Transcript of Is Game 3 Of The NBA Finals The Biggest In New York History? | Local Hour New

Sehr gut, sehr gut, sehr gut! Sehr gut? WISO Steuer ist sehr gut. Das sagen ganz viele. Cool! Wer sagt das?

Stiftung Warentest, Computerbild, Focus Money, Chip, Finanztipp. Such dir was aus.

Mega! Aber das ist doch bestimmt kompliziert.

Nö!

Einfach Foto von der Lohnsteuerbescheinigung machen und fertig.

Klingt sehr gut. Ist sehr gut.

Hol dir dein Geld zurück mit WISO Steuer.

Ein perfekter Frühlingstag. Sonne. Park. Picknick.

Und so viele Pollen.

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I'm concerned about Zaz's growing old man tendencies. He limped in today complaining about his airline experience. I think a lot of people, I mean, I think most people flying these days are complaining about their airline experience. What happened to you?

So we fly to New York on Friday, my wife and I, and I sit down in my seat. We both, we do the move, Dan, where we each buy an aisle seat. Okay, we're gonna sit next to someone we don't know, but we both want aisle, so we both buy aisle seats. And I sit down in my seat and I immediately am like, this isn't comfortable. It feels strangely uncomfortable, my seat. And after like a minute, I turn to my wife and go, "I'm really uncomfortable." And she looks at me and she goes, "There's no cushion on your seat." And so I look down and I see like, you're right, it's completely flat. So like—

Was it a full flight? You couldn't go get another aisle seat?

Well, eventually, like, and I'm not a complainer, so I was talking to the stewardess. I'm not complaining to the stewardess, you know? Well, wait a minute. What's the distinction?

You're making there. If you're telling her about something that you find unsatisfactory, that's a complaint no matter how you deliver it.

I'm not delivering the information as if I'm angry or anything like that. Like, I'm told—

I'm telling her, but you are complaining.

No, but I'm like, hey, my, my seat, it doesn't have a cushion. It's like I'm sitting on plastic.

It's a reasonable complaint, but you're complaining.

And, and so one of the things I said was, is, is there— are there any other seats on the flight? Like, I didn't go into I need a refund. Like, it's just, hey, is there another seat that I could sit in? You know, it's like, no, it's a full flight. And so I'm like sitting on plastic the entire flight. I was so uncomfortable.

Now, is this one of those American Airlines busses that you were on, or— No, what's the plane?

That would have been comfortable. All right, it was on JetBlue. And yeah, like, I—

the whole—

I was So uncomfortable for 2+ hours.

Amin flies more than just about anybody here, I think. He does more flying. He loves getting his miles and stuff. You've noticed, Amin, that the entire flying experience has been cheapened, correct? Not like that I'm longing for the 1950s when they were serving prime rib at the front of the plane, but it's all been cheapened.

I wouldn't know, Dan. I get upgraded.

So you don't have any flight or travel complaints? You're flying in and out on those 2 flights from San Antonio because there ain't no direct flights Miami to San Antonio.

Antonio. There is. I flew it on it. Really? It was a small plane, but yeah, no complaints. No, it was great.

By the way, I felt like I was bothering the stewardess when I was telling—

flight attendant. That's why.

Oh, it's not—

I felt like I was—

was it a lady?

Of course it was.

Like I was bothering her. This is a reasonable thing to bring to the attention— or a gay— of the flight attendant, right? Like, this isn't something I should keep to myself and just hang with them, right?

Don't, don't bend to the woke mob.

What ended up happening? Nothing. You just ended up flying.

What am I gonna do, sit on the floor?

So flat-assed? You ended up flying flat-assed all the way.

I was like, I was getting a pain down my leg. I thought I was getting a blood clot.

I have talked to a great many of my peers my age about how flying destroys them now compared to how flying didn't destroy them when they were doing it in their 20s and 30s. You're of an age— this is a conversation I was having with Stu Gotzelot about when he was flying. You're of an age now where you have to take care of your body. That kind of flight you will wear with you for 2 weeks in your hip and elsewhere. You're going to be sleeping uncomfortably. You're going to be in some pain.

I was really uncomfortable, and I think I'm feeling it now. Terrible. I was sitting on plastic on a plane.

In terms of what New York is going to experience tonight, is it the biggest stuff since the Giants were playing the undefeated Patriots, or the Yankees and Arizona after 9/11?

This is the biggest sporting event in the history of New York City. Easily. Easily. Tonight, because you've got— obviously the Knicks are up 2-zip, looking very good in the Finals. You've got all the celebrities that already come on a Tuesday night in January, But now it's an NBA Finals game, the first one in 27 years.

