 Welcome to another episode of In The Zone. I am your host, Chris Broussard. We've got a great show for you today. We check in with the interview with Howard Beck, longtime NBA writer from Bleacher Report. He gives us some great insight on the NBA playoffs and a few other matters going on around the association. But first, as always, we're going to hit you with a top five. And remember, throughout the playoffs, we are doing the top five post-season player power rankings. So check it in at number five, none other than the best player on the planet, LeBron James. Do not blame LeBron for the Cavaliers being in a 2-2 dogfight with the lowly Indiana Pacers. He is doing it all. He's been phenomenal. He leads the Cavs in scoring 32 points a game, rebounding 12 boards a game, assist eight a game, even blocks one a game, all while shooting 54% from the floor. But everybody needs at least a little bit of help. Here's how little bit of help LeBron is getting. All four of the guys that started with him in game four, every single one of them is shooting below 40% from the field in this series. Kevin Love, supposed to be his number two. Now that Kyrie Irvin has gone 12 points a game in this series. LeBron needs some help, but I'm not going to punish him individually. He's at number five. At number four, Ben Simmons. Some call him LeBron James as protege, but he is not playing like anyone's protege right now. He is taking the NBA by storm. In his first playoff series, he darn near average a triple double to lead the Sixers to a 4-1 series victory over the Miami Heat. 18 points a game, 10.6 rebounds a game, a team high. That's right. Simmons led him in rebounding, not Joel Embiid. And also through a nine assist a game, shot 50% from the floor. And just to let you know, he gets it done on both sides, a team high 2.4 steals per game. With Ben Simmons running the show, everybody in Philadelphia gets to eat. Six players average in double figures in the series, including five who scored more than 16 points a game. At number three, Drew Holliday. He teamed up with Rajan Rondo to outplay one of the best backcourts in the league, in Portland's Damien Lillard and CJ McCollum in the New Orleans Pelicans. A sweep of the third seated Blazers in the closeout game, which many people say is the hardest game of a series. He put up 41 points, eight assists, and for the series shot 57% from the floor. He also showed you that he is one of the best defensive guards in the league. He put the handcuffs on Damien Lillard. After Lillard had this tremendous regular season, Drew Holliday held him the 25% shooting in the 150 possessions that he defended Lillard during the series. At number two, Rookie Donovan Mitchell. He is straight ball and all he's doing is out playing an MVP and two other veteran stars in the Jazz's series with the Oklahoma City Thunder. With no other teammate virtually who can create his own shot, Mitchell is averaging 27 points a game and also for good measure, eight and a half rebounds a game. In game four, he bested Carl, the mailman Malone's rookie franchise record for points in a game by 33 points in a playoff game. That total made him just the third rookie in the last 50 years to score at least 110 points in the first four playoff games of his career. The other two, Michael Jordan and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Anytime you put yourself in that kind of company, you know you're getting love from in the zone. And at number one, for the second straight week, Anthony the Brow Davis. How can he not be number one? I mean, he's leading all scores in the playoffs with 33 points a game. In their sweep of the Portland Trail Blazers, he averaged 12 rebounds a game, shot 57% from the field, made nearly two steals a game, blocked nearly three shots a game. I mean, he did it all. He is the number one reason that the Portland Trail Blazers have prematurely gone fishing, shopping, sunbathing, whatever they're doing now, they're no longer playing basketball and Anthony Davis is the main reason why. That is why he's number one on this week's top five post-season player power rankings. All right, I want to welcome into in the zone good friend of mine, long time colleague, Howard Beck. He's a senior NBA writer at Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter at at Howard Beck. And he's also the host of the full 48 podcast. It's an honor to have you on Howard. How you doing today? I'm honored to be here, Chris. Thanks for having me, I'm great. Great, great, great. Well, let's get right to it. It's a tons of NBA stuff going on, obviously. First, you're based in New York. So I want to ask you there. The Knicks obviously are going through a coaching search. They, you know, fire Jeff Hornacek after the season. And some of the candidates, Mark Jackson, David Fisdale, David Black, you know, it seems to be expanding by the day. But I want to ask you this first, because I jokingly, although it really is true, I kind of feel, I jokingly refer to the Knicks as the place that legends go to die. Because, you know, they fired Isaiah Thomas, who obviously was a legend, Lenny Wilkins, Larry Brown, Phil Jackson. And for all of those great basketball minds and figures, it's ended ugly in New York. You were there, if for a lot of those, if not even all of them, what do you think? Yeah, okay, all of them, okay. So you know, like, what do you think has been the problem there, why none of these great basketball men have been able to succeed there? Well, and by the way, you could add Mike Dantoni, who of course now is a genius, now that he's in Houston. Thank you. He was an idiot. Dantoni was an idiot in New York. He's a genius again in Houston, I don't know. He learned a lot of basketball. He learned a lot more about basketball in the last five years, clearly. Dantoni Walsh left here under a cloud. You know, it's, yeah. Dantoni had probably one of the more successful 10 years, right, of those guys we named in New York. He did, right, and he left anyway because of the aggravation and, you know, just didn't want to put up with it anymore. I mean, listen, every question about Nick's instability and that is in their DNA now. Instability, whether it's the front office, coaching staff, roster, that instability is part of the Madison Square Garden's culture and that stuff always goes to the top. It goes to the owner, it goes to Jim Dolan and this is his legacy. This is what he has created, an environment where even the best in the business, as coaches, as GMs, have a hard time succeeding here. Now there are some details that are important, of course, along the way. Phil Jackson was probably