Big Changes Needed For Hawks & Trae Young? + AD Trade Possibilities & Clippers Improvement

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Big Changes Needed For Hawks & Trae Young? + AD Trade Possibilities & Clippers Improvement"

Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective | December 29, 2025

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Overview

In this episode, Brian Windhorst, Tim Bontemps, and Tim MacMahon examine critical storylines from around the NBA, primarily focusing on the Atlanta Hawks' troubles with Trae Young back in the lineup, Anthony Davis trade possibilities, the Clippers’ signs of life, and notable league trends involving financial constraints and player markets. They sprinkle in notable statistical deep-dives, anecdotes, and sharp analysis on how new CBA rules are changing everything from trade possibilities to team-building strategies.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

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1. Atlanta Hawks’ Spiral with Trae Young’s Return

• Hawks’ Recent Struggles:

  • Since Trae Young’s return from injury, the Hawks are on a six-game losing streak and have dropped into the play-in zone of the East.
  • With Young on the court: 2–8 record, defensive rating of 126.2 (very poor), and being outscored by nearly 7 points per 100 possessions ([03:05]–[03:54]).
  • While Young was out: Hawks went 13–9, ranked 12th in defense, and Jalen Johnson elevated his play (averaging 23–11–9 on 51% shooting).

• Defensive Woes:

  • "Their record is awful with Trae Young in the lineup and good without him..." — Tim MacMahon ([02:54])
  • The system falls apart defensively with Trae’s return, despite his offensive numbers being solid (21 PPG, 10 APG, ~40% 3PT).

• Front Office Signals:

  • The Hawks did not attempt to sign Trae Young to an extension, which insiders see as a sign they’re seeking an “exit ramp” ([05:55]).
  • A trade, however, is difficult due to Young's contract (player option: $49M in 2026-27) and new CBA constraints that depress his trade value.

• Roster Construction Issue:

  • Hawks have been building a long, athletic roster — with Young as a glaring outlier ("Trey doesn't fit in that vision at all.") ([06:38])
  • Fewer teams are interested in taking on high-salary, weaker-defense point guards.

Notable Quotes:

• “You can’t have a guy making 30% of the cap who has that sort of effect…” — Brian Windhorst ([13:17])
• “We're in a situation now where if you're the Hawks, it doesn't seem like Trae fits long term...” — Tim Bontemps ([07:46])

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2. The Changing NBA Trade Market: AD, Trae, and the New CBA

• Diminished Market for Stars:

  • Not just Trae — similar for Anthony Davis (AD), Ja Morant, LaMelo Ball, and even names like James Harden.
  • New CBA rules and cap constraints make it harder to move huge salaries.
  • Teams can't just offset by paying down salaries (as in MLB) ([13:25]).

• Anthony Davis's Market:

  • AD’s trade value is hampered by age, contract, and extensive injury history (13 groin injuries, 195 data entries for injuries/illnesses per Jeff Stotts’ database ([26:32])).
  • Lakers’ potential return for AD likely to be uninspiring compared to what they gave up for Luka Doncic in the past.

Quotes:

• “If you think you're going to get the bonanza picks package and all that for Anthony Davis, you're setting yourself up to be disappointed...” — Tim MacMahon ([15:37])
• “It's the new reality... Even great players, even players you desperately want to have... It's very hard to move big salaries.” — Tim Bontemps ([16:15])

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3. Kawhi Leonard, Clippers’ Resurgence, and Realistic Expectations

• Clippers’ Recent Improvement:

  • Four-game winning streak capped by Kawhi’s career-high 55 points ([69:42]).
  • Brook Lopez moving into the starting five has improved spacing and helped both Harden and Kawhi operate ([47:02]).
  • Clippers’ defense returning to form after a rough start.

• Still Realistic:

  • At 10–21 (post-win), acknowledge that a top-6 seed is likely out of reach, but they remain in the Play-In chase with over 50 games left ([49:54]).
  • “If they're a play-in team, do I think they're going to pull off an upset? No. But hey, they took the Nuggets to seven games last year.” — Tim MacMahon ([50:19])

• Front Office Approach:

  • No real incentive or ability to tank due to lack of draft picks.
  • Trade market for aging stars like Kawhi and Harden remains soft; team's best move is to push with what they have.

Notable Moment:

• Kawhi’s Historic Night:
  • 55 points: 17-26 FG, 5-10 3PT, 16-17 FT, 11 REB, 5 STL, 3 BLK ([69:30], [69:42]).

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4. Financial Constraints Transforming League Trades

• New CBA = Fewer “Blockbuster” Trades:
  • Players like Trae Young and Anthony Davis simply don’t command the same bidding wars.
  • "This is the new reality of where the league is at from a financial standpoint…” — Tim Bontemps ([16:15], [11:07])

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5. Brooklyn Nets’ Surprising Defensive Surge

• Nets Defense a December Surprise:
  • 7–3 in last 10 games
  • #1 league-wide in defense for December (DefRtg: 103.5) ([29:38]).
  • Success driven by playing bigger, longer lineups — Noah Clowney, Nick Claxton, Michael Porter Jr.
  • Michael Porter Jr. thriving as the primary option in recent games ([32:22]).

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6. Utah Jazz: Unexpected Wins Complicate “Tanking” Narrative

• Jazz and Nets Both Succeeding Under Young Coaches:
  • Keonte George making clutch plays and possibly most improved candidate ([36:21]).
  • Jazz and Nets both frustrating lottery projections due to good young coaches and overperformance.

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7. Victor Wembanyama’s Leadership Lesson

• Noted as great with the San Antonio crowd (and responsible for the "banging the drum" tradition), but skips media after a big loss.
• “Being the face of the franchise is a full time job. And I would even say it’s more important...after a loss than it is after wins.” — Tim MacMahon ([40:16])

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8. Giannis Antetokounmpo Drama: Dunk & Future in Milwaukee

• Stat-Padding Dunks Spark Scrutiny:

  • Giannis throws down a windmill with seconds left in a decided game; Bulls object, but Giannis claims it's about firing up the team ([57:07]–[60:06]).
  • “We're not the champs. Why should we play the clock out and have respect and fair play? We're fighting for our lives right now.” — Giannis, paraphrased by panel ([60:04])

• Will Giannis Ask Out?:

  • Vague but pointed response to questions about his future: “I'm here, I'm here, I'm here. Don't ask me that question...As long as I'm here, I'm going to give everything.” ([63:54])
  • Winds up with panel consensus: Unless he asks out, Bucks will remain “pedal to the floor” and try to improve roster ([64:30]).

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Notable Quotes by Timestamp

• On Trae Young and Hawks’ Dysfunction:

  “The issue is all at one end of the court...their defense has gone off a cliff…”
  — Tim Bontemps ([23:41])

• On CBA’s Shifting Financial Realities:

  “Trey is one of the first...all-star max players who is now running into this new reality of the financial constraints of this new CBA.”
  — Tim Bontemps ([11:07])

• On Anthony Davis’s Market Value:

  “Anthony Davis is due to make $120 million the next two years and is approaching 35 years old and gets hurt a lot. That is not a realistic expectation.”
  — Tim Bontemps ([13:25])

• On Giannis’s Non-Answer:

  “I'm here, I'm here, I'm here. Don't ask me that question. I'm here. It's disrespectful toward my teammate, myself and my teammates...”
  — Giannis Antetokounmpo, as recounted by Tim Bontemps ([63:54])

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Key Segment Timestamps

• Hawks/Trae Young Defensive Split & Future — [02:54]–[14:12]
• CBA, AD, and Difficult Player Trades — [13:25]–[19:40]
• Clippers’ Improvement & Kawhi’s Night — [19:55]–[22:37], [47:02]–[54:01], [69:30]–[70:15]
• Nets' Defensive Surge — [29:38]–[34:41]
• Jazz Overperforming & Tanking Talk — [35:48]–[39:47]
• Victor Wembanyama as Franchise Leader — [37:52]–[41:49]
• Giannis Dunk Drama & Bucks Future — [56:50]–[69:14]

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Episode Tone

The conversation is free-wheeling, analytical, sometimes playful (e.g., family and t-shirt cannon stories), but always insightful and direct about league realities. The tone is candid about how new league rules are reshaping the market, and realistic about challenges facing star players once seen as “trade-proof.”

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Final Takeaways

• The Hawks’ experiment with Trae Young looks close to breaking; trade is possible but complicated.
• New NBA cap rules and CBA have flattened or depressed markets for max-salary, non-superstar players.
• Anthony Davis's trade value is nowhere near what his résumé might suggest.
• The Clippers are showing signs of a turnaround but have a limited ceiling.
• Old teams are out, youth and length are in — as seen with the Nets’ defense.
• Star players, even those with huge numbers or contracts, are not immune to tough market realities.
• The Bucks need more than just Giannis back; their future—and his—remains a league-wide story.

