Pod Insights The Bill Simmons Podcast An NBA Power Poll, the Surprise Celtics, the Queen Conundrum, and Fake Trades Galore With Rob Mahoney About this episode The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Rob Mahoney to discuss all the NBA teams in a power poll before talking about their favorite TV shows of the year (2:54).
Host: Bill Simmons
Guest: Rob Mahoney
Producers: Chia Hao Tat and Eduardo Ocampo
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Transcript 20,979 words · 2 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:00 Bill Simmons? This episode is brought to by WeatherTech. Whether it's a pumpkin spice coffee that goes splat in your seat, or a weekend tailgate that leaves your trunk full of gear and who knows what, you're gonna want WeatherTech in your vehicle. Whether you call it fall, autumn, or spooky season, whether the mess is your fault, the kids, the dogs, or the weather's fault, you're gonna want WeatherTech for American-made floor liners and a cargo liner that laugh in the face of fall weather. Visit weatherTech.com today.
0:29 Bill Simmons? The Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by the Ringer Podcast Network, where we put up a new Rewatchables on Monday night. We did Shampoo 50 Years Later with Cameron Crowe and Sean Finacy. And if you like movies like Singles and Jerry Maguire and Almost Famous and Say Anything, and you didn't think we could weave a 50-year-old Rewatchables movie in with all of those movies and get a lot of good anecdotes and stories from the guy who directed those movies, think again, because this podcast was awesome. Please go check it out. Go check out our new Ringer podcast, Game Over with Max Kellerman and Rich Paul. We launched the first one on Monday. It's gonna be Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Already making some news with the first one, but high hopes for that podcast. Really fun
1:14 Bill Simmons? to work on, and I'm glad to have Max back talking sports. Glad to have Rich talking sports. Who knew Rich had so many takes? All right, then don't forget about our Music Box series. We had the Jeff Buckley documentary last week. We have one about Wizkid coming this week. It's December 11th. It's about Wizkid and basically the history of Afro beats. It's really, really, really cool. Please check it out Thursday night, and then it will be available on HBO Max all week. Coming up on this podcast, Rob Mahoney, who has someone up and on all season, but we made up for it by going for almost 100 minutes. I threw a power poll at him from 30 to 1,
1:55 Bill Simmons? and we went through it, and we talked about every team. Just all kinds of questions, fake trades, philosophical discussions. Rob was more excited about the Celtics than I am. We covered it all, and it's all next. We're gonna take a break. We're gonna talk about We're going to talk about Pearl Jam. Oh, no, we're not going to talk about them. They're going to sing for us. And then we're going to bring in Rob Mahoney. And I did all this for the NBA Cup. We can talk about the NBA Cup on Thursday. So Rob Mahoney, next. This episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by State Farm. Having insurance isn't the same as having State Farm. It's like expecting a linebacker on the football field, but getting a line cook. Sure, they both can handle the pressure when it starts heating up, but only one is stopping a touchdown.
2:40 Bill Simmons? You wouldn't settle for just anything for your team. So don't settle for just any insurance when it comes to getting help you need. State Farm is the real deal. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
3:18 Bill Simmons? All right, we were recording this Tuesday morning, Pacific time. This guy has not been on my podcast all season, and that's my fault. But you are a busy guy, Rob Mahoney.
3:26 Speaker 01 It's true.
3:26 Bill Simmons? Bring your NBA show. Joanna has co-opted you for the prestige TV show. You're just doing a lot of stuff during the big picks sometimes.
3:34 Speaker 01 I'm still taking it personally, though. You know, like, I now just have a lifetime grudge against Tim Legler, all because of you, Bill. I don't, thanks a lot.
3:42 Bill Simmons? Fuck you, Tim Legler. We're doing this before the NBA Cup. So I think I might do something at the cup on the top. Do you care about the NBA Cup is my question?
3:53 Speaker 01 I have chosen to care about the cup. Has it given me a reason to believe that the basketball will be like above and beyond? Absolutely not. But I like, I like to find a little something to care about in the regular season, even if it's somewhat arbitrary.
4:06 Bill Simmons? I've landed in the camp of, I like watching basketball where the players care. I don't really care about the reason why they care. But as long as they care, I'm in. And it feels like they care. Now, they could care because of the money, because the courts look weird, because there's less games on and they know the other players are watching. I don't know all the reasons. But the intensity is there. So that's why I'm gonna watch. But ultimately, like, it took me 10 minutes to remember who won last year. And I genuinely don't remember who won two years ago. Who won two years ago? Was it the Lakers?
4:39 Speaker 01 It was the Lakers.
4:40 Bill Simmons? That's probably why I blocked it out of my mind. All right. So I invited you on. This is gonna be a long, meandering pod where we go through a power poll that I sent you, that you might disagree with some of the choices. And we're gonna go from 30 to 1. And I wanted to hit each team. And occasionally have a question as I go through the teams that I want to raise. And I did not send you the questions because you're a pro. You don't need the questions. You're ready to roll. You can go blind.
5:08 Speaker 01 I appreciate that.
5:11 Bill Simmons? But the dregs is our first group in the power pole.
5:14 Speaker 01 Yeah.
5:16 Bill Simmons? And I think Washington is the worst team in the league. I don't know if that's gonna stay.
5:22 Bill Simmons? But right now, they're the worst team in the league. And yet, I don't begrudge any decision they've made. I know they're gonna be able to trade McCollum or Middleton or just buy them out. Their roster doesn't make sense. I don't really care. I like some of their players. I like some of their assets. They have some flexibility. I don't really have a lot of notes on Washington, but do you have any notes?
5:42 Speaker 01 I think you're right on that they're just in a different class of losing. And I'm with you. Like, I like a lot of the prospects, big picture. Like, it's gonna need to suss itself out in terms of who is actually important here long term. But Alex Sar's development has been a great story. They've had a ton of injuries. There's a lot of reasons why they are here versus like 28th on this list. The number one reason might be the defensive attention span of the Washington Wizards is one of the most disastrous things in the NBA. If you are sitting courtside at a Wizards game and walk too quickly to your seat, every Wizard will turn and look at you. So this is just what a young team is at this point, and that's okay.
6:18 Bill Simmons? Yeah, they have a, it's their defensive rating's almost 124, which is impossibly high.
6:23 Speaker 01 Yeah.
6:24 Bill Simmons? Like, if you had a 124 offensive rating, you would be among the best teams of all time.
6:30 Bill Simmons? They're also, they're minus 15.6. They're doing everything right. And it's a draft that we feel like there's three franchise guys. There may not even be a fourth one that emerges. And they've played it perfectly. The idea of trade, you know, in retrospect.
6:43 Speaker 01 Very tough.
6:44 Bill Simmons? Not awesome, but also maybe not put it in this position. All right. I don't have any questions about Washington. I do have questions about New Orleans. Who's number 29 on my list? They're 3 and 22, which is amazing because. I like nine of their players, eight of their players.
7:00 Speaker 01 But do you like them in the roles they are playing right now?
7:03 Bill Simmons? I'm just saying as assets, kind of like them. But um, so I tweeted this last night. I really hated Derek Queen trade. I thought it was actually irresponsible and fireable that to not put protections on the pick. And even if they had put a top three on the pick, I still think Atlanta does the trade. It's a huge asset. It's probably the biggest asset in the honest sweepstakes if we have sweepstakes. And yet I also really liked Derek Queen. I liked him in the draft. I've thoroughly enjoyed watching him in these games. He's, he's got just this extra competitive side. Like he's really competitive. He's a really interesting offensive player.
7:46 Bill Simmons? He's kind of moved into this one of one zone of where you see people like Shangoon or, you know, there, there's just certain players where like I'm not seeing that anywhere else. And I kind of feel, I don't know what he is. He might be a sieve defensively. You might never be able to win with him. But offensively, he's fascinating and I think he's advanced. And it's interesting because he's played against all these dudes because he's always been one of the best players. I think that's why Dumas liked him so much. So trading that asset for him on paper was the right move. It was just the asset they gave up was so terrible that it's kind of overshadowed the move. But I still like the player. Does that make sense?
8:25 Speaker 01 Wouldn't that be the greatest accomplishment for him in his career to just overcome this disaster trade? That I think would hang around the neck of almost any other player who are involved in that circumstance. But he is so good and so demonstra- like demonstratably and obviously talented and skilled in the exact thing that bigs can transform their team with, which is running offense. If you can be a Shangoon like hub, like put Nikola Jokic in his own category. But I like the Shangoon comparison because they have the same like wiggle through the defense kind of drive. Like Derek Queen improbably has one of my favorite spin moves in the NBA. Like there's just a lot to his game that really, really works in ways that obviously with the Pelicans broadly do not work.
9:07 Bill Simmons? He's a half court possible, like elite, elite, elite half court guy. And they already has a couple of really fun, like he did one yesterday to take the lead against the Spurs with like on Cornet, where he goes to the basket, but somehow slides. Into the defender and all of a sudden he's getting a layup and you're like, I don't even know, he never was by the guy. How did he get a layup? Everything seems to go in. He's also a really good passer, but you can definitely run a top 10 offense through him at some point. So, you know, should they have put the protection on the pick? Fuck yeah. They, everyone should have been fired for not doing that because the trade, but I really like the player. And I, to me, I was trying to think like,
9:52 Bill Simmons? who are their actual keepers? If you had to say, because I think Fears, I don't know what Fears is. He's certainly not a bust. I don't know if, you know, that's somebody like, when you think of like the situation Cleveland's in with Garland, who I think would be the best possible upside for somebody like Fears, but Garland could still get targeted by everybody.
10:14 Speaker 01 Yeah.
10:15 Bill Simmons? So, but I still think Fears is a keeper. I think Queen's a keeper. And I think Murphy is a keeper, even though they might trade him, which we'll talk about in a second. Are there any other keepers on this roster for you?
10:25 Speaker 01 That might be it. And Murphy, as you mentioned with the trade illusions, like is just so roundly valuable to every other team in the league that maybe he seems like a keeper, but is, you know, you get the one offer that's too good to pass up on. I could absolutely see that. Otherwise, I'm with you that there are a lot of individual players that I like on this team. I mean, frankly, Sadiq Bay has been playing really good basketball lately for a team that really has no, given him no reason to do that, other than trying to get healthy again and put his career back on track. But between him and Herb Jones, even like, I mean, Kevon Looney's getting like DNPCDs for the Pelicans these days. There's a lot of guys who I think are situationally useful, but are not useful put all together.
11:06 Speaker 01 And like, that is a bummer of a situation. And thank goodness for Derek Queen for making it watchable. And I think to your point about him being a player of like real import for this team and a keeper in exactly that way. The fact that Queen is so surprising as a ball handler and as a creator, that he's doing all of these things, that he has the unusual footwork. It doesn't just make for like good league pass fodder. It makes for genuinely inventive playmaking. It makes him really tough to pin down, even for like the example you said with Luke Cornet. Luke Cornet's a really good positional defender, and he's trying to figure this guy out.
11:39 Bill Simmons? Yeah.
11:41 Bill Simmons? Well, we'll see if he can be the face of the Vegas franchise in three years when they're the Las Vegas, probably not the Pelicans, the Las Vegas Deuces or whatever they call themselves.
11:50 Speaker 01 You can't be the Deuces. You can't volunteer yourself as number two.
11:54 Bill Simmons? Yeah, good point. Oh, yeah. Aces, Deuces. I'll come up with a better one. I have three trades. I'm just gonna throw you quick for them. I would trade Herb Jones right now. I think at the contract he's at, like, literally what the Lakers need. And it's easy. It's like connect Kleber in a 2031 first, call it in, and now you have...
12:18 Speaker 01 I love that for the Lakers, too.
12:19 Bill Simmons? Yeah, that's, that's like, just call that in. He's on a good contract and maybe it would even take more than that. I really like Alvarado for one of these contenders. And I was going through, trying to find the perfect team and was looking at Houston for a while, but I'm not sure I want to mess with the Reed Shepard thing because I still feel like how he grows is going to determine so much for them. But Minnesota seemed nice, which is easy. That's like Dillingham and you do a pick swap in 32. Or...
12:47 Speaker 01 Especially for Minnesota. Very quietly, Rob Dillingham got yanked out of the rotation last night. We're getting like real live Bones Highland minutes and, I mean, Bones...
12:56 Bill Simmons? It's really rough.
12:57 Speaker 01 Bones did what he could with those, but yeah, the idea of someone like Alvarado in that spot, I do quite like, too.
13:02 Bill Simmons? Yeah. I mean, honestly, he's, from what we've seen of Rob, he's young, but is more just a contract that you can exchange for Alvarado, maybe more than an asset unless he shows something. Yeah, it's tough. That's why a swap has to be in there. But the one I really liked for them, and Detroit has some flexibility, so basically they could trade Sasser, and let's say a 2030 unprotected first for Alvarado, which seems like a lot. Maybe you put a top three on it, whatever. And it would save New Orleans 4 million. They'd get a pick. And then you'd put Alvarado, like, could Detroit be more Cobra Kai? Actually, they could. Let's put Jose Alvarado on the team and have him trying to, to do the sneak around as somebody's
13:46 Bill Simmons? inbounding the ball and then steal, like, all the annoying stuff he does on top of all the other annoying guys they have.
13:51 Speaker 01 That'd be tremendous.
13:52 Bill Simmons? It's just perfect. He's like, he's out of central casting. So sign me up for that trade. And then here's my last one. I was trying to think of Eclipse Hail Mary. The Clips are like three wins or three losses outside of the 10 seed. It's not like their season's over.
