Transcript of Part 1: NBA Trade Deadline Reactions With Rob Mahoney and Wosny Lambre

Coming up, part one of our special Live Trade Deadline Extravaganza Next. We're also brought to you by the Ringer podcast Network. Put up a new rewatchables on Monday night. We did Before Sunset. The sequel to Before Sunrise was four of us, me, Sean, Chris, Mallory. You can watch it on Ringer Movies YouTube channel. You can also watch Sean and Chris and I did a trailer reaction to the new Jurassic Park movie, which I think is called Jurassic money bag, so you can watch that on YouTube as well. You can watch all the videos and clips from this podcast on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. That's where we went live, and we did a part one and a part two heading into the Trade Deadline. This is the part one that we started at 145 ET heading into the 75 minutes right up to the Trade Deadline. We recap a bunch of the stuff that already happened, tried to anticipate stuff. When you listen to it, keep an ear for that. Then part two is coming a little bit later. That is everything right after 3: 00 PM, the official Trade Deadline and our final thoughts.

Plus, my million dollar pics for the Super Bowl, which we barely talked about this week. Sorry, Sometimes basketball wins. I hate to break it to everybody. Anyway, here's me, Rob Mahoney, and Big Was, talking to NBA Trade Dubbline. Part one. Let's go. I don't know what my camera is, but this is the Bill Simmons podcast, YouTube Live, presented by Nicolou Bultro, Superior Light Bier, the official beer sponsor of the NBA. That's Rob Mahoney. That's Big Was. We're about to go live here and a big trade happen. Cleveland gets DeAndre Hunter for Levert, Neang, two second-round picks. Second-round picks, giant commodity was, and then two first-round swaps. We don't know what they are. I like this trade more than Rob because I like DeAndre Hunter, and you're like, Go ahead, do your thing.

I'm a skeptic. I'm a DeAndre Hunter skeptic. I like players who will on occasion pass. Deandre Hunter doesn't really do that. Now, he's granted, while not passing, had the best season of his career by far, has scored and shot in a that he never has before. That's all well and good. But when I'm imagining the Cleveland free wheeling offense, I want somebody who's going to move the ball who knows how to play and flow, and that's not really what DeAndre Hunter does to the point.

Is that Levert, though? I mean, Levert is a little ball stopper.

This year it has been. He I've actually been a good soldier within that context. And I take your point, but I think he's actually done a pretty good job of that exact thing this year.

You love the Hawks.

I did.

That's one of your surrogate teams.

Yeah, for sure, especially when Jalen Johnson wasn't injured. But Hunter, I think this year has most often looked like the version of him that's been sold to us basically since he's been drafted. This big physical guy who is really toolsy, but every now and again will make a shot and even create his own shot, which takes him past the three and D element. The D has been hit or miss his whole career, and even his shooting has been hit or miss. But this year, he's actually making shots.

And I think 39% from three.

That's what I think attracted him to the Cavaliers.

Did you guys see the Cavs South the game the other night?

It caught half of them. I did.

I think this is the trade for our Celtic series where you're thinking we got to go against Tatum and Brown for two weeks, potentially. We need to wing with size. We're not totally fired up about this Levert-Neang situation. Can Hunter be the guy? I don't know. I like the trade. I don't care about swaps. Cleveland is going to be good the whole decade. Neang and Levert, whatever. Second-round picks, whatever. Hunter's on a great deal. I think he's making 17.

It's not too bad.

It's pretty reasonable for a score like that. This is the first year that it's felt like a great deal. That's the crazy thing.

I think anytime you can get somebody under 20 who could play in the last five minutes of a round two playoff game, that's a pretty good deal.

Yeah, I think Hunter is another one of those guys like Rui who looks the part where it's like, oh, he's this big, physical guy, and we could get him to guard Tatum and Brown. But in practice, he's just an offensive player. He's He's never been a defensive force at any point. Maybe in moments and possessions at a time, you'd be like, wow, if he could just tap into that always. And so that's why I feel like he's available for a Karras Levert in second-round pics, where famously great guys get picked.

I also like Cleveland going for it a little bit, pushing in in a way that there are certain non-negotiables on their roster, like Darius Garland, Jared Allen. Those guys are only going to play one position. But otherwise, you want a little lineup flexibility. You want the ability to play Struce or Dine Wade there or now DeAndre Hunter at the three, four. There's some options for Cleveland that I think are pretty appealing, not just for a Celtics matchup, but really just getting through the Eastern Conference alive.

It's risky to make a trade when you're doing really well, to just mess with the chemistry and the vibes of what you have. But going back to the Boston thing, I'm looking at Hunter's last season because I remember him just playing well against the Celtics, my favorite team. They played them four times last year in the regular season, and he was good in three of the games. Then they played in the playoffs. I can't remember what he did against playoffs, but I don't know. I'm sure they're trying to figure out Tatum and Brown, that's the mountain. Who's out there that's had some success against those guys? Then they're studying these center things. I just don't really understand it from a Hawks' perspective. Because they don't have their first-round pick unless it's like, what is it, top 10 protected?

Something like that? I think it's I think it's the tank in motion now, Wes? Of course. I think the tank has been in motion once they decided that- When Jalen Johnson got hurt.

They really have not been able to function without him.

For the season. Hunter has been there for so long. He's been there long enough to get a rookie extension. He's not new. In a certain sense, he's a known commodity for them. I can understand him being like, look, this thing has run its course. Let's get at least something out of this. And we're not the type of team where we're winning so much. And he helps as this ancillary part that will help us out, fill in the blanks, rotation-wise. It's just like, let's get something for him. We're going in this mega youth movement.

So I just looked it up. That pick is unprotected that the Spurs have.

Yeah, the one for 2025.

So you can't even call it a tank trade because what are they tanking for? To give San Antonio a better pick. And by the way, that pick, the D Aaron Fox thing, the more I think about it, unconscionable that Sacramento doesn't get that pick. But they get two pics and they get this flimsy Charlotte pick that really turns into two seconds. Not real. I'm just not trading. You watched D Aaron Fox last night. I'm just not trading them unless I get that Atlanta pick, especially after Jalen Johnson goes out. It's like, that might be somewhere between seven and 10. You're giving me that pick if I'm trading Dieran Fox. Somehow San Antonio keeps it.

But that's a team that they just dug themselves out of the absolute Nadira vibes in Sacramento. It got so weird and so bad for their season, and they finally get this momentum with Doug Christie. They finally have some things with their roster sorted out. I don't know that it's realistic to expect the Kings to just sit on a couple of months of De'Eren Fox pouting, if that's what it would have been.

Yeah, and to what end, right? I guess the Hawks pick is definitely valuable. I could see it landing, what are they? Probably in the 10 range or something like that, which, of course, is a valuable pick. But at the same time, when the guy says that he wants to go to San Antonio. San Antonio is clearly positioned to sign the guy outright if and when they need to or have to. And it's like, the closer he gets to his free agency, the less valuable he becomes. I do wonder how much leverage they have in a situation to be like, screw that, you're giving me this. Because the Spurs season was going fine. They could make the argument that, look, we don't need to bring Fox in right now. We like the way our young guys are coalescing around Wemby. The Chris Paul thing has worked out. Knock on what he hasn't even been hurt. And so there's no rush on our end. So they definitely could credibly say, We could walk away from the table.

But then you see what happened last night, and you're like, This is why you got Dieran Fox. You have this guy who's this really special, potentially generational player. He's in year two. We've seen the time table of some of these guys goes way faster than we expect. Now you had Fox. So Hunter, it was the 2023 playoffs when he played Boston, and he basically put up 17 and 6, 37 %. But I always felt like... I'm not saying he down Tate or Brown, anything like that, but I always felt like it's the 6-8 guys that are the guys that you want against us. From a Cleveland standpoint, I just wonder if that game changed their mindset at all. But I like the trade for them. Big picture. So Butler happens yesterday, not quite worthy of an emergency trade, emergency Trade Pod.

Who thought about it? It was worthy until Saturday happened. I think without Saturday, we definitely treated as a monumental Meantoo Trade, Jimmy Butler's teaming up with Steph Curry and Draymond. That whole saga ends. It's a story. It's a jolt to the warrior season. It's just after the Luka Donchik. We're broken.

The meter is broken as far as the World Records.

Well, Tuesday night, when it seemed like Durant might go to the Warriors, and it was a three-teamer with Butler going to Phoenix and whatever going to... That was emergency trade where they... I was ready for that one. Yesterday with Butler after he sulked for four months and He didn't want to go to Golden State, and then it was like, well, can we frame it as it's a two-year extension, but it's really a one-year extension because he was already in her contract. He made an extra, I don't know, 60, 1 million bucks, maybe, 69 million bucks, whatever it is, to basically torpedo this Miami situation.