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Summary authored in the voice and spirit of Windhorst & The Hoop Collective, preserving key speaker insights and the context for listeners who missed the full episode.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Hello, welcome to the Hoop Collective podcast. We talk about the NBA which we're doing on Sunday evening. Joining us from New York City back on the east coast just in time for all the snow is Tim Bontemps.

[C]

Hello everybody.

[B]

And joining us from Oklahoma City where he saw the Thunder break their long losing streak. I was worried that the Thunder were headed for disaster, but they righted the ship today against the 76ers as Ban McMahon.

[D]

Howdy partners. Shea sat out of fourth quarter and was just happy over there on the bench. It was quite a different sight than these last couple against the spurs. But the Sixers, they're no Spurs. There was no wimbeat, no embiid either for that matter. But yeah, I agree with you. I think the Thunder probably going to end up being just fine.

[B]

Isaiah Hartenstein today tweaked his calf though. Um, so that's a bit of a concern. I suspect there could be some updates by Monday on that.

[D]

Well, yeah, they, they play tomorrow so there will be updates. At least some level of an update. Left late in the third, did not return. This will shock you to know that the Thunder were tight lipped about it post game and yeah, and, and we will see. But you know, it's obviously those calf injuries are, are tricky and finicky and you know, I, I, that was not an encouraging development.

[B]

Yeah, so we'll see what happens there. The Thunder have depth though and they've, they've shown it before at the big man position. So they may have to deal with him. You know, they, we just had this Austin Reeves injury where he had a calf injury, came back for two games, re injured the calf and now is out at least a month. Although I think the Lakers said that it was a different part of the calf for a different injury. That was one way to the other. I don't know.

[D]

I'm skeptical of that. I have no medical degree but yeah, I doubt it.

[B]

Well, yeah, they just, no team wants to give the concept that they brought a player back too early. Like that's you know, whether it is or it isn't, no team wants that. So anyway, Monday the Thunder play the Atlanta Hawks. The Atlanta Hawks are an interesting team right now. So they have lost six games in a row. They have fallen completely into the play in zone in the Eastern Conference. They've gone from several games over.500 to several games under. And I don't know how to say this other than it coincides with Trae Young returning from, from injury, from that knee injury.

[D]

I mean, their record, just looking at their record, their record is awful with Trae Young in the lineup and good without him, that is.

[B]

Yeah, Bot Simpson, you have the, you have. What's the raw number?

[C]

I mean the raw numbers are when Trae Young plays the Hawks this year have gone 2 and 8. And that includes a game in Brooklyn against the Nets when he got hurt when I believe the score in the first five minutes of that game was something like 18 to 2 and he then hurt his knee. They came back and won the game. But I'm pulling up quickly, trying to pull up what the on off splits are for him. So when Trey is on the court this season, the Hawks have a defensive rating in 280 minutes of 126.2, which for the record is not great. They're being outscored by almost 7 points per 100 possessions. And when he's on the court, their defensive rating goes all the way down to 112.9 and they're even. So it's a negative almost seven point swing. The offense does get worse, but not as, not as much as the defense gets dramatically better. And therein lies the problem with Trey Young and the Hawks.

[B]

Yeah, so he was out almost exactly six weeks. Okay. And in those six weeks the Hawks went 13 and 9 and they ranked 12th in defense in those six weeks, which is, you know, middle of the pack but, you know, certainly put you in position to compete Jalen Johnson in the. That he played out of the 22 games that Trey missed. Jalen Johnson played in 20 of those games and he averaged 23 points, 11 rebounds, nine assists on 51% shooting when Trey was out. Since Trey's come back, there's been six games. They've lost all six. He's only played in five of them. He did skip, I think a back to back in those six in those six games and again, he didn't play in one. And they got blown out in that game by San Antonio. But in those six games they've ranked 28th in defense since he since he came back, I.

[D]

Now, I'm going to say another factor there is Porzingis has also missed all those games.

[B]

Absolutely. Porzingis has been out the last couple. Actually, He's. He's been out straight the last couple of weeks, but he's missed a lot of time in the last month dealing with illness shams and Om Yung Masook reported on Sunday that he could be back in the next few days, however, coming back from dealing with the illness. Absolutely true. But Porzingis missed a lot of time before that, too, where they were better defensively. So. And here's Trey's numbers. He's come back and he is. He's played in five games. He's averaging 21 points a game. He's shooting 39 and change. I'll give him 40% from three, and he's averaging 10 assists. He is not playing poorly offensively. He's. He's played pretty. He's like. He's dogging it out there. Um, it's just that their systems defensively are really. They suffer when Trey's out there. It's not all a product of him. I'm sure if Quinn Snider was here or if Trey was here, he could illustrate ways that maybe that's unfair to assign it to him, but, you know, the numbers are the numbers.

[D]

Well, and the other. The other thing here is the Hawks certainly are indicating that they're looking for the exit ramp with Trey Young. They did not make any attempt to get him signed to an extension. When that's the case with your face of the franchise, that's a pretty clear message that, you know, the end could be near. And we've talked about this a lot with Trey. The same is true with Ja Rant in Memphis and with Lamelo Ball in Charlotte that if they. If there's an attempt to trade these guys, it's not going to be easy. There's not going to be some wide array of teams raising their hand and trying to get in on the bidding. And I'm not sure if they're going to. If you're even going to be able to make a trade that's going to bring value in return.

[C]

If you look at the Hawks roster, the theory of the Hawks is pretty clear, right? They want to have long, rangy, athletic players at every position. And pretty much all the moves they've made have been geared towards doing that. And when Trey wasn't playing and they were rolling out there with a lineup with Nikhil Alexander Walker and Dyson Daniels and Jalen Johnson and Kongwu and Zachary Ricochet, last year's number one overall pick. Those guys all are long, rangy, athletic players, right? And they don't have a ton of size. They've struggled on the boards at times. They're not a perfect team. They struggled in the half court, offensively, like, they had a pretty. They had pretty rough offensive half court numbers. But there was a theory of what that group looked like and that it worked, at least to a certain degree. And they were, you know, a pretty competitive team. Trey doesn't fit in that vision at all. And when you look at the modern league and the amount of physicality that is going on in these games, and we've talked about the emphasis on offensive rebounding and just the size the teams are playing with across the board. Trey's one of the smaller players in the league. He's always been a rough defensive player. And it's not hard. While you can argue it's not fair, it's not hard to do a one to one correlation of the defense going off a cliff with Trey Young on the court and say, the offense coming down is going. We can go at Trey Young every time and have success. So to your point, McMahon, we're in a situation now where if you're the Hawks, like, it doesn't seem like Trey fits long term. And so the question is, is there a path to getting him elsewhere that can allow them to pivot in a direction where they can focus on the way they've been building this team, which is in a vision of guys that frankly don't fit Trey's profile? And like, I think that's one of the bigger questions to watch in the league between now and the trade deadline. Because if you look around the league for all the reasons we've been talking about, all these point guards, and you wrote that story with Bobby about it, like, there's not a lot of teams that need point guards and there's not a lot of places where you go, yeah, this team is anxious to go trade for a $45 million guy. Which is the same part of why Anthony Davis's trade market is impacted. And all these other guys that are potentially on the market might not be going anywhere.

[D]

Sounds like young. Mr. Bontemps is a Trey Young fan, is not liking what he's hearing in the background over there.

[C]

Mr. Bontess is still adjusting to east coast life. It's been a long afternoon, long day of naps for him. So, yeah, yeah, still trying to get back to sleep.

[B]

Jet lag for the little bon. Although young, Mr. Bontemps has been to the West coast about four times already and he's got a better passport game.

[D]

Than I do, too. It's ridiculous.

[B]

I think that's accurate.

[D]

No, but would Trey. I don't know. I don't know where the destination would be. Like Minnesota would like to upgrade at point guard, but I don't know if there's a deal that makes sense for the Wolves. Just making the problem is the salary. Just making the salary match is going to be tough. And like I can just tell you, you know, the Mavericks would like to work out a deal to send Anthony Davis to Atlanta, but Trey Young's not going to be part of that. They want to move forward with Kyrie IR as their point guard and you're not going to play those two guys together.

[C]

And by the way, just to interject, if the Hawks do a Trey Young a deal for Anthony Davis that doesn't include Trae Young, they are not only a second April team in 2026, 27, they're like wildly into the second apron in 2026, 2027. The Atlanta Hawks are not going to be wildly into the second apron. They haven't even been into the tax in a long time. So that is not, to me, any sort of realistic path to something happening.

[D]

Now, that's assuming Trey would pick up his player option, but given the chilly trade market, it's probably in his best interest to pick up that player option.

