The Mailbag: Dangerous NBA Teams, Lottery Tweaks, the KD Files, The Oscars, and Cruise vs. Pacino | With Chris Ryan and Joe House

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Chris Ryan to dive into the mailbag and answer questions from the listeners (2:21). Then, Joe House joins to talk about their favorite NBA bets post All-Star break before ending the show with some more mailbag questions (43:21). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Chris Ryan and Joe house Producers: Chia Hao Tat and Eduardo Ocampo This episode is presented by State Farm®. Dishing the assists you need off the court. State Farm® with the Assist. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit⁠⁠⁠ www.rg-help.com⁠⁠⁠ to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Bill Simmons?

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

• 0:36Bill Simmons?

  The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. We're also brought to by the Ringer Podcast Network. We're having a new episode of the rewatchables that went up Monday night. We did Bond movie, we did GoldenEye. It was me and Sean Fantasy and Chris Ryan. Had a lot of fun talking about the movie, the video game, CR on Earth, a new impression that he's never done before. We had a lot of laughs, a lot of fun. Go check it out on Netflix, on Spotify, wherever you get your pods. Next rewatchable is going to be Crazy Stupid Love because we had to do one Valentine's Day adjacent movie before we get into March. And I have an exciting announcement for March on the rewatchables, but we're going to wait for our first guest, Chris Ryan is coming on.

• 1:21Bill Simmons?

  He's going to do half of the mailbag with me. I have just unbelievable mailbag questions, so many. So I had to use this time as there's no sports whatsoever, other than Winter Olympics, to bang out some mailbag questions. Chris Ryan going to join me for the first half. Our old friend Joe House is going to come on for the second half where we do some NBA stuff. That is the podcast that's all next. We're going to take a break, Pearl Jam, and then CR, Chris Ryan. The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. The football season may be coming to an end, but things are only getting started on the court, on the hardwood, on the wood, as some people call it. FanDuel, the number one choice for same game parlays, live betting, and much more during the NBA season. Don't forget with FanDuel, you get paid instantly when you win.

• 2:05Bill Simmons?

  Download the FanDuel Sportsbook app right now.

• 2:10Bill Simmons?

  And play your game. 21 plus and present in select states or 18 plus and present in DC, Kentucky or Wyoming. Game, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com, call 888-789-7777, or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut.

• 2:52Bill Simmons?

  All right, we are recording mid-afternoon Pacific time. There's no sports going on other than the Winter Olympics. What country are you rooting for, Chris Ryan? America?

• 3:01Speaker 01

  I'm just rooting for, for fun, frozen competition, you know? Yeah, sure. I'm rooting broadly for America. What about you?

• 3:08Bill Simmons?

  Well, you and I, we did the two-man luge together in 2014. I thought that was fun.

• 3:14Speaker 01

  Is that what you're calling the black hat pod?

• 3:16Bill Simmons?

  The two-man loser. No, it's all right. There's a lot of like luge, bobsled, skiing. I have trouble keeping track of which events are more important than the other ones. And then they're like, oh, it's, it's the figure skating, short session, free skate, whatever. I'm like, oh, that's an important one. That's like the Tonya Harding one.

• 3:38Speaker 01

  I feel like I'm just getting killed by, I'm getting killed by just finding out what happens early in the day so that I can't watch prime time. And that's my fault. Like, you know, it's just, but when I open up the New York Times or ESPN or The Athletic and it's just like, here's everything that happened that you were gonna watch at 8:00 PM tonight. I just wind up losing a little bit of juice for it.

• 3:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I do wonder, was it better in the 70s and early 80s when we had no mechanism to find out what happened and everything was a constant surprise and we never knew what was live and taped? It might have just had a better way to live.

• 4:09Speaker 01

  Absolutely. Read the news once every day.

• 4:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, sounds great. We're gonna do, I have a two-part mailbag. I'm gonna do half with you and half with House. I sent you a couple of questions. I kept some questions away from you. But basically, all the mailbag questions I'm getting right now, and please, please stop sending these to [email protected]. I'm good with the tanking solutions. We have so many, and I can't think of another sports kind of debate topic where everybody's like, I've got it. Is there anything else like this where you could be in a bar and somebody's like, no, no, here's what they should do. And everybody's all of a sudden the expert and nobody has it.

• 4:52Speaker 01

  I found the limit of what I'm interested in in sports, and I think it's solutions to tanking. You know, I, God bless you. I was listening to you and Zach on Sunday, and I could tell even you were like losing your own mind trying to figure it out. Cause like,

• 5:04Bill Simmons?

  There's no answer.

• 5:05Speaker 01

  There's no answer. And also, the answer is, we need a bad draft. So this draft is too good and too many people want to get in on AJ and Darren and Boozer. And we just, we just need to have better basketball to think about, you know, because I think we're just getting a little too distracted with how to fix something that ultimately is pretty good. But I do think some of the stakeholders involved have different, different objectives than maybe the common NBA fan. And that's why I think it causes so much frustration.

• 5:35Bill Simmons?

  I think the biggest problem for the NBA, we talked about it Thursday night in the live show, is that football ends and you, basketball finally has center stage and it should just be more positive stuff instead of all of us like, how do we fix this? What's wrong with this thing? Even Mark Cuban today came out as pro tanking, which I enjoyed. It just feels like he's trying to stick it to everybody these days.

• 5:55Speaker 01

  I fully just, that's exactly what I mean. Where Cuban's comments, while very well informed from his perspective as a former owner was like, nobody remembers shots and dunks. They remember the experience of an NBA game. And I can just assure him that I'm the exact opposite. Like, I actually don't really love going to NBA games. You know, like they're like, I like it when the basketball is good, but as a

• 6:19Bill Simmons?

  Playoff games.

• 6:19Speaker 01

  Personal consumer experience, I can think of a lot of better ways to spend my money than having like, 22 year old rap music blared at me for three hours like, it's, it's, it's a really like, I thought he, he misidentified what was at issue there.

• 6:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, we could be going to Black Hat at the new Beverly Cinema. We could be spending our time in a much better way. All right, mailbag questions, these are all real questions. First one, the KD Twitter burner account scandal is the first scandal to reference the Epstein files instead of Watergate. Everyone is calling it the KD files is blank gate dead. That's from Don H. So basically what he's saying, CR, Watergate with the 52 year run here of just gates. I went on Wikipedia and I went and looked at all the gates and they had them broken down in a sports, culture, politics, tech. Like, there's just a lot of gates and the Epstein files have basically said, move over buddy. There's a new, new sheriff in town and now we're using files.

• 7:18Bill Simmons?

  Are you buying this? Is gate done?

• 7:20Speaker 01

  I thought that this question was a pretty poignant, maybe unwittingly in the wake of the mass Wapo, Washington Post layoffs. And that's obviously where a lot of the original Watergate reporting happened with Woodward and Bernstein. And I think that we used to rely on these institutions to ferret out this information through investigative reporting. And then interpret the information and tell us, hey, here's what's important. Here's why you should care about this. Here's, here's what might happen because of it. And now especially with like the Epstein stuff, you're basically getting raw intel, like on social media.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  You're looking at redacted files, you're looking at, you know, basically like the stuff that a journalist would look at to interpret. And you're being asked to do it yourself and sometimes you have to battle against the sheer amount of it. In the case of the Epstein files and also like whether or not some of it is, is real or not, because that's obviously starting to come up.

• 8:17Bill Simmons?

  That's the biggest thing, the AI.

• 8:19Speaker 01

  The Katie thing is kind of a good example of that. Like I, I think it's hilarious, but I'm not a hundred percent sure it's him, you know? And I don't really even understand where it came from and what's going on here. I mean, where, where's your head out with this?

• 8:33Bill Simmons?

  We'll never know. He hasn't said anything. If I had to bet my life one way or the other, I would bet yes. Triple double cocaine bear is one of the funniest things anyone's written on any platform in the last 30 years.

• 8:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:47Bill Simmons?

  And I don't think we'll ever find out the the true answer.

• 8:51Speaker 01

  You think KD's throwing around Hitler and Stalin jokes in his group chat?

• 8:55Bill Simmons?

  I don't know, man. I don't judge anyone's group chats. It's a group chats. It's a private space. You just never know what's going on in there.

• 9:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:03Bill Simmons?

  It could be a combo of some real stuff with some AI stuff. And that's like you laid out. This is the problem in 2026. Always trying to decipher what's real and what's really. You can feel Instagram changing in real times where you're like, oh, my God, that cheetah climbed into a kid's bunk bed. And it's like, oh, that probably didn't happen.

• 9:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:21Bill Simmons?

  You know?

• 9:22Speaker 01

  That cat sings Sinatra perfectly with its meows.

• 9:25Bill Simmons?

  That cat was in the dunk contest. I have my top five gates ever. That's what this question inspired. In no particular order, I didn't want to really rank these, but Spygate, Nipplegate, Deflategate, Bountygate, and Poopgate. When the Dave Matthews Band emptied the sewage tank into the Chicago, I don't know, Chicago Barsh, and they called it Poopgate.

• 9:54Speaker 01

  You have Poopgate above Iran-Contra.

• 9:56Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but here's my question. So Iran-Contra, I feel like we just called that Iran-Contra.

• 10:02Speaker 01

  Or like an affair, the Iran-Contra affair.

• 10:05Bill Simmons?

  That was really a gate. I don't, I really thought about that because that was like the biggest one after Watergate. But I don't ever remember, there was some Contra gate, but I really feel like that became Iran-Contra.

• 10:15Speaker 01

  Does a gate necessitate it being broken by journalists? Or is it just sound cool if you put gate at the end of it?

• 10:23Bill Simmons?

  Well, so that's what I thought was interesting. Nipplegate. And poop gate are culture gates, right?

• 10:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:29Bill Simmons?

  This is just Timberlake pulling Janet Jackson's thing off at the Super Bowl and then poop. And then Spygate, Deflategate and Bounty Gate were all these football scandals that we just put gate on at the end because it was funny, but that's what the names became. And you go through all the other ones, the gate never really stuck, didn't stick like I thought.

• 10:49Speaker 01

  No, and deflated ball affair does not have the same.

• 10:53Bill Simmons?

  No.

• 10:54Speaker 01

  It doesn't have the same ring to it.

• 10:55Bill Simmons?

  And I think scandal kind of stepped in too. So anyway.

• 10:58Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 10:58Bill Simmons?

  Those are the best gates. Uh, next question from David from Flemington, New Jersey. With more KD burner account news allegedly coming out, who of the pre-social media pantheon guys do you think would have also had burner accounts if they existed at the time, if any? I had one in particular that I'm positive would have had, but what do you have for this?

• 11:18Speaker 01

  I was thinking about this because like a lot of the people who I think are the most opinionated, I also think would have had better things to do than than tweet or text a lot. You know, like Barkley is like, I get paid to say stuff.

• 11:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 11:31Speaker 01

  I'm not going to be on a group chat like saying what I really think.

• 11:34Bill Simmons?

  Kobe I think would have been good, but I also don't think he would have done it.

• 11:37Speaker 01

  Kobe was right on that. He was, he was right on the sort of border between social media being something where you're just like, oh my God, the Knicks won. And now like laying in on AI all the time.

• 11:50Bill Simmons?

  Kobe was also like a call, call whoever out of the blue. Like he called me out of the blue once. He would do that to everybody.

• 11:56Speaker 01

  Practice Mitch.

• 11:57Bill Simmons?

  Or send you a long email or he would call, he'd read a piece that, so he was more of a direct to direct, not like a in the shadows.

• 12:05Speaker 01

  Yeah. I wish, I wish Durant would try that. He should just call Jabari Smith and tell him how he feels about his shot selection.

• 12:12Bill Simmons?

