The Hot 76ers and an NBA Chemistry Breakdown With Doc Rivers, Plus the Mailbag and NFL Picks With Joe House

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Doc Rivers to give his thoughts on the start of the new NBA season, and much more. Then, Joe House hops on to answer some mailbag questions before making their Ringer 107 picks for the week. (0:00) Intro (2:10) New NBA season with Doc Rivers (11:36) 76ers and LeBron (20:05) Luka Doncic and MJ (25:55) The new draft class (33:48) GSW, Curry, and Yaxel (38:06) Dybantsa and the Pelicans (44:26) Dame and Giannis (52:53) Cavs (01:00:42) NBA injuries (01:09:16) Either/Or Game (01:16:42) O. J. Simpson story and Larry David (01:21:31) OKC, Wemby dominance, and Jokic (01:28:46) Mailbag questions with Joe House (01:58:43) Ringer 107 Picks, Week 9 Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Doc Rivers and Joe House Producers: Chia Hao Tat and Eduardo Ocampo This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Create a Personalized Price Plan® today. https://www.statefarm.com/lp/football/ The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Bill Simmons?

  This episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by State Farm. Every football player brings something different to the field. Maybe they have a cannon arm, speed, power. Maybe they have their own podcast. That being said, no two players are exactly alike. And the same is true off the field. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you. So they can help personalize coverage for your life and budget. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

• 0:33Bill Simmons?

  The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. Where we put up a new rewatchables on Monday. We did All the Right Moves. And on this Monday, we're doing Air Force One. It's on Netflix, so you have time to watch it. Super fun podcast, me, Chris and Sean for that one. Coming up on this podcast, Doc Rivers, my old friend. He's not coaching anymore. He's going to be on this podcast a lot more. He came over and we talked a lot of basketball stuff. And I made him tell an OJ Simpson story. And it's all really good. You'll have a good time. After that, Joe House came on, did a couple of mailbag questions. And tried to finger, figure out, I think it's week nine, Ringer 107 picks.

• 1:15Bill Simmons?

  And how I can snap out of this kid of either going two and three or three and two. I'm just in two and three and three and two hell. I've officially become, I don't know, who's the team that is 500 just year after year? I'm that team. Who is that team? The Carolina Panthers? No, they're, they're not good enough to be, maybe I'm the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I don't know, whoever I am, I want to step out of it. House now will be doing picks, talking football. So that is all next. We take a break, my friends from Pearl Jam, and then Doc Rivers. This episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by State Farm. Every football player brings something different to the field. Maybe they have a cannon arm, speed, power. Maybe they have their own podcast. That being said, no two players are exactly alike.

• 1:59Bill Simmons?

  And the same is true off the field. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you. So they can help personalize coverage for your life and budget. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

• 2:37Bill Simmons?

  All right, Thursday afternoon, Doc Rivers is here. He's not coaching this season.

• 2:42Speaker 01

  Fresh from Max and Helens.

• 2:44Bill Simmons?

  Fresh from Max and Helens. And you got the waffle.

• 2:46Speaker 01

  I got the waffle.

• 2:46Bill Simmons?

  Super happy.

• 2:47Speaker 01

  It's amazing.

• 2:48Bill Simmons?

  I'm surprised you're not just like in like a diabetic coma right now from the waffle.

• 2:52Speaker 01

  I have a lot of energy.

• 2:54Bill Simmons?

  The waffle is like a top five thing to eat.

• 2:56Speaker 01

  It's a dessert.

• 2:56Bill Simmons?

  I'm glad you had it.

• 2:57Speaker 01

  But it's amazing.

• 2:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:59Speaker 01

  It really is.

• 3:00Bill Simmons?

  Basketball has been going on now for two weeks and two days.

• 3:03Speaker 01

  Interesting.

• 3:03Bill Simmons?

  I have a lot to discuss with you. But we should, we gotta start here, though. So you're not coaching again, you don't think?

• 3:09Speaker 01

  Oh, no, no.

• 3:12Bill Simmons?

  Cause you told me, well, you told me this three years ago.

• 3:15Speaker 01

  Well, I didn't, I didn't really mean that then, but now for sure. No, really, I love where I'm at in life, like.

• 3:22Bill Simmons?

  I like where you're at in life.

• 3:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm going to Maui next week. I just came back from Portugal. I'm going to New Zealand in four weeks.

• 3:31Bill Simmons?

  You're popping on here a bunch of times. You got NBC, you can do some games.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  I have NBC, I get to do games with Austin, get to do games with Scow, with, with Grant Hill, with Tracy. I mean, all the guys I've coached.

• 3:42Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 3:43Speaker 01

  I'm basically doing games with.

• 3:44Bill Simmons?

  Not Ben Simmons. Ben Simmons isn't going to be involved.

• 3:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, we won't be doing a Ben Simmons game.

• 3:52Bill Simmons?

  But so you like it? You're glad to have the mic in front of you again?

• 3:55Speaker 01

  I like the mic. I like that I spaced out enough that I can enjoy life too. So I get all of everything I want.

• 4:02Bill Simmons?

  And you're in the sweet spot right now because you just coached against all of these guys.

• 4:06Speaker 01

  It's, it's.

• 4:07Bill Simmons?

  You have a wealth of information.

• 4:08Speaker 01

  I have great information and you know, I have great field. I've been around it long enough, but knowing all the coaches too. I'm getting so many calls from coaches.

• 4:17Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 4:18Speaker 01

  I'm not going to give the name, but I was talking to a coach last night. He literally has never called me in his life. And we're talking.

• 4:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 4:24Speaker 01

  And I was like, yeah, yeah, now we're talking. He's like, well, you were the opponent.

• 4:29Bill Simmons?

  Right. So now you're like, now you're like the guru Yoda guy.

• 4:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't know that, but, but it's, it's interesting how many, you would think, you know, some questions are about ATOs and what I was looking for. But you know what? Most of the questions are, it's about chemistry and you know, about, do you like this fit? It's really interesting. I should write a book on that, you know, cause it's interesting.

• 4:55Bill Simmons?

  We've talked about that a bunch. And you were saying about that, the two-way contracts have screwed this up a little bit. You know, the Celtics have Conley at the end of the bench, right? And then Paul George, who's 36, who's super happy at his point in life. And those are the vets you can tell.

• 5:10Speaker 01

  Bill, it's like the secret sauce right now. You look at last year in the finals, the Knicks chose to have veterans at the end of the bench.

• 5:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 5:17Speaker 01

  The Spurs, I can't think of the, the big center.

• 5:20Bill Simmons?

  Well, that Kelly Olynyk, they had, uh, who's the other one?

• 5:23Speaker 01

  The, the African center, I can't think.

• 5:24Bill Simmons?

  Oh, Bianbo.

• 5:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was great. Like he was the guy that would always talk to, when Bianbo, uh, and I get the young movement too. But when you're trying to win, you know, I always felt like you need a box in. Like you need the front stars, the young guys and the guys who are eager to play for more than just winning. If you know what I'm saying.

• 5:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 5:47Speaker 01

  Then you need the back stars, the back older guys. So there's no way you box them in. Uh, you box them in about winning. I've always felt that that was very powerful. But what a lot of teams are doing, the backend are young guys who have been not playing. They don't care. They want to work on their own games. They're frustrated.

• 6:04Bill Simmons?

  They're going back and forth to G League.

• 6:05Speaker 01

  G League and back. And they're frustrated because these guys, people don't understand, these guys have all been stars somewhere.

• 6:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 6:12Speaker 01

  You don't get to the NBA without have been a star somewhere and not playing or playing in the G League. And they're looking at the guys right in front of them. I should be playing in front of him. Cause everything's a competition.

• 6:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 6:24Speaker 01

  Uh, that's not healthy when you're trying to win something.

• 6:27Bill Simmons?

  Well, so let's do some chemistry stuff first.

• 6:29Speaker 01

  Let's go.

• 6:30Bill Simmons?

  Cause I went to Miami and, and the Clippers last night.

• 6:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:33Bill Simmons?

  Miami's playing tonight.

• 6:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:34Bill Simmons?

  And you know, I, and I should force myself to go to more games, but I get lazy as I get out. They're all on the TVs and.

• 6:42Speaker 01

  It's so nice.

• 6:42Bill Simmons?

  It's just so much easier to watch seven games at once. But you just pick up so much. So one of the things I always look for, and I know you love this too. What's going on on dead balls?

• 6:51Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 6:52Bill Simmons?

  Are guys interacting? Are guys looking at each other? Are, are guys touching? Are they high fiving? It sounds like weird, right? But Duncan would always come over.

• 7:00Speaker 01

  No, the touching thing.

• 7:01Bill Simmons?

  Put his arm around everybody. Garnett would do the same.

• 7:03Speaker 01

  Bill, the year we won it, I think I've told you this before, Harvard did that study with touching.

• 7:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 7:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, and we had the most touches in the league, meaning just people grabbing, holding. The Lakers were three that year.

• 7:15Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 7:16Speaker 01

  And the bottom five were the bottom five teams in NBA. Like chemistry matters and touching matters, being connected matters. And I, the eye contact, you know, always, I could tell like if guys are talking, especially the number one and two players. If they never acknowledge each other, if they talk, but not really, uh, they talk away like they, he's there. He's talking this way. They're not connected. And it takes time sometime to get there. Early on, it may not be ready yet, but it, I've seen teams, you could make the case of the Knicks last year.

• 7:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 7:50Speaker 01

  Brunson and, and Karl Anthony and the rest, they were not connected for most of the year.

• 7:56Bill Simmons?

  And then it came together.

• 7:57Speaker 01

  It came together. And once it was connected, you can never unconnect it.

• 8:01Bill Simmons?

  Well, that's why, so Miami's early, Giannis just got there. It was just five ships passing in the night for two plus hours. And they're not talking during dead balls. They're just going in different spots. Spoelstra is kind of the one talking. Bobby Portis is trying to get people going.

• 8:17Speaker 01

  Bobby is being Bobby.

• 8:18Bill Simmons?

  Coming in and out, right? But for the most part, just seemed like a disconnected team. Fourth quarter, they give it to Giannis. They just have them start going downhill, trying to get the basket, they get back in the game. Klay hits the big three, they all go nuts.

• 8:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:30Bill Simmons?

  I left the game, I went with my friend Mike Toland, who I think you know.

• 8:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:35Bill Simmons?

  And we were just kinda like, man, weird vibe with this team. But it's early.

• 8:39Speaker 01

  It's early, but it's early, but you know, um, Giannis is, you have to learn how to play with Giannis. Uh, it, it's unusual that you have a player that's not like a great shooter, but still a great scorer. Uh, there's certain type of things that have to happen. The spacing has to always be right. And you feel like you're in a way as a player with Giannis, if you're in the wrong space.

• 9:03Bill Simmons?

  Right. You can feel that last night.

• 9:05Speaker 01

  He feels like you're in a way.

• 9:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 9:07Speaker 01

  If you don't have the right spacing. And so you can see they're still working on that a lot. Um, you know, I don't know if the right prescription, and I felt this in Milwaukee. Giannis with the ball in his hands too much is not as good as Giannis.

• 9:22Bill Simmons?

  You know what they did last night? They didn't do that for the first three quarters.

• 9:25Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 9:26Bill Simmons?

  And they fall way behind.

• 9:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:28Bill Simmons?

  Last quarter, they flip it and now they play like that. But then the other thing they did was they, they had him in the corner sometimes.

• 9:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:36Bill Simmons?

  And Bam at the top, but then they would flip them. But then sometimes they would try to get them involved from the corner. It would be like this late post up.

• 9:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:42Bill Simmons?

  You know? Oh, you have space, we'll push you up over there.

• 9:46Speaker 01

  I think Giannis, when he doesn't have the ball, is always hard. You have to figure out where to put it. Well, that's why I love him as a roller.

• 9:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 9:55Speaker 01

  You know, he doesn't love rolling, but when he does, you think what, when they want it. Uh, and he had that last, the last game, he was amazing. So, but if you toss that, yeah, you toss that game out. The games they won is when, uh, Drew had the ball or Chris Middleton had the ball.

• 10:10Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 10:11Speaker 01

  Giannis was the picker and the roller. You look at the first two games in that series, he had the ball all the time. So it's a fine line that you have to walk, uh, with them. Now, open court, you can throw it to him and let him go, but you gotta have your spacing right. He will, I think what they've already, he's, he's an extraordinary passer. That surprised me.

• 10:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I noticed that last night.

• 10:31Speaker 01

  When I took the job in Milwaukee, it's wow. He's got a great vision in that way. All right, but with the ball at times, he didn't have great feel. You know, he's, he's a, he's an interesting guy to coach and to play with. But if you get it right, he can, he can change your team and it's hard to get it right.

• 10:48Bill Simmons?

  Doesn't seem like the athleticism is where it was at his peak either. That was the other thing.

• 10:52Speaker 01

  No, it's not.

• 10:53Bill Simmons?

  So I remember like the, the year after they won, they played the Celtics and Middleton was hurt. And it was basically like Giannis against this really good young Celtics team. And he was so fucking scary.

• 11:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:03Bill Simmons?

  That whole series, he was overpowering them. I don't feel like he overpowers them quite the same way anymore.

• 11:07Speaker 01

  As much, he can sometimes going downhill. Uh, he's not the defender that he used to be.

• 11:13Bill Simmons?

  Noticeable last night.

• 11:15Speaker 01

  I felt like towards the end, people were attacking him off, they were trying to get him to switch on him. Cause weak side off the ball, he's fantastic.

• 11:22Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 11:23Speaker 01

  And he's, he's, you can attack him on the ball. And I think that's what teams are doing now to him.

• 11:29Bill Simmons?

  That happened to LeBron too, over the years.

• 11:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:31Bill Simmons?

  Still great off the, on the side, but teams that actually go at him a little more.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  You know, my last couple of years coaching, if LeBron was in an action, I was, I wanted to go at LeBron. Opposed to letting him, he has such, LeBron's IQ is, is genius level, right? So.

• 11:46Bill Simmons?

  Well, he's the old guy in the pickup game, figuring out where his spots are.

• 11:49Speaker 01

  I always tell people, my last couple of years, I couldn't even move. I, I play well on my brain.

• 11:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 11:55Speaker 01

  I just, well, he's gonna do this, you know? You kinda could figure it out and that's where LeBron's at now.

• 11:59Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 12:00Speaker 01

  With still being a hell of an athlete.

• 12:02Bill Simmons?

  Well, I wonder.

• 12:03Speaker 01

  I like LeBron's role right now. Love it.

• 12:05Bill Simmons?

  Well, so that's a good chemistry team.

• 12:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:07Bill Simmons?

  So my, but you know, obviously there's a lot of personalities and egos. You're throwing a team together like that, Jalen's in there. And from what I've seen so far, there seems like a lot of joy. It seems like they've all accepted it's Maxey's team. And LeBron, you know, it's, we're watching these guys, you don't know what's really going on, but LeBron seems super happy.

• 12:28Speaker 01

  It's the happiest I've seen him in a long time.

• 12:31Bill Simmons?

  In a long time, right?

• 12:31Speaker 01

  I don't think he was ever that happy in LA.

• 12:34Bill Simmons?

  No.

• 12:34Speaker 01

  Uh, like this happiness. I'm not saying he wasn't happy in LA, but this is true happiness. Um, I think he's kind of, you know, I, I, I don't know if it was Bill Russell or one of them guys was talking about young players playing with old players. It's like the young players kinda, uh, the old players kinda pull the young players along the right way. But the young players push the older players to, to, to play better and harder, you know? And, and you feel a little bit of that. And I gotta say, and I've told you this before, Tyrese Maxey is, if, if you describe personalities, and I like doing this as weather patterns.

• 13:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 13:12Speaker 01

  Man, I, I do it all the time. I've done it this week twice with other coaches. They call me about a guy and I'll say, he's very sunny. You know, like when he walks in a room, do you bring sunshine? I bet everyone listening right now knows, there's a person, every time they see them, they get happier.

• 13:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 13:30Speaker 01

  They also have a person, every time he walks in the room, there's a cloud behind him. And Maxey's one of these guys that he can fit on any team. Uh, I was telling Grant Hill, if he's not on the Olympic team, you're, you're crazy.

• 13:43Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 13:44Speaker 01

  Uh, because he's just gonna do good. Uh, even if he's not playing, he's just, he smiles, he's happy, he's competitive. You, and he's a phenomenal basketball player. Um, but you look at their team, okay, at the five, top three center in the NBA.

• 14:01Bill Simmons?

  Top four. Yeah, top five when he's healthy.

• 14:04Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 14:04Bill Simmons?

  I don't trust him being healthy.

• 14:05Speaker 01

  If you look at Maxey at point, top five.

• 14:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 14:08Speaker 01

  Point guard.

• 14:09Bill Simmons?

  Top four or five.

• 14:09Speaker 01

  You look at Brown at the three.

• 14:11Bill Simmons?

  One of the better forwards in the league.

• 14:13Speaker 01

  Top, top three. So we're talking about, and we haven't mentioned LeBron.

• 14:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 14:18Speaker 01

  In that, and LeBron or whatever he is, top five, you know, a four right now. And then, uh.

• 14:24Bill Simmons?

  And then BJ, one of the best young athletes.

• 14:26Speaker 01

  You know, top five defender at the two spot right now. So when you look at that makeup, but I still think, and I've said this before, anybody can go out and get the stars. Uh, it's the other guys, and I think that's where they hit the home run. I mean, obviously getting LeBron.

• 14:42Bill Simmons?

  The Simons thing enraged me.

• 14:43Speaker 01

  Simons.

• 14:44Bill Simmons?

  But for nothing, he was 13 million for two years.

• 14:47Speaker 01

  Carwell Pope.

• 14:48Bill Simmons?

  And Dean Wade.

• 14:49Speaker 01

  Dean Wade, Carwell Pope.

• 14:50Bill Simmons?

  Pope was terrible last year.

• 14:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, but he's perfect for this team.

• 14:52Bill Simmons?

  They brought him back, yeah.

• 14:54Speaker 01

  And because he's winning, he's playing a role to win. Guys like Carwell Pope late in their career, they can play on a bad team.

• 15:00Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 15:01Speaker 01

  Uh, it just doesn't fit. They're trying to play right for other guys. Now he's in the perfect role.

• 15:07Bill Simmons?

  I love Sim, Simons was great on the Celtics. And what's cool about him is he's not consistent, but he can win you a half. Like every four games or every five games, he could just let, he'll like 17.

• 15:19Speaker 01

  Too, like he looks like this year, he's accepted his role even more.

• 15:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 15:24Speaker 01

  Like, so they got, I mean, right now, they're the best team in the NBA. Uh, they're gonna be hard to beat.

• 15:32Bill Simmons?

  Interesting.

• 15:32Speaker 01

  You know?

• 15:33Bill Simmons?

  Well, they've certainly, they end the games, last five, six minutes, they're getting stops.

• 15:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:38Bill Simmons?

  And Maxey can get by and get shots wherever he wants.

• 15:41Speaker 01

  Joel can get fouled.

• 15:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, Joel still has that 15 footer, he can make whatever.

• 15:46Speaker 01

  Ball, he isos you, you can't switch a small on him.

• 15:49Bill Simmons?

  And then LeBron just gets his stuff.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  You know what LeBron is?

• 15:53Bill Simmons?

  He's just gonna get 20 to 23 points.

• 15:54Speaker 01

  LeBron is why we'd love him to have been like early in his career, even though he, he had the score.

• 16:02Bill Simmons?

  He was too good, yeah.

• 16:03Speaker 01

  But I've always looked at like, he's the second, he's the closest to Magic Johnson.

• 16:08Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 16:09Speaker 01

  To ever have played, like as far as, uh, being big and able to facilitate. LeBron's vision is still underrated. Like he, he's not a great, good passer. He's a, he's a great passer and he sees it early.

• 16:22Bill Simmons?

  It's the Swiss Army knife thing that I think that reminds, like Magic could have gone just kinda anywhere and sent to LeBron.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  LeBron is doing now, you know, uh.

• 16:29Bill Simmons?

  And you know, he's playing with center.

• 16:31Speaker 01

  He can play anywhere. LeBron, you know?

• 16:33Bill Simmons?

  And he's kinda like, I like this, let me please add this to my resume that I played center on a 55 win team a little bit.

• 16:39Speaker 01

  You've seen LeBron on the street.

• 16:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 16:40Speaker 01

  And I, and I say that because people, uh, this summer, I'm at Riviera golfing and LeBron and Draymond Green and Rich Paul are there. Um, and you know, I went over to talk to him.

• 16:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 16:52Speaker 01

  And I walked away from LeBron, I've been, I've coached against him his whole career, you know? Every time you see him in golf gear or street clothes, you're like.

• 17:04Bill Simmons?

  That looks like a freak.

• 17:05Speaker 01

  This guy is the biggest human being on earth. And then when you look at his weight, he weighs more than Karl Malone. Karl Malone was the biggest thing in the NBA at the power forward. LeBron weighs more than him, he's faster than him. It's, it's just an incredible athlete. He really is.

• 17:20Bill Simmons?

  Cause you always think about like tight ends in football are huge guys, right? Like Gronkowski's huge guy.

• 17:25Speaker 01

  Small.

• 17:26Bill Simmons?

  And yeah, LeBron would be four inches taller and 30 pounds bigger than every tight end.

• 17:30Speaker 01

  Gronk came in the locker room when I was coaching the Clippers and he's standing next, he stood next to Blake.

• 17:35Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 17:36Speaker 01

  I mean, Blake made him look small.

• 17:39Bill Simmons?

  That's another one, we did, we did a pod two weeks ago, just a huge guy, he's 6'9". Even as a retired guy, like just like, you're kinda like, oh shit, I forgot you're 6'9".

• 17:48Speaker 01

  He's gotten a little smaller, but he's still humongous, yeah.

• 17:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, so the LeBron piece of this, I agree with what you said about the Lakers that I never, maybe the only time was the COVID season, which they ended up winning. When he was, he still had his fastball, Davis was there.

• 18:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:03Bill Simmons?

  I always felt there was a Kobe piece to, to him in LA where it was just clear, this is such a Kobe town. And he, they were just never gonna fall for him in the same way. And he goes to Philly, everyone in Philly is like, we love having you, this is unbelievable.

• 18:18Speaker 01

  This is our guy.

• 18:18Bill Simmons?

  Thank you.

• 18:19Speaker 01

  I think it'd have been different if it hadn't have been COVID. Like COVID actually hurt his love in, in LA.

• 18:24Bill Simmons?

  No question.

• 18:24Speaker 01

  They want a, they want a title and you can say what you want about the COVID title, it was different.

• 18:30Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 18:30Speaker 01

  There's no doubt about that. Uh, but they would have been one of the best teams if there had not been COVID and, uh.

• 18:37Bill Simmons?

  Well, the three teams were your team.

• 18:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:39Bill Simmons?

  The Bucks and the Lakers. And one of those three teams were gonna win.

• 18:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, in normal circumstances, yeah. And so when you, it, it hurt him because they wanted, it was almost like people denied the title. There was no parade, so he didn't really, it's unfair to him cause he didn't have his day in LA. And then he came out of COVID and they made the trade, then they got, turned into a bad team. So what people saw with LeBron is the year before COVID in LA, they were awful.

• 19:07Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 19:08Speaker 01

  The year of COVID, they were great, no one saw them. And then after COVID, they were bad again.

• 19:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 19:13Speaker 01

  So for the most part, the Lakers fans never saw a great basketball team.

