wrong team. I don't know. That is in his late twenties. You could say he was hurt during the playoffs, lost his confidence. We're buying low, but I thought that was interesting.

• 20:43Speaker 02

  The idea of him being on the wrong team would suggest that he's not a winning player. It would, he's on, he should be on exactly the right team. It should be, the Spurs should be the right team. They have this opportunity this summer to like, lessons learned and, and, and take that right into next season.

• 21:03Bill Simmons?

  You and I have been following basketball our whole life.

• 21:05Speaker 02

  It's true.

• 21:06Bill Simmons?

  This Fox Harper thing is not going to end well. I'm sorry. It's just won't. I'd be, I'd be shocked if it's like, hey, we figured it out. Three guard rotation like Detroit in the late eighties and, look at all these good numbers when Fox and Harper played together. I just, I don't see it. I think Harper is that special. And, and what we saw from him in the playoffs was about as high of a level from a 20 year old guard as we've seen. With Magic being a 10 out of 10 and Kobe, you know, in the, in the 2000, was Kobe, I forget how old he was in the 2000 finals. I think it was somewhere around 20, but if that's, if that's the top of the pyramid, some of the stuff Harper was doing, was, wasn't there, but it was at least sniffing in the vicinity of it.

• 21:49Bill Simmons?

  And I thought in game five, I thought that had a chance to be his masterpiece. It was like, we've single handedly flipped the series.

• 21:56Speaker 02

  He went all the way to the hole, the layup in the last two minutes that he missed. I mean, he was there. He did the thing. He got all the way there.

• 22:02Bill Simmons?

  I love how he played.

• 22:03Speaker 02

  Me too.

• 22:04Bill Simmons?

  He wasn't afraid at all. I love the defense he was playing on Brunson. Brunson was making big shots on him.

• 22:11Bill Simmons?

  So yeah, we. I'm interested to see what happens with Fox. And then you have the Yanis piece, which people have been reporting now for two days. Like the, the reason this stuff gets out, if it's just Boston and Milwaukee and they're talking about stuff, very unlikely stuff gets out.

• 22:30Bill Simmons?

  But if, and I, for the aggregators, I am saying if, if Jalen Brown was the piece being dangled for Yanis, and Milwaukee is like, well, we don't need Jalen Brown, what could we get for him? That's how stuff gets out. That's where you get into trouble. That's when you start calling these different teams, including the Clippers. I do wonder though, if there's a, a, the Clippers thing feels a little real to me because I don't know who they know, who, I don't think they have any idea who they should take at five. I think that's a real issue because they just invested in Garland and the next three guys at five are all point guards. So you can't take a point guard there. You have to do something at five.

• 23:13Speaker 02

  I like the idea of the Clippers taking a big swing. They want to stay in the mix. For sure, Ballmer and the front office there, they've shown, you know, the, the willingness to go ahead. Like, look at what they did preceding this trade deadline. Those are big swings. James Harden and Zubac, those, that's a front office that's like, we know we got to do something. There's a reset. So Kawhi is an element of the next step of, of the reset. Certainly makes sense to me. But they are retooling, not rebuilding. And how can they play a role? It feels like Milwaukee wants a full rebuild, right? They want to come up with, with some combination of draft picks and or very young players, you know,

• 23:58Speaker 02

  players brand new to the league. And are, is the Clippers the right conduit to that? I mean, it feels like there needs to be a fourth team.

• 24:06Bill Simmons?

  Well, let me ask you, do you think if you're the Clippers and you have Kawhi and you have Garland and you have a little more of a veteran team, you're probably on a little bit of a shelf life with Kawhi. Not just contractually, but just with him as an impact guy is 34.

• 24:23Bill Simmons?

  If you were able to turn that fifth pick into Jalen or somebody like Jalen, is the fifth pick worth more or less than that? Cause I think you can make a case, Jalen. Being one of the top 12 players in the league, second team All-NBA last year, coming off a career year is probably worth more than the fifth pick by himself.

• 24:42Speaker 02

  Well, how do they get Jalen? That's an, it's an impossible contract. That's the thing that, how could the Clippers possibly?

• 24:47Bill Simmons?

  It's three years left. It's three years, like 60 million a year, basically. But the Clippers are under the cap now. They, Garland's at like 36, 37. Kawhi is close to a max, but they have a bunch of other stuff after that.

• 24:58Speaker 02

  They have to extend Matherin, don't they?

• 25:00Bill Simmons?

  They have to. Or just let him go. Or he's in the trade.

• 25:04Speaker 02

  Oh, interesting. I still like Matherin.

• 25:07Bill Simmons?

  And if you're the Bucks and you, like, could I sell that to my fans? That I traded Giannis, but I got the fifth pick back and I said the 10th pick. Now I have five and 10 in an awesome draft.

• 25:21Speaker 02

  Is that enough?

• 25:23Bill Simmons?

  Well, you and I both love Akuf probably the most.

• 25:28Speaker 02

  Huh. Boy.

• 25:29Bill Simmons?

  Akuf, by the way, there's a lot of buzz on him just killing these workouts and teams being like, holy shit.

• 25:35Speaker 02

  We need one or two more assets for, for Milwaukee.

• 25:39Bill Simmons?

  I agree.

• 25:40Speaker 02

  I feel like.

• 25:40Bill Simmons?

  Well, we'll see what happens. Um, I'm really excited to see how all of this plays out.

• 25:45Speaker 02

  This is great. What a Monday after the finals. Let's go.

• 25:49Bill Simmons?

  Um, we're gonna take a break. We're gonna come back and we're gonna talk about Jalen Brunson and the pyramid right after this. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. This summer soccer is here. The watch parties will be spectacular and they'll be going every day, back to back to back. Don't worry. Uber Eats has your game day essentials covered with 30% off offers from Aldi, Kroger, Dollar General. Oh yeah. All the snacks and groceries to keep your crowd happy delivered straight to your door, like chips, dips, wings, whack, fresh ingredients for the perfect game day spread. Order in so you can stay locked in on the game, all the hosting.

• 26:30Bill Simmons?

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• 26:51Bill Simmons?

  All right, so I wrote my basketball book in 2009, spent three years on it. Joe House was one of my conciliaries and one of the gimmicks, which was an idea initially from my buddy Gus's dad, Wally Ramsey, still kicking it in his mid 90s. Shout out to Wally, who always thought the Hall of Fame should be a pyramid. I wrote a column about this or another column about this, eventually built the basketball around it. Five levels, and as the levels go higher and higher, we then get the true flavor of who mattered the most, with the top level being the Pantheon. The biggest thing, as we talked about all this stuff, trying to figure out why guys matter, why people should have been underrated, overrated,

• 27:36Bill Simmons?

  just trying to measure impact. Could you win a title with this guy? We always gravitated to the actual titles. Did this guy carry a team to a title? Did this guy do everything it took? Would you rather have 15 years of somebody who was really, really good and made a bunch of All-NBA teams and brought you to the precipice, but you couldn't win a title if he was your best guy? Or would you rather have a shorter window with somebody who, his peak, you could win the title with them? And we always gravitated to that as we talked about it. And that's why somebody like Bill Walton, who really had, you know, the 77 Blazers run, then win the title. He's the MVP of the next year, even though he gets here near the end. He's hurt for the rest of his career

• 28:21Bill Simmons?

  and then is the sixth man on the 86 Celtics. So has basically three moments. And I still had him in the top 35 in my book. I can't remember where he landed exactly, but it was like, I know for that one year, Bill Walton, I can win a title with him. So now you have Jalen Brunson, who's never been a first-team All-NBA guy, who had no MVP votes this year at all. And yet he just dragged the team to the NBA title house. He did something that a bunch of great guards were never able to do. He did something that James Harden, as a starter on his own team, never even made the finals and fell short over and over again. Steve Nash, who was an unbelievable player, two-time MVP,

• 29:05Bill Simmons?

  through no fault of his own, could never quite get the team there. Chris Paul finally did it in the 2021 finals late in his career, but they lost. Jason Kidd, two straight finals, but he lost and then finally gets one later as a, as a role player starter on Dallas. What Brunson did was up there with Dwyane Wade in 2006. It was up there with Walton in 77. You can go on through, but we're just dragging a team to the finals. And he is somebody that I never in a million years would have thought would make the pyramid that I sent you a piece of as I keep always work on the rankings. I'm going to start here. I think he has to be one of the top 50 players of all time though.

• 29:50Bill Simmons?

  And I don't even think it's debatable. So your, your initial thoughts on that?

• 29:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, so I want to gently push back. You said twice that he dragged the team to the, now I'm now that, that we have to recognize the greatness of Karl-Anthony Towns, the contribution of OG and Kobe.

• 30:08Bill Simmons?

  One of the best secret teams we've had in a long time. I conceding all that, but you know what really helped?

• 30:13Speaker 02

  Right.

• 30:14Bill Simmons?

  Anytime they were down in the end of games, down nine, down 10, down 14, Jalen Brunson would just figure out how to get offense for them.

• 30:21Speaker 02

  And not just figure out, but by design, like this is part of the brilliance of the front office of Leon Rose and Worldwide West in assembling a team and ultimately arriving on a Jalen Brunson centric end of game phenomenon. And it's truly a phenomenon. I, I didn't, I couldn't get in touch with the Ringer research staff to go back to the point where we measure, okay, all the guys are together. How many times did this group in this combination come back from double digit deficits? A second half and win games in the regular season and in the playoffs. But we do know that in these playoffs, they went six and two.

• 31:03Speaker 02

  The greatest accomplishment in in in play in a playoff run in terms of being down double digits and coming back in and winning games. In the play by play era.

• 31:12Bill Simmons?

  One of the great live bet teams in the history of any sport.

• 31:16Speaker 02

  Exactly right. He was the leading scorer on a team that had the best point differential in playoff history. The leading scorer was Jalen Brunson and the Knicks are are stand are on on top of that that mountain. Uh, they, oh, go ahead. No, I know. It's good.

• 31:33Bill Simmons?

  I was gonna say the a big part of my book, which was basically the premise of it was Isaiah saying the secret of basketball is it's not about basketball. It's about all the other stuff. It's about selflessness. It's about putting ego aside. It's about how you connect with your teammates. The chemistry you have, your ability to galvanize everybody around you. Brunson had all this and.

• 31:54Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 31:55Bill Simmons?

  Hey, in in one of the best possible ways as a guard, um, I truly don't think he had ego and what was I think he just wanted to win. And he wanted to prove everyone wrong and he didn't care how they did it. But over and over again, he was their best option. Cause he was the guy over and over again, who could create the best offense for them and he got better when it mattered. He never got tired. He played 39 minutes a game in the finals. As a small guy, the stuff that he did was inconceivable. And what he did in game five, I'm just gonna say it like the more I look at it and stare at it, I I think is one of the great finals games. Like, you know, Jordan game six 98 is the greatest game I've ever seen anyone play.

• 32:35Bill Simmons?

  When you consider Pippin's hurt, Rodman's a mess. Like you basically, he had to control the pace and every moment of that game. And then what he did in the last minute, you know, basket steal basket to end it. But the Brunson thing was pretty close, like Towns being in foul trouble. They're covering OG on the, on the corner threes and there were multiple moments where the game was going to get away from them. And he just wouldn't let it happen. And especially in the second half, he was just like, all right, I'm just going to keep scoring and let us hang around and the Spurs are going to fold. So I value that more than anything, right? And maybe I overrated with the pyramid, but you seem to agree with me.

• 33:13Speaker 02

  Of course, I mean, this is the, the funny, the league invented an award, the clutch player of the year for, as a regular season award. It's only been around for four years. He, he won it. I mean, he's one of the four guys that won it. Now, De'Aaron Fox did win it also, so I don't know.

• 33:28Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but it's regular season, you know?

• 33:30Speaker 02

  It is regular season, but this is, we, one of the themes of when we've gotten together. You know, we've talked about, this is the DNA of, of this particular Knicks team, the particular run that they are on. They just never concede anything, uh, in any kind of deficit, second half, it doesn't matter. And that's a regular season and postseason trait for, for this team. And the tip of the spear is, is Brunson. We really haven't seen a guy, uh, that fits his, his, to your point, his stature. But, but also, I mean, he's in that class of, of who do you trust to go get a bucket right now? Or to make the best basketball play right now?

• 34:10Speaker 02

  His 30 foot shot over Wemby at the end of game four was the right basketball play. Him getting that shot up immediately created an advantage for the Knicks that they, he recognized it as the double team came over, as Fox came over to double. That created an advantage, like even a missed shot is the right basketball play. And that's the thing that we're, we're, we're looking for a historic, how do we put him in a place in the history of the league amongst the all time greats? And, and where you have him feels right to me.

• 34:42Bill Simmons?

  He's probably the toughest guy in the league. Is that fair?

• 34:48Bill Simmons?

  Tougher guy in the league right now?

• 34:52Speaker 02

  I mean, he did withstand some injury scare at the very beginning of the series. And we thought, you know, maybe.

• 35:00Bill Simmons?

  Wemby getting in his landing space in game five, it's just like, I think that guy could have had, you know, a high ankle sprain, whatever. And he just would have been like, I'll deal with it later. He's the mentally toughest guy in the league, which, you know, I think Curry's up there. There's been some great players over the years, but for right now, the mantle of, I just trust him the most. It doesn't matter where he's playing. On top of taking the responsibility of 53 years, which is like, you know, when this happened for the Red Sox, it was really Ortiz, right? And it was a bunch of guys and there were a million heroes in that from Derek Lowe to even Curtis Laskanic coming in and getting three outs at the perfect time.

