← The Herd with Colin Cowherd
The Herd with Colin Cowherd
Hoops Tonight - NBA title CONTENDER RANKINGS: How Thunder, Nuggets, Rockets, Spurs, Knicks, Lakers, Warriors rank
00:35:38
Loading summary
Transcript27 lines
- [00:00]
Podcast Announcer
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.
- [00:04]
Host of Hoops Tonight
What's up?
- [00:05]
Cam Jordan
It's Cam Jordan. I'm back with season three of your favorite podcast, the off the Edge with Cam Jordan podcast. Tap in every Wednesday to hear conversations with my friends and stars from the NFL, the sports world in general, and entertainment about everything from teams and players making waves to pop culture. And I'll take you inside my journey through my 15th season in the NFL. Looking forward to you joining me this season. The season of more on the off the Edge with Cam Jordan podcast. Catch new episodes every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [00:35]
Host of Hoops Tonight
Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage. Store more and do more with your data. Try them for free@wasabi.com the Volume. All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight here at the Volume. Heavy Friday, everybody. Hope all of you guys had an incredible week. We are getting into our contender rankings today. As promised. Once a month, I want to kind of circle back to our teams that are currently in the mix for the championship in the NBA. Sometimes we'll have a guest, sometimes we won't. I was gonna have San Vicini on today. He's feeling a little under the weather. So we're gonna have Kevin o' Connor to come on in our early February contender rankings, and then I'm going to have Sam come back on in early March for contender rankings then. But as we head into the new year, I wanted to dig into our top three tiers. There's been a lot of change since our last contender ranking. Some teams moved off the second tier, some teams moved on to the second tier. Whether or not I was going to put OKC in their own tier. All that we're going to get into today. You guys know the joke before we get started, subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel like this video. And if you want to get mailbag questions into our Friday mailbag starting next Friday, leave them underneath these full episodes on YouTube. Put mailbag colon, write your question. We got two more mailbags later on throughout the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So at this point, I think there are 11 teams that have at least some slight pathway to compete for a championship. I have three teams in the top tier. These are all teams that I think have a real legitimate, like, massive shot to win the trophy this year. These are the teams that, like every day they're sitting in the locker room, they're like, we can do this. We're on a mission to do this. I have four teams in the second tier. These are teams that I think have a real championship ceiling, but they have some pretty glaring flaws. They require a mix of maybe some favorable matchups, maybe some internal things going their way. These are locker rooms where they're going to have nights where they have some doubts in the locker room about whether or not they could reach that goal. But I do truly believe that ceiling is there, and they've demonstrated that ceiling within this season. Then I have four teams in the third tier. These are teams that I think are well below the level of a traditional contender and that have not flashed the upside of a championship contender yet this season. But they have some kind of internal upside that at least makes you consider them a long shot. To be clear, I view all four of these teams as pretty far below the top seven. So I really only think there's seven teams that have, like, a good shot to win the title. But there's these additional four that I want to get into that I think at least have that potential upside, that very, very small window of opportunity that makes it so that you can't completely knock them off that list. So let's start there. We're going to rank all 11 teams today. For all intents and purposes, there's only seven that I think can win the title, but we're going to go through all 11. We're going to work backwards, starting with number 11, the Golden State Warriors. They keep dropping games in particularly painful fashion. Losing a heartbreaker to the Raptors the other night, where they led by seven with less than two minutes left, ended up losing by 14 in overtime. A couple of nice wins after that to Brooklyn and Charlotte. I'm actually recording this on New Year's Eve, and Golden State played at 11am local here in Denver today. It's just kind of part of the weird New Year's Eve schedule. But I got a couple of wins after that to get back to two games above.500. They're kind of like the opposite of the Lakers in that I think they're better than their record because of clutch basketball. Like, The Lakers are 20 and 11 because they're 10. And, oh, in clutch games, you know, a couple of those go a different direction. Austin Reeves misses a floater. Somebody misses a shot over there, someone makes a shot over here, they could be sitting, you know, closer to where Phoenix is in the standings. Right. Similarly, the warriors have been hovering right around.500 in large part because they've lost 11 clutch games this year. It's been a combination of issues. Their clutch defense has been terrible. They're about a 127 clutch defensive rating and they've had a very high turnover rate in crunch. In crunch time, they're turning the ball over on over 15% of their possessions. In crunch time, they've actually scored the ball pretty well when they get to those spots. I may be completely delusional here, but I still think this is a good basketball team and they have a trade to make with Jonathan Kaminga. So I think it's very possible that this team goes on a run in the second half of the season. It's one thing that, like, if what I believe about this team is true, I believe they will finish the season a lot better than just a.500 basketball team. I think they'll be substantially above.500 at some point later on in the season. Nobody, not even warriors fans, are going to view this team as some sort of substantial title threat. But when you factor in Steph Curry, the continuity this team has, Steve Kerr is a playoff coach, the potential of return in a Kaminga trade, they're at least that long shot title threat that's going to cause them to register on a list like this. Even if I don't view them as as substantial as those top seven