The Shot Clock Pod - Week #20

[00:00:00] Alright, it's time to talk basketball. I'm Jose Solviati, editor of thepeachbasket.net. He's Steve Prusiello, long-time educator, vice principal, high school basketball coach, and athletic director. And this is the Shot Clock Pod, the best 15 minutes of NBA Random Thoughts online anywhere. If this is your first time listening, welcome. We are so glad you found us. This podcast was born out of the content of Steve's 13 Rules Random NBA Thoughts articles, which he publishes weekly. Steve and I have exactly 15 minutes to discuss what's on his website.

[00:00:30] He's mind around the NBA. Today we'll discuss his latest 13 Rules Random NBA Thoughts article where he shares his thoughts after a pretty interesting week 20 of the 2024-25 NBA season. I say interesting because the cream is rising to the top. The good teams are, you know who they are now. You know who the mid-tier teams are. You know who the teams on the outside looking in are. So I think it's interesting and we saw a little bit of that play out. I mean, some good battles this week. So let's talk about it. Steve, are you ready?

[00:01:00] I'm ready. Let's do this. I'm going to start the timer. Now let's go. All right. You wrote about the Lakers, which you tend to do quite a bit. I'm just calling it out. We'll get more clarity on if the Lakers are contenders tonight. Obviously, you wrote this before the game. When the Lakers play the Boston Celtics. The Lakers lost 1-11 to 1-1 to the Celtics in Boston. So do we get that clarity? Are the Lakers contenders?

[00:01:29] I think if you were going to put it in tiers, you would put Boston, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma City, and Cleveland on the first tier and have it next tier. And when I say that, I would say that, let's say 90% chance that one of those three teams I just mentioned win it.

[00:01:47] And the Lakers would be with everybody else. And by that, I mean, everybody else would be the Milwaukee's. I guess the Knicks, although they've been trounced pretty good by good teams, but the Knicks, Golden State, Denver, all of those teams, you throw them in a thing, the 10%, it's one of the 10% teams.

[00:02:07] So I think they're a little bit short. I think we saw guys that the Lakers used last night that on Boston, Oklahoma City, or Cleveland wouldn't get on the court. So it tells you the depth and what they have is nearly as good as what those three teams have in depth. You know, and the other thing, when you play the Lakers, Boston does this often. They will designate somebody on the other team to shoot, meaning playing five on four.

[00:02:37] And last night it was good when who made to Finney Smith, who made two. So they got hurt a little bit, but over the course of a game, everybody's going to revert back to their normal numbers. So I don't think there's have enough offense to, to win those kinds of games unless Luca goes off and he almost did, but unless he goes off.

[00:02:59] And one more thing that's interesting with Luca there, an outstanding player to me, offensive player is Reeves. They don't use him. And that's a problem because he can play offense. And if he's going to be out there and I know he had 16 or 18 or whatever he had last night, but if he's going to be out there, if you watch the game, Boston continuously posted him up.

[00:03:21] They had Horford down there to had Jalen Brown down there. And you know what? He can't defend that well. So he's giving it going to give up more points in a big game. They don't get you unless he's got the ball more. Yeah. I think they'd call that out in the broadcast a little bit too, about how Austin Reed had been playing so well. And he saw his numbers really moving up career highs. All of a sudden he stalled out and he's going to have to, because now you've got two ball dominant guys on the team. And so he's, he's the third option.

[00:03:50] And you could argue he was even with a D, but he found a way to score. I think that's going to be harder and harder for Reeves. Now. One more crazy point I'll make. And with LeBron hurt, it could change everything. But when watching the game, I had the feel that Luca just felt like he wasn't, he didn't belong.

[00:04:12] He did belong at the end when LeBron went out, he played like he did with Dallas. But prior to that, he was like, I don't want to ruffle any feathers here. I'll do things. But, and he just shrunk away. And a guy that good should have been sharing the ball, even though LeBron is going off and he wasn't.

[00:04:35] Yeah. The biggest fear, excuse me, for those that don't know, I'm in LA, Steve's East Coast. The biggest fear in LA is that Luca chooses not to sign long-term with the Lakers. And there's a lot of talk. We've heard about it historically, about how difficult it is or can be to play with LeBron James. He's such a good player. People aren't sure what to do. Maybe how to play alongside someone like that. We had the same argument with Toby for a long time.

[00:05:03] Yeah, that's absolutely the big fear. One of the interesting things, and maybe I'm off on this. You would know better as a Laker guy. LeBron still can play. He's incredible, but I think he cries more to the officials than he did ever in his career. And I think he almost thinks he's LeBron. So he's telling the officials, you know, how to do the play the game or how to call the game. Am I wrong on his complaining?