never the best idea to hire as a team president in the first place, a job he'd never done before. But still, that things end badly here for legends of all stripes. You know, it doesn't happen that way over and over and over again if there isn't something wrong with the organization itself. And of course there's something wrong with this organization. So, you know, Dolan, to his pseudo credit, when he hired Phil said, I'm gonna do this and get out of the way, I have concluded I am not good at basketball. Which was the right thing for him to say and it was probably a line that was fed to him by somebody else. But from everything I gather, he pretty much stuck to that and he held to his promise to not interfere. But he probably placed his faith in the wrong person. And I say that as somebody who has great respect for Phil Jackson and like him a lot and obviously I've covered him for five years in LA. But I don't think that that, you know, when you finally decided as the owner to take a hands off approach, you should have put it in the hands of, the franchise in the hands of somebody who was really not just capable and a smart basketball mind, but somebody who had the experience of running a front office. And Phil Jackson didn't have that. So call that whatever it is. The fact is you still end up having to turn around and chase off another big name. And you know, he, you know, elevates Steve Mills who has been with the garden in one capacity or another for most of the last two decades through all of this instability. And then he hired Scott Perry. So now you've got a new-ish front office, but I mean, the jury's still out on that. I don't know, you know, it's hard to know where they're heading. Now they're gonna, that Tussum, you know, Mills and Perry will pick their head coach. So we'll know more soon about what their ideas are, presumably and what the kind of direction they're choosing. But yeah, listen, if things go badly again, you know, Porzingus is out for most of next season and, you know, Milakina doesn't take a big step. And, you know, Tim Hardaway Jr. doesn't keep growing. If nothing changes, you know, two years from now, you and I could be having the same conversation. They'll have fired Steve Mills and Scott Perry and whatever coach they've hired will be gone too. And we'll be doing this whole cycle all over again. And listen, that's part of pro sports. Coaches, GMs are hired to be fired, but you should get a longer life cycle out of them. You know, you could have been up those averages, you know, get seven or eight years out of a front office and four or five years out of a coach instead of like two years. That would be an improvement. Well, that's what, before I ask you who you think will be the best man for the job, it doesn't matter. I mean, because they, it's not a great job as constituted and, you know, Porzingus, it looks like he could be out for most of next season. It's not all. Yeah, and that's the thing. When you ask, is it a good job or what kind of coach fits? It almost doesn't make a difference to me because this is not a team that's designed to win right now. It's still a roster that has a lot of holes and the most important player, Porzingus, is missing at least half of next season and potentially all of it. I mean, you know, none of us can know that, right? Every ACL surgery, every ACL recovery is a little different. And, you know, he has seven, three. I mean, this is not the average, like, which is one thing when like a six, two guy tears his ACL and gets it repaired. The kind of pressure and torque and strain that a guy at seven, three who moves like Porzingus does, that's a different kind of stress on the knee. So maybe you're gonna take a more cautious approach and maybe that's the wise thing to do with him heading toward free agency next year from the summer. So it's hard to know. And so, yeah, it's probably another lost season. I mean, I don't think that's even a stretch to say that without your franchise star for most or all of the season, and with nobody else to really build around, you know, I don't think it's a team designed to make much progress. And so when it comes to the coach, listen, I guess the right answer is a coach who is a teacher first, who's a development guy because it's, you know, you've got some key young pieces whether it's Porzingus and Nelikina, the draft pick that they're going to get in June, currently what, ninth, I think, you're gonna have, you know, it's a developmental group, you know, they've got some veterans hanging out, but I think your best bet is to try to offload those guys which they should have been doing anyway and keep going young, because you just need to build a group that's gonna grow around Porzingus. And, you know, now, who fits that bill? I'm not sure. There are some pros and cons to all of these guys, but as I say, I know I'm not sure it matters who the coach is for at least the next year or two. Yeah, no, that's a good point. I've thought Mark Jackson will be a good fit, obviously the New York Ties, but he was good with Golden State as a young team that gets instilled confidence and defense of mentality and all that. I'm gonna do the impression he's been black balled, is that, do you tend to agree with that? Or, and I don't mean an official conspiracy, but you know, his name has kind of been sullied out there and this might be one of the few jobs he could actually get. Yeah, I saw that you had tweeted that the other day. I cringed a little, to be honest, because it's a strong term. I don't view it as Mark Jackson being black balled. I do think there's skepticism out there about him, whether people believe that's justified or not. You know, there was a messy ending in Golden State. You know, they didn't fire him just because they lost, you know, in the first round series to the Clippers, it wasn't about that, they won 50-something games. Yeah, that was a breakthrough season in terms of their win total for 51 season and forever. So it wasn't about the results, it was about relationships, both with his staff, with other people in the organization. Look, it's certainly fair too to say that, yes, that was a young team that he developed, that he instilled, especially the defensive end, a tremendous discipline in and it became a 50-win team under his guidance. But their offense was average and they had through the greatest shooters, as he was the first to note, possibly the best shooter in the backcourt in history, he was absolutely right about that and I think a lot of people in the scoffed when they first heard him say it, he was right, but he didn't deploy them well. His offensive schemes were