Go on.

Then you've got the sitting US president is gonna be there.

He will be sitting 'cause he can't stand anymore.

Then you've got the most popular mayor in the history of New York will be there as well. Objection. Sitting upstairs.

Objection.

Sitting upstairs. Sitting with the people. Sitting with the people.

Rudy was America's mayor.

When you add all those things up, Dan, the stakes, the combatants who will be on the floor, Victor Wembanyama, obviously the most remarkable athlete really right now. And then all of the extra people in the peanut gallery, if you will. There's nothing like it. Not a Super Bowl, not a World Series, not Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio. None of that.

Can I go a hypothetical Super Bowl? Jets-Giants.

That's not real and it's never going to happen.

Can I—

that would be bigger. Can I throw you Mexico starting the World Cup this week in Mexico against South Africa?

Nope. That's not New York City, though.

No, I know, but like, it might not even be the biggest event this week.

I object to a number of things Amin said, but you can't say Wen Banyama is the best athlete going right now when Shohei Ohtani still exists and has an ERA under 1.

That's right, Dan. Shohei Ohtani walks down the street. Victor Wen Banyama walks down the street. Any street in the world. Where are people gravitating? Where are they gravitating?

Well, in Japan. I don't believe that it's going to be Wembenyama.

Okay, so basically you did one of those maps, you know, where they say, oh, the whole country—

He said any street.

Okay, any street outside of Japan.

Land does vote.

Regardless, I would say to you, just in terms of athletic feats, the moment that Wembenyama starts being able to do everything he's doing in basketball and then have an ERA under 1 as well, then he will be in the conversation with Shohei Ohtani.

You guys are doing a weird conversation about who's better at their sport. I'm telling you The— I said, yes, I said the most remarkable, the guy who is drawing attention, the guy who makes grandmothers who don't watch basketball turn on the TV. They're not doing that for Shohei because Shohei, as great as he is, he might be the greatest baseball player ever, he hasn't cracked through like this guy has cracked through. This guy cuts across every single demographic.

My wife and I were in New York City this weekend. On Saturday, we went to the NBA store. Which was slammed, alright? Just so much Knicks gear being bought.

It was just me doing it.

But we went to the NBA store, we wanted to buy my younger son a couple of, a couple of shirts. We wanted to buy him a couple of Victor Wembanyama shirts. Like, he likes Wembanyama! And so we're like really sheepishly walking through the store looking for the Wembanyama shirts amongst all the Knicks stuff. And afraid that someone's gonna get mad that we're walking around with Wemba Nyama shirts.

I've got a number of things that I want to get to, including these games in New York in just a second. I was surprised— perhaps I should not have been given the way the internet connects people today— in New York, it happened to me several times where somebody's just pointing at me and saying, "82-0." And I was surprised. It happened to me quite a bit this weekend in Miami too, where evidently this game that has gone viral that people think that we rigged around here, even though I'd never played it, didn't know what they were talking about. And when they made me play it the other day, I was watching and seeing it for the first time, and all my questions were genuine because none of the things that we did were rigged. But evidently people are shocked that on our first try we were able to go 82-0. What is the name of this game? I don't—

I've only played it once, several times.

Literally said it. Okay, so 82-0 is the name of the game. I didn't know that that was the name of the game.

Is, is the name of the game 82-0 or is it 82?

Is it? Because people were just saying 82 to me.

No, I just told you that it was 82-0 several times.

Okay, people were just saying 82 to me, but people think that we rigged this because you guys are still playing it and unable to get 82-0.

I've never gotten 82-0. I've never done it.

How many times have you played it?

I played it so many times this weekend that I've gotten some 82-0s. You gotta have Wilt though. Yeah, you gotta. I told you that, yeah. I've probably played it hundreds of times and I've gotten like 2 82s in a row. It's like insanely hard. By the way, there are 2 weird cheat codes in it. The Wilt, '60s Wilt is the number one cheat code, but I've all, which I knew, but I've also been told that Washington Wizards Russell Westbrook is another cheat code, which is so odd.

Uh, can you guys play for me? This is authentic. We did not make any of this up. I did not know what I was doing and I won on the first try somehow. Let's, uh, play at least a little bit of this. Yeah!

Again! What a day! My leg! You're welcome.

Wow.

Hey, hey, hey.

Oh, looks like 7th Avenue outside the Garden.