• 19:18Bill Simmons?

  And then the look of thing became this disruptor of all of it.

• 19:22Speaker 01

  I'm still that, that, that deal still, it's, every time I think about it.

• 19:27Bill Simmons?

  You were coaching when that happened.

• 19:29Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 19:30Bill Simmons?

  So you got, you just got a text that that happened and you were like, wait, what was the trade?

• 19:34Speaker 01

  You know, I was in Milwaukee in my apartment and our PR guy texted, and I told you this, I literally said, that would be crazy if that happened for real. That's what I text back. I text that back, cause I didn't seen it.

• 19:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 19:48Speaker 01

  And he said, Doc, no, this is real.

• 19:50Bill Simmons?

  This was the trade.

• 19:51Speaker 01

  This is the trade. And I was like, no way. Like it was a no way.

• 19:59Speaker 01

  I think there's gonna be a book in 10 years.

• 20:03Bill Simmons?

  About that explains something.

• 20:05Speaker 01

  It has to be more than what any of us know.

• 20:08Bill Simmons?

  Well, now it's it worked out great for everybody because.

• 20:10Speaker 01

  No, it worked out great for the Lakers.

• 20:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, but it also the Dallas ends up with flag.

• 20:15Speaker 01

  They get flag, who I love.

• 20:17Bill Simmons?

  Now, you could argue, maybe you didn't need all the pain to go from Luca to flag.

• 20:22Speaker 01

  That's the point I'm making.

• 20:23Bill Simmons?

  At least they got.

• 20:23Speaker 01

  And flag is one of my favorite young players. Cause he's about the right stuff. He's a lot like Maxi to me, like just about the right stuff. But my gosh, Luca is the best scorer in the NBA in the last whatever amount of years.

• 20:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Where would you put him against James? Cause it's a little similar with the heliocentric.

• 20:44Speaker 01

  He's different. Uh, they are different, even though they both hold the ball forever.

• 20:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 20:48Speaker 01

  You know, and you know, even in Lucas heyday in Dallas, people never talked about it. But you know, they killed James Harden for having the ball, but Luca actually had the ball more in his hands. And no one ever said that. It was really interesting, but it is different. They're they're similar in the way they hold the ball.

• 21:06Speaker 01

  I it feels like Luca does this action quicker than James. They both are extraordinary passers. The only difference is, and I've, I've always said this and James actually disagreed with me. And I still believe it. When James wants to just be a point guard.

• 21:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 21:26Speaker 01

  I, I think even though it takes away from some of his scoring, I think overall he's a better player. And it makes him even more dangerous.

• 21:35Bill Simmons?

  He was like one of those actors that he was like an actor that couldn't decide whether he should do comedies or dramas.

• 21:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's about right.

• 21:41Bill Simmons?

  Kind of bouncing back and forth.

• 21:43Speaker 01

  And he was so good at it. Like, and it, and it's hard for a guy to hear that knowing that, wait a minute, I led the league in scoring.

• 21:49Bill Simmons?

  Right. I scored 36 a game on the point guard.

• 21:52Speaker 01

  To be a point guard. And in our team, I thought, yeah, you're still gonna score 25.

• 21:57Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  Cause he just scores anyway, you know?

• 21:59Bill Simmons?

  With Luca.

• 22:03Bill Simmons?

  I agree with you. I think he's a better scorer than James.

• 22:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:06Bill Simmons?

  He has the ball a lot, but it's also like, it makes sense, especially if you have the team they have. And his stats are basically, he's like 38 a game right now, 38, eight and eight.

• 22:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:16Bill Simmons?

  But the way their offense is rolling, that actually seems like it's conceivable. That's where he's gonna end up.

• 22:22Speaker 01

  Oh, I don't think it'll be far off. I mean, he, he has the ball. He shoots the ball a lot right now. Uh, he's efficient.

• 22:30Bill Simmons?

  40 conceivable to you? I mean, that's a, that's, cause they've been playing a shitty schedule so far. They played the Clippers, the thing twice, the Kings.

• 22:37Speaker 01

  The, the, the weight of the league, uh, eventually someone will do something this year. It throws them off for five or six games where he has to figure it out. He will.

• 22:46Bill Simmons?

  I don't know if 38 is conceivable to me either. Cause you figure like, it's, it's like one where you're hurt, you get 13 points because your knee hurts.

• 22:53Speaker 01

  It to me for him is 36, 35, but if he stays at 38, it's, it's just absolutely amazing.

• 22:59Bill Simmons?

  MJ did 37.

• 23:00Speaker 01

  And right now, but MJ did it at 52%.

• 23:03Bill Simmons?

  Kobe, 35 was his peak.

• 23:06Speaker 01

  What separates MJ from everyone else is when you throw the field goal percentage in.

• 23:10Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  It's.

• 23:12Bill Simmons?

  Also, we were both there and you were there actually playing against them.

• 23:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:16Bill Simmons?

  There's been nothing like that.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  Never.

• 23:18Bill Simmons?

  I feel, I feel like he, especially if we had all this stuff now, and then people get mad, the newer generation of fans get mad. Cause they're like, we don't want to hear this. Talking to the old guys, talking, I'm just, I'm just telling you like.

• 23:30Speaker 01

  I love the new guys overall.

• 23:31Bill Simmons?

  It would have been 45 a game for him with the, with the rules.

• 23:33Speaker 01

  Guys, I am not, I'm an old guy that celebrates the young players.

• 23:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 23:39Speaker 01

  But MJ was, there's nothing, there's never been a player like MJ in the NBA in history. With, he had everything.

• 23:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 23:46Speaker 01

  A lot of the guys had a lot of things. MJ had everything. And the, the best thing he had was the mind. He was just a tough SOB, um, just mean as a snake on the floor. Believe that game should be played a certain way and took offense when it wasn't.

• 24:02Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  Uh, if you did something dirty, like the little trick I used to do by hitting guys elbows with my fingernails. He lost his mind one game against me. It's the game where we're grabbing each other's shirt. Because I finally got called for it and I complained about it.

• 24:17Bill Simmons?

  When he came at you?

• 24:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, I, I finally got called. I did it three times and you know, it makes you take a bad shot.

• 24:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 24:23Speaker 01

  Uh, and it's hard to see. It's, it's really a clever move. A lot of players still try to do it. I got away three times in a row. He like hit the side of the backboard, hit the corner of the rim. And then they finally called and I was like, what? And it, he, it like enraged him that I was trying to act like I didn't do it.

• 24:41Bill Simmons?

  And he's like, you motherfucker.

• 24:43Speaker 01

  That's when he came up and grabbed, like grabbed his shirt. Cause I had to, had to keep acting. I couldn't say, well, I actually did it, you know, at that point. So that's what I loved about him. But you know what's crazy though? There's so many crazy stats with MJ.

• 24:56Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 24:57Speaker 01

  But the last three years, they won the title.

• 24:59Bill Simmons?

  That's the craziest stat. They never lost, what was it? Three games in a row ever?

• 25:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, but more importantly.

• 25:05Bill Simmons?

  And he played every game.

• 25:06Speaker 01

  He played 82 games.

• 25:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, and all the playoff games.

• 25:09Speaker 01

  All the games.

• 25:09Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 25:10Speaker 01

  It's, his, his energy was incredible.

• 25:15Bill Simmons?

  The thing that he, that, so I've always said the Utah game, the game, the last game where he made the shot.

• 25:22Speaker 01

  Been the perfect ending.

• 25:23Bill Simmons?

  The entire game is the greatest game I think anyone's ever played, just because he had to play it exactly that way with the pace.

• 25:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 25:30Bill Simmons?

  And pick his spots. Pippen's like a shell of himself. So I've talked about that before. And the closest I've ever seen was LeBron in game seven against, uh, the Celtics in 2018. Same thing, he played all 48 minutes.

• 25:42Speaker 01

  Game six. Oh, game seven, the Cleveland game.

• 25:44Bill Simmons?

  Game seven in Boston, 2018.

• 25:47Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, games, his game six, Miami was phenomenal.

• 25:50Bill Simmons?

  Well, that was, that was against you.

• 25:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 25:52Bill Simmons?

  That was just, he would, he went nuts.

• 25:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, he had no choice.

• 25:55Bill Simmons?

  7, 2018, he was like, I have to play off 48 minutes. How am I gonna do this?

• 25:59Speaker 01

  That's right. Yeah.

• 25:59Bill Simmons?

  You know what I mean?

• 26:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:00Bill Simmons?

  How am I gonna handle the pace of this? And that, those are the only two guys ever I've seen with the capability of doing that.

• 26:07Speaker 01

  Yeah. You know what Michael didn't get credit for was the steal.

• 26:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Oh, yeah.

• 26:10Speaker 01

  I mean, the way he talks about the steal. But he snapped back from the baseline and stole the ball. I mean, that was, that wasn't a call play. That was an instinct. That's, that was phenomenal.

• 26:21Bill Simmons?

  Pretty, you look at the talent back then, it's pretty rough. The guys that are in those finals games and the point total, like one of those games, I think the Jazz had like 55 points.

• 26:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:32Bill Simmons?

  That is one thing about now, we've, there's just the craziest amount of talent I've ever seen in my life.

• 26:37Speaker 01

  I think this is the most talent in a long time. I don't know if.

• 26:41Bill Simmons?

  Like the rookies that came in this year?

• 26:43Speaker 01

  This is the best rookie class.

• 26:44Bill Simmons?

  Holy shit.

• 26:45Speaker 01

  I was talking to Lawrence Frank last night, uh, because I can talk to him. You know, and.

• 26:51Bill Simmons?

  Was he asking if he knew where he could find some alcohol?

• 26:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know. You know, if you know Lawrence, Lawrence has more energy. You, you know Lawrence. Can you imagine him right now?

• 27:01Bill Simmons?

  Just not being able to be involved with the team at all.

• 27:03Speaker 01

  Imagine. I, I text him all the time and I, I say, Lawrence, he calls back in a minute now. But.

• 27:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 27:09Speaker 01

  It's like he, he needs something to do. Cause Lawrence is a basketball fanatic.

• 27:14Bill Simmons?

  You know what's not fun is watching that Clippers team.

• 27:16Speaker 01

  They're not very good right now. No.

• 27:18Bill Simmons?

  I only saw one.

• 27:19Speaker 01

  They don't have scoring.

• 27:20Bill Simmons?

  They only have one guy who can be you off the dribble.

• 27:24Speaker 01

  Girl.

• 27:24Bill Simmons?

  And you need, you need like five to be good.

• 27:27Speaker 01

  At least guys that can, uh, attack closeouts. Like you don't actually have to be a great off the dribble guy, but you have to have, if you have a shot and a counter move to put on the floor versus closeouts. You're pretty good. Uh, Ingram, they really need him back.

• 27:43Bill Simmons?

  Whenever he comes back.

• 27:44Speaker 01

  They need him back desperately because now at least you have two guys you have to focus on. Right now, they just have no offense.

• 27:50Bill Simmons?

  So Miami started playing defense near the end.

• 27:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:53Bill Simmons?

  And you know, where it's like 24 second shot clock violations, fall away three pointers with one second left. You start, Hotchabore hit the backboard on a three. It was like, oh, we're doing this now.

• 28:05Speaker 01

  Yeah. Struce came in and made a shot. I mean, good to see him back, but they just need more scoring.

• 28:09Bill Simmons?

  I worry about that Wogler pick. Now I need to see him more. I don't, I don't have an opinion one way or the other. It worries me that he can't go by anybody.

• 28:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think he, um, is one of those players. He can shoot the ball. He can really see the floor and make plays. I think he's one of those players, you put him on a good team, he's really, really good. Like really good.

• 28:31Bill Simmons?

  There's a Halliburton kind of pace in him.

• 28:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:33Bill Simmons?

  But Halliburton could go, Halliburton go by people.

• 28:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, he didn't have the speed.

• 28:37Bill Simmons?

  So what he does is like.

• 28:37Speaker 01

  Halliburton should be the MVP of the league. Cause every time he leaves, the, his team.

• 28:42Bill Simmons?

  But yeah, the team completely falls apart.

• 28:43Speaker 01

  Seen that before. Like every team in the NBA can lose their best player for a couple of games. They play all right.

• 28:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 28:49Speaker 01

  But when Halliburton doesn't play, they don't win. It's, it's a different basketball team. It's unbelievable. Now they do have other injuries.

• 28:56Bill Simmons?

  So Wogler. It's where I, I want to see him more because he likes having, he likes contact. He likes having guys on his side.

• 29:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:05Bill Simmons?

  And kind of playing off them, but he doesn't go by people.

• 29:08Speaker 01

  I also.

• 29:09Bill Simmons?

  Aikov goes by people.

• 29:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, Aikov is, I mean, he's, he's real now.

• 29:13Bill Simmons?

  And he's just on the wrong team.

• 29:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's just.

• 29:15Bill Simmons?

  He's a TBD.

• 29:16Speaker 01

  Some of his shots. And right now, I, I think he's thinking, I can, I'll shoot. I really believe that's how he's playing now.

• 29:26Bill Simmons?

  He takes some shots where if they cut to the coach, the coach would just be like.

• 29:29Speaker 01

  Oh, boy. He can pass the ball too. He's a hell of a passer as well. Uh, Wag, what I, what I worry about with him right now is you're right. He likes getting guys. But in college, he was the strongest guy.

• 29:41Bill Simmons?

  Right. He's the weakest guy now. Yeah.

• 29:43Speaker 01

  And so that's why I have faith in that he's going to be a better player because he's going to get stronger.

• 29:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 29:49Speaker 01

  Right now, he's just not.

• 29:50Bill Simmons?

  I wish they had taken Burris. I like Burris, but.

• 29:52Speaker 01

  He's good.

• 29:53Bill Simmons?

  He's good. Yaxle's been great. Boozer.

• 29:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:56Bill Simmons?

  Peterson's the one that I think people are starting to panic about a little bit.

• 30:00Speaker 01

  A little bit, but I, I'm still high on Peterson.

• 30:02Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 30:02Speaker 01

  He's just too skilled. Uh, Boozer, I gotta tell you, uh, Bill, I, I, I watched Boozer closely in the last four or five college games. And I, I wasn't that impressed.

• 30:13Bill Simmons?

  Interesting.

• 30:13Speaker 01

  Um, and now I love him. I love him. If you watch, uh, I watched the New Orleans game. He didn't play great. He just does every, he's a winner. Like every, he's always in the right place. He does the right things. He has no flash to his game. And so you mistake that sometimes with being slow and he's not.

• 30:35Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 30:35Speaker 01

  He shoots the hell out of the ball, rebounds the hell out of the ball. He picks what he picks, should pick. He rows when he should row. He's in the right spot. Uh, he's been taught well. Like he is a straight up winner.

• 30:49Bill Simmons?

  It's a good way to put it. I always call those guys additive guys.

• 30:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:53Bill Simmons?

  They're just like adding.

• 30:54Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 30:54Bill Simmons?

  And there's nothing, everybody likes playing with them. People like coaching them. Even if they have a bad game, they're still doing like four or five things.

• 31:01Speaker 01

  Changes demeanor.

• 31:03Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 31:03Speaker 01

  Like he would be a dream guy to coach.

• 31:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 31:06Speaker 01

  And I really put, you put him on any team.

• 31:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 31:09Speaker 01

  The team's going to be a better team. Even a bad team, they're going to be a better team.

• 31:12Bill Simmons?

  Interesting. I talked about this on my Tuesday pod. It's interesting. Utah didn't take him.

• 31:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:17Bill Simmons?

  Cause if he, he feels like the most Danny guy to me.

• 31:19Speaker 01

  He really does. I actually thought that.

• 31:21Bill Simmons?

  And his dad played there and.

• 31:23Speaker 01

  But Danny loves athletes.

• 31:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 31:25Speaker 01

  And I think that's probably what swayed him.

• 31:27Bill Simmons?

  Like when he got seduced by JR Ginnis?

• 31:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. He loves athletes. Exactly. He loves athletes. So.

• 31:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Cause they, I talked about Tuesday, there's this alternate universe where they have Kessler and Boozer together. And instead they have Peterson and Triple J who never plays.

• 31:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. I don't know what the deal with Kessler. Like, I love Kessler. Uh, I liked him in Utah.

• 31:49Bill Simmons?

  I don't know.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. I just, I just, I don't know. I think.

• 31:52Bill Simmons?

  They like the trade. They got all these picks back.

• 31:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, they did.

• 31:55Bill Simmons?

  But it's like, cool. You just gave up a center. Everybody want, but I don't know. I, I thought that was a great trade for them, but.

• 32:00Speaker 01

  I think Kessler's a type of guy. That can play in any era and, and, and can help your team. I mean, listen. Uh, rim protector is a rim protector.

• 32:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 32:11Speaker 01

  And.

• 32:13Bill Simmons?

  And around the basket with his hands up.

• 32:14Speaker 01

  Basket. He's deflecting. Uh, he rebounds the ball. I mean, it's, the Lakers are not a very good defensive team.

• 32:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 32:22Speaker 01

  Uh, but without him, they would go down historically as the worst defensive team in the history of the game. He's, he belves them out.

• 32:29Bill Simmons?

  Well, my guy Tybo's finally getting.

• 32:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's playing well.

• 32:32Bill Simmons?

  One more chance.

• 32:33Speaker 01

  He's actually playing well. I'm, I'm happy for him. I didn't think he loved the game enough. I just thought he, you know, he kind of was this flower child.

• 32:41Bill Simmons?

  Life or death for him. Yeah.

• 32:42Speaker 01

  Just wouldn't, but I honestly, right now, watching him play is like he's, he's kind of realized of, is almost out of the league.

• 32:49Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 32:49Speaker 01

  And it's funny, a lot of those guys just, they get out of the league.

• 32:54Bill Simmons?

  Uh, right.

• 32:55Speaker 01

  He kind of, he's a smart kid and he kind of realized, you know what? I gotta get to cooking here. And he's driving the ball. He's attacking. He has confidence. He's a hell of a defender. Gambles too much, you know?

• 33:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 33:08Speaker 01

  He always led the league in fouls from reaching and stuff like that. But man, he's solid.

• 33:13Bill Simmons?

  If I was ever a GM, maybe there's still time. I'm a big, you have to have one elite skill guy. I don't care what it is.

• 33:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:21Bill Simmons?

  But if I don't know what your elite skill is, I can't, I can't, I'm not buying you. And at least with him, it's like, this guy's really tough to score against. He at least has that.

• 33:30Speaker 01

  He's an NBA defender.

• 33:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 33:32Speaker 01

  He's hard to pick. He keeps coming. Uh, his rare contests, like, um, you know, the game where if, if you go back. When we were in Philly, we played Golden State and it was, it was the next game Steph broke the record.

• 33:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 33:47Speaker 01

  And you know me as a coach and I love Steph. I mean, he's a, he's in the family.

• 33:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 33:52Speaker 01

  But.

• 33:52Bill Simmons?

  Literally.

• 33:53Speaker 01

  I was literally saying in the family, I do not want him to break the record tonight. And you go back and look at that game, it was all Matisse. Uh, he guarded.

• 34:02Bill Simmons?

  Please.

• 34:03Speaker 01

  Yeah. He guarded the hell out of him. You know, because Steph takes some shots and here comes Matisse from behind. You know, with those long arms, he recovers.

• 34:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 34:12Speaker 01

  You know, and so, yeah, he's, he can really defend.

• 34:16Bill Simmons?

  Speaking of Steph, we're talking about chemistry.

• 34:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:19Bill Simmons?

  Golden State, if you watched, I remember texting you after the first or second game. I was like, oh my God. What are we going to do about our guy?

• 34:26Speaker 01

  I'm more confident now.

• 34:28Bill Simmons?

  Um, I've done a 180.

• 34:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yaxle is kind of.

• 34:31Bill Simmons?

  Yaxle, Yaxle was like plugging in.

• 34:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:34Bill Simmons?

  There was no electricity and he plugged it in.

• 34:36Speaker 01

  It's like he's, he's kind of giving him like real energy, you know?

• 34:41Bill Simmons?

  Guess what? Cause he's, he can actually create offense.

• 34:44Speaker 01

  He can play.

• 34:45Bill Simmons?

  And he can play, he can guard and play different positions. He's exactly what they needed.

• 34:49Speaker 01

  They, they couldn't have drafted a better.

• 34:52Bill Simmons?

  What a miracle.

• 34:52Speaker 01

  Person. Like it's a perfect fit. I, here's my concern with, with Steph. All right?

• 34:58Bill Simmons?

  That he's 39?

• 34:59Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I keep hearing people, even you've said it. Uh, we talked about this. You know, so they got Yak, so they have all these picks, you know, their plan is in a year or two. It's like in a year or two, in a year or two, Steph will be on the PJ tour.

• 35:15Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 35:15Speaker 01

  Before he'll be playing basketball.

• 35:17Bill Simmons?

  You really think that?

• 35:18Speaker 01

  I don't think he plays more than two or three years, you know?

• 35:21Bill Simmons?

  So this is your, I think, I would say three seems fair.

• 35:24Speaker 01

  Right. But, uh.

• 35:25Bill Simmons?

  Cause don't you think he'd want to be in the Olympic team again?

• 35:28Speaker 01

  I don't know. I think he should be.

• 35:30Bill Simmons?

  How do we not have him on the Olympic team?

• 35:32Speaker 01

  Let me say this. If Steph retires next year, when the Olympics come, they should still put him on the team.

• 35:37Bill Simmons?

  Exactly. He's gotta be on that team.

• 35:39Speaker 01

  He's always going to make shots. Um, but I do, I'm so concerned by that. Like, okay, let's say in a year and a half. They finally get the right team. Now Steph's 40. I just don't want him wasted. So this is more of a personal concern. Like.

• 35:55Bill Simmons?

  But what are you saying? That you want them to trade everything to make, be good this year, next year?

• 36:00Speaker 01

  Only if they can.

• 36:00Bill Simmons?

  Cause that's how I feel.

• 36:01Speaker 01

  Only if they can get the right thing.

• 36:03Bill Simmons?

  I'm rooting against the Wizards.

• 36:04Speaker 01

  But yes, I'm hoping they trade all these draft capital. Cause at the end of the day, once Steph leaves, all this draft capital doesn't mean as much. Cause you're not going to get a Steph. So you're not going to be as good. You're going to, Golden State's going to go through a, a drive here. Uh, let's right now cash in.

• 36:24Bill Simmons?

  I would argue the league is open enough with the OKC injuries and San Antonio's young and.

• 36:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:30Bill Simmons?

  So I'm, I've been rooting against Washington, um, which one of my best friends, Joe House, but I want, I want them to get to the Davis. Yeah.

• 36:37Speaker 01

  I think he'd be perfect.

• 36:38Bill Simmons?

  And I, and Davis is a classic, can you just be paid year to year guy?

• 36:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. He would be perfect in Golden State.

• 36:44Bill Simmons?

  Don't give him two years, three years. Wiggins is like this.

• 36:46Speaker 01

  Great shooter.

• 36:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 36:47Speaker 01

  Uh, and, and the league is willing to deal. Like there's guys out there.

• 36:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 36:52Speaker 01

  Uh, you know, Steph or, or Steve though, he's not going to take a bad guy, you know?

• 36:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 36:59Speaker 01

  And that's to his credit. If I could do my coaching career over again, I would have fought more for that. Like, you know, I took a lot of, Danny and I, we, we were gamblers.

• 37:08Bill Simmons?

