Thibs Fired: What Now for the Knicks? Plus, a Pacers Deep Dive With Caitlin Cooper and Throwback Thunder Time With Jeff Green and Kendrick Perkins.

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All right, coming up on the Zach Lowe show, it's a loaded Wednesday show.

Normally, we go Thursday.

We switch it up this week because of news and the way the final schedule rolls.

So, roll with us.

We open up.

We're going to talk about Tom Thivideau and the Knicks.

The Knicks firing their coach with $30 million left on his contract and coming off the most successful season they've had in a gazillion years.

Why'd they do it?

Well, we'll talk about that.

What comes next?

That's a big question for the Knicks.

Better Nil is higher.

And then it's an NBA final smorgasborg.

I already did my deep dive preview with Kurt Goldsbury on Monday on the Zach Lowe show, but we're going even further because it's the NBA finals.

The Pacers, they're huge underdogs.

Caitlin Cooper of the basketball, she wrote Patreon of Pacers, genius, X's and O's, the whole thing, tells us, where can they attack?

Are there little places in the Thunder defensive juggernaut to prick at?

Do they have any hope?

What about on offense?

How can they stop Shea Gildrus Alexander?

How are they going to do it?

She's going to tell us, you're going to come out of this so much smarter.

You're going to know what to look for, what the Pacers are going to try to do to make this a series.

And then some Oklahoma City alumni tell good stories about the good old days in Oklahoma City and what it means for them to see the Thunder back in the NBA Finals all these years later.

We might roll out a couple more of these as the finals goes on.

That's all coming up on today's Zach Lowe Show.

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Welcome to the Zach Lowe Show.

It's a special Wednesday edition, given the schedule.

And I was going to open this with some big picture NBA thoughts, focusing on some teams that have maybe been under the radar for interesting coming off seasons.

Utah was going to be one of them after the Austin Age hiring.

We're going to scrap that because the NBA news cycle rolls on.

The Knicks,

72 hours after losing in the Eastern Conference Finals, their first Eastern Conference finals in 25 years, fired the coach who stewarded them there.

Tom Thibodeau is out after five years as the Knicks head coach.

Surprising, maybe shocking, not so much.

Bill hinted that he could see this coming earlier in the season before the playoffs.

Tibbs' career winning percentage stands at 579,

exactly tied with Eric Spolstra.

Some irony in that, that Spo is now the and has been since Pop stepped down, the longest tenured uh head coach in the NBA, and it's not close.

And Tibbs was actually climbing up those rankings and in a symbol of the sort of chaos of coaching in the NBA.

You win, sometimes you get coach of the year, you get fired, you win, you get to the Eastern Conference finals for your SADSAC franchise's first time in 25 years, you get fired.

And also, the SPO connection is interesting because I think Spo is regarded as one of the elite quarter-to-quarter, game-to-game, minute-to-minute playoff tacticians, a guy who can take you over the top in that sense, much like Rick Carlisle has done for the Pacers.

And Tibbs, I think, is viewed as more of the floor raiser archetype who maybe is not on that SPO level as a playoff game-to-game, quarter-to-quarter, minute-to-minute tactician.

Is that fair?

We'll talk a little bit about that.

By the way, it's not like unprecedented for a coach with this level of winning percentage to get fired.

Here are some coaches who

outrank Tibbs on all-time winning percentage that have been fired lots of times.

Mike Brown,

similar sort of

pigeonholed as a floor raiser guy.

George Carl got fired a whole bunch of times.

Doc Rivers fired a whole bunch of times.

Mike Budenholzer fired right now.

So, not unprecedented.

A couple of things went into this.

Number one,

I think

it's a statement from the Knicks' front office.

And yeah, from James Dolan, too.

And by the way, rule of thumb, anytime it's leaked through reporters that, oh, no, no, this was a GM's decision, not an owner's decision.

You may have been sitting in the exit interviews, but trust me, this is a Leon Rose decision.

It means that the owner did have a role in the decision, whether he wants to do it or whether he wants to say it or not.

But a couple of things.

Number one, I think it's a statement that we don't think we are as close to being a championship team as the cliche two wins from the finals would typically indicate.

And I think that's probably fair,

if not correct, maybe correct too.

Remember, we're about to see this in 24 to 48 hours.

The Pacers aren't the bar.

The Thunder are the bar.

And that bar is really, really, really high.

And, you know look the pacers have some chance at an upset but uh it it's higher than anything that the eastern conference can provide and the knick's path through that eastern conference was not easy their plus or minus for the playoffs was exactly zero 10 and eight with a zero scoring margin the detroit series kind of a struggle the boston series you know i some people would chalk that up as a boston collapse in the first two games it's always some of one

and some of the other some collapse some comeback.

Some meant some instability and wobbling under pressure and some thriving under pressure and seizing opportunities that come to you.

The Knicks seized that series and they were on track to go up 3-1 before Jason Tatum's awful, awful injury that's going to submarine the Celtics and really flip the East on its head for the next couple of years.

Their offensive rating for the playoffs, this is an offense first team.

It's built to be a scoring juggernaut that does enough to survive on defense.

For the playoffs, they scored 112.7 points per 100 possessions.

That was about five points below their regular season average and would have ranked 21st in the regular season.

Now, is that entirely fair?

Not really.

They faced two and then two very good defensive teams and then a third okay to good defensive team in Indiana that they actually scored pretty well against.

But I think there was a sense that the offense was a little stuck in the mud.

and a little bit uncreative given the talent on hand, particularly in those first first two series, both of which the Knicks won, by the way.

We'll get back to the offense.

The Pacers are, it is really interesting to think about the Pacers.

I think the Pacers are leaving in their wake, in the wake of their just rampaging, fun and gun, choke sign, dance around, outrun you, siakama blur and transition, in their wake.

They are leaving just a pile of organizational existential crises behind them.

And I think,

like, I think that's two-pronged.

I think it's two-pronged in terms of the way teams interpret the Pacers, opponents interpret the Pacers.

One prong is, really?

The Pacers?

Are they that good?

Who's their third best player?

We can't beat that team.

Like, Pascal Siakam's that good as a number two guy.

Like, we're overwhelmed.

We're overwhelmed by the pace and fury and spirit and depth of like Andrew Nebhart, Aaron Niesmith.

Like

this, what Niesmith was like a cast off.

Obi Toppin was our cast off.

The Knicks cast off.

We're overwhelmed by these guys.

And on the flip side, number, the second prong cuts exactly the opposite direction.

And it is very relevant, I think, to the Knicks.

Whatever they're doing, can we get some of that?

Like,

that's pretty effective.

And it's a style of basketball that doesn't look like how we play.

And yeah, our players are not those kinds of players.

We have a very different kind of point guard, very different kind of set of players.

But like, can we have a little bit of that?

Because that shit's fun to watch and hard to play against.

And it's balls flying.

Can we get a little bit of that?

Pacers, man, just

leaving people befuddled and questioning everything they thought they knew about themselves.

Credit to the Pacers.

I think number two.

It's also a statement by the Knicks, a statement of reality, that if you want to make a change, and I think the Knicks feel like they need to make a

much harder to change the players than it is to change the coach, even if you owe the coach $30 million.

And I would implore Tibbs: take a year, man.

Take a vacation, go visit your buddies, spend James Dolan's money, live it up.

Anyway, it's particularly harder to change the players once you have gone all in to acquire two of them, the last two of the puzzle piece.

Five first-round picks for Mikhail Bridges and Randall DiVincenzo, and another pick for Carl Anthony Towns, making a gazillion dollars and eligible for an extension, by the way.

They don't have much left to trade.

They have a Washington first-round pick that is essentially a fake first-round pick that will become two second-round picks.

Now they're Washington second-round picks, those are pretty good.

Sorry, Wizards.

Not a lot great going on in Washington.

And some swaps and all that.

But look, we all know that they went all in for this team.

And those two players, I think, factor into this, obviously, very closely.

Bridges,

the five first-round picks are going to hang around his neck forever, and it's not his fault.

It's just the reality.

And

I think it's fair to suggest that

in making that trade, they expected the Knicks for Mikhail Bridges to be more than a 3D guy, limited offensive role player that he was for not all the season, not all of individual games.

You would see glimpses of Brooklyn Mikhail Bridges, glimpses of Phoenix Mikhail Bridges.

But there was a sense, I think, that a sense of incompleteness about this offense centered around Mikhail Bridges and his role.

And that obviously needs to sort of change and round out in a way that the Knicks apparently have concluded Tom Dipoteau was not the coach to do.

And then Towns,

second team all NBA.

By any measure, fantastic offensive season.

Fantastic offensive playoffs, too.

Defensively, look,

it's just always going to be a puzzle.

It's always going to be a problem.

And the Knicks, just like the Minnesota Timberballs before them, got to the end of their first season in the towns experience, shrugging their shoulders and being like, is he a center?

Is he a power forward?

How do we build this team around him?

Is a lineup with Brunson at point guard and Cat at center dead on arrival defensively because of the lack of rim protection, the lack of switchability?

No matter who the three wings are in between those two guys, and those three wings are really, really good.

Do we need to make this Mitchell Robinson starting alongside Cat thing a permanent feature of our team, whether it's a 15-minute a game feature, a 20-minute-a-game feature, a five-minute-a-game feature?

Is that Mitchell Robinson?

Is it another center?

That's the reality of Kat.

Offensively, that's all the defense stuff is just, it's just going to be a problem that you have to work around.

Offensively, the numbers are great.

It was just always, it was hard, man.

It was grimy.

It was tough.

It was cat pumping and driving and just jitterbugging his way in with like elbows flying over here, limbs flying that way, bodies falling over.

It was like bowling.

It's like cat bowling, pins just falling, including cat falling a lot.

And nobody punishes you when you fall at the rim like the Indiana Pacers, by the way.

That's an automatic basket the other way.

His threes were down, too few threes.

And look, part of that is we know.

We know, we knew from before they even played a game.

And then when they played their opening game against Boston, part of that is teams are going to put smart teams, are going to put their centers on Josh Hart and wings on Towns and do everything they can to switch and take away his pick and pop, which is the Trump card, which is the ace in the hole for them.

And he didn't get as many of those

as I thought the Knicks probably needed him to get.

Another relevant stat,

Brunson Cat pick and roll.

Regular season, 27 picks

per 100 possessions.

That's like fairly high.

It was, I'm looking at it right now on tracking data.