14:10 Bill Simmons? Do you roll the Zion dice? Have we reached that point? Is this like the I'm down a million dollars at the casino in Vegas? And I'm just gonna put another million on red and try to win it all back? Have we reached that point if you're the Clippers?
14:23 Speaker 01 Is that a thing you've done?
14:24 Bill Simmons? No, I'm hypothetically movie scene.
14:27 Speaker 01 Okay, just making sure.
14:27 Bill Simmons? Clippers are in the movie in Vegas. It's Saturday night, it's four in the morning and they're down a mil. And, and there's like, you know, the casino boss is watching them and there's some bad guys in the background and ready to beat them up if they don't make the money back. That's where they are right now.
14:43 Speaker 01 It's the kind of bet where as you try to make it at the table, they make you sign some kind of waiver just to make sure that this is all above board.
14:49 Bill Simmons? Right.
14:50 Speaker 01 So I think with the Zion situation, that would have to be the case too. Like they're, they're just in such a weird spot. And frankly, like I salute you for trying to find the silver lining and where the Clippers are right now as far as their distance from 10th place, but they feel kind of hopeless. They feel pretty lifeless, to be honest with you.
15:06 Bill Simmons? The silver lining for them, I don't know if you've watched any clips.
15:10 Speaker 01 Too much.
15:11 Bill Simmons? Kawhi's, Kawhi's moving around pretty well.
15:14 Speaker 01 He's doing fine.
15:15 Bill Simmons? Like he, there's still some moments for him on defense where it's like, oh, you know, I'm sure like there's contenders and people with big contracts that are also looking at him.
15:25 Speaker 01 Yes.
15:26 Bill Simmons? Kind of going, huh? I think they'd be nuts to trade for him because God knows when he's playing. But like the Zion trade's easy because they have the Collins and Bogdanovich expirings. You throw the Pelicans in 2030 unprotected first. I don't think the Pelicans want to be in the Zion business anymore.
15:42 Speaker 01 I don't think so either.
15:43 Bill Simmons? I can't imagine they're going to extend that deal. Maybe you even put a top three in the first, but I really, the team I really wanted to take a swing for him was the Warriors, but I couldn't figure out the money. It's, it would basically be like a five for three. Those things never happen. But the Clippers, so just think conceptually, Harden.
16:02 Speaker 01 Yeah.
16:03 Bill Simmons? Kawhi, Zion, Zubats, and some sort of like person in the corner who's just ready to make a shot. And you just had this really weird team of guys that can go one-on-one depending on who your weak spot is. And you have some rebounding. And then if Zion turns into Zion again, and maybe they could just spend a ton of money on him, unlike what the Pelicans have done to try to help his health.
16:33 Bill Simmons? Maybe you're dominating the boards. Zion's had moments over the last couple of years that you're like, wow, is this one of the 10 best guys in the league? You seem dubious.
16:42 Speaker 01 Well, Zion playing is rarely the problem. As you mentioned, it's Zion not playing. That's the issue for the Pelicans and would definitely be an issue for a Clippers team that has the same concerns about Kawhi, that is out Bradley Beal for the year already, that's had Derek Jones out of the lineup, and that's been kind of a disaster, missing him. Like, they've had so many guys in and out that the idea of investing in yet another player who might not be available, I just don't know if spiritually they could bring themselves to do that.
17:08 Bill Simmons? Counter. The more players you have who might not be available, odds are like three of them will be available.
17:15 Speaker 01 So you're advocating-
17:16 Bill Simmons? You have five guys who might not be available, maybe two of them will be available at all times.
17:20 Speaker 01 This is like a cyborg model. Maybe you can put Zion's arm and Kawhi Leonard's core and like, maybe there is a workable player between five of these guys.
17:28 Bill Simmons? Can I get two of these guys at any time? Anyway, those would be my three fixes. Number 28 is Brooklyn. Somehow 6 and 17. Couple Nets fans in my life have been chirping about the Porter trade. I would urge them to settle down.
17:43 Speaker 01 He's been good, though.
17:44 Bill Simmons? Yeah, sure. Sure.
17:47 Speaker 01 Yeah.
17:48 Bill Simmons? Fine.
17:49 Speaker 01 That's probably the appropriate response, but he has been quite good in a situation where I don't think that was necessarily a given.
17:55 Bill Simmons? He beat the Celtics. Like, he just destroyed them in Boston, right in front of my dad, running the same play over and over again. My dad was furious at Mizzou after the game. I was thinking about a Porter-Warriors kind of match, which I know has been floated around out there, but I thought, you know, from a money standpoint, it gets a little tough because it would have to be like a three-for-one and the Nets already have 100 players. But conceptually, just putting Porter in that Kaminga spot, somebody who's been in big games, somebody who's a streaky scorer, which I kind of feel like the Warriors need. They need that one wild card guy who can rebound a little bit. I thought that was mildly interesting. I don't really know what Brooklyn does. The next team is teams I have some questions on.
18:40 Bill Simmons? Number 27, Sacramento.
18:43 Bill Simmons? Six and 18 with a net rating of 10. Rob, I just want to go through this sequence with you just to commemorate how amazing it was.
18:51 Speaker 01 Please.
18:52 Bill Simmons? After the light, the beam, loose to the Warriors and seven, just everything that happened. They drafted Carter, who got hurt and missed his whole rookie season.
19:05 Bill Simmons? Right ahead of Ware and McCain. So you start there. They spent $74 million on DeMar DeRozan, basically because they were at a furniture store and they already had a full living room. But somebody was like, hey, we have this couch for half off. Like, whoa, that's a nice couch. And they just bought the couch that no idea where to put it.
19:21 Speaker 01 Stacked it on their other couch. I'm sure it'll work.
19:24 Bill Simmons? We'll put the couch on top of the couch. They gave Sabonis a $186 million extension, like a year early for no reason, competing against nobody. That was weird. They turned Mike Brown into Doug Christie.
19:36 Speaker 01 Yep.
19:37 Bill Simmons? That was odd. They turned De'Aaron Fox into Zach Levine, a 27 Spurs pick that will probably be in the twenties and a 2031 Wolves pick, which reunited DeRozan and Levine, who already had failed together in Chicago. They watched Tyrese Haliburton lead Indianapolis to the, uh, to the finals. They gave Keegan Murray $140 million, which I think is more than Jalen Johnson got.
20:04 Speaker 01 Is that true?
20:05 Bill Simmons? Or bigger deal. Right at that same number, right in the Jalen Johnson neighborhood. They gave Dennis Schroder 29 million for two years and then signed Russell Westbrook, who immediately took Dennis Schroder's job.
20:16 Speaker 01 Yep.
20:17 Bill Simmons? And was the rare situation of they have to now trade Dennis Schroder, who they can't trade yet because they just signed him. And now they have to get rid of him. They have zero tradable assets, except for Keon Ellis and Sabonis. And they buried Keon Ellis and I don't even know if he has value anymore. And I mentioned all of this because this is the team that's probably getting the number one pick. When you do that many dumb things in a row, this is how the NBA works. They just hand you the number one pick and you get to basically start over. But what did I miss? Did I miss anything?
20:47 Speaker 01 I think you hit all the main salient points. So in terms of the number one pick, is that the basketball gods awarding them? Or is that a shadowy cabal within the league office freezing an envelope?
20:58 Bill Simmons? No, I don't think the shadowy cabal wants to help.
21:01 Speaker 01 The Sacramento Kings.
21:02 Bill Simmons? Yeah, I just think this is how the league works sometimes where it's like, wow, you've done that many stupid things in a row.
21:07 Speaker 01 See, we say that, but if that were true, wouldn't the Kings have had many, many first round picks over the years?
21:12 Bill Simmons? Oh, that's a really good point.
21:13 Speaker 01 Like, they operate in a different nebulous space than basically anyone else in the league. And you're right, like, I would add only in terms of the bright spots this season, relatively speaking, like, yes, Sabonis has been out for now.
21:26 Bill Simmons? They were bright spots?
21:28 Speaker 01 Well, quite muted, but you know, a slight blinking light off in the distance that is Maxime Renaud, who's been giving them like actually decent minutes at the five. This is what I'm clinging to, watching Kings games. I'm like, can I just get more neat Clifford minutes, please? Can I get like literally anything with a pulse happening in this game that isn't like Zach Levine gunning for whatever it is that Zach Levine guns for?
21:52 Bill Simmons? I, I think they are the wild card of League Pass every night, where you go to the games and they're either down 30 or they're like beating Denver by 10. And you're like, I just, what's happening? Usually they're getting killed. I don't know how to fix it. It's the worst ownership situation in the league. I think that's fair. And, you know, Vivek seems like a nice guy, but this, this couldn't, couldn't be worse from really the moment he bought the team. I can't even imagine being a Kings fan. I've never been, I guess I was in somewhat of a situation like this with the Patriots before the Solvins sold. But to be in a situation where your team is just owned by somebody who's just proven to be inept, and then they won't sell the team.
22:36 Bill Simmons? I don't know how you, at some point, you, I don't know how you keep caring at the same level when there's no chance for it to get better. Because as long as this person's involved, it will never get better.
22:49 Speaker 01 And not just inept, but very involved. Like, can we just get Vivek like a fidget spinner and get him an office in the corner? Like, I think we just need to keep him busy doing something that is not running this particular team.
23:01 Bill Simmons? It's the team that didn't take Luka Doncic. And that alone would be the thing people mentioned for 10 years, but there's 40 other things to mention.
23:10 Speaker 01 Do you think, has the Luka trade supplanted the did not take Luka Doncic discord? It just kind of put them off in the shadow, giving them some cover?
23:20 Bill Simmons? 26 Chicago. I can't believe they've fallen to 26.
23:23 Speaker 01 Yeah.
23:23 Bill Simmons? They're nine and 14. The moment Kobe White came back, it just kind of fell apart. And I don't, not to blame him, but it just, they, they had a nice thing going for a couple of games without him. And then when he came back, I don't know what happened.
23:38 Bill Simmons? I don't, I have a small question on them. Did they, A, they passed on Queen to take a guy who's now out for the year. The French guy who people thought they reached for anyway, when they took him. That was bad in itself.
23:50 Bill Simmons? It's, I, I was even, I, I searched Bulls Reddit, did a deep dive on Bulls Reddit to find out if there was a.
23:56 Speaker 01 What's the vibe over there?
23:57 Bill Simmons? Oh, it's, it's grim.
24:00 Bill Simmons? Did they pass on the Pelicans offer or was the offer made for, we'll give you next year's first for the 12th pick? Nobody seems to know for sure if the Pelicans dangled that trade to anybody other than Atlanta at 13. My guess is like, if you like Queen that much, you probably dangled him at 10, 11, 12.
24:19 Speaker 01 I would think, yeah.
24:20 Bill Simmons? And if Chicago passed them that trade, fire everybody. Like literally, if I, if I own, and I don't even know the Bulls care about the team, Ryan Storffs, I don't even know if they're following what's going on. But if they, that's one where you bring everybody to the office and be like, yo, we checked the phone records. We saw Joe Dumars called on June 28th at 4:30. Can you tell us what happened in the call? And just, just grill them until they admit they turned it down. That's a fireable offense in my opinion.
24:47 Speaker 01 That would be disastrous, especially given the way everything has turned out where the Bulls are like, not even really as competitive as they would like to be, which is just basically being the eighth seed, like they're fighting, clawing to even be in the play in mix. And they're young guys, as you mentioned, like one of them is out for the season. Modus Buzella is who I like a lot is doing well, but like not blowing the doors off of anything necessarily. And all of the oxygen has just been sucked out of their offense. Like everything that they had going for them early in the year, all the shots that were falling, aren't falling. No one really respects all that, like all that ball movement. No defenses are really like falling for it or getting pulled by it anymore. They're just daring them to beat them. And guess what? Like this collection of Chicago Bulls can't really beat people that way.
25:28 Bill Simmons? I really miss the two weeks when it seemed like Josh Giddy was a transformative superstar. That was really fun. He was just a triple double waiting to happen every night. It was great times. Yeah, it was great times.
25:39 Speaker 01 Now that, you know, they run a lot, they throw the ball around and they accomplish very little. Unfortunately, sometimes the story of a Josh Giddy led offense.
25:48 Bill Simmons? The last team I have in the dregs sadly is Indiana at 6 and 18.
25:52 Speaker 01 Yeah. They have won two in a row.
25:55 Bill Simmons? Yeah, so it felt like they rounded up the tanks when they had all those injuries to start the season. I picked them to go over when we did the over unders for the year. I still don't think that was the wrong pick. I think they had all these injuries to start the year and they had already not had Halliburton, obviously, and lost Turner.
26:13 Speaker 01 Yeah.
26:14 Bill Simmons? But I do think there's a world where if you play this season 10 times, there's like six versions of it that play out like the Celtics season has. Where the infrastructure and the guys you had and the guys who have had a taste in these playoffs kind of banded together and overachieved. But they just had so much bad luck with all this stuff. But the one thing is the Turner thing is a huge, thank God he didn't resign here for that money, I think at this point, right? If you're them, Huff has the same stats.
26:42 Speaker 01 Yeah, it would have been pretty costly and Turner too, like his value is depleted without Halliburton out there. Like he, their synergy is kind of generating what it is that he does so well offensively. Honestly, though, given those two gap years for Boston and Indiana, the Celtics can kind of like if they're overly competitive and do really well as they have been and continue to play this way. And then get Jason Tatum back later this season, next season, whatever. They have enough talent to continue to be a really high level contending team. The Pacers though could use that top five pick or so. Like honestly, this is not a, it's a disastrous outcome in the present tense because these games are a really rough watch. So many guys are just in way over their heads right now. But given all those injuries, given the needs of the team, given that it's kind of a natural pivot point with Halliburton's injury.
