Transcript of The Greatest Comeback In Sports 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, Fokus 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.

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See your game last night, Dan?

I was locked in on Cubs-Rockies. The Cubs scoring late, but then the Rockies, 2 in the 8th and 1 in the 9th to win 3-2.

So disappointed in you. If there was ever a time for your baseball score update gag on social media, it was, it was last night.

I haven't put anything on Twitter in I don't know how long.

I know, I figured you lost your credentials.

No, I just haven't had any desire to go into what has become a cesspool. But that would have been a good time to put the joke up at the end of that game. What is game that I would have chosen? Athletics, Brewers? Like what?

I was dialed in Astros, A's. Can you believe they blew that game?

Astros. I thought that was Astros Anaheim.

Yeah. Angels.

I'm sorry. You were locked in.

That was— I was so— I was so dialed.

He was exhausted last night.

He went 2 for 2 from the field. Yeah. Brian Mitchell Robinson.

So you played. Oh, Tony, you play. You guys played together last night.

I didn't play last night. I was obviously watching the game very astutely, but Mike went and played. And I actually got the text from my guy who invites us over to play. He's like, hey, 7:30. And I look at the time, it's 7:29. I'm like, yeah, an hour ago would have been great if you would have told me.

I am always a little worried by intramural role player who takes his role playing seriously. That guy is someone I'm scared of. Thank you. You should be. Mike Ryan wants offensive rebounds. He wants to make sure to set good picks. That guy is not someone I ever want to be playing with or even have on my team.

You set screens in pickup? Of course. What a dick. What do you mean? You gotta open up the shooters. You gotta also seal the baseline. But this game was a lot tougher for me, Dan. A lot tougher for me to get the boards. You know why? Black guys.

Put it on the poll, please, Juju, @LevittardShow. Do you allow picks in your pickup basketball?

Are we playing basketball? We're not playing basketball. I don't get it. So what do you want to do? Just run around? Sounds like you're 3 years old.

I thought the poll was gonna be, do black guys make it harder to get boards?

They're tall. Uh, Zazz, you're objecting to the idea of plays in pickup basketball and a role player who is setting a pick to help a teammate.

Like, Mike, if someone's hot in the pickup game, you're on defense, if someone's hot in the pickup game, do you double?

Oh, it's not a double.

No, it's not a double, but you know, it's like—

communicate.

Like communicate, I'll pick him up, I'll pick him up, you stay on ball, you stay on ball. Okay, sometimes we'll both collapse.

Let's close out on the shooter. But where's the line though? Zaz is asking a good question on where the tipping point is on this, because if he's conceding to you, okay, I'll allow that you can do some picks in a pickup basketball game, but then you guys are saying the next step on that, which is doubling the hot guy, is a bridge too far.

There's no zone, there's no doubling, there's no box and one, there's no trap at the half court. Like all that stuff doesn't exist. You don't play basketball. You think of those things. Obviously, Zastink, so those things doesn't play basketball, hasn't played basketball in 25 years.

Yeah, this must be what it's like for Sean Payton at a presser when like some idiot media member—

Yeah, I'm gonna double them.

Yeah. Why didn't you throw it on third down? Like, man, you don't play the game.

Why would a bridge be too far?

I would assume that as a marching army tries to strategically get from place to place, there's a bridge that's too far.

Kind of like the Key West Bridge.

Yeah, it's too long.

That's too long.

That's too—

Remember when James Cameron blew up the old one? That was awesome.

That was— was that Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis?

The attack. Will the hand of God put your header back on track? Football is back, Jack. Mbappé's flying through the air. Ronaldo's here for one last prayer. Will Messi come out to play? Or is it victory for the USA? It's corner kick. When the box is packed, that's how you know that football is back, Jack. Let me hear you say— football, football, football is back, Jack. The time is here, open the gates. The long wait is over, so we'll yell, let's go, States! No need to back down, just strike the ball, start the attack. If you say this game's the best, I'll say zagat. Football is back, Jack. Football is back, Jack. Football is back. Football is back, Jack.

