Transcript of Part 1: An NBA Midseason Power Poll, Plus OSU vs. Notre Dame with Joel Anderson and Van Lathan

Coming up, I have an NBA Midseason Power Poll plus college football. A lot of it. Next. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. I don't have a new rewatchables for you this week. We did record a long, giant mailbag that we're going to run on Monday's episode, and then we'll be back to a normal schedule after that. So thanks for your patience on that one. You can also check out the Ringer Movies YouTube channel for a lot of the old rewatchables we've done, as well as the Spotify Archives. We're also brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook, where we're We're still doing 30 on 30. It's a profit boost token. We do it on Fridays. Any 30 plus point score or 30 on 30 special bet gets boosted with a little profit boost. For instance, Shay Gilgis, Minder is playing Dallas on Friday, the team that knocked him out of the playoffs. They don't have Luca. If you think he's going to get a little revenge game, just put a little 30 plus on it, get the profit boost token, It all was great. Look for 30 on 30 on the FanDuel Sportsbook app.

Coming up on this podcast, it's basically midseason NBA, so I wanted to get down a giant power poll and count that everybody from 30 to 1. So did that, and it took longer than I thought. Sorry, I had a lot to say. Followed by Joel Anderson, recent addition to The Ringer, who we're going to talk sports culture and a lot of college football. Then Van Lathen comes in to talk about the Championship game and Joel's five favorite things in college football. That is part one of this podcast because I'm going to do a part two later with NFL Million Dollar Picks that's going to go up 10, 11 hours from now. That is the schedule. Everything is okay here in Southern California. Definitely better than it was three days ago. Still terrible, but we got through all the wins on Tuesday and Wednesday. Now, the recovery and all that stuff is in in full swing. I'm going to talk about some charities and stuff that I like in part two of the podcast. Here's part one. Going to do the midseason power poll in one second. First, our friends from ProJam. It's the January 16th, almost midseason NBA Power Poll.

We're going to go from team number 30 all the way down to team number one, separated by sections. I'm going to get off a bunch of takes. So going backwards. There's five teams that are just openly tanking right now. I'm putting them in the capture the flag territory for Cooper Flag. Getting a lot of buzz lately, that Cooper Flag. I don't care if they do 6'7. He's going to be awesome. Washington, 6'32. Charlotte, 9'28. Toronto, 10'31. Utah, 10-29. That's our 30 to 27 rankings. What's interesting is none of those teams really have an awesome trade piece. Utah has a couple of smaller runs, like Sexton's interesting. Clark Jackson, although he's not having a great year. Brooklyn at number 26 is our big entry for this. They're 14 and 27. They lost by 59 points last night, and it felt worse. Cam Johnson would be the potential move for them. Pretty decent contract. We've talked about it before in the podcast. It's basically 22 million a year for a couple of years. Could you go to Memphis for Smart and Leravia at a first? They're going to take first baby. I couldn't find a lot of traits for him because a lot of teams don't have contracts to patch together around that mid-20s stuff, or if they do like some of the second-apron teams, what they're sending out has to be more than what Kam Johnson makes.

It's a little complicated, but Memphis was the one team I was looking at. A fun topic with the Nets is what's Ben Simmons' next contract? Probably minimum. Would somebody get frisky around July sixth and be like, Ben Simmons, all-MBA a couple of years ago, and all of a sudden, he's making two years for 20. Who knows? I really like this draft, though, and I'm just starting to get into it. Once football ends, I'm going to throw myself into it a little bit more because it's fun. But Flag, love, two record kids, the Lithuanian kid at Illinois. I think there's real stakes, and I think we're going to see some pretty incredible tanking as we get on this stretch. The next category is the pre-tankers, which includes Portland at 25, they're 13 and 26. If you catch them on the right night, they look pretty good. It's a weird team. They remind me of when you go through one of those old basketball handbooks or basketball reference and you go to the 1979 season, you just look at the players on teams. You're like, That's an interesting team. What were they thinking there? They have three centers and no point guards and eight wings.

What the hell is this team? That's Portland right now. I also think DeAndre Ayton probably should have played in 1979. Might have been a better year for him. I don't know what this team is. I don't know what the point of it is, and I'm not sure they know either. I don't know what the trades are. Ayton is now untradable, I think. He's been pretty bad. Scoot is the one they have to figure out if they can unlock as an asset. He had 39 points two nights ago. My stockbroker called me immediately. But before that 39-point game was trending toward the most wrong I've ever been about a lottery pick in the last 35 years. And I actually made a list. I went through and I tried to remember guys that I was super high on and why didn't it work out. Going backwards. I think these were the biggest misses for me. Weisman, 2020. Not 100% my Mostly my fault. Not 100% my fault. It was the COVID year. He had barely played at Memphis. Theoretically, he made sense as this big guy who could pass, who could... It just didn't work out. I don't have a ton of regrets about it like I do with Scoot, where I just thought Scoot was going to be this downhill Russell Westbrook, unbelievable athlete guy, and we just haven't seen it.

I have no excuses with Scoot. Why has been there some excuses. Lanzo in 2017, I was super high on, and he just got hurt, so I don't feel bad about that. Jibari Parker, 2014, I really liked. Now, his knees were made of Fusilli, so I don't know how much blame I can get for that one, but he will also belong to this an error. He made way more sense in the 1990s and 2000s, what his game was. The scoring small forward, it couldn't guard anybody. Then as the league shifted, it's like, is he a four? Is he a three? I feel a little bad about that one, but not scoot level. Michael Kid-Gilkrest in 2012 I loved. I liked him at Kentucky. I just thought he was going to be an incredible 3D guy once he learned how to shoot threes. Guess what? Never learned how to shoot threes. He had some weird elbow thing. His elbow was always like... I forget what he was like, a childhood injure or something. He just could never shoot. This one is probably my worst one since Scoot. Derrick Williams in 2011. I still don't know what happened here.

When you think where the league was going in 2011, that's right when Curry was starting to blow up a little bit of Golden State. Maybe a year later was when the Curry and the Threes started. But Derrick Williams on paper, the perfect stretch for, just exactly what you'd want. Somebody, good athlete who could rebound and shoot Threes. And I don't really know what happened. He went to Minnesota. I'd love to do his career again. I'm not going to admit 100% defeat on it, but I'll admit 90% defeat. Ricky Rubio, 2009. My two favorite guys in that draft were Curry and Rubio. Not in that order because I liked Rubio. I thought Rubio was going to be a generational point guard. I was all in. I'm not positive I was wrong because, first of all, he goes to that weird Minnesota team. They have 100 point guards. He doesn't come over right away. Right as it's starting to really happen for him on the T-Wolves, Kobe crashed into his knee and he blew out his ACL, and he was never the same. I would love to do his career over again. I still feel like I was right on him, and it just didn't happen.

So Still not as bad as Scoot. Then the last one, Jay Williams in 2002. I think I have a column in the archive somewhere where I thought he was a better pick than Yang-Ming. I'm not positive I was wrong. Jay Williams was a really exciting guard. I remember we talked about this. He came on my podcast seven, eight years ago. He was an electric Westbrook-Rose athletic point guard that he was definitely something. Then he had the motorcycle accident, we'll never know. Out of all of these, I think Scoot was just the biggest miss for me because I thought, athletically, what he was as a downhill guy and as a competitor, I just thought he was going to be awesome, and I missed it. I'm still holding on his stock. Maybe it'll turn around. 39 points the other night. Not given up yet. All right, number 24, Chicago. They're 18 and 23. Super fun team. Great league pass team. Lavina Lovina has been awesome. Lovina has rejuvenated himself as a trade value asset to the point that if you're ranking him against all the other guys who are definitely available, you'd probably want him the most.

You'd definitely want him more than Beel. So he's 23 3, 5, and 5. He's like a 50, 40, 80 guy this year. He's had good games against really good teams. He had two really good games against Knicks, really good game against Boston, two really good games against Memphis, a really good against San Antonio. He's putting up big stats against excellent defensive teams. I think he's a really interesting trade piece as we head toward the deadline because I don't know why Chicago wouldn't want to explore trading him, but compared to Bale and some of the other ones, even Jimmy Butler, who you just have no idea where his head's at. I think he's a legit trade asset. I think Vucevic is a legit trade asset. On the other hand, why give those guys away? You You're going to be a top 10 draft pick anyway, probably. I don't know why I would just be like, Yeah, sure. Take Vucevic for a protected first. I'd rather just keep them and hope his value goes up. Regardless, this is the perfect Jerry Reinds' derp team. They're mediocre, they're fun to watch, they're not in the luxury tax, and keep cashing those checks, Jerry.

Next category, we just did the pre-tankers. I'm calling this category the Rock in the Hard Place. Number 23, Philadelphia. They're 15 and 24. That's really awful. Four and 19 against above 500 teams. Yikes. Paul George, He's played 26 games. He's shooting 42%, 2.7 free throw attempts a game. As you know, I love free throw attempts because it tells you, does somebody go to the basket or not? He doesn't go to the basket anymore. Not sure what he's doing. He was 5.3 free throw attempts two years ago. Just in general, looks old. I don't know if this is a phase because he was hurt before the year. Maybe his conditioning wasn't there. Maybe podcasting. Maybe he's proving that podcasting is more grueling than you guys give it credit for. He doesn't look the same. He doesn't look the same to the point that I think if Philly called Miami and said, We'll give you Paul George for Jimmy Butler, I don't think Miami does it. I don't think they want any part of three more years after this year of Paul George. He's hit point already unless he can show on a basketball court that he's better than that.

Because right now, we're not seeing it. I didn't like when he complained about playing the five when it beats out, and he said, This is just not that fun for me. You're trying to win games, you're 15 and 24, maybe do whatever it could take to make the team better. Rough signing. So you have that. The nick Ners thing has gone terribly, and I am not ruling him out for the Amazon NBA Studio show next season. I think he's got to be in there. Embiid, this is the big thing. Thirteen games, 389 minutes this year. For his career, he's missed 404 games now, and he's played 446. He's edging toward 50/50, I played or I didn't play for my entire career. They had a 4-5 this week. That was the biggest stretch of their He's in playing all playoff teams, all really good teams. He missed the first two. We'll see what happens with the others. He's got knee stuff plus a foot thing, and it just doesn't seem like it's going to happen again in the same way. I remember Goldsbury asked me earlier in the air, is he in a 2008 Shaq stage?

Embiid. 2008 Shaq played. He was, I think, third-team on VA. Embiid doesn't play. When you miss 404 games over the course of 11 years, yikes. When he did play, offensively, it looks great, can still get to the free throw line, can still make that little 20-footer at the top of the key. It's still big and huge. He falls down all the time, falls down more than ever. I think his fall down per 48 minutes is the highest it's ever been. The thing that was really alarming with him was the Golden State game a couple of weeks ago. I'm not sure if you guys saw it, but Golden State was just doing the thing where everybody's cutting and moving and passing and the ball's flying around. They're doing a 2014 Spurs thing. And Embiid was wandering around like a drunk guy outside of the bar at 2:15 in the morning trying to keep up with it. If you watch that one game, you would say to yourself, It is impossible to think that this team could win four straight play-off rounds, which if they make the play-offs now, they'd have to win at least one play-in game, maybe two.

They'd have to play Cleveland in round one Then you'd have to play the winner of whoever the four or five is, and then the Knicks, Celtics would be waiting in the... I mean, there's no way. I was thinking, the Knicks who They always had this relationship with Embiid, with Leon Rose and West, and those were his guys. It was always like, Well, if he ever gets unhappy in Philly, the Knicks will trade for him. Can you imagine if the Knicks went all in for Embed last summer? Instead of getting towns and bridges, they basically took all those assets and just had Embed. Then what happened with Embed this year, 13 games, 389 minutes, was happening in New York after they had this super fun team last year. It's a bullet dodge, my friends. Anyway, they are number 23, and I think we can cross them off as a title contender. I'm ready to do that. New Orleans, up to 22. They're 10 and 32. We knew they would be a what the fuck happened in that team in the West, and they're the team. They had a stretch where their body language was the worst in the league.