27:28 Speaker 01 This is not the worst possible outcome for them.
27:31 Bill Simmons? I agree. I'll be interested to see where they lean over the next like 30 days.
27:37 Speaker 01 Yeah.
27:37 Bill Simmons? Cause now we're, we're in a situation now where you really have a chance to get a top three pick. But if you, like if they're 12 and 22 in a couple of weeks,
27:49 Bill Simmons? that all of a sudden now you're in the seven to 10 range, which will still be good in this draft. All right, we're taking a break and then we're going to life support. The Bill Simmons podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. FanDuel is putting you in control right from tip off. That's right. You choose your own reward, play it safe, go for it, feeling bold, that's your move, whatever your style. You're in control. You can bet the NBA cup.
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28:54 Bill Simmons? expiration leg requirements and max wager amount. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Game, problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. Call 1-888-789-777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Every football season, the same thing happens. The game somehow makes everybody really hungry. Quarterback scrambles clearly a sign for breakfast burritos. Yeah. Turnovers suddenly deserted at 2:00 p.m. doesn't sound so crazy. Wing formations, well, those can only mean buffalo wings, as if they're ever not in play. Even the goalposts start looking suspiciously like french fries. It's almost like football
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30:04 Bill Simmons? I had a small question. I already mentioned it to you, but would anyone actually trade for Kawhi? Is that a guy? Does he have trade value? I guess is my question. Like, I feel like Embiid does not have trade value.
30:15 Speaker 01 I agree.
30:16 Bill Simmons? I don't think Paul George has trade value. I think he, maybe two months from now, if he played every game and looked good, maybe a mild piece of it. Does Kawhi have trade value? Our off, our front office is like, looking at tape of him and discussing him and wondering if they should make a play for him as like a very, very discount superstar move.
30:39 Speaker 01 I think the answer with him is not that kind of opportunism. It's not like the savvy front office that's like making its calculated gamble. It's who is going to be desperate enough to talk themselves into something like that? Like, who will just be on the edge of, if we don't pull out like a guaranteed playoff spot this season, we're all going to lose our jobs. Our team is falling apart. And that's where I don't know who that team is. Like, that team that's really going to be so desperate that they would roll the dice on everything that Kawhi is, but most importantly, what he isn't, which is an every night superstar. You can sort of build your foundation around and have a baseline expectation that he will play.
31:17 Bill Simmons? Yeah, the only team I could think of was Detroit. Just because the trade-
31:20 Speaker 01 They're way too good, though.
31:22 Bill Simmons? Well, I know, but that's the only one where I could see them having a meeting about it and be like, wow, we could just turn Tobias Harris and Ivy and a contract into Kawhi and just put Kawhi in the Tobias Harris spot. Could we win? Could we make the finals if we did that? And then they would reach out to Kawhi and Kawhi would be like, I don't like cold. No, thank you. Please don't do this. But that's the only one where it's like, if basically he's, not that he would be free because I like Ivy and Harris, I think is a valuable veteran for them. It would cost them something. But that's the only one where it's like, oh, this is a noticeable upgrade. And then you, when you watch Detroit, who I think is really good, so much depends on Cade in the last three, four minutes of these games. I think that gets easier to stop in a playoff series.
32:07 Bill Simmons? When you're just watching it for two straight weeks and they're just doing the same thing every time. They don't have that second
32:12 Speaker 01 Yeah.
32:13 Bill Simmons? wild card, something yet. And Kawhi would be the highest possible version of that if he was healthy, but I still feel like they need, I don't think they need to go all in. They certainly don't need to trade for Anthony Davis or anything like that, but they need some sort of somebody. Maybe it could be Ivy. I don't know.
32:28 Speaker 01 Maybe. Is there a Cleveland case? Just because that-
32:32 Bill Simmons? The problem is they can't, they can't do trades.
32:34 Speaker 01 Well, they're, yeah, they're over the A-
32:35 Bill Simmons? It's like a, it has to be a one for one where the contracts are like exact is the only way to do it. Unless they like shed salary, then did it.
32:42 Speaker 01 There are some like funky ways to kinda get around the can't aggregate salaries rules. It's, it's all like needlessly complicated. I think it would be very difficult to engineer, but in terms of a team that needs some of what Kawhi does and might also be feeling the pressure a little bit to provide it almost immediately.
33:01 Bill Simmons? Yeah.
33:01 Speaker 01 They're a team that I would at least think about.
33:04 Bill Simmons? It's certainly the team that has to feel way different than they did a month ago.
33:10 Speaker 01 Yeah.
33:10 Bill Simmons? Where it's like, wow, we could really make a playoff run here to now it's, it's December 9th. They have to be looking at the East going, we can make the finals. Like absolutely, we can make the finals. There's no question, are we good enough to do that? What is the move? And they have a lot of flexibility to do it. So I would rather see the Clippers trade Zion. 23 Milwaukee, 10 and 15.
33:35 Bill Simmons? I still like this team and I don't think we ever saw it.
33:38 Speaker 01 No.
33:38 Bill Simmons? Did, did all these guys ever play together? We never really saw everybody together other than for like two games. And I still like the concept of Giannis and shooting. And we just, you know, the, the thing is the East, the way it is, they're still going to be a playing team if they don't trade Giannis.
33:55 Speaker 01 Sure. They'll be in the mix for that stuff. I mean, do you think we will see another Giannis game in a Bucks uniform? Are we like, is the, is the alarm blaring that loudly? Or is it possible that once he comes back from the calf stuff that we might see that team?
34:10 Bill Simmons? I don't think anyone's trading for him unless they see him running around for two weeks.
34:13 Speaker 01 This is fair.
34:14 Bill Simmons? This is like the decade of being afraid of calf injuries. This is what's happened. I have a hipster question for you, like, you know,
34:22 Speaker 01 Yeah.
34:24 Bill Simmons? With, in like alternative music. Be like Pearl Jam was actually Stone Temple Pilots. Like those, those people that tried to zag against the famous bands.
34:34 Speaker 01 Yes.
34:36 Bill Simmons? Was the Myles Turner signing slash Dane buyout actually worse than the Derek Queen trade?
34:43 Speaker 01 It hasn't been good. No, no one is gonna argue that it's been good.
34:48 Bill Simmons? But really, like, at least the Pelicans got Derek Queen, who's really good. You know, really, really good. The Bucks might have to now trade Giannis while also paying Dame for the next few years and also overpaying Myles Turner. That actually might be more of a disaster if you're looking at, I mean, it's more of a disaster that they didn't put the protections on the Atlanta pick. I get it. But if you're actually looking at who got less out of this whole thing, it might actually be Milwaukee.
35:17 Speaker 01 It might be, but I at least understand why it happened. Like, it does have a whiff of, like, what if the LeBron Cavs trade for Antoine Jameson and Shaq? Like, there is that kind of vibe of, like, the last ditch effort before disaster strikes. But I can at least understand that kind of desperation. As you mentioned with the Pelicans, there's just, like, no justification for it. It wasn't needed. It wasn't necessary. You could probably have pulled off that deal without, like, with much heavier protection on that pick. And so why it turned out the way it did, no one really knows except Joe Dumars. Why this turned out the way it did, I think all of us could look at the Bucks and say, yes, we don't agree with the mechanics and it's gonna come back to bite them. But this is a team that's on the edge and feels like they need to do something dramatic.
36:01 Bill Simmons? I hated it, but I understood it.
36:02 Speaker 01 Yeah.
36:03 Bill Simmons? I didn't like it. Next category is a really fun one. Thanks to all these teams for a lot of league past joy this year. The Young and the Frisky. Starting out with, uh, number 22, Utah.
36:16 Speaker 01 Will Hardy might disagree with the Young and Frisky, at least the Frisky part of that as of late. I don't know if you.
36:21 Bill Simmons? True. He did get mad. He did get mad.
36:23 Speaker 01 He got, he got big mad. He wants these motherfuckers to fucking play harder, uh, which fair. And honestly, that's the way you have to coach these teams in this range sometimes.
36:31 Bill Simmons? Yeah, I wouldn't call Keanu George, uh, consistent. But he has had some moments, but this team's been in some fun games this year.
36:39 Speaker 01 Yes.
36:39 Bill Simmons? Like, especially like, uh, for us on the West Coast, like, they're, they've just been in some good ones. They've been in some real, like, high offense battles. They're doing everything right. 21 Portland.
36:52 Bill Simmons? Who really fell off over the last couple of weeks.
36:56 Speaker 01 In their defense, they have no guards, like they just have no one healthy. They're starting Citi Sissoko. That is the state of things for the Blazers.
37:04 Bill Simmons? Yeah, it was tough because they threw a lot on Drew's plate and it went great for about two weeks, but he's in his mid 30s and got hurt immediately.
37:13 Bill Simmons? Charlotte, number 20, 7 and 17, two wins against Toronto. Zach ridiculed me when I made them my number six pick in the league pass draft a couple of weeks ago.
37:25 Speaker 01 They're a great league pass team.
37:26 Bill Simmons? I love watching Charlotte.
37:28 Speaker 01 Yes.
37:28 Bill Simmons? I really enjoyed it. I just really enjoy when they have all their guys. Brandon Miller is one of those guys. If you catch on the right night, you're like, this guy might make five all NBA teams. It's weird. The weak part of their team is LaMelo. Not knowing what you're getting from him game to game, and then even when he plays, then they like defer to him too much. And he's, that's the part they can't figure out. And I also don't think, do you think he has trade value at this point?
37:55 Speaker 01 He's such like a matter of taste that if he does have trade value, it's with only like a very select group of front offices at this point. Like between, honestly, like the injury history is a huge part of it. Everything you take away from like, is he a winning player and that whole conversation? And then within it, not having his best individual season, like that's just a couple too many disqualifiers to really have a robust trade market.
38:19 Bill Simmons? Who hangs up faster Harden for LaMelo straight up?
38:22 Speaker 01 I think the Hornets have to hang up like that. That doesn't get them anywhere, does it?
38:27 Bill Simmons? It makes them pretty interesting. That's just you're getting out of the LaMelo business once and for all.
38:33 Speaker 01 Yeah.
38:34 Bill Simmons? But I think that I agree with you. I think the Hornets hang up faster.
38:37 Speaker 01 Personally, as someone who likes watching the Hornets, I don't want to watch the James Harden Hornets. That's not, that's not what I'm signing up for.
38:43 Bill Simmons? Con Knipple Hornets. Well, this leads to one of my big questions.
38:48 Bill Simmons? Could this be the best NBA draft since 1996, this draft we have now? And I'm going to use it by this, this way to assess it.
38:58 Bill Simmons? How many guys from this draft could you see conceivable be making an all NBA team? Being one of the 15 best guys in the league. I'm just going to list some names and you tell me when to stop.
39:09 Speaker 01 Okay. And the threshold was all NBA, right?
39:12 Bill Simmons? One all NBA team.
39:13 Speaker 01 Okay.
39:15 Bill Simmons? Flag.
39:17 Bill Simmons? Harper.
39:22 Bill Simmons? You're pausing.
39:22 Speaker 01 No, I'm, I'm in. I was, I was saying, keep rolling. I'm, I'm down for a potential Dylan Harper All-NBA. I could see Canipal.
39:28 Bill Simmons? Edgecombe?
39:30 Speaker 01 Maybe.
39:32 Bill Simmons? Maybe.
39:33 Speaker 01 I mean, it's maybe for all these guys. All NBA is tough.
39:37 Bill Simmons? Edgecombe's like 15 years old. I don't even think he's fully through puberty yet.
39:41 Speaker 01 But V, like VJ. VJ Edgecombe could be a seven time All-Star and never make an All-NBA team.
39:46 Bill Simmons? True.
39:47 Speaker 01 You know?
39:47 Bill Simmons? All right. So this is all conceivably maybes.
39:49 Speaker 01 Yes.
39:50 Bill Simmons? Cedric Coward.
39:53 Speaker 01 I don't see it. All-Star maybe, All-NBA.
39:57 Bill Simmons? You're not buying like this is the next Kawhi? You're, you haven't seen any of that stuff?
40:02 Speaker 01 How many All-NBA teams has Kawhi made?
40:05 Bill Simmons? Well, he's made at least one.
40:06 Speaker 01 Yes. He's, it certainly fits the one threshold.
40:07 Bill Simmons? He's had to be one of the best 15 guys once.
40:09 Speaker 01 That's true. May, maybe Cedric Coward can have like that kind of peak season where he does cut in, but I don't necessarily see that kind of potential.
40:16 Bill Simmons? First team all defense, 20 points a game. Derek Queen.
40:24 Bill Simmons? Oh, you thought about it?
40:25 Speaker 01 I, I'm tempted. It's not inconceivable.
40:29 Bill Simmons? I have for the first six are yes or maybe for all six. Ace Bailey is when it starts to go sideways.
40:34 Speaker 01 That's a no.
40:35 Bill Simmons? So it's six and I, and maybe one that we're not even thinking of, cause these drafts sometimes are like late. There's a late bloomer. We didn't say. So 1996, Iverson, Kobe, Nash, Ray Allen, Stojakovic, Marbury, Jermaine O'Neal, Sharif Abdur-Rahim, eight All-NBA guys.