too simplistic. They were very heavily reliant on isolation play. You know, Steve Kerr brought a more dynamic offense. Now, would that offense have bloomed under Mark Jackson anyway? We'll never know. But I think that people are judging him on the results. I think that the relationships and the things that people have heard and have been reported probably hurt him a little bit. I think he's gotten, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, Chris, hasn't he gotten into a couple interviews over the last couple of years? I thought he's at least interviewed for a job or two. He may have, I mean, not many. I don't know exactly if he's had interviews. I can't recall off the top of my head. I think maybe one or two, but obviously, yeah, he hasn't gotten any of those jobs, but yeah, there's no doubt. I mean, Kerr took them to a whole other level, you know, and that as well as some of the other issues could definitely be hurting him, but it'll be interesting to see who they go with in New York. Now, I wanna move on to, oh, go ahead, go ahead. No, I was just gonna say, quick thought. I do think that he would be an interesting choice for New York for some of the reasons that you kind of alluded to. If you're not gonna win for the next couple of years, get a coach who is a strong leader who can not only raise up the young guys, but also it's important in New York to have a coach who has a certain presence and who communicates well with the media and who resonates with the fans. So if you're gonna be losing anyway, it would be good to have a good personality in that spot where, you know, well, there's good coach, bad coach, average coach, whatever, he's a representative of the team. He puts a different face on the team that fans, I think, would respond to. So at least it's a little bit of goodwill and a connection to the fans that has a value of its own. And that's not to say that his coaching doesn't have a value. It's just that in New York, you have to consider these other things too, especially if they're continuing to go through a period here that's going to be a little rough on the court. It certainly would help to have a good ambassador of the club and one who already has a New York credibility standing there in front of the cameras every day. So there's a lot to say for that. I do want to get into some playoff talk, but I want to ask you before that another, you know, you mentioned some dysfunction and some issues going on with when Mark Jackson was in Golden State relationships. How surprised are you to see the way this situation in San Antonio with Kawhi Leonard and the Spurs has developed and where do you think, you know, how do you think it ends up? I mean, a lot of people around the league think he'll get traded this summer. Others think the Spurs will still offer him that super max and try to work it out. Well, where do you stand on the surprise factor and then on how it ends up? I mean, I have misread this situation from the start. I gotta say, like I, if you had asked me a month ago, two months ago, four months ago, I would have said there's no way he's still out in the playoff. He's going to be playing in the playoffs. He'll be back in the playoff. I would have thought that absolutely. I'm stunned that he's not. Now, is that because of injury that continues, that truly still needs rehabilitation? Is that because of some mental block? Is that because of some rift with the organization? Is it all of the above? I don't think we know, which, you know, hey, typical of the Spurs, we know as little as possible. Yeah, I still have a hard time believing as great as that organization has been and remains that they won't find a way forward here. That not just the 200 million that's eligible, that's on the table for Coiliner and an extension, but just the fact that you know this is an organization that in general is going to do things right, is going to make the smart moves. Once you can get guys in a room and talk this out and discuss whatever the differences of opinion are about the injury or the treatment, the rehab, whatever. I gotta feel like, because it's in everybody's best interest, I think it's in Coiliner's best interest to resolve this and stay there. I said it's obviously in the Spurs' best interest. So yeah, look, after all this time, I think we all should probably still have faith that the Spurs will figure out a way to resolve what is clearly a very unusual drama for them. Do you, a lot of teams, reportedly the Clippers are gonna put together a tray package for him. I think Boston will try to do that. And even, I mean, they certainly have the pieces to probably put together the best or certainly one of the best offers. If you were running Boston, would you put Jaylen Brown or Jason Tatum in a deal for Kawhi or would you kind of stay in Pat? Yeah, it's a really tricky one, right? I mean, look at how great those guys are playing and they're still so young. They have the potential to, you know, be, you know, both of them to be perennial all-stars. But could they be as impactful as Kawhi? I mean, Kawhi was an MVP candidate a year ago. And Kawhi, you know, when he was healthy was one of the best two-way players in the NBA. He's built for today's NBA. Ordinarily, I would say you take the, you know, I guess the burden hand is the one who's not actually in hand in this case, but the analogy is all screwed up. But I want to be established all-star, not the guy who might become an all-star, right? As long as he's still in his prime and Kawhi Leonard is. So ordinarily I would say, yeah, go ahead and flip the young guy with the potential for the guy who already has that potential realized and who you can get several more years out of and who might accelerate your ability to become a true championship contender because you put Kawhi Leonard at full strength with Kyrie Irving, Al Horford, and whichever of the two young guys that you kept and the rest of that crew. Plus they've still got more picks because they always have more picks. You're in great shape to contend, right? And maybe you get a leg up on Philly because they're coming fast too. But here's the concern. What is the physical part? Is Kawhi right? If he's not right yet, why isn't he right yet? And is he gonna get back to the old Kawhi? Two, this does kind of feel like there's something else going on, right? Like whether it's him or the advisors around him or if it's psychological, the way it kind of was with Derek Rose coming back from his knee years ago, then you start to worry about mindset and you're doing a choir with Kawhi. Yeah, does that make him maybe less valuable to, you know what I