OKC Wins the Title, Haliburton’s Devastating Injury, the Durant Trade and NBA Draft Buzz With Ryen Russillo and Zach Lowe

Summary

The Bill Simmons Podcast - Episode Summary Episode Title: OKC Wins the Title, Haliburton’s Devastating Injury, the Durant Trade and NBA Draft Buzz With Ryen Russillo and Zach Lowe
Release Date: June 23, 2025
Hosts/Guests: Bill Simmons, Ryen Russillo, Zach Lowe

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1. OKC Thunder Clinches the NBA Championship

Overview:
The episode opens with Bill Simmons expressing both joy and sorrow over the Oklahoma City Thunder (OKC) winning the NBA Championship. While celebrating OKC's triumph, Simmons reflects on the dramatic nature of the Finals and the high stakes involved.

Notable Discussion Points:

• Thunder’s Defensive Prowess: The Thunder's exceptional defense was highlighted as a key factor in their championship run, emphasizing their ability to grind out wins despite offensive shortcomings.

• Comparisons to Sports Movies: Simmons likens the Finals to a narrative straight out of a sports movie, where the underdog team overcomes immense adversity to win.

Notable Quotes:

• Bill Simmons [04:27]: “This was some sports magic stuff that happened to the Pacers, like actual.”
• Zach Lowe [05:34]: “This is something magical that happened for the last two months.”

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2. Tyrese Halliburton’s Injury: A Heartbreaking Turn

Overview:
A significant portion of the podcast is dedicated to discussing Tyrese Halliburton’s devastating injury during Game 7 of the NBA Finals. The injury not only affected the outcome of the game but also has long-term implications for Halliburton and the Thunder’s future.

Notable Discussion Points:

• Impact on the Game: Halliburton’s injury occurred early in Game 7, shifting the momentum and ultimately undermining the Pacers' chances despite being a strong contender.

• Long-Term Consequences: The injury raises concerns about Halliburton’s future in the NBA, with an estimated 18-month recovery period. Simmons and guests discuss the potential career ramifications and the uncertainty it brings to the Thunder’s dynasty.

• Emotional Reactions: The team’s resilience and unity in the face of adversity were praised, yet the injury casts a shadow over what could have been an unforgettable Finals series.

Notable Quotes:

• Ryan Rosillo [04:59]: “OKC's up 22, you're like, this thing's over. And then it's the Matheran show.”
• Bill Simmons [10:01]: “This actually feels like a sports movie... it's like getting hit by a sniper from the crowd when you go down like that.”

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3. The Kevin Durant Trade: A Strategic Move for Houston

Overview:
The discussion shifts to the recent Kevin Durant trade, analyzing its impact on both Houston and Phoenix. Bill Simmons and Zach Lowe provide insights into the strategic benefits and potential drawbacks of the trade.

Notable Discussion Points:

• Houston’s Acquisition: Houston’s trade for Durant is seen as a home run, providing them with a seasoned superstar capable of making clutch plays.

• Phoenix’s Gamble: Phoenix’s decision to trade Durant is scrutinized, especially considering the perceived undervaluation they received in return. The implications of this trade on Phoenix’s future competitiveness are debated.

• Trade Dynamics: The complexities of the trade, including the assets exchanged and the potential long-term effects on team rosters, are explored in depth.

Notable Quotes:

• Bill Simmons [68:12]: “I think for Houston, no brainer, 10th pick, wouldn't have played for them. Plus you get rid of Brooks now you get to play Tar Eason and Whitmore... it was an awesome trade for them.”
• Zach Lowe [72:30]: “It’s what we call sunk cost.”

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4. NBA Draft Buzz: Predictions and Insights

Overview:
The latter part of the podcast delves into the NBA Draft, with Bill Simmons, Ryen Rosillo, and Zach Lowe sharing their predictions and analyzing the potential impacts of various draft picks.

Notable Discussion Points:

• Top Draft Picks: The trio discusses the viability of players like Ace Bailey going to Utah, Trey Johnson's potential sixth pick, and the strategic preferences of teams like the Celtics and Spurs.

• Draft Strategy: Emphasis is placed on team needs, player fit, and the importance of pedigree in draft selections. The conversation covers how teams might maneuver to secure desired picks and the potential outcomes based on current team dynamics.

• Undiscussed Prospects: Lesser-known players such as Hanson Yang and Cedric Coward are evaluated for their potential roles and impacts in the NBA, highlighting the depth and unpredictability of the draft.

Notable Quotes:

• Bill Simmons [97:21]: “He just couldn't see it. He felt like a 13 to 17 range guy to me.”
• Ryan Rosillo [118:07]: “He was filthy in those games that he played this year. But if you want to tell me, hey, he was against Northern Colorado...”

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5. East Conference Outlook and Future Contenders

Overview:
Concluding the episode, the hosts examine the East Conference's landscape for the upcoming season. They speculate on which teams might rise to prominence and the factors that could influence their success.

Notable Discussion Points:

• Potential Powerhouses: Teams like Cleveland, Orlando, and the Knicks are analyzed for their prospects, considering recent performances, injuries, and roster changes.

• Draft Impact: The impact of recent draft picks on the East Conference's competitiveness is discussed, with a focus on how young talents might develop and contribute to their teams' successes.

• Strategic Moves: The possibility of wildcard teams emerging from trades and draft picks adds another layer of excitement and uncertainty to the conference's future.

Notable Quotes:

• Bill Simmons [60:07]: “If I'm chasing a ring, I'm trying to go east harder than ever now.”
• Zach Lowe [100:41]: “They were taking him to trade because he’s a pedigree guy and fits the Darrell profile.”

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6. Final Thoughts and Closing Remarks

Overview:
As the podcast wraps up, the hosts reflect on the whirlwind of events surrounding the Finals, the trade of Durant, Halliburton’s injury, and the upcoming draft. They express their anticipation for the next NBA season and the unfolding stories within the league.

Notable Discussion Points:

• Legacy of the Championship: The immediate legacy of the Thunder’s championship win and how it will be remembered amid the surrounding drama.

• Future of Key Players: Speculations on Halliburton’s comeback and Durant’s future with Houston, along with implications for team dynamics and playoff prospects.

• Draft Excitement: Continued enthusiasm for the NBA Draft and the potential game-changers that new draftees could bring to the league.

Notable Quotes:

• Bill Simmons [131:01]: “This is like my wife and my daughter are watching this one. My dad and I got to watch Keegan Bradley...”
• Zach Lowe [130:47]: “It's going to go down as a weird podcast. It’s a strange moment to be to talk about.”

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Conclusion

This episode of The Bill Simmons Podcast provided an in-depth analysis of one of the most dramatic NBA Finals in history, spotlighting OKC Thunder’s victory, the critical injury of Tyrese Halliburton, strategic moves like the Durant trade, and the excitement surrounding the NBA Draft. With insightful commentary from Ryen Rosillo and Zach Lowe, the podcast offered listeners a comprehensive overview of the current NBA landscape and what to anticipate in the upcoming season.

Transcript

[Bill Simmons]

This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra, the official beer partner of the NBA. What do I love about the NBA championship? Well, first of all, I love when the Celtics win, but that's not happening this year. But you know what I really love? The drama, the pressure. Everything goes to the highest level. Guys are injured, guys are banged up, guys are hungry. It just brings out the best of everything. And Michelob Ultra is helping you celebrate like a champion with a chance to win your own limited edition championship bottle, just like those gifted to the NBA players during the championship parade. Enter now at michelobaltra.com Courtside Champs bottles Michelob Ultra Courtside Victor Solomon Champs Bottle Sweepstakes. No purchase necessary. Open to US residents 21/ends June 22, 2025. See Official [e-mail] Rules for free entry, prizes and details. Message and data rates may apply. Void where prohibited. The Bill Simmons Podcast is presented to you by State Farm. We are also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network where I have a new rewatchables coming for you on Monday. It is still New York City Month. I kept calling it New York Month. It's really New York City Month. We're trying to find movies that feel very New York Cityish. So we did Die Hard with a Vet Vengeance, me and Ben Lathan and Chris Ryan that is going to be running on Monday night. It was a really, really, really good one. Excited for you to listen to it. And then we have one more movie after for New York Month that I'm trying to figure out. But we'll be taping that later this week. So you can check out the rewatchables of the Munger Moves YouTube channel. It's also a video podcast. And there you go. We have a bunch of NBA Draft stuff if you're into the draft because where you're about to listen to Our Post Game 7 NBA Finals podcast with a tragic twist thanks to the terrible Halberd entry. But it's Ryan Marcillo and Zach Lowe coming up. Zach stays for the first hour and then Marcel and I talk about the Kevin Durant trade plus the NBA draft. So that's coming up. It's two hours. We did it live on YouTube, but the ringer has all kinds of great stuff coming with the NBA Draft this week. You can check out our NBA Draft Guide which you can find on the ringer.com you can check out the Ringers NBA Draft Show. We're solo. You can check out the Ringer NBA Show. Whole bunch of stuff. So good Draft this year. I'm giving this draft an A minus just from a storyline standpoint. So there you go. I'm going to be back on Tuesday and then probably Wednesday night after the draft. And those will be the podcast this week. Zach Rosillo coming up next. First, our friends from Pearl Jam after this break. This episode is presented by State Farm. It's no secret that great teams need great teammates. I've been saying this for years. And when it comes to insurance, State Farm is there to help you find the right coverage for your home car and more. Whether you need an in person or digital assist, they're ready. When life hits you with a full court press, get a game plan that helps fit your life. Talk to State Farm today. State Farm with the assist. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability and eligibility vary by state. All right, we were recording live after the trophy celebration. Game seven, the NBA Finals. Ryan Marcillo is here. We brought in Zach Lowe for this one. We thought this was gonna be a special night. It was definitely a memorable night. It was a sad night. It was a happy night for OKC fans. Sad night for basketball fans. I've never watched a Game seven like that in my life. Rosillo. I'm gonna start here. I think this might be the first NBA playoffs that comes and goes where the team I'm gonna remember isn't the team that won the title. When I think of it first, as weird as that sounds, I can't think of another playoffs. You always think of the champ first. You go through, it's like 21, Giannis 20, LeBron and the Lakers in the bubble. Like, you go on through this one, I'll be thinking, okay, see, win but Indy. And they'll be right in the sentence with them.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, I wanted to wait until it felt like kind of a bummed out recap of Game seven, but I guess it's already there because I think all of us that were watching, as soon as you saw Halliburton go down, you're like, all right, how are they going to do this? And then they're up at half. It actually felt like the Halliburton injury messed up OKC more than it did the Pacers. So that would be like the first thing that I had from the game being like, are you guys seriously going to let this happen to you? Or it's the Doc Rivers theory, but it's Doc Rivers theory in game.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, and then on top of it, even when these down, what was it? They were down like 18 late. Zach in the fourth quarter, and Mathart made a couple plays. You're like, are they gonna do this? Like, I wasn't counting it out. They're down 1-0-389 or whatever it was with four minutes left. I'm like, I don't know, maybe they could do this.

[Zach Lowe]

I literally went into the living room to watch the last five minutes of the game with my wife and talk her through the hallibur and injury, because she was watching it in the other room. I'm watching in my office. I'm like, it's over. And then I'm like, I. I look up the score. I'm watching Mather. I said. I literally said to her, I think I might have to go back to my office and take this. Like, watch this with a little closer.

[Bill Simmons]

I know this team would not go away. Uh, man, I. The Halberton, I. I mean, there's so many decade ramifications for this. Like, obviously, the Pacers, next year, we can go into all that a lot later. So did you think they. Did you think they actually had a chance to win tonight? When you watched the first five minutes pre injury, what were your thoughts before he goes down?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Well, look, every single time somebody asks me about each one of these games, I would just go like, this Pacer story is crazy. But eventually the talent and the defense of what OKC is. And I know a little bit later I want to share some of their statistical profile stuff from all these playoff games, because you're like, this team just won the championship, and it's because of this defense, and it's because of that takeover in the third quarter. So I wouldn't rule out anything with the Pacers because we've all come away incredibly impressed. And just their toughness and how they're built and who they are and their belief and all that stuff. So I think everybody just kind of raving about him on social media. But in those first few minutes, I thought there was, like, two things that were going to stand out. SGA was not ready for how much they collapsed on him in game six. It was pretty obvious. He had a career high eight turnovers. And with his passing tonight, you could see that he had adjusted for that. However, okc, all of these threes are wide open and they still miss them. This is their ninth game in these playoffs where they're 30% or lower from three point. But, yeah, I guess I never really ruled anything out. Even as Zach was saying, they're up. OKC's up 22. You're like, this thing's over. And then it's the Matheran show. And you're like, what the hell? Like in that five, that six to five minute mark, you're like, they've already chipped away 10 points on this thing.

[Bill Simmons]

I was getting ideas, Zach. Cause two things. They were calling it tight early, which I thought if, if Indy had the recipe for Indy to win is are they going to call it tight? Is OKC going to look tight? And then could Indy come out, hit some threes and start? And they went to timeout and Halbert and was mean mugging the crowd. And I was like, okay, this is if, if Indy was going to steal this game. This is the recipe. And Indy, I think OKC was even 4 for 17 from 3 at halftime, you know, and, and then the defense took over and that was it.

[Zach Lowe]

I. I thought your question to Ryan was actually, did you think they had a chance to win after the injury and at halftime?

[Bill Simmons]

That's. I guess that's another question.

[Zach Lowe]

Well, because my answer to your actual question is of course I thought they had a chance to win. With Halliburton playing well, I thought this was like not quite a coin flip game. I predicted OKC by four. That was my random, you know, OKC really close prediction. Of course I thought they had a chance to win. And I don't think you're wrong to say the runner up is as memorable or more memorable than the champion. Because this was like some sports magic stuff that happened to the Pacers, like actual. And I'm not just talking about the crazy Halliburton end of game shots and buzzer beaters and miracle comebacks and all that. I'm talking about like, you know, I was talking to the GM of another team today and I was like, what, what do you take out of this Pacers thing? What do they win or lose? And he said, hope. We take hope because they are a study in like alchemy and the whole adding up to way more than the sum of its parts. Like something magical happened to them. In the nexus of style of play, unique superstar chemistry, toughness, how personalities and games all mesh together. It was like it was magic. And when they're up one at halftime, you allow yourself to think like, are they actually going to do this now? I thought the whole time they're just are not going to be able to score enough points and Oklahoma City is not going to have to even play a good offensive game to win this game. They're just going to grind them to dust piece by piece by piece, drip by Drip by drip. And that's what happened. But I. Like, this was a magical thing that happened for the last two months, even. Even extending into the regular season, obviously. And it's. It's just. I mean, it's just such a gut punch for it to end this way. I mean, the shot. I don't know if you guys are still watching of Halliburton on crutches in the hallway. McConnell in years hugging him is. Is just. It's. And, like, I know the Thunder are celebrating. They should celebrate. They were the best team all year. It just. There's no question that it feels like everybody, including the Pacers, and starting with the Pacers, was robbed of what should have been an epic, epic moment in the NBA.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it's. As you know, I love sports movies. And there was that moment at halftime where you're thinking, like, this doesn't even feel like a real. Real life thing anymore. This actually feels like a sports movie. This is like watching the Friday Night Lights movie when they're going in the finals trying, and then they lose at the end. It's like, oh, my God, those scrappy underdogs, the way they responded to losing their best guy in the worst possible way. You know, it's almost like you're getting hit by a sniper from the crowd or something when you go down like that. And to. And to just have them be like, shake it up. Be like, all right, let's stay focused. I don't know how you stay focused in a moment like that. Like, it's certainly this. When it happened in the Celtics a couple rounds ago, the game was basically over at that point. But Indiana, they had 43 minutes left in the game. And I agree that. I thought it affected both teams.