Is that worth it?

Would you do that for $69 million-wise? Would you just completely torpedo a situation? Probably, yes. He would do it for less.

Here's the thing.

How about $6. 9 million.

Here's the thing. The Suns had agreed in principle to give him two extra years on top of what he already had in the bank for next season.

But what? That would be tampering if they did that. What do you mean?

You're not allowed to do that. All of these reports about tell Golden State no, or tell this person to go away, or whatever. It's like holding out hope that Phoenix could somehow, by some miracle, get Bradley Beale out of there so they could bring Jimmy in and actually give him that extra year. Once that became not a possibility, it's like, all right, cool. We'll settle for Golden State. I want to get the hell out of Miami. It's only one year added. My agent's framing it as 120. It's really like 111, but whatever. I think he was just really holding out for that extra year that Phoenix had promised Can I give you...

Can I do a performance theater of how the Miami Phoenix Trade Talks went? We would love it. Just every couple of days. What about Beel for Butler? No. Durant, we would do. Okay, we'll call you back three days later. Hey, Beel maybe for Butler? No.

This is a perverse take on the Julie Delpey before Sunrise, fake phone call.

I think it just went on and on. Every time Miami is like, No, Durant. We're not taking Bradley Bill. Nobody wants Bradley Beale. Then they're telling Butler, We're not taking Bradley Bill. And Butler is like, Well, I'm going to act like even a bigger dick. Like, Fine. We can just keep doing this. We're not trading you for Bradley Bill.

Bradley Bill. It's just like at a certain point, Jimmy, it's worth it to take this to the summer. If Bradley Bill, who has a no trade clause, it's not even just like, all right, we get Bradley Bill. It's like, if something comes up, we to use this guy to move or whatever. He's still a good player. He's not worth the fifth highest salary in the NBA, but he's still somebody who can play, who can help a team. It's not the end of the world. Bradley Bill, where he gets to dictate terms to the team that he gets traded to, it just makes absolutely no sense.

Without the no trade clause, is he more tradable to you?

He's gone. I think it is the signature hang-up. It's not just like, Oh, could you trade him to Miami or whatnot? There would be a taker.

On the market. Because you think you get him this season, you have him next season, you can trade him as an expiring. But with the no trade, you're stuck with him for three years.

You literally can't trade him.

You honestly cannot.

One of my many hot takes of this two-part Trade Deadline podcast, I think Bradley Bill is playing well for the Suns. Have you watched him lately? He's actually playing defense and he's playing hard and seems dedicated. He's been trying. But I just don't want to pay him $50 million. But it's not like he's a disaster.

No, he's still somebody who contributes. I I don't say he could contribute to winning. It's just when you're paying somebody like that, you would hope he's your on-ball guy, your shot creator, your defensive disruptor.

What do we say when they made the trade? We were like, This is stupid. This is too much money. Why are you doing this? We said it when Washington gave him contract in the first place. Why are you doing this? This is too much money. Why did you put the no trade clause in? This was a comedy of errors. And now Phoenix, so they made a trade. They finally dumped Nerkage.

Congratulations to them.

Nerkage, they used one of those three pics they got from that stupid trade they made with the 2031 first that they gave up, that they were going to regret. And they got back, what was it? One of the Martins. They got back Mechage. Cody.

Yeah, Vasili Mechage.

It just moves around every year. Yeah. They got back a couple of seconds because everyone loves seconds now. Sure. Got to get those seconds. Get that one in 20 chance.

You might have gotten a player. It looks good in the tweet.

One in 18 chance. We maybe got a rotation guy.

I have a very bad feeling. We're going to look at the total math of that, breaking up the one pick into three, and it's going to be three deals that are basically like this. Basically, use a first to dump Youssef Nerkjass contract.

To dump a dumb decision you made.

Yeah, to try to rebate another bad decision. The other ones, we'll see what happens. Maybe they pull a rabbit out of their hat this summer. Maybe there's even time left for them to something out here. I think that was a blunder in itself.

The sons are like somebody who remodeled their whole house and then built a giant movie theater in the house. And then six months later, we're like, Why did we do this movie theater? We should have done Bring the contractor back. We've got to change that.

Who is the movie theater in this metaphor?

That was the murkage, whatever that complicated DeAndre 8 and Shade where they're like, We got to get out of the Chris Paul business. If we turn him in DeAndre and it's Nerkich and Beel, and we do all these swaps that kill all of our leverage, we'll be fine. Then six months later, they're like, Oh, fuck. Now what do we do? They're just constantly working on their house, and they've just destroyed their house. Their house has no value left. They paid 10 million and put in 10 million for a house that's that worth seven million.

Is destruction a ninth seed in the plan or potentially a eighth? Is that destruction?

Are we sure anymore that that's where they're going to end up? I think it's striking looking at the rest of the bubble teams, all teams that are making moves right now. The Spurs, the Warriors.

Let's talk about this because this is part of the Butler conversation. Definitely. If you look at the West, OKC, Memphis, Houston, Denver, and the Lakers, who we're going to talk about. The Lakers are 29 and 19, and I think Aero pointing up. I think all five of those teams are in the playoffs, right? There's one payoff non-play-in spot left. We have the Clippers at 29 and 22. Looking a little creaky.

Yeah.

Minnesota at 28 and 23. They've looked creaky the whole time. We have four teams with 25 losses, Dallas, Sacramento, Phoenix, Golden State. So now that's 11. And then we have San Antonio at 22 and 26 with some good vibes. There's 12 teams that have a chance. Four of those teams are not going to make the playoffs. And I can stare at that list forever. And it's like, who would your four be? Who's your number one? Would you have San Antonio as your number one pick for not making the playoffs?

I think they might be just because they're a little further behind the Too far behind? I mean, too far behind with two games back sounds insane, but it's more that there are too many teams in front of them. They're one loss back.

If they went on a five-game winning streak, they'd be in the ballpark.

Yes.

Would you agree with that?

I would say the Spurs are the first ones out for sure.

Okay, so now it gets fun. Who's your number two pick for, Sorry, the West is too loaded, you're not making the playoffs?

I think it might be the Suns. I think it is. I think it might be the Suns.

I will say- I'll probably go Sacramento, but I understand the Suns Skepticism, for sure.

Well, can I give you the Fandil odds? See, this is cheating. Spurs plus 370 has the highest odds to make the playoffs. So they agree with us on that.

Who do they have second?

Say, I've ruined my own draft. I should have looked at this after. Sacramento plus 290. Yeah.

Yeah. Sacramento, to me, is the clear second.

I feel like that's a little bit of Zack Lovine disrespect.

Is it?

I think the Malik Munch, Zack Lovine, Sabonis thing is going to be pretty decent. They brought in Jonas Valentunis, which is not nothing.

They basically have thrown away the point guard position. But when you watch them, especially in crunch time, it makes sense with Malik running stuff, and it's not that crazy. Then when they did the Valentunis trade, I was like, What the fuck is that? That makes no sense to me. You can't play him and Sabonis at the same time. I was like, Wait a second. I started getting flashbacks to bad Fiba games. I'm like, Oh, those guys were teammates. Then you go read it, and those guys are boys. They've figured out how to either play with each other or not, and they got them for free. They just have all these professional veteran basketball players. I would put Phoenix over them. Phoenix is plus 198 on FanDuel to make the playoffs. I think the Phoenix thing, the stuff you hear through the grapevine about the locker room.

Shocking.

Our guy Coach Bud, maybe a Donnie Nelson on the Knicks-ish where it's just not working out at all. You're not going to believe this was, but it seems like KD might be on another unhappy team. There's been no track record of that over the years.

That's never happened, literally.

Booker looks just miserable at all times.

It's been a weird year for him.

Then Biel is getting heckled at home games. I would have them second and Sacramento third. What do you have? What's your order for the top three?

I would say about the same. I want to put this out there not because I want it to happen, but because I fear it could happen. If the Dallas Mavericks do not make the playoffs, as a son of Dallas, I would like to be able to go home again, and I fear that the city would be raised to the fucking ground.

So Dallas is minus 110, and Golden State is plus 126. And I got to be honest, I would bet on Golden State to make the playoffs over Dallas. I think this Dallas thing could go bad. We haven't had the three-week Kyrie injury. I don't trust AD's health. The team's weird. There's big three stuff going on, but Clay's in the big three. It's like, we're done. That's not a thing. 2020's Clay in the big three is out. Also, the fan base is so angry and so hostile, and the vibes are just so brutal that I could see it tailspinning. I really could.