• 35:42Bill Simmons?

  But it was ultimately Ortiz and the entire Red Sox fan base going, this makes no sense. We lose all the time. We haven't won in 86 years. Something bad's gonna happen. The other shoe is gonna drop. We're gonna get kicked in the teeth. And just kind of looking over at Ortiz and being like, but he doesn't seem scared. And we have this guy and the Yankee fans seem scared of him. And that's what Brunson did for this Knicks team. Like as great as OG was, and we'll talk about him in the mailbag. Towns, Bridges, like their bench guys, everybody chipped in, which was a great thing about this team. But ultimately to flip history, you have to have a guy who's, who's just completely different. And I, so when I think of him historically, even though he's never been a top five all NBA guy,

• 36:28Bill Simmons?

  I think he has to be in the top 50 now. And what gets interesting is when you start comparing him. So I got an email from Harry, who said, did he just, did Jalen just set the record for biggest historical leapfrog in NBA history? What was the biggest jump in one postseason? Um, but really you have to say by an older player Brunson's been in the league eight years. So I think one guy I was thinking was Kawhi in 2019.

• 36:55Speaker 02

  I'm told you, of course, of course, you and I immediately. That's, that's the first guy that comes to my mouth is Kawhi in 2019. Amazing.

• 37:02Bill Simmons?

  Cause I wouldn't have, I wouldn't have, I don't think Kawhi in the pyramid.

• 37:05Speaker 02

  Right.

• 37:06Bill Simmons?

  He would have been in the honorable mention with a chance.

• 37:08Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 37:08Bill Simmons?

  But then that 2019 playoffs ended and it's like, well, he's now in the top 40. I gotta figure out the rankings now. Cause this is what he just did was nuts.

• 37:17Speaker 02

  Yeah. Finals MVP for two different teams and drag. He dragged Toronto.

• 37:22Bill Simmons?

  Oh yeah. Well, Dirk's the best example. Um, for a late, late career guy. Cause Dirk was in the 1997 draft. He won that finals in 2011. So he's year 14. I had him 39th in my book, which was

• 37:38Speaker 02

  Dirk, you had 39th.

• 37:39Bill Simmons?

  Which came out before the 2011 title, right? So then he wins the title. It's like, well, now you're moving up buddy. Here I have a little, I have a little suite, uh, right underneath the penthouse for you. So he's, you know, I think I have him in the 21, 22 range now. And then you have the younger guys like SGA that they win the title, they jump up, but that's a little more common. The Brunson thing, I wouldn't, I wouldn't even had him on honorable mention until these playoffs, like

• 38:05Speaker 02

  I understand.

• 38:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. He just, he didn't have the credentials yet.

• 38:08Speaker 02

  Right. And, and he's only halfway through his career. I mean, he's only 29. He should play another seven or eight years.

• 38:16Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. He's a chance to bump it.

• 38:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 38:18Bill Simmons?

  So.

• 38:19Speaker 02

  Just enhancing the overall career resume.

• 38:22Bill Simmons?

  So if you go in the top 50, where just so people know, like there's, you know, Clyde Drexler have in the mid 50s, Gary Payton, these are guys that were the best player in finals teams who had a bunch of all MBAs and really good careers. But we just had a lot of players since I did the book. We've had, you know, almost two decades worth of more seasons and more great players. In level three, so goes level one, level two, level three, which was no doubt about it. Hall of famers who ranked among the best for a few years with every requisite resume statistic to match. No MVP winner can drop below level three unless there's a fantastic reason. Unfortunately, that's Derrick Rose, but.

• 39:04Bill Simmons?

  Had Iverson at 52, who I think you and I ride for maybe a little more than others historically, but it's really just the 2001 playoffs and really no success postseason wise other than that. But you go down and there's this whole bunch of guards that Brunson is in the middle of now historically. Luka Doncic, George Gervin, James Harden, Sam Jones. So I'm going to ride for it to the death because he was the best big game guard of, of the first basically 40 years of the league, other than Jerry West. Jason Kidd, Steve Nash, and Walt Frazier. I have all those guys in the 40s and you could argue about the order, but they're all there.

• 39:47Bill Simmons?

  They all, they all MBAs. Frazier has the 70 and 73 finals. Frazier was top five first, top five, first team NBA four times. Nash had the two MVPs. Kidd was an MVP runner up, but dragged those two Nets teams to the finals, which mattered. Then he won a title and was, Jason Kidd was just awesome. Like, oh, the stats aren't going to be kind to him because of the three point shooting and the field goal percentage, but we were there.

• 40:13Speaker 02

  Well, he made threes. It'll be a three point shooting percentage thing to knock him, but made threes is in the top five in the history of the league.

• 40:19Bill Simmons?

  Right. But it, for years, he was 29%, 30%. And he was the best defensive player of all these guys other than Frazier. Sam Jones was 10 championships. He had,

• 40:33Bill Simmons?

  he had three, he had, I think a couple of MBAs. Oh, there it is. Three top 10s.

• 40:40Bill Simmons?

  But was the key guy in those Russell teams in the 60s because they needed somebody to basically do the Brunson at the end of games. Harden gets, Harden was MVP, three time runner up MVP, six top five, three third team MBAs. He was runner up for MVP three times. And averaged 36 a game when you're, his statistical resume is just overwhelming. And it's basically the Karl Malone situation.

• 41:09Bill Simmons?

  I don't know what to do with Harden.

• 41:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, I mean, here's the thing. And I spent some time with, what do they call basketball reference now? Is it basketball stat heads, that had basketball?

• 41:20Bill Simmons?

  That has, yeah, it's part of basketball reference.

• 41:22Speaker 02

  Yeah. If you side by side, James Harden and Charles Barkley, you would be surprised.

• 41:32Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 41:33Speaker 02

  I, I think we've had now 25 or 30 years of Charles in our lives and the cultural force. He's an icon. He's an NBA icon.

• 41:43Bill Simmons?

  I have Barkley much higher than these guys.

• 41:45Speaker 02

  You do.

• 41:46Bill Simmons?

  For the record, yeah, he was in the mid twenties for me when I did the book.

• 41:49Speaker 02

  Right. It's gonna be tough. I think as, as we try and process the NBA from the kind of the, this, this era and, and going forward, what do we do with a player like James Harden? And how do you contextualize his inability? He's only been to one finals. It was, he was coming off the bench for Oklahoma City.

• 42:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, he, he never made the finals as a starter. He was one and four in conference finals in general. He's 17 and 17 in playoff series. And, you know, one of the conference finals he made, they benched him against the Clippers in game six and came back with the bench guys when the game was over, like he was about to get bounced in that. But, you know, this is one of those cases where sadly we were there.

• 42:36Speaker 02

  Right.

• 42:36Bill Simmons?

  The statistical resume was, was there, but ultimately the number one value we have with all this stuff is, how did you perform when it truly mattered?

• 42:47Bill Simmons?

  Did you understand the secret? Could you elevate your team around you? And he just could never do it. Really at any point in his career, right? Barkley is a good example because the 93 Suns, they come as close as you're going to get to winning the title and they lose to the best player of all time, who's at his absolute fucking apex. Right. That's the only reason he didn't win the title and I, I don't know how much I can hold that against him because I don't feel like, I feel like he did everything possible in that finals and we know what happened. Kevin Johnson stunk in those first two games.

• 43:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:19Bill Simmons?

  That's why they lost the finals. The Bulls team was kind of ready to be beaten.

• 43:23Speaker 02

  The question with Harden, um, and obviously you and I share the same kind of perspective on, on him. We've watched it. Like he was, he was there present for us and in all of our, uh, NBA hoops fandom. Um, you know, he's been in our lives for so long. Will, will history be more gracious towards him?

• 43:46Bill Simmons?

  Like it's, like it's happened with Karl Malone right now. Basketball has not personality, personal has, yeah.

• 43:51Speaker 02

  Yeah. Well, but right. Because the era in which Harden, Harden in the West against the teams that he went up against, um, not being able to topple Golden State, you know, catching the end of, of the Spurs run, you know, is it, can we legitimately pin responsibility on him for the, for his inability to take a team?

• 44:14Bill Simmons?

  I think we can in 18 and 19.

• 44:16Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 44:17Bill Simmons?

  Because 18 was sitting there for them and they didn't win. And basically because he didn't do the, have the Jalen Brunson game. 19 Durant's out.

• 44:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 44:28Bill Simmons?

  And they have six at home against Curry and Curry has what? Two points in the first half or one point? I can't remember. And, and Golden State's ready to be taken down and they just couldn't do it. The fundamental question here, because George Gervin's another one. I have him and Harden right next to each other. Very similar careers and Gervin's big moment was the 1979 Eastern Conference Finals against your beloved Washington Bullets. Up 3-1 in the series and can't close them. And if he gets to that, if he gets to that finals and they're probably favored to, uh, to beat Seattle at that point and they win the, that gets, it's a complete whatever. But fundamentally, this comes down to this.

• 45:13Bill Simmons?

  You're a Washington fan. I'm giving you the ability, you can have Harden or Brunson for their entire careers.

• 45:25Bill Simmons?

  From what you've just witnessed, which guy would you rather have? And we don't know how it's gonna end with Brunson. He's only been in the league eight years. But your whole goal is, I just want to win the title. Are you taking James Harden or you taking Jalen Brunson?

• 45:37Speaker 02

  I mean, it's a no brainer. It's easy. Flags fly forever. The only thing that matters is the chip. That's why the pyramid is tilted the way it's tilted. You have to have the rings. And it's not just Brunson delivering. It would be really curious how we would regard Iverson. Iverson took a team that really, when you look back at that Sixers team, it's like, wow, look at the surrounding cast here.

• 46:05Bill Simmons?

  Built around all of his strengths and weaknesses.

• 46:09Speaker 02

  Right. If they had somehow pulled something out, that, but Brunson's a different cat, a different animal altogether. He is such an important element of that cohesive team that the Knicks have built. And yet, when there's six minutes left in the game and the Knicks could be down a dozen points, you never, never, never think for a second that they don't have a chance to win, as long as that dude has the ball in his hands and he's more healthy than not.

• 46:39Bill Simmons?

  You know what got lost in the Brunson celebration over these last two weeks? He was the one that got the ball in game two and Wemby threw it off Castle's back and got Wemby to foul him.

• 46:50Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 46:51Bill Simmons?

  Like that, the thing, one of the things with Brunson that I've appreciated-

• 46:54Speaker 02

  And remember, he missed one of the free throws, but go ahead.

• 46:56Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, he did.

• 46:58Bill Simmons?

  But one of the things I appreciate about him is it's like, oh, you gotta pick on Brunson, pick on Brunson. Much like Jason Kidd and some of these other dudes, is actually like sometimes an asset defensively, like he's fucking annoying to play against. He's taking charges all the time. He's getting steals. He's in the right spots, but you look at- His, his four year, four years in the playoffs now. He's 29 a game. This is four years across the board, like a lot of playoff games, 29 a game, 26 finals. He was 33, four and five, played 39.2 minutes a game.

• 47:35Bill Simmons?

  It's just better than anything James Harden ever did, and it was a higher level than anything James Harden ever did. And I'm sorry, and I, I just, if I, if I could have either career for the same reason out of when I did my book, I would rather have Bill Walton, just so I could get those peaks versus David Robinson's entire career. I just would, because at least, my only thing I want is a title. And I just know that if I have that guy, I have a better chance. And I, that's not rings culture to me. It's more like, that, that's why I'm not discounting Barkley, because I don't feel like Barkley did everything he could have done, and they probably should have won the 93 finals, and he went against a fucking comet that we've never seen in our lives. That's the only reason he had a win.

• 48:17Bill Simmons?

  Karl Malone went against that same older version of the comet and really fucked up in both finals. And not to mention some of the other stuff that happened, and it's hard to separate that from his, from his history. So I do value that stuff, because the only goal is to win the title. I don't care about your career. Like, I care about your career in the context of, did it produce championships and chances to win championships? So with Brunson, I don't know, that, that, so I have him at 40, which I sent to you.

• 48:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, my only quibble.

• 48:52Bill Simmons?

  Because it was in the vicinity of the Bill Walton range, and I think that's fair to put him near him.

• 48:59Speaker 02

  You had him one spot ahead of Frazier.

• 49:02Bill Simmons?

  I did.

• 49:03Speaker 02

  I, I think they should at least be tied until we get a little more.

• 49:08Bill Simmons?

  I'm happy to flip him. This is why I wanted to have you on. So you'd put. So that this opens the different conversation because greatest Nick of all time should probably have the higher pyramid ranking, right?

• 49:20Speaker 02

  Sure. And, and, and let's, I'm, I'm all ears. I'll listen to everybody, all the smart folks that will be doing this greatest Knicks of all time. It is appropriate for that conversation to be had. Now, you, you saw, uh, Rick Brunson do the, well, Patrick Ewing's the greatest Nick. When that was, you know, that was nice. That's a, you know, I understand the gesture.

• 49:41Bill Simmons?

  He's not.

• 49:42Speaker 02

  Um, that, that they're making.