W-F-A-T. Holy shit, what a comeback! The San Francisco Giants are down 8, headed into the bottom of the 8th, and they win the game with 5 in the 8th and 5 in the 9th. Wow is correct, Roy, and if your microphone is on, the audience would have heard it.

Wow!

Now it heard it too long and too loud because you've got the audio levels wrong. Wow. A wow too far. In the last half of the 9th, Zazz, 2 Nationals pitchers threw 21 pitches and allowed 5 runs, 4 hits, and a walk, and got no outs.

That's where you get screwed by the 3-batter rule.

What is the 3-batter rule?

He's right.

You probably want to take one of those relievers out, but you can't because you gotta leave them for 3 batters.

3-batter rule. That's a thing now? Yeah. How about that?

It's been like 2 years.

Couple years.

Oh, I'm sorry, you watch baseball, good for you.

Jerks. Mike Wilbon was just on television saying, and this is a lot of experience that that man has, Mike Wilbon is saying that that's the most shocking result that he's ever seen covering basketball, and he's not prone to overreaction and hyperventilation. He usually does perspective. And I think even allowing for the idea that that comeback is more probable in today's game than it's ever been, it is jaw-dropping stunning to see the Spurs go from scoring the most points in a first half a road team ever has in the Finals 76, to ending up at the end of the game with 106. To, to have the first half go better for the Spurs the way that it did, in a way that made it seem like that game was going to be easy to win, and to have the Knicks have a better second half statistically than the Spurs had in the first half was stunning. Zazz, just truly epically stunning. Uh, Knicks fans will never feel anything like what this series feels like the remainder of their life. After seeing a bunch of playoff games that weren't any good at the end and a whole regular season that didn't have a lot of close games at the end and was filled with blowouts, every one of these games has been decided in the last few minutes.

And this one, more improbably than you will ever see at the end of a basketball game. Plenty to dissect in all of the wreckage, but I do want to celebrate the Knicks more than killing the Spurs, because I do think everyone's gonna be killing the Spurs, killing the Spurs, killing the Spurs. If the Knicks thought they were gonna win that game when they were down 29, they're the only people in the earth, on the earth, who thought they were gonna win that game.

I, uh, last night was such a great example of, of everything that I love about sports, and it doesn't even matter that it's the Knicks, and obviously the Knicks get no love in the Zaslo Mansion, but there were so many people Obviously everyone who was in the building, but just, just Knicks fans, friends of mine who are Knicks fans. You, you had one of the greatest moments of your life last night, and these people are so happy. And it, it reminded me of how I felt like, like 2 and really 3 years ago, even when the Panthers fell short in the Stanley Cup Final, when they didn't even win that series, just how I felt throughout that run. The Knicks fan is experiencing that emotion that most of them have never ever had because it's been over 50 years. I, I felt really good for those fans last night. It was so cool.

Very few fan bases ever have had what this one now does, where you have the confidence that you can come back from 29 down because you just did it to Cleveland a series ago when you were down 22. So at this point, I'm not actually sure how many people are leaving that building in the second half, uh, when in a lot of previous history, you would leave at halftime. You can't with the way those tickets are that expensive.

Dan, you know what else I've never seen before? We're like 15 minutes after the game ended last night. It looked like no one left. They were all still there. The court was packed. It's like they stormed the court, and all the fans were still in the building. They're, they're playing music. The fans are dancing and singing. I've never seen that before.

Sorry, I'm watching Spanish television this morning. It's so good. What an atmosphere.

What outfits. Was Tracy Morgan crying last night? Put it on the poll at @LebatardShowJuJu. Was it really strange seeing Larry David happy? Because I didn't know what to do with his happiness. He was courtside next to John McEnroe. A lot of people, if they are turning on Knicks fandom, they're turning on the celebrities. Like, they don't like to see, uh, the Hollywood elite that kind of happy.

