← The Herd with Colin Cowherd
The Herd with Colin Cowherd
Hoops Tonight - Best Of: Bad News Bucks, LeBron vs Stephen A. Smith, Thunder/Celtics Finals Matchup?
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Nikki Glaser
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Jeff C
It's Jeff C from Club 520 podcast here to share my latest fresh take on the 2025 NCAA tournament brought to you by Wendy's the official Hamburger of March Madness. This past weekend was a great round 32. I had the best game of the year. Had to be the Maryland versus Colorado State game. It ended with a game winner. It was exciting. Derrick Queen Good shot. Looking ahead to the Sweet 16. I'm really looking forward to watching Arkansas versus Texas Tech. I'm looking forward to it because it's similar styles. They both play hard defense, they both greedy teams and they play in the post. It should be a battle for the ages. I'm also looking forward to the Duke vs. Arizona game. Both elite programs. Legendary status. It should be a battle that we all looking forward to. Probably be the game of the night. And when it comes to the Final Four, I'm all in on Duke and Houston. Two great coaches, two legendary programs. Should be exciting for their road to the Final Four. More from me soon. But while you're watching the games, remember the freshest deal in fast foods. Gotta be Wendy's. Right now you can get a junior bacon cheeseburger or a double stack for $1 with the in app offer and purchase. Again, head to the Wendy's app to grab a $1 Junior bacon cheeseburger or a $1 double stack with the in app offer and a purchase for the freshest hamburger around. Gotta be Wendy's. The official hamburger of March Madness.
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That's code HOOPS. For new customers. Get $200 in bonus bets when you bet just five bucks only on DraftKings. The crown is yours. Gambling problem. Call 1-800-GAMBLER in New York, call 877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY to 467-369 in Connecticut. Help is available for problem gambling. Call 888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org Please play responsibly on behalf of Boot Hill Casino and Resort in Kansas. 21 + age and eligibility varies by jurisdiction. Void. In Ontario, new customers only. Bonus bets expire 168 hours after issuance. For additional terms and responsible gaming resources, see DKNG co Audio. Welcome to the Best of Hoops Tonight, featuring my top takes from recent shows. Damian Lillard is out indefinitely due to a blood clot in his calf muscle. For first of all, this is just a huge bummer. And let's all just hope that he can be back in time for the playoffs. Because regardless of how we all feel about the Bucks, I would certainly like to see them get their chance to show what they can do in the postseason at full strength. But this situation has me thinking because things look more than bleak for Milwaukee right now. Even healthy, I have the Bucks firmly outside of my top tier of championship contenders. The and I don't think they're close to good enough on either end of the floor to actually win for playoff series. And now you add this wrinkle with Dame's condition, which is going to have at the, you know, best case scenario, him just barely stepping on the floor before they start playing real playoff games. So to me, it's just becoming increasingly likely that the Bucks have a disappointing playoff performance and that Giannis in the trade buzz surrounding him starts to get really loud this summer because again, I don't think the Bucks are close. I like there's, to me, if I look at the top tier of contenders and it's going to be, you know, five, six, seven teams when it's all said and done, we'll see. But you know, I look at Boston and OKC is kind of like clearly above the rest of the teams in that tier and the teams below there, the teams like Cleveland, Denver, the Lakers, whether it ends up being the Knicks or the warriors, teams like that, I view those teams as substantially less likely than Boston and OKC to win the title. And so when you get to the following tier after that, I mean we're talking it's pipe dream territory for most of these guys. And like that's with Giannis playing as well as he's been he's been playing this year. It just doesn't feel like they're close. Giannis will have two guaranteed years left as well as a player option, obviously I would view that player option as something that he would end up opting out of or extending out of. And, and so realistically, you've got these two guaranteed years left this summer. And so if you wait an additional summer now, you have the whole like, well what if he doesn't resign problem that's affect his trade value. And so I think it's possible that we end up seeing a Giannis and 10 a trade this summer. And so we've talked about a lot of different teams and different places that he could potentially go. But I, I, I've talked a lot about the Thunder going after a guy like a Kevin Durant or a Lori Markanen or something. What if Giannis is the guy that the Thunder end up going after? They obviously can afford him. He's 30 years old. He is A perfect complement to Chet Holmgren. As a matter of fact, you could argue that the Hartenstein salary is the best vehicle with which to facilitate that sort of trade. Hartenstein and then throwing in some of the younger talent, maybe someone like a case on Wallace and maybe one other player with a bunch of draft compensation. You can visualize a scenario where the team is built around a core of Shea and J Dub and Shet with Giannis and like Giannis would immediately make them a