  Well, McHale was like that too.

• 37:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. We, we were gamblers.

• 37:11Bill Simmons?

  Some ex players like, I played with guys like that.

• 37:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. We.

• 37:14Bill Simmons?

  We, we can fix him.

• 37:15Speaker 01

  That's exactly right. But when you look back on that, you're like, man, no, they're, they change a little, but they are who they are.

• 37:22Bill Simmons?

  Example of it working out? Like in your career, where you had a guy who was like kind of on the press.

• 37:28Speaker 01

  Well, Eddie House was not known as a great team guy, kind of, kind of a wild card.

• 37:33Bill Simmons?

  Turned out to be a great team guy. Yeah.

• 37:34Speaker 01

  And he turned out to be phenomenal.

• 37:37Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 37:37Speaker 01

  With our basketball team. So he would be a, a good example, uh, of it's probably a couple more that I'm missing.

• 37:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Yeah, Mikhail was famous for that. He had a stretch of Minnesota where he was just going problem after problem with that attitude of like, I don't know.

• 37:53Speaker 01

  And then the worst thing that happened to me was in Boston, especially even in Orlando, I had success. Like, the first year, I had some names, I had coaches, you can't take, and we had a various, uh, I won coach of the year, we had, and now all of a sudden, you're the coach that can handle these guys. No, no, no, I'm not.

• 38:10Bill Simmons?

  You get the reputation.

• 38:11Speaker 01

  No, I'm not.

• 38:11Bill Simmons?

  Nobody can handle these guys.

• 38:12Speaker 01

  Nobody can handle these guys, but, and, and you can handle one. Now, you have two, three, and four on your team, and you're in trouble.

• 38:19Bill Simmons?

  So, do you think there's, it's conceivable that Golden State could be like a top five team in the West with one trade?

• 38:26Speaker 01

  With one trade, yeah.

• 38:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that's how I feel.

• 38:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, but it's gotta be the right one, and I don't know, me, Anthony Davis, obviously, but, uh.

• 38:34Bill Simmons?

  Washington's in a weird, I don't know how much Washington you've watched, because AJ's good right away. Like, he's got it.

• 38:39Speaker 01

  Washington's in a tough spot.

• 38:40Bill Simmons?

  Because it's like, so do you double down on that, or what do you do?

• 38:43Speaker 01

  I don't know, there, I, I would, uh, AJ is great, right? Um, uh.

• 38:48Bill Simmons?

  But he has it, you can see it.

• 38:50Speaker 01

  I'm keeping A D, if I'm trying to win in Washington, maybe move the other parts, but.

• 38:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 38:54Speaker 01

  Uh, boy, they're in a tough spot, because what you can't do anymore, you can't have bad contracts.

• 39:01Bill Simmons?

  Well, they just gave out the Trey one, they triple downed on Trey.

• 39:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:05Bill Simmons?

  Who can't shoot.

• 39:06Speaker 01

  No, but I think he can. Oh, you mean Trey, um?

• 39:09Bill Simmons?

  Trey Young.

• 39:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, he, well.

• 39:11Bill Simmons?

  He, he's a shooter who, that's, the shots don't go in.

• 39:14Speaker 01

  No, well, he's a shooter.

• 39:15Bill Simmons?

  Can the shots go in for you to take these shots?

• 39:17Speaker 01

  Well, when he takes better shots, they go in.

• 39:19Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 39:19Speaker 01

  You know?

• 39:20Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 39:20Speaker 01

  I mean, Paul Pierce and I had that big argument in my, our first year.

• 39:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 39:23Speaker 01

  And I said, he said, I'm a great shooter, I said, well.

• 39:26Bill Simmons?

  Not with the shots you're taking.

• 39:28Speaker 01

  Not with this percentage.

• 39:29Bill Simmons?

  You're right.

• 39:29Speaker 01

  I said, so either you're taking shitty shots.

• 39:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 39:33Speaker 01

  Or, um, you're not a good shooter. It's one of the two.

• 39:38Bill Simmons?

  Wait, so when you caught Paul, this is a good, this is a good, like, to bring this to the current league now. Like, guys who are in bad situations for a couple of years, and the habits can kind of stick sometimes if it's not too late. And I think there's a couple of guys like that now. Like, I think, I still like Sab, I might be the only one who still likes Sabonis.

• 39:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:58Bill Simmons?

  I know he's too expensive.

• 39:59Speaker 01

  You're higher on Sabonis than I've ever been.

• 40:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, yeah, I, I still feel like in the right situ, but he's been on so many bad Kings teams that I think everybody's just quit on him now completely.

• 40:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, I do think.

• 40:09Bill Simmons?

  Still feel like there's a world where he could be good somewhere.

• 40:11Speaker 01

  He's a hell of a player, I've just, I don't know what, what he does, if he can win in the defense. But I can tell you one thing, um, he would be, he is not a happy with the losing, and.

• 40:22Bill Simmons?

  No.

• 40:22Speaker 01

  Of all the players, like, this is killing him.

• 40:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 40:25Speaker 01

  And I don't care where he goes, he'd be better fit. Like, he wants out, he, he didn't have to say it, I'm saying it, you know?

• 40:33Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 40:34Speaker 01

  It's just, you know, we haven't heard from him since he left Indiana. Like, he's been.

• 40:41Bill Simmons?

  He had the one light the beam season.

• 40:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, and that was a good season.

• 40:45Bill Simmons?

  They basically lost in round one.

• 40:46Speaker 01

  And then they lose Mike Brown, like, I mean, just, they finally win, think of the logic. They finally win, Mike Brown turns them around, give them, you gotta give him credit for that. And then they just, in one year, he's gone.

• 40:58Bill Simmons?

  And you can't say that Mike Brown was a bad coach, because he just won the NBA title.

• 41:02Speaker 01

  And, and he turned that team around, you know? Mike Brown's also taken the Cleveland deep, I mean, so he's won a lot.

• 41:09Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by Expedia. You know how at the end of the season, your team goes to Cancun, sometimes earlier than expected? Sometimes after blowing a 3-1 series lead, but what if you went to Cancun? With Expedia, save up to 30% when you bundle and save, you can book the flight or the hotel now, then book the rest later. In all fairness, though, hopefully, your team doesn't go to Cancun, 1-2-3 Cancun. Or, if they do, you go with them. Expedia, the one place you go to go places. Sign in to save, savings vary. This episode is brought to you by TikTok. When you watch a football game, you follow the ball, right? Well, there's a video on TikTok where this guy says to watch the players without the ball, watch the routes, and the action, away from the play. I'll change how you see the game, and guess what, he's not wrong.

• 41:51Bill Simmons?

  That's the thing about discovery on TikTok, one video can change the way you see the game. You can learn something new or see things in a completely different way. Your next discovery is waiting on TikTok, visit tiktok.com/discovermore. It's time for a new segment, it's called Greatest Plays of All Time, it's brought to you by State Farm. We've witnessed some legendary plays throughout football history, truly legendary plays. Plays that can never be recreated, they're designed for that precise moment on the field. The same reason why State Farm helps personalize coverage, because you need a plan designed to suit your unique situation. Uh, I talked about some iconic plays from history the last time.

• 42:29Bill Simmons?

  My favorite play of this season so far, 2026 NFL, um, was actually against my favorite team, the New England Patriots. We had the Bears, I thought we were gonna get a stop. Caleb, um, with, had huge pressure in his face, there were hands up, and he zipped a line drive over the outstretched fingers of the defensive lineman to the one spot, I think it was Adunze, who had to catch it like this, because if he had thrown it straight to him, it would have been tipped. And it was just a perfect quarterback play, it was everything you would ever want, um, from the best guy on your team. And it, it, plays like that are a big reason why I think the Bears are a legitimate Super Bowl favorite. But I think that was the play that stood out to me over everything else I've seen this season.

• 43:14Bill Simmons?

  When it comes to coverage, you need a game plan that fits your unique situation, kind of like how Caleb was unique to make that play. State Farm takes the time to get to know you, so they can help personalize coverage for your life and budget, like a good neighbor. State Farm is there. If, uh, you could coach any team right now, just that it would be fun to text you about during the season, it would be New Orleans for me. I don't know how you coached that team, like, just how anyone would.

• 43:42Speaker 01

  I still like them.

• 43:43Bill Simmons?

  It's, and you liked them before the season, and you were like, that team has a lot of talent, I like them, and I was like, that team's a mess.

• 43:49Speaker 01

  They're a mess, but I still like them, I mean, last, the other night, uh, so I'm doing that on NBC, the.

• 43:55Bill Simmons?

  Oh, and they blew the nine-point lead with a minute left.

• 43:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, and so, it was, it's like the NFL version of the red zone.

• 44:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 44:04Speaker 01

  And we clip over to the New Orleans game, New Orleans up nine with like.

• 44:08Bill Simmons?

  It was like 70 seconds left, yeah.

• 44:10Speaker 01

  And I say it, I said, man, this game's not over, and, and, uh, Scal started laughing, he's like, what are you talking about? Said, I'm telling you.

• 44:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 44:18Speaker 01

  They just do crazy stuff right now.

• 44:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 44:22Speaker 01

  And, and you can see it, turnover, uh, they, they had one possession where they just dribbled the clock out, wasted possession, they showed a picture of poor Jamal. You can see him, like, about to implode.

• 44:34Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 44:34Speaker 01

  And then they came out with a great play, uh, the score tied in, and I, I would bet my life, that ball was supposed to go right to a pocket pass to Zion, and Murphy keeps the ball.

• 44:48Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 44:48Speaker 01

  And, you know, he wanted to be the hero, he wanted to take the shot. And, like, I'm thinking Zion going downhill at an angle is unguardable, and they had it.

• 44:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 44:57Speaker 01

  And they just didn't make the play. So, they've lost three games that they've taken, they, they've figured out how to take a win away.

• 45:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, the Denver one was the worst one.

• 45:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, they had a win, and they literally took it out and said, we'll lose. So, either that's gonna turn around, and they're gonna get hot, it's so early, or it's gonna go the other way, and it's gonna go really bad.

• 45:19Bill Simmons?

  It's, I've seen Fears look like the worst player in the league.

• 45:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:22Bill Simmons?

  And then you see him on a different end, it's like, wow, Fears.

• 45:25Speaker 01

  Well, he lives up to his name. He has no fear.

• 45:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 45:28Speaker 01

  When he play, like, that's how he plays, for the good or bad of it, you kind of need one of those on your team.

• 45:34Bill Simmons?

  He reminds me of those guys from, like, the late 70s, like, all those, all those little point guards that just, like, had no fear at all.

• 45:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, he doesn't, I mean, he's tough, uh, you know, he has to learn how to actually be a point guard at times.

• 45:47Bill Simmons?

  Portland is the opposite, where, also a super weird team, but they've actually figured out kind of what their identity is. He's got everybody going downhill, Abdi looks even better than did last year, and Dame is back.

• 46:01Speaker 01

  Dame's been great.

• 46:01Bill Simmons?

  We haven't talked on the podcast since Dame became Dame again.

• 46:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's been great, I've talked to him probably three or four times.

• 46:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, so what happened, what's your take on?

• 46:09Speaker 01

  He's just happy.

• 46:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 46:10Speaker 01

  He's happy to be at home, uh, and you know, like, Dame, you gotta give him credit, um, he, and he told, he told me this, he's like, man, we, we made it clear whose team it was, early. And he said that, and that was coming from Dame and Ja. Like, they, they gave, they gave the other kid, you, it's your game.

• 46:29Bill Simmons?

  You're talking about Denny?

• 46:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 46:31Speaker 01

  We'll figure it out around you, we'll figure it out around you. Uh, Dame's just had a great place in his life right now, he, he really is.

• 46:37Bill Simmons?

  You had, like, when you coached him, he was like, shelve himself, Dame.

• 46:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:40Bill Simmons?

  Just trade out of nowhere, he's getting divorced.

• 46:42Speaker 01

  Getting divorced.

• 46:43Bill Simmons?

  Trying to figure out how to feel the honest.

• 46:45Speaker 01

  It really wasn't ever welcome in the way he should have been, in my opinion.

• 46:49Bill Simmons?

  You talking about by players or by the city?

• 46:50Speaker 01

  By everything.

• 46:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 46:51Speaker 01

  You know, um, and he really, you know, he was, had a lot going on in Portland, so he, he, he was traded, you could have traded him, uh, for him at a worse time.

• 47:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 47:01Speaker 01

  Uh, the biggest thing with that trade is, um, like, you just can't trade Drew.

• 47:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 47:08Speaker 01

  I always thought, once I got there, it's a man, if Drew had have been there with Dame, and you're honest, that team would have been so much better.

• 47:16Bill Simmons?

  You can't trade Drew without putting a condition that they can't then trade him to Boston.

• 47:20Speaker 01

  You're talking about a backfire, like, that was unbelievable.

• 47:25Bill Simmons?

  I don't know if you're allowed to put conditions in trades, but.

• 47:28Speaker 01

  That should have been more.

• 47:29Bill Simmons?

  But I will say, I would have put the odds. I don't know, five to one that Dame would look like Dame again?

• 47:37Speaker 01

  I don't know. I just had the inside.

• 47:39Bill Simmons?

  After that injury?

• 47:41Speaker 01

  I had some inside information. Awesome. Just watching.

• 47:43Bill Simmons?

  So you would have taken the bet?

• 47:44Speaker 01

  I would have taken that bet. No, like especially.

• 47:47Bill Simmons?

  Just little guards at that age?

• 47:48Speaker 01

  Especially what he was gonna do. Like, he's gonna not lose his shot. He still has that dangerous, like, little Like Dame is, Dame is super athletic, but he's never played that way. He's played at Gears.

• 47:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 47:59Speaker 01

  And so he can do that in his sleep. That's why I looked at that.

• 48:03Bill Simmons?

  Unbelievable. It turns out they get him for, it's like thirteen, fourteen. They just pay him last year. They don't care. They're gonna suck anyway.

• 48:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, and he's still getting paid.

• 48:11Bill Simmons?

  And then, yeah. And now they have him at this.

• 48:15Speaker 01

  Well, he's still getting paid from Milwaukee.

• 48:17Bill Simmons?

  I know.

• 48:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:18Bill Simmons?

  Was it twenty-two a year?

• 48:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, so he's doing great. He's a happy man.

• 48:23Bill Simmons?

  I didn't like that. We argued about that when you did that.

• 48:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, well.

• 48:26Bill Simmons?

  That was, that was a desperation trade.

• 48:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm gonna have a no comment on that one.

• 48:30Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 48:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was, they didn't.

• 48:32Bill Simmons?

  Take the no comment.

• 48:33Speaker 01

  Not only was it a no comment, it didn't turn out good either. You know, it just didn't turn out well.

• 48:37Bill Simmons?

  It did not.

• 48:38Speaker 01

  I actually don't mind the gamble. You, you have a guy.

• 48:41Bill Simmons?

  But you know now, like, you just should have traded Giannis that summer. They just weren't ready to do it.

• 48:46Speaker 01

  They weren't ready to do it. No, I don't think Giannis helped in that either, though. And, and, and, and John's defense, I thought Giannis kept yo-yoing, you know?

• 48:56Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 48:56Speaker 01

  I think when I look back on that whole situation, Giannis wanted out, but he was a buck. And he didn't want to be the guy. He didn't want to be the bad guy.

• 49:05Bill Simmons?

  He didn't want to mess with the legacy.

• 49:06Speaker 01

  He wanted, he wanted John and Wes and those guys to say, we're trading you, instead of him asking for a trade. To me, that was the game that was being played.

• 49:15Bill Simmons?

  I meant to ask you this earlier, because I thought about this during the game, and I thought about what you said with how close he was with his brothers.

• 49:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:21Bill Simmons?

  And so in Miami, he doesn't have the brothers.

• 49:23Speaker 01

  I think it's great for him.

• 49:25Bill Simmons?

  You think it's great? Because I was wondering last night, because he seemed kind of, I don't know, I was wondering, like, does he need his brothers?

• 49:30Speaker 01

  Well, no. I, I felt that way in Milwaukee. Like, yeah, I just think if you're the best player, you gotta give yourself to the team. You gotta lend your personality and your energy. You gotta sit with your team. You gotta talk with your team. And I thought.

• 49:47Bill Simmons?

  He can't just be like you and your brothers.

• 49:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, that enabled him to not do it. And it was easier for him to not do it. You know, when they had Drew and Brook and Chris Middleton, they had a lot of leaders. Having your brother around was fine. But once they all left, and it was just LeBron, it, I mean, just Giannis. Giannis needed to just give himself to the team, not to anyone else. So I, I, I think it's great for him there. I think it'd be worse because now he has someone, he wouldn't, he wouldn't engage with these guys. And for them to take that next step, they're still not there. You could see it.

• 50:28Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 50:28Speaker 01

  They have to learn how to engage with each other.

• 50:30Bill Simmons?

  Do you think that's different for non-American players to be a leader of a NBA team of rich adults?

• 50:36Speaker 01

  Not with actions, no. Like, your actions, Luka.

• 50:41Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 50:41Speaker 01

  They, they all love Luka. Like, he gets along great. Tim Duncan was a non-American kind of, you know?

• 50:49Bill Simmons?

  Tim Duncan was an alien.

• 50:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, he was.

• 50:52Bill Simmons?

  He played on one leg for the last half of his career, averaged twenty-two and ten every day.

• 50:56Speaker 01

  He gave himself to the team. So no, you know Joker does too, in his own way. So no, I, I think it's, uh, there's sometimes a language disparity.

• 51:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, right.

• 51:07Speaker 01

  You know, and Giannis loves talking Greek, as crazy as it sounds, you know? He, when he was on the bus with his brother, they started talking, and I didn't even like that. I was like, I don't know what you're saying.

• 51:18Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 51:19Speaker 01

  You know, so.

• 51:20Bill Simmons?

  But it sounds like, you know, every time we've ever talked about Giannis, it sounds like you loved him.

• 51:26Speaker 01

  I liked Giannis a lot.

• 51:27Bill Simmons?

  That you just loved him as a dude.

• 51:29Speaker 01

  I liked him more as a dude.

• 51:30Bill Simmons?

  Coaching him, but you were also like a whiff frustrated with something.

• 51:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's, um, he's, it's not easy. He's not easy because he plays at this crazy downhill pace. Um, he, he's really, and he's really a difficult guy. I was telling someone this. He, he has this great passing ability, but he doesn't necessarily have the super IQ at the same time. It's really a strange thing. And he really has one way. Downhill, force, force, force. Like, every play, he wants to force it. And there's times he didn't, where I wish he'd do one thing. I wish he learned how to execute better.

• 52:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 52:13Speaker 01

  He's one of those guys that you get a lot of them from the US, um, AU guys that have never needed to execute because they can do it on their own.

• 52:22Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 52:22Speaker 01

  Where, but that doesn't help the team. And like, I think, and I told me Giannis, this, the thing he needs to still learn is the value of execution. How important it is when you're in practice and then shoot arounds to lock in on execution. Uh, and, and now he has a coach who is as good as there is in execution.

• 52:43Bill Simmons?

  Well, it's hard when you've been able to, your athletic ability is so dominant.

• 52:47Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 52:48Bill Simmons?

  That that can carry it half the time anyway.

• 52:50Speaker 01

  Good for him.

• 52:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 52:51Speaker 01

  And what a lot of players don't understand, yeah, I don't need that. I can do that. Yeah, you can. But for the team to work, you have to learn how to execute. I thought it was interesting last night. He was out of bounds. He was the passer, you know, and he made a great pass. I mean, the guy was so damn open.

• 53:06Bill Simmons?

  How about, how do you not, I know Ty Lou was probably in the huddle being like, hey, here's the one thing I don't want to give up, is an open Klay Thompson corner three to right where the guy's in about it too. Can we please not do this?

• 53:21Speaker 01

  I literally have a memory of people's end of the game.

• 53:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 53:25Speaker 01

  And, and, and that was one of Spo's favorite plays, like.

• 53:30Bill Simmons?

  The double pick.

• 53:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, and, and so the Clippers were switching everything. The problem with the way they ran that is your back is to the pick.

• 53:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 53:39Speaker 01

  So you're gonna, you're gonna get nipped off. The only thing that the Clippers made a mistake is the guy guarding the ball. You, you gotta take the baseline. No way. When I'm at the end of a game, side out of bounds, that ball has to go that way. If it was a young kid, you could see him, he actually opened up. Giannis almost, he threw a bounce pass.

• 53:57Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 53:58Speaker 01

  Like, his arm should have been standing there. That pass should have never been allowed.

• 54:02Bill Simmons?

  Put him there or just put him in the corner?

• 54:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 54:04Bill Simmons?

  Just have him standing where the ball's gonna go.

• 54:06Speaker 01

  Yes, but now you got.

• 54:07Bill Simmons?

  Three seconds left, I'm betting everything, it's going to Klay in the corner.

• 54:10Speaker 01

  He's gotta clear, now you can see everything. No, Giannis can see everything anyway. He's big, so.

• 54:15Bill Simmons?

  Chemistry, Cleveland. Now, you had that game when you were doing the NBC.

• 54:19Speaker 01

  On Monday, and I hate talking about chemistry when I'm not actually there. You've been talking about being there to being on TV. But from afar, and I said it, I said it at halftime, they asked me, what's Cleveland's adjustment? And I said, joy? How about some joy? Like, they just, I don't know, I've seen only two games, uh, and unfortunately, they're both Oklahoma.

• 54:44Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 54:45Speaker 01

  But they don't, they don't seem to be, like, vibing. I, I don't even know what the word is, Bill. There's, from afar, it just feels like there's something that, uh, like the Donovan James thing. Um, and I think, I don't think I'd ever say this, James doesn't have the ball in his hands enough. Like, he never, like, the other night, the first Oklahoma game, I said, James is not involved as much.

• 55:15Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 55:16Speaker 01

  It looks, that's how it felt.

• 55:18Bill Simmons?

  Well, you got a lot of mouths to feed. They need to spend money on Peyton Watson.

• 55:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 55:22Bill Simmons?

  He's good when he has the ball. That was my fear with them. I still went over on their, that was like forty-nine wins.

• 55:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 55:28Bill Simmons?

  I thought they were gonna be a fifty-win team. But I did have some concerns about.

• 55:32Speaker 01

  Watson was great.

• 55:33Bill Simmons?

  Be happy with this.

• 55:34Speaker 01

  Watson was phenomenal when Jokic was out because he had the ball in his hands.

• 55:38Bill Simmons?

  That, exactly.

• 55:38Speaker 01

  All the time. And is, is Watson, like, this is where, like, when you are putting a team together, and I, and, like, I love Watson as a player. But on the Cavs, he's not gonna have the ball. He's gonna be reduced to a catch-and-shoot player a lot.

• 55:54Bill Simmons?

  You must want to see him on a team like Brooklyn.

• 55:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, where he can play, where he can get downhill, uh, and then go grab a great shooter and put him on Cleveland. Because you got James and, and, and, and Donovan. There's not gonna be a lot more ball handling.

• 56:09Bill Simmons?

  Then you gotta run your Mobley play every once in a while.

• 56:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know who Mobley is? Mobley's a damn good basketball player.

• 56:15Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 56:16Speaker 01

  Um, I think we keep waiting for him to be this great scorer. Uh, Mobley reminds me a little bit of Scottie Pippen in, in, in a very positive way. Uh, the problem is no one wants to hear it. Like, it's not enough. Scottie, and Phil Jackson said this once, Scottie was so dang good at so many things. He could never just be a scorer. He just is good at too much. And I feel that way about Mobley. Like, Mobley is good with passing, great defender, you know?