Their home court, when they do the wide shot, all the seats in mid-court, maybe one-third of them are full. The energy is just super Super, super weird. They should probably be doing everything possible to suck at this point. And yet, when you watch them, which I've watched a couple of games, they've turned in a really fun League Pass team. Trey Murphy is playing great. Zion's back, Murray's back. They're a good team when everybody's playing. They're not a great team, but they're a good team. You would think they were like a 6-10 playoff seat potentially with everybody. They haven't had anybody. But they're 10 and 32. I don't know what the move is because it's really hard for them to tank when they have as many good players as they do. One thing they got to get credit for, they just nail their draft pick every year. Messi has a chance to win Rooky of the Year this year. Every year, it seems like they hit their pick. Trey Murphy, who they just resigned, but Hawkins. I like all these guys. They have a bunch of trade assets. Ingram, 36 million expiring. Zion, 36.7 with outs every year.

Mccollum, 33 and 30.6. Sorry, CJ, for mentioning you in a trade rumor. Murray, 29.5. They have moves. I just don't know what the move is. My guess is they'll probably limp along for the next month and try to figure out what they are and if they keep winning games, maybe start trying to talk to into or run at the 10 seed, which would be insane. But what else are you going to do? You have all these good basketball players who are trying to play hard. This is a team to watch. It's a team to watch from a spoiler standpoint, from a trade machine standpoint, and then the Zion piece of it where he goes away for four, five, six weeks, whatever it was, comes back and looks really good. It doesn't look fat or out of shape, and you're like, Whoa, this is going great. Then the story comes out, they have to suspend him because he's repeatedly late to practice and stuff, and you just got this guy just never, ever going to get it. I would still trade for him if I was a team like San Antonio. We'll get to that in a second.

Next category, The Trade Machine Heroes. Phoenix, number 21. They're 19 and 20. Their last 15 games, they're basically 22nd net, 26 defense for points per 100% of possessions. This team is just not good. You can talk Walk yourself into, Oh, they just got a little bit... I don't see it. I watch them play whoever, and I'm very invested in them because this is going to be probably the first FanDuel Superboost we've lost since 2020. We thought they were going to get 47 plus wins. We thought they were going to shoot a bunch of threes. Brusillo House and I were all aligned on it. Then you watch them and I just don't see it. They can't rebound. They can't protect the rim. The guys don't seem like they like playing with each other. You watch them play a team, I don't know, pick a bad team. They'll play Charlotte or Washington or whoever. You're watching the back and forth, you're like, I'm not sure they're much better than this other team. The league is just really good and really deep. What's funny, Katie and Booker are both over 36 minutes a game, and they've actually had them for most of the year.

It's a team that makes more sense on paper in 2017 than in 2025 when you need depth. They just threw away depth. The build The Beale Trade was Chris Paul, Shamet, 2024, '26, '28, '30, first-round swaps with Washington in a bunch of seconds for Beel. It was a terrible trade when it happened. I hated it. I thought they left themselves with no outs. I was not a giant Beale guy. Now he's at 50, 53.7, and 57 million for this year and the next two with a no trade clause, and they can't trade him. He knows they can't trade him. I'm not sure he gives a They have Nerkich at 18 and 19. They have Grace and Allen at basically 16 this year, and then three more years after that. Those are their trade assets. Nobody wants Beale. Nobody. Not one team. I don't know what they do. I do know this. I was thinking about the worst big threes of all time because we did use the big three. I didn't, but we used the big three word with Durant and Booker and Beale. This is up there for worst big three of all time.

But I think the as much as I love Steve Nash, is Kobe and Dwight and Nash, that one year at the Lakers when people were calling them the big three, and then Nash was like his body just completely broke down. Kobe hated Dwight. That's probably our worst big three. You could talk me into LeBron and AD and Russ. Some people try to get it going when Russ and Paul George and Carmelo were on the same team that one year. But this is like a possible Mount Rushmore, Oh, my God, I can't believe we called them the Big Three situation. It's also another unhappy Kevin Durant team. We have the 2019 Warriors, unhappy. 2022 and '23 nets, unhappy, unhappy. 2024 sons, unhappy. 2025 sons, currently unhappy. I'm just flagging it. Maybe it's a coincidence. One more other thing with them. Bill keeps being mentioned in trades as if anyone's trading for him. It's like, Well, Jimmy Butler really wants to to Phoenix. Cool. You're going to have to trade Kevin Durant or Devon Booker for Jimmy Butler because you're not getting him for Bradley Bill. Nobody wants that contract. Nobody wants Bradley Bill. I think he's the number one trade asset you don't want in the entire league.

Sorry, Bradley Bill, but it's true. The Suns are the guy in your fantasy league who text you and tries to trade you DeAndre Swift for Brock Bowers. Hey, I see you need a running back. What about Swift for Bowers? And you're just like, Dude, stop. Nobody wants Beale. There's Nobody wants Nerkage. It's like, yeah, you're not getting Vusovitch for Nerkage in a couple of number two. Stop. It's not happening. The whole league is annoyed by the Suns. It's a really important point. Everyone in the league is like, Ishmael is just on a bender, and this team is insane. And stop calling us. Miami at number 20, speaking of Bradley Beale. They're 20 and 19. It's weird. In the top half of the league, in offense and defense, they're an awesome Tyler Hero year, who at the end of some of these games has really been a pretty special offensive player. Sometimes you catch a certain heat game with two minutes left, and he's just slicing and dicing somebody. I think that's one of the reasons Butler might not have been 100% happy with this Miami situation because when you watch him, there's games where Hero just seems like a way better option at the end of games.

Bam's offensively is just taking a huge step back, and I don't really know whether it's an aberration or what's going on there, but it's worth mentioning that I don't think he's as big of an asset as he was last year. Maybe he'll come back. But if you don't get a star back in a Jimmy Butler trade, what's the point of this team? Because your top two is Bam and Hero. Congratulations. I don't know where that's getting you with the way the league is now, with how deep and awesome it is. With Jimmy, no deal works with Houston and Memphis because they don't want them. Dallas or Milwaukee, they don't have anything they could trade back. Sacramento, there's like a Derozen Herder, Trey Liles or Keegan Murray. But if I'm Sacramento, I don't want to deal with Jimmy Butler and trade for him, and then he's unhappy in Sacramento, and then he's opting in for 50 plus next year. I'm not doing that. Denver, I don't think Miami takes Michael Porter Jr. Plus Nagi, which I think that that would basically have to be the trade. I'm also not I'm sure Jimmy Butler solves whatever issue Denver has because they're already like, shaky enough with three-point shooting, and then they're going to get rid of Michael Porter Jr.

I don't like that trade for anybody. Plus, Denver is playing better. Phoenix, they're not taking Beal. Golden State's not trading. Wiggins, Encomming, Bingo and other stuff for Jimmy Butler. If I'm Miami, I'm not trading Jimmy unless I can get Zion in a three-way, I mean, a basketball three-way. Ingram and McCollum together from New Orleans with Butler and Rajeev going out, I would consider that. I don't know why New Orleans would do that. Tobias Harris and Tim Hardaway expiring, plus maybe a protected pick from Detroit. It's a little more interesting Because Kate has become a top 20 player in the league. If you're the Pistons, you could just basically make a 30 cents in the dollar trading against Jimmy Butler and hope that he's excited for the next year and a half. Paul George mentioned earlier, no way. Then there's maybe a trade where you just get cap space back. But I thought for sure Jimmy Butler was going to get traded. Then the more I sniffed around, talked to different people, tried to figure out the trades, I don't think there's a trade. I don't know what happens here. Maybe there's a surprise team like, Oh, my God, the Pistons traded for him.

There's one team coming up later that we'll mention for this, but I'm really having trouble, and I'm the Trade Machine, We'll take a break and we'll finish the power pull right after this. Sometimes in basketball, 30 points could be worth more than 30 points. And now you can get a 30% profit boost from The Ringer with FanDuel's 30 on 30 during Friday's NBA action. That's right, The Ringer, teaming up with America's number one sportsbook to give you a 30% profit boost. When you either pick up player to score more than 30 points or bet on our new exclusive 30 on 30 special markets like any game to have both teams score 30 plus points in the first quarter. Looking at the Friday slate, I would target Shay on OKC going against Dallas, the team that knocked him out in the playoffs last year to get a little revenge 30 plus. You can go there, look at all the matchups, pick whatever you want. Ride with that pick, make your own. Look for 30 on 30 in the FanDuel Sportsbook app or head to fanduel. Com/bs for your choice to score a bigger payout this Friday.

Don't miss your chance to find out how much more 30 can be worth with FanDuel's 30 on 30. Must be 21 plus in present in select states or 18 plus in present in DC. Opt-in required. Bonus issued as non-admirable profit boost tokens. Restrictions apply, including any token expiration and max wage or amount. See terms at sportsbook. Fielder. Com. Get in problem call when Gamble or visit rg-help. Com. All right, next category for the power poll is the feel good upstarts. That can only be the Detroit Pistons. I had the number 19th, the 21 and 19. They had a huge bummer with Jade and Ivy getting hurt, which a game that I was actually watching when it happened in a play that the guy diving for the loose ball goes into the side of somebody's leg that you just think would happen more often in the NBA, never does. Then when it happens, it's awful. But that was a bummer because they were really starting to figure out something with him and Kade. I really liked when he would come set to pick for Kade, and they would do this small man's pick and roll thing.

Kade is basically 24, 7, and 10, and he's 45%, 38% from three. He's going to be on the All-Star team, and he's turned into an awesome asset. We were unclear the first couple of years, especially with the way the team was losing. But I am willing to redo now my number one pick since Tim second list where there's eight definitive nos. You would not take this guy again. Aten, Fultz, Simmons, Bennett, Oden, Bargnani, Kwame Brown, Ola O'Candy. I still can't believe Ola O'Candy went first. The late '90s were for basketball content. I really wish I had a bigger audience back then. The list, there's seven guys: Zion, Wiggins, Wall, Bogot, Kmart, Elton Brand. I'm going to put Risa Shay in there, too, because I like Risa Shay. He's 19. We have no idea what's going to happen. But that's a... You can see it. There's a case for it. Some of those guys like Zion and maybe even Wiggins, maybe the next five years will even boost them into the yes category. Then the YES guy, you would take this again. When Mby, Paolo, Edwards. Three great ones, three great number one overall picks there.

Anthony Davis, Kyrie, Blake Griffin, Derrick Rose, Dwight Howard, LeBron, Yau. That was 10 the last time I did this. We have two additions. I think Karl Anthony Towns is officially a yes. He's been a really good number one overall pick, especially the fact that he was part of a really good Minnesota team last year that almost made the finals. Then this year, one of the best 12 players in the league so far. He's in there. Then I think Kate is a yes, though. I think when you think about, did that number an overall pick? Did that work? Did that work? Did that not work? He definitely 100% worked. Kudos to him. I'm still interested to see what they do with Tobias Harris and Hardaway as Trade Bay because you can get to 41 million with them. They also have this 14 million under the cap situation. There's a lot of fun stuff they can do, and the fact that they're over 500 even without Ivy in an Eastern conference that has been pretty weird. I'd like to see them do something. All right, next team, Sacramento number 18. They are 20 and 20. This team would have been a three seed six years ago, and now they have a fired coach, and I don't know what the hell they are.

They fired Mike Brown. They lost the first game. They won a couple of goofy games that they shouldn't have won, and now got the momentum, and now all of a sudden, the vibes are good. It's like, See, that's why we fired Mike Brown. I'm not sure that was the difference. Obviously not in the locker room, but I just think they had some bad luck earlier in the season, and they got some better luck later. Now the Rosen's starting to look better. Fox missed a couple of games. I was watching them because House and Sal and I and Hinch, we did a parlay over under wins total bet three weeks ago, and one of them was Sacramento under. I think it was 42 wins. We were like, Sacramento, this team is falling apart. Then they fired the coach five days later, and now it's coming with Doug Christie, former star of basketball. I don't know what happens with them. I'll tell you this, though. There was a moment with the Kings where it felt like they were full kangs. You go, they're 13 coaches in 20 years. They had that They played the beam season, then they over extended Sabonis.