teams. Especially in a Western Conference where even Oklahoma City has shown some matchup vulnerability this year. The stat you cling to if you're a Warriors fan, they have a plus six net rating when Steph, Jimmy and Draymond are all on the floor together, a 121 offensive rating with that group and you feel like they can play much better than they have on defense. That's what you're clinging to if you're a Warriors fan. Number 10, the Los Angeles Lakers. For the first time in the Luca era, I've dropped them off of the second tier of contenders. I was tempted to flip them in the warriors last week. There was a moment there where I was like, man, are even the warriors better? But even with all the warriors, with all the Lakers flaws, excuse me, I do think they're just a touch better than the warriors when they're fully healthy, but I have removed them from the second tier for two reasons. One, their roster is just completely overmatched in the modern NBA from a shooting and athleticism standpoint. They're incredibly slow and unathletic and they're incapable of knocking down open catch and shoot threes. In the Pistons game, for example, how many times did you see Jake Gravy or Marcus Smart end up wide open and the guys just can't hit the Shots as a team, they're making 7.5 catch and shoot threes per game, which is the worst in the entire league. For some perspective, there are 19 NBA teams that average at least 10 made catch and shoot threes per game. The lakers are getting 7.5 worst in the entire league. So every night they're operating with extreme deficits. And two of the most important aspects of modern NBA basketball, being able to run around and sprint and cover ground as athletes and the ability to knock down open catch and shoot threes. 2. For the Lakers to compete with the best teams in the league, they needed Luca to be at the level of the top players in the league. And he just hasn't been. His scoring volume is nothing to like, just ignore. But he's the most mistake prone superstar in the league by a mile. The amount of missed shots and turnovers he has relative to his peers is jaw dropping. This is a crazy stat from the Pistons game. Game. The Pistons scored 19 points directly off of Luca turnovers and missed threes in transition. So like Luca misses a step back three up top. Jalen Duran just runs right past him, gets a dunk out the other end off of the miss, throw a pick 6 on the left, Marcus Sasser saves it in bounds to Isaiah Stewart under the basket for a dunk, that sort of thing over and over again. 19 points in one single game directly off of Luca, turnovers and misstep back threes. So like when you really dig into it, it's like, yeah, he had 30 and 11. His counting stats continue to be incredible, but he just misses so many shots and he turns the ball over so much that it undercuts his success. And to put, to put it very simply, with this version of Luka Doncic, the Lakers have no shot to win the title. But you can't completely count them out because there's always that threat that Luka will return to form, that LeBron will reach a top 15 level before the end of the season. Then Austin Reaves gets back and continues to kick ass that the team hits on a trade and they go on a run, right, like that's why they're on this list. But I view that now as so much of an extreme long shot that I've removed them from that second tier of contenders for the first time since the Luka Doncic trade. I am incredibly excited to tell you guys about our new partnership with Vuori. Those of you guys who are familiar with Vuori have noticed that I wear it on the show and I have done so for years now, almost every single day, because it's become a workhorse for me. And that's why I'm so excited about this partnership. I've actually been advocating for this behind the scenes for a while. It's a product I really believe in and I'm really excited that we get to partnership with them now. My journey with Vuor I started because of a very simple problem. I'd wear shirts on the show and then after I'd watched them four or five times, they would just kind of degrade and turn into something that wasn't anything close to what I had originally purchase. And so I wanted to invest in quality clothing that could become my workhorse for my daily life. And that is exactly what Vuori is. From the Sunday performance sweatpant that I wear around my house all the time, that's super comfortable, that even now that it's cold in Colorado and I go play basketball, I can literally play basketball in the same sweatpants to the Sunday performance shorts that I play basketball in. My favorite thing about Vuori is all this stuff. All this clothing is so perfect for the active lifestyle that I live, but it's all so high quality and so attractive looking that I can wear it in formal settings. I live in this stuff every single day. And I'm so excited that we have the opportunity to partner with them now. Vuori is an investment in your happiness for our listeners. They're offering 20% off your first purchase. Get yourself some of the most comfortable and versatile clothing on the planet@vuori.com Hoops that's V U-O-R-I.com H O O P S Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. Not only will you receive 20% off your first purchase, but enjoy free shipping on any US orders over $75 in free returns. Visit vuori.comhoops and discover the versatility of yori clothing. And exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. The season's heating up and Door Dash has a way to keep fans deep in their bag the whole way through. You know how players have their bags that moment when the announcer goes, oh, he's really in his bag tonight. Well, fans have that too. With doordash, snacks stay stocked, gear stays fresh, and the watch party vibes stay absolutely immaculate because the games move fast and if you're not in your bag, you're already behind. And honestly, doordash is there for the emotional rollercoaster of the season. My team loses and suddenly I'm a dessert person. Doordash always comes through for me after a blown lead. My friends silent DoorDash pulling up with fries and maybe even a face mask so I can process what I just watched. Then there are late night cravings. I'm watching post game interviews at midnight, reliving highlights, and out of nowhere I need chips. Doordash is built for that moment, and when the group says pull up, DoorDash makes sure I show up prepared with snacks, drinks and even an extra charger. From tip off to OT. Stay in your bag and order on DoorDash. DoorDash in your bag all season long.
