 What's the word, y'all? Everybody knew that this year was gonna be an all-time tank job. Even Adam Silver said before the season started, if y'all started taking too hard, I might send you down to the G League, even though we can't really send you down to the G League. But I'ma say that we will send you down to the G League because we know that Vic is that nice. Which is super interesting for Adam Silver to even really say, especially since the NBA bought the opportunity to put Vic on NBA.com's app so the world can really see how good he is so fans will advocate for loss after loss after loss. But don't you do it. Don't you dare tank this season because Adam Silver not playing. And well, we got teams that are completely diving into the tank a quarter of a way through the season. The Houston Rockets are three and 14. The Detroit Pistons are four and 15. They won tonight against the Denver Nuggets. Surprising Kevin Knox game. Surprising Kevin Knox game. The Charlotte Hornets have dealt with injuries and they're four and 14 on the season. The Orlando Magic are five and 13. All of those teams have one goal in mind and his name is Vic. But then we have these teams like the Indiana Pacers who are 10 and six, a team that a lot of people, me included, thought were going to be terrible. We have a team like the OKC Thunder who've come back down to earth quite a bit after their hot start again. But they're seven and 10, but they feel too talented to be in that bottom section with the rest of those teams we mentioned. So the Pacers and the Thunder have a dilemma on whether or not they should flip the switch off to get down to catch up with those other teams. And we go talk about that after we talk about our sponsor. That sponsor, of course, is Prize Picks. Hit the link in the description and use co-canny because Prize Picks is matching all new players' deposits up to $100. I love Prize Picks because it's just you versus the numbers. You pick some of your favorite, least favorite players. You pick a stat like points, rebounds, assists. You see the number and you decide if you think they're gonna go more or less than that number. Here's an entry from a few days ago. They recently added six. They used to be between two to five different players that you can add. No, now you can do a six player entry. Poku came through and gave me 10 points in the first quarter. Jewel and Bean, I'm sorry, I pray for you to downfall a little bit, but you've still been killing the game. Jamerang got his boards. Mike Conleave and passer like crazy. Derrick White scored 27 points. I think that was a season high and Luca got a lot of fantasy points in the first half and my $30 entry turned into $750. Won't you look at that. It just adds another element for me as I'm watching these games, an extra thing to root for. So hit the link in the description download the prize picks app and use code Kenny and go ahead and deposit something and they'll match it up to $100. Shout out to prize picks for sponsoring another video. I'm gonna start with the Indiana Pacers because well, they are far behind on this tank job. They are 10 and six on a five game win streak that nobody's talking about. And I think partially is because they had one of the easiest schedules in basketball. I mean, you can only play against the teams that are in front of you, but they've definitely beat up on some mediocre teams. So maybe that's the reason why people ain't talking about them being as good as they look right now. But boy, has it been fun. They're one of these teams that before the season started I thought I would just watch occasionally because Ty Reese is my boy. But no, Ty Reese is having an all-star caliber season and Benedict Mather as a rookie has exceeded almost everybody's expectations. I genuinely do remember on draft night I was getting tweets from people that saying Benedict Mather is gonna immediately come in and be really, really good. I didn't believe it. I don't watch Collins basketball. So I didn't really know what to expect. And boy, they were right, W take. But they've been super fun to watch because I think they play off each other so very well. I think that Benedict Mather and got drafted to the perfect scenario where he's in a situation where he don't have to worry about nothing by getting his own buckets. He's got Tarris Halliburton who continues to climb up this rank as the greatest passing point guards in basketball. And then he's got one of the greatest passing secondary ball handlers and TJ McConnell. I want to TJ McConnell's on my favorite team, bro. He does everything you want a backup point guard to do. He's gonna be a little menace similar to Jose Alvarado before Jose Alvarado. And like I said, he just has the vision that you want from a backup point guard. But this off season, you gotta remember what the Indiana Pacers did. I think if you go back to my Eastern Conference prediction video, I had the Indiana Pacers finishing 15th in the conference. I had them as the worst team in the East. And the reason for that is because after they traded for Tarris Halliburton he played 26 games of the team and they won six and they lost 10 straight games to end the season. And what did they do? They sold Malcolm Brogdon in free agency or in the off season. So I was like, there's no way, right? I underestimated how good Tarris was gonna look in year number three. And again, not really normal Benedict Mathering was capable of, I didn't really know. But even with all of that, this record of 10 and six is still amazing. So did this cross worlds? Do we continue to play with our current team? Or do we try to figure some things out before it becomes too late? Now their