[C]

You have to operate under the assumption with options that people will do the thing that's in their best interest. And as of today, it's hard for me to sit here and see Trae Young doing anything other than picking up an option for 20, 26, 27 for almost $49 million.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I think Trey is in the situation like we've seen many players in years past, where is there a possibility that he could work out a contract where he declines the player option, takes a new contract that guarantees him more money over years, but lowers the the average salary. That's possible. However, you know, that's hard to do when you've been the franchise player of a team and you're still in your prime years.

[C]

And I think Trey is one of the first. Go ahead.

[D]

I was going to say it's possible for him to maybe do that with another franchise, but I don't know that at this point it makes a lot of sense for the Hawks to even give him pay cut extension.

[C]

Well, I would. I would argue it doesn't. And it also goes back to the same thing we've been talking about for more than a year now, which is we are entering into a new reality from a financial standpoint across the league. And Trey is one of the first guys who's, you know, these all star Max players who is now running into this new reality of the financial constraints of this new cba. And five years ago, Trey probably does get a max or probably does get something close to a max or is has been traded somewhere for a big.

[B]

Maybe not even five years ago, Right.

[C]

Maybe not even. But it's. Things would have been different. I would just to say five years ago for a safe exercise, I think this whole situation would look different, but it's not.

[B]

A year ago he would have extended already.

[C]

Yeah, certainly that would be. If you go off the prior decade of evidence that we have, he's a guy that would either be on the Hawks or would be extended or to McMahon's point, would be elsewhere and extended. And the fact that he's not, I think, goes back to all of these big questions that are coming in terms of how things are going to look different in this new system that we're in. And he's one of the first guys that I think is really running into the realities of that where there's not a huge market for his services. And he's going to say, hey, I'm making this money. I'm an all star player. I'm putting up big numbers like I should be getting paid and I'm just not sure where the market is.

[B]

Especially if you're a Trae Young fan. You're like, the guy's. Did he lead the league in assists last year or was he second believe he led last? Yeah, I mean, the guy puts up routinely 20 and 10. Like he averages 20 and 10. And so you're saying, wait a minute, how can a Player average is 20 and 10 who's 27 years old? You're talking about how there's not that much of a market for him. And I can understand why that's hard. That's a hard sell. It's certainly a hard sell to him. You know, the, the thing. So his, his number next year, his player option is 49 million. That is 30% of next year's cap. And we've just illustrated that, at least right now and, you know, we'll see what happens the rest of the season. I don't know. But right now he's. Him being out there is not contributing. You know, it's not that he's hurting the team. It's not helping the Hawks win.

[D]

Well, you can't have a.

[B]

Well, I just. You can't have a guy making 30% of the cap who has that sort of effect, you know, whether it's his fault or its circumstances or whatever. And so that's the reality.

[C]

Right? And this is a situation where trae Young making $25 million has a much different market. Right? Like, you can't. This isn't baseball. You can't say, hey, Minnesota, we'll take on 20, 20 million dollars of trace money and you send us back 25. Right. That doesn't work in the NBA. So whether it's. Again, whether it's Anthony Davis or Trae Young or any of these other guys, like, this is, you know, I think Band said it a bunch of times, Anthony Davis wants to get extended wherever he goes. Right. Okay. Well, Anthony Davis is due to make $120 million the next two years and is approaching 35 years old and gets hurt a lot. That is not realistic expectation to go somewhere and get extended for a huge number going into your late 30s when you have that. That evidence behind you of what this is going to look like.

[B]

And Jeff Stotts, who runs in street clothes, is a good follow on X and he's got his blog in street clothes. He stopped me when he put out the number this week, or I guess last week. So AD Is out right now with a groin injury. Was he day to day McMahon?

[D]

They're saying he's day to day. Sean's report. He's expecting to miss at least a few games.

[B]

Okay. This is the 13th groin injury of Anthony Davis's career where he's missing.

[D]

When did groins become adductors, by the way?

[B]

Whatever. Call whatever you want. 13th time. I mean, that is. Wow.

[D]

I mean, that's tough. And. And obviously there's been. There's been Cavs, there's been, you know, multiple other injuries. But, I mean, he's played this year less than half the Mavericks games. You know, since he's been in a Mavericks uniform, it's way less than half the games. And, you know, he's a. He's a very like a dude there. There are 500 team with him and 4 and 13 without him this year. He's still an extraordinarily impactful player. I mean, he's a walking double double and, you know, still one of the best defensive bigs in the league. Especially, you know, he wasn't in great shape early in the season as he's gotten in better shape, but again entering his mid-30s, very expensive now wants to continue to be very expensive with more guaranteed years. It's a, it's a complicated trademark. And the other thing is, you know, the Mavericks are sitting here. They gave up a perennial first team all NBA player entering his prime to get this guy. You know, even though the guy who made the trade, I heard something about that, yeah, the guy who made the trade is gone, but the owner who approved it is still the final decision maker. And you know, do you want to take back? Because whatever they get for Anthony Davis, people can look at and go, this is what the return for Luke ended up being. And, you know, so you've got that call it pride or whatever is in play here and like the Mavericks are, if you think you're going to get the bonanza picks, package and all that for Anthony Davis, I think you're setting yourself up to be disappointed that anchoring.

[B]

Is part of the straight team to walk, isn't it? Because we're not trying to be critical of these guys. We're just trying to explain the way the other league is seeing them.

[C]

And it's just the new reality. It's the new reality of where the league is at from a financial standpoint like the league, the NBA is operating more or less in a hard cap system now, like you, it's just, it's very hard, especially in season, to move big salaries for anybody, even great players, even players you desperately want to have. Like to just construct a trade for a player making 45, 50, 55, $60 million is extremely difficult right now. It's very hard for teams to do. That's before you get into all these teams having traded draft picks and everything else. Like Cavs corner over the second apron, can't make a trade. The Knicks $5 below the second apron.

[B]

Can'T really, really coming at me because I keep saying it's, it's impossible for the Cavs to make. I don't. I think I said impossible. It's difficult. Obviously there are trades that the Cavs can make that work on the trade machine.

[C]

That's right. It's just, it's just unrealistic to expect.

[B]

Them to make them a trade that makes them better, that is legal. You start getting, you start entering fantasy land.

[C]

That's right.

[D]

It's very hard to trade. The other thing is when you're dealing with a guy like Anthony Davis or, you know, in the case of Kevin Durant last year, I think it's similar situations. They're going to have some say in the matter. Like, you couldn't just trade Kevin Durant to Golden State if you didn't want to go there. It's just not the reality of the way that the NBA works. You can't just trade Anthony Davis to a team that's not willing to give him an extension this summer. That's not the way this works. And it's not an insult to Anthony Davis to say, hey, the market for Kevin Durant was a good starter in Dylan Brooks.

[C]

And let's be honest, at the time, Dylan Brooks is seen as a was. He's played really well for Phoenix. He's like a starter. I'm not even sure I necessarily a starter.

[D]

He was a good starter for the rocks, but whatever.

[C]

No, I agree, but I just mean it's not like he. It's not like he was some, like a crazy value deal. I was a perfectly adequate contract.

[B]

Can I just say, I was talking to an NBA GM in the last day or two where he was like, you know, we looked. When we were at the start of the season, we looked at the Suns and we sort of said, that's an easy game. Because he was talking about how. He was talking about how in the Western Conference, like, the valuation of schedules is like, from where you were at the start of the season to now is totally different. They were like, yeah, he's like, you know, we had a few games with the Suns early in the season, and we thought those would be easy games. And we're like, those were not easy games. So Matt Ishbia, you know, let it be.

[D]

But again, the return for KD was Dylan Brooks, Jalen Green, who. You can sell that as an upside play, but really it's salary filler and then their own pickback, which was the 10th overall pick. So again, if you're looking at, okay, that's what the market was for Kevin Durant, and you had to wait until the summer to get a deal done for the Mavericks. If you can get a deal where you're getting draft compensation, and I don't think it'll be plural, expiring salary and a young guy with some upside, that to me is a great return for Anthony Davis, that's going to not win any press conferences.

[C]

No, I mean, in that anchoring. That anchoring is the thing that's weighing on all these conversations. Right. Like, to your point, McMahon, Dallas has the Luca trade anchoring whatever happens with Anthony Davis, because whether Nico Harrison's there or not, obviously he's not. Any Anthony Davis trade immediately is Going to be reflected back on. Well, he just got acquired for Luca. Now he's getting traded for X which is going to be Luca. I can just, you know, news news.

[D]

Maybe, maybe Luca Garza.

[B]

Right. And by the way, Luca Garza's getting it done there. And that's right.

[C]

The Blazers beat the Celtics tonight. Nice win for them.