  So my, here's my one that I definitely think would add a burner account. There's no question. And I'm positive he would have had it. I'm as positive as I could be about a theoretical concept of something that's impossible to prove. Will Chamberlain.

• 12:27Bill Simmons?

  Will Chamberlain, I was fascinated by him when I did my book. I read all the books that he wrote. I read all the magazine profiles. It was back in the air in the 60s. You would do like your first person magazine piece for Sport Magazine or Sports Illustrated.

• 12:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:40Bill Simmons?

  And he would just trash everybody. He would trash his teammates, his coaches. He would blame everybody else. This was one of the main reasons I wrote a whole chapter about Russell over Will. Because he, and this is why all the other players didn't like him, that he, you know, he got traded twice. People would always like take shots at him, his rivals. And I just think he absolutely would have been, had burner accounts and he would have been like, Bill Russell sucks, man. He has no left hand. And it would have been like some Dipper69. That would have been his account.

• 13:11Speaker 01

  Dipper69. The real 100? Yeah.

• 13:15Bill Simmons?

  He was the most sensitive, always trying to patch his legacy on the fly person that we've had. KD just loves it. He just loves being in the middle of all this stuff and rolling up his sleeves. So whether this was his account or not, I think what's, what's a little more interesting is that he has enough out there already that people just believed it. Cause it was like, of course it's him because he did all of these other things too.

• 13:38Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, I think that there's also like, aren't people basically lining up, there's like, allegedly like this was discovered by the Rockets a little while ago. And that's right around when the Rockets sort of fell off a cliff. So yeah.

• 13:52Bill Simmons?

  Which leads to, um, next question from Gio in New York. Is Kevin Durant becoming the modern day Rick Barry? Accomplished player, but difficult teammate. So I'll take this one first.

• 14:05Bill Simmons?

  Rick Barry was, was really disliked when he played by teammates. And there's a lot of documented evidence that I covered in my book. He was just a very polarizing player in real time. The interesting thing about Durant, even though if you go back basically to the 2018 Warriors and most of the teams, really every team, except maybe the 22 Nets, felt like there was an unhappiness about them or something kind of sliding sideways. Never really knew what was going on.

• 14:34Bill Simmons?

  But you never hear the guys badmouth him. And that's the difference, even like the Warriors thing, which went, got so weird in 2018 and 2019 in a whole bunch of different ways. And he had the famous blow up with Draymond in the Cooper game. But those guys don't talk, they didn't talk shit about him after. They didn't throw him under the bus. Um, I can't really think of a lot of instances, even after he left Phoenix. People weren't afterwards, they were like, yeah, you know, we're just trying to change the identity of the team. They weren't like, and they basically just got rid of two guys. They're like, we're a completely different team now. This is the kind of Suns brand we want. And it's, but this also wasn't Durant and Beal's fault. So what, what are you trying to say about last year? I never added that up, but I do think people like him. So it's, it's really complicated.

• 15:20Speaker 01

  I've stopped like thinking that I think about NBA players the same way NBA players think about each other. You know, like Harden's a really good example where Harden is warmly greeted every team he goes to.

• 15:32Bill Simmons?

  Teams do love Harden. Yeah.

• 15:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. And so like, just because I have bad feelings about him because of Philly or because Rockets fans might not like him or Brooklyn fans might not like him. Ultimately, like he's obviously very popular among his coworkers, which probably tells us more than, than we could ever write or say on a podcast. As far as Durant goes, I wanted to ask you, like, let's say this goes as bad as it possibly could hypothetically.

• 15:55Bill Simmons?

  Like Houston goes in the tank.

• 15:57Speaker 01

  Houston craters, he has like a hamstring and he's like, I'm done. Ime is like, fuck this guy, whatever happens.

• 16:05Speaker 01

  How many, how many more stops does this guy have on the world tour? Like at a certain point, I would imagine like he's got to stick out a situation that doesn't go right. You know, and, and he's got to kind of be like, this is where I've, I've put down stakes and I'm here to fix this team. And maybe I made mistakes, but they made mistakes. Like I just don't, I don't see him washing up in Charlotte. And, and like playing, playing somewhere else next season. Do you?

• 16:32Bill Simmons?

  I thought this Houston stop was going to be the stop. I loved how they were playing the first six weeks. And I really felt like that was the perfect team for him. And he was kind of a leader, but they also had a lot of different ways to go.

• 16:44Bill Simmons?

  But I don't, what you're describing basically is when do you hit the Chris Paul zone? Of people are just like, yeah, we're good. It's you're not, you're not worth it basically, but that, but with Chris Paul, that happened because he wasn't good enough anymore.

• 16:58Speaker 01

  You know, to take on all the other stuff that is allegedly sitting there. We're not talking about a guy who's like, I can give you 18 serviceable minutes and like be a good leader. I mean, Kevin Durant's still an elite player, so it's sort of strange to be in this kind of situation where it's like, would you rather just get off of this to not make your whole locker room toxic?

• 17:20Bill Simmons?

  Let's say this was true, this burner thing. What's his move if we're his PR team? Just, but just wait for it to go away, pretend it never happened?

• 17:29Speaker 01

  Uh.

• 17:32Speaker 01

  I would probably, if I were him, come clean about it just because it's like, he's just too online. Like he's, it's not gonna, he's not gonna not see the entire internet talking about this. Like he already responds to people as Kevin Durant, you know, like, so for him to be like, I haven't really been paying attention. I'm going zero dark 30 here. Like that's not gonna, that's not gonna fly with people. So I'd probably either just be like, look, it's bullshit. It's not me. I, if I want to say something on social media, I put my name on it. But, uh, yeah, this is just such a mystery to me.

• 18:05Bill Simmons?

  It would be weird if, if he went on the counter attack and did the, these were private text threads. I'm not going to apologize for them. Do you all, would you all want your private text threads to come out?

• 18:18Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 18:18Bill Simmons?

  I bet you wouldn't. And he just like, and people are like, yeah, uh, all right, let's move on.

• 18:25Bill Simmons?

  All right. Here's from Jared Blank.

• 18:28Bill Simmons?

  He had an idea for the NBA lottery. There's a 15th ping pong ball, and if that ball is picked as one of the four balls, the team with the first pick now gets the 32nd pick. It's the ping pong ball of death. Would you tank if you knew there was a one in four chance that you'd basically lose your first round pick? Now, I wouldn't do one in four chance ball of death, but it would be interesting if there was a ball of death and it could move you from one to 14. You're just at the end of the ladder if you get it, or one, or you, you just move to the 10th pick if you get it?

• 18:59Speaker 01

  It's certainly a more-

• 19:01Bill Simmons?

  I don't know, I like it.

• 19:02Speaker 01

  Entertaining version of when you're watching the lottery and you're like, oh my God, did we just lose our pick? Wait a second, maybe we just moved fully like 10 picks up.

• 19:11Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 19:11Speaker 01

  Which has happened a couple of times. Again, like all of these lottery and taking solutions, like I kind of lose me on the third step of advanced chess. So I'm not sure, but Jared, I like the idea of like Austin Ainge's head exploding like-

• 19:28Bill Simmons?

  Oh no! There's like a little skeleton logo on it. They got the ping pong ball of death! Uh, this is from Joel in Brisbane, Australia. I thought I'd do a couple of Super Bowl emails for you, just, just-

• 19:40Speaker 01

  I'm here for you, man. You know how I feel about the Patriots.

• 19:42Bill Simmons?

  Here for me or here for you because you deserve it. Joel said, tough watch. Drake May looked overwhelmed by the moment. The Seattle defense reminds me of Draymond Green stealing Jaylen Brown's heart in the 22 NBA finals. We, I guess he's a Celtic fan, weren't ready to win, just like Drake May. He knows he has what it takes to get there, but needs to learn how to win, just like the Jays did. I've heard this take before. Do you think there, like you're a neutral observer, you hate the Celtics, you don't really care. Do you think there's some sort of positive legacy from that 22 finals where it's like, not quite ready yet, got your, got your job punched a couple of times, tasted your own blood, now you have to come back a couple of years later?

• 20:26Bill Simmons?

  Is this a sports thing you would believe in? Cause you've had the opposite way where like that happened to the Bensamids, Joel Embiid, Sixers, and they tasted their own blood and guess what? They didn't like it.

• 20:37Speaker 01

  I think a better example would probably be like Kurt's losing to Mahomes, the Eagles losing to the Chiefs.

• 20:42Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 20:43Speaker 01

  Taking out Dell, finding out what like a sort of fine, fine differences there are between winning and losing sometimes because of the, the penalty that happened at the end of that game and then coming back even stronger. So yeah, I, I believe in- Moral losses sometimes. I gotta admit, I hadn't really considered what the Warriors triumphant championship really meant to Jalen Brown.

• 21:06Bill Simmons?

  Oh, I think those guys, because game four, game five, game six, those guys were just, it was a heavyweight fight and they were just in the corner getting annihilated.

• 21:15Speaker 01

  I never wished that you were back on ESPN more than right now and the idea of like the Warriors win the title and you're like, I'm just thinking about Jalen Brown. And what he's gonna do.

• 21:24Bill Simmons?

  You know what's a great example of this? Magic in the 84 finals.

• 21:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:28Bill Simmons?

  When he really falls apart and his, one of his nicknames that he got after the finals was tragic Johnson and but it turned out, it turned out to be the best thing for his career. Like all of a sudden gave him the eye of the tiger. It was the Rocky III scenario. And that's happened a few times with the greats over the years where they get their teeth kicked in. And all that does is make them figure out like, how do I get better? I mean, there's some cases where the guys get the teeth kicked in and they never get the chance to even get back there.

• 21:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, I think that the between the impatience of fans and front offices and also just like the churn of, of title contenders in any sport, but especially even in the NBA. It's like tough. It's kind of, it is kind of interesting that the Celtics have been this good for so long that they can go through that kind of narrative of ups and downs.

• 22:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. This one's really for you. I didn't give you this one either. It's from Mark L. What do you think of Super Bowl 60 being known as the it follows Super Bowl? Sam Darnold, well known for seeing ghosts of the past. It was obvious during the game, they'd been passed on to Drake May. Now we wait to see who May passes them on to in a big game. I love this.

• 22:36Speaker 01

  For a second you meant Sam Darnold and Drake May were both virgins.

• 22:42Bill Simmons?

  Maybe, well, they were maybe big game virgins.

• 22:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:46Bill Simmons?

  I like the it follows concept though. So then now.

• 22:48Speaker 01

  Drake May pass the it follows like thing down to? God.

• 22:53Bill Simmons?

  Well, so now that would have to be like the Bengals are good again next. I guess Joe Burrow has already been in the Super Bowl.

• 22:58Speaker 01

  He's already been.

• 22:59Bill Simmons?

  Maybe it's Bo Nix.

• 23:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, Bo Nix is good.

• 23:02Bill Simmons?

  Or Caleb Williams that pats on the Bears play next year. Maybe a big game Caleb Williams just gets it, goes into complete.

• 23:07Speaker 01

  Sky involves. Yeah.

• 23:08Bill Simmons?

  I like the it follows thing's funny. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Imagine a game where you're on the court solo. No coach, no teammate, no one in the stands, no opponent. It's just you. Stressful, right? Well, sometimes life can feel like that, too. That's when State Farm, that's when they come in. They're on the bench, ready to help you find the right coverage when it matters most through an agent, online or on the app. State Farm, with the assist. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability and eligibility vary by state. This is from Edward. Is industry not enough of a big deal? Or just the right enough of a big deal?

• 23:52Bill Simmons?

  I look forward to this show like nothing since Breaking Bad, but have nobody to talk about it with other than the watch? And Katie Baker's recaps, two ringer plugs.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  Thank you for listening.

• 24:03Bill Simmons?

  My girlfriend thinks the show is depraved and none of my friends care. That's from Edward.