[Zach Lowe]

How could it not?

[Bill Simmons]

And OKC even a little more. And they were saying the crowd was kind of like, what do you do for the crowd? You know, the whole thing. Definitely one of the weirdest things I've ever seen in a big game. So can you think of in any other. Like, this is a do or die game, and you bring in this variable that nobody's expecting. I couldn't even concentrate on the next half hour of the game. Like, I didn't even really take notes. I don't know. I was watching it, and, you know, Indiana was hanging around, but I don't really know. I don't really know what happened in the first half. I was just, like, kind of stupefied. It was like, did that just happen?

[Zach Lowe]

These games?

[Ryan Rosillo]

I think the last two. The first half have been played at such a frantic pace. And. And I don't know that that showed out in the pace numbers, because that was a big thing that we talked about with the way Pacers had run through the east, because OKC was going to be comfortable doing some of that stuff. But I think the energy, right, the effort, the sheer effort that you see the Pacers throughout, you either match it or you don't. And you see what happens in Game 6 for OKC. And then it always felt like the games, when they came out in the second half, like the last couple, it was just. Even though you just come off this break, you could see that that first half was, like, draining for all these guys. And, you know, I expected. I expected. Okay, she. Oh, okay. Okay. See, to shoot it better, because the role players are going to shoot it better at home traditionally. But I. I don't know, man. Like, it. It was. I think it actually speaks to the Pacers in that all they've done is fight now for months. And if Halliburton's going down, as much as the three of us could be sitting here and be like, how do you reset yourself? Like, because it happened so fast, like, you're out there. There's nothing. There's no other game. And if anything, right. They've proven that they're going to respond. So I. Yeah. At halftime, Nemhardt hits that shot, you're like, they're up one.

[Zach Lowe]

Anything.

[Bill Simmons]

They know how to talk about it at halftime. When they doing the halftime show, they're like, what's. Like, they didn't even ask Bob Myers, you were in this exact spot six years ago.

[Zach Lowe]

I can think of one. One game. One thing they could have talked about at halftime.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, I mean, it would have been how I led the show. Like, Bob, this. You had KD coming back from a. From a calf strain in 2019. You were worried about it. He came back and he made the injury worse. Everyone was saying this wouldn't happen to Halbert, and then it happened. I. I mean, I gotta admit, when he had the calf strain in Game five, I. I Googled all the Achilles injuries, and there. There. It didn't seem like there was any sort of rhyme or reason to whether there was a connection or not. Some people are like, it's two different injuries. But this was exactly what happened to kd. It's hard not to think this was just the sequel to it. And I. I mean, there's this one.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You think this is different than KD just because it's. It's Game seven, it's, it's a couple minutes in.

[Bill Simmons]

It's, well, I'm saying it's the same situation where he's coming back playing hurt on an injury, that if it was the regular season, he's out for three weeks, four weeks, like he's resting it, but that he was playing on an injury he shouldn't be playing on. Normally they were claiming it wasn't going to make any worse, and then, you know, it gets gets worse and I, I, I just don't know what's going on. They, I mean, this is a whole separate topic and it was one that I was texting with a bunch of different people on. It's like, where are these Achilles injuries coming from? These used to be old man injuries. They're now happening. These dudes who are in the prime of their career, in Tatum's case and Halliburton's case. And I, I just don't fully understand it. And I don't, I, I know that's going to be a huge topic over the next four or five days, but it's maybe some of the stuff we've talked about on past pods about how the sport's harder to play. There's more running, there's more training, and the miles that you're carrying are from a AU is they're just more wear and tear in these guys. But it doesn't make sense to me why guys who are 24, 26, 27 years old are blowing out their Achilles.

[Zach Lowe]

Well, the other difference with Durant, too, is Durant hadn't played in a month and then he came back and like Hal, the reason it feels a little, it doesn't feel that different to me. But the difference. Halbard just kept playing through this and played pretty well last game. But look, I mean, like, it's a hard game to talk about because we should. This should be a crowning moment for the Oklahoma City Thunder for just the greatest, quickest rebuild from bottoming out kind of to utter dominance and having a team that is literally the best team ever, probably in all of professional sports, the best position to win now and win later of any team that maybe has ever existed. And it is their crowning moment. But in 15 years, the number one thing we'll remember from this game is that Tyrese Halliburton, in a game that we were all jacked up to watch, got hurt seven minutes into the game.

[Bill Simmons]

And a game where all the casual fans are watching. This was one of the, this is like my wife and my daughter are Watching this one. My dad's here. My dad and I got to watch Keegan Bradley some somehow. Get back, come back on Tommy Fleetwood in the Hartford Open today. That was. That was a fun sports moment. This was not as fun to watch Halliburton go down. I don't know. Rosillo, what the OKC piece of this. I think Zach makes a crucial point that this might be the beginning of, you know, a half a decade run. I feel like you and I have talked about this after titles before. Like, we did this, we talked about this after the Denver finals. I remember, like, Jesus, Jokic, Murray, they're both so young. Like, we kind of do this after every finals, but in this case, with how young they are, I don't even feel like they've peaked with whatever their core is. It feels like that's two years away. So this is pretty unique.

[Ryan Rosillo]

There's no reason to think that this is Jalen Williams peak. There's certainly no reason to think that it's Chet's peak. I mean, offensively, he was so good defensively tonight, especially to close that one out, you know, and the Pacers wanted to go small because they wanted to be chaotic. They wanted to try to challenge all the inbounds. I mean, OKC didn't have a time after Caruso couldn't get the ball in, so they were going to have a timeout the rest of the game. SGA's got the fifth foul, which is another thing. At that five minute mark, you're going, what if like TJ went right at him on the next possession. I'm like, if he fouls out, like, this has been four guys on the Thunder all looking to get the ball back to SGE for about an hour and a half here. So, yeah, like, what's that going to look like? And a real weird part of me was like almost rooting for SJ to foul out. Just be like, all right, here we go. Like, Halliburton's out, SGA's out. Like, let's see what happens here. But yeah, I, I don't always love the. It was kind of the Mission impossible line that I had where like when the eighth one comes out, you can't say this the third best one ever. You have to say that it's the best Mission Impossible. Nobody's going to do that and have it be in the ad. And no one can just win a championship without the follow up questions of like, how real is this? And a lot of times it's total bullshit. It's a Waste of time. It's a Monday topic after a championship. It's not good enough to just celebrate the championship, but as Zach said, considering what they've done, how they've built this, how young this team is, what, the Youngest team in 40 plus years win a championship like this, and even with a couple warts, you know, that their defense seems to solve and we can say now solves enough for them to win a championship, it's totally reasonable to look at them and go, all right. You know, of all the teams in the West, I know we'll get to the east later, because Sixers fans must just be like, all right, is this the year? There's. There's no reason to think any of that stuff. Normally, that post championship discussion, I just think is so fatiguing, and this one is completely relevant.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, can you imagine if they had ended up with Philly's pick? If they had the seventh pick? With all the Ace Bailey drama right now and be like, are they going to fucking get Ace Bailey? Is that where we're headed with this? I mean, that seventh pick especially. I know Rosello's been grinding tape. I think even our guy Zach Lowe's been grinding a little bit. Grinding, Grinding a little bit.

[Zach Lowe]

Grinding is strong. Whatever is like a little soft grinding.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, finish sanding.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, but that seventh pick is, you know, you might really get a dude there so that maybe that's the one silver lining with this OKC piece. Zach, one thing I liked about them today, I thought, you know, Jalen Williams was bad in the first half, but really came on second half. SGA was great the whole game. I really liked everything he did today. And then Chet was great. You know, you win the title, you want your best guys to have a good game in the biggest, biggest stage. I do think we're going to have a complicated relationship with this as a game seven, though, because you think back to all the game sevens from the past and the first thing that jumps to your mind with each one, like 2016, LeBron, the Block, Kyrie shot, and you just go through and it's in this one. You. You're probably going to think about Halburn first and then probably SGA second. What. What else? What would be the takeaways other than that?

[Zach Lowe]

Well, SGA, you know, greatest 8 of 27 shooting game of all time. Like, it snuck up on me how bad he shot from the floor, but he made 11.

[Bill Simmons]

He made a shot for the last 40 minutes, right?

[Zach Lowe]

But 11 free throws, 12 assists, one of the best passing games of his career. Yeah. J Dub, like you said, recovered from a shaky first half, pretty dominant second half, and Chad was just everywhere defensively and just their wealth of defensive talent. When they don't play Joe at all, it's like, what am I even supposed to do against this team? It's just, what. Like, that guy made all defense. That guy made all defense. Those four would have had they been eligible, but they didn't play enough games. Like, what am I even supposed to do? And that's like the ultimate tribute to this team is the one thing that's consistent game in and game out is the puzzle that no team could solve four times in seven games is Oklahoma City's defense. No team was able to solve it. Maybe the Pacers, you know, who knows what happens if Halliburton doesn't get hurt? Do they put up a better fight? Obviously. But, like, this is a tribute to how good the defense was. With 11:22 left in the game, Shea hit a step back. 3. 84, 68. I wrote in my notes, zero test by that. And which. By which I mean, could they not score the rest of the game and still win? Is. Is. Is Indiana even going to get to 84? And they did get to 84. They got to 91. But like, I. I actually thought, could the Pacers pitch a shut out for 11 minutes and 22 seconds and still not win the game?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, what was it? They had that stretch where TJ was the only guy that scored for. It was like 10 minutes, 10 plus.

[Zach Lowe]

Minutes of the game. And it's. And like Pascal, I like. I just. It shows you how great Halliburton is. Like, he is the straw that serves to drink. His combination of the threat to shoot off the dribble from 30ft, the instant getting off the ball, passing, the unpredictable movement, it's like without him, the whole thing. They're not the Pacers. And they were. They. They did enough to stay in the game for a half, but they just. Their backup plan just wasn't there. The separation that Siakam thrives on, all the gaps he sort of darts through when they open up, they don't open up without Halliburton.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yes. Siakam hit that three, right? So there was that weird near shot clock violation three that Dort hits. And it's ridiculous. All right. And it was off another one of these. Kind of like messy. Just get it back to sga. Like, there were a lot of offensive possessions here for okc, where I was like, the other four guys have zero interest in Doing anything and just hoping SGA figures it out. So I think I'm with both of you guys that if you look back at the box score on this one and be like, SJA didn't really have that great of a Game seven shoot, it's like, yeah, but he's dictating everything. It's like a bad Steph Curry shooting game where you're like, okay, but he's still so important, everything that's happening. And I do think there was an adjustment and his willing to pass because only had two assists in game six. So Siakam comes right back and hits that three. I think about 10:30 left in the third quarter. And at the time, I'm like, if the Pacers pull this off, like I wrote it down, it was like, this will be such a monstrous three, because Dort shouldn't have hit that one. It just goes in from that 10:30 moment on. Even though TJ is just dicing everybody up, because even in Game 7, the secondary defenders still weren't ready for this TJ McConnell fucking show. It's unbelievable what he did. He's. What, he scores all those points in a row. Siakam did not take another shot in the third quarter until that thing at the very end with five seconds left. Now, he did sit for five minutes. So then when I thought, okay, he got that rest, he wasn't a big part of the offense because everybody's kind of watching TJ Go off. I was expecting him to try to get that push. And very early in the fourth quarter, he gets a possession, and you can see that he wants to be aggressive. It's not him checking out. It's him not, you know, like, being afraid of the moment. It wasn't any of those things. But he gets into this position where Chet comes over, just swallows him up. And Siakam twice had these two early positions in the fourth quarter where he's. He's like, this is, to Zach's point, like, oh, shit. Like, everybody's paying attention to me now. And I'm not going to be able to just cut off Halliburton dicing everybody up and just breaking the paint.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, that was the fun part about that McConnell stretch, when he scored all those points. But I think he also had at least four turnovers, and they were just like. If you ever wanted your answer on, could McConnell be Jalen Brunson on the Knicks if you geared your offense around him? We're throwing everything we have at stopping him. I think he had the two turnovers in A row and they hit the three threes when they blew it up and all of a sudden they were up nine and they were just coming at him, coming at him. And it was like, oh man, the clock struck midnight for poor TJ McConnell and then he scored 10 straight points. He was like, no, I'm just going to go to the basket over and over again and was just fighting these guys off by himself. But yeah, I thought the thing they miss, I mean on top of all the other stuff you miss with Halburn, they just don't get fast breaks without him. You know, they're not, couldn't push, they couldn't push the pace at all. And if it's going to be a half court game, OKC is beating anyone except maybe Denver. If we're just going half court versus half court and that's how Denver was able to hang with him. What else do we need to talk about? OkC y Zach, is there a way for them to get better in your opinion?

[Zach Lowe]

Oh Abs, absolutely.

[Bill Simmons]

What would be our number one move?

[Zach Lowe]

Well, I think, I mean, you know the talking points are always, well Chet's just scratching the surface of what he can be offensively and you know, he did not shoot the three, maybe one or two from three today, did not shoot the three well in the playoffs again. And J Dub still has levels to get to as the second and third guys. I think just along with that those guys getting better offensively comes a. They, they still have like molding of a general offensive system to do that's that doesn't default all the time to just like Shay, can you do something at the end of the clock? And I think that's what Ryan was talking about earlier of like just the dependence on his one on one game. The synergy between Shay and J Dub, you know, we saw them run a few pick and rolls at in this game like they did at the end of game five. I think it was when they, when they cracked the defense a little bit with that. I just think like just building out the offense is the thing that would scare me about the Thunder if I were all these other teams in the west trying to load up and compete with them is that they still have as a collective levels to get to. But look, I mean the Halliburton thing is also a reminder that even, I mean the Thunder are probably going to be the exception given how well they are set up now and later. But like none of this stuff is guaranteed. That's what's heartbreaking about this Halliburton injury. Like, it's not like when were, when's the last time the Pacers were in the finals. There's no guarantee they'll be back at this stage ever in Tyrese Halburn's career. Like, none of this is guaranteed to you, not even to the Thunder. And that's why getting all the way here after all this grueling stuff and having an na, it just sucks. Like it just objectively sucks.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I would also add, like I'm happy for Presti because it was always the annoying guy and I'm using that as just the catch all annoying guy of like, oh, if he's so good, you know? And you're just like, shut the up. Okay. And to think of what Zach's talking about with Halliburton. Like, I thought about it too. It's like, what's the likelihood Halliburton gets back to the NBA Finals? Like, it's, it's far more unlikely than likely. Just the way this stuff plays out. And if you're a Thunder fan and it's not like I have this decades long like sympathy for Thunder fans the way you would maybe say like the Cleveland Browns or something, but for that group to have Katie Westbrook harden surge and make it to the NBA Finals in 2012 and feel like they were competitive, right. Even though it was a five game series and you're kind of leaving there going, all right, you know, we got some of that playoff seasoning and we're good. And imagine like telling anybody. Imagine telling Preston be like the next time you guys are going to be here. It's in 13 years. So it's like, it's amazing.

[Bill Simmons]

Rehabilitation. Yeah. I was when they were watching, watching everybody hug and celebrate and pretty. They showed Presti hugging sga and you think back to that summer when and Ryan and I were doing pots together that summer and all the focus was on the Quippers trade. And man, OKC did well for themselves because they had hit a dead end. The Westbrook era was done. This, this there was it. There was no chance to win a title with Westbrook and Paul George and whoever else they had and to be able to parlay that into what they did with weirdly an umbilical cord to that 2012 finals that Ryan's mentioning where it does feel like it's somehow connected to that era because they took that era as far as they could and then they turned all the assets into the rest of it. I do want to point out they did. I mean, did you feel like this was OKC's first title or their second? Zach, just a. Just a question.