That's what it's going to be tonight. People are really mad at Trump for showing up. He's going to make traffic a nightmare. He's going to make everything there inconvenient. Wildly inconvenient. Nobody wants him there like he is going to a place where fewer people want him. This one's got to hurt, right? Where the personal stuff is. He fancies himself a New York guy. He wants to be in the center of this. And wherever it is that this person is human— and I don't know that he is necessarily— but wherever it is that he can hurt, uh, going back to what it is he fancies his city, nobody wants him there, and he's going to get booed out of the building. We're an empath.

I was— I wasn't sure if I thought he was going to get booed until now. You see over the last few days how they're closing off 7th Avenue. You're not going to be able to do a watch party outside the building. It's going to take hours to get into the building. It's going to be TSA-style screening. There may be people who are getting there late, and it's all as a result of Trump. Now I know he's going to get booed.

We were talking the other day about in the history of South Florida, there have been very few tickets like Colombia-Portugal for the World Cup, which starts in a week, and we were talking specifically about the fact that poor people just do not have access to being able to get anywhere close to the intimacy of the energy and the joy.

Forget poor people. Let's not mischaracterize that the way that many people are. There are plenty of upper-middle-class people that are shut out because of what tickets have become in this country.

Okay, and but what's going to happen outside of Madison Square Garden today by banning the party? You're not allowing any of the people who don't have the access, who can't afford to get in— You can watch it on TV. You're not allowing allowing them to celebrate in an organic fashion with each other in someplace that's not a sports bar, because that— you— I'm having a hard time, I mean, articulating. I'm surprised you're here today. You were in San Antonio and I thought you'd be in New York. I'm having a hard time articulating to the audience how seismic a sports event this is in that city. The fact that they're stunned to be leading the Finals 2-0 2-0, I saw it like this is happening all over. Bill Maher the other day cut short his show because he's like, I gotta watch the Knicks game, I've been waiting for this since high school. You got a whole bunch of people who have checked out on the Knicks for 25 years because they're tired of getting embarrassed coming back to the bandwagon because it's so much fun to be a part of something they never thought they'd actually see.

No, it's like I said, this is the biggest by far sporting event ever. You said Jets-Giants, that doesn't have the same hold as the Knicks do. I can't remember who said it first, but think about New York City, Manhattan, the real estate. Look how many basketball courts there are. Like, hey, we could add another building here and charge exorbitant rents and all that. No, we're gonna play basketball here every other block. It's the city's game. People care about the Knicks in a way that's weird. They cared about them when they were bad. Now they're actually not only good, they're kicking ass. They're on a historic run, and it's all culminating tonight, Game 3, the first game in 27 years in New York. I cannot stress enough, we are in a weird kind of— the city might be burnt down if the Knicks go ahead and go up 3-0 in this series. Like, you're talking about no watch parties. I'm laughing because, like, you don't think the people are still gonna be outside? And say, oh, we're gonna cordon off—

they just moved the watch party somewhere. It's like, I'm going to Central Park.

Zazz, these people aren't watching. They just want to wild out. So if you say 34 to 29, Shut down 7th and 8th Avenue. Guess what? Outside that cordon is going to be mobs of people. I was there when they beat Cleveland and they had that area cordoned off and people were climbing over the barricades. So the whole thing with the president coming, it's a really weird scenario because now you've got beyond NYPD, you've got Secret Service, like, but have we ever put the president in a situation where there might be a half a million people who don't give a shit about anything.

Where there might be a riot.

There might be a riot. So I don't know how this is gonna go. My guess is he's gonna leave well before the game's over. He can't stay until the end of the game.

Given the way these games have gone, they've both been close late, and Amin has been right about the Spurs' inexperience late in these games because they've coughed it up late. But I want to talk about the series. I don't want to apologize to you. You still have time to apologize. I don't want to apologize to you before we're actually wrong on anything. But the thing that I wanted to ask you guys, because I want to ask you a number of questions. The first is, is Jalen Brunson playing to his averages? Because this is a wildly inefficient Brunson that's beating the Spurs. Like, do you believe Jalen Brunson has been good in this series by his standards? Yes or no?

I would say yes, because he's, he's done in the fourth quarter of these games what needs to be done to win the game. So in that sense, yes, he's doing what he needs to do.

Those are two different things though, because— and I don't know what, what was he in the first game? He was 7 for 25. In the, in the second game, he was like 12 for 31. So he's shooting about 30%, and honestly, the reason that the math has always been against the little guy in this kind of scenario, uh, all of history as your reference, Isaiah Thomas being the outlier, This is why the small guy doesn't win these games, because he generally doesn't have enough around him to overcome the inefficiencies. When you run into a top-5 defense, you're not going to be the same player that you were. But Amin, I'll ask you the question. Yes, he's won the game late. The— in the last few minutes of the last two games, he's outscored the Spurs 10-5. But Amin, has he played to his standards? Yes or no?