• 24:09Speaker 01

  I think for industry fans, we're eating well. This is exactly where we want the show to be. And it actually is building out like a future for itself, where it can be like anything it wants. Like when you think about where the show started about, you know, these probationary finance executives, like in this training program. And now it's about international espionage. It's pretty incredible. But, you know, I totally understand if somebody is just like, there's just too many threesomes on this show and too much ketamine. So I think it's right where it needs to be. You know, it's like building towards the future, but it's, it still weeds out the squares.

• 24:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, just when you think the show is going to calm down, all of a sudden, there's a giant strap on dildo. And you're like, oh, okay, we're doing this again in the first episode.

• 24:56Bill Simmons?

  I think this season and last season, I've watched every season. The first time I was fine with, I enjoyed. Didn't really like, wasn't going to tell my grandkids about them. I thought last season was superb. And I think this season has been otherworldly. Like almost like to the point, I'm starting to go Scientology on it with, like trying, getting mad when people in my life, or I know like it haven't watched it. Like we're hitting that point with it.

• 25:20Speaker 01

  Do you, what do you think is the resistance people have to it? Is it the raciness of it? Or is it like the British, Britishness of it?

• 25:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I think it's the, people feel like it's not an American show. So it's a strike against it, right? It's like, ah, yeah, it's hedge fund show set in England. No, thanks.

• 25:35Speaker 01

  Two of the main characters are American. And it is, is pretty easy.

• 25:39Bill Simmons?

  Doesn't that giant stars?

• 25:40Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 25:42Bill Simmons?

  But it's just exceptionally well acted. And I thought

• 25:44Speaker 01

  Harrington is so good this year.

• 25:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, so Jon Snow, I'm from Thrones, is in the show in a completely different, like just physically looks different. Everything's about him different. I wrote this down, CR. Well, first of all, is this a coastal elite bubble show?

• 26:00Speaker 01

  Probably.

• 26:01Bill Simmons?

  Is the studio a coastal elite bubble show?

• 26:03Speaker 01

  Definitely. I'm sure that the same, both of those shows probably appeal to anyone, anywhere. Like studio's funny, studio has lots of fun manic gags. And industry has sex and drugs and like nail biting, thrilling moments of, of corporate and, and international like crime.

• 26:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 26:26Speaker 01

  But I think largely the languages that they're spoken in and the, the concerns that they have are probably limited to a certain coastal elite, if you think that that's a real thing.

• 26:37Bill Simmons?

  I wrote this down just for you. If you told me in 2011, 15 years ago, that in 2026,

• 26:47Bill Simmons?

  LeBron would be playing in the All-Star game. Trump would be in year two of his second term. You and I would be doing a video podcast on Spotify and Netflix. Or there would be a superb HBO show that featured Sally Draper blowing Jon Snow. What would, what would have blown your mind the most out of those four?

• 27:08Speaker 01

  It would be the latter.

• 27:09Bill Simmons?

  Has to be the last one, right?

• 27:11Speaker 01

  LeBron takes care of himself.

• 27:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, Trump, who knows? Yeah, who knows where this podcast is gonna go, but wait.

• 27:16Speaker 01

  And I love that.

• 27:17Bill Simmons?

  Sally Draper, what happened?

• 27:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:19Bill Simmons?

  I just can't get over it.

• 27:23Bill Simmons?

  Oh, wait. I have another tanking question for you.

• 27:26Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 27:27Bill Simmons?

  It was a sliding scale with rookies' choice. I talked about this, this is from Imran in San Francisco. I talked about this with Zach a little bit about could rookies get autonomy with where they go? Especially in the high picks. His idea was a, was a scale that slides from like 20 million to three. And the, the athlete can actually just pick what number is the combo with the right team. I think, and I, this is what I said to Zach and I've refined a little bit, but if the five worst teams, whoever wins the lottery, or you could just be the bottom five. If it's just a ticket to be in the top five. And then when the first pick comes up.

• 28:10Bill Simmons?

  So it's like the, the, the five teams have decided that they would take Cooper flag in this spot.

• 28:17Speaker 01

  Okay. So like the, the jazz.

• 28:20Bill Simmons?

  They all send their list. Here's who we would take.

• 28:22Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 28:22Bill Simmons?

  And it's like by consensus, Cooper flag would be the pick here. Cooper, come on up. You could go here, here. You go the Sixers, Spurs, Mavericks, Hornets or Jazz. Your call.

• 28:34Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 28:35Bill Simmons?

  And then he just gets to pick.

• 28:37Speaker 01

  So this is kind of like the voice.

• 28:38Bill Simmons?

  It's, and that has become love is blind cross with the NBA draft.

• 28:43Speaker 01

  It would be amazing if, if they made the number one pick, like Darren Peterson comes out from behind the wall and he's like waiting to see what GM meets him on the carpet.

• 28:54Bill Simmons?

  It's like, oh my God, it's Danny Age.

• 28:55Speaker 01

  Oh, it's, it's Danny Age. Cool. I love Salt Lake City.

• 28:59Bill Simmons?

  It'll never happen, but I really like that idea. Uh, I got a few questions about this, but Mitchell Eppner, who's been in a bunch of mailbags over the years, um, he called me the media personality who's done the most to dramatize the question of who gets the hammer during the in memoriam segment of the Oscars.

• 29:15Speaker 01

  You really have.

• 29:16Bill Simmons?

  You know what? I'll take credit for that. It's something I've always cared about. Um, I, I really feel like it's an important thing. And he mentioned, he sends this before the tragic death of 95 year old, uh, big shot Bob Duvall.

• 29:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:29Bill Simmons?

  He said he sees three incredible choices in order of passing. He's not ranking them. Robert Redford, Diane Keaton, Rob Reiner. And now we have Duvall and send me a long thing of pros and cons.

• 29:46Bill Simmons?

  Where would go? And I, I would have said Redford.

• 29:52Bill Simmons?

  Before the Duvall thing, now, now with that, these are like, I don't remember we've had four like this. In the same Oscars thing. I don't know what they do CR.

• 30:01Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, you could make an argument for any of the people, the big names that you've mentioned could get like their own.

• 30:08Bill Simmons?

  Their own little, little area.

• 30:09Speaker 01

  On the show.

• 30:09Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 30:10Speaker 01

  And I, I would argue that that would probably be quite meaningful if every 10, 15, 20 minutes Conan took a break and was just like, we just want to pay tribute to the work and life of Redford, Keaton, Duvall and, and Reiner. And if somebody comes talk, you could do a montage. It almost feels like the, the in memoriam is not enough.

• 30:30Bill Simmons?

  That's where I landed as well. And if we're doing like, maybe Redford's the last one of all the ones they do, but man, I can't remember four like that.

• 30:38Speaker 01

  I just hope that the Duval gets the hammer and the last scene is just that guy going, let me tell you something, my kraut big friend.

• 30:46Bill Simmons?

  Jack Waltz. If you, if you take the two Godfathers out, what's your Duval Mount Rushmore?

• 30:52Speaker 01

  Uh, I love him in Apocalypse.

• 30:55Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 30:56Speaker 01

  Now, I love him in Network. Um, a late, later period one that I really enjoy him in is The Paper. And trying to think of like one that's kind of like a funky, oh, uh, the TV film version of One Some Dove.

• 31:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. So I somehow never saw that. And, uh, my dad loves it. I might actually bang it out.

• 31:17Speaker 01

  He's amazing in it. Him and Tommy Lee, it's like five or six of the best hours you can spend is watching that. It's so good.

• 31:23Bill Simmons?

  So I have Apocalypse. Santini has to be on there. That's like a once in a decade crazy performance. Um, I really love him in Days of Thunder. I just love that he did the movie. Plus there's that famous story of him just bitching Tony Scott out for

• 31:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:39Bill Simmons?

  10 minutes being furious at him. And then my last one would be Invasion of the Body Statchers, which he's in for like 10 seconds on a swing in a priest outfit, just being fucking crazy, just for no reason at all. They just throw them in there. Um, this is from Spencer. After listening to Bill and CR talk about Miami Vice the show for years, I finally bought the entire series on Blu-ray. I just finished a season one episode called Home Invaders about a group of robbers that left Chicago and continued their MO of breaking into homes in affluent neighborhoods, blah, blah, blah.

• 32:13Speaker 01

  Which is basically Heat Two.

• 32:15Bill Simmons?

  Well, that's his point. He said, gathering info from one of their members who's a valet at a shopping complex. Thought it sounded familiar, the exact storyline as part of Heat Two. Michael Mann breaking out the old hits. I don't even care because it's so great. Do you care?

• 32:29Speaker 01

  I don't care. To love Michael Mann is to love Michael Mann motifs. I was just watching Manhunter last night with my wife and the, the, the great Samurai man staring out over water. Even William Peterson's house in, uh, Captiva looks a lot like Neil's house in LA where it's like all blue, very minimal. So like, I think that you go to Mann because he has these recurring themes and recurring bits of information and he shares them across films. I mean, I think that there's like, there's connective tissue from Thief to Manhunter to Heat to Collateral. Like, you know, you could just, you could, it's, it's actually one of the best parts about loving his movies.

• 33:11Bill Simmons?

  I think you could go through the first season and a half of Miami Vice and probably pull 10 movies out of there. Like the Bruce Willis episode, 100% a movie. The great McCarthy episode, 100% a movie. Uh, Lombard, that Dennis Farina character, the mob boss, you could have easily turned that into a two hour something. There are two two hour movies in Miami Vice in the first season. You just keep going and going.

• 33:35Speaker 01

  What are we just gonna do it?

• 33:36Bill Simmons?

  Which one?

• 33:37Speaker 01

  We're just gonna say fuck it and just do like a rewatch of it?

• 33:40Bill Simmons?

  Of the entire first season?

• 33:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:44Bill Simmons?

  Are you throwing this out at me?

• 33:46Speaker 01

  Like this, this summer? Should we just say fuck it?

• 33:48Bill Simmons?

  Like just do 20 minutes an episode?

• 33:52Bill Simmons?

  Well, we did Call of Duty Revenge.

• 33:53Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 33:54Bill Simmons?

  On rewatchables. I do get the email from time to time, people wondering why we haven't done the pilot.

• 34:01Speaker 01

  That would also be a rewatchable to me.

• 34:03Bill Simmons?

  Which peaks with, um, I mean, there's some, there's a couple of great moments, but that it does peak with, um, Tubbs dancing with his buttons open to Rockwell. Somebody watched, watching me in a strip joint.

• 34:18Speaker 01

  Is it streaming right now? I don't think it is.

• 34:20Bill Simmons?

  No, it is. It's on a, I think it's on Pluto and Paramount, but you can, you can bang these out. Like they'll have sales on like Fandango and it's like 9.99 for the series. I did it. I banged it out. I just was like, I'm taking this down. Um, I might have to think about that.

• 34:36Speaker 01

  Just, just putting it out there.

• 34:39Bill Simmons?

  People will have America vote on this and top five tanking. John S. wants to know is Taylor Sheridan basically white Tyler Perry? So I checked, I checked with Van and Van had some thoughts.

• 34:54Speaker 01

  What were Van's thoughts? I want to know.

• 34:55Bill Simmons?

  They had some thoughts. He, Van was like, we've talked about this. I was like, I don't know if we had. So here's the thing. I think both of them are creating content driven toward certain kind of bases slash pieces of turf that are available. And Sheridan, like we talked about earlier with the coastal loop bubble, Sheridan's like, there's like 45 states out here that are underserved. I'm just going to make shows for them. But I actually do think, I wouldn't say it's like, these aren't like all what shows, like there's a lot of stuff going on. They definitely veered toward conservative. Like I didn't watch Lioness, but Van said Lioness got super conservative at one point. I think when man season two had a couple of moments.

• 35:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:39Bill Simmons?