good rebounding team when they've been a terrible rebounding team. In the Shay Gilbert Alexander era. I think he's a just a shoe in basketball fit in general with all of those guys. He immediately changes the physical profile of the team and makes them that much more bruising on the front line. Especially if the Thunder end up struggling this year in the postseason and they end up like losing in the second round despite someone like Shay having a great series. I think it could end up putting more pressure on OKC to make him more aggressive to type of deal and you could see a trade partnership kind of forming there. And like, like, it's like the Wemby problem we talked about with San Antonio. If your star is ready to go and like ready to win the title, but your guys like your young players around them that are progressing at the same time, but maybe not at the same rate and it looks like they're not ready, then you end up in a situation where it's like we can't just wait around while, you know, Victor Wembanyama becomes one of the best players in the league and we can't support him properly. And, and that's the thing. Like you don't want to run into a situation with Shea where he feels like the Thunder are just processing a bunch of young talent and they're not really going for it. And so if that ends up being the case, you could see that pressure start to build and you could see a trade partnership start to form. And if they end up making a deal for someone like Giannis, they would immediately solve all of their weaknesses and I think that would make them the most talented team since the 2018 Warriors. So that's a, a dynamic that I see kind of sort of taking some shape and man, that would be a crazy league altering type of deal. LeBron goes on Pat McAfee show and he starts pontificating about Giannis and what he would average in the 70s and he says Giannis would average 250 points if he played back in that era. And like, frankly, I just don't see the point in this for the same reason why it's lame when the older players start disrespecting this era. I think it's lame for today's players to do the same thing with the past. Now, for the record, there's a reason why they're doing this. There's a reason why J.J. redick said those guys played against Plumbers. There's a reason why LeBron James is talking this, and it's because they're sick and tired of the old guys talking. I just think it's pointless to stoop down to that level, frankly. It's just not productive. It doesn't actually solve anything. And here's the thing. Would Giannis score 250 points a game if he played in the 70s? No. But yeah, he killed those guys. He'd average 40, probably maybe even closer to 50. But who cares? Comparing eras is completely pointless. Jalen Green basically has the same career true shooting percentage as Kobe Bryant. Does that mean Jalen Green was just as efficient putting the ball in the basket as Kobe Bryant? Yeah, in a literal sense, but not in a realistic sense, because the game of basketball is very, very different now. Dudes in the 70s had bad shoes, they had shitty flights that they took to their road games, they played brutal schedules, they had nowhere near the knowledge and understanding we have today to make our professional athletes the best they can be. Schematics have involved over the years, it's just more smart minds have gotten involved in the game and made their imprint. Strategically, I think it makes absolutely no sense to compare basketball from 50 years ago to today. And again, even if you, you know, justify it with the way that those guys have been treated by the older generations, I just think stooping to that level, all it does is further denigrate the game. And now we're in this weird war where like the younger players are shit talking the old days and the older dudes are shit talking to young guys and everyone's just being disrespectful to the game of basketball. And so I hope that that stops soon. I disagreed with LeBron's approach there last night. Bronnie hits five more threes, finished with 17 points, nine rebounds and six assists and a win. This is on the heels of him dropping a career high 39 points in a previous G League game a couple days prior. And that was on the heels of him dropping 17 points in a real deal NBA game against the Bucks, where he made a lot of moves that looked very much like a well rounded professional Basketball player. I thought this was a great time for us to just remind everybody that Bronny James was the 20th ranked prospect in the nation in his high school class. He was a McDonald's All American. He was absolutely unquestionably on an NBA trajectory before he experienced cardiac arrest at USC. But then he got his NBA opportunity despite struggling for a while after the cardiac arrest incident. And as a result, he became one of the biggest stories in all of media, not just in sports media, but the whole thing got picked up by political media because LeBron has ventured into that arena a few times and obviously has made enemies in there. That is one hell of a cesspool in political media. And it is as contentious as it can be. And there's an entire side there that will jump on every little thing that LeBron does. And so it became absolutely nasty. Can you imagine being Bronny? And again, I want you to disconnect from LeBron for a second. Bronnie James is an entirely different human being than LeBron. An entirely different person. Anything that he gets as an association from LeBron, Imagine being in his shoes and dealing with that. Can you imagine getting on his phone and scrolling Instagram and seeing content creators