They did the Barnes extension. Vizenkoff, that signing was terrible. They blew Devon Carter pick. They did the Rosendaal, and it was just like, Oh, the Kings are back. But now they're playing well, so I don't know. I'm sure their fans are confused, too. Interesting play in team, by the way, because Fox and Sabonis, they have two of the top 25 guys in the league, so I'm not positive I would want to see them in 8, 9 game. Lakers, I have 17, 21 and 17. They're still on the bottom 10 in the league on defense. They're in the bottom five in the league rebounding. Two things that scare me. There was a Dallas game last week when Dallas abused Austin Reeves to the point that I thought Reeves' corner was going to throw in the towel. That's the rub with this Lakers team is that any smart team can just attack them defensively. It's like, Pick your guy. Do you want to attack Reeves? Oh, Connect's out there. Let's attack him. Oh, LeBron's decided not to move around on defense today. Let's just start doing back cuts and making him move around. They're just too easy to score on.

I like the Finnie Smith trade, though. Max Christie's playing better, and I don't dislike the roster. I think they have real issues that are going to surface in the playoffs. But as a regular season team, especially when LeBron plays well or Davis plays well in any given game, it feels like they can beat just about anybody except for seven teams. But for the most part, this team, not even close to being a contender to me. It would be a miracle if they won one round. The LeBron plus minus stuff is pretty strange. I did that a week ago, I looked it up. He had the worst plus minus of anyone who's playing 30 minutes or more in a winning team. It was minus 6.2. It's mostly the defense. But if I were them, if Jeanie Buss asked me what to do, I would tell them not to trade any assets. I don't understand the point of doing that. There's no scenario where they make the finals. There's no trade out there that would put them in the final. Golden State, number 16, probably in a similar situation. I think the difference is they're in top five defensive rating.

They have a bunch of tradable stuff, and they desperately need a second score. You could see a world where if they got a second guy who could up out Steph, maybe they become frisky or they're well Coached. They have a lot of continuity together. The problem is if you get somebody like Jimmy Butler, you're going to have to give up Wiggins in the trade. Now I'm losing stuff defensively. I'm losing other assets. The trade that makes sense to is Vucevic. It's made sense for, I would say, about a month and a half. It's basically, Looney can be any, makes eight million, Moses Moody, put Payton's expiring in there or another, it's Kyle Anderson, whatever you need to do. Throwing a pick and just add Vucevic and have him playing off with Curry. I think somebody told me this, Curry's never had a stretch five in his entire career. Every guy the league has played with somebody a three who could make a three, and he's just never had it. Curry's had an interesting point in his career because they've cut his minutes down on 31 minutes a game. His per 36 is still right around where you want it to be.

He's 26 a game, 45%, 42% from three. But I did my Ringer 100, and I couldn't justify putting him in the top 10 anymore, at least right now. It could change in a month. But if he's your best player on a team and the supporting cast is solid, you're just not a contender. When I did my top 100, I had Jokuj first, Yana second, I put Shay third, Tatum Luca, fifth for now because he's hurt and there's durability stuff with him that I'm not positive about. I have Wemby, sixth, Davis, seventh, Mitchell, eighth, Brunson, 9, Edwards, 10, Curry 11. Curry versus Edwards and Brunson, I think, is the big question there. But those guys are just more reliable night to night at this point. Curry is 36. It's just the way it is. If it was one game with my life on it, it's a different question. But if we're talking about a regular season, I don't see how he's in the top 10 right now. That could change. Next category, the Young & Funds. By the way, Golden State, this is not the Jimmy Butler team for me. Not worth it. The Young and Funs.

I only have one team in this, Atlanta. I have them 21 and 19. They got Trey going a little bit. We talked about Trey a month ago. He's up to 23 a game, 12 assists. His shooting percentages are up a little bit. He's had some good games when other guys weren't playing, you can see, Oh, this is a game I get to shoot 33 times. I still really like this team as a stealth. You You'll beat them in round one, but it's probably not going to be that easy. Their three-point shooting is the thing that's been really hurtful to them. Daniel is 31%, Risa Shay, 28, Jalen Johnson, 32, Bogdanavich, 34, not as high as these guys used to be. I'm still in on these guys. They've never had all their guys together for more than two weeks. When everybody comes back, I don't think they're a trade team to try to get a better asset. But I think they're going to be around 44, 45 wins. That's where I have them penciled in, just because the East is going to really start tanking. That brings to the next category, secretly scary Round 1 opponents.

You could talk yourself in Atlanta being there, but Indiana number 15, definitely. They're 22 and 19. They're 11th in pace this year. They were second last year, so they're a little slower. I think that's Seahcrum related. They're ninth in offense this year. They were second last year. But the last 15 games, they're fourth in offense. They've had no knee Smith for 35 games. Hal Burns had a weird year, and every time it seems like he gets gone, something happened, he just hurt his ham string. In general, I like this team, and I like what I've seen from Walker the last couple of weeks from them. I want to see this team in March. This team is like a pause button. Let's see what you look like on March 10th. Then San Antonio is the other team like that. They're 19 and 20. They're always hanging around these games, and they haven't quite figured out how to close them. I think last night was a really good example. Again, against Memphis, which was an awesome game. They played the most fun game of the season against Denver a couple of Fridays ago. That was the, Wemby is officially here.

We knew he was already here, but he's officially here now game where Jokuj praised them afterwards and talked about how he was generationally special. Really cool moment. Wemby is 25, 11, 4 assists, 4 blocks of the game. Their defense is sixth in the last 15, which is why you have to consider them a scary playoff team. Wemby We should have a different Defensive Player of the Year award now because he should just get it every year. We should actually have the number two guy should get a separate award. Nobody has ever win this award again as long as until Wemby is 35, assuming he stays healthy. I was talking about him with somebody yesterday. He's a foot longer than everybody realizes when they're playing. One of the most fun things about watching him is every game, there's four or five moments where somebody is in the paint and they think they're going to get him, or they think they're going to shoot a floater, or they think they're going to get a layup past them, and they just forget he's got this extra foot that his body goes up. They're always like, oh. Even as they're shooting it, he's going up and they're realizing mid-shot, oh, God, he's going to block this.

They can't stop it because their body has already committed to it. But the fact that he's growing like he is, which is not surprising. Then Castle has shown some stuff like he did last night against Memphis. Castle, I think the second half of the year is worth watching as what's his ceiling. This is a terrifying round one team. I don't want to see Wendby in a series, period. There was a play last night in the fourth quarter where he ended up with the ball on the left side of the foul line, where if he turned into the paint, he could have shot a jump hook. He never goes there. He's always around the three-point line. They always run stuff with them 25 feet from the basket. In this play, he had the ball because a play broke down, and they gave it to him in the top of the foul line. The other team immediately panicked. The point guard came down and doubled him. Then he turned into the lane. The third guy came in, so now he's being triple-teamed. Then somebody back cut, and he was able to pass the guy and get a layup.

It made me think, when he realizes that the foul line is where he needs to be, that's his spot. The The same way Nowitzky realized it, the same way Duncan figured out his spot. I talked about this with Kurt Goldsbury a couple of weeks ago. What are his spots on the floor? That left side of the foul line where he can turn and he can either shoot a little 15-footer or he can put his head down into the paint, jump hook, or pass to a cutter, but everything is coming with his right-hand. He can hold the ball up like it's a fucking grape. That's the key to Wemby, I think, going forward If he figures out that spot, plus he has the top of the key and the ability to shoot threes, those two things combined, I just think he's going to be an absolute bitch in the play-out. I'll tell you something else. This is the number one, holy shit, I can't believe they traded for Jimmy Butler team, where the Spurs just say, Fuck it. This guy's the sixth best guy in the league. Maybe we should see what's up. Would they do that with their culture?

I don't know. This is also a holy shit they traded for Zion team, which if I was the Spurs, that would be the guy I targeted. Bring him into our organization, our culture. Put him with Wemby. Now this is the most terrifying circle on anyone's schedule. It's like, Oh, my God. We have to play Wemby and Zion today. All right, next category, Puncher's Chance. Mississippi I can't rule them out yet. They're 21 and 19. I have them 12. They're up to fifth in defense. They were first last year, but now they're fifth, so that's better. Here's the thing. They finally realized something that I I've touted on this podcast many, many times over the years and in my column, and it's something I just instinctively believe in. Just play your best five guys. Stop worrying about positions. We need somebody who's... People always do this with point guards where it's like, Well, that guy looks like a point guard. Mike Conley, Godspeed, great career, really enjoyed him. Incredible teammate. Everybody loves him. It's over. It happens. This is what happens to point guards. He's done. It's a wrap. They realized a couple of weeks ago, we should just play DiFrancenzo and not have a point guard.

Difrancenzo is reinvested and has been playing really well, and they're playing better There's a Conley with Randall that can get them to about 43 million. They'd have to take somebody back who makes less than that. I don't know if they'd even trade Conley. There's no trade for him straight up because he's got another year after this But there's still a move with them, and part of that move has to be maybe get Julius Randall out of here. The thing with the towns trade, which I think has just worked out horribly for them. And this was the worst case scenario of the trade, which was that it boxed them in. Nobody really wants Randall. Now they had to resign Conley. Nobody wants him. But it was a financial trade. It's yet another reason why Glenn Taylor is one of the five worst NBA owners we've had. The move to Trade towns and then extend Gobert to try to get him on a cheaper deal was just a fucking double whammy. You can't bounce back from that. The lesson, as always, is A-Rod is a loser. The Sleeper, number 11, Orlando. They're 28th offensively. There's only two teams in the league worse per 100 possessions than Orlando.

And yet, they're four games over 500, their defense and their camaraderie and they're feisting and their competitiveness has just carried them in all these games. They're opposing rebounding. They're first. Teams are only 40.6 rebounds a game against them. They're dominating the boards. They're great against the three. Teams are 31% against them with the three. They get steals, they get all this stuff. The zombie magic. Unfortunately, they can't shoot and they can't score. Palo came back. Franz is eventually coming back, and nobody wants to play this team. They're six Seed, seven seed, eight seed. I don't want to see them. If the Celtics are the three seed and Orlando is the six seed, I'm bummed. That's a really hard team to play. It did make me think, though, this is a good example of NBA depth being deeper in a significant way than it was 13 years ago. You're talking about players like 75 to 300 are so much better than they were in the early 2010s. They have the Silva, Oh, what's Let's just throw him in. He's not even playing. Now he's in there and we're going to him in crunch time. But Tadzie, I think that's how you say his name.

Isaac, Cole Anthony, Anthony Black. These guys are all good. I was looking at the 2012 Celtics, a team that was up 3-2 in the Eastern Conference Finals with a chance to go to the finals. This was their 5-10 guys in that series. Michael Petras, Brandon Bass, Keion Dooling, Marquise Daniels, Cribsma, Greg Steamsma, and Ryan Holland. That was our bench. The league is way better now. Number 10, the Clippers. Still can't get a feel for if this team is a contender or not. They're the League's best coach, solid team. The bottom seven offense, top five defense. They have a pretty good homecourt advantage now. They have Kawhi, at least at the point where I'm interested to see where it is in March and April. They have this Norm Powell jumping from 14 points a game to almost 24 at age 31, which I think we need a new award. I would get rid of clutch player. I never know how to vote that. I would replace it with the Tommy from Goodfellas. Look at this fucking guy. That would be my award. Norm Powell would win because I have no idea how we went from 14 to 24, but we did.

