Max Extensions, Plus Zach’s WTF Teams With Rob Mahoney and the Debut of Mets Corner With Sean Fennessey

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Coming up on on the Zach Lowe show, we have a loaded program today with the great Rob Mahoney.

We're going to talk Chet Holmgren extension, Devin Booker extension, the difference between them, why that difference is relevant.

Got some hot takes on both of those things.

Or not hot, but just good takes.

Very interesting team building decisions for both the Thunder and the Suns with lots of cap implications.

And then

Zach's WTF is this team teams.

What happened to these teams?

Where are we?

What's going on?

What are they doing?

You always get to this time of year in July and you're like, all right, let's take stock.

The dust has settled.

What's going on with these strange teams?

We're going to hit the Bulls, the Warriors, the Heat, the Raptors, the Hornets, Pelicans.

Well, just, it's been enough.

We're going to give you a little break.

Wizards, we're going to give you a break.

You're just trying to be bad, we know.

Kings, too depressing.

But those are going to be our WTF teams.

And then

the debut of Mets Corner.

We're going to do a little baseball.

little Queens New York baseball with the one and only Sean Fenny.

I'm back in.

I'm in just enough.

I know I'm the worst kind of person.

I have just enough knowledge, just enough knowledge to have really bad hot takes about the New York Mets and baseball.

So we're going to share some of those on Mets Corner, which will be a recurring thing.

Enjoy the Zach Lowe show coming up.

Welcome to the Zach Lowe Show.

It's Thursday.

NBA offseason is slowing down.

We're creeping toward a Las Vegas trip.

Rob Mahoney, how are you, sir?

I'm doing great.

I'm ready for the desert.

You know, bring the heat, bring the dry atmosphere.

You know, bathe me in chapstick.

I think I'm ready to go.

Speaking of Vegas, so my plan for the podcast is first 45 minutes, I want to dive in to the groups for the in-season tournament that have been unveiled this week.

Have you studied them?

Can you name all the groups by heart?

Have you started to project?

Do you even remember who named the in-season tournament winner from last year?

It was the Bucks, right?

It was the Bucks.

And

it heralded a truly great season for the Milwaukee Bucks, I thought.

I thought it was the moment everything turned around for them.

You know, a real before and after A versus B situation.

And we never looked at the preseason or early season Bucs the same way.

Have you opened the email and or read any story about the groups for the 2026?

I guess this is 2025, 26.

I don't know how even to characterize it.

IST.

You know what?

That one went to just mark unread for me.

I think I can name the groups.

I believe believe they are A, B, and C, right?

Those are the names of the groups.

I don't, I don't know.

How about we name them?

We name everything else now in the NBA.

Every single series has a trophy named after a famous person.

How about we take random players that have excelled in the IST in the past and name groups after them?

This is like, this is what happens in Las Vegas.

So I mentioned a couple of Kakamame ideas that have come from Las Vegas dinners over the years.

One was the, and I broke this down extensively extensively last year, an imaginary three-on-three tournament involving all 30 NBA teams where the three participants are the controlling owner, the head coach, and the lead decision maker in the front office.

And who would win that tournament?

The other one was we need to name various parts of the Thomas and Mack Center because there's two courts.

There's like many entrances and exits.

There's an atrium kind of between the courts.

It's generous to call it an atrium.

It's a concrete whatever.

We need to name it after Summer League stars.

So like the Josh Selby annex of the Thomas.

This is what happens in Las Vegas, is these things.

Okay.

We're not going to talk about the IST because who cares?

Nobody cares about the IST.

Sorry, NBA.

Not yet, anyway.

Maybe there's hope for it.

Two big extensions occurred before we get to my WTF teams of the summer.

Chet Holmgren signed a five-year extension with the Oklahoma City Thunder, and Devin Booker tacked on two years to his deal at approximately 140, 145.

That will take him through

the Suns at 2029, 2030.

He will make, it's impossible to know, despite the fact that these things are reported with specificity and precision.

He will make Ballpark $70 million in 2029, 2030.

Chet Holmgren in that same season will make Ballpark $51 million.

So there's an $18 to $20 million difference between them based on the percentages of the cap.

Now,

that raises a whole lot of thorny issues.

I just want to read

some of the reporting on the Chet extension and the Paolo Bancaro extension, both on the same timetable.

The lead to the ESPN story on Paolo Bancaro is he agreed to a five-year, $239 million maximum rookie extension that could reach $287 million, $287.

And then it goes on to say if he hits the all NBA criteria, MVP, defensive player of the year, he's not going to win defensive player of the year.

But 239 to 287.

Okay, those are numbers.

The Chet Holmgren extension reported as Oklahoma City star and champion Chet Holmgren has agreed to a fully guaranteed five-year maximum rookie contract extension that could reach $250 million.

So by definition, a max extension for this tier of players is five years, 239, approximately based on the cap assumption for next season, 2026, for 2026, 2027.

Rather,

could reach 250 versus could reach 287

is quite puzzling to me.

Um, because the implication in a lot of the reporting on Chet's contract is that if he hits these various Derek Roser criteria, the contract will jump somehow.

But unless it's like specifically negotiated to just jump like to 25.8% of the cap, a jump from 239 to 250 just doesn't sort of make sense and certainly doesn't mesh with the Bancaro explicit reporting about MVP, all NBA, et cetera.

Which leads me to believe, and the contract is not in the NBA system yet, which leads me to believe this is all cute and fudgy reporting across the board.

And I'm going to guess, my educated guess is when this contract comes in, it's just a straight 25% of the cap.

There is no bump up for Derek Roserule.

This is just my educated guess.

It could be wrong.

But I think what's happening with the could reach 250 million is that we're getting cute with, well, the cap could actually rise a little bit more for 2026, 2027 than the NBA's recent somewhat pessimistic projection.

And in that case, because everything is based on the starting salary in that year, the contract could bump up to $250 million.

That's my guess that this is just a straight 25%.

The J-Dub contract contract isn't in yet.

But these are interesting to the Booker and Holmgren things are interesting contrasts.

I love Devin Booker.

I think you probably love Devin Booker.

I think he's a winning player at a high level

in the NBA.

And

I think those playoff runs, the deep playoff runs with Phoenix, there's something to his game that translates to the very highest level of bad.

This guy had 40-point games in the NBA Finals against an elite defense, switchable Milwaukee Bucks defense.

He's also made two all-NBA teams and finished in the top five at MVP one time.

He's 28 years old, will turn 29 when next season starts.

This deal will carry him through his prime.

He'll be 33 in the last season of the deal.

So it's not going to be like he's old

when this kicks in.

But at 35% of the cap, he's going to be making almost $20 million more a year in those out years than Chet Holmgren will make, having signed for presumably 25% of the cap.

I love Devin Booker.

Wherever people have Devin Booker ranked in their ringer 100 or whatever, I'll bet you he's two or three spots higher for me.

I think he's made a lot of progress as a defensive player when there have been stakes.

There have not been a lot of stakes for Phoenix in the last couple of years.

And yet that contract extension came out, and we all expected it, but it came out last night.

And I was like, oh man,

that's going to be 35 to 37% of the cap, depending on projections and how it rises and falls over the length of the next six, seven years.

And I'm just like,

I'm just not sure a guy who's not a no-brainer top 10 player in the NBA is

that's going to be, and you, and you pile on top of that the fact that in those years, there's going to be some amount of dead Bradley Beal money on the books because I think the wave and stretch is going to happen next week, and I think he'll sign with the Clippers next week.

I mean, that's like

$85 million to $90 million of your cap for those two guys.

I don't know what else you're supposed to do if you're Phoenix because this is your franchise guy.

You've publicly proclaimed he's your franchise guy.

He has taken you and led you to the NBA Finals.

I just know that

this deal, and I loved Evan Booker.

This deal made my stomach turn a little bit.

And I think what the implication of that is, is you just say, you know what?

You're under contract for two, three more years.

Like, we don't need to do this now.

Let's just see how the next 18 to 24 months go and revisit life.

Yeah.

I wonder how much of that is.

Look, it's just the team protecting itself in a way, not just investing in a guy who has stuck around and generally wanted to be there.

But also, what if next year is just awful and Devin Booker decides by January that he wants to be somewhere else?

Then he is a more tradable player.

I think in terms of the length of the deal, even though there is that huge salary commitment, like if you want to be in the Devin Booker business, you probably want to be in it over the longer term.

All of that said, the 35% max, to your point about the threshold for a top 10 player, it is just a different level of responsibility.

It is a different level of production that's required.

And Devin Booker has been an incredibly consistent producer overall.

Like, he's a good all-around player in all the ways you described.

He's also not quite as adaptable and malleable as his skill set would suggest that he could be.

Like, he has not proven to be a plug-and-play alongside every possible star and it just kind of works sort of player.

Like,

it takes some maneuvering.

It takes some massaging.

It takes the right kind of talent around him, as do many of the players in the league.

And that's kind of what separates to me the true top class of superstar players from the next group of guys.

And Devin Booker is in that next group of guys.

Like, he, on a great season, would be kind of firmly in the top 10.

And on an iffy season, might be somewhere closer to 15, you know, maybe even a little lower than that, depending on, as you said, the stakes and how hard he's playing.

He's a really good player.

And so

I find it impossible in the Suns position to give up on a player as good as him or to even roll the dice with the future of a player as good as him.

And so if he's willing to sign an extension, I get the compulsion.

But it makes me queasy too.

I just don't think he is or will reach the threshold that will make sense at a 35% cap rate.

I just straight up wouldn't have done it.

And I understand that that's going to make for some uncomfortable times within the Phoenix Suns.

Well, how does that play out?

Like, you don't give him the extension, as you said, you play out the last two years of his deal, and then what?

I think, again, like I mentioned this the other day, Rafael Stone has found a way to exercise every bit of leverage he has now with younger and less proven players for the most part and not apparently not alienate them or from what I've heard directly, their agents.

And so I think I would have, now, look, look, once Matt Ishbia says all the things things he said publicly, the toothpaste is out of the tube.

You have to sign the extension at that point because you have to put your money where your mouth is.

I would never have put my mouth there, so to speak.

I'm very careful about where I put my mouth in general.

That's a good policy.

And so I would go to Devin Booker and have just said, hey, look, you're on the books for $53 million this coming season, $57 million the next one, $61 million the one after that.

Locked in, guaranteed.

We got a lot of time.

Let's see how the league evolves.

Let's see how the Western Conference evolves.

Let's maybe have a discussion like other players of your ilk have had of, hey,

can we work something out where it's not everything to make us a little bit more nimble in terms of building a winning team around you?

Now, understand that's an uncomfortable conversation that gets into like labor rights issues and why should a player have to sacrifice for, why should a star have to sacrifice for the good of his team, et cetera, et cetera.

But these are also just the rules.

The more expensive you get, the harder it is to build a team around you.

I'm sorry, sorry, but that's just the reality.

And it's even worse now in the second apron era.

But I have a lot of, I have, I have some takes on this.

Would you like to hear some takes that I think the chet Booker contrast in terms of just raw money owed brings up for me?

Definitely hit me.

Number one,

I am more passionate than ever about my proposal from now seven years ago that other teams have teams have proposed something similar where if you draft a player and you sign him to a 35% max at any point in his career, there should be some mechanism of relief, whether it's for tax relief or apron relief or

some special little cap exception that you get that decreases the financial crunch that is created by that because it should be nothing but celebratory that you draft a player that good and keep him for that long and he's so endeared to the fan base that and

In a lot of these cases, you're almost effectively punished for it because unless you're Nikola Jokic, who you should pay 50% of the cap for if you can,

it's just, it becomes, for lack of a better word, a bad contract.

And I just don't think that should be the case.

I don't think any team should get to this point with Devin Booker or in the past, Russell Westbrook, John Wall, Demarcus Cousins, maybe not the best example, Jimmy Butler from back in the day, Blake Griffin.

Be like, yeah, it's just like,

boy, I don't know if we want this guy on our team at this money.

It should be more celebratory than that.

This is sports.

It's about fandom and fun.