[B]

Yeah, the Celtics had a four game win streak, bro.

[C]

Yeah, they've been playing really well.

[B]

By the way, breaking news from Intuit Dome.

[D]

Uh oh.

[B]

I went to the Clippers Pistons first half tonight. I had to leave to do this podcast to make sure that McMahon could get done. I don't know what you.

[D]

You were dragged out of there kicking and screaming.

[B]

I' on my 8 year old who's attending the game tonight with my wife. My 8 year old got a T shirt from the T shirt Cannon.

[D]

Oh, nice.

[B]

It is. It is three sizes too big. It's. It's three sizes too big. Orange. It has nothing to do with the Clippers. I guess it has a Clippers logo.

[D]

Wait, no, it is. They have those weird like orange Crush. It's like their uniforms. I had to ask them. I'm like what is up with all this? And it's like some hodgepodge of all the different places I didn't Graves and San Diego Clippers.

[B]

But like I guess that is true with Sugar. I think it's called something. Yeah.

[D]

So it's tied into these uniforms. But if you're all uniform requires like a three paragraph explanation. Find some.

[B]

He won't be ready to wear this T shirt for three to five years. But he is very excited. It's just breaking news that the T shirt Cannon has smiled.

[D]

Did he box out to get it?

[B]

I don't know. I have to get full details later on. The Clippers are in a dog fight right now with the Pistons. I think no matter what happens, my son will walk away happy in this game. Sorry to interrupt you.

[C]

No, it's. But it's just like it's the same thing. Obviously it's a different degree, but it's the same thing with Trae Young in Atlanta. This is a guy who is the best player they've had since who, Joe Johnson, Dominique maybe Dominique, arguably. Like you could argue Dikembe. Like regardless, he's for a Hawks franchise that hasn't had a lot of highs.

[B]

He's been the face of the franchise for the better part of what, seven, eight years?

[C]

For a better part of his time. He got them to a conference final.

[B]

Guy was traded for Luka.

[C]

Yes. Yes, but he, but he's had a really, he's had a really good career in Atlanta. He's a really popular player. He's still putting up big numbers. It's not like he's fallen off a cliff.

[B]

So you go to a Hawks game, there's a lot of guys, there's a.

[C]

Lot of 10 jerseys, there's a lot of 10. So the anchoring of that, again, if you're going, hey, we're moving on from Trae Young. Okay, what's the return? Well, the return is getting out of next year's money. Like I would argue, getting out of next year's money is a good return for whether it's the Mavericks for AD or for the Hawks for Trey Young. But that's easy for me to say sitting here and not the person who's executing the trade.

[D]

Trey Young's number 11, just to be clear.

[B]

Sorry, I was like, I didn't think he was number 10, but I didn't want to.

[C]

No, number 11. Been a long day.

[B]

Yeah. You're jet lagged. I get it. At the end of the day, TREY YOUNG At 30% of your cap for any teams, it's a tough sell right now. That's just, you know, that's, you know, that doesn't mean he can't be a productive player. It's just really hard at 30% of your cap.

[D]

Well, and the other thing here, though, is for the Hawks to be any kind of threat to make a playoff run, they are going to need a Trey Young type of offensive talent. It's just probably a guy who's a better fit for this current roster than Trey Young and Jalen Johnson can become that. Maybe they get that with the Pelicans pick. But they're not a threat this year, is my point.

[B]

So defensively is where they're obviously suffering, I will say in the game. Since Trae Young came back, Jalen Johnson's numbers have actually increased. He's averaging 27 a game on 55%, shooting 10 rebounds.

[C]

I mean, they've had some crazy scoring games that they've lost in this run.

[B]

They're just still averaging. He's still averaging nine assists a game since Trey came back. So it's not like they've taken the ball out of his hands. They have come in with a plan about how they're going to keep Jalen Johnson highly involved in their offense, and it's working. So I don't want to. I don't think this is a matter of, like, Trey doing something wrong or like, you know, hogging the ball or whatever.

[C]

No, the, the issues are all, the issues are all at one end of the court. That, that's it's the bottom line. Their defense has gone off a cliff and as a result, so is their record. And like it, the fit just isn't there. And so here's the, here's the point change between now and February 5th, the.

[D]

Five games they've lost with Trey in the lineup since he's returned. Here's how many points they scored. 126, 151, 23, 111 and 125. I think we can all say, yeah, they've got some defensive issues.

[C]

More Hoop Collective podcast after this holiday.

[A]

PSA from DSW this is a reminder that shoes are a gift. Literally. So unwrap something good, like boots that inspire your next big adventure. Or cozy slippers that give you an excuse to stay in. Or sneakers that feel like pure joy. Because shoes aren't just shoes, they're exactly what you wanted. Let us surprise you so you can surprise them. Find shoes that get you and everyone on your list at prices that get your budget at dsw stores or dsw.com this episode is brought to you by State Farm. Listening to this podcast Smart move Being financially savvy Smart move. Another smart move having State Farm help you create a competitive price when you choose to bundle home and auto bundling. Just another way to save with a personal price plan, like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings and eligibility vary by state.

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[C]

By the way, to go back to ad, I was texting with Jeff Staats, our friend of the pod, and I asked him what the you mentioned that 13 number in terms of his groin injuries that he had logged in his database. Jeff has this database that goes back a very Long time. And I asked him, how many times have you logged anything for AD in your database? And I double checked with them and it's data entries for injury and illness, to be clear. But the. You guys want to guess the number of entries for AD?

[D]

50. 50.

[B]

I was going to say I'll take 49 to try to win the prices. Right.

[C]

The answer is 195.

[D]

Oh, my gracious.

[C]

Now, remember, this is anytime the guy is in an illness or injury of any kind. So.

[B]

Has he played 15 years? Is this his 15th season?

[C]

This is his 14th or 15th season. He was a 12 draftee, so I think it's year 14.

[B]

All right, so just on average, that's 14 entries a season.

[C]

Yeah. So Anthony Davis ranks second all time in his database. Who do you think ranks first? Quiz. It's not Kawhi.

[B]

Kawhi hasn't played long enough.

[C]

Kawhi has a career high 46 points in this game.

[D]

That's what I was going to say.

[C]

The third quarter.

[D]

The third quarter is not over.

[C]

Yes, Kawhi.

[B]

It's a.46 is a career high.

[C]

That's. The Clippers PR staff just tweeted it out.

[B]

I might have to get back in an Uber.

[C]

They're up by 22 on their way to a fourth straight win. It's been a very interesting week. We'll talk about that in a minute.

[D]

Yeah, yeah. Way to leave that one, Wendy.

[C]

Who do we think. Who do we think is.

[B]

My son and wife will see history.

[C]

Yeah, there you go.

[B]

I don't think Embiid's been in the league long enough. I'm just going to guess Vince Carter because he was in the league 22.

[C]

Years, saw Vince Carter. Right Kind of guess, though, Dirk. Longevity is in. Longevity is the right guess. Not Dirk. I think there's one fairly obvious guess that hasn't been guessed yet.

[B]

Well, LeBron hasn't been long.

[C]

LeBron James is the answer.

[B]

Is that right?

[D]

Really?

[C]

205, huh?

[B]

That's. I wonder how many with the Lakers. Because it's.

[C]

Again, you're talking 23 seasons. He's played almost 10 more years than Anthony Davis.

[B]

All right, so let me run that. What do you say? 205.

[C]

Yeah, it's a little. It's a little.

[B]

It's a little average of nine.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

Nine.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. All right. Well, I just didn't think he'd had that many injuries, but I guess full credit to Jeff.

[C]

Then again, that's any time a guy shows up on the injury pool with anything.

[B]

I understand.

[C]

Still, it's It's a lot of interest.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, I guess LeBron had that like whole season where he was on the injury list every game for. For that foot.

[C]

Yeah. I mean, I don't know the exact breakdown of what Barrett's.

[D]

It's like, like Tom Brady's shoulder. I remember every injury report with a shoulder.

[B]

I thought it was his knee.

[C]

Full credit to Jeff. His database, like, it's pret.

[B]

That database is one of a kind. There are probably teams that don't have records on their own team, much less every player in the league. All right, well, let's go to the opposite end of the spectrum. A team that's sort of overachieving. Let's welcome the Brooklyn Nets to the Hoop Collective because they're in the bottom three of teams we discuss. And they have earned our attention because they've won seven of their last 10 games. It actually coincides with December 1, I think. They've played 10 games in December and anyway, they've won seven to 10. They won three in a row, guys. In this 10 game span, they're number one in the league in defense, which is a stunner because between the middle of October when the season started and mid November, first two months of the year, they were 29th in defense. And over the last 15 games, they've been second to the Thunder. In the last 10 games, they've been first.

