13 Rules: NBA Random Thoughts - June 8, 2024

[00:00:01] Alright, it's time to talk basketball. I'm Jose Salviati, editor at thepeachbasket.net.

[00:00:06] He's Steve Percello, a longtime high school basketball coach, educator, vice principal, and athletic director.

[00:00:12] And this is 13 Rules Random NBA Thoughts podcast. The best 15 minutes of random NBA thoughts online anywhere.

[00:00:21] If this is your first time listening, we're glad you found us welcome.

[00:00:24] This podcast was born out of the content in Steve's Random NBA Thoughts articles, which he publishes weekly.

[00:00:30] Steve and I have exactly 15 minutes to discuss what's on his mind around the NBA.

[00:00:36] Today we'll discuss his latest 13 Rules Random NBA Thoughts article with a focus on,

[00:00:42] understandably, the NBA Finals after game one.

[00:00:46] Steve, are you ready?

[00:00:49] I'm ready. I am not. Get the timer. Boom. I have it. Timer is on.

[00:00:55] 15 minutes start now.

[00:00:58] Alright, as you always do, you wrote about a few things. A lot of things.

[00:01:02] I want to start with this one. You called Jalen Brown, who had a good game one

[00:01:07] in the NBA Finals, the Boston Celtics, the Boston Celtics best player.

[00:01:11] This is a guy who's not even all NBA. How can he possibly be a Celtics best player?

[00:01:17] First of all, that's a travesty, not all of them. But more importantly, I said in the playoff,

[00:01:23] if you've watched all the games, you'd realize that and just,

[00:01:28] you know, defensively, if you watched the game the other night in the third quarter, he took it over.

[00:01:33] He made a couple big blocks at the rim.

[00:01:36] And this is when Dallas was making their run.

[00:01:40] He's also guarding Donchik, which I'll talk about in a few minutes.

[00:01:44] Think about what he's doing, and he was the high court.

[00:01:48] So like in the game, what doesn't this guy do?

[00:01:53] He just doesn't blow. He's punishing when he goes to the basket.

[00:01:57] Very difficult for anybody to defend him, and he's developed a nice team footer.

[00:02:01] So in every part of his game, it has gotten so much better.

[00:02:06] Don't forget, he was the MVP of the last series against Indiana.

[00:02:11] They realized how good he was.

[00:02:13] He just does it all on the court and really been impressed

[00:02:18] with what he did. And I think the other night, I know Pruzinkis had a great game.

[00:02:22] He was the best guy on the court the other night.

[00:02:24] Garen. So it took carries on and on with.

[00:02:29] So let's talk a little bit about this, because I know this is something that

[00:02:33] that you wanted to bring up, and I think it's important and it's applicable here.

[00:02:37] The best player on the team is supposed to be Jason Datum, right?

[00:02:40] I mean, he's the guy did make all NBA.

[00:02:43] He's the guy who's kind of the face of the franchise.

[00:02:46] So Jason Datum, I would think, I mean, this guy is there.

[00:02:49] Is there an issue in the locker room?

[00:02:52] You know, because this guy was better than me in game once.

[00:02:55] That might be an issue for some players, don't you think?

[00:02:58] I don't think it is with him.

[00:02:59] If you want, when he went to when Brown was given the MVP

[00:03:03] in the last series, it was one of the first ones smiling and clapping.

[00:03:07] Yeah. The other thing you find about Tatum,

[00:03:10] there's a lot of pressure in Boston on the title.

[00:03:12] I think we spoke about that last year. Sure.

[00:03:14] It doesn't care how, as long as they win.

[00:03:18] So I think I believe that it doesn't bother him.

[00:03:22] And you've got to give him a ton of credit.

[00:03:24] You know, while Brown's going off and guys are hitting threes all around them,

[00:03:28] he's not he's not trying to hog the ball, dominate the situation.

[00:03:32] He's riding with it and figuring it's only going to get you better.

[00:03:36] Now, for an NBA player, that's incredible maturity

[00:03:39] because most NBA players, their egos hurt and they're upset.

[00:03:44] And, you know, that's not going to happen.

[00:03:46] They're not giving the ball up as much and just going to try,

[00:03:48] you know, gore and do all the different things.

[00:03:51] And by the way, again, he's out, which I believe over 10 rebounds a game

[00:03:55] in the playoffs.

[00:03:56] He's and he's a fifth serve usually at least five every game.

[00:04:00] So he's doing it.

[00:04:02] He's doing all the things that have to be done.

[00:04:05] Now, I would look and think that he's going to go off

[00:04:09] at one of these just everything's going to be cooking.

[00:04:12] And he's because he's too good a player.

[00:04:15] He's he's an old NBA player as Jalen Brown should be.

[00:04:19] Yeah, he could.

