Colin Cowherd (3:12)
Yes. So Denver wins at home. They force a game seven. And what these NBA playoffs have clearly illustrated the dominant regular season teams. A lot of them pretty. A lot of them. 3 ball reliant. The Cavs are out. The Celtics probably will be in. OKC is now in a game seven. We've always understood playoff basketball is more intense. But the NBA's willingness to let it be super physical has made the pretty teams pretty vulnerable. Celt Cavs both could be out by tonight. And they lived on the three. Oklahoma City's depth and blowouts and youth. They're going to a Game 7. These playoffs have had some tush push to them. Denver is a great example. Old, big, strong, tough. A lot like Minnesota, who's already in the Western Conference final. And Denver's bench, that's been the concern, right? Like it's limited. But last night, once again, Westbrook had a couple of big buckets and another Gonzaga guy stepped up when Jokic hit the bench. Julian Strother was absolutely excellent hitting shots. Again, a Gonzaga guy. But it's never been more clear. The gap between the NBA's regular season and postseason, it's wider than we thought. And we thought it was different. And a lot of this is Adam Silver just saying. Listen, I'm getting complaints. I'm hearing complaints. It's 2, 3 ball reliant. How do you change it? Let them be physical. Bang around the shooters. Scoring inside matters more. Minnesota is not relying on a 3. Pacers are not reliant on a 3. The Knicks are not reliant on a 3. Denver's not. And so now, now the Lakers and the warriors, they have that veteran playoff experience, but they don't have the size and that's their shortcoming. I think it's made for highly entertaining basketball. I thought Denver was done, but the former champions have a chin. And again, I think I like Oklahoma City in game seven. They're at home. I think they'll shoot the three ball better. But you're giving me Jokic, you're giving me Gordon, Jamal Murray was great being sick. We have the potential for a number four seed facing a number three seed in the Eastern Conference final and a four seed facing a six seed in the Western Conference final. And listen, I said during the regular season I thought the game was too pretty, there's too much scoring. I wanted more analytics, less analytics, less three ball shooting. And Adam Silver listened to me and a lot of you that were saying the same thing, let's get physical. It works. It's entertaining basketball and it's benefited the Knicks and the Pacers and Minnesota and Denver last night. Teams that don't necessarily rely on three ball shooting. We got a game seven and here's the coach of the Nuggets, David Adelman. The challenge of playing great teams, it's just being consistent mentally. And again I've said this throughout the series. What they did this year is incredible. They've earned the home court on Sunday and on the flip side, we've earned the right to go down there and the opportunity to try to beat them in a game seven. So this is what it's all about. Team that's done it all year long group in there that's hung a banner. You know, I would tune into this game. So it's interesting. The Celtics Cavs in the Thunder during the regular season averaged 120 a game. Those teams are now down to 114. And those teams were making 16 to 16 and a half three pointers a game. They're now down to 14. Well, that's, that's, that's six points. And these are close games. So again, Minnesota, the Knicks, the Pacers are physical and long. All the teams with size that aren't reliant on the three are either winning or about to win. And I think it's better basketball. I just, I've enjoy the playoffs. I like it. I've said for years, give me a mid range jumper. I just don't want 62 threes winning the NBA championship. So we saw baseball do this for years. They started tweaking and tweaking and tweaking and it was harder to score runs and stolen bases were going down. So baseball makes the base Bigger, they get rid of the defensive ship. Well, what's happening, right, there's more hits, average is going up, there's more runs, there's more base runners, there's more stolen bases. The NFL tweaked their catch. So what we, what we're seeing in real time here is the NBA during a season of three point parades saying, you know, we don't want our, we don't want our playoffs to look like that. We want our playoffs to be about veterans, stars, physicality, a little NFL tush push. And this is what you get. And I think it's been great. So yesterday, a story broke yesterday. Oh, wait, it broke a year ago. And I got crap for reporting it. Whatever. Seth Wickersham, great reporter at ESPN Reports, something we did a year ago, which is Caleb Williams, dad wasn't in love with the idea of his son being a Chicago Bear based on, you know, history and the truth. And Caleb Williams, you know, was considering his options, but eventually just said, I'll be a Bear. So. And here's the thing. This story broke yesterday when we were on the air about midway through the show. All those concerns and all those Chicago Bears hurdles turned out to be true. So where you land, you know, this is 75% of the game for a quarterback. Go look at Matt Stafford, easily the best high school quarterback in the country. Best college quarterback. Had to go 13 years to really find Sean McVay. He was 74 and 90 in Detroit, first couple of years in Los Angeles. Like, is he better than Aaron Rodgers? He's hoisting a trophy, beating Joe Burrow in the biggest game of the year. Go look at Jared Goff, 0 for 7 with defensive minded Jeff Fisherman. One year later, 11 and 4 with McVay and a passer rating in the hundreds, he looked like a bust. Sam Darnold, disaster with a defensive coach and the Jets. Well, some Adam Gase and, you know, some offense, some defense. But where you land matters, disaster in New York, struggled in Carolina, magical in Minnesota. Baker Mayfield. It's Hugh Jackson, it's Freddy Kitchens, it's Greg Williams. It's. It's. Oh, then he finds McVeigh and he finds Liam Cohen. What do you know? Baker looks like a top 12 to 13 quarterback in the NFL. He, you know, he. The bottom line in this stuff is if you start looking at your Bakers, if you start looking at Darnold, if you start looking at Goff, if you start looking at Stafford, if you start looking at all these guys, where you land matters, and that's What Caleb Williams was worried about. I mean, it's like if you were going to date a rock star and you were worried about infidelity and a wild lifestyle, that's, that's not being cynical, that's not being skeptical. Those are legitimate concerns. Now, the good news is, and we talked about this yesterday, the good news is you can rebound. You couldn't like 20 years ago if you got stuck with your first coach, you know, coaches, that may be it. Like, that's it. There are so many now, great young offensive minds, so many McVeigh copycats. You know, Kevin O' Connell, Minnesota, they call him the Tall Sean McVeigh. There are so many good offensive coaches that a Darnold or a Geno Smith or a TUA or a Jared Goff has a second chance. And I think Caleb got lucky. The Bears got rid the front office ownership, got rid of the defensive head coach and the defensive staff. They got him potentially his Sean McVay and I think Ben Johnson, much like Sean McVay or Sean Payton in Denver or Kevin Oconlon, Minnesota, what's the first thing Ben Johnson did? Clean up the offensive line for his young quarterback. Something Mike Tomlin can't do for the last decade. So I think it's going to turn out well. But I think all this stuff ask yourself when you were coming out of college, if I would have told you, yeah, there's this company that's going to choose you, they really like you, but they have 100 year history of not getting your position right. Would you not be concerned? So here's espn. Seth Wickersham, that story that broke during our show yesterday on Chicago radio, and then Ben Johnson, too. Seth, how close do you think the Williams family was to actually not being drafted by the Bears in some way, either getting out of it or having.