[C]

In the month of December, the Nets have a defensive rating of 103.5. That is three entire points better than the Oklahoma City Thunder over the same period.

[B]

Well, they don't have to play the spurs all the time.

[C]

And they have a net rating in the month of December of 10.3, which is only behind the Celtics and again the Oklahoma City Thunder. That's pretty good company for the Brooklyn Nets to be in.

[B]

Yeah. And so I will point out, Cam Thomas is a guy who. He's been out for most of these games. This is a guy who's not known for his defense, although he came back the other night and came off the bench and put up 30 in Minnesota and had. And the Nets gave the. The Timberwolves such a jolt that the Minnesota fans, I think the previous home game they beat the Thunder and then the next home game they lose to the Nets, they get booed. And Ant says they should have booed us. But. But Cam Thomas did have 30 off the bench and he was plus 21 his first game back. What is as I've talked to people and gotten their opinions. You know, one of the things that Happened when Cam Thomas went out. He's been out. He was out about a month, but just in general. Jordy Fernandez, by the way, you remember earlier this season, they started out 0 and 7 or 0 and 8. And at 1 point Jordy was like frustrated and he was like, I can't get these guys to play hard. And Michael Porter Jr. At one point, like criticized the team's guard play at one point. They're, you know, they have the five rookies this year, they call them the Flatbush Five. The Nets fans do. At one point, Jordy stopped playing them or cut their playing time because they were getting roasted on defense so bad. So it was. But you know, obviously they're in a rebuilding situation. They traded for their pick back this year and you know, they're not trying to make the playoffs. But you know, there was a lot of frustration and they've totally turned it around. But one of the things that's happened when Cam Thomas went out, they really, Jordy started playing a really, really long lineup. And bontemps, you have talked about these teams who are really long. You've talked about the spurs, you saw them play recently, and just how long they are. Well, if you look at the lineups that the Nets have been playing, not only Michael Porter, who's 610 out there, but they've put Noah Clowney in the starting lineup. And with Noah Clowney and Nick Claxton in there and Michael Porter, they're just really, really long. It's resulted in like really great numbers in their paint defense. Like it's hard to score on them in the paint. They've got shot blockers and defenders in there. And look, I mean, the numbers don't lie. You know, Jordy's got him playing with really good defense. They're playing with long lineups. Michael Porter Jr. Is playing great. He's shooting 47% from three pointers during this last 10 games. And guys, look at the last 19 games at Michael because he missed some games with the back. His back tightened up a few weeks ago when he missed a couple games. They're 10 and 9 in games. The last 19 games Michael Porter's played in.

[C]

Well, I mean, Michael Porter is another example of the same corollary we were talking about earlier with Trey Young and Anthony Davis where Michael Porter Jr. Is a very good player. He's a flawed player, but he's a very good player. And he was part of a championship winning team in Denver. And like we talked about at the time, Cam Johnson's a nice player, but that was not a talent upgrade for Denver. It was a salary reduction to get another good player in to replace Michael Porter, to get them below the second apron and to get out of the tax and they could tire that. I don't remember exactly where they wound up, but that was what the motivation for that deal was. You muted McMahon.

[B]

Jackson finally had enough to create flexibility.

[D]

For making the way.

[B]

Kawhi has 51 through three quarters.

[C]

Yeah, 25 in the third. He's been on an absolute heater.

[B]

Do I need to pause this and well, they're up by 23.

[C]

No, I mean go back to the.

[D]

Sound like you're talking about Clippers like when that's grown.

[B]

I'm sorry, I'm just giving a real. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm just giving a real time update.

[D]

Yeah, do grunt work. You don't.

[C]

Yeah, we'll circle back to the Clippers in a bit. But yeah, so like Michael Porter Jr. Can score and is a guy who go out there and get buckets. Like he's on a team where he's being treated like their primary option and he's getting buckets. And to your point about the length that they're playing with, I'm going to see them play the warriors on Monday. Warriors had a brutal loss in Toronto on Sunday. We're up in most of the game, blow the lead, get blown out in overtime, see how they look.

[D]

But Scotty, what he had 23 and 25 rebounds with a triple double.

[B]

He had something like eight rebounds in overtime. He got like every rebound in overtime.

[C]

Yeah, and he got the game. He got the game time offensive rebound to put back late in regulation. But you know, the warriors not a big team. And if you look at this Nets team, these six guys have played in at least nine. Michael Porter has played nine. The other guys have played in all ten of these games in December. Danny Wolf, who's a seven foot rookie day. Ron Sharp, who's a six eight, you know, hard rebounding, big man Jegor Jemin, who's their the eighth overall pick, who's another six, eight big guard Porter, who's a 610 forward. Claxton, who's another 610 center and Noah Cloudy who's another 610 wings. So like those to your point, that's six guys all playing fairly heavy minutes that are all big and long. And if you're rolling them all out there, that's just a lot of space that's being gobbled up all at once.

[D]

Well, and listen, I've compared The, it's different styles here, obviously, but to me, the Nets and the Jazz are in the same boat where they've got really good young coaches and you're just not going to be able to get great lottery odds. If you have anything resembling NBA talent with Jordy Fernandez as your coach or with Will Hardy as your coach, maybe you can get lucky and bounce up in the lottery. But you know, the Jazz, like there's this spotlight on the Jazz now, which by the way, the Jazz, who are coming off a back to back when they beat the Pistons and the Spurs. There's this spotlight on the Jazz now because people are like bracing for the Tank so they can keep their top eight protected pick that turns into dust after this year. But, you know, we'll, we'll see how that unfolds. But like Brooklyn going in the season, Brooklyn was expected to be one of the worst teams in the NBA. Like they were expected to be, I think it's safe to say a bottom three or four team in the league just based on talent. And then they're, you know, their number one or two offensive option missed most of the season so far. And they're, you know, they're not like a threat to make the playoffs or anything, but they're pesky.

[C]

I mean they were three and 16. They're now 10 and 19.

[B]

Right. I went and looked. They went from number three and right now they're, you know, tank tankathon, they're sixth and they were I think second, second or third. And the jazz, we sit here today, the Jazz are in ninth, which is the magic number. And look, there's, you know, there's 2/3 of the season left, but you know, 1/3 in the Jazz are in ninth. Keonte George hit a, has hit some big shots. Easy was he had two game winners this year.

[D]

Now he has three go ahead shots in the last five seconds.

[B]

That's three. That's three.

[D]

You know, including the game winner the other night against the Pistons. And he's like, Keonte George is absolutely, if he's not the front runner for most improved player, he's, he better be on any short.

[C]

He's on the list.

[D]

But you know, we've been saying about the Jazz because they haven't had the super high pick in the lottery. We've been saying like they need one of these recent first rounders to really pop. Keonte George wasn't a lottery pick, but he's the young recent first rounder who's finally really popped for them. And honestly last year was A disappointing year like Will Hardy basically cussed him out during his exit interview and he responded to that the way that they hoped he would. And the guy's averaging 24 a game, like 24 and 7 and been great in clutch situations and looks like he can be a cornerstone for them moving forward. They still, they think Ace Bailey's going to be a cornerstone too. So there's some things that it's just like you can, you can envision the Jazz competing for a play in even a playoff spot in the near future. It's just, it's, it's very tough to see them really becoming a, a team that has a chance to make a deep playoff run unless they either get lucky with a pick or lucky in the lottery.

[C]

We were not on site obviously for that Jazz spurs game, but I wouldn't say it's the best look for Victor Wembanyama to go from banging the drum after beating Thunder to not talking after their eight game winning streak ends, by the way, against the Jazz.

[B]

Okay, I will say this. I do think banging the drum is pretty cool.

[C]

So I think banging the drum is.

[B]

Very cool in case people didn't see it. So the, you know, more and more teams are developing and they have for years, but are developing these sort of, you know, fanatical sections.

[C]

Wimby developed a section. No, the spurs thing is next level. And that's all from the Jackals doing it.

[B]

Yeah. And Victor, you know, this is a European thing, you know, we see in soccer proper football. And you know, Victor is, you know, he works with them and so he's developed this post game, he was the.

[D]

Judge tryouts for the group.

[B]

I forgot about that.

[C]

Yeah, he was. I mean, it's all his idea. It's a very cool thing.

[B]

So after. So, you know, in the same spirit as lighting of the beam, it's the same concept, something to rally around when you win, you know, bring out a drum and you know, match it with clapping. And it is really cool to have your franchise player engage with your fans. And I will say this, that from his rookie season, Victor really embraced the crowd in San Antonio, wanted to cultivate it. I was at a game in his second year where they beat the, I think they beat the Knicks in overtime. It was a tremendous game. Jalen Brunson hit scored 60, Victor had 40 and 20 was an amazing game. By the way, my son was at that game too. And now he's going to see Kawhi I won. Was. He's. I don't know if he understands what he's saying. But anyway, after that game, he, we grabbed the mic and he just talked about the crowd and everything like that. So he's looked for that a long time. I think it's really cool that he's doing this. But to your point, Bon Temps, we.