• 49:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. So the, the thing with Frazier, two titles, not one, played one of the great game sevens ever in 1970s. So he matches Brunson there. 35 and 19. I think he had six steals, like demolished Jerry West. And then, uh, you know, was probably the best defensive guard of the first 35 years of the league, not to mention all the other stuff. His career was shorter because everyone's career was shorter back then. Like, I'd love to see the guys now. Do you think LeBron would have played 20, how many years he had to? 23? So playing 23 years in converse with no versa climber and flying coach? Guess what? He's not. So you gotta factor that in too. All right. I'm fine with Frazier over Brunson, but Brunson

• 50:27Bill Simmons?

  has a chance to pass him with a couple more great seasons.

• 50:31Speaker 02

  He's sitting right there. He's only halfway through his career. Let's, let's let him get there. And there will be now. Yeah, go ahead.

• 50:38Bill Simmons?

  I have him above Nash, Kidd, Sam Jones, Harden, Gervin and Luka.

• 50:43Speaker 02

  What's wrong with that?

• 50:44Bill Simmons?

  I'm just for the audience.

• 50:47Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 50:47Bill Simmons?

  And for Luka, the regular season resume is tremendous.

• 50:51Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 50:52Bill Simmons?

  He did make a finals.

• 50:54Speaker 02

  He did.

• 50:54Bill Simmons?

  He has the second highest career playoff average of all time, 30.9 points a game.

• 51:02Bill Simmons?

  He's six first team O M Bs already and has a chance to, if he can put it together for one year.

• 51:11Bill Simmons?

  Move into the top 20, 25 range.

• 51:13Speaker 02

  And it will be a combination of him and the right circumstances. I mean, you know, it shouldn't be lost that, that, that the Brunson place in the, in the pyramid is a testament to the, his, the, the front office of the Knicks taking the swing that they took. He, he wouldn't be in this place without the context.

• 51:34Bill Simmons?

  And just that people think this is reactionary or whatever, like this is how I did the book. Like I had Dwyane Wade, I think in the top 40, maybe even top 35, just because of what he did in the 2006 finals. Like, sure, that's it. Like you get a major bump if you pull that off on the biggest stage and you help drag your team to the title. So there's some centers ahead of, uh, ahead of Frazier and Brunson. Just because I think the center position was more important for a longer period of time with the league. Cowens, Willis Reed, David Robinson, Walton, Berry. So I do have by the pyramid rankings, Willis Reed as the best Nick ever. But I, I don't know if I'm right. I just know from, he was the MVP of the league. Frazier and Brunson were never MVPs of the league.

• 52:19Bill Simmons?

  He went against all of these great centers during a time when you basically couldn't win the title or compete for one. Unless you had an awesome center, he's going against Kareem and Wilt and all these dudes. Like you kind of had to have that. So I have the Cowens, Reed, Robinson, Bill Walton, all in a row. And then the, the two guards I have ahead of all of these guys. And I gotta look at John Stockton again, cause I'm trying to decide if I overrated him a little in my book. But I had, right now I have Stockton 34 and Chris Paul 33, cause of how long and ridiculous their careers are.

• 52:54Bill Simmons?

  And they were in finals and really guys I, you know, I, I thought had some, some bigger moments than James Harden. But that, that gets, that's where it gets tough. James Harden versus Stockton versus Chris Paul with Chris Paul. Really that 21 finals changed Chris Paul's legacy by about 10, 12 spots.

• 53:13Speaker 02

  And appropriately so. I do think when you sit down and do the side by side of Harden and Stockton, it's really close. It's a very like they're they're whatever the comparability score is like they're they're they're really close those two.

• 53:29Bill Simmons?

  When I did, uh, when I did the book, I wrote about, um, I wrote about Stockton, why he couldn't get to level four, why he was in level three. And I think you're mentioned in this because it was like, here's the thing, he probably shouldn't be this high. Where did I have him? I had him, Jesus, I'm still there is I had him 25 in the book.

• 53:55Bill Simmons?

  And I made all the cases for why maybe he shouldn't be there.

• 54:00Bill Simmons?

  But then it was the experience of watching him. And how great he was and how he would always like just pick his run the team, get everyone else involved for three and a half quarters and then pick his spots and was a fucking assassin. It was like,

• 54:13Speaker 02

  Assassin.

• 54:13Bill Simmons?

  I just don't feel like the stats can properly reflect that, the way he kind of carried the team and and you just kind of always knew he was lurking and you always thought he was going to come through when it mattered. Right?

• 54:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, I wonder if if going back, miss, are we misremembering how effective he was in the clutch versus Karl Malone?

• 54:35Bill Simmons?

  Hmm. It's possible. I but this is what the tough, the further we get away from this stuff. We always felt like Stockton was the good guy in that team and and Karl Malone was the one you could get the 44 minutes out of and you didn't trust the last four. We were probably too hard on Karl Malone. I mean, I created the whole 42 club, so he would be discounted. By the way, Wemby missed the 42 club. It worked.

• 54:57Speaker 02

  Are you surprised?

• 54:58Bill Simmons?

  No.

• 54:59Speaker 02

  Me either.

• 54:59Bill Simmons?

  Brunson, uh, Brunson didn't get there, but really hard for guards to get there because they had the rebounds. All right. So Jalen Brunson, 41 in the pyramid. Unbelievable.

• 55:10Speaker 02

  Great, welcome aboard.

• 55:11Bill Simmons?

  What would the Fandel odds have been on that before the before the playoffs?

• 55:15Speaker 02

  They wouldn't have given us odds, you know, 150,000 to one.

• 55:18Bill Simmons?

  All right, I'm gonna take one more break and then we're doing a mail back.

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• 56:21Bill Simmons?

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• 57:06Bill Simmons?

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• 57:31Bill Simmons?

  All right, mailbag. These are actual questions from actual listeners. B S podcast 33 at gmail dot com. If you want to send one in. Thanks to everybody who sends stuff in. Always really fun stuff to go through. Matt from New York wants to know. Jalen Brunson now has the number one Jalen spot on lock. There are four Jalen's on all NBA teams. I'm requesting you to stop calling Jalen Brown, just Jalen during podcasts because it's too confusing. So he's basically making the argument, we have all these Jalen's. The only Jalen now should be Jalen Brunson and then everybody else, we should say their last names. But Jalen Williams is J dub.

• 58:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:08Bill Simmons?

  Jalen Brown becomes JB.

• 58:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:11Bill Simmons?

  Jalen Johnson now becomes Jalen Johnson or double J. Jalen Dern is just Jalen Dern and Jalen Green's Jalen Green. I'm fine with this. I think Jalen Brunson has assumed control of the name Jalen, along with our buddy Jalen Rose.

• 58:24Speaker 02

  Well, the original Jalen.

• 58:25Bill Simmons?

  The original.

• 58:26Speaker 02

  I mean, there's always, there's only one OG. That's the original Jalen, Jalen Rose. Sure, fine. I can, I can subscribe to this. I feel like Jalen Brown's been JB for a little while now. Anyway, it's been convenient to call him JB. But Alpha Jalen is Jalen Brunson. It's undeniable.

• 58:44Bill Simmons?

  My wife calls him Brunson burner.

• 58:48Speaker 02

  Brunson burner. Okay.

• 58:49Bill Simmons?

  And because we, when she would ever watch the finals and they would be down like that. And she'd like, did the Brunson burner heat up yet? I was like, it's pretty good.

• 58:56Speaker 02

  Great. Really good.

• 58:59Bill Simmons?

  Joel, like, I didn't send you any of these, so you're reacting to these in the moment. Joel wants to know.

• 59:06Bill Simmons?

  The answer is most likely still no. But now it's more interesting. With Brunson winning championship finals MVP.

• 59:14Bill Simmons?

  Is Dallas letting him walk now a worse decision than trading Luca?

• 59:18Speaker 02

  No.

• 59:20Bill Simmons?

  What's your case?

• 59:22Speaker 02

  It is a diabolical mismanagement to not get anything back, to have not. But nobody in the entire league forecasted this version of Brunson. And think about all of the pieces that had to be put into place for us to achieve and realize this, this version of Brunson.

• 59:50Bill Simmons?

  Counter, we thought it was ridiculous in the moment that they weren't paying Brunson.

• 59:54Speaker 02

  We did.

• 59:54Bill Simmons?

  It was four years for 55 million. They should have done it without blinking. What the fuck were they doing?

• 59:59Speaker 02

  That's right. Mismanagement. Yes. It was a colossal blunder.

• 1:00:03Bill Simmons?

  The Luca trade led to Cooper flag. What did the Brunson trade lead to? Or Brunson leaving?

• 1:00:09Speaker 02

  Uh, Luca.

• 1:00:11Bill Simmons?

  No, Brunson led to eventually trading a first round pick for Kyrie.

• 1:00:15Speaker 02

  They made the finals after he left.

• 1:00:17Bill Simmons?

  Because Brunson left, they went and traded for Kyrie. So that would be the case. I still think Luca's worse.

• 1:00:22Speaker 02

  Luca's worse.

• 1:00:23Bill Simmons?

  Because here's the thing, they didn't, as we discussed a hundred times, they didn't shop the Luca trade is what, what made it horrible. And they didn't shop it because if it came out, their fans would have rioted. That should be alone why that's worse.

• 1:00:37Speaker 02

  Their fans did riot too.

• 1:00:39Bill Simmons?

  Their fans weren't rioting after Jalen Brunson left, but they were upset that it was mismanaged. Yes. The Luca trade led to actual Dallas almost shutting down as a city.

• 1:00:49Speaker 02

  The league had to give, give them the number one overall pick. The league gave them Cooper flag.

• 1:00:53Bill Simmons?

  This was Mark Cuban's fault though.

• 1:00:57Bill Simmons?

  Don't look at him. He was in charge of not giving Brunson the four for 55. He hired Nico Harrison.

• 1:01:04Speaker 02

  He did that.

• 1:01:05Bill Simmons?

  Who then traded Luka Doncic with the new owners that Mark Cuban sold the team to. But none of it's his fault. I don't know how all this happened. Unbelievable. He's done an unbelievable spin job. Reed wants to know.

• 1:01:20Bill Simmons?

  You said during the playoffs this year that Brunson isn't a top five player, but the Knicks build a perfect roster around him, complimenting his offense while compensating for his defensive limitations. Are there any other players on your you can't win if that guy is your best player list that you'd reconsider in that Brunson led a title team? So I will, I will say this, I didn't have a Brunson as a top 10, as a top five player, but I do now. I handed in Ringer 100 and I had him fourth. I didn't put him ahead of Wemby and Joker and SGA, but you could make a case that he should have been, but I thought four seemed fair.

• 1:01:57Speaker 02

  It also was fair over the course of the regular season. I went back and looked at just the season rankings, a handful of times where we're sharing lists and comparing notes and stuff. You had him 10 at different points during the regular season. You had him 12 at a moment or two.

• 1:02:11Bill Simmons?

  He was like eight to 12 range for most of the season.

• 1:02:13Speaker 02

  That was all fine. And, and he, you know, would he end up making the second team All-NBA? Or did he make third team?

• 1:02:18Bill Simmons?

  Second team.

• 1:02:19Speaker 02

  Second team.

• 1:02:19Bill Simmons?

  Cause it was appropriate, but yeah.

• 1:02:20Speaker 02

  That's, that's all fair.

• 1:02:22Bill Simmons?

  So you can't win if that guy is your best player.

• 1:02:28Bill Simmons?

  The only names I wrote down were Devin Booker and Jaylen Brown.

• 1:02:32Speaker 02

  Oh, wow.

• 1:02:33Bill Simmons?

  I went through the Ringer 100 and I was trying to figure out, cause the natural inclination of this is like, could you win a title now with Trey Young? It's like, I don't think so. Um, I think it would is-

• 1:02:43Speaker 02

  This is at the moment, this right now, not, uh, not, we're not talking about two years ago or-

• 1:02:49Bill Simmons?

  Talking about right now, this moment.

• 1:02:51Speaker 02

  I was gonna include Joel Embiid, but that's obviously ludicrous now.

• 1:02:57Bill Simmons?

  I think, I think that's okay. I think you could include that, cause that would seem improbable now, but also conceivable, right? Jaylen as the guy, cause ultimately what we're talking about here is I have a good team built around this one central force who will be able to get me baskets when I need them the most. This is the reason the Spurs didn't win. Um, they couldn't get baskets when they needed them the most. Ultimately, that's why they lost. Booker, I think is a really good one because I think his stock has slipped a little bit.

• 1:03:27Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:03:28Bill Simmons?

  And, um, and I'm sure Phoenix is now looking at what just happened with the Knicks, being like, we could do this here with Booker. We could build the same type of team over the next two, three years. Uh, chemistry, the secret, we just learned the secret from Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal, what not to do. And let's build a team around Booker and he can be our Brunson. Um, the only other one I was mildly intrigued by, but feel free to talk me out of this in two seconds. Shangoon?

• 1:03:59Speaker 02

  I don't think he's good enough.

• 1:04:00Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that's where I landed, but I

• 1:04:02Speaker 02

  For the conversation.

• 1:04:03Bill Simmons?

  Thought about it in my head. I thi- I think. I think that's the best.

• 1:04:10Bill Simmons?

  Kind of asset guy right now, who I feel like somebody could get. Like if I was Milwaukee, I would be looking at him. I thought he was in the worst possible state. He had no fucking point guard last year. On a team that had no three point shooting and had Kevin Durant with a burner scandal and

• 1:04:24Speaker 02

  It will always go down as one of the most curious set of decisions by the Houston Rockets. For a team that was, that seemed so prepared.