Oh, but you know what? I think there was a massive difference. Like, everything that we wanted— if you're an unbiased fan, you're into, you know, what's going on, it's going to be a scene— everything that we wanted to see in Game 3 from that atmosphere at the Garden we got in Game 4, because as it turned out, all the celebrities who were there in Game 3, so many Fugazi fans who were there as far as the celebrities. Last night felt like the real celebrity fans, you know, Larry David and McEnroe and Mariska Hargitay and Tracy Morgan and like the— Chalamet and Stiller.

Seinfeld.

It felt like those were the real celebrity fans. It felt totally organic and real last night.

We came very close to the amazing blessing of having all of those people spend all of that money on tickets and leave with just two enormous heartbreakers of basketball games. It has been a great series.

Uh, it's a classic.

Well, I just don't know which one's better, the hockey or the basketball, like in terms of where it is we are on both of them. I'd also ask you, uh, is the difference so far in that series a potential Alvarado backcourt violation?

Not a backcourt, completely clean. I said potential.

I said potential. De'Aaron Fox did a million things wrong at the end of that game.

Oh my God.

One of them was fouling that immediately when Alvarado was in real trouble as he was about to fall over the half-court line.

I get wanting to tout the fighting spirit of the New York Knicks. They put themselves in position to win that game. They did not give up. I understand why you want to celebrate them. You're a huge Knicks fan. This is about the Spurs. Choking in epic fashion.

Also, the Spurs lost? The Knicks didn't win?

We're gonna have that discussion a little bit, but look, I'm not used to these games when you get to this far in the season having teams execute so poorly. And I'm saying that too of the team that came back from 29 down. Like, Josh Hart, put a Lobo mint under your pillow and dream big. You got let off the hook. You made two all-time gaffes in that one potentially. The almost backcourt, the missed layup when he was caught in between the dunk, the turnovers.

New York not boxing out Stephon Castle when he got the rebound and put that up.

They did a lot of stuff down the stretch that isn't necessarily championship execution. But De'Aaron Fox made an all-time blunder.

Multiple.

Yeah, but the one at the end after he makes a big play and again, championship level execution from the New York Knicks. Turnover, pick-six the other way if you're playing in the first quarter. But in that situation, the time is way more valuable than making it still a one-possession game.

But let's, let's examine some of this for a second. Put it on the poll: collapse or comeback at Le Batard Show. Uh, collapse or comeback.

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 Lebatard. I'm just here to say one thing: the Knicks are 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.

Before I get into the minutia of this, because there's a lot of good minutiae here, including I think De'Aaron Fox acquired 4 stable at the end, making 3 mistakes in the last 12 seconds, the Alvarado one being the least bad of the 3 mistakes. Let's play the sound, though, of Charles Barkley speaking for a whole lot of people here.

We saw the dumbest basketball team in the history of civilization. Wow. We saw they had a 25-point lead, took 8 straight threes like They thought to get like— that was some of the most mismanaged, stupid basketball. Hey, when you blow a 29-point lead, the other team has to help you. The San Antonio Spurs helped the New York Knicks win this game by doing some of the stupid-ass stuff I've ever seen on a basketball court.

So that's harsh analysis, and I don't know that it's inaccurate, but he speaks for a lot of people after you watch the Spurs after the Wemby flagrant. And if he gets one more, it's an automatic suspension. 6 for 35. They go 6 for 35 and 2 for 15 from 3. Uh, it was indeed a meltdown. Uh, I find fairly stunning what I'm about to say to you, which is Brunson in half his Knicks playoff games has scored 30-plus. Last night between him and Anunoby, they scored 69. The rest of the Knicks scored under 40. All of them. Knicks bench Alvarado made more shots the last 9 minutes than all of the Spurs did.

Towns attempted 5 shots.

The bench— well, what happened the first minute of that game was crazy in terms of— It reaches. Well, but if you've paid tickets for that and that game keeps going that way where they take Towns from you when clearly from the beginning the Knicks were going to work the whole offense through Towns and he gets 2 fouls in 1 minute and the Spurs have to use one of their challenges in the first minute of the game. Uh, I thought all of that was enormous until it wasn't.