mean, team's question is that the guy we can count on? You know what I mean? Yeah, for sure. That would give me pause. That would absolutely give me pause. Now that's why you do your due diligence and of course Danny Age's as skilled as anyone, he and I would assume no other GM would make a deal for Kawhi Leonard that cost you great prospects and picks and everything else unless you have determined for certain that he's fine, mentally, physically, emotionally and otherwise. But right now I think there's good reason for people to wonder about his mindset. And so those are the things you have to resolve before you give up anything of great value. And the Celtics, look, you always love the guys you have, right? If you're a Celtics fan or if you're Celtics officials and coaches, it's really hard to give up the young guys that you think could grow into superstars that you drafted, who you've already got the emotional and actual investment in and you'd rather see those guys and then say I don't wanna trade them for anything. Well, if it's the old Kawhi Leonard, the guy who was MVP of the finals a few years ago, yeah, it's worth sacrificing one of those young guys. But if it's anything less than that, you just, you know, you probably can't. So that's an interesting quandary for all these teams that are going to be poking around about Kawhi Leonard is how much do you give up given what's gone on for the last eight months? Let's stay in, I guess we've been in the East and the West with Boston and Kawhi Leonard. Let's stay in the East. Cleveland, you know, obviously struggling a bit with Indiana in their first round series. Do you, you know, LeBron is always the guy, the lightning rod, and he'll get criticism if the team loses. Some people put it all on the supporting cast. Some people put it all on LeBron. How do you read this? Is this, the struggles they're having, is it more just he doesn't have the help? Is it he is aging a bit even though his numbers are still huge? What do you think, you know, we're learning about LeBron right now or learning about the cast right now? I've felt from the beginning this season and I wrote this back in November when they were five and seven or whatever it was. And before they had their first big turnaround when they went a bunch of games in December against a really soft schedule. But I wrote back then, and I've been saying ever since, before the trades and after the trades, this is the worst supporting cast LeBron has had since he left Cleveland the first time in 2010. And it's true, if this is not this group, whether it was the Derrick Rose, Isaiah Thomas, Dwayne Wade, Iman Shumpert, Channing Frye group that they shipped out, or whether this new group was Rodney Hood, Jordan Clarkson and the rest. Either way, this is not as good as the Cavs team that they had the last few years because you don't have Kyrie Irving and some of the guys who were left over from those years aren't as good as they were. Tristan Thompson's not the same guy. Jared Smith's not the same guy. Shumpert before you shipped him out, wasn't the same guy. They're just nowhere near as good as they were the last three years in Cleveland. And there's certainly nowhere near as good as those Miami Heat teams were with a still in his prime, Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosch and the great supporting cast that they had there. So this just isn't a very good team overall. And that everything always goes back to LeBron is just, it's such a dumb, tired trope. And I know that this is how we as fans of the media talk about the NBA in general. It's never about, you know, can the Celtics win? It's gonna be can Kyrie win with the Celtics and it'll always be a referendum on his move. And, you know, it's never, you know, right now it's not about the Thunder, it's about Russell Westbrook. I mean, that is how we talk about the NBA because superstars define the narrative and they're the ones who drive the conversation. But the reason I always defended LeBron's decision back in 2010 to leave Cleveland for Miami was because it's a very simple truth about the NBA. Nobody wins a championship on their own. Even the best players in history don't win it on their own. Magic and Kyrie needed each other. Pippin and Jordan, Shaq and Kobe, on and on and on. And so if you can't get stars to Cleveland then LeBron going and finding his own star teammates was fully justified in my opinion and he's been vindicated as far as I'm concerned as well. And it's the same reason why I understood why he left Miami for Cleveland and went back because that heat team was starting to erode. So right now what he has is a very, very good Kevin Love. Kevin Love's an all-star and a legitimate all-star but he's not at that same level of all-star or that same level of offensive dynamism as Kyrie Irving, as Dwayne Wade was. He's not a creator, he's not a playmaker. So, and the rest of those guys these are average or below players, Chris. I mean this is, you know, for whatever people loved about Jordan Clarkson in LA and the numbers he put up, you know, like the guy can score a little bit. Coming off the bench on a bad team, yeah. On a bad team and he's got a lot of bad tendencies and Rodney Hood, you know, there's a reason Utah was willing to just like let him go for nothing because he's a really frustrating and consistent player. He like, these are not, you know, these are bench players essentially. Larry Nance, I mean, they're fine but in George Hill's banged up, so this is just not a very good group. If the Cavs go down to the first round, the world's gonna come apart at the seams and everybody's going to, you know, especially other people who already don't like LeBron or already skeptics of LeBron are gonna put it all on him. Fine, I guess that's the way the world works but it's a dumb interpretation of what we're seeing. LeBron is still performing at an incredibly high level and every team in the league would kill to have him and he just doesn't have that much support around him. I still think they'll get out of the first round but, you know, I've had skepticism about this team as I say all season that they would come out of the East and when asked, I would still lean their way based on LeBron if nothing else and because nobody else in the East can make that convincing of a case but, you know, our buddy Michael Lee tweeted it earlier or maybe it was last night that the East is wide open and I think that that's the case right now which is a good thing. Would you still pick, I mean, LeBron, I've said that I've picked him just kind of a blind face. I think he really looks like the best team but, you