  But in general, I don't think Tyler Perry could have written Sicario. That's my answer.

• 35:44Speaker 01

  Okay. I would just love to see a big dinner party with like all the characters from Perry and Sheridan. Just hanging out.

• 35:52Bill Simmons?

  Maybe they should just do like a movie where they just kind of merge worlds.

• 35:55Speaker 01

  Yes. Medea's Lioness.

• 35:58Bill Simmons?

  Paramount. Speaking of rewatchables. This is from Garrett from Ohio. I am listening to the son of a woman rewatchable. Craig, producer Craig asks, who is more important to the pod, meaning the rewatchables, Cruz or Pacino? This made me think if the rewatchables is the NBA, Cruz is LeBron and Pacino is Steph Curry. He keeps going. It's mostly believed Steph influenced the league more, although LeBron went to and won more titles and is the better overall player. By the way, they won the same amount of titles. Cruz has made more appearances and probably one more movies, but Pacino has shaped the podcast more.

• 36:42Bill Simmons?

  Vincent Hanna is like Steph's long pull up three in OKC in 2016. The league and the pot are in the spots they are today because of it. It's from Garrett from Ohio.

• 36:53Bill Simmons?

  I think he's right that Pacino probably means more to the pod, even though Cruz has been in more movies.

• 36:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think that I get more out of bad Pacino movies than I get out of bad Cruz movies, of which there aren't that many. But like, for instance, like, I'd rather watch, um, I'd rather watch The Devil's Own than Oblivion. You know, like, I just really think that Al Pacino represents what I love about, like, taking a big swing on a piece of shit and trying, trying something when you're playing the devil. And Cruz is just, he's just Tom Cruise every time, you know what I mean? And he, he fits himself into certain things and you can watch him in Eyes Wide Shut and you can watch him in Mission Impossible. And it's consistency there. So I guess that is LeBron. I think this is a good, good metaphor.

• 37:36Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, the LeBron Cruz thing is, is a pretty good combo. Like, like when you think about, like, just reliable year after year. Sometimes they'll get a little, they'll, they'll take a swing at something. Like Cruz will be like, fuck it, I'll do this Stanley Kubrick movie in London for a year and a half. LeBron is like, I'm gonna try to go back to Cleveland and I'll get them to trade for Kevin Love. We'll see how this works.

• 37:58Speaker 01

  When's the last time you watched Eyes Wide Shut? Just out of curiosity.

• 38:01Bill Simmons?

  So you watched it last weekend, right? We did that, we did it for rewatchables a while ago. And now it is like this movie that it was like number 12 on iTunes.

• 38:09Speaker 01

  It's a Canary in the Coal Mine kind of movie now.

• 38:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, Tubi was running it. I know, I saw too, that it was like most popular on Tubi. And people revisiting it based on certain real life things. Did you learn anything this time around?

• 38:22Speaker 01

  Um, I think that it was just, is one of those movies that it could be another hour longer and I would not blink. You know, like it, it just could go on forever. I think, uh, it's just also one of the great movies to read about after you get done in a watch is to go on and just go through every single symbol, every single frame that it's like, look, you put a pentagram behind him. And you're just like, holy shit, did he? Uh, so it's just one of the great texts, but obviously pretty relevant now.

• 38:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, my son watched, um, he'd already seen The Shining a million times, but then he watched 2001. And then he watched Full Metal Jacket and he was with his friends on, uh, it was like a four day weekend. And he's like, which, which Kubrick movie should we watch? And I was like, Full Metal Jacket. And then the next day he came back because they were all like sleeping in somebody's house and he came back and he was like, yo.

• 39:17Bill Simmons?

  And I was like, you liked it? And he was just like, hey Joker. I was like, you liked it, didn't you? And he was like, he was like, what an amazing movie.

• 39:26Speaker 01

  Was he doing Denofrio? Yeah, okay.

• 39:28Bill Simmons?

  And he's like, I looked for the rewatchables. I couldn't find it.

• 39:31Speaker 01

  I'm in a world of shit.

• 39:34Bill Simmons?

  He was like, how have you not done rewatchables on that yet? So he's really into it. So on Sunday, we watched Room 237, which I think is in the running for one of the best documentaries of the past 20 years.

• 39:46Speaker 01

  Amazing stuff.

• 39:47Bill Simmons?

  It's just like the craziest documentary.

• 39:50Speaker 01

  But you don't want to do Eyes Wide with him. Too uncomfortable.

• 39:54Bill Simmons?

  With Ben?

• 39:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:56Bill Simmons?

  My wife and I talked about it because he wanted to watch it with us. And we were like, we're good. There's still some lines we don't want to cross with you.

• 40:05Bill Simmons?

  Eyes Wide Shut might be one. Maybe solo that one? Or, or watch with the, with the, with your girlfriend? But we're gonna pass.

• 40:13Speaker 01

  Oh my God.

• 40:14Bill Simmons?

  But yeah, Room 237. I don't know how they pulled it off where they just take all these people who's in, and you can find it basically anywhere, but all these different people who interpret different things about The Shining.

• 40:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:28Bill Simmons?

  And I actually think this would be a good rewatchables. This is the Room 237. Or it would just be a good segment. Because there's a couple of guys where I'm like, like the, the Calumet Cairns guy? I'm like, this is pretty good. He does only put it behind.

• 40:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:44Bill Simmons?

  Behind the scene, in the background twice. This has to mean something.

• 40:47Speaker 01

  Like the thing that's, you know, everybody is obsessed with is the final scene of Eyes Wide Shut.

• 40:53Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah.

• 40:54Speaker 01

  And whether Helena like looks back.

• 40:56Bill Simmons?

  Because they gave their girl, their kid away.

• 41:00Speaker 01

  Or she's taken, yeah. We did a lot, we did a pretty close second spectrum watch of that the other night.

• 41:07Bill Simmons?

  Here's the thing with Kubrick. By all accounts, just an amazing preparation guy. Like even in room 237, they talked about how he went to the hotel for the hotel that he was scouting for like three months and just checked out every part of it. So everything that's in The Shining, like the carpet, the fact that the guy who, the boss that Nicholson goes to see about the job, he's got a window in his office when there's no way there would be a window in that part of the hotel. And it's like, everything is, happens for a reason. But then you could also go, maybe Kubrick was just old and he just, just didn't realize that that room should have a window. And it's like, I don't think so. I think he really did think about every aspect of this.

• 41:51Speaker 01

  First of all, I fully think he thought about every single thing. But it's funny because when you're watching Eyes Wide Shut and you're like, this feels so otherworldly. It's because he rebuilt New York City on English downstairs stages. And he did it like detail perfect to like where the newspaper boxes would be. And you're like, what was he trying to say? And it's like, well, he also hated flying, so he didn't want to shoot New York. So like, I guess it's kind of, it can be both.

• 42:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, Eyes Wide Shut, you could say he's trying to tell us all the stuff that we're now finding out about in the Epstein files. Or he just wanted to make a movie about a fucked up marriage and what would happen if like something went sideways. Who knows?

• 42:31Bill Simmons?

  Somebody named CP, didn't give his full name, asked if he's too late on the potential of a month-long theme, theme month called The Rewackables and suggested two-month junction in Tarzan. I thought with Bo Derek. I thought I'd leave you with that one. I rejected Rewackables. I think that could be the end of the podcast.

• 42:54Speaker 01

  No comment.

• 42:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, we're not gonna, we're not gonna do Rewackables. But yeah, that's it. That's all I have for you, CR. How are you feeling about the Sixers heading into the, end of the All-Star break?

• 43:04Speaker 01

  Well, I'm glad we're not Houston.

• 43:09Bill Simmons?

  Good to see you. Oh, by the way, last thing before we go.

• 43:13Bill Simmons?

  I told you this, uh, yesterday. March is gonna be CR month on the rewatch.

• 43:18Speaker 01

  It really is.

• 43:19Bill Simmons?

  It's.

• 43:20Speaker 01

  What it, what made you do this? Just like it's time? Finally, you were worried about my, my wandering eye?

• 43:24Bill Simmons?

  No, it's time. No, there's a couple, couple of movies that we were due and, uh, and it's gonna kick off on March 2nd. On Netflix, we're gonna do a live Sicario. I won't spoil the other movies, but we're going live Sicario, me, you and fantasy.

• 43:39Speaker 01

  It doesn't feel real. I'm not gonna believe until we're actually live.

• 43:42Bill Simmons?

  Are you gonna be nervous for this? Is this gonna be like more nerve wracking than a live show?

• 43:46Speaker 01

  I've been training for this my whole life.

• 43:48Bill Simmons?

  Live Sicario, March 2nd. All right, Sierra, good to see you. Thanks.

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• 44:17Speaker 03

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• 45:16Speaker 04

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• 45:22Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by Viori. When it comes to clothes that score high in both comfort and style, Viori is my MVP. Sunday performance joggers, oh yeah. They have the perfect, I could watch a game and then go out to dinner vibe. And the Meta pant, that's my number one, I need to look like I tried option. Get 20% off your first purchase at Viori.com/Simmons and discover the versatility of Viori clothing. Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. Excitement is in the air. That's right. It's the start of NBA season. I can't wait to get together with friends, share some Michelob Ultras and watch Tip Off. Plus, as the official beer sponsor of the NBA, Michelob Ultra is getting you closer to the action with experiences that make you feel like

• 46:06Bill Simmons?

  you're courtside to actual courtside tickets. Enter now for a chance to win at michelobultra.com/courtside. Michelob Ultra Courtside 26 to 27. No purchase necessary. Open to U.S. residents 21 plus. Begins on October 1st, 2026. Ends on June 30th, 2027. Multiple entry periods. See official rules at michelobultra.com/courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes and details. So we're going to keep going on the mailbag with Joe House who's here. Hello, Joe House. Highlighting a huge opportunity on FanDuel through March 1st. We talked about our NBA futures at the beginning of the season. Had some good ones, had some bad ones. Right now, your futures pick could actually land you at the NBA Finals. Just use your profit boost on any eligible NBA futures selection.

• 46:50Bill Simmons?

  You're automatically entered for a chance to win a trip for two to the finals. Plus NBA store credit. So we're going to talk about a couple of over unders that we love. We also love the Charlotte Hornets for the division. They're a couple of games behind Orlando, but that's still in like the four to one range, House, and I don't really fully understand it.

• 47:14Speaker 05

  Well, they have a little bit of a difficult schedule.

• 47:17Bill Simmons?

  Sure.

• 47:17Speaker 05

  And, you know, they have to jump over the heat as well, don't they?

• 47:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they have to jump over both of them. But right now, it is Orlando's 28 and 25, Miami's 29 and 27, and Charlotte's 26 and 29. So 27 games left, they'd have to make up four losses, basically. And I actually think that's four to one. I think that's relatively reasonable to me. Anyway, we're about to talk about a bunch of these in one second. It's a perfect time to lock in those predictions, potentially secure your seat at the NBA Finals. Send to Fanduel Sportsbook, place your PBT wager before March 1st. Fanduel, play your game. All right, House, we're gonna do a mailbag in a second, but I talked about over under. So the season comes back on Thursday, and you and me and Sal and Hench have spent a bunch of time trying to figure out bets we made. You guys do award stuff, which I'm

• 48:08Bill Simmons?

  not allowed to bet on, but we did did wonder, like, the Cooper Flag Rookie of the Year odds did seem really high, considering I don't trust if Dallas is gonna shut them down. On Fanduel, there's some teams that have tanking potential. You can't even find the over unders. I sent you eight, and I want to go through the three honorable mention for me for over unders, just for win totals. And then the five I like. But these three stood out to me. Charlotte, who is 26 and 29, their under is 42 and 1/2. So they'd basically have to go 16 and 11 or worse to basically go 42 and 40 or worse. 17 and 10

• 48:49Bill Simmons?

  beats the over under. My question for you, House, is 17 and 10, that seems high for Charlotte. Like, I was looking at just like the last 25 games in the league. The only team that went 18 and 7 was Detroit. Five teams had 17 wins or 16 wins. Like, we just have more parity. And 17 and 10, I just think's gonna be hard, but I also don't want to bet against Charlotte. So I think it's a stay away.