Harden is interesting because on the one hand, he's one of the reasons that they've overachieved. On the other hand, a lot of his best games seem to come against shit defenses or mediocre teams. Then the worst games, if you really watch carefully, it's against Houston, OKC, San Antonio, Boston, Minnesota. There's some fool's gold with the Harden He's 35% from three, 44% on twos. He seems like he's the same, but he's not. He can still give you a good quarter, but not a whole game. They really need Kawhi back for me to take them seriously. That's the last noncontender for me until we see with Kawhi. All right, next group, definitely lurking. Milwaukee, I have them ninth, 21 and 17. They still have Yannis. That's it. They're shooting threes way better than I think anyone expected. They're in the top three there. Really good in corner threes. I don't want to see them in the play-offs, if that's okay, because that's the 3-6, possibly if it's Boston, Milwaukee. I don't want to see Milwaukee. I don't want to see Orlando. Actually, the way Boston's playing, I don't want to see anybody, but they're lurking. Dallas is lurking.

I'm not willing to make any big judgment with Dallas. Luka has missed 19 games. Kyrie with some back stuff that's a little scary because he's been in the league for a while and he's a guard, and I always worry about aging guards sitting there early mid This is a let's see in March team for me. Also not a lot of moves, but Luca turns 26 next month. Let's point that out. Usually, you have your apex season, age 27, age 28. We're in range, and it's not this year, but it's a wait and see team for me. Then Houston, number seven. You could talk me in Houston being fifth. You could talk me in them being 12 because I don't think there's an extra gear I think they're here, and they're here every game. When we get to the playoffs, they're still going to be here. They don't have the ability to do this because offensively, it's just too choppy. They're really keeping their fingers crossed with Jalen Green now. I watch a lot of Houston. I really, really, really like watching Houston. We're going to talk about Joe Anderson in a second. But the Jalen Green piece is the piece.

43% field goal, 35% threes, 2.6 assists, 4.2 free throw attempts. I'm just reading those stats because this is your crunch time guy, and the odds are he's not going to score or create a shot from somebody else in the biggest moments of the game. That's one. At least not yet. He's young. Maybe it's in there. Then Van Bietz, the other one who's 15 points a game, six assists. His clutch numbers are probably the worst in the league. Those are their two options at the end of the game. It just turns into a rock fight. The rock fight recipe, their third to last in three-point shooting, 28th. They're first in rebounds. It's just a rut. You watch the last five minutes and it's like watching '90s basketball again. Could they turn VanVleet and a bunch of stuff into Fox? I don't I'm Sacramento. If I'm Sacramento, I'm not trading Fox, but that's the only way this changes, I think. Otherwise, I'm fine. Joel and I talk about it in the next segment. I'm fine with Houston. Just, Hey, this is great. We're a top four seed. Let's see what happens in the playoffs. Let's see if Jalen Green has another gear.

Let's see what Schengen can do. Jabbari Smith. Let's just see what this looks like for a year, and then we'll decide in July who we are. I think that's the move. The contenders. I have six contenders. Number one is Texas, who's top seven offense defense. Brandon Clark is back. Angry Jaws back. Duncan on Wemby last night, even though it didn't count, still fun. Their bench is just... I've never seen anything like this bench. Brandon Clark Huff, Aldama, Wells, Cunard, Eedy, Leravia, Pippen. Sometimes a couple of those guys will start, but they just can survive and injure anybody in the team for a week, and you don't even notice. The Leravia contract was weird where they did the Jalen Smith thing, didn't renew it. Now, I guess he's a trade piece, but he's playing really well. I want to shout out Wells. I used to do when my fingers worked and I had a column, I used to have my Bill Simmons All-stars for random guys in the league I just love. I love Wells. Wells, watch Memphis and watch if the other team has a really good swing. Wells is a lot But a lot of times the guy guard in the swing and really being a pain in the ass.

But that guy, there's something there with Wells. That's why when you think about, I've heard Cam Johnson mention with them, and they could easily trade Marcus Smart and Leravia for Cam Johnson throwing some pics and improve that Marcus Smart stuff. I would want to see what I have with these guys for another couple of weeks before I think about a trade. The team seems like they have good chemistry. They really like each other. There's a regular season versus playoff's conundrum with them, that the team in the regular season is perfect with the depth. But in the playoffs, when the same team is seeing you six, seven times in two weeks, is there an extra gear? It's the same issue Houston has. Marant plays three, DMP, plays five, misses eight, plays one, DMP, plays five, DMP, plays two and a half, gets hurt, DMP, plays three, misses five. He's just not on the floor enough, and that's why it's the hardest to take them seriously when we have to think about, can they win four straight play our friends? We do not have evidence that Marant can play for two months in a row. Until we do, I have them as a pseudo contender.

I do want to mention, Jaron Jackson has been awesome this year, and I loved watching him go at Wemby last night. He's one of those guys who, when he's going against Sabonis, Davis, Wemby, you really could see him being like, I'm taking the challenge tonight. Denver, number five. Let's go. Jokeage, 24 and 16, fourth in offense. Their three-point shooting is still abysmal. They're bottom three in the league. But Murray is starting to show signs. As always, online criticism works. No. Tv criticism, maybe that works. Well, Murray does look a little bit better. Jokuj has been... They're 25 plus points better when he's out there versus when he's not out there. The Wemby-Jokuj battle two Fridays ago was the highlight of the year. He's doing stuff offensively that doesn't seem conceivable. It seems like it's out of the 1962 season. Right now, I don't think he's the MVP because of what SGA is doing and what he means to that OKC team. But what's changed is now they're a top four seed, and whatever happens these next two months, maybe he can play himself in that combo. They have a GM and coach that famously doesn't seem great.

I've heard that they don't talk. I find that hard to believe, but it's the worst kept secret in the league. There was a thing where they presented Malone with some win staying, and Calvin Booth is the GM, and he presented this Jersey. I was studying the clip because I was like, I thought these guys didn't interact. I love that Russell Westbrook is relevant on this team. They really needed him. They needed him when Murray was flaming out a little bit there for a while. They needed him in days when Aaron Gordon, when he got hurt for... They just needed his energy, his rebounding, how weird he is, the fact that he just puts up stats. He's been really good for them. I think he's been way outkicked as coverage of what they ever could expect with Westbrook. But I wrote down, putting him on this Jokuj team, I'm not sure if it's like Daniel Day-Lewis in an Apatau Comedy or Will Farrell in a Paul Thomas-Henderson movie. But it's so I'm into it. It's just constantly weird. There's a lot of no, no, no Russ shots with three minutes left where he just decides, I'm going to take this corner three.

But he plays really hard, and it really seems like Jokuj likes him. So I think he's been a bonus. I think he's saved them in some respects because he's not afraid and he puts up stats. Number four, the Knicks. The town's trade is just amazing. Just an incredible trade. I know their defense dropped, but just when you think the two assets they gave up versus the one they got back and how great he's been. It's an amazing trade. 25 and 14, 55%, 45% from three. Really has a chance if we were doing the old school, Center forward guard for all NBA, really has a chance to be second-team all NBA. Might make second-team all NBA anyway. I think I'd rather have him than Anthony Davis at this point, as crazy as that sounds. He's younger and I just think he's more impactful day-to-day. The Tiff stuff is the thing to watch, the minutes that he's putting on these dudes. Last night, overtime, he's just hard-played 49 minutes. Brunson's playing 40 plus minutes in really hard games and also doing two-thirds of the stuff offensively, and I just feel like he's going to burn these dudes out.

As a Celtics fan, this is where I take my basketball analyst part out. Just as a Celtics fan, please, Tib, continue to play these guys 40 plus minutes a game. Thank you. The Celtics, number Three, 28 and 12, second offense, 6 defense. Started out 16 and 3. They were seven and seven in their last 14 games. So what's going on? Well, You win the title and it could go one of two ways. Either you have a huge chip on your shoulder and it's like, We got the Bullseye, come get us, and you just kick everyone's ass. That would be like the 92 Bulls. Or then the more typical way it goes is you got a little bit of an on-off switch. You feel like you can still turn it on and it's going to be there when it needs to be there. The Celtics had a road trip the other night where the first two games were Houston and Minnesota, and they just played really well. It was one of those road trips where it's like, All right, we still got it. Then they immediately fell apart after and lost some games. They're losing games at home.

They're not shooting nearly as well. Last year, they were 39% on threes and 49% just field goal in general. So very close to where Cleveland is this year. This year, they're 46 and 36. So it's not dramatic, but it's a little dramatic. It's three points a game. They don't rebound as well as they did last year. They were second in rebounding last year. They're ninth this year. Tatum has a way bigger rebounding burden than he used to. White has just really fallen off the last 20 games, and I think he's hurt. And I think he's been hurt for a month plus. And I just think he's playing hurt because he was incredible the first five weeks, and he hasn't been. Drew's older, If Drew was a little more hit or miss than maybe he was last year. I'm still not worried, but what worries me is this. Last year was a cakewalk to the finals. It wasn't their fault. It was just the way it played out. If they fought it with three seed, potentially that's Milwaukee or Orlando on round one. Milwaukee is Giannis. Orlando potentially defensively could be a real issue for them, especially if you watch the stagnant Celtics offense lately.

Knicks round two, not having home court. Cleveland One round three, no home court. It's like night and day compared to last year. There's stuff... Kp is just coming back in a real way. Tatum has been stupendous. Fifth in scoring, 18th in rebounding, plays his ass off every night, plays defense. He's just a top five guy in the league by any calculation. Jalen's shooting numbers are down. It's all little stuff, and I'm willing to say it's more the camp of we won last year, we're hibernating until the playoffs. I don't love it, though, with the younger team, and I don't love the white stuff at all. I want to really know what's going on with them. The schedule is rough. They really need that two-seed. If I'm the Knicks, If I'm the Knicks, I'm playing Jalen Brunson in the heart, 48 minutes a game trying to get that two-seed. I think that's what they should do. Wink, wink. Cleveland, number two, 34 and five. First offense, 10. They're basically the 2021 Celtics. They've basically recreated what that Celtics team was. They're 50% on field goals, 40% from threes. They can play defense. The Celtics had those two forwards that were a huge mismatch for everyone, Brown and Jalen.

The Cavs more have that same thing with the yards with Mitchell and Garland. What's crazy is they really, really, really played the minute stuff well. Mitchell is 31 a game, Moby is 30 and a half, Garland is 30.3, and Allen is 29. And what's their record? 34 and 5. Those guys are sitting for one-third of every game. They're killing teams. It's very similar to Boston last year. I said this a couple of weeks ago. I'll say it again. I take them really seriously. I do not think this is a regular season team. I think they're really good. I think Mitchell is ready for a bigger moment. Mitchell, if you're doing a draft of all the guys this year, when we get to the playoffs who might have started here and went up to here, like Jalen Brown last year, Mitchell is the number one candidate, and I would have Wemby number two. Just while we're here, things you're not allowed to say on pregame shows about Cleveland or OKC anymore. People got to start talking about SGA. We're talking. People got to start realizing how good Donovan Mitchell is. We We are. People got to start talking about Jalen Williams.

We are. People got to start talking about Evan Mobley. We are. People got to give more props to the job Sam Presty has done. We have. People got to take OKC more seriously. We are. They're the favorites on Fandil, which takes me to OKC, the favorite, 33 and 6. First in defense by a lot. This is one of the great defenses regular season-wise. Anyone has put together. They forced turnovers at an absurd rate. Everybody seems to... The only real weakness they have is opponents can rebound on them a little bit. They've shown the ability to come back in games from double digits. They did against Minnesota and the Clippers and the Knicks and the Celtics, which I think is significant. Chet, I don't know when he comes back, but they're doing all this without Chet. When Chet comes back, this becomes a nightmare team. I don't think they make a trade. My guess is they don't. If they made a trade, they'd probably try to improve the Wiggan spot or the Isiah Joe spot. I just don't think Presty rolls that way. If you go back and you look at the KD Russ Harden era, Harden was really the only trade he made during a five, six year straight.