His standards is winning, so yes. That's what he's there for.

That sounds corny, but I think you're 100% right.

The standard is— You're totally right. We need this. We need a win. He says, "I got you. Give me the ball. Get out of my way." And like, and this is all kind of the perfect storm of them embracing Mike Brown's offensive adjustment that he wanted to do at the beginning of the year, and everyone was kind of grumbling. But the idea is that, hey, we can put KAT in the high post and have him spray the ball all around. But there comes a moment where it's like, it's end of the game. We're going to put the ball in Jalen Brunson's hands and he's going to get it done. Then everyone's percentages are down. Everyone's shooting poorly in these NBA Finals.

Brunson is shooting 34% for the series. And for most of the playoffs, he shot the ball really well.

Actually, everyone's percentages are down. And that's, that's fine because again, we understand that these are two great defenses. We understand that there's higher stakes. We understand that the referees are letting a lot of contact go. Basically. And the idea is, can you get it done when you need to get it done?

I know, I know that the Spurs, obviously down 0-2, we can point to them and say, obviously they're in trouble. But here's the reason that I think they're in trouble beyond the 0-2. It's not just that Brunson, I don't think, is playing as well as he usually does. And it's not just that Karl-Anthony Towns has been better than Wemby over the 2 games. The refs tried to give that game to the Spurs.

No, they didn't.

I mean, you give KAT that 4th foul and take him out for the 3rd quarter when he won Game 1, and it was a bullshit 4th call. Like, you do not do that to a star player. You know the situation. You know that he's got 3 fouls. They knocked him out for the 3rd quarter. They gave Mitchell Robinson a bullshit tech. Tony Brothers made a call from 70 yards away when he was the official that was least qualified to make the bad call. Spoken like a Knicks fan.

Celtics fan.

Yeah, they tried to give him the game, man. When you, when you sit there and you give Karl-Anthony Towns a real— I mean, you know, that was a bullshit fourth foul on Karl-Anthony Towns that knocked him out for the third quarter. I sound like Andre the Giant.

You're a pathetic shell of a human being.

Yeah, I, I thought, I thought he fouled him. I like— I don't think that's a bullshit call. I think, I think there are— you could argue that there were a lot of non-calls. I think that's an argument. But to say those— that foul was, was bad or wrong or, or not appropriate. I don't think that's correct. I think, look, for the most part, I think the refs have allowed the players to win or lose the game. They have done a great job of just staying out of the way.

Summer always hits different once the big game starts stacking up. Now you've got finals games on every other night. Baseball's rolling all week, racing on the weekends, and suddenly everybody's looking for an excuse to get together. The other night, a buddy texted me, we've got the game on, come through. I figured I'd stop by for maybe an hour. That was optimistic. Next thing you know, everybody's locked into the game and we're all part of the coaching staff. Somebody's yelling at the ref, somebody else is suddenly an expert on pitch strategy, and nobody's even pretending they're leaving early anymore. It's one of those nights where you take a sip of Miller Lite, look around, and realize, yeah, this is exactly what summer is supposed to be. That's why Miller Lite is always part of these nights for me. It's clean, refreshing, Easy to drink when it's hot outside and perfect for long nights hanging with friends, watching games. An all-American summer starts with an all-American beer. Miller Lite. Go to MillerLite.com/Dan to find delivery options near you. Or you can pick up some Miller Lite pretty much anywhere they sell beer. It's Miller time. Celebrate responsibly.

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Don Libertard. John, can you rate my Al Pacino from that billiard scene in Carlito's Way if I do it for you? I think it's pretty good. Yeah.

Okay.

Stugatz. You think you're big time? Well, you're gonna die big time. That is my infamous On a scale of 1 to 10, that's a, that's a 7.6. Solid.

Good job.

Good job.

That's a Sui nominee right there.

This is the Dan Levatar Show with the Stugatz.

Let's talk about the end of that game and let's talk about Wembanyama for a second. Uh, how did you like the last shot?

I thought the last shot was fine. He was wide open. They drew up a play for him to have a wide open 18-footer. I mean, I mean, you're shaking your head. That's an unbelievable look with the game on the line.