• 56:48Speaker 01

  Trying to make him a scorer is a mistake to me, you know, just let him play.

• 56:53Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's like when you used to have to run the one post-up play for Perk.

• 56:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, get out the way early.

• 57:00Bill Simmons?

  What did it happen in the game?

• 57:02Speaker 01

  We had two.

• 57:03Bill Simmons?

  Jump hook.

• 57:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, we had two rules, never throw, run the first play for KG because he would break the glass because he was so fired up.

• 57:09Bill Simmons?

  Right, right.

• 57:10Speaker 01

  He would not make the shot.

• 57:11Bill Simmons?

  He's just the head buddy in the basket support.

• 57:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, I learned that one early and Tibbs and I used to die laughing about it like, we know who not to run the first play for.

• 57:20Bill Simmons?

  I remember those first couple of Celtics games, my dad would, we would talk after and he'd be like, KG's just insane.

• 57:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, I felt the same way.

• 57:29Bill Simmons?

  He was so crazy.

• 57:30Speaker 01

  I didn't either. Bill, I felt like your dad. I didn't believe it.

• 57:34Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 57:35Speaker 01

  Like when KG came, I thought the world of him.

• 57:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 57:40Speaker 01

  But the only thing I wasn't buying was his energy. I was like, there's no way, guys.

• 57:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, how does he keep that up every game?

• 57:45Speaker 01

  That can't be true. And then in Rome, after three practices, you're like, oh, this is real. And it, and it's still real. When you're a real captain.

• 57:53Bill Simmons?

  Now.

• 57:54Speaker 01

  He is.

• 57:54Bill Simmons?

  No, who, which player now would be?

• 57:57Speaker 01

  That's a great, that's a great call.

• 57:59Bill Simmons?

  I think that player exists.

• 58:01Speaker 01

  Well, I know who it could be.

• 58:02Bill Simmons?

  Who?

• 58:03Speaker 01

  Uh, Wilson, the rookie.

• 58:05Bill Simmons?

  Oh, you like him?

• 58:06Speaker 01

  I love him.

• 58:07Bill Simmons?

  I told you about how he fouled Hugo from behind down 40 with 50 seconds left, just hard fouled him.

• 58:12Speaker 01

  I love this kid. Now, he may have given the greatest rookie interview in, in sports history.

• 58:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 58:18Speaker 01

  You know, when he hadn't played at all, he played the first summer league game, they asked him, was, was he happy to be back? And he says, happy. Man, I got a coach fired. Like, to say that as a rookie.

• 58:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 58:30Speaker 01

  About Hubert Davis, is who he's talking about, because he.

• 58:33Bill Simmons?

  Cause he got hurt.

• 58:34Speaker 01

  He got hurt and they, you know, they tanked the rest of the season. To have that awareness. I'm like, man, this kid is built differently. Uh, he, he can do everything.

• 58:45Bill Simmons?

  Well, compare him to T-Mac your first Orlando year. Now, T-Mac was obviously 30 points a game at that point.

• 58:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, T-Mac had played three years in the league though, right?

• 58:53Bill Simmons?

  But he, to me, he looks like a slightly taller T-Mac would be his destiny.

• 58:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, I've been asked a bunch to compare him and I think he's closer to KG than T-Mac.

• 59:03Bill Simmons?

  Interesting.

• 59:04Speaker 01

  In some ways, you know? That's why you look at eras. What if KG had have played in this era? He'd been a three-point shooter, easy.

• 59:12Bill Simmons?

  He would have been a five.

• 59:13Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 59:13Bill Simmons?

  Well, that's why I think with Mobley, I still feel like there's another piece of his career where he's just a center. Cause I don't think, what we think of centers now, I think the biggest advantage for him would be to be the five.

• 59:24Speaker 01

  Well, he actually plays the five. One of the things I think Kenny does a good job of is they start the two guys. And then if you look at the game, they don't play again until the third quarter.

• 59:36Bill Simmons?

  I would just never want to play them together.

• 59:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't like them together.

• 59:40Bill Simmons?

  Advanced metrics with them.

• 59:41Speaker 01

  I, I just don't like it. I, I, I would, I would want more firepower. Uh, cause you gotta fight it. Like, you gotta decide who you are. You know, like if you're gonna be, if you're gonna play both of those guys, then you need to be a great defensive team. You know?

• 59:55Bill Simmons?

  Right. Or you have to be the best rebounding team in the league.

• 59:58Speaker 01

  Exactly. And if you can play one of those guys, you can be a great offensive team. And if I got James and Donovan, I'm gonna go the offensive route. You still gotta play defense because you can't win a title doing one. You know, the last, what, 30 years, if I had to be in the top 10 in both, in the top five in one. So you, you gotta do both.

• 1:00:17Bill Simmons?

  He's on my trade list.

• 1:00:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:19Bill Simmons?

  Just because I think that team.

• 1:00:21Speaker 01

  Allen?

• 1:00:22Bill Simmons?

  No, I think, I think Mobley because.

• 1:00:26Speaker 01

  I think if they traded one, it would be the other.

• 1:00:28Bill Simmons?

  I'm not reporting that. I'm just saying that, like, that's a guy if I'm another team.

• 1:00:32Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:00:33Bill Simmons?

  And I'm making a list of like, who do you think we could get?

• 1:00:36Speaker 01

  Actually, either one of their babes can help teams, so.

• 1:00:39Bill Simmons?

  The problem with Allen is they extended him.

• 1:00:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:42Bill Simmons?

  I don't want to pay a center 30 a year that's not a.

• 1:00:45Speaker 01

  When you make a trade, the numbers, you can't make a bad trade anymore, Bill. It ruins your team.

• 1:00:50Bill Simmons?

  Well, that's the Allen thing.

• 1:00:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:52Bill Simmons?

  All right, so we don't think he's a top five center.

• 1:00:55Speaker 01

  He's right there.

• 1:00:57Bill Simmons?

  He's above average.

• 1:00:58Speaker 01

  He's not as good as Joel.

• 1:01:00Bill Simmons?

  He's not a, I don't think he's a top five center.

• 1:01:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay.

• 1:01:02Bill Simmons?

  I don't want to pay any center that's not Jokic, Embiid, whoever, more than 25 million a year.

• 1:01:09Speaker 01

  You can't pay anyone anymore. The, the days of you being the second best player. And so the, the, the days of he's not a max player, but he's in a max player situation are gone. If you're not a max player, you're just not a max player.

• 1:01:25Bill Simmons?

  Was that, is that Chet?

• 1:01:28Speaker 01

  Uh, it could have been.

• 1:01:29Bill Simmons?

  Cause I feel like Chet's right on that fringe of you might be making too much money.

• 1:01:32Speaker 01

  He's so young.

• 1:01:33Bill Simmons?

  He's hurt three times in five years.

• 1:01:35Speaker 01

  That's what I'm worried about. I'm worried about his injuries, you know?

• 1:01:38Bill Simmons?

  And then Franz, it's, Franz is over 40.

• 1:01:40Speaker 01

  Same thing.

• 1:01:41Bill Simmons?

  Franz can't shoot.

• 1:01:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, the, the, the Magic, that's another team when you look at like chemistry.

• 1:01:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I don't like the.

• 1:01:47Speaker 01

  I don't like how they fit right now. Uh, they have these injuries too. I mean, they're injured, they're injured every year.

• 1:01:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, why is that?

• 1:01:55Speaker 01

  So I don't know, but.

• 1:01:56Bill Simmons?

  You're near Orlando. It's nice and happy in Orlando. The sun's out. There's golf courses.

• 1:02:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is nice. It is nice. Uh, my whole theory with this injury stuff is, um, and I believe it, and I've said it for three years now, four years. If you don't play basketball, you're gonna get injured, period. And I'm, I'm not changing from that.

• 1:02:17Bill Simmons?

  So you're talking about the training camps aren't long enough?

• 1:02:20Speaker 01

  Nothing's enough.

• 1:02:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:22Speaker 01

  It's, they.

• 1:02:23Bill Simmons?

  There's no practice.

• 1:02:24Speaker 01

  There's no practice time, Bill. Like, before the year, when you get your schedule, the coaches map out the whole season. Oh, man, this is gonna be a great practice day in the middle of the season. We have two days off. You get to that day. You, you, you schedule all your stuff, you're excited, and then about an hour before practice, the science guys come in. All right, um, he's out, he's out, he's out. He can run.

• 1:02:50Bill Simmons?

  Science guys, where do they come out of a van?

• 1:02:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's what it feels like. Yeah. You know, your whole team that, you know, you have some, uh, he can run, but no contact. He can do contact for 20 minutes, but no one-on-one physical contact. And you're sitting there like.

• 1:03:06Bill Simmons?

  So this wasn't happening with Cliff Levingston and Antoine Carr?

• 1:03:09Speaker 01

  No. Can you imagine Mike Fratello? You know, the greatest, the greatest Mike Fratello one. Someone asked me about Mike Fratello. I said, my favorite Mike Fratello story is, he had heard about strength coaches.

• 1:03:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:21Speaker 01

  This is now my first eight years. There was no strength coaches until I got traded.

• 1:03:26Bill Simmons?

  Assistant coach, no strength coach.

• 1:03:27Speaker 01

  I had Willis Reed and Brendan Ser, Ronnie Rothstein.

• 1:03:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:31Speaker 01

  You know, so Mike decides, we're training camp, going into a camp, he's gonna get a strength coach. And I'm like, okay. So the first day, the guy has these jump ropes out and we jump and rope. And then he wants his lay on the floor. All of a sudden, the whistle blows. It's Mike Fratello saying, hey, get the F out of here.

• 1:03:56Bill Simmons?

  That was it. Strength coach fired?

• 1:03:58Speaker 01

  It lasted literally.

• 1:04:00Bill Simmons?

  Oh, my God.

• 1:04:01Speaker 01

  40 seconds, 40 minutes, I mean, 20 minutes and the guy was gone. I never saw him again. And I was like, yeah.

• 1:04:09Bill Simmons?

  Death of the strength coach.

• 1:04:10Speaker 01

  Cause he could see us laying on the floor. You know, the guy has got.

• 1:04:13Bill Simmons?

  You're getting sleepy.

• 1:04:14Speaker 01

  We're like, what? This is, uh, and, and strength coaches are important. Don't get me wrong, but that was funny. It's just now, they do all this loading stuff, all this stuff, but they don't play basketball. And you can't mock basketball. You can't. You gotta play it.

• 1:04:33Bill Simmons?

  I had a whole thing I did on Tuesday about the schedule and, cause Kurt Goldsberry for us were a really good piece about how the league's getting younger.

• 1:04:40Speaker 01

  It's getting younger.

• 1:04:42Bill Simmons?

  The old guys and just the shelf life of players. It's now starting younger and it's really ending younger.

• 1:04:47Speaker 01

  It's because of the two-way though. That's why it's getting younger.

• 1:04:49Bill Simmons?

  We talked about that. There's a two-way.

• 1:04:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:51Bill Simmons?

  It's easier to have a guy making 800, 10,000 versus 4 million.

• 1:04:54Speaker 01

  Bring down to the G League. It's so much easier to run your team financially that way. It's not necessarily good for your team if you're trying to win.

• 1:05:02Bill Simmons?

  It's not good for a coach.

• 1:05:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:03Bill Simmons?

  Cause you have all these young guys you gotta take care of. But, um, we were talking about different things with the schedule and how much. I think basketball's harder. Our friend Eddie Johnson, furious, I went on their show yesterday furious at me. Thinks it's gotta stay 82 games.

• 1:05:20Speaker 01

  I'm, I'm.

• 1:05:20Bill Simmons?

  It was just as hard when we played in the 80s.

• 1:05:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't buy all that stuff. It, it was just as hard. Travel was even harder.

• 1:05:27Bill Simmons?

  Well, that, so you had travel was harder, the eating habits were terrible, all that stuff.

• 1:05:31Speaker 01

  Flew commercial and, and the biggest thing that was harder was the floors. No one talked about that. Our floors were, it was laid on cement.

• 1:05:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:38Speaker 01

  The floors are like springboards now. So, so a lot of things that are better.

• 1:05:44Speaker 01

  I think the training was harder, which was better.

• 1:05:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, cause like Bill Fitch would have these famous practices where he'd run these guys three days.

• 1:05:52Speaker 01

  I played for Pat Riley.

• 1:05:53Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:54Speaker 01

  Okay, like, when I got traded to the Knicks, I was at UCLA.

• 1:05:58Bill Simmons?

  But you got hurt playing for Pat Riley.

• 1:05:59Speaker 01

  I did, well, the second year, but when I got traded to the Knicks, I remember Magic and Byron and James, we were at UCLA playing pickup games. Think about it. That's what we did all summer. Uh, and they were laughing. It's like, oh, you done. You are done. Your legs are done.

• 1:06:17Bill Simmons?

  That's what happened to James Worthy. His career was done in 12 years.

• 1:06:20Speaker 01

  Because Magic, Rouse was the extreme of it at that point.

• 1:06:25Bill Simmons?

  Like a drill sergeant.

• 1:06:26Speaker 01

  And they were right. Like, I was, those practices were, we practiced every day.

• 1:06:30Bill Simmons?

  All right, so what's the middle ground of this? Cause I agree with you.

• 1:06:33Speaker 01

  The middle ground is a little bit longer preseason. Um, not games, practice. Let them play, let them scrimmage, let them play more basketball. And if you're gonna have these practices, you can't have a bunch of guys in white coats over there telling you. They can't play. They have to play more basketball. The second part is the scheduling. I think we've hurt ourself by doing every other game. Every other day. Again, there's no practice times. I, let's add a couple more back to backs. Uh, and that's crazy.

• 1:07:08Bill Simmons?

  This is great. A pro back to back? I've never heard that.

• 1:07:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:12Bill Simmons?

  Unbelievable argument.

• 1:07:13Speaker 01

  Home and home back to backs.

• 1:07:14Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 1:07:15Speaker 01

  Try to add more home and home back to backs. And the reason you're doing that is because now.

• 1:07:19Bill Simmons?

  Because now you can practice in the office.

• 1:07:21Speaker 01

  You're giving more off time.

• 1:07:22Bill Simmons?

  Uh. So you're saying like when you played Monday, like the Celtics played Monday in Houston. Then Wednesday at home.

• 1:07:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, no.

• 1:07:29Bill Simmons?

  So you can't practice, you're flying back, you're not practicing Tuesday. Now it's just game, game.

• 1:07:33Speaker 01

  It's just game, game. And you go a month in some of the schedule, whereas every other day.

• 1:07:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:39Speaker 01

  It's just, there's nothing. There's no recovery. There's no practice.

• 1:07:42Bill Simmons?

  So the league thinks they're helping the players with the day off.

• 1:07:45Speaker 01

  I think it's backfiring. I think if you added a back, a home and home, if you can do that somehow, figure out how to add a couple of home and home back to backs. Cause that's, that one team's, and then, uh, the team that's coming in on the second game is not playing a back to back. You are, but you're home and home. So it's no advantage either way. Um.

• 1:08:02Bill Simmons?

  I like this. So you would stay at 82?

• 1:08:05Speaker 01

  I would. And, and I just think it can be done. I just.

• 1:08:08Bill Simmons?

  Well, you like money though. You'd want to make the most money if you're playing and coaching. Right.

• 1:08:12Speaker 01

  If you go back to when all these guys came in the league, all this, you know, load management. Just go back and look. Injuries didn't go down.

• 1:08:23Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:08:24Speaker 01

  They've gone up.

• 1:08:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. So why?

• 1:08:26Speaker 01

  Because then that, the guys aren't playing enough basketball.

• 1:08:29Bill Simmons?

  Do you like my, my sneaker theory?

• 1:08:32Bill Simmons?

  The low tops are actually maybe not a good idea?

• 1:08:36Speaker 01

  Well, I was a pro low top guy.

• 1:08:38Bill Simmons?

  Okay. So that's, but you did tear your ACL.

• 1:08:41Speaker 01

  I tore my ACL. I sprained my ankle all the time. I just didn't like high tops and I was forced to wear them. I wore them half my career. I couldn't stand them. Uh, I used to think this little piece of leather is not going to stop me from spraining my ankle. Yeah.

• 1:08:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:55Speaker 01

  And, and when you got older, Bill, you needed every little bit of leather off of you.

• 1:08:59Bill Simmons?

  Right, right.

• 1:09:00Speaker 01

  You needed every, that was too heavy. Uh, yeah, I don't know. I've heard the shoe thing too, uh, a bunch that.

• 1:09:06Bill Simmons?

  People say the, the arch isn't high enough anymore. It's too much pressure.

• 1:09:10Speaker 01

  I have Chuck Taylors on. You know, now I didn't play in Chuck Taylors, but they're flat. You know, I don't know the whole, I'm not smart enough to know that. I just know if you're going to be good at something and you, you want to be better at it. You gotta do it. You can't mock it.

• 1:09:27Bill Simmons?

  If we went to 70 games and you had more time to practice between games.

• 1:09:31Speaker 01

  It would be awesome. It wouldn't hurt.

• 1:09:34Bill Simmons?

  You don't think that would make the league better though?

• 1:09:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, it may. It may. I'm not, I'm not against that. I just think you could still do 82 and, and do it well too. Uh.

• 1:09:43Bill Simmons?

  Would you do it where it's 82, but nobody's allowed to play more than 70?

• 1:09:49Speaker 01

  Oh, you mean players?

• 1:09:50Bill Simmons?

  But max amount of games you can play is 70, but the season's 82.

• 1:09:54Speaker 01

  I would either do a 70 game schedule, uh, but then guys got to play 70.

• 1:09:58Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 1:09:59Speaker 01

  You know, uh, I just think we're miss, I, I think. Where I think the players struggle now is execution, learning how to play together.

• 1:10:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:11Speaker 01

  And that's because how can they?

• 1:10:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, and then the rosters are changing so much every year.

• 1:10:15Speaker 01

  Change every year.

• 1:10:16Bill Simmons?

  Look at that Milwaukee team. Those guys are thrown together this year.

• 1:10:19Speaker 01

  Guys don't play long enough, uh, don't practice enough. Um, yeah, I think we would see a better brand of basketball if they had more time on the floor, working on it. Into the game plays would be amazing. Uh, defenses would be great. I, I, I think every coach would, would sign up for that.

• 1:10:37Bill Simmons?

  All right. Since you're going to be on a lot this year, I have a, I have a couple of quick games for you. Just either or is. Max or Kade? You could have one or the other for the next five years.

• 1:10:49Speaker 01

  Well, it's unfair because I love Maxie.

• 1:10:51Bill Simmons?

  I know.

• 1:10:51Speaker 01

  I just love the kid. Now, if I took the, the love of Maxie, K's just bigger. I'm always going with size.

• 1:11:00Bill Simmons?

  I think that's the right answer.

• 1:11:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:02Bill Simmons?

  And yet, I'm so impressed with Maxie.

• 1:11:05Speaker 01

  Uh.

• 1:11:06Bill Simmons?

  I love how he just gets his, I was talking to Tolan about this last night. He just gets his stats. He'll have eight points in the fourth quarter, but he'll, he'll go on those maxi runs and he'll get 12 points in two minutes.

• 1:11:18Speaker 01

  I agree, but in Bill, you're right. He didn't get them.

• 1:11:20Bill Simmons?

  I'm not saying he's chasing him. I'm just saying he ends up with the stats.

• 1:11:24Speaker 01

  They ever looked like he's trying to get them. Maxie is, Maxie didn't know what he has in the game. That's what I love about him.

• 1:11:31Bill Simmons?

  Right. You don't see him doing that.

• 1:11:32Speaker 01

  If you asked him how many points he had, he would, I don't know.

• 1:11:37Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:37Speaker 01

  Like, I love guys like that.

• 1:11:39Bill Simmons?

  I love guys where I think they have like 15 points and they have 29.

• 1:11:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, those are the smooth.

• 1:11:45Bill Simmons?

  You have 29?

• 1:11:46Speaker 01

  Those are the smooth guys.

• 1:11:47Bill Simmons?

  I'm at this game.

• 1:11:48Speaker 01

  There's a lot of guys, really good players like that.

• 1:11:52Bill Simmons?

  Who would you keep out of Palo versus Franz?

• 1:11:55Speaker 01

  Palo, probably. Um, yeah, I just talking to someone about that and yeah, probably because. I like the way Franz plays better than the, the way Paulo plays.

• 1:12:10Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:12:10Speaker 01

  Because he's a downhill, quick decision player. I do think, uh, Pablo is just more skilled. You know, um, he can do more things and.

• 1:12:22Bill Simmons?

  Palo's the right answer.

• 1:12:23Speaker 01

  Yeah. And if you needed a, he has a, I always look at like, who can close the game better?

• 1:12:29Bill Simmons?

  Would you keep both?

• 1:12:30Speaker 01

  No, no.

• 1:12:32Bill Simmons?

  I wouldn't either.

• 1:12:32Speaker 01

  I, I think, I said that last year, like the, uh, this summer, I was shocked. They didn't do anything. You know, I just thought that they would move one. Uh, and you know what's so funny? It doesn't mean that one's not a good player. It's just players don't fit sometimes and you're trying to build a great team. And to me, it's, it's a team, um, that doesn't fit. Now here's the only problem. How do we know? They haven't played together much.

• 1:13:00Bill Simmons?

  Right. One of them's always hurt.

• 1:13:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. It'd be nice for them to have a 20 game run together and see what they actually could do. They just have never done that.

• 1:13:10Bill Simmons?

  The Chicago Bears.

• 1:13:12Speaker 01

  Come on now. It's, I, you know, someone just made a comment. Uh, it's, Chicago's a Bears town. And that's not taken away from any team, the Cubs.

• 1:13:24Bill Simmons?

  It's a Bears town that had a decade and a half long Michael Jordan cameo.

• 1:13:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, but still, still was a Bears town.

• 1:13:29Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:13:30Speaker 01

  In 85.

• 1:13:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:32Speaker 01

  Come on. Like, uh, they are a joy to watch. Right? And, and this is what I would say. Ben Johnson's a phenomenal coach.

• 1:13:41Bill Simmons?

  You've been a Bears fan your whole life.

• 1:13:42Speaker 01

  My whole life. Yeah. This is straight.

• 1:13:43Bill Simmons?

  From Chicago.

• 1:13:44Speaker 01

  This is straight emotional heart. But I will say this. Caleb, I wasn't sure about. And I was sure about his talent. I wasn't sure about his leadership.

• 1:13:55Bill Simmons?

  It was like one of those NBA young guys where you're like, is this guy happy or not?

• 1:13:59Speaker 01

  And I think his relationship, uh, with the GM, his relationship with the coach. Uh, I think he's aware that USC, they felt like he was an individualist. Always talked about I, I, I myself, myself, myself.

• 1:14:20Bill Simmons?

  Hmm.

• 1:14:21Speaker 01

  Uh, stood out individually. He always did things to bring attention to himself. And I think he's been made aware of that. And he's actually trying to do something about that.

• 1:14:31Bill Simmons?

  You know, when I first noticed that, when they, when they signed Bajin to the extension like a year plus ago? And Ben Johnson was, just went out of his way to talk about what an awesome teammate he is, a leader, and this is what you need at this position. And it felt like he was.

• 1:14:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:14:47Bill Simmons?