He did the Jeff Green Perkins. That was pretty early before they made the finals. Then he did the Hard and Trade, which was a financial trade. But for the most part, he's a continuity guy. I think they roll with what they have. Their playoffs could look like, round one, maybe it's San Antonio, maybe it's the Lakers, maybe it's the Kings or the Warriors. Round two, Denver or Dallas. Round three, Memphis or Houston. I don't see anybody beating these dudes. The biggest reason is SGA, who is out off of the following head-to-head just this season. 45 against Harden, 45 against Halliburton, 40 against Ant, 39 against Luca, 36 against LeBron, 35 against Curry, against Boston and Tatum, he did 33, 11, and 6. Played the Knicks twice, 39 and 33. Best player in the league this season. He's got to be the MVP because he's meant the most to the best team in the league. Now, you could say, Well, why didn't we do this with Tatum last year? He's just been more impactful day to day than Tatum I can't believe this is the guy I watched as a kid on the Clippers as a rookie.

I never in a million years would have thought that this would become one of the best, most creative scoring guards I've ever seen. Him and Brunson, watching those guys just over and over again get the shots they want and create the shots they want against these defenses that are designed to stop them is pretty nuts. Is it going to work in a series? It really depends on Jalen Williams. That's going to be it. It's because at some point during a seven-game series, you're going to try to take out SJ and you're going to send second guys in them, and you're going to make other team and you're going to make the three-point shooting beat you, and you're going to put the ball in the hands of Jalen Williams. You're going to put the ball in the hands of Jalen Williams and you're going to say, You know what, dude? Go for it. If you beat us, so be it. From what we've seen him in the playoffs last year and even in the NBA Cup this year, I'm not positive he can do it, but that's the play against them once we get to the playoffs.

They're the best team in the league. I think they have a legitimate chance at 70 wins because of their depth. Could they get to 70-12, 70-11? It's possible because night to night, game to game with how good their defense is and their scoring and their three-point shooting. I think they can get there. Anyway, that is our half-season power poll. Coming back, we're going to talk to Joel Anderson from the Ringer, and then eventually, Joel Anderson and Van Lathen about college football. See you in a second. All right, Joel Anderson is here. We have a whole long history. How many times did we almost work together before we actually decided to work together?

I definitely came down to the old studio in 2016, and you guys showed me around. I did the whole thing. We went to lunch, didn't we? Didn't we go to lunch that time, too?

I thought there was a 2014, too. Wasn't there a Grantland era? We definitely talked then. We talked in We talked in '20. We talked in '20. For whatever reason, it never worked out. Now, all of a sudden, you're with the Ringer, and we couldn't be happier.

Can I say something about that, too? Yeah. I was in between jobs a few months ago, and I was about to accept another offer. I reached out to Connor Nevens, people at the Ringer, though, Connor, because Connor was my editor at ESPN, and I was like, Hey, man, I got this offer, and it's It's exciting, but I just want to make sure that Bill, you got sure that this isn't going to work out. And Connor was like, Yeah, man, you should probably just go ahead. It's fine. Bill's busy or whatever. And so then I texted you right after that. I was like, I don't know if Connor's right about this. And you were like, What? I thought... And then everything started rolling, and here we are today.

It's so funny. Yeah, because we had talked, as usual. I probably forgot to follow up two weeks later. Anyway, it finally worked out. But we always felt like dating to the Grandland days, sports culture, real life stuff. We always like the people who dabbled into all these different circles. You're like the epitome of that. You care about all these different crazy, all the stuff you've done in the past. What was the best narrative podcast? What was the one you were proudest of, of all the stuff you did?

Oh, definitely Slover and 6 to LA Rides. Just because I was fascinated by LA as a city, and it emerged from my reporting on season three on Biggie and Tupac. I was just like, Oh, if I ever got a chance to tell that story, which is part of the reason 2020 got held up, right?

Yeah.

That got put in my face. I was like, Well, I have to do this. This is a passion project. Humanizing Rodney King, just talking about the divisions in the city, how it was more complicated than people thought. I couldn't wait to do that. That was probably the thing that I'm most proud of. I did a season on Clarence Thomas a couple of years later, which was more critically acclaimed, but my favorite is season 6 of Slow Burn, the LA Rides.

What was the most surprising thing you learned about Tupac and Biggie when you worked on that one?

I think the degree of intimacy between them. It makes sense in retrospect of how things got out of control. Because that hatred, that anger, only comes about when you know somebody and they're like your friend. They were really friends. Tupac had a lot to do with Biggie becoming a celebrity and getting accepted out on the West Coast. Tupac wanted to sign Biggie to his record label. But then Tupac was like, I don't know, this Diddy guy, Puffy, he knows what he's doing. You probably should stick with him. But we could collaborate.

Yeah, I mean... Right.

In some ways it worked and in some Anyways, it probably is best we didn't get to see how that was going to turn out in the end. But yeah, man. That part of it was the thing. I knew that they had been cool, but I didn't know how cool. That was a revelation. It explained a lot about what happened after once I learned that, I think.

How many years before somebody does the Drake-Kendrick version of that podcast? Do we need time to pass? What's the right amount of time to actually let everything settle and then dive into it?

Because in so much with, Drake is unsettled. We I don't know where he's actually going. He hasn't really released any music. He hasn't really presented himself in front of the public again. Actually, I'm fascinated by what Kendrick is going to do at the Super Bowl is the LA guy. He probably had one show in mind, and now, after all this, the events of the past week, I wonder if he's going to have to broaden it, a shift focus. But because of all that, because we haven't had, their careers haven't continued. Doesn't it have at least 10 years? Don't you think we got to give it 10 when Drake's almost 50?

Yeah. I don't know what the right level of distance is, and especially in the documentary era, it really feels like that shortened. The last dance to me, what was that? 22 years from the last season. That was the perfect amount of nostalgia time.

It really was.

Because you want people... You want them to have enough distance that they can really say shit after the fact in the interviews. The Last Dance is a good example. I've certainly had all that. But also, there's a whole new generation moving up that wants to learn more about it. I just feel like that window is shortened now. Now it's like 10, 12 years and not 20.

Absolutely. The thing is, and if you wait for too long, somebody else is going to do it and they may screw it up. Then it's like, well, you really don't want to go over that ground again. It's already out there, but then it's maybe not the ideal project at the end of the day. Wait, let me ask you about the last dance thing then. Yeah. Don't you think that they... I felt like because of all the fallout as a result of that. I don't know what the hell is going on with Scottie Pippen. Anytime I see Scottie Pippen in a video or a reel out, I feel sorry for him. I don't know how much of this emanates from what came out of The Last Dance or whatever, or he's gotten divorced, but I feel like they almost have to revisit and re-interview some of these people because I feel like there was a lot of fallout from The Last Dance. I feel like that story got sparked back up, and I need some closure in a lot of these things.

Yeah, I think Isaiah probably has more of a case for feeling like he was completely betrayed by it. He just comes off like the villain. Pippin is more complicated because they tell the whole story about 94 when MJ is gone and he doesn't want to come back in the game. That was a big part of his legacy. When I wrote about him in my book a million years ago, a lot of what I wrote in the Pippin part was about it's unfair that that moment framed his career when he was the most selfless teammate, awesome guy to play with, one of the best 30 players ever. But I think if you really watch the Last Dance Again, the last episode, it circles back and talks about how much pain he was in in the '98 Finals. But part of me wonders, did Pippin even finish it? Because by the end of it, it's heroic watching him go through this stuff. But I mean, big picture, what changed is I think people are Sports people are so much more hesitant down to be in docks unless it's about them, unless they're the stars. You don't want to be the bad guy in a sports doc.

I think the Isaiah thing, we dealt with it with the Celtics when we did this nine-part Celtics doc that's coming out in 2025. And 15 years ago, we would have gotten everybody. This time around, it's so much harder to get people.

Really? Yeah. Oh, man. You can't tell me who's been a source of frustration here then, Cam. Sadly, no.

But it's just, I think, the way it is going forward, because in the late 2000s, especially, nobody really knew what documentaries were. They weren't made like they are now, where it's like they're leading Netflix and they're leading HBO and whoever. So I think the stakes feel higher, and people either feel like if it's not about them or if they're not getting paid, they just don't want to be in it.

That was the big problem with the big E. I'll just admit this on your show here. I did not like Season 3 for Slow burn, like the Biggie and Tupac, because so much of it was people not wanting to talk. Because first of all, people have talked about Biggie and Tupac forever. Some people think they deserve their own documentary. And then, yeah, Other people are like, Why would I talk about this if I'm not getting paid? I feel like people have gotten attuned to the idea that, All right, well, I've got this information if you want it. I need something out of this for myself. Actually, though, now that you mentioned it, I would watch the Scottie Pippin documentary.

His whole background, which they went into a little in the last stance, but he was about as broke as it gets growing up as a kid. I think his dad basically couldn't work, was handicapped. That led to all the financial decisions he made were just trying to grab money, grab these extra long contracts where you're not getting paid. Never being able to bet on yourself because you needed money so bad. It was this eight-year spin cycle for him. Just bad contract after bad contract. Unfortunately, with sports, you make a couple of bad decisions, you can't get out of it. Now we have the NBA where you have Jimmy Butler or Bradley Beale stuck in situations they don't like, but they're making 50 million a year. So it's like, I don't really feel that bad for you.

I don't feel... Also, Jimmy, you could show up. You could play. You know what I mean? The thing... I call him Jimmy 6 Seed. I'm like, I can understand. I could understand the heaps problem here. They're like, Well, you want to just Coast through the regular season. Why don't you take the responsibility of leading us to homecourt advantage in the playoffs once? That would be cool. Wouldn't that be nice? Also, that would do the Arsons, whatever, a solid. I'm sure I would earn them a lot of money, too, for having playoff games in the first round.

It's such a mid-2020s thing where it's like, here on the one hand, I see the case for Jimmy. Brought the team to the finals in '20 and '23, was expecting them to make some upgrade. It's not Miami's fault. I don't think necessarily that Portland didn't want what they were offering for Dame Lillard, but they didn't get anybody else. So he's doing the, I'm not getting enough help thing. I see it. I also see the Miami side of like, we're paying you 50 million a year. You're the best guy in the team. We're paying you to be there for nine months a year. We don't want to have to wonder when you're playing or not, and why are you unhappy? It just feels like a bad marriage. It's the classic bad sports marriage.

Don't you think he would have been pissed if they had gotten Dame, too? Now that we've seen Dame, I'll go back to Dame, it was the Tokyo games. I remember thinking, Man, he looks not good out there. I liked it when they had Drew holiday out there instead of him. I was like, Oh, man. I didn't know if he had just turned the corner in his career or what. But I was like, I don't… When he went to Milwaukee, I remember thinking, I don't know if that's going to be the answer, but okay, we'll see. If he went to Miami without Giannis, I think they would have a lot more reasons to be pissed down there.

I remember making those points when he was being When he was being shopped in the different teams. Then everybody was like, You're just Celtic fan. You don't want Miami to get Dame. It's like, Look, there's some evidence that he's an awful defensive player. He's also a little guy hitting his early mid-30s, which we have a lot evidence with that, that that gets a little dangerous. I actually think he's been a little better in Milwaukee this year than I was expecting. But the Jimmy thing is in such a strange spot now because he also has this player option next year. So if you trade for him, you We're also paying him next year. So it's a two-year commitment. It's his only leverage over Miami because if they don't trade him, then he could just opt in and now they're paying him. So now he's screwed up one year instead of two for them. But if you're Miami, you don't want to take a bad contract back. Philly's like, All right, fine. Take Paul George. You can have him this year in the next three. Miami's going to be like, No way. We're not taking Paul George.

The thing is, they just have to get over the idea. They're not going to win a championship now. I mean, that's the thing. They have to take their medicine, I guess. They have to be bad, but that is not a Pat Reilly thing. He's not going to allow them to be bad.

Yeah, because they have some good assets. They're a little bit better than being in the middle, but they're They're not a top six playoff team.

Right.

Hero is playing the best he's ever played. If Jimmy comes back the way that he could actually play, they're pretty interesting. They're not going to make the finals again. But it's an unsolvable one because what you don't want to do is compound a mistake by taking somebody else's mistake. That's why Bradley Beale has never happened in a million years. But if Phoenix plays worse and worse, maybe now Durant becomes a possibility. At least you're taking advantage of somebody else's misfortune to get out of yours.