It was 25th in frequency among 138 duos who ran at least 200 pick and rolls.

27th, that's like pretty high.

It's right next to in the rankings, the Tyrese Maxi, Andre Drummond two-man game, the Devin Booker Mason Plumley two-man game, the Scoot Henderson, DeAndre Ayton two-man game.

Probably not enough, but not terrible.

Great efficiency across the board.

In the playoffs, that dropped to 18 per 100 possessions.

That's just like too few.

I don't care what the matchups are.

I don't care who's guarding Josh Hart.

I don't care who's guarding Carl Anthony Downs.

I don't care who's guarding Jalen Brunson.

That's not enough.

And yeah, smart teams put their centers on Josh Hart.

Well, Indiana didn't do that all that much.

Credit to Miles Turner.

He was able to scramble,

corral Brunson, corral the ball handler, get back to Cat.

Detroit spent damn near the entire series with Jalen Duran on Cat.

And people who listen to this podcast know that I was yelling about it the entire time.

How are you not spamming the Brunson-Cat pick and roll when Detroit is gifting you the exact matchup that you want over and over and over again?

And I just never really got a great answer for it.

And I think

that kind of,

that question kind of encapsulates why we're here with the Knicks.

Look, there are other things going on with this team.

Bill alluded to some of them

in his thing about the Tibbs thing yesterday.

A lot of interesting personalities on this team.

A lot of it, you know, big personalities with big roles and big goals and big ideas of what they are in the league thrown together

semi-like not that long ago.

Even the Andanobi trade is like not that long ago.

And having to figure it all out on the fly in one year together.

Kat, obviously, right before the season started, comes in.

I think the Rick Brunson dynamic, which Bill brought up, is

certainly a unique one within the NBA.

And,

you know,

I would imagine it's awkward for some people to have the best player's dad

on staff.

That's just a reality.

And, like, let me tell you, when this happened,

the secondary wave of texts and calls to my phone was: Is Rick Brunson coming back?

What are they going to do with Rick Brunson?

I don't know the answer to that question.

It's a tough conversation with Jalen, one way or another.

But I think beyond that,

I think there's just a sense of

this roster is really, really good.

It wasn't good enough this year.

We think maybe with some

different voice, that's the phrase everybody always uses, a new voice.

Tibbs can't change his voice.

He's always going to talk like this.

We have more than enough to win.

Different voice, different imagination

that maybe the ceiling can budge just enough higher to get you to a finals level, to a puncher's chance against OKC level.

Is that true?

Well, we're about to find out.

And there's no, by the way, there's no denying that Tibbs is a very, very good NBA coach.

That's the risk here.

Tibbs is like, it's unassailable.

If you want to win a lot of basketball games, hire Tom Thibodeau as your coach.

Has he made the finals as a head coach?

No.

Has he won a championship as a head coach?

No.

Would life be different if Derrick Rose didn't get injured?

Maybe, but, you know, we don't need to revisit that whole thing.

There's no denying that.

And the risk here is:

I don't know who they're going to hire.

All the names have already been thrown out there.

I don't know how many of them are realistic, not realistic.

It's a little early and it's a little fresh.

The risk here is chaos.

Like, we have seen teams move on from coaches who get you to here and

go up.

That's the Steve Kerr, Larry Brown.

There's a model for that.

We've also seen teams move on from coaches who get you here.

and you go down to here and then you're just here hovering in mediocrity for like 10 years and eight coaches.

And you wake up and you're like, What the hell just happened to our franchise?

That's the risk.

But, you know, I don't think it's like

wrong for the Knicks to conclude we just

were not, we might go a little bit down if we make a mistake with this hire, but we need to risk it for the chance that we go up a level.

And we don't think Tibbs is the guy to take us up a level.

Why would they think that?

Number one, I really think

going to Landry Shamett and Delon Wright late in the Pacer series when their backs were against the wall, I think that was a big deal.

Now, you can spin it as like, well, he adjusted.

He brought these guys in.

My guess is internally it was regarded as too little, too late.

Why did we have to reach a crisis point for you to play the bench?

One of the reasons that Tibbs is an elite floor raiser and regular season wins machine is he plays his best players tons of minutes.

We don't need to to litigate the minutes issue.

I don't really think it's arguable that

he plays the starters too many minutes.

It just is, it's a thing.

It's real.

I'm sorry, coach, but it's just too many minutes.

And I keep harping on that game against Charlotte in December, which they won by 24 points.

And Tibbs played Mikhail Bridges the first 46 minutes and 30 seconds of the game consecutively.

I'm sorry.

You can't do it.

You can't do it.

And it's not even just because of the minutes load.

Forget the minutes load.

Mikhail Bridges is an Iron Man.

He's very proud of being an Ironman.

You can't do it because you need to arrive at the playoffs knowing that guys 7 to 11 on the roster in the right matchups can give me 13 minutes.

Like, I need to know that Landry Shamett and Delon Wright can give me 14 minutes against the Pacers.

And for the Knicks, who are going to be pressing up against the second apron, may be able to duck it this offseason.

By the way, it's a big reason that trading towns for Durant, for instance, is very, very difficult.

If it's two second apron teams, it's damn near impossible.

And maybe

they will have an easier time ducking at the next season, but they need Tyler Kolick and Pascal Mdadier and guys like Huck Porty.

They need

one of those guys, two of those guys, to arrive at next April with a track record just big enough to be like, that guy can give us 13 minutes in a playoff series.

And I think they justifiably are like, we don't know if we're going to get that if we stick with this coach.

The other thing is the offense.

And it's funny because Tibbs

has been sort of pigeonholed as a defensive coach.

And

he revolutionized NBA defenses with the scheme that he deployed in Boston for their championship run in 2008.

You look at the numbers, his teams have always been really good offensive teams.

And that's what gets Thibodeau's allies within the league upset when he gets criticized for being uncreative, predictable, slow, whatever on offense, and then gets fired is because they look at the numbers and they say, look, this offense, Minnesota, ranked number seven.

The Bulls were like top 10 three times a row.

The Knicks were top 10 this year.

And

that's very fair.

Like,

Tibbs is

the numbers are what they are.

And it was funny, a month or two into this season.

When I was not working at all, I mean, I was watching games and talking to people, but I had no outlet to say or write anything.

I thought about like, this is an interesting start for a Tibbs team because the classic Tibbs offense is just a battering ram of efficiency.

It doesn't ever look pretty.

It doesn't ever look fast.

It doesn't ever like confuse defenses with crazy play calling or quick adjustments.

It's offensive rebounding, free throws, slow pace, lots of isolation, which results in low turnovers.

And all of that turns into efficiency, just a battering ram of simple, straight down the middle, pounding toward efficiency.

And early in the season, I was curious because when you play cat at the five, you lose some of that.

You lose the just interior, just pound, pound, pound, offensive glass, pound, pound, pound, all of that.

You become more of a five-out team.

And early in the season, I was like, good for Tibbs.

There's like some adaptation here.

Towns was sort of lifted up and used as a passer, and Ananobian Bridges were getting these

cutting baskets off cuts.

And Brunson was an off-ball screener now and then.

And,

you know, they just sort of looked like a non-Tibbs offense in some ways.

And they were producing at a good level.

And then, and in the end, they still ended up looking like a Tibbs offense to wit, fourth in free throw rate, ninth in offensive rebounding rate, seventh lowest turnover rate, 27th in three-point rate.

So despite how how it looked, they still sort of profiled in the end as a Tibbsy offensive team.

And

I think the Knicks just said there's a ceiling on that.

We need to be more creative.

We need to be faster.

We need to be more unpredictable.

There's an idea that they need maybe to play true five-out lineups more.

In other words, if Kat's at center, can we have

everyone else on the team be a three-point threat so that teams can't put their centers on Josh Hart?

If that's Miles O'Bright, if it's Landry Shamett, if it's Player X that we sign with the taxpayer baby mid-level exception, can we get to that lineup?

And look, every team wants that lineup type.

It's really hard to build a five-out offensive lineup that does not suck on defense.

It's why the Pacers are in the finals.

They built that kind of lineup.

Who are you going to hide your center on in that lineup?

Aaron Neesmith, he'll run around and make 40% of his threes.

Andrew Nemhart, good luck.

He's a very creative player.

The Celtics won the championship with that kind of lineup.

Five out, good on defense.

Very hard to build.

Maybe the Knicks had the personnel in-house to at least try it for a few minutes here, a few minutes there.

I never thought it was realistic that Tibbs was suddenly going to cut Josh Hart's minutes to 18 minutes a game.

He's been the heart and soul of the team for two years.

I didn't hear a lot of Knicks fans clamoring for less Josh Hart until like two weeks ago.

Certainly not in last year's playoff run where everybody loved the team.

I think, just as another example, like one of the fun things about Robinson coming into the starting five and being a role man, like a hard roll man, screen dive, which Kat doesn't do all that often.

And I think could do more in those five out lineups if we ever see them.

It's effective.

Is that it kind of unlocked Bridges as more of a secondary ball handler.

When you have a real role man and Bridges coming off screens on the left wing with that role man, all of a sudden it was like, this is why we traded for Mikhail Bridges.

And that's the thing about this is like the hints were there.

The hints of a more creative, more diverse, higher ceiling offense, you'd see them.

They were there.

They were there at the beginning of the season.

They were there in the playoffs, but they were just hints.

And I think the Knicks decided we can't have it be hints.

It's got to be something that's baked into the DNA of our team, despite the fact that our point guard plays a ball-pounding, ISO-heavy style, despite that, um, and Tibbs got Brunson moving off the ball a little bit in the playoffs and all that.

We, it can't be baked in, it's gotta, it's, it can't be hints, it's gotta be baked in, it's gotta be in our DNA, and Tibbs isn't the guy to do that.

We need a new guy to do that, and I honestly, like,

I think that's fair.

Um,

I think that's fair.

I will say this: A, he wins games, B,

how can I say this?

If you talk to Tibbs about all this,

you would be,

if you're a Tibbs critic,

you would be pretty goddamn surprised and impressed by his responses in this theoretical conversation.

Because here's the thing about coaches: the coaches that you all think suck and are dumb and slow to adjust, you have that conversation with them, you're going to realize real fast how out of your depth you are.

The counters that Tibbs would have to all of this shit that I'm saying now, I would be like, oh, oh, so you actually thought about all of this and then charted it out five steps ahead and have a,

if I do that, they're going to do that.

Like these are not original ideas to this coach.