[Zach Lowe]

I don't get the question.

[Bill Simmons]

OKC won the title today. Is it their first title or is it their second title?

[Zach Lowe]

I'm not going to wade into these ones with you.

[Bill Simmons]

No, you're waiting in. It's a question you have to answer.

[Zach Lowe]

It's their first NBA championship.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, there we go. This is my Minneapolis Lakers case or something.

[Zach Lowe]

But does anyone.

[Bill Simmons]

Nobody know? KC and the fans are like, we got our second one.

[Zach Lowe]

No one's fighting with you on this one, right?

[Bill Simmons]

Lakers title, Minneapolis Laker Point. They still claim the 5 Minneapolis Lakers title. Sorry. Whatever.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Jack Sick was seventh in MVP voting that year.

[Bill Simmons]

This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. One of the best things about summer, all the different sports going on. You might be playing volleyball, golf, tennis, baseball, who knows? There's so much to do. If you really want to have some fun, spice things up with Michelob Ultra as the prize. Because winning always tastes better with Ultra on the line. I'm a big tennis guy, especially during the summer. Nothing better than a couple sets. Sweat it all out. The Ultra's waiting for you. Don't do this with Pickleball because you shouldn't play pickleball. Play tennis. That's what the real people play. Play tennis. Have. An Ultra superior is worth playing for. You can fill your fridge with Mick Lobotra this [e-mail], super easy. Enjoy responsibly. Copyright 2025 Anheuser Busch McGlob Ultra Light Beer, St. Louis, Missouri. This special portion of the Bill Simmons podcast is being brought to you by Loom by Atlassian and you're feeling stuck at work. They can help you trade out lengthy emails and unproductive meetings for something better. Loom's video messaging. With it, you can record your screen, you and your voice to share messages easily so you can save time and still stay connected. Share a quick update, provide feedback, train a colleague, everything in between. Try loon [e-mail] that is. L o o m com. Can we fast forward to how weird the east is next year and then circle back and talk about the finals? I don't know how long Zach's staying because he's on east coast time. I'm glad we have to talk about this.

[Zach Lowe]

No, but I'm glad you're doing it this way because. And I'm this. I just want to say this before we go forward. I'm glad we're doing this right after the heat of the moment. And after the trophy presentation because it's going to go down as a weird podcast. Like, we. And it's weird because we don't know how to talk about the game. Like, what you said before about, I was just in a haze for like an hour after Halliburton got hurt. So this should be a strange podcast that jumps from like, hey, are the who's favored in the east next year with all these injuries? To what do we think about the Thunders legacy as a champion to poor Tyrese Halliburton? Because it just. It's a hard. It's just a strange moment to be. To talk about. So I'm glad we're getting strange. Let's talk about the freaking east next year.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. So. So two pieces. The first piece is the Halliburton piece out for next year. No question. Heartbreaking. I was so bummed out. Like, I just couldn't believe it. I like it because you knew right away. It feels like we've seen enough of these that as soon as you saw the calf shimmy, right? You're like, oh, my God. Really? This is happening for him. He just went through this whole eight, nine month thing where he went from basketball fans, knew who he was, wasn't really a household name to like, I felt like he became a legitimate star. He became the face of a team that we all loved. Even if you weren't a Pacers fan, you have your own thing. Like, this was the frontman of a team that I think was the biggest winner of this entire NBA playoffs that didn't win the title. And now he's just gone. We have no idea when he's going to. It'll be 18 months before we see him play basketball again. And I just can't believe this is how this worked out. Rossillo, where you have somebody who's. It's like watching some, like a summer movie where they're promoting this movie coming this movie coming this so and so. And it's like, oh, man, this guy's the new Superman. He's gonna be a big star. And then that's it. We just don't see him. I just can't believe this is how it happened.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. Because I couldn't even start thinking about the east until like halftime. Because then it crept in my head and I knew we probably should have to do some of this because, yeah, I think all three of us are like, you know, it's not like we're a Thunder podcast. You know, sometimes, like, I think of the sports center rules, the arguments I would get another radio show back in the day of like, well, this team won. It's like, so what are we supposed to do? Just say they were awesome for seven minutes? Like, what's the actual topic?

[Bill Simmons]

And we've, and we've gone. We've all on our own podcast. We've all talked about all the reasons that are awesome. I mean, the east was weird before this Halliburton injury. We were like, what's going to happen with the east next year? We had no idea. Now it's three times weirder.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Well, maybe I could guess that Zach, the GM you were talking to wasn't Kobe Altman. If he was like, this gives us hope. Because it felt like a team, a team that didn't have high end talent. And after Cleveland, Cleveland gets.

[Zach Lowe]

Excited for the potential lamelo ball. Jalen Green backcourt down the line.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, the bell about J Con Canipple. Yeah, let's go.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Knipple and Jalen Green work together. But if you're looking at everything that we said in the moment with Cleveland, you're like another disappointing early exit, incredible regular season profile. Clearly Garland is even more hurt than we realize if he's going to miss time in next season. But I would always talk with you about it and be like, you know, Most of the GMs are just going to go, hey, we, we really like our four guys. We spent a ton of money on the fifth guy and Hunter, we added shooting and all these different things. I mean, Ty Jerome's probably gone, but we'll probably just run it back even if we seem a little flawed. And it's embarrassing that we lost that series of the Pacers even with the Garland injury. Now if you're Cleveland, you're just going, well, of course we're running it back now. Like, who are you afraid of?

[Bill Simmons]

Tatum's out, Halberton's out, and the Knicks just had a coaching change and God only knows what's going to happen with them.

[Zach Lowe]

Dame's out. Does that even. I mean, if you think that matters.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that's definitely 100% part of it. And Orlando, who does his Bane trade. And now they're like, jesus, did you.

[Ryan Rosillo]

See the Orlando odds went from 30 to one to win the title to.

[Bill Simmons]

12 to one after the injury. Come on.

[Zach Lowe]

Well, this is one of my, this is one of my subplots that I talked about last week is like. And it's even more relevant now. Is there another Bane style move coming for like a random team? Not that Orlando was a random team. I thought Orlando would have been a 50 win team this year had they stayed healthy. So they're, they're above that. But like, are the Hawks going to be like, hey, you know what? How many picks we got? Like, can we go. Can we go get. I don't even know who it would be. Can we go get this guy?

[Bill Simmons]

That guy?

[Zach Lowe]

Like, like, why not?

[Bill Simmons]

Do you want to do some Hawks trade exception talk?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Oh, my God.

[Bill Simmons]

25 million. Yeah, they could fit Dylan Brooks right now. We'll take them.

[Zach Lowe]

Think bigger. I don't know.

[Bill Simmons]

No, I'm just.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I think smaller when it comes to trade exceptions because I was some free agency thing the other day and it's like, oh, it's like, okay, right. So the $25 million player has to be another guy that costs that much. The other team doesn't want anything back for a value.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm ashamed to admit the only reason I know about that trade exception is I was looking at three way deals with Drew going to Phoenix and Dylan Brooks going to Atlanta and the Celtics getting Royce O' Neill and saving like $23 million. I did. I just, I gave it a test drive on the trade machine. I'm not saying it's a trade that could happen, but I was trying to. Trying to figure out some. Cause I mean, I can't wait to do that. I probably should have. Maybe I could screenshot it and put it on Instagram. But yeah, if you're Cleveland, you have like a legitimately embarrassing loss. You win 64 games and you just go out. You get basically sucker punched in round two. And then after that happens, Tatum go. As that's happening, Tatum goes down, Halbert goes down. And the Knicks got. Only we still don't know who their coach is.

[Zach Lowe]

So you're saying Cavs 73 and 9 mixture, let's put the pressure on them now.

[Bill Simmons]

Let's. Let's run. And then Orlando, I think, is feeling good. And then I think you guys are right. Like there's going to be some Wild Card east team. We've had some fun trades where teams who weren't in it were like, maybe we're. Maybe we're a contender and they'll just do something crazy. I'm not even playing Bulls.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, they start calling up what's going on with Julius Randall and you guys.

[Zach Lowe]

Hey, look, man, Toronto, Toronto took Yaka Purdle off the table for Kevin Durant. Like, I don't. I don't know if I don't. Maybe Toronto's not our candidate for a wild trade. If you're taking Jakob Pertle off the table and Kevin Durant trade talks. It's, you know, maybe.

[Bill Simmons]

Maybe real.

[Zach Lowe]

That was real. Yeah, it's a real thing that happened.

[Bill Simmons]

And it was the Miami thing. Real. That Sean said, because that, like, that Haywood, Highsmith. No.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, that one was Sean's. With Miami. Was. No one was available.

[Zach Lowe]

Tell me what he said. I didn't see it.

[Bill Simmons]

He's basically saying, like, they were like, we'll give you Wiggins. Wiggins and a contract. And the 20th pick. Like, they basically offered nothing.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Sounds like somebody's a little anti.

[Zach Lowe]

I like Jakob just fine. I'm just like. Like, if are. Like, can you. Do you want Kevin Durant or not? Like, do you. Like, why are you on the phone with whoever is taking calls for the Suns if. If Jakob Pertle, who I. How. Where. What is he, the 16th best starting center in the NBA? 12th, 9th, 18th? I don't know.

[Bill Simmons]

I certainly would not take him off the table for anyone who averaged over 20 points a game last year, much less 25, 26, 27. Yeah. So he ended up going to Houston. We're going to talk about that later. But, yeah, so Cleveland, Orlando, I mean, and then you look at the Pacers, they have this magical run. It's amazing. And now, you know, no Halbert next year. Not a lot of ways.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Detroit, 58.

[Zach Lowe]

58 wins next year for the Pistons. I mean, Ivy coming back.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Ron Holland, year two.

[Bill Simmons]

Are there our guy. Is there anyone else, now that Durant's off the table, that you feel like is a elevator for a team like Detroit, for instance? We've already had two. We've already had Bain and Durant traded.

[Zach Lowe]

I'm looking at the standings. I mean, it's. It's. It's going to be hard to find a team that's, like, motivated to sell. Let's call it like the Jeremy Grant line. A team that's motivated to sell a player that's better than Jeremy Grant. Like, I think we all agree Jeremy Grant's a nice NBA player from a team that might at some point want to pivot away from him, but also not a guy who you're going to be like, whoa, they got that guy. That changes my. My whole thinking about the team. And the Memphis guys seem to be somewhat off the table. I think your best candidate would be Markkanen. Right? Like, just, like, if they decide just this is Collins.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Is Collins above or below the Jeremy Grant line?

[Bill Simmons]

Below. I don't mind him. I think it's an expiring contract too. But the Grant thing, you're taking on some real money that's like over 90 million. So I'm not as excited for that. I know if Rosilla was a gm, he would have, he would have already scouted all the Ayton post ups from last year. Try to, try to talk yourself into it.

[Zach Lowe]

The other place to look is like, like DeRozan to me doesn't, doesn't do it. But the Levine, like is there any big Zach Levine fan? Like this guy's changing. Is he above the Jeremy Grant line? I think he probably is, but not by, not by as much as his sort of raw stats would suggest, I don't think.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Well, he's playing for his number one fan right now in the back.

[Bill Simmons]

So Priscilla, how far below the Jeremy Grant line do you have Bradley Beal? Is it, is it like you go into the basement and then there's a special freight elevator where you have to go another. It's like nobody knows about the elevator and then you go another three floors down.

[Ryan Rosillo]

If I could do Beal 4 Grant, I'd make a Grant statue.

[Bill Simmons]

If you're, if you're Phoenix.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. You don't even have to play.

[Bill Simmons]

And then he would veto it after you made the trade. Yeah, I, I'm sorry. You know, one of the reasons is that Durant trade happened was because the draft is somehow three days from now. It's on a Wednesday night, we just had game seven. It's that we have a 72 hour and so Phoenix wanted that 10th pick. I still feel like Dallas has. Dallas is the one I'm watching because I just don't think the roster that they have is going to be the roster they start October with. And I don't know whether it's going to be Gafford or Clay or PJ Washington or what they do, but I just feel like there's some sort of move with them and I think Gafford would have real value.

[Zach Lowe]

But, but I'm talking about like that's not catapulting.

[Bill Simmons]

That's, that's below the, that's below the Jeremy Grant line. But I think Dallas is the most likely trade. And then I think Sacramento. I'm always going to be on the edge of my seat waiting to see what they do.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I didn't think we were going to do a Gafford Grant debate, but I mean Gafford probably means more for certain teams than Grant would because as talented as Grant is, he also can be a little Tobias Heresy.

[Zach Lowe]

Look, I just want to apologize to the listeners. We're all just part of my basketball soul just evaporated during the tyree celebratory. And now my brain is broken. And I'm going to say the following sentence out loud on a podcast an hour after Thunder won the championship. Does anyone know what's going on with Zion Williamson? If we're talking about the Jeremy Grant line and tradable guys, is he. Do the Pelicans want him?

[Bill Simmons]

Joe.

[Zach Lowe]

Joe Dumars is somehow now the GM of the Pelicans. Like, do we know what's happening there? Because I guess that's another name. We should at least be like, that guy could change if he ever actually played. He could change some, change some teams.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, Rossilla is our number one Zion expert. I know he's been monitoring it.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, I still think ownership really likes the idea of him there and they feel burned historically with other big names asking out and having great stories. But, you know, again, I don't know that because Baron Davis was good after, I'd be like, we have to keep Zion. I personally would just be like, hey, it's time to move on from this. Even though I think all of us, when it's good, we love watching it. I've referenced that Minnesota regular season game when he was back and he was spry and ready to go. And I was like, this is a fun, fun game. But there's also, like a basketball question with Zion, because the best. The best version of him is when he's your point guard and you just let him go point Zion and he kills everybody. No one can stay in front of him. And the funny thing is, like, you play off of him because he can't shoot. And that's normally you do against somebody who's a penetrator, but you actually are allowing him to get a running start, so it kind of backfires. So you then have to close out on somebody who can't shoot. And then I've always kind of liked his passing. But, yeah, look, if he were healthy, we could probably have this conversation about him. But I do think that there's a fair conversation about, like, what he would actually bring to an already established team if it's, we just got to clear out and let him go. A much taller, more athletic version of TJ McConnell. Like, as great as TJ McConnell has been throughout the series, I didn't think I'd ever see 5 out TJ McConnell just beating up on a defensive player in the restricted area. And a team being like, this is how we want to run our offense. This is like, who. This is our identity.

[Bill Simmons]

What, Zach, if you had to make a documentary about anything about the 2025 finals with just a. TJ just trying to, trying to figure out how this guy was attacking one of the best defenses we've seen in the last 40 years and getting shots that he wanted. Just trying to understand that that's, that's like a. That's like a two hour doc.

[Zach Lowe]

Apologies to listeners again, but there was like, There was a.2 and a half years ago, he, he would not shoot. Like, he did not want to shoot. And then sometime last season, this the. I don't know if he flipped a switch in his head. If Rick Carlisle flipped a switch in his head, he was like, I'm going to go get me some buckets and I'm like going to be an elite isolation isolate, forget picks. I don't even need picks. I'm just going to isolate. Like I'm a 6, 8 wing and I'm going to get buckets on fucking everybody off the bench and play my way into the six man of the year conversation. I've never seen a transformation like it. The Thunder just won the NBA championship, by the way.