  Code talking to Caleb. Like this guy, the way he behaves, I want you to do, but he never said Caleb's name.

• 1:14:52Speaker 01

  You could see it. Like even Caleb catches himself now. He actually, uh, after they beat Seattle, which was a beautiful game.

• 1:15:01Bill Simmons?

  It really was.

• 1:15:01Speaker 01

  Uh, he started, he was saying, man, one thing I like, I, and then mid-sentence.

• 1:15:06Bill Simmons?

  Caught himself.

• 1:15:07Speaker 01

  He starts saying we.

• 1:15:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:08Speaker 01

  And I was like, oh, he's aware of it. He's trying. And I think his teammates feel that. They feel like this dude is really trying to, to be with us.

• 1:15:17Bill Simmons?

  I didn't tell you this, but after they beat the Pats and I was in Boston, I just went on, I bet them to win the Super Bowl.

• 1:15:24Speaker 01

  I hope you're right.

• 1:15:25Bill Simmons?

  Cause I, and now they're like the most popular Super Bowl pick. The odds have dropped. They're like eight to one now. But, you know, they won and it was all the Pats and Drake threw this dumb pick. And I was like, we played well.

• 1:15:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:37Bill Simmons?

  Like, we played really well in that game. They beat us. So that really.

• 1:15:40Speaker 01

  They've won some impressive games.

• 1:15:42Bill Simmons?

  And then they kicked Seattle's ass too.

• 1:15:44Speaker 01

  Uh, this is the craziest statement. They have to learn how to beat the Packers.

• 1:15:48Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:15:48Speaker 01

  I'm telling you, like last year.

• 1:15:50Bill Simmons?

  With like a baggage rival.

• 1:15:51Speaker 01

  We won two miracle.

• 1:15:53Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:53Speaker 01

  Games. But if you look at both of those games, the Packers outplayed us throughout. Now this year, Caleb was out, hurt. But they just, they went up and down the field on us like no other. We, that's the last demon to me. The Bears have to figure out a way of just beating the Packers head to head, straight up, both teams play their best. Right now, they haven't done that.

• 1:16:14Bill Simmons?

  Well, he got Dennis Allen's kind of his tips.

• 1:16:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:16:17Bill Simmons?

  Cause when they played us and they had these, they're doing the Flores thing. They got all the guys up. Some guys are coming in and. I don't know. I, I thought it was hard. Now they got Simmons.

• 1:16:26Speaker 01

  Simmons is huge because they do like playing a lot of one-on-one.

• 1:16:29Bill Simmons?

  Right. So now they can have four man rush.

• 1:16:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:16:31Bill Simmons?

  Then they can also do the blitz thing.

• 1:16:33Speaker 01

  And they, and then get Swift back too. Like, so it's funny. They're adding to their defense.

• 1:16:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:39Speaker 01

  You know, one from injury, guys getting healthy and two, that, come on, that trade. I mean, that's, that's.

• 1:16:45Bill Simmons?

  Hey, you give up two firsts, but they're the end of the first round. You have absolutely loaded juggernaut.

• 1:16:50Speaker 01

  The thing I hate about this whole, uh, draft capital first, well, you're not getting them for free.

• 1:16:56Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:56Speaker 01

  So you traded a 26 round pick, a first round and a second round for the third best defense type, like. Yeah.

• 1:17:07Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:17:07Speaker 01

  Even, you're not, no matter if you kept those picks or not, you're not getting better than what you got.

• 1:17:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, you're also getting a guy that's never been to a Super Bowl.

• 1:17:14Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:17:15Bill Simmons?

  Who's one of a beloved teammate.

• 1:17:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:17:17Bill Simmons?

  You know, it's a little Reggie way Packers-ish. Just like a whiff.

• 1:17:20Speaker 01

  And a good chemistry guy. Cause they loved him. You know, they loved him in Tennessee.

• 1:17:26Bill Simmons?

  Um, I wish you luck with the Bears. I'm rooting for you. Didn't they sort of White Sox run too?

• 1:17:31Speaker 01

  White Sox was the most fun baseball team. Can I say this about the Brewers by the way? The most well-coached, together team. They were like fundamentals, like.

• 1:17:45Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:45Speaker 01

  Forget all these analytic numbers. They played baseball like the old fashioned way. They granted you. They were down in half the games.

• 1:17:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:55Speaker 01

  In the playoffs and they won. And you thought they were still going to win. You actually knew.

• 1:17:59Bill Simmons?

  It was impressive.

• 1:18:00Speaker 01

  It was impressive.

• 1:18:03Bill Simmons?

  I wanted to do, cause you're coming on a lot this year.

• 1:18:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:06Bill Simmons?

  We're, and every podcast with the Doc story. That hopefully will get cut out as a YouTube clip and people will be like, holy shit, I can't believe that story.

• 1:18:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:14Bill Simmons?

  I think you have to tell the OJ Simpson story.

• 1:18:17Speaker 01

  Oh, wow. Yeah. You know, the relationship part.

• 1:18:22Bill Simmons?

  I mean, there's a couple of different stories. I don't know which one you want to tell.

• 1:18:25Speaker 01

  Well, I knew.

• 1:18:26Bill Simmons?

  But I think you have to tell the OJ story, cause you, so you come, you come to play for the Clippers.

• 1:18:30Speaker 01

  I come to play for the Clippers.

• 1:18:31Bill Simmons?

  You're the most interesting year of all time when you're on the Clipper.

• 1:18:34Speaker 01

  We had the riots.

• 1:18:36Bill Simmons?

  And you, you, you become friends with all these celebrities, including OJ Simpson.

• 1:18:40Speaker 01

  OJ and I, Marcus Allen, Al Collins, we would go to the Brentwood Market over there. Uh, I don't know what it's called now, but, uh, we had lunch all the time. Like I had, I bet I had 20 lunches with him on game days. You know, he loved lunch at 12. That's when I had lunch, right after shoot around and we would have lunch. And then my, my ex father-in-law, uh, we had dinner, uh, at the Ivy. And OJ and Al Collins walk in, they join us into my, you know, after the whole murder thing, my father-in-law until his dying days. That was still like one of his greatest stories.

• 1:19:18Bill Simmons?

  Oh, that, that, that he got to meet these guys?

• 1:19:20Speaker 01

  Then I had dinner with OJ and Al Collins.

• 1:19:22Bill Simmons?

  But this was pre everything?

• 1:19:24Speaker 01

  This was pre murder and then, no, but no, then the murder and he's still, my father-in-law's still alive.

• 1:19:29Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:19:29Speaker 01

  So he's telling everybody.

• 1:19:30Bill Simmons?

  Still defending him.

• 1:19:31Speaker 01

  I know Al, I know Al, I know Al. He's a great guy. And then the craziest one, and David Robinson, Benny down there, girl. Uh, and, uh, I'm missing somebody, uh, Avery Johnson. Uh, we were at dinner on Montana Avenue. This is when OJ was in prison.

• 1:19:50Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:19:51Speaker 01

  And Al Collins is in the restaurant and he walks over to the table to say hi. I saw him. I didn't even know what to do. Like, and do I go say hi? You know?

• 1:20:00Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Cause you'd had like 30 lunches and dinners with him, right?

• 1:20:03Speaker 01

  But it's kind of.

• 1:20:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. What do you do?

• 1:20:05Speaker 01

  I haven't seen him since, you know, it was, it was, so anyway, he comes over to say hi and he said, hey, uh, I'd love you to talk to OJ. And I'm like, what? And I said, no, I'm, I'm good. And I, I was telling you guys, I, I walk away from that and we were talking about it in the car. Could you talk to OJ? Did he have a phone? Do you have a cell? How could I talk to him?

• 1:20:29Bill Simmons?

  So you think he had a cell phone?

• 1:20:30Speaker 01

  I do. I think he had access to talk to people.

• 1:20:34Bill Simmons?

  And Al Collins wanted you to just call, call the juice.

• 1:20:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:38Bill Simmons?

  Be like, hey, it's Doc.

• 1:20:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, just.

• 1:20:40Bill Simmons?

  Just check it in.

• 1:20:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I was like, nah, I'm, I'm good. I'm not doing that. So, but it was really strange, you know?

• 1:20:48Bill Simmons?

  So Brentwood Country Bar, it's you, Al Cowling, OJ?

• 1:20:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:53Bill Simmons?

  And who's the fourth?

• 1:20:53Speaker 01

  And then Marcus should join. Not as much. Well, Marcus should have joined three or four times, you know, cause him and OJ at that time were very close.

• 1:21:00Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:21:00Speaker 01

  So, uh, and it's crazy. All of a sudden, all this OJ stuff, I mean Larry's story is hilarious.

• 1:21:07Bill Simmons?

  Right. The day of.

• 1:21:09Speaker 01

  The day of the murders, he saw him at Riviera, you know, and, and you know, it's not a joke, but you can joke. And he said, I should have asked him to play another 18. None of this would have happened, you know? So yeah, it's crazy.

• 1:21:23Bill Simmons?

  Speaking of Larry, we'll end on this. Um, did it, did it get resolved at the club that Larry just left after nine holes? What was the fallout from that?

• 1:21:32Speaker 01

  It's still a fallout.

• 1:21:32Bill Simmons?

  Is ESPN going to cover it? Like, how does this play out?

• 1:21:35Speaker 01

  I think there should be some conversation, live conversation about that. He believes he did the right thing.

• 1:21:41Bill Simmons?

  So it's a foursome ahead.

• 1:21:42Speaker 01

  Two foursomes, we play every Saturday and Sunday.

• 1:21:44Bill Simmons?

  One foursome's ahead, one's behind. He's in the foursome behind, doesn't like how he's playing.

• 1:21:49Speaker 01

  But the problem is there's a bet.

• 1:21:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:51Speaker 01

  There's always a bet. The, uh, two best balls of the group. If one guy jumps out.

• 1:21:57Bill Simmons?

  It screws up the bet.

• 1:21:58Speaker 01

  It screws up the bet. And Larry was having a horrendous round, which we all do in golf.

• 1:22:04Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:22:04Speaker 01

  And Larry thought his round was worse than anybody else's, is the way I looked at it.

• 1:22:09Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:10Speaker 01

  And he, he said, uh, all right, I'm done. And I wasn't there, thank God that day, because, uh, I got all the texts and there were guys, they were pissed. Like you can't quit. You messed up the bet. And so the group and Frank got upset and said, bet's off.

• 1:22:27Bill Simmons?

  So we need to start a judge show.

• 1:22:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:22:30Bill Simmons?

  With a judge where golf, golf grievances come in and the judge decides on the golf grievances.

• 1:22:36Speaker 01

  Golf grievance show, you would be here for hours. There's so many things that happen on a course with grown men arguing. It's unbelievable.

• 1:22:44Bill Simmons?

  I love it. Well, he's tried to capture some of it on Curb Your Enthusiasm.

• 1:22:47Speaker 01

  He really did.

• 1:22:47Bill Simmons?

  He had multiple storylines.

• 1:22:49Speaker 01

  Maybe too well sometimes.

• 1:22:52Bill Simmons?

  All right, Doc, I'll see you in a couple of weeks.

• 1:22:53Speaker 01

  See you in a couple of weeks.

• 1:22:54Bill Simmons?

  I think we covered everything.

• 1:22:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. Good, good start to the league though.

• 1:22:56Bill Simmons?

  Good start.

• 1:22:57Speaker 01

  Really good start.

• 1:22:58Bill Simmons?

  Good to have you back in my podcast life.

• 1:22:59Speaker 01

  Well, we didn't talk about Oklahoma, which is sad, you know?

• 1:23:02Bill Simmons?

  Oh, we didn't?

• 1:23:03Speaker 01

  No, that's.

• 1:23:04Bill Simmons?

  Well, you know my take. I think they're going to be fine. The Jalen Williams thing sucks. They're going to replace the minutes for every, though I, I'm not counting them out yet.

• 1:23:12Speaker 01

  I'm not counting them out. They're going to be right there. You know why? Uh, but if, if they get to three minutes in a game, they're winning. They got the best closer in the NBA.

• 1:23:21Bill Simmons?

  And the three guard lineup that they, they're kind of have to play now, it's still pretty hard to defend.

• 1:23:26Speaker 01

  But they, they are not good, as good defensively. Like you can't lose those guys and trade Lu Dort.

• 1:23:33Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:23:33Speaker 01

  And think you're going to be a better team.

• 1:23:35Bill Simmons?

  Well, they actually traded Lu Dort because they didn't feel like he was Lu Dort anymore.

• 1:23:39Speaker 01

  Well, he can make shots. You know, he's such a liability on offense.

• 1:23:41Bill Simmons?

  He hurt them last year.

• 1:23:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. He, he hurt them.

• 1:23:44Bill Simmons?

  So they lose on defense, obviously.

• 1:23:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:46Bill Simmons?

  But I do think offensively, they can patch it together until April. They get two of the guys back.

• 1:23:51Speaker 01

  And McCain gets to play the role he wants to play anyway.

• 1:23:53Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:23:53Speaker 01

  Cause as they said in Philly, he's shooting it.

• 1:23:57Bill Simmons?

  By the way, we didn't, we didn't talk about Wemby having 52, 28 and.

• 1:24:02Speaker 01

  Greatest stat line.

• 1:24:02Bill Simmons?

  Whatever, whatever, with the Wilt storyline.

• 1:24:04Speaker 01

  It's a Wilt Chamberlain stat line.

• 1:24:07Bill Simmons?

  Did you watch that game?

• 1:24:08Speaker 01

  I watched the second half. Come on. It's.

• 1:24:12Bill Simmons?

  Flag was psyched out. I zipped through it when I got home from the Clipper game.

• 1:24:15Speaker 01

  Did you see when he blocked one flag?

• 1:24:16Bill Simmons?

  When he had to block the three guys in a row?

• 1:24:18Speaker 01

  Yeah. And the first one, flag, that was a floater.

• 1:24:21Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:24:22Speaker 01

  From the elbow. Wemby came from under the basket. You could see Flag like shaking his head. Like he, you know, like when you get hit and you're trying to get the cop with, he was basically out of hell.

• 1:24:34Bill Simmons?

  When you, when you coached against Wemby, did you have to like tell your guys like, hey, this now doesn't work?

• 1:24:41Speaker 01

  No, you don't have to tell them.

• 1:24:42Bill Simmons?

  They just know. They're instinctively scared.

• 1:24:45Speaker 01

  In the league, no other player in the league that there's an awareness of where he's at than Wemby.

• 1:24:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:51Speaker 01

  I mean, he, he had guys, I, I don't know who it was, one of our guards pump faked a three-point shot.

• 1:24:58Bill Simmons?

  Wow.

• 1:24:59Speaker 01

  Tells you. And there was.

• 1:25:00Bill Simmons?

  So you played against Manute and Mark Eaton were probably the closest to this.

• 1:25:04Speaker 01

  Yeah. You know, it's funny.

• 1:25:05Bill Simmons?

  But Mark Eaton was two inches shorter.

• 1:25:06Speaker 01

  Yeah. Manute was interesting, more like Wemby, uh, in fact, and, um, there were so many times where I, I could see Manute at the free throw line. I have whoever beat.

• 1:25:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. He, but you know, he's behind you.

• 1:25:19Speaker 01

  But I didn't think he can get to it.

• 1:25:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:21Speaker 01

  I thought I was fast enough and somehow bam. And you were always shocked. Like, how did he get that? That's what's going on with Wemby.

• 1:25:28Bill Simmons?

  I feel like if we had advanced metrics in the late eighties, Manute would have played 35 minutes a game.

• 1:25:33Speaker 01

  Oh my gosh.

• 1:25:34Bill Simmons?

  I think they would have realized what an absolute asset he was.

• 1:25:37Speaker 01

  He was so disruptive. I couldn't wait till he went to the bench.

• 1:25:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. I don't, I just don't think people knew because it was so odd to watch.

• 1:25:44Speaker 01

  All you know as a player, you did not enjoy playing against Washington. You didn't want to play against them. You knew it was going to be, especially me. I wasn't a great shooter. So I needed to drive.

• 1:25:53Bill Simmons?

  Right. I thought he was pretty good. Yeah. This one, so you would say Wemby versus Luca for MVP?

• 1:26:00Speaker 01

  That's right now.

• 1:26:02Bill Simmons?

  But who would you, who would you lean toward? Cause if Luca's going to go 38 a game the rest of the year.

• 1:26:08Speaker 01

  I just think we discount defense too much. I agree with what Wemby said.

• 1:26:12Bill Simmons?

  And the fear of somebody.

• 1:26:13Speaker 01

  Last year.

• 1:26:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:14Speaker 01

  Like he was, Wemby was top three MVP last year offensively.

• 1:26:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:21Speaker 01

  And no one counted the defense part. I think the voters dismissed the defense too much.

• 1:26:26Bill Simmons?

  I thought about it. I just didn't feel like he played enough.

• 1:26:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, he didn't. He didn't. The right guy won. Uh, the right guy won. Um, I don't think, uh, we've heard the last of Joker. I'm telling you. I worry, I'm worried. Like.

• 1:26:41Bill Simmons?

  I tried to reverse jinx it on Tuesday. I talked about how I felt like Apex Joker was finally gone. Cause he's just not making threes anymore.

• 1:26:47Speaker 01

  No, he's, in last year and a half now, he's struggled from the three-point line. Um, and I worry about him. They're, they're, you know, they're, they're an interesting team. They're not playing well. Um.

• 1:26:59Bill Simmons?

  What, but what's weird is Murray's playing great.

• 1:27:01Speaker 01

  Yeah. I wouldn't want to play them in the playoffs. I mean, they almost beat Oklahoma game seven, you know?

• 1:27:09Bill Simmons?

  They're not going to beat anybody if he's not making threes anymore.

• 1:27:12Speaker 01

  No, he needs to get back.

• 1:27:13Bill Simmons?

  I just think people play five feet off of him.

• 1:27:15Speaker 01

  Uh, he does, he's, he's a freak. Uh, but him shooting threes changes the game.

• 1:27:21Bill Simmons?

  I'm not counting them out.

• 1:27:21Speaker 01

  That's why Wemby is so good. As good as Wemby is, and one thing I'll say that they've added, he's added. The shot he missed against the Knicks was the right shot. You remember they ran the pick and roll?

• 1:27:32Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:33Speaker 01

  They threw it to him on the elbow. That was his bread and butter. He just missed it. He ain't missing that right now.

• 1:27:38Bill Simmons?

  I forgot to ask you during the chemistry convo, the, starting the three guards together seems to be so clearly a, we don't want to make any of these guys mad.

• 1:27:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, probably, but they get along. Like, uh, it's probably the right thing to do too. Like they, they, they have unbelievable chemistry.

• 1:27:53Bill Simmons?

  So I disagree. I don't, I don't, I would not start the three guys together. And I wonder when Tobias comes back. I'd bring Fox off the bench.

• 1:28:01Speaker 01

  Oh, you can't. Like Fox has to start to me. I think Fox is way better than we remember. Uh, we, it's hard to knock out of last year.

• 1:28:09Bill Simmons?

  So who do I, who do I?

• 1:28:10Speaker 01

  Yeah. If you, if you start Fox, who do you sit?

• 1:28:15Bill Simmons?

  I

• 1:28:16Speaker 01

  Or do you leave it alone?

• 1:28:17Bill Simmons?

  I can't sit castle.

• 1:28:19Speaker 01

  No, that's

• 1:28:19Bill Simmons?

  So now I have to make Harper my sixth man, but they clearly did this because he didn't want to. They didn't want him to be a six man.

• 1:28:25Speaker 01

  Absolutely wanted to start. Well, I thought it would have been a problem he had and I don't. I think he he's, I think that team is is

• 1:28:33Bill Simmons?

  You know what I would do if I was running San Antonio? I would do like a two hour McHale, all the great six men and just give it to Harper and be like, look, it's your two.

• 1:28:42Speaker 01

  Well, I've tried that. I've shown that I

• 1:28:44Bill Simmons?

  Doesn't work?

• 1:28:45Speaker 01

  It does with some, you know, like I had Jamal and Lou Williams. They wanted to come off.

• 1:28:50Bill Simmons?

  Can't you just do the, hey, it's who finishes the game that matters?

• 1:28:53Speaker 01

  He got pissed when you wanted to start him.

• 1:28:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:55Speaker 01

  You know, he was great. So, but it is tough when you, and, and really like one of Brett's genius things was he realized it's not the best five players should start.

• 1:29:05Bill Simmons?

  Right. It's whoever's finishing.

• 1:29:07Speaker 01

  Yeah. He needs the, one of the top three players to come off the bench.

• 1:29:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:13Speaker 01

  And, and that worked. It's just in this generation.

• 1:29:16Bill Simmons?

  Kind of what the Celtics do with Pritchard.

• 1:29:17Speaker 01

  That's exactly right.

• 1:29:18Bill Simmons?

  Best player, but he

• 1:29:19Speaker 01

  Comes off the bench.

• 1:29:20Bill Simmons?

  Comes off the bench.

• 1:29:21Speaker 01

  And they, you know, it's what Indiana in the slow version do with McConnell.

• 1:29:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:25Speaker 01

  You come in, they play a whole different way.

• 1:29:27Bill Simmons?

  I don't like starting the three guards.

• 1:29:29Speaker 01

  I don't mind it. Um, you know, we'll see when Tobias comes back and gets right.

• 1:29:34Bill Simmons?

  32% from three for them this year.

• 1:29:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:36Bill Simmons?

  Which I don't like either.

• 1:29:37Speaker 01

  That, they lost last year because they're not a great shooting team. That's their only Achilles heel is their shooting. If they can make threes, you're not beating the San Antonio Spurs. But you go back in the playoffs, they didn't, they didn't shoot the ball well. And if they don't shoot the ball well, they can't win.

• 1:29:54Bill Simmons?

  Well, this was great. We talked about all the teams.

• 1:29:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:57Bill Simmons?

  We talked about OJ. We talked about the Bears.

• 1:29:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:30:00Bill Simmons?

  And Larry quitting after nine holes.

• 1:30:01Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:30:02Bill Simmons?

  We've covered it up.

• 1:30:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:30:03Bill Simmons?

  I'll see you in a couple of weeks. Thanks for coming up.

• 1:30:05Speaker 01

  This is fun.

• 1:30:06Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by PayPal. The holiday rush is coming and you can get ahead of it with PayPal. Shop your favorite online stores with PayPal this season like eBay for collectibles, Fanatics for team gear, Walmart for tech. Check out the flexibility to pay now or pay later and split your payments with Pay in four with no interest, no late fees. Shop now with PayPal. Paying for subject to approval. Learn more at paypal.com slash paying for PayPal, Inc., NMLS 910457. This episode is brought to you by Viori. When it comes to clothes that score high in both comfort and style, Viori is my MVP. Sunday performance joggers. Oh yeah. They have the perfect, I could watch a game and then go out to dinner vibe.

• 1:30:51Bill Simmons?

  And the meta pant, that's my number one. I need to look like I tried option. Get 20% off your first purchase at Viori.com slash Simmons and discover the versatility of Viori clothing. Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions.

• 1:31:07Bill Simmons?

  All right. Joe House is here. It's Thursday. He had some oral surgery on Monday.

• 1:31:14Speaker 02

  Thank God that that was the word. Yes, I did have oral

• 1:31:17Bill Simmons?

  You're healthy and happy.

• 1:31:19Speaker 02

  I did.

• 1:31:19Bill Simmons?

  Got a tooth fix.

• 1:31:20Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 1:31:22Bill Simmons?