• 1:04:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:33Speaker 02

  Coming into the season, and as soon as F V V got hurt over the, over the summer. It's like they went into some kind of lockdown mode. I don't understand it. Like. You had a catastrophic thing happen. You were completely loading up. You have the head coach in place. Uh, with Eme, you, you, you brought Durant in. You're

• 1:04:54Bill Simmons?

  That's the thing. They had Durant in, so why are you tossing away the year?

• 1:04:57Speaker 02

  Right. Just nothing. We're just, we're just gonna, uh, uh, tread water and see if we can pull something out of our butts.

• 1:05:05Bill Simmons?

  Shangoon turns

• 1:05:06Speaker 02

  Weird to me.

• 1:05:07Bill Simmons?

  He turns 24 in July. Last season he was 29 and six assists a game. Shot 52% at a, without a point guard. I don't know. I feel like there's more there.

• 1:05:19Speaker 02

  Plus two picks to Milwaukee. Now you're talking. Like he, reminder to, to

• 1:05:23Bill Simmons?

  If I'm Milwaukee, I would rather have Shangoon and, and other stuff. For Yanis than that weird Miami offer. It's like, here's a bunch of our guys from our 41 win team. And some non lottery, non top 10 picks.

• 1:05:37Speaker 02

  There's literally nothing coming out of Miami that's of any interest whatsoever. Like I love Bam. Bam's good, but. It's, it's a, that's a bad, that's an average basketball team.

• 1:05:48Bill Simmons?

  Milwaukee called you and said Shangoon for Jabari, but you gotta say yes right now. And you have to take back Kuzma in the deal. Would you do it?

• 1:05:55Speaker 02

  Wait, wait, wait. Shangoon for who?

• 1:05:57Bill Simmons?

  For Jabari Smith and Shangoon. For Yanis. And Houston would also have to take. Kyle Kuzma's expiring as part of the deal. So Kuzma and Yanis for Shangoon and Jabari Smith.

• 1:06:09Speaker 02

  Could

• 1:06:10Bill Simmons?

  Would you rather have that than the Miami offer?

• 1:06:13Speaker 02

  A thousand percent. Not even close to me.

• 1:06:15Bill Simmons?

  I think I would too.

• 1:06:17Bill Simmons?

  Um.

• 1:06:20Bill Simmons?

  Jason from Ohio wants to know, after seeing the love and affection New York City's had for Brunson as the star that finally brought them the championship. Which player do you think has the most regret for not going to the Knicks and ending the drought when they had a chance? Is it LeBron, KD, or someone else? So this was the case, I remember writing a piece about this in 2010. That 2010, think about that.

• 1:06:46Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:06:46Bill Simmons?

  2010, saying this was the all time move for any NBA player. They had 16 more years of sadness after that. But we were saying like, this is the move for LeBron and Wade. You win a title in New York, that's the greatest thing you can do in the league.

• 1:07:02Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:07:02Bill Simmons?

  They ended up not going there. There's a lot of reasons for that, including the Knicks seem like kind of a mess. Donnie Walsh in the wheelchair, they made some weird sopranos video, all that stuff. And then KD and Kyrie in the, uh, in the summer of 2019.

• 1:07:18Bill Simmons?

  KD's coming off the Achilles. Kyrie wants to get out of Boston. KD wants to be in New York with Rich Kleiman and their whole business. I was doing pods saying, cause I, I knew they were going to be in New York. It was like, he's going to the Knicks, they're going to be in New York, not realizing that they were picking Brooklyn and not New York. Which one is worse to you, LeBron and Wade not going there or KD and Kyrie?

• 1:07:43Speaker 02

  I'm gonna say KD and Kyrie, just because the, um, the East is so, was so gettable. Like you could fast forward right into a bunch of finals, like a string of, of finals appearances with the, you know, the talent that, that they could have had in place there in, in, uh, in New York. I mean, you, you know, the big what if is the injury situation or surrounding Kyrie? Would he have gotten hurt with that same kind of frequency? I mean, you remember Durant was, you know, the only guy out of, uh, Harden, Kyrie, the only one that was healthy.

• 1:08:20Bill Simmons?

  They were a 17 win team heading into that free agency. Led by Tim Hardaway Jr., Kevin Knox, Dennis Smith, Emmanuel Mudiay.

• 1:08:35Bill Simmons?

  Enes Kanter.

• 1:08:36Speaker 02

  It was a great tank job.

• 1:08:37Bill Simmons?

  Noah Vonley.

• 1:08:38Speaker 02

  They were tanking. They tanked.

• 1:08:39Bill Simmons?

  Frank Nuslinka.

• 1:08:41Speaker 02

  They were going for the Zion sweepstakes.

• 1:08:43Bill Simmons?

  Mitchell Robinson was there. Luke Kornet was there. But they went to the Nets and made them kind of clear the house and do the whole thing. It's a really interesting KD what if. I don't know if they win the title with him, but think about how he is considered right now versus if they had gone, him and Kyrie together to the Knicks, rejuvenated MSG. Maybe Leon comes with West the next year anyway. Builds the right team around them.

• 1:09:09Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:09:11Bill Simmons?

  And maybe this all happens for those two guys. It is a pretty good what if.

• 1:09:14Speaker 02

  That's a great one because think of that, right? That the magnetism of those two guys coming and what that does in terms of the incentive for other people in the league. Everybody loves the bright lights of MSG. Everybody wants to be the king of New York. Those guys' miscalculation was that Brooklyn was going to be a thing. Brooklyn is never going to be a thing. It's not a thing now. It wasn't a thing back then, and it's never going to be a thing.

• 1:09:39Bill Simmons?

  Think about the next four East title winners after that, after they went to Brooklyn. 2020 Miami, unbelievable COVID season. 2021 Milwaukee, which was a good team. I mean, Middleton, that was the best year he's had. Drew Holiday, Giannis. They had their role players. Connaughton was good that year. 2022, a very young Celtics team that probably wasn't ready.

• 1:10:05Speaker 02

  Not ready.

• 1:10:06Bill Simmons?

  2023, the Heat again. Like KD, Kyrie, and a couple other people could happen. Now Kyrie did get a little little cuckoo there for a couple of years.

• 1:10:19Speaker 02

  There was all kinds of stuff.

• 1:10:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, and I think he settled into a better, much better place. I actually like everything that Kyrie is saying and doing the last couple of years, but he was getting a little weird there.

• 1:10:31Speaker 02

  We're going to have a new round of Kyrie sweepstakes this upcoming season. It's going to be one of the fun storylines this summer.

• 1:10:37Bill Simmons?

  At least the KD staying there and Brunson moving in there. Who knows? But it is a pretty good one. James, who says, love the pod. Thanks, James. With Brunson winning a title in NYC, my friends and I, New York natives, have been debating, who is the top dog of the city? The debate falls largely on Jeter versus Brunson while Frazier edged in stone. I introduced the backroom theory. Essentially, Jeter and Brunson walk into a restaurant at the same time. Who does the owner give the backroom to? This is just a great way of framing Brunson versus Jeter, and I'm gonna throw Aaron Judge in there, too. Let's give those number one. But say Aaron Judge is there, too, and all of them, there's one backroom for 10, 10 seats. Who gets it? I think Brunson gets it now.

• 1:11:21Speaker 02

  You don't think the owner says, guys, can we share? Would you, would you guys be willing to share the room?

• 1:11:24Bill Simmons?

  No, each of them have nine people with them.

• 1:11:27Speaker 02

  Well, some of, some of them, like, you know, I would be, it would be like you and I don't know who your equivalent is going in there. And then, and then I, like, I, if I, I would get kicked out. Like, some of the entourage has to go sit out.

• 1:11:39Bill Simmons?

  No, they would see you and be like, oh, Joe House is here. That's gonna run the bill up by $2,000.

• 1:11:45Speaker 02

  Fair enough. Fair enough.

• 1:11:47Bill Simmons?

  I think it's Brunson. I think Jeter lost his spot. He had it for, from the late 90s to now. I think it's over.

• 1:11:53Speaker 02

  There's a, there's a generation, I, I, we should ask Jacko. I feel like there might be a generation now that might not remember the greatness of Derek Jeter. Is that possible?

• 1:12:05Bill Simmons?

  It's a long time.

• 1:12:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:12:07Bill Simmons?

  His last World Series, they won in 2000, and then they had the tainted 2009 title.

• 1:12:14Bill Simmons?

  Here's a great one. Scott Cameron. By the way, Judge wins the World Series, and now him versus Brunson is an argument, but he hasn't. Scott Cameron writes, Brunson just became only the third under six foot three guard, along with Isaiah and Gus Williams, to be the best player in a title team. Where does that put him in the small guard pantheon? I, I bring this question up, and I'll answer it in a second. I left out Gus Williams last weekend, and I feel really bad about that. He also wasn't in the pyramid of my book. Um, and I feel bad about that, too, and I think it's one of my big misses because, I went back and made a playoff MVP list at one point. I think he was the 79 playoff MVP. He was the best guy in the 79 champs.

• 1:12:58Bill Simmons?

  He averaged 26.7 points a game during that playoffs. He has a first team All NBA, second and two thirds. He was fifth in MVP voting in 82. He made finals, finals, Eastern Conference Finals, three straight years, held out 80, 81. He's the best point guard in the league from 78 to 82 for five years. He's the best point guard in the league and then Magic takes it.

• 1:13:22Bill Simmons?

  And then ends up on your beloved Wizards team, but I, I feel like I've done a bad job keeping the Gus legacy alive. I know you loved him too.

• 1:13:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, for sure. And, and when you do the, the resume, um, it, it's just that, that was such a quiet moment for the league.

• 1:13:37Bill Simmons?

  I know, and I think I penalized them for that. Yeah. And it was like Walton wasn't there. It's like, you can't do it. So if you're going to praise Brunson, you can't just discount Gus Williams, you know? So I, I feel like I did a bad job. Anyway, the, uh, small guard pantheon. It's Brunson, Isaiah, Gus Williams and Tony Parker with titles.

• 1:13:56Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:13:57Bill Simmons?

  And then Iverson and Dame and Chris Paul.

• 1:14:01Speaker 02

  Wait, where's Tiny Archibald in this?

• 1:14:03Bill Simmons?

  Tiny can be there too. I'm just saying those are the four guys with titles. So I think if you're doing a pantheon, small guard pantheon, you do the titles and non titles. So maybe the non titles is Iverson, Dame, Chris Paul, Tiny Archibald.

• 1:14:17Speaker 02

  Okay, okay.

• 1:14:18Bill Simmons?

  Although Tiny Archibald did win a title in 1981. So maybe he should be on there too.

• 1:14:25Bill Simmons?

  It's to, to me, it's Brunson and Isaiah, but I think Gus Williams.

• 1:14:30Bill Simmons?

  As the, I think that's, you gotta start with those three and I, I again, apologies to Gus. Ethan wants to know where I planned on putting OG and Inobi in my Ringer Top 100. That there's a case that he should be top 25 or higher. Best non-senator defender in the league, really good offense. If you secured your number one awesome superstar, isn't he the perfect number two? Perfect compliment, all time winning basketball player coming off a great, uh, playoffs. I handed my Ringer 100, I had OG 17th.

• 1:15:05Speaker 02

  Oh my God.

• 1:15:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:06Speaker 02

  What?

• 1:15:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:07Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:15:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. You know what I like, House? Winning.

• 1:15:10Speaker 02

  Is he, is he ahead of Cat in, in what you just handed in?

• 1:15:14Bill Simmons?

  You know where I had Cat? 11th.

• 1:15:16Speaker 02

  Oh, okay. All right. Whew. All right. I mean, all right. Okay. Fine.

• 1:15:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:21Speaker 02

  Um.

• 1:15:22Bill Simmons?

  I saw three Knicks in the top 20, and I think that's the right call.

• 1:15:26Speaker 02

  Yeah. Again, when I was looking at over the course of the regular season, OG was always in the like the 40 range. Now, he was consistently ahead of De'Aaron Fox, which I felt I was glad that, that, you know, to look at the rankings and see that. Um, but the, the only thing ever with OG is availability. Like, you know, he, it's just the, the injury stuff. Now, congrats to the Knicks.

• 1:15:47Bill Simmons?

  In the playoffs, we felt.

• 1:15:48Speaker 02

  Of course, of course. That's right. Um, congrats to the Knicks. Congrats to OG. That he, we got all the way through. Um, he was able to get himself completely healthy for the finals run. It was a thrill to see him at, at his, at his peak, his basketball IQ. This is the thing that, that we should also laud this, this Knicks teams for. Well, the reason that they had the highest point differential is because the, they had the highest level of decision makers. Yes, Cat with the dumb foul trouble would always be something that you can point to. I would also say that he was getting picked on. I mean, the two fouls at the beginning of, of game four were to me ludicrous, but look, uh, that's setting all that aside. OG, um.

• 1:16:33Bill Simmons?

  How about the OG fifth foul in game, game five? They didn't even replay that, I don't think.

• 1:16:38Speaker 02

  No, I know. I know.

• 1:16:39Bill Simmons?

  Scott Foster's, I got fifth foul.

• 1:16:41Speaker 02

  An all time big brain. OG. So great. Congrats. Great job.

• 1:16:46Bill Simmons?

  Matt from LA wrote, um, that I said OG is the best three and D guy of the era. And he's like, what about early Spurs Kawhi Leonard?