Yes.

And I mean, this kind of ties into the Giannis conversation, too.

Like you're seeing in the life cycle of the Bucs that it reaches a point where

even if you can convince that star, one of the best talents in the league, to want to stay with your team after all those years, they need a little bit of convincing.

Like the roster is going to turn over naturally by, I don't know, year 10 in the league.

And so it feels natural to me, as you're saying, that you want to celebrate and you want to incentivize those kinds of arrangements, those kinds of partnerships.

Like everything in the league right now is geared so much on like a two to three year timeline before you have to make pretty drastic changes in the financials of your team to make it feel sustainable.

If there's any mechanism for long-term relief, I think the league needs to look at it really seriously.

And the place to do it is here.

The place to do it is in with the best players, keeping the best teams competitive, finding ways to put players like Devin Booker in the spotlight and keep them in the spotlight.

Take two, um, the seniority wage scale, which is a classic union thing.

And I have no objection to it.

Like, I want the best players to get paid the most amount of money.

I just think Chet Holmgren, in his age 23 to 27 seasons, should be able to make as much as Devin Booker in his age 28 to 33 seasons.

So I just think, I mean, and again, this opens up a can of worms for teams who will have to negotiate really hard with players who will think, well, I'm entitled to the 35% max if that's what the rules are.

But I think you should be able to pay a young star as much as you get to pay an old star because it's more likely you're going to get the best years of their production and less likely that you're going to get the downslope of their production.

Now, again, that opens the door to like every guy who's a top 25 player coming off his rookie skill contract will be like 35% of the cap.

Guess what?

You got to negotiate.

That's life.

That's my take number two.

I think the young guys should be able to get paid as much as the old guys right away.

Well, let's talk voting demographics because in order like the owners are never going to push for that.

That has to be a player-pushed agenda, I would think, in order for something like that to go through.

In order for it to go through, you would have to have the league would have to shift younger enough that there would be enough young members of the NBPA to vote in that direction.

And at the same time, that's true, because it's all coming out of that 51% pie.

Completely.

And enough younger players who are also not trying to like ruffle the feathers of LeBron and Steph and the older guard of the league.

You know, I think there is a sense of deference even within the union as far as that kind of stuff goes.

I don't know that I've thought this one out all the way through, but it just does strike me as problematic that

the worst contracts in the league are often tied to truly great players, and they're the worst contracts because they're signed when they're older in their careers.

And the best contracts are often tied to truly great young players because they are artificially capped at this 25% threshold.

That can go up to 30%.

This is my take three.

Speaking of the Derek Rosenwell bump that I don't think Chet Holmgren got, if I'm Jalen Williams and Jalen Jalen Williams agent, I am apoplectic, apoplectic at everybody involved that me making all-NBA in my third season does me absolutely no good in negotiating my next extension

because it's all dependent on your fourth year if you hit those criteria.

That year, you signed the extension after your third year.

Your fourth year is the all-NBA MVP defensive player of the year.

We could all agree J.

Dub is not going to win Defensive Player of the Year as great as he is, and he's not going to win MVP as great as he is.

The The MVP is on his team, so he's got to make all NBA in year four.

We all know a million things could go wrong.

Everyone, it is everyone, more people could stay healthy.

He could get hurt, whatever it is.

And if I'm his agent, which is Bill Duffy, and I'm any agent, I'm like, what BS that this dude already hit the criteria in his third year while we're negotiating this extension?

And I just can't walk in and ask for 30%.

I have to hit it again the next year.

I think that's complete BS.

I think if you make it in your third year, it should count.

I think if you make it at any point, it should count.

Like, if you've made it during your first four years in the league, what are we talking about?

Anyway, I have no, I expect the J-Dub extension to be done in the next, I don't know how many days, weeks, whatever.

It'll get done.

And I'm sure this is exactly what they're negotiating about is this bump.

And I think he should just get it.

I think it should already be done.

Okay, and by the way, Nicole Jokic also is not signing an extension this summer.

I think that's, it's never a nothing burger with the best player in the league, but I think everybody was prepared for that.

It's financially prudent.

Any other takes on any of this?

I just think maybe we just need, you know, regarding the 25% versus 35% maxes in general, the Paolo, Chet, Devon Booker conversation, I think we just need different language than calling all of these max contracts.

Like it's they're clearly not equal things that you need to consider in an equal way.

And to that point, I'm just very rarely fussed about any version of the 25% max Rose Rule included or not, Rose Rule Bump included or not, for a player of Chet's caliber or Paolo's caliber.

Like, these are not the guys you worry about.

This, you know, if you're 23 and a champion and already an all-defensive caliber rim protector and maybe have a future where you're the defensive player of, you know, of the league, like I, I just don't really have any problem with a contract like that.

No, I think you do the Chet deal without thinking about it.

And now we get, you know, real quickly, we get to watch Oklahoma City now really start to navigate the financial realities of its team.

This coming season, they should be able to duck under the tax, which is important for them because they're going to skyrocket in 26-27.

When the J-Dub and Chet extensions hit, they're going to absolutely blow past the second apron.

on paper.

Now, they also have like as many as four picks in next year's draft.

I think it'll more likely be three because they have Utah's pick, which is protected, and Utah is just not going to win a lot of games, obviously.

And then in 27, 28, Shay's mega deal kicks in.

Kayson Wallace's next deal kicks in, and I think he will emerge as a must-keep core player on their team.

And so the money just becomes overwhelming.

I don't think they're going to be willing to pay a lot of tax.

They already know what's coming.

I think they are also willing to eat the frozen draft pick stuff because they just have so many draft picks that they're like, if that's the penalty, cool.

Like, we don't really care.

The rubber will meet the road in 2930, which is a long time from now when the repeater tax would kick in.

And I just think it's going to be fascinating to watch, just to name a few things.

Hartenstein has a player option, a team option rather, for 26.27 at 28.5 million.

That seems tailor-made for either, sorry, you're going to have to play on another team, or we're declining that.

Can you sign a team-friendly extension?

Yeah, Lou Dort has a team option, 18.2 million, 26, 27.

That's going to be very interesting to see how that's handled.

And then I just think you're going to see these shufflings of like Isaiah Joes and Aaron Wiggins and like these guys that are making 10 to 15 million dumped into people's space here and there, whatever it ends up being.

But the dance is going to be fascinating because the three guys are going to make an enormous amount of money, 85 to 90% of the cap, whatever the math is.

And I think Wallace,

I mean, I'm just betting on Kason Wallace making continued leaps to his game to a point that he's just like, we got to have this guy on our team, and he's going to make a lot of money when he hits restricted free agency.

He's either going to be exactly that player, or he's going to be enough of that player where they would be able to trade him for somebody who is more cap-appropriate for what they need at that point in time.

So it's going to be one of those two options.

But I think the value of all those picks, we talked about it a lot with the Thunder, is not just getting the next Kayen Wallace in the door or kind of calling your shot in the draft in the range that you're in to be able to to maneuver a couple spots.

It's the difference between straight salary dumping someone like Aaron Wiggins when the time comes versus trading him and a pick for something that would actually help your team at that point in time, right?

It's like there's so many good players here who could help other teams, but the opposition senses your desperation when you're in the Thunder spot.

They're not just going to take guys back for free, even if they might help them.

Like they're going to try to squeeze everything they can get.

And that's where a little greasing of the wheels can go a long way.

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okay next segment i i said to you i want to talk to want to talk about my you know every year we get to this point in july it's july 10th and the dust settles and you start remember you know scanning rosters and looking at what everything looks like now you think there's always teams like wait what happened who's on that team what what's what's going on with these teams why did they do nothing or why did they do that thing that is puzzling where are they going what decisions are still yet to be made and i have five teams on the list for Zach's WTF is this team teams.

Now, I'm cheating a little bit because the Warriors are on here because I just want to talk about the Warriors.

And I just want to apologize right off the bat to the New Orleans Pelicans, who are the WTF is this team team.

I just feel like we all need a little bit of a cooling off period.

They need a cooling off period.

Derek Queen needs a cooling off period.

Joe Dumars and his 14 phones need to just recharge.

He needs his own charging station.

We need to just just leave them be for another day and then you have the tanker teams we know what they and the kings i i just they didn't make my list either just because i i i just it's too sad i can't i can't even believe what has befallen the beam team and i don't want to talk about it you you can't believe it

if you and i in inherited the two seasons ago yeah but actually go back even further if we had halliburton if we had the haliburton version of the team sure or even the beam team when we've traded Halliburton for Sabonis, and we set out

to, in 18 months, ruin the team, I don't think we could actually do any better than they've done.

That's what I'm saying.

I can't believe it.

Of course, I can believe that tragedy in basketball terms has befallen the inept Sacramento Kings.

Sure, I just, I can't believe how fast it came and how bleak it is to look at their roster right now.

It's like, I got to watch this team next year.

So, we're not even talking about them.

Okay, team number one, the Miami Heat

just traded for Norm Powell.

They have one of the more interesting team building decisions, speaking of Devin Booker, left in the summer of business, which is Tyler Hero is eligible for an extension.

And that's a player that...

That's an interesting negotiation if it's going to take place at all.

He has two years left on his deal.

Again, there's no need to do it now.

I'm sure his representatives would love to jumpstart a, hey, this guy just made the all-star team, right?

He did make the all-star team.

I made it.

He did make it.

Strike while the iron is hot and look it's it's become kind of fanciful to

mock the heat as the new play-in mvps and where could a team really go with tyler hero and bam out of bio making 80 90 we'll see how much million dollars combined um they are out one draft pick to charlotte but only one

and it's and you know jakez you i heard you talk about jakez um on group chat stepped back last season.

Jovich seems to take two steps forward, one step back every season.

Jovich, rather, I'm bullish on him.

Kalel Ware, like it.

Jakachunis, like it.

Like the fit even between Ware and Bam, even though I'm not sure that's the long-term look I would lean into.

There is stuff to like here.

I might just be.

So if you look at FanDuel right now, odds to win the conference, they are plus 5,000.

Now, they're obviously not going to win the conference.

I just think it's notable that they are behind the Raptors and then way behind the Pacers, way behind the Bucs, and way behind the Celtics, who are all better than plus 2,000 or lower than plus 2,000 to win the conference.

I may be scarred by the fact that five or six years ago, when they were in like the Josh Richardson, Deion Waders, Hassan Whiteside Hell, I said on national television, I'm not sure any team has a bleaker long-term outlook than the miami heat and two years later they were in the nba finals or something something like that so i i may be just defaulting to this team gets rabbits out of hats of various both of the jimmy butler ilk and the duncan robinson undrafted guy ilk um

i think the heat even just projecting next year are a little better than that um and a little closer to those other teams who all have over-unders in like the low to mid-40s range

and i i mean i get the concerns about their long-term future.

I don't know what the next pivot is, but are you, is this just this hope?

Am I wrong?

Is this just hopeless?

So here's the thing.

Short-term, I think it is kind of hopeless.

But to your point, I don't rule out the heat in terms of their near-term future.

Like, the rabbits have come out of the hats.

We have all seen them.

We have all beheld them.

This is a team that does produce those kinds of miracles.

So I'm not ruling out that they get the next star who comes available through some miracle trade or unearths, as you said, the next Duncan Robinson type role player.

That stuff all feels entirely possible to me.

This collection of players, I don't feel particularly heartened by.

And some of that is like you get breakout seasons sometimes that feel like they open everything up for a team.

And sometimes you get a breakout season and it feels like, oh, even the best case scenario, Tyler Hero leads us to this place.

Like, this is the best basketball he's ever played.

And they ran straight into the shot creation wall.

Like, they just could not produce enough consistent offense with him and Bam like driving the ship in that way, especially in the playoffs.

And I got a cop to it.

I am Bam fanboy number one.

Yeah.

I'm at Bam is a winning player.

Bam is a stud.

He is.

Bam did not have a good enough season last year.

And I think even he would say that.

Did not have a good enough season.

I think he's clearly all those things on defense.

Always going to be kind of in the running for all defense consideration.

Like he's switchable.