making highlight reels of his mistakes in summer league or in garbage time in an NBA game or in the early G League days? And can you imagine the comments underneath those videos and the direct messages that he receives? And again, as we've talked about, like, when you venture into this world, there are perks that greatly outweigh the negativity you face online. But that doesn't make the negativity like just go away or that it's just super easy to handle or anything like that. It sucks. I had a much, much smaller level just as a content creator in the NBA media face a certain amount of negativity. Like, you don't wake up one day and like read the comment that's talking shit about the way you look or the way you sound and then suddenly just be like, oh, that's fine, no, no worries. We'll go about our day. It still sucks. And this kid was getting it at a preposterous volume every single day because he suffered an injury, a condition that dramatically affected his basketball development. I was thinking about, I was actually talking about this with my buddy Richmond Weaver on the radio a little bit earlier this morning. I remember when I broke my foot in between my first two seasons playing in college. I had a really rough first semester in non conference play because I was struggling with like confidence in My foot, like, my ability to plant that foot, I, you know, play it about. Back in college, I was playing at £225. Like, I. Like. It's just a lot of weight to be planting really heavy on a foot that I was nervous was going to give way, and. And it affected my play for months. Can you imagine cardiac arrest? Can you imagine, like, playing hard after cardiac arrest? Can you imagine pushing yourself and, like, feeling your body, like, start to, like, really get into high heart rates and how that could potentially scare you, how that could affect your willingness or ability to compete to a certain extent? Like, I. I just have so much sympathy for what Bronnie has been through over the course of this last year, in the sense that he's been put through hell because of his dad in his Persona. And look, has LeBron done some things that is accentuated the amount of attention on his son? Yes, he's made some comments. He's done some things. I'm not going to sit here and pretend that that hasn't happened. But he's LeBron James, so we're not also going to pretend that if LeBron shut up that Bronny wouldn't be a public figure. He still would. LeBron could have said nothing, and Bronny would have faced 99% of the exact same circumstances that he's faced over the last year. And the fact that his entire basketball pedigree and everything he accomplished up until the cardiac arrest was just crumpled up and thrown in the trash as part of the way that whole thing was discussed, it just. It just was nasty. And I just feel really bad for him, and I'm just excited for him that he's starting to break through on the other side of this and show some of that pedigree that he demonstrated when he was in high school. Now, for the record, this won't be linear. The development of young players is not something that just goes up and up and up. He'll have stretches where he has bad games in the NBA. He'll have bad stretches of games in the G League. He'll make mistakes. There will be more content creators that have more opportunities to slander him for whatever reason. But what you're starting to see is the upside. You're starting to see that he can shoot. JJ Redick talked the other day about how he expects Bronnie in the big picture to be a great shooter. You've seen some of the upside with him as a defensive playmaker. You've seen some of the upside with him as a downhill threat. Towards the rim as a playmaking talent. He's got ability in there now. I still maintain that. I think it'll be at least a year or two before he can be a guy that plays real rotational minutes at the NBA level as a guard off the bench for somebody in the NBA. I still think he needs quite a bit of time to get there, but the potential has always been there. It was missing in terms of the production for a little while as a result of what happened to him at usc. And I'm happy that we're all starting to see some of that potential start to come to fruition right now because it's just a reminder and quite frankly a resounding statement that most of the stuff that was said about Bronny and said about LeBron over the course of the year with Bronnie and his journey to where he has in the NBA was just complete and utter bullshit. And Bronnie's just rubbing that in everybody's face right now. And I'm happy for him. Kind of a fun question. What? With Boston and OKC looking like the clear two best teams, it's very likely they could end up facing each other in the finals. I'm curious to hear your take on how they match up. I would imagine Porzingis would defend, Chet Tatum would defend Hartenstein. Brown would defend Shea, Holiday would defend Dortmund. Derrick White would defend Jalen Williams. Is this the close, is this close to what you'd expect or do you disagree with me Also, if possible, could you maybe list what you think would be the key factors for each team to win a seven game series? Love the show. Keep up the great work. I hope your skiing trip was tons of fun. Thank you for the kind words and for the support. I agree with you that Boston and OKC are looking to me like the clear two best teams. I don't think they're separated enough to be on completely different tier than the teams that I have below them being right now Cleveland, Denver and the Lakers. But teams like the, the, the Knicks or the warriors could