[00:04:21] All right. Great segue.

[00:04:23] You said, you know, you expect

[00:04:26] Jason Tatum go off in one game.

[00:04:30] Again, this is the segue.

[00:04:31] Luka Donsich, he's a great player.

[00:04:34] And you wrote you affect him to go off in at least one game.

[00:04:38] Now, I looked at the box score and I saw 30, 10 and 10 game

[00:04:42] game one.

[00:04:43] Does that count in your book is going off or do you expect the even bigger

[00:04:47] game from this guy?

[00:04:47] Well, first of all, it's 30, 10, one.

[00:04:52] You know, we had member they only had nine assists now.

[00:04:55] Oh, team.

[00:04:58] Oh, got you, got you, got you.

[00:04:59] All right. Right.

[00:05:01] Right. Here.

[00:05:03] He took 26 shots to get the third.

[00:05:05] He put.

[00:05:07] Think about that, if a team's taking 80 to 85 shots,

[00:05:10] that's almost a third.

[00:05:12] And he's getting 30 points.

[00:05:14] So now if you do a little math, what do you get?

[00:05:17] Ninety five points.

[00:05:19] You don't win with 95 points.

[00:05:21] So what Jalen Brown did against him is he made him earn it.

[00:05:24] He he he's unstoppable,

[00:05:26] but he made him earn his points in this particular game.

[00:05:29] And again, you give Brown a lot of credit.

[00:05:32] But also, when I say going off with Luca,

[00:05:34] I'm talking about a 40, 10 and 10.

[00:05:37] Yeah. You know,

[00:05:38] and 40 on 20 shots, something ridiculous like that.

[00:05:43] That's what I'm talking about.

[00:05:44] And look there more than anybody in this series or probably in the NBA, right?

[00:05:49] Capable of that at any time.

[00:05:52] Scary to think, but yeah.

[00:05:54] And, you know, apologies to all of Celtic Nation

[00:05:58] for me granting Luca every Mavericks assist in the book.

[00:06:02] That was my bad.

[00:06:04] Plus one nine plus one.

[00:06:08] Right. Right. Right.

[00:06:08] I give them all of them. I give them all to him.

[00:06:11] We could not have a 13 rules

[00:06:14] random NBA podcasts without bringing up Los Angeles Lakers.

[00:06:18] I think it's written into our contract.

[00:06:19] You wrote about it, though.

[00:06:21] So I got to bring it up.

[00:06:22] You like Danny Hurley for the Lakers.

[00:06:24] If it happens, it's a time we're recording this.

[00:06:27] It hasn't yet.

[00:06:28] But you question the timing of the announcement.

[00:06:31] What do you think is up with that?

[00:06:32] Is this a conspiracy theory we're working here?

[00:06:35] You know what?

[00:06:37] The Lakers have become a

[00:06:41] interesting organization.

[00:06:43] But choice of words, thank you.

[00:06:46] I don't know if they stumbled into it or what,

[00:06:49] but it just doesn't look good.

[00:06:52] Generally in sports, the NBA finals,

[00:06:55] everything stops in the NBA.

[00:06:57] You get a higher coach, you wait till after it's over.

[00:07:00] If you're going to do all different things, you wait.

[00:07:04] You know, you don't you let these people, these players

[00:07:07] who've earned it have in code who've earned.

[00:07:11] So I just I have a difficult time with them.

[00:07:15] You know, I believe I don't know if the Lakers are putting up

[00:07:19] another banner for winning the.

[00:07:22] Tournament, yeah, yeah, I don't know if they're getting another banner, but

[00:07:27] tied in 1717 with championship.

[00:07:31] You just you just sit there and shake your head.

[00:07:34] Come on, what are we doing here?

[00:07:37] This is this crazy load to do that.

[00:07:40] They had a month to come up with.

[00:07:43] You know, they wanted to talk to this guy and a whole month.

[00:07:46] Right. The Lakers at their best or worse.

[00:07:52] So you do think this was intentional?

[00:07:55] If it wasn't, I think so.

[00:07:58] Right. Thank you.

[00:08:01] You know, the L.A. not yeah.

[00:08:03] Yeah.

[00:08:05] Hunter. Well, I'll leave a little room for error.

[00:08:08] Ninety nine percent intentional.

[00:08:10] Yeah.

[00:08:12] Not not the other one.

[00:08:15] There might be comments because you don't do it.

[00:08:18] You just don't do we break norms all the time in our society.

[00:08:26] After a while, you don't know what is up and what is down.

[00:08:29] And this is a great.

[00:08:31] All right. Well, let's see.

[00:08:32] You know, the talk here is that the last time the Lakers went after

[00:08:38] a high profile coach, it was Sheshevsky from Duke and he turned him down.