He knows more about basketball than I will ever know.

He forgot more about basketball today than I will ever know.

So just remember when you are levying all of these, like, well, I wish they would do this.

I wish they would do that.

He's thought a lot about it.

That said,

I think stubbornness is one of Tibbs's sort of defining traits.

And even if you see hints of it, even if he's thought about it, even if he's had staff meetings about it, you default back to what's comfortable to you.

And the Knicks have decided that defaulting back to the comfort zone is not where they want to go.

And now you got to nail the hire.

That's all.

Got to nail the hire because the pressure is going to be on.

You've said conference finals is not good enough.

You've fired

the winningest coach you've had in a gazillion years.

And you better get this hire right because

you've made a a pretty strong statement here.

And as I said before, the downside is chaos.

And

Tibbs did a good job in New York.

You can't tell me otherwise.

He did a good job.

I get the issues that they had in the end.

I get the decision even.

It's hard.

These things are hard.

It sometimes requires pain and losing the news cycle and being criticized for decisions you make if you want to try to get to the next level.

It's complicated.

And here we are.

And now we just have to see who they hire.

The Knicks, man.

Woo!

Conference finals and out.

You just wonder, game one.

Game one.

Was it Tibbs' fault that they missed all the free throws?

I'd have to go re-watch the end of game one to really see

what

coaching errors may have occurred there.

Because that game goes the other way.

Tyrese Halliburton shot blows, the wind blows it.

The leprechauns, if the Madison Square Garden had leprechauns like Boston's Arena blows a little bit to the right,

we may be in a totally different place.

Okay, let's talk about the finals.

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All right, it's time to talk NBA Finals.

Oklahoma City is a favorite.

We're going to have some Oklahoma City nostalgia coming up.

But the Pacers are in the finals.

And if I've learned one thing in the playoffs, it's don't doubt the Pacers.

The Pacers, Rick Carlisle is up there cooking up something.

One of the greatest coaches in the game.

Tyrese Halliburton, maybe one of the two or three most creative players in the game, they're cooking up something.

And if there's anyone in media who knows what they might be cooking up, it's Caitlin Cooper, who runs basketball.

She wrote a Patreon that you should subscribe to.

I'm a subscriber.

Caitlin, my daughter wore your basketball, she wrote t-shirt.

uh yesterday and has declared it already one of her favorite t-shirts and let me tell you

that's a tough inner circle to get into.

So tough, she's not above reaching into the hamper for one of her favorite t-shirts, even if it's dirty, because she doesn't want to wear any of the 45 that are sitting in her closet.

It's a tough inner circle to crack.

Caitlin, how are you doing?

That's an amazing story.

I really appreciate that on her behalf.

I've had some people tell me things about the t-shirts, but I think that's going to be my favorite one that I'm going to hold on to.

So I'm doing well.

Really excited to talk about the Pacers being in the NBA Finals.

What a time to start a Patreon the last couple of years about the Indiana Pacers, huh?

No kidding.

I got an Eastern Conference finals running my first full season this year.

Now I get to see them go even a step further.

So definitely an exciting time to be doing this independently.

So if you don't subscribe to Caitlin's Patreon, like the level of basketball knowledge is just crazy.

The breaking down of the tapes, she knows the players.

She knows the tendencies.

She knows the play types.

It's just the highest level stuff you're going to get if you want to understand like what are the Indiana Pacers actually doing on a basketball court.

If you want to discuss is Tyrese Halliburton a superstar or not, maybe

you need to go elsewhere.

But if you want to know what's actually happening in the basketball game, it's a good place to start.

So I want to ask you some granular questions.

First of all, let's zoom out.

The Pacers are huge underdogs in the series.

I picked Thunder in five.

That seems to be like a consensus pick.

Do you think they're being underestimated, or is that general premise fair to you?

I feel somewhat

out of bounds with this series to a degree because I've never prepped to see the Pacers play a playoff series against a team from the Western Conference, let alone a team that plays as weird as the Oklahoma City Thunder and a team in the Oklahoma City Thunder that didn't have Chet Holmgren for two games.

So I felt like even when I was doing my own preview, it was a lot of guesswork.

I do think after everything that I combed through, that this is by far going to be the toughest.

defensive test that they've seen because the Thunder just, they defy convention defensively in so many ways.

It's not only that they pack the paint to such a degree and they load up at the elbows and the blocks.

It's that they are helping from very odd locations at times.

They're able to get away with gambles.

Everybody knows about how much they turn opponents over in part because their help is so locked in and it's locked in in ways that not every other team does.

So for the Pacers' perspective, you can look at the numbers.

You can see that Tyrese's drives are down against Oklahoma City, that his paint touches are down, his restricted area touches are down.

The Pacers are a team that preaches one of their favorite sayings, paint to great.

So the challenges are going to be there, but I also think that there are some advantages that they'll be able to poke at in ways that maybe they didn't have to access in the prior two series, but are still accessible to them against this particular team.

Yeah, what you just said about the Thunder's defense

being a different challenge, I mean, to me, if I had to broad strokes, summarize why this is a difficult matchup for the Pacers, other than the fact that the Thunder won 68 games and are just objectively awesome,

is that the Pacers have,

I keep using the word frenzy.

They have overwhelmed the Eastern Conference with their frenzied style of play on both ends of the floor and the way they play defense informs how they play offense.

It's all part of one machine.

Um, but just the sheer

speed of their offense in the half court, the random screens, the cuts, the movement, the passing, uh, and the depth that they use to sustain that style so that no one gets tired and everybody can play at that crazy pace just overwhelms teams.

Frenzy.

And the Thunder live in the frenzy already.

They are totally fine playing that kind of style,

that kind of speed, that kind of pace, and they have the depth to match Indiana.

And so those advantages, I think, that Indiana has had against the East are kind of not there against this particular Thunder team.

But I want to drill down because you said advantages.

And

that was my challenge in prepping for this series is like, where can the Pacers poke?

And that's why I wanted to have you on because I know you're going to be ahead of me in that analysis.

You're going to have found places for the Pacers to poke.

So, my first question to you is: this:

Assuming the Thunders start

their usual starting lineup, double big, Holmgren, Hartenstein.

How do you think they match up on defense?

And if you were their coach, how would you match up on defense with particularly with the two big guys?

Who would you have them guard?

Based on what we saw in the regular season, I think it's fairly likely that you might see Hartenstein cross-matched onto Siakam.

They've seemed like they want to put the more switchable defender onto Miles Turner.

And to be honest, like if I was the coach of the Thunder, I would probably be leaning more heavily on just going with home grin at single big.

And I think that they'll lean heavily on lineups with no bigs against the Pacers because I think that's probably going to be their more advantageous start.

But a lot of times, Miles has been guarded by Jalen Williams.

He's been guarded by Kendrick Williams because they've just liked the ability to switch and be pushing him into that three to 10 foot area.

I've talked about it.

Miles, as good as he's been as a shooter this year, he's shooting a career worse from that particular range.

And the Thunder do have a lot of physical guards who are able to push him up a little bit off the court.

And to me, if I'm the Thunder, when I'm watching some of the play types that you're talking about, where it's, you know, the Pacers get through first option, second option, third option, fourth option, and there's still nine seconds on the clock.

The Thunder were able to take away the first, second, third option.

A lot of times, a lot of those possessions were ending up in like the Miles Turner, mid-post, face-up, mid-rangers, which he's capable of making those.

But if I'm the Thunder, I feel good about that outcome.

I think most likely it'll be Lou Dore on Teres Halliburton.

He'll be doing a lot of face guarding there.

I think probably if they went smaller, you would see Kaysen Wallace on Nemhard and you'd see Shea Gildes on Neesmith is what I'm expecting.

If not, then I would probably think Hartenstein, Siakam, Holmgren Turner.

So you mentioned the cross-matching of Thunder centers on Siakam, Hartenstein, particularly on Siakam and the wings, Jalen Williams being the main one because he's the biggest on Miles Turner.

And we did see that a lot, actually, more than I had expected when I went back and watched the games.

Of course, the difference is that Chet Holmgren didn't play in those games.

If it were me,

I might start with Holmgren on Siakam and Hartenstein on Turner and just feel that out and see how many pick and pop threes is Miles Turner really going to get, really going to take and really going to make.

And I also just like the idea of

I want Chet as close to the rim as I can get him.

And Siakam, although he's going to be everywhere and have the ball a lot, including in pick and rolls as both the ball handler and the screener, is going to keep Chet closer to the center of the floor, whether it's, you know, closer to the rim.

What do you,

that's leaving aside, let's leave aside the one big, no big thing, which we're going to talk about.

Like, what do you think of that?

Am I, am I off for that on that?

Is Pascal too physical?

Is he going to back home run under the rim and shoot over him or like get his little 15-footer going?

What do you think of that matchup?

I mean, I think the thing that we've seen, like, not to drill down on the double big, but I think that we've seen with the Pacers most often is that they make space for each other a lot.

So, whichever one is guarding is Hartenstein is guarding.

I think they're just going to use that guy more predominantly as the screener and try to relocate Holmgren weak side corner as much as they could.

I mean, that was the attack point against Carl Anthony Towns and Robinson most typically.

It was get Carl Anthony Towns into action, relocate Robinson as the help defender, which

Robinson's help tendencies for the Knicks weren't at the same quality as the Thunders are.

And I think that another good point with the Thunder is

it's not often that they're only relying on Holmgren as the rim protector.

Like they have democratic rim protection.

Like you can't even just relocate one guy.

A lot of times it is multiple people.

And I think that's

including their guards, by the way.

Like even including Shay will throw himself at the rim and make a nuisance of himself.

Okay,

the one big, two bigs, no big thing.

I think you hit it.

I mentioned it on Monday with Goldsbury in my sort of longer preview.

Look, the Thunder are great in any alignment that they use.

To me, given the way the Pacers play with five-out spacing and speed,

this is tailor-made for them to go one big.

And we will see no bigs for, I think, more than we've seen in every playoff series.

Wouldn't even surprise me if we got to a point fairly quickly where they start Caruso over Hartenstein or start Wallace over Hartenstein or something like that.

Let's say we get to that.

Let's just posit that we get to the point where they're playing 75% or more of the game with one big on the floor.

You said the word advantages.

Where can the Pacers poke at the Thunder defense in that alignment?

What are you, the biggest puzzle to solve in the NBA is how to score enough against the Thunder?

How can the Pacers score enough against the Thunder?