potentially join that tier for me as well before the end of the season. But I do think that there's a slight gap between those two teams and the other teams. I think it's more likely that OKC gets upset in the Western Conference than Boston gets upset in the Eastern Conference. That said, if I had to pick what I would expect to see in the Finals at this point, I do believe it will be Boston versus Oklahoma City. Now, with the matchups that you talked about, there's an interesting dynamic that you're referencing that I think gets a little bit more complicated because of the way that Oklahoma City can play their two bigs together. So we've seen the Celtics put Jason Tatum on centers before with the intention of being able to switch ball screens, right, and shut down a team's primary ball screen attack. Now, so much of this depends on what direction the Thunder go with their starters. Like, is this going to be a situation where they play Chet and Isaiah Hartenstein together with the starters, or is this going to be a situation where they choose to start an Alex Caruso instead and go with Chet at center? Like, those are the different dynamics that could change this. But I think it's actually far more likely that they put Tatum on Chet than on Hartenstein. The main reason why is because Hartenstein is not a pick and pop threat, and he's not really much of a vertical spacing threat. So it's not like the Dallas Mavericks problem where you could open up a bunch of easy lob dunks. Because while Hartenstein does have some finishing ability on the roll and some really good short roll finishing ability with this floater, he's not the vertical spacing threat that you see from some of the other vertical centers in the league. Right? And so Chet's ability to pick and pop on Porzingis would be a problem because you're not going to want to switch with Porzingis as much. And if you put Porzingis on Chet, they're just going to spam, pick and pop and get Chet into space at the top of the key with an opportunity to shoot a three or drive a closeout. So if you put Tatum on Chet, then you can switch the Shea Chet ball screen or the J Dub Chet ball screen. And with Porzingis, you can at least force Hartenstein to make his little floater that he has to make as he attacks Porzingis helping in those ball screen situations. So I think that's more likely how they'd match up. The J Dub and Shay thing gets really tricky because conventional wisdom would tell you putting Jaylen Brown on Shay, he's your best perimeter defender when he's locked in and engaged, he's your best opportunity to slow shade down, so to speak. But I would argue that that creates a complicated matchup with a guy like a Jalen Williams. Like, I don't. I wouldn't put Derrick White on Jalen Williams because I think you're giving up a little bit too much strength there. Derrick White is such a good off ball defender, such a good rim protector as a guard. I would slide Drew Holiday onto Jalen Williams and put Derrick White on Lou Dort and have him as the Roamer, the guy who's helping but still offering contests in those situations. I think you could go either way with Drew on Jalen or. Excuse me, with. Yeah, with Drew on Jalen and Jalen on Shea. Or you could go with Drew on Shea or Jalen on Jalen. But either way, I think it's most important to keep Porzingis out of the pick and pop and to keep Derek White out of a situation where he's guarding somebody that's too strong for him. And I think that gives them their best chance on the other end of the floor. I think it's pretty straightforward. You're going to get Dort on Tatum, I think you're going to get J Dub on. You're going to get J Dub on on Jalen Brown, right? I think you're going to end up getting Hartenstein on poor Zingis because he's more of a post up threat. And again with Boston, it also depends, like are they, you know, how often are you going to see two big looks? How are we going to match up when they do go to two big looks? There's going to be situations where that gets complicated. But I look at the Thunder as more of a switch and contain type of team with trying to guard Boston. And so I think we will see some small ball looks, we will see some ched at center, a lot of switching everything and trying to contain the ball. And to me the biggest swing factor of the series is going to be decision making for both teams. To me, the Thunder actually remind me a lot of the Celtics back in 2022 where they just have this sky high potential based on what they do on the defensive end of the floor. And they have all this offensive talent but they just make some sketchy decisions a lot in big spots and Boston has outgrown a lot of that over the last couple of years in their growth into becoming a champion. And that's my number one concern with Oklahoma City is when they get into high leverage situations, their decision making. That said, as we saw, we can see Oklahoma City do similar things to Boston that Boston struggled with in the past in terms of decision making, handling perimeter defenders that contain the ball and force them into tough contested pull up jump shots instead of the wide open catch and shoot jump shots that make their offense so unguardable. And so I think decision making on offense is going to be the biggest key for both teams in that series. Again, I'll go much deeper into that if we get to that point. We're going to do season, we're going to do series previews for every single playoff series like we do every single year. And so no matter who ends up playing in the finals, we will do deep dive breakdowns before the series. When the time comes.