schedule is gonna start to change. It's no longer beating up on the Orlando Magic on back to back nights. It's like we're about to go play against really, really good teams. Out of their 10 wins, only two of them have come against a team that was above 500 when they played against them. So it's not like they've played anybody just yet. But majority of people, me included, believed that they were gonna be traded in Miles Turner and or Buddy Hill this season. A lot of us thought it was gonna be to the Lakers very easily like that. But the way they're performing right now and all of these rumors that I'm seeing, I wouldn't be surprised if they decided to keep Miles around. He's averaging 18 and 10. He's shooting the best 3.0 percentage of his career. And when he is on the court, teams shoot 8% less or worse at the rim. That puts him in the 93rd percentile, ladies and gentlemen. That is close to Rudy Gobert this season. I mean, he's always been one of these type of dudes but like it's amplified right now. So they got to decide, do we trade Miles away? Cause right now his stock is at an all-time high. This is the best basketball he has ever played in his career. Do we trade Buddy? Who's having a good season as well as the biggest commodity in basketball is the 3.0 shot. And Buddy, he was one of the best in basketball at that. And maybe selling him right now doesn't hurt too bad or you feel okay about it because you have Benedict Matherin. You have a Nim Hard who's been in the starting lineup and been playing really, really good. Even though they got some funky jump shots out there in Indiana between him and Ty Reese and even TJ McConnell's jump shots got a little bit to it that makes me like, what? They got some funky jump shots but he's looked really good. And then given a second life to Aaron Neesman if he had a really big game a couple nights ago they have this depth at this position that maybe you feel okay with letting Buddy go for whatever it may take. But the paces are again such in a weird spot because I believe there's value when you have a young roster to continue to build this culture of winning. One thing I know about Ty Reese is that he wants to build culture no matter where he goes. He wants to build community in the cities that he plays for. When he played in Sacramento he's doing a lot of charity work trying to build for that community. And now he's in Indiana and he's trying to do the same thing. And there's value in being good. There's also value in the first overall pick. So which one do you weigh more? And I'm trying to look at it this way and maybe this is not the best way to think about basketball and why I don't have a GM job. These are what CBS Sports or whoever the hell this is decided were the top 20 players in basketball. And I'm looking at it like, I think it's all right if you don't get the first overall pick. Because though they're 10 and six right now and they're playing great basketball they have the fastest pace in basketball. They have a top 10 offense and in the last two weeks they have the number three defense of basketball. Again, I play against many great people. I still don't see them as a legitimate playoff team just yet. So if that is to be true and they're not a team that's gonna end up with Vic I mean, I'm looking at the top 20 players in basketball. How many of them are like the number one former number two picks? There's usually good value and potential superstar players once we get to the sixes to whatever. Cause I mean, honest, you know where he was drafted. Kevin Arrant, okay. Steph Curry, you know where he was drafted. Yolkens was a second round pick. Like how long until we get to the top overall pick? It's like Braun who again is in the year 37. So I don't know how he's doing it. But again, maybe there's a flawed way to kind of think about these things. But I think there's a way you can teeter the line of being a lottery team, but maybe not being that first overall pick team and still building really a really good team in the future. Because I am a firm believer that Tyrese Halliburton is legitimately this nice. Right now the way he's playing if the all-star game was today, he was, he would be an all-star pretty easily. And the way Benedict Matherin is showing his game can be surprised if he turns into one of the better players in basketball. So now we already have this foundation of a backcourt that could be potentially elite. We don't necessarily need the number one overall pick to continue this rebuild, even though again, we're talking about Vic here. Vic with Reese would be, it would be amazing. But the likelihood of that, even if they take all the way down to the bottom, where they got the highest odds, we still only talk about a 14% chance of getting him. It's only the flat odds to make it all right. You might even get to the end of the season and we have the eighth best odds and boom, we end up with Jamarant. Cause that's what the, the Indiana, no, no, that's what the Memphis Grizzly did. So like there's, there's a couple different directions that this organization can go. And I don't want to jump the gun because even though they are 10 and six, they can easily go into 10 game losing streak. Again, I think Tyrese is too good. And some of the other players on the roster are too talented for it to happen, but we've seen crazier things in the, okay, see thunder are in a similar way, but not to the craziest extent because they have a million first round picks over the next X amount of years, but they started off the season seven and 10 and Shay Gildius Alexander is a legitimate, legitimate superstar. And there's a lot of conversations revolving around Shay and there