• 1:16:55Speaker 02

  Fine.

• 1:16:56Bill Simmons?

  Best defensive player in the league. Sat in the corner, shot threes, crashed a glass. So I was looking at the three, three and D only really goes back to 2009. Trevor Ariza was the first like impactful, and it was really only in the finals, but had a really good three and D finals. It was the first time Posey was in there. There was a couple like.

• 1:17:14Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:17:15Bill Simmons?

  Three and D adjacent, but not like what we have now. I was looking, I went through all the title teams trying to figure out the best. Like there's 2023 KCP, there's a couple Danny Greens, but they're all like 11 points a game in that range and didn't take a lot of field goals. It is 14 Kawhi and 26 OG. These are the playoff stats.

• 1:17:36Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:17:37Bill Simmons?

  OG was 20 points a game, 20.1 points a game. His percentages were 56 field goal, 49 free, 85 free throw. He only took 11.6 field goal attempts a game and averaged 20.1 points. 2014 Kawhi, 14 points a game, 10.4 field goal attempts, so only one less shot a game. 51, 42, 74 percentages. So they're around the same. It's just, he took less threes than OG did, but it's a good one. Now Kawhi was guarding LeBron. OG,

• 1:18:11Bill Simmons?

  I guess was, was guarding the guards on the Spurs. He didn't have a LeBron type assignment, but that they're 1A and 1B. I'm not, Kawhi won the finals MVP. OG had the most famous play in basketball in the last 10 years.

• 1:18:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, let's just have them side by side. That's good.

• 1:18:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I think it's side by side. I don't want to pick between that. Okay. I'm glad you agree.

• 1:18:34Bill Simmons?

  A couple more Brunsons. This is from D Bob in New York.

• 1:18:38Speaker 02

  Okay, D.

• 1:18:39Bill Simmons?

  Brunson and the Knicks are now the ninth team out of 80 champs not to have a top five player.

• 1:18:47Bill Simmons?

  26 Knicks, 14 Spurs, 04 Pistons, 88 and 89 Pistons, 79 Sonics, 78 Bullets, 73 Knicks. And he threw the 48 Bullets in there for us.

• 1:18:58Speaker 02

  Thank you, D Bob.

• 1:18:59Bill Simmons?

  Um, basically he's saying going by MVP votes or first team MVP.

• 1:19:05Bill Simmons?

  He suggests, can we have a, can we get rid of the can't win a title without a top five player rule? If nine of 80 champions didn't have a top five player.

• 1:19:17Bill Simmons?

  That's like 14%.

• 1:19:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:19:20Bill Simmons?

  My counter is that I would argue Brunson now is a top five player and maybe he doesn't count for this one. 14 Spurs was really the last one where we were like, I don't even know who, do they have a top 10 player? But I think Brunson, it's Joker, SGA Brunson, Wemby and Luca, probably in that order.

• 1:19:38Bill Simmons?

  Or Wemby over Brunson, however you want to do it. But those are the five best players in the league right now.

• 1:19:43Speaker 02

  True. Yes.

• 1:19:45Bill Simmons?

  But do you, do you think, are you ready to dump that rule though? Because that did make me think.

• 1:19:50Speaker 02

  No, because it's 86%.

• 1:19:53Bill Simmons?

  Right, the other way. I was thinking about doing a playoff manifesto. I was gonna do a playoff manifesto for basketball next year and I think that would be one of, like their suggestions, they're not set in stone, but I think that is a good one to look at because that is once a decade.

• 1:20:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, right. There you go. Once a decade.

• 1:20:10Bill Simmons?

  So, once a decade, something weird happens. This is basically the way to look at it. Jonathan in Jersey wants to know, wants us to know, guess who has the most playoff wins for a player since 2021? It's no longer Brown or Tatum or Marney Celtic. It's Jalen Brunson at 51.

• 1:20:25Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:20:25Bill Simmons?

  Greatest playoff performer of the decade so far. That helps the, the pyramid case. All right. We're gonna take one more break and then I have a lot of Spurs fan, Spurs emails that you're gonna enjoy.

• 1:20:35Speaker 02

  Oh, boy.

• 1:20:36Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by Sony Pictures Classics. A perfect crime film, says the Daily Beast. John Tortore gives a career best performance. Don't miss the acclaimed new thriller, The Only Living Pickpocket in New York. Tortore stars as an aging master pickpocket, whose latest score puts him in the crosshairs of a ruthless crime family. It's also starring Giancarlo Esposito, Tatiana Maslany, Will Price, and our guy, Steve Buscemi. See the film that the LA Times calls instantly classic, The Only Living Pickpocket in New York. Opens in theaters October 23rd in New York and Los Angeles, nationwide October 30th. All right, quick break. This episode is brought to you by Fire TV. You ever sit down

• 1:21:18Bill Simmons?

  ready to watch the game only to search and scroll endlessly? If so, you need Fire TV. It shows your live games from your favorite teams all in one place, right on the home screen. No more searching. Just sit down and turn on Fire TV. Separate subscriptions may be required. Feature and content availability may vary. David wants to know, game five, did the rich New York asshole fans just indecent proposal the entire city of San Antonio?

• 1:21:47Speaker 02

  Wait a minute, what's the, walk me through it.

• 1:21:50Bill Simmons?

  Remember indecent proposal?

• 1:21:51Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:21:52Bill Simmons?

  Redford, Woody Harrelson and Demi Moore need money.

• 1:21:55Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:21:55Bill Simmons?

  They're in Vegas gambling and Robert Redford becomes infatuated with Demi Moore and he's like, I'll pay you a million dollars for a night with your wife and then they argue about it and decide to do it and she does it. That's basically all the Spurs fans with their game five tickets.

• 1:22:11Bill Simmons?

  There's 45% Knicks fans there.

• 1:22:13Speaker 02

  I saw.

• 1:22:14Bill Simmons?

  You're able to pay for your season tickets by doing it, but it is, I do like the indecent proposal game is a pretty funny way to do game five.

• 1:22:22Speaker 02

  Really good.

• 1:22:24Bill Simmons?

  Mike G wants to know, um, 2026 Knicks best example of the secret since the 14 Spurs. How many other teams would you say fully embodied the secret as well?

• 1:22:41Bill Simmons?

  I thought the 16 Cavs kind of got there.

• 1:22:44Speaker 02

  Sure, sure. I, I mean.

• 1:22:47Bill Simmons?

  I really respect the, the, I know there was Draymond suspension, but winning that game seven in Golden State and

• 1:22:53Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:22:53Bill Simmons?

  Richard Jefferson and Kevin Love like playing date like, I thought that, I don't think they got there the whole playoffs, but I think they got there in those last three games. But every team embraces it to some degree. The 14 Spurs is the most famous one, I think in the last 12.

• 1:23:09Speaker 02

  Sure, that's fine. Um.

• 1:23:11Bill Simmons?

  And the 11 Mavs I would put up there too.

• 1:23:13Speaker 02

  We're really splitting fine hairs to me because every one of like the, the 23 Nuggets.

• 1:23:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, 23 Nuggets is a good one.

• 1:23:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's pretty good. Like, you know, they really understood, uh, and Joker is the facilitator of, of, uh, the secret, right? You don't, who, who do you want touching the ball, um, to administer the secret?

• 1:23:31Bill Simmons?

  17 Warriors had it.

• 1:23:33Speaker 02

  Joker.

• 1:23:33Bill Simmons?

  The thing is every, every champion has the secret to some degree.

• 1:23:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:23:37Bill Simmons?

  There's two teams that feel like they won because of the secret in the last 13 years, the Knicks.

• 1:23:44Speaker 02

  That's fine.

• 1:23:44Bill Simmons?

  Spurs where it was like, one of the top two reasons they won.

• 1:23:49Speaker 02

  Fine.

• 1:23:49Bill Simmons?

  Um, I think 11 Mavs are up there. I would put the 04 Pistons there.

• 1:23:54Speaker 02

  Good.

• 1:23:54Bill Simmons?

  Um.

• 1:23:55Speaker 02

  Agree.

• 1:23:56Bill Simmons?

  That's probably it.

• 1:23:57Speaker 02

  It's fine.

• 1:24:02Bill Simmons?

  Travis from San Antonio said, salty Spurs fan here.

• 1:24:08Bill Simmons?

  Watching Fox in the finals was as painful as it can get. It had me wondering, what are the worst finals performances from the highest paid guy on the team? I did not send this to you. I did the research, though.

• 1:24:21Bill Simmons?

  Fox was 13, 3 and 6. He shot 34%, 25% from 3.

• 1:24:28Bill Simmons?

  Got torched by Brunson on the other end and then had the game four brain fart.

• 1:24:35Bill Simmons?

  I'm not ready to put 2016 Curry in there. I do think some people would.

• 1:24:41Bill Simmons?

  23 a game. He was 40 and 40, 40, 89 shooting splits. He played a bad game seven. I don't think he was bad for the series.

• 1:24:52Bill Simmons?

  These five, I think, are in the combo.

• 1:24:56Bill Simmons?

  I'll go backwards from further sway. 1993 Kevin Johnson, mentioned earlier, 17 points a game. Just absolutely murdered them in the first two games. It's got to the point where Frank Johnson seemed like a better option for him in the series.

• 1:25:10Speaker 02

  I remember this, yes.

• 1:25:11Bill Simmons?

  My mind went there immediately. Stats backed it up. Nick Anderson with the four free throws that he missed. For the series, 12 points a game, 36% shooting, 3 for 10 free throws. And just got wiped out. So he has to be mentioned. There's a great, this one got lost to history, but Kevin Martin, I'm sorry, Kenyon Martin in the 2003 finals against Duncan. When Duncan ran amok and one of the great start to finish seasons anyone's had. He destroyed Kenyon Martin in the first couple of games of this series. Kenyon Martin for the series was 14 and 10, 34% field goals. We made a lot of jokes as it was happening.

• 1:25:46Speaker 02

  I don't think it was really his fault, though.

• 1:25:49Bill Simmons?

  He got destroyed by that. He took a lot of shit that series. I'm just saying.

• 1:25:52Speaker 02

  I know, but.

• 1:25:55Bill Simmons?

  He was going against Tim Duncan, the seventh best player of all time. Kobe Bryant, 2004 finals against the Pistons.

• 1:26:02Speaker 02

  Wow, that's funny. Of course, you had to do that.

• 1:26:07Speaker 02

  You're not, the premise here, though, was like, highest paid. It's not just naming famous guys.

• 1:26:14Bill Simmons?

  Worst finals, performance from highest paid guys.

• 1:26:17Speaker 02

  So that Kenny Martin.

• 1:26:18Bill Simmons?

  Kenny Martin was the highest paid guy on that Nets team.

• 1:26:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, for sure. Okay, I get that. But Kobe in 2004, okay, all right, all right.

• 1:26:25Bill Simmons?

  Can I give you the stats?

• 1:26:26Speaker 02

  Go ahead.

• 1:26:27Bill Simmons?

  They lost in five. Forty-six minutes a game. Twenty-three points a game. Three assists a game. Thirty-eight percent shooting, seventeen percent from three. He was three for twenty-three from three.

• 1:26:43Bill Simmons?

  And kind of got his ass kicked by the Pistons. Now, the Laker fans, I've heard the spin from the Laker fans on this. Shaq was out of shape.

• 1:26:51Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:26:52Bill Simmons?

  Kobe had to take a lot of shots near the end of shot clock possessions. I'm just saying. He has to be mentioned. But the worst one ever is LeBron in 2011.

• 1:27:03Speaker 02

  Oh, wow, okay.

• 1:27:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:04Speaker 02

  Okay, all right.

• 1:27:06Bill Simmons?

  He dipped down, he was like a twenty-seven, twenty-eight points a game guy. He dipped down to eighteen a game. Eighteen, seven, and seven, thirty-two percent from three, twelve for twenty from the free throw line, and famously had the eight-point game in game four. He was being guarded by J.J. Barea and really felt like he melted down in a bunch of different ways, to a point that we started to wonder. Is this gonna happen? Do we put too much pressure on him? Then he bounces back the next year and goes on his run. But I think I think that that's probably the worst one, other than Nick Anderson. What would you say?

• 1:27:42Speaker 02

  Um, well, was Nick Anderson at that point? That's the other one. Was he, he was paid at the top of that Orlando team?

• 1:27:49Bill Simmons?

  Nick Anderson was not, and he shouldn't be in the conversation, but I just wanted to talk about how terrible of a finals he had. Kevin, Kevin Johnson versus Barkley is probably even.

• 1:27:59Speaker 02

  Yeah. Um, I mean, Kevin Johnson made more than Marley at that point, right?

• 1:28:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, so he's in the top two. But yeah, if you're talking highest, highest paid, it's Kmart, Kobe, and LeBron. But I wanted to mention Kevin Johnson and.

• 1:28:13Speaker 02

  De'Aaron Fox by default is the highest paid Spur?

• 1:28:17Bill Simmons?

  It's the highest paid Spur. It's just a fact.

• 1:28:19Speaker 02

  He's the highest paid Spur.

• 1:28:22Speaker 02

  I am going to again, mount a gentle defense for Fox.

• 1:28:26Bill Simmons?

  I love this. Cause you want the Wizards to trade for him.

• 1:28:29Speaker 02

  No, no, I definitely do not want that. But he missed a whole bunch of playoff games. He was missing games because he had a leg injury. He had an ankle injury.