Let me tell you something. I mean, as a Rockets fan, I grew up in Houston. Yeah. Please don't trade for KD. I like our young core We have a lot of assets. Please, I just want to rock with Amen, Jaylen, St. Gwen. I just want to see that with Eme, and let's just go with that. Let's not do the KD thing because as great as he is, I just feel like the days him being able to elevate a team in quite that way are over. I like what we're doing. It's the only thing that makes me feel good about missing out on WMDBE in the draft. Please, Houston, if you can hear me, let's keep this roster. Let's just rock with it for a little bit longer and see where we can go with it, please.

How close were you to WMDBE? I forget. How many picks?

I mean, two. But I think they had the second best odds to get WMDBE or something like that. They ended up picking third, which is fine. I'm not upset with the pick, but obviously it's not Wimpy.

To recap, you're not totally fired up. You didn't get a generational SuperDuper star.

I think that what the Rockets are doing is the only thing that makes me feel good. I'm like, Oh, this is the team. They're really good. They're young. They can grow together. Also, I feel like they're strong in a way that could cause problems for Wimpy. This physical deep team. I could see that causing WMDBE problem. So I'm like, okay, if we can keep this together, then I'm fine with it. But if not, then I'm just going to, yeah, the labor missing out. We got Yau, we got Ralph Samson, we got Dream. I just expected the WMDBE thing was supposed to be us. That's supposed to be the Houston thing, and we missed out on it.

I forgot about your Rockets connection. I think they're the most fascinating team to be a fake GM for when you just look at their assets. Because they're 26 12, or at least when we're taping this on a Wednesday, every time I feel like they're going to maybe tail off a little bit, like Jibari Smith got hurt, and you think, All right, here we go, because this team is not a 26 and 12 team. Last five minutes of a game, they can barely get a decent shot off, and it's going to dip. Then they just keep winning and winning, and they're really mentally tough. They play good D, they have good coach. I don't know what I would do. I don't know what the tweak is.

Well, let me ask you because you're the NBA expert here. Do you think, though, this is one of those examples of a team that has already capped out on it? They play really, they're young. Eme can get them to play really hard in the regular season, but when it comes to the postseason, there may not be another gear for them. There's not. At least right now.

No, there's not. The question you have to ask when you're in a situation like them is, like OKC two years ago. They were basically a 500 team. They played really well together. They had a certain ceiling to what they were doing. He was very hesitant of trading anything for it. Then last year, same thing. They ended up... They really could have beaten Dallas. They could have made the finals, but they were still really hesitant about making a move. Then this year was when they made the move. I think they have Ives Houston's conciliations Thierry, unless I could get Daren Fox for Vanvleet and some pics, if that was really sitting there, you have to do that. If you can basically just change your point guard position, because Vanvleet, I admire the guy He's always hard. He's an overachiever. But when he has the ball with three minutes left in a tie game, I don't have any confidence in scoring.

Nobody is scared of him. You don't mind him having the ball, right? No. Yeah.

If they could get a five A box-type level guy, like a Booker somehow became available. That's the only thing I would think about. I want another year with Jalen Green because I still don't know what he is. Yeah. Same thing with Jibari, who I think I like a little more than most. Then I think their number one asset is Thompson. If I'm ranking their trade assets, I think he might be number one for me.

I was so mad when they picked him, by the way, Bill. I was like, Man, what the fuck? This overtime elite shit, man. I was like, I don't want this dog. It did not feel good. But yeah, I love that dude so much, man. He's such a dog. It's very rare that he's on the floor and he's not the best athlete on the floor, which is crazy to say in the NBA, but that is legit. At least I think.

I know a couple of people that have seen the Rockets in person this year, separately in different cities, and all of them texted me after and were like, Oh, my God. This guy, athletically. It was the same feeling I got, too, where it's like just certain guys move differently. This is a league of these awesome athletes. These are some of the best athletes we've produced as a country. And yet some guys still stand out. He was one of the guys that you're watching going, Man, it just feels like he's a split second faster, more athletic. He can bend in any way, more explosive. I don't know what his ceiling is, but from what I've seen so far, there's no reason to me that a Pippin would be the ceiling for me. I don't think that's a crazy thing to say.

No, not at all. How old is he? Again, he's like 20.

Yeah, it's like 21. 20 or 21, something like that.

Yeah, man. There's There's so much growth left for his game. I don't know if you want to clear it out so that he can become the alpha dog on your team.

Well, we don't know offensively. We don't know is the shot ever going to be there. Scotty always... He was basically going to Michael Jordan basketball camp every day. The IQ stuff from MJ eventually morphed. But he was always such a good playmaker and passer. He had a little weird post-up game. I don't know if that stuff's in there, but the It's defensive athleticism stuff. If you're doing grades, he's A plus.

A plus.

Yeah.

No, I want to hold on to that guy forever. I love it. Again, I could probably live without Dylan Brooks, but I understand his role on a team like that. It helps to create a culture which was totally different than it existed a couple of years before.

Well, one fun thing that's happening with Houston, Memphis, Oklahoma City, and then I'm going to say half of Minnesota, but you have some real Alpha-E defensive teams, athletes. They're all around the same age range for the most part. When you watch League Pass, you'll be like, Oh, Houston's playing in Memphis. This game's going to be fucking awesome. Oh, my God. Houston's okay seating it. Oh, my God. I can't wait. There's this little subset now of the league, that's basically the sons of LeBron. All of them were probably... They don't even remember the NBA when LeBron wasn't in it. It's something. You know what I mean?

Oh, yeah, absolutely. I was looking. I mean, dude, the Southwest standings in the NBA. San Antonio was fourth, man. They're fourth, 19 to The fifth-place team is the Pelicans. I felt like if Zion is right, they can beat any of those teams any night, too. They're 9 and 32. But if Zion is right, which is- I watched it last night.

They beat somebody, and Zion was... I don't know if they're auditioning him. I'm on the record. It's the most fun trade that we can come up with in basketball right now is Zion to the Spurs.

Oh, man. Come on, Doug.

No, I'm telling you.

No.

What? Put Zion. I don't want that. Zion with Wemby, Zion, trade their stuff a couple of pics. I don't want that. Put him in a different organization. Come on. Get him the ball. You're out. Why don't you like that?

Because I don't like the Spurs. I don't want to hear their mouth. Oh, because of Rocketsing. I don't want that. I don't want that to be that good. You're being selfish. That's terrifying. I don't want that to happen. I also feel like Zion looking up at Wemby and being like, Man, look how this guy, how serious he takes this career. They were talking about his dedication to the game when he was 17 years old over and- Learning two languages, learning how to become a face of a league, basically. He's planned it all out.

I wouldn't compare. This isn't an exact comparison because Randy Moss was better than Zion, and Randy Moss did more stuff than Zion, and he was healthier than Zion. But there was a moment when Randy Moss was on the Raiders that year, and they were a dumpster fire. Everything was wrong. He wasn't playing that hard. His asset as a trade asset, slipped to the point the Patriots stole him for a fourth rounder. It was a fourth round pick.

It was crazy. Yeah, right.

But they got him, and then he was immediately rejuvenated. I do wonder if that happens, whoever gets Zion, if they could just get him in the right saying, would that be the best trade you could make?

I think that is like 90... I'm like 90% certain that's going to happen. Because he did not want to go to New Orleans in the first place. It just felt like it was never going to work out. In New Orleans as a franchise, I feel like if you're C. J. Mccollum, you're a professional. I'm just going to show up. It doesn't matter where I got a ball, I'm going to do it or whatever. But the expectations for Presa was so much more than that. Clearly, he thrived in a place where he was the star of the show and there was a lot attention on him. It just felt like New Orleans is not where it needs to be. Also, the training staff, I don't know.

What do you mean you don't know? It's the worst organization in the league. That's a huge part of this.

Yeah, I feel like it's pretty much guaranteed that if he goes place that he feels motivated to play and he's got a bunch of guys or dogs around him, I feel like it's a certainty that he's going to take off no matter where he goes.

He's at least showing flashes, too. Even in the playing game before he got hurt, he was taking it to LeBron in a way that was unusual.

He likes being that guy, man. It's clearly in there. I think that unless he gets hurt, it's going to come out, and it's going to come out somewhere else. It's just some places, it's just not going to happen, dude. I feel like we've seen enough of New Orleans now. It's just not going to happen down here. It's time to go somewhere else.

Well, I know New Orleans is bad for me when I'm there for four days. I can't imagine when you're him with some of the vices that he has.

I feel like New Orleans is sad, though, too. I feel like I could be down there for three or four days, and then I got to keep it moving.

It's like Vegas. Yeah. Vegas is fun for three days. This is too much. The thing with him, these are the NBA players I grew up with where these guys, they have so much talent, they're so awesome, but they never find the right spot, right situation, whatever, and then it just never happens. Oh, Van Lathen is here. He's going to join us. We'll take a quick break, come back, and talk some college football with Van. All right, Van Lathen is here. He's joining us. We're going to talk college football. Yes. Is this the first time you guys have been on a podcast together?

Yeah, ever. A lot of respect for this guy. Yeah.

Likewise, man. Likewise.

College football. I'm going to let you guys carry this. I'm just going to be the point guard to set you up. I'm going to be like Reid Sheppard in the G League, just running fast breaks and raining threes. We have Joel's five favorite things for college football. Before we do that, Notre Dame, Ohio State. Every person I know who gambles on college football is like, Just throw Ohio State in a parlay. It's a wrap. They're bigger, they're better. This is done. They were the eighth seed this year. Is this done? Does Notre Dame, is there a nobody Is that the next case?

I think Notre Dame probably has a lot of bulletin board material. People are on Ohio State like crazy. They have a ridiculously talented roster, and they're peaking at the right time. However, I, despite all of the animus between LSU fans and Notre Dame fans online, I am not ready to say that Freeman and his staff up there in South Bend are not going to find a way to make this game competitive and not have a chance to win this game in the fourth quarter. I think that they will.

What do you think, Joe?

I definitely think it's going to be closer than people think. But at the end of the day, your limitations are your limitations. Notre Dame can't pass. They can't pass the ball. I feel like that's going to be a real problem in a game where... I The thing about Ohio State, which we'll get into it in the list later, but somebody's supposed to slip free. Like, Trevian, Quinchan, Jeremiah, Ameca, Darnell, somebody is going to bust loose. Notre Dame is going to have to do something other than put together a 13-play, 72-yard drive to keep up. I just think eventually, after a while, that takes a toll, and they'll fall behind. But I agree with Van that it's They're going to be much closer and they're going to be a tougher out for Ohio State than people think.

I think what happened with me with Notre Dame was the last game, I think there were a lot of questions answered. Now, we could talk about Penn State and some of the limitations that Penn State has, particularly the explosiveness that they lack in their downfield passing game. But a lot of questions, should I say, that people were asking about Notre Dame in the game, which was if they ever got behind, could they play from behind? That the offense have enough wrinkles goals, that they have dynamic enough talent on that side of the ball to get them back into a game where they couldn't play complementary football defense.

Like a Pittsburgh Steor situation? Exactly. We're down 14, the game is now over.

That's how we sit.

But they got down 10. They got down 10, and Reilly Leonard was even knocked out of the game, which honestly, I think, worked in Notre Dame's favor a little bit because they weren't really preparing for the backup quarterback to come in there and complete a couple of passes. They played from behind, and they made enough plays in passing game in that game against a quality, not quite as good as Ohio State defense, maybe not, but it's not too pretty comparable, a quality Penn State defense. They made enough plays in the passing game to go win the game. They are facing an uphill battle, but for some reason, I think the game will be competitive.

I can't envision a scenario in which Notre Dame can get to 24, and that's why I don't think they can win. I feel like Ohio State can F up. We can't curse here, right? I can say fuck. I can say fuck. I know you all curse, but I'm new here, right? All right. Well, I think Ohio State can fuck around and get 24. They can just luck up into a couple You hit Jeremiah deep, a drive or whatever. Notre Dame, again, better than people that think they're going to be, but I don't think they can get to 24.