Where are they going to look?

Given how many corner threes that the Thunder give up, the highest frequency in the NBA and how willing they are to help off of the corner, the Pacers top 10 at the NBA and throwing passes to the corners per 100 possessions, Tyrese is very underrated at reading the weak side corner with the skip pass, especially against scram rotations.

And something I've been working around in my head is, is, you know, if it's miles and they're willing to, there's a cross match there and they're doing a lot of switching, how much would the Thunder really need to scram that?

So

slow down.

Tell people what you mean by scram switch.

I know what you mean, but explain what you mean by a scram switch.

So let's envision that Holmgren's guarding Pascal Siakam in the weak side corner and Miles Turner goes and screens for Tyrese Halliburton and Lou Dort is guarding Tyrese Halliburton.

So Lou Dort would then switch.

onto Miles Turner as he's rolling toward the basket.

A lot of times teams, when that roller is being defended by a smaller defender, will off-ball switch with Holmgren jumping onto the screener with Dort then being kicked out to the corner.

So it's an off-ball switch to resolve the mismatch that's being created.

My question is, based on what I've seen and how comfortable they've been for the most part with letting Miles shoot those turnaround mid-rangers, is would they actually scram it?

depending upon who the switch is against.

I'm leaning towards no, but my initial thought was Tyrese is so good at beating the timing of those.

I've literally seen him beat the timing of a scram switch from one corner, standing in the right corner, throwing it over the top of the defense to the left corner, that that feels like an optimum place for the Pacers.

And they're also a team that plays as a team and they're very comfortable playing out of the weak side of the floor and getting those skip passes to there and letting that guy do a reattack, pass the ball on.

They love the extra pass up from the corner to the wing.

And they've been the top team in the NBA playoffs shooting from the corners.

So that's a good juxtaposition.

I think that's one.

But like I said, I'm tossing around in my head, how much would that scram actually be there for him to beat the timing from?

But that feels like the most obvious one, especially because I think a really underrated aspect of what this run has been for the Pacers is that Neesmith, Nemhard, and Siakam are top three right now, an effective field goal percentage from three among some of the higher volume shooters.

And then the person that I think offensively stands out the most, aside from that concept, is Siakam.

Like when you're really thinking about it and you look back at game five against the Knicks and the thing that bothered the Pacers a lot in that game was the face guarding from bridges against tyrese and the fact that ogiananobi as the team's strongest defender was guarding andrew nemhard and ducking under screens against andrew nemhard that's the first time all season that i had seen a team face guard tyrese and then put their strongest link against nemhard because a lot of times tyrese is very content to be like you know we can play four on four and allow Andrew Nemhard to initiate with Miles Turner.

That's what they did the whole Cavs series.

Nemhard ran more pick and roll than Tyrese did.

So given that I think that the Thunder can replicate that pretty easily against Tyrese and Nemhard, it makes me think that they're going to have to get more creative in what they're doing against Siakam, whether that's early against Hartenstein, if they do play big and if they were to cross-match that.

They've done some crazy things.

I've seen Siakam as a pick and roll ball handler against Hartenstein.

with Tyrese face guarding and pushing his guy into a ball screen with Nemhard as a stack screener.

Like I fully expect this series to get weird with little things such as that.

And if it is Chet, then they might just be using Siakam as a screener more often, similar to what they did with Mobley to try to get Chet away from the basket towards Tyrese and be attacking through that way.

So I really think Siakam is going to be a big linchpin on both of the ends of the floor, but especially offensively.

And then probably the third concept that I would look at is the Pacers have done a lot of guarding, especially with Jalen Brunson.

I've called it guarding him by forcing him to guard.

Like during the the regular season, Aaron Neesmith set two screens with Jalen Brunson guarding him.

And the last series, it was over 85 screens and six games against the New York Knicks.

So while Shea Gildis is a much better defender than Jalen Brunson, I still think there might be some merit to guarding him by forcing him to guard.

So I think you might be seeing.

a lot of guard-to-guard screening actions involving Aaron Neesmith just to make sure that Shea Gildis is actively involved in the action.

So what you're really saying is there just aren't very many good answers against the Thunder.

You just have to live with the only answers that are like semi-plausible.

And one of them is, to your point,

no matter who, if it's one big,

whoever that big is on is going to be in a lot of pick and rolls because it just bends the defense more than the other options that you have and lifts the big man away from the basket.

And maybe you get a switch, and Tyrese can do something with that switch.

The same thing with Shay.

Like, you can't really hunt Shea.

Shay's a good defender, and the Thunder have no weak links, and we all know that that's why the Thunder defense is so good.

But it's kind of like,

what else am I supposed to do?

And at the very least, I'm going to make him expend a lot of energy on defense.

A couple of things you mentioned: the threes and how well the Pacers are shooting.

The Pacers are an incredible shooting team.

I think people have kind of been slow to realize what an elite shot-making team this is.

I've mentioned it before, like by the location of their shots, they should not be this great of an offense, but they outshoot expectations from every spot on the floor.

They are an elite shooting team.

And the Thunder give up tons of threes.

And I just think, obviously, they're going to have to take and make a lot of threes to have a chance in this series.

My favorite thing you said was the scramp switching passing by Tyrese.

It's one of my favorite little niche passes in the NBA.

Tyrese is so smart that not only does he anticipate that switch from big man coming from corner, kicking out guard to the perimeter, not only does he anticipate it and pass ahead of it, he baits it so he can throw that pass ahead of the defense.

That's how smart he is.

And to your point, I'm not making that switch.

Lou Dort on Miles Turner, like you want to post up Miles Turner against a freaking brick wall?

Cool.

Go ahead and do it.

Yeah, he's got a height height advantage.

I don't care.

If Miles Turner makes so many 13-foot jump shots that I have to change my defense, then wow.

Credit to Miles Turner.

I'm not switching Caruso.

I'm not switching Kason Wallace.

I might not even switch Shay against Miles Turner.

But we'll see.

But like you said,

Rick Carlisle's got a lot of other cards in his deck.

different pick and roll setups, different staggered screens, staggered screens where the screens are 15 feet apart instead of five feet apart.

Like they're going to cook up a lot of stuff.

It's just a challenge.

Can we flip to the other side of the floor real quickly, or do you have more you want to say on this?

Well, just like a quick specific action that I think could be effective for them.

If people want to watch for it, you can watch Tyrese.

So hold up his hand with a letter C.

That's what the Pacers call it.

And like with regard to Siakam, Siakam will go up on the empty side of the floor as if he's approaching from the corner, set a touch screen.

He's one of the best in the NBA at staying lower so that he can get that switch.

If he sets that, I think that something that's really beneficial to the Pacers is they'll put Miles Turner at the top of the key.

So depending upon which big, you know, if Chet's guarding Siakam, if Chet's guarding Miles, I think this could be advantageous in either way, because then they'll enter the ball for Miles Turner from above the break to Siakam against that switch.

And I think Siakam is going to be a lot more effective than Miles at going against these post-ups.

And while the Thunder will bring somebody off that opposite corner, another thing that the pacers can do in combination with that that they'll do often is they can put Tyrese in the weak side corner, set a weak side flare, lift him from that corner.

And if that's Lou Dort and he's providing the backside help on Siakam, now he has to make a decision.

Am I going to go help Siakam or am I going to lift with Tyrese shaking up from the corner?

Like it's those types of things where I think that they're going to have to be very detail oriented in how they're removing the Democratic rim protection and how they're lifting those guys.

So I think that that's an action you'll see a lot because because it's going to be one of two things.

Either Siakam's going to set that screen and maybe Chet switches out to Andrew Nemhard as the ball handler on the empty side of the court, or Chet's guarding Miles Turner, likely with his feet outside the free throw line.

And Siakam's going to get to go out of post-up against potentially one, maybe two smaller guys.

So those types of things, I think that'll be prevalent within the Pacers offense.

See, look at that.

Look at that, people.

Caitlin, everyone listening to this, you can all show off now to your friends you're watching the game with.

When Tyrese makes a C with his hands, you can be like, so this is what's about to happen.

Here are all the counters on this play.

And your friends will be like, wow, you're a really smart basketball person.

And you don't even have to credit Caitlin.

Just pretend like you know this on your own because she gave you the knowledge.

Okay, defensively,

which is almost the end of the floor that's getting a little less attention because the Thunders defense is such a monster.

Oklahoma City's offense against Indiana's defense.

SGA pick and rolls rolls against Miles Turner's guy.

So traditional pick and rolls, bring the center up, Miles Turner's on the center.

How do you expect the Pacers to handle those?

I think that based on what I saw in the two games, it's going to be a ton of Andrew Nemhard guarding Shea more than about anybody else.

Maybe there was a dash of Ben Shepard during the regular season.

I think

I know that people think Neesmith has more length, which was certainly true against Jalen Brunson.

But the problem is I think that you need Neesmith against Jalen Williams too much, so that it is going to have to be Andrew Nemhard, and it's going to be needed to be Andrew Nemhard because he's the best on the roster at applying the full court pressure, which, at least from that standpoint, should be

a difference maker to an extent because the Thunder haven't seen the degree of ball pressure that they're about ready to see from the Indiana Pacers throughout this playoff run yet.

So I think that they'll play it somewhat traditionally.

It'll be the normal like Andrew chasing over the pick.

And if he can't get over, then it's going to be a VR switch between Miles and Andrew Nemhard.

The biggest question to me about.

Tell people what a VER switch is.

So basically, you're going over the pick.

And if Shea gets deeper than the free throw line, that's typically the trigger point.

So if he dribbles past the free throw line and Andrew isn't back in front yet, he'll veer in front of, you know, Chet Holmgren as the screener and he'll get into his legs.

And then it's called a late switch because you're not, Miles isn't.

step up switching.

He's late switching because he's going to absorb the ball coming toward him.

So that's typically how the Pacers prefer to defend those types of pick and roll actions.

And I think partially against Shea, the most interesting question, and it relates somewhat to how they guarded the Cavs, is how many defenders are guarding Shea Gilgis?

How much help are they willing to send on the drives?

Because they set a help defender on over 80% of the drives against Shea during the regular season, and he still averaged 31 and 8 on over 70% true shooting against the Indiana Pacers.

So,

the interesting aspect of that is like they almost completely removed the help against Donovan Mitchell against the Cavs.

And the Cavs have a ton of off-ball cutting and screening motion around the pick and roll.