- [11:59]
Danny Shapiro
Hi, I'm Danny Shapiro, host of the hit podcast Family Secrets.
- [12:03]
Host of Hoops Tonight
We were in the car like a Rolling Stone came on and he said there's a line in there about your mother. And I said what? What I would do if I didn't feel like I was being accepted is choose an identity that other people can't have.
- [12:16]
Podcast Announcer
I knew something had happened to me in the middle of the night, but but I couldn't hold on to what had happened.
- [12:23]
Danny Shapiro
These are just a few of the moving and important stories I'll be holding space for on my upcoming 13th season of Family Secrets. Whether you've been on this journey with me from season one or just joining the Family Secrets family, we're so happy to have you with us. I'll dive deep into the incredible power of secrets, the ones that shape our identities, test our relationships, and ultimately reveal who we truly are. Listen to Family secrets on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [12:59]
Host of Hoops Tonight
What's up?
- [13:00]
Cam Jordan
It's Cam Jordan. I'm back with season three of your favorite podcast, the off the Edge with Cam Jordan Podcast. Tap in every Wednesday to hear conversations with my friends and stars from the NFL, the sports world in general, and entertainment about everything from teams and players making waves to pop culture. And I'll take you inside my journey through my 15th season in the NFL. Looking forward to you joining me this season. The season of More on the off the Edge with Cam Jordan Podcast. Catch new episodes every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [13:30]
Host of Hoops Tonight
Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage. Store more and do more with your data. Try them for free@wasabi.com you know the.
- [13:37]
Podcast Announcer
Shade is always shadiest right here. Season six of the podcast Reasonably Shady with Gisele Bryant and Robyn Dixon is here dropping every Monday as two of the founding members of the Real Housewives Potomac. We're giving you all the Laughs, drama and reality news you can handle. And you know, we don't hold back. So come be reasonable or shady with us. Each and every Monday, I was going through a walk in my neighborhood. Out of the blue, I see this huge sign next to somebody's house.
- [14:09]
Danny Shapiro
Okay?
- [14:10]
Podcast Announcer
The sign says, my neighbor is a Karen.
- [14:18]
Host of Hoops Tonight
No way.
- [14:20]
Podcast Announcer
I died laughing. I'm like, I have to know. You are lying. Humongous, y'. All. They had some time on their hands. Listen to Reasonably Shady from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [14:39]
Atlanta Is Podcast Host
Like, if we're on the air here and I literally have my contract here and I'm looking at, you know, as soon as I sign this, I'm gonna get a seven figure check. I've told them I won't be working here in two weeks. From the underground clubs that shaped global music to the pastors and creatives who built the cultural empire, the Atlanta Is podcast uncovers the stories behind one of the most, most influential cities in the world. The thing I love about Atlanta is that it's a city of hustlers, man. Each episode explores a different chapter of Atlanta's rise, featuring conversations with ludicrous Will Packer, Pastor Jamal Bryant, DJ drama, and more. The full series is available to listen to now.
- [15:16]
Host of Hoops Tonight
I really just had never experienced anything like what was going on in the city as far as, like, you know, seeing so many young, black, affluent and creatives in all walks of life. The church had dwindled almost to nothing. And God said, this is your assignment.
- [15:31]
Podcast Announcer
And that's like, how, you know, like.
- [15:32]
Host of Hoops Tonight
Okay, oh, you from Atlanta for real.
- [15:34]
Podcast Announcer
I ain't gotta say too much. I'm Grady, baby.
- [15:36]
Host of Hoops Tonight
Shut up.
- [15:36]
Atlanta Is Podcast Host
Listen to Atlanta is on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.