  This is the worst gambling weekend of the year for football with all the terrible quarterbacks. I just can't believe how much crap is happening. Including, we're doing this before Thursday's game with Baltimore's third stringer playing on a Thursday night game against Jacksonville, but you go through, we have Carson Wentz, Gardner Minshew has a job now.

• 1:31:44Speaker 02

  Why not?

• 1:31:46Bill Simmons?

  The Justin Herbert's still playing.

• 1:31:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:31:49Bill Simmons?

  Uh, you go through and it's, we have Drew Locke is in our lives now and he might even be coming up in Ringer 107 for me. Shador Sanders will be playing this weekend.

• 1:31:59Speaker 02

  Speaking of, speaking of guys that might show up.

• 1:32:02Bill Simmons?

  Uh, and Joe Milton among, uh, among many favorites. It's gotten to the point where J.J. McCarthy is not even one of the seven shakiest quarterbacks in the league. And now we believe in J.J. McCarthy.

• 1:32:12Speaker 02

  Not, not an eyebrow raiser in any way, shape or form.

• 1:32:15Bill Simmons?

  I have some, uh, mailbag questions before we get to our picks.

• 1:32:19Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:32:19Bill Simmons?

  This is from Brian Godish. He theorizes that Gardner Minshew is the McRib of NFL quarterbacks.

• 1:32:28Bill Simmons?

  Here's his case. Nobody knows exactly when he or the sandwich returns.

• 1:32:34Bill Simmons?

  When they return, people get over rationally excited. Does that include Joe House?

• 1:32:39Speaker 02

  I've got, absolutely. You kidding me? Mc, the McRib announcement is always like, you know, uh, almost as good as, you know, the announcement, my kid was, was, uh, my wife was pregnant with my kid. Close to that.

• 1:32:52Bill Simmons?

  Weirdly passionate fan base. Joe House belongs to that. Available league wide, nationwide every year. And after two weeks, you remember why Minshew and the sandwich was only available for a limited time.

• 1:33:04Speaker 02

  Well, you only need it for a limited time.

• 1:33:06Bill Simmons?

  It's a two weeker. It's like, oh, I really like Minshew, but you don't want to be going back every Wednesday for the McRib and maybe not Minshew either. I like that. The McRib.

• 1:33:15Speaker 02

  That's a good one.

• 1:33:16Bill Simmons?

  Gardner Minshew, the McRib.

• 1:33:17Speaker 02

  Very good.

• 1:33:18Bill Simmons?

  I remember being in Washington DC once, watching Minshew light somebody up with you.

• 1:33:24Speaker 02

  Oh, I thought you were going to say, uh, watching me eat a McRib or two or three.

• 1:33:28Bill Simmons?

  Definitely watch you eat a McRib or two in your day. Pete in Fall, in Falls Church wants to know if we've ever thought of releasing an edited version of the podcast for those of us who listen with kids in the car. He says it shouldn't

• 1:33:43Speaker 02

  Got it.

• 1:33:44Bill Simmons?

  Says it shouldn't be too difficult now with AI tools. He's a big fan, but recently had to explain to my wife where my four year old learned the phrase, eat a big fat dick. And it didn't go over well. That segment sneaks up on you.

• 1:34:01Speaker 02

  I have no regrets about eat a big fat dick. Uh, and I do understand the sentiment that he's sharing. I was much more worried that, that, uh, we were talking about pre come. Um, and him having his four year old explain that to his wife.

• 1:34:17Bill Simmons?

  Colin in Portland, Oregon said, hey, Bill and House, I'd like to submit the Seahawks offensive coordinator for this week's eat a fat dick award. How many more times do we need to watch two terrible run plays and a third down pass sailing over JSN's head? Immediately followed by the camera painting to this guy who looks like he prefers a Monster Energy Drink over a third down conversion.

• 1:34:40Bill Simmons?

  That's Kubik's replacement. I don't even know who it is. I think it's Danny Kelly.

• 1:34:44Speaker 02

  No, it's not. I, I, Florrie, his name is Florrie. It's, it's like a hockey name. Um, I will say it's unfortunate when you have a circumstance where the successor can't live up to the standard set by his predecessor. I mean, they won the effing Super Bowl and on top of that, he doesn't look the part. I, I mean, you know, I'm not out here to judge, but I did used to make fun of Matt Nagy quite a bit, showing up on the sidelines, looking like a hobo.

• 1:35:16Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:35:16Speaker 02

  Uh, so I feel like it's fair enough.

• 1:35:20Bill Simmons?

  I'm not quitting. I'm not quitting the Seahawks yet.

• 1:35:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:35:23Bill Simmons?

  Pete Donahue in Homewood, Alabama writes, am I the only one that feels uncomfortable watching Monday night football with Aikman and Buck? It feels like I'm at a couples dinner at a nice restaurant with another couple that everyone knows is getting divorced. And they can barely hide their disgust for one another. Dinner conversation doesn't flow. Lots of eye rolls. They're only staying together for the kids. They're dragging down the evening. ZS Pen really going to do this to us through the rest of the football season through the Super Bowl? I feel completely the opposite. I love it.

• 1:35:53Speaker 02

  I could not agree more. I am with you.

• 1:35:54Bill Simmons?

  I want them to stay together and just be in mutual hatred. Trey has the same where it's like Bucks setting up and Trey's just like,

• 1:36:08Bill Simmons?

  yeah, you're exactly right, Joe.

• 1:36:10Speaker 02

  It's an extra reason to watch. I'm, I'm there for the drama. I, I mean, it's super intriguing.

• 1:36:18Speaker 02

  People can't

• 1:36:19Bill Simmons?

  That's a great point, Trey.

• 1:36:22Speaker 02

  People just listening can't see what you're doing. We're just hiding behind the mic.

• 1:36:26Bill Simmons?

  For the weird social video.

• 1:36:30Bill Simmons?

  He just, he looks like somebody's in his earpiece, giving him the worst news possible about the stock market that day. And telling Troy that, or that he, his crypto account got wiped out. He's like,

• 1:36:44Bill Simmons?

  I love it. I don't want them to break up.

• 1:36:46Speaker 02

  Me either.

• 1:36:46Bill Simmons?

  Keep them together.

• 1:36:48Speaker 02

  Well, I mean, they're going to break up through, you know, natural causes at the end of the season. But we, I mean, the drama is phenomenal. I mean, all the way through the Super Bowl, it's going to be tremendous. I love it.

• 1:37:01Bill Simmons?

  Shiro in South Side of Chicago was upset that, uh, I disparaged. I didn't disparage. I, I talked about the peanut punch last week.

• 1:37:10Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 1:37:10Bill Simmons?

  And I talked about how, um, you know, we named it after Charles Peanut Tillman. And I was like, yeah, it's like, like when we named Tommy John surgery after Tommy John, like good player, not great. I heard from a few Bears fans who were furious. He did make the Pro Bowl twice.

• 1:37:28Bill Simmons?

  I did not know this. Career interceptions and forced fumbles among defensive backs. Charles Woodson, 83 career. Charles Tillman, 82. Ed Reed, 75.

• 1:37:40Speaker 02

  My word.

• 1:37:41Bill Simmons?

  That's the top three.

• 1:37:42Speaker 02

  That's rarefied effing air.

• 1:37:44Bill Simmons?

  Forty-four forced fumbles, most ever by a DB. This is Shiro telling me. And he's saying, I'm not arguing Peanut was Deion or Dwell Rivas, but when your statistical neighbors are Charles Woodson and Ed Reed, you're held a lot more than a guy with the gimmick. I completely agree. I apologize profusely. Peanut Tillman was really good. I should have, I should have mentioned that better. He did make two Pro Bowls and it's a bad job by me.

• 1:38:07Speaker 02

  I mean, I'm surprised Shiro didn't invite you to eat a big fat dick.

• 1:38:11Bill Simmons?

  He, I think he was basically saying that.

• 1:38:13Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:38:14Bill Simmons?

  Doug writes in, he said, Sal and I were talking about Herbert had the deer in the headlights look. And he said, I was disappointed you and Sal both missed the opportunity to say beer in the headlights. Since his career's never been the same, since he started dating Madison Beer. I'd like to popularize this right now, the beer in the headlights look.

• 1:38:33Speaker 02

  That's pretty good.

• 1:38:35Bill Simmons?

  It's pretty good.

• 1:38:36Speaker 02

  I'm there, I'm there for it.

• 1:38:39Bill Simmons?

  Rich and Josh from Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.

• 1:38:43Speaker 02

  Together, Rich and Josh wrote in together?

• 1:38:46Bill Simmons?

  People want us to come to Australia and do podcasts.

• 1:38:48Speaker 02

  Say when. I can't, I can't tell you how quickly I would jump on the effing airplane for it.

• 1:38:53Bill Simmons?

  It couldn't be further away from us. They want to know if we have anointed Yaxel a jizz room all-star yet. And they don't know what happened to the jizz room all-stars after we debuted that team with Caleb Wilson. And then kind of let the concept go after that. And I think Yaxel is already on the jizz room all-star team.

• 1:39:11Speaker 02

  Well, the only issue is he's kind of every other game. He's not every single game. It's lighting it on fire. I mean, I, I can tell you this because I've lost some, some prop bets on Yaxel.

• 1:39:26Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 1:39:26Speaker 02

  When he went on a, I can't remember.

• 1:39:27Bill Simmons?

  That's why we shouldn't do prop bets.

• 1:39:28Speaker 02

  What game last week? Well, it was a modest, I played modest totals for him to exceed them and he didn't even have double-digit points in the game that I, I bet on him.

• 1:39:37Bill Simmons?

  Maybe you should just watch basketball for the sport itself instead of betting on the individual success of the players.

• 1:39:44Speaker 02

  Maybe you should eat a big fat dick.

• 1:39:50Bill Simmons?

  Austin L. from New York. So we have no jizz room all-stars, by the way? There's nobody you would add?

• 1:39:57Speaker 02

  Well, let's really, you know, take the time.

• 1:40:00Bill Simmons?

  Ty Jerome is in line right now in the night call, waiting to get in.

• 1:40:04Speaker 02

  Those floaters, what a revelation. Let's like, let's do it properly and not just spur of the moment in response to an email. Let's sit down and do a segment.

• 1:40:12Bill Simmons?

  So next week, you want to next week and we'll announce our first month NBA jizz room all-stars. Okay.

• 1:40:18Speaker 02

  Phenomenal.

• 1:40:19Bill Simmons?

  That's fine. Austin L. from New York, longtime fan, says, if you're the Jets, why aren't you thinking about trading two of your, they're going to have three top 10 first round picks. Why not trade two of them for Herbert? There's no QB with this talent in the draft class. And he says, how is this not on every talk show and sports podcast right now? Honestly, I don't think Herbert's worth two first round picks from what we've seen. He's been the worst quarterback in the league. Now, he's also had the worst offensive line in the league, but he, the thing, I've watched a lot of Chargers, partly because they're always one of the only three games on in the late games. And I, and I feel like I've bet against them. I've just had best of it.

• 1:41:01Bill Simmons?

  The picks that he's throwing, a lot of the times, aren't the offensive line's fault. They're just terrible, awful throws.

• 1:41:07Speaker 02

  They're, they're rookie reads.

• 1:41:08Bill Simmons?

  Like the one last week, we, Sal and I talked about it Sunday night, where he's just throwing it right to a linebacker that's waiting for it. I would, I, I just wouldn't trade for him with the contract and what we're watching. I would be really scared.

• 1:41:21Speaker 02

  They're clean pocket, they're clean pocket picks. Like he leads the league in interceptions. And if you go back and look at the circumstances under which he's throwing the picks, they're terrible. He's not seeing the, the, the D backs.

• 1:41:35Bill Simmons?

  He's a mess.

• 1:41:36Speaker 02

  He's not seeing the linebacker. Yes. And the idea of that guy going to the Jets, is this, is this, is this a bit, is that a joke?

• 1:41:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that sounds, that sounds like a Nathan Fielder.

• 1:41:47Speaker 02

  We don't know who the head coach is going to be. When the head coach arrives and whoever the new offensive coordinator is, then maybe. With the offensive weapons, there's a good argument to be made, like as soon as next season. We kind of made the argument this season that the Jets were looking at like, they could be a seven-ish win team. They're not going to be because that head coach is going to cost them. He already has. I mean, he's already cost them.

• 1:42:09Bill Simmons?

  He's cost them four games.

• 1:42:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, I was going to say at least two. Yeah.

• 1:42:13Bill Simmons?

  Oh, it's at least three. It might even be four, but it's at least three.

• 1:42:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. But I mean, as soon, when they get a head coach and have some, some proper, you know, order of operation in that place, they, they could be interesting. And that would be the time that you might consider doing something quarterback wise.

• 1:42:29Bill Simmons?

  You know who the head coach isn't going to be? Bob Chesney. Because he's staying at UCLA. And I'd like to invite the USC fan base that goes on message boards.

• 1:42:39Speaker 02

  Don't do it.

• 1:42:39Bill Simmons?

  As well as Penn State.

• 1:42:40Speaker 02

  Don't do it.

• 1:42:41Bill Simmons?

  And Michigan and everybody else.

• 1:42:44Speaker 02

  Don't do it.

• 1:42:44Bill Simmons?

  To go eat a fat one. Because all they were doing was trying to, trying to antagonize the UCLA fan base and make everybody think the coach is leaving. And he's not. He's staying.

• 1:42:56Speaker 02

  It's hilarious.

• 1:42:56Bill Simmons?

  And you guys can all eat a big fat one.

• 1:42:58Speaker 02

  It's great. College football is the best.

• 1:43:01Bill Simmons?

  I love it. I'm still like so captivated by the rankings every week. They're the dumbest things. This is the dumbest system anyone's ever had. You just move up when people above you lose. And I've brought this up to people and they've said like, well, what else, what other system? This is stupid. So UCLA is now five, but as soon as they lose, they get to drop 10 spoils and we, we just do this like.

• 1:43:24Speaker 02

  They'll probably be 13 or 14 if they lose.

• 1:43:27Bill Simmons?

  Of course. So my, my thing, I think they should change it. I don't think anybody should be ranked one through 12. And I just think it should be like you go into the club of the top 12 teams and they just announce the teams in alphabetical order. There's no ranking. There's no way to move up or down. And you're just in the club and we vote on that club every week. And then we don't have to pretend that UCLA with a third string quarterback is the fifth best team in the country because it's absurd. They're not. And I, I've loved watching them and they're eight no and it's been.

• 1:43:57Speaker 02

  No, I know.

• 1:43:58Bill Simmons?

  Really fun. They are not one of the five best teams in college football.

• 1:44:01Speaker 02

  First of all, it's hilarious for you to jump into college football and have ideas for fixing something that's been.

• 1:44:07Bill Simmons?

  At age 57.

• 1:44:08Speaker 02

  So.

• 1:44:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I'm right here, baby.

• 1:44:10Speaker 02

  The most corrupt institution. This is really saying something, but by far the most corrupt institution in the United States of America during our lifetimes, which I mean, that's really, we've lived through some stuff, but college football over our lifetimes.

• 1:44:23Bill Simmons?

  Overboxing?

• 1:44:25Speaker 02

  I, I mean, the, the sheer exploitation of the kids over the, the, the period of time, like, you know, all getting up to the point now, finally where the kids started being compensated, but the gross, you know, misalignment of, of incentives and interests, these coaches making mult, the, the highest paid state employee in the state of X is the college football coach. What the fuck are you talking, anyway? Setting all of that aside, I love the moment that we're at with college football because it's absolute unadulterated, pure chaos. None of it makes any sense. Anybody that pays attention for 10 seconds, like what a joke this is. But when the playoffs come, the games are goddamn good.

• 1:45:07Bill Simmons?

  Gambling's great.

• 1:45:08Speaker 02

  They're goddamn good games. I love betting on them. It's phenomenal. What a great product.

• 1:45:12Bill Simmons?

  Let's ask Troy Aikman what he thinks. Little visual gag for people that watch the pod. They're out there. They're watching the pod. You're going to love this one. This one, Conspiracy Bill, got this email from listener Brenneman from Boston and had to put the iPad down and do a lap around the house. He was so excited. First of all, I love anytime I get an email that says, this email is for Conspiracy Bill.

• 1:45:44Speaker 02

  All right.

• 1:45:44Bill Simmons?

  He's activated at all times.

• 1:45:46Speaker 02

  Great start.

• 1:45:48Bill Simmons?

  Did the Warriors actually make a genius move signing Porzingis, knowing he wouldn't play? And at the worst, they could not pay him. And also use his salary as a zombie trade piece that could be combined with other trades over the course of the season? Did they know this whole time that there was no way he was going to actually play? Conspiracy Bill would like to weigh in here.

• 1:46:14Speaker 02

  Okay, I mean, I'm, I'm listening.

• 1:46:16Bill Simmons?

  They don't seem upset that he's basically not been going to the facilities and that they don't know what the deal is with him. Steve Kerr is basically like, yeah, I don't want to talk about it. Nobody's, nobody's basically going, like if, if Mitchell Robinson was doing this for the Celtics, everybody would be like, what the fuck is going on?

• 1:46:35Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:46:36Bill Simmons?

  Where's Mitchell Robinson? We just paid him $15 million and I guarantee Joe Mazzola would be like, yeah, I don't know where he is. The Warriors all seem good with this. Conspiracy Bill signs off on this. I think they knew he was probably, it was like 25% chance, maybe he plays again. 75% chance he flakes out. Either way, it's a salary cap spot. I actually believe maybe they, maybe this was intentional.

• 1:47:01Speaker 02

  I still don't understand.

• 1:47:03Bill Simmons?

  Conspiracy Bill believes that, not Bill Simmons.

• 1:47:06Speaker 02

  So the concept is that they sign him to the extension because the 20 million bucks, when you pair it with another reasonably priced player.

• 1:47:16Bill Simmons?

  When you pair it with, say, Draymond Green, who makes, say, 27 million a deer and say you combine 27 and 20, and now I can get any max player.

• 1:47:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, okay.

• 1:47:26Bill Simmons?

  Huh.

• 1:47:27Speaker 02

  Interesting.

• 1:47:28Bill Simmons?

  Hmm.

• 1:47:29Speaker 02

  I mean, the owner does think that, that did at one point in time say that they were light years ahead. Who am I to argue?

• 1:47:35Bill Simmons?

  Are you going to root for Draymond Green when he's on the Wizards?

• 1:47:39Speaker 02

  I root for the Wizards. You can see this. I'm repping the district. You see this, this cool hat I have on? District D Y for the Bounce Up Baby, who I got to see up close and personal last night.

• 1:47:49Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Can you give us the scouting report? You got C A J in person. They got their asses kicked by Atlanta, but give us your A J scouting report.

• 1:47:56Speaker 02

  Amazing, great seats. Kudos to the organization. Thank you for all of the hospitality. Amazing for me and my family.

• 1:48:06Speaker 02

  He is so physically strong. He is strong. He's got big shoulder strong and he can get to the hoop. Now, last night was one of those rookie hazing nights where the referees as a group show up and say, we're not giving you anything at the rim. You can go to the rim as many times as you want. We're not giving you any of the fouls. I mean, it's part of what drives me bananas with the NBA reffing. I'm not doing a referee like bitching session. I understand the order of things. The rookies, you know, you have to kind of earn the respect or whatever. But when guys go to the hole and, and there is contact at the hole and the offensive player is disadvantaged, it's a foul. It's always been a foul. Just give them those. Don't, you don't have to give them the ones where,

• 1:48:47Speaker 02

  that are out at the free throw line. But I, I mean, he, he is a physical specimen and he's fast and he's long. And as he continues to, to, to get more comfortable, it's going to be a, a, a absolute thrill to watch.

• 1:49:01Bill Simmons?

  So in person, how big did he seem like LeBron size?

• 1:49:05Speaker 02

  No, he's not as big as LeBron. No.

• 1:49:07Bill Simmons?

  No, but I'm saying like the height wise, did he feel like he had like the?

• 1:49:11Speaker 02

  He's in that range height wise for sure.

• 1:49:13Bill Simmons?

  So it's like skinny LeBron, like early mid 2000s LeBron body, mid 2000s.

• 1:49:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:49:19Bill Simmons?

  How did you feel about?

• 1:49:20Speaker 02

  He's fast.

• 1:49:22Bill Simmons?

  How about the swagger? What was the ad test saying?

• 1:49:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, I love that. All of it. All of the swagger.

• 1:49:28Bill Simmons?

  How about like the interacting with teammates?

• 1:49:30Speaker 02

  They love him. The team loves each other. Wonderful team dynamic. Anthony Gill is kind of like the, the player's coach on the bench. He's up greeting every single player as they come off the court, telling them good job or giving some encouragement, telling them something about, so they, there's, the vibes are immaculate. This is a team that's going to hang around 500 until they decide it's time to go ahead and trade Anthony Davis. And I'd be fine with that if it was sooner rather than later. They're abysmal at shooting the three and.

• 1:50:03Bill Simmons?

  You should trade him today.

• 1:50:05Speaker 02

  I don't know if, if they can, you know, what, what's going to improve the three point shooting. But if you can't.

• 1:50:11Bill Simmons?

  Trade him right now.

• 1:50:12Speaker 02

  There was a, they were, the Hawks just shot the, the, you know, went like 20 of 45 or something.

• 1:50:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you went to an amazing Dyson Daniels game.

• 1:50:20Speaker 02

  I, I, I mean, he, the Hawks are legit and, and Jalen Johnson didn't play. The Hawks were missing their best player. It didn't matter. They can score from every one of the one through five positions. They all are, are, are comfortable. That's an organized operation. I, I think the Hawks, you know, don't sleep on the Hawks.

• 1:50:39Bill Simmons?

  Can I do a wind horse really quick?

• 1:50:42Speaker 02

  Please.

• 1:50:45Bill Simmons?

  Why would the Hawks play their best game of the season without Jalen Johnson?

• 1:50:54Speaker 02

  No, no, no. They caught a Washington team that's still finding its, I, you know.

• 1:51:05Bill Simmons?

  Could you?

• 1:51:05Speaker 02

  Corey Kispert put Trey, Trey, Trey Young in the torture chamber. Corey Kispert took Trey Young to the hole like seven straight times. It wasn't that many, but felt that way.

• 1:51:17Bill Simmons?

  You don't think Trey, Jalen Johnson could be the centerpiece of a trade to get them an even better guy than Jalen Johnson?

• 1:51:24Speaker 02

  He's so good.

• 1:51:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I know.

• 1:51:26Speaker 02

  Who, who, who's better than him that they would get? You're talking about a top 15 player.

• 1:51:30Bill Simmons?

  I know. That's what I'm talking about.

• 1:51:32Speaker 02

  You're talking about a top 15 player.

• 1:51:34Bill Simmons?

  Just trying to start shit. I'm going to see Fox Reddit will aggregate me.

• 1:51:39Bill Simmons?

  Eddie from LA wants to know, wow, this is a great question. Good questions this week. Is Will Hardy the first ever? He was a problem coach in NBA history. Will Hardy was a problem. Look at this ATO. We've heard how great Will Hardy is for years. Now the tanking Jazz were simply holding him back from being among the best coaches in the league. Well, now he has a real team trying to win and they suck. Maybe he's a good coach, bad team guy.

• 1:52:07Speaker 02

  Wait, I don't know what that means. Good coach, bad team.

• 1:52:10Bill Simmons?

  He's a good, good coach for a bad team.