I think the theory that you replace Luca's production or lack of production because he's not on the floor with AD who's played at an all-star starter level damn near the whole year you become this defensive jugger. Now, I think the theory is sound there, specifically in the regular season. If they're just a really hard nose, we grind out games defensively, team in the regular season. I don't buy it as a playoff proposition.

They did get the better Martin, brother. Yeah. They got Caleb Martin.

Unfortunately, Boston doesn't play in this conference, so I don't know how good Caleb Martin can be. I just think...

Not what they needed, by the way.

I just think a motivated Jimmy actually fitting a Golden State need, meaning somebody who can do something off the dribble that isn't Steph Curry and can play defense, even though he's not what he used to be at all. He used to be an ace defender. He's not that, but he's way more than competent. And just the motivational factor. I think the FU Jimmy factor is going to be at a very high level. And Draymond, super competitive guy. I understand why the odds are such.

Golden State, 25 and 24, Dallas, 26 and 24. And my guess is you got to get to maybe 46 wins. It's not just about being one of the six playoff teams, but you want to be seven or eight. You don't want to have to win the two road games in a row. I want to talk about the Jimmy FU factor. We're going to take a break for the podcast. 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. Fanduel, the Ringer, teaming up to give you a 30% profit boost when either pick a player to score more than 30 points or bet on our new exclusive 30 on 30 special markets like any game. Just looking at the Friday slate, I don't know, you could ride the SGA train. He's dropping 50 points left and right. He's playing Toronto. They can't guard anybody. You could do Cade Cunningham against Philly. You could do Yannis against Atlanta. I like that one. There's some good ones. I'll tweet out my pics when we get to Friday, but if you want to ride those or make them your own, look for 30 on 30 on America's number one sportsbook, FanDuel Sportsbook, in their app.

Or head to fanduel. Com/bs for your chance to score a bigger payout this Friday. Don't miss your chance to find out how much 30 can be worth with FanDuel. 30 on 30. You must be 21 plus in present in select states or 18 plus and present in DC. Opt-in required bonus issue does non-advocable profit boost tokens. Restrictions apply, including any token expiration and max wage or amount. See terms at sportsbook. Fanduel. Com. Again, problem caught when a hundred gambler, visit rg-help. Com. I've said this before, and I feel really strongly about it. I actually thought that was a great trade for Golden State. I don't think they gave up really anything. I know they loved Andrew Wiggins, but just fundamentally, it was an NBA 2K trade where you're just cheating the system and you're basically just turning Wiggins into Butler.

Keeping Kuminga out of this thing.

Keeping Kuminga was amazing. The protected pick, whatever. The key to me would be, if you're looking at it going, is Butler still good? Can he still be that guy? Because we didn't see it last year. He kept missing games, missed the playoffs, this year was spotty. I think I talked about this part in a pod, but five, six weeks ago, he had a game in Detroit when he was just awesome. You can go back, you can watch it on League Pass. That's all you need to see. This was not one of those, Oh, Jimmy made some threes and had a good game. He was fucking awesome. He was pissed off. I think he was mad at Miami. I think this was his trade value audition tape, and he just ran a mock in this game. And I just think that's what he's going to do in Golden State. I don't know if it's going to last two months. I don't know if it's going to last a year in two months. I think two years from now, it could be a catastrophe for them where they're just like, oh, my God, we have Draymond and this guy.

What the hell? But short term, with Curry's window, you got to do it.

A couple of things that I love about the deal. One, it pays deference to the end of the Steph era. So Jimmy His deal basically coincides with Steph's deal. Two, Jimmy Butler is a maniac. He's going to be extremely motivated, and he's an upgrade to what Andrew... You can say whatever you want. He is a clear talent upgrade to Andrew Wiggins, sometimes here, sometimes there, whatever. Then third, I like that it just clarifies the Kamenga stuff because with these young guys, we see it all the time. When they're in these trade rumors for an entire season, it's like, all right, that's now been clarified. You're going to be here. This is what the team looks like. Let's go. I'm really high on this for Golden State.

Unless Kamenga is trading the next hour, which he might be.

But even preserving him to potentially include him in another deal is important. And I think the Jimmy Wiggens comp, like Andrew Wiggens has had a perfectly fine season. I don't mean to diminish it, but Jimmy is a totally different level of creator. And most importantly, he is a go-to scorer, as we've discussed, but also a point trigger man for a lot of the Steph Curry off-ball stuff in a way that Wiggens is just not comfortable doing. And so now you have another person who can do that in addition to Draymon, in addition to Pajemski, if you have him in that role. You have someone who can actually make some plays for the way Golden State wants to play.

Yeah, there's the crunch time piece, but there's also the every four games, he's just going to be awesome in a game. Right now, this Warriors team, unless Steph is awesome, you saw last night against Utah, they can just suck for five minutes and all of a sudden, blow a game. They've blown a lot of uncharacteristic close games. I'm going to say this, knock it on wood, I love Steph. He's at a different point of his career. He can still hit the heights, but he can't do it nearly as consistently.

He can't put a team on his back.

No, it's not 2022 final Steph is not... He's at a different point of his career. He just is. But I still think he could be a really great piece of a good team. With Butler, the question for me is that Detroit thing that he did that I saw, is that a once every two weeks thing? Could he dial that up? Could he carry them? Because they're going to need to jump on his back. Then when Kamiga comes back, if they keep him, and now they have some scoring off the bench, they have less guys in the team, which I think was a weird thing for them, too. They had 12, 13 guys that needed a play now that they've got the numbers down. But I just thought fundamentally it was an awesome trade. I still don't feel great about it as a basketball fan, but I just think that's... We just had these moments where this guy who's making 50 and then 52 next year. It's not even the final year of his deal. He has a contract next year with a player option he can opt into, and he's just decided, I don't like my situation anymore.

I'm going to torpedo it. I really feel like whenever the next CBA comes up, how do they figure out a wrinkle for this? Because if you're a Miami fan, you just be like, What the fuck just happened? We just turned Jimmy Butler into Andrew Wiggins.

I mean, how do you... It's like if you're playing a game of chicken against a guy who's willing to die, how do you win? I just don't know.

He's Don Toretto in every fast appearance movie.

He's not going to finish. He's willing to do it. How do you win versus that? Again, I personally wouldn't have carried it the way Jimmy did. The way he's obviously looking at it is like, this is literally his last payday ever in the NBA, major payday. He's looking at it like, I have to do whatever I have to do to make sure I secure that win. Unfortunately, it got ugly. I can understand feeling entitled. It got... It was like got disfiguring. Yeah, it was bad.

It was like Vanela sky, Tom Cruise face level ugly.

And I've been carrying Jimmy Water just in the sense that he's overachieved. He was an A plus player for Miami for what they did when they got him, what the expectation was and what he actually delivered. And for him to feel like, Yo, why won't you place faith in me that I'm going to overdeliver again as I've done my entire tenure year? So Him being like, Yo, this is a slap in the face.

That's a tough one to say, though, when you're just missing games left and right last year. Which I think was Miami's problem. It's like, Dude, first of all, you're under contract for this year, next year, and play more. But then, Riley did the old guy thing.

That's what he does, though.

He did it to LeBron. Two days before LeBron left, and LeBron took it personally. I love every time he does it. But the question is, do you need an old crazy guy running your basketball franchise? Because he clearly He gives no shits anymore.

He does not. But it's also not a coincidence that every star leaves Miami feeling like this. By the end, it's always ugly. There's no peaceful transitions of power.

Even Hassan Whiteside, he's like, I'm fucking... I just wish it ended better. They also got Golden State's first, which is top 10 protected for two years around, then unprotected. I'm not scared. I still have Steph during that home run. Poor Dennis Schroeder. Can the guy just find a house to live in?

Unfortunately, there are marks So trade culture.

Yeah, that was tough. Because last time I checked, every professional sport has trades.

Oh, my God. Yeah.

But he's stuck in this new role with the apron, where if you're over 12. 8 million, nobody who's over a certain apron can buy you out.

I think it's if you're over any apron at all, first or second, you can't sign a buyout guy for the bid level.

I thought there was a 12. 8 million level, too, for certain... So there's eight teams he just can't even get bought out and go to.

Basically, if your contract is just over the non-taxpayer full mid-level, which his is by a hair, just barely, then you can't sign with any apron team as a buyout guy.

One thing I didn't get with Miami, because actually there was a world where they just get Wiggins, Kyle Anderson, and Schroeder for It feels like they basically just said, We don't want Dennis Schroeder. We'd rather have cap space?

But it's telling when a team like the Heat who, say what you will about their personality management, they're pretty good talent evaluators, and they have just decided, Thanks, but no thanks on Dennis Schroeder.

I'll just tell you, my dad and I talking last night. Miami just has a slew of guys who killed the Celtics, and Dennis Schroeder kills the Celtics for some reason. Wiggins had a lot of success against them in '22. Kyle Anderson is just weird in general, and we were like, I hope they don't keep all these dudes because if we see them in a '27 series.