I mean, yeah, it was enormous, but that was Towns also doing the thing where— this has been a lot of his career where he, he plays dumb. Those were fouls. Sass. You can't behave that way. He's hooking Wemba Nyama's arm. It's early in the quarter when he already has a foul, and then his third foul is a clear push in the back. He was playing dumb.

This is sometimes where the challenge pisses me off because it's like, all right, we're challenging the foul on Wemby, but hold on, we're gonna give a foul to that because we saw him do something earlier in the play before the foul was called.

Like, that's BS. When Zazz's analysis is, that's dumb from Wemby, and Barkley's analysis is, but the other guys were the dumbest team in the history of basketball civilization, you have some things happening in a game that are uncommon.

We saw the dumbest basketball team in the history of civilization.

Oh wow. Put it on the poll at Le Batard Show. That's what an oh wow sounds like when it's at the microphone. Put it on the poll at Le Batard Show. Would Popovich have been worth 1 point last night? Yes or no? Oh wow. Would Gregg Popovich have been worth 1 point? And let's see if we can hear Mitch Johnson talking after the game because the crowd noise around it makes it hard to hear the Spurs coach who's supposed to be in a bit of a hermetically sealed cinder block sort of environment where people can, in the media, who are partnered with these leagues, can get the sound they need from the people involved in the combat.

Okay, front row all the way to the right. Tom.

Mitch, Tom Walsborn, San Antonio Express-News. The 30 points in the second half, what, what went wrong offensively in your mind? Uh, I mean, obviously a few things to score 30 points in a half. We got away from what got us the 76 points in the first half, just in terms of putting pressure on the rim, rolling after screens, running, continuing to find the paint, whether it's for ourselves or for a teammate. We got on our heels and, um, you know, missed some shots. And then, you know, you don't get as many free throws and high, high percentage looks.

Oh wow, that was great.

It sounded like a laugh track in the background. They kept like putting up and down.

You heard the hey hey, if like the scene in Elf when he's doing like the dances. Credit to him, I would have got up and left.

Are you guys sure though that that sounded all happy to you? Because I think in another context this might be in the realm of what it is Jets fans were doing to Tim Tebow, where to me the way it sounds like it could sound like Mitch Johnson has just descended into hell and that That's the sound that you hear in hell.

T-Bone, save us!

Either New York fans happy is the sound you hear in hell, or New York fans sounding happy is hell for everybody. And so I'm interpreting it that way because a lot of people will tell you these are the worst fans in the world.

Not a, not a good series for Mitch Johnson. Not a good series. Really? And the final two plays of the game, I think, kind of encapsulate Mitch Johnson in this series so far, where the final play that Anunoby gets the tip, Mitch Johnson decides we're not going to guard the inbounds pass, we're not going to guard the inbounds pass. And it allows Anunoby to essentially have a free run to the basket where De'Aaron Fox went 3-for-3 in those final possessions there, where he also then doesn't— he decides to stand around and not even block out Anunoby. But Mitch Johnson chose not to guard the inbounds pass, and the inbounder got the winning basket. And then the very next play, Mike Brown says, we're going to guard the inbounds pass. And the play that they drew up was perfect. Dylan Harper— I think it was Harper— Castle, Castle was going to have a wide open layup on the last play of the game, and Harper's pass got deflected by the inbounds defender, Karl-Anthony Towns.

Even at the littlest, smallest leagues and levels, they always tell you the inbounder is one of the most dangerous guys in the court because you turn your back and he's at the hoop scoring a layup, 3-pointer, open shot. And he had a 45-foot runway to just fly like Superman. He looked like Michael Jordan in Space Jam. All of a sudden his arm went— kept going up, up, up, up, up.

Bad series.

And then to have the touch of just like, boop, just like touching the ball and it going in.