All right. Two follow-up questions off this. One, Ohio State was the eighth They're ranked eighth heading into the playoffs. So a year ago, they're not in the playoffs. So now they're heavily favored to win the title. So what does that mean big picture? Were we just doing this wrong the last 20 years? Do we have to go back and go through all the times when maybe the wrong team won? No.

What does it mean? I don't think that Ohio State necessarily deserves to be the national champion. By the standards of the champions that have come before them, they are a failure. They didn't beat their biggest rival. They didn't win conference championship. So that they win, it redeems the fuck-ups they had earlier in the season. But I don't think it means that they deserve to have been in the playoffs. It's just a circumstance of history that they're in the playoffs. But I don't... They're the best team, but they didn't live up to that during the year. If they didn't make the playoffs, I don't think anybody would have lost any sleep over.

Well, counter, they lost two games by four points.

Yeah, but I mean, well, we'll talk about it. But I mean, had you watched you're going to play this year?

Yeah, I watched that game, and the announcement were shocked as it was happening. I mean, yeah. What's your take?

I think the dynamic, it depends on which version of college football that you believe in. If you believe the traditional college football way of doing things that I was brought up on, and I'm sure Joel brought up on, too, which was the most deserving team won the national championship after a full body of work was examined, then Ohio State is not there. But what I think they were trying to move to by expanding the playoff was to see if they could get to a situation where the best team wins the national championship, and that's on the field. That means that if you slip up a couple of Saturdays, it doesn't matter because if you have the best roster and you're playing the best at the right time, then you get a chance to prove it on the field. Right.

So that Michigan loss in the old system is catastrophic for them. It's over. It's one of the worst losses in the history of Ohio State. Well, let's It's one of the worst losses in the history of Ohio State. No, it's not.

It's the worst loss that I can remember in that rivalry. But let's not even talk about Ohio State. Let's talk about Notre Dame, that loss at home to Northern Illinois. That is a disqualifying loss in most iterations of the old way of doing college football. It is not in this particular day.

Is that better or worse?

I guess it depends on what you think. I wrote about this for theringer. Com. I know you did. What I would say is that if college football fans can disabuse themselves, it's like as Vans said, the most deserving notion. It's like, well, NFL fans. When when Katie and the Bucks won the Super Bowl, I mean, I don't know if anybody thought they were clearly the most deserving team or anything like that, but they won. They were the champion. Nfl fans accept that.

It's going to be like Washington with Jaden Daniels when he wins the Super Bowl in three weeks.

Or it'll be like when a 9-17 beat an undefeated New England I didn't want to.

I was trying to be nice.

Also like that. I blocked that out. I don't even remember that happening. Is that the Patriots? All right. Sorry, Joel. Go ahead.

No, but I'm with you on that. If it's going to be like that, then, and we're going to become college fans, become NFL fans. They'll be like, All right, that happens to be the champion this year. But I guess as an older dude, I like every game. That loss in Michigan should count for something. In this way, it just made Ohio State mad. But it used to be that, oh, man, the whole program crumbles. Ryan Day has to go away. Caleb Downs is back in the portal, all that stuff.

There's a cultural question in Columbus right now, too, with my Ohio State fans. The question is, it sounds stupid to people who don't understand college football and don't understand the rivalry, but it's a question that's very much on the mind of these people up there. The question is, would you rather beat Michigan or would you rather win a national championship? Now, the answer seems obvious. There's no Ohio State fan right now on the precipice of winning a national championship that's going to say, Oh, man, blah, blah, blah. This doesn't matter as much. But then the day after the Michigan loss, the week after the Michigan loss, when they were talking about Ryan Day, the way that they were talking about Ryan Day, they would be lying to you if they had told you right that that wasn't a soul-crushing moment that not even a national championship could completely repair and heal.

I think that there's still questions, even if he wins the national championship, is this the right guy? Is this the right guy?

It's hilarious, though. Yeah.

He's lost to Michigan four times in a row. Bill, are you familiar with the Bayou Classic? I brought this up on Risillo's podcast. Shout out to Riggs. But the Bayou Classic, at Southern University, rest in He's dad. They would rather beat Grambling than win the swath. That's a no-brainer. It's a one-game Super Bowl that means everything from some people that are traveling from up north in Louisiana down to New Orleans, us making a shorter drive, and it's all on the line right there. That's just the way college football is. If you ever get to a point where Ohio State fans will care even a centella less about beating Michigan, you've lost the whole sport.

Notre Dame. Can you walk me through the relationship Notre Dame has now in 2025 with America? Because I know what it meant in the '70s days. To me, it felt like the biggest school on the planet forever. Then all of a sudden, it wasn't. Then it came back, and now where are we in 2025?

I think it's still probably personal. It probably is the program that your grandmother is most likely to recognize. It does have that, and it no longer has the cachet. There was a time this large Catholic, wealthy university, owned network. It had all these advantages over everybody else. Well, we all know that that's not even true. They lost a coach to LSU. We're not in no disrespect, Van, but LSU is not Bama. It's not Texas. It's not Ohio. Oh, my God.

This is like shots fired. We're just saying.

Jesus. When I grew up, LSU was a seven and five-ass program. No, it was seven and four-ounce program. Oh, my God. Are you fucking with me right now?

Before Before Kevin Falk went there- I'm going to get hit by a bullet.

Before Kevin Falk went to LSU, and then definitely before nick Saban got there, they were like, If Texas A&M lost to LSU, I'd be like, Man, what happened to Texas A&M?

So this is bullshit. It is because LSU was down in the '90s. That's just true. Lsu won the SEC a couple of times in the '80s, which was a hell of a time to win the SEC. The program was pretty good. It was very important. We had a Hyjman Trophy winner, all of that stuff.

We're talking about Billy Canon?

Yeah, I'm talking about Billy Kanner, 1958. That matters, right? What are you talking about? 1958. Hold on.

Do I get to count my Celtic title from 1958 for you guys?

You all count all them titles from You don't count them. You don't count all of them titles from back in the segregated days in Boston, not in the NBA. But what I'm saying is, LSU, when we came into college football, was down in the '90s. The reason why the program was down, I'm not about to do a whole LSU defense, is because a lot of the best players from Louisiana were escaping. Warwick Dunn didn't go to LSU. Cordell Stewart didn't go to LSU. Some of these people. What happened was nick Saban was able to reorient It was brilliant. Jerry DiNardo, to a degree, was able to reorient the position of LSU in Louisiana where we could keep some of the talent back at home. When that started, we became a perennial power.

Let me throw this theory at you because I say that nick When Saban actually integrated the SEC. The way that he recruited at LSU, if you look at the recruiting rankings over those years, starting from the '98 when Saban gets there, every year, the SEC school. Lsu starts creeping up the recruiting rankings, and then slowly but surely, and certainly by the time he goes to Alabama, all the other schools start to catch up and they're like, Oh, yeah, I guess we need to recruit these guys. Because it used to be there was a lot of reticence. Even in Texas, there was some reticence that the University of Texas, they didn't really recruit the guys out of the urban centers like Dallas, Houston. Those guys went to Florida State. They went to Michigan or whatever. They didn't go to Texas. Then something happened in the late '90s, early 2000s. I said, nick Saban, for me, when I looked back at what he did, I felt like he integrated the SEC in a way. I think that's what was the inflection point for LSU. But prior to that, come on, man, you know what you all were.

In the '90s, we were down. You know what Texas In the... Oh, come on. I didn't realize Billy Kanan. I forgot about Billy Kanan's husband. Billy Kanan's.

You know what really happened? Shaq went to LSU. Shaq went to LSU and it bankrupted the whole school for 10 years. They're still playing Because they hired a guy.

This is a cautionary tale for any college program. They hired a guy named Curly Hallman. For most programs- Never trust a Curly. And by the way, we're talking It's so interesting that people go, LSU was not Bama. Bama was down for 10 years, too. Bama was down, super down. We were kicking Bama's ass every single year until Saban comes to Bama. The This year's saving was at Bama. Bama loses to UL Monroe. So what I'm saying is any program out there, you look at when Bobby Bauton leaves Florida State, what Florida State has to go through until Jimbo Fisher gets there. You look at Texas and Mac Brown. Texas is just getting back. It doesn't matter what color your blood is in college football, if it's blue, if it's red, whatever it is, you are one bad coaching hire. One bad coaching hire. When we were coming up, Nebraska was an unquestionable blue blood. Tommy Frazier, Lawrence Phillips, all of these guys haven't been nationally relevant since. Colorado, you're one bad higher, one bad higher, two maybe at the most from being in a situation you don't want to be in.

I wasn't saying LSU was Indiana. I'm saying that you all would not know the Dane. We weren't know the name. Nobody ever thought about LSU.

Don't apologize to him. You're right.

Nobody thought LSU was this great Blueblood program.

It was a good solid It's a good, solid program. It's a good solid program. But what I'm saying is that if you are a program and you represent a culture where football is very important, it is in Louisiana, it's like live or die in Louisiana. It is, whether it's LSU, Southern, high school, whatever. You're actually one coaching higher away from being able to harness the power of your state. Lsu was not in the same conversation with Notre Dame, USC, or historically, and probably still isn't. But I will say since 2000, you have three national championships. You've played for a fourth national championship.

Nobody wants to hear your credentials.

You've won the SEC.

You've had an undefeated senior team. This is what we wanted to do. Your team's not even in the championship team.

You've had two Heisman Trophy winners.

Are you happy with your program? Are you happy? It's not like a fucking booster.

It's like having Buddy Garanty here talking about, Am I happy with LSU right now?

No, I think we should be doing better. But to me, trajectory matters, and the entire context of where you are matters. Coach O, who was a great coach in terms of what he was able to get on the field. What a character.

A great coach.

Character. I mean, I'm going to be honest with you. In terms of when I say he was a great coach, this is what I mean. If you put together the team that we had in 19 together, you got to at least have the potential to be a great coach. He wasn't great long term guy because he likes to fuck Booster's wives and- Eventually. Whatever. He wasn't a good long term guy, and he left the program in shambles. For what we needed for the time that we had him, he was good. He took what lets couldn't do, undefeated season, all of that stuff. Now, LSU is getting back to the point to where people in South Louisiana are looking for real results from Brian Kelly, and we'll see in the next couple of years if we can deliver him.

Can I throw a hottest take at you guys? Most important guy this century for the SEC, Dante Culpepper.

Why?

Because if Saban picks Drew Brees over Dante Culpepper, he never goes to Alabama. Then what happens to the SEC?

What are you talking about? We would have been Alabama.

Would you have? Yeah. Would you With Les Miles? Man.

No, we would less miles?

For real? No.

I don't know if that hottest take worked, but I wanted to fire it off anyway. I think it's very interesting.

I like it.

Because I still think Saban's in the NFL now if he has Drew Brees. He would have had Drew Brees for 15 years.

Oh, no. I Actually, I was confused. You're saying he went to... What I meant to say is- Saban picked Culpepper over Drew Brees because Drew had a certain shoulder. What I was saying is, I got a little turned around. I was saying is if Saban never leaves LSU, we'd have been Bama. We wouldn't have been Bama with Les Miles. I see it. You're saying if he stays in Miami and he has a lot of success there, then he never comes back. What happens? I mean, look, yeah, for sure. That's the way things happen.

I'll say if Saban stayed at LSU, LSU would have been better than Bama. Lsu has a lot more going for it as a program and in terms of what its potential is as opposed to Bama, I think.

All I'm saying is this. I've spent my life watching LSU football, I can tell you this. With the talent that is inside of Louisiana, when you look at the guys that we got out there, and you all can say whatever you all want to say about LSU, about whatever. People can say whatever. Man, Jamal Chase. Jefferson. Jefferson. When When you look at the talent in the NFL, I'm not talking about guys that just came through.

I mean, BTJ.

Nabors and Thomas.

I'm talking about guys that are from our state.

Wide receiver factory.