You really worried about this version of the heat? I'm always worried about Miami.

I'm always worried about them. Never not worried about the heat.

Right now, the heat are three games out of the fourth seed in the East. This is their new rotation. They got Tyler Hero and Terry Rozier, more or less running point. Scary, Terry. Duncan Robinson, and they brought in Davian Mitchell from the Raptors.

Another guy who I've always liked. I wanted to see him on a decent team.

Sure. Andrew Wiggens, of course. Haywood Hy Smith, Jaimehakes. Bam has been playing the four with Kalele Ware.

Nicola Jovich. Ware has been good for a month. It's been quite good.

Ware is very good.

And Kyle Anderson. Tell me that is not the most Miami heat-ass team you've ever heard.

It's Kyle Anderson is one of the most Miami Heat guys.

There's definitely going to be an annoying team to play against. I just think this version of Boston is just too-Oh, I'm not worried about them for Boston.

It's too much.

Okay, that makes two of you. I don't want to play Miami. They fucking pulled a Jedi mind trick shit against Boston.

They definitely have a bunch of solid rotation guys. It's just like, who individually are you scared of in a series?

What do you think Terry Rajer would bet on? Too soon? Come Come on. He was absorbed.

Stop it. This segment is sponsored by FanDuel.

Miami has Capspace now. They're under the tax. They have a trade exception. And maybe they'll do one more thing before the 45 minutes from now deadline. I don't know, man. The way Hero is playing, Bam has been playing better. Yeah. Where out of nowhere, it feels like they have a little bit more of an identity. They have some shooting. We'll see if they can get more from Rozier, who's been really bad ever since they made that trade. But just as a sneaky, you're down 2-1 in a series against them wondering what happened. I still feel like they're on the radar for me. Nobody else in the East is. That's the only team, once you get past the 4 seed, that's the only team I'd be a little worried about in a series.

Did you have anybody else? I think the Bucks are still interesting enough, and I think the Magic, if they ever get their shit together, are still interesting. They've got a lot to figure out offensively, though.

I guess the Bucks, now that they got Kuzma because he was red hot. He was playing great this season.

Can we talk about that?

He was doing great this season.

What does the apology sound like these days?

I'd never seen plus minuses that could get to minus 59.

He hasn't played on an actual NBA team for five years. This is year five in NBA, Siberia.

That was his choice. He had options to leave and play for competitive teams, for example. Fair.

Maybe he was looking out for a better championship situation. I just think in 2020 on the Lakers, he was the ultimate role of that.

Was he really doing Yes.

He was the ultimate role guy.

Again, the last two good players he played with were Brad Bill and who?

Is this Bob Karrington? Rob, is this happening right now?

Listen, at this point,Defensive.

Kyle Kuzma monolog. Great cutter.

Not a great shooter, but can make open shots when called upon.

Okay? How about a terrible shooter? He's shooting 27% from pre this year.

I would say the shot quality has been horrible on a that's going nowhere.

He has shown no professional pride whatsoever this season.

He's been actively bad. He looks like he is on autopilot.

I just think it's different when you play on a team that's actually playing for something. Absolutely.

I think he's in the running for worst player of the season. Wow. If we were doing LVP, if you've actually watched Wizards games, I think he's one of the worst players I've seen this season. Can he just flip the switch and put it back? I don't know.

I mean, it's hard to be that inefficient, that passive-aggressive, and that much just straight chilling. All the time. It's really a rare skill.

The Wizards basketball situation is hell.

It's bad.

It's hard.

Isn't that bad? They have a bunch of young guys. They have Jordan Pool playing actually pretty well this year. I don't know. Is it that bad? You're a veteran on the team. You didn't want them to trade you last year. They're trying to trade you to Dallas. You're like, I want to be here. I'll put this.

This wouldn't be a problem if what the Bucks weren't giving up is a player who is very important to their team and Chris Middleton who just can't do it at that level that they need him to do Can he move?

He's got two bad angles.

But what they needed was somebody who could do some Chris Middleton adjacent things. And Kyle Kuzma is closer to Tori and Prince than he is to healthy Chris Middleton. That's a big problem for a trade like this.

But was there a Chris Middleton-esque guy out there?

No, and not in trading Chris in his current form. But that's the quandary that the Bucks found themselves.

Chris Middleton this year, guys, has been a non-entity.

He's been an occasional entity.

There was a stretch two weeks ago when he had zero points in two of three games, like a Goose eggs. It was a lot of alternating. But somehow he's shooting like 45% from three or something crazy.

Coolsman can play four for these guys next to Yannis or next to Brook if you need them to. Again, I think that role played junkyard dog guy is still in there.

Yes, we're recording this.

One last thing, because I think the Kuzma thing is going to work. When Team USA was assembled last summer, Kuzma, who was like an outspoken Twitter guy, he's like, Yo, these guys are big NBA players and names, but somebody's going to have to fill a role. Somebody's going to have to do these dirty work things. And Devin Booker famously said, I will, or whatever, quote, quote, quote, or whatever. This is cool as me explains to you. I understand what it means to be on a team that's trying to do something meaningful. It was five years ago.

Dwight Howard was on that team. Look, Rajon Ronda was on that team. Covid, it just happened.

I think Doc, as a coach- Joe Biden was alive. Is the guy who will curse you out for not doing the right thing in terms of playing your role, playing next to Yann.

I'll go the other way. I think Doc is going to hate Kyle Kuzma. I think he's going to hate Kyle Kuzma. I think he's going to like it. I think he's going to be like, I can't believe we traded for this guy.

Why didn't my scouts tell me? In three, four weeks when this thing is actually working- We disagree.

Rob, you get the tiebreaker vote.

It's not going to go well. He's Kyle Kuzma. Wow. Here's the thing. When you approach a trade of this magnitude, and this is a huge trade for the Bucks, they've been waiting to either trade Chris Middleton or Brook Lopez for the right move that came along. This is not the right move.

I'm going in our YouTube chat. Thanks to everybody who's sending questions. Wrapped Stalian says, Hey, if it weren't for Kuzma, we might not have the nickname Din Shitty. I forgot about that. I forgot about the Kuzma Dinwiddie feud. People want to know if they can trade Jordan Pool. He's playing pretty well this year.

He's also there, I want to say, the elder statesman of their rotation right now.

Is Jordan Pool an Orlando Magic candidate?

I don't think he's an Orlando Magic player, personally.

But Does Orlando know they were allowed to make trades?

We're going to soon find out.

I think they did the Vucevic trade, and they're just like, mic trap. No more trades for us.

They did it. They probably should be a little bit more desperate in terms of getting some offense together.

Gms, they fall in love with their young guys. So it's not that surprising that they still think all of these guys are going to come through in a major way. Jailin Sugs going down, I think, is just underrated in how- It's really hard them to lie.

It turned out he was their MVP. Who knew? I thought it was Palo.

Super important to their team.

With the Milwaukee, that Kuzma trade, which is really a money trade. They have to waste their first-run pick they took last year. Aj Johnson got under the apron, which raises the question, why did the CBA suck so much? How did the league just turn into just people trying to get under the apron, make financial moves, save tax money? I know it's on the one hand, you have the NBA, the owners, Adam Silver, probably the smartest lawyers on the planet. And then on the other side, you have a couple of players, some dude who took the job because they thought it'd be cool to get a picture with LeBron, and they just get worked every time. But this is disgusting. It's two things. It's terrible.

So nobody's going to convince me that this doesn't cost players money. People say, Well, no, the basketball revenue is guaranteed, and teams have to spend to a floor.

But those are literal facts, though.

Yeah, no, that's cool. But teams going above and beyond. Sure, sure. What is called for is his more money in the player pool. And now teams will just say, We don't have that option because of these things. And the reason why the players agree to it is that the new CBA kicked in, and they 2X the money. So when you're making all this money, it's like, Why are we going to buy for this. We're richer than we've ever been by two and a half times X. And so that situation converged to let the owners get this. And it's literally so that Joe Laker could forever just be like, he His first five, six years just always spending way over the cap and always going into the luxury tax. Now, he could go to his fan base without any retribution and say, Guys, second apreed out.

Yeah, my hands are tied. My hands are tied. What can a guy do?

The owner is just literally like, Oh my God, we're never going to have to do this again. There's an apreed? Oh, my goodness. That's the thing.

Ultimately, what you're describing is in some way the way the leak has been for a long time. It was just they were mostly trying to dodge the tax. Now, even if you are above the tax, there are more lines to dodge and harsher penalty.