So there's a lot of things that's wrong. We'll start with— it started Western Conference Finals Game 1, him taking that 3-pointer. I told you all that's a bad shot because he's not a good shooter. He's a streaky shooter. That knowing time and clock, that's a bad shot. But what it did, everyone gave him a parade as, oh my God, he's so amazing. And now you're talking about the long 3-pointer. Yes. Yes, every time Victor Wemby now takes a jump shot, it's a validation in his mind like, yeah, that's what I do. That play was designed to be a pick and roll. He's supposed to roll. If you go back and look at the clip, you've got Josh Hart on one block and OG Anunoby on the other block, and that paint is wide open. And Fox turns and he's like, oh, but here we go, Mitchell Robinson's trying to go 2 on the ball. If Wemby rolls, all he's got to do is just throw it up to the sky and that's it, game over. But Wemby pops. Why? Because I'm a shooter. Oh, there you go, remember? Game 1 against the Conference Finals, I hit that shot, but that's not a good shot because he's not that good of a— it's not Steph Curry poppin'.

And so when we're talking about high percentage shots, and more importantly, when we're talking about the follies of youth, of not understanding where is my bread buttered, that's what happens. It was a bad shot because he had a better opportunity going to the rim, but he didn't even explore it. He didn't even try to think about it because in his mind This is the best shot I can take.

I would have preferred for him to go looking for a foul call. I also would say, uh, Zazz, that while an 18-footer as your last shot when the defense clamps down for any other human being is probably a decent look, he can get an open 18-footer anytime, anywhere, against any player who has played throughout history. There's never going to be a time that he can't get an 18-footer. So I do think it's the shot the Knicks would have wanted him taking, which is what would make it a less than good shot. It's one of the things that he does as a player that skews everything. The probabilities tilt in his favor because he's taller than everybody else, and the athleticism makes it so that there is no stopping him from getting a 17 or an 18-footer whenever he wants it.

I mean, we know why he took that shot because you have two options there. You could either go to the basket, maybe you're fouled, maybe you're not. It could wind up being a super difficult shot, or you're guaranteed a wide-open 18-footer, which, like you said, you could have at any time. So he took the option of, all right, I'm gonna get the shot that I know I can get. You drive to the basket, you don't know what kind of shot you're gonna get. Heck, you might get fouled and you can't even get a shot off, and you don't get the call. He chose to go with what he knows he can do. That's why I didn't have a problem with it. I had a problem with the 2-for-1 shot he took with 30 seconds left, uh, uh, guarded from 20 feet away.

These are tired shots.

That was a bad shot.

He's taking tired shots. In fact, his iconic one from the previous series, he was dog tired before that shot. It just so happened to go in. He's taking— his shot selection seems to be based on his conditioning right now.

Fatigue makes cowards out of everybody, and what happened at the end of that game— let's talk before, uh, I mean, I'd like to get your analysis on what happened with 10 seconds left. The Spurs have the ball, the game is tied, uh, Wemby has secured the rebound, and, um, I don't think I have this wrong when I say just about anytime in that situation you either call a timeout or you have your best player keep the ball. You don't throw it as an outlet pass to the guy who had 21 turnovers in 2 games and in Castle and hasn't been very good in this series. You don't treat that last possession like it's a fast break in the second quarter of a regular season game. But I mean, obviously it didn't work, uh, and we wouldn't be talking about it if it hadn't gone off of Castle's back and gone out of bounds. It would have been normal outlet pass with 10 seconds left, and you're not allowing a very good defense with the Knicks to set because you're trying to take advantage of the fact that you already have the advantage of moving downhill.

But getting Wemby some rest there and getting a timeout and gathering yourself obviously would have been better than what they've chosen. Once you have the ball with 10 seconds left in a tie game, there's no circumstance under which you can be allowing the Knicks to play for the win in regulation. Like, once you grab the ball off the rim with 10 seconds left, that game, the regulation of that game has to end with the Spurs taking a shot. It cannot end any other way. So what did you see, Amin, at the end of that game that broke down? And I'm with Mike on the analysis. Why wouldn't and how couldn't Wemby be tired? And of course, those are the plays made by dead legs fatigue. And the first thing to go with exhaustion is judgment.

Yeah, and I think also this is where the inexperience comes in, where you are not cognizant or aware of, hey, I'm tired. Hey, I have to ration out energy to have something left here. Hey, I got the rebound, tie game, under 10 seconds, we're not calling timeout, it's my world. And instead I'm like, oh, let me pass to Steph Castle, which is something that he never does. They usually let Wemby bring it up. At the same time, I'm Steph Castle, it's Game 2 of the NBA Finals, maybe I should look up.

I want to ask you about something that you just casually mentioned about the lack of a timeout. Um, that in that scenario, does Wemby just usually push forward there? Because you could argue that it's also inexperienced from the head coach in that situation.