have been since he's blossomed into an all circle of a talent. And the conversation is, who's going to trade for him? The Knicks are gathering up picks because the Knicks want to be in on a Shay Gildius Alexander sweepstakes. I don't think there is a Shay Gildius Alexander sweepstake. Everybody keep talking about his timeline doesn't match what the, what the O.K.C. Thunder want to do. And at the way he performs and the way he is, I said the same thing about Steph one week ago. He is the timeline, y'all. He's 24. He's not 29. Why are we acting like he's, he's posting or getting past his prime? He is 24 years old and the average prime in basketball is once you hit that 27 over all time. Oh, 27 over all, 27 year old time. He ain't even in his prime yet. And y'all talking about him potentially being traded. We don't know what's going through the psyche of Shay, but he has said on multiple occasions that he's here for the long run. And I can understand why, because though they are seven and 10, they have played better than a seven and 10 team. If you ask me, he single, almost single handedly has won them more games in the, you'll have to remember the spacing in the lineups that bro was playing with is near non-existent. And he's averaging a 30 piece on crazy great efficiency. And honestly, they just draft the chat last season. Of course he can't play this season. And next season he's gonna come in, he's gonna be rusty, probably won't have the most amazing rookie year or whatever, but they have, they have Shay, they have Giddy, they have Chet. Of course everybody in their organization would love to potentially have Vic, but it can be deeper than that. Same conversation I just had with the Indiana Pacers that there is value and building good culture. And the O.K.C. Thunder have done a okay job of that considering they don't have any vets. Like the Indiana Pacers have veterans on their roster that have been around the league for some time. Like James Johnson is the perfect example. I didn't even know he was on the goddamn team a week into the season. That lets you know I wasn't watching like that, but he is a guy that helps instills culture and just teaching these young dudes the way of the lamb. You know, 26 year old Miles Turner is the longest 10 year pacer. He's teaching these young guys a lot of stuff. The Thunder don't really have that. And yet we're not seeing any bad infrastructure in what they're doing, but because Shay is so goddamn good. And since Giddy is continuing to take steps every time he laces up his sneakers. And since Poku is having the best year of his career, no, no, no, let's quickly talk about Poku because let me read you some statistics. This was written by Jaden Rule and he is writing for SB Nation's version of O.K.C. Basketball. And it is called WelcomeToLoudCity.com. The name and article is actually, I could just show you, what am I doing? Poku is finally playing good basketball. One hell of a headline. They should have bowled it to finally. But here we are. Here's some crazy stats. The efficiency of his scoring output has been a much welcome surprise. His first two years, he shot 28% and 28.9% from 3% respectively. His shooting form has improved considerably. His legs are no longer swinging out, yada, yada, yada. And then 3% is on the season. Same number of attempts as like the previous seasons, 41% right now. But this is the thing I love the most. Is the jump shooting, man. You got a lot of time to figure that out. His finishing at the rim has seen considerable improvement this season as well. Converting on 78.8% of his shots from within three feet of the basket. That's plus 8.5% increase from last season and a whopping 23.4% increase from his rookie year. I don't know how sustainable it is, Poku. But he's taking steps in the right direction as one of the biggest projects in the draft class. So he continues to improve. Giddy continues to improve. Shay is still doing his thing. And they have guys like Jalen Williams and potentially like five first round picks in this draft. So I don't feel like Shay gives Alexander as a trade piece as a legitimate thing or them shutting Shay down in the hopes of adding 6% extra percent to their odds are gonna be a thing to see. Now I could be mistaken. Who really knows? Same pressing them are crazy, crazy people. But I still believe that this is a team that continue to play the brand of basketball they're trying to build and still look back in two years and still be excited and happy with the result. At the end of the day, it's not about whatever pick you get. Okay, maybe in a draft like this where Vic is that player that everybody wants. It's about what you do with those picks. There are a lot of organizations who names I won't throw under the rug that have had top picks after top picks. And we can go as far as 20 years ago that can consider to be really, really bad every single season. They ended up having top five picks every single season and then turning to nothing because they missed on draft picks. It's about getting to that position and having the scouting team and having the culture because every player I've ever talked to always talks about it's not just about me as a player. It's about what I'm getting drafted into to get the most out of your draft picks. So we have these teams like the Pistons, the Hornets, the Magic, the Rockets, even the Spurs at this point because even though they started off with five and two they've lost every single game since then basically they might be in the lead for Vic but that doesn't necessarily mean they'll be in the lead for winning in a couple of seasons. Let me know what you think. I'll be in that comment section.