[Bill Simmons]

So Lou Dort would be the only. Well, Lou Dort would be the only thing if they had to like, try to save money with extensions, that's the only move. And I just wouldn't trade him.

[Zach Lowe]

He's beloved to know he's beloved. And I'll tell you this about Lou Freak.

[Bill Simmons]

He's also too important on what they do. I just. To me it's a, you know, you.

[Zach Lowe]

Know what we can say about Lou Freak and Dort. You can say a lot of things about Lou Freak and Dortmund, but you could never say he will stop shooting threes. If he goes into a slump, that dude is going to keep on shooting. Contested three after contested three after contested three, right? And he doesn't care if he's missed six in a row. He shoots with the conscience of like Klay Thompson. Just like, of course I'm going to make like the next seven that I take. I love it.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's a third.

[Bill Simmons]

I always feel like they're going in.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You do?

[Bill Simmons]

I do. I don't know why. I just something about him.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He's got a very specific launch angle where there's some. Where you go, whoa, whoa. Like this. He is. He is playing this one up. I did have a list of to dos for the Thunder had they blown this, which I, I wrote some of that stuff down. First one of the reasons they can't get rid of Lou Door, even though it's been suggested, if they want to get really clever and constantly stay in front of this and allow themselves financial flexibility, I would be afraid to see what the personality of this team is without Lou Dore. Yes. Okay. Because every team needs a badass. And he's still kind of a quiet badass. He's not an outward, emotional guy. And at the times when I was wondering what the hell's going on with this team? Like, what's. What's wrong with the Thunder right now? And it's like, are they too casual? Are they still a little too chill? Is that still even something that's fair to say about a team that just won an NBA championship? Because clearly it's not so detrimental that it prevents them reaching the ultimate goal. Cause they just did it an hour ago. But it's part of the dork conversation, because this is. It's like taking Draymond away from prime. Stephen Clay, as great as those dudes were, you needed somebody who was always on edge. And I think every team needs one of those guys. And Chet's certainly not ready to be that guy. I don't even know if that's in his personality physically. Like, I'm so excited about Chet when he can actually hold his position, because, I mean, it's just a nightmare for him trying to hold up. Which looked a lot better when the other team went small tonight. But the Dort thing, I think is really interesting because I'm with you. Like, you would hear, could they get in front of that? And I think they desperately need his personality.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Because he's the reason you do it is. I think he's up to like 20 million a year. And you could just. You have guys on your bench that are cheaper replacements. That's it. That would be the only reason. But Zach and I went to game four, and in the second half of that game, he. I thought he was the MVP of the game. Him and Caruso, they just took the game over with their, you know, by. By just being like, alphas on defense in, like, a really specific way. Like the way they carried themselves, what they try to do to Halburn. I mean, one of the complaints I had about this series was there was very little bad blood, shit talking, anything. All the stuff that we're just used to in a final. It was a very polite series and that. I thought the second half of game four was the only one when they really ramped it up where it felt like a little More. A little more personal. I don't know Zach. So if they keep him then you have all these young guys on the team. I guess it is what it is.

[Zach Lowe]

Seems great. Yeah. I was going to say we can, we can.

[Bill Simmons]

There might be some topage minutes somewhere. Maybe some garbage time stuff for him. I don't know how they change.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It was my thing.

[Zach Lowe]

They have 15 contracts next year, like 13 guaranteed contracts. And then AJ Mitchell and Big Jalen Williams are team options. That's 15 dudes. That's all you can have on an NBA roster. I think the guy to look at for like how do they re reorient the roster a little bit to just not be a second apron team and just get crushed by luxury attacks. More so than Dort is Hartenstein's player team option rather for 28 and a half million and 26, 27 maybe. You know I'm not saying they would decline that. I just think like that's. I'm sure that some part of their brain is like it would be really great if two years from now he was not super essential to our like Chet had ascended and the rest of our team had ascended where it's not like super essential to pay another center this much money. And I bet Dort would take a decent like team friendly deal too when it comes time.

[Ryan Rosillo]

The heart the Hartenstein signing felt like the cap scheduling signing that we see a lot of teams do where it's like before we have to extend all of these guys, let's just use the space now, add the asset. You got to have the owner sign off on it. But I mean he's a. He's a really big story. And remember last year their fatal flaw felt like the rebounding. The rebounding rate numbers were atrocious. They weren't great this year. They weren't very good at all in the playoffs but.

[Bill Simmons]

And he wasn't very good in the finals.

[Ryan Rosillo]

No, I, I really think he, he became. You know they ran the first two plays for him where game six it was a hard roll and then they did the same thing tonight but they weren't able to get it to him. And sometimes when I see that kind of stuff it's like they want to set the tone to have him be a little bit more engaged offensively and even his passing is really good. But you know it's one thing when you're running your regular season offense through him 30ft away from the hoop and he's kind of passing over the top of defenders. If you, if you're Caught up in some sort of scramble. But you could see Dagnall with just trying to go away from him, you know, I mean he started the series of them on the bench, you know, so that's a really expensive luxury to have for a team that's going to have to pay a ton of other guys.

[Bill Simmons]

So that special portion of today's episode where we looked at the Easter conference was brought to you by Loom by Atlassian. With video messaging from Loom, you can trade out these novel length emails and back to back calls. And finally stop feeling stuck at work. Simply record whenever you need to share it with your team. No video production or editing skills are needed. It has easy to use skills and AI features to help you make it exactly what you want. Get back on track. Try loom [e-mail] that is L O M.com Zach, I don't know how long you're staying, but we got to talk SJ really fast here because he is the first since Shaq 2000 scoring title MVP, finals MVP. And the problem with SJ is there's not a lot of controversy with him. There's not a lot to say. There's no zags. He's just scoring 30, 32 a game. Sometimes it can get a little one dimensional, but I feel like that's probably the fault of his team. Like Rasol laid out earlier, his assist stuff was really good today, which is a theme that we've seen in the as we get, especially these finals games that happened with Tatum last year where the unselfishness really comes out as like a strategy. But is there another level for him to go to or is this it?

[Zach Lowe]

No, I mean, look, it's hard to have another level from MVP in a year where in a year where Jokic had the year that he had and you still won MVP and it wasn't like an outrage. I think he stepped up his three point volume this year and if you could marry that with some better three point efficiency, he'll continue to grow as a playmaker. I like the stuff they were doing out of timeouts with him off the ball. We would talk about that on podcasts where he would set back screens like you knew. But there's like, what else are you supposed to do? I do think it's kind of cool. The whole foul grifting thing kind of faded. Like it wasn't a talking point at all in the finals and I didn't feel like it. It needed to be. Like he wasn't like shamefully going for Fouls. And I don't. I think that was always kind of overblown. It was cool that that just vanished as a storyline.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

What do you got? No one talked about Nemhardt trying to get fouls. Just a little counterpoint there.

[Bill Simmons]

Decent. Zach.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. Not even a zag on that one.

[Bill Simmons]

8.9.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's funny because Tatum, the Tatum conversation, always felt like, hey, he's really good and he's never going to be the best player in the world and it's okay. And the Celtics were always ahead of schedule, playing deep into the playoffs. And then it was like, yeah, but you actually think they were going to beat some of these teams. The Eastern Conference finals are. Granted there's. There's a heat or two one in there that you're like, okay, what went. What went wrong there? Especially a couple years ago. But it felt like Tatum. And maybe it was because of the Olympic stuff where it was like, if this guy's so good, you know, the cool thing for SGA because it all feels very on schedule with this team because as you had said, which I think another thing we need to give the Thunder a ton of credit for is I've heard people talk about them like, oh, they tanked. They just. They had Chris Paul that one season. They get the game seven of the first round against Houston and then they have two down years and then they're right back into it to being competitive. This is one of the quickest resets ever. And again, when you nail on the same draft Chet and Jalen Williams to go with a guy who's going to be mvp, like, that's pretty good. Like, a lot of the hard stuff is done on your to do list and building out a roster. So however this team has been around, this isn't like. And this may have led to some of the lack of interest that it wasn't the best player in the game at a young age trying to finally get over the hump or it wasn't one of the guys who was considered the best player in the game. Like, imagine Giannis without a ring being in the NBA Finals in 2026. And it's like, man, now maybe with him not being American, that would be a little different. But there seems to be a need for some dramatic buildup. And the funny thing is this all feels very, very on schedule. Like, it makes sense that they. I think they still should have beat Dallas last year. They didn't. They House Minnesota. We start to think, okay, this pace thing's probably over. Ends up being a Terrific series. But them winning this in this year, in this form, even though I still want a little bit more from the guys around him, it, it's just so like, like there's nothing disruptive about it.

[Zach Lowe]

Ahead of schedule. It's ahead of schedule. I, I mean, when the west is.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Supposed to beat him.

[Zach Lowe]

Well, I'm just saying the team to your teams don't get this good this fast with this many young players. And even Shea's turning 27 in like three weeks. He's still like, not like he's just entering his traditional prime.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it's like it's basically their second playoff run. So from that standpoint, just based on how the league works.

[Ryan Rosillo]

How the league works, I would say yes, they're heavy, but they were the favorites too. Yeah, but based on the competition.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, but it is weird that they didn't have their version of, you know, the, the, the Steph game in 22:22 against that Celtics team. Like there's just like the heartbreaking loss. The closest they came to is Shea fouling. Who is it P.J. washington in the corner on the three. That was their heartbreaking loss. Usually you have a couple years of those and they, they just didn't.

[Zach Lowe]

Flashback to two years ago when Denver wins the title. If you had said who wins the championship next? Who wins the championship sooner, the Nuggets again or the Thunder, you would. We would have all said the Nuggets, of course. Like the Thunder. They're playing team like they've before the Zeke Naji, the play in the leap last year.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's a fair point.

[Bill Simmons]

Again, they were crippled by one $8 million extension.

[Zach Lowe]

Completely paralyzed up the play in team to what they were last year is that's the mega leap. I mean they made another mega leap this year, but that was the one where I was like, you saw it coming. I didn't think they would make that leap that fast. And that's like a massive, massive jump.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. I remember doing this before two seasons ago, just trying to figure out was it realistic and looking at history and there were some pretty decent examples, which is why if you're Detroit or Orlando, you can look at OKC and be like, hey, you know, it's not as crazy as you think.

[Zach Lowe]

They were below 500 two seasons ago they were 40 and 42.

[Bill Simmons]

Right.

[Ryan Rosillo]

But everybody thought that year they're going to have like 20 wins.

[Bill Simmons]

And Priscilla, the point you made about how they really only threw away two years. It felt like more than two because all the Poku 5 out offense just watching that on league pass in real time in February, March and April. That's why it felt like five years. But it was really only a little cluster of a couple months.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You think Poku watched?

[Zach Lowe]

Oh, boy, he did.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm sure he did. How could he not more bummed out Poku or Josh Giddey?

[Zach Lowe]

Josh Giddy's gonna get paid.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I guess he'll get over it.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I'd bet money Poku didn't watch. He was like, that was last night.

[Bill Simmons]

I didn't realize. Well, it is interesting. Cause you think of the initial incarnation of this team. It was SGA and Giddy together, right? And then there was this moment where sga, all of a sudden it's like, yeah, Josh, you're just not going to have the ball a lot anymore. We have this guy and he's going to average 30 points a game this year. Our whole team is moving this way. So maybe you can learn how to shoot some corner threes and push the ball when you get it. And that was it. And SJ just took the team from him. The Jalen Williams piece, him. I remember he was such a fun draft guy. We all. I think the ringer was really high on him that year, right? Weren't we all in on him as like, the. What draft is that? 2022? Was that.

[Zach Lowe]

At the same draft? Sitting the same.

[Bill Simmons]

But I remember, I remember Sharks left him like we were. We were. We loved all the. Is there a Jalen Williams for this year for you, Rosello? Do you have one yet?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Ooh, that mean little Carter Bryant. I don't like Carter Bryant as much as everybody else does. Apparently, like every single team really likes him. And I'm always kind of like, huh, Wow. I guess I'm wrong. We shall see.

[Bill Simmons]

Zach, you should sand that Carter Bryant tape for like about eight minutes, you know.

[Zach Lowe]

But you know who J double is for me, there's. I actually should make a list of these guys. There's always a bunch of guys. There's always one guy every draft, maybe not even every draft, maybe every other draft. Who? I watch him play. I'm not a college basketball guy. I'm not doing that stuff like you guys are. I'm just flying. Watch a little YouTube and do this. There's always one guy who. I watch him play his first NBA game and I text like 10 Scouts. How the hell was this guy picked 12th or 15th or 17th and not like way higher than that. And Jalen Williams was that guy. I watched him play one time. I was like, Whoa. This guy was like. He was 12th, right? Like. And he was like, a late driver behind. That's right.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Same draft, you know, so that's why I'm still excited about him. Presti took him before, so, you know.

[Bill Simmons]

Does Zach know about Usman Island? It's just Rosillo in a cabin with no electricity.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Just like cabin sailors. It's on shore. Just washed up on shore.

[Zach Lowe]

I'm reaching out to you, trying to get off like Tom Hanks and Castaway. The waves are smashing your raft.

[Bill Simmons]

He's not giving up. I mean, he's only, like, 22, right? Isn't he? He's still young, unfortunately.

[Zach Lowe]

He's on a team of people who are also 22 and way better than him.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I could see a second unit running their offense through him. Was a worse roster.

[Zach Lowe]

But then again, people used to say this about Nismeth island, and look what happened.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, now I floated out Cam Whitmore island today, and I'll tell you, we weren't. Didn't have enough people working in the office to write down all the credit cards. People are in. People are ready.

[Ryan Rosillo]

People are saying TJ modeled his game after Campbell Whitmore.

[Bill Simmons]

So we have final finals odds right now on FanDuel. OKC is plus 220. It's, like, far ahead of everybody else.

[Zach Lowe]

Just to make the Finals.

[Bill Simmons]

No, to win the Finals.

[Zach Lowe]

Win the Finals.

[Bill Simmons]

This is about as prohibitive of a favorite coming out of the Finals as we've had. So my thing is, if I'm chasing a ring, I'm trying to go east harder than ever now. Right. Like we talked about the LeBron scenario.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Oh, boy.

[Bill Simmons]

What was that four weeks ago? Rossello, when I was throwing Cleveland trades with LeBron, Jared Allen and DeAndre Hunter for LeBron? Something like that. Little. Who says no action.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Is this what Travis has to say? He has the no trade clause just in case.

[Bill Simmons]

No, he would have to agree to the trade. But if he's agreeing to a trade, there's only one place I think he would go. But if you're LeBron, could you talk yourself into that? I don't know. I'm just. I'll put it this way. I haven't taken my eye off that situation. Imagine if I sound like a lunatic.

[Ryan Rosillo]

If Giannis had ended up in the West.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. Well, now. I mean, we didn't talk about Milwaukee, but more, they weren't trading Giannis anyway. But now they have to feel even more emboldened to keep Giannis and see what they can patch.

[Zach Lowe]

It's A whole conference of why not us? Just every team. Why not us?

[Bill Simmons]

Is it? Well, I'm going to bring up the Celtics. It's a 56 minute mark. Do the Celtics reevaluate how they're thinking about everything?

[Ryan Rosillo]

My quick answer would be only based on the options that present themselves. If somebody thinks they're getting Jaylen Brown at a discounted rate, they're probably just going to say no and be a competitive team next year.

[Zach Lowe]

I would say no. Yeah. I still think they have to slough off some pretty major salary just to. Just to do it.