[C]

Love all of Victor's talking. Victor's. Victor's great talking after games all the time. It's just if you're going to, if you're going to be, if you're going to brag after wins, like, don't, don't disappear when you lose in Utah. That's all.

[D]

Being the face of the franchise is a full time job. And I would even say it's more important for the face of the franchise to be accountable and in that spokesman role after a loss than it is after wins. You know, like, look, and this is something, this is not unique. A lot of young guys do. Yes. You know, these young, very competitive guys that get pissed off when they lose. It was a bad loss for them. They'd been rolled and they, you know.

[C]

It'S not the end of the world.

[D]

It's just, you know, it was let down type of game, whatever. But you know, Scott Tomlin, the former math PR guy, came to an agreement with, with Luca when this was something Luke would do is he'd get mad. He blowed the media off after losses. And the agreement was, hey, you know, there can be some times where you don't talk post game, you know, but it's gotta be after a win when you weren't like the main character of the, of the game after losses. You gotta be there every single time because you are the guy who everybody wants to hear from. You're the guy who is supposed, you know, for better or for worser, this the face of the franchise sets the tone for everybody else. So I don't think it's the end of the world. I did think it was a bad look and hopefully it's something that, that Wimby can learn from because like, you can't do that. I promise you this.

[B]

After the post game, Access Police. Right there.

[D]

Exactly. But like after every Thunder loss, unless Shay is in street clothes, he's going to be talking.

[C]

And by the way, Che was sitting there. Chase sat there after they lost three in a row to the spurs and said they're better than us. Like, you know, like, yeah.

[D]

And LeBron's no longer the face of the franchise for the Lakers, but he's freaking LeBron James. So him.

[B]

Interviews than any NBA player in history. Well, that's fine.

[C]

That's fine.

[D]

Guess what? You're still on a max contract. You're still LeBron James. I understand when you when the Lakers lose for him to duck out the back doors.

[C]

None of it's a character assassination, but it's just, you know, it's just if we're going to praise Victor all the time, which we do, deservedly so like does that it's worth pointing out it's wasn't great. That's all.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

More Hoop Collective Podcast after this Brooks.

[D]

Running reminds us that we're all powered by something. Whether it's the me time energy of a run after a day at the office, the electrifying energy of your first marathon, or the infectious energy of a group run with your friends. No matter what energy powers you, Brooks has gear specifically designed to unleash it. So lace up and let it out. Let's run there. Visit BrooksRunning.com today to learn more.

[A]

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[B]

Required Good morning crust. It's a great day to be a bread brother.

[D]

Mornings are not my jam or jelly.

[B]

Oh come on, stop loafing around.

[D]

I just woke up feeling hollow inside.

[C]

Just grab one of the new morning uncrustable sandwiches like Bright Eyed Berry or.

[D]

Up an apple filled with 12 grams.

[B]

Of protein and tons of deliciousness crust. What are you eating?

[D]

It's just granola. Not even yogurt.

[C]

No crust, no fuss. Uncrust your mornings.

[B]

I will say this, like with every Utah win, the stage gets more set for how extreme the Jazz will go are willing to go how extreme the Jazz players are willing to because you know, like Lowry Markkanen can push back if they're deactivating him for not real reasons if he wants and whether the league does anything. The league hit the Jazz last year with a fine. It's just it's on center stage right now what happens with the Jazz.

[D]

But again, we're talking about this right after they beat the Pistons and the spurs in a back to back.

[C]

Yeah. So one and one. One thing to consider too is like, you know, two of the teams behind them in the standings are the Mavericks, who've been playing much better. And we'll see how long AD is out. But if AD isn't traded and AD plays the rest of the year, like Dallas, probably going to be better than them. And look, this game isn't over. Maybe I'll brew these words, but the clippers are up 18, like eight to go in the fourth quarter and Kawhi has 51. They're about to have won four in.

[B]

A row in 32 minutes.

[C]

They beat Kid 24, 25 in the third quarter. They beat the Rockets the other day. Like, maybe you, I mean, think we're about to talk about the Clippers anyway. You were there, Brian. But like, yeah, there's a, there's certainly a world where the Clippers somewhat get back on track. They're only a couple losses back of the Jazz and they get ahead of them also. And then the math starts to look well.

[D]

And the Clippers are obviously motivated to win as many games as possible. There's no benefit in them being bad.

[C]

That's right.

[D]

Well, there is. Yeah.

[B]

So I spent, I, I spent several hours talking to folks between the Clippers and the Pistons tonight. By the way, the Pistons second straight year that they have had to be on the west coast on Christmas without playing on Christmas, which it happens to teams, but two years in a row is kind of tough. And I think one of the other Pistons staffers told me that it was several times in the last five years that's happened.

[C]

The last couple days aside, if the Pistons keep playing like they have been the first couple months of the season, they might be playing on Christmas next season.

[B]

So that's true. Yeah, that's true. And yeah, they're in the process of maybe losing another game here. But Christmas for the Pistons was spent in Salt Lake City. They had the choice of Sacramento, staying in Sacramento or going to Salt Lake. And the team went to Salt Lake, an enviable choice. They had two days off and some of the players did take some time and go someplace else, but the bulk of the team was toasted. Christmas. A lot of their families came, by the way. Speaking of families, a lot of families are on the road right now. And we mentioned the Nets. Jordy Fernandez's birthday was I think Saturday and the Nets and his family was there and his kids surprised him with the cake after shoot around and they sang. The whole team sang Happy Birthday to him in Spanish. So that was. Yeah, dirty.

[C]

Family's around a lot of games. He's got, he's got younger kids and he comes out. He also, like Will, is one of these young head coaches that doesn't just sit in his office all day before the game. So he comes out to court, out to the court and says hello to people, his kids around a lot. So that was pretty cool to see.

[B]

Yeah. So anyway, the Clippers. The Clippers are on the way to their fourth win. The Pistons, you know, won't give up because that's, this is going to be.

[C]

An epic jinx when they come back.

[B]

It's 19 points with six minutes left.

[C]

I feel pretty good.

[D]

I'm looking over here right now like.

[C]

I feel pretty good, but we'll see.

[B]

So, okay, so in talking with the Clippers, a few things. One, obviously Ivica Zubots went out with the injury. And so what has happened is Brook Lopez has gone to the starting lineup. Now, look, everybody will tell you that Brook Lopez has pretty much for the bulk of the season so far just not been good. But they will also tell you that Brook Lopez has been an absolute total pro, showing up at 8 in the morning on practice days and staying late and doing all of his work. And you know, it's one thing to say that a guy is a pro, it's another thing when you're playing terribly and losing minutes and doing it at age 37 and that his work ethic never changed. And so what's ended up happening here is as he's gone into the starting lineup, which is where he's been for 95% of his career, the floor spacing. He's a floor spacer compared to Zubatz, who doesn't shoot threes. Zubatz does a lot for the team, but the floor spacing has definitely helped James Harden. Harden is now operating with a little bit more space to drive. And when he kicks, there's, you know, the floor is stretched a little bit and the, and the shooters have some more time and their three point percentage is going up, you know, and even like tonight, Lopez isn't having a great shooting night. But like, even in the first half, you could tell in the game plan that the Pistons were certainly aware of that. Lopez just had a nine three pointer game. He made nine three pointers the other night in Portland. Pistons were aware of it. You could see them guarding him a little bit. And that opened up some more isolations for Harden and for Kawhi. Now look, at the end of the day, Kawhi is heating up and that's probably the biggest reason why they're why they're getting going. Obviously tonight he's red hot. He's 17 of 24. He's hit five threes, but a bunch of those are from mid range. He's also getting to the foul line, but so their offense is at the time when it needed. It is getting, is, is, is getting that sort of spacing influx. Derrick Jones Jr. Is just back from injury and he should help their defense. And look, it's a small sample size. It's four, it's four games. Obviously their defense for the first three months of the season was putrid. They went from a top five defensive team to a bottom five defensive team and there's, there's accountability for that. There's their lack of athleticism, their inability to get back after turnovers. All that stuff is true. But there has been a, this is what the folks in and around the team say. There has been an improvement in returning to the defensive principles. They've tried to be better at that end of the court. Now if they win this game tonight, which it's now a 15 point game.

[D]

Keep talking.

[B]

If they win this, if they win this game tonight, they'll be 10 and 21. Okay. There are 51 games left. They acknowledge that, you know, a top six seed is probably out of their grasp. But with 50 games left, if they can get health for Kawhi and Harden and they can start to get some traction here, they are not at all giving up on this season. And they, they, they don't own their pick, so they wouldn't. Anyway.