[00:08:43] So a lot riding on this.

[00:08:46] But I do want to keep the focus unless you guys.

[00:08:50] I want to ask you one time.

[00:08:53] The Lakers are notorious again.

[00:08:56] Yeah.

[00:08:57] And now they are going to break the bank for early.

[00:09:01] To me, I'm struggling with them trying.

[00:09:06] What? Why are they changing?

[00:09:08] And and I did mention the article, I just want to say something.

[00:09:11] They probably will be a great coach.

[00:09:14] You did say that.

[00:09:15] Let me get this.

[00:09:18] I think the Lakers are notorious.

[00:09:22] You did say that.

[00:09:23] Let me get this.

[00:09:25] How many games a year does a good coach make a difference?

[00:09:31] Well, that's such a good question.

[00:09:33] I had best five, 10 percent, maybe.

[00:09:36] Right. So if you have if you have a team going to win

[00:09:40] 42 to 45 games, 10 percent is five more.

[00:09:45] Warning.

[00:09:47] So now you're up.

[00:09:49] He.

[00:09:50] What is that game?

[00:09:52] Right.

[00:09:53] Playing.

[00:09:56] You know, maybe a little past the play and maybe they'll, you know, get to get swept

[00:10:00] in.

[00:10:03] You know, to me, to me, coaches, your last worry.

[00:10:07] Well, I get some more players.

[00:10:09] Yeah. Yeah.

[00:10:11] I I know that we could spend all our time talking about the Lakers

[00:10:15] because you are so passionate about that team, but we got to keep the focus on

[00:10:20] the teams that are playing.

[00:10:22] So I want to pivot back to Boston Celtics.

[00:10:26] You said and he was Kristoff Porsing was great in his return

[00:10:31] that second quarter.

[00:10:32] He was amazing and his return was amazing.

[00:10:36] But is calling him Larry Bird asked, which you did just if.

[00:10:42] Yeah. Tell me what did you watch the quarter?

[00:10:46] No, I would.

[00:10:47] I know if you watched it, it was a thing bird.

[00:10:53] And that's all, you know, again,

[00:10:57] we were almost to.

[00:11:00] To put Porsing is what Bird is crazy.

[00:11:03] You don't do that. Right.

[00:11:04] You don't any people are a bird.

[00:11:06] Right.

[00:11:08] But for that time, he was he was great.

[00:11:12] He also got the Celtic going.

[00:11:15] It made the game a hell of a lot easier for them, you know, when he did that.

[00:11:20] Because honestly, Boston, they did shoot 38 percent from three,

[00:11:25] but they didn't really shoot well.

[00:11:27] They really didn't.

[00:11:29] I'd seen them go on roles.

[00:11:31] They didn't do that.

[00:11:32] So, you know, to me, he was the guy that got him going.

[00:11:36] And don't forget, Brown was the high schooler.

[00:11:39] He only had 22.

[00:11:41] Well, that's not much.

[00:11:43] He averages 45 in the playoff.

[00:11:45] So they, you know, his shooting real well was something got them going.

[00:11:51] But now that that would be the difference in that game.

[00:11:55] Got got them on a roll and never looked.

[00:12:01] Yeah. You know, looking at the box score only.

[00:12:05] All right. And the box score is does not tell the whole story.

[00:12:09] But you and I've talked about this.

[00:12:11] Boston shot 38 percent from three, 47 percent overall scored one hundred

[00:12:16] and seven point total in the high score was 22.

[00:12:21] Those are good numbers, but that was not

[00:12:24] the best that this team can play by far.

[00:12:27] Is that fair? Yeah, I thought where they played well,

[00:12:31] I thought the defensive plan was excellent.

[00:12:34] I believe they took away.

[00:12:36] And one of the things Dallas relied upon is the corner jumper.

[00:12:40] On the corner three and they took that away.

[00:12:42] And if you watch some film of it, he held the defending

[00:12:46] defending the quarters held it around.

[00:12:49] He they didn't drop down to go in a dribble driver.

[00:12:52] And so it took away that.

[00:12:54] That's why Luka, who's actually only had one assist

[00:12:58] because he couldn't kick it out to those people.

[00:13:00] They were covered and they weren't getting it open, open three added.

[00:13:06] You know, again, PJ Washington's done quite well shooting out of the corner.

[00:13:09] Look up and shows Jones.

[00:13:12] So, you know, with by taking that away,

[00:13:17] that was and then Boston did that.

[00:13:20] Say one other thing to it, it's interesting.

[00:13:22] In the next game.

[00:13:25] I know they did a lot of high screen

[00:13:27] a role with Donchik and the big and lively or Gafford.

[00:13:32] Probably the smartest thing they can do is do that with Kyrie.