[Bill Simmons]

And it's been a really frustrating conversation with Celtic fans in my life who don't seem to understand how the seller cap and trades work. Really? They're going to trade Drew Holiday and get under the second apron? It's like, well, you know, they have to take a contract back.

[Zach Lowe]

Look, I know these things are very complicated and running a sports league and organizing a sports league and a collective bargaining agreement is very hard. The NBA has not helped itself be fan friendly in that regard. Like, I like the swaps upon swaps upon swaps upon swaps thing. Like, I just have regular people in my life where, like, can you explain why this pick is. I thought my team had a pick, but my team suddenly doesn't have a pick and it's this pick instead. I'm like, it's, let me direct you to real GM and even that you might want to get your attorney to help you understand what's written on real GM to figure out that one.

[Bill Simmons]

The only one who has it figured out is, is our friend Bobby Marks who just has these screenshots with all the informations that he can Twitter pick out at any moment that just tell you exactly what a team has. He's the only one who seems to understand it. I remember Rousseau and I were doing one pod after they did the CBA and we felt like something substantial had happened, but we didn't understand it. We were like, this feels like something. It just feels. And we just. And then people started telling us after, like, oh, yeah, this is a fucking disaster. It's a hard cap. And now Zach officially anointed it a hard cap. But even the Durant trade, I think that was one of the reasons it's just not easy to make trades anymore.

[Zach Lowe]

There are all these trap doors that you forget about. Like, oh, but if I do that, oh, then I'm capped at the first apron. That's right. If I do this in a trade and like I send a pick over here, then oh, the first. I'm hard capped at the first April. And so I got to do this.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like, okay, okay.

[Zach Lowe]

The cap guys should all make, like, a million dollars. The best cap guys. Because it's so goddamn hard.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I'm sorry. I just saw a headline on ESPN and.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, let's hear it. Oh, no.

[Ryan Rosillo]

SGA in the conversation with Jordan and Kareem.

[Bill Simmons]

What conversation?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Tall, athletic.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow.

[Zach Lowe]

Okay, so I see the headline, and it's a talking. It's a video clip. So I would watch the video clip. Maybe it's single season accomplishment. I'm assuming that's the context. I would assume it is in. In which case it's like, okay, you know, 30 points a game. 30 points a game in the finals again, finals MVP. Regular season MVP.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I'm gonna listen to it. Yeah, I can't wait.

[Bill Simmons]

As soon as we're done, I'm going to grind that video.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Zach's a journalist of the three. He brings up a great point. Like, I get mad whenever it's like somebody else gives you the titles. I'll look at titles of my own podcast. Being like, that's not what I said.

[Zach Lowe]

Well, there's just no way that anyone is, like, now he's in that class of player for a holistic career. Like, no one would ever say that it has to be a single season thing.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, there. I mean, the most interesting thing with him is the guard conversation that he's in now from start to finish seasons. The pool that he's swimming in is pretty crazy. We're going to take a break, Zach. Are you. You have a. You on east coast time. And we're going to talk to Rant now. If you want to stay, feel free to stay.

[Zach Lowe]

Parachute out. I will parachute out and let you guys do the Durant thing. I appreciate you letting me crash the party. The usual Simmons party. And I just. Weird night. Weird night in the NBA.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You're right, Zach. Regular season for one season averages mvp. The whole thing. Great instincts on this. A guy could be an editor.

[Zach Lowe]

Great instruction. Thank you for making me better. Congrats to the Thunder. I'm going to go watch some TJ McConnell highlights before I go to bed. No, you're not. And see what happens. Enjoy the Durant trade talk, guys.

[Bill Simmons]

This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn. During the season, every baseball team plays 162 games. It's a true test of endurance. It's not enough to have a hot month or two. You need sustained dominance throughout. Well, the same is true for your small business. It's not enough to have a great Q2 or even a great year. You want year over year growth that starts with better hires that'll be there for the long haul. To find Those hires, use LinkedIn. LinkedIn has strong hiring data and insights that you won't find anywhere else to help pair you with the best candidates, from unique skills and interests to the connections you have in common. Based on LinkedIn data, 72% of small businesses say that LinkedIn helps them find high quality talent. LinkedIn also lets you go beyond people who are actively applying in a given week. 171 million LinkedIn members aren't actively seeking jobs, but they are open to new opportunities. That's a big pool to miss out on. If you're not hiring with LinkedIn. Find your next great hire on LinkedIn. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com Simmons that's LinkedIn.com Simmons to post your job for free. Terms and conditions apply. This episode is brought to you by Altra Running Every pair of Altra shoes has a roomy toe box and zero to low drop which lets your toes spread and keeps your foot in a more natural position. All in the name of comfort and performance with a variety of styles. There's a shoe for everyone. It's comfort you have to feel to believe. Try Altra for yourself with a free 30 day trial and free shipping at altrarunning.com. this episode is brought to you by Yeti Summer is basically here and if you're getting outside, you need to check out YETI Hard coolers. They're built like tanks, super durable. They hold ice for days like they're tundra 65 iconic for a reason. Just an absolute beast for tailgates or tournaments. The Roadie 32 wheeled cooler. That one's awesome. You can pack it with a ton. Just roll it along. And if you want something super portable, the Roadie 15 is perfect. It even fits wine bottles. Find your cooler and gear up for summer with YETI Hard Coolers. We're gonna talk to Rand who got traded. So on the one hand, I feel like the league should pass a rule. There should be no trades within 24 hours of NBA Finals. Game 7. Seems like a decent rule. On the other hand, I don't know how you would enforce it and I thought it was a pretty fun trade. I thought it was an awesome trade for Houston. I just loved it for them. We could talk about the Phoenix part after.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Let's go. Why don't you just take. Don't even ask Me a question.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, we talked about this last week. I had so many more assets in the trade. They didn't give up Jabari Smith in the trade. That's a fucking miracle for Phoenix to trade Durant. It just speaks to what I mentioned. I can't remember the last pot I did was Wednesday or Thursday. But I just think the offers were so terrible, everyone lowballed them because everybody knew they had to trade him before the draft and everybody knew they wanted a pick. And it ends up being Jalen Green, who I don't know if there's four teams that they could spin him to for 33 million a year. And then Dylan Brooks, who at 21, 22 million a year, I think is a solid asset if you're trying to, trying to win games. And then the 10th pick, and that's basically the trade. So I think for Houston, no brainer, 10th pick, wouldn't have played for them. Plus you, you get rid of Brooks now you get to play Tar Eason and Whitmore, basically give them those minutes. Plus Amen Thompson. Like, I just thought, I thought the trade was a home run for them.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, I loved it. I mean, Stone is on an absolute heater. He's. He's been incredible that draft picks, they've been incredible and how they've worked a lot of this stuff. And yeah, we knew that they were limited offensively. Like the Durant market. Right, The Durant market, if we go through it, you knew it was getting bad when you were just least hearing the rumors of like, Miami won't include who. At first it started with like Hillel, where you're like, okay, I could see why you just wouldn't want to be in a hurry or you would say no until you think like, if you wanted Durant that bad, you're saying no about where for days until maybe then you finally give in. But then you're like, hawkez wasn't. Come on. Like, there's no, there's no way. Because the salary piece that you're moving out in Wiggins, I think is less attractive than Brooks because Wiggins is probably going to get you some numbers, but I don't know that he impacts the game the same way Brooks does. And by the way, shout out to Brooks for all the jokes when the Lakers eliminated. And granted, he brought a lot of it on himself and then he wouldn't do anything with the media after they would lose. So it's not like I was feeling bad for him, but like, dudes didn't think he was going to be in this league. And I still think he's somebody who impacts games. And when that contract came out and Houston gave all that money to Brooks and gave the massive deal to Fred Van Vliet, a lot of us are going like, man, that is so much money for that level of dude. But it's like, well, we got to spend it on somebody. We probably have to overspend this way. Now we're Houston and they flip Brooks into Durant. So, like, there's just all these things you can look at with Stone being like, oh, he did that. Right. That worked out well. So credit to him, credit to Brian.

[Bill Simmons]

Got two guys who he knew could play in playoff series and they did.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Right. So like the Yaka purdle part of it, like, was he really not available? Well, maybe not. I probably like him a little bit more than Zach does. And considering how expensive Toronto is, like, they're going to have to get one of the expensive guys, get like rid of one of those dudes. When you heard the Knicks rumors, like, now we've come full circle, it's like, well, first of all, apparently they didn't want him. But the early stuff on that was Mitchell Robinson and og Now I look at that, I'm like, Phoenix would have been pumped. I love Mitchell Robinson.

[Bill Simmons]

Now, remember I was thinking Towns for Durant straight up, that I mean, that's like three times when Houston paid.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. So that's not happening. And then when it comes back to Minnesota, I can understand like with Randall and the playoff player option, which he probably ops into at like 30 million because I don't think he wants to opt out and go to this free agent market. But then it's like, if you're Phoenix, do you want to get in the Randle business for 30 plus another 60 plus million over two years? I don't know. I don't know that. There's a ton of teams that want to do that kind of stuff. And then even San Antonio, and I'm finishing here quickly, but like San Antonio, if they had done it and whatever their case was, I would have been like, okay, yeah, that makes sense. And if they don't do it, which obviously they didn't, then I could also understand their position on that one being like, yeah, maybe it doesn't make a lot of sense to add Durant here because you're not just adding a 37 year old player who's a terrific scorer. You're adding somebody who doesn't have the greatest history with how happy he stays with franchises and the fact that he's going to cost you like another 120 million, which this probably was worked out ahead of time for him to be like signing off on this, even though we had heard last summer, right around this time, almost exactly to the day a year ago, that he wanted Houston, but Phoenix didn't want to move him out. All right, so you put all that together and I think it kind of makes sense that this is what the price ended up being, isn't it?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Well, for Houston, you're getting somebody who can shoot the ball in the last four minutes of a game and maybe appear on a panel about the future of the intersection between athletes and business.

[Ryan Rosillo]

There we go.

[Bill Simmons]

Get those two, those two verticals covered.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Now, are you mad that Ruben didn't invite you again this year?

[Bill Simmons]

I got invited. I just went to New York.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You didn't go. White party. You going to that?

[Bill Simmons]

I don't go back Eastern this summer. I try not to. How about you go to Vermont?

[Ryan Rosillo]

I go back to Vermont. Usually I go back to the Vineyard.

[Bill Simmons]

No, it's a no brainer for Houston. I think it's great for Durant. I was really excited because I want him to have one last act. I wanted him to go to the right team. I think Miami is a disaster. And I really am dubious how much Miami even wanted him or what Miami wants to do in general.

[Ryan Rosillo]

They didn't want to add Hawkez legitimately didn't put. Want to put him in a deal after all the other guys they want to put in a deal, then they clearly didn't want him that bad.

[Bill Simmons]

No. Like, if I if high Smith, if I had a buddy who was selling like, I don't know, a Ford Bronco and I knew you love Ford Broncos. I'm like, this dude's. It's like a 1973 Ford Bronco. He's like giving it away. And you're like, yeah, I don't know. I'm like, but you told me last week you really wanted a Ford Bronco. This guy. It's right here. This is so. I just don't think Miami, I don't think that Miami knows what they want to do. We talked about this last week. I think they're a mess. I don't think they, they have any idea whether they should be trying to pursue and try to be good in the playoffs or go the other way. So Durant didn't happen to give him an extension? Just didn't seem like they want to do it. You're paying $100 million a year to him and Tyler Hero, where are you going right, A year from now? Is that a recipe for anything in the East, Durant? Well, I guess in the East. So anyway, with Houston, the fact that. What's really interesting to me about this is they kept their flexibility for one more trade if they want to do it. And I don't know whether that trade happens in the summer or whether it happens in the December, January, February range. But, like, for instance, as we covered many times, Giannis is not getting traded this summer. But if it's January and they're 15, the Bucks are 15 and 25, and he's like, you know what?

[Ryan Rosillo]

This sucks.

[Bill Simmons]

It's time.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Poor box fans have to hear what they say.

[Bill Simmons]

They still have their chance. If the Celtics change their mind and they're like, God damn, we didn't realize we'd be this bad and we're going to pay how much money in luxury tax? Like, yeah, maybe we will trade Jaylen Brown. They have the flexibility still in some of the assets to make a second move, which I thought this was going to be their move, and this might be move number one. So I thought from that standpoint, great. And then from a Durant standpoint, I'm excited to see him in playoff games again because I thought it sucked. Those teams that he was on, basically, since that Brooklyn Bucks game were not fun teams to watch, you know, and teams that had real. No, no real upside from a Phoenix standpoint, I have no idea what they're doing. You have to really like that 10th pick. You have to feel like you're getting somebody who is going to be potentially like an all NBA guy if that's the centerpiece, because we know it's not Jalen Green and Booker together, that's. I can't imagine how those guys are playing together. And then you got Bradley Beal next to them. Like, what is this?

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's a lot of depth.

[Bill Simmons]

What is this?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, no, I know one position.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm worried about your guy. I don't know if you want to talk to somebody about all your Booker stock, but you might want to get rid of some.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It won't be his fault.

[Bill Simmons]

Diversify the portfolio.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, we're probably going to have to make a call tomorrow, but there's a lot of other factors. Let's have a Jalen Green conversation right now. What do you think? Let's do it. Like, what do you think of him?

[Bill Simmons]

I want him to go to a bad team and have the ball a lot for like a year. That's what I think I'd love to see him and maybe Phoenix will be the bad team. I. I do feel like there's something there and I think he's young and I think he's had stretches that made both of us go, wow. I thought he got worse last year as the season went along and I thought in the playoffs they were scared to even have him out there in some of the fourth quarters, but he's still young enough that there might be something there. I don't. Can you run an offense with him as like the creator slash, looking out for everybody else? We haven't seen it yet.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Well, you could argue, which is why.

[Bill Simmons]

I'd want to see him on a bad team.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, I know what you're saying. I mean his second year he had almost a 30% usage rate on a team that won 20 games. So I don't know that Houston's ever shied away from exactly what you're talking about. Like, but I think.

[Bill Simmons]

But an older version of him, to.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Be fair to you. Exactly. I know what you're saying. You're saying, okay, fifth year version of him. I don't, I don't know if that's the recipe because clearly he's going to get his buckets if you give him the shots. And when you get drafted as high as he gets drafted, it's a bit like a top draft pick in baseball where they almost always will call him up, even if they don't know that he deserves a roster spot or Volpe.

[Bill Simmons]

Like how that Volpe's just in the Yankees even though he's big bonuses, you.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Know, signing bonus stuff would happen in baseball all the time where you'd be like, why is this guy get called up? There's like five other guys in Double A that are better than him. It's like, well, we didn't spend the resources on them, so we have to make sure we know whether we're right or wrong on this guy. So I think there's. It's not apples to apples, but there's a close parallel there between Jalen Green being picked as high and going, all right, go to work. And I know I've already referenced it before too many times on the POD because we just did it. But that stretch when Shingoon was out at the end of the regular season last year was when I thought this light went off for him two seasons ago. Yeah, but then you go to where he was in the playoffs and you're like, hey, your counters don't work and you can't shoot. And we desperately need, like, the possessions are there for you. We don't really love any of our options here. It's not like there's two awesome hall of Fame scores and you're getting shut out because you're the third option. Like, we're allowing you to be a one option here offensively, probably a lot longer than anybody else would want to. And again, credit to Stone.