Okay, so you guys say bad series for Mitch Johnson, and I continue to tell you guys that sometimes the coach is going— the guy on side line is the one that we're going to concentrate on, but the execution is what ends up mattering. So a couple of games ago, I was telling you that Mike Brown got exactly the matchup he wanted and Mitch Johnson got exactly the one he didn't want. When it's De'Aaron Fox against Anunoby, you've got your weakest offensive player who's on the court kind of hurt going up against their best defensive player. And by the way, Anunoby has been exceptional for them for years now. There was a time that this organization was thinking, should we go Hardenstein or should we go Anunoby on who we're shining here, and they let Hartenstein go, and they made sure that Anunoby was locked up. And that guy for them this season has been an All-Star and keeps putting up these 30-point games where I didn't think that was something— efficient 30-point games is not something that I was going to see consistently, consistently from Anunoby early in his career.

Not only consistent and most efficient, it's the most efficient game in a Finals game ever. I think he shot 58 from the floor, 56 from 3, and 92 from the free throw line. It's like one of the most incredible games.

One of his missed shots is the one at the end of the quarter that he lobbed 3/4 of the court. Front of the rim like that. It's lunacy the way that that guy's accuracy from distance— I do not consider him a great 3-point shooter. He's fine, but I don't consider him a great 3-point shooter. I'm going to say again what the Knicks got from their bench last night. Other than Alvarado, it was 2 baskets.

2.

Alvarado ends up scoring more in the last 9 minutes than the Spurs did because of how epic the collapse was. But let's play the sound, uh, please, because I want to compare these sounds. It's a happier, uh, New York feeling around Mitch Johnson. But let's go back to halftime of the butt fumble game where the Jets are running back into the locker room, and what you hear around the tunnel is this. This has not been altered in any way. Teebo, save us is actually something I'd expect expect to hear in hell if somebody was trying to escape. If a Jets fan was wearing a Jets jersey in, in hell, wailing and gnashing, uh, Tebow, save us! Uh, let's hear the sound though around Mitch Johnson. And while it's happier, I still think this is just hell after the Knicks have won.

Okay, front row all the way to the right. Tom.

Mitch, Tom Worsborn, San Antonio Express-News. The 30 points in the second half, what, what went wrong offensively in your mind? Uh, I mean, obviously a few things to score 30 points in a half. We got away from what got us the 76 points in the first half, just in terms of putting pressure on the rim, rolling after screens, running, continuing to find the paint, whether it's for ourselves or for a teammate. We got on our heels. Feels and, um, you know, miss some shots and then, you know, you don't get as many free throws and high, high percentage looks.

Seemed pretty joyous. Seemed pretty joyous.

I want to go back to Anunoby for a second, and if, if we could hear OG Anunoby after the game when he's asked about, you know, the final play and how he feels, uh, you know, going into the next game.

You just hit the game-winning shot in an NBA Finals game in front of your home crowd. How does that feel?

Uh, it feels cool.

I mean, everyone's pretty excited. I'm excited too. I'm excited too. We're all excited.

We're enjoying it right now, but we're just focused on the next game now.

I'll never forget, you know, he was on the Raptors— either he was a rookie or it was his second year when the Raptors won the championship in 2019. And there was one game where he hit a monster 3 late in the game which won the Raptors game. And someone asked him like, how do you stay so calm and cool there? And he was just like, that's my job, that's what I'm supposed to do. And that's how he is every game.

He's cool, he's stoic. Brunson, Brunson has some of this. I will say again, I noticed this again last night. I don't know if anyone cares. So often we are discussing and dissecting under a microscope some of the minutiae here around these teams. As soon as that game ended, on the court still, uh, while the, the fans are going crazy and it's a crushing historic loss for the Spurs, uh, Wemby on the court is immediately going and applauding with De'Aaron Fox, telling him it's okay, we still are good. It's just an unusual reaction to have in that moment when your, uh, your entire, uh, reason for working in sports has just come crashing down at your feet in the way that is, uh, nationally and internationally embarrassing and makes Charles Barkley say this after the game, echoing afterward: We saw the dumbest basketball team in the history of civilization.

Wow.

I mean, that last sequence, man, like Fox missing the layup.

Oh, Wemby missing the 2 free throws with a minute 47 left was excellent.

What do you think he was doing with his head? Was he saying like like settle down, or was he doing I'm in your head?

Oh no, absolutely doing I'm in your head.