And I think what the Pacers decided going into that series is we're going to change the types of threes they are going to get and we are going to remove the natural kick out and passing avenues because we don't trust Donovan Mitchell's passing creativity.

So they funneled a ton of usage to him.

They had the lowest closeout rate relative to the 30th ranked team in the regular season, the lowest help rate on drives relative to the 30th ranked team in the regular season, and funneled a ton of usage, hoped that he would run out of gas and involve him in the action in a ton.

It was relatively the same thing against Jalen Brunson, with the exception of Andrew Nemhart just being absolutely awesome in game six, and the fact that they helped off Josh Hart a lot.

Siakam will be guarding Lou Dort, and Siakam will be roaming off of Lou Dort a lot because that's his most natural role on defense.

So I expect to see that.

But I think the biggest question for the Pacers is which one of those pathways do they want to take?

Do they want to keep sending that degree of help despite the fact that Shay still scored over 30 with them doing it?

Or do they want to be like, hey, you might score 40, but we're going to take away everything else.

And we're also going to involve you in a ton of actions at the other end of the floor and hope that they can make that same relative gamble against Donovan Mitchell with the knowledge that Shay is a much more dynamic driver and also is going to be a bigger player for Andrew Nemhard to have to wrangle with.

I think that's the most fascinating thing about what they're going to be doing defensively: is how many people, even more so than who it's the volume of defenders that he's going to see.

That's really interesting because the sort of,

I think, the

most common way or not strategy, but if Oklahoma City loses,

the strategy is often, well, you know, we saw it against Dallas in last year's playoffs, Denver Series this year's playoffs is take away Shay's pick and roll game, whether it's through zone or extra help or whatever, and just bet against their three-point shooters.

And if you can, and they're only shooting 33.5% from three in the playoffs, despite getting hot against Minnesota, and just sort of bet that Chet misses a lot of threes and Caruso misses threes and Dort misses threes.

And what you're positing is almost the opposite of that, which is just

make Shay do everything and take away their rhythm and see what happens.

That's really interesting and not necessarily intuitive to to me but it's but it's interesting and obviously you can mix you can do both in the course of a game and sort of try to keep them off balance but that's that's a really interesting thought

yeah because that that was exactly i didn't expect them to do that against cleveland because it's not what they did against cleveland during the regular season either

cleveland's a great shooting team and they set a ton of nail help towards mitchell and garland in the two regular season games and the calves love when the defender from the wing goes over to the nail that they'll do those slide cuts.

The player from the corner goes to the dunker.

The player at the wing slides into the corner and it makes it very hard on that nail defender to chase back out.

The Pacers are basically like, we're going to take away that lyricism.

And that's what they did.

Now, obviously, Oklahoma City's offense is different than Cleveland's, but

I will be very curious to see how they start that off and what it looks like.

But I do think to your point when you said that about zone, it's possible that the Pacers might mix in.

a little bit of zone.

They have not done that much during the playoffs, but in the one game against OKC, they did.

And they'll likely put Tyrese at the bottom.

And the one thing that benefits them there is, is if Tyrese is at the bottom of his own, the Thunder love running inverted actions and guard screens.

They run more guard screens than anybody in the NBA.

That was an issue for the Pacers against the Bucs.

The AJ Green inverted for Giannis was like nightmare fuel for them for a lot of games.

And if Tyrese is guarding, I can't believe we're.

I can't believe we're talking about AJ Green screening for Yannis.

I mean, it was that the Bucs dating to Malcolm Brogdon and Pat Conaton have done this, like Giannis getting a flat screen from a shooter is like a major, major problem.

But you're right that the Thunder are the best in the league and the most experienced in the league at guard-guard screens, whether it's, you know, it's going to be a way they hunt Halliburton, obviously, and they could do it with, you know, Shea screening for Halliburton's guy, either way.

But your point is, I guess, that the zone sort of takes that out of the game plan.

Right, because they had back-to-back possessions in the game in March toward the end of the third quarter where it was either Jarrett Walker or Pascal Siakam as the on-ball defender with Tyrese as the screener defender and just that guy leaking out.

A lot of times they want to use Tyrese with the show, and then

he doesn't get back in time to the player leaking out.

The player at the corner then has to lift up and help, and then they're giving up corner threes.

So they had issues with that against Milwaukee.

And yeah, so if you can run some zone, not only to disrupt.

Shea, hopefully, the Thunder saw more zone during the regular season than any team.

They've seen more zone during the playoffs than any team.

You're also getting the dual benefit of Tyrese isn't being hunted as much because he's playing at the bottom.

And in the one game against OKC, they didn't even just play zone.

They played zone and then Tyrese matched up on a

flash to the high paint and they went man mid-possession.

And then they started switching after that.

And I've seen a lot of NBA teams.

That's like the biggest trend I've noticed across the NBA this year is mixed defenses.

Teams starting out in zone and then having a trigger point, whether that's the trigger being a high post touch, whether it's the ball going to a certain side of the floor, maybe it's one or two passes, but teams are looking for an advantage of confusion.

Like, how can we disrupt that offense?

So, we'll see if they're willing to go to some of that too.

Obviously, the two prior opponents, Denver, went to it a ton, and Minnesota mixed it in some.

Listen, people, you're ready for the finals now.

You know, I did a big preview with Kurt Goldsberry the other day.

You can listen to that.

Caitlin Cooper has got you set up for everything that Indiana is going to try to do to narrow the gap.

How much fun are you having, by the way?

What a blast this team is.

When did you sense that

maybe there's something here?

Like, when did you start to believe that this team could get this far?

There was probably three inflection points when Andrew Nemhard was off the minutes restriction and he was looking like an all-NBA caliber defender and was definitely the spearhead of the transformation that they made on that end of the floor, along with, you know, not as many turnovers, Siakam really coming into his own and finding a role.

There was a lot of factors, but that was number one, because I always thought that the offense would get back to being the offense once Tyrese was back to being himself.

There was always the question of could they make a big enough leap defensively?

And they did, which deserves credit to the coaching staff, deserves credit to a lot of players making individual defensive strides.

But then I think the two-game stretch when they got the win over Cleveland and snapped their win streak in the second half, and they were doing it with really extensive ball pressure.

turning the Cavs over in the back court and doing that against a very, very good basketball team.

I was like, this is something.

And then when they went into Boston and Tyrese tied his career high for points in the paint, and he was being a lot more persistent as a driver, albeit against the Boston defense that prefers to run people off the line.

But to see him do that without stopping himself, things were all coalescing at once.

And then obviously, like Aaron Neesmith's made a lot of strides over the back end of the season since his ankle injury as well, which probably deserve more words and talking than even I've given him, despite the fact that I've written about him.

But yeah, I think that all three of those things, and then the fact that they had their own version of March Madness with game winner after game winner after game winner, and they kept finding a way to win games and they kept finding a way to do it in a different way.

That was very meaningful to me as well.

And they've continued pulling off some of those miracles in this playoff run as well.

So definitely the funnest season that I've had covering the Pacers in the 10 years that I've done it.

Yeah, the

Tyrese paint thing is super interesting.

And Bill and I went live after their game four win against the Knicks.

And that's what really impressed me about that performance from him.

And obviously, it was like, what was it, a 30-15 kind of game?

It was a crazy game, but it was the Knicks, like many teams do, saying, we're going to make you play like Chris Paul.

We're going to make you play slower, go over screens, meander into the paint with a guy on your hip.

We know you don't want to do that.

We know you want to get the machine moving.

And he took what they were giving him and played like Chris Paul and made mid-range shots, layups, like that.

When he is able to mix in every part of his game, even against his nature, that's when you get the A-plus Halliburton games.

And obviously they're going to need minimum two A plus Halliburton games to have any shot in this series.

Caitlin Cooper, the Patreon is basketball.

She wrote, you can subscribe.

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I also have the jump passes are good t-shirt, which is, which gets a lot of questions around the neighborhood.

Just yesterday, I went to pick up my daughter's friend for the swim team carpool.

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And I was like, how much time you have?

Do you really want to know the answer to this question and why this shirt exists?

Caitlin cooper thank you for your insight you make all of us smarter and uh we'll talk soon thanks so much for having me

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Charlie Sheen is an icon of decadence.

I lit the fuse and my life turns into everything it wasn't supposed to be.

He's going the distance.

He was the highest paid TV star of all time.

When it started to change, it was quick.

He kept saying, no, no, no, I'm in the hospital now, but next week I'll be ready for the show.

Now, Charlie's sober.

He's going to tell you the truth.

How do I present this with a class?

I think we're past that, Charlie.

We're past that, yeah.

Somebody call action.

AKA Charlie Sheen, only on Netflix, September 10th.

All right, we've got some downtime until the final starts, and

it's been a long journey for the Oklahoma City Thunder to get back to the finals after 13 years away.

And I thought it would be fun to, I'm calling it Oklahoma City Royalty Alumni.

Get a few of them on the pod.

Jeff Green, you are not just a former Oklahoma City Thunder player.

You are a former Seattle Supersonic player who made the move from Seattle to Oklahoma City.

How are you doing?

I'm good.

I'm good.

And yes, I am only one of two

continue to play, that play for the Sonic.

So

holding on strong.

You and Kevin Durant, who was a childhood friend of yours.

And

in watching film of some of your key moments of your career, I had forgotten you were the inbound passer to Kevin Durant in Brooklyn, Milwaukee Game 7 for the foot foot on the line three-pointer that almost won the series.

I was.

I was a little upset that he wore a size 18,

but you live with the punches and you happy you put yourself in that position.

So

wish we won, because I think that would have been another ring on my resume.

So Seattle,

original Thunder player.

What are your memories from like knowing you're going to move to Oklahoma City?

I don't remember exactly when everybody knew that the move was going to happen.

And then uprooting your life after one year in the NBA, after, by the way, you got traded at the draft from Boston to Seattle.

So

what do you remember from that year?

It must have been a strange year.

It was,

like you said, from the jump,

getting traded at draft night for Ray Allen, going to Seattle.

And then going out of Seattle.

And shortly after,

we get a notice that the Seattle Supersonics are being bought by Clay Bennett.

But at that point, we thought we were staying in Seattle.

He didn't make it clear of any sort that we were moving to Oklahoma.

And then throughout the season, we kind of heard chirpings of us moving.

And then towards the end, it was, you know, we're leaving.

And it was kind of upsetting.

because you fall in love with the community, you fall in love with the city, everything that's a part of your first year, where you're at, you embrace it.