[Bill Simmons]

We're in the playoffs and we need you.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. Yeah. And you can't. So, hey, he didn't. He didn't close out a bunch of playoff games his fourth year in. That's probably being a little harsh, but I think he needs to figure out how to play with somebody else and maybe that's good for him and Booker, you know, I don't know. Or maybe they want nothing to do with it and they're happy to get the pick. They're happy to have Brooks to add some kind of toughness because whatever it is Phoenix is doing is it feels like they're still trying to fix this thing on the fly around Booker, which is usually just going to make it worse.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't think. If the goal is to keep Devin Booker as your franchise guy through his entire prime, I don't know if this trade is going to help that. Who's your best case scenario for them with the 10th pick who could actually come in and play real minutes for them and be good for them?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Because I don't think it's going to be there. Oh, gosh. I don't know that he's going to.

[Bill Simmons]

Want him at 6.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Vasini thinks he will be there when we talk. I don't even know if we did that on the pod because I like Malawatch more than he did. He does way more work on it. So I would defer to him if you're listening to this, but I listen.

[Bill Simmons]

To that whole podcast on Saturday morning.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Thank you, Bill.

[Bill Simmons]

Had a coffee. Seven o' clock in the morning. When somebody writes 160,000 words about the draft, I'm going to give them an hour. He's literally run 160, 000 words.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's insane.

[Bill Simmons]

That's like almost the size of what my book was just banging about. Unbelievable.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, it's unbelievable how. And so we were talking about the Malawatch range because then I. There was this guy Noah Essenge who's playing a fan in the German league. And then somebody else hit me up. He's like, you know, when we went to their facility. Facility. They were playing your podcast like, do you feel bad now about what you said about snk? I was like, you know what, I'm mad. I'm mad that draft people are talking about his incredible free throw rate. And I'm like, I watched the games. I can't believe the horseshit stuff that he got.

[Bill Simmons]

Calls you made him better. Maybe it was a wake up call for him. You're talking about how he's falling down all the time.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, get up, dude. What's going on down there? So, yeah, if there's a center. But this is a weird because after Malawatch, unless you like Baron Jer Moore, which I don't think that's. That seems a little high for him. I do like Sorber, the kid from Georgetown. And again, the mock stuff is stupid because then you keep looking at him and you're like, I love this guy. At 14. It's like there was one.

[Bill Simmons]

No, but there was one. You guys had a disagreement on one guy that I thought was fascinating because I thought Fears was guaranteed top 10 and Sam had him 18th and was like, look, I don't like small guards.

[Ryan Rosillo]

And he can't show me.

[Bill Simmons]

He's like, show me this. Show me this small guard with shooting issues that's come into the NBA and been awesome. And I was like, ah. Because I just had him in that 7 to 9 range. Just assumed. But then that put the fair guy to me a little bit.

[Ryan Rosillo]

What I do love about this draft after the first two is that like Trey Johnson, the Texas kid makes the most NBA type shots of any player in this draft. Right.

[Bill Simmons]

And can't finish anything.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Can't finish the room. Just atrocious numbers.

[Bill Simmons]

What he's like basically the best version of Eddie House you've ever seen in your life. That was. That's my trade. Johnson take. It's Eddie House on a heater.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He's a little bigger than Eddie. VJs got the most in him out of this group. And Knipple is the most adaptable. And I don't know what's going to happen because then you keep hearing that Utah likes Fears at five. Because if you're talking yourself into Fears, you go, he can already get to the rim and get past defenders in a way that is so special, there's.

[Bill Simmons]

No way they can take him fifth. I can't accept it.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Why? Because of Utah's roster? Because of him.

[Bill Simmons]

I just think he's. You can't. You have to take who's left between vjooqic and Ace Bailey and Kanipple, you have to. And if you want to get nuts and take Male maybe fine, you can talk me into the centerpiece but you can't take fears Twin towers Kessler Malawatch. Well then you trade Kessler to the Lakers for the two first round picks they've been allegedly offering for a year and a half. I just feel like Utah's have to, they have to be dying for Vijay or Knippo to get there and if neither of them in there they're just going to take Tre Johnson because he'll. He's the best asset at 5 like that's how it has to play out.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I don't know what Danny's role is as far as like the final say now with Austin there and of course Zanuck was a big part of all of the stuff that happened but Danny was getting on.

[Bill Simmons]

Ryan Smith has final say listening to Danny and I think those other guys are in the room would be my guess.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Ace feels like such a Danny pick. It really does to be like what's wrong with these? Right.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. He's like I watch Ace, I see a 30 point a game scorer. Yeah. Because the stuff to be scared of with Ace it's so funny because if he turns out to be a bust you go see the stuff. The way he handled his representation the Rutgers that team never won. The fact that his assist rate you could just point to all these different things but like if you watch the right YouTube clip on him you like, like you think he's in the running to go head to head with flag and Harper like there's one of those hoop intellect had some really good YouTube videos shout out to that guy. I don't understand why you watch.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Do you not have synergy access?

[Bill Simmons]

No, but I'd like watching I like the YouTube guys where the guy tells me the strengths and weaknesses. I like those clips. There's a hoop intellect does a good one.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I think there's like a Marty Conlon YouTube clip still going around being like how did it not happen for this guy?

[Bill Simmons]

Well that's the thing you I like seeing the weaknesses. Cause like VJ the weaknesses were what you pointed out. It's like how come every time he drives to the basket he whips the ball against the backboard and it goes flying the other way. It's like at some point the guy can't make a layup. That seems like an issue. But with Ace there was a chase down block section that was like the most exciting 45 seconds I've had in June other than maybe the halberton game winner in game one. He looks like LeBron on these chase down blocks, like 2012 LeBron. So there's just like a lot going on both ways. Like, can clearly score from 18 to 20 already, like nobody you've seen. But I also think he might not play for two years. So for Utah, do you care?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Well, Utah should be doing anything based on need. And the fact, like I'm always trying to think about, like, because Danny's drafting habits, anytime he just. You're like, oh, Mark is smart. Yeah, that makes sense. And you could say, I remember one time I'd asked him, we had like press availability. I didn't go to many of those, but one time I was just there in Waltham and I went, what's the most important asset? Like, what's the most important trait to have? And it was. He was like, he's shooting, like shooting, shooting. So then you're like, okay, well that doesn't really make a lot of sense of fears. And then you could counter that by saying, well, he took Rondo. It's like, no, he took Rondo because he thought Rondo was a freak and every other thing. And they said it took him 20th, right? He also couldn't believe how much he had fallen because I think they had him like six or seven. But the Jaylen Brown conversation, because you remember that draft very clear. It's Ben Simmons, it's Ingram 1 and 2. And then it was a constant, like, what the hell is going to happen at 3? Because there's all these other names. People kept thinking Chris Dunn. It's like, well, if they don't like him and he played at Providence, then nobody should want to draft him. Even though Chris Dunn had a nice little revival this year with the Clippers, but certainly not what you're thinking of with the number three pick. But the Jalen Brown conversation, because that Cal year was a mess, right? Cal was there, that other kid was there. They're big time recruits. And like, Jalen didn't even look like he knew how to play basketball yet. But the Ange argument was physically, he was so gifted in his size. And there were still some like, you know, we're talking about Jaylen Brown's handle cow. But he, he wasn't worried about all the other basketball stuff as much as he thought, like, this guy kind of fits the mold of this big athletic wing and if we let him just kind of get loose, he might figure some things out. And I've been thinking about that when I've been thinking about Bailey. But the difference that we know is that. Wait, hold on.

[Bill Simmons]

Can I add one thing on that Danny thing? Because it's a really important point you just made and there's one piece you're missing and we've talked about it before, I think a million years ago. Danny loves pedigree. And if you go back, like you mentioned that Jalen thing, the ESPN top 100, Jalen was the fourth guy in that class, right. Danny doesn't care about what was your college year like? Like they took Avery Bradley that year 19. He was the number one guy in high school the year before. Ace Bailey, the number two guy a year ago and went to this weird Rutgers team where they basically just had two guys and nobody else. Right. It's got weird representation. It's all fixable stuff. Danny's going to look at the pedigree, which is why I don't feel like. I don't feel like fears is in play for them. If you look at that draft last year, first of all, there were five guys that were 95s or higher in that draft class. Cooper one, Ace two, VJ three, Harper four, Trey Johnson five. And I just think he's a pedigree guy and he's going to take one of those five guys. Whoever's left, they're taking. And if it takes Bailey, they're taking him.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's a great point because it was a big Bob Myers thing back in the day. Like Patrick Baldwin Jr. Was a five star. He was supposed to go to Duke then, right?

[Bill Simmons]

That's a good example.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Kavon Looney was like a big time high school guy before he went to ucla. So there's a lot of that stuff there too. The Avery Bradley calls perfect. Now what I'd also say, and this is really about the draft and trying to figure out what the hell Utah's going to do is if Ange thinks that Ace is not wired to be competitive because it's clearly Jaylen Brown had that in him. You know, even if you don't like Jaylen Brown, like, you know, when he takes the core, like rational confidence, right. He thinks he's going to win if he picks up on anything that he thinks, like Ace is checked out when it comes to that. So even with the pedigree, even with the physical stuff, even with the classic, like, I can't believe this guy's still here at 5, because that's what it would be if they were to take him and go, we're not even good now. So the idea that we're Supposed to worry about how does he fit in with the rest of the roster? Like, who cares? Yeah, if they don't take them, I would imagine there's something that Ange thinks is alarming about the way the kid is wired, which is again, why everybody makes mistakes on this stuff. Because we don't really know the Wizards.

[Bill Simmons]

Passing him on six, that will mean there's some real fears going on that all the NBA people know that we're not even known about. Like just about work ethic, work habits, stuff like that. Because for the Wizards to pass on him would be insane. That's like a miracle if he gets to six.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It wouldn't make a ton of sense there. And it would at least make more sense that that's why he's shutting down these interviews and workouts. Because he's thinking, which a lot of the guys do think. It's like, well, if I go to Washington, I can give up the money from pick three to pick six because I'm going to get so many touches. Although Bub Carrington may have something to say about that.

[Bill Simmons]

Let me show you how it works here in Washington.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I like Bob. So. Okay, well, let me ask you. What do you think Darrell's going to do if he has to have the pick? Because, you know.

[Bill Simmons]

So two options. You love this. This is draft week is my favorite. Priscilla, if they keep the pick, I think it's vj. I've been saying that all along. I just think he fits the Darrell profile. I feel like they're gonna do some trade back, a spot trade bet, like stay in the top five, but try to trade back and pick up an asset and try to leverage Charlotte, who I think really does want. Ed wants vj And I think if Charlotte can move up for not a huge price and take VJ and just make sure they get him at three. I just. I feel like he's going to move back a spot and end up with Knipple. Knipple checks. A lot of Darrell boxes can play with the lineup they have. He's got size, he rebounds. There's some stuff when. When Flag wasn't playing or when Flag was in foul trouble, where the offense, like, I don't know, I. I mean, I'm. I'm biased cause I like him, but I just feel like he's the most additive guy in the draft. And Daryl has always gravitated toward those guys. Like, remember he made that Shane Batty a trade. How many years ago was that? It was just like we didn't have stats to Quantify all the stuff Shane Batty was good at. And Darrell had The first, the 1.0 version of those stats and was just like, no, no. When he's in the lineup, all of these awesome things happen. And it's not about the counting stats. It's this, this, this, this, and this. I think Knipple's like that. I think they need a guy like that. They need like a connector shooter. Doesn't need the ball that much.

[Ryan Rosillo]

That's asking a lot, though, of a team with now title aspirations coming in and being like, all right, do you.

[Bill Simmons]

Honestly think they have title aspirations? Because I don't. You think, like, they think. You think Daryl thinks, oh, everyone's talking about Cleveland and Orlando and like, why, why not us? Like, I think he's thinking, can indeed play 40 games.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Okay, sure, right. But, and I was thinking about this the other day and like the haul that Phoenix sent out for Durant and what they get, you know, not even two years later. Right. It's.

[Bill Simmons]

It's called. It's what we call sunk cost.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's brutal. Like, when you see the side by side and you're like, that is one way to derail.

[Bill Simmons]

We both like the trade. We just didn't understand why Cam Johnson was in. It is my memory. But we both thought it was a good, it was a good trade for them. They're getting an awesome player.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You know, I'm fine with thinking it's. It's good to get Kevin Durant if you can get him.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

If that ends up being something, I.

[Bill Simmons]

Don'T know why Cam Jackson was in it. But. But yeah, you're right.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Look, it's very new owner syndrome. Right? So, yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Two years.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Right. Two years of not even. Well. Right. We have to go back to February. When was the trade? It was February, Right. Super bowl week, because it was in Arizona. I was thinking about Phoenix this morning when you were hearing that it might happen in the side by side thing we just talked about. But it's very simple to be like, well, they shouldn't have waited. It's like, well, they just got him. Okay, so.

[Bill Simmons]

Right.

[Ryan Rosillo]

And if you're Phoenix, you're going. We won 47 games last year and we didn't have all of our guys or 45 games. Excuse me. We didn't have all of our guys playing together at the same time. You know, we didn't have enough flexibility. We kind of figured out some things on the margins, and if these three guys can all play together and we feel a little bit better about the center rotation. And we have shooting to play off of what should be a ton of help to these three dynamic on ball scores. That's when people were still tricked by Beal. I don't blame Phoenix for saying if because this league more than any other league, and you could argue with the same with quarterbacks and your pitching staff and break and spring training, but because there's so few players, there's way more conversation of talking yourself into the if scenario. Same thing with the Clippers.

[Bill Simmons]

We went way over on the Suns 47 and a half. We thought they were going to be good last year.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, I thought we were right there with team. So they're thinking, hey, if we could. If this, if this were to break, you know, it's better than the unknown or like hitting the reset button when the owner gets pissed about it, your business partners get pissed about it, your vet players get pissed about it. You know, we in the media really overrate the simplicity of just, wow, tear it all down and start all over again. The same reason why the Clippers would sit there again and go, well, hey, look, but if, but if Kawhi is healthy and here were the Clippers with this incredible close of the season, maybe the best defense in the NBA over that stretch, and then they lose in the first round again. All right, whatever. I imagine Josh Harris and Daryl and everybody's playing this if game, especially with all of the injuries that we've seen throughout the east in the playoffs. So for you to say, like, do I think they're a title contender within Bead's track record, it's not a good bet. But the if scenario here is even more appealing than it was yesterday for them. So that's why, like, much even as, as much as I love knipple embiid.

[Bill Simmons]

Trying to play 10 straight playoff weeks, though. That's why I can't. Come on.

[Ryan Rosillo]

No, I can't. You're right, I cannot.

[Bill Simmons]

I just, I'm out. I've given up on that possibility. I would say 50 to 1 odds.

[Ryan Rosillo]

But. But what if. You know the rest? What if he does, right? What if he does. What if it's March and you're like, hey, you know, Cleveland has a great regular season record. The Knicks have a really nice record. If the Knicks are the same team, they're going to be good even with a different coach. They're still going to be a really good team. And then, you know, is the Orlando. Is Franz ever going to hit a fucking shot here?

[Bill Simmons]

Right.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You know, if you're the Sixers, like, I don't know that you should be afraid of any of that stuff. The scariest thing is the team that you see in the mirror, not necessarily anybody else in the Eastern Conference. So I know this has become a far more expanded conversation around con and we both love the guy, but that's asking a lot of him. Like, all right, huge game five minutes ago in the fourth quarter. Like, all right, we're going to get Khan initiating some of this stuff.