• 49:13Speaker 05

  Yeah, I like the idea of staying away. I think the number is is fine at like 42. So the under makes sense to me. 41, 42 feels like the right number.

• 49:23Bill Simmons?

  But we don't want to bet the under.

• 49:25Speaker 05

  And right, that's the karma. And we already have cash in pocket with a beautiful over for Charlotte.

• 49:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 49:34Speaker 05

  So let's keep the karma headed in the right direction.

• 49:36Bill Simmons?

  Golden State is 29 and 26. Their over under is 43 and a half. If you go over, that means they only have to go 15 and 12 the rest of the way. And it looks like they might have Porzingis back. I think it's a stay away just because I don't trust them from a health standpoint, but I also, I don't think they're going to tank.

• 49:55Speaker 05

  I'm violently opposed to Golden State's success. I'm heavily invested in them missing the playoffs. I don't think that they have any rational incentive to bust ass through the balance of this season. The mileage on Steph, you can't get it back. So the right thing to do is to get to the end of the season, try and, and over the course of the summer, figure out how you're going to be competitive next year. Is there something that can be done with Jimmy Butler in the, in the, over the course of the summer and go from there?

• 50:31Bill Simmons?

  I agree. It's a stay away. And I also think this next one's a stay away, but I thought the number was intriguing. The Lakers right now are 33 and 21. The over under for them was 48 and a half, which means they would have to go 16 and 11 down the stretch to go over. The only reason I mentioned that is because I think the Lakers are the hardest record team to figure out. Where you catch them on the wrong night and they just suck. You're just like, what is this team?

• 50:58Bill Simmons?

  And it almost feels like two losses, but it's only one loss. And then they'll have other games where they suck for three quarters and then they just have Luca and LeBron on their team. And they just figure it out down the stretch. I find it hard to believe they're not going to go 16 and 11, but I also don't want to bet on it.

• 51:13Speaker 05

  They're an under for me. Their schedule is backloaded to take advantage of the fact that they become a prime time team. You know, in these Saturday games, these, these Amazon Prime games, these NBC games, LeBron's not playing in any back to backs.

• 51:30Bill Simmons?

  Oh, that's a good point too. Yeah. Yeah.

• 51:32Speaker 05

  Their, their strength of schedule is inside the top 10 in terms of what they have to face over the balance of this season.

• 51:37Bill Simmons?

  15 and 12 would be under for them. Okay. Here are the five I like. Cleveland, right now 34 and 21. The over is 52 and a half. They would have to go 19 and eight over their last 27 games. Last 25 games, House, they're 18 and 7, fifth in net. They added Harden, they added Schroder. And I really like the Harden thing. They haven't been healthy all year and I think, to me, that's a 60-plus win team, especially with Harden, the fact that he's durable and that they could have somebody take a night off and he could just run the offense. Everything could run through him. They'd have to go 19 and 8 to beat that over and under and I like it. I like the, I'm over for them.

• 52:14Speaker 05

  I like it too. The crazy thing is with the 18 and 7 over their last 25 and then us projecting them out to win basically another 20 games, that's them playing at a 70% win percentage north of that.

• 52:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 52:31Speaker 05

  Which they just did over the last 25 games, 72% win percentage for that they have to hold in and at that level. Now, I think the way that they reinforced their depth, the, um, obviously Harden and what that means in terms of taking off load for Mitchell, but all, more importantly, Schroder backup, competent guy, guy that can consume minutes. And the Ellis piece of this is super underrated. We're not, we're barely scratched the surface of what Ellis is gonna be for them. Um, I, I think that they are loaded and their schedule is great. They get, um, Brooklyn twice, they get Dallas twice, they have the Bucks twice, uh, and then all of the bums, Chicago,

• 53:15Speaker 05

  the Pelicans, the Whiz, the Pacers, Utah. I really like the way that, that Cleveland's lined up here.

• 53:21Bill Simmons?

  All right, Cleveland over 52 now, that's first. Second one, CR and I talked about Houston and the KD burner scandal earlier, burner gate, burner files. Houston's 33 and 20. Their over under is 51 and a half. 18 and 11 or worse hits the under. I love the under. I just think they're a different team with Adams out and they haven't had Van Vliet all year and Adams, with Shengun was their superpower. Talked about this with Zach on Sunday, that's gone. Um, I don't know what kind of injury risk they can afford either at this point. They have some weird off the court stuff. They're in a harder conference. There's less teams throwing games away in that conference and just in general, 18, 11,

• 54:03Bill Simmons?

  17 and 12, 16 and 13. I feel like they're in there and I'm under, House.

• 54:09Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's a strong under for me. I said on this program, I think it was.

• 54:13Bill Simmons?

  You said, yeah, you said it three weeks ago. Yeah, yeah.

• 54:15Speaker 05

  I love them under 53 and a half. That number ticked down to 52 and a half, and now it's sitting at 51 and a half, and it's still an under. In addition to the points that you just made, Kevin Durant is third in the NBA in minutes per game. That is not sustainable. That does not make any sense. That's not a path to success as you enter this playoff run. And the reason that he is in that position is because they can't score at the end of games. They have, they really, really miss Dillon Brooks. Think about that. But it's FVV and Dillon Brooks both missing. The perimeter scoring just isn't there.

• 54:57Bill Simmons?

  There's some tough, tough Shingun stats.

• 54:59Speaker 05

  Right.

• 55:00Bill Simmons?

  Thompson can't shoot at all. Teams aren't even guarding him anymore. I don't want to like cross them off because I still think they might be a bitch to play in the playoffs, but I think for a regular season, hard under. Next one, I'm a hard over for Minnesota's 34 and 22. Their over is 49 and a half, which means 16 and 10 hits it. And notice, like Houston has 29 games left, Cleveland has 27, everybody has 27, 28, 29 left. Minnesota only has 26. Schedule's spread out. They got to Soon New. They, I think, have underachieved a little bit at 34 and 22. Anyway, I like the team. I like the durability of the team. And 16 and 10 with also them trying to get into the top four,

• 55:45Bill Simmons?

  which is another piece with them because you get top four, you get to host home court. So I have this marked down as Minnesota over.

• 55:52Speaker 05

  I am right there with you. They are jumping over Houston in my lineup there. I don't count the Lakers as a top 14, but for the reasons I just mentioned. So Minnesota into that top four makes sense. They're incented. And the thing that is, the remains to be seen, two pieces. Anthony Edwards reminding us on a national stage that he is that dude. And Minnesota does get a bunch of prime time games down through the balance of the schedule. And I think that Ayo, Ayo acquisition is just going to be.

• 56:29Speaker 05

  We're gonna really.

• 56:30Bill Simmons?

  I loved it so much. And somehow they got Mike Conley back with the most obscure rule I've never heard of in my life, that if you trade a guy and then he gets traded to a second team and waived, you get him back. Who knew that was a rule? That's a rule?

• 56:44Speaker 05

  I'm sure.

• 56:44Bill Simmons?

  I thought he traded a guy, they weren't able to get him back for the rest of the year. Now it's like, if you trade him and trade him again, I get him back?

• 56:50Speaker 05

  Nobody wants him. Nobody wants him. He has a home in Minnesota.

• 56:54Bill Simmons?

  Well, I mailed you this, I mailed you and Sal and Hensh this, that if you do a West Final Four right now, who are gonna be the four West semifinal teams, if you win OKC, Denver, San Antonio, Minnesota, that's plus 652, and I think that's way too high. I think that's one of the best bets on the board because I think that's the top four. So somebody's gonna have to beat them not having game seven at home. We've seen, you know, we've seen the higher seeds, somebody will blow it. We saw it last year with Cleveland. We saw Milwaukee a couple of years ago. It's not like it doesn't happen, but I just think that's gonna be the final four.

• 57:28Speaker 05

  Those are the four best teams in the West as, as we sit here today.

• 57:33Bill Simmons?

  The only thing would be Minnesota Lakers, if that's the four or five, I think it's just a terrible outcome for the Lakers.

• 57:40Speaker 05

  They cooked the Lakers. We just watched this last year. It's a 4-1 at best for the Lakers.

• 57:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

• 57:45Speaker 05

  They lose, they win one game.

• 57:47Bill Simmons?

  With the Lakers over under, I was almost wondering, would they try to tank to get to the six, just to get away from Minnesota? All right, next one, two more. Knicks 35 and 20 right now, over is 52 and a half, and they're, they'd have to go 18 and 9 the rest of the way in 27 games. Some of the same stuff you have in the, in the East with a bunch of shitty teams. I love the Alvarado's thing when it happened. I thought he was one of the best stealth guys to get at the deadline. I wanted the Celtics to get him. You could already feel how different they look with him. They have a better bench. I think they're, I just feel like they're gonna take off. It's weird to say you would like the overs for both the Knicks and Cleveland, but I think by the end of the year, it's gonna be a top three with those three. And I like the over.

• 58:32Speaker 05

  It makes sense. It's what their priors lined up and we took overs for both Cleveland and the Knicks at the outset of the season. I had the Knicks getting the 53 or 54 wins this season and I had Cleveland in like the 58 win category. And so the fact that they had the hiccups that they had regular season wise, but now they're poised. They have the rosters lined up, especially Cleveland depth wise.

• 58:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 58:56Speaker 05

  We just need OG to get more healthy than not. If we get OG, if you tell me OG is going to play 75% of these Knicks games down the stretch, then I love it.

• 59:06Bill Simmons?

  So the last one, I just had to look on Fanduel again to make sure the odds didn't change because I can't believe this one.

• 59:13Speaker 05

  It's an insane number.

• 59:15Bill Simmons?

  It's, I, I just can't, I'm stupefied by it. Orlando is 28 and 25 right now. Their over under is 45 and a half wins, which means they would have to go 18 and 11 to be over. If you get 17 and 12 or worse and you win the under 16 and 13, 15 and 14, house. Last 25 games, they had the 24th net rating. They have not passed the eye test all year. It is

• 59:41Speaker 05

  Not once.

• 59:42Bill Simmons?

  It has looked like a team that has had something wrong with them for four months. I don't know what's going to change and I have no idea why anyone would think they're going to go 18 and 11. I thought this was insane.

• 59:54Speaker 05

  I said not once. They did beat the Knicks in Madison Square Garden.

• 59:58Bill Simmons?

  Right. And we were like, oh, maybe here comes Orlando. And then they lost to somebody shitty like two days later.

• 1:00:04Speaker 05

  What's the Franz forecast? That's the most important thing for this.

• 1:00:07Bill Simmons?

  Like, when does he come back?

• 1:00:09Speaker 05

  Yes. Will he, will he come back?

• 1:00:12Bill Simmons?

  Put it this way, this number has it built in that he's coming back. So if he doesn't come back, that helps the number, but uh.

• 1:00:19Speaker 05

  No, this is a huge under for me. This, this team offensively has been one of the most dysfunctional in the entire NBA, which is so weird to say because the Bain acquisition was successful and the emergence of Black. He's, he's really effing good.

• 1:00:37Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:00:37Speaker 05

  Uh, and, and Palo has numbers, but they're empty calories for, for, for some reason. They still have two games against Cleveland, two games against Detroit, two games against Minnesota, Oklahoma City and Boston. Give me the under, baby.

• 1:00:53Bill Simmons?