The city embraced us.

And it was kind of disappointing to move, but

it's a business first.

We realized that quick due to the move.

But we enjoyed the city of Seattle.

You know, they embraced us, they gave us love, even though we had a terrible season when you look back at it.

But

we love the city of Houston.

So we were a little hurt that we did have to move.

What is your favorite PJ Carlissimo story from the year and a half he coached you in the NBA?

Because that's one of the great mismatches of personality, experience coach versus super young rebuilding team.

Like, give me just a go-to.

This was what life was like under PJ.

Well, the

first sight was just like, you know, growing up, you hear about the story.

Everybody knows about the Latrello Spiral story.

And that's the first thought that goes through your mind.

It's like, like, damn, like, he got coached, choked out by a player, you know?

But off the court, he was an amazing, amazing guy.

Love drinking wine.

Some days you smelt it in the morning

on his body, but it was like, you know,

damn, he's a great guy, you know, so why must Free Royal do that?

Then you get on the court and he's very intense.

And you're like, wait, who is the guy that's, you know, who's this guy?

you know he's mf for you and but you know he pushes you know he pushes to be better, he coached us hard.

And,

you know, you, you kind of related to it after a while, being young, you just wanted to make a make a mark for yourself, wanted to be loved by everybody, and uh, you wanted to do whatever it took to get on the floor.

So, uh, we embraced this hard coaching and, you know, we kind of rolled with the punches of, you know, the way that he spoke to us and the way that he got us to go play.

You move to Oklahoma City.

Russ joins the team.

Ibaka joins the team.

And you grow up up as part of this young core.

Now, you get traded out of it.

We'll get there.

And then you play with James and KD again in Brooklyn, and you've moved around a lot, obviously.

Like

those formative years, you guys go, some of you go through the move to Oklahoma City.

You go through a coach getting fired and Scott Brooks coming in.

You go through the growth process from bad team to good team real fast.

How close are you all now?

Like, who are you still close with from those days?

Because that's a special experience, even though you got sort of ejected out of it earlier than you probably wanted to.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, we all wanted to just grow our careers together, obviously.

But like I said, business is part of the game.

And I'm close with pretty much all of them.

We all have

the same relationship, but different.

If I had to put it in order, probably me and Russell are still closer because, you know,

we have, you know, kids similar age.

Our wives know each other.

You know, he came to my wedding when I got married.

He was there.

So I would say me and him kind of grew closer.

But, you know, Kevin, you know, me and him go

way back before, you know, this NBA started.

So, you know, our relationship is still strong.

Me and James is still strong being able to play with him multiple times in my career.

We still hold vibe relationships.

So I'm pretty close with everybody, but I think that's due to my personality and, you know, how I am.

So we all stay in touch in some form, whether that be when we see each other or just through text.

So

the relationships are still strong.

When you win the championship for the Nuggets a couple of years ago,

are they texted?

Like

who's the first one you hear from of those guys?

No, I heard from Kevin.

Being that he already won one,

I think, yeah, the first one to win one out of

that core of OKC.

I got her from him, heard from Russ.

I didn't hear from James, though.

But, you know,

I wasn't sure about it at that moment.

I didn't give a damn who texted me.

I was just having fun.

So,

you know, the love was definitely there.

They supported.

You know, and I was rooting for.

you know, Russell this year to win one, hopefully with Denver, due to the blood ships I still have on that team.

So, you know,

it was bittersweet that we all don't have one, but, you know, it is what it is.

Okay, let's go to your actual time in Oklahoma City.

Okay.

2010 playoffs, your first, you go from like a 20-something, 30-something win team to a 50-win team.

And you

something like that.

And you face the Lakers.

in the playoffs, like the defending champion Lakers.

You go down to ONLA, you come back and tie it at two in Oklahoma City in the first playoff games that city has seen from the Thunder.

It's Powell, it's Kobe, it's Bynum, it's Odom, it's all the old head Lakers.

What do you remember about?

That's just, I mean, I covered that playoff series, not in person, but I was watching it.

I loved it.

It was so much fun.

What do you remember just to take games three and four at home, evening up that series and like telling the Lakers, like, yeah, this is like, we're a young team.

This ain't going to be a walkover.

Like, what do you remember about those games?

That must have been so much fun.

Yeah, I remember the city.

They came out and supported, man.

That arena, I've never been in an arena so loud.

Outside of

game five in Denver,

that arena in OKC

that third year in game three and four was like loud.

rattling your brain just like i can't believe these people are in here celebrating us as hard as they are but we were one rebound away from i think pushing it to game seven and

i think it was that turning point for us to know like okay we're capable of going against the best because at that time the lakers were the they were the best that i believe it was a 1-8 uh matchup so it was it was amazing to be a part of i think it was the stepping stone of you know where we could be and how special we could be um so we we really enjoyed that matchup.

We really, you know, gave it all we had.

You mentioned one rebound away.

I watched the last few minutes of that game just to refresh my memory.

You're up 94-91 in game six in Oklahoma City as the clock is ticking down.

Russ misses some jump shots.

That happens.

And Powell gets an offensive rebound putback to put the Lakers up by one with 0.5 seconds left in the game or something crazy like that.

Maybe 1.5.

Russ misses a totally hopeless heave three at the end and i and they cut to you actually after the game is over and you got your head in your hands like this just leaning it on your hand just leaning down toward the floor you looked like legitimately distraught um do you remember like

were you as distraught as you look did you remember what that feeling was

because when you're in the moment you never think that you can lose you never think it's going to be over

and in my mind i was very confident that we can win that series.

And, like I said, when you're in a moment, you're not thinking about, oh, when if we lose this game, the game is over.

The emotions are going to go like this.

No, you don't know that feeling until that buzzer goes off and you're like, oh, wait, this is over.

And I think all those emotions and the confidence, it was kind of like a blow to the stomach.

It was like, man, like, it's really over.

And, you know, with the group that we had, I think we had a special group and we could have, you know, did some special things in the playoffs.

So for me, it was just that feeling that or of like, man, like, I can't believe this is over and not knowing where it was going to lead to, but

I was just very distraught of, you know, how it ended, one rebound and, you know, what could have been.

Kobe.

goes around hugging everybody from your team and and saying a few words to everybody.

And I think I see him hug you on the video.

Do you remember anything that he said from that moment?

I'm beyond us.

No, no, I don't.

Like, cause you're still in awe.

So for me, it was just giving my respects and, you know, I'm moving on.

Do you remember the locker room after the game?

Any memories of, you know, it's your first sort of like gut punch end of the season as a young team.

I don't know if Scotty says something, if anyone, if any of the players say something, what do you do that night after the game?

What are your memories of that?

I know we were all hurt.

We all were confident in what we were were able to do and our ability to go against the Lakers.

I think the first two games, it was kind of just like a, we're in this moment and we were kind of like in awe.

And then we kind of came back third and it was like, all right, let's just play our game.

And that's what we did.

And for it to be over, I think we were all just hurt.

We were just

mad that that moment has come where the season was over with after all the hard work we put in from the last two seasons to get to that point when in going for 22 wins to 50 plus 50 wins, I

So it was, it was definitely something that

we look back on now and like it was the missed opportunity, you know, from one rebound.

So I think we were, a lot of guys were hurt.

I'm guessing you felt individually like, well, we're going to be right back at this for a lot of years.

100%.

100%.

And then the next year, you get traded to Boston.

for perk.

And you've, I read some of your old quotes on that trade.

It was emotional for you to get taken out of that group and go to a team that was in a different state.

And you talked about how you were replacing sort of a fan favorite too, which made it a little harder for you.

But I wonder, like, who told you about the trade and

how hard was it for you?

Yeah, I remember Sam Colby.

It was the last minute of the trade deadline because we were all watching it.

We were in San Antonio about to leave for Orlando.

You know, like every team, they pushed that time back an hour because,

you know, something could happen within that last hour.

So you don't want to be on the bus, you know, be mid-air flight.

So I remember they pushed our time back to fly out to go to Orlando.

And I got the call at like

2.50.

And it was, hey, God,

you know, you know, I hate to it for me, but, you know, we're going to trade you to Boston.

And it was kind of like a shock, you know, I'm thinking that, you know, we'll never break up.

We're a family.

And, you know, I was never going to move on from OKC.

You know, I'm drafted and playing with the guy who I grew up with from the same area, five to 10 minutes apart.

So, yeah, in Kevin Durant, that storyline there.

And you grow relationships, had a relationship with Russell, James, Nick Collison,

Sephalosha,

Eric Maynor.

So we all had a tight-knit group.

And to break it up, and I was the first domino of that,

I was very, very upset, very, very upset.

But at the end of the day, I looked at it as an opportunity to grow, knowing in the situation I was going to, a young guy going to a veteran team, being able to play with some legends and, you know, Rondo.

Paul, KG, Ray Allen.

I mean,

I played with Shaq my first year

that I was there.

I was kind of shocked to be in that lock room, you know, kind of like a deer in headlights, you know, not knowing what to do, how to act

based off just who I was around and not trying to, you know, get on anybody's nerves, pretty much breaking up what they had, knowing that they lost a fan favorite, a team favorite.

So it was, I was kind of, kind of confused, kind of just, you know, lost pretty much in that situation in the first couple of months I was there.

Was it hard to watch the 2012 finals when the Thunder get there and play Miami?

Was it hard to watch that?

Were you rooting for the Thunder?

Were you,

how was that for you?

Of course, I was rooted for them.

Because obviously, when you're part of an environment, you take on the environment.

And at that time, LeBron James and the Miami Heat were enemies.

So you take on that and

not just take it on that persona.

It's, you know, these are,

they're going against some guys who I have close relationships with.

And I'm not, I'm not no hater.

Like I want them to win

because I still had that bond with them.

So I was definitely rooting for them.

With them back in the finals now,

do you still feel a connection to that city and that franchise?

Or is the sort of cold reality of the business and moving around?

And that obviously there's nobody there left player-wise.

And I mean, Collison is still there in the front office, but, but, you know, does it beat it out of you?

Or is there still some part of you that's like, this is kind of cool?

Like, are you texting Kevin and Russ about like, I can't believe they're back in the finals?

No.

No, no, no.

But I still, I mean, I talked to Sam Presti, just shout him a text of like, congratulations.

But I still root for him.

I've been, like you said, I've been on a lot of teams.

And every team that I've been to,

you know, I leave.

I believe I leave with a mark.

