 But here's a reality check with Michael Jordan. Do you know what his record was in the playoffs before Scotty Pippen arrived? Oh, I do one in nine swept flights. Three quarters of the season, as Boston was struggling, I still was like, look, Milwaukee, Toronto, Boston are all on the same level. He seemed to be getting the same calls in the regular season on the three-pointers. In this game, early, he didn't. Chris Broussard here and welcome to the brand new Hoops on Fox podcast. This podcast will give you your daily dose of all things NBA from Fox Sports, including the best content from Skip and Shannon, Nick Wright, plus special guests, fresh NBA content from myself, post-game interviews from NBA stars around the league, and much, much more. Up first, Chris Broussard joined Skip and Shannon to break down the Celtics' game one thumping of the Bucks. Chris, you have been high on the Bucks all season long. We haven't forgotten, so how much trouble is Milwaukee in? Well, as somebody who picked them in six in this series, they're in more trouble than I expected. I'll tell you that. Look, all season long, well, for three quarters of the season, as Boston was struggling, I still was like, look, Milwaukee, Toronto, Boston are all on the same level. Here are them could win the East and then toward the end of the season, like the last month when Boston didn't turn it around, still had their problems. I wrote them off. I said, they can't beat Milwaukee or Toronto. Now Boston has apparently flipped the switch, and this is the team that most people expected to see throughout the season. And I think they're capable of beating Milwaukee, Toronto, Houston. I'm not sure yet about Golden State, but I think they're right there with those teams. Now I'm not saying they will beat those teams, but they're capable. I'm still with Milwaukee. I still feel good about them. But this is gut check time for Yanis Adedicumpo and Mike Budenholz. Both of them. Yanis is probably going to be the MVP. He was my vote. And this game yesterday kind of reminded me in a different way, obviously, of game two with Kevin Durant and Patrick Beverly. How Beverly did this incredible job guarding him. And it looked like he had really found out an answer to stop Kevin Durant. Now Kevin Durant answered in a big way. He obviously since then he's been off the charts. Let's see if Yanis can do that. Now in fairness to him, he didn't get any help. Not from his other starters, Brooke Lopez, Eric Bledsoe, Sterling Brown. They were like three for 17 combined. Didn't produce any points. Middleton didn't have this usual type of game with only 16 points. The bench gave him something, but he's going to need more from his other guys. Budenholz are as well. He was out coached. And Budenholz is probably going to be coached a year. The coaches voted him coached a year. He again got my vote. But Brad Stevens out coached him yesterday. When the opponent comes into your building and shoots 54%. You are the best defense in the league. They made some adjustments. You just stood pat and didn't. And now it's time for Budenholz to make the adjustments. Remember a few years ago when Atlanta won 60. And then the Cavs swept them. And we gave Budenholz and I think rightly a pass because he didn't have stars. Obviously the Cavs had LeBron and Kyrie and all that. He won't get a pass this time. You've got the star in Yanis. I think the talent is close. Maybe you give Boston a slight edge, maybe. But the talent is close. So it's gut check time for those two guys. And obviously game two is a must win. I agree. You hate to say they're in trouble. They go down 0-2 there in big trouble. They'll probably get swept. Skip, Yanis, and this is the reason why when I look at Yanis, he has to take another step. Because if he couldn't get to the rim, you see what happened. They forwarded him off. They say, you're not getting to the rim. And when he got to the rim, Al Horford says, I'm challenging everything. If you put me on a poster, you put me on a poster. But I'm not giving you any dunks without you being challenged. And all of a sudden, now you're looking at him. He's 7-21. And like I said, you're going to have to trust. Well, how am I going to trust Brooke Lopez, Sterling Brown, Eric Bledsoe. They 3-17 with 12 points. I can't trust that. I needed Milton to give me a little more. Because the Celtics got great contribution. They got Jason Tatum didn't play particularly well. Al Horford was magnificent yesterday. Kyrie was Kyrie. Jaylen Brown. Gordon Hay was stepped up Terry Rogier. The guys that the Celtics were counting on, they showed up and they showed out. Especially Al Horford. Al Horford on the defensive end skill, he's this, I believe he's the second best player. He's the second most important player. Because the pick and pop, he can pick and roll. He sets very good screens. And he's a very, very good defender. As Giannis, is he a very good defender? He was fantastic. Because