  I honestly, I keep checking it to understand, try to understand what's happening. So, all right, so we're over Cleveland 52 and a half, under Houston 51 and a half, over Minnesota 49 and a half, over Knicks 52 and a half, and under Orlando 45 and a half. I think those are five good ones. We're gonna take one more break, come back and do the rest of the mailbag. And now it's time for the paradox playbook, presented by Pepsi. Have you heard about the Pepsi paradox? It's this idea that when labels and bias disappear in blind taste tests, 66% of people in last year's Pepsi challenge preferred the taste of Pepsi Zero Sugar over Coca-Cola Zero Sugar. Well, if your favorite team had that winning percentage,

• 1:01:37Bill Simmons?

  they would almost always make the playoffs, right? Which got me thinking, sports is full of paradoxes like this. You see this every year, especially in the NBA. The NBA season is so long. We always see a team that we don't really take seriously around the 50 game mark. I remember this happened with the 2022 Celtics, 25 and 25. You just kind of forget about them. And yet every year, there's that one late bloomer. It happens in the NFL too. And there was the Celtics, the Mavericks, the year Luca made the finals with them. And as you're looking at the NBA season this year, just kind of look around the landscape. Who hasn't peaked yet? Who might peak? Doesn't make a lot of sense. You would think the good teams would reveal themselves before Christmas, but sometimes that doesn't happen. That's the paradox.

• 1:02:21Bill Simmons?

  Well, let me ask you this question. Are you picking the zero sugar cola that you actually prefer? Or are you settling for the label that you think you prefer? Hmm. Go out and try Pepsi Zero Sugar today. Let your taste decide. All right, House, have some good mailbag questions. I tried to not give you any of the tanking ones. This is a long email from somebody named Marco P. in British Columbia. Oh, Canada. It's one of the more interesting theories I've gotten in a while, and I can't wait to read it to you as a fellow lover of NBA history. He says, "I don't think you could win a title with your best player resting. If your best player plays less than 60 games, you cannot win a ring."

• 1:03:08Bill Simmons?

  I pulled that number straight out of my ass. Then I went through the last 45 years of NBA history. Apparently my ass has great aim. Now, he mentions the 21 Bucks championship. Giannis played 61, but there was a post COVID. It was a 72 game season, so cross that off.

• 1:03:24Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:03:25Bill Simmons?

  2019 Raptors, Kawhi played 60 games. Then he writes, that's it. Since 1980, no other team won a ring if their best player played less than 60 games. Why do I bring this up? I have Wemby in the rookie draft by fantasy league. He's a five year keeper. I'm increasingly realizing I'll never win with him.

• 1:03:45Bill Simmons?

  My theory is you can't win a title with your best player playing under 60. Is that the team develops chemistry and identity without your star? When he comes back, the action's halting and awkward, especially in the playoffs. And then he says, yes, I'm aware Curry played 51 in the 2018 championship, but we all know who the best player was on that team. Shots fired, but also not wrong.

• 1:04:08Bill Simmons?

  So he says, unless you're a historical super team with one A, one B options like Curry and Durant, you cannot let your best player miss more than a quarter of his games. You cannot afford to rest them. That's what history says. So I went back further and I looked at everything basically since Bill Russell. The most anyone missed was Bill Walton in 1977. He played 65 games, missed 17.

• 1:04:34Bill Simmons?

  Is there something to this? We, we have, basically the only outlier we've ever had is this completely insane 2019 Raptors title, which I'm, I want to go in with you in a second. Other than that, we've never seen it happen otherwise with resting and a title. Why is that?

• 1:04:53Speaker 05

  I'm shocked that you took the time to go investigate even, even further and really test this. It feels self-evident to me. I don't mean to be, yo, Captain Obvious here.

• 1:05:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:07Speaker 05

  Yeah. Playing. 70% of the games feels pretty effing important to me with with your best player for the reasons that the author of the email shares and.

• 1:05:20Bill Simmons?

  But have you ever heard somebody mention this in the discourse like if you don't play this guy enough, history says you actually won't win the title. That I've never heard anyone say that before.

• 1:05:30Speaker 05

  Here's what's annoying and depressing and disappointing. We're only talking about it because of the last five years, the effing NBA, the the arrival of load management and the arrival of, you know, the guys looking for opportunities, the teams looking for opportunities to to rest their players. And then you can't have the combination of load management and injury, which is, you know, basically the last five years of Kawhi Leonard.

• 1:05:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:58Speaker 05

  I mean, this is why Kawhi with the Clippers is a complete bust.

• 1:06:03Bill Simmons?

  So I don't, the 2019 Raptors legitimate title they won, and I actually ended up really liking that team. I respect the title. It's also an incredible outlier, right? Where you had LeBron goes to the West that year, Cleveland blows up. Celtics have all that talent. Gordon Hayward comes back, second year of Kyrie, Brown, Tatum, they blow up for whatever reason. Giannis is a year away, not quite there yet. Lakers are a year away from getting AD. Houston and Golden State are probably the two best teams. Houston can't get by Golden State, even though KD is hurt. And Golden State loses KD in the playoffs.

• 1:06:44Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:06:44Bill Simmons?

  Then we get to the finals and KD comes back and blows out his Achilles in game five, followed by Klay Thompson blowing out his ACL during a hot streak in the third quarter of game six. Now, you could say this was how five year little NBA dynasties are supposed to end. It's too much wear and tear. It's all that. It was an iconic Kawhi playoffs. Fred VanVleet in the finals had a just insane heat check. Curry stunk in game six, but partly because they was the only guy they had to guard. They threw everything at him.

• 1:07:17Speaker 05

  He was exhausted. He was every other game Curry at that point.

• 1:07:20Bill Simmons?

  This was, we've seen it with the 89 Lakers, 87 Celtics, like the 04 Lakers. We've seen these great teams at the tail end. They can't sustain it. And the Raps had a great player. They had luck from injury. No injuries, seven really good guys, all who could create their own shot. And a couple of wild card heat checks and they deserved to win. With that said, I still can't believe what happened to Warriors and I almost think of them first when I think of that playoffs. Right. It's like, what, what are the odds KD and Klay are going to go down in the playoffs? Like that was fucking insane.

• 1:07:55Speaker 05

  Yes, yes. I mean, it's the, the only thing I can think of that's like in the neighborhood. I'm, I'm probably missing something obvious, but I think about Isaiah Thomas.

• 1:08:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, sprain of the ankle. Yeah.

• 1:08:06Speaker 05

  Yeah. Against the Lakers.

• 1:08:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that's a really good one.

• 1:08:08Speaker 05

  And how, what an impact that had.

• 1:08:10Bill Simmons?

  So that brings us, by the way, with Kawhi, they also had that game seven against Philly with the crazy shot in the corner. And that whole, that game is nuts. When you go back and actually look at that game, Kawhi took 39 shots in that game. Dan Vliet was like in an absolute shooting coma, like kind of nobody else stepped up. I think maybe Ibaka stepped up and Kawhi just basically carried everybody. So that leads to our next question. What Boston sports moment would you compare the game seven Halliburton injury to? We were so close yet to quote Dan Campbell, it may have been our only shot. I am a fan of the 26, 27 NBA champion, Indiana Pacers. Corbin H. wrote that. So there's no Boston sports moment.

• 1:08:50Bill Simmons?

  Like the only one would be like if, you know, when Brady blew out his ACL, that happened in the Pats Giants Super Bowl. There's no way to compare it to game seven, your best player gets hurt. As you have the lead in the first half, I think the only one you can compare it to is that Isaiah again. Because same situation that when he sprains his ankle in game six against the Lakers, comes back. They almost win and it gets pulled away from them at the end. And then he's too hurt to really do anything in game seven. Detroit had never won the title before like Indiana. That's the only one I can think of where it's like, wow, if that didn't happen, we might've won.

• 1:09:26Speaker 05

  I'm more disappointed than you taking the bait of picking one that's asks about a, a Boston sports moment and relates it to.

• 1:09:33Bill Simmons?

  He was just trying to get the mailbag. Come on.

• 1:09:35Speaker 05

  And all, I understand that. I mean, it's like the, the crass pandering.

• 1:09:39Bill Simmons?

  It's well played.

• 1:09:40Speaker 05

  And you bite down, you know, hook, line and sinker on it.

• 1:09:46Bill Simmons?

  So I was trying to think, what would be the other game that was like this anywhere? You need the best part of the team going down. I think it would have to be a team that's never won.

• 1:09:57Bill Simmons?

  So that kind of rules out KD and Klay going down in back to back years. You kind of have to go to sports movies. You have to go to like Pele and victory and getting hurt. And even he came back and tied the game. I don't, the Hal Burton thing's like, well, it's like over here. It's that, that, that to make it seem like it's comedy, but it's like, it's so fucking crazy that that happened. I can't wrap my head around it. So, um, all right. I didn't want to throw a bunch of tanking things at you, but I really liked this idea from Nick in Nebraska. And I think you're the perfect guy to mention this. Nick in Nebraska. Nick in Nebraska, not, no relation to Nick Iada. Talks, he talked about college football playoff bracket and how committee gets in a room and proclaims the rankings, right? The committee says, here are the rankings from one through 12.

• 1:10:42Bill Simmons?

  There's a narrative, they buy into it. Good wins and good losses matter, he writes. The draft lottery has been a breeding ground for conspiracies. Like Ken Loong in industry, you go straight to the problem. Determine the draft order by committee that makes the order based on who deserves what pick. And incentivize the best behavior karma becomes a real thing. Think of the content. Now, I don't think they're going to do that, but it did inspire an idea that I want to throw at you. Okay. So I think we have a thousand and one ping pong combos for the lottery. I think that's what it is. Great. Whatever it is, it's, I think that's a thousand. What if we had a karma rankings committee? I was doing the lottery karma rankings every year.

• 1:11:24Bill Simmons?

  Where I was like, who actually deserves the number one pick based on how they handled their business during the season? Did they have bad luck with injuries? Is it their fault they're in this situation? Did they conduct themselves with grace and competitiveness and sportsmanship? If we had a karma rankings committee and we put another 250 balls in the lottery and we had a committee and they actually voted 150 balls to first place, 75 for second and 25 for third place. And those balls just went in the lottery. Would you like that?

• 1:11:57Speaker 05

  Extra balls.

• 1:11:57Bill Simmons?

  Extra balls with committee and, and stuff to argue about and content for us.

• 1:12:02Speaker 05

  I mean, I really feel like you're baiting me, uh, right now because of what happened last year.

• 1:12:08Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:12:09Speaker 05

  With the, with the, with, I won't curse, the Dallas Mavericks, the least deserving team in, in the history of the NBA draft, in the history of the NBA lottery.

• 1:12:21Bill Simmons?

  Right. So they would have, they would have had balls taken away. They would have lost a hundred balls.

• 1:12:25Speaker 05

  They should have had no balls. They should have been eunuchs.

• 1:12:28Bill Simmons?

  Well, so.

• 1:12:29Speaker 05

  Going.

• 1:12:30Bill Simmons?

  So my thought was 250 balls go in, 150 for first place, 75 second, 25 third, but we also vote on two teams that should lose balls.

• 1:12:40Speaker 05

  Yeah. Now we're talking.

• 1:12:42Bill Simmons?

  Hundred, we take away 150 balls.

• 1:12:43Speaker 05

  Takes them away.

• 1:12:44Bill Simmons?

  A hundred from the first place and, and 50 for second place. So if we voted right now.

• 1:12:49Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:12:50Bill Simmons?

  For the karma, for, for, I want to give these guys more lottery balls. They deserve them. Indiana has to be the first choice.

• 1:12:58Speaker 05

  Why?

• 1:12:58Bill Simmons?

  Because.

• 1:12:59Speaker 05

  Why do they have to be first?

• 1:13:00Bill Simmons?

  They've, they've had a ton of injuries. Have you watched them? Like they still like give a shit. Like they're trying to win some of these games.