know, until I see him go down I'll probably stick with LeBron at least this year. Do you have a feeling on that? Yeah, no, it's kind of the same thing. Like, you give the team with the best player in the NBA the benefit of the doubt. LeBron is still playing like an MVP. It's hard to bet against him even though he doesn't have the kind of help around him that he really needs to win a championship or truly contend. Can he still get out of an Eastern Conference where you've got a Toronto team that doesn't inspire a ton of confidence and a Philly team that's still pretty young, you know, Boston, Milwaukee, Washington, all these teams like, you know, and I'm not predicting, by the way, Milwaukee or Washington are going to come out of the first round. I'm just saying as you look at everybody every single one of these teams there's the reason you could try to make a case for them and then there's a thousand caveats behind it. And yeah, Philly looks like the strongest right now but, you know, hey, we're still middle of the first round and, you know, things can change rapidly. So yeah, LeBron gets the benefit of the doubt until we see otherwise. So I'm not gonna ask you, where's LeBron going? Because obviously none of us know. I don't even know if he knows it. I doubt he knows at this point. Where do you think would be the best fit? And maybe it's Cleveland, I mean, if you feel, but where do you think would be the best fit for him next year? So let's start with a premise. Let's start with a premise that wherever LeBron is signing in July is the place that he's going to spend the rest of his career, whatever that is, three, four, five, six years, and that wherever he is, he wants to make sure he can still be in contention every year. That he has a true shot at contending if not immediately, then very, very soon thereafter. If that's the case, if I'm LeBron and whenever this Cleveland run ends, if you're looking around at that roster, where are you seeing a future on that roster? So I feel like Cleveland, like I'm already ready to like cross them out if it's based on contending. Now, basically just, you know, hey, stay home, don't burn those bridges again. Maybe your family has settled and everything you don't wanna leave that area again. Okay, I could see it on that, but if it's about contention, I don't see it in Cleveland. Do you? I mean, unless that next pick wins the lottery, jumps up to one and they can flip it for an all-star because that pick, I don't care who it is, that pick ain't helping LeBron James win championships even if it's number one. And I don't think he'll get excited about it. Are you right? No, no, that kid's gonna need to grow up and develop just like everybody else who comes out of the draft. And I think if LeBron were to tell Cleveland, I'll stay, you know, for the next several years, I think they would trade that pick for it. Yes, yes, but if that pick stays at eight, then you're not getting much for it probably. But if that pick gets to number one, two, three, now you've got a shot to flip it for somebody who can help you right now, assuming that LeBron says I'm gonna stay and play with that guy. But short of that, he's not staying to play with Jordan Clarkson and Tristan Thompson and like that. I don't see it. I mean, I don't know how else they get better. What are the moves they can possibly make? So if it's about contention, I think you start looking elsewhere. Billy becomes really intriguing in that sense. But let's play the what if games. We all think that Durant probably doesn't go to the Warriors if not for the fact that the Warriors lost to Cleveland and now there was justification to need him. What if the Sixers get to the finals? Even if they lost in the finals, the Sixers get to the finals without him. That would be really weird for LeBron to like go jump to the team that's already in the finals. I was gonna ask you that. And I know it's not your style to rip somebody, but as you know, a lot of people would just counsel LeBron. Do you think that would be too, would that be too negative of a look for him to go to the Easter Conference champion who's right there on the verge of maybe winning? Well, it's interesting. It's interesting because let's look at that in the light of the other moves he's made. When he went to Miami, he was looked at his front running to an extent because he joined up with Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosch. And then nobody'd ever done anything like this before and people flipped out about it. But it's not like the Heat had been a powerhouse until those three got together, right? Like they had been years since they'd been in the finals. And when he went back to Cleveland, he was joining a team that had been in the lottery every year since he had left. So he wasn't, the idea of being a front runner, and that's the backlash that Durant got. I think, I can't say this definitively, but I think that LeBron has always kind of looked, has been offended by the idea that Durant was doing anything similar to what he did because Durant did go to a team that had been in the finals, whereas LeBron helped build something in Miami and helped build something in Cleveland. So I think, I don't think LeBron wants that look. I don't think he wants to be viewed the way that Durant was viewed as being a front runner and joining essentially a rival. What if the Sixers are the ones to knock the Cavs out in the second round? Like, and then he goes to them, it's gonna look like the Durant situation. And I don't, and again, I'm not one who judges Durant on that. I'm fine with it, but that is how a lot of people viewed it very negatively. So I think, as long as Philly doesn't get to the finals or knock out the Cavs, I'm like, that's an option. That's another thing I like, Chris. Yeah, go ahead, go ahead. No, no, go ahead, go ahead. Well, I see Philly in the Lakers as just two interesting options from a narrative perspective. And LeBron's always very aware of the storylines that will attach to decisions that he makes and things that he does, right? So in both cases, he can go to a storied franchise that has gone through a very fallow period. The Sixers, it's no longer fallow, they're in the playoffs, they're good. The Lakers still in a fallow period. But storied franchises in big cities where if he shows up, it's I'm gonna bring these guys back to glory. I'm gonna bring up the young pups. I'm gonna teach them the ways of LeBron. I'm gonna teach them about work ethic and how to think the game. And I'm gonna restore glory. Like the Lakers haven't done anything since Kobe started going into decline. And LeBron goes there. He can