No, so they, they typically in those scenarios don't call timeout. They don't call timeout. And it's funny, Stan Van Gundy was on the radio this weekend and he thought that after the Brunson make one, miss one free throw, they shouldn't have called timeout there either. They should have played live, uh, I was like, the reason I disagree as a coach, the reason why they called timeout is because one second earlier they just messed up and, and they're discombobulated. It's a young team, guys. That's what happens when it's your first time at the rodeo. There, it just happened two weeks later than I said it would. That's the only difference.

Let me read some Wemby, uh, quotes to you guys and, and ask you what you make of this. On the last shot, he says, quote, of course I like the shot. I feel like in this moment you need to shoot to score. In moments like this, results matter more than process. We just need to score. I just need to score. That's the whole point. That's what he says there. And this quote was confusing to me. He says, quote, personally, I think I could have been better in recovering from the high of the Conference Finals, but I mean, here we are. We can't change the past now. We, we have to— we're already focused on Game 3. What the hell does that mean?

I, I think he's uncommonly honest and introspective. And what he's saying is, yeah, we won the Conference Finals, I lost my mind because It's the mountaintop, we beat the champs and all that stuff. And that energy drop or shift from winning one series to going to have to compete in another one is something that, again, a young player and a young team, they're not accustomed to.

I was wrong about that. Like, I pushed back last week on the idea that— I think it was Nick Wright who came here and said it— how they were way too emotional after winning the Western Conference Championship and there's going to be a huge letdown. And I thought that was nonsense. Nonsense. It looks like it was not nonsense. And Victor Wembenyama is saying there that it wasn't nonsense.

Whatever you guys remember from 2010 and 2014 about the Miami Heat where Mike Miller is losing his shoe, that's Shamet now. What a moment. That's Shamet for the New York Knicks. And whatever it is are the emotional moments for you, there are a generation of Knicks fans that will remember that the Spurs went to that bullshit of fouling Mitchell Robinson and he made 2 free throws with a broken hand. And stopped it and stopped it. They gave off— the Spurs gave off, in trying to get a second quarter advantage and extend a lead to double digits, they gave off that they want Mitchell Robinson off the floor, that they're trying to do that ticky-tack bullshit of fouling a guy.

It's loser shit.

It really is. It is loser shit. But then to lose the game because he makes two free throws, you lose by a point, the guy with the broken hand made two free throws. People are going to remember that Mitchell Robinson stopped them from fouling him and stayed in the game by having a better shooter shooting percentage with a broken hand from the free throw line than he would, uh, under other circumstances when his hand's not broken. To me, when I'm watching that, I feel so bad for Mitchell Robinson. Here's a guy who's worked all his life to be good at basketball, and he's put in a situation where the world is watching him, just waiting for him. He's alone on the stage with just his thoughts. Here, big fella, you're bad at this. This is an insecurity for you. Here it is in front of everybody. We're going to keep fouling you on purpose, not even bother playing basketball, and just put you in the center of your insecurity. Empathy. Uh, let's go to Mike Brown here reacting in a way that surprised me to the idea that Ben Stiller is a celebrity who's at his games.

This is a great day for me today. Um, for the first time, uh, I got a chance to meet Ben Stiller. I don't know if he's in here or not, um, but I actually gave him a handshake and a hug. I got my man Fat Joe sitting in the back. This is The great day for Mike Brown. Yeah, I'll take it. Appreciate you being here.

You got to play it cool if you're Mike Brown there. What are we doing?

It's a cool story for him. Him and Karl-Anthony Towns in particular have a huge opportunity to totally change the narratives around them and basically become Joe Namath in that town. Like if Mike Brown, a vagabond head coach that is usually a punchline that is always super easy to let go, If he is the head coach that ends up doing this for the New York Knicks, he's an all-time legend, Hall of Famer. He is— I mean, forget it. In that town, made man for life.

Don Lebatard. I'm just here to say one thing.

The Knicks are fucking back. Stugatz. Tyrese Haliburton, 6 points? Fraud.

Everybody was like, yo, he's better than Jaylen Brunson. He's better than—

the Knicks should have drafted him. Fraud. This is the Don Lebatard Show with the Stugatz. I'm in on Carlin. Like, I like his whole story.

Well, he'll remind you about it. I think he has a pretty keen awareness of what he has in front of him right now.

He's about to remind you.

An MVP. I think he has a— he's very smart. Like, I think he has an eye towards legacy building right now, and he's taking those opportunities.

His, his mother died of COVID He's played through that. Obviously, he, he is allowed to remind us as much as he wants.

Agreed.

About what happened.