40:56 Speaker 01 Pretty good.
40:57 Bill Simmons? It's fucking amazing. Three MVPs. So even getting, I was looking it up, like even getting six would be like the number two highest total, I think, for a draft.
41:07 Speaker 01 Yeah. I was gonna say 03, but I don't think they have eight All-NBA guys. Yeah.
41:12 Bill Simmons? Yeah. And then there's a couple of others that are like four. I think there was one five, but for the most part, really hard to find depth like this. So, um, all right. Next category.
41:24 Bill Simmons? I love Charlotte, by the way. Keep doing what you're doing, Charlotte. Signs of human life is our next category. Number 19 Dallas at nine and 16. Would you trade Anthony Davis? Cause I would not.
41:35 Speaker 01 For what?
41:36 Bill Simmons? I would ride this out for six more weeks.
41:37 Speaker 01 Yeah, I don't really see the urgency in it.
41:40 Bill Simmons? Me neither.
41:41 Speaker 01 Like I get the, the ultimate want to turn the page as a franchise. I can understand, but Anthony Davis is really good. And honestly, when healthy, very good for this team. So I don't really see. I'm not, I'm not feeling that like absolute push that we have to get this done, even by the trade deadline, to be honest with you.
41:59 Bill Simmons? I am only caring about flag if I'm Dallas. What's good for flag? What's good for flag is to play with Anthony Davis. That's it. Put him together.
42:09 Speaker 01 It's also to play with Ryan Nemhard, apparently. You know?
42:12 Bill Simmons? Guy. Undrafted free agent Ryan Nemhard. Turns out, uh, playing in big games for your entire high school and college life, and then leading the NCAA in assists. Maybe you should be one of the 60 players drafted.
42:24 Speaker 01 Pretty good.
42:26 Bill Simmons? When do you think, who writes the first, what, what's the date of the first story about? Could the Mavericks be a stealth contender? When it's like Kyrie could come back on, you know, February 22nd. They have a chance to be like a nine or a 10 seed. Would you want to see, when does that all start? You think Christmas?
42:45 Speaker 01 Uh, not this season. I don't think.
42:47 Bill Simmons? There's no way, right?
42:48 Speaker 01 Not this season? No.
42:50 Bill Simmons? There's no way?
42:51 Speaker 01 Who is writing that story?
42:52 Bill Simmons? I don't just, you know, people.
42:55 Speaker 01 People.
42:55 Bill Simmons? Somebody.
42:56 Speaker 01 People might, you know, maybe there's a whisper in some back alley somewhere.
42:59 Bill Simmons? Be a credible person.
43:00 Speaker 01 I don't think it would be super credible. I don't think they have that in them, but they're scoring again. I, I fully support them actually playing point guards. It's turned out to be like a masterful move for them. I've, they've been much more enjoyable to watch and ultimately just much more successful.
43:14 Bill Simmons? The irony of one of the 10 best point guards ever, Jason Kidd. Discounting the value of a point guard for three weeks.
43:25 Speaker 01 It's pretty good.
43:26 Bill Simmons? Makes you think he was trying to get Nico Harrison fired. It doesn't add up.
43:29 Speaker 01 It does not add up.
43:30 Bill Simmons? But it does not add up at all.
43:32 Speaker 01 But maybe, maybe the thinking is I am the point guard, right? As the coach, I will manipulate the pieces on the board and control everything I can control and just have, you know, my reasonable facsimile D'Angelo Russell, classic, you know, traditional point guard, who now cannot play on the court without a point guard chaperone. Uh, maybe that was the thinking, but did not work out regardless.
43:53 Bill Simmons? It's be another fun Alvarado team, by the way.
43:57 Bill Simmons? Memphis number 18. A lot of signs of life when, once the moment Zach Eadie came back, Wells is playing again, Coward looks great. And it's one of those things where it's like, A, I don't know if I care if Ja Morant comes back. And then B, it's like, would you think about trading Jaren Jackson and just trying to get more picks and building around young guys? And I don't know. Do you need Jaren Jackson on this team? Do you like Jaren Jackson as like a, like a high asset? Are you a Jaren Jackson fan?
44:31 Speaker 01 I am still a fan. I think in part, I mean, what he is defensively is clearly potentially transformative for a lot of teams. I also think as far as bigs go, his ability to drive, not just like shoot, but actually drive out of those situations is incredibly useful. And it, it diversifies what Memphis does when he's out there. Like, I like the element that he brings to this team to a degree where I'm not rushing to get rid of Jaren necessarily either. They do need some guard though, whether that's Ja Morant, or eventually Scottie Pippen, or eventually Ty Jerome. Like, one of those guys will eventually play and that'll probably help them because God bless Vince Williams, moonlighting at point guard.
45:07 Bill Simmons? I love that.
45:07 Speaker 01 And winning games and doing it is, it's been an incredible process, but I don't know that that's anyone's dream of what this team looks like.
45:15 Bill Simmons? Weirdly fun league past team.
45:17 Speaker 01 I think Edie is a huge part of that though.
45:19 Bill Simmons? Yeah.
45:19 Speaker 01 Yeah, like, and that's the thing, because before, the early returns on Zach Edie in his NBA career felt a little novelty to me. It was like, you know, they would feed him in the post, he would get points, and then in other ways, both defensively and on the board sometimes, to be honest with you, would end up giving back a lot of those points. And so it was like, is this guy an actual difference maker in the NBA? I mean, he's been the Grizzlies' best player in the vast majority of these games. He's like, really changing the way that everyone around him is playing in a way that feels pretty sustainable, feels like something that the Grizzlies can rely on for potentially a long time. Like, this is a different guy than we saw last year.
45:55 Bill Simmons? It's a bummer Charlotte passed on him at six a year ago, because he's kind of exactly who'd be the fun missing piece for that team. And it was kind of dumb that they didn't take him or Klingon anyway. Yeah, the only thing I was thinking with Jackson, if you're, if you're the Hawks, and you're not getting Giannis, unless Jalen Johnson is in the trade, I don't think. And I'm not trading Jalen Johnson in a Giannis trade where I also have to give up that New Orleans pick. Like, I just, what's the point of trading for Giannis if I can't then try to win the title with Giannis? I'm not, I'm not giving away everything I have so Giannis can be in a slightly better position than he's in with the Bucks.
46:34 Bill Simmons? But if I could flip Porzingis' expiring and that New Orleans pick, and maybe one other pick for Jaren Jackson, and put him in the defense, his ceiling on defense with some of the other guys I have.
46:50 Speaker 01 Yeah.
46:51 Bill Simmons? That's pretty interesting. And then if I'm Memphis and I could have a chance, I'm not going anywhere anyway, and I have a chance to get a top-five pick, and, you know, kind of move away from this model that doesn't work anymore anyway, I'm thinking about it.
47:07 Speaker 01 So if you're Atlanta in that scenario, are you looking to play Jackson at the five? Are you looking to play Johnson, Jackson, and Kangu altogether?
47:17 Bill Simmons? Akongu is my backup center. My crunch time lineup. I just have length and switchability everywhere now.
47:25 Speaker 01 Yeah.
47:26 Bill Simmons? Right? It's I'm just and Jackson can do some of the stretch stuff that Porzingis does, but defensively is just a different animal. Right? And now the no Trey Hawks. There's a couple of lineups you could put out there. That's like, Jesus. You know, I don't know.
47:43 Speaker 01 I kind of dig it. I hadn't really, I hadn't really thought about Jaren Jackson as a fit for them, but he does kind of play into the way that they're kind of styled right now.
47:52 Bill Simmons? Yeah, doesn't help. I think their rebounding is going to be the issue for them in the playoffs. And he's not helping that because he's a terrible rebounder for his position.
48:00 Speaker 01 Yeah.
48:02 Bill Simmons? Number 17 Philly. Just a quickie question. Do you have? I think for all NBA, Jokic and SGA and Luka have to be the three.
48:11 Speaker 01 Yep. If they're eligible, we should say.
48:14 Bill Simmons? True. Giannis, I don't know if he's going to play enough games, but is Maxey like right now in pen as a first team all NBA guy for you?
48:21 Speaker 01 I think he's going to end up one by default just because like, you know, between Wemby and potentially Luka and potentially Giannis, like those guys getting disqualified. Maxey has made a compelling case as anyone else in the league, basically.
48:34 Bill Simmons? Would you have him? So let's say it's Maxey against Cade and Brunson and Ant. Is he the leader of those four? Because for me, I give him a slight edge because I just think what he's done day to day and the burden he has on that team and how many minutes he's playing and everything he has to do night to night and the joy he has. And what an awesome teammate he seems like. I just, to me, he would be the number one guy. Some of the Knicks fans would be like, that's not fair Brunson. The Detroit fans would be like, that's not fair. We're winning with Cade. I think Cade probably has the best argument, but I honestly would have Maxey over all those guys.
49:08 Speaker 01 I think Cade is the best argument and is obviously the best player of that group, just in a vacuum. And yet I'm with you. I think Maxey, like I think ultimately for me, it'd probably come down to Cade and Maxey because of like how much Cade is driving. And as you said, how much the Sixers are relying on Maxey to the point where there's really no question whose team that is anymore. Like where the future of Philadelphia's basketball lies. It's all Tyrese Maxey and I mean, VJ Edgecombe and the other guards to a certain extent, but he's, he's put them in, like shifted them in an entirely new direction and gear.
49:40 Bill Simmons? To do what he's done and to basically eradicate the Embiid and George contracts.
49:47 Speaker 01 Yeah.
49:47 Bill Simmons? Where Sixers fans don't even really care because they have Maxine Edge come is just an amazing achievement. Is Jalen a second team all NBA for you?
49:55 Speaker 01 Is who?
49:56 Bill Simmons? Is it Jalen Brown? Has he been one of the 10 best players for you?
49:59 Speaker 01 I want to, I want to talk about him for sure. Um.
50:02 Bill Simmons? To me, he has to be in.
50:03 Speaker 01 If he's not second, he's definitely third. I think it's probably going to depend on that like dogfight of like how much of a glut is there for the second team?
50:11 Bill Simmons? Here's what's shocking about Jalen.
50:15 Bill Simmons? I mean, Giannis isn't playing enough.
50:19 Bill Simmons? Jalen has a case for being the best forward in the league right now.
50:24 Speaker 01 Case for the best forward in the league.
50:25 Bill Simmons? Centers and guards across the boards. It's basically him versus Luca's not a forward, right?
50:31 Speaker 01 I don't think so, no.
50:35 Bill Simmons? Jalen Johnson, Scotty Barnes, Towns, if you consider Towns a forward.
50:40 Speaker 01 Yeah.
50:41 Bill Simmons? Where it's like a weird forward situations here because we don't have Tatum. But it's really all guards and centers. And I think Jalen has the best pure forward in the league right now. Siakam, like go, go through all the rosters.
50:52 Speaker 01 Well, did you say KD?
50:56 Bill Simmons? Oh, KD, I guess. Yeah, I had him in, but I don't, I don't think KD's been one of the 10 best players. Like I think Jalen's been more impactful than KD this year. Jalen's been going toe to toe with the best players in the league for three weeks, you know, as like the only real star on his roster. And he's like night after night has answered it. I've been really impressed.
51:15 Speaker 01 Tremendous. And I think shifting from, obviously he's been a very good scorer for a long time, but a little more of a come and go score and burst and runs kind of guy. Becoming just one of the most reliable first option creators basically in the entire league on in terms of like an every night basis, putting up damn near 30 a night. The fact that the Celtics now have another one of those guys is pretty ridiculous for when Tatum comes back. It's, it's been just a remarkable trajectory for Jalen Brown from a season where like I expected the excess, but thought it would come at more of a cost. And he's just been everything they've needed him to be.
51:50 Bill Simmons? I'm stunned by this move that he has now where he fakes like he's driving to the basket with his right hand and does the stop, the bend down crossover, fall back 12, 13 footer. It's unstoppable and it's not a move that he really had until this year. He tried to do it for, but he, his dribble is always too high. He would get picked. And he was like, and either I'm shooting threes. I'll shoot a 20 footer if I'm open or I'm going to the basket. And that was kind of his offensive game. And now he has this sophisticated, he's averaging 16 two-point shots a night. Like think about that, not even threes, but and, and he's shooting almost 50%. So he's turned into this DeRozan, Kawhi kind of two-point shooter.
52:35 Bill Simmons? I, I just think he's been awesome and he's carried the load. Like we'll talk about the Celtics in a second. Phoenix, I have it 16 in the signs of human life, just because we, they're over under was 31. The Brooks thing's incredible and Brooks has become now the most underrated player of the decade. It's just like Dillon Brooks win, Dillon Brooks wins, you can't refute it. Definitely changes the thing. I don't really fully understand the Phoenix thing. I mean, they're only, they're 14 and 10 or 15 and 10, I think, I think they're 14 and 10.
53:05 Speaker 01 14 and 10.
53:06 Bill Simmons? The Gillespie piece is the part I don't understand the most because they actually needed him last year. And, and there were moments where he looked good, but then Bud just never played him.
53:14 Speaker 01 Yeah.
53:16 Bill Simmons? And now when you watch him, he looks like he could be an all-star. I know he won't, but you know what I mean? Like he's way more talented than they gave him credit for last year when they actually needed him. I don't, never understand that.