now be in the same, he could be up there with Kobe and Shaq and Magic and Kareem and Wilt and everybody and be part of that legacy. But to add to it, because you'd say, well, why would you wanna follow those guys? Well, because things are crappy there now. I'm gonna be the guy who's gonna, you know, to help Brandon A. And Groom and these guys learn and grow into the championship team that they can be. And I'm gonna lead them back. And so I'm gonna go down to Laker Lore as the guy who restored glory. And it could be the same thing in Philly, although Philly's obviously several steps ahead of the Lakers at this point because of, you know, Simmons and MB, but I can see similar themes attaching to each of those and that being attractive to him. I mean, bringing that up. And you, as you mentioned earlier, you covered the Lakers for several years as a beat writer. You know that organization. You know the city, the fans. If LeBron goes to the Lakers, does he have to win it all? Cause I've said that other than Elgin Baylor, every other player with the Lakers of LeBron's ilk, Jerry West, Kobe Bryant, Shaq, Kareem, Magic, you know, they all deliver championships. And the Lakers don't get excited about a second round appearance. You know, our Western Conference finals appears. So do you feel he would have to deliver a championship there? And if he didn't, would that be kind of a market on his leg, a negative mark on his legacy or, or not? He gets a little bit of breathing room on this, Chris. But although we should throw in one other factor here. Cause I don't think he's going to LA unless Paul George or somebody like that is going with it. Like he knows he can't, he can't win it on his own. Like going, I mean, maybe he'd be slightly better off with Lonzo Ball and Brandon Ingram and those guys than what he's got in Cleveland. Maybe, but he's also going to them be in the Warriors kind of rock conference, even the West, it's a lot harder. But I tend to think that he's not making a move to a place like the Lakers without another established star coming with him. And I think Paul George is certainly in play and that, that combination with the young guys, plus then they become an attractive destination for other veterans who are like, you know what, I'm going to go chase a ring and take less money. Like you could see them building up that roster quickly around those guys if they made that commitment together. So then to your question about, do you have to win a championship? Yes and no. I mean, yeah, that's the only way they judge anything in LA. It's always championship or boss, first, second round appearances. They don't like, they don't hang division banners at Staple Center. You know? Yeah. That, that, you know, that's a Sacramento thing. But I do agree that the standard there is very high for what's considered to be success. However, we, we are looking at LeBron going into year 16. And I think that he's now, if he goes to say LA, he's going there as kind of older Kareem, where Paul George and Ingram and Ball, those guys eventually become like the magic Johnson role of being the, the more of the engine while LeBron can play, I don't want to say secondary. I don't know how he's ever secondary. But in the near term, he's still primary. But we're not, it's not that far off. Eventually, like he is human, I think. Yeah. Like at some point, at some point, and that's to me, that's the other consideration that people haven't thought enough or talked enough about, which is wherever he goes next, yes, titles are important, contention is important, personal, professional happiness, all those things are important. But it also should be somewhere where as he moves into his mid to late thirties, he's 33 now, when he's 36, 37, if he's still playing, he can't continue to handle as much of the load as he does now. So somebody else on that roster has to be growing into that role. And he becomes, like I say, more of the Kareem to magic, where he is the older statesman who can still do a lot of damage, but he doesn't have to carry his heavy load anymore. So I think that's a huge part of this. And because of that, to get back to your question, I think it alleviates a little bit of the title demands because it won't always be in his hands. It's gonna start to become somebody else's responsibility with him. Yeah, no, that's a great point. You mentioned Golden State earlier. Do you think they still are the team that gets out of the West ultimately this year? Or can they be pushed by New Orleans, which obviously had a great first round sweep against Portland? Yeah, I wish we knew what Steph Curry was gonna look like, because if we could assume a fully healthy, peak level Steph Curry from game one of the second round, then I'm like, it's the Warriors still, no question. No question, the Pelicans are great, they're gonna push them, they're gonna make it hard. They have earned our respects, they've earned the Warriors' respect, but it's definitely the Warriors. But we can't say that right now. Curry's gonna be reevaluated later in the week, maybe he plays game one, maybe he doesn't play until game two, for all we know. And we don't know what he'll look like when he gets back out there. Is he 100% or is this gonna be like a couple of years ago where he's never quite right again for the rest of the postseason? Then they become a little more vulnerable. Now the Warriors still have more talent, they obviously have more experience at this level. They've been together longer, there's still a lot going in their favor, and I'll still say that they're going to win that series, but if Curry's a little diminished, you know, the challenge becomes steeper because stopping Anthony Davis, I don't know, that's probably not possible. So what you're gonna need then is to just have the firepower where it doesn't matter. And to have the full firepower, you gotta have Curry out there with Durant and the rest. So I think the Pelicans are gonna be able to win. So if Curry, let's say he misses the first two, I'm just obviously speculating. If he misses the first two games of the series, then comes back at, you know, 85, 90% playing well, but maybe not quite at his optimum level. Do you actually think New Orleans could beat them? I think it's possible. I'm not ready to say that they, I certainly wouldn't predict it, but if we're talking Curry missing the first two games and coming back diminished for game three through whatever, that's really, I think that's pretty scary. The Pelicans are legitimately good now. They're still weird. It's still kind of a strange group, but it's much more logical group than it was when they started