And then he missed 2 free throws.

Oh, I felt like Dylan Brooks on the sidelines.

I was just watching like, ah, that was the first quarter where Wemby's pointing to his head telling Mitchell Robinson I'm in your head, and then Mitchell Robinson gets the flagrant for putting an elbow in Wemby's neck.

Don Lebatard.

And he was doing all kind of wild stuff when he threw the ball off the glass to himself and yammed it. I was like, wow, that's crazy, you're on perks. Stugatz. You know what I mean? That allegedly, allegedly Allegedly, allegedly, allegedly, allegedly.

This is the Don Levatar Show with the Stugatz.

Let me get to a couple of the things here though at the end of the game that I found most interesting, uh, because everyone's going to be talking about De'Aaron Fox on the offensive end because of course you need to pull that ball out and kill time and dribble and get your free throws and not have happen what happened. If you have the ball in that situation situation up 1 with 10 seconds left, everyone knows you just hold on to the ball. You don't do anything. Everyone knows that?

Everyone—

well, De'Aaron Fox, even after the game, didn't think he had done something wrong. But I want to go to one of the other mistakes because I don't know if people sort of were paying attention to this part. As good as Brunson was in that game, and that was his best game of the series, he had at the end one shot where he just hits the backboard, where he's driving and he just hits the backboard.

Clock was running down, yeah.

Yeah, the clock was running down, and there was another The other shot he took, I don't think that's a good shot, but it's Brunson, it's your team, I will live and die with whatever Brunson does if I'm the Knicks. I don't think it was a great shot from the distance, but the thing that I wanted to say about what happened there is when he releases the ball, Brunson is the only one who's further from the basket than Anunoby. You cannot let him come from further away than anybody on the court other than Brunson to get in clean, and that was De'Aaron Fox's fault. He just stood there. So you've got the guy that they acquired for these situations to be a veteran sort of stabilization force doing 3 things in the last 12 seconds, says like 3 things in the last 12 seconds when you're like, where you're like, Jared Fox, what do you, what do you, what are you doing? And so many, so much of the commentary after the game, immediately after the game, was people who had been watching basketball all their lives. Wilbon Barkley, Ernie Johnson. 'Listen, what the hell just happened?' was the, was the verbal response from these people.

Why, if you're De'Aaron Fox, they're not guarding the inbounds pass, and so, okay, it's because you want to deny the inbounds, you want to, you know, try and keep the ball from actually being inbounded to Jalen Brunson. But once the ball is inbounded to Jalen Brunson, why are you helping Wemby defensively, especially when you love so much time on the clock? But I'll I know you're saying you don't like that shot by Brunson there. That was a fantastically high IQ play from Jalen Brunson for two reasons. The first one is Wembenyama is guarding him and he is so far from the basket, so he's keeping Wembenyama from being able to get a defensive rebound. And by taking the shot that early, you're allowing a potential tip-in. Like, it was an incredibly high IQ play from Jalen Brunson.

Shouldn't have had that much time And it's on De'Aaron Fox. And Dan said like everyone in basketball knows what to do in that situation. Not if you were watching the broadcast. The broadcast didn't mention what a gaffe that was. That is an all-time sports blunder. And if you were watching the broadcast, you would never know it. It was a huge botch by that team.

It wasn't great, but you're talking about 3 seconds, 4 seconds.

Yes. And that's again, That's the game.

That's the game.

Because that shot off with 6 seconds.

That ball went in.

Well, you don't get the tip in.

That ball went in under 2 seconds. That game is over. Remember, that game is over.

That block.

Maybe he makes both free throws and it's a 3-point game.

Okay, but, but here's the thing. You're talking about an amount of time that is not super significant because when that ball gets brought up the other way, Alvarado has to go almost have a backcourt and then he fouls him, right? Like there's a span of time, there are 4 or 5 seconds.

He's hoping the middle of the court court, and, and Fox doesn't even bother to try and trap. She's like, here, let me take the foul. It was— you had one player in the Knicks that was playing with a high IQ, and you had the other player with the Spurs, both of them veterans, who were playing very low IQ.