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Nikki Glaser
Features this is Nikki Glaser from the Nikki Glaser podcast. On a more serious note, I'm still thinking about that commercial with Tom Brady and Snoop Dogg hating on each other. Because when you listen to the reasons for hating someone or something, you realize just how stupid they really are. There is too much hate in this country and it's gotta stop. So join us at iHeart in standing up to it. If you see hate, speak up. Call it out and you can learn more by following oupwithhate.
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Foreign hey Jason, commenting from all the way across the pond and not so sunny England. Love the show and have been watching for years. How much of a realistic shot do you think Draymond has a defensive player of the year this year? With Wemby unfortunately getting hurt, it opened up for someone else to sneak in and grab one this year. The warriors went say 10 and three in their last games this year and Dre plays excellent defense as he did against Milwaukee. Is he in with a real shot again? Love the show and hope all is well. Thanks again for support and hopefully you get some better weather over there. Here in Tucson it's going to be like Yesterday it was 96 degrees so we're already heading into the summertime. I I think Draymond would be my pick for Defensive Player of the Year if the season ended today. I think Evan Mobley's had a great defensive season. I just think Draymond Green is a better and more disruptive defensive player. I think Draymond suffers a little bit from the reputation in the sense that like he's just been such a good defender for so long that people just don't think about it as often. And Mobley, even though he's been a defensive prospect his whole life this season has just been a lot of narrative weight behind him and what the Cavs have have accomplished this year. But like I don't think you have to do much more than just watch some some of these two teams play and just watch how important Draymond is to what they do defensively and his ability to show up at the level but get back and he's one of the best defenders in the league at being two places at once, having a foot in the paint, disrupting things, but being able to close out and get excellent contests on three point shots on the weak side. He's such a great defensive playmaker. To me he's the best defensive player that I've watched this season. On DraftKings, Draymond right now is the favorite at minus 130, Evan Mobley at plus 110 and then Dyson Daniels at plus 1300 in third place. I like that value for Draymond simply because Gold Golden State has a lot more to play for over the course of this final stretch of the season. Cleveland has nothing to play for but get to mid April healthy and so you're just going to see a higher level of intensity out of the warriors over the course of these final few weeks of the season. And I think that just bodes well for Draymond's capability to lock up. That award is an interesting one. Who's a bigger liability on defense between Jokic in Luca? This one's tough. I think they're close, but I would give a slight edge in terms to who's a bigger liability to Luca. And ultimately it just comes down to size. They both really struggle. Neither of them can guard one on one on the perimeter very well in space. They're both elite defensive rebounders, which I think is an asset on the defensive end of the floor. That is under discussed. Like, Luka has helped make the Lakers a serviceable rebounding team despite a lack of size at the center position because he's an excellent defensive rebounder. Not as an athlete, but he just has a nose for the ball, meaning he's just good at anticipating where the ball is going to come off the rim. And he's got a good pursuit of the ball. That allows him to get a lot of defensive rebounders rebounds. That said, two things. Jokic is a little bit better defensive rebounder than Luca. And two, Jokic is big, which allows you to set up potential defensive schemes that keep him around the rim or put him in situations where he can be successful. It's harder to do with Luka. Point being, if you're building an elite defense from scratch, I think it's a little bit easier to build one around Jokic than it is to build one around Luka. That said, they're both defensive liabilities. Jokic has been a substantial defensive liability since he won the title. I don't know what's going on there. He just hasn't really committed to that end of the floor as well as he used to. They're both bad on that end, but I would give Jokic a slight edge as a better defender than Luka. Do you think that this is LeBron's last chance to win