the season. Like they're better off, I know, I'm gonna kill, they are better off without the Marcus Cussins. It's better to have them. I agree. You know exactly what you were about. Your identity is about Anthony Davis and to an extent about Drew Holiday and everybody else fills their roles around them. Now they could use more shooting. They could use more wing defenders. They could use more depth. There's a lot they could use, but an even more logical lineup, especially for today's NBA, with Anthony Davis as your undisputed number one option, your undisputed center, with a stretch four in Miratitsch next to him. This is a more logical ration of what they had to open the season. And I think they're truly dangerous. And Alvin Gentry knows that Warriors team well, so they're gonna be prepared. Yeah, and I'm with you on Cussins. Look, I know it doesn't really happen much in today's NBA and obviously he puts up huge numbers, but I would say you're a small market team where money matters. You can't just spin through the roof. So that's another thing that I think they're a better team without him as good as he is individually. I just, for all the reasons you said. And I mean, why would I pay that? If I pay that huge money to him, I mean, I'm through the luxury tax because Drew Holiday's making big money. Obviously Anthony Davis. I mean, do you think they would have the guts though? Cause a lot of teams just won't let a guy like that go. Most of what I'm here now, although it could change, is that it looks like they'd bring him back, but what are your feelings on that? My feelings are that Demarcus Cussins is a risk. He was a risk even when he was healthy because it was just his volatility, his track record, but he's a bigger risk now because Achilles injuries are no joke. It's not a pretty list of people who have tried to come back from these things and he's later in his career. He's still in his prime in theory, but prime varies from player to player depending on your health and right now he's got a very serious injury to overcome. He's also, he's a big guy and he's not one who's ever been viewed as particularly diligent about his workouts. So that he may gain, that he's almost certainly gaining weight while he's recovering. I think there's a lot of risk there and I put it this way. If the question is would you keep him if it took giving him a max deal? I'd say absolutely not. There's no way I'm giving him a max deal. The only way I'm bringing him back is at some sort of lesser number that minimizes my risk and even then I'd be uncomfortable because they're playing so well without him and look, he's got a track record. He's been a tough haul for teams to deal with and that money, now you and I both know, the salary cap is complicated and just because you don't spend 150 million onto Marcus Cousins doesn't mean you automatically have that available to spread around other players because the cap doesn't work that way. However, you can't tie up all that money knowing that you do have all these other needs and that if you've got a rush and it's really working well, that's made it to the second round for the first time with Anthony Davis that has nice pieces there. Now what I'm thinking is what's the best use of my resources within the constraints of the cap to get myself a point guard because Rajan Rondo is eventually going to age out. I don't know how long he's sticking around but I'm going to need a point guard of the future if Drew Holiday is now essentially kind of like a ball handling off guard. I'm going to need more shooting. I'm going to need, as I said, perimeter defenders. There are other needs I would rather take care of with that money. Yep, now I'm with you. The team they beat Portland, is it time to blow up that backcourt? To some people it's reminiscent of Steph Curry and Monte Ellis and remember that Monte Ellis trade at the time was not popular when they split up those two. Do you see the same thing being necessary in Portland? Yeah, the only problem I have with that analogy is that whoever is Monte Ellis in this analogy is way better than Monte Ellis. Like, Monte Ellis got the benefit of being like a fun to watch high scoring warrior at a time when the warriors had been crappy for so long that fans just like it didn't, they were going to embrace and elevate him regardless. So his stature in the Bay Area was a little bit beyond or a lot beyond what he actually merited, I think. So I think CJ McCollum, if McCollum is the Monte in this analogy, he's way better than Monte. But anyway, I think the trailblazers have painted themselves into a corner. Obviously a lot of those big contracts they gave out in 2016 are coming back to haunt them. The Nurkitz deal, which looked good in the short term, it still is fine, it's not hurting them and he's a free agent so he can walk. But I mean, he's not that piece they were missing. Like what they wanted was if we can find that frontcourt piece to balance out our all-star-ish backcourt, then we're good. They just don't have anybody they can rely on outside of the two guards. And so if you're locked up cap-wise, which they are, if you don't have anybody immediately emerging in the frontcourt and we'll see about Collins, but it could be a while, I think you have to seriously entertain it. I think that you've got to find another way forward. And I don't know, there's just not that much flexibility given their cap situation. If you just roll it back to the same group next year, still built around McCollum and Lillard, you can expect probably the same result. Yeah, yeah, nah, I hear you, I hear you. Before we go, you retweeted something, I think it was Monday morning, this morning, saying that basketball Twitter is getting less fun every day and wonder why it has to be so toxic. Tell me kind of what your feelings are on that and does that weigh on you, being a high profile and active basketball Twitter personality? As are you, my friend. And you probably get a lot more backlash, you get a lot more backlash than I do with your TVI. Yeah, so Tom Ziller, who writes for Espionation, who's excellent at his job, and Tom Ziller has always been a very thoughtful basketball mind, whether he's writing for Espionation or whether he's tweeting, he's always got interesting things to say, and it was Ziller who posted, or it was part of his roundup this morning that basically he was explaining why he's no longer on Twitter. He's going on Twitter to tweet out his links to his material, but he's not engaging on Twitter anymore, he's not having the conversation anymore because he feels that things have gotten too toxic. It's interesting, I