that's what teams have been doing. They've been putting their big guy on Giannis, daring him to shoot from outside. Where they put Rudy Gaubert, he goes by Rudy Gaubert Dunks it. They put Joel and Bede on him. He up fakes Joel and Bede, he goes by him and dunk. Al Horford said, nah, I ain't taking the bait. Go ahead, if you want to shoot them three, have at them. Because I don't believe you're Steph Curry. I don't believe you can make enough to make me come hug up on you and you go by me. They got the work cut out. They better not lose this next one, Chris. They lose this next one, somebody's gonna be in a heap of trouble. And Giannis, you know, hey Giannis, you might want to rethink that. Because you lose this next game, you'll have plenty of time to film with LeBron James. God, you won't be busy. Space Jam 2 is back on the table. He does not do Hollywood. Hey, and clearly he don't win playoff games either. So if you don't win this game, He shall see. You lose game two, skim balers. Hey LeBron, Giannis will be joining you. So my first takeaway from after the game was, suddenly Kyrie Irving is happy. He's just happy. He's so happy. This could throw a monkey rich in some offices and plans, right? He's happy. He's feeling great. He's happy with his teammates and his teammates are probably like grudgingly happy with him because he's really playing and he had a career high, 11s, 6s, way to go. And my other takeaway was, I've told you from the start, I just need to see Giannis do it at the highest level. And this is not the highest, but it's pretty high. These are home games after you swept a team, you should have swept, but these are home games against a legitimate contender. And you came up small yesterday in the double block. He didn't play 6-11. No, he did not, but that was the double block by Orford. But they were both bad ideas from Giannis. You can't just shoot it right in his face. Cause the first one was right in his face and he ate that one. If we can see it and then he, I think it's coming later. Whoops. That's another one. He may see like Al Horford 6-4, Al Horford 6-10. Giannis doesn't have tremendous moves cause he hadn't had to at that height. So the Celtics blocked 11 shots yesterday. Jason Tatum, Marcus Smart and Al Horford each blocked three shots. That's a lot of blocking going on in the house of blocks. Where Giannis usually just terrorizes the visiting team. And again, Giannis had by far the worst plus minus on the floor. He was a minus 24 and he didn't get much help. But again, they're all waiting for him to go and then they feed off him. They've been feeding off him all year. Did they miss Malcolm Brogdon? Yes, they do because he is a hellacious perimeter defender. Just a tough guy. Is he gonna make it back this series? They say shooting, I don't know. It sounds iffy whether he's gonna be able to play and they're going to need him because once Boston lost Marcus Smart it somehow clarified the rotation. All of a sudden it all fell into place the way it wasn't before. Listen, Terry Rozier comes off the bench just lighten it up. He had nine rebounds yesterday. That's just, you know, every time he comes in I'm like, he can play. And we saw he could play last year. And somehow he and Kyrie have kind of made peace with their minutes and the threat factor both ways. So all of a sudden, like you said, switch got flipped. And I would expect Milwaukee to win game two but they have to win game two. This is do or die. You hate saying the game two is a must win but it's a must win on your home court. You know what, when I listen to Kyrie the thing that I love about Kyrie and what I'm starting to see, I see growth. Because he knows, he said it, I can get my shot anytime. I can get whatever I want. I can get anywhere I want. If I want to get to the rim, I can get there. If I want to pull up in the mid-range, I can get there. If I want to shoot the three, I can get there. It's all about not alienating. So he has to find the fine line. Do I go take over? And then these guys don't have a rhythm. It was like, okay, I got going early. Okay, now let me get my guys a rhythm. They need me again. Let me get going again. Okay, now let me find my rhythm because 11 assists, Kyrie, 11 assists. What I see in Kyrie is I've been watching this all year. He really is following in LeBron James' footsteps. Like during the regular season there was drama. A lot of it created by him, right? And then compose season, flip a switch, everything's good. And now they're rolling. He really seems to be following in LeBron's footsteps. He does. And now the two besties, Kyrie and KD, are both very happy all of a sudden, right? And they're both dominating at the same time. I don't know if that speaks well for them to stay or... Listen, if they both go somewhere together, they're going to take this league over. Good question. And look, Kyrie, I hope just for as a fan, I would love to see KD and Kyrie go to New