- [15:44]
Host of Hoops Tonight
Number nine, the Cleveland Cavaliers. The stat you cling to if you're a Cavs fan is that the Cavs have played just 161 possessions this year with Darius Garland, Donovan Mitchell, Evan Mobley, and Jared Allen all on the floor together. In Those minutes, they're plus 24 per 100 possessions, but only 161 possessions because of how devastated they've been by injuries with those groups. By the way, they've been awesome on both ends of the floor. So you can explain the majority of their issues just by pointing to injuries. I'd be quick to. I'd be. I wouldn't be too quick. Excuse me. To blame it all on injuries because there are some recurring themes, particularly with the defensive end and with their rebounding and their overall physicality, it's just not the most physical team in the world, really, in any of their position groups, which I don't love with the playoff team. But the case for Cleveland is that in a flawed Eastern Conference, they could get healthy. And if they got healthy, they're every bit as good as those top teams in the conference. I actually really like what I've seen from them the last couple of weeks. They easily could have won that Knicks game on Christmas Day if it wasn't for some super hot shooting from Tyler Colic and Jalen Bronson down the stretch. The. The win in San Antonio was super impressive on both ends of the floor. I do think the Cavs are gaining real momentum. I think they're about to make their run on the standing, like in the standings and go from being, you know, six, seven playing type of team to something up closer to the top. I think they're about to make that run. The main reason I'm keeping them down in the third tier is one, I'm just not sure we're ever going to get to see the fully healthy version of this team. Every single, every single season, Darius Garland does seem to get banged up. It always does seem like one of their guys is dealing with something that has him out of the lineup. And at a certain point, that's just kind of who you are. And then two, that lack of physicality in all their position groups, I think it makes them really high risk for upset in a playoff series. And it's why I'm not quite as high on them as like a second tier contender, for example, even though I can admit that their injuries have held them back in the standings. Number eight, the Boston Celtics. The case for this team is really simple. Most of their statistical markers are excellent. They're fourth in offense, they're fourth in net rating. They're positive in all the margin stats. They outscore teams and points off of turnovers. They outscore teams in second chance points. They outscore teams and fast break points. Right? So they're winning on the margins. They just have this glaring personnel weakness in the front court, which you saw in their most recent loss against the Blazers, where once again, they're picking on their bigs and drop coverage. And then as soon as they go away from their bigs and go small, you're seeing them get bullied. Whether it's, you know, Denny Abdia going at Peyton Pritchard or it's, you know, Diamond Clinglen clinging, just burying Hugo Gonzalez underneath the basket. Like, there's a size and athleticism deficit in that front court that's just really tough for them to overcome at this point. So in theory, you add Jason Tatum, you hit on a trade for some front court depth, suddenly this looks like a very dangerous team, Right? Those are all long shots, though. We've basically never seen a player come back from an Achilles tear in less than a year and lead a team through a full playoff run. All trades are hard to make. So, you know, like, it's when you talk about matching salary, dealing with the aprons, you know, having enough roster spots to take in players, like, there's so many different things that make trades hard to make. So I do view it as an extreme long shot that they actually accomplish what they need to accomplish to compete in the East. But the shot is there in a way that none of us could have predicted before the season. So if you're a Celtics fan, you gotta be absolutely thrilled with where you're at. You're 20 and 12. Jalen Brown as, like, the leading man on a. On a real team for the first time in his life, like, that has been a smashing success. He's been incredible. So much so that, I mean, I've seen Celtics fans arguing whether or not it's his team or Tatum's team when he comes back. And I think Those are the NBA's version of first world problems. Like, it's awesome that you have both. And I don't know why. I've seen this with Lakers fans, too, where it's like, oh, this is LeBron's team, or this is Lucas team. It's like, all that is really dumb to me. Like, you need lots of good basketball players. Like, you just got to figure out how to coexist, which we all know that Jaylen Brown and Jason Tatum can. So I think Jaylen Brown being awesome is nothing but good for the Celtics. Again. There's just so much that has to go right for them to be able to make their run. But I'm registering them as a shot to win the title in a way I didn't think was possible before the season. So you got to be thrilled if you're a Celtics fan. All right, let's get into our second tier. Remember the second tier. These are teams that I think when they're in the locker room, they're going to have nights where they're like, oh, shit, we're going to win this thing now. They're flawed. They're going to have nights where they look bad and you go, man, this one flaw we have, we might not be able to overcome that, right? Like, these teams are not perfect, but they are another level above the teams I just listed in terms of checking boxes that you need to check to compete for a title. Number seven, the Detroit Pistons. I think they're a very dangerous playoff team because of their physicality at every position group from their guards to their bigger wings to their centers. They're super athletic and strong all over the floor. They get up into the basketball in the perimeter, they force turnovers, they generate a ton of margin in transition and on the offensive glass. I was actually talking about this the other day with respect to the Lakers with my buddy Damon Rangula is a big Lakers fan and he was making the point that like last year's playoffs were indicative of the fact that margins actually matter a lot more than they used to. It used to be that that was more of a regular season thing. And then you get to the playoffs and it's your half court offense versus my half court offense. Let's see who can score in the slowdown basketball. But what he the point that Daman was trying to make was basically like, we've seen these teams essentially demonstrate that it's the opposite. You want to avoid the half court as much as possible and the more you can get out and transition, the better, which has always been a concept.