He's flexible.

He's all those things.

Has not leveled up or really diversified what he can be as an offensive player.

He's had seasons where the mid-range game is there.

He's had seasons where the handoff game is there.

None of it is really coalesced in a way that feels meaningful and sustainable.

And so when you look at the kind of the bones of this team, yeah, they could make the next move for the next star.

Will they have enough of the kind of support structure to make that make sense?

That's something that I worry about with this group.

And that probably depends on, one, what you think of Khalel Ware and if he would be involved in that kind of deal to begin with.

I kind of think that he would be.

But if he was still around, is he the kind of guy who's ready to go next season with a star teammate?

And what do you think of guys like Andrew Wiggins at this point in his career?

Like, what do you think of Davion Mitchell, who I'm actually kind of high on Davion Mitchell, but it really is like a judgment call come and go on so many different component parts of this team.

So on where,

obviously he was famously not touchable in the Kevin Durant trade talks, and they actually were even more protective of their asset base than that.

I've talked about what they were willing to put on and what they weren't willing to put on the table.

And I think that was a wise and probably difficult look-in-the-mirror moment for the Heat, who always want the next big thing and decided we're actually just not ready.

We're not good enough to justify a swing like that.

On Wiggins, I'll tell you what I think of Andrew Wiggins on the Miami Heat.

And I like Andrew Wiggins.

He had a great finals for the Warriors.

He's a good player.

He's a good NBA player.

He's a fifth starter on the wing, reliable kind of guy, good player.

I just am penciling in decline,

or he has a player option for 26, 27, and then I'm penciling in just just not on the heat after that.

Like, just I'm not, not part of the plans.

Terr Rogier was a total zero for them last year.

And if he's a total zero again, I think their championship odds or whatever their odds on FanDuel, their placement in the hierarchy is probably like not crazy.

You've talked about Norm Powell.

I've talked about Norm Powell.

They got him for nothing.

I think that's a fun dimension that they've added to their team.

I'm bullish on Jovich.

And I think the Powell thing also, they needed to just get smaller and faster with more shooting.

They had too many power forwards kind of on the team, and they flipped one and some other stuff in Kyle Anderson for Powell.

We'll see how Yakachunis is.

Like, maybe that becomes a home run pick for them.

They were thrilled.

I think they had him toward the end of the top 10 on their board, and so they were thrilled that he fell there.

They like Pella Larson and Kashad Johnson.

We'll see.

Yeah.

You know, I mean, I got to say, I like Pella Larson.

He's pretty good.

That guy can play.

And as we're talking about like the Duncan Robinson types and like people who could really pop, like, I would not rule out Simone Fontecchio having a Duncan Robinson kind of season for them.

You know, just like all of a sudden, he becomes an important spacer.

Are the only national anythings that are just all in on Simone Fontecchio being a useful role player?

We were stunned, stunned that the Pistons wouldn't even play him.

Unforgivable.

Yeah, I don't know what this team is.

I mean, High Smith is a good player, too.

He's a free agent after this coming year.

You know, they know

they're just in the same mode as they were a year ago, which is, hey, we got Norm Powell for free.

He is an ejection of like dynamism to our offense and pace that we need and just almost recklessness.

I like the idea that there's a reckless Miami Heat player.

Yes.

And look, in the East, like, understand where we are in the hierarchy, but like, if things go right, maybe we could be the sixth seed or the fifth seed instead of the ninth seed or the tenth seed because none of those teams, the Milwaukee, Indiana, Bostons, like like all those teams are one injury away from severe peril and not even a major injury.

And all of them have depth issues.

If you look at like Philadelphia's bench, by the way, Philadelphia's bench, Grimes will be added to it, but

it's not great.

And Philadelphia, God only knows.

I mean, they did.

They, speaking of WTF teams, they are like, just exist in their own universe of like, I don't know, okay.

Like, I guess I'll just, let's just catch up on Christmas and see what's going on with the Sixers.

I don't know.

I wish I had more interesting things to say about the Heat.

Right now, they're trapped in the middle, and their big project as a team is how do we get untrapped in the middle without tanking because we don't want to tank, and tanking is less profitable than it used to be, and we're the heat, and we don't tank unless it's by accident almost.

I think what you said about them needing that sort of reckless element feels telling to me.

Like, they have a lot of guys who know their lane and know how to play their roles or have like very defined skill sets.

And I think part of what made the Khalil Ware experience so exciting last season is that's a guy who's undefined, who's like, okay, he can do a little of this, he can do a little of that.

We're still trying to feel out what his best role in the lineup is, what position he plays, who he should be playing with.

Like, there's a variability to his game that basically no one else on the heat has right now.

And that's like Norm Powell just had another, he liked Tyler Hero, had a big jump last season.

I don't expect another huge jump from those guys.

They kind of are who they are, or they're going to level out a little bit, one of the two.

Wiggins, we well know his habits at this point.

Like he is, he is going to be a fine enough defensive player, a fine enough shooter in spots, a fine enough, like spot creator here and there.

Bam, as we talked about, hasn't really taken huge jumps.

And so it's like, who else are you getting a step forward from, if not someone like Khalil Ware?

And you would love for a team in that position to have three guys who could be thrown into that category.

And I think part of the reason the Heat find themselves here is it really is just kind of like a lot of very known elements.

And then this one wild card off to the side.

On where, the wear, for what it's worth, and maybe it's worth nothing, the wear-bam lineups were like plus four and a half per 100 possessions last season.

Uh, I like wear a lot.

I like everything I saw about him.

I guess what I'm saying is this: I think they're over-under the last time I checked, and it's too early for these.

It was like high 30s, mid to high 30s.

I think they're going to be better than that next year.

Like, it would, if they won 44 games next year, that would not be a surprise to me at all.

Yeah.

And that could get them into conversation for a top six seed in the Leastern Conference.

And so, and then beyond that, we'll see.

Okay, next team.

The Golden State Warriors have done essentially nothing except watch Kavan Looney,

a heart and soul player for them, move to the New Orleans Pelicans.

I think, you know, all the reporting is that Al Horford is going to be there and something is delaying it.

I don't know what that is.

I expect him to be there.

Maybe Mark Stein reported the Anthony Melton.

They're in that derby to the degree degree that there's a derby to be in.

I think there should be.

That sounds pretty thrilling.

If he can stay healthy, he's a very good player.

He's had back injuries, then he had the knee injury last year.

And so here's my thing with the Warriors.

This is very big picture, zooming out.

Present day,

why

explain to me why I feel in the pre, we'll get to the future later.

Present day, this team had a bananas record with Jimmy Butler and Steph Curry.

I don't remember what it was.

It was like crazy, like 25-5 or something like that.

They win against a very tough and good Houston team in the first round, despite Jimmy Butler missing one game and most of another game

with a rear end injury.

And then Steph gets hurt in game one of the Minnesota series and they're dead on arrival.

So given that background and the clear, although somewhat brief track record of success that they have, why am I just feeling like, is that the best it's ever going to be for this version of the Warriors?

Like, why do I not feel awesome about the Warriors with Jimmy Butler and Draymond and and Steph?

And like, they'll add Horford.

And I bet they start Horford too, because I think they want to start bigger and not burden both Draymond and their wings with the every, like, we're playing small ball all the time thing.

Why do I not feel great?

Just isolating next year.

Right.

I think there's two things.

One,

this was a team that needed to make some moves to begin with to just get like bodies in the door.

And so for there to be no official moves on the books yet, even if we're all penciling at Horford, feels a little tenuous in a way that I don't love, particularly in a Western conference where the threshold for contending has gone up.

Like, OKC is going to be better.

Houston is leveling up, Denver is patching up holes in its rotation.

Minnesota's right there, back-to-back Western conference finals.

So,

the most basic reason for my

pessimism is too strong a word, is exactly what you just said about the incumbent, you know, whatever you want to classify, the four best teams in the West.

Like, those four teams, three of them being better, and Minnesota being largely intact.

But even just separating that,

I still feel somewhat worried.

So explain why that might be to me because my brain is having trouble.

The other part of that, to me, what I'm getting stuck on is I fully believe because we have just seen it that the Warriors with Jimmy are capable of that kind of end-season sprint.

They know they have this many games until the end of the year after getting Jimmy.

They have to push hard for the finish line to try to secure playoff seating as best they can and then play the playoffs.

We know they can do that.

Who are the players on this roster who are going to make Steph and Jimmy's job easier for 82 games?

And kind of offshoot question: Who does Steve Kerr trust to do that?

Because this is kind of like the constant push and pull with Brandon Pajemski, a guy who, by role, probably could do more than any other player on the Warriors roster based on what he's asked to do.

The problem is when he does do more, he tends to drive Steve Kerr insane.

And so, like, how they navigate stuff like that, I don't know how you get through 82 with this group.

And that's why I was really hoping, you know, D'Anthony Melton, I really love D'Anthony Melton, but you laid out his injury concerns are very real.

The Warriors have experienced it themselves.

He's not the guy you come, you bring in expecting him to play big minutes over the course of a season.

Like, who are the guys who are helping Steph and Jimmy save their legs?

Who are the guys helping them to get to the finish line?

Because we know if they can get there, they're going to be competitive with some of the best teams in the league.

They have all the savvy, they have the skill, they have the balance, but this is maybe a team of too many 16-game players and not enough 82-game players.

And given that, I mean, the team, the core is like ancient.

If Al Horford, Jimmy Butler, Draymond Green, and Steph Curry are four of your starting five and four of the six most important players on the team, you have now become an ancient basketball team.

And ancient basketball teams don't tend to excel over 82 games, which means you're going to be entering the playoffs, I mean, as either a play-in team or a road team in the first round of the playoffs, or both.

Yeah.

And

it's just hard to imagine this roster, barring a seismic move, winning

two to three playoff series from that disadvantageous position, given that you're still ancient when you get to the playoffs and still more likely to wear down and still more likely to suffer an ill-timed injury.

I love Pajemski.

I assume he will be the fifth starter along with Curry, Draymond, Butler, and if they get Al Horford.

The foresome of Curry Pajemsky Butler Green was lights out, regular season, lights out playoffs.

And that off the bench, I can still have Buddy Healed.

Moses Moody, who I am higher on than the Warriors coaching staff appears to be.

I think he's good.

And then, like,

the lack of anything.

I guess Moses Moody is now a power forward, but the lack of any other power forward on the team is troubling to me.

They have Jackson Davis and Post as backup centers.

Gee Santos is still around.

Maybe they'll sign somebody that I'm not thinking of.

Like, even a guy like Yabuselli would have been awesome on this team.

Huge.

And of course, if we're talking about power forwards off the bench, that brings us to Kaminga.

And

the other depressing thought about the Warriors as currently constructed, depressing, but also like the most likely outcome by far to the end of a dynastic era is that the two timelines thing has not happened.

And

the post-step future, despite all the talk about it, all the careful planning planning for it, several savvy picks.

Like Pajemski looks like a good pick for where he was drafted.

Even like a guy like Jackson Davis looks like a good pick for where he's drafted.

Definitely.

Despite all of that, the post-step future looks incredibly bleak, which makes the Kaminga transaction that is coming.

I'm expecting a sign and trade.

I don't know where.

I don't know when.

And maybe there is no sign and trade, and maybe they re-sign him, and that's the transaction.

Do you think there's any chance he just takes the qualifying?

I don't think either side wants that.

And so I'm going to say if there's a chance, it's minuscule because I think that's bad for both parties.

But what I was going to say is the Kaminga transaction, whatever it is, to me, is

maybe the single most important franchise-building transaction that's coming in the next two to three to four months in the NBA.

And I just don't see a world in which that transaction sets the Warriors up for a happier post-Steph future because I don't think that's going to be we re-signed Kaminga and he's a breakout star for us.

I think it's going to be a sign-in trade in which the return is slightly underwhelming.

And it's just you go back and we don't need to relitigate the Wiseman pick and all the, you know, the trades that they didn't make and they end up making the Butler trade.

Like I wrote this when they lost to the Kings

in the play-in.