[Bill Simmons]

But I do think he could play 20 to 25 minutes a game for a good team next year.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I think he can figure out anything that is needed of him. It's just a matter of whether or not he'll be able to execute those things. Like, he won't be lost in a basketball court. Court because he's so like. That was my favorite thing once I really dug into him, just how smart he was off ball cutting and you know, when he. I just. There's so many basketball players when they have the ball and it's all predetermined, it's fine, but when they get stuck, you know, it's like a college quarterback who. We were talking about this. I think with Vicini, we're college quarterback. It's like, all right, these are the two reads. Like, this is the. This is who you're trying to beat. If you see the safety do this, then just throw it underneath, keep moving the chains. It's like, all right, so this guy threw 4,000 yards. Like, is he good? And like, no, he's not any good. And there's a lot of guards that it's like, okay, we're setting the ball screen here. You're going to go here. If the help comes off the corner, then it's open to three. And if this guy plays up, then you should be able to have the roll guy. And it's like, what happens if both things stop? Am I going to like, then I have to decide. I have to come up with something. And that's one of my favorite things about knipples that I thought he saw the game at a level that I couldn't believe for his age.

[Bill Simmons]

He'd be really good for any of these teams. The thing that's a bummer is that the number three pick isn't like, we have like flag, then we have Harper and then it drops again. I wish the number three pick was good enough that we could really have a Utah Paul George trading up from 5 to 3. But you have to take Paul George's contract. Like, I actually wish. Cause I think, I think Danny would do it. I don't think he would care. He'd be like, fine. Paul George is still pretty good. If we can go from 5 to 3 and get this guy, I'll take the contract, I don't care. But it's not, it's not worth it in this draft to do that. I don't think 5 to 2 is a different scenario, but I don't think the spurs would go near. I think the one thing that's changed over the last two weeks, I said this to you last week, is I think the, I think once the spurs got a little closer to Harper, really like diving into him, they were like, oh, shit, okay, we don't, we don't screw the Kevin Durant idea. And I still wonder with Fox is, I still think a wild card for the summer.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, I, you got to wonder though, like, if that was the Fox market that just happened.

[Bill Simmons]

Then but wasn't part of that. Teams are afraid of, of clutch and they wanted to go to the spurs and some people kind of backed off because they felt like he was headed that way anyway. I don't feel like it was an official trade market. It seemed like he's like, he wants to go there and then that's how it played out.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Okay. But that entirely may be true. And I think there is.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't know.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's hard for me to remember all this stuff with this, but it's always a good reminder that when we hear about like teams making calls and I've even made this mistake too, which I regret when I make it, but I think these teams are constantly canvassing the league to kind of get an idea of like, hey, would you ever do this without any intention of ever doing any of those things, but just trying to figure out what the value is. And that Fox trade didn't really give up.

[Bill Simmons]

No, it was a no brainer.

[Ryan Rosillo]

So. So you're bringing in even as flawed as, like, even the most, the most ardent detractors of Fox. I still like them. I still like the Aaron Fox. You know, I'm saying he's perfect, but I like him. But the market wasn't that strong for him.

[Bill Simmons]

Are you going to like him as much when he's gets like a $230 million extension for four years? Might not like him quite as much, but I'll still like him. If both of us were GMs, like, you're running New Orleans, I'm running like Charlotte. I would call you all the time.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Why?

[Bill Simmons]

I would have like Five GM friends that I just called constantly to check in. And then every once in a while, I'd be like, yeah, what's up with. What's up with Mark Williams? And just, you know, because I'm sure they just are shooting the shit on the phone, right? It's like, oh, my buddy's calling. And then at some point, you can kind of steer it toward feeling out if a guy's available or not. And I'm sure that, like, Danny and Kevin McHale. I'm sure Danny would do that all the time when McHale was in Minnesota. Right. You're not going to trade KG. Right. He's just, you know, just kind of working it. But I think that's how. I think how this is how some of this shit works. I think these guys just. There's certain guys that just call everybody.

[Ryan Rosillo]

All the time, check anything. There's talkers, guys that can't help themselves. And it's like, even though he's my friend and I've known him for 30 years in the business, if I can just get him on the phone, start bullshitting, like, maybe he'll say something. Because that was the old Dan Duquette thing, is that he used to not talk. You'd be on the phone with him and he wouldn't say anything.

[Bill Simmons]

You have to make conversation.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Right, right.

[Bill Simmons]

Because he thought John Walsh interview move. John Walsh's famous move, not talk. You're on a job interview. And he would just be silent. And it was like a power move. And then you would start talking.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. He recommended a good book when I met with him.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Game changer.

[Bill Simmons]

He'll do that. Yeah, do that, too.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Let's stay on this, though, because I was thinking about the Luca trade again.

[Bill Simmons]

Great example. The best ever example.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Exactly.

[Bill Simmons]

Nico just bitching about Luka. Luka Dodge one day and Pelinka going, hey. And then all of a sudden, they're. They're negotiating, right?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Because I was looking at all the picks that Bain got, and it was like, you know, we're not sure that Luke is going to resign here, so we can only give you this. This one pick. We can't even do a swap. We can't even do a swap. I don't know if Plink will ever write a book. But since Nico's his guy, which he clearly had the inside track on this entire thing, why there was no market for Luca because no one else knew that he was available. And some of this after the fact reporting on, like, well, they had called this team. But then you hear from the team that they're like, we, we didn't. They were asking for our best player, saying Luke wasn't part of it. We didn't. Like, whatever you want to do to make this look better for Nico, but if Pelinka ever writes a book, and I wish you could get Polinka to like, completely tell the truth, but like that moment when Nico said, I, I would do this, I would do Luca for A.D. and you know, figure out the rest of it, A.D. and Reeves.

[Bill Simmons]

And be like, well, we're not trading Reeves. Is it still a conversation? And there's a posity because, like, yeah, there might be. Really?

[Ryan Rosillo]

What?

[Bill Simmons]

Huh?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Because you wonder if Rob, based on what we're talking about, like, with guys calling each other is Rob thinking, I've heard you bitch about this guy for like two years because we've known each other for so long. And was that, you know, this is all hypothetical. I don't know the answer to this stuff. That's why I wonder if it would ever come out of the book. Because could Rob ever just be like, I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it. And then make his friend Nico look bad, which would feel kind of shitty if they still have a good relationship. I mean, Pelinka should love him now, but if Pelinka would ever, in that moment, honestly answer 20 years from now in some interview where he was on the phone being like, holy shit, I can't believe I'm actually going to be able to do a trade that. A trade like this that is just not supposed to happen.

[Bill Simmons]

I would also love to know the whole Magic's last year with the Lakers when Magic went on first take and said he got stabbed in the back by Plinka and then they were fine. I would love a whole chapter on that in the Plinka book. I'd also love a chapter on playing with the Fab Five. The Plinka book I'm signing up right now. I'm pre ordering it.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Mark Twain would publish it. He was big in the publishing business, killed it with grants, but then wanted to do a book on the Pope. And the Pope was like, are you sure? And he was like, are you reading.

[Bill Simmons]

A Mark Twain book right now?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, just finished Chernow's Mark Twain book. I already interviewed Chernow last week. Right. Going to run it later this summer. Yeah, yeah, it was on the list. But you would call me all the time. I think I'd get sick of you calling me that much though, because I think you would be trying to get over on me. Be like, let's see, Priscillo has a couple cores, lights in.

[Bill Simmons]

Be checking in. Because I know. I know you would start bitching about somebody on your team within like 10 minutes. You'd be like, fucking Jose Alvarado. This fucking guy. Should have seen him in the fourth quarter, calling for ISOs. It's like, you're lucky you're playing.

[Ryan Rosillo]

But see, I would know you too well, though. Cause then you'd be on the phone with Darryl being like, rosillo hates Alvarado. Like, I think you get it for a top 50, top 50 protected, there.

[Bill Simmons]

Must be, like an honor amongst. So you might. But you must have your two or three gms, where you're like, these are your guys. Like, if. If you're bitching about your team to the other gm, I'm sure you get feedback from somebody, you know, who works for a team, who's listening to this afterwards. But I'm sure you get. I'm sure you have your guys that you feel like you can vent to. I'm sure friend to friend, that must exist.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I'm sure that exists. But I think this is one of the fascinating parts about the job. And that's why you can bring it full circle here with a Thunder Presti when he's at the Combine. Back when it was at the old one, when I would host it.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He wouldn't even stand there anymore. He wouldn't. I don't know if he still does it now, because none of us are even allowed to. Kind of. Even though we can get in, we can't go to this big section, which is fine. We shouldn't be able to go to that section. And. And, you know, I. When I was still hosting it, I could walk wherever I wanted to. But now that I have nothing to do with it, like, I shouldn't be over there. I think I went to get a box score once, and I was kind of like, you know what? I shouldn't do this anymore. But I remember years and years ago, Presti, like, hey, you're not anchoring it anymore, buddy. Put the. Put the box score back. Presti was, like, standing by himself, like, arms folded. And I'm like, is he that freaked out that he can't even, like, sit six seats away from somebody else? I was like, yeah, maybe that was.

[Bill Simmons]

I forget the player. But that was. I think it was Dave Cowens. That was a red R back move where he went to scout Cowens, and he stormed out at halftime. Yeah. And people were like, whoa, red Hated Cowan's, but he loved them. So, you know, anytime he went to a game, people knew he was there. This episode is brought to you by the Wells Fargo Active Cash Credit Card. This is an ad for the Active Cash credit card from Wells Fargo. That's a mouthful, but that's because it packs a lot in. Earn unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases with it, big or small. So whether it's buying tickets to the game with your mom or grabbing a coffee with your dog, earn unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases made with it. Say it with me. The Active Cash credit card from Wells Fargo. Learn more@wells Fargo.com ActiveCash terms apply. This episode is brought to you by Whole Foods Market. Being a grill master feels great. Saving on high quality barbecue supplies feels even better. $3.65 by Whole Foods Market. Make delicious no antibiotic meats, classic summer slides and delicious beverages and condiments to fire up your spread. And if you can spot their yellow low price and sale signs, you're in for a huge win. There's so many ways to save on summer grilling favorites at Whole Foods Market. Find their great low prices in store and online today. Can we do draft really quick? So Harper second. If you had to bet Edgecomb now is almost a 3 to 1 favorite on FanDuel to go third. So it's just, would you go chalk and say Edgecombe to Philly number three, Knipple four and Danny says fuck it and takes Ace Bailey five. I don't your prediction?

[Ryan Rosillo]

No, I really don't have any. Like, I'm probably a day or two away for feeling good about it, you know, just because of just bullshitting with guys and, and because everybody has a different board for everybody else right now.

[Bill Simmons]

But if you had to pick, if.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I had five, right.

[Bill Simmons]

Would you have Bailey go into Utah or somebody else?

[Ryan Rosillo]

That means Trey Johnson's going sixth.

[Bill Simmons]

No, that would mean Trey. Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

My whole Bailey Utah exercise was just you and I talking out, I think seeing what aims.

[Bill Simmons]

So you'd have Trey Johnson ETA.

[Ryan Rosillo]

You can shoot.

[Bill Simmons]

I think you're right. You and I see this Danny thing the same way I think he fucking takes Ace Bailey. His whole history of the last 20 years is he would take Ace Bailey. So unless I want to talk, massive red flag that we don't know about. I just think that's the kind of guy he takes.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Unless he, if he feels like, okay, I saw enough from him that I think he might check out of games and he's not, he's not competitive enough because then I think it's kind of a no. That's like a deal breaker for somebody like Ange. Because even with the pedigree, you know, I'm not saying everybody's perfect, but he likes guys with a little motherfucker in him, too. Well, the other Gabe Vincent was starting fights with anybody, but.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, the other piece with him is Gabe Pruitt.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Excuse me.

[Bill Simmons]

If you're. Are you drafting somebody because you think you have one more tankier in, you were. What Austin Ange said about we're done tanking. If you feel like there's one more year you want to throw away, Ace Bailey is perfect for that, because he's probably a year or two away from having any sort of impact at all.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Here's the thing, is there's no one you're taking at that pick that is now preventing you from taking true. Like, you say you're not.

[Bill Simmons]

The Ace is like. He is like a project. Trey could come in and be fun off the bench. Like, I think right away, I think he would be. He'd definitely be a league pass guy. Where I could see you texted me in December be like, yo, you watching Trey right now? Like, he's one of those guys, he.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Can absolutely light it up, and there's.

[Bill Simmons]

Zero fear lights, like, 16 points in four minutes kind of guy.

[Ryan Rosillo]

So I know some people have talked about, like, it not being necessarily, like, the best fit for him. And granted, they're making a coaching change anyway, but, I mean, that was still a pretty efficient offense from that group. And, you know, he's going to be set up off the ball a lot, which is probably what they need. I mean, God, they've got so many guys who love having the ball in their hands. And, you know, I don't think that you're sitting here. I think Zach was smart to kind of bring up. I don't. Maybe you were. I forget if you were. Zach did an hour or so ago, bringing up, like, who would be the line above Jeremy Grant, where marketing would be. He would be above it, I would think. But market is probably not good enough to go. No, we've got our one, and we'll figure out the rest of the pieces later. So, I mean, Austin Ange can say we're not tanking. I just. I think the rule is you can't ever say that you actually are. But I don't know who they would pick to be like, holy shit, they're not tanking now. They just took VJ Fell to them.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. Can I test drive a Couple draft stuff. I'm not done with my sweep yet, but I'm. I'm pretty close.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I know I let you down with VJ to three. I'll say.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, but you didn't let me down. I wanted to test drive a couple. A couple half assed just doing. Doing my rounds. Stuff that jumped Malcolm Gladwell, blink test stuff.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I love it. I love the bl. You know what? There's value in the blink test.

[Bill Simmons]

I've been pretty good in that. I've been pretty good over the years with that. I don't see it with Danny Wolf. I know he's polarizing. I don't see it. What don't you like?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Does he shoot it well enough?

[Bill Simmons]

No, I can't. Well, I can't imagine him in games like the ones that we just watched the last two rounds. Like, just where would he be? Like, could he put up stats on a team? Sure. But like, if I'm actually trying to win the title, where am I playing him? And is the, Is the ball running through him? Like, I just. Who are the examples of guys like him that have been impact dudes on actual good NBA teams in the last 20 years? I just have a lot of questions. If he's in the 13 to 17 range, that's one thing. But like some people are saying, like, he could go like, you know, in that 7 to 10 range. That just seems pretty high to me.

[Ryan Rosillo]

If you're saying that Danny Wolfe to you would not crack the rotation of two of the deepest teams in the NBA that just played for a championship, I would agree with you.

[Bill Simmons]

Let's go Final four. Let's go Final four. Let's go. Last eight. The problem is eight teams is the best thing about.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Well, the best thing is probably his rebounding, but it's that you're letting him have the ball in his hands as this 611 point guard. So there's a little.

[Bill Simmons]

Who's doing that though, when we're in like may.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Taller Joe Ingles. Jingle juice.

[Bill Simmons]

Taller Joe Ingles. That's interesting. All right, so we've seen that work a little bit.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Ingles was an incredible, like pick and roll read decision guy. And you know, look, if you stick Danny Wolf in the corner and be like, hey, you're only doing this, then don't take him. There's. There's no point. He's a very unique player.

[Bill Simmons]

The Cedric Coward thing worries me like, to get on the board there.

[Ryan Rosillo]

This is a bit like the Jalen Williams question from before where it's like a Bunch of guys that were draft people were like, you know who's pretty good is that guy at Santa Clara. And then the first time I watched Cedric Coward, I didn't see where Bassini had him in his rankings. I go, dude, I love Cedric Coward. He goes, yeah, me too. I have him ninth. And I was like, oh, shit. Oh, frown face. Bill does not like him.