• 1:28:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:39Speaker 02

  And it is not that uncommon for a guy to come off of an ankle injury and to not shoot the ball well. Now, the challenge is the moment called for the highest level, all of the shots that became available.

• 1:28:54Bill Simmons?

  That's a Mitch Johnson problem then.

• 1:28:56Speaker 02

  That's right. I agree. It's more of a Mitch Johnson problem than the Aaron Fox blame circle to me. If I'm handing out slices of blame pie. The, the, what, the way the Knicks played second half defense especially is, and, and fourth quarter defense. What was open was a mid-range jumper for whoever had the ball. And that mid-range jumper, the bug, the guy with the ball at the end of games was De'Aaron Fox. And he missed nearly every effing one of them. I mean, and that's the, the, why you have salty Spurs fans writing in.

• 1:29:26Bill Simmons?

  Next year will be Lori Markkinen banging them down.

• 1:29:30Speaker 02

  That is a really good trade. It's really good.

• 1:29:33Bill Simmons?

  You're gonna love this next email. And I almost sent it to you, but I wanted your natural reaction live on the podcast. It's from Todd Womack.

• 1:29:42Bill Simmons?

  He writes, he's French, he's cheesy, and he melted down. Wemby's nickname should be fondue. Put it out there, Bill.

• 1:29:51Speaker 02

  I love it.

• 1:29:53Bill Simmons?

  He's 22 and this is probably the low point of his career, but the big fondue is pretty funny.

• 1:29:59Speaker 02

  Somebody, you know, part of the rich experience of these finals was after each game, trying to imagine what the New York Post might run as their cover thing. And one of the after game four, my two favorites, they didn't go with either one of them was just the tip for OG come flying in. That was magnificent. I heard that from many quarters, including my boy, my boy, Peter Friedman gave me that one. Uh, and then Sacre blew it. That was somebody on, on the internet who had, had, uh, I'm in your, I'm in your head, Wemby. On the floor yelling at Mitchell Robinson, doing that thing. And then the headline was Sacre blew it like.

• 1:30:38Bill Simmons?

  Wow.

• 1:30:39Speaker 02

  Oh, thanks. God damn magnificent. I don't remember who put that on the.

• 1:30:43Bill Simmons?

  The big fondue would have been a good post, post.

• 1:30:46Speaker 02

  Well, let's keep going. The big, that's great. There's no reason to get off of it.

• 1:30:49Bill Simmons?

  Do you like fondue Wemby or the big fondue?

• 1:30:52Speaker 02

  I like the big fondue better.

• 1:30:53Bill Simmons?

  I want to get all these jokes going because he's going to wreak havoc on the league and the angrier he gets. The more fun the next seven seasons will be.

• 1:31:01Speaker 02

  This is what makes next season, this upcoming season so goddamn magnificent. How many times did Knicks go right the fuck at him? He's like, O G Onanobe is like, I'm gonna dunk on this bitch. I'm gonna dunk on him.

• 1:31:12Bill Simmons?

  Brunson clip in the second half, there was a slow mo version of it. Was one of his baskets in the fourth quarter. Wemby gets switched on him. And Brunson does like, he does the Brunson thing where he seems like he's going to go left, crosses over. Gets Wemby on his side and Wemby's like sprawling around. It looks like a deer on ice. Gets Wemby on his side, then cuts in like he's gonna try to get a foul on Wemby. So Wemby kind of stops and he does this thing again. And then Brunson cuts the other way. Wemby's flails the other way to go get him and then Brunson comes back and does a left flip. It's like.

• 1:31:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:31:47Bill Simmons?

  In slow motion, it's like one of the great clips I've ever seen in basketball and it's like everything you need to know about how great Jalen Brunson is. Just fucking working a seven foot six guy.

• 1:31:56Speaker 02

  He was cooking up the fondue. It's amazing.

• 1:31:59Bill Simmons?

  Fondue chef.

• 1:32:01Speaker 02

  This is good.

• 1:32:02Bill Simmons?

  Before we moved to LA, my wife and I went to Montreal.

• 1:32:05Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:32:05Bill Simmons?

  And we went to a.

• 1:32:06Speaker 02

  Wonderful city, Montreal.

• 1:32:07Bill Simmons?

  We went to a fondue restaurant.

• 1:32:09Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:32:10Bill Simmons?

  And we just ate fondue and it was like one of the great, most memorable dinners I've had. It was like just fondue, just.

• 1:32:17Speaker 02

  There was a chain of those.

• 1:32:18Bill Simmons?

  Going nuts on fondue.

• 1:32:20Speaker 02

  There used to be a chain. It was like called the hot pot. I can't remember now. Uh, it was like a.

• 1:32:25Bill Simmons?

  Have we had fondue together?

• 1:32:28Speaker 02

  I don't think we've ever had fondue together. That's amazing. How have we not had fondue?

• 1:32:32Bill Simmons?

  I wonder if Chang has fondue thoughts.

• 1:32:34Speaker 02

  Let's do this.

• 1:32:35Bill Simmons?

  I'm going to dinner with Chang tonight. I'm going to talk fondue with Chang. You're missing it because you live here.

• 1:32:40Speaker 02

  Manifest it.

• 1:32:42Bill Simmons?

  Cam from North Carolina. I got a bunch of different versions of this question. We'll go with Cam. Is Wemby the quickest hero to villain arc in sports history? I think you can make the case, the finals alone changed how people looked at him entirely. Like even SGA that happened over the course of the season and in the playoffs. Then Chris from DC. He added, um, he added, Wemby walked into June as the consensus future face of the league and walked out of it as the most unlikable man in the sport. I went in rooting for this guy hard. I came out wondering if he's the most punchable player since peak Draymond.

• 1:33:18Bill Simmons?

  And then Kevin said, um, has anyone in history pulled off the difficult feat of going from emerging face of the league to man, this guy's a fucking jackoff. In less than two weeks. Um, Nathan Stewart wants to know, is Wemby a fake tough guy? He comes across like the villain in a teen movie, always smiling and acting like the perfect kid when the adults are watching, but playing dirty and trying to bully people and no one's looking.

• 1:33:44Bill Simmons?

  It just keeps going and going.

• 1:33:45Speaker 02

  Phenomenal.

• 1:33:47Bill Simmons?

  This is the sentiment right now. This is why I said to Zach Lowe on Saturday night, when I was talking about face of the league, future of the league, Wemby's here. And it was like, this was kind of a catastrophe for all those angles. I think it was. It wasn't a catastrophe for his career. He's 22. He's got his whole career. I'm not overreacting to that. This is part of the process. It was just interesting to watch the perception of him shift that fast, right?

• 1:34:10Speaker 02

  Well, here's the thing, and uh, I want to sit, take a couple of steps back and see as we approach the next season, whether this still holds true. I think there is, there's never been a more pronounced kind of experience of NBA basketball than this moment. I think he's absolutely beloved by kids around my age, by teenage kids, uh, and, and, and, and younger. They will all. Universally tell you that they love Wemby and they they are not like.

• 1:34:41Bill Simmons?

  My son loves Wemby, same thing.

• 1:34:43Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:34:43Bill Simmons?

  And he's 18, he's a little older than your boy.

• 1:34:45Speaker 02

  How many games did he sit down and watch from the beginning to the end of these NBA finals? I mean, I could tell you for my kid, none, zero. He, my kid doesn't sit down and watch, you know, games all the way through.

• 1:34:54Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:34:54Speaker 02

  He comes in, I make him come in to watch fourth quarters for me. But nothing about what went down in these finals changes his perspective when it comes to to to Wemby. And and you know, the reverence, he, I can't tell you how many times this big dummy kept coming to me. Dad, how far away is Wemby from the GOAT? I'm like, you gotta get, you gotta leave the room right now. Cause I do not want to be responsible for child abuse, but I will hit a man if you keep talking to me that way. I even if it's a young man, but I mean, that's, that's, there is we out the, the, the, the basketball commentary. Everybody in our echo chamber writ large, all of New York, all of New York hates Wemby now.

• 1:35:35Speaker 02

  I mean, it's wonderful to have him as a villain, but I think there is still yet amongst this generation that's coming up. As NBA fans consuming the NBA, not by watching games, but by consuming it on the internet. That will still hold Wemby in the highest regard.

• 1:35:50Bill Simmons?

  Honestly, similar to us with Jordan.

• 1:35:53Speaker 02

  Maybe.

• 1:35:54Bill Simmons?

  We were in college together, we love Jordan, we love them. But when they play, when they played the Lakers in 91, I was like, he's gonna lose, he's not ready for this yet. Is it Magic, the old guys, they're gonna teach, teach that Michael Jordan a lesson. And this is part of the process, you gotta get your teeth kicked in early. You gotta climb the ladder rungs and then you gotta get to where you're gonna get. I will read these two emails, though.

• 1:36:18Speaker 02

  Melting Pot, that was the name of the fondue place, I didn't look it up, I knew I could get it, The Melting Pot, keep going, sorry.

• 1:36:25Bill Simmons?

  Michael from Chicago, can't help but think Wemby is pulling a 98 Karl Malone.

• 1:36:29Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 1:36:30Bill Simmons?

  Clutch free throws aren't going in, tentative to shoot, didn't seem like he totally wanted the ball. Not to say he'll never have it, but he just doesn't have it yet. Might be mean or unfair, but here we are. He's 22.

• 1:36:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:36:43Bill Simmons?

  This criticism I agree with.

• 1:36:48Bill Simmons?

  After what, this is from KJ. After watching the playoffs, I knew two things about Wemby. He's either seven foot five, seven foot six, or seven foot seven.

• 1:36:56Speaker 02

  Agreed.

• 1:36:58Bill Simmons?

  I think he's seven, seven, but they're claiming seven, five, but he's probably really seven, six. That's the first thing. Second one, he's gassed at the end of these games. Has there ever been a 22-year-old superstar who was always gassed at the end of big games? Magic certainly wasn't. Jordan Bird, Wilt, Russell, Kobe, Duncan, you get the picture.

• 1:37:16Speaker 02

  Wrong.

• 1:37:16Bill Simmons?

  This is it.

• 1:37:17Speaker 02

  This is dead wrong.

• 1:37:18Bill Simmons?

  Who do you have?

• 1:37:19Speaker 02

  Go ahead.

• 1:37:19Bill Simmons?

  Shaq?

• 1:37:20Speaker 02

  No, no, I'm not, I'm not, go ahead. I will finish the point.

• 1:37:23Bill Simmons?

  That's it, that's it, that's it.

• 1:37:24Speaker 02

  Okay. Um, we, we began this entire time together, this wonderful time on this Monday post NBA finals, talking about, you know, some of the ways that the Knicks took advantage of, of the Spurs. I think it, it is a learned skill. Part of what is, is involved with this version of the Spurs. None of those guys ever played this level of basketball under these circumstances. These are the highest leverage mo- exactly. The highest leverage moments of their entire lives on a basketball court. Now, Wemby did get the Olympics. You know what the difference between the Olympics and the NBA is? The Olympics, it's the games for 40 minutes. They're not 48 minutes.

• 1:38:09Bill Simmons?

  Two and a half weeks.

• 1:38:11Speaker 02

  Big, big breaks in between games. This, this version, and that's why I said earlier, I, it's a learned skill. It's a skill. You have to, and you have to, uh, not just the individual players understanding when to expend energy and when, and when not to. You don't win the game in the first quarter or the second quarter, like all of those kinds of lessons.

• 1:38:32Bill Simmons?

  You don't celebrate the Western Conference Finals like you won the title.

• 1:38:37Speaker 02

  Well, that, that was fine. I mean, this was, that was unexpected and their, their target all along was Oklahoma City. We know this from, from the way that they win at Oklahoma City all season long.

• 1:38:47Bill Simmons?

  My biggest regret was I dis- I discounted how they reacted after they beat OKC.

• 1:38:53Speaker 02

  In your own handicapping of how this Knicks Spurs.

• 1:38:56Bill Simmons?

  I thought they had a better team than New York. I thought they had the perfect team to go against Brunson and I was right for three and a half games. But what I discounted was they'd kind of already climbed the mountain, whereas the Knicks were like icy fucking older veterans. Who were like, this next series is the one. And that Spurs, I don't think I ever realized that until it was too late.

• 1:39:16Speaker 02

  How else are they gonna, they can't learn it. That this is the reason why, you know, it's a very, very unique thing that we experienced this year. Where we kept saying, is this the moment where we see the Spurs inexperience catch up to them? It wasn't until they made it to the finals and went against the Knicks. I don't think there's any other team in the entire NBA. Except for maybe a fully healthy Oklahoma City. If Oklahoma City hadn't undergone the injuries they experienced with Mitchell and J-Dub. Exactly right. Then where would that have ended up?

• 1:39:47Bill Simmons?

  But they kind of had, they kind of had OKC's number. I think what was interesting about this one is like Castle lost confidence as the finals went along. Now, you could have said it was the moment, it was the, how many minutes they played in the playoffs, but those last two games, he, he went sideways, you know?

• 1:40:03Speaker 02

  He did not shoot the ball well. He didn't shoot, but I mean, again.

• 1:40:06Bill Simmons?

  Foul trouble in game four and then game five was kind of afraid to do stuff, but this is all part of the learning experience. All right.

• 1:40:12Speaker 02

  We agree.

• 1:40:13Bill Simmons?

  This next question from Ethan is a good one, though. Eighty years of NBA history tells us that if you make the finals this young and lose, you probably won't make it back with the same iteration of that team.