[00:05:33] Am I wrong on his complaining? No. Whether or not he does it more now or not, I don't know. Again, he started out in your neck of the woods out in the East. But yeah, I understand it. This is a guy who's been doing this for 20 years, longer than some of the refs who are calling this game. So I can understand it. I do wish he didn't do it. I do wish he didn't exaggerate fouls. I do wish Luca didn't do it. But the way the game is called right now, you've got to do it.

[00:05:59] I just don't want the NBA to turn into major league soccer. If you guys follow soccer, the exaggeration is too much. It's the quantity of complaining as well. And that's a very big thing. Every player complains. But you also have to understand somewhere in the middle of last year, the NBA decided through their refs that they are not going to call a lot of stuff.

[00:06:25] Yes. And all of a sudden, you'll see last night, Jalen Brown, a couple consecutive, he got whacked. And they didn't call it. Brown got a tee for it. J.J. Redick went off because he felt it was a foul knock call. They're not calling what they did call. And it does make a problem. But you know, what are you going to do? You can't change it. So you got to play.

[00:06:48] I think the NBA has a few things to look at. Like they got enough on their plate with 50 All-Star games. But there's a lot to be tweaked and repaired with the NBA. But we got to get going. We talked a lot about the latest Celtics game. Let's talk about the Miami Heat. They seem destined to be a play-in team this season. But looking ahead, you said that they need a new number one. When I think a lot of people in Miami think they got their number one in Tyler Hero. Why don't you think he's that player?

[00:07:16] You have to do it every night. He's got to make big shots every night. He's not. I kind of look at the Heat. If you back him up to be your number two guy and bam, the three guy, and you get a scorer, shall we say, a guy by the name of Durant? If you get a scorer, all of a sudden you've lifted yourself into the conversation. I don't think you're good enough to win it, but you've lifted yourself into the conversation.

[00:07:44] So what their job becomes to go out and get him. Now, how do you get him? What do you give away? And can you still be a good team after you make the trade? Because you've got to put some quality into the deal. And just using Durant, Phoenix is going to want draft picks. They're going to want all kinds of things.

[00:08:07] If Mikael Bridges went for five number ones, Durant, you just give him every draft from now until 2050. So it's very interesting, but that's what I see. Great players come out every night and make big shots down the stretch. He doesn't. Interesting. Yeah, you called him a solid number two. So let's see what Pat Riley has up his sleeve to get him enough to go with that beta.

[00:08:34] Yeah. Let's talk about another team that's underperforming and a level lower than the Miami Heat, unfortunately. And that's the Philadelphia 76ers. A lot of blame to go around. It's silly. Daryl Morey has gotten his fair share of it. But you think the finger should be pointed elsewhere? Who do you think is blame? It's silly. Let's think about this. If you're the president of the organization and you're going to go out and give your star player quarter of a billion dollars,

[00:09:05] gee, it's staggering. Just hearing that is just staggering. Why I said it. But if you do that, are you doing that on your own or is ownership okaying? Right. And I said in the article, if ownership is not okaying it, I wonder how the hell he made so much money. Because that's something that Woody Johnson would do with the Jets. And he came in, he made the money, his family made the money. Those kind of leaders, they're going to make silly decisions.

[00:09:34] But if they lay it on Morey, and I'm sure Morey initiated it, but without them okaying it, they've got to take some responsibility in this thing. And it's a horrible situation. They're on the hook for a lot of money and four more years. And if this guy can only play a little bit, they're done. And it's complicated. Let's face it. Paul George, he's on the downside. Now, he had a drop, I think, of four points last year to this year.

[00:10:03] Again, Lawrence Frank pulled back on offering him an extra year. Yeah. Don't you think they see him every night? They see him and they didn't think it was worth it? Why the heck would Philly go out? That might be a Morey decision. That was a bad decision. So you've got two guys that, what are they going, out a good year, Embiid will play 50, George 60.

[00:10:31] You've got a problem. And Max, he's good, but he can't carry a team without those two. Yeah. So we are at the place in Philly that we talk about a lot on this show, and that is the difficulty of a GM. And, you know, that's a tough job, right? Do you maybe move on from Embiid, which would be just rock the world on par with a Luka trade? Or do you just keep plugging along and hope for the best?

[00:10:55] Because, yeah, four years, $248 million, or better put, a quarter of a billion dollars on the hook. That's just absolutely staggering. I'm hoping things work out. I believe in the last year, he's got a player option. Do you think he's going to take it? I think it's $70 million as last year.