- [21:22]
Danny Shapiro
It's been.
- [21:22]
Host of Hoops Tonight
It's just been struggle. It's been a struggle to get that sort of thing to translate to the postseason in the past, not last year. We saw Oklahoma City and Indiana win series and Oklahoma City win a title. Indiana come very close by winning on the margins. It just helps to be able to avoid the half court as much as possible when you have a defense that can get you out in transition a lot. If you have the ability to turn half court misses into points on the offensive glass, it just buys you a ton of margin for error in that half court basketball department. Detroit's a perfect example of that. Their half court offense can slow down sometimes. Cade can go cold from the perimeter, he can miss some easy shots. Sometimes you can have some turnover issues. They don't really have a reliable secondary option, right? So they can go cold from time to time, but they get out and transition off of their defense and force a lot of turnovers and score off of those turnovers and they turn a lot of their misses into points on the offensive glass. So they have that margin for error. I have them at the bottom of this tier because they're kind of Light on that aggregate offensive skill piece. Cade has an enormous amount of offensive responsibility on this team, but I think this roster is absolutely capable of winning an NBA championship. They have one of the special offensive engines in the NBA in the form of Cade. They have other guys who can break the defense down with dribble penetration. They're an elite defense and rebounding team and they win on the margins. That's a lot of checking boxes. And if they hit on a trade at this deadline, which I believe they will side note. And this is again, this is just for fun, everybody. So everybody chill out and have some fun for a second. I think Detroit is actually my favorite LeBron trade destination. It was thrown out. We were just hanging out after the stream on Lakers Collective actually this morning. And Trevor was, was just joking about it and he was like, what about Detroit? Because I was saying like, is there a team out there that can like really use a 4 but also allow him to not necessarily play super hard on defense and on the glass during the regular season? And Trevor was like, well, what about Detroit? And then I started to look at it and I was like, this actually makes a lot of sense now. For the record, I don't think LeBron will get traded. This isn't even my favorite Pistons trade. My favorite Pistons trade is still Michael Porter Jr. But just for fun, I wanted to dig into this idea. So the way it would look, so it'd be something about. It'd be something like LeBron and Bronnie for Tobias Harris. Another big expiring so the Lakers don't have to worry about taking too much long term salary on Caris Levert, Javante Green and Marcus Sasser. So for the Pistons, they would get a legit number two for Cade, who could be like a secondary offensive engine off of Kate Cunningham to make his life easier in that department. A massive upgrade of power forward. He's just a better player than Tobias Harris. And then the Pistons have the personnel to actually put up with LeBron coasting in the regular season. They've got athletes all around him and they have such a depth of athletes that they, you know, they could lose a Javante Green and a carousel Verde. But LeBron kind of takes that carousel vert role of like being kind of a secondary ball handler. But you still have plenty of athleticism off the bench. You still have Jaden Ivy, you still have Ron Holland. It doesn't dig into the identity of the team. Obviously Javante Green's been a big part of it. You'd essentially because Marcus Sasser has been more or less out of their rotation when Carousel Verde is healthy. So you're essentially turning Javante Green into Bias Harris and Carolvert into LeBron James. That's a pretty substantial upgrade there. And then for the Lakers, they get a bunch of athletes. You know how much Lakers could use a guy like Javante Green or a Marcus Sasser that can guard the ball and, and get some dribble penetration for them, or Caris Levert, you know, that kind of thing. So it was just, I was just looking at that, I was like, oh, that's a lot of fun. Again, not going to happen. Not even my favorite Pistons trade. I think Michael Porter Jr. Still makes the most sense. The downside of making a move for LeBron is you would not have a long term solution. Michael Porter Jr. Could be a guy that's your power forward for three, four years, right? So that's why he's still my favorite option. But it just was funny because it got pitched to me this morning and I was like, you know what? Like if, like if LeBron was on the Pistons right now for Tobias and Marcus Sasser and Caris Leverton and Javante Green, do the Pistons immediately become the runaway favorite in the Eastern Conference? They probably become the runaway favorite in the Eastern Conference like overnight with a move like that. So it's just fun. It's just fun to think about. Number six, the Minnesota Timberwolves. All season long, Minnesota has been a frustrating team to watch. They're currently getting their butts kicked right now on the road in Atlanta. Inconsistent effort, energy on defense, late game struggles that have plagued them for years. But I always like sustained this belief that they have the ability to ratchet up their athleticism and physicality to overwhelm the best teams in the league when they get to the postseason. And I do think we've seen enough of that in the last couple of weeks to justify that upside. Again, I was talking about that as kind of one of the characteristics I'm looking at in this tier is like, have you demonstrated at