I've never seen it be the number one reason for this many trades before. We've always had financial implications and stuff, but this is different. You have 8, 9, 10 teams that are just like, we're doing this because it gets us under Aprain 1, Aprain 2, Aprain 3. I also think the fans don't want to take the time to understand it. They don't care. It's confusing. And it turns into this have, have not of basketball conversation.

Nobody can explain to me what problem it was solving. What was solved by this in terms of selling it?

It seems like they were... So I talked about this. We talked about this, about the Zach LaVine thing, where it's harder to trade Zach LaVine. So Zach LaVine then goes, All right, I guess I'll roll my sleeves up and I'm going to have an awesome season for Chicago. It's not like I can go anywhere. But for every Zack Levine, there's been 10 other ways that this went wrong. And it just seems like there's more player movement. There's more guys getting bought out. There's more roster turnover. We had another trade, by the way. What did we get? The Clippers have traded Terrence Mann, a beloved Clipper guy forever, who always had the T-Man game, and Bones Highland, who couldn't have been more available for Bogdan Bogdanovic in three second round picks. Now we're talking. The Clips needed a heat checky off the bench guy like this. I was really hoping Denver would get Bogdanovic because he has the Jogich thing. But as you know, Denver is not allowed to make trades or spend money. I think they're a zero him.

Look, first week of the season, the Strather talk, even the Christian Brown stuff. I was like, Zeke Najee. I was like, Zeke Najee made a couple of threes the other day, and I was like, What the hell is going on? I was just like, Guys, I get it. You love your young guys and whatever.

You say this like you're not talking up Julian Strather in the group chat. No, I'm just saying now I have the receipts.

I'm like, Damn, I'm like, Damn, Strather is better than I thought he was. So maybe they will be vindicated, but you're right, Bill. I would have loved to see them do something like a bogey thing. I was excited when they were in the Zack LeVine sweepstakes, allegedly. This happened in the Celtics five years ago where they either have giant contracts or small contracts that no in between, and you can't get the 16 a $20 million guy because you literally can't put the contracts together.

Bogdanavich and the Clippers.

I love the pickup for them. It is a buy-alow thing, and we need to acknowledge that Bogey is having the worst season of maybe his entire professional life, including pre-MBA, just has not had in the way that you would expect.

He's been an underrated post-Olympics slowdown guy.

Almost everybody who went to the Olympics has been a little step slow this season. It's been a thing for sure. So I would love to see him recapture some parts of his game, surrounding him with high leverage defensive personnel with the Clippers. That's a team that is so desperate for shot making, depending on what's going on with Harden, how he's being pressured that night, where Kawhi is in terms of his health on a day-to-day basis. They need what Bogdanovic can provide. And so if this is the cost, absolutely, why not?

Can I read you his stats?

I'm a little worried to even hear them.

Ten points a game? Yeah.

The shooting percentages are bad.

Well, you know how normally 50, 40, 90 is the standard for percentages? He's a 37, 30, 88 guy.

That's not what you want.

Seven 2. 6 PR. It's like nearing Brian James level of... Oh, God. Sorry, Was. But last year, 17 a game. Yeah.

I feel okay being a bogey apologist, not a cop.

Yeah, I always feel with him like, first of all, Atlanta could not have been more of a wrong team for him. I don't know if Trey Young is the catalyst for him. I want to see him on a team that's like, you're coming in, you're going to play eight minutes. We're going to run plays for you. We're going to run you off Go nuts, do your thing. Then for the Hawks, Terrence Mann, another long swing guy. There's some Clipper fans of my life who were like, When are they going to unleash this guy?

Never really happened. Never really got off the ground. Bones.

Bones?

What about him? He is a player in the NBA, that's for sure.

He's a player that made a lot more since 30 years ago.

Back when I was just, again, applauding everything the Nuggets did, I just swore Bones was going to be a person. He was the truth. A person.

But then he failed an IQ test. He wasn't happy playing with Nucoli O'Kish, which is the number one IQ test.

He was complaining that he wasn't getting enough tick on a team that had Nucoli O'Kish.

He thought he was better than Jamal Murray.

Yeah. Tough.

Now he's about to be on his third team.

Almost borderline, we could replace the N-waiters and the rewatchables with the bone tile heat check. It's almost like a personality heat check. All right, so Atlanta, they're really gutting this thing.

I guess it makes sense in the way that the future of their team is more Jalen Johnson, Zachary Richesche oriented, right?

Like Richeshe.

I think there's something there that works. Do you have to do all of this housekeeping right now? I don't exactly know why it would need to happen right now.

Yeah, I guess the idea that they're not keeping their pick is like, why are you losing and giving them a better pick? It's like, that's gone. It's off the door.

We got to do it right for our team. The sun cost there. I've heard that. Yeah, it's like we already lost the pick. What do we care if it's 4, 12, 15? I would personally care. I would be like, Oh, my God.

The spite piece. Yeah, you got to stick it to them.

We've seen this happen in the past. I remember the Clippers that one year when they traded their number one to get rid of Aaron Davis' contract. We're just going to eat it. Then it turned into Kyrie Irving. You just never know. I just wouldn't want to find out. Speaking of teams that we don't know what the hell they're doing, Toronto traded for Brandon Ingram?

What is this?

I did a tweet where I did the power rankings of teams that I don't know what you're doing. I didn't put Toronto in the top five because I haven't known what they're doing for over a year. They just every year trade their pick. They get a guy who's He's likable. He doesn't seem to make sense with any of the other players they have. I have no idea why you would trade Bruce Brown, Kelly O'Linnick, and a pretty mediocre first. That's Indiana's pick. To then pay Brandon Ingram when you're already overpaying Scottie Barnes, you're overpaying quickly. R. J. Barrett's making a shitload. I just don't understand their team.

It's tough. I remember when Masai was... He was like a GM free agent, and it was like, Is he going to New York? Is he going to do this? Could he save the Knicks? And there was rumors that he got equity in the Raptors and all of this stuff. To use all of that cache and literal equity and goodwill to do this with the Raptors since he re-signed with them. It's just so rudderless and directionless. And I get it. Brandon Ingram is a good player. I understand why you would want him on his team, but what is the idea or the theory of the Raptors?

I genuinely don't. They're a team that wants to play a very loose, free wheeling, democratic style. That's not Brandon Ingram. That is not how Brandon Ingram plays basketball. If you did want a big forward to put next to Scottie Barnes, why did you trade the better one in Pascal Siakam? The Siakam comparison is inevitable because they're giving up that Indiana pick. They're giving up Bruce Brown. They're giving up Kelly O'Linnick, who I want to say was involved tangentially in that deal in a follow-up with Utah. And so now you traded Pascal Siakam for an expiring Brandon Oshaya Bhaji was in that deal, the pick that became Jacobi Walter. That's your Pascal Siakam Hall. Why didn't you just keep Pascal Siakam if that's where you were going to end up?

Brandon Ingram has been available since June? Back in the days when we had video stores and you would just scroll by the new release section, you'd be like, Huh, domestic disturbance with John Travolta and Vince Vawn. I don't think so. Then you'd walk around for 15 more minutes and then you'd pick up the VHS tape again. Travolta and Vince Vawn. Then you'd stroll around again. That's Brandon Ingram. People were just strolling by the new release offer him for nine months.

Here's the justification. It's like, you know Brandon Ingram is going to feel a way about New Orleans not paying him because he feels like he's accomplished stuff there. Oh, yeah.

There's so much stuff.

There's a entitlement there. But then you go a whole year and a half, basically, where nobody wants you. I think he comes into that contract negotiation with the Raptors with a little bit more humility. I'm sure that's probably what they're banking on, where he doesn't think he's a five-year maximum contract player.

I think it'll probably be a shorter term deal.

It'll probably be like a three-year.

But are you telling I'm just seeing a future where they pay him upwards of $40 million a season. And to do what?

He is a-Dynamic duo. Him and Scottie Barnes.

He doesn't fit with Barnes. He's hurt all the time.

Him and R. J, they occupy the same area of the court.

He has a I'm already frustrated. He has a top five body of like, Oh, man, you're going to get hurt. Just when you see him in person, he's so skinny.

Does it space? No. Which the Raptors need?

He will occasionally talk himself into taking spot-up threes.

But occasionally. Here's the red flag for me beyond all the other red flags. You had Golden State, who was definitely strolling around that new release video store over and over again. Steve Kerr, who coached Brandon Ingram on one of those Fibit teams. No shot. And by the end, Brandon Ingram is like, sick. He can't play in the last two games because he was just out of the rotation. And Golden State, who desperately needed anything. And this was the layup trade of all time. Give up nothing for Brandon Ingram. They were like, we're good. We're not doing that. Then Miami, they're sitting there, too. Hey, we could turn, whatever. Maybe we'll turn. And Miami is like, We're also good. And then you have Toronto who's like, We don't think we can get free agents ever. So this is how we get free agents. And then they talk themselves into it. I don't like it.