[D]

Sure, there's no benefit to giving up. They can. And look, if they're a playing team, do I think they're going to pull off an upset? No. But hey, they took the Nuggets to seven games last year. There's a reason we all thought they were a top six team in the Western Conference. Like they were a really, really good team last year. I don't, I don't know anybody who thought they were going to fall off a cliff like they did for the first, whatever, third of the season.

[C]

No, and listen, we have seen as this year has gone on that.

[D]

Age.

[C]

In the NBA right now is not a positive thing generally.

[D]

Right.

[C]

We've seen younger team, the team the Clippers are playing today is a prime example. Right. Like Pistons have been off to a great start, spurs went off to a great start, Rockets off to a great start. You know, we've seen youth really come to the fore this year in a lot of different ways.

[D]

Thunder still young.

[C]

Yeah, right. Thunder obviously they're, they're one of the younger teams in the league. But you know, in like youth and athleticism in general, the Clippers have not a lot of either. So that is obviously one thing. However, I will, I will go back to another team that Brook Lopez was on, the 2013-14 Brooklyn Nets, who I covered, who were an example of a team that had a horrendous start like this, looked like things were completely off the rails. Jason Kidd was going to be fired if they didn't win a game in the city Tim McMahon is in right now in Oklahoma City after they started that season 10 and 21 on New Year's Eve getting absolutely smacked by the spurs and could have lost the game by 70. I think they lost it by 28 and Brook Lopez was out for the season with a broken foot. Things look completely off the rails. And then they changed some principles around on defense. They started playing Kevin Garnett at center and Paul Pierce a power forward and they closed the season going 34 and 17. They get the 44 wins, they end up making the second round of the playoffs. Now I am not saying, to be clear, that I think the Clippers are going to go 34 and 17 to close the season and completely turn things around, but to go back to the beginning of the podcast and the conversation around all of these high priced players, Kawhi Leonard is still a tremendous player when he's locked in like this. However, there is not a trade market for Kawhi Leonard around the league. I don't think. And I think James Harden is still a very good player. I believe I voted for him for all NBA last year. He made the all Star team, had a great year. I don't think there's a ton of trade interest in James Harden either. So if you are the Clippers and you don't have your draft pick and you are pot committed to this team.

[B]

I do think, by the way on Harden, I do think there are teams that would trade for him but he's not available right now.

[C]

Well, I don't mean the teams. My point is teams would have interest in getting James Harden, but they're not getting back some crazy return for him. So they're not getting back talent wise.

[B]

Well, he makes $40 million and it's just, it's hard to execute a trade.

[C]

That's why I said you're trading for.

[B]

James Harden because you're trying to make a run in the playoffs and it's hard to execute a trade for a guy making 40.

[C]

It goes back to the conversation we had at the beginning. So again, if you're the Clippers and there's no incentive for you to be bad, like the only thing you can really do is look at your team and say how can we try to lean into what we have and figure out a way out of this mess? And we'll see. This is now a thought. It was going to be an 11 point game. We'll see. They may, this may be really an all time jinx.

[D]

This is going to be a classic.

[C]

If they do, if they do win this game, they'll have won four in a row. They'll have had a couple of really impressive wins.

[B]

Jackson, how many times can we say if they've.

[C]

Well, it's today's NBA, whereas we know there are all sorts of comebacks but.

[D]

We at least we have to extend this podcast until the game is over or at least decided.

[C]

Well and also like Coopers haven't scored.

[B]

In like three minutes.

[D]

Hey, we haven't talked about Giannis yet. We still have time.

[C]

Yes, we do. But the, the bottom of the west outside top five, six teams. Five, six teams and exactly. Murderers Row. So the Clippers, even after this insanely bad start they've had, are still only a couple games out of the playing like they're, they're another good week from being in the top 10. And if they're playing, if they're ninth and they have to beat say Memphis and Phoenix to get in the playoffs, the Clippers aren't going to be like, oh, we have no chance to do that.

[D]

Memphis Washington tonight, by the way.

[C]

Yes. With Dallas another, by the way, sitting courtside watching because the Suns are playing the Wizards on Monday. At one point they cut aft out of a commercial and there's Dylan Brooks sitting there baseline watching the game. It's like what, what is Dylan? You can talk trash to two teams at once.

[B]

Well, I will say this about the Clippers before we move on. They were obviously they are a very old team, but during this stretch, which has been a lot of losing, they have started to play some younger guys and they have found some guys that they trust putting in their rotation. Jordan Miller, Kobe Sanders and even their first round draft pick from this last year with Zubacz out, Jannik Niederhauser, who was in the G League for a bunch of this year.

[D]

You were nervous about that pronunciation.

[C]

I could see that tensing up as he was going to say it.

[B]

Come on. I was talking to people about him tonight. There were.

[D]

That was you mispronounced Zubots after you had them on the podcast.

[B]

Yeah, I was mispronouncing it to his face, like three times. The Clippers still haven't scored, like in now three and a half minutes. We just. We're just killing time here. Anyway, they've played these younger guys and, you know, they've. I don't know. Hopefully they can stay in the line in the rotation, but that's happened. Okay, you mentioned Giannis. So Giannis came back. He'd been gone for three, four weeks dealing with the calf injury. The Bucs had gone 2 and 6 without him. They come back, I think they're in 11th, 10th or 11th place on the edge of the play in right now. And he has a Great game. Scored 30 points. Chicago had won five in a row. Cause all roads lead to 39 wins.

[C]

He had 27 points until about five seconds to go in the game.

[D]

And boy, listen, that captain bothered him when he hit the accelerator at about half.

[B]

So he got a. He got a breakaway in with less than 24 seconds. Where the team ahead. I think they were ahead by nine or so.

[C]

Something.

[D]

The game was over.

[B]

They were in the spot where the team was dribbled to fall out.

[D]

Yeah, it was less intense.

[B]

The Clippers just hit a three. Everybody relax. They were in the point where if you are ahead by that, by three or four possessions, you're dribbling the game out. He did not dribble it out. He went to the other end and threw down a hellacious windmill dunk that if you were at the United center.

[C]

You probably remembered it looked like a slam dunk contest. Dunk.

[B]

Yeah. Was an awesome dunk. Yeah.

[D]

It was the most inspirational stat padding in NBA history. Oh, he just wanted to inspire the troops. Watch me pad my stats, guys, and then watch the other team get mad and you guys deal with the mess in the middle of the court. I'm going to walk right off the floor to the locker room. That is leadership, baby. God, I was inspired by that.

[B]

Well, I thought it was interesting that, you know, the Bulls, naturally, especially Kobe White, were not cool with it. Regardless of where you are.

[D]

Oh, Vooch was. Vooch was.

[B]

Vuch was there first. That's right.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

Vuch was the guy who got to him first. The funny thing I thought, now, listen, as a guy, I love Bobby Portis, okay? I love Bobby Portis as a guy. Got to know him and his family during the 2023 World Cup. But Bobby comes running onto the court in full warmups, and he is defending Giannis But I got to tell you, if the situation was reversed and somebody did that to the Bucks, Bobby would have been in their face for the other thing. Bobby was just doing what his role is. But look, regardless of where you are, on whether you think that, you know, you shouldn't score at the end of the game, you know it's going to.

[D]

Be a thing if you do it.

[B]

Of course he knew exactly what he was doing. And then after the game, Giannis posted on. Posted the dunk. Post a photo of the dunk on X and, like, celebrated it. He explained that he needs to fire up his team and inspire his team that if they're going to make a run, that he, you know, he's missed so much time, he just wants to enjoy it. Okay, whatever.

[D]

Let's read the quote is something else, though.

[C]

Yeah, I got it right here.

[D]

Okay, read it.

[C]

So he started getting asked a question. It says, do you want to be here if you guys are not going to be able to.

[D]

No, no, Read the quote about the dunk first.

[C]

Well, it's okay. I thought you were asking me to read about that. I don't have that.

[D]

And then we'll get to that one.

[C]

I don't have that one right in front of me. But it was essentially, the essential quote was, we're going to. This is going to. Hold on, I got it right here. Okay. Quote. What? We're 11th in the East. Are we 11th in the east or 12th? 11th. Just gotta keep finding our identity. And if that is to get a little bit of scrappy at the end, so be. We're not the champs. Why should we play the clock out and have respect and fair play? We're fighting for our lives right now.

[B]

Why should we have fair play?

[C]

This is real talk. I've been 13 years in the league. If we keep on losing, brother, probably half the team's not going to be here. We're not going to make the playoffs. Like, I really don't care. At the end of the day, I just want to be available, be healthy, and help my team win. And if that's what has to happen for them, everybody to wake up and understand, like, we're fighting for our lives and we got to get our hands dirty. So be. I think that's a interesting explanation for just deciding.