Like the most likely scenario by far

when

Durant Durant left and Steph got hurt and Clay got hurt and they had this like interregnum of mediocrity to being bad was

even if the two timelines plan is mildly successful, the young guys will not be ready in time for the old guys.

And then the young guys will not be good enough as a group to be the nucleus of the next championship team because that's hard to do.

And it's particularly hard to do when you have the number two pick and it ends up being a total bust.

And then the most likely scenario was at some point, whether it ends up being Jimmy Butler, but it could have been Siakam or Ananobi or all these other guys that they were rumored for, you cash in and you get a guy that allows you to compete with pride through the end of the Steph era.

And there's, I said, I wrote this and I've said it.

There's honor in being a good Western Conference team with very little championship equity.

There's honor in winning 48 games in the West, winning a playoff series and bowing out in the next round.

That is a fine way for Steph to go out raging against the dying of the light over the next two or three years.

But I don't see,

I just don't see any championship ceiling here right now.

And I don't, and the future would frankly scare me.

It would take so many things breaking right, starting with a great return on a Kaminga sign-in trade, which I

don't know why we would believe that that would be coming given the market.

And frankly, given the market for sign-in trades this summer, like what is it that the Wolves got back for Nikhil Alexander Walker?

Is like a second-round pick and a trade exception, basically?

Is the net from that?

I think there's an argument that even though his ceiling isn't high, Nikhil Alexander Walker is, in some ways, a better winning playoff performer right now than Jonathan Kaminga is.

I don't think that's even arguable.

And I'm the captain of like Kaminga is good.

And you and I are kind of hard opposites on Kaminga.

I'm just endlessly intrigued.

I'm intrigued.

I wish I had more to ride on.

I wish I had more to believe in.

And he hasn't really given us that over time.

But yeah, I think if they don't get anything substantial back for him, why they would expect to be in the Western Conference finals other than Steph Curry is magic incarnate, I wouldn't really see the logic in it.

It's depressing.

All right.

Team three, unless I don't remember it.

I already threw my Golden State notes on the floor.

So goodbye, Golden State.

Good luck, Steve Kerr and Mike Dunleavey Jr.

Look, they're going to be good.

Like, they're going to be a very good team.

I don't mean to dispute.

Like, their record with Butler was a real real thing.

They, right now, on FanDuel, have, I think,

seventh best odds to win the West.

But, like, that means you're a really good team.

Like, the West is just that good.

Okay.

We're going to switch conferences and switch to a far more depressing situation.

I listened to Bill and Ryan

discuss their bleakest team outlooks in each conference.

And when Bill selected the Chicago Bulls as his bleakest Eastern Conference outlook, Ryan was shocked.

Not shocked, maybe a little, surprised.

I was nodding along in agreement because I just don't think the national media has adequately internalized

how strange this situation is in Chicago.

And Bill nailed it.

And

I just,

you know, I just...

I mean, let's just review.

Let's do a roster reset.

Okay.

I would love to.

A couple of things.

Vuch is a free agent after this season, still on the team.

Kobe White's a free agent after this coming season and will not sign an extension because it makes no sense for him.

The same may be true of Iod Dasumnu.

And so here is the starting five.

White, Josh Giddy,

negotiations ongoing and may be ongoing for a bit.

Somebody at the three, a person.

Out of a group that includes Kevin Herter, Patrick Williams, Isaac Icoro, Julian Phillips, Dalen Terry, Isenge they just drafted.

Who knows what he's going to be?

Boozellus.

The only reason for Hope here is Boozellus.

That's it.

And then Vooch.

And then the bench is basically all those guys I mentioned, plus Dasumnu, and Jalen Smith.

And wow, how fitting that Jalen Smith is on the roster because they have him.

And they have Patrick Williams, both of whom were picked over Tyrese Halliburton.

And honestly, it's kind of a crime they haven't signed Killian Hayes to just round out the bad top 10 whatever picks from that draft.

And I look at this team.

They have paths to cap room, easy paths to cap room

in all of the next future summers.

I like Kobe White a lot.

Giddy, we'll get to.

I'm actually like super intrigued by what Boozelis looks like with more opportunities on the ball.

I spent part of my July 4th watching Boozelis drives and pick and rolls and like

on-ball basketball.

And I get

more intrigued by him.

And I hope they give him more opportunities with the ball next season.

I just look at this and I'm like,

what am I banking on as a Bulls fan other than we finally tank by accident and the lottery gods are finally kind to us and we get something like we got with Derrick Rose?

Because I look at this team and I'm like,

unless Boozelis is a star.

And that's in the universe of possibilities to begin with.

But even I just, as much as I liked watching Boozelis and diving into his tape, I just don't think like the ceiling of Matis Buzelis, like that you get the 100th percentile outcome.

I don't think is like a first-team all NBA player.

Maybe not even a second-team all-NBA player.

They have all their picks.

They have a Portland pick coming in.

I just don't know where this is leading.

And I don't have any faith in this front office and more importantly, this ownership group to find a creative solution to lead it anywhere interesting.

I mean, thank goodness that they're the player that they're potentially investing in is Josh Giddy, one of the biggest quagmires in the league in terms of talent and playmaking and limitations.

Like

there are no answers.

There's certainly no easy answers.

But I think the only through lines do go through Boozelis being really, really good.

And maybe you mentioned like they have that path to cap space.

Like maybe there is an upcoming market in being the one team with cap space where somebody is banking on being a free agent.

But if you were that somebody, why would you sign up to play for the Chicago Bulls?

And I say that that not just looking at the roster, but looking at the recent history of that management, of believing that this is a group that could shepherd the next winning Chicago Bulls team, like sustainably winning Chicago Bulls team.

I do not believe it.

I don't believe in the transaction chain.

I don't believe in this group of players.

None of it makes any sense to me, frankly.

And to the extent that we like Buzelis, which I do, he does feel like a

do a little bit of everything ballasty kind of second or third best player on a really good team.

Like, he's going to be in that kind of mode that's really valuable and that guys like us freak out about, but isn't the player you hang an entire roster on?

Like, he just, I don't think he'll ever have quite the creative skill set to do that, which is fine, and which is still a great outcome, but doesn't necessarily give you a direction as a franchise.

And that's that's why they feel so rudderless.

There's just nobody here who's like, okay, you can chart a course by that guy's skill set, that guy's strengths, this guy's potential.

Everything feels muddled to the point that it just reads like nonsense.

They missed the window to Trade Vucevic

by, I mean, the window, the house.

The house got torn down.

There is no house there anymore.

Yeah.

And they're just, they're paying the price for that and for three major pivotal moments, setting aside the Lonzo injury and that first 35 games where they look like, okay, something interesting is happening here with Alonso, Levine, DeRosan, et cetera.

The Williams draft pick,

it's just,

if it's not over, it's very close to over and

it's not going to work or hasn't worked.

The initial Wooch trade, which cost you the pick that ends up being Franz Wagner,

was a bad trade then and is worse.

And then to get none of the good assets from either the DeRosen trade or the Levine trade.

I mean, they got their pickback in the Levine trade.

They got control of their pickback, which they ended up needing because it was the 12th pick.

It was top 10 protected, I believe.

It's just like,

it's just that those are four crippling moments of indecision/slash poor decision slash whatever you want to say.

And now, I mean, I like Buzelis.

He's got a little more juice on the ball, a little more creativity on the ball than I recalled from watching his rookie season when I dove in.

And Giddy.

Look, I was slightly defensive of the Bulls in the Giddy Caruso trade, not as full-throated as Bill was and Ryan was.

But I said, like, there's going to come a stretch where he puts up monster numbers and people are going to be like, oh my God, did the Bulls get this right?

And that stretch has happened.

It did come.

Even last season, like

he doubled his free throws per 36 minutes.

Yep.

He shot 38% on threes, which, okay, I'm monitoring it.

I'm officially monitoring.

shot

he made now this is the this is

the caveat to the 38 on threes he shot 18 of 51 on off-the-dribble threes, which is kind of a shot like you've got to have if you're going to be the engine of an elite offense in the NBA.

18 is a lot for him.

He made three the year before.

And so that's a jump.

But it's like,

I just don't know

where you're going when you hand the offense to Josh Giddy.

And the Bulls would say, well, we haven't.

We handed the offense to Kobe White and Josh Giddy and Nikola Vucevich, which is all very interesting.

And why I asked you a challenge question, which is,

let's pretend that Josh Giddy in three years is fully actualized as a player and is on a 50 to 55 win team.

Like, what does that look like?

Because I don't think it looks like Josh Giddy runs 40 pick and rolls a game.

No.

So, like, is there a comp?

Is there any comp you can think of?

What does it look like?

I have three comps.

I hate all of them.

But this is an impossible exercise.

As the Thunder found out, ultimately, and as the Bulls are finding out now, it's very difficult to figure out the historical path for Josh Giddy to be a meaningful player to a championship team, given all of those quirks.

And I will say, too, in addition to improving his game in all the ways you laid out, I actually thought he played better defensively down the back part of last season than we've seen him play generally over the course of his career.

So there's little strides being made all over the place.

I don't want to ignore them.

The first comp that came to mind for me was Hidu Turkalu.

Like, if you're going to put the ball in the hands of somebody who is as big as Josh Giddy, but not a standout NBA athlete, not a volume scorer, not an amazing Swiss Army knife defender.

That's kind of a model.

And now Hidu was much bigger, and I would say just a like balls-out big-time shot maker in a way that Josh Giddy is.

Now, like, he doesn't have a problem with the off-the-dribble three.

Like, that was kind of the crux of his game in a lot of different ways.

But if you're going to talk about like a key playmaker that is kind of a point guard, but kind of not, like, maybe Hidu is a reasonable model.

And he, and he becomes, you know, what option was he on the great Orlando Magic teams that were the peak of his career?

A third, fourth option, sometimes second option and crunch time, like kind of guy with an elite, elite role man, lob threat, whatever in Dwight.

That's a good name.

I honestly like, did you have others?

Because I couldn't think of any.

The others are like, I have a couple candidates that don't fit at all, but they're interesting.

Lamar Odom, much bigger, much more of a forward profile, but gets you to what feels like a rational end point for Josh Giddy, which is sixth man playing starter-ish minutes.

Um, he just like he just has that kind of game.

I know he's taking steps forward.

I know there, there are believers in his late season performance from last year.

I just, I don't know that he's ever going to be able to actually drive that kind of winning high-level offense.

And so, then if he's your secondary creator off the bench or your tertiary creator off the bench, things start making sense.

So, here's the bottom line.

If you're a

non-shooter is too strong of a word because all these guys are great shooters.

If you're a shooter, if you're a tepid shooter and your number one skill is having the ball and you're tepid to the point that people will invite you to shoot, they'll go under screens.

They'll do all those things.

You've got to be really, really great at a lot of other things to be the number one guy on a championship level team.

You've got to be a great finisher at the rim, which he is not and never has been.

You have to be a very good defensive player.

He's been the opposite of that, other than rebounding.

He just doesn't do those two things well enough to carry that kind of burden.

So here are some names I thought of.

He's nothing like this player, not nearly as good as this player, and not likely to become as good as this player.

But I'm just thinking in terms of hybrid, on-ball, off-ball, versatility, clear third option on a great team.

Whatever the Josh Giddy version of being Derek White looks like, that's like again, he's Derek White's an all-NBA level defender.

Josh Giddy's not a top 200 defender in the NBA.

So, but like

the point is, he's going to have the ball some, but he's going to have to learn how to be effective off the ball.

And in Derrick White, the other name I thought of is this is like Apex is

this is a leading question because I know some of the answers, but like, why can't Josh Giddy be more like Franz Wagner?

I think one of them is something that's like one of the hardest things to teach or to improve, which is an innate sense of like seeking physicality, like seeking contact.

Like, Franz Wagner is a downhill elbow in your teeth kind of driver.

Physicality was the number one answer I was going to throw.

Yeah, I think like Josh Giddy, for as much as he's improved kind of driving on little in-between shots and like trying to get to the room and trying to draw fouls, it's just like going against the grain of his game in so many ways.