53:26 Speaker 01 I mean, they beat the Wolves last night without Devin Booker because Colin Gillespie turned into a fourth quarter supernova. And that, that's just been a kind of a regular occurrence where he's been an incredible shooter. He's, I mean, turned out, especially for his size, the playmaking has been really impressive. Like he sees lobs and cross-court stuff that guards his size usually don't. Really, really impressed, honestly with his ball movement, but really the Suns overall. Like I know their defense gets a lot of attention because of Dillon Brooks and kind of the edge they play with now. But this is a group of guys who either weren't on the team or weren't in these roles, ala Colin Gillespie, who stepped in the season and just like knew like that exactly how to play together. Like they just got the angles, the cuts, the timing, really remarkable and very surprising,
54:10 Speaker 01 given the players that they were able to cobble together there, but it's just kind of worked.
54:15 Bill Simmons? And the coach is doing a great job. I feel like we have more good coaches than we might have had at any point this century. Where I look around the league and I'm like, that guy's a good coach. Yeah, that team's really well put together. We don't have a lot of Doug Christie's, I guess is my point.
54:32 Speaker 01 I feel like the general rules are always, there are like five exemplary coaches who really help you a lot. And there's five at the bottom that really kind of drag you down. And everyone else is sort of in the soft, you know, middle of the bell curve or whatever.
54:44 Bill Simmons? Now, now the bell curve seems higher, right?
54:46 Speaker 01 It's higher. And there's like maybe, maybe one or two guys in the league in terms of the, the bottom end of coaches. If that, I think the low hanging fruit has just been picked up by basically every team out there to the point that there's only so much you can do to really shoot your team in the foot.
55:00 Bill Simmons? We also have a couple of coaches, I think, having career years like Missoula, Spoh. There's people who are just like doing, like, I think JJ's been really good. I don't understand the Lakers' record at all with some of the limitations they have. Some of the bad teams, like the Nets' coach is really good. I think the Raptors' coach, I think that team's overachieved. Uh, all right, one more break and then we'll do the top 15. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything. And whether it's a flea flicker or a tush push, you need a plan that fits your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you so they can help personalize coverage for your life and for your budget. Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
55:41 Bill Simmons? 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 the experiences that make you feel like 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+. 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.
56:22 Bill Simmons? All right, we'll rip through the Trade Machine crew really quickly because we've talked about these teams already on my pod a bunch. Toronto's 15 and 10. They fell back to earth a little.
56:30 Speaker 01 Yeah.
56:31 Bill Simmons? They had some easy schedule stuff the first part.
56:35 Bill Simmons? I'm still not sure about this team. Their fans were really chirpy when the record was good. That settled down a little bit.
56:42 Speaker 01 Sure.
56:43 Bill Simmons? I, the most important thing to me is that Barnes just feels, it still feels like he's gone up a level. And this is the most I've liked watching him. Ultimately, I'm not, not sure what the destiny of this team is. Their bench seems like it saves their ass a bunch with shed and Mamu and Agbagi, all these, like it's some dick, they'll come in and they'll be down 10, all of a sudden they'll be up eight. I'm not sure what the move is with them either, because I think it would be hard for them to make trades. This is kind of their team, but they should be in that six to nine range, right? Somewhere in there. I don't think they're a top five team. Golden State, they're-
57:21 Speaker 01 I think they have enough good players, the Raptors do, and like move, like salaries that could actually be cobbled together to get something important back, that you kind of have to talk about them with it, when any of these like big potential deals come up.
57:34 Bill Simmons? Golden State, 13 and 12.
57:39 Bill Simmons? They're just too old.
57:41 Speaker 01 They are too old.
57:42 Bill Simmons? And the Kaminga thing is now a catastrophe.
57:46 Speaker 01 It's awful.
57:47 Bill Simmons? It's gonna be worse. And they seem, everybody seems to think they could trade him at January 15th for something. Why am I trading for Kaminga? Why do I want to pay him $22 million a year? Like the Warriors won't even play him and they need somebody like him and he's not even playing anymore.
58:02 Speaker 01 I think this is the thing that would worry me the most about trading for him is not like, he can't be a superstar, or he can't be a team player or whatever. It's he goes to these stretches where he'll start the season and play four games, doing what you want him to do as a team. And then he'll just be off in the wilderness for 20 games. Like he just does not have it in him in terms of the patience and the focus and the commitment to play consistently winning basketball. And that's why you see even like Steph, Steph has been out, Draymond's been out, Jimmy Butler's been in and out. They've been resting a bunch of guys. This should be Jonathan Kaminga time. And instead it is Pat Spencer time. Like that, I think that's just like a damning, it's a damning situation all around in terms of where he, I would say where he finds himself, but it's really where he put himself.
58:48 Bill Simmons? Do you feel like Draymond's at the same level he's been at in the past?
58:51 Speaker 01 I do not.
58:52 Bill Simmons? I don't either.
58:53 Speaker 01 Still really good, but.
58:54 Bill Simmons? I wonder if that's a bigger issue for them. And I think it has more to do with the league just got so much bigger. That just philosophically, that 2017 type lineup that the Warriors could throw, or maybe earlier than 2015. I don't know if that's doable anymore with the centers we have in the league. Like it's like, oh, good. We're playing Zach Eadie tonight. You know, oh, here's Shangoon. Like I, I just don't think it's sustainable in the same way. So you almost need him as a four.
59:26 Bill Simmons? Playing with a center. But if that center can't shoot either, now I have two non shooters in the league where everybody loves space. And I just. I, I wonder if that's almost a bigger issue for them than, than Kaminga. Kaminga, whatever. It's 22 million a year. If he plays, he doesn't play, but the figuring unlocking that Draymond part. Cause he does so many good things from a team defense standpoint, but the rebounding combined with the lack of size. I think it's a real issue for them.
59:52 Bill Simmons? The ship has sailed, but they won in 22.
59:54 Speaker 01 They did like.
59:55 Bill Simmons? That's, that's, that's, that's the thing. They won an unbelievable title. They did it. They answered everything. Atlanta, number 13, we've talked about them. And then Miami at number 12, two Miami things. They're 14 and 10. Really, really fun league pass this year, uh, team, which, which is shocking. The Norm Powell thing, I. He was so huge for the Clippers last year. And then the playoffs was up and down. And then the feedback from the Clipper side was like, we didn't want to pay him an extension. He would have been a problem all year.
1:00:28 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:00:29 Bill Simmons? And he's going, when it goes to Miami and immediately becomes the same 25 point a game a scorer. He was in the first half of the Clipper season. You can run crunch time offense through him. He's great against good teams. Like the better the team is, the better he is. And that Collins and Beal combo for Powell, like almost single-handedly explains the Clippers season. Like they, they, they basically just gave away 10 points a game. Kawhi insurance for when Kawhi never plays, an extra crunch time guy, a guy who sucks the Clippers fan. Like you can literally explain the entire Clippers demise with that trade.
1:01:07 Speaker 01 Why? And honestly, it's not just the Clippers too. I feel like the Blazers had their version of this. The Raptors had their version of this with Norm Powell. This is just like so many teams that have talked themselves out of, oh, this guy just scores all the time. Every time he touches the ball. Granted.
1:01:23 Bill Simmons? We don't trust this.
1:01:23 Speaker 01 Yeah. Sometimes, you know, sometimes doesn't always pass a lot. At times earlier in his career, especially was more of a liability defensively, but I think it's really worked on that part of his game. Has just become a dead eye shooter, a go-to scorer. And this is where, as I'm getting into like, you know, we're, we're almost in all-star season, Bill, as far as like penciling in our teams. It looks like there's probably only going to be room for one member of the Miami Heat.
1:01:47 Bill Simmons? It has to be Powell.
1:01:48 Speaker 01 Does it have to be?
1:01:50 Bill Simmons? I, for me it does. Yeah. It has to be.
1:01:52 Speaker 01 Like I think Bam is a better player than Norm Powell. And ultimately the Heat are still a defense-first team that is winning mostly on that side of the ball. But Powell is also like on the, riding the wave of everything in terms of their reinvented offense. And it's like, it's so symbolic of why they feel different this year that I'm with you. I think he's going to get a lot of votes, but I'm, I'm not just like ready to rule out Bam's importance in all this too.
1:02:17 Bill Simmons? Well, it's also, what are we at? The 25 game mark? We still have, when do we have to vote? We have like 12 more.
1:02:22 Speaker 01 Yeah, at least I would hope.
1:02:25 Bill Simmons? My other question.
1:02:28 Bill Simmons? Because, you know, if they could trade the Rozier contract, it puts him in play for a bunch of players, whether Kawhi Leonard, who we mentioned earlier, Giannis, the high end, Jaren Jackson, I mentioned, name a player there in play for, if you can take the $26 million expiring Rozier contract, put it with one or two other assets. Now you can mix and match anybody. I could try to get Trey Murphy. We'll take Jordan Poole's contract with Trey Murphy. We'll throw these contracts back and all my, all our picks, like whatever it is, you can get whoever
1:03:03 Bill Simmons? So, and I did a deep dive on this. Unclear if Charlotte knew about the investigation when they traded him. They've never said publicly. My guess is they knew. These teams always know. So they trade him to Miami. Odds are they knew he was being investigated for a gambling scandal. That's pretty fucked up.
1:03:21 Speaker 01 Yes.
1:03:21 Bill Simmons? That's like when OKC traded Jeff Green to the Celtics and knew he was hurt. Like their teams will do this from time to time. This is pretty fucked up.
1:03:29 Speaker 01 Well, this is why you're getting the chatter about like, is there going to be some kind of recompense to the Heat as a result? Like, would they be getting some of like a pick back or the some of the protection back?
1:03:39 Bill Simmons? Right, that's that was gonna be my second thing. It doesn't seem like Miami can get the pick back. But it seems like they should, and I don't want to defend the Heat because I hate the Heat, but I think it's unfair. They lost, it's their 27 first round pick. And it's crazy that they're not going to have that pick because they traded for Rozier, who was under a gambling investigation. The other team didn't tell them. They should get the pick back. And if they got the pick back, that unlocks the rest of their first round picks. 26, 27, 28, 29. They can do, at that point, you can really go after whoever. But the other piece is they don't know if they can trade him yet. Until they actually put him in a trade and the other team agrees.
1:04:24 Bill Simmons? And then the league decides whether they could put him in a trade or not. But the league won't tell them until the trade is, it's like, why are you penalizing these guys for trading for a guy under false pretenses? Like, I've never seen the league fuck over a team like this, like this decade. I think it's really weird.
1:04:42 Speaker 01 I mean, just a very cool situation all around, from the gambling scandal to now all of like the the web implications for all of these other teams. It's ridiculous.
1:04:50 Bill Simmons? It almost feels like they're punishing Arison a little bit. And I don't really understand that part either. I don't understand it. I mean, the weirdest thing that ever happened in the league was when the great Reggie Lewis died in the with the Celtics. And David Stern made them carry his cap figure for the next three years of the contract.
1:05:10 Speaker 01 I did not realize that happened.
1:05:12 Bill Simmons? Yeah, they carried it 94, 95, 96. When you have like these other things where it's like an injury exception, we could get like, they just made them care. And that was, everybody in Boston felt like that was just a fuck you to the Celtics. This feels like a fuck you to the Heat and I don't really fully understand it.
1:05:29 Speaker 01 Yeah. How are there so many ways to get cap relief, all kinds of relief in terms of your team building flexibility? Like, there's a lot of mechanisms teams have to work with right now. And yet there is no answer for the fact that we are staring down a massive gambling scandal in a league where gambling is only getting more prevalent. And like, this is not the last time something like this is going to happen. And so it, honestly, the league should take this opportunity to iron out what the protocols are because this stuff isn't going away.
1:05:55 Bill Simmons? And what, what is the conversation when like, so Pat Riley calls Silver or Harrison calls Silver? Let's say Harrison calls Silver. He's like, yo, my guys told me, um, we don't know if we can trade this for a Gier thing or not. I just want to check with you. This seems crazy. So we don't know if we can trade him until we complete the trade and then you guys tell us if we can include him. And Silver's like, yeah, yeah.
1:06:25 Speaker 01 Just a lot of no comment from the league office.
1:06:28 Bill Simmons? Well, can you give us a, can you give us a hint? Like, would you approve the trade? I can't. Like, this is an insane situation. All right. Top 11, the wild cards. Orlando, 14 and 10. Um, every time you feel like, think, good things are starting to happen for them, something bad happens. Although at least Franz didn't blow his knee out.
1:06:48 Speaker 01 Yes. That in itself is a good thing.
1:06:50 Bill Simmons? Zach floated this out on his pod on Thursday and I was instantly jealous of it. He told me on the phone he was going to do it. And I was like, fuck, that's a good one. Uh, and it can't happen under the cap until the summer, but I just thought, as a thought experience, the Yanis for Palo, straight up, who says no, is probably the best who says no in the league right now. Like, if it was available, would Orlando say fuck it and just do it? And it's about as big of an age disparity as we've had for a major trade.
1:07:18 Speaker 01 Yep.
1:07:18 Bill Simmons? Like, it's the Mitch Richmond, Chris Webber trade, kind of on acid. I think I would do it if I was Orlando.
1:07:28 Bill Simmons? And I think I would do it if I was Milwaukee. Just fundamentally, let's forget the cap, all the other components. It can't happen anyway, but just fundamentally, I would do it if I was both teams.