We saw the dumbest basketball team in the history of civilization.

Oh wow. Think about one of the things that we're talking about here, because I do want to examine what Zaslo is saying there about Brunson's high IQ play, because I will live and die with whatever it is Brunson's doing, but that shot from that distance is not a great shot.

He wouldn't have taken it if Wembenyama wasn't guarding him. I don't believe you have him so far from the hoop.

But one of the things that was happening at the end of the game is the acquisitions that these teams made for this situation were on display where it's De'Aaron Fox against Alvarado. They traded for Alvarado during the season. Alvarado was being trusted there because Shamet has gone cold and is still getting some of the minutes. But they're trusting Alvarado in that situation. And so you've got a situation with 5 seconds left in the game, Zazz, where it's not Brunson with the ball, it's not Towns with the ball, it's at half court somebody who doesn't have a lot of experience in the Finals falling over the line with De'Aaron Fox guarding him. And I just want to go through with you guys some of the numbers here, even though I know that numbers talk is usually something that people tune out on, because I just think some of the numbers here are super interesting. So teams down 20-plus points the last 2 years in the postseason. The Knicks are 5-3 the last 2 years in that spot. The rest of the league is 4-71.

Oh wow.

And the, the half, at the half, the Knicks had made 15 shots and the Spurs had made 14 threes. Oh wow. So you had these, the Spurs basically starting as hot as is possible for a team. And then there's this stat: before last night, when teams are down 20-plus in the fourth quarter, uh, they were 4-750. Oh wow. So this goes in the all-time bucket where you have some all-time things. And Mike's right when he says— and I'm curious because the announcers can always make this stuff worse. And I don't think De'Aaron Fox's move is going to be considered an all-time blunder because the announcing team didn't react to it as if it was an all-time blunder. Usually the audience needs a little bit of permission to rally en masse, and the announcers will help you with that. That was not the case last night, and I thought it was weird that they were, they were a bit muted about all of that.

Did they get swept away in the emotion of that building? Did they not realize that De'Aaron Fox was in a rush to make it still a one-possession game? What was your reaction?

Reaction.

Granted, that, that, that place seemed nuts. It seemed like an insane asylum. I get not being like fully clear, but in my house, I was by myself screaming, what are you doing? I don't know if you guys reacted the exact same way. It felt dumb from the jump.

Run to the corner. My, my reaction— that's it. My reaction was that as soon as he's on the fast break on the left part of the lane, I expected him to go toward the basket and then veer off into the corner and loop back around like every other NBA player in situation knows to do because you don't risk losing the ball. And specifically, right, this, this part is all like, okay, maybe if it's Brunson, maybe if it's Brunson, but not if it's that guy. Like, Anunoby is their best defender. Like, that guy's locked down, and that's not the guy I'm going after.

I actually didn't say anything while it was unfolding because my wife was sleeping right next to me, and I'm watching the tablet, it's on my stomach, I didn't want to wake her.

So you're kind of like a mime, you're like—

Yeah, yeah. And my son, my 14-year-old son watching in his bedroom down the hall, he's screaming, uh, you know, as the ball is, is into the background. I'm trying to be really—

Why aren't you watching it like with him? Why are you in bed watching?

You know what happened? I, I, I had a very big day yesterday. I, I had a great day. I had a very big, very emotionally draining day yesterday. Dan, I saw He-Man. So by the time the game's on, I'm, I'm, I'm emotionally drained. I'm Okay, and at halftime, I, I almost shut the game off at halftime. Like, the Knicks weren't coming back. It was a terrible game.

Everyone I was at bowling with, we, we agreed, we're just going home. This game's over. We don't need to go watch it anywhere.

Terrible game. So at halftime, like, we all dispersed— me, my son, I got my cousin who's staying with us as well. We all dispersed to our separate bedrooms, like, all right, I'm going to go watch upstairs, you know. And that's, that's why it went down like like that because the game was bad.

Uh, yesterday on the show I was laughing with you guys because I'm always laughing at everyone's perpetual need to declare a series over before it's over.