And maybe he improves gradually over time, but I don't think he's ever going to have the full Franz experience.

I got nothing more to say about the Bulls.

Do you like it?

Do you like, I mean, like all those wings I named, like the random backup wings, Akoro, Williams, Terry, Phillips, have any of them done anything to you?

Like Dalen Terry and Julian Phillips are the ultimate like.

What did they do?

Like, I don't, I wish I knew a little bit more about what they did at this stage.

One's a first-round pick, one's an early second-round pick, I believe.

Like, I wish I knew a little bit more about, like, what exactly do you do here for us?

Julian Phillips will occasionally have a Bill-style this guy just does stuff game, like, where he's just, like, all over the place.

Like, you can feel the energy.

But is the energy productive?

I haven't really seen it on any consistent basis.

I do like Iodesumu, and he's a guy who's kind of plugged in as a three-guard option for them sometimes.

Obviously, he's like a good energy defender, but doesn't chart as being

a much improved player over the longer term.

I think this is kind of going to be who he is, unfortunately.

I thought the Isaac Okoro trade, and we talked about this some on group chat, was like inexcusable.

Like, I just, I don't see the merits of it at all.

Um, even with Lonzo's injury history, the idea of trading somebody who actually means something to your team when he's on the floor in Lonzo and like changes the way you play in a meaningful capacity toward a player who just like can't even consistently stay on the floor for the Cavs, despite the fact that he learned how to shoot corner threes, despite the fact that he's a fine enough defender.

Like, Isaac Okoro is not the answer to what ails the Bulls.

At least the Cubs are good.

Also good this year, the first-place Toronto Blue Jays, which brings me to our next WTF team, the Toronto Raptors, who are

very expensive, tax expensive, tax

expensive.

And I just have no earthly idea what this team looks like on the court.

None.

I think they're actually going to start their five highest paid players.

Emmanuel Quickley, R.J.

Barrett, Brandon Ingram on the Raptors, for those who forgot, he plays for the Toronto Raptors.

Yeah.

Well,

he will play.

Scotty Barnes.

I remain, as I think you are, on the bullish side of Scotty Barnes.

Agreed.

And a Scotty Barnes leap, mega leap, changes everything for this team.

And then Purdle, who they just extended on a deal that I thought was fine.

You know, a lot of people made fun of that deal.

Like, Jaka Purdle is a good player, and that's a fine contract for a good starting center.

That's a starting five that includes

arguably, depending on how Quickly plays,

no good three-point shooters.

I think Quickly's a good three-point shooter, but I just don't, I just fundamentally don't know how that lineup functions on offense.

And by that, I mean like I don't know who has the ball, when, what combinations are used.

I just don't, I don't know how it works.

And then it makes the bench like, so all the guards I acquired via draft and trade are just on the bench.

Now, all our shooting guards, Grady Dick, Jacoby Walker,

Abaji, Jamal Shedd, who's not a shooting guard, is a point guard, come off the bench along with the Murray Boyles, who I like and they're very excited about, Jamison Battles hanger.

I just,

it's a bench of unproven, unremarkable, inexperienced, and obviously they're going to stagger minutes extremely.

Like two of those.

five guys will two of those four on-ball guys will be on the floor at all times right for sure um but i just fundamentally look at those five guys in the starting five and i'm like i just don't know what this is.

I don't know how it translates to functional NBA offense.

I just don't.

I just don't believe that they can play together.

And in particular, the Ingram, Barnes, RJ trio.

I don't see how all three of those guys have really good seasons together as teammates.

It just doesn't really make sense.

It doesn't really make sense with how they play.

I think there is a sort of like...

dreamed version of this like equal opportunity offense.

Like all these guys can handle the ball.

They're all such versatile players.

Like they're going to be able to work off of each other.

I think that is pretty divorced from the reality of who those guys have been and the tendencies of their games.

And it's kind of like abstracting skill set from who these guys actually are on the court.

Brandon Ingram is a player who can score and can create and can lift the floor of your offense to a certain degree.

But I don't think has meaningfully like made many players better over the course of his career.

Like doesn't really have that kind of all-around game, even though he's ostensibly a point forward.

Scotty Barnes is kind of perpetually in search of the best version of his game, and we're going to see if he finds it this year.

I, too, am quite bullish.

He's very young.

He's very young, and I think he's going to be a fantastic.

I think Scotty Barnes will make an all-NBA team in the next three years.

Feels entirely possible.

I'm not worried about Scotty Barnes.

I am worried about who Scotty Barnes is as Brandon Ingram's teammate and as R.J.

Barrett's teammate and as Emmanuel Quickley's teammate who quietly just like did not play basically at all last season.

I think the rosiest colored glasses version of the Raptors' future is: look, so many players miss games in part because it seemed like the team was basically sandbagging down the stretch in the season.

Get all those guys on the court together, all of a sudden, they're going to be much better than what are they with?

30 games last season.

They're going to be much better than their win total.

Counterpoint, none of those guys know how to play together.

No one in this roster has like a meaningful way in terms of like ingrained continuity and chemistry.

So, what are you building on?

What are you building toward?

And as you mentioned, all of it is quite expensive, quite experience, and expensive in a way that's very familiar to me as a Bay Area resident, where I pay through the teeth for everything, including what turns out to be like kind of a middling experience a lot of the time.

So, what are you going to do with a roster like that?

Also, relevant to that quintet of players.

So, there's that arc-shaped line painted on the court.

And behind that line, you get an extra point for making a basket.

Yes.

I'm not sure that the Raptors have like internalized how important that is in 2025.

I mean, Barrett shot 35% last season and has shot well for the Raptors.

I don't know that I want RJ Barrett to be like, he's my Klay Thompson now.

Like, I just want that guy gunning threes.

Like, that's not who he is as a player.

And you just named the guy who, to me, is like the most important player on this team is Scotty Barnes.

The swing player on this team and the guy who absolutely has to hit now is Emmanuel Quickley.

He's making $32.5 million for the next four four seasons.

Yeah.

I remember people being like, well, he's the best player in the OG Ananobi trade.

Like real NBA media people were saying that.

Like he was the reason the Raptors made that trade.

That's fine.

That's one thing.

RJ Barrett was kind of like, you got to take him, throw in.

But then there was a lot of chatter about like, oh, secretly, like, you don't know because you're not an NBA diehard, but Quickly is the gem of the trade.

And I remember saying on my podcast, like, apologies to Emmanuel Quickly, I like him.

He was in my most intriguing players column a couple years ago.

OG Anadobi is the best player in the trade.

Like, I'm sorry.

And quickly has done essentially nothing as a Raptor due to health issues.

And the idea of him makes sense.

We need a guy who's going to take a lot of pull-up threes.

He can do that.

We need a guy who is maybe not a great passer, but a good enough passer to be on par with Scotty Barnes as the orchestrator of our offense.

A guy who can screen for Scotty Barnes in inverted pick and rolls and flare out for threes and keep the machine moving on the catch and roll to the rim, cut every once in a while, and all of that.

The idea has got to become a reality like now because this team has no outs.

Now, they have the outs in terms of like they have all their picks and they owe no picks, so they can throw a million picks and swaps into a trade for Giannis or whatever fantasy idea you want to come up with down the line.

But all of it's like it's I can picture a spooky molder.

I call them the spooky molder Raptor fans because the world is against them.

Adam Silver is the smoking man and

all that.

I can see them saying, well, Rob, you know, you're naming all these players, but like we could easily trade these guys.

You know, they're all tradable.

And I'm like, okay, we just, we live in a world now.

We just saw good $20 to $30 million players given away for next to nothing.

Norm Powell, John Con, like, these guys are, is RJ Barrett better than either of those guys?

He was not better than Norm Powell last year.

He's got two years and

57 million dollars left on his deal okay like good luck i don't know what i don't know what that's getting you brandon ingram has 38 40 41 million dollar player option 42 million player i like brandon i'm a little more bullish than you are in brandon ingram but like i don't like that's not a plus tradable contract right now i don't know what i just don't know where any of this is going i mean talk to the pelicans Talk to the Knicks.

Those are teams that tried to trade those guys for years on better contracts than they're on right now, and ultimately, like had a really hard time doing it while getting anything meaningful and constructive back in return.

And so, if the plan is overpay these guys now and figure out the rest later, I understand that from like an asset play, asset play management standpoint.

I just don't think it's going to have the outcome that the Raptors and their fans might want.

They're in danger of the tax this year, they're in danger of the tax next year.

They have they're over the cap in 27, 28,

three years from now.

28, 29, they have $135 million already committed to just Scotty Barnes, Quickly, Purdle, Murray Boyle, and all the picks that will come in in the interim.

No other signings are included.

No mid-level signings, nothing in the interim.

No Ingram, no Barrett.

And so I just...

They're trying to do that.

They would tell you, we're trying to do this middle build thing.

We think we can win 42 games next year, 45 games if things hit right.

And then we'll have all this flexibility because we have our picks and we can do this thing where we build from the middle.

It's admirable.

They don't want to tank.

The only year they tanked was the Tampa tank when they were relocated and took advantage of it and got Scotty Barnes.

It's just, it's going to be a haul.

And I just...

Fundamentally, I'm like, I just don't think that five-man starting five is going to be a functional NBA offense.

It could be good.

It could be a good decent defense.

I just don't know that that's a roadmap to anywhere interesting right now.

Well, I mean, that's one more variable to hang on the board.

I think a lot of the premise of this group hangs on the idea of, oh, they're going to be able to replicate some of their defensive success from the back part of last season.

I mean, we'll see.

Like, that's a historically fluky part of the game.

That's my favorite spooky molder take of all Raptor stakes.

It's like, you didn't pay attention.

We were the ninth ranked defense in the last 20 games.

You mean when none of your guys were playing?

Like, when literally none of your core players were playing regularly at all, you were a top 10 defense for 15 games.

Awesome.

I'm going to pencil them in neck and neck with the Thunder next year for best defense in the NBA.

Let's pencil it in.

Okay, last one.

They may not qualify for this because I just don't think they're going to be good enough.

And

they're closer to just the tank-tastic group in the East.

I just like to talk about the Charlotte Hornets who have like 14 guys under guaranteed contracts before you get to Musa Diabate, who, by the way, might be their starting center

next season.

And

they've obviously have done quite well on the fringes under this new ownership group.

They have four extra first-round picks coming to them in the next five years.

Some of them are good.

Some of them are eh.

They should be pretty nimble cap-wise.

You just look at this team, and it's like, what a strange conglomerate of players.

So here's their starting five next year.

Here's all I know for sure.

Lamello Ball.

Are they all guards?

They might be all guards or power forwards.

Lamello Ball, Brandon Miller, Miles Bridges.

Those are the three.

The other two spots, I don't know.

Who's the wing between Lamello and Brandon Miller or next to Brandon Miller?

Could be Colin Sexton on the team.

Could be Josh Green on the team.

Could be Trey Mann re-signed an $8 million contract.

Don't think that would be the thing, the answer.

Could be Con Knipl, rookie.

Like Con Kniple, just fine.

Could be Josh Okogie.

He's got a non-guaranteed contract.

He's probably, he might have to be a cap casualty.

No clue who it's going to be.

Pat Conaton on the team, but Conaton.

I always do that.

Pat Conneton on the team.

Not sure how long that's going to last either.

Liam McNeely.

I don't know.

Whatever.

Who's going to be the five?

This is the most depressing center situation that I can remember.

And if I'm Lamello Ball, I'm like, I understand Mark Williams has some health issues.

You clearly telegraphed to the whole league.

You can't wait to get rid of him before we got to pay him.

Who am I throwing lobs to next year?

Who am I passing to?

Like, Diabate, Mason Plumley.

I will say they like this guy, Kalkbrenner, yeah, that they got in the second round, who is a multi-time, I think, defensive player of the year, whatever conference he was in.

Okay, like, is he going to start now?

That's your 15th guaranteed contract, I guess.

So, we're already full.

Are we going to play?

How does Salon fit into this?

How does McNeely fit into this?

How does Grant Williams fit into this?