York. But Kyrie's in a great... You know what, I would too. Just for the league, it'd be great. And it was spread out the talent on that. But Kyrie is in a phenomenal situation. Phenomenal. I mean, you got a great organization, a great supporting cast, great coach. You know, he's a superstar. And they probably get Anthony Davis if he stays. Like, it'd be a lot for him to leave. KD, I just think Golden State, I think this might be their last run, just because of the mental. It's mentally taxing to keep going to the finals. But we'll see. Isn't that wild though that we're talking about one game and the whole regular season was kind of a disaster for the Celtics? Yet now they figured it out. Right. And he said they would. Well, this is why, with Milwaukee, why I picked Toronto to beat them in the conference finals. We'll see if they get there, but because of the lack of experience. None of these guys, none of them have this type of experience. So let's see how they... And you're gonna understand, Toronto, you saw what that old boy... Ooh! Boy, that no more. Oh, see, I don't know. I know they miss him down south. Yeah, I know they would. The first of all, there would not have been a game seven. Right. There wouldn't have been a seven scene. No! Well, who knows that he would have even played? Oh, he's playing. All he's gotta do is let him miss 20 games. Wait, it took him two years to get healthy just recently. He finally said I'm healthy now. He ain't fully healthy yet. He's still missed 20 games. Oh, really? But them other 62 that he played. Well, I'm here to tell Chris Bressard the bucks are done. Oh, they're done. You're gonna fool Paul Pierce. Oh, yeah. Done. They're just done. So they're gonna get swept? They won't get swept. I expect them to win two, but they're not gonna win three or four. So you give them five? I just think the Celtics have, it's just some mindset. It's just, we're the Celtics and you're not. I got another case of do, they don't lose in five. I think the bucks stop here. I got a case of do, they don't lose in five. Well, to your point, Tatum struggled. So they can even look at that and say, we didn't even get a good game out of Tatum. I'll take Boston right now for a case. Just straight up for a case. You do it? Oh, they got a one game lead. You gonna talk about all you take? Okay. Well, you love Milwaukee. I'll take Toronto right now for a case. Oh, wow. That's going way out on the line. But you want to take both. I'll both like Philly, right? Joe L and B. They done? Joe L paying 12 minutes a night. He came home. I know for a fact, he should not even be playing Joe L and B. It should not be playing right now. So they got no shot without him. No. And this is what Horford, remember Horford did a great job on MB last year in the playoffs. That guy's a great defender. Smart. That's my new fave. We got a different game to talk about. Really? Did you say new fave? Really? He in my five. Faster. He's just saying. You said new fave. Number one. No, no, no, no, no. He in my five. I'm just asking. You know, T-Mobile got that fave. You know, you got five. He's in your new fave. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, you think he's going in front of the bar? I was just clarifying. He's in your five. You were right. I was right. He said new fave. He's jumped completely off that bandwagon. He is. Out of sight. Out of line. Rod ain't going nowhere. That is true. He's going nowhere. Rod ain't going nowhere. Oh, you got jokes, huh? Yeah. Okay. Next, Nick and Cece examine the non-calls and game one of the Rockets Warriors. All right, Cece, is James Harden right to be upset with the officiating in this game? Well, the officiating was not consistent. You know, typically you listen to referees that are part of the shows and part of the telecast and they talk about there is no regular season and post-season refereeing. And that's just not true. They can't admit it to the public, but the style for which they're going to play, how NBA players play defense in the post-season is totally different. And the refs typically call it. Now, as far as the three-point shooting, we saw last year, Harden didn't get as many calls in the playoffs as he did during the regular season. Thus far, he seemed to be getting the same calls in the regular season on the three-pointers. In this game early, he didn't. And if you look at late in the game, the last one with Dreymont, I thought Dreymont could have gone to the side. Harden was going a little more forward and forced his legs into Dreymont, but that's at the end of the game. And they hadn't called that on Clay Thompson and a couple other warriors during the game. So typically as a player, you say, okay, the referee is going to be consistent throughout the game. So at the end of the game, he shouldn't have expected that call, but how they called the three-point shooting, not letting the Rockets land was a huge advantage for the warriors in this