• 1:13:07Speaker 05

  They went on a stretch there. As soon as Matherin went out, they went on an all time, all tank. I mean, it was McConnell was hurt. I know, but, but the.

• 1:13:17Bill Simmons?

  They lost their best guy in a game seven last year. Well, I would vote for them first. So who would you vote for first?

• 1:13:24Speaker 05

  Washington, obviously.

• 1:13:25Bill Simmons?

  I had them second. I had them second, but Washington I think has handled the season relative, with relative dignity.

• 1:13:32Speaker 05

  They've tried to compete, uh, you know, within reason and it's a super young team and they've given some veterans an opportunity to go out and, and, you know, distinguish themselves. Maybe Marvin Bagley, uh, the third will get another contract out of the, the fact that he, he showed decent for Washington, now got traded.

• 1:13:51Bill Simmons?

  Now it's on Dallas, like killing, killing it for them. Right. So I'd have them second. I would actually have Milwaukee. I would give 25 extra ping pong balls. None of this was their fault. They traded, they, they amnesty, whatever they did with Dame Lillard. They tried to get Miles Turner.

• 1:14:05Speaker 05

  You don't think that's their fault? Like the extraordinarily poor front office?

• 1:14:09Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but they won the title with what they did though. It like they're in this position partly because they did that Drew Holiday trade and then did the Dame trade because they were constantly trying to actually compete.

• 1:14:19Speaker 05

  The Dame trade turned out to be an act of desperation that that didn't pay off, but you want to reward them for taking the swing, the big swing.

• 1:14:27Bill Simmons?

  Listen, is there a guy available who can, who can hoop, who might have some personal issues? They welcome them in Milwaukee. It's like, nobody wants Cam Thomas, we'll take him. I like, I would, so I would go Indiana, Washington, Milwaukee. Your order would be Washington, Indiana and who?

• 1:14:50Speaker 05

  I, I wanted, I would have said Charlotte, but they're too good.

• 1:14:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, Charlotte's too good.

• 1:14:53Speaker 05

  They're not gonna be a lottery.

• 1:14:54Bill Simmons?

  So you only have two votes. And then for the takeaway ping pongs, Utah has to be number one.

• 1:15:00Speaker 05

  I honestly think that, I'm sorry, I, I would, I would reward the Pelicans maybe. I don't think the Pelicans.

• 1:15:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Cause it's not like almost like a, you feel bad because of Joe Dumars giving their pick away.

• 1:15:11Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:15:11Bill Simmons?

  But the thing is you reward them and then that pick just goes to somebody else.

• 1:15:17Bill Simmons?

  So you're rewarding Atlanta. Atlanta's like, please reward us.

• 1:15:19Speaker 05

  Atlanta gets even more.

• 1:15:21Bill Simmons?

  So if you're taking the balls away, Utah would be my number one pick to be penalized here.

• 1:15:25Speaker 05

  Well, they have to be because they, they did the most dishonorable thing at exactly the wrong time. The, the true mistake for Utah, they, they can compete. They can, they can win on lots of nights. Like I loved your idea of this threshold wins.

• 1:15:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:40Speaker 05

  27 wins. This Utah team is in the mix. Like they have enough talent to compete for mid twenties kind of wins all the way up.

• 1:15:49Bill Simmons?

  Oh, I think they could be in the thirties. I, I think they could do what Portland did where at least they, they could go 32 and 50 if they really went for it.

• 1:15:56Speaker 05

  Kessler out. I mean, you know, that, that, the, the West is tough and Kessler's out. So, I mean, I, I get, I think 27 is a, is, is secretly a, a great number, but um, the, their true mistake is like. The whole sports world is about to shift its attention away from football. So you can't do the open and notorious tank right as we're all starting to pay attention to you go straight from a cousin Sal, you're crying in, in, in your hot water.

• 1:16:28Bill Simmons?

  This cousin is Right here.

• 1:16:30Speaker 05

  Is mostly kind to you.

• 1:16:33Bill Simmons?

  Oh, the cousin was terrible to me. A lot of people mentioning, people are asking, boy, okay. He was terrible.

• 1:16:39Speaker 05

  He was fine. Um, but that was the Sunday pod. And then the Tuesday pod is you losing your mind with Nick Wright entirely appropriate, entirely deserved.

• 1:16:50Bill Simmons?

  About Adam Silver, yeah.

• 1:16:51Speaker 05

  And the bum ass Utah Jazz, because the bum ass Utah Jazz did that thing right before the all, like, we're all, the whole league's going to be together for the All-Star break. Why would you do it right before the All-Star break?

• 1:17:02Bill Simmons?

  I like when, when they were like, the, the owner who we actually like, but the owner was like, hey, we won the game. What did we do wrong? We're getting fined for winning a game. It's like, come on. I like the idea of taking ping pong balls away and I would love the chance to vote on that. And I'd like to volunteer both of us to be in the voting committee if they ever do this.

• 1:17:20Speaker 05

  Yeah, I volunteer.

• 1:17:22Bill Simmons?

  Honestly, out of all the taking ideas, I think this is my single favorite of karma ping pong balls, one way or the other, as a way to just ding people that don't behave properly. Like, there's no better way to do it. Just slap you on the hand. Hey, I was lucky enough to get a son and a daughter through their early teens and their mid teens in the social media era. And even though we were constantly monitoring it, there's still a whole bunch of stuff that can go wrong. And that's why Instagram teen accounts have automatic protections on by default. Built in content settings for the content teens can see, contact limits for who can contact them and time management tools like daily time limits and sleep mode. Teens are automatically placed in the teen accounts.

• 1:18:05Bill Simmons?

  Teens under 16 will need a parent's permission to change any of these settings to be less strict. Instagram will continue adding built in safety features to help create age appropriate experiences. Learn more about teen accounts and Instagram's ongoing work to protect teens online at instagram.com/teenaccounts.

• 1:18:23Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by Expedia. You know how at the end of the season, your team goes to Cancun? Sometimes earlier than expected? Sometimes after blowing a 3-1 series lead? But what if you went to Cancun? With Expedia, save up to 30% when you bundle and save. You can book the flight or the hotel now, then book the rest later. In all fairness, though, hopefully, your team doesn't go to Cancun. 1, 2, 3 Cancun. Or if they do, you go with them. Expedia, the one place you go to go places. Sign in to save, savings vary. Quinn G. from Denver.

• 1:18:57Bill Simmons?

  You're really the perfect person for this question. He stole this from Twitter, he says, but was curious on your thoughts. He's calling it the Palo theory. The idea that drafting a good, not great player with a top pick is more detrimental than drafting a bust? Because said players are likely to be overcommitted by cap resources, especially on the second contract. It's almost a branch of the Ewing theory, right? Who's lived this more than you?

• 1:19:22Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:19:23Bill Simmons?

  I mean, you had, you had John Wall and Bradley Beal.

• 1:19:26Speaker 05

  Yeah, well, Bradley Beal wasn't the number one overall pick. He was a third pick.

• 1:19:31Bill Simmons?

  No, but I just like the idea of like, a top pick, like a top.

• 1:19:36Speaker 05

  A top five.

• 1:19:37Bill Simmons?

  Bradley Beal is third pick.

• 1:19:39Speaker 05

  Yeah, that's what I mean.

• 1:19:40Bill Simmons?

  Like a top three, top five pick that then gets a giant contract.

• 1:19:45Bill Simmons?

  Second contract, kinda because the team doesn't 100% have a choice. Sorry, sorry to bring up some bad memories.

• 1:19:54Speaker 05

  I don't, I mean, we've, we've said this, but however many times on this pod, the single biggest sin you can commit in, in the previous iteration of the NBA and the current iteration is to pay a super, play a superstar or, you know, a very good player like he's, like he's a super duper star.

• 1:20:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:13Speaker 05

  That's the thing that hurts you more than anything. That's why we have a worst contracts draft on this program.

• 1:20:19Bill Simmons?

  I would name the theory after Zach Levine personally.

• 1:20:22Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 1:20:23Bill Simmons?

  And I would, I would kind of open it up so it's not just top pick, but it's that conundrum that these teams get into where it's like, well, and I have been, I don't, you can go through all the podcasts I've done and everything I've written. This has been one that I have been slamming my fist down every time. I would just never do it. I would never pay the non superstar superstar money. There's no track record of this ever working. Find me the, find me the player where this was a good idea for it. Does not exist.

• 1:20:54Speaker 05

  It's terrible. Not exist. Can't find one.

• 1:20:57Bill Simmons?

  Josh from Dallas writes, none of my four kids have ever been a big basketball fan. I'm a huge Mavs fan. Yesterday, my 10 year old son came downstairs, said, hey dad, can we watch the dunk contest? I was a little dumbfounded. Here are the highlights. My 10 year old, who are these guys? Is LeBron in this? My 15 year old. After Keishon Johnson, Keishad Johnson missed his attempts, but danced. Why is he dancing? That was bad. My 10 year old later, why aren't any of the Thunder doing this? My eight year old moaning after Carter Bryant missed his final dunk. This is so boring. They then asked me why none of the good players were in it, meaning players they know and hear about at school. I was mad at the NBA. The dunk contest offended me.

• 1:21:38Bill Simmons?

  Josh from Dallas. So you have a 15 year old kid who is right in the dunk contest wheelhouse. I, I think was 15 when the dunk contest came. Maybe I was 14 in 1984. You were 15. And it was easily one of the most exciting things that happened that year for me. Not a lot of girls for either of us back then.

• 1:21:59Speaker 05

  No, not at that age.

• 1:22:00Bill Simmons?

  No. But it was just like, oh my God. And now all these years later. I think it comes down to, how do you get kids to watch something where they don't know any of the players? So did James House watch the dunk contest?

• 1:22:13Speaker 05

  No, no. And I would not for one second suggest to him, like he's doing whatever he's doing online with, with his crew.

• 1:22:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:21Speaker 05

  You know what would have gotten his attention and what we would have watched together is Max McClung. McClung would have been going for his fourth.

• 1:22:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:30Speaker 05

  McClung is an internet sensation. His reputation preceded him. It was a stroke of genius for the league to leverage into a cult hero, an internet cult hero, and have him available for it. How, we have to find those guys. Find the interesting stories. Find the guy. I mean, with all due respect to the competitors that gave it a go, that this year, that was the least compelling, the least interesting. The only reason to watch it at all is to send, you know, the snarky ass jokes that we sent back and forth to each other.

• 1:23:04Bill Simmons?

  Also, no more centers, please.

• 1:23:07Speaker 05

  There's a way to do it like.

• 1:23:09Bill Simmons?

  Raise the rim, make it the 12 foot rim.

• 1:23:11Speaker 05

  No, like if you got, if the guys are incented, a couple of times over the last couple of weeks, you guys, you and maybe Nick and maybe Zach, there are all the dunks have been done. I disagree with that. All the dunks have not been done. I mean, when we, when you get the, the real elevated competition, that Zach Levine, Aaron Gordon competition, those were, those, they're, they're variations, right?

• 1:23:35Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:36Speaker 05

  But there was some genuine innovation, but passing it underneath the butt with the legs straight out, that Aaron Gordon did, I'll never forget that. That was like, that's up there for me in terms of a wow dunk that I don't, I don't feel like I'd seen before. And McClung, because of his size and the way that, that the ferocity of that, those are you, those are unique dunks. Those are, those belong to him and those, those stand, withstand the test of time, in my opinion.

• 1:24:01Bill Simmons?

  So you want like a wild card, a traditional dunker in there, even if it was somebody who's not in the NBA or the G League?

• 1:24:09Speaker 05

  That would be fine. Yes. Somebody that resonates with the culture. I don't know who that is. Now, I, I haven't been watching.

• 1:24:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, we're too old.

• 1:24:18Speaker 05

  Elon isn't out there.