Like, Derek Stingley. When you talk about guys that are from our state, if we can recruit our state will be competitive with anyone.

Can we switch gears because we're running out of time. All right, Joel, rip it off. Your five favorite things about college football this season. Van and I are the audience. I made you have a list. You can go five to one or one to five. Your choice.

I was going to go five to one. Let's do it. I'm going to Okay, real quick. Bill, did you follow Holy Cross football from 2021 to 2023?

Yes. You did. I was into it.

What did you think of the quarterback play?

Well, he went to UNLV and then left after three games.

Yeah. That was my number five thing. Matt Sluka going to UNLV because first of all, I think it was one of the rare things. It ended up okay for everybody. But for people that don't know, Sluka, he was the quarterback at Holy Cross, transfers to UNLV, plays the first three games. Unlv looks great. I was like, Man, UNLV's got a good damn football program. How What happened there? Well, it turns out that he decides to sit out the rest of the season and take a red shirt because the school didn't follow through on whatever promises they allegedly made about NIO.

I thought- Well, the follow through is they didn't fucking pay him. Whatever the money was, I just don't think he got it.

They promised him 100,000, and he only got like a thousand. It's still unclear what the difference is here and why those expectations weren't met. But it's like one of these where you could project your feelings about the N-I-L era onto the player in this situation. If you like me and you like players getting paid, I didn't mind him withholding his labor until he got what he felt was promised. If you don't like it, it was about these spoiled and entitled college players, poor advertising money over the team. I thought it was a really fun story that didn't ultimately hurt anybody because UNLV still was badass and. Wait, though.

There was a third piece to it, though, which is you have thousands of these these business deals being cut left and right with teenage kids or kids who are 20, 21 with these different colleges, they're probably not... They're just like, Yeah, we'll get you 25,000. There's so much room for sleaziness that I don't think we've ever seen before. We've only had this with boosters before.

You're just seeing now the opportunity for people to get in people's ears and promise things that they can't then deliver on. The college athlete who is now in a brand new world that's like the Wild Wild West with not a lot of protections or structures there to protect them or their family or protect the schools, either, you're just seeing a lot of promises not being met. We'll see who has the power at the end of the day.

It's either the Wild Wild West or it's like that new Netflix show where just everybody gets brutally murdered. What's that show? American something?

The Western? I know what you're talking about.

Tim Riggens is on it? Mm-mm. It was on Netflix. It's set in the 1800s. Everybody just kills everybody.

Was that Roots?

No. No, it's Peter Berg's new show. It's called American Something. It's about Wyoming and it's like 1883, more about. No, I didn't see that one. Anyway. All right, Joel. All right.

Wow. All right, I'm going to move to number 4. Nick Saban was actually trying to be honest earlier this year when he said, The only place you play in the SEC that's not hard to play is in Vanderbilt. Then it's like not even a month later, Alabama goes into Vanderbilt and loses for the first time since 1984. Got their ass beat. Vanderbilt scored 40 points on them. They didn't look into those points. They beat their ass. It was just hilarious because first of all, you also get to see Bama fans go crazy now. They've lived an unprecedented ride for the last 15 to 20 years. To see their faces and to see how they responded to losing to Vandy in the first year post-Saben, it was hilarious. I had to put that in there before. Good one.

I would also add for Saban, I loved when Shane Gillis made fun of them, and Saban didn't know how to handle it. It was one of my favorite TV moments in a while. Because Saban had no sense of humor about it. No. He was like, Who the fuck is this guy? He's saying we cheated? By the way, how does he know?

Did Shane say anything about chargers or anything? He didn't say anything about a dust charger, did he?

No, he was just talking. He made a Paying the Players joke, and Saban was just like...

He wasn't fucking with it.

Anyway, number three.

Number three. If you were like me, since I followed college football, the idea of Arizona State football has always been like, Man, Arizona, why isn't Arizona State any good? They're in a fast-growing area. They got a lot of sun. It's like a school where academics ain't going to be in the problem. If you were like me and you saw the Playboy edition of Pac-10, Pac-10 season is like, Arizona, you know what I'm saying? It's rolling.

Let's say elite milk.

You said it, not me. I can't. You know what I'm saying? I'm a family man. I am, too.

But the truth is the truth.

Anyway, about Frank pitch. No, I'm just joking. But man, Arizona State was dope this year, man. You see, it's like, Oh, man, Arizona State's good. They might have a future. They got a 34-year-old coach he can recruit. They got a little off it. They're not going to get Cam Skatebo. I call that dude pocket grunk. I don't know if he's going to be good in the NFL or whatever, but as a college character, he was perfect for Arizona State.

I think as a fourth rounder, he's a must. Why don't you get past the second round? You're just throwing darts against the dartboard.

Taking a flyer on him. I mean, look.

Could he be like Tyler Algier?

What you do know is he has an incredible skill set. He can do a lot of different things on the football field. He might not have all the measurables. I'm sure he'll run like 4'6. Man, 4'6. Yeah, but he is a football player. Yeah, He's so competitive.

Who's been good since he was probably, what, seven years old?

He's always found a way.

I'm in on that, dude.

The tape always matters more to me than the measles. Your tape always matters more.

It feels like he's going to have some moment where somebody's starting running back will get hurt next year or a year from now, and that guy's going to go in and have like 110 yards and be the big fantasy pickup. God only knows.

I mean, that dude beast it against Texas. Texas has all the athletes you could think of. He was awesome.

All right, number two.

Number two. This was the first Heisman in about a decade where QB wasn't a serious contender. I love that because we could talk about Travis Hunter, who I don't know. I've never seen anything like that in college football. Maybe if you go down a level or something, you could say, There's a guy that played a thousand snaps in a season. But I've never seen anybody do that and Excel in the way that Travis Hunter did. There was a game this year against UCF. He had nine passes for 89 yards, a breakdown, a pass break up, and interception. He took up an interception, and he was on the field for 128 of 143 snaps in that game. I'm just like, Yo, I don't know what more you could... People thought Charles Woodson was amazing because he played a few snaps at receiver. No. Travis Hunter was doing something else, totally. The Ashton Genti kid... I just... Let me get on the soapbox for a second. If you think that Ashton Genti got exposed against Penn State, you were stupid. I literally think that you don't know ball. Because if you watch that defense and That guy, it took everything in that Penn State defense, and they focused all their efforts on them because Poiseud State couldn't pass, and that dude still hammered out 100 yards.

There was a 10-yard run early in the fourth quarter where six Penn State guys got a hand on that guy. I remember that. Yeah, man. I love him.

It felt like they were almost running a goal-line defense on him. Yeah, but I mean, he's getting crushed.

It was tough yards, but every yard that he got, he had to take it from the defense. He proved to me what a good back he was by his performance in that game.

Yeah.

Abdul Carter is supposedly a badass, and he got hurt tackling Ashton Genti in that game. You know what I'm saying? Anyway.

Hunter is your favorite because obviously, I'm moving… I have the fourth pick in the draft of my beloved Patriots because we fucked up the last game of the season. But Carter is one of the guys, the fan base is we have a new coach. He wants to build around the lines. We're like, Look at this guy. He could be amazing pass pressure, but he's probably not going to be there at four. I feel like he's going to go before that.

Man.

It feels like a Will Anderson situation, right? Where he'll just go second.

I mean, if he does get drafted high, a lot of people say... But my thing is this, if you guys, if Will Anderson... Will Anderson. If Will Campbell, homer pick, if Will Campbell is still on the board when you guys are drafting, you guys should take the left tackle.

I think that's where we'd probably end up. You would play Hunter, D-back or receiver?

D-back because it's so much harder to find guys with that skillset at that position. You can get a receiver, maybe not as talented as Travis, but you could get something, a reasonable approximation. On defense, though, there's just not cuts like that.

Because it seems like the move with him, and maybe he ends up on the paths, I don't know, but cornerback and then special packages and maybe third and eight and up comes in and he's like your third receiver. Maybe he's like 10 offensive plays a game and then cornerback, which even that would be like, nobody's doing that now.

Right. I mean, look, I don't know what the feasibility is of him playing too much going both in the NFL from a wear and tear situation. Travis has been injured before. I don't know what the feasibility is of it. I know if I was him, I would want to play the receiver. If I was him, just for the money. However- It is warm out. They're going to want him.

It's like 30 million a year, at least.

Yeah, they're probably going to want him to play DB. But if I was him, I would want to find my way to- It's so much fun.

I remember as a kid, or I wasn't a kid, I guess I was in college, when Deon, he was a D-back, but then every once in a while, they would play him at receiver. Every time he came in, it was so fucking exciting. I was like, Are they going to throw him bubble screen? Is he just going to throw a deep for him? It was like, you couldn't take your heads off it. All right, number one.

Number one. This is obvious. There was just nothing that was going to indicate that Michigan was even going to be competitive with Ohio State. It was nothing. Ohio State was a 19 and a half point favorite coming in that game. They had a $20 million roster. Michigan didn't even have their best player of that The cornerback, Will Johnson, he was out that game. This was like, they had it all set up. They're at home. They can exact revenge on this team and just totally exercise all those demons. They lost to the brokeest dick offensive team. I saw it hit that. They cannot throw a forward pass on that team.

It's one of the most embarrassing and shocking college football losses I've seen. Really, maybe since since Michigan lost to Appalachian State a couple of decades before. You know what I mean? I struggled to explain how that game happened in the way that it did.

With the stakes for Ohio State.

With the stakes for Ohio State, with everything that was on the line for Ohio State in terms of what they were playing for structurally in terms of a college football championship, but also culturally. The fact that they have been getting their asses kicked and Harbaugh was there, and this It was the time for them to actually win that game, 31 to 10. They couldn't fucking do it. And not only that, they got fucking manhandled and got their goddamn manhood taken by their arch-rivals. I could not believe it.

I love this theory that that loss was worse than the high of winning a title. But let me tell you something. That's a really interesting seesaw.

It diluted home, too. They did it on your home field, bro.

I'll be honest with you, though. I think that loss catapulted them into a national championship run. It made them mad. They got pissed off. They got embarrassed. They just have not played anywhere nearly like the same team since. The unbeatable behemoth that we were told Ohio State was going to be this year, they've played that way subsequently to that loss. That says a lot about their staff and really a lot about their players and their program, to be honest with you.

Do you guys like Ohio State fans?

No. Okay.

No. All right.

I have one thing to say, and I have a theory. I know concussion came out nine years ago, but I talked about this on the press box. I think Ohio State's quarterback got a concussion in the second quarter. I think Will Howard got a concussion because he missed the play for a hit. They said they were looking at his head. He said he was okay. He went back in the game and he never looked the same. I know that football, we've moved on from that, worrying about CT and everything, but I feel like that dude got a head injury.

I will always, for the rest of my life, think Mahomes got a concussion in that bangles game at the end of the first half. He was never the same after moment, and that was when they lost. I still can't believe they didn't make the Super Bowl.

You know what? I'm getting so sick of this conversation, this bleeding heart liberal bullshit that I'm listening to. You guys are talking like it's 2018. It's over.

I forgot. It's Trump's America now.

The unwokening has happened. Scramble their brains. If I see you out there wearing one of those soft helmets, I'm going to start trolling you and your family. Scramble their brains. It's over. We don't have to care anymore. We don't have to care about nothing.

The great unwokening?

The great unwokening has happened. We don't have to care about nothing. Put two right back in the game right now. Put them right back in. I don't care. It's over. I don't have to care no more. No We're on marches.

All right, we have to run. Van, a pleasure. Joel, awesome to finally have you on.

Yeah, man. I had a lot of fun with you guys.

Yeah, we'll do it again.

Easy on LSU.

All right, that's it for the podcast. First, thanks to Joel and to Van. Thanks to Kyle, Gehow, and Souruti for producing. As always, don't forget, you can watch clips and videos from this podcast on the Bill Simmons' YouTube channel. Don't forget, part 2 of the Thursday extravaganza is coming Later, tonight, NFL. Lots of it. See you in a couple of hours.

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