[D]

Everybody follow me. I'm. I'm stat padding the truth.

[C]

And again, as you said, as you said, the.

[B]

The.

[C]

The. My favorite part was a picture that was shown of, like, every guy on both teams at center court arguing and Giannis Just walking off.

[D]

You know who the best leader in NBA history was? Russell Westbrook for the Thunder. Because Patton stats is leadership, baby.

[B]

Well, at least it wasn't like Mark Williams and, you know, Jose Alvarado, who had a good old fashioned fist fight. I think they both landed blows on each other, I think.

[D]

And that Jose definitely landed. Jose landed a punch. I think he had suspended for two games.

[C]

A smack.

[B]

Yeah, okay. It was a smack.

[D]

Yeah. Because Williams got a game. Jose Alvarado got two games. But then Bon temp's the other quote. And this is like, listen, man, again, I have said many times, if Giannis wants to ask Adam Milwaukee, he has every right in the world to do it. He should be treated as nothing but a legend in Milwaukee. It's odd. Like, the guy, not only will his jersey hang from the rafters, there should be a statue. There will be.

[C]

There will be.

[D]

But for him to let this thing linger, literally for years and just the passive aggressiveness and then act like it's offensive. Ask for a status update. Come on, dude.

[C]

Well, listen, whatever your opinion is of that, right, let's. Let's get to the crux of the matter. The crux of the matter is, you know, one of the biggest stories in the league over the past month or so has been will Giannis Tede Koun be a buck on February 6th or not? Right. And my belief the whole time has been there will not be some public declaration from Giannis or his camp that he will be traded during the season. And that goes. It's me. We're doing actions over words. And the actions for the past however many years has been. Giannis has done everything but want to go near doing that. Right. So after the game, they're. They win this game. I don't know who asked the question. This is from.

[D]

Oh, it was, it was. It was the bass tones of Jamal Collier.

[C]

Oh, it was our guy, Jamal. Okay, great. I was reading this from Kurt Helen's write up of it at Basketball Talk. So during his postgame media session, Giannis was asked, quote, do you want to be here if you guys are not going to be able to. And it got cut off. Giannis cut off Jamal. Then. Then he said this. I'm here. I'm here, I'm here. Don't ask me that question. I'm here. It's disrespectful toward my teammate, myself and my teammates. I wear that jersey every single day. It's disrespectful towards the organization, my coaching staff, myself and all the People that work hard for me to come out here and say, I don't want to be here, don't ask me that question. I'm here, I'm putting on the jersey, and as long as I'm here, I'm going to give everything I have, even in the last second of the game. Now, he did say as long as I'm here, so you could say, okay, what does that mean? However, Giannis has been very open about this point the whole time and not wanting it to be out there that he is asked out of Milwaukee. Now, you to your point, McMahon, you can. You can say this. It's crazy the way this has been handled and the like, in, am I in? Am I out? Whatever has been this, like, long standing thing that's hung over the franchise. I get all that.

[D]

And that kind of commitment is what he expressed in the meeting with the owner, that he doesn't remember it happening.

[C]

Go on. Well, that's all fine. Right? But I think we would all agree the actions of the Bucks, again, to go to the POD motto, actions over words. The actions of the Bucks. The entire time Giannis has been there, especially the past several years when John Horse has been running the team has been pedal to the floor. We're going to dam the torpedoes. We're going to trade everything we can to get better and try to improve and try to make a run with this guy on the team and try to keep him here. Right?

[D]

And that's still the case.

[C]

And that's still the case. And I think unless Giannis Tenno in the next five weeks says, get me out of here, I don't want to be here anymore. I think that's going to be what happens. And I think he's going to be on the team on February 6th, and I suspect the Bucks are going to improve their roster and they're going to trade the remaining draft stuff they have in salary, go try to get better, because that's the only thing they've done year after year after year now for five, six, seven years. And you could say that's like Giannis is. It's dumb for Giannis to do that. It's dumb for the Bucks to do like you. Whatever you want to say about it doesn't really change to me the reality of the situation, which is, unless there is a public declaration of I want to play somewhere else, it's time for me to go, which he's been very vocal about not wanting to do that, I don't see why this situation is going to be Any different six weeks from today than where it is right now, which would mean a boring trade deadline.

[D]

Wendy's just looking at the Clippers score and.

[B]

No, I mean.

[D]

Comfortably.

[B]

Yeah, that's all fine. I would just say that the Bucks have got to start winning because it's, you know, you can make. I mean, you know, there are trades that the Bucks could make. You know, there's, I don't want to get aggregated, but there's.

[C]

Guys, we just, we can just say there's trades they can make. We don't have to.

[B]

There's trades.

[C]

They're not impacted. They have a draft pick. They've got, they've got some draft assets. They're not, they're not in the tax because of the, the Dame Lord wave and stretch like they, they, they have full flexibility to do a lot of different stuff.

[B]

They could add, they could add, they could add a piece or two, but if they don't start winning more. Because like I said, basically this year they've been slightly over.500 with Giannis in the lineup and way under.500 without him. And so if you want to believe he's going to play every game the rest of the way, they've got to demonstrate that they're more than a 500ish team with him.

[D]

Well, is being six games under.500 and out of the playing picture, is that failure or is that steps to success?

[B]

Wow. I just. The team is not good enough now, you know, we can debate about if they are. If they put a couple of pieces of their roster together and trade for a player of depressed value that, you know, seems like it's a big name and, you know, does that make him sixth? You know, like, I, I don't know. But Giannis is what, what the Bucks.

[C]

Would argue right, is in the 18 games he's played, in the 520 minutes he's played, they're plus 10 or plus nine and a half now. I would argue they're minus nine and a half when he doesn't play. And that swing is indicative of the rest of the roster, the 19 point differential in the negative direction when he's not playing. And I, I don't think they have the depth to necessarily make a real run in the Eastern Conference.

[D]

However, that dude, they have their, their ceiling is getting bounced in the first round.

[B]

Let's.

[C]

Well, I, listen, I, I agree. I have said I think they should have traded Giannis a year and a half ago. If you were just looking at it from a holistic long term, what's the best time to maximize his value trade situation. Right, but that's not what we're talking about. And if you look at the Eastern Conference right now, the team with the best record, the conference just lost to Utah and the Clippers. They're a team that's never won anything in the playoffs. The Cavs, Cavs corner and Detroit lost.

[D]

To the Mavericks recently, too.

[C]

It's been a rough. Yeah, Cavs corner is a mess. The Knicks are a top heavy team that if they, you know, if Jalen Brunson gets hurt, you know they're in the same boat as anybody else. Like the Bucks could sit there and look in the mirror and say, we have the best player in the conference. If we add some stuff, why couldn't we make a run? Now I don't think they're making a run, but this is what you do when you don't want to trade the best player that's ever played for your team. And you're only going to do it if the guy says, it's time for me to go. Which is why this, to me has always led to Giannis plays the seasonality. And then we get to the real moment of truth this summer when he's presented with every contract extension he could want. And it said to him, what would you like to do? And if he says, I think I'm going to wait, okay, then you have your answer as to what's going on and then you make a trade. But that point isn't right now unless Giannis says it's time to go. And I think this whole situation, as silly as it was with the dunk and everything else, it was another opportunity for him to say anything other than, I'm going to be here. And instead he said, don't ask me about being here. I'm not going to say I'm not going to be here. Well, okay, then where's it going to end? I think it's going to end with him being on The Bucks on February 6th.

[B]

Well, what's most important is that the clippers won by 14. They held another opponent under 100 points. They're going to give up 99 points during this four game win streak. This was the first game of a five game homestand. The next two games are against the Kings and Jazz.

[C]

Kawhi, 55 points, 17 for 26 shooting, 5 for 10 from 3, 16 for 17 from the line, 11 boards, 2 assists, 5 steals, 3 blocks, 39.

[B]

I wasn't watching the second half, but with Kawhi, because I think hard. Went to the line like 10 or 11 times too. I'm wondering if JB had anything to say about some of this.

[C]

They were combined 27 for so they were a combined 27 for 28 from the foul line. Darrell Jones took first game back from what looked like a rough knee injury. Thankfully wasn't too bad. He took one free throw, looked like he had an and one. The entire Pistons team was 24 for 28 and that was all the free throws in the game. So there you go.

[B]

All right, well clip. The clip joint is doing well. All right, that's enough for tonight. All right, well everybody look forward to a good New Year's week. Thank you to Devon and Jackson for putting this together. Thank you to McMahon and Bontemps. Thank you to you for watching and listening to the Hoop Collective. We'll talk to you in a couple days.

[D]

Adios amigos.

[C]

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