mean, I think we've all felt that at times, and I used to be much more active in trying to respond to people in my mentions on Twitter. I now am very selective about it, and if people are just being belligerent or just being jerks for the sake of being jerks or just trying to provoke me or trolling or whatever, I'm very generous with the block and the mute keys these days. Like I don't care. I don't care what my follower count is. I don't care if I'm losing people. Obviously from a lot of what I've done in terms of politics that I'm retweeting, I don't care who I'm alienating at this point. I just, I gotta do what makes sense to me. And if people are coming to my mentions just to have a fight or just to scream or hurl insults, I don't need it. So I block or I mute and I don't respond very often. Occasionally, I had a bunch of Pacers fans coming after me a couple of weeks ago because of a video I did in which I referred to the Pacers as uninspiring. It wasn't uninspiring as a group, it was uninspiring as a contender for the East Crown. I was putting them in contrast to the Sixers among choices that you could pick to come out of the East. But that word really, really pissed off a lot of Pacer fans. That Pacer fans coming at me and because enough of them did with the same complaint, I thought I should at least respond. I found the one guy who was actually being civil and I responded to him and said thank you for being civil. Here's why I use that word. Here's what I was referring to. Here's what the context was. I'm not sure why people are so out of, been out of shape but okay. In doing so, I hope that the rest of them would see the response to that guy and that would just take care of it. But all the ones who were being belligerent either muted or blocked. I don't know what Ziller, what specific thing. I'd be curious to know if there was a specific exchange or series of exchanges or what it was that finally drove him to say he's just not gonna do it anymore. I've never reached that point. There have been plenty of times where I feel like Twitter's just a freaking cesspool and it's dragging us all down. But you can regulate that yourself. You can choose not to respond. You can choose to block and mute. You can choose how much to use it. But yeah, there are times it's a little depressing to see what's on there. I know, I got one more question before you go in this kind of facts of basketball. Before, if I were to tell you Golden State does not reach the finals, who would your, and I'm gonna, I'll just do it in the East too. If I were to tell you Golden State and Cleveland don't reach the finals, who would your picks be? Who would you think would reach it? I mean, I really have a hard time believing it's anybody other than the Warriors or Rockets. So if it's not the Warriors, I'm going with the Rockets. I just don't think anybody else is even close to their level. And as fun as intriguing as the Pelicans are, that would be an awfully big leap for a team that hadn't even been in the playoffs for a few years. And normally, I would apply that same principle to the Sixers that for a team that hasn't been in the playoffs in years to make a leap from lottery to finals is huge. But the East doesn't have a team like the Rockets or the Warriors. The East doesn't have anybody that you just look at and say, well, you're never getting past team X. If it's not, so if it's not the Warriors, it's the Rockets. If it's not the Cavs, man. It's wide open, there's no question. It's like, it's like, look, Toronto fans, this is another fan base that's always got a chip on their shoulder, they feel like they don't get respect and people don't give the Raptors their due. It's hard for anybody to buy, I think even for a lot of Raptors fans, it's hard to have faith in the Raptors. We've seen so many flame outs. So we've seen it even in this series where they start to get a little bit wobbly. And I hate to sound like the bandwagon hopper, but like, man, the Sixers are really, really good. And they've got two guys who could be MVP caliber players year in, year out for the next 10 years. And while they're young at the two most important spots, you know, their two best players are the young ones, they do have some vets around them. They do have JJ Reddick and Amir Johnson and Ilya Sova and Bellinelli. They got some guys who have been around and they've got a really good coach and Brett Brown who doesn't get nearly enough credit. You know, it's hard to make that leap, but all right, for the sake of argument, yeah, I'll go Sixers. Well, Howard, my man, thank you. You were great as always. I appreciate the insight and I will see you. I'm sure I'll see you somewhere. It may not be till the finals, but I'll see you out there on the road somewhere. No, absolutely. Definitely see you somewhere along the way here. Who knows? Maybe we'll be hanging out in Philly in Houston. Yeah, that's right. I would agree with your picks too. If it's not going to stay in Cleveland, I would agree with Houston and Philadelphia. So we'll see. Hey, I'll leave it on this note. At least there's a conversation to have. At least there's some mystery, which we didn't have for the last couple of years, right? So that's a plug. No, I agree. And I've said, I don't know if you agree, to me, this is the first time since 2011 when Derek Rose had his career changing injury in Chicago that if LeBron doesn't make it to the finals, there's kind of that intriguing team in the East. Like, if Philadelphia makes it, I don't think people be quite as into it as if LeBron made it. But I think they would captivate the fans nationwide because they're now this young up-and-coming team, this guy that people compare to Magic Johnson and Ben Simmons and Embiid, arguably the best big man in the league. I don't think we've had a viable option in terms of being a captivating team other than LeBron in, you know, six, seven years in the East. Absolutely, agreed. And I think that that is why so many people are so eager to jump on the bandwagon because it's not just that they're all of a sudden good, it's that they're fun, they're intriguing. Yeah, but like I say, whoever makes it, even if it's the Cavs again, the fact that we can even have a reasonable conversation that there is some question, some mystery about it is good for the NBA because that feeling of inevitability the last couple of years was a little bit of a downer. It's more fun to have a real debate and see how it develops. No question, no question. All right, my man, again, great job and I'll see you down the road. Appreciate it, Chris. Thanks for having me. Take care. All right, Howard. Yep, later.