• 1:24:19Bill Simmons?

  You only know what resonates with golf. Um, like, like your guy Anthony Kim. When he lived her tour action.

• 1:24:29Speaker 05

  That was amazing. I stayed up till 1:45 in the morning, uh, East Coast, watching Anthony Kim.

• 1:24:36Bill Simmons?

  A reader named Kyle proposes a new category for the trade value list, the missing piece overpay for borderline all-stars and elite role players who would theoretically be the missing piece for a title team. Some examples, Zubats of the Pacers, Bain of the Magic, Gobert of the Wolves, Holiday of the Bucks and McHale Bridges. I like this. This almost should be like its own category.

• 1:24:56Speaker 05

  It should, yes.

• 1:24:58Bill Simmons?

  For like four teams in the league, these guys are worth 40% more than for everybody else. I gotta, I gotta figure out a factor that in. Doug K. from Brooklyn.

• 1:25:10Bill Simmons?

  Wants to know why we count All-Star selections. Either for guys who got voted and didn't play. Or the guys that there were replacements. He says, seriously, in 10 years, we're going to look back and say, wow, Brandon Ingram was an All-Star in 2026. Wouldn't it be useful to know that he was the fourth fucking replacement? No, he wasn't better than Giannis that year. That's from Doug K in Brooklyn. I stand by this. When I look by, I actually agree with Doug. When I look at the basketball references and you look at the All-Star games who played, there's no context for replacement players. And I know.

• 1:25:43Speaker 05

  You can look that up. It's knowable.

• 1:25:46Bill Simmons?

  It's knowable, but hard to find out.

• 1:25:48Speaker 05

  This, this doesn't bother me as much.

• 1:25:51Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 1:25:52Speaker 05

  Because when you're evaluating. But you're, you think about it in the context as, as the, the true NBA historian that you are, you're looking for benchmarks and one of the benchmarks is All-Star appearances. And it's okay. You like, you're not looking singularly at one All-Star appearance that has a, an asterisk next to it because that tells you what kind of a player that you would remember. If Brandon Ingram only makes one All-Star game, then you're going to know that those were the, that was the, the context.

• 1:26:24Bill Simmons?

  So you wouldn't give him an asterisk or, okay. Did you like my idea for at the end of the All-Star game, they vote for the top five guys who gave the most shits? Sponsored by State Farm.

• 1:26:39Speaker 05

  I don't know. It feels like we could get a little more on the nose with, uh, like Dude Wipes. I bet Dude Wipes would be, could be a good sponsor for that.

• 1:26:47Bill Simmons?

  I was thinking, cause Zach and I went right after the All-Star game. I think what really worked was that the first three quarters, there was like a crunch time at the end of every quarter. And we, we might've said that during the pod, I don't remember. But that, having like the dopamine of, oh shit, there's two minutes left. Oh, this is, and I felt like you could see it in the game. Like you could feel it. And like the guys kind of all of a sudden it felt like basketball. I know you enjoyed it as well.

• 1:27:14Speaker 05

  I did. And, and you know, it reminded me of how well the All-Star game, was it in the bubble or after the bubble when we had the Elam ending?

• 1:27:23Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:27:25Speaker 05

  They played hard as fuck. That was like within the last, you know, uh, half a decade. That, that game also shared the, the giving a shit attribute.

• 1:27:39Bill Simmons?

  Evan Johnson said, I saw this on Reddit, so I can't take credit for it, but what are your thoughts? And I swear he uses your team here. If the Washington Wizards were able to have one normal person, a non-NBA player on their roster, who is able to wield a metal bat, could they win the championship this season? Please note the standard foul flagrant rules would apply, AKA an attack by the bat, some without the ball would still result in shots after the bonus, etc. Hope to hear your thoughts. Go Wolves. That's from Evan Johnson.

• 1:28:10Speaker 05

  Hope to hear your thoughts. This is murder ball. I don't know if we, I mean, this is, why do we have to do the Wizards? A normal person with a bat, a normal person isn't going to be able to really wreak any havoc. You need a, Washington Nationals are very available.

• 1:28:30Bill Simmons?

  Cousin Sal has a bat and he's in a Wizards jersey.

• 1:28:33Speaker 05

  Cousin Sal is not a normal person.

• 1:28:34Bill Simmons?

  And he's just going around with the bat, trying to like, what would you, you try to take out like legs, right? I feel like they would win the title. I would pick them to win the title. Yeah.

• 1:28:43Speaker 05

  The problem is that a normal person can't keep up. And who's to say, are the players prohibited from killing the normal person? You can't put a normal person on a basketball.

• 1:28:54Bill Simmons?

  The rules.

• 1:28:55Speaker 05

  On a court, a regular person, like trying to be, to move at the speed that those guys move at, they'd be dead.

• 1:29:04Bill Simmons?

  He said, please note the standard foul flagrant foul rules would still apply.

• 1:29:08Speaker 05

  Oh, good. It was a flagrant two.

• 1:29:10Bill Simmons?

  So if you hit somebody with the bat, you're out. And then you, would you get suspended? I think you would probably get suspended, probably more than Isaiah Stewart got. So you really only get to do it once. You would save it.

• 1:29:23Speaker 05

  The percentage of success would be so low. The guys are such good athletes and a normal person is just a normal person. There's no way that a normal person could go out with a bat and hit a player in a way that to cause, it would be like just sheer dumb luck. You can't keep up. Also, the players would just beat the shit out of you and take the bat and beat you over the head with it. That's what I would expect. A normal person with a bat. Oh, guess what happens? Even a bum, even Kalil Ware would take the bat and beat the dude over the head.

• 1:29:57Bill Simmons?

  So you tried in game one of the finals, you'd probably say back guy. So we want to get suspended for the season. Yeah, you'd immediately go after the best player on the other team. That guy gets suspended, but now you've removed the guy from the team.

• 1:30:08Speaker 05

  As soon as you took a step towards them, imagine if, if the Pistons were in the finals, what would Beast Stu do? What would Durin do? What would Holland do? Let Holland, Holland would, would go, go murder this person.

• 1:30:20Bill Simmons?

  See, in this scenario, I think that guy would probably be on the Pistons. I think he would fit in with that team.

• 1:30:29Speaker 05

  Bad guy.

• 1:30:30Bill Simmons?

  Robert McNamara asks, Adrian Peterson, Big Ben and Antonio Brown all become Hall of Fame eligible next year. That got me thinking, the purge, Hall of Fame edition. Every 10 years, voters just ignore morality and vote in all the assholes. How to deal with baseball steroid era solved? Tell Gronk to wait here and think about how pissed Belichick and Kraft would be getting into the purge class. So much spite.

• 1:30:55Bill Simmons?

  So to every, in the seventh year of every decade, it's a purge Hall of Fame. And it's like, here, here we go. Bonds, Clemens, come on down. I really like this idea. It's one of the best ones in a while. Huge thumbs up.

• 1:31:12Bill Simmons?

  Tuvia writes in, thanks for bringing back the mailbag. Now my younger kids will know what's happening when they hear laughter from the bathroom. Peace and blessings. I was begging bathrooms once upon a time.

• 1:31:23Speaker 05

  He's great. Well, he, your phones come, go into bathrooms.

• 1:31:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. All right.

• 1:31:28Speaker 05

  Somebody, I saw this on the internet that if you go into the bathroom without your phone, it's like taking a 90s shit.

• 1:31:40Bill Simmons?

  All right, two more. We got to end with some goofy ones because that's how the mailbag usually goes. Kevin Dotson writes, if your penis was an NBA player, if your penis was an NBA player, who would you want it to be and who is it really? I think most of us want to be an undeniable force like Giannis when we're probably just Reed Shepard. I don't really have an answer for this one.

• 1:32:03Bill Simmons?

  Thanks.

• 1:32:03Speaker 05

  I want to be, I want to be Darryl Dawkins.

• 1:32:07Bill Simmons?

  Breaking backwards.

• 1:32:08Speaker 05

  You know it.

• 1:32:09Bill Simmons?

  Leo from Austin, Texas and France.

• 1:32:13Bill Simmons?

  Writes in, Bill, I have two words from you. Minority divorce. Think Minority Report, but the precogs anticipate divorce. Think about how easy it would be if married couples could agree on separation and splitting stuff before it becomes a big mess. The cops and lawyers show up even as you're getting ready to get married and they say you should end the relationship amicably by February 9th. Otherwise it'll be a mess. Picture the faces of the spouses being dumbfounded. It's a half-baked idea, of course, but you know how this pitch works. Minority divorce, the sequel to Minority Report. They just come in and just blow up relationships.

• 1:32:50Speaker 05

  Half-baked. Well, they wouldn't, but they know. The relationship has a ticking time bomb.

• 1:32:56Bill Simmons?

  Precogs.

• 1:32:57Speaker 05

  That's the, that's the, that's the element of it, right?

• 1:32:59Bill Simmons?

  Would the precogs be better to say crime or divorce? I don't know. It's a tough one.

• 1:33:05Speaker 05

  But the, the two are linked.

• 1:33:06Bill Simmons?

  Oh, good point. Anything else to cover before we go? You gotta drive your son to a basketball game. The mailbag is back.

• 1:33:16Speaker 05

  It's really good.

• 1:33:18Bill Simmons?

  We got a guy in the Wizards hitting people with the metal bag.

• 1:33:20Speaker 05

  You, you didn't answer which, which player your penis would be.

• 1:33:24Bill Simmons?

  I gotta think about it more. I, I like the Darryl Dawkins. Yeah. You'd wanna be like the, wouldn't you want to be Will Chamberlain, the Big Dipper?

• 1:33:31Speaker 05

  Yeah. Well, that's a very, very strong one. Shaq feels good.

• 1:33:35Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:36Speaker 05

  I mean, you know.

• 1:33:37Bill Simmons?

  All right. House, any golf, any golf things for us to think about as we head toward what golf season right now?

• 1:33:42Speaker 05

  It's Riviera. We just went from Pebble Beach, an amazing weekend at Pebble Beach. Collin Morikawa wins for the first time on US soil in four and a half years to Riviera in your backyard.

• 1:33:53Bill Simmons?

  I know.

• 1:33:54Speaker 05

  I gave out on the FanDuel Sportsbook, on the Fairway Roland Golf Podcast Program on Netflix as well.

• 1:34:02Bill Simmons?

  Hmm.

• 1:34:03Speaker 05

  A parlay of Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler to finish inside the top five. Available right now at plus 475 because the heart wants what the heart wants. I want to see Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler going head to head down the stretch Sunday afternoon in your backyard and let all of America watch it prime time in LA. It's gonna be awesome.

• 1:34:25Bill Simmons?

  That sounds great. And as you mentioned, Fairway Roland, available on Netflix now. You can watch it as a video on Netflix or Spotify. House, great to see you as always.

• 1:34:34Speaker 05

  Always my pleasure.

• 1:34:37Bill Simmons?

  All right. Thanks to CR and Howson, Gahow and Eduardo. Don't forget, new rewatchables went up on Monday night, GoldenEye. You can watch the movie on Netflix, then watch the rewatchables on Netflix, or watch it wherever you get your podcasts, including Spotify. Next week, Crazy Stupid Love, that is also on Netflix, so stay tuned for that one as we kind of count the days down until CR month. I can't wait. I'm going to be back Thursday, I think, pretty sure, with one more podcast. If not, I'll see you Sunday.

• 1:35:25Bill Simmons?

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• 1:36:09Bill Simmons?

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• 1:36:54Bill Simmons?

  Also starring Steve Buscemi, another one of my guys, Parker Posey and Tom Waits. Wild Horse 9 is being hailed by critics as a revitalizing shot of pure entertainment and easily one of the best films of the year. Don't miss Wild Horse 9, only in theaters November 6. Get tickets now.