I believe that

I've gained relationships that will never go away.

And I still root for people.

I wish people well.

But I do have friends on the Indiana Pacers, Thomas Bryant, who's in Denver, James Johnson, who's a great friend of mine.

you know i i don't have i'm like 50 50.

i just want to see a great series

i like it 50 50.

where were you when James Harding got traded?

And who do you from from the Thunder?

From the Thunder.

And who's like the first?

In my head, you have like a group text with all the Thunder guys being like, what the hell just happened?

Where were you?

Who do you talk to?

Like, that's an all-time NBA earthquake.

Well, back then, group text wasn't in back then.

Oh, my God.

Are we that old?

I guess we are.

We kind of hate ourselves with that one.

But

I can't remember who I spoke with.

I think I was just kind of like, wow,

they really traded traded James and just six man in a year, you know, a valuable piece of what they just did, get into the finals.

Like,

how do you let something like that go?

You know, and,

but at the end of the day, you realize that it is business because it just happened to you a year before.

So it's, you know, it's like, all right, you know, let's see what he can do with his opportunity in Houston.

And

as history writes, I think he did really well.

So for him, I think it was the best move.

For okc i think you know

people say it was because of a couple million dollars that they didn't want to match uh they let him go but we'll never know the truth but you know i think it worked out for both teams

uh jeff green what are your plans for the offseason what are we going to see you back in the nba i assume we the league can't get rid of you you're bouncing around you're always everywhere every beloved teammate like i don't think i i i think people know that but not to the degree that it's that it's true like you want to stick with this, right?

Yeah, of course.

I want to play as long as I can.

The goal is to get to 20 years,

too shy.

And Houston

has been home for me for the last couple of years.

And I want to keep it that way.

And hopefully we can make something work where I can retire there, whether it be 20 or 21 years.

My wife says 20, and that's it.

So I think I have.

I think I know what that is.

So two more years, it is, you know, making it 20.

But, you know, I love the situation in Houston.

I want to keep playing.

And like you said,

I've been doing this for a while.

I hold the record for the most teammates.

You know, so, but, you know, I can't help but that a lot of guys want to be my teammate.

So, you know, it's been fun.

It's been a long journey, but, you know, I love this game.

You know, I'm still passionate about it.

I still love to work out.

I just got done working out.

So, you know, I want to keep it going until I can no more because, you know, it's only a short window when we get to play this game that we love.

Any final favorite Oklahoma City-related story, thought, restaurant, anything we didn't get that when the words Oklahoma City are said to you comes into your mind?

Otherwise, appreciate the time and the stroll down memory lane.

I mean, for me, it's every time I visit

Oklahoma City when I play, it's all about the people.

Because when I first got there, never

been to Oklahoma,

the people embraced us.

They welcomed us.

They gave us so much help throughout the city as far as getting around.

And then just to think about how the city was when I first got there compared to how it is now is night and day.

The growth of the city,

the money that people put in that city is amazing to see.

And I'm, you know, I'm proud of the city and how it's how it's grown and I'm happy for the city and how the team has played for them them to get them to this point.

So I know they're hoping for a championship.

I know they'll celebrate like no other they were to win.

And, you know,

maybe they will.

I guess we'll see.

Jeff Green, like a true, like a media member and a true fan, just wants a good finals.

Just wants a good, long, good, exciting finals.

Hey, man, I know you're busy.

It's the offseason.

You got family.

Thanks for making a little time, and I'll see you down the road.

Good luck this offseason.

I appreciate it.

Thank you.

All right.

We're going to wrap our Oklahoma City Thunder Nostalgia Tour day one with the other end of the Jeff Green Kendrick Perkins trade.

Oh my God, it's Kendrick Perkins.

I used to work with you all the time.

How you doing, big fella?

I'm all right, Zach, man.

What's going on with you?

I miss you, man.

But, you know, just working and

looking forward to these finals, man.

Two young teams.

Happy to be back in Oklahoma City.

How you feel?

I'm good, man.

I'm going to see you at the finals at some point.

I'm not sure when, but I'll see you there.

We'll say hello.

I want a big perk bear hug.

I miss my perk bear hugs.

I got you.

So you're live from Oklahoma City, and that's why I wanted to have you on.

I wanted to, you know, it's been a long and interesting path back.

to the finals for the Thunder, and I wanted to have some sort of OG Thunder people on.

Does this, does this, you know, it's a business.

You got traded out,

you left Boston, Oklahoma City, you bounced around the league, now you're in the media.

Does the business kind of beat the nostalgia out of you, or does this still mean something to you to be back in Oklahoma City where you were for your prime, a lot of your prime in the finals?

Does it mean something to you to thunder in the finals?

Oh, absolutely, Zach.

I mean, especially when, you know, from the time you step foot, you know, off the airplane,

you feel the

love.

And it brings back memories and make you realize, you know, why you missed this place and why you, you know, why I miss being here and playing in front of these fans.

They're the best fans in the world.

And, you know, just walking into that arena, you know, especially during the Western Conference Finals and just seeing one thing they have is stability, right?

And you see all the old faces.

I saw all old faces of when I was playing from, you know, Coach Mac, who was the security guard, to Ayana, who was working as Sam Presley, personal assistant to you know all these faces are still here some

you know almost 13 years later and so when you think when you look back you're like damn you know you see the kids that were babies now they all grown up and it's just like a big family union man and the love that you feel

I mean you know to be honest my wife and I was talking about shoot should we move back look at that

well I was reread I was rereading your book look at at this.

I can promote it on video, The Education of Kendrick Perkins.

I wanted to get back familiar with what you said.

And you talked about, you know, you get traded from Boston to Oklahoma City.

You've talked a lot about the emotion of that trade and,

you know, crying with KG and just how hard it was to leave those Boston guys.

And I don't want to rehash that.

We know that part.

But in the book, you talk about Oklahoma U, Oklahoma University, and how that was sort of the nickname for how the team carried itself and practiced and how that sort of surprised you, this whole Oklahoma you mindset.

So tell people what you mean by that and what it was like

entering as the old head really on a young team.

Well, I mean, Zach, and that's a great point because, you know, when I first got here, I didn't know what to expect, right?

You come from a championship team with a lot of veterans, and all of a sudden you come to this young squad that, yes, we've been watching.

And we saw them get put out the year before by Los Angeles Lakers, right?

Kobe and the Lakers.

And when I got here, I didn't know, and they were on the road.

And

at that time, before they built the new practice facility, by the way, one of the best practice facilities in the entire league.

I mean, people need to really do a tour and feature the

Oklahoma City practice facility as one-to-one.

But let me say this:

I get, I get, I arrive in Oklahoma, And when I get here, the team is on the road playing the Orlando Magic.

So they're flying home there at night.

They're off of back-to-back, right?

And so I'm thinking, usually, when you have back-to-backs, you have days, the next day is automatically off.

That's how it was in Boston.

Well, it wasn't like that in Oklahoma City, right?

They landed late from Orlando.

They took it.

L, came, they landed.

Next thing you know, I get a text, hey, practice at 11 o'clock.

And I'm like, practice?

Sure, it's not treatment, weight room.

No, it's practice.

And when I walked in, Kevin Durant was already working out on the floor, like going through a full workout, three, three coaches, you know, working them out, double-teaming, triple-teaming.

He getting to his spots.

And so I'm like, okay, maybe he's just getting his work in and getting out of here.

You know, probably, we'll probably go have a film session and a walkthrough.

Well, then I see James come on to the floor.

James Hart, he comes on, he gets his individual work in.

And they say, I know Scott Brooks, like, let's get it in, let's start a practice.

And they started going live.

Now, I was injured at the time with a strange MCL, but they started going live.

And I mean, going hard.

And this is off of back-to-back.

And I'm like, what the hell?

Like, these are the days we're supposed to have off.

Like, these are automatic off days.

And these dudes out here really going at it on the back-to-back.

So after practice, again, this is when we were practicing in the skating ring, right?

They turned the skating ring into

the first practice facility that Dougloma City Thunder ever had.

So, after practice, I go in there and have a conversation with Scott Brooks, first time meeting him face to face since the trade.

And he's like, Perk, I need you to bring that leadership.

I need you to be our anchor.

He's going over our road, this, that, another.

And he said, Let me tell you something.

I call this

Thunder Youth because these guys go hard.

It's like a college.

They don't take days off.

We work hard.

It's the atmosphere in the arena.

It was just, and everything about it was just exactly what he called it.

So then all of a sudden, the next day we got a game.

I walk into the arena and I'm blown away.

Again, I haven't played a minute.

So I walked into the arena.

I'm blown away by the energy of the arena.

And I'm just like, oh.

Damn, shit.

This is what college feels like.

Wow.

Well, you get there.

You make the conference finals in your first year there.

You lose to the Mavericks who go on to win the title.

Then you make the finals in 2012.

You

win game one at home.

Lose game two.

People may not remember.

You think Durant was fouled on that jumper to try to tie the game?

You think LeBron fouled him?

I don't know.

I know he fouled him on the baseline.

They didn't call that.

I know that.

That drive KD had on the baseline, LeBron fouled him.

I mean, did he follow him on the jumper i believe he did but we don't want to revisit that though sad what do you remember so that finals ends 4-1 miami

and there's the famous shot of russ kd and harden arms around each other shoulders on the bench kind of soaking it in everyone thinks you know this this team's gonna be back here x amount of times What do you remember about the locker room after that game or the flight back after that game?

Is there a conversation?

Is there a moment?

Like, what are your flashbulb memories of that game post-game scene?

Well,

it was more so, you know, Scott Brooks congratulating us on the wonderful season.

Derek Fisher spoke up.

I've spoke up, said a few things.

And

we were kind of like, we just got to keep building.

And we know what it takes now to get over the hump.

Like, we faced a team that was starving for a championship.

We was just happy to be there as young guys.

Well, those young guys, and they didn't expect, well, they didn't know what to expect until Miami actually, you know, made us smell like cologne.

But here's the thing: I believe, Zach,

Kevin Durant, Russ, and James they went to the Olympics right after that, right?

In 2012.

Okay, London Olympics.

They went to the Olympics in 2012.

Yep.

They went to the Olympics and they went.

That's when KD went.

KD and James.

Yeah, they're all on that team.

You're right.

They're all on that team.

And so they get back

and we're in training camp.

And I remember KD telling me, he's like, man, we're going to lose James.

And I was like, huh?

He's like, man, we're going to lose James.