He's been better than Wemby in this series. I don't think any of us had that. I don't think anybody that was, that was doing the predictions on these games would tell you that they would watch the first 2 games of this series. If you asked anybody to sit in front of a television for the first time to watch basketball with no familiarity about who the players, who the names, who the stories are, they would tell you that Wemby is not as good as Karl-Anthony Towns. That's weird.

If you said to someone, if you have a casual fan watching because they heard that the best player in the league is playing in these NBA Finals, like, whoa, that guy Towns, you're right, he's so good.

Really unique skill set for his size. We were talking last week whether or not Anthony Davis is the only comp for someone who would give Wemby those kinds of problems on both sides and fatigue him. Because if Wemby's fatigued, at least part of it is because that's a ass body that he's banging against when he's guarding him. And, and of course he's gonna get tired there, but the skill set of Anthony Davis hasn't been able to make a 3 since the bubble. Like, you have to guard Karl-Anthony Towns out there always. Like, you cannot leave him, uh, open or even mildly contested. He's a 3-point shooting champion.

Yeah, and it like, it's, it's not just the shooting, Dan. It's like you said, it's the physicality. It's the bumping them. And, and what's happening is because because Victor Wembenyama doesn't have the best discipline, especially when he gets tired. He closes out hard. They're attacking the closeouts. You saw OG Anunoby do it. You saw Karl-Anthony Towns do it. You saw Mikal Bridges do it, where Wemby's leaving his feet and they're looking for it, waiting for it, and then they're driving and he can't recover because he's out of position. But I did want to point out something. I got the screenshot of that last play right here, and I'm gonna do a little czar de télescope for you here. You guys see here Mitchell Robinson is over here. Mikal Bridges. Here's Fox. Look at all of that lane right there. Who's going to stop him? OG or Josh Hart? At best, that's a foul. If I, if I could do video, which I can't because of rights fees—

roll it.

But if I, if I could roll it one extra second where Fox picks up the ball to throw the pass, you can see he's trying to lead him like, guy, go, go, go, go. But Wemby, Wemby wants to be here. You know why? Because Zaz was going on himself when he hit a 3.

And if that's why— and if Hart collapses on Wemby, there is another option. I know it's Castle, but he's out there in the corner. He's not pictured on this.

The thing about that is that only Antetokounmpo and Wemby are players who could dunk that, like, from the free-throw line. That can actually— that opening can result in either a dunk or a foul because of his length. I should have mentioned earlier, by the way, when I was saying Anthony Davis and Karl-Anthony Towns are the only ones with the unique skill set enough to be giant and take you out to the 3-point line. Obviously, Jokic is also that, but it's, it's a very small list throughout the history of time that could create that set of problems for Wemby. Uh, are you guys— uh, Zaslo has said that if Game 2 went to the Knicks, the series is over.

I, at halftime of Game 2, I tweet out series is over. Like, the Knicks were up by 4 at halftime. It felt like they were up by 20.

And then Wemby went for 22 on 9 of 13 shooting. He had 5 rebounds, 3 blocks. He was was really good in the second half. And when they were down by 14, they cut to the video of him reaming out the entire bench. He scores 7 of the points as they make this comeback. He has the shot with a minute left that goes in, that he gets the and-1. He makes the stop late on Brunson, guarding him one-on-one, and then the turnover happens.

But he was great.

Like, I feel like we're a bit overreactive to how— to how Gaston—

how important he played. They won 13 in a row, right?

That's the Knicks. I'm not talking about the Knicks, I'm talking about Wemby.

Individually. But Jeremy, the face of the league, the conversation that means having any street in America— Wemby is the athlete for our times. You can't let Brunson take the game for him from you in the last 15 seconds.

He missed the shot.

Well, and also made the mistake before the missed shot. Like, Wemby lost that game at the end. If Brunson's going to get— if these guys are going to say to me Brunson is there only to win, and therefore the fact that he's shooting 30% for the series doesn't matter because the result is all that matters— if the Wemby quote is, of course I like the shot. I feel like in this moment you need to shoot to score. In moments like this, results matter more than process. If result matters more than process, Wemby lost that game at the end.

Hard stop. And his process sucked too. That's the other part, right? That's the other side of that coin. Jeremy, you're saying, oh, but Brunson lost the game, uh, second earlier.

He missed the shot too.

He missed the shot, but he missed a shot in a tie game. In a tie game. And then Wemby makes a turnover that makes it not a tied game anymore. And by the way, before that turnover, he had the 2-for-1 shot where he that terrible airball 3. He had an awful end to the game decision-making-wise, process-wise. That's a bad shot, that's a bad turnover, that's a bad foul, that's another bad shot. There are 4 straight things where he made the wrong process.