• 1:40:25Bill Simmons?

  He lists eighty-six Rockets, Hakeem and Sampson, didn't get back there until ninety-four. Shaq and Penny in ninety-five, never happened again. LeBron in oh-seven, never won in Cleveland.

• 1:40:39Speaker 02

  Well, until sixteen.

• 1:40:41Bill Simmons?

  But came back and it was, he was the only same guy on the team and had to leave for four years.

• 1:40:46Speaker 02

  Fair, fair.

• 1:40:47Bill Simmons?

  And they had to rig three lotteries for him. Did I say that aloud? KD, Russ, Harden.

• 1:40:56Bill Simmons?

  That was a joke. KD, KD, Russ Harden and Ibaka in 2011 traded Harden, never got it back. Interesting. So this is once a decade, 86, 95, 07 and 11. And now the Spurs would, I guess, be the next example in 26. There's two outliers for this. The 22 Celtics, they lose the finals. Everyone's ready to trade JB for whoever. And they make it in two years later and they win with the same nucleus. They have Derrick White, they have Pritchard, they have Horford still. And they have the Jays. Well, they get, they get, they add Porzingis and they add Drew Holiday. But they had a lot of the same nucleus. So that's an outlier.

• 1:41:41Bill Simmons?

  And then the 79 Sonics, they make the 78 finals, they lose game seven. Dennis Johnson goes, I think, 0 for 11 in game seven, but then they win the next year against your team. So interesting theory, though. Didn't make me go, huh?

• 1:41:58Speaker 02

  What can the Spurs do? Because I think this is the version of the Spurs that we're going to see for the next couple of years. There aren't like huge swings.

• 1:42:07Bill Simmons?

  Become the guy we think he is and build the right team.

• 1:42:10Speaker 02

  That far away, but the

• 1:42:13Speaker 02

  support the idea that it may not come next year, that it might not even be two years from now. Is how good the West is. We still have these.

• 1:42:21Bill Simmons?

  And injuries.

• 1:42:22Speaker 02

  Yeah. Well, sure. Yes. Always injuries, especially with Wemby.

• 1:42:25Bill Simmons?

  Coach Steve has a Spurs overreaction trade.

• 1:42:29Speaker 02

  Oh, right.

• 1:42:31Bill Simmons?

  The Warriors received De'Aaron Fox, pick number 20 and Mitch Johnson. The Spurs received Jimmy Butler's expiring and Steve Kerr.

• 1:42:40Speaker 02

  Wow. Wow.

• 1:42:44Bill Simmons?

  I gotta say, I kind of thought about this for a couple of minutes and I landed in a really good place with it.

• 1:42:49Speaker 02

  This sounds very petty. Coach Steve must be from San Antonio. That is a very petty trade.

• 1:42:54Bill Simmons?

  So Steve Kerr, you're, you're buying low on Mitch Johnson. But younger guy moving in, maybe, you know, maybe learns, got some scars in the finals. You get pick 20.

• 1:43:05Speaker 02

  We know that Kerr loves.

• 1:43:07Bill Simmons?

  Expiring and Steve Kerr gets to go back to San Antonio. I like.

• 1:43:09Speaker 02

  Well, not only that, he loves Steph, but who, what coach would say no to the opportunity to coach up Wemby?

• 1:43:16Bill Simmons?

  I'm just.

• 1:43:17Speaker 02

  And Castle.

• 1:43:17Bill Simmons?

  Could somebody aggregate that? Like, that's a real trade. I want to, I want to see everybody go nuts. It's reporting.

• 1:43:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:43:25Bill Simmons?

  Andrew Rell says, as someone who loves all sports, you know as well as I do, sports are a copycat league. If you're an NBA exec in any stage of your franchise, what did you learn from how the Knicks were built? How would you copycat it?

• 1:43:41Bill Simmons?

  I have five things for you. Tell me if I missed anything.

• 1:43:43Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:43:45Bill Simmons?

  Executives with connections that run a little deeper than just, oh yeah, I met that guy a couple of times. Like Wes recruited towns when he was 15 years old.

• 1:43:55Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:43:55Bill Simmons?

  OG and an O B with C A A. Brunson, Rick Brunson, that whole thing. Like, these are like real relationships and Bridges, Villanova. Like, how do you replicate that with somebody? Right? So we've seen Aron Tellem went to Detroit and that didn't work. We saw Bob Myers go to Golden State. That did work. We saw Nico go to Dallas. Too early to tell if that worked. But you're talking about connection personality guys. There are a few of those left. There's some, some pretty high powered agents left. There's somebody like even the ringers, Rich Paul could run a team. Like there's guys who have a lot of relationships who could, who could do it. So that'd be one.

• 1:44:32Bill Simmons?

  This one's interesting. Targeting proven starters, hitting the 25 to 28 age range, a little bit older, like the Rashid Detroit. OG Bridges, even when they got Brunson, like getting guys at that second five years part of their career, but not too late. Right?

• 1:44:53Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:44:54Bill Simmons?

  Like somebody like Giannis in year 14.

• 1:44:58Bill Simmons?

  Or Kevin Durant in year 15.

• 1:45:00Speaker 02

  You gotta find out.

• 1:45:02Bill Simmons?

  But you know what I mean? That makes sense, right? Like that second five years of somebody's career, can we get somebody in that range? Leveraging the player to player friendship histories, chemistry, work ethic, gritty guys, I think is one. And then that my biggest lesson for them is don't be afraid to take a couple swings. Like firing Tibbs was a swing. Doing the OG trade and guaranteeing him this contract when we weren't positive, he could always stay healthy was a swing. Jalen for four for 106 was not a hugely popular contract. Five picks for Mikal Bridges, like this team fucking went for it a few times. And I think anything else would you add?

• 1:45:39Speaker 02

  No, and I don't know how replicable any of that is. I mean, the, the, the challenge, um, the, the, the thing that the Knicks pulled off was like literally decades in the making, right? It's, it's, it's Leon Rose and Worldwide West in the situations that they've been in.

• 1:45:56Bill Simmons?

  Building these lifelong relationships.

• 1:45:57Speaker 02

  Right? Yes. Yes. And, and having perspectives on players that were undervalued or underappreciated in their situations. And understanding the force multiplier of bringing those guys together. Like, you know, we know we can unlock something. We, we know something about Bridges that he doesn't need to be an alpha, that he can be even a, what is he? A theta, whatever, alpha, beta, whatever the third, the third wheel is. He doesn't even need to be a second. He could be fourth because you have key of cat also. And they got the best version of cat because they got a combination of cat maturing.

• 1:46:38Speaker 02

  Also like, you know, cause think about how many times the Knicks, uh, you know, theoretically were trading cat, right? Over these last two years, oh, we gotta trade cat. Like even Knicks fans, we're not reaching our, our potential. You know, we only won 50 games two years ago and 53 games this year and cats holding us back. And Tibbs and cat can't get on the same page. Like, well, that, that means Tibbs has to go because we're not going to trade cat. Like, just think about that and how they were rewarded for just, let's just settle down. Let's just hold on. And the two, uh, the best player in the first two games of the NBA finals was cat.

• 1:47:13Bill Simmons?

  Do you want to be one of the judges of my Ringer game show that I'm going to start this summer where we take Knicks fans, we give them truth serum? What's the thing where you have to, the drug where you have to tell the truth?

• 1:47:23Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 1:47:24Bill Simmons?

  Would they have traded Towns and OG and Obi for Giannis and Kyle Kuzma a year ago? I just want to know how many Knicks fans would have 100% locked into that.

• 1:47:33Speaker 02

  That's fantasy.

• 1:47:35Bill Simmons?

  No, he'll lie. Fantasy, fantasy lies all the time.

• 1:47:41Speaker 02

  Fantasy the liar.

• 1:47:42Bill Simmons?

  Travis wrote a Tibbs thing actually about, did I hate watching Tibbs run a rigid seven man rotation into the hardwood until the wheels fell off against Indiana? Absolutely. Did it drive me crazy how it completely froze out assistants, managed huddles, blah, blah, blah, but I cannot deny the results of that boot camp. Tibbs pressure cooked the core. He conditioned these guys to play heavy minutes without buckling. Taught them elite habits, blah, blah, blah. If he hadn't done all that, this roster doesn't win a title. So why is he still single without an NBA team? If I was running a lottery team like Charlotte, Washington, Portland, Chicago, Dallas, I would take a flyer on him immediately. What are your thoughts on that?

• 1:48:21Speaker 02

  This is a brilliant email and I hope it didn't come from Tibbs' agent because...

• 1:48:26Bill Simmons?

  It came from Travis Thompson.

• 1:48:28Speaker 02

  Well, Travis Thompson, I don't, I don't, Travis, this is brilliant. I, I could not agree more. I think what Tibbs, this is literally the thing that I've been sort of railing against in terms of the criticism of San Antonio, their, their not being ready. Then this Knicks team was ready and part of the getting ready was what Tibbs did to them. It's absolutely on the money and I do think, I, I have been wondering aloud, why isn't Tibbs at least like a defensive assistant somewhere? You know where Tibbs would make sense? And I, I don't know.

• 1:49:03Bill Simmons?

  San Antonio defensive coordinator?

• 1:49:06Speaker 02

  I mean, he could, it could work. Well, because Sean Sweeney is about to leave. He's the new head coach of Orlando. I wouldn't hate to see Tibbs in Washington DC. I would not hate it.

• 1:49:16Bill Simmons?

  As your head coach?

• 1:49:18Speaker 02

  I don't know what role.

• 1:49:18Bill Simmons?

  Can you get rid of the guy who gave up 83 points to Bam Adebayo?

• 1:49:22Speaker 02

  I'm not. Brian Keefe has done a magnificent job and I don't have anything bad to say about him.

• 1:49:28Bill Simmons?

  Get out of here.

• 1:49:28Speaker 02

  During his tenure here in Washington.

• 1:49:29Bill Simmons?

  You're crazy.

• 1:49:30Speaker 02

  But I, I don't hate the idea. Tibbs deserves another shot. We'll just, I'll leave it at that.

• 1:49:37Bill Simmons?

  I agree. Gerald sent a long email about the 2026 Spurs being the reincarnation of the 2012 Thunder that I thought was interesting. How they ended up in 2012 finals going against like, like a boys against men type situation. Also a five game series that I felt like OKC was in those first four games.

• 1:49:55Speaker 02

  Good, good.

• 1:49:56Bill Simmons?

  And the refs.

• 1:49:56Speaker 02

  Good. I like it.

• 1:49:57Bill Simmons?

  I can't say I love the refereeing of the first four games of that series. And then by game five, they kind of wilted and.

• 1:50:03Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:50:03Bill Simmons?

  But they were toe to toe with them that whole series. All right, couple more and then we'll go. Tim Gibson said, I'm sorry, I have to bring this up. The closest sporting event to what happened in MSG with game four of the finals has to be game six of the 86 World Series. Not just because of the insane comeback and the choking aspect, but because it was the win before the clincher. Thanks for all you and everyone else at The Ringer does. From Tim. It's pretty good.

• 1:50:29Speaker 02

  Pretty good.

• 1:50:30Bill Simmons?

  I, it really is. It's the win before the win. It was kind of the miracle that got the Knicks fans to drop their guards finally after Trump game three. Game four, down 27 and you need some sort of karma shift. You have the Brunson front rim bouncing right to OG crazy tip sequence. That's basically the equivalent of the Red Sox having the 14 straight strikes to end the game and not being able to. Um, and then, uh, the Darren Fox slash Bill Buckner. Um, you could keep going, but I, I thought that was pretty good and that, and I still think game six of the 86 World Series is the worst sports loss of all time.

• 1:51:13Bill Simmons?

  Um, I'm biased because I'm a Boston fan, but to come all of those pitches away from winning the World Series and then not doing it, but then having to play game seven.

• 1:51:22Speaker 02

  Um, the only, I love this and, and it marries up perfectly because it was the game before the clincher. The only one that rivals it. And you mentioned it like immediately in the, in the moment. No, no, no, no, no. The Atlanta Falcons giving up a 28 lead in the Super Bowl. But that wasn't, you know, that's the Super Bowl, which is not a game before a game clincher kind of situation.

• 1:51:44Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 1:51:46Bill Simmons?

  Dustin says, I have great news for Dallas fans.

• 1:51:51Bill Simmons?

  It's been a tough month for Dallas fans.

• 1:51:54Speaker 02

  Is he talking about the Dallas Mavericks? He is greeting news for Mavericks fans?

• 1:51:59Bill Simmons?

  He thinks the Cowboys have replaced the Knicks as the sports team with the most fans who have had the longest drought. And will go the most nuts if they actually win the title. And he was like, sure, it's cool that they won the Super Bowl when I was seven, but the last 30 plus years have been brutal. So they won the Super Bowl in 95. So that's 31 years. So if you're, if you're 36 years old or under, you have no recollection of the Cowboys winning the Super Bowl. I turn the podcast over to you, Joe House, because we're the ex Redskins commander fans in this whole thing. And I would argue Washington has almost not as many fans as Dallas, but they have a fucking lot of fans. And your Super Bowl drought was Mark Rippon, 91.