1:07:39 Speaker 01 I think my general standing is I would almost always trade for Giannis. Like, there's really very few teams where I'm like, I don't want that guy. Or like, I think this is one of those cases where part of my brain is saying, no, like, trading Giannis leans into the same kind of spacing problems that Orlando already has. And the other part of my brain, which thankfully is much later, is saying, this is fucking Giannis Antetokounmpo. And if you can trade for him, you trade for him and you figure out all the other stuff later. And with Paolo, who's immensely talented, just surrounded by all kinds of questions as to what the best version of him will look like, or can he get there? Or like, even just something like the speed and the pace at which he plays. There's still a lot kind of hanging up in the air. There's nothing hanging up in the air with Giannis to a point where I would feel,
1:08:23 Speaker 01 I mean, of course, you feel a little dicey about trading anyone that talented, that young. But if you're gonna do it, you do it for someone like Giannis.
1:08:30 Bill Simmons? The nine-year age gap, but it's a really interesting one. Number 10, Cleveland, 14 and 11, net rating of three. I have no fucking idea how this team has 11 losses. It's inexplicable. They don't seem like the happiest team.
1:08:45 Speaker 01 No.
1:08:47 Bill Simmons? Have we reached peak?
1:08:51 Bill Simmons? Mitchell or Garland, it's time to choose.
1:08:55 Speaker 01 Is there a choice? What is the choice?
1:08:59 Bill Simmons? Pick one, trade the other.
1:09:00 Speaker 01 No, but I'm saying like Donovan Mitchell is dragging this team around. And Darius Garland, when he, even when he's out there right now, does not look like the Darius Garland that we know and love. And so I fully expect that version to be back at some point, but when? And is he gonna be the kind of guy you can rely on to be healthy versus, Mitchell's been one of the best players in the league.
1:09:22 Bill Simmons? Counter, you could get a shitload for Mitchell. And then you bet on Garland. I mean, obviously, the move is to trade Garland.
1:09:29 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:09:31 Bill Simmons? I don't know who the suitor is for it. And if, if I'm having meetings about should we trade for Garland, I'm looking at all the injuries he's had. All were pretty fluky.
1:09:42 Speaker 01 Yep.
1:09:43 Bill Simmons? They weren't like, uh, all these wear and tear, like there's something structurally wrong, like Embiid style injuries. They're more like, oh, that's a shame that that one happened.
1:09:51 Speaker 01 Yeah, it's more like breaking bones in your face, you know, like there's just stuff that happens to him that, I agree, there's not like a chronic track record, but stuff does happen to him.
1:10:00 Bill Simmons? I'd be trying to trade for him if I was another team. This would be somebody I would be targeting. It was like, there's blood in the water, let's go get this. The thing is, it's really hard with Cleveland because it has to be almost a perfect trade. Or it has to be a team that can take him and give Cleveland less back, which is why, look, I, I can't pretend to figure out what the Brooklyn Nets, how they approach stuff day to day, week to week. But to me, this is like a perfect Brooklyn Net situation where they're like 15 under the cap. They could move a piece back, save Cleveland some money, get them under the apron where now that maybe they can do a second trade,
1:10:42 Bill Simmons? send some picks that way and basically make a bet on Garland as like a guy going forward. That's what I would do. I still feel like Garland can be that guy. I feel like he can be the face of a, of a franchise. I don't know if he can be one of the 15 best persons in the league, but I think he can be a guy that on a really good team could be your second or third best guy because we've seen it. He's, he's already done it.
1:11:03 Speaker 01 I like him much better on other teams, frankly.
1:11:06 Bill Simmons? Me too.
1:11:06 Speaker 01 Like I, I think he might just need a fresh start. He might need, honestly, like alluding to this kind of guard and guard conversation, maybe more of the keys, maybe more opportunity to kind of find his footing with all of that usage. That might be a thing for him, but as it stands, like I'm, I'm almost surprised that you lumped in the Cavs as a wild card because there's not a lot of wild happening with this team. Like they feel inert.
1:11:29 Bill Simmons? They have too much talent. I can't rule, we've just seen it happen too many times where a team was slogging along for 25 games and then the light bulb went off.
1:11:37 Speaker 01 And they have been massively injured, like they've been missing multiple guys in basically every game. So it's like, that is a qualifier, but at the same time.
1:11:44 Bill Simmons? Guys and, and you know, there's guys that I feel like. Like Deandre Hunter, I'm not sure this is the right team for him.
1:11:51 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:11:52 Bill Simmons? There's more subtle moves they can make.
1:11:57 Bill Simmons? It's funny, you meant what you said about Garland. I am in the stealth, I feel that way about Austin Reeves as well camp.
1:12:06 Bill Simmons? I love Austin Reeves when LeBron's not playing.
1:12:08 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:12:09 Bill Simmons? But when all three of them are playing, all of a sudden, Austin Reeves is not as impactful or whatever, because he's on the same team with Luka Doncic and LeBron James.
1:12:18 Speaker 01 Sure.
1:12:18 Bill Simmons? Yeah, game the other night, we had 11 points and this is a guy who was averaging 29, but he's just the third option.
1:12:28 Bill Simmons? Is there a Reeves and a ton of picks and other stuff for Giannis?
1:12:34 Bill Simmons? Anything if Giannis was like, I want to go to the Lakers. That's where I've decided I want to go. You told me to pick my team. I've picked my team and it's the Lakers.
1:12:44 Bill Simmons? Is there enough with a Reeves as a headliner with all their picks that gets your attention? Or is that a hang up?
1:12:50 Speaker 01 Can you get there salary wise?
1:12:52 Bill Simmons? You would have to really patch together all their expirings to get there. Vanderbilt, Kleba, I mean, Gabe Vincent, you'd have to really throw them all together.
1:13:02 Speaker 01 How insane is it that both of these conversations are happening where you are saying LeBron James, maybe the greatest player of all time, is getting in the way of Austin Reeves being Austin Reeves, which I both agree with and not like, I think he's had a couple more games lately where it's like.
1:13:16 Bill Simmons? It's a usage rate thing though, Rob.
1:13:18 Speaker 01 Completely.
1:13:19 Bill Simmons? Like that's an. Because one of the highest usage rate guys, guys in the decade and you have LeBron James, he should have the ball.
1:13:26 Speaker 01 Yep.
1:13:27 Bill Simmons? So now Reeves is kind of over here.
1:13:29 Speaker 01 But what if, but part of his job is to put up 30 a game when LeBron is out like, you know, it's like, it's part of the modulation of what makes him valuable. But the other part of this is we are earnestly floating Austin Reeves as the primary return in a Giannis trade and I'm like not walking out of the room right now.
1:13:46 Bill Simmons? He's averaging 29 a game.
1:13:47 Speaker 01 It's insane. He's been awesome.
1:13:49 Bill Simmons? It's a relatively small sample size. It's like 104 minutes. But when LeBron, Luca and Reeves all play together this year, they're minus 8.9.
1:14:00 Speaker 01 Not ideal.
1:14:00 Bill Simmons? Kind of backed up what I'm watching because it is a little clumsy. You have three guys who are, you know, Reeves ideally. I love when he has the ball. I love when he's like the main creator and it's just not going to happen with those other two guys anyway. Uh, okay. So I'm more bullish on Cleveland maybe turning this around than you, it sounds like.
1:14:19 Speaker 01 I would love to see it. I just don't think we've seen like any kind of spark that's going to lead to that yet. Maybe it'll still happen though.
1:14:26 Bill Simmons? What actor has Evan Mobley? Where you're like, I know he's going to win the Oscar, but now it's like, oh shit, he's 45 years old. And that happened.
1:14:34 Speaker 01 He's, he's consistently still really good though. You know, it's just like, is he really good in a leading capacity? Is he gonna be more of a character type?
1:14:41 Bill Simmons? Where it's like, oh, in Train Dreams, he was great. Might get nominated.
1:14:46 Speaker 01 Is he, is he a Val Kilmer? Like, does he have that?
1:14:51 Bill Simmons? More charisma.
1:14:52 Speaker 01 I mean, look, uh, defense has charisma in its own way, you know?
1:14:57 Bill Simmons? True.
1:14:58 Speaker 01 I, but I agree with you. Like he's in a, he's in a weird spot.
1:15:01 Bill Simmons? One more jump.
1:15:01 Speaker 01 I think we would all love to see it.
1:15:03 Bill Simmons? Just.
1:15:05 Speaker 01 Just nudge him along.
1:15:05 Bill Simmons? All right. Number nine, the sleeper. San Antonio.
1:15:10 Speaker 01 Let's go.
1:15:11 Bill Simmons? 16 and seven, and they haven't had Wemby for three weeks. Net rating 3.8. This Dylan Harper thing. Wow.
1:15:28 Speaker 01 Speak on it. What are you, what are you seeing?
1:15:32 Bill Simmons? I was thinking about all time situations where somebody had this crazy luxury of somebody who is clearly going to be awesome. Like maybe even like Hall of Fame awesome. And they don't really need him in the early part of their career and anything he does is like a bonus. And it was like the Celtics were in this situation with the McHale, where he was like, there were games he didn't even play crunch time for the first couple of years. This is like one of the 50 best players of all time. Rodman on the Pistons was like this, but you have this crazy, talented, monster asset.
1:16:04 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:16:05 Bill Simmons? And it's like, oh, you're going to do something that is awesome. That'll be great. Um.
1:16:11 Bill Simmons? He can do so many things offensively already and he looks like he's 25. Some of the moves, like you can't even remember when you're watching him, what hand he shoots with.
1:16:20 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:16:22 Bill Simmons? He's so comfortable bouncing off people and getting to the rim and I'm just absolutely in love with him as a player. I fucking love Dylan Harper. What a pick. What a, what a fucking miracle for them.
1:16:33 Speaker 01 He just gets into the lane about as easily as anybody in the league right now. And it's not, it's not all brute force. It's not all pure speed. You're right. Like he is just kind of bouncing between people. The footwork is really great. Just like a really clever player. And he's gonna have to figure out some of like the big picture stuff on running a team. Like that's just a natural part of the evolution, but for him to be in this like low stakes role, as you're saying, where he can just come in and be himself, it's hard not to be blown away by that on a nightly basis.
1:17:01 Bill Simmons? Really competitive. It's funny watching him. It's like in football, you see all these running backs. And then there's like three running backs every year that are just different than all the other guys. Like it's like Jameer Gibbs right now, where you're like, that guy's just different. Like if he's in space, he's breaking it. If he's, you think that he's gonna get tackled behind the line, he got out of it. They just move differently and cut differently, which is what it's like watching him. Like he, he cuts and moves like a running back. It doesn't even really seem like a basketball player to me sometimes. But that guy is just, to get that dude at number two is, after getting Wemby, is one of the, one of the bigger combo miracles we've seen. So for me, it's like, I'm doing everything I can if I can get Trey Murphy if I'm them.
1:17:45 Bill Simmons? Doing everything possible. Harper's untouchable. Castle's untouchable.
1:17:50 Speaker 01 Sure.
1:17:50 Bill Simmons? Wemby's obviously untouchable. Fox is untouchable. I'm not trading Luke Cornet either. You can have everyone else I have and all, and we could talk picks and all that stuff. But if I can keep that nucleus, but add Trey Murphy to it. I can make a real run at OKC, not this year, but maybe a year or two years from now.
1:18:08 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:18:08 Bill Simmons? That would be my goal.
1:18:09 Speaker 01 It would have to be a pick space conversation, I think, because like, I also love Devin Vassell for this team, and he's been awesome lately, in particular during this like offensive swoon, where they've just been blowing teams out, like really just outscoring teams, frankly. He's been really important to that formula. But you're right.
1:18:25 Bill Simmons? But couldn't he be the centerpiece of a Mur- do you like Murphy more as an asset for this team than Vassell? Because I would rather have Murphy.
1:18:31 Speaker 01 I would rather have both, is what I'm saying, you know, if there's a way to engineer it where it's a more picks oriented return for New Orleans, and like, if that's enough to dangle in front of them, the problem, as you'd mentioned earlier in some of the trade conversations with the Spurs, like, are their picks going to be valuable? Like, are San Antonio's own draft assets actually that enticing to teams anymore? I would, I would think you would have to hesitate if you're a team like the Pelicans.
1:18:55 Bill Simmons? They have an Atlanta pick a year from now, and they have a Dallas pick a couple of years from now.
1:18:59 Speaker 01 Yeah, swap, I think.
1:19:00 Bill Simmons? Yeah, swap. They have a Celtics pick a couple of years from now, but you're right. They don't have that like killer pick.
1:19:05 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:19:06 Bill Simmons? Which is why I think they would have to put somebody good in it, but, um, all right.
1:19:12 Bill Simmons? One more quick break, and then we gotta talk about Celtics. This episode is brought to you by Sony Pictures Classics. A perfect crime film, says the Daily Beast. John Tortore gives a career best performance. Don't miss the acclaimed new thriller, The Only Living Pickpocket in New York. Tortore stars as an aging master pickpocket, whose latest score puts him in the crosshairs of a ruthless crime family. It's also starring Giancarlo Esposito, Tatiana Maslany, Will Price, and our guy, Steve Buscemi. See the film that the LA Times calls instantly classic, The Only Living Pickpocket in New York, now playing in theaters nationwide. All right, quick break. This episode is brought to you by Fire TV. You ever sit down,
1:19:55 Bill Simmons? ready to watch the game, only to search and scroll endlessly? If so, you need Fire TV. It shows you are live games from your favorite teams all in one place, right on the home screen. No more searching. Just sit down and turn on Fire TV. Separate subscriptions may be required. Feature and content availability may vary. All right, we're down to the top eight, and somehow we have not mentioned the Boston Celtics yet, who I have in their own category called the one comeback away contender. And that comeback is Jason Tatum. The Celtics are 15-9 with a plus 7.2 net rating. They are second in offensive rating.