• 1:52:12Speaker 02

  Okay, okay.

• 1:52:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's like a 27 and 55 team. You're like, man, Will Hardy's bringing the most out of him. He's doing such a good job. I mean, the real reasons they, they have, they're one and seven and not good is because Jaren Jackson got hurt. Who would have guessed?

• 1:52:29Speaker 02

  Triple J's out.

• 1:52:30Bill Simmons?

  And, and Nurkic got hurt because God forbid you lose Nurkic. Those are the two reasons they're saying.

• 1:52:36Speaker 02

  Well, they didn't have any size. This is another thing that I want to give Washington credit for. You know who plays and who has a great, like effing brain in his head and who, um, the, everybody likes. You should see these chats he was having with the refs. Deandre Ayton is a value, $9 million Washington spent.

• 1:52:56Bill Simmons?

  It was a great trade.

• 1:52:57Speaker 02

  To the whole goddamn league and Washington is the team that acquired him. Another tremendous asset if, if, if some team like the stupid Jazz, like just looking around, he, Ayton is, is, is, I mean, I, I don't want to overdo it, but.

• 1:53:14Bill Simmons?

  No, that.

• 1:53:15Speaker 02

  A real a, a, a addition, a real valuable addition.

• 1:53:19Bill Simmons?

  I talked about this on Tuesday with Goldsberry. Just a terrible trade by Polinka. The whole league needs a backup center. Like Philly, this Philly season might hinge on whether they can get one in time before the Embiid injury, right?

• 1:53:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:53:33Bill Simmons?

  But you look all around the league, it's really hard to find anybody that has two guys, you know, that can come in and actually defend the rim. I think, I feel like Atlanta needs a center, but they gave away Ayton for two second round picks and Hardy, who doesn't play.

• 1:53:48Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:53:49Bill Simmons?

  By the way, you know who needs a backup center? The Lakers.

• 1:53:53Speaker 02

  They could use Deandre Ayton.

• 1:53:56Bill Simmons?

  I love that you're rooting for and defending a team that includes Trey Young and Deandre Ayton. You're gleefully talking about them.

• 1:54:05Speaker 02

  And Washington, three first round picks. One of, one of only a handful of teams.

• 1:54:10Bill Simmons?

  Scott in Salt Lake, the quick one from Scott in Salt Lake City. He said, uh, Sunday's post game pod, Basal. We're talking about Aaron Glenn and the history of shitty Jets coaches. Netflix closed captioning identified Rich Kotite as Rich Coach Check.

• 1:54:28Bill Simmons?

  Is this in the Hall of Fame or Mount Rushmore for closed caption interpretations that actually make more sense than the real name? Rich Coach Check. Why didn't we think of that in the mid 90s when he was running teams into the ground? Could have called him Rich Coach Check.

• 1:54:41Speaker 02

  That's a great, that's a very, did you guys mention Gase?

• 1:54:45Bill Simmons?

  For what?

• 1:54:46Speaker 02

  For the, for the string of terrible Jets coaches.

• 1:54:50Bill Simmons?

  He should be mentioned. I mean, there's been a bunch of them.

• 1:54:53Speaker 02

  I, the only reason I'm thinking of it, speaking of names and the way that, uh, didn't you guys have, um, a mass, a serial killer, a mass murderer nickname for Gase?

• 1:55:05Speaker 02

  I feel like you did.

• 1:55:06Bill Simmons?

  I think we called him John Wayne Gase, maybe something like that.

• 1:55:09Speaker 02

  That's it. I think that, I think, which is appropriate.

• 1:55:15Bill Simmons?

  Two more emails. Mitch in Indy sent an incredibly long email about how depressed he is as an Indianapolis Colts fan. And, uh, and how they're tanking now, but they don't have a first round pick. And how it's the process, except if Joel Embiid was going to the Jets, that's where he is. But he, he said, Carly's, Carly or say Gordon's on the sideline taking detailed notes during all this. And he wonders if this is basically The Shining where she's just writing over and over again in a book like, all work and no play makes this owner a dull girl or something like, and it's just the notebook is just filled with the same sentence over and over again,

• 1:55:58Bill Simmons?

  which I fucking loved. And every time they, every time they show her now, I'm going to think of that. So, so far we've had her compared to the super bad dick book with Joda Hill and The Shining, right? The same sentence over and over again. That's Carly's notebook so far.

• 1:56:14Speaker 02

  I do, I do want to pose this question.

• 1:56:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:18Speaker 02

  How much would you pay for the notebook? What would you pay?

• 1:56:23Bill Simmons?

  The end of the year for the notebook, like charity auction?

• 1:56:26Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 1:56:29Bill Simmons?

  Well, I think the better question is what would it go for in an auction with somebody trying to find the answer?

• 1:56:35Speaker 02

  It's a great question. That, I like that, that phraseology better.

• 1:56:42Bill Simmons?

  You know what I heard? There's apparently, um, apparently Jim Ursay was, had a documentary being filmed about him that is never going to come out now, but they spent like years and years with him. And apparently it's amazing and we're never going to find out about it.

• 1:56:57Speaker 02

  Why? Why? Why want to come out? Is it not flattering?

• 1:57:00Bill Simmons?

  Cause I think he died and then the, the family doesn't want it to come out.

• 1:57:04Speaker 02

  Oh, that's a bummer.

• 1:57:06Bill Simmons?

  Last question from Steve in Minneapolis. It's about Joe House.

• 1:57:10Speaker 02

  Right here.

• 1:57:12Bill Simmons?

  Joe House has developed a frustrating habit of stopping himself right before saying something interesting, controversial, or bitingly funny, fearing he might experience some type of online blowback or negative response. This happened a few time on the, few times in the October 29th podcast. He stopped himself from disparaging the NHL. He turtles anytime the WNBA is mentioned.

• 1:57:35Speaker 02

  That's different.

• 1:57:36Bill Simmons?

  And he had a horrific no sell on your OJ Simpson joke. And it goes far beyond the most recent episode of this pod. I've observed him falling into this habit over the last few months.

• 1:57:46Speaker 02

  Habit?

• 1:57:47Bill Simmons?

  Quote, "I'm not going to say anything," said with a wolfish grin, "has become common practice for Joe House. The worst part is the audience knows House has the goods and he's more than capable of being cutting edge and hilarious. I am suggesting, his dad is named Dick House. I am suggesting you refer to him as Dick T's House until he stops doing this and giving me the goods. We need to encourage him to let it rip. Love the pod and I love House." That's from Steve in Minneapolis. Well, they put a lot of thought into that.

• 1:58:18Speaker 02

  Feel like I do.

• 1:58:18Bill Simmons?

  Are you holding back, House?

• 1:58:20Speaker 02

  I don't feel like I am. I feel like, you know, I mean, the, the, the evidence kind of, the record speaks for itself.

• 1:58:26Bill Simmons?

  I, that's how I feel, but obviously.

• 1:58:28Speaker 02

  We literally have a segment this year between you and I called Eat a Fat Dick.

• 1:58:33Bill Simmons?

  I know.

• 1:58:33Speaker 02

  What am I holding back?

• 1:58:35Bill Simmons?

  Tell Steve from Minneapolis.

• 1:58:36Speaker 02

  WNBA is, is my third, third rail. I don't remember not saying anything bad about the NHL. Why wouldn't I say something bad about the NHL? What the fuck do I care about that league? They just made up extra games. Like, you know what? Fuck it. They, they, they should just go year round. Nobody would, like, people have fun going to hockey games.

• 1:58:55Bill Simmons?

  The players would never, the players would never complain. They're like, this season's 135 games. They'd be like, alright.

• 1:59:01Speaker 02

  Fine. Alright, boys. Let's them up.

• 1:59:04Bill Simmons?

  I'll play with a torn labrum. Uh, I will say, I think it's been the league's best, I don't know whether my algorithm is finding it better or whatever's going on, but it's been the best year ever for social media highlights with the NHL. There's been better fights than ever.

• 1:59:18Speaker 02

  Fights are great.

• 1:59:18Bill Simmons?

  There's been better, like, really hard, crazy checks.

• 1:59:21Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:59:22Bill Simmons?

  And people getting pissed. And McDavid looks like he's on cocaine at all times in these games now. He's going 140 miles an hour. It is stupefying how good he is this year.

• 1:59:33Speaker 02

  I need, I need that, that algorithm. Send me, send me something so that I get clicked in, cause I'm not getting enough. Oh, I'm, I'm getting a fight here and there, but not enough. What am I looking at? What should I go to?

• 1:59:43Bill Simmons?

  I said this before, I think the fights are, I think they're getting too good at fighting.

• 1:59:47Speaker 02

  Oh, so it's scary.

• 1:59:49Bill Simmons?

  I want to go on our What Chaos pie. I haven't gone, I haven't crashed the What Chaos podcast yet, which is excellent, but I, I really want to dive into this with those guys. I feel like the, these guys train now.

• 1:59:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:00:00Bill Simmons?

  To hockey fight and they, they all have like styles. Like when we were growing up, these guys were just like, you know, they're, they're just like losing their mind. Yeah, like they're just mad at each other.

• 2:00:10Speaker 02

  I don't know. Something over the last 20 years or so, like we can come up with examples of guys that are absolutely professional fighters. Domi, Brashear, like you can come up with the guys that were the, they made their bread and butter, uh, you know.

• 2:00:23Bill Simmons?

  I still felt like it was a little more organic than what I'm watching now. What I'm watching now is like disciplined, I, I grab your shirt here and, and I get you here, but then I do this and I go and I go down. People are throwing uppercuts now.

• 2:00:38Speaker 02

  I want to hear, okay, let's, let's get on What, What Chaos.

• 2:00:41Bill Simmons?

  I really want, yeah, I really want the What Chaos guys to break this down once and for all, cause I feel like the level of fighting is just better and somebody's going to get seriously hurt soon, would be my fear, but maybe I'm just old.

• 2:00:53Speaker 02

  I don't like that.

• 2:00:54Bill Simmons?

  Alright, did we cover everything? So you feel like you're the same guy?

• 2:00:59Speaker 02

  Other than the, the WNBA, the third rail.

• 2:01:03Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by McDonald's. If you're building an all-star breakfast lineup, you need a few key players. A sausage McMuffin with egg? Sure. Crispy hash browns? Absolutely. A small coffee to wash it all down? No question. And right now you can get all three for just five bucks. That's a pretty stacked breakfast roster. Get a sausage McMuffin with egg plus hash browns and a small coffee for just $5. Only at McDonald's for a limited time. Price and participation may vary. Promotion pricing may be lower than meal pricing.

• 2:01:37Speaker 02

  Prices may be higher for delivery.

• 2:01:40Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by NBA 2K27. We just had one of the craziest off seasons we've had in the NBA, which is perfect for 2K because every 2K season can be one of the craziest off seasons. Uh, the whole league shifted in real life. It could shift to an NBA 2K27. The best place to compete with these new look rosters and also try to figure out who's on what roster. You can see how, uh, new teams and new dynamic duos match up. You can play Philly, feel what it's like to have all of their new guys with the old guys. And you can also take a struggling franchise to the NBA finals if you want, because it'll never happen in real life for a couple of the struggling franchises. You know who I'm talking about.

• 2:02:23Bill Simmons?

  Anyway, NBA 2K lets you experience every transaction and storyline right from your home. Pick up your copy of NBA 2K27 right now. Today's Ring of 107 brought to you by FanDuel. Make this your most rewarding season ever. Download the FanDuel app to check out our 107 picks and boosted teaser every week this season. Two weeks ago, somebody called me the Pittsburgh Steelers or the Pittsburgh Steelers or whatever.

• 2:02:53Speaker 02

  It's very good.

• 2:02:54Bill Simmons?

  Because I had, I have two and three, three and two, two and three, three and two, two and three, three and two.

• 2:02:59Speaker 02

  You just have to finish one or two games above 500.

• 2:03:01Bill Simmons?

  I read that email after week six and since then I've gone two and three and three and two. Every single week I've gone two and three or three and two. And it's now week nine, which means apparently I'm going to go two and three. We have less games to work with this week. I did not like the slated.

• 2:03:15Speaker 02

  Only one last game. It's 15 games. There's only two teams on the bye.

• 2:03:18Bill Simmons?

  Plus we lost the Thursday game. Plus there's a bunch of games I'm not going near.

• 2:03:22Speaker 02

  Okay, okay, okay, okay. I get your point.

• 2:03:24Bill Simmons?

  I had the.

• 2:03:24Speaker 02

  We're tied, by the way. You and I, dead even.

• 2:03:26Bill Simmons?

  I had the smallest list possible. I know we're going to agree on one game. I'm positive. You get to go first this week, but I know we're going to have the same team on one of these. I have a feeling we might have the same tees.

• 2:03:40Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:03:40Bill Simmons?

  And then I'm.

• 2:03:41Speaker 02

  You'd be surprised.

• 2:03:42Bill Simmons?

  I'm prepared for anything with the other ones, but you go first. Who do you have this week, Joe House?

• 2:03:46Speaker 02

  I'm going to go ahead and lay the nine and a half points with the San Francisco 49ers.

• 2:03:52Bill Simmons?

  That's my first, first game on the board. That was the one I knew we would both have.

• 2:03:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, they are at home against the Vegas Raiders.

• 2:03:59Bill Simmons?

  Oh, you're doing the, you're doing the Niners?

• 2:04:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm doing the Niners.

• 2:04:03Bill Simmons?

  Oh, I thought you were doing another nine and a half. Okay, so we don't have the same.

• 2:04:07Speaker 02

  Oh, no, I'm laying the nine and a half. I, I, I, part of this, the handicap includes Mike Evans being back. It includes, um, Debo being back. It includes the idea that this, um, defense is, uh, getting healthier with, with, uh, the possible return of Bosa. But, um, a couple of things I, I like situationally. Purdy covers big numbers. I think he is eight and O straight up and maybe like six and two against the spread, seven or more. Um, but situationally Raiders coming from, um, game that they, they, they went all the way out, uh, you know, all out against that Jets, East Coast, back here now to, um, San Francisco.

• 2:04:49Bill Simmons?

  You're giving us the travel? I thought that didn't matter anymore.

• 2:04:52Speaker 02

  It definitely matters. In football, it matters. It definitely matters.

• 2:04:55Bill Simmons?

  So I looked at this, isn't the big case that the Raiders are good against other bad teams? And as soon as they play a good team, they could just get their asses kicked?

• 2:05:05Speaker 02

  Not only that, they have one of the worst defenses in, in the league by, you know, several of the measures going up against the most explosive offense in the league with, uh, Shanahan and extra time. It's the coming off the bye thing especially for me with San Francisco. Um, and the way that, that San Francisco is capable of handling its business, anything less than 10 to me feels fine and I'm going to go ahead and lay it.

• 2:05:32Bill Simmons?

  I, I'm obviously going to have them in a three-team, 10, 10-point tease this week. There's no question whatsoever. Um, I did not have them in this. One of the things with the Raiders that's interesting, and I only know this because he's on two of my three fantasy teams. Ashton Gentey just be coming basically a third down back. Cause he's, I'm trying to find, there was a great thing I saw. I can't find it. Um, he's by, you know, they have those stats about yards added to whatever you're rushing, your rushing attempts would have been, where people are like, oh, he'd be plus 24 for yards that he's got beyond what he was expected to get. I forget what the stats called. And Ashton Gentey was minus 109 or something.

• 2:06:16Speaker 02

  Oh, my.

• 2:06:16Bill Simmons?

  For this year. He's lost like a hundred more yard, I, whatever it was, he was last.

• 2:06:22Speaker 02

  Rushing over expected, is that?

• 2:06:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, yeah, one of those.

• 2:06:24Speaker 02

  Alright.

• 2:06:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I just mangled that. The good news is people won't be dicks about it.

• 2:06:31Bill Simmons?

  But yeah, Ashton Jettie was the worst. Anyway, uh, so you have Mike Washington probably with most of the carries. Nobody can name a running back in their team. And the only thing with the Raiders that you get worried about is the cheap touchdown near the end.

• 2:06:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:06:44Bill Simmons?

  But the Niners have been really good at, at just extending leads and then just finishing games.

• 2:06:49Speaker 02

  Putting the clamps on.

• 2:06:51Bill Simmons?

  I have them in a three-teamer.

• 2:06:52Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:06:53Bill Simmons?

  My first pick.

• 2:06:57Bill Simmons?

  I don't love it. I don't love that I'm doing this. I think it's a great pick. I can't believe how high this line is. The Jets are nine and a half.

• 2:07:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:07:05Bill Simmons?

  In KC.

• 2:07:07Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:07:08Bill Simmons?

  And it's just too high. It just is. I don't love the Jets. I don't really want to bet on the Jets. But the Jets are pretty healthy now. I don't know if, if, I assume Garrett Wilson's playing. He got the concussion last week, but for the most part, pretty healthy. They've lost by three points, seven points, 11 points, seven points, three points and three points.

• 2:07:30Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:07:31Bill Simmons?

  Their games are close. They have a lot of talent. When you watch the Jets, you don't understand why they're not better. I know they have, you know, the, one of the worst coaching situations in the league. They're 23rd in DVOA, which surprised me. I felt like that would be better. Casey's eighth. Casey lost 23 two weeks ago to Seattle, 28 and 24 to Denver. Still have the same offensive line issues. Mahomes still has the same concerns about what's going on with his deep ball stuff. They still have wide receiver stuff. Teams have started to figure out if we can just take Kenneth Walker out of this game, we're good to go. Kelsey's looking creaky. I don't think the Chiefs defense is that good. I think the Jets could actually win this game.

• 2:08:15Bill Simmons?

  I don't think they will, but I actually think they could. But the nine and a half just seems too high. I don't feel like the Chiefs should be favored by seven over anybody that's at least frisky, you know? And then you have Gino in there at the end of the game. I just, I think people are going to be throwing the Chiefs in the three point, three team 10 point teases that this is the one that would make me nervous.

• 2:08:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:08:38Bill Simmons?

  And I just don't know how good the Chiefs are. I really, I watched them very closely the last two weeks and I don't know if they're that good. So that's my case. Jets bust nine and a half.

• 2:08:48Speaker 02

  They went up against, you know, two of the best five defenses in the league, so it's not that, that big of a surprise. That they didn't look, you know, great. I am only not playing this game because I'm waiting for it to get to 10, which is out in the market. A lot of 10s out in the market.

• 2:09:08Bill Simmons?

  I thought about waiting to see if I could get a 10 on Sunday.

• 2:09:10Speaker 02

  The nine and a half is minus 122. Okay, that's fine, but yeah, the thesis is right. You're making the right point.

• 2:09:19Bill Simmons?

  I think this goes the other way though. That's why I want to grab it at nine and a half, which is a stupid number because you, you know, nine, nine and a half teams don't win by that. But I was worried it was going to go down the other way and drop to like seven and a half on Sunday. So I'm grabbing it now. I just think that line's too high. I don't get it.

• 2:09:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, I don't have any argument with you. And in general.

• 2:09:39Bill Simmons?

  And by the way, Aaron Glenn, not exactly, oh, it's like Sal in Tennessee. You know, he's there long-term, at least beyond, he's at least coaching there next season, right?

• 2:09:52Speaker 02

  Sal is not going anywhere. Yep.

• 2:09:53Bill Simmons?

  Where I look at Aaron Glenn or Stike on the Colts, those guys are basically coaching for their jobs now.

• 2:09:59Speaker 02

  They are. This is an audition for whatever comes next.

• 2:10:03Bill Simmons?

  And FYI, if I'm the Jets, I know this is insane. I, I, I accept that this is insane.

• 2:10:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:10:14Bill Simmons?

  And I think we've already crossed them off in the Bill and Sal Sunday cross off. If I'm the Jets and I'm two and six, I'm, I'm in why not us mode in the, in the facilities. Like, why not us? We're two and six, but we play Kansas City, home Buffalo, but then at Chargers, at Miami, we have an at Arizona left.

• 2:10:36Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:10:37Bill Simmons?

  We have a home Minnesota, week 18, at Buffalo, game might mean anything. Like, why can't we get to eight, nine wins? Who knows?

• 2:10:45Speaker 02

  Maybe they'll get to the seven that we thought at the beginning of the season.

• 2:10:48Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:10:48Speaker 02

  Other aspects of, of why this particular game, just in general, Mahomes as a, as a favorite of seven or more hasn't been great. He's under 500 against the spread. And there's this weird little stretch that the Chiefs have been on coming off of these games against this version of Denver. They're 0-5 against the spread the week after playing Denver. So over the, because they've been these knock down, drag out, you know, physical games with the way that this Denver defense has been lately.

• 2:11:16Bill Simmons?

  One other thing I like about this game, two of the worst special teams by DVOA in the league so far, which always is a wild card. Like with a high line, it's just something stupid will happen with special teams.

• 2:11:28Speaker 02

  The Jets last year had a really good special teams. I don't know what happened.

• 2:11:32Bill Simmons?

  Right. But they have, they got Mitchell going. They have Cooper back. You know, they, if Wilson plays, they have three legitimate receivers. The Chiefs have had some injuries. I don't know. I just thought that line was too high. All right, your next pick.

• 2:11:48Speaker 02

  I thought for a minute that I might be swearing this team off after their performance on, on Monday night. They really disappointed me on Monday night against the Chicago Bears. I understood the idea of why the Bears were live as underdogs in Seattle. And I said, you know, I can't do it anymore with Sam Darnold. Well, guess what? I don't have to do it anymore with Sam Darnold, at least not this week. It's Drew Lock at home. Seattle is laying eight and a half against the Arizona Cardinals. And this is, the line went crazy. It was like in the 12s and went all the way down to under nine because of the substitution of, of Lock for Donald.

• 2:12:28Bill Simmons?

  I don't understand it at all. It should have stayed the same.

• 2:12:32Speaker 02

  Of course it should have. Have we been watching this team all season long? And by the way, these two teams played in, in week two and Seattle kicked their ass. And Drew Lock was the quarterback. He was 19 for 27 for 235 yards. They ran the ball 40 times, Seattle did. Drew Lock had three touchdowns. Mike McDonald is 5-0 straight up and against the spread against Arizona. And Arizona just, you know, had that great dramatic overtime victory in Dallas. Now they have to travel to Seattle.

• 2:13:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:04Speaker 02

  This is Seattle season. This, they cannot lose anymore. You know, they have like maybe one or two more games they can possibly lose and make the playoffs. Because the whole AFC North, NFC North looks like it's going to make the playoffs. I love this situation. I love the idea of Minshew going up against Mike McDonald. With Mike McDonald having a full week to prepare for him and, and, and that defense feeling like they left a lot to be desired against the Bears. The Bears had long drives. They marched the ball, these long time of possession drives. Yeah, the, the Bears are, are in another class. I'm going to go ahead and lay it with Seattle, minus eight and a half. I'm, I'm happy to do it.

• 2:13:45Bill Simmons?

  I fully support it and it leads to my second bet, which is a tease.

• 2:13:50Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:13:51Bill Simmons?

  Which I was delighted by.

• 2:13:53Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:13:53Bill Simmons?

  It is the Seahawks and the Bears. I am putting it together and I'm going to make the case for each. Seahawks down to under three to two and a half, thanks to the Drew Lock gift. I'm with you. This is, this is it. Like there's no room for error. We have eight playoff teams in the NFC. It's, it's Seahawks, Rams and basically two of the NFC North teams battling for that last spot, right? Because you figure Bears, Vikings are going to be in there unless the Vikings completely crater. So now you have Packers, Lions, Seahawks, Rams on a death match just to be the seven seed.