I don't like it at all.

The talent doesn't fit at all. But again, another lanky, rangey guy who they love, but he's never been... He's never used his tools for good.

It's fake size, and he doesn't guard. Never, ever.

And he's ball stopper.

He absolutely is ball stopper. He's ball stopper, Tiff. He absolutely is ball stopper.

Ball stoppiest. Would there be a worse team to be the fifth guy?

Than this one? Meaning you never get the ball past to you?

It's like you're like Agbaji. You're like, Fuck. Oh, my God. I'm just going to be in the corner over here, guys.

Agbaji seems like he has a good head on his shoulders. He seems well adjusted.

He's having a good year. I was wondering if he was a sneaky trend in that piece. He's also been frisky lately.

Especially on D. They've guarded really well.

Well, their fans are frisky. They're always taking everything personally. They did win the title in 2019.

They have a lot to take personally. There's reasons to boo the national Anthem right now.

Right. 2019, they won the title. And since then, Masai has just been on a heater. It's like when Obama finished the presidency, he's like, I'm opening a production company and I'm playing golf. Masai I'm going to trade for Brandon Ingram.

Shout out to our colleague Danny Chou, who flagged, this is now four consecutive trade deadlines where the Raptors have traded a first for a guy who's about to be a free agent.

Because they feel like they can't sign a free agent? I guess. Did Danny Chou like this? This trade?

I can't imagine. I can't imagine.

I'm going to say Brandon Ingram is not a Danny Chou type of player.

Doesn't strike me as one.

Then the New Orleans side of that trade, just quickly. They're down to as assets, Trey Murphy, the best player in the team, who I think is their only untouchable.

He's been really good.

Zion Williamson, wild card, could get traded next half hour. C. J. Mccollum, always in Trade Rumors. Herb Jones, Missy, Alvarado and DeJante Murray, who will not be playing for at least a year.

Torn Achilles.

That's brutal. Their first-round picks are fine, but not... They're whatever. They used to have like, Oh, look at all those first-round pics. They've taken all of them. But you go back to that '80 trade.

Dude, I go back to 2019 all the time.

But look at all the people in this trade. Deandre Hunter, Brandon Ingram, Lonzo Ball, who I think was way more of an asset back then than he got hurt. Josh Hart, Mo Wagner. I forgot how Mo Wagner was- 22 first, which became Dyson Daniels. The 23 swaps didn't apply, and then the 25 first pick. It was a lot. When you look back at, they did get a lot of players.

Lonto, Josh Hart, Brandi Ingram.

I mentioned this because none of those guys are on the team?

Yes, that's the thing.

None of them.

I've said this a couple of times. I remember being at Summer League in 2019 after they traded AD, draft Zion, who looks like he's going to be the next LeBron James. I remember seeing Griff at Summer League, and there was an aura emanating from him. Everybody wanted to bend this guy's ears.

It was like, my God, Griff, he's done. You got Zion and a million pips.

They are on their way. They got all these pips, and their young guys are cross control and blah and this, and there's so much versatility and oh, my, New Orleans is it. And what's come of this AD trade? One frisky first-round series.

A ton of assets that look awesome on paper, but no longer play it in the team.

Yeah, it didn't quite work out.

And The Lonset thing was the thing that I think hurt them the most because I actually really think Lonset... We're seeing this diminished version of him in Chicago who's still a really additive player.

He just got an extension, two years, $20 million, which is nice little turnaround for him.

Yeah, but going forward, I I don't know what this team is. I don't know how long they're going to be in New Orleans. I don't know how long Zion is going to be in the team. I don't know what the plan would be going forward with this roster. And the Murray trade is catastrophic. What would you do with Zion? I would have traded Amardi. Same. But the public- I don't think it's ever running in New Orleans, so you just have to accept that. We all said how Jimmy Butler for Wiggins is a trade that makes no sense on paper. But if you're Miami, you don't have Jimmy Butler anymore. You have the Ghost, you have zombie Jimmy Butler who's not an asset. So now you turn him into a guy who can play defense and down and hit some threes.

I think that's where you get into really tough places when you don't actually have the ideal version of the player anymore. And the Pelicans have not had the ideal version of Brandon Ingram for quite some time, mostly because of injury. But they held on to him too long in the same way that the Raptors held on to see Huckum too long. You can see this chain of events of some of these teams that are feeling pinched where they don't move their guys when they need to move them.

And then the perils of the max contract era is that when you have your own guy and he's clearly one of your best players, there's a pressure to pay him a max deal, which he'll be in the same pay grade as guys that are just clearly much better. Bonafide All-stars and Ingram and even Siakam. These are high-quality players. Are they max players? But the way the system is set up, you have to pay these guys in accordance to this freaking pay scale. Yeah.

Well, think about this. We knew somebody was going to suck in the West heading into this season. We're like, There's just too many good teams. There's too much talent. Who is going to be the out of nowhere, this team sucks team? New Orleans has played 15 games and one twelve. That would not have been on my bingo card. They have so much talent. You can feel something stinky maybe with them, the way they're heading the Trey Murphy thing, Zion, you never know. But this is 12 wins is nuts.

We thought they were clearly going to be above play in range. They'd be in the sixth, maybe even 5 range.

Their over-order was like 45 and a half. It is lower now.

At his idiots on New Orleans coming into this year.

We are going to take a break for the podcast. Phoenix, going forward, the Durant piece of the Butler Trade, which we did not discuss. What did you think of him being like, I'm shutting this down. I don't want to go to Golden State. If you trade for me, I'm going to be unhappy because that's confirmed. I heard all the same stuff everybody else had. It seemed like on Tuesday, that was going to be a three-way trade. I think it was really close. He basically came down to, Are we sure KD is on board with this? The feedback was, he's not. He doesn't want to go back. Rob, you're in the Bay. Why didn't he want to go back?

What was it? I can't imagine a single reason why he might not want to run back that experience.

Probably a Draymon thing.

I could imagine that being a potential holdup.

A Steve Kerr piece, the Draymon piece. This will be bad for my legacy.

I think him coming back to the Bay, if there ever was a full circle moment for that, it would require Kevin Durant to have a dramatic reimagining of who he is as a player and a person and the way he fits into the basketball universe. And I give Kevin Durant credit for this in a way. He has a very firm and fixed understanding of who he is. It is not the guy who needs to go crawling back to the Warriors to win again. That leads you to some places like Phoenix with this particular roster sometimes. But it didn't really fit with the KD that we know that he would want to do something like that.

It doesn't fit because it would have made sense basketball-wise, which is just generally not what KD does. He doesn't do the basketball thing except for Golden State. That's been the only time that he put the thing on the floor first, and he didn't really care for the results in terms of his own personal happiness, as he said previously.

I went back and looked at his 2019 game log splits because he was really good to start the year. Then after the Draymond thing, I forgot. He was like 21 a game, 33% from three. Then in the playoffs, he ran back up and he was awesome. But it was damaging for months. That's what's so funny when you see these stuff now, these podcasts, where these guys do these fake things together and it's like, Draymond and Katie, no, no, we're good. It's like, there's no way they're good. Katie's never forgiving whatever happened, whatever was said. No. There's that piece. There's probably a Steve Kerr piece. But from a basketball standpoint, if I was him, I would have rather been on Golden State. It's a no-brainer. I don't want to be in this Phoenix team, this crazy owner, no pics.

It's almost you fit the thing like a glove. Obviously, KD is good enough to do all the ball movement stuff, but that's not what Golden State would be asking them to do. They'd be asking them to be KD. Again, just get the ball and cook people and Steph and everybody else will work around it. But again, I can understand not wanting to go back and do the same thing and wanting to maybe, if Phoenix isn't what you ultimately end up doing in terms of signing an extension with, exploring some different option that makes you a lot happier. And I think Phoenix's whole thing has always been with trading all these pics and this and the future is done. If we want to, we'll do a fire sale for Katie and Booker, try to get a bunch of pics back and just move on with our lives. That's what it feels like the Phoenix thing is.

It felt like this could have been the first time in Kevin Durant's life where he didn't really get to pick, and maybe he just would have gotten moved somewhere. But then when he was so vocal, it made it clear he didn't want to play for Golden State. I think it changed the math a little bit. Ultimately, I think the only way it would have worked for Katie as a warrior, again, is if it was also a more elaborate LeBron going to Golden State thing. That would probably have to happen guys.

Even it's not- Honestly, just put a bullet in my head. I just wouldn't be able to handle it. I think you're probably bailed out on that just because the timeline were so different. The last thing the league needs is- Let's talk about these old guys some more. Can we bring in Conspiracy Bill for a second? Let's do it.