1:20:32 Bill Simmons? They are first in threes made and 30th in pace and 30th in free throw attempts.
1:20:38 Bill Simmons? Nemeus Kada is plus 16.7. So good. Jordan Walsh, looks like he might be a first team all defense guy. The way this is going, he got DMPs the first month of the season.
1:20:51 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:20:52 Bill Simmons? I have my take on what's going on here, but I want to hear yours first.
1:20:57 Speaker 01 My take, I've been, I've been struggling for the unifying theory of the Boston Celtics. Like what is happening here? Because I, this isn't even pandering at this point. Like this isn't even like you playing the Celtics too closely to your heart. They are legitimately one of the best teams in the league right now for reasons that are often like a little elusive. What I've come down on is this, like, I think what they do and most of their success, like a lot of their success is driven by how successful they've been offensively right now. As you mentioned, they win the possession battle almost every night, right? The combination of a lot of offensive rebounding and not turning the ball over. They have all these extra possessions and then they just like stretch that margin by taking as many threes as they do.
1:21:39 Speaker 01 And so they take what should be like an incremental advantage and blow it out.
1:21:44 Bill Simmons? And if you have 16 a game, Rob, they're making 16 threes a game.
1:21:48 Speaker 01 It's, it's bad. And like, it's not like they have the greatest shooters in the world. They have good shooters, but what they have is a commitment to taking them and a commitment to generating them. As has been kind of the Missoula style for a long time running now. But that combination of like, if you have elite possession gaining talent and enough shooters to at least make this kind of engine work. I think that can clearly take you to some interesting places.
1:22:11 Bill Simmons? I agree with everything you said. It's basically a system. So if you're thinking like, how did they stumble into the perfect, nobody believes in us, overachieving NBA blueprint that we've seen from time to time. Right? We saw with the 2016 Celtics, we saw with the 03 Pistons, we saw with the 2011 Grizzlies. Fundamentally, you still need a really good player leading it. This isn't happening unless you have one really good player and they have one of the best 12 to 15 guys in the league. And Jalen having his best season ever. They have an absolute lunatic as a coach, one of the most over competitive guys in the league. Who's just a full-fledged absolute lunatic, who all he wants his team to do is win. So they're never going to tank.
1:22:56 Bill Simmons? And he has an idea of how they should play. But the biggest thing to me as I watch them game to game. If you go through their top 11, every single guy has something to prove. Every single guy has some sort of hunger for something. So it's like Jalen Brown, Tatum's not here. I've always thought I could carry a team like this, so he's in. Derrick White, I've always thought I could do a little more offensively. Here we go. Same for Pritchard. Simons, contract year. Cada, I've never gotten a chance. Hauser, finally getting more minutes. You go on down line. Jordan Walsh.
1:23:30 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:23:30 Bill Simmons? I would fucking kill somebody to play 25 minutes a game. Hugo, I'm 19, I'm a rookie. Josh Minot, thank God, I'm finally playing basketball. There isn't a single guy on this team who's not like, I'm so happy to be part of this and I will fucking kill myself for us to win games. And you can feel it game to game. And I think that's made the difference because they're going toe to toe against everybody. The only team, like there's a Houston Rockets type team that they're just going to be pretty helpless against.
1:23:59 Speaker 01 Sure.
1:24:00 Bill Simmons? Like teams with real size and rebounding, it's just, they just don't have enough. But they figured out how to play these wings that just, all of them are maniac. Like Hugo's a maniac. They put him against Towns last week and Towns was like, you could see Towns like, where did this guy come from? Did you let him out of a cage? What happened here? They just, they have a bunch of maniacs, Rob.
1:24:26 Speaker 01 Yeah, I think, look, the top end of the rotation where I talked about Jalen Brown, him locking down that spot, as you mentioned, hugely important. The middle part of their rotation, I think we all more or less bought in on, right? Like the Derrick Whites, the Peyton Pritchards, like those are not the guys you worry about. To me, a lot of this team's success is the trifecta of Jordan Walsh, Josh Minot, Hugo Gonzalez. Like, it's not, like normally when you take three flyers like that, maybe one guy hits, but they've all been good in various ways at different points in the season and sometimes overlapping all at the same time. And they're all just enormously active. Like, I mean, Gonzalez is a case in point where I'm trying to get used to his game at the beginning of the season and trying to decide, is this is just a guy who runs around
1:25:09 Speaker 01 a lot or is he actually accomplishing things? But the level of activity is just warping plays. It's, it's starting to get in people's heads. Like it's starting to actually like speed things up for players on the floor. And I think you have that intensity from Walsh. You have Minot who's like length can be incredibly disruptive. And so all of a sudden you have this like roulette wheel of energy players who all are slightly different. And I think that honestly like really helps hold this rotation together in a lot of ways.
1:25:36 Bill Simmons? I think it's a little disorienting for teams, especially if you're not seeing a playoff series and it's just on the schedule and you played this team, this team, now you're playing this. It reminded me, you might not have seen the Texans Chiefs game on Sunday night.
1:25:48 Speaker 01 You know, I somehow missed that one.
1:25:49 Bill Simmons? Yeah, I figured you missed it. But the Texans have the best defense in the league and they were just hitting the shit out of the Chiefs. And then the fourth quarter, the Chiefs had a couple of big drops. And the reason they had the drops was because, you know, the guys have eyes in the back of their heads because they're getting absolutely nailed the whole game. And after a while you get a little jittery. You can feel it happening a little with the Celtics in some of these games where it's like we're, we took Jordan Walsh out, that guy who's, who's been flying around like a maniac. Now here's Hugo and he comes in and he's a maniac for 10 minutes and then Minot's. So there's something about it and Missoula is like, go, go, go. But they've been really good for four weeks here. And playing good teams.
1:26:30 Speaker 01 As you're describing the Texans defense, how is it possible that the Rockets and the Texans are just the same team right now? Like, how is that a thing that's feasible?
1:26:38 Bill Simmons? Yeah, if the Texans could offensive rebound, they actually would. Yeah, so adding Tatum to this, and it's the perfect way to add him where it's like, we'll give you Shireman's minutes, right? We'll ease you in with like 20 minutes a game.
1:26:53 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:26:54 Bill Simmons? And I'm pretty sure he'll be an upgrade. Although I do, I think Shireman's been okay too. Anyway, this is.
1:26:59 Speaker 01 I need to say, just as a matter of like discretion and responsibility, Jason Tatum should not play this season. Like it just, this team is, this team is good. But also.
1:27:08 Bill Simmons? But if he's ready to play, why wouldn't he play? Like, so here's the case. Like Drew Smith, Drew Smith got hurt on December 23rd, same exact injury.
1:27:16 Speaker 01 Sure.
1:27:17 Bill Simmons? And was playing in time mid-October for the Heat. It was a 10-month injury for them. Maybe it was a nine-and-a-half-month injury.
1:27:24 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:27:24 Bill Simmons? And Tatum even had the surgery faster than he did and, you know, has been a maniac working out. I, I think it might be a 10-month injury now, if you're ready, which 10 months for Tatum would be All-Star break.
1:27:36 Speaker 01 It just.
1:27:36 Bill Simmons? And I don't know, if you're him, why wouldn't you play?
1:27:38 Speaker 01 He, I'm sure wants to play. Like, I'm, I'm not saying Jason Tatum isn't working for it or won't be like physically ready, like meeting the bare minimum threshold of what is required to return. I'm just thinking about Jason Tatum and what he does on the floor. And it's the explosiveness, even of just like his creating separation off the dribble. It's his ability to switch and handle bigger players defensively and like the flexibility that he provides you and all of that workload that it puts on your lower body. Like, he's so important to the team. And this is, this is all great as a one-season amazing story. Jalen Brown leap, you know, all these great developmental subplots. Like, this is great.
1:28:17 Speaker 01 But if, if he re-injures something in the process of coming back too soon, that is just about the worst possible case for this Celtic season. So maybe I'm erring on the side of caution, but like, I, I think this team is good enough to just kind of let it ride and have fun with the lower stakes of not having Jason Tatum involved.
1:28:35 Bill Simmons? I think the luxury they have is they can wait until they feel like he's actually legitimately 100% and then wait another month.
1:28:42 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:28:43 Bill Simmons? But I still think he should come back because otherwise he's not playing in November. 19 months off doing anything, I don't think is great.
1:28:52 Speaker 01 That might be true.
1:28:53 Bill Simmons? And I would rather see him just play. He's gonna play basketball anyway. He's gonna wanna test his leg. He's gonna wanna go. You might as well do it for 20 minutes a game. It's an interesting conundrum, but it's certainly like, they went, I went there the first, I watched that Washington game and I was like, they should tank. And I can't believe some of the guys that are playing big minutes, like, what are we doing? And now it's like, whoa, what happens in February, especially when you look at the East, you don't like anybody. The one move away contenders, number seven, the Lakers, 17 and 6.
1:29:21 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:29:22 Bill Simmons? What should their record be, just in your opinion? What, what, do they feel like a 17 and 6 team to you?
1:29:27 Speaker 01 I mean, it's.
1:29:28 Bill Simmons? Do they feel like a 15 and 8 type of team, 14 and 9? Where, what would? In your head, do they feel that good?
1:29:34 Speaker 01 They don't quite feel this good. And like, I think that speaks to their season being a little surprising, right? It's Reeves really popping off. It's Luca looking, I mean, just even better than you could have expected. And some of their role guys like really hanging together, despite the fact that this is not a roster that has a lot of depth to it. At the same time, like, they've, they've earned it, like, they've, they've pulled off these wins and they clearly have something that is like a little bit greater than the sum of its parts happening there. Maybe that's a credit to Luca or JJ or Austin, or whoever you want to attribute it to, but they, they don't quite feel 17 and six, but who am I to argue with what they've done?
1:30:09 Bill Simmons? The thing I would worry about if I was them is just the Ayton turning into a pumpkin. He's now hit the point where the Laker fans seem like they actually trust him a little bit, and that's usually where it's gotten to be.
1:30:21 Speaker 01 The most dangerous place to be in the world.
1:30:22 Bill Simmons? The most dangerous place to be with De'Andre Ayton. So just be careful. Minnesota 15 and 9.
1:30:25 Speaker 01 Before we do Minnesota, I want to say one, one thing about Luca really quick.
1:30:29 Bill Simmons? Yeah.
1:30:31 Speaker 01 I think we were broadly like all, you know, reveling in his season. He's going to be an MVP candidate if he's eligible, all of that stuff. But like, when he is right like this, every drive he makes ends in points. And it's like, it is so striking to see just like the, the methodical nature of it again at this, like at this volume where I just think he's looked better this year than ever before somehow, despite the fact that he's already coming from a final standard, an MVP candidate standard. It's like, if the defense collapses, he's obviously way too good at finding the lob, finding the shooters. If you get too physical, he is the best player in the world right now at drawing fouls. And this was the part that blew me away. If you don't foul him, Bill, he is shooting 94% around the basket. 94%.
1:31:15 Bill Simmons? Zero to three feet, right?
1:31:16 Speaker 01 Zero to three feet. So like, how, when all of those three things are true, I mean, that's how you become 17 and six, despite having a roster that may not suggest it. It's how you become a somewhat improbable Western Conference contender, even in a really stacked group.
1:31:31 Bill Simmons? Yeah, I mean, the real reason you're 17 and six is your best two guys were averaging 63 points a game.
1:31:37 Speaker 01 Yep.
1:31:37 Bill Simmons? LeBron out. I don't even think that was possible. Yeah, there's, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I feel like this team's pretty close to being the other Western Finals team. If something weird happened with Denver, just because of how good Luca's been. And it seems like LeBron, who I'm not sure wanted to be there at the beginning of the year because he didn't want to be on somebody else's team, but now is starting to see, oh, actually, at this stage of my career, I'm probably the best possible, this is the best possible use of me.
1:32:10 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:32:11 Bill Simmons? Everybody wins. Like, maybe I can figure this out and use my, my chess master brain. So there's something here, but I still feel like they're a guy short. I don't know what the trade is. They have some expirings. They have some picks, so we'll see. Minnesota number six, 15 and nine.
1:32:27 Bill Simmons? It's just not a team, it's a team that with the point guards they have and the amount of responsibility they have on Edwards' shoulders, I don't think is sustainable for three playoff rounds, much less four.
1:32:38 Speaker 01 I agree with you. I mean, they're also just-
1:32:39 Bill Simmons? You need a point guard.
1:32:40 Speaker 01 Yeah, they need a point guard. They need that stability just a little more. It's not that Ant hasn't done well enough or like frankly Dante DiVincenzo has been good. He's just not their point guard. And so-
1:32:50 Bill Simmons? If you lose multiple eight points in the last minute leads.
1:32:54 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:32:54 Bill Simmons? Odds are you need a ball handling thing and you know, we can see this coming.
1:32:57 Speaker 01 They are the best team in the league that like regularly just loses their entire mind. And so like what you want to do with that is up to you, but they can, they can fight with the best of them and they can lose games that they have no business losing.
1:33:08 Bill Simmons? And the league is way better at pressing now, too. So you can really like get the ball back against them if you want to.
1:33:15 Speaker 01 It's a great call.
1:33:16 Bill Simmons? Let's go get the ball.
1:33:16 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:33:17 Bill Simmons? Detroit at number five, we talked about them, 19 and five. The only thing I wrote down here was Ivy, question mark.
1:33:24 Speaker 01 Yeah. Well, I mean, still writing out that minutes limit right now, it seems like.