game. And it was totally different than what they had called during the regular season against Harden and other jump shooters. And when you saw the coach and Chris Paul and James Harden after the game, their frustrations boil over. The context here matters. You know how we get those end-of-game final two-minute reports? Well, the individual teams can get those reports for the full 48 minutes. And in last year's Western Conference finals, the Warriors got the officiating edge according to the NBA's own data in six of the seven games. The Warriors were plus over 90 points in the Western Conference finals that went to seven games last year and had an enormous edge in games five, six, and seven. So that was the Rockets feeling when they didn't win last season. Then do you remember this year? To play in January 3rd Rockets Warriors when Kevin Durant is five steps out of bounds. Probably the worst missed call in the season all year. Now the Rockets end up winning on a wild James Harden 3, but that still happened. And now, first half, first game, your whole season been building to this. And the refs tell you, we missed at least four of them. That was 10 free throws, not 12, because one of them Harden made the three. That's 10 free throws the Rockets were deprived of what the rules say they should have gotten. And there's an element of C, are the officials different in the postseason or are they just older? Because one of the things Houston believes is, and they think they have the data to back it up, is the officials who had been in the league longer to where this was not a point of emphasis, the landing space are less likely to call it than the younger officials. In the playoffs, you get veteran officiating crew, crews and they seem to be going against it. But whatever the reason, the Rockets have now played eight critical postseason games last year against the Warriors. And the Warriors have got a clear and obvious edge in the officiating in seven of the eight in a series that you said it when you walked in this morning. It's a missed opportunity for Houston. A win there would have been enormous. And they should have, I don't want to say expected it, but given how Steph played, given how Clay played, given that the Warriors had less than 48 hours rest, they could have won that game and stolen home court advantage. And they feel like the refs took that opportunity from him. One point against that argument is that the refs in game admitted to the coaches and the players. So they're the same older refs. They admitted during the game that they had missed the calls. If it was after the game and they had missed those calls and the refs hadn't said anything, then I might be able to look back to the theory of all, well, maybe it's the older refs because this is a rule that's been in the last couple of post seasons. No, so the thing, it was a great opportunity. And that's one part of the game. Golden State and how they played basketball too, that should be part of the conversation too. Because the refs didn't take the game away. It's just one of the storylines looking to the result with Golden State not playing a great game, Steph being injured, Clay being injured, and then be able to summon up some type of strength, less than 48 hours after clenching against the Clippers in L.A. to be able to get named game number one. That should be the storyline because I believe that game number one, you know, to steal a win, Golden State, I believe will be the difference in the series. This is the way the Rockets play. This is what they count on. They count on being able to make that shot and to get that call. If the refs don't change the way they're calling this series, do the Rockets have a chance? Well, if the refs started ignoring the rule on Fallon three-point shooters, no, the Rockets will be in real, real trouble. I mean, they, you can't, I think everyone believes this is going to be a very close series or it has the potential to be a very close series. And if you're talking about the Rockets believe last night, they missed eight of these foul calls. The refs reportedly admitted to missing four in the first half. If you're talking about taking away 15 to 20 free throw opportunities, then no, nobody would be able to overcome that. And for people think, oh, they'll get it right, they'll get it back in game two. Last year, the NBA apologized for the game five officiating and then the Warriors had the edge in game six. They apologized for both of those and then the Warriors had the biggest edge of the series in game seven. During that 0 for 27 streak, there were multiple times that the NBA's own data says, oh, they fouled them on a three-point shot. And so this just, it's just, what's so odd to me is, you would think if there would be any team that wouldn't get the benefit of the doubt from the officials. It would be Golden State with the way they treat the officials with Draymond and Katie's technicals, but that