I thought he was already in the room with us.

No, we bring him in. Okay. I'll put a hood in. Conspiracy Bill is here. Are we sure there's that lingering bitterness with KD for the Billy's injury and maybe how that was handled by the team?

In which direction? Him towards Golden State? Yeah.

People don't remember this, Bill. That's why you're Bill Simmons. I'm not Bill Simmons.

I'm Conspiracy Bill. Conspiracy Bill is here. But that's why- I'm I'm just asking. I have no inside information. Please don't aggregate this. I just always thought it was a little weird. He hurt his calf, came back, and blew out his Achilles.

People don't remember. And I was like, at the time, there was a bit of a whisper campaign of, what's up with KD? What's taking him so long? You should be back already. He looks good when we see him in practice, when we see him in the gym, blah, blah, blah.

He's going to be a free agent. He doesn't want to risk it.

It was a whisper campaign. He came back and then tore his freaking Achilles. And Bob Miles was crying at the news conference and all of that. I always thought that was like, Man, damn, we did say he was loafing and taking too long.

Another great appearance from Conspiracy Bill. That was great. What a cameo by him.

Why did something to it.

I wonder what the people think on the chat. I'm going to look in the chat for this. Oh, man, that really got the chat going. People want a 90-minute Conspiracy Bill. So maybe I just put it on the hood every time.

I'm sure you've gotten a few of the conspiracies with the Lucas situation.

It's out of control. We're saving all Luka Laker stuff for part two. We're on Trade Deadline Watch. We have Cody Zeller and Houston's 2028 second-round pick going to the Rockets so Atlanta can get under the luxury tax. Sources tell Freep Sports that Dennis Schroeder will end up with the Pistons as part of the massive Jimmy Butler deal. I love that. Find the pistons. I'm just getting a little frisky. Could I get to succeed? I have an awesome player. I have a team that is tough and likes playing with each other and that gets a little aggro in some of these games. They're not afraid to get chibi with guys. I have the scariest guy in the league in beef stew. Why not?

They also ended up with who did they get in the Butler deal? I want to see if it was Lindy Waters and Josh Richardson, I want to say, end up playing. Yeah, Josh Richardson. Maybe not players have been important for them. Lindy Waters, I could actually giving them some minutes and some stretch at times. I could see him giving them some two minutes. Here's a fun one.

In the Bogdana and Bogdanavich trade, the Clipper's got three second-round picks back, including their own pick. We love a paper turn. We're trading so many second-round picks. Teams are now reacquiring their own picks.

You don't love any pick like your own pick.

We finally got it back. They should do the welcome home jumbo jump thing. Do you think we should have third-round picks? Should we have third-round picks?

Who are we drafting in the third-round?

I don't know. These teams love trading these pics. Then they could just put like they've acquired four third-round pics and a second-round pick.

More bites at the apple, Bill.

If we say the Lakers things for part two, what else jumped from the trade deadline for you?

The Fox thing, I think, was cool in a couple of ways because a lot of people felt like the Spurs should hold out for a better superstar. I said this on our podcast. It's almost like your friend who is addicted to Tinder and there's a nice girl who wants him and wants to settle with him, but he's like, Yeah, but I got these five other hot chicks on Tinder that might want to mess with me. It's like, No, get with the girl that's a nice girl, good-looking girl, wants to be with you. Settle up with that one.

Do you think the was 10 years ago would have made this take? Of course not. No. This is personal development.

Of course not.

That's a very mature version of was. You're very buttoned up today.

You got the cardigan going. The Spurs locking in on not just the Aaron Fox as a talent, but temperamentally, he's a Spurs player in terms of his headspace, his approach to the game. He's just not an NBA diva. He's about the right things. And I thought they were smart to just be like, you know what? It's not going to cost us a ton to bring this guy in. Yes, some people might look at the extension like, are you going to pay him $48 million?

I would. I think he's a top 30 guy.

Yeah, I'm okay with it.

To me, I'm okay. Also, he wanted to be in a small market Texas team, which is pretty rare.

Go get him. And I'm happy they did that.

I thought it was like, the more I stared at it, it was like 62 cents on the dollar for what they paid. I can't believe Sohan or Vassell were not in the trade. And I don't know what the Bulls. The more I stayed at the Bulls part of it- Their part of it is the most confusing. Every time they make a trade, you're always like, Wait, what are they getting? It just seems like now it's like, cool, we get Zack Collins for two years. I just don't get them at all.

Another team that just held on to Zack Levine for two long waiting for the perfect deal to materialize, and it never did.

Do we know that better deals were available earlier than this?

Better than this?

Yeah. I think Golden State was trying to get them before they went down the Butler Road. But I think that was sitting there. I thought he was the sneaky trade piece of this whole thing. His contract's bad, but it's not that bad. It's this year, next year, and then it's an expiring. He was playing great. I think I'd said this before, but he plays well against good teams, which I think matters. I don't know what to make of that Sacramento team. We talked about it earlier, but you could tell me they're going to win 10 of their next 12. You could tell me they're going to lose 12 in a row. It's a weird team.

Their owner just doesn't like the idea of a complete teardown and rebuild. Other people might have been like, look, Fox has been our franchise player for how long? We built everything around him. We moved Halliburton out of here because of him and our belief in him, and he no longer wants to be here. All right, let's start all over. See if we can get some bonus offers out there. Let's start all over. Do something different.

They've made the playoffs one time in 20 years. I get it.

I I get it.

That's the thing. It's like, in theory, sure, from an asset standpoint, maybe there's an argument for a teardown. Sabonis has been probably a little too good, at least as a regular season player for that.

Who trades for Sabonis? I feel like he's way more valuable to them than he would be to some other team.

That could be true.

A wise GM told me once, you always want to have six or seven dumb teams that you can trade with at any time in a 30-team league. Sacramento has just always managed to be one of those teams.

This has been a big deadline for potentially dumb teams. I know we're not dipping too much into the Lakers part of this yet, but the Luka trade has made me feel young again. It is hearkening back to a time of our youth where there just haven't been that many the old-fashioned absolute dog shit, like David Khan style trade.

I was literally about to scream it, Bill.

That's what it looks.

Khan is running a team in France right now. We have 12 minutes left in the deadline. And so far, we're in Cody, Zelle or Dennis Schroeder land. Is there a team that you are surprised, hasn't done anything yet?

Definitely the Magic, most surprised because they're so rudderless right now. And the idea that you wouldn't try to spruce that thing up is tough. I think the Knicks are really counting on Mitchell Robinson coming back and being that anchor. It's a big roll to dice. They really need him.

But the big man market has also dried up pretty fast on them.

Okay, so a budget mind- But you have nick Paxton and Cam Johnson still sitting there.

They're not sitting there. The nets, are they trying to stink or not?

Why is nobody going to scoop Clint Capella? Is this an injury history thing?

He's currently injured, I want to say.

I think it's a Swiss thing.

Magic should have probably tried to something. I get it. They can be patient. Their guys are still young and all of that stuff, and they feel like they're building towards something. But the Magic should have done something. I'm always going to think the Denver Nuggets should have upgraded.

Denver is my number one. I don't know what apron Denver is in, but they seem perfectly content to stay in that apron and not do anything. I was even wondering, when Middleton got moved to Washington, would they try to make a move with Porter and use that Middleton contract, get one other, try to do a three for one, something like that, and maybe jump on the chance to dump Porter somewhere. But Porter has actually been playing pretty well lately.

And Michael Malone was quite definitive. Yeah. They are not going to trade Michael Porter.

So it seems like he's there. Murray, they're already all in on. Jokaj obviously doesn't go anywhere. Gordon, they extended, and they just don't really have the flexibility. But if they do the Zeke Najee with Sarich, some swaps, second, third, and fourth round picks, and just I don't know, what could you get for that?

They are actually close. They feel like one even minor role player addition could tick them up a couple percentage points in the title race.

Yeah, I think so. Also, just related to that- Especially in the West. Why has nobody made a move for Jeremy Grant? I know the Bucks were kicking the tires on him.

Because they have a league pass?

They were kicking the tires on him.

Because he makes 35 billion a year, or whatever? 32?

And He's already 30.

But I just- I think he's on trade about that number.

It's one of those things where guys on bad teams, I feel like you get in the right situation that's actually playing for something. You can change the contours of what you do on a night-to-night basis if it's for some greater good.

A couple of YouTube chat questions as we wait for a trade. Daniel wants to know if we can discuss Butler's Jersey retirement in Miami and whether that would happen. Who was retired over there? I'm already on The record is after Vince Carter's number got retired in New Jersey and Toronto, I think everyone is eligible now, especially Vince in Toronto. If that can happen, I'm fully prepared for Jimmy Butler in Miami. I think that It did happen, but we'll see. It'll probably be after Pat Raleigh's dead, maybe like 15 years from now.