Are we going to play super small ball with all those guys on the court?

I just, it's a strange team, and really, it just comes down to LaMello Ball and Brandon Miller.

Yep.

And so, I ask you, Rob,

what is Lamello Ball?

In abstract terms?

Just

I sat down and I watched an hour or two of LaMelo Ball pick and rolls from last year because I just want to re, like, I like to do this with players who I'm going to talk about.

It's like, let me just refresh.

my memory and get it all fresh in my head.

What does this look like?

What are some strengths and weaknesses?

Because you notice stuff when you watch just a player versus watching a Charlotte Hornets game.

You'll notice more quirks and tendencies.

And I have been a Lamello Ball, I've been on the more positive side of Lamello Ball because I just don't think

he's 6'8 or 6'7.

The size, the shooting ability, and the vision and creativity,

it's really hard to find that all-in-one player.

Yeah.

And yet he never plays, first of all, he's always injured.

And

he took

here's just the funny thing about Lamobile.

He took

24 shots per 36 minutes last year.

Since 2014, three players have had a season in which they have taken at least

23 and a half shots per 36 minutes.

and played at least a thousand minutes.

So we're filtering out on basketball reference all the guys who played like 200 minutes.

It's happened in three player seasons total.

Lamello Ball

in 2024, 2025, playing Carnival basketball, shooting step-back threes.

Yep.

Russell Westbrook, the year he won the MVP.

Okay.

Yeah.

And James Harden in 2019 when he averaged 1,000 points a game.

And I don't think he won the MVP that year.

I think he won it the year before, but it was one of his many top three finishes in the MVP.

That's the list.

And I'm sorry, Lamello Ball, not in that class of player.

Understand all your teammates were not very good.

Brandon Miller was injured.

So I just ask you, like,

I'm less certain now than I was a year ago that I should be bullish about LaMelo Ball.

What is he?

I don't understand what he is.

I mean, he is their team.

Like, whatever you think of Brandon Miller, he's not the kind of talent who gives your team structure.

And when you have LaMelo on your team, you kind of are a Lamello outfit.

Like, you're going to play more or less his style.

You're going to flow through that creativity that I agree is really exceptional by NBA standards.

Like he sees and tries and does things that players do not do.

And from that, I think you can create all kinds of interesting offense.

Can you channel it consistently, especially in a half court setting in a way that leads to winning basketball?

I don't know.

Like the start of his NBA career would tell you largely maybe not.

But I continue to believe in it.

I continue to beat my head against that particular wall and think with the right combination of players, the Charlotte Hornets can be better than the 10th seed in the Eastern Conference, which they've not been able to do in the time Lamello has been in the the league.

A lot of it comes down to whether he can play or not.

A lot of it comes down to the ankles.

I think he had ankle and wrist surgery.

It was, I guess, just get it all done at once situation for LaMelo.

With him, though, with those injury concerns, all of a sudden you have to have all these guards.

Or at least I can understand why you would talk yourself into, oh, we need these kinds of scorers, these kinds of ball handlers, we need options for when Lamello is hurt.

If that's how you're categorized as a star, as a liability in that way, that feels like a huge problem.

The fact that your style is also somewhat of of an open question, I think is a pretty big problem.

I still would continue to invest in it because I am an insane person.

So I'm with you.

Like I look at his contract.

He's got four years left on his contract.

It's going to be on Spotrack estimated to be 22% of the cap at the end of its deal.

It's $38,41,000, $43,

$46, excuse me.

I'll tell you one thing I'm not doing right now

is prematurely deciding we just need to get off this guy and restart the franchise and selling for whatever I can get.

First of all, I don't know that there's a deal out there that's appealing.

Second of all, like I'm just still too intrigued.

Now, the shot selection last year was egregious.

And what's interesting about Lamello is that he is, there are so many contradictions to his game.

He clearly takes greedy shots.

Yes.

He's also not inherently a selfish player.

Like if you watch the reel of his pick and rolls, he will make not just the right pass, he'll make a quick pass.

Like if you double him, he will hit the screener rolling to the rim.

Or if he sees people rotating from the wing, he'll hit the guy on the wing right away.

Like he won't waste any time and the machine will move from there.

He sees every pass.

It's interesting.

I watched, I don't know how many dozens or hundreds.

I don't think I saw one successful pocket pass the entire time that I watched.

Part of that is because he's a little bit of a daredevil.

Yes.

Part of that is because he preferred to lob to Mark Williams.

Not a bad decision, by the way, given Mark Williams.

And part of that is that in the paint, he's still a very unpolished player

who doesn't seem to quite...

Like, there are all these weird quirks of timing.

and angles to his game.

And you can see him learning.

And he got to the paint more two years ago and finding the reads.

And occasionally, he'll get he's one of the, he's like Halliburton that he can get up in the air and still make a nice drop-off pass to his big man.

Something about the timing of his game is just a little bit off.

And that's setting aside the fact that you talked about winning basketball.

There's a looseness and a laziness to the way he processes the game in the half court that is just not okay for a player who's so clearly smart and creative.

At the end of games, there's never any calculation of like what matchup should we be hunting?

Yeah.

Who has a mismatch?

What should I go after?

And I talked about him as a walking contradiction.

For a player who wants to play fast and will throw the hit-a-head pass, he also will just lope the ball up the floor.

Nothing will happen until there's 11 on the shot clock.

Some screen will happen, and he's not great at setting up his guy to run into picks either.

And then he'll just sort of step back and dance with the ball a little bit.

And it's like, dude, you got to get, he does nothing off the ball.

Nothing.

He's got to have that to his game.

And to charles lee's credit he set way more ball screens last year than he had in prior seasons but still not enough but there's something

there's something here yeah

and it's just hasn't clicked yet it's it's a strange watch i'll tell you if you watch 200 lamello pick and rolls it's like this is a strange strange player There's something just like so avant-garde to all that, to all those contradictions, to the fact that

he really does run almost entirely on vibes.

And you would love more intention to that.

I think the contrast with Tyrese Halliburton is so fascinating because you're right, they both do hit ahead in a kind of similar way.

They both can be like really good rebounders.

I think Lamello's rebounding is a super underrated part of his game, to be honest, and the way that accelerates the break.

But

Halliburton is a guy who he comes out of a game, and the games where you see where he doesn't shoot enough, you can tell going into the next one that he's had the conversations with the right people in his life about, like, okay, I want to get to these spots next time.

I want to challenge this matchup next time.

Lamello doesn't seem to do that.

He's, I mean, I don't know that he's a player or person I would burden with a lot of introspection, to be honest with you.

I think he knows what he does well and he tries to channel those things as best he can, but he is a read and react player in the moment.

And I think that can lead to some truly, truly spectacular outcomes.

You can put together a reel of five or ten, even like late game plays in games that the Hornets are in, where he does things that other stars do not do.

Will drive, draw three people in the lane, and make a spectacular kick to the corner for a crucial shot that other stars would force themselves.

The combination of his genuine want to set up other people and also genuine want to just like try flashy shit for the sake of it is some of the most watchable basketball in the league, some of the most chaotic basketball in the league.

And I wouldn't want to live and die with like my job writing on his success.

But as someone who just has to watch and try to guess at what he's going to do, I enjoy this part of it.

And

I do think eventually he's going to get somewhere.

Their play-by-play guy eric collins who i'm sure we both love it has

something between like a panic attack and seeing god and speaking in tongues like four times a game watching lamello and their offense was way better with lamello on the floor last year now that's partly an indictment of what's coming behind him but it was also just good like by the numbers it was a good offense when he was on the floor i'll just say this

There's been a lot, like obviously they're rebuilding and they picked high again in the draft this year after picking Brandon Miller a couple years ago, et cetera.

Nick Smith Jr., by the way, is still on the team.

I don't know neither here nor there.

He was like third on the team in total minutes last year or something like that.

There's just a lot of guys on the team,

none of whom are good centers.

I will say, Diabate, as a league pass experience,

I really appreciate it.

I really enjoy watching him.

Should not be starting NBA Mass.

He shouldn't.

So they're rebuilding.

They have all these extra draft assets, and we've spent a lot of time.

There's been a lot of like, would they ever get off LaMelo to go into like a deeper rebuild?

I almost think one of the most fun outcomes of the next 18 months in the NBA is if they actually go the other way and Lamello steadies a little bit as like a playmaker and they decide, you know what?

Let's overpay for some disgruntled guy who's 29 years old and just see what happens here because they have the ammo to do it and there's a world in which they're ready to do it faster than people expect.

And I want to to live in that world I don't want to live in the world where the hornets have traded lamello ball for 30 million dollars of expiring money one protected first-round pick and another protected first round pick I don't want to live there this is one of those areas where the salon pick

it was it was kind of flummixing in a lot of different ways one of which is they could really use a guy who's just a little further ahead on the curve in that spot like

I don't know what to make of Deshaun Salon yet.

He just looks like he's figuring everything out on the fly in real time, as many young players do, but like even more raw, even more of a longer-term project.

Very excited.

He's always very excited.

Whenever he does anything well, he's extremely excited, which I find quite charming.

And like maybe if you want to chart the longest possible path for the Hornets, maybe that's a useful player to have in five years.

If you want a player who's going to be good in the next two to three, I don't, I don't know what he's going to be.

And maybe he's someone who could be enticing to one of these teams you're talking about, to where you overpay and he's involved.

He can be a part of a rebuild somewhere else that makes sense.

And you get the Hornets version of a Pascal Siako, right?

Like a stabilizing kind of half-court player who can fit everything you do and run the way that you run, but also gives you this other dimension.

And I think if you can get that guy and Brandon Miller becomes some version of that guy and is a little steadier, pulling up off the dribble, pays off on the defensive potential that he's already shown.

There's the bones of something.

It's just like, I don't know if it's enough bones to make up a whole skeleton or if it's going to be some mutant like abomination.

Now, to your point, everything this front office and ownership group has done has trended towards the long, long,

long lens of team building up to and including the salon pick.

I like Brandon Miller.

I think Brandon Miller is going to be a really good NBA player.

Lamello's got to be better defensively.

We didn't even talk about that.

But everything they've done has trended like hinky style.

longest view in the room.

So maybe my dream of a win-now trade in two years is stupid.

I'm just saying I wouldn't shut that door completely, and I don't think they should shut that door completely.

Let's see how this team plays.

They're not going to be good this year.

I don't know how many games are going to win, but it all comes down to Lamello, who it's time.

It's time to be healthy.

And that's a lot of luck, I realize.

It's time to

be a serious player all the time and not just some of the time because the talent is there.

Okay, Rob Mahoney, what do we got coming up from you?

Great question.

I mean, we're kind of shifting into off-season mode, group chat-wise.

That's going to be a little bit of a mystery situation going forward.

But, you know, we're going to pod here and there.

We're going to make it happen.

I think I'm writing next week on the Sicko signings of the summer, the true degenerate stuff, much of which we have talked about today.

You know, really getting deep into Yabu Sele trend in Watford territory.

So that's

trended Watford.

Trend and Watford's good.

Good player.

Rob Mahoney, thank you, sir.

Talk to you soon, bud.

See you in Vegas.

Yes.

Thanks, Zach.

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All right, it's finally time.

Mets Corner.

Sean Fantasy,

I'm back.

I'm back.

I'm in just enough to have a lot of dangerous takes.

I'm in just enough to get hurt a little bit, but I'm back in.

I'm back in.

I lived up to my vow.

I'm not watching every game.

I'm not watching all nine innings of the games that I watch, but I'm watching pieces almost every night.

And I think I told you the other night, I put my daughter to bed.

We had just watched the Mets go up 2-1 over the Orioles.

And I checked the score as I was putting her to bed.

It was 5-2 Orioles.

And she was so sad.

She's like, oh, they're going to lose.

It's the eighth inning.

Came back to my office, flipped it on in the background.

Lindor home run.

Alonzo home run six to six.

I run into my daughter's bedroom because I know she's still going to be awake.

And I say, honey,

they tied it.

It's 6-6.