1:33:27 Bill Simmons? Yeah. So, but long-term, I think this is their ceiling, whether it's seven fours, 10 fours, 14 fours. Can he be awesome for them? Can he be a trade piece to turn into something bigger? Whatever. He's the swing, something for them because I like their roster, but I want to see what happens with him. New York number four, 16 and seven, plus 8.2 net rating.
1:33:51 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:33:52 Bill Simmons? Here's my question. Is there any scenario?
1:33:57 Bill Simmons? Where if the Knicks were in the finals, they could beat one of the three teams in the West, Houston, Denver, OKC.
1:34:03 Speaker 01 I
1:34:03 Bill Simmons? Are they just at a class below those teams?
1:34:07 Speaker 01 I don't see it. I really don't. I mean, Oklahoma City is frankly, just way too good for anyone in the East. And I think the particular problems that Denver's size presents and Houston's size presents, you're just like begging for a Karl Anthony Towns, three fouls in eight minutes kind of game. You know, it's like, it's just putting a lot on him to have to handle. And then it's like, okay, now Mitchell Robinson, like you're, you're put to the front line. OG Anunoby, you're having to guard Nikola Jokic all of a sudden. Like, it's just a lot to put on those guys in a way that I know their defense has been better lately. It's also been better because they've had a little bit of a cupcake schedule and that's great in terms of getting everything right. But then you have to go do it against some of the best teams in the Western Conference. And I don't, I don't see that in them just yet.
1:34:51 Bill Simmons? We agree. Now, if I switch towns for AD. And AD is healthy?
1:34:57 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:34:58 Bill Simmons? Do you feel differently?
1:34:59 Speaker 01 Does Anthony Davis, and I say this with the greatest respect, Anthony Davis is an amazing player, do literally anything against Nikola Jokic? Like, that is a matchup he can't win. And so I think it helps against Houston for sure. Maybe it even helps somewhat against OKC. I, I think Denver, weirdly, that doesn't really change anything at all for them.
1:35:18 Bill Simmons? I think I agree.
1:35:21 Bill Simmons? So sadly, the Knicks making the finals will be the win this year. And then they need some sort of, some sort of luck. The contenders, number three, Houston, 15 and six, plus 10.8. Second in the league. Number two, Denver, 17 and six, plus 8.6. Doing it without really important guys for the last couple of weeks, like, it's actually kind of crazy. They have not had Gordon, they have lost Christian Brown pretty early.
1:35:46 Speaker 01 Yep. And during that time, they've been, I think, the second best offense in the entire league with both of those guys out. Like, the depth is just totally different this year.
1:35:55 Bill Simmons? So I think Denver is the only team that should chase OKC. Like, if they had a chance to turn Cam Johnson and multiple picks into Trey Murphy, I would.
1:36:04 Speaker 01 So you don't think Houston's in that group?
1:36:06 Bill Simmons? That was my question.
1:36:07 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:36:07 Bill Simmons? If you're Houston, do you chase OKC? And by the way, I have as the prohibitive favorite. Normally I have the favorite as number one. I have the prohibitive favorite as number one. OKC 23 and 1 with a net rating of almost 16.
1:36:19 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:36:21 Bill Simmons? Should anyone other than Denver chase OKC this year? Do you just, is it a 2017 Warriors situation where you're like, you know what? We'll see you guys next year. Good luck. Good luck winning the title. Is it even worth it?
1:36:34 Speaker 01 I think Houston's already chasing. Like, I mean, trading for Kevin Durant means you are chasing this right now. And the timer is going off.
1:36:41 Bill Simmons? There's other, there's an extra move there. I mean, they could go all in on the honest move. They could go, there's other things they could do and they could trade assets to try to improve this team. I'm just not sure if that changes their destiny.
1:36:55 Speaker 01 I also think as constructed, like I could, I could see them beating Denver. I don't think that's outside the realm of possibility. And then.
1:37:02 Bill Simmons? I agree with you.
1:37:02 Speaker 01 Yes, the Thunder are going to be a tough matchup for anybody, but like, I don't like, at least play it out. Be as physical as they are. Like they're just such an imposing team that maybe they really could take. If you, if you're meeting the Thunder late in the playoffs and they've already been worn down by having to play high level of physical competition, and then you have to meet the Rockets in the conference finals. Maybe that's enough. Like, maybe that's enough to kind of take the wind out of their sails a little bit.
1:37:26 Bill Simmons? Yeah, you beat, you're not going to beat OKC, but if you beat OKC, you're getting weird. You're there, you're getting weird because you have Jokic, who's the weirdest start to go against in a playoff series of this, probably this century. Or you're Houston and you're just like, we just have incredible amounts of size.
1:37:44 Speaker 01 It's so fun.
1:37:45 Bill Simmons? We're just going to try to overpower you and you can have all your shade points you want and press us and we'll turn the ball over 20 times. But we're going to have 30 offensive rebounds today.
1:37:55 Speaker 01 My favorite bit of Rockets weird is like, yes, they are a giant bruising team. And then they have Reid Shepard and Aaron Holiday running around and I don't think I've seen them miss a three in a month. It's like, it's.
1:38:04 Bill Simmons? Right.
1:38:04 Speaker 01 It's very like the gym bro with the little Pomeranian running around kind of vibe in Houston. And I, I really enjoyed the physical comedy, I gotta say.
1:38:12 Bill Simmons? I'm so happy Reid Shepard's good. We just need more weird, weird old school point guards like that. Who could, who feel like they came out of, what was that show Willow Bay and Ahmad hosted Inside Stuff? He seems like he's come out of an Inside Stuff reel from 1992. It's like, now watch Reid Shepard against the Charlotte Hornets.
1:38:33 Bill Simmons? OKC, I asked this to Sal on Sunday because it's still like around five to one. I just think OKC is breaking the 73 win record and I think they're actually going to care about it.
1:38:43 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:38:43 Bill Simmons? Do you see a scenario where they don't? Because it's still like plus 500 and that, which means like it's a pretty big long shot by gambling odds, but I don't see how they lose nine times, do you?
1:38:56 Speaker 01 They would have to.
1:38:56 Bill Simmons? Or I guess they would have to lose 10 times.
1:38:58 Speaker 01 Yeah, it would have to be kind of an inexplicable lull, like where something is just like a little off in late January and all of a sudden they drop three of five games to teams that they wouldn't ordinarily do. But I'm with you, it's hard to imagine this team doing that. We've seen them do it shorthanded. We've seen them do it on off shooting nights. We've seen them do it basically with every combination of variables against every level of competition already and they just beat everybody. The, in order to get to that point, like they would have to have one of those unusual stretches. The parlor game that we've been playing on group chat is when will the Thunder lose their first game to an Eastern Conference team? And will that, like, could they go the entire season blowing out every Eastern Conference opponent? And I, I think it's pretty possible they don't lose to
1:39:43 Speaker 01 any East team until February at this point. I, I mean, if that, like, it's craziness.
1:39:48 Bill Simmons? They remind me of when, when my daughter was playing club soccer and we'd have these tournaments. You know, you go away for the weekend and you'd look at the brackets and there was one team that was just winning like nine, nothing, eight, nothing, 11 to one. And you were like, probably not beating that team. This is what they're, they're like the freaking club soccer juggernaut just destroying everybody. And even when it feels like the game's late, you know, close and gettable late, then Shay just makes four shots in a row and OKC wins.
1:40:18 Speaker 01 That's crunch time player in the league right now.
1:40:20 Bill Simmons? I don't really know what you do. They have answers for everybody. I do think Denver should chase them though. And they probably have 15 games here with Cam Johnson.
1:40:30 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:40:30 Bill Simmons? To figure out if they can trust him in a playoff series or not.
1:40:33 Speaker 01 I mean, he, he looks on course at this point. I think, I think he's, he's really straightened himself out.
1:40:39 Bill Simmons? Sure. I'd like to see another, how many, how many games is 15 months a month?
1:40:46 Speaker 01 Oh, how many games in a month? Yeah.
1:40:48 Bill Simmons? Probably reassessing around January 15th. Like, if this guy's in the corner in a game seven in OKC with a minute left, is he making it? I'm in that mode because the Bruce Brown thing's been great. It's, it's just clear. This is the team. This is for whatever reason, his soulmate team. I like the Hardaway randomness. Jonas, we all knew that was going to work, but you know, they're just deeper and better. And when they get everybody back, they're going to be a real problem.
1:41:16 Speaker 01 Definitely.
1:41:18 Bill Simmons? The Cam Johnson piece is the one because that's the, that's the shot that's going to be open for them. And it's been open the whole season.
1:41:23 Speaker 01 Yes.
1:41:24 Bill Simmons? Teams are like, and I, by the way, I love the way Murray's playing.
1:41:27 Speaker 01 Oh, he's, it's been incredible.
1:41:29 Bill Simmons? Murray's like a borderline in the combo for 13 NBA range. If you're making teams like he's, he's on the fringe. What's your favorite show of the year?
1:41:40 Speaker 01 The Pit?
1:41:42 Bill Simmons? Okay. That's your gold medalist? Who's your silver medalist?
1:41:45 Speaker 01 I think probably Severance silver medalist. I'd have to think about it, but there's something about the like simplicity of the model of the pit where like, I know exactly what I'm walking into and yet I'm still a mess watching two people say goodbye to their elderly father. It's like, I, I know what's being done to me here and yet I am powerless to resist it.
1:42:05 Bill Simmons? Taft?
1:42:09 Speaker 01 Wait, Taft?
1:42:10 Bill Simmons? What was that show called that? Task. We just potted for an hour and a half straight.
1:42:14 Speaker 01 The classic Taft biopic that whizzed through Netflix mid-season. You know, we, we, we whiffed on that one. It's all right.
1:42:21 Bill Simmons? Task.
1:42:22 Speaker 01 Task has got to be top five. Is it, is that your number one?
1:42:29 Bill Simmons? I really like Beast in Me.
1:42:30 Speaker 01 Beast in Me was really good. I really enjoyed it a lot.
1:42:33 Bill Simmons? Enjoyed Task. I did not watch The Pit. I've been saving it. I do not like Severance. I'm sorry.
1:42:38 Speaker 01 It's okay.
1:42:39 Bill Simmons? I think some people have zagged on it. I'm one of them.
1:42:44 Bill Simmons? Anything else that was out there? Those are the big ones, right?
1:42:47 Speaker 01 And or-
1:42:47 Bill Simmons? Studio, Studio was fine. Your Friends and Neighbors was super fun from an Apple standpoint.
1:42:52 Speaker 01 That was a show that existed, that's for sure.
1:42:54 Bill Simmons? It was a show that existed that we got some mileage out of.
1:42:57 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:42:57 Bill Simmons? But I think it's been an okay TV year.
1:42:59 Speaker 01 It's been fun.
1:43:00 Bill Simmons? I mean, Stranger Things was, was awesome for a lot of people. I don't watch that show, but-
1:43:04 Speaker 01 Not for me.
1:43:05 Bill Simmons? My kids, my kids were out of their minds about it. Can't wait for the last four, but yeah, it's been solid.
1:43:10 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:43:11 Bill Simmons? All right. Rob Mahoney, gonna be on the rewatchables finally.
1:43:14 Speaker 01 I know.
1:43:15 Bill Simmons? Lot of rumors about this.
1:43:17 Speaker 01 Extremely excited about that.
1:43:18 Bill Simmons? Rewatchables, I won't say the movie, but yeah, doing a four personer. You want to say the movie?
1:43:24 Speaker 01 I mean, I think we really should have had a top five cast for, you know, just, just for the sake of, of the symbolism.
1:43:30 Bill Simmons? We're doing high fidelity. We're recording it this week and it's going to be Monday's rewatchable. So looking forward to that. I'll see you tomorrow. Thanks for popping on, Rob.
1:43:38 Speaker 01 Of course. Thanks, Bill.
1:43:39 Bill Simmons? All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Rob and Gahal and Eduardo. Don't forget about the rewatchables that went up yesterday. We did Shampoo. Don't forget about the new Game Over Podcast with Max and Rich. Don't forget about the new Whiz Kid documentary that is coming on Thursday on HBO and HBO Max. And I will be back on this feed with a nice big juicy pot for you on Thursday. See you then.
1:44:17 Bill Simmons? Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino, or 18 plus and present in DC, Kentucky, or Wyoming. Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. Call 888-797777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut, or mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here, visit gamblinghelplineMA.org, or call 800-327-5050 for 24/7 support in Massachusetts, or call 877-8HOPENY or text HOPENY in New York. This episode is brought to you by Searchlight Pictures, WildHorse9. John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell, I like those guys, star in the sharp-witted comedy thriller from Academy Award winner Martin McDonagh.
1:45:02 Bill Simmons? Writer-director of The Banshees of Minnehoshan and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, set in the 1970s, filmed on location on Easter Island, Malkovich and Rockwell play CIA agents Chris and Lee, who are caught in a dangerous game of secrets and survival. 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 6th. Get tickets now. This episode is brought to you by Whole Foods Market. Fall is here and Whole Foods Market has everything you need for cozy meals, seasonal treats, and easy entertaining. Elevate your hearty dishes with tasty bone-in beef short ribs or New York strip steaks
1:45:47 Bill Simmons? with no added growth hormones or antibiotics. And as the fall evenings draw in, why not get ahead of cold season with immunity shots, herbal teas, lasages, and supplements? Make sure you look for sales throughout the month. Shop fall flavors with higher standards at Whole Foods Market.
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