hasn't been the case when these two teams have been had to head. I'll say this again, the refs were part of the storyline, but they had nothing to do with Clint Compella. Why he didn't show up to the game, had nothing to do with PJ Tucker. Why he has 0 for four and 39 minutes of playing got zero points. So yeah, we can sit here and blame it on the ref seven to eight line, but in this game, the Rockets had a chance to win the game on the court. Harden had the ball in his hand. He decides to take a three-pointer, contested by Draymond. He didn't have to take that three-pointer. He could have taken it to the bucket. There was still time to build like, or if he's the MVP of the league, he can also make that shot. He'll call that a good shot. That was a better look than Damien Lillard had to knock down the bill to get them to the bill to advance. So I think there was still more opportunities and more with the X's and O's and what they didn't do. And the Warriors starting making a lineup adjustment, putting the Hampton five, starting them out there. That was just as important. If you want to talk about the referee and there's other things we should be able to talk about which led the Warriors getting game number one. There's no doubt that the Rockets officiating a side are gonna look at the missed corner threes, PJ Tucker and others, the inefficiency from what is PJ Tucker, but also Daniel House when he had his opportunities. Emon Schumper getting a bigger role because Austin Rivers was out. Clint Capella not being able to take advantage of the size mismatch. He took two shots. Right, like when they start the Hampton's five, you would think that hardened pick and roll lob would be there, it wasn't there the entire game. And Gerald Green played seven minutes and the Rockets were outscored by 16 points in the seven minutes he was on the court. They maybe should have learned the lesson from last year's playoffs against this team. Gerald Green's a tough matchup against Golden State so they had other opportunities but all those things not withstanding, this is now a theme for them going on the second straight year in the playoffs against this team. Now Rick Bueger joins Jason McIntyre to go over their current top 10 players in the NBA. Does this series, and I know it's just four, five games, does it cement Damia Lillard as a top 10 player in the NBA? No, I mean, for anybody as of right now, yes, in prisoners of the moment, yes, go ahead, throw him in your top 10, he's a top 10 player. You know what, he's the best point guard I've ever seen. He's amazing. All right, Rick, 20 second time I'll hold on. A lot of people are gonna vote him as second team all NBA point guard, right? Yeah. That would put him in the top 10. If you're looking at Curry and Harden as the first team, Kairi and Dame as the second team. No, no, because it's position, it's position. He can be the third or fourth best guard or point guard and not necessarily be a top 10 player. I'll press you on it. Especially because if you're looking at guys like Kevin Durant and Kawhi and Yanis and you've got any number of point forwards that are going to be in that top 10. So let's quickly rattle through it, okay? Yanis, we both have top 10. James Harden, top 10, Kevin Durant. Oh, top 10. Steph Curry. Yes. LeBron. Yes. Okay, so that's five. Yes. Kawhi Leonard. Let's put him to the side right now. Okay, I haven't topped that up. Oh, you know what, I take that back. Put him in. Kairi Irving would be seven. Put him in. Okay, now we're getting down to what I think is the tough area. Yes. Paul George is probably gonna be the third. He's in. Okay, he's in. Joellen B. I have him in. Oh. You taking Joellen B to build your team around over Damian Lillard? I know it's simply kind of a different question, but in a guard wing league. Yes, but there's so much that Joellen B can do. He has range. My greatest concern about building around Joellen B and somehow, how did we go from our top 10 to guys that we would build around? Or we say- Yeah, okay, well that's a top 10. I mean, there's a distinction. Yeah, no, no. Because this is the thing that Philadelphia's gonna have to face. Ben Simmons and Joellen Bede cannot coexist on a championship team. We agree on that, right? You're gonna have to make a decision between those two. If it's talent, there's no question. Joellen Bede is the guy that I keep and I move Ben Simmons. But there's a big one there. There's the health factor. I don't know. I mean, Joellen Bede for his age, the fact that he's already sitting out games with sore knees and a sore back, like you can't do back to back season like it's fifth year in the league. Exactly, can I count on that? But if it's just a matter of talent, when you're the best player at your position and he is, when healthy, the best player at his position. I think I hear somebody at the door. Anthony Davis is knocking. What? He wants to know how you do not have three time all