And your guy, Lindor, she loves Lindor, hit a home run.

And Alonzo hit a home run.

She's like, Polar Bear.

Yeah, Polar Bear hit a home run.

And like, it's tied.

They might win.

And...

They did win in extra innings, 7-6.

I learned in that game as I texted you that you now start extra innings with a runner runner on second.

Cool, awesome.

Didn't know that.

And I had forgotten

what a thrilling Major League Baseball comeback win feels like.

Felt great.

Mets are 53 and 39 going into a doubleheader today after a 3-13 plummet.

It's been a wild ride.

How should I feel?

I'm glad to be back.

I missed this romanticism in my life.

Welcome back.

And, you know, you brought a partner with you, with your daughter, which is wonderful.

And the Mets Faithful grows stronger every day.

As you know, I have, I'm a very complicated feeling Mets fan because this, in theory, should be the greatest stretch in the history of the team.

I mean, the ownership, the management, the roster.

Not since 1986 should we feel so confident.

And yet, every game is kind of like that game on Tuesday night where you're not totally confident, something terrible seems to happen.

And then somehow they just kind of pull themselves out of it.

And this is kind of a continuation of the team that they were last year.

So how should you be feeling?

I think excited?

I think hopeful.

For me, that's weird because I am just the most burnt out, angry, ready to explode Mets fan on the planet.

But the last few years have been very odd to feel more comfortable, more excited, and

thinking maybe we have a chance to do something that I did not think they would be able to do when I was 25, 35.

And now as I get close to 45, I feel like maybe I will see a championship before I die.

So this is the number one benefit of me being laid off by ESPN is it happened right as the Mets were entering a magical postseason run.

I was like, all right, I'm going to be back in and I'm going to watch it.

And I've stuck with it.

But I also am still in like the question phase of like, I have a lot of die-hard Mets fans in my life.

And I'll ask like, wait, so who is this guy kind of questions?

Like, I'm still learning who this guy is.

All these pitchers have like no Major League Baseball track records, but they're all good.

Like, how is this happening?

And I keep hearing, well, that's a a David Stearns thing.

This is what they do.

So, can I ask you some questions?

Please do.

When did this traveling thing and hand signal, like every time they get a hit or an RBI, they make this thing and go like this?

And I think it's very cool, and my daughter does too.

Who started that?

When did it start?

That's this season, is that that's the team's celebration.

Last year's team celebration was more of like a kind of an ass slapping kind of gesture.

And this year, it's more of a, I don't know, like a rumba dance.

It's, I assure you, it is not an NBA official calling a travel, even though that's what it looks like.

Who is the chairperson of this?

Who's making these decisions?

If I had to guess, Pete Alonzo, he's, you know, he's kind of the goofball of the bunch.

But this is seemingly a very tight-knit team.

You know, there's

a lot of groupings of friendships.

You've got Francisco Lindor and Jesse Winker, who kind of grew up together.

You've got...

Pete Alonzo and Brandon Nimmo and Jeff McNeil who've all been in the Mets system for a long period of time.

You've got new entrant Juan Soto, but clearly he's got a friend in Starling Marte.

So you've got these kind of agglomerations of friendship.

And so together they all, they come up with these bits, these moments, these inside jokes every time they do something cool.

So I, again, am coming from a place of total ignorance.

I could not have identified Juan Soto on the subway two years ago.

It is, as I watch the games, I do feel like, so they do this thing, the traveling thing, and then they do the little photos that they they do, the snapshots after home runs, which is very charming, and I'm glad they still do that.

I do get the vibe from Soto that he thinks all of that is kind of silly, and he's a reluctant participant in it, but a participant nonetheless.

Am I wrong about this?

Well, it's colored by the fact that there was a narrative in the first 30 games of the season.

issued largely by Yankees fans and Yankees broadcasters that Soto was somehow unhappy to be on the Mets, that he was miserable, that he had accepted the most money as a free agent, but that he wasn't really a part of the culture of that team, that he was a true Yankee and he'll always be a true Yankee.

And so I think that that is informing some of this.

I think Juan Soto is just a little bit more laid back and his swagger is kind of within himself as opposed to the goofball stuff that kind of highlighted the 2024 Mets with Grimace and OMG and everything that Iglesias was doing with the performances after the game.

And there's something, there's just something a little bit lighthearted and silly about this crew.

And I don't get the impression that's really Soto's vibe.

He's a little bit more of a Steve McQueen type, more of a silent assassin.

But since they have started winning and since he has really come alive, and in the last five weeks, he's basically playing the best version of baseball that you can.

I get the impression that he's a little bit more comfortable getting into the silly stuff.

So I have a very good friend, Tim, who's a die-hard Cubs fan, big baseball fan.

And he was like, you're going to love Soto.

And I said, well, other than the fact that he's awesome, why?

And he said something like, every at-bat is like theater with him.

Like, there's a certain strut to him and a certain calculus.

And obviously a lot has been made of like, is he taking too many pitches?

He loves to take pitches.

And then I told you, I was watching the game the other night, and he had an opposite field home run.

And I don't know baseball stats at all.

So I don't know how extraordinary this is or not.

But the sideline guy, Steve Gellbs, I think his name is, who's very...

Gells, yeah, from SNY.

I don't, you call him a dugout guy.

What do you call him in baseball?

He'll go into the field he'll he'll go onto the field he always interviews the the the sort of signature player after every win he had this stat that soto either swing starts his swing or contacts the ball or something

five inches with the ball five inches closer to the catcher's mitt or five inches further from the mound than the major league average and how he's able to wait longer because of his opposite field power and that's that was like that seems like a crazy stat to me but i don't know but it seems very interesting.

I was like, okay, I'm going to learn.

I'm learning stuff about baseball.

They now measure all of these things.

I think his approach to hitting,

he had been compared to Ted Williams from even his earliest seasons in 2019 and 2020 in Washington.

And part of that was because he had this incredible recognition that he was able to identify what pitches were.

And so one of the reasons why he's always at the top of the league and on-base percentage is because he walks all the time, right?

He knows not to swing at bad pitches.

But the other thing is that, you know, he's still only 26 and he's really strong, really strong.

And so we've seen like in the last month or so, all those opposite field home runs are because of what you're talking about.

He's essentially waiting on breaking balls deep in the box and able to just kind of muscle them out of the stadium as opposed to just standing way far up in the box.

Like watch Ronnie Mauricio on the Mets hit now.

He gets way close into the front of the box and he murders.

fastballs.

If you throw him a fastball in the zone, he can hit it 450 feet.

Not so much with breaking balls.

Soto is the rare hitter who can kill the fastball and also has this very artful, it's kind of like being deadly from the mid-range, you know, like I'm trying to think of basketball metaphors that will make this coherent for you, but he's just that unusual combination of patience, power.

And then even what we saw last night or two nights ago, 10th inning, first pitch, knew exactly what he wanted.

And just seeing iSingle through infield playing in, trying to avoid a runner advancing to third base, he's also just intensely intelligent as a hitter too, situationally.

So it's kind of crazy that he's on the Mets.

I still haven't really fully accepted that maybe the greatest or second greatest hitter in baseball is just on our team, but he is.

So that's nice.

So you mentioned one of my, a topic for one of my other questions.

What should my, on a scale of

one, two,

like Victor Wembanyama, what should my excitement level be for Mauricio?

Because I'm I'm getting up to like a six and a half, seven with some of the plays he's made at third base and he hit a home run the other day.

Like he's supposed to, like he's a hot shot prospect, right?

He was a hotshot prospect because he's an extraordinary athlete, an unusually gifted athlete for baseball.

And then he had a pretty significant injury.

I want to say he had an ACL tear

about a year and a half ago.

And so he's been recovering and he was murdering the ball in the minor leagues in the first month of the season this year.

And they kind of called him up surprisingly quickly.

And you you could tell that he, while he was flashing the power, he really struggled for about three weeks.

And now in the last week and a half, two weeks,

the guy that I thought he was going to be two years ago when he got his call up to the bigs is starting to show up.

But he made a play in the eighth inning two nights ago that was...

a real highlight reel play where it was a hot shot to third base.

He stepped on third base and turned a fast double play that was the kind of thing that maybe not since Howard Johnson we've been dreaming about as Mets fans.

I mean the Mets have kind of a complicated history with third base.

David Wright alone, who was a solid infielder, but not the most athletic player, it would be exciting if Mauricio developed.

Mauricio just doesn't hit lefties.

So I don't know if he'll ever be a true everyday player.

But man, he is,

he looks like De'Aaron Fox out there.

I mean, he is just huge, super strong, and super fast.

So I think you're, what level should it be at?

He's not a Wemonyama.

No, no, I know that.

I'm just, I was putting what 10 is.

Yeah, probably a 6.

Like, there's a chance that it works out.

They have this weird.

The Mets have this weird thing where they have three legitimate third-base prospects, and every time one of them starts to play well, the other two start to suck.

So Vientos is one, and who's the other?

Mark Vientos, who was extraordinary last year and playoff hero.

Brett Beatty, who has also played some second base.

I do too.

He's kind of your classical third baseman, where he can flash power.

He's really rangy with a glove.

He seems to be a very smart player, but he can't ever get his on-base percentage over 300.

So all three of those guys are in this kind of, and they're all buddies, and they all came up together through the system, and they're in this kind of generational war.

I think only one of them can really take the spot, but we'll see what happens over the next month or so.

Next question:

How is Francisco Lindor not made an all-star team with the Mets?

And I'm not saying that skeptically, like, I was surprised because he was second in MVP voting last year, was he not?

So, like, and he's

his first Mets all-star team?

Has he been injured?

Like, how did this happen?

He just every season gets off to an incredibly slow start.

I think historically.

He's Jamal Murray.

He is Jamal Murray.

Yeah, I mean, minus the injuries.

But he consistently hits 220 through April and May every year.

And so you get to all-star voting time in June, and you look at his counting stats, and it looks like he's not a very important player, setting aside his incredible defensive skill.

And then invariably, it gets hot, and he gets hot.

And every summer, he tends to annihilate.

Now, this year was different.

This year, he actually hit in May and June.

And because of that, he got voted in.

But it's obvious he's one of the 10 10 best players in baseball and has been for the last seven years.

He had a particularly gnarly first 18 months with the Mets where he both didn't play as well as he could have and had a couple of public snafus that I think he'd probably take back if he could, where he was sort of like adversarial with the fandom in part because of something that his teammate at the time, Javier Baez, was doing.

And that kind of set him off on the wrong foot a little bit.

And then after that first season, he really course corrected.

And I've said this a couple of times now, but to me, he is like entering like R Jeter territory where he's like, he's the guy I want up at the right time.

He's the person I trust the most on the team.

He's the person who like my heart is with when they're going good.

So,

you know, should he have made the all-star team last year, the year before that?

Probably, just because he's kind of consistently the best or the second best shortstop in the National League.

But it's nice that he didn't take so long to get hot this year.

I'm going to now have to Google all the stuff you said about adversarial and this baez person who I don't know who that is.

I'm going to Google it.

Let me surprise myself.

I'm going to Google it.

There's a thumbs down circumstance.

Julius Randle?

Like with some Julius Randle vibes?

Okay, great.

My daughter absolutely loves Lindor.

And it's so funny to see how, remember how kids process sports.

So he took her to her first game.

We had amazing seats.

Lindor, I think, was 0 for 4.

I don't think he did anything in the game, except he turned maybe three double plays.

Peterson had an incredible outing.

And the double plays were like not Ray Ardonia's highlight double plays, but they were like slick double plays.

And that combined with the puffy hair, she was just in.

And me saying that Lindor is really good.

Her first question after did they win is, how did Lindor play?

What did Lindor?

She loves Lindor.

So I'm all in on Lindor.

Okay, next question.

They signed Soto for a good, literally like a billion dollars.

And all my Mets fans' friends were priming me for like, well, Alonzo's gone.

Alonzo's, they can't afford to keep Alonzo.

He's going to have a market.

And Alonzo has been the best hitter on the team this year.

So like, what was plan B?

Like, who was playing first base for the Mets?