[00:13:37] And the reason being it was in his

[00:13:40] well, they're going to they're going to try to either hedge it

[00:13:43] or they're going to go out on the shooters.

[00:13:44] But if Kyrie moves quickly, he's going to get an open shot

[00:13:48] or Donchik is going to get an open shot off of it.

[00:13:52] That might be a way to unlock the deeper off.

[00:13:56] That's what makes the finals so special, right?

[00:13:59] Instead of having, you know, a day right to prepare.

[00:14:02] You've got three days, you've got practice, you've got film.

[00:14:07] Again, looking just at the box score, Kyrie, 12 points, 0 for 5 shooting.

[00:14:13] You tried to correct me with this. I was totally off.

[00:14:15] I counted 30, 10 and 10 for Luca because he had 10 defensive rebounds,

[00:14:19] 10 total rebounds. I misread the box score.

[00:14:22] But yeah, nine total assists for the entire team.

[00:14:26] That's honestly shocking.

[00:14:29] That's got to be game point.

[00:14:30] That's got to be part of the game in taking away that.

[00:14:34] And by the way, there was no lops either.

[00:14:37] So they took away that also.

[00:14:39] And that made Gafford and Lively ineffective.

[00:14:42] Right. Yeah.

[00:14:43] So Joe Missoula, who people have maligned all over the place

[00:14:48] and have to have to great credit

[00:14:52] for the game plan they came up with.

[00:14:55] Now the ball's in Dallas court and they've got to come up with something.

[00:15:01] You know, we'll do that.

[00:15:02] They also have to do some serious thinking about how

[00:15:06] and Boston moves the ball well, how they can.

[00:15:09] Boston had wide open threes and they didn't shoot as well as they usually could.

[00:15:12] How they will begin to try to take away those wide open threes.

[00:15:16] Cleveland made an adjustment in the last year, two series ago,

[00:15:20] and they took Boston off on a three.

[00:15:24] You want to get more of it.

[00:15:25] That's what the Dallas has to figure out as well. Yeah.

[00:15:30] You know, it's funny, you just got done asking a really good question, right?

[00:15:33] Over the course of an eight game season,

[00:15:35] how many games does a coach impact right now?

[00:15:38] You just threw out an arbitrary number.

[00:15:40] I think that number goes up in the finals, right?

[00:15:43] Because we're going to see what kind of coach Jason kid is right.

[00:15:46] What kind of staff he's got.

[00:15:48] Are there going to be adjustments or are they just going to roll the dice again?

[00:15:53] What? You can you can draw anything

[00:15:58] all you want and plan all you want.

[00:16:01] But if the shot doesn't go in,

[00:16:03] what the defenders just depth well, and you can do that's right.

[00:16:06] So so it's very difficult to determine.

[00:16:10] Adjustments and how successful they are, my point. Yeah.

[00:16:15] But, you know, as a parent,

[00:16:17] when you look at the stats at the end of the game and see nine assists.

[00:16:19] Wow. Yeah. You think, OK, what did they do to change this game?

[00:16:25] And again, look on his dribble drives to the middle.

[00:16:28] He's great at kicking it out to the weak side corner.

[00:16:31] And they get wide open threes.

[00:16:33] They didn't do it.

[00:16:34] You can do it.

[00:16:35] And if you watch it also, Derek White, a couple of I think he got a block

[00:16:39] or two on Luka, he pitched in and took it away.

[00:16:44] Derek White was grinding, you know, times he was grinding.

[00:16:49] I mean, this is how I guess I know what that are Boston.

[00:16:54] But yeah.

[00:16:56] Well, game one was was was was great.

[00:16:59] Certainly great for Boston.

[00:17:01] But now everything just gets ramped up a little bit.

[00:17:04] Game two is important.

[00:17:06] It's it's the game that Dallas needs to avoid a must winning game three.

[00:17:11] Great. They can't go down to you because you can't go down.

[00:17:14] Oh, three. I know three.

[00:17:15] Nobody's ever come back from that.

[00:17:17] And that's not happening this year.

[00:17:18] Should they find themselves in an old three hole?

[00:17:22] But one step at a time, you heard the buzzer go off.

[00:17:24] We talked over it again.

[00:17:25] It's what we do.

[00:17:26] Our time is up.

[00:17:27] Please make sure to read Steve's entire article.

[00:17:29] We'll link to it below.

[00:17:31] You'll get all of his thoughts on the NBA finals.

[00:17:34] As always, thank you for listening.

[00:17:36] Please consider subscribing.

[00:17:37] It absolutely helps us in the channel.

[00:17:40] Join us next week on the 13 rules.

[00:17:42] Random NBA thoughts podcast.

[00:17:43] The best 15 minutes of random NBA thoughts online.

[00:17:47] We'll talk next week.