• 2:14:29Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:14:30Bill Simmons?

  And you can't lose this game. You have Minshew, who's fooled everybody and they're forgetting all these other times Minshew has been a star. I love Minshew. He used to make a ton of jokes about him. Yeah, he's the McRib. He's not going into Seattle and doing that. And I also feel like the Bears are really good. So instead of looking at it going, oh man, what's wrong with the Seahawks? It's like, the Bears are good. The Bears know who they are. They do everything well on both sides of the ball right now. And Seattle had Darnold who was hurt early in that game, it turns out, and played all the way through it. They have a running back situation they're trying to figure out. They don't really have a second receiver. They had a couple of injuries on defense. And now this is a, all right, let's go. They're going to win by,

• 2:15:15Bill Simmons?

  I would say they're going to win by three or more. So they're the first part of my tease.

• 2:15:19Speaker 02

  I agree with the, they're, I think they're going to win by 10 because I'm laying the eight and a half, goddammit.

• 2:15:24Bill Simmons?

  I like it. Well, and then Price now they have for a full week with Charbonne and.

• 2:15:29Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 2:15:30Bill Simmons?

  We'll see if Shaheed, is Shaheed on the injured list or is there a chance he plays this week? I can't remember. I think he might be on the injured list. So I'm putting that with the Bears.

• 2:15:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:15:40Bill Simmons?

  The Bears are playing Tampa Bay. It's minus six and a half. So basically they have to win by a point. They win this.

• 2:15:46Speaker 02

  They have to win.

• 2:15:48Bill Simmons?

  Look, Bears coming off a dramatic, emotional Monday night win. Everybody's all excited about them. They had, I think, like almost half of the Super Bowl bets this week. They keep track of the Super Bowl futures. I have them at 14 to one from two weeks ago. They're now eight to one. Everybody's on it.

• 2:16:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:16:08Bill Simmons?

  All the signs are there for, oh, oh, that, oh, oh, they're down 10, nothing. I, but I just think they're really good. And I actually, I'm going the other way. I think they're about to go on a fucking ride.

• 2:16:21Speaker 02

  Oh, okay.

• 2:16:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Um, I just think that I, what they did to the Pats was impressive. They have a bye week coming up, which I love. It's like, let's fucking take care of business. Baker Mayfield, who had zero pass completions last week, um, let's just get through this. And then we come out of the bye and we have home New Orleans, at Detroit, home Jacksonville, at Miami is the next four. I don't think they're at Buffalo in week 15. I think that's the next time I'm worried about them. I think they win all those other games.

• 2:16:51Speaker 02

  Interesting. Jacksonville will be interesting. I'm rooting for it. I wanted that to be interesting. I want them to be.

• 2:16:56Bill Simmons?

  In Chicago, a little cold for our guy Trevor.

• 2:16:58Speaker 02

  Could, could be for sure. Count on that.

• 2:17:01Bill Simmons?

  I'm all in on the Bears. I think that, I think it's just an awesome team. And when I look at the Bucks, who, I think the Bucks are a team I would have backed on a couple of different situations. Cause how good their defense has been, they got the running game going. They have the Irving Gainwell combo. Ibuka is supposed to be back. But I, just Baker Mayfield in Chicago, when we don't know if he can throw a football. And with all the dumb turnovers he always has anyway, like he's going to give them two turnovers. So I'm taking the Bears. I think Caleb's.

• 2:17:32Speaker 02

  I'm not gonna go that far in terms of Baker giving them two, but I will say this, the two things that, that kept me off. I really looked hard at the idea of playing the Bucks because it feels like we're top of market with the Bears now. And I actually, I.

• 2:17:45Bill Simmons?

  And it's a Sunday night game, Collinsworth and.

• 2:17:48Speaker 02

  It's the third straight primetime game for the Bears. And it doesn't happen a ton, but when it does, you know, the, the record against the spread's under 500. Um, in the third game, the, uh, the reason that I paused is because the Tampa Bay Buccaneer run game against what this Bears defense might look like with Simmons. Simmons was fucking incredible. He was a goddamn home wrecker. And I was like, oh my God, if they can do this and, and it was his pass rush that, that, that collapsed what Seattle was trying to do. He's a run stopper.

• 2:18:26Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:18:26Speaker 02

  Like, I don't, that, that gave me pause. And then the great unknown surrounding Baker. So the only way to, to get invested in this, I like the idea of your, of the tease that you're doing. I did not have the Bears in the tease, but I like that, that play.

• 2:18:39Bill Simmons?

  Seahawks, Bears. All right. Your time for your third pick.

• 2:18:43Speaker 02

  Um, I regret this. Say it right up front, uh, acknowledging how, uh, you know, vulnerable this, that this, this is not well thought out. And I did it last week when I played the stupid ass Patriots who were up eight. I mean, all they had to do, no, they were up 11 and all they had to do was give up the stupid field goal and they would have covered.

• 2:19:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. The DB screwed up, got the touchdown.

• 2:19:08Speaker 02

  The effing touchdown. I knew I was, you know, fucked right in the face. Thank you for that Patriots. And the Patriots sleepwalk, you know, they had the 10 game rest coming into Miami. It doesn't matter. Not completely ill-prepared. The whole first half was a goddamn.

• 2:19:22Bill Simmons?

  Out of it.

• 2:19:22Speaker 02

  You did. I know.

• 2:19:24Bill Simmons?

  And we've, we've no starting receivers and we, and we're on like our fifth and sixth guards.

• 2:19:29Speaker 02

  Well, it didn't matter. Watch the second half. Oh, all of a sudden, well, they moved the ball right down the effing field and, and. Anyway, I'll stop. I'll stop with the belly aching. I'm doing the exact same thing this week. I'm playing the goddamn New York Giants laying points going into Philadelphia. Do you know how stupid that is? Do you know how dumb? The, the last time the Giants won in Philadelphia was over a decade ago. I think it was 2013. The last time the Giants were favored going into Philadelphia was like the, you know, before the 2010s. Um, and you know, the, the, this, this Giants team, you're, you're really having to invest a lot in what we saw out of J.

• 2:20:14Speaker 02

  This is me investing in J.J. McCarthy. Did the, did the one, one game in one quarter of J.J. McCarthy? Does that make the case? Well, the, here's the thing.

• 2:20:24Bill Simmons?

  Scat boom might not play.

• 2:20:26Speaker 02

  I know. That, that, I don't care. It doesn't matter. I'm, I'm not gonna go ahead and lay it with the Giants. What I saw out of them in terms of their organizational, uh, stability. This is a disciplined football team and it was, it was kind of a radical, uh, eye opener. That Houston game. They took so much advantage of the lack of discipline of, of, um, that Houston defense. Especially, you know, again and again, they were running these delayed stunt blitz things. And the Giants had an answer for it every time. And J.J. McCarthy was fucking poised against that. And I think this Eagles team is quietly quitting.

• 2:21:09Speaker 02

  It, it is, you know, I think this whole Joe Milton thing, I don't, I think if they were, if they intended to try and mount some kind of like, this is how we're going to save the season. We're going to take a run at the division. We would have seen it last week. Washington was there for the taking. I assure you.

• 2:21:27Bill Simmons?

  Trying to roll over. You're on your back with your feet and legs up.

• 2:21:31Speaker 02

  The whole, the whole first half, the, the, the full Washington menu was on full display.

• 2:21:37Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:21:38Speaker 02

  Uh, you know, pre-stat penalties, we got them. Uh, missed field goal from 50 yards. We're right there. Like, you know, questionable play call out of the offensive coordinator? Yes, sir. We, we're giving you the whole menu and the Eagles still rolled right the fuck over. Especially in the second half. And the reason that the defense, the defense of the last three games has given up, you know, like 30 something, 25, you know, 28, all of these numbers north of 25 points because they're on the goddamn field the whole game because all that the Eagles are doing is going three and out. A point that you made, how many games ago? Three games ago?

• 2:22:15Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah. When they had everybody.

• 2:22:18Speaker 02

  He's on a pitch count, you know, like he, he's a decoy. He's not out there to go run the ball 25 times. Um, so.

• 2:22:25Bill Simmons?

  So you're going Giants minus three.

• 2:22:27Speaker 02

  I'm laying it. I know how stupid it is.

• 2:22:30Bill Simmons?

  Well, it's not as stupid as you think. Cause that was my next pick.

• 2:22:35Speaker 02

  You didn't interrupt me.

• 2:22:36Bill Simmons?

  I let you go. I let you go.

• 2:22:39Speaker 02

  You did. You could have made, I know you have some points to make as well.

• 2:22:43Bill Simmons?

  Joe Milton's starting for Philadelphia. Let's start with there. Um, I, I haven't seen a single Eagles receiver that I would want to start for one minute on my fantasy team. Lemon is aptly named. Um, here's my big thing. I agree with you. I think the Eagles, the, the fork in the road was last Sunday night.

• 2:23:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:23:05Bill Simmons?

  And they told us what they wanted to be, which was a team that's gonna suck. I saw CR a couple of days ago.

• 2:23:11Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 2:23:12Bill Simmons?

  Asked him how many more wins, how many more wins he thought the Eagles had in them this year. And he thought either one or two was his answer.

• 2:23:19Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:23:20Bill Simmons?

  The, the most rational Philly fan that we know.

• 2:23:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:23:24Bill Simmons?

  Here's my big thing with this. So this is, oh man, Eagles at home.

• 2:23:31Bill Simmons?

  Who's going to this game? You know who's gonna go to this game? Giants fans taking the fucking train because this is their one chance. J.J. Harbaugh, Malik Neighbors, who's been one of the best receivers in the league now for four weeks. And let's go. And I feel like there's gonna be a lot of Giants fans at this game.

• 2:23:50Speaker 02

  You know what, um, really proves this up? How many Knicks fans showed up in the Philly building the last two seasons? The Knicks fans took over the, what, what used to be called the spectrum, whatever the name is of the place they play basketball now. Completely took it over in the playoffs.

• 2:24:07Bill Simmons?

  Go to this game. Eagles fans. What's fun about going to this game? Oh, we're starting Joe Milton? We're gonna lose to the Giants? I'm not fucking going. Put my tickets on a ticket site. But I think there's gonna be Giants fans there. I think they're gonna try to just run the ball, let the Eagles screw up. Joe Milton, who played one good game in his life that cost us the first pick in the 2024 draft for the Patriots. Uh, other than that, has just not been anything remotely approaching NFL quarterback. Not to mention their offensive line's way worse. There's no skill guys. The Giants. To me, this line's gonna go up and I think this ends at four and a half and I'm grabbing it at minus three right now.

• 2:24:47Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 2:24:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. I think this line goes up.

• 2:24:49Speaker 02

  I'm surprised that we were both in agreement on the Giants.

• 2:24:52Bill Simmons?

  I think this is gonna be a super depressing game. I know, I don't, the Eagles fans don't want them to win anymore. It's not like they have a chance to do anything. They'd rather see them lose and there's gonna be a bunch of Giants fans there.

• 2:25:03Speaker 02

  Incredible timing for the city of Philadelphia to have the Sixers at eight and one. And that city completely on fire for the Sixers. They're like, fuck it. Let's, let's, let's make the Eagles a completely lost season. So we get the high draft picks and we're in position, you know, for the retooling that we need. And, and yeah, I, I said the.

• 2:25:21Bill Simmons?

  I was with Mike Ton, I was with Mike Ton at the Clipper game last night. Diehard Philly fan. He's thinks there's no chance that anything happens with this team and they, you know, some of the contracts they gave out, some of the guys they lost, some of the injuries they've had. It's like not anticipating the Lane Johnson, you know, that that he might just exit stage right at some point during the season, all this stuff. It's a bad season. They have some draft picks, but they might even make a trade before Sunday, right? Like you might have Giants minus three, which we've locked in now and something might happen. All right, your last pick. You have a tease.

• 2:25:56Speaker 02

  I have a tease still, yes. My tease is Detroit minus one. I'm going to tease them from seven down to one. I came close to going ahead and laying the points with Detroit on the road in Miami.

• 2:26:06Bill Simmons?

  I don't like that.

• 2:26:08Speaker 02

  I think you think Miami is is capable of winning outright. See, here's the thing. The way that Detroit established the run against Minnesota last week, when they they played a kind of bully ball that we didn't really know that they were capable of, but they still have that phenomenal offensive line. And the adjustment by Campbell at halftime, they were golf was getting killed. He was getting like Minnesota was super alive to win that game. All right. The only thing about this, this, this situation that scares me a little bit is Detroit coming off of back to back Green Bay and Minnesota. And then, you know, those are super important division games. And then going on the road down to Miami, is it going to be hot? Like, what's the story? That's why I wouldn't lay the seven, laying one Detroit cannot cede any ground.

• 2:26:53Speaker 02

  They have to win these winnable games.

• 2:26:55Bill Simmons?

  You left out their kind of bad defense that now no longer has Jack Campbell.

• 2:27:00Speaker 02

  They're missing guys.

• 2:27:01Bill Simmons?

  Well, good luck to Jack Campbell.

• 2:27:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:27:03Bill Simmons?

  Knock on wood for that dude. But that's the harder defense. He's not playing.

• 2:27:07Speaker 02

  I know, I know. Branches in concussion protocol. One of there's a cornerback that's I, I, I get it. I get it. It's still Miami. I did watch the New England Patriots go right down the fucking field every time they needed to in the second half.

• 2:27:21Bill Simmons?

  You can throw in Miami.

• 2:27:22Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:27:23Bill Simmons?

  Which they didn't have the receivers, but they said fuck it and did it anyway.

• 2:27:26Speaker 02

  You know who has the receivers?

• 2:27:28Bill Simmons?

  I know.

• 2:27:28Speaker 02

  Detroit. And, and I'm, I think golf is, is, is just as good as Drake Bay.

• 2:27:32Bill Simmons?

  I'll say this about Miami after watching them a couple of times in the last few weeks, including that entire Patriot game. They do play hard and seem like they give a shit.

• 2:27:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:27:43Bill Simmons?

  Cause you have these bad, like the Chargers are the opposite, right? The Chargers go down by eight and they're just like, they're like looking at their watch. Oh shit, there's an hour left.

• 2:27:53Speaker 02

  Grandpa Harbaugh.

• 2:27:54Bill Simmons?

  Miami like gave a shit. Like Miami was going for that win and I, I, to me, the Lions are a stay away, but.

• 2:28:01Speaker 02

  I understand. I get it. That's why I'm teasing it down to one. I'm going to go ahead and tease the Panthers up to eight and a half. I might've played the Panthers plus three. I love the situation going up against this Denver team that continues to scrape wins out of its butthole at the end, but they're, the most important thing with Denver is those wins come when they are at home. They don't get those butthole wins.

• 2:28:23Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:28:23Speaker 02

  When they're on the road and the Panthers are a much better team. I also love the idea of the Panthers with the extended rest after the humiliation on Thursday night football, although they did battle back in that game. They fired the defensive coordinator. They changed their defensive scheme and there's no way to really plan for that for Denver with the 37th out of 42nd ranked quarterback in the NFL, Bo Nix, the, the abomination that is Bo Nix. So I like, I would have played the Panthers minus three. The threes are gone. The market's two and a half, but I have, I, I like the idea of teasing it up to eight and a half for the Panthers.

• 2:29:00Bill Simmons?

  So they still have some D back stuff, the Panthers.

• 2:29:03Speaker 02

  Sure. Love to see Bo Nix throw on.

• 2:29:06Bill Simmons?

  Their receivers are back.

• 2:29:07Speaker 02

  Good luck.

• 2:29:09Bill Simmons?

  Right. And you figure at home.

• 2:29:11Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:29:12Bill Simmons?

  I don't mind having Carolina at home. They also went against Tampa when they got their ass kicked a couple of weeks ago and it seemed like a bad loss, but Tampa's defense just might actually be good. Then they had to play on a Thursday. They fired the DC. I looked at it too. I, I took a, if it was three, I, I would have taken it for the contest, I think, but the two and a half scared me off.

• 2:29:33Speaker 02

  Yeah. So I just pushed it up to eight and a half. I'm comfortable with it.

• 2:29:35Bill Simmons?

  One of my rules is that I don't want to take a NFC South team in a tease for Ringer 107.

• 2:29:43Speaker 02

  Fair, fine rule. I almost took, go ahead.

• 2:29:46Bill Simmons?

  But I am going to take an NFC South team for my last pick.

• 2:29:50Speaker 02

  Are you, go ahead. God damn it. It was 50 50 for me. I know who you're going to take. Go ahead.

• 2:29:59Bill Simmons?

  I, it's a chance to bet against Shador Sanders.

• 2:30:01Speaker 02

  I know, I know.

• 2:30:02Bill Simmons?

  I gotta do it.

• 2:30:03Speaker 02

  I know.

• 2:30:04Bill Simmons?

  I gotta do it. And the Browns have been, hey, everyone's running on them and the Saints have no running game to speak of, but I actually would rather bet on the team that can't run the ball against the team that's not proven they could stop the run. They get back. So this is a leap of faith because Banks.

• 2:30:21Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:30:21Bill Simmons?

  Is coming back at left tackle, left tackle, hopefully.

• 2:30:25Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:30:25Bill Simmons?

  Right? This was a top 10 draft pick for them a couple of years ago. Got hurt, hurt his ankle five weeks ago. The offensive line fell apart the moment he went out.

• 2:30:33Speaker 02

  Humongous for them.

• 2:30:34Bill Simmons?

  He's been practicing. I'm going to assume he's playing.

• 2:30:37Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:30:38Bill Simmons?

  That makes me feel good. I like that they're home.

• 2:30:41Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:30:41Bill Simmons?

  The line is, is like, this is the lowest value you can take the Saints at home against a bad team and the Browns are a bad team.

• 2:30:47Speaker 02

  Coming off the bye.

• 2:30:49Bill Simmons?

  Browns on the road versus the Browns at home.

• 2:30:52Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 2:30:52Bill Simmons?

  Um, this feels like a classic terrible Browns game and uh, I wish it was two and a half, but I don't think I'm going to get it.

• 2:31:01Speaker 02

  Third road game in, in, in, in four weeks or something like that for the Browns. The Shador thing is, is what's most compelling. Isn't, um, the, the rookie wide receiver going to try and play Tyson? Isn't Jordan Tyson?

• 2:31:13Bill Simmons?

  He's practicing. I've been, I've had him on two fantasy teams, just on the IR basically for two months hoping. But yeah, if he comes back, now I get, now who knows? But I, I like this spot for Shuck.

• 2:31:27Speaker 02

  I came super close. I had, that was coin flip for me between the Giants, uh, laying the three on the road or the Saints at home minus three. I love, I love the case for the Saints. I did come close to it.

• 2:31:41Bill Simmons?

  Here's another.

• 2:31:41Speaker 02

  I might put him in.

• 2:31:42Bill Simmons?

  Here's another thing. Yeah, I mean, you could put it in on Sunday. Here's another thing I really liked about this bet. I'm looking at the standings right now. Cleveland's still five and three.

• 2:31:55Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 2:31:56Bill Simmons?

  Is Cleveland really going to go six and three? Like from what you've seen, does that make any sense at all? The six and three Cleveland Browns? This is that thing that's going to happen?

• 2:32:07Speaker 02

  If Deshaun Watson was playing quarterback, I would not dismiss that out of hand.

• 2:32:11Bill Simmons?

  Right, I agree.

• 2:32:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:32:13Bill Simmons?

  So they go, they go at New Orleans this week and then home Houston, week 10, and then a bye week.

• 2:32:20Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:32:22Bill Simmons?

  Sounds like five and five to me.

• 2:32:24Speaker 02

  Sounds like five and five to me too.

• 2:32:26Bill Simmons?

  And then New Orleans, because the NFC South is a quagmire and the most fucked up place on the earth, they win this game, they go three and five. Atlanta loses to Cincinnati and Spain, they go three and six. Tampa loses to Chicago, they're three and six.

• 2:32:42Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 2:32:43Bill Simmons?

  And then Carolina, you have beating Denver, but let's say they lose, they're three and five. And all of these teams would have three wins if New Orleans beats the Cleveland. And that sounds perfect. After nine, nine weeks, we'd have 12 wins in the NFC South, split evenly. A couple of people have been sending me, cousin Sal is right on now for his seven and 10 prediction.

• 2:33:04Speaker 02

  It's incredible.

• 2:33:04Bill Simmons?

  So if we were in week nine with everybody with three wins, we, we were dead set for that seven and 10.

• 2:33:10Speaker 02

  We are cooking, baby.

• 2:33:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. I'd love to know what the parlay was of if you went for the other three teams to lose and New Orleans to win. So we would have the three, the three win bukkake, three win NFC South bukkake. That's what would happen. Okay.

• 2:33:29Speaker 02

  Can bet it this week.

• 2:33:31Bill Simmons?

  So your Ringer 107 picks. We both have the Giants minus three. You have the 49ers minus nine and a half to lay it on the Raiders.

• 2:33:41Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:33:42Bill Simmons?

  You have the Seahawks minus eight and a half.

• 2:33:45Speaker 02

  To lay it on the Cardinals.

• 2:33:47Bill Simmons?

  And you have a little bit of a tease Detroit down to minus one against Miami in Miami, which makes me nervous for you. And then Carolina plus eight and a half against Denver. I have the Jets plus nine and a half in Kansas City. I think that line's two points too high. I have the Saints and Tyler Shuck minus three against Shador Sanders. And then last but not least, a little tease with the Seahawks. Little, little get back with Drew Locke under three. Who they playing? I had it written down against the Cardinals. And then the Bears, just to beat Tampa, just beat them by one and we're good with that. That is our Ringer 107. It was brought to you by FanDuel. Download the app now to find all your 107 picks. Make this your most rewarding season ever.

• 2:34:31Bill Simmons?

  FanDuel Player Game Odds Subject to Change. House, we'll see you on Ringer Wise Guys tomorrow.

• 2:34:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, let's go. Bunch of winners.

• 2:34:40Bill Simmons?

  Good luck with the Wizards. Uh, I'm sorry, that guy wrote that mean email about you.

• 2:34:44Speaker 02

  Well, it seemed like it was from a place of love. That's the way I prefer to look at it. And I'll try and come up with some more cutting, cutting edge stuff for him as soon as I can talk again.

• 2:34:53Bill Simmons?

  All right. And be on deck because I honestly don't know how many more Sundays Sal's going to make here.

• 2:34:57Speaker 02

  Oh, I'm, I'm always on deck. I'm always rooting for the cousin Sal.

• 2:35:01Bill Simmons?

  Always start warm up in the bullpen around two o'clock on a Sunday.

• 2:35:05Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:35:06Bill Simmons?

  Thanks, House. See you in a week. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Doc, thanks to House, thanks to Gahan Eduardo, thanks to Chris and Jack at Spotify. I'm going to be back on Sunday night, right after the Sunday night football game with the Oxy cousin, cousin Sal. And enjoy the weekend. Don't forget to watch Air Force One because that's the next rewatchable and I will see you live on Netflix on Sunday night.

• 2:35:53Bill Simmons?

  Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas and affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in DC or Wyoming. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or 1-800-MYRESSET. 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 seven support in Massachusetts or call 8778HOPENY or text HOPENY in New York for Louisiana, call 877-770-7867. This episode is brought to you by Searchlight Pictures, Wild Horse 9. John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell. I like those guys.

• 2:36:36Bill Simmons?

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