And like, they'd be up a creek without this dude.

Through the first two months of the season, they would have been screwed because he was so dominant and he was the centrifugal force of their offense.

I don't know.

You know, one of my pastimes is overanalyzing off-season moves for the New York Mets.

And I've been doing a lot of that in the last month in part because they had that really gnarly skid.

And I was just telling my producer, Jack Sanders, I was in person for four of those 13 losses.

You were at a Braves game, right?

Like the House of Horror.

Three Braves games and a Dodgers game.

And it was a pretty rough stretch.

Fuck the Braves, by the way.

Still, despite 15 years of lapsed fandom, fuck the Braves.

I could not agree more.

Fuck them.

So, anyhow, and how wonderful it's been to watch them completely fall apart this year.

Anyhow,

with Pete, I don't know what the plan was.

I think the sentimental fan loves Pete.

He's homegrown.

He has been a dominant power hitter for six seasons now.

He's just a very likable guy.

He's just a goofball, and he seems like a a very nice person.

And

from the cold-hearted analytics standpoint, he's exactly the kind of player who just does not age well.

And so David Stearns is extremely shrewd, and you could tell since the moment Stearns arrived that Alonzo is just kind of not exactly his kind of player.

You know, he is defensively limited.

He is prone to the breasts.

Which is funny because

they talk every game about how elite his stretching is from first base.

Great stretch guy.

Look at that stretch from Pete.

His stretching and scooping actually is elite, but his range is really limited.

And he has a tendency to just have brain farts when it comes to throwing the ball.

In fact, he had a brain fart throwing the ball to Kodai Senga like three or four weeks ago that forced Senga to kind of reach up.

And then that had him strain his.

He's coming back, though.

He is coming back this week, Friday, I think.

Anyhow, Pete is wonderful.

I don't know how you can justify a five-year, $150 million contract for him in the offseason because that would be like just not good baseball strategy.

And yet, I would like him to hit 600 home runs and retire as a Met.

So, what do you do with that?

I really don't know.

So, this is, so basketball analyst brain coming back to baseball is really interesting for a lot of reasons.

One of which is,

you know, like in, I'm not comparing these two things, but like, you see in basketball, these sort of like lifetime achievement contracts for the guy who's been on the team his whole year, and they're like objectively bad contracts.

Kobe would be the classic example.

And now, even just coming back into this last season, as Alonzo hits the all-time great home run against the Brewers, and now is off to this great start.

And I'm learning about his history of the team and what he means to the chemistry of the team.

The fan in me is like, can we just, can this guy just be on the team forever?

Like, he should just feels like he should be a forever player.

And I understand how that cuts against the grain of how sports actually works since I cover another sport rather intensely.

Similarly.

I'm checking the standings every day, and I couldn't even tell you right now how the baseball playoffs actually work anymore.

Like how many teams get into it, who plays who, and this and that.

I obviously know the division winners all get in and there's a benefit to being one of the top two division winners and then there's wildcard teams.

So I'm like the jockeying between the Mets, the Phillies, the Cubs, and probably the Dodgers.

The Dodgers come back a little bit, but let's just put them on a pedestal.

It's very important to me.

And then I'm like, man.

Let's say they finished second to the Phillies and they're a wildcard team.

Again, I don't know how this works.

I could be wrong, but I'm like, man, 162 games and then just like it comes down to a game.

Like, this is what I'm emotionally putting my heart on the line for.

At least in the NBA, like, I get in and if I'm a good team, like, I pretty much know where I stand and it's pretty predictable.

Like, is like, I don't know if I'm ready for this is what I'm saying.

The opposite is also true, which is something that I've been struggling with.

And when they, you know, added additional teams to the playoff structure.

I didn't like it at first because you watched a couple of teams that I felt were inferior get really hot.

Like the Arizona Diamondbacks had an incredible run to the World Series with a team that I thought was okay.

And they just, as baseball is, you kind of have these 10 or 15 game stretches where you get really hot or really cold.

And if your team is really hot, you can make a run.

Then last year, the Mets were that team.

You know, the Mets played really, really well in the second half of the year.

But then through the playoffs, they had heroics after heroics.

They had these extraordinary moments.

Guys like Mark Vientos, who's hitting like 180 this year, has made a run.

He looked like an absolute stud in the playoffs, especially against the Phillies.

So I don't really know what to do about that.

You know, like you can draw bad luck and get eliminated in a one-game playoff, and then the whole season seems like a waste or you can be a wild card team and you can run all the way to the you know uh national league championship or even to the world series and maybe even win so it it is different than it was when we were growing up when it felt like making the playoffs alone meant you were one of the elite teams in in in the sport you know or you were one of the five or six or maybe even three or four elite teams in the sport it's different now it is much more of a

It feels much more like a tournament than it did in the past.

But I can't be too mad at it because last playoffs was some of the most fun I've ever had as a baseball fan.

What were they?

Was it 99 when they were in the wildcard game against the Reds?

And Ricky Anderson hit home run that game.

I was a high school teacher that year.

It was my first year.

And so talk about it, like they had to win that game.

That was a must-win game, obviously.

Was it a wildcard playoff game?

Like, it was a playoff game to become the wildcard team.

It was a one-and-done situation.

I think it was because there was a tie, right, at the end of the season.

Yeah.

And I had one particular class that was just unruly.

Just they were nice kids.

They were just unruly.

And I said the day of that game to them, I'm going to make you guys a deal.

If Al Leiter throws a complete game shutout tonight, none of you speak for the entire class unless you are spoken to by me.

And god damn it, Al Leiter threw a complete game shutout in that game.

And they all came in silent.

Oh.

They listened.

And I initially, after about 20 minutes, I was like, all right, I'm going to drop.

I'm going to drop.

Unbelievable, Al Leiter.

Wow.

Wow.

Okay, that's a comet-like event.

I mean, there's no way you could replicate both the complete game shutout and the kids not talking.

Probably like 132 pitches of Al Leiter just sweating through every 3-2 count imaginable.

It was like a different sport back then, too.

Now, if you can get a pitcher past 90, it's shocking.

This is part of what I'm learning.

I guess the starter is just going to go four and two-thirds, like every game.

That's just what it is now.

Like, David Peterson pitched eight, I think, when I went playing.

It was like, is this the world record now for longer?

He was being treated as though he were Cy Young himself.

Okay, last question, and then I have a story for you.

This is coming from someone who chipped my parents' wall throwing a remote control,

a television remote control out of rage

over a John Franco blow and save.

Sure.

I remember him well.

This is coming from someone who never trusted Armando Benitez to walk across the street.

Okay, I wouldn't trust him to walk my mom across the street, despite the gouty numbers and the fastballs and all that, and was wildly unsurprised when he blew a save in game one of the Subway series.

I kind of trust Edwin Diaz.

Should I trust him?

Like, I really trust him.

When he comes in the game, I'm like, this guy's fucking awesome.

Is he just awesome?

I trust him already more than I trusted any of those guys.

Am I being stupid?

I don't think so.

Now, I know that mentally he is prone to doing things that infuriate fans who are especially fans.

Tell me, because I don't know this.

Well,

two things.

One, he will occasionally just walk the nine-hitter on four pitches to start an inning.

That's Benitez,

which is a sin as a closer.

Secondarily, he's historically bad at holding runners, and so he gives up a lot of stolen bases.

Now, that has no idea.

Interesting.

That has been mitigated by the fact that Luis Terenz has been their catcher, who is one of the very best at throwing runners out.

In fact, there was a moment earlier this season where Dia

had a runner on base and Terenz threw him out and there was a replay.

This happened like a week and a half ago.

Anyway,

so there are some hang-ups with Diaz, and he has had a really parabola-like career as a Met.

Where when he was first here, I want to say it was in 2020 when that trade happened, he was traded for a very high-end prospect named Jared Kelinek.

And Mets fans were mad because he was an elite outfield prospect and they struggled with their outfield for years.

Kelinek never shook out, but Diaz was awful in his first season and a half as a Met.

And then by 2022, he became the single best closer in baseball.

And he was extraordinary that year.

And then he played in the World Baseball Classic.

He, I believe, tore his Achilles, not his Achilles.

I'm not sure what he injured himself.

He's celebrating.

He's the celebrating guy.

He had a knee injury celebrating, and he had a long recovery to come back.

And then last year, he was good, but up and down.

This season,

he has looked again like the best closer in baseball.

He's given up one run in two and a a half months.

And I don't think people realize that he has not blown a save this year.

I'm not sure people realize that.

It's actually quite strange that he's not in the all-star game.

So

this is me.

I mentioned before.

He is in the all-star game.

I apologize.

He is in the all-star game.

I am the most dangerous kind of fan in that I have a little bit of information and I'm extrapolating a lot from it.

And I've clearly re-engaged at the best stretch of this dude's career.

And so now I trust him.

I trust him with my life on a baseball field much more than I ever trusted any Mets closer.

And I'm now you're setting me up for like, okay, maybe I need to step back, but I can't now.

It's too late.

I trust him.

I have in person watched some of the worst implosions in baseball closer history from him in circa 2020.

I mean, he was god-awful.

Remember when we traded for Billy Taylor from the A's to fortify our bullpen?

That didn't work.

Didn't go great.

Didn't work.

All right.

Last thing is a little story.

Have you heard my Aaron Boone story yet?

No.

Let's hear it.

All right.

So last year

in June, my

high school that I graduated from asked me to be the commencement speaker at the school.

Nice honor, right?

It's like 600 kids graduating class.

There's probably like 5,000 people watching me speak.

Unbelievable.

Terrifying.

And so in Fairfield County, Connecticut, lowest hanging fruit to get young people engaged in what you're saying about sports is anything Mets versus Yankees.

It's just like you get everybody riled up.

And so in the middle of my speech, I have this joke about how, you know, look, you get choices in life between good and evil.

Like, one of the choices is Mets versus Yankees.

And, you know, one is good, one is evil.

And it was better than that.

And I talked about how I had bonded with my Mets fans' friends in the mid-90s about Generation K and how, you know, I didn't mention Generation K, but I mentioned just bonding with them.

And it was.

I got a name-dropped Bill Pulsifer in front of a bunch of speeches.

I love Bill Pulsifer.

He was my favorite member of Generation K.

He was awesome.

I thought he was, at least.

And so I get, and I, and I called back to it later in the speech, and it got a great reaction both times.

People are like like booing, cheering.

It's exactly what I wanted.

And I sit down back in my seat after a speech just on a high, like 11 minutes, nailed it.

Everybody thought it was great.

And the principal of the school comes up to me.

He's whispering.

He's like, yeah,

so we didn't look at your speech ahead of time.

We should have told you.

Aaron Boone's son is graduating today.

And he's here.

He skipped their game against the Orioles.

to be in the audience for this.

And I look straight at him and I go, good.

I'm fucking glad.

Even more glad that I said it this time.

And so then I learned people who I knew were sitting with Aaron Boone in the stands when I said the joke.

And he was a very good sport about it.

And everyone looked at him.

So, Aaron Boone, if you're listening, you got to come on Mets Corner to remember how apparently I maybe like almost ruined your son's high school graduation.

I was, he, the principal was so like trepidatious, like, I'm so sorry to tell you this.

Like, he thought I was going to be mortified.

And I was like, fucking good.

I'm glad Aaron Boone was here.

All right, Sean Fantasy, we'll reconvene maybe in a week or two weeks or something.

We're going to do this regularly.

Hopefully, not for this long.

I'm sorry I kept you on.

It's the first one.

Might as well go long on the first one.

Enjoy the double header today.

Thank you for coming on.

You too, buddy.

Thanks, Zach.

All right, that's it for another edition of the Zach Lowe Show.

Thanks, Rob Mahoney.

Thanks, Sean Fenty.

Thanks, New York Mets, for being back in my life.

Thanks to Jesse, Chris, and Isaiah on production today.

We'll be back next week from Las Vegas.

Scheduled TBD.

We're hoping to have some celebrity NBA guests on.

And in addition to our usual stuff, thank you for listening to the Zach Lowe Show.

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