Probably. He's definitely wanted the greatest heat ever.

Russell Martin says, Sacramento turning into the Bulls is so sad.

This is disrespectful. To Damanus Sabones.

It's not.

They're better than the Bulls. They're better than the Bulls. They're the Bulls with Damanus Sabones. Yeah. That's a meaningful difference.

That's a different thing. The Bulls basically had, what was it, 30 games in Lanzo's first year?

But what a beautiful 23 games they were.

And Sacramento has been that good. Capella is not injured.

Capella is not. I don't know. If you need big man help...

He might be day to day. He might be a minor.

If you need big man help, why are you breaking the bank to me I know we're saving it for the second half for Mark Williams.

Save it for the second half.

Where you could do something for Clint Capelef just for this year.

A couple of people are asking about KD. Kd to the Spurs. Katie to the Grizzlies, Katie to the Rockets.

Katie to the Grizzlies is a Katie move.

What's the most interesting of those three?

Katie to the Grizzlies is a KD move because they have the stars already, so he won't feel like the burden is all on the end.

I was wondering how you're make this insulting for a second. Yeah, the burden is- I thought you were a cop of any of it. I was like, I was confused.

No, he's going to recognize the burden will not be all on him. And so he can go in and just do KD things. Just come in, get Can you go over the offense in the two out of every five games when Ja doesn't play for some reason?

Is Ja not playing today? No, he's got bronchitis. Listen, it also would be very bitter.

Ja is just trying to save himself for the playoff.

Has Ja played four games in a row?

I'm concerned. I think so. Yet, but they're being very cautious.

Should I be surprised when I put the Grizzlies on League Pass and it's like, Here's Ja Moran, he's playing tonight. He's like him and Joel Embiid. I can't believe you're on my TV.

It's the perfect compliment I could play to Grizzlies, and I get it, I'm in the tank for them. Even when Ja is not playing, I still want to watch that team.

The Jaron Jackson Jr. Agenda is strong.

My biggest regret is not voting for him as an All-Star starter. I didn't have the balls. I wasn't strong enough. Then Rosillo, of course, did it, and then I was super jealous of it. Because when you watch him, there's definitely an aggro Jaron Jackson this year, especially in crunch time. They'll run offense like Bam out of bio style. He'll bring the ball over mid-court and be telling people where to go.

Drive at people, too.

That would be the kick of the potential Kevin Durant trade would be that the Grizzly has spent all this time cultivating this very elaborate interwoven offense. It's like, Let's just get a ball of Kevin Durant.

If the Rockets traded, I'm trying to think what the KD trade would be, but I think VanVleet would have to be in it. Probably so. Because they can't trade. But if it was like...

Who's playing PointGuard for them?

If it was like VanVleet, Terry Easton, a bunch of picks, and Phoenix just gets a reboot, and then they get out from under the money stuff next year. I'm not wavering from my... I wouldn't do anything if I'm the Rockets this year because I don't think they're in the title. I want to move into this summer and make a move with Jalen Green or Shingun.

Also, if you're going to do that, man, get somebody who's in their 20s, even if it's their late 20s, get somebody in there. Don't get a 38-year-old, man.

You're adding years to him. He's like 36, 35. Mahony, where do you stand on KD right now as an impact guy? He's really good. Because his stats...

His stats are insane.

I was actually looking at this. I did a little... I actually did some homework for this pod because it's my job. I was looking at KD this year versus KD career. His last 15 years, from 2010 to this year, he's 28 a game. This year, he's 27. He was seven rebounds for those 15 years. He's six this year. He's five assists, he's four this year. For those 15 years, 51%, he's 52 this year. 39% for three, 40 this year. 7. 6 free throw attempts for those 15 years. 6. 1 this year. He's 91% of what he normally is. The only slippage I really see is when I watch because he just looks a little creakier, stiffer than he used to be. He used to be like such a One of the smoothest players. The way he moved, he was so smooth. He's still smooth, but he's not like that. Is there anything else you've noticed?

I mean, he is by far their most reliable creator this year. He's the only reason their defense has ever remotely worked, which it mostly does not. But he's the only thing papering over most of their mistakes and the lack of ball pressure on the perimeter. There's a reason why when he's out, they look like a totally different team. They don't know how to work without him in Phoenix.

The only thing he doesn't do anymore is turn the corner on guys. He's not getting to the cup the way. Like, prime KD, that was what made it unstable.

But he still gets to his spots. But he can always get to his spots rather than- Hey, we have a trade.

Sir.

Shams, yet again. Shams just dancing in Roja's wake. He's having a great time. The Grizzly is trading Marcus Smart and a 25 first-round pick to the Wizards in a multi-team trade that sends a couple of second-round picks to Memphis. Memphis creates a roster of flexibility and cap stuff with the move. We also have Sean saying, Kevin Porter Jr. To the Bucks for Mahjan Bochamp. I've gone a couple of Kevin Porter games where you're watching. I'm like, This guy's pretty good. No. Then you have to calm yourself down. No, he gets to the basket, man.

He has moments where he looks like an above-average NBA athlete, where it's like, man, this guy has some physical gifts in terms of quickness and all of that.

Can we talk about the smart thing, though? They trade smart, two first-round picks. They trade two first-round picks. Basically, Porzingas for Smart is the trade. Smart shows up and he's been banged up the entire time, which I think is... I tried to say this delicately when the trade happened. I think the Celtics this car has a lot of miles on it. Sure. Let's sell a year too high than a year too late. I wonder because he's been expiring this year or next year? Can't remember. Let's find out. But he still feels like a playoff guy for me. I remember the Lakers tried to get him a year ago, and I wonder if that ends up being a Laker possibility would be my guess. I'll find out as you guys talk. Marcus Smart, anything left in the tank?

I mean, this is a player over 25 for the Washington Wizards, which does not fit their timeline. With Middleton. Two adults. I guess that's true. They do have Chris Middleton now. What a weird roster. What a weird way for Marcus Smart's grizzly's tenure to end. I can't believe that we got here.

Next year is his last year, $21 million.

$21 million for Marcus Smart.

Yeah, I don't know what's left.

Well, now that they have Marcus Smart, the Wizards have waived Reggie Jackson. Reggie. Shout out to Reggie Jackson's-Maybe back to Denver. Brief Wizards career.

Yeah, with Marcus, whether there's anything left in tank or not, as somebody who watched a lot of his career, most of his games that he played, just that style of play, you're just not aging nicely. All the fucking abuse that his body took, all the charges he took, all the big guys he had to go against, and I don't know. I just want to get to the world where he's retired and he's the lead analyst with Drew Carter on Celtic Games. Maybe with Scal, we can keep Scal. But I think Marcus Smart will be an incredible post-career local Celtic guy.

That'd I hope. I'm trying to figure out what Memphis is doing because the reporting from Shams around the Marcus Smart trade is that it's creating roster flexibility. And Memphis just- So there's some trade coming. Dumped Jake Leravia, who can actually play. Rotation guy. To the Sacramento Kings. Nice little pickup for them.

They did that weird thing with Leravia where they didn't extend his option. So he was a free agent after the year. And then he started playing really well. And they fucked it up. The King's got Leravia. They got Leravia. I like him. I was hoping the Celtics to get him.

What are the grizzlies going to do here?

I wonder if there's... Now I'm starting to wonder if there's some KD potential.

It won't be very exciting. Although, when the KD era in Phoenix appeared that it might be coming to a close. I was trying to reflect and to be like, Okay, what have we done here? About two years as a son so far, obviously hasn't had the playoff run this year. A six and nine record in the playoffs with Phoenix. One playoff Series win. Series win.

But that awesome two games with Booker where they scored like- That was sick. 90 points each game together. It was like, holy shit.

They were down to zip to the nuggets and came back and tied the series up.

Hey, guys, we have to end part one of the podcast, but we're staying on YouTube. Don't leave. We're just ending part one of the podcast, which will go up pretty shortly. All right, that's it for part one of the BS podcast. Remember, part two is coming pretty soon right after the trade deadline. Thanks to Kyle Creighton, Gehow, and Sruti for producing. As always, you can watch all the clips and videos from this podcast on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel, See for part 2. On the wayside, I don't have a few years with them. On the wayside, on the Must be 21 plus in President Select States for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus in President DC. Gambling problem? Call 100 Gambler or visit rg-help. Com. Call 188-789-7777 or visit ccpg. Org/chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp. Org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gambling helpline ma. Org or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts, or call 1877-8 Hope, NY, or text Hope, NY in New.