[00:11:16] So it's astounding. And that's the kind of mistake that your franchise isn't recovering from that easily. I mean, with Paul George, you're really, they will become the Charlotte Hornets in a couple of years, unless some struggle is about. Okay. It's interesting, the blessing and the curse of getting in a generational talent, right? We've seen it go really well, San Antonio, Tim Duncan, and others.

[00:11:46] But then you think about where it gets a little muddy. Luka and Dallas ended up badly. And then the Sixers and Embiid might be on that road, too. Just to add to that, I think what's going to happen in the NBA, guys like Jalen Brown are not going to automatically get the max. There's going to be negotiations because Brown's a good player. Right now, he's at his peak.

[00:12:10] However, I think the max is maybe the top 10 players in the league. And Brown is not one of them. So that's another way to look at it. I look at tracks like Ananobis for $41 million. Yeah. It's astounding to me. And these guys are one-dimensional players. It's just not going to happen. Teams can't afford doing that and having a bench and a team around. All right. Yeah, again, toughest job.

[00:12:40] One of the toughest jobs around is a GM, especially when you're up against it like you are at the league. But let's end on a good note because I love this. I don't think in the time we've been doing this show, we've ever or rarely talked about the Portland Trailblazers. I loved your shout out. You called them a potential Western Conference consistent playoff team. You qualified it with an S. What did the Blazers need to take the next step? Well, I think Klingon has got to progress and get better as a rim protector and also able

[00:13:08] to score not running through him, but score on the rebounds and all the little things. But they also need a four. They need a four. Jeremy Grant, I guess, is their four. He's more of a three. But they need another banger that can help them there. And then they could be something to be reckoned with. Their offensive production from Henderson, Sharp, Simons is really good. And Danny Avijia is a good, good player. They stole him from Washington.

[00:13:38] So they've got some offense. And I don't know if the defense is good enough to get it. We've all seen when a team is playing games where 120, 130 points are being scored, those teams don't last real long. They win their share, but they don't go far in the playoffs and so on. And this team offensively has that potential to win, though they're 45, 50 games a year.

[00:14:07] But that's not a title team. But they have that potential because of the offense. He didn't show the buzzer. I'm real quick. You hear it. That was absolutely perfect. He timed. I don't think that's ever happened. That's cool. But I'm going to because I, again, I love the shout out. It's been tough in Portland for a long time. I'm a fan of Chelsea Billups, the coach there. And I hope that he gets a chance to really develop what he has built. I don't know that he will, frankly.

[00:14:36] But I just think it's good. It's good for Portland. And I hope that they can keep this team together. The Blazers historically have not been. And if this was another team, they may very well jettison all the young talent and try to bring in a big to try and fast track the process. I hope the Blazers don't do that. And I hope they build this team like they did with Dane and CJ McCollum. They didn't get them where they wanted to be. But as a fan, I love watching that. And I hope that's what happens in Portland.

[00:15:04] They've got an interesting decision with Billups. They have an option for him next year. In other words, it's on the team. Now, the other point with that would be, do they re-sign him for a longer contract? Where do they cut bait? So, that's a big decision. I understand the liking of Chauncey Billups. I thought he was a really good player. However, I don't know the type of players they've drafted or offensive players.

[00:15:34] I don't know if they've really thought about. And when you're really bad like they were, you're just trying to amass talent. You know, I don't know if they've thought about the defensive side of the game. Okay. So, you're saying on top of everything else, they may need a defensive-minded coach. You know what? And it's very difficult. When you hire a legend like Billups, it's really hard to fire those people. Yeah.

[00:15:58] So, does that mean maybe they get a defensive mind as an assistant coach? What I'm saying is there has to be more of a defensive mentality for them to make a big... Gotcha. No, that's fair. That's fair. All right. We'll see how it plays out. I think you would much rather be on the Portland Blazers trajectory than maybe a Philadelphia 76er trajectory, a Miami Heat trajectory, or even a Los Angeles Lakers trajectory.

[00:16:27] Although, they got Luka. So, they do things. If they can get somebody that can help, it's big. They'll be viable. And I'm not talking about like a journeyman like Valanchunas. I'm talking about better than Valanchunas. A journeyman. Yeah. Hard to come by. But let's see. It's going to be another interesting offseason in the NBA. But that's it. You heard our buzzer go off. You heard us just barrel through it like we do. But thanks, as always, for listening. Please make sure to read Steve's entire 13 Rules, right?

[00:16:55] The NBA Thoughts article will link that anywhere you're listening or watching this show to get more random thoughts after week 20 of the 2024-25 NBA season. And please consider subscribing, liking, commenting. All that stuff matters and goes a long way. Thank you very much. Join us next week on the Shot Clock Pod. The best 15 minutes of NBA Random Thoughts online anywhere. Talk thanks, sweet Steve. Thanks. Take care.