He ain't going to sign this contract extension.

I'm like, I know Sam go, you you know give him the bag he earned it six man of the year like promising future keep it all together he was like man no perk is bigger than that and i'm like well what you mean he's like bro the whole time we was in the olympics everybody kept telling james that he needed his own team so i'm like word he like yeah man and james feel like he want his own team So when I hollered at James, I'm like, James, what you think?

He was like, no, I want the max.

And I was like, I think they're going to give you the max.

I think the max, I think Sam Preston made the offer him.

I think it was what, 60, 64, maybe a little high, something like that.

He's like, No, I want to be a max player.

I want to be the franchise.

And I was like, James, he's going to make sure I'm like, no, I want to be that dude.

And man, we went into training camp and he didn't sign the extension.

And then all of a sudden, next thing I know, he was traded to Houston.

And I'm like, what the hell?

Like, that quick.

but he wanted his own team all along.

And turns out he really was right.

He was that dude.

Cause when he got to Houston, he took off Zach.

He took off and up this game another level.

You get Kevin Martin and some picks, young guys back.

And I think

fans, now that so much time has passed, the next three seasons are kind of glossed over a little bit.

Injuries messed up your playoff runs in 13, 14, 15.

You didn't make the playoffs 15.

The whole team's decimated.

And then everyone kind of fast forwards from 2012 Harden trade to Clay Thompson game in 2016.

In between that are two long playoff runs.

In 2013, Russ messes up his knee.

2014, you lose to the Spurs in the conference finals in an absolutely epic series where Surge misses the first two games.

I wonder what those two

mean to you personally, and what I mean, you get traded the following year

to Cleveland, but those two seasons are, I mean, they Thunder won 60-something games the first one, 58 the next one.

Like, those are great teams, bad injury luck.

Like, could those teams have won the whole thing if they were healthy?

Well, I believe we definitely would have made it back to the finals.

But let me say this: that we could blame LeBron, D-Wade, all those other guys that won the 2012 Olympics on why the 2012, why the Thunder, the young Thunder big three were broken up because they put into James' head that he needed to be the man.

And they was right, though.

They was right.

They was right.

James did what was best for James.

But I will say this.

In those times, right, I got to see growth and I got to experience growth.

and be part of greatness,

right?

And especially when you look at Kevin Durant when Russell Westbrook went out, his MVP season, and what he was doing, how he was playing that point forward.

You know, how he was.

Slim Reaper, Slim Peak, Slim Reaper season.

Yes, yes, man.

Yes.

I mean,

it was a special moment.

I think he had like that, it was

a streak of 25 points per game type streak, I believe it was.

He was on.

I think he at one point he had like, I believe, what, 13, if I'm not mistaken.

But anyway, it was a,

zach it was one of the moments where you just seen him zone out right like he wanted that was that was the moment right there that mvp season where kevin durant wanted to put the world on notice that hey like i'm one of the best if not the best basketball player in the world like i could do it all i watched him

borderline help serge ibaka get into the all-star game right like he was making plays surge was averaging a career high at the moment.

Probably should have made the all-star game, but Kevin Durant, that growth, I was able to see him grow in certain times.

I was able to see,

you know,

somebody write an article about him, call him Mr.

Unreliable.

I believe it was in that same season, if I'm not mistaken.

It was during a Memphis playoff series where he missed a couple.

There was some stuff that you guys ended up winning that series in seven, I think.

We was down

two i believe it was

heading to memphis and we went got game six in memphis uh obviously kd and russ did they thing but reggie jackson had his moment i believe it was and then we went on to win game seven but i remember how pissed off kd was about the article because it was mr unreliable and at that moment Rudy Gay had punched him in the mouth in game one and game two and sent the message, Zach Rando, punched me in the mouth.

And all of a sudden, the response, the growth.

So, I mean, I just remember just seeing KD grow into its own

in those moments and be able to grow through adversity.

How has your job in the media complicated your relationship with those guys, particularly Kevin, who's gone at you at Twitter a few times?

I mean, it's hard.

It's hard because, you know, Zach, you can't straddle the fence, right?

And you got to call it like you see it, especially a a guy.

Oh, you know, when you're a franchise guy and you retire, they roll the red carpet out for you in the media, right?

You kind of don't even have to do too much, right?

They just give you a platform.

But when you're a role player, although I was a champion and played 14 years, I had to earn my way, right?

Especially here at ESPN.

And so I had to be real all across the board.

And I think,

you know, who I am,

a guy that's going to speak his mind, which I've been the same person that I am on TV.

I was that same guy in the locker room.

So I don't know why people get so offended, but yeah, it has hurt some feelings.

But I always say time heal wounds, you know what I mean?

So I don't get too caught up in it.

I continue to do my job because I look at it like this, Zach.

I left my basketball career.

I closed that chapter of my life and I've been locked in and focused on this career ahead of me.

So I don't even too much harp on it no more.

And I'll be like, you know, I got a saying that I got, that I picked up from my boy Marcus Spears, big swag goo.

He was like, Perk, you know how many people get mad at me on a day-to-day basis?

You know what I always say?

They'll be all right.

So that's how I just approach it.

They'll be all right.

We're just talking sports.

You talk about in your book, and you've talked about it, I think, on TV before, that you could feel

the Russ KD

connection fraying a little bit, or you could feel some.

I mean, you talk about in your book how everyone had their own crews, that they hung out with their crews more than the team itself, whatever.

Could you feel like,

did you picture it reaching a point where Kevin would actually leave the team?

No, I never saw that coming.

I didn't see that coming.

And I think, you know,

one, did him and Russ see eye to eye?

No, I mean,

they were able to coexist, right?

They had a lot of success together.

They didn't win the championship, but they won a lot of games, put up a lot of big numbers, like legacy moments together between the two of them.

But I think it was a combination of both on why Kevin Durant left.

Sam Preston was a very good friend of mine.

You know, he comes from the Spurs culture, right?

And so he falls from that tree.

He fell from that.

He falls from that tree.

And so, you know, Sam, Sam used to be kind of strict very well not kind of very very very strict on certain things you know when it came down to

certain things about having your freedom and i think that was the breaking point with kd

and once we saw him go to golden state is when we saw him be more open right that's when you saw him start like speaking his mind more he didn't have the burner account on twitter like we started to see a different version of KD, and I think that's what just wanted to open up.

So, it was a combination of him and Russ just,

you know, I guess

growing apart over time to the relationship just ended, but also was a, you know, some doing.

And I think if you ask Sam Preston this, he'll tell you as well.

Some of that fell on his shoulders.

If he had, if he had a chance to do it all over again, in that moment, would he have done things differently or been a little more um

lenient towards you know guys being able to be themselves right because he's still sam pressy to this day but i'm starting to see like this young thunder team they starting to be able to be you know be themselves right like sga j dub like we we know their personalities we know chip personality like and i think sam grew over time too and i think he learned from that kevin durant situation as well so we're playing the hits here you know kd russ the finals, all that stuff.

I'm just wondering, as we wrap it up, like, when you think about your time in Oklahoma City,

are there stories, like, are there memories?

You'll forget the hits.

Are there, is there like, I remember that random dinner I had, or that fan that said this to me, or that teammate that I'm much closer with than maybe people realize?

Like, give me some, like, sort of off-the-beaten path, what this city, what this place means to you, stories.

Well, so, I mean, it's like, it's like this, right?

it's like when you get here zach and

to oklahoma the first thing you do is go down to the memorial right of the oklahoma city bombing and when you go down there judge taylor right was the judge that was over that trial right for the oklahoma city bombing and he takes you

he takes you on this tour and he breaks it he gives you all the insight that you want to know about the trial and then at the end he sums it all up by saying and

you're gonna see why this this here brought us our city and our state together like no other right and so when you feel that togetherness when you see those shirts and everybody in the stands wearing their t-shirts and people on tv like man okay see really into it no that's really them being together that's who they are and so You know, when I think about that and I think about who is one of my closest friends and still a good friend, great friend of mine, was actually Wilson Taylor, right?

And Wilson Taylor was actually

the assistant equipment manager at the time, but he was the son to Judge Taylor.

And Wilson used to be with me all the time on the road.

Man, we used to hang out, used to come to the house, all this.

And it's crazy because now he has graduated as like the lead guy now, and now he has a whole family.

And I remember remember him as a youngster asking me questions about you know uh

accent uh asking me questions about you know what it's like and how this and just getting advice so it just seem like everything go full circle but man you know we used to my family and i we used to go to kd restaurant uh after every game go eat food over there mickey manos and you come back now mickey manos no longer exists and we like what like those are the moments so

I mean, you know, from us buying a house out here, the first, the only NBA city that I played in that we actually bought a home,

having to get a tornado shelter installed, and then leaving and signing a tornado shelter for the people who actually bought the house.

Like, that's crazy.

You know what I mean?

So, just those little things, I mean, because that's what matters.

Perk, it's great to see you.

I'll see you soon in person at the finals.

Thanks for going down memory lane with us about the Thunder.

They're back.

It's been a long, wayward journey.

They're back, and they're big favorites.

Have you said your pick on TV yet?

I assume you never know.

I'm being fair, Zach.

And let me say this.

I don't want to disrespect Indiana because they're here for a reason.

So I'm going to say Oklahoma is six.

Now, do I feel that way?

No, but I'm going to say Oklahoma is six.

I got Oklahoma winning their series.

And I'm giving Indiana two games.

I believe they're going to win two games at home just because I don't want to disrespect them in their journey of reaching the NBA Finals.

Yeah, fair enough.

I mean, they're big underdogs.

They're big underdogs because they're playing a 68-win team that's 12-4 in the playoffs with a scoring margin that's crazy.

I picked Thunder in five, so I suppose by your standards, I'm disrespecting the Pacers, but it's more that I'm respecting the Thunder.

We'll see.

Maybe the Pacers will surprise us, Perk.

If this thing is 2-2 coming back to Oklahoma City, boy, would that be fun.

It would be fun but let's see though we'll see all right perk thank you sir i'll see you soon buddy thank you

all right that's it for today's zach low show game one of the finals tomorrow buckle up i might be on bill's podcast after that show we'll see i will also do a special weekend episode between games one and two what to look for in game two who the hell knows what's going to happen with the pacers they might be down 20 with 90 seconds left to win game one enjoy the finals everybody thank you to jesse Jonathan, and Isaiah on the production side.

We'll see you shortly on the Zach Lowe Show.

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