Really bad.

Forget about— In the same way that I go back to Western Conference Finals Game 1, that process sucked and everyone was swooning because he made the shot, but I'm the only one sitting here saying, saying that's not a good shot.

The only one— I was right there with you, and they were making fun of me for the fact that he was shooting with 20 seconds left, 26 seconds left, trying to get a 2-for-1 when the carom would have made it under 24 seconds.

I totally get what we're talking about here. I just think that he stepped up in a way in the second half that was impressive. We've seen other legendary players have the type of first half that he did in the NBA Finals and then cower under the pressure of what that was. Yes, young player making mistakes late, being in a situation he's never been in before, but this guy at least stepped up and had the second half they needed him to have.

No chance tonight to get back. They have no chance tonight.

Let me, let me backtrack for a second because, uh, history doesn't remember these details. This is what history remembers. Karl Malone and Stockton were great in that series, and late Michael Jordan pickpocketed created their best play, slapped it right out of his hand, and then, and then made the shot at the end. These things aren't remembered forever because of what happened in the third quarter, Jeremy. It's— they're not remembered forever what happened early in the fourth quarter. The way they're remembered forever is what did you do at the end, and that's the way it works. So yes, a great player was great for most of that second half because he's taller and better than most of the people out there, but when it came to fatigue time, his judgment collapsed.

And the other thing I would say is, Jeremy brings up that he had a strong second half, was a big part of that comeback, obviously. They didn't run— so this is the part where I hold Mitchell— excuse me, Mitch Johnson and the Spurs players accountable. The entire first half, they didn't run a single play for him. I charted it. I sat there and was like, every single one of these plays, he had, I think, 4 or 5 scoring attempts. They were all based off of, oh, the thing that we tried didn't work. Well, here comes Wemby, let's give it to him there. In the second half, they did a better job. Again, I think the first 2 minutes of the third quarter, they didn't run a play for him. Every team knows, like, hey, I gotta get my big guy involved. They start game halves and quarters with, we're gonna run a couple for the big fella to get him involved. These guys have perhaps the best player in the league, and I gotta tell him he's got to yell at him in the middle of a timeout in the middle of the second half, get me the goddamn ball.

What did you make of the, uh, adjustment? We, we've seen Wemby on Brunson a little bit, but in Game 2 it felt like we saw it a little bit more. I actually think that that's the play. I know Brunson is quick, and it may seem counterintuitive because you're worried about Wemby's fatigue, but his size and length makes up for the steps that he would lose. And it seems like he's certainly bothering Jalen Brunson. Why wouldn't he? Do you think we see more of that?

No, because I think that's fatiguing too, running around and having to keep up with Brunson, because Brunson moves a lot. Again, the Knicks Knicks have kind of transitioned away from just give the ball to Brunson and everyone watches. Well, they give it to Towns, now Brunson is going, he's setting, uh, down screens, he's popping or curling or cutting depending on where the read is. By the way, Knicks had a bunch of looks right at the rim because the Spurs defense, while amazing in pressure, once it comes to the half court, those kids were falling asleep. There were backdoor cuts left and right. They had no idea what coverage they were in multiple times. I've never this in an NBA Finals game multiple times. They're running down the court, who do you got? Who do you— what are you talking about, who do you got? It's the NBA Finals. But this is all part and parcel what I'm talking about. This is their first time at the rodeo.

Gonna learn a little bit about Wemby tonight, right? I mean, like, they're down 0-2 going on the road in the Finals. Obviously the end of Game 2 disaster for him. We're gonna learn a little bit about him this evening.

So 5 times in NBA playoff history the home team has lost the first 2 games games and then ended up winning that series. Not in the finals. That's never happened in the finals, right? So already he's in unprecedented territory. Like, we say, oh, don't go down 0-3. Already we're unprecedented territory. So the one thing that I would say is, if you want to build a legacy, if you want to have a legacy-defining moment in game, it's got to be tonight.

There is such incredible theater tonight for all the reasons we laid out. It pretty much has everything. The only thing that this game is missing to take it next level is that added juice of animosity. Animosity like that.

I know they played in a finals before, but you don't usually get animosity in the finals, but like, like a storyline, like a foil.

It doesn't really have that. And that's the only way that it probably goes next level. But this is appointment television, not just for sports fans. This is a tale of the human spirit right now.

Amin has said a couple of times during this segment, first time at the rodeo, and I'm curious as to why it is the rodeo gets that distinction of all the places in the world that you can go and be all aud the first time.

WFA-T!