NBA first team player, Anthony Davis, who a year ago, first team all NBA, first team all defense. And now Anthony Davis, because he missed like 26 games, he's chop livering. Which year are we talking about the best 26 games? Because he's missed a lot of games, a lot of seasons. He's had some injury issues. You've gotta have him top 10. No, I've always had this issue with, AD is not in my top 10. AD might not be in my top 15. I am not. All right, do we have to stop down here? I mean, come on, Anthony Davis not top 15. Talent-wise, and this is kind of the distinction when we get into the Damian Lillard conversation, because there are so many intangibles that Damian brings to the table. His leadership, his dedication to the trailblazers, and I know that sounds kind of quaint. That's important right now. But the fact of the matter is, like he's brought that team together, and this goes back to his AAU days. He was on the Oakland Rebels. They were the team that wasn't sponsored. They were the team that had to have bake sales and sell beef jerky, and they had to do all kinds of things to scrounge up the money to go to tournaments. The Oakland soldiers were the team that they were the Nike sponsor team. LeBron came in and played for them. You remember Leon Powell? Yes, yes, yes. I remember him covering high school basketball back in the day. Exactly. Now Damian will tell you the soldiers didn't want him. The soldiers will say, no, Damian could have come played for us, but he didn't want to. Nobody wanted him. We were state, yeah. Bottom line is he stayed with the Rebels and they eventually played a tournament where they beat the soldiers. He stayed with the group of his friends that he grew up playing with. And he's always had that mentality that, you know what, if I stay loyal, if we stay together, our continuity and our dedication to each other will trump pure talent. So what we saw and what we've seen with these trailblazers is something that Damian Lillard has basically built his entire career on. And that's where, that's one of those intangibles that when you get to the NBA, it's still about talent. It can't quantify that, really. Yeah, physicality, about all those. Let me add one quick note. So I do have Dame Top 10. I would take him over Kawhi Leonard right now. I think he's got that killer mentality at the end of the game. Well, you think Kawhi doesn't? I don't know that he does. He played with the Spurs, where he was second banana to Tim Duncan. He played with the greatest coach. I need to see what he does in the Sixer series. I'm discounting New Orlando Magic, who tried to defend him with Jonathan. Well, he's gonna, he's gonna. Aaron Gordon, like. No. Jimmy Butler Kawhi Leonard's gonna be a show next round. I like Butler a lot. I would put him in contention for Top 10, Jimmy Butler. Yeah, the first round matchups. I mean, you're also gonna see, you're probably gonna see Kawhi Leonard on Ben Simmons. Yes. A great deal. And Kawhi Leonard has eaten Ben Simmons' lunch. Ben Simmons is 22, Rick. Come on, let's see. I'm a big Simmons guy, but one last point. But that's where Kawhi is good. Kawhi is good as a, he's a great two-way player. My concern with him is not that he's not a closer. I think he's happy to have the ball at the end and take the shot. It's that does he make everybody better? Is he a playmaker? Or is he really kind of an isolationist, where if I tell him to stop this guy, he can stop that guy. If I tell him to go score on this guy, he can score on this guy. But if I ask him to blend what you're doing with the rest of the team, can he do that? Because he started his career as a blender in San Antonio. Let me just remind everybody, Anthony Davis, a year ago at this time, swept Damien Lillard out. Now he had help from Holiday. Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. It was Damien Lillard against Yusuf Nurchkitsch, all right? And the difference in that series was Rajan Rondo and Drew Holliday swallowed up CJ McCollum and Damien Lillard. And CJ McCollum and Damien Lillard came back this year and said, we have a problem playing against big guards. I mean, let's be honest, I am not giving that series to AD. AD was not the difference maker in fact, Holiday was tremendous. This year, you know who the best player on that team was? Even when AD was there, you know who it was. You know who it was. Julie, don't tell me you're gonna say Julius Randall. No, no, no, no. Just make it, sir. No, okay. Mr. Holliday, yeah. He was phenomenal. Yes, he was, at the end of games, you talk about being a closer. That's my problem with AD. AD, talent-wise, I would agree with you. Is he a top 10 talent? Yes, because he's a great two-way player, athletically, but I'm putting him in that tracing the Grady camp of a guy who is a phenomenal talent as a basketball player. 