any point this season that you are capable of winning a championship? Right? And like, so for Detroit, for example, they're literally the best team in the Eastern Conference by record, right? And they have a bunch of wins over.500 or better teams. Like, there's every reason in the world for the Pistons to sit in their locker room and be like, we can do this, right? For Minnesota, it was that win over Oklahoma City. That win demonstrated that upside. I'm actually even higher on Minnesota than I was to start the season because of some of the improvements I've seen on offense, especially Anthony Edwards, and just how much more methodical and patient he's been on his drives. His rim finishing is skyrocketed. Jaden McDaniels becoming a 40% three point shooter. He's been much more polished offensively ever since the playoffs last year. I think that's a real leap from him. They have that combination that I think you need in order to compete with a team like Oklahoma City, but just in general to be a problem in the postseason. And that's a combination of size and athletic advantages, but also guys that can dribble and create shots. They've got a bunch of dudes between Anthony Edwards and Julius Randle and Nas Reid. They've got a bunch of dudes that can break the defense down with their athletic advantages. And then as a team, they can all shoot the ball really well off of that. I think it's a combination that causes a lot of problems for teams in the postseason. Their personality is frustrating. They do not bring the appropriate level of focus and attention to detail on defense often enough. They're going to have frustrating stretches where they look bad. They're kind of like the the Philadelphia Eagles of the NBA. Or if you catch them on the wrong night, you think they're the worst team in the league. But like every year, there they are again, you know, late in the postseason, because they're just bigger and stronger and faster than everybody. And that's kind of how I see Minnesota right now. Today's show is brought to you by a presenting sponsor, Hard Rock Bet, the official sportsbook partner of the Miami Heat and the Orlando Magic. When it's cold outside, that's when you know the hardwood is heating up. Between the NBA and college, there's basketball on every night. And every night is a shot to build a same game parlay and score a major bucket on Hard Rock Bet. You're home for hoops action all season long. If you ever miss tip off of that big game, don't worry. Hard Rock Bet lets you live bet all game long from the first bucket to the final buzzer. So you're never too late to find a winner or grab that player prop that you had circled. If you haven't tried your first bet on Hard Rock Bet, there's still time for you to get $150 in bonus bets. If you win, just place a $5 bet and if it hits, you get not only your winnings, but an extra $150 in bonus bets. Plus hard rock bet offers new promos every single day. So whenever you're listening, just open up the app, Check out what you've got. Any day of the week, download the Hard Rock Bet app and make your first deposit today. Payable and bonus bets Not a cash offer Offered by the Seminole Tribe of Florida in Florida Offered by Seminole Hard Rock Digital LLC in all other states. Must be 21 plus and physically present in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee or Virginia. To play Terms and conditions apply. Concerned about gambling in Florida? Call 1833 playwise in Indiana, if you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-9 with it gambling problem call 1-800- gambler in Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee or Virginia. Number five the New York Knicks in Jalen Brunson's last 10 games and again, I'm recording this on on New Year's Eve, so I'm going to miss a game between now and then. In Jalen Brunson's last 10 games, he's averaging 33 points per game on 62 true shooting with just 1.7 turnovers pertain. For the season, he's averaging a career high 29 1/2 on 60 true shooting, which is 2.2 turnovers per game. The level of scoring volume and efficiency we've seen Jalen Brunson operating at in the last month is flying way too far under the radar. When Shay Gilders Alexander was doing this, we said he was having one of the greatest guard seasons ever. That's the type of territory that Jalen Brunson has entered into. With the level of play he's been at for the last month, I think he's making that leap to the top tier of superstars. I talked about this on the show the other day, but I think he's been even better than Luke has been over the last month. It's just one of many things about the Knicks that feels different to me this year. Brunson's playing the best basketball of his career and has arguably been a top tier superstar this season. Mikhail OG and Josh Hart, all three of them have been phenomenal on both ends of the floor. All three of them have been better this year than they were last year. Mikhail's shooting the ball better and guarding better. Josh Hart's shooting the ball better. Just in general has been a better offensive threat than he was in years past. OJ Anunoby has been devastating two way all over the floor this year. Carl Anthony Town struggled to start the year, but he's been way more efficient in the last few weeks and the team has found a lot of valuable depth and like a gunner like Jordan Clarkson, it's not particularly efficient, but that can come in and bring a spark of energy and hit a couple shots and change a game like he did on Christmas Day. Tyler Kolek and just the job he's done as a backup guard who can also scale up as a scorer when he needs to. Landry shame it and his movement shooting before he got hurt. Obviously Mitchell Robinson's been healthy and available