Uh, series is over, Knicks.

How many times in that game did you say series is over? Spurs got this.

I, I text my other son who is in, in New York right now. I just asked him, yo, Knicks are fucked. Came back and won.

Yeah, Barkley at the end, uh, at the half of Game 3 said this series was over, but I wanted to ask ask you, uh, about the analysis from Draymond Green after the game where he said— and this is, uh, a sentence that legitimately came out of his mouth— once the Knicks got it down to 12, it's a wrap. And I'm like, what are you talking about?

It's an arbitrary number. Like, why didn't it go single digits there?

10?

Even though it was 12, Denver's lead in the stands, you're like, don't let us get this down the 10. Yeah, 10 is the magic number. It's like, if we can be within 10 with 6 minutes left—

12 though. I originally thought that the Draymond Green audition was going to be sort of an internship to replace Charles Barkley, and I think he's exposed himself over this time where it's like, nah, I don't really want to hear from you on some of this stuff. You're knee-jerk and it doesn't have perspective. I also felt, and put this on the poll as well, @LeBittardShow, did Charles Barkley have the Spurs on the money line last last night, because that commentary is the commentary of someone who is most emotionally lost a giant bet that they didn't expect to lose and is mad at a team and just calls them, you dumb dummies.

We saw the dumbest basketball team in the history of civilization.

Wow.

You dumb dummies, you stupid ass. You dumb dummies, you stupid ass was Charles Barkley's analysis, and I'm saying it's leagues better than Draymond Green's analysis, which was as soon as the Knicks got it down to 12, it a wrap.

Don't want to be a hipster about these things. Swept away in it. It's a '90s-ass series. I, I like it. I'm just really thrown by the lack of execution from both teams in, in an NBA Finals. Like, we, we went from Spoh and Pop to Mike Brown and Mitch Johnson and people not knowing basic Basketball 101 level execution. It's no wonder that these teams winning these titles just just go fade into the background now? Because I, I look at that like, Wemby's going to be in the conversation as long as he's tall and healthy. But New York, you better win this.

He'll probably stay tall, right?

Yeah, probably. But I, I don't know if these teams have staying power. I don't know if anybody has staying power. These teams aren't out-executing anybody else. They're getting hot at the right time. It's just weird to see basketball played kind this dumb, as Charles Barkley described it, in the NBA Finals.

We saw the dumbest basketball team in the history of civilization.

Wow. This part has been great, though. Not much difference between those teams and all the games tight late is crazy. Like, this is— this is not what OKC was doing last year where they were just running roughshod over everybody. You have our undivided attention because everything here is late. Everything Everything here is interesting. Everything here is close. And we know that there's not much difference between these two teams. I'm not sure how surprised anybody would be, given how the Spurs look in every first quarter, if the Spurs won the next 3 games or if the Spurs took it to 7 and then lost in Game 7 at home, because I'm pretty sure these teams are evenly matched. Like, whatever— whatever the differences are between them, in 3 of the games you have a bounce go differently— literally a bounce go differently— and you've You've got a, you've got the Spurs up 3-1.

I'm off the pulpit though. Happy June. This is unreal. Every night there's a banger. NHL, NBA. Oh, for good measure, we're throwing in the best sporting international competition in our nation. We're just going to drop that in the middle of this. And also the Heat might get Giannis.

Tony, you know about that Stanley Cup Final tonight?

Nah, what's going on?

Oh, good series.

You're trying to tell me that that's better than what's happening in the NBA Finals? Crazy. You're nuts, man.

We're going to talk about the World Cup and Giannis. But when Mike says something being dropped in, I don't know if you guys saw this dropped in after the last 20-plus years of basketball, middle of the finals, middle of the epic everything. LeBron's on his podcast saying, well, I don't take a backseat to anyone in the GOAT conversation. Like, don't forget about— don't, don't forget. Hey, you guys, don't forget I've been here for 20 years. I used to— I used to play in these games.

We saw the dumbest basketball team in the history of civilization. Oh, wow.