26. But at this point, he still doesn't know to how to apply. I can see the headlines now. Rick Buke, Anthony Davis is not a top 15 player, woof. Following, Colin Coward explains why Yanis needs the help before he can be a championship contender. My favorite NBA reality check for all the Michael Jordan worshipers out there. Many of you in your 20s and 30s didn't even watch him play live. I saw every series and every playoff game he ever played. He's the greatest player probably in league history. LeBron, I think at his prime was close. I think Magic in his prime was very close. But here's a reality check with Michael Jordan. Do you know what his record was in the playoffs before Scottie Pippen arrived? Oh, I do one and nine swept twice. What up, bro? Doesn't fall in line with all your MJ worship. One and nine. He was crappy in the playoffs. Swept twice. Because what we do in basketball, especially the NBA, we glom on to the star and we think the star decides everything. If that was the case, then Kevin Durant would have won the West every single year. But his number two was unreliable, Westbrook. And LeBron has only had great success when he's got an all-star as his number two, Kairi Wader Bosch. Michael Jordan didn't do anything in this league except score. He didn't do anything in the postseason until he got Scottie Pippen, one of the best 50 players of all time. We pay attention to the one and the ones are key, but ones don't win in this league without a two. It's why I never bought into Denver, why I think the Raptors have limitations and why I didn't buy into Milwaukee over Boston. I'll take Boston narrowly. If you look at the greatest team in league history, it's probably the Bulls in 95. The second best player was Pippen, a top 50 player. Second best team I've ever seen is the Warriors. Their second best player, Steph Curry, the only unanimous MVP in league history. The third best team I've ever seen, maybe the second best is the Showtime Lakers. Magic, the second best player was Kareem, probably the best center in league history. By the way, Shaq and Kobe is probably the third or fourth best team I've ever seen. Whichever you preferred, it was a Hall of Famer, was the second best player. The Milwaukee Bucks second best player is Chris Middleton. He's a hard worker and a good kid, but he played college for three years. Translation, it's not that gifted. Then he went to the NBA, rookie year averaged six points and was demoted to the Fort Wayne Mad Ants. He has become a very good player, but if he's your number two, if he's your Pippen, if he's your Kobe, if he's your Steph, you're not winning the title. And I don't think you're winning this series. Now Boston doesn't have a dominating number two either, but let's just for the sake of argument, take Jason Tatum. Jason Tatum was a high school All-American and then a college All-American and only had to play one year of college at the best program Duke. And then NBA people said, get out of college. You're too good. Oh, and then as a rookie made the All-Rookie team and in the playoffs was actually shockingly good as a rookie. He didn't get demoted to the Fort Wayne Mad Ants. Now he's not one of the stronger twos in NBA history, but he has a transformational basketball talent who's still a baby. Now you can argue Al Horford's a two and Gordon Hayward's a two or Jason Tatum's a two. I would say Tatum is their second best basketball talent. That's why I think this is a close series. The Houston Rockets number two player is a nine-time All-Star in a first ballot hall of famer, Chris Paul. And why the Warriors are gonna win their number two is Steph Curry. Maybe the most transformational basketball player of my life outside of LeBron Magic and MJ. Nothing against Chris Middleton, but the reason I took Boston in this series was their two is a four or at best a three Chris Middleton. I like him. He's not a two. Jason Tatum has Knights. He's an absolute two. And I think longterm, he's absolutely a two. He didn't play particularly well in game one, but we spend so much time looking at the one. Kevin Durant got the one finals in the West before Golden State, because he and the two didn't work. Look at the dynasty in our lifetimes. One of them, Spurs. Tony Parker was an MVP candidate and he was a two to Duncan. Then they switched. Then Duncan was the two and was the first Ball Hall famer. I can remember watching Larry Bird have back-to-back playoff games where he scored eight points, but they had a two named Kevin McHale who could score 24. It's not just about the one. Denver doesn't have Jamal Murray dependable two. Chris Middleton should be a three or a four. They're not championship teams. Now I don't think Boston has the best two in the world, but he is an absolutely elite basketball talent who the reason Jason Tatum is not a one, he's too inconsistent. But on the night he's good. Oh, he's really good. Thank you for listening to the Hoops on Fox podcast. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a five star review letting us know what you think of the show.