a title next year? Even they improve the team, he will be on the same level and get the Lakers to come back into contention. I don't think this is LeBron's last chance. I think next year will certainly be his last chance in terms of like, at a star level. There's an off season here where the Lakers immediately become a buyout destination. Or not a buyout destination, a veteran minimum destination. The Lakers are going to get some discounted talent this summer because you want to go play in LA for Luka Doncic and LeBron James and have an opportunity to contend for a title like that's going to be really appealing to people, especially players that are play finishers that would benefit from what Luka Doncic does the next year. Next year's Lakers, I expect to be a top tier contender right out the gates. I think they're going to be a really, really good team with a summer to rebuild around Luka and LeBron. That said, right before LeBron tore it, or not tore, but strained his groin against the Celtics, he was playing at a top five level. You combine that with Luka Doncic, who has been playing in a top five level since then. The two of them together, with Austin Reeves, with Rui Hachimura, with Jackson Hayes, as the vertical spacer, with Dorian, Finney Smith, Gabe Vincent, Jared Vanderbilt. This is as this is certainly the best chance he's had since 2021, and I certainly consider this to be a real chance. I just think he'll probably have a slightly better chance next year. Now to your point. LeBron will be 41 next year. When they get to the postseason, he'll be older, probably won't be as good. There will be some small amount of decline barring a severe injury. If that's the case, though, with better supporting talent and now that Luka's in the picture, they don't need LeBron's top end as much anymore. They need a consistent floor with him, which I still think will be there next year. And I think that that's something that they will be able to leverage into competing against for a title one more time next season. The Volume what's up guys? As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting HOOPS tonight. It would actually be really helpful for us if you guys would take a second and leave a rating and a review. As always, I appreciate you guys supporting us, but if you could take a minute to do that, I'd really appreciate it.
- [32:19]
Nikki Glaser
This is Nikki Glaser from the Nikki Glaser Podcast. Have you guys seen this new commercial from Stand up to All Hate? It's basically Snoop Dogg and Tom Brady going back and forth with reasons that they hate each other. But then when you really listen to them, the reasons for the hate are just so stupid. I don't know. This. This commercial really got me. It's a strong reminder that hate in our country continues to be out of control. So join us at iHeart in standing up to it. If you see hate, speak up, call it out. Your voice is a powerful tool in this fight. You can learn more by following OTs upwithhate.
- [32:50]
Nissan Representative
Okay, so we all need to get away from the world sometimes. Well, in the all new 2025 Nissan Murano, you don't even have to go anywhere. The Murano is the getaway. Just picture it. The Bose Premium sound system plays your favorite music as the Murano's massaging leather appointed seats melt away your stress. Yeah, that's a real getaway. Drive the all new 2025 Nissan Murano today. Bose and massaging leather appointed seats are optional. Features PayPal lets you pay all your pals like your graduation gifters.
- [33:21]
T-Mobile Representative
Who's paying for the mattress topper?
- [33:24]
Nissan Representative
You mean the beanbag chair?
- [33:26]
T-Mobile Representative
Aren't we getting a mini fridge? Can we create a pool on PayPal? It lets us collect the money before we buy. Ooh, yes, that's smart.
- [33:37]
Nissan Representative
Glad we can agree on something easily. Pool split and Send Money with PayPal. Get started in the PayPal app, a PayPal account is required to send and receive money. A balance account is required to create a pool. This Valentine's Day, Celebrate every love story with Pandora. Whether it's romantic, platonic, familial, or a gesture of self love, Pandora's versatile designs let you express your unique connections in meaningful ways. Each piece tells a story of love or friendship that transcends materialism, turning every gift into a heartfelt message that connects hearts from best friends to significant others. Pandora helps you honor the bonds that make life richer and more meaningful. Make the feeling last from first sight to forever. On Valentine's Day and every day. Be love. Shop Pandora Jewelry today in store or online@pandora.net.