• 1:52:43Speaker 02

  91 and, and to, you know, further this, we had, uh, you know, a, a, a demon in charge of the franchise. I mean, a person that came in and ruined every single tradition that Washington had in, in place and a whole. I mean, part of the point of pride for, for Washington fans growing up in the seventies and eighties was that there was a culture. There was a way Jack Kent Cooke, you know, not, notwithstanding, uh, his checkered history with the Lakers and the rest of it. As an owner of the Washington Redskins was a magnificent owner and did entrust, you know, the people that he put in charge to make good decisions.

• 1:53:24Speaker 02

  And, and a culture developed in Washington, and that was part of the pride that we all felt that we, it felt like Washington was built up the right way.

• 1:53:33Bill Simmons?

  RFK, the hogs, you're in the city.

• 1:53:36Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:53:37Bill Simmons?

  It was the biggest. By far the biggest team in the city.

• 1:53:40Speaker 02

  And then to have the new owner come in and basically for two decades, take a shit on every single thing. He took a shit on the fans. He took a shit on the, on the city. He took a shit on winning. He, he was all to his own narcissistic ends.

• 1:53:56Bill Simmons?

  And he was a huge dick.

• 1:53:58Speaker 02

  And it took a, a, a, a near act of God for the league to kick him out, you know, to finally try and realize the potential of what this Washington franchise. Dallas is not in that class.

• 1:54:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Dallas has been relevant the whole time and has an owner that actually spent money. It was interesting to build a new stadium.

• 1:54:17Speaker 02

  All of it.

• 1:54:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. You, you had more of the Knicks arc of just being disemboweled for two straight decades. And then on top of it, the RG three piece of thinking you finally had the savior and then the guy gets hurt in a year was another, another dick punch.

• 1:54:33Speaker 02

  The Rams sent out in, in a, in a game after RG three was no longer on, on Washington. All of the draft picks, they sent out to the center of the field when, when they were doing the, the coin flip before a regular season Rams Redskins game.

• 1:54:47Bill Simmons?

  Just to fuck you.

• 1:54:48Speaker 02

  Yes. Yeah. Sean McBase, or I don't remember who the head coach was, just sent out all the guys that they got in that trade.

• 1:54:55Bill Simmons?

  Terrible. We'll end there. That's a good one to end on. I'm glad you were able to make the case for Washington. I do think there's only a couple, you know, like Buffalo is obviously.

• 1:55:04Speaker 02

  Yes. Buffalo deserves.

• 1:55:05Bill Simmons?

  But Buffalo doesn't have a million fans. You know, Minnesota is another one. They haven't won a title since 91. They've never won a title with the Timberwolves. The Lakers left and went, won all these titles without them. But they don't have a million fans. I think when you get to the Cowboys and Redskins, which is what we grew up with, those, those franchises, and then also had success, and then that success was taken away. I think that I think those are the right two answers. There's nobody in the NBA like that. And then the Maple Leafs in the Maple Leafs in hockey, I think would be the other one.

• 1:55:37Speaker 02

  Ironically, the Giants have been bad for a long time. I mean,

• 1:55:40Bill Simmons?

  I know, but that was 2011. I'm

• 1:55:42Speaker 02

  Okay, all right, fine.

• 1:55:43Bill Simmons?

  Anyone who wants to shed tears for the Giants can honestly go fuck themselves.

• 1:55:48Speaker 02

  Obviously, I agree.

• 1:55:49Bill Simmons?

  Right in the face.

• 1:55:50Speaker 02

  Yes, wholeheartedly agree with that.

• 1:55:52Bill Simmons?

  Before we go, what's your US Open pick? I know you'll be covering this on Fairway Roland and the Ringer Gambling Show all week, but what do you got?

• 1:55:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, so I get I reserve the right to change my mind over a couple of times. Scottie Scheffler at plus 550 is the best odds of any major. This is his

• 1:56:06Bill Simmons?

  Six to one on Fandel right now.

• 1:56:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, his first attempt to clinch the Grand Slam. It's his first attempt because he just won the British Open last summer. So this US Open that he hasn't won, he's got the Masters, he's got the PGA Championship, he could clinch the US Open at those odds.

• 1:56:24Speaker 02

  Hey, but how about this? I like the prohibitive favorite, but it is a good setup for him. And the thing that has been holding

• 1:56:29Bill Simmons?

  See, like the narrative.

• 1:56:31Speaker 02

  I do like the narrative. It is the lead narrative. Scotty is fine. And then going down the card a little bit, Matt Fitzpatrick has been on an absolute heater. Now, we've had two European winners win the first two majors of this season. We had Aaron Rai from the UK win the PGA Championship, and obviously Rory won the Masters. But Matt Fitzpatrick very easily could have four wins this season. He finished second this most recent week at the Canadian Open. He's just on an all time heater. And so I want a guy like that. The incredible ball striking and no problem at all with the distance that Shinakok is going to pose.

• 1:57:07Bill Simmons?

  Can I give you two?

• 1:57:09Speaker 02

  I'm listening.

• 1:57:13Bill Simmons?

  Fleetwood 20 to one?

• 1:57:15Speaker 02

  Love Tommy Fleetwood. Everybody will remember that in 2018, he shot a 63 that came this close to being a 62, lost by one stroke to Brooks Koepka. Great. Love Tommy Fleetwood.

• 1:57:27Bill Simmons?

  I was just wondering, is it in the air from this Knicks title?

• 1:57:33Bill Simmons?

  Being probable, feeling a little more probable. We just had UFC where Pereira and Taporia just lost. Like, weird is like the World Cup, God only knows what's gonna happen. The Team USA

• 1:57:48Speaker 02

  Look at you.

• 1:57:48Bill Simmons?

  Looked incredible on Friday night. It's just just gonna be a weird month of sports. And if that's the case, Fleetwood.

• 1:57:58Bill Simmons?

  I also like to offer you Xander Schaafle at 20 to 1.

• 1:58:01Speaker 02

  Xander's wonderful. He has an extraordinary track record at US Opens in particular, but nobody in golf, other than Rory and Scottie, has as many high finishes in majors over the last 10 years.

• 1:58:15Bill Simmons?

  He's our number one. You're due to actually win a major guy right now.

• 1:58:18Speaker 02

  Well, he has two majors. He won two in one season, but he won the PGA Championship at Valhalla, and then he won the British Open at Troon. So he's due to win, you know, the US Open, the granddaddy of them all.

• 1:58:32Bill Simmons?

  I meant the real majors. The Masters and the US Open. The only ones. There's two tournaments that actually matter, and he hasn't won either of those.

• 1:58:42Speaker 02

  Both of those are great picks. Worth getting some money down on both of them.

• 1:58:49Bill Simmons?

  Before we go, I just, I went to the, I went to the World Cup.

• 1:58:54Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, the opener at SoFi. Look at you wearing the jersey.

• 1:58:59Bill Simmons?

  I saw the best American soccer game we've ever played in the World Cup. I was, I was in the FanDuel box. Shout out to Christian. And, and we had great seats. I had a great time. It's, I gotta say, I was, I was blown away by the, by the team. And DeBundo was calling this before the tournament. He was telling us, like, look, I get it. I get the skepticism. Just know, this is the healthiest we've been in like four years. This is the first time we've had all of our guys.

• 1:59:31Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:59:32Bill Simmons?

  They demolished Paraguay in the first half. It was unbelievable to watch. We had guys, Pulisic was just, just dominating their back right guy. We, over and over again, guys just beating people 1v1 and then creating plays. And I couldn't believe it. I was just, I was just dumbfounded. And then, I don't know if that's the peak.

• 1:59:57Bill Simmons?

  We'll see, Australia beat Turkey.

• 1:59:59Speaker 02

  They did. Upset.

• 2:00:01Bill Simmons?

  So now we have this Friday game. We have this Friday game that I think is really great. It's Friday afternoon, 3 o'clock Eastern time. This is a, everybody has to leave work.

• 2:00:13Bill Simmons?

  Lunchtime. That's the, do not put in a full day. Go to a fucking bar.

• 2:00:17Speaker 02

  It's a national holiday. There's no work. There's no work. It's Juneteenth. It's a national holiday.

• 2:00:22Bill Simmons?

  It's Juneteenth.

• 2:00:23Speaker 02

  You're not familiar with Juneteenth?

• 2:00:24Bill Simmons?

  I forgot it was Juneteenth. It's a holiday. This is unbelievable.

• 2:00:31Bill Simmons?

  I didn't, I didn't realize that was the same day. I don't, I don't look at this.

• 2:00:35Speaker 02

  3 o'clock on Juneteenth.

• 2:00:36Bill Simmons?

  I work every day. I never know what the holidays are.

• 2:00:37Speaker 02

  I understand. I get it. I get it.

• 2:00:39Bill Simmons?

  Holy shit. This is gonna be a really special day. And it's really a country that I like.

• 2:00:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:00:45Bill Simmons?

  In general, but not on Friday. Fuck these guys.

• 2:00:48Speaker 02

  I hope we get to see, is it at SoFi?

• 2:00:51Bill Simmons?

  No, it's in Seattle.

• 2:00:53Speaker 02

  Oh, oh. I want it to be in a warm climate because the photos that are coming from the warm climate games, like I had a buddy who went up to Philadelphia yesterday to see Ecuador play the Ivory Coast.

• 2:01:03Bill Simmons?

  It's a wild card.

• 2:01:04Speaker 02

  And he was, it was hot in Philly yesterday. Woo wee. He says, first of all, I mean, I wonder if this marries up with your experience. Uh, this is my boy Miggy. He says that, um, it's like a rock concert. It's like, it's not like a sporting event that you've ever kind of gone to. It's like a constant, constant high energy of the crowd the, the entire time. But yes, I, I want.

• 2:01:29Bill Simmons?

  We're not gonna have that kind of complete experience in LA. Like where you're really getting it, you know, Scotland was in, in the Boston game playing in Foxborough. And my daughter went out with her, my daughter went out with her boyfriend Saturday night. They went to this place called Coogan's, which was filled with Scottish people watching the World Cup and losing their minds as game five of the NBA Finals was on. And she said it was the best sports bar experience of her life. They had like the greatest time ever. And she was like, these Scottish people are fucking nuts.

• 2:02:04Bill Simmons?

  She's like, we love them. We've never seen anything like that. They were just maniacs. And I was like, you realize your mom's half Scottish, right? And she's like, oh, now it all makes sense.

• 2:02:15Speaker 02

  She just, she's 21 years old. She just realized?

• 2:02:19Bill Simmons?

  Which makes her like 25% Scottish and 25% Italian. But, but she said, she said it was one of the most fun nights because now she's 21 too. But she said they had like the greatest time. And so I think in some of these other cities, it's a little bit of a different experience than going to SoFi in LA, but it was still great. I mean, it was, everybody had the jerseys, people going nuts. The, the striker's third goal for us.

• 2:02:44Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:02:45Bill Simmons?

  Was, had to be the greatest American goal I've ever seen.

• 2:02:48Speaker 02

  Balogun, how do you say his name?

• 2:02:50Bill Simmons?

  Balogun.

• 2:02:51Speaker 02

  Balogun.

• 2:02:52Bill Simmons?

  But we're both gonna fuck that one up.

• 2:02:57Bill Simmons?

  It was like, our country doesn't score goals like this normally. You know?

• 2:03:02Speaker 02

  Badass.

• 2:03:02Bill Simmons?

  Great run, muscles the dude off and then just like blast like, and he's already turning around as the ball's going in the corner.

• 2:03:10Speaker 02

  I love that guy.

• 2:03:11Bill Simmons?

  Holy shit.

• 2:03:12Speaker 02

  He could have played for two other countries and he chose us. I like the guys that, that choose us, the guys that have options, but choose us.

• 2:03:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, there's, I don't want to point out, there's two weak spot guys that I didn't love during that game.

• 2:03:23Speaker 02

  Don't, let's not talk about it.

• 2:03:24Bill Simmons?

  I don't want to, I don't want to talk about weakness. I want to talk about strength.

• 2:03:26Speaker 02

  Be positive.

• 2:03:27Bill Simmons?

  We were awesome. Richards was a fucking maniac in that game. But I really got excited. Like I, I couldn't be more excited to, uh, for the Friday game and everything else. So World Cup, I can't wait to lose more money on it. Thanks to Tony Tokens. You'll be on Ringer Gambling Show, Fairway Roland. Thanks to Gahal and Eduardo as well for producing the pod today. I'm going to be back. I think I'm going to have two more pods this week. So stay tuned for that. And then Hand That Rocks The Cradle is up on rewatchables right now. Joe House, um, I didn't tell you this yet, but you're, you're going to be one of the people live with me at the, right after the NBA draft on Tuesday night. So don't go.

• 2:04:02Speaker 02

  Let's go.

• 2:04:03Bill Simmons?

  Don't go anywhere.

• 2:04:03Speaker 02

  I'm in.

• 2:04:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Your team will take AJ.

• 2:04:06Speaker 02

  Fly out to LA for that then. If I'm going to be live, I might as well be live. Why don't I have a meal? Like you're, you're holding out meals with Dave. Hang over my head. Why don't I just come out?

• 2:04:15Bill Simmons?

  I'm sending you pictures tonight from the Dave Chang Mill. We're going to a good one.

• 2:04:19Speaker 02

  Go get some fondue.

• 2:04:20Bill Simmons?

  All right. Thanks, House. Thanks to the big fondue. Thanks to everybody else. Thanks for all the mailbag emails out there. And I'll see you a little bit later in the week.

• 2:04:47Bill Simmons?

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• 2:05:31Bill Simmons?

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