this year. Something is just different. The issues with Cat on defense, they're still real and they're going to have to overcome those to get to where they want to go, but I just think the Knicks might be so much better across the board that they can overcome it this time around. Their offense is 4 1/2 points better per 100 possessions than it was last year. That down the roster improvement from certain guys, the emphasis on early dribble penetration from Mike Brown that's generating the types of higher quality catch and shoot looks than they got last year. All of it is amounting to a better basketball team. I don't think they have the two way ceiling that some of the teams above them on this list have, but this to me is by far the most optimistic I've been about the Knicks in the Brunson era. I think they have a real shot to win it all. Number four, the San Antonio Spurs. Their offense is flawed and it's highly susceptible to cold spells that have plagued them in the last week and that's what keeps them off the top tier for now. If you're for you spurs fans, in our Wednesday show I did a kind of a deep dive into how the Cavs guarded their guards and some of the stuff that they can do to address that and just what it means for the future of the Spurs. But this team has a huge leg up on all the other second and third tier contender teams in the form of the simple fact that they have Oklahoma City's number. They're probably the only team in the league other than Denver that can like confidently look in the mirror and say we can beat these dudes. Denver, because they pushed them to seven last year, were the worst team in San Antonio because they're 30 against them this season. Everyone else, it's either theoretical because they don't know or it's a massive long shot. I like the spurs as a playoff team in general because they check some of Those classic boxes like they are excellent rim protection team. They can provide 48 minutes of just real barrier between dribble drives in the rim. They also have a depth of perimeter defenders that can get up into the ball. I've always loved that bracket of being able to pressure the ball, but also being able to protect the rim. And then on the offensive end, in addition to Wemby, they have a depth of dribble drive creation that can break the defense down at the point of attack over and over again. A bunch of guys that can beat their man off the dribble. For all this talk about their shooting before the season, including from people like myself, they've been firmly in the middle of the pack as a catch and shoot team this year. Now, one of the things we saw, especially in the Cleveland game, is that they put bigs like bigger forwards on Steph Castle and on Dylan Harper and really sagged off and went underneath screens. And there's a lot of stuff that they're going to have to work out schematically to try to keep things flowing for them on offense. When they run into that, I think they're even going to see more exaggerated versions of that where they put centers on Steph Castle, things along those lines. There's stuff that they're going to have to figure out. But overall, I can't believe after how low I was on this team coming into the season that I have them at 4th of my contender rankings. They're an awesome basketball team. Last note. I can't wait to watch Wemby in his first playoff series. I think he's going to be able to ratchet things up defensively in a way that is devastating to opposing offenses. It's going to be fun to watch. Number three, the Houston Rockets. It's so funny because the talk before the season was that they needed a point guard, and I was in on that idea too. Not so much that they needed a point guard in the most traditional sense of the word, but just that they needed another dribble shot creator. A guy that can run pick and roll. A guy that could do what Fred Van Vliet did, right? But I'm completely off that idea now. I don't think they need a point guard at all. I think, you know, there was a lot of that talk that resurfaced, especially after their recent slide a couple weeks ago where they dropped a few games. I don't think the Rockets have issues on offense breaking the defense down. Kevin Durant, now Burn Shangoon are drawing multiple defenders constantly Reed shepherd has blossomed way sooner than I expected into a tertiary ball handler. He's getting 1.08 points per ball screen, including passes this year on over 200 reps. He's done great work in ball screens as a shot maker and as a playmaker. He's a legit option for them there. They just need to figure out how to capitalize on the four on threes. Like think of it in a real basic way like this. You have a point guard. What's the point guard's job? To find out where to enter the offense. Okay, we want to get the ball to kd. Okay, we're going to throw the ball to kd, we're going to run this set. We're going to get the ball to KD on the block. Well then the double team comes. And when the double team comes, the exact same fucking problem happens that we were talking about before. The point guard enters the equation where KD is dribble on the ball up the floor and he's picking up a double team right away. The doubles are the doubles. Katie and Shangun are going to draw the doubles. The team needs to figure out how to more quickly and efficiently break down those four on threes into dunks in wide open threes. It's just about like to me, like instead of getting a point guard, they just need that fifth guy, the guy who can go next to kd, Jabari, Shangun and Thompson and be the combination of defense and shot making that they need. And I think they found it. I think Tar Eason could be a good option there. I still think Dorian Finney Smith, as he continues to get his