[Bill Simmons]

I. I'm not saying I'm out.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Did you only watch a dialogue game?

[Bill Simmons]

No, it's not a. Don't. Like, I don't know, like, the way they were talking about him. What I heard about, oh, this guy, he's fast, right? Like, I started getting the Jalen Williams in my head, and then I watched it, and I didn't feel like he was athletic enough on that. On that level. I don't know. I just didn't totally see it. He felt like a 13 to 17 range guy to me.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Okay, 13 to 17 range.

[Bill Simmons]

This is blink test, but this is like a fast riser.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He only played in six games. Wasn't clear for contact with his shoulder injury. Forever started in D3 goes to Eastern Washington.

[Bill Simmons]

The D3 goes. It scared me, too. I can't lie.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He was filthy in those games that he played this year. But if you want to tell me, hey, it was against Northern Colorado. Looked like somebody from the lacrosse team was out there. No offense to Pat, but. Or Anton, but I would say he was. He was filthy, and he was like, a man. And he was, like, mean to guys. And then he got some kid in the post where he was like, I'm gonna fuck with you so bad that I could score on the first second, but I'll just do it on the third move.

[Bill Simmons]

So you're in on him?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, I like him better than, you know, some of the other. Like, dude, everybody loves Carter Bryant because he's six, eight. He's really young. He can really shoot it. He can play defense. Everybody really likes the kid. I'd say, like, highest approval rating of the kid is VJ or Malawatch. Teams have talked about just raving about them, like, vj. Just off the charts, I guess, in all of his interviews and his background and everything that he went through. And there's a lot of people that really like Carter Bryant, Arizona. I saw a guy that. The good parts in that three and D6, eight, whatever. Okay, fine. Like, that guy's a very in demand type of player. The second he had to do something with the basketball after, like, it was either shoot it or it was an outlet pass on a defensive Rebound. It was a nightmare.

[Bill Simmons]

I really like Malawatch. I think there's a case for him to go sixth. Like, if the Wiz took him sixth, I wouldn't make fun of halves.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Sar, Malawatch, Twin Towers. Double bigs. Adam's Shingoon response case. They're in the finals a couple years.

[Bill Simmons]

Little twin towers. Same 40 years later. The Samson Elijah one.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Does SARS spacing provide enough for Malawatch to operate those lobs? Who's to say no, right?

[Bill Simmons]

Here's a positive one. I'm kind of talking myself into Derek Queen. I think it depends on the team big time. I think there's teams where it could be a disaster, but there's. There's a lot of stuff there. And then. What's the dude's name? Yaka Yakos. How do you say his name?

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, good.

[Bill Simmons]

From Illinois. Yakos.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. You did great.

[Bill Simmons]

That guy's an NBA player. I don't know when. It might not be till he's 28 and it could be his third team, but there's something. There's a. There's a wherewithal he has offensively and how he uses teammates. That. I just see it. It translates. And there's going to. I know he's going to get hunted. Like all the usual shit with him, but that dude would be fun to play with and is unique and has, like, an elite skill, as you know. I love elite skills. When I look at this draft stuff, I'm always like, what's your thing? What's your trump card? What's the thing you have? He would be fun to play with. So it feels like he's dropping a little, right? Doesn't it feel like he's. People are cooling off on him a tiny bit.

[Ryan Rosillo]

What are you talking about? Like, outside of the top 10.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, initially, he was supposed to be, you know, top eight or nine. Now it feels like he's in the. I don't know, a little lower. He.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He probably could shoot it a little bit better. I mean, I like him better than Demon because he can shoot it, and Demon just couldn't shoot it all year long. But apparently Demon, the BYU kid, is lighting it up in some workouts with the shooting.

[Bill Simmons]

So I'm. I'm out on him. I do not have an opinion on him. I couldn't crack that one. That one. I threw my hands up.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I like Hoyles. He's probably a little smaller for the way that he plays. And then Derek Queen, I'll admit, I just don't know that I can figure it out, it's all over the place. But sometimes it's really pretty good, man.

[Bill Simmons]

And then I'm like, with Sam, the one that said, like, he's just been somebody who's played against men for the last couple years. Yeah, I like that. It's meaningful.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I like Sorber, the Georgetown kid, because I think he's a legit center.

[Bill Simmons]

I haven't researched him yet.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Nick Clifford's probably the most well rounded guy, but I think he's already 23.

[Bill Simmons]

Where do you stand on Fleming from St. Joe's I don't know what he is.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Well, physically, he's a specimen. Okay, so he's enormous. He's like 230. He's chiseled and, you know, playing in some of the games that I was watching, there are times where I'm like, is he a small forward or is he a center? Because I think he wants to be a small forward. And I'm not saying he should be a center. So maybe there's a ton of value in him and his size, you know, stretching the floor for you a little bit. But I think he was so physically gifted. I would have liked to see him make people feel him a little bit more.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

But, you know, to be fair, again, I'm not doing this year round. I'm not, you know, watching every single game. I was watching Hugo Gonzalez the other night. I was like, I think he might suck, but I like him.

[Bill Simmons]

I liked.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He has shot it, like he said, five different stints in Europe, and he hasn't shot over, I think, 27% for three. And he's not a point guard. So I'm like, okay, how does this work? But I. I gotta tell you, fun kid. Fun little guy out there. Well, he's not. He's six' six.

[Bill Simmons]

Shocker of shocker. I like Clayton Jr. I mean, it's the most predictable Bill opinion of all time, but I just don't see how. He's not an NBA player. And I don't know how many more times we have to do this with these guys. Brunson was one from way back, but what did he go like, 31, 32? It's like at some point, at some point, it should matter what we saw. There's other times where it shouldn't matter at all. But you can kind of. You have to filter it. And he's clearly somebody who could play in NBA games and create his own shot.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Dista. Yeah. And the shot making, like. Yeah, again, Trey's the best of the class, but there's Some Walter Clayton shots where you just go, like, I can't even believe, like, he has the balls to even take this. And then it felt like it went in more often. Hanson Yang. I'm gonna give myself the combine. There is value in the combine. Okay. Didn't speak a lick of English when he was at the combine. And so he would just kind of do this, like, yell when he wanted the ball, like, ah, ah. And then he had this baseline spin with. With the ball.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

And one flushes it. I was right there on the baseline when it happened. And I. I tweeted out that I've seen the. I think it was on threads. I'm on threads a lot lately. I was like, I've seen the future of the NBA and it's right in front of me. Hanson Yang got a couple chuckles.

[Bill Simmons]

The threads. Audience really liked it.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. And the peanut gallery at the combine. And now people think he might go in the 30s. So if your team takes Hanson Yang in the 30s, you may have something. Bit of a project, but you may have something.

[Bill Simmons]

I. I don't mind the Stanford senior because I scouted him because there was some Celtics buzz with him. So of course I had to watch all his combine.

[Ryan Rosillo]

He was awesome at the combine.

[Bill Simmons]

He seems intrigued.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Awesome.

[Bill Simmons]

Hasn't really been playing basketball that long, which I think sometimes is a bonus room to grow. Yeah. All right. There's our draft thing. I know you're going to be tackling a lot this week. Hopefully we'll have one fun trade and that's it. I've run out of things to talk about. Unless you want to talk about what do you do with Connor McDavid.

[Ryan Rosillo]

No, I just want to say one last thing about the Thunder.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Ryan Rosillo]

This is a team that finished the playoffs 11th in rebounding rate. 12th, and defensive rebounding rate. Their assist percentage was 11th. Their three point percentage may have dipped down. It was 13th out of 16 playoff teams.

[Bill Simmons]

Might have been worse after today.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Might they had like a couple points they had to make up there. So 13 as of today, they fouled at the third highest rate. They had, I think, nine games. Under 30% from three, maybe under 31% from three. So nine bad shooting games in the playoffs. They went five and four of those for this team to win an NBA championship with the lack of shooting and the rebounding being an issue and fouling all the time speaks to how insane this defense was. And we saw it in the third quarter and you can see it like a switch when that group gets connected and says, you know, Granted, TJ went crazy, but all the turnovers they were committing because of the pressure, I think it was a 192 run. As great as SGA has been at the peak moments and the MVP and deserving, all that kind of stuff, for a unit to have six, seven guys, it's like we just got to be dogs defensively. And for that team to win a championship. I know how disappointed everybody is that it wasn't the full version, obviously, with the Halliburton injury. But that's some pretty special stuff to be able to pull, to win 16 games with some of their deficiencies that they had.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I mean, game four will be the thing I remember about that team, watching them just basically refuse to let the Pacers start their offense within 30ft of the basket for an hour. I've seen good defense before, but I don't know. It was also a team that if you were calling the game and letting them kind of get away with stuff, they became completely unstoppable. Right. It was like an NFL defense where you're like, oh, you're gonna let us do this? And then they would just. And I felt like that was happening a little bit tonight once Caruso and Dort and Wallace could really get physical. 40, 50ft from the basket. Yikes. What happens with McDavid? It's gonna get worse, not better. This was. It feels like their best chance with the cap.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yep. And here's the thing. Last year, they were a better team where this year people couldn't believe they beat Dallas and Las Vegas, where last.

[Bill Simmons]

Year they weren't even favored in Round one. I think the Kings were favored.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Kings came out smoking, too. Right. So, you know, they get to return Tripp, But I watched all the games. You know, I don't know that. I have a ton of great insight on all of it, but this is. This will bother me. This will bother me in a way. I don't want to be a Charles Barkley level, won't be a Chris Mullen level, but it's going to bother me, like, how will the rest of your life be if McDavid never hoist the Cup? He'd be okay.

[Bill Simmons]

I feel like he's. I've been watching hockey since when Bobby Orr still was good, and he's one of the six or seven. Just easily best players I've ever seen. And I can't believe he hasn't won a Cup yet. I was thinking about something with Marchand, though, and the Panthers, how he goes to that team, and it's the perfect team for him because they just have a bunch of fucking assholes that are just agitator assholes. And it was like, finally, I'm with my people. And it made me think, like, I wish the Bruins, in retrospect, had just been like, you know, we have this guy. He's just so fucking annoying. He drives everybody crazy. We should just get, like, four more of those guys and just we become. That becomes our identity. Because I do feel like, like Evander Kane was so mad that by the end of the series, the game's over, there's two minutes left, and he just went over and he slashed Tkachuk as hard as he could so he could get a game misconduct and not have to be in the handshake line. Like, that's, you know, that you. You have a team full of dicks. When somebody's like, I just. I can't shake hands with these guys. Just, can you kick me out of the game? So it just made me think, like, that would be an interesting. Almost like how Presti put together that OKC team of these fucking silent assassins who just get work done and have no ego, and they all do the press conference together. Could you have done that with Marshan? Just like, let's go get five assholes, and that'll be the nucleus of our team.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I don't know the answer to this because, again, I don't know the sport super well, but it feels like we touched on this a bit in the last few years. I feel like the NBA playoffs is very different than the regular season for a bunch of obvious reasons, but, like, some of the shooting variants, I wonder, like, could you trick yourself into thinking that you're this really good offense? But then all of a sudden it's like, yeah, but those guys just aren't going to be as comfortable. And I mean, again, okc, a lot of these threes were wide open and these guys didn't make them. And it still didn't matter. They didn't make them enough.

[Bill Simmons]

Even wide open corner threes.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. And then you could see, like, I mean, not to recap game seven again, but Jalen Williams had one where he passed up, opened one to throw it to door. And I'm like, dude, what? Like, you had 40 the other night. Yeah, like, what is that? And he responded and he. And he closed well. But do hockey GMs have to think about, like, I need a completely, like, different team that survives advancing through the chaos of the NHL playoffs. Like, hey, we may not be the best offense. We may not be all of these things. But at least we have like the right personalities. And maybe I'm just telling hockey people what they've already known. And this isn't a secret.

[Bill Simmons]

I think they must think about it.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, but they must is the biggest gap. Like, football is pretty straightforward. Baseball's a total coin toss. Like, you could talk about how valuable pitching was. I remember, like, all I would do is look at the pitching matchups for every single playoff series. And then all these times it didn't really matter or the Braves would have had more World Series. Right. It's just. Baseball's just so fucking weird in the playoffs. But hockey feels like a real departure of like, we can have this really good team, but we need these kinds of personalities that may not show up or may not be as valuable in the regular season because obviously Florida checked all those boxes of the last two years.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, and the goal, you have to have the goal. It starts with that, which is. That was Edmonton's biggest failure in the last couple years.

[Ryan Rosillo]

But I didn't think it was really some sort of. I didn't think it was a Skinner. Like, I didn't look at this final and go, oh, well, you know, once again it's Skinner's fault. And then obviously.

[Bill Simmons]

I know, I know, but it was that. I mean, when you're changing, yeah. You're, you're swapping dudes in and out. It's usually not an awesome sign.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah. But I could name, I could name like 10 plus guys from the Panthers that I'd be like, oh, that guy did this and this guy had this game. Then Reiner, of course, closes it out. Rodriguez, like all these other dudes that aren't Sam Bennett, they're really did.

[Bill Simmons]

Can't stand them.

[Ryan Rosillo]

There's so many dudes that you could name. There are so many times, like you mentioned the Evander Kane thing. I was like, I almost made it. Tobias Harris joke. Like, he's on the Oilers. You know, there was just a lot of dudes that we know the names because we've been watching the playoffs with them these last two deep runs. But to just the very casual drive by fan that I am, there's a lot of guys that were on the Oilers. Right. I can't remember like that guy ever having a moment that stood out.

[Bill Simmons]

The Canada not winning a Stanley cup since 93 is one of the craziest streaks in sports. It really is. It's just nuts. 32 years and the last time they won, they beat Gretzky and the Kings, which was like, you know, one of the most important finals, at least in America in the last 40 years.

[Ryan Rosillo]

It's like Sam Malone not getting laid for a year.

[Bill Simmons]

That was a. I think that was an episode, you know, voodoo, you know, vudu. It turned into fandango. It's like a streaming movie TV service.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I thought you meant the parts.

[Bill Simmons]

No, you can rent and buy movies on it. Sometimes they have these sales. They had the entire Cheer series streaming for 29.99. And I was like, fine, that'll come in handy on an airplane.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Why not switch out to Blu Rays?

[Bill Simmons]

It's just like, who knows? See, it's. How many seasons was it? It was like 11 seasons. It's like over 200 episodes. Fine. 30 bucks. Twist my arm, I'll do it. We almost called you for the Die Hard with the Vengeance rewatchables on Friday, but I knew you were at elite 11.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Yeah, went down to elite 11. I had a busy day. What was it? Why was I so busy that day of Elite 11?

[Bill Simmons]

You love Elite 11.

[Ryan Rosillo]

I do.

[Bill Simmons]

We have to go. We're over the two hour mark. I feel bad for Gahao and Eduardo. Thank you for. Thank you for producing the pod for us, guys. Thanks to Zach Lowe for stopping by. Another season, the books for us. Thanks to everybody on YouTube who watched us. And you're going to be doing a bunch of stuff this week. We love the draft. Hopefully we'll get some more trades. Priscilla, good to see you.

[Ryan Rosillo]

Thanks, Bill.

[Bill Simmons]

Must be 21 plus in President select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 + in President D.C. gambling problem. Call 100 Gambler or visit rg-help.com, call 188 or visit ccpg.org chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplianma.org or call 800.327.550 for 24. 7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-87.7.8, Hope NY or text hopeny in New York.