legs underneath them will be an option for them there. I think that sort of wing do everything wing is more important as a fifth guy in that lineup than bringing like you know, the a vintage, like get everyone to their spots kind of point guard. I think the entire purpose of offense is to break the defense down and to get quality shots. The Rockets can do that. They just have to stop turning the ball over and like frankly the large sample data on their offense is absurd. Their offense is awesome. They it like when you look at their clutch games that they've lost, it actually has been their defense that's been a problem. And in many cases it's because you know, they email Udoka went with a Steven Adams or he went with the Reed shepherd. And I think now settling in on Tar Eason is that fifth guy is going to kind of settle down some of their late game stuff and they're going to need reps. Like they're going to need a lot of reps between now and the end of the season to get better at capitalizing on those four on threes. You know, it's been interesting as I look back, zooming out like they're not as good defensively as we thought they'd be in large part because they play a lot of these bigger bodies that are pretty slow footed so they can be a little susceptible to speed. They're not as good defensive rebounding as you would expect for that exact same reason. Long rebounds, quicker bodies can get to them, but they're still pretty good on defense. They're still pretty solid as a defensive rebounding team. They're the best overall rebounding team in the mile because like they're just this transcendently great offensive rebounding team and they're so much better on offense than any of us thought they could be thanks to the fact that Kevin Durant and Alper and Shangoon are breaking the defense over and over again, bringing that second defender and then they've had a lot of improved spot up shooting down the roster. Number two Denver Nuggets soon to be playing Team Denver Nuggets As a result of the first significant injury in Nicole Jokic's career, I still remain super high on this team and I view them as the biggest threat to win the title behind Oklahoma City. Everything I expected about this team this summer ended up coming to fruition. Like Nicole Jokic is still the best player in the world by a clearly discernible margin. Jamal Murray was motivated by the roster moves and some of his shortcomings in the last couple seasons to show up to training camp in shape. He's about to make his first All Star team. He's been incredible. Aaron Gordon looked a fantastic before he got hurt. I talked about how the depth would make them more able to succeed when Jokic is off the floor. That was clearly bearing out in the numbers before all these injuries hit and Cam Johnson improved their overall foot speed on defense in their best lineups and he was really starting to click on offense before his injury. I get that it's a pessimistic time to be a Nugget fan. You have four starters down with substantial lower body injuries. That's brutal. The next month of Nuggets basketball is going to be a chore to watch, but none of these injuries are season threatening. Guys are going to come back and when they are healthy they have the best combination of top end firepower, depth of talent, experience, continuity and real matchup advantages that they need to beat anybody in the West. I still think they have a fantastic chance to win the title this year. They just need to make sure that they're healthy when they get to early April. Number one, the Oklahoma City Thunder. I was tempted a few weeks ago to put them in a tier by themselves at the top of the league, but then they dropped four out of their six games in that stretch against Minnesota and Oklahoma City and a lot of their issues from the pass rose to the surface like they can still get out rebounded, generally kind of overwhelmed by teams that have a lot of perimeter size. They can still get shaky with their catch and shoot shooting, especially when they play athletic teams that can throw good closeouts. They're shooting plummets when they face closeouts and then after Shay Gilders Alexander, their ball handling gets just a little shaky. Compared to some of the other top teams, I think A.J. mitchell and J Dub are really good and better options than most teams in the league, but there are some other teams towards the top of this list that have some better secondary options than what Oklahoma City has right now. Who knows, maybe JW will play better over the course of the season, but it's just based on what we've seen so far. That said, I still have seen plenty this year. This year in terms of improvement with guys like Shea, who's gone up a level across the board in a lot of ways, with Chet, who's gone up a level across the board in a lot of ways. The overall jump shooting of the team, you know, in the large sample, they've actually been shooting plenty well. It's just been again, these specific matchups and these specific types of shots that they've been missing. I still think that makes them a clear favorite to win the title this season. The Timberwolves in the Thunder demonstrated that they're not some sort of unbeatable juggernaut or anything like that, but they are the best team team in the NBA and I do think they have the most complete team to survive four playoff rounds and hoist the trophy this year. All right, guys, that's all I have for today. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting us and supporting the show. We'll be back on Monday for our usual power rankings episode. I hope everybody had a happy new year and I will see you guys on Monday.
- [41:02]
Podcast Announcer
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.