NBA Weekend Winners & Losers | Golden State, Witcher Wemby, Coop & More

0:00 Before we bless you with another classic, a quick word from Kelshi. With Kelshi, it's pretty simple. You're trading yes or no on events like sports, movie premieres, you name it. And the price moves based on where the money goes, so it's reflecting public opinion in real time. And new users who use the promo code NODUNKS will receive an extra $ 55 when they trade $ 25. Link is in the show notes.

0:24 Trade responsibly. JD, hit the horns! Yay!

0:34 Good morning, sweet world, and welcome to the No Dunks NBA podcast. It's Monday, November 2nd, 2026.

0:41 I'm J.E. Skeets here in the Classic Factory and alongside me, as always, Tass Mellis. Podcast listeners, this is for you.

0:48 Next to him, it's my top shot hot boy, Trey Kirby.

0:52 And over yonder... making the magic happen, super producer JD. Hello. There he is. Here we are.

0:58 Shout out to the viewers and listeners joining us here on a Monday. We've got NBA weekend winners and losers on today's podcast. A whole lot to tackle from the NBA weekend, but a little bit of housekeeping before that because we had another wedgie.

1:13 What a start to this season. Wedgie number six.

1:17 In Memphis, and it was Kingsguard Daquan Plowden with the, uh, Three-point wedgie, but off the bounce, which is always fun.

1:24 Yeah.

1:25 Such a gentle lay right there as it landed in between the wedgie.

1:29 You don't see that as it lands between the rim and the backboard very often.

1:33 Not at all.

1:33 It's fantastic. Pace for 55. Have you crunched the numbers? Are you okay with that? Well, yeah.

1:38 I talked to Ricardo, who conducts our wedgie tracker.com, and he thought maybe he should swing... The average more current because what he's always done is use our entire track since we started doing this in 2014.

1:53 But more recently, there's been more wedgies.

1:56 So the number, if he goes that way, he still hasn't done that, would be even higher than the current 55 that it's on because the last few years. been steady right right okay yeah so you know what's it we're talking right now we're in the we're talking right now.

2:10 Yeah right now like as we speak here i just like to.

2:13 See i like to see a wedgie on this show every two or three days That's what I'm looking for.

2:19 Yeah. You don't need it every day. I agree. Yeah. Just, you know, keep sprinkling them in here and there. And it's sad if a week goes by and we don't have a wedding. That's right. That's a tragedy, it feels like. But yeah, you know, every couple of days is perfect. And as long as Tass is happy with the pace, I'm happy with it. Okay, good. It's solid. It's solid.

2:36 We're coming off a 74 wedgie year. That was crazy. I mean, that was nuts, but it's been hot recently.

2:41 Also on Friday night, we had a big game between these two guys when it came to our pick-em, and TAS has managed to tie it all up. In the short month of October, you were in a two-game hole. You needed two wins at the end of the week. You did it. So Trey and Tass are tied here. So the tiebreaker is tonight to decide who the loser is and who has to pay it off for the rest of the week. Yeah, it's going to be one of these lengthy payoffs that we sometimes do. So the game, I have it here. We'll show you where the Kelshi users are leaning. It's the Celtics Rockets. Okay, Boston and Houston.

3:18 The users are saying Houston.

3:20 But that's a head-to-head matchup.

3:22 We got to take into consideration the line, which is the Rockets by four and a half. And so you need the Houston Rockets, Trey, to win by five or more. Tass taking the Beantown boys.

3:33 Here we go. Trey feeling good with the Rockets winning by five and? You don't? You're shrugging? I don't know. I don't know if the Rockets just shot the cover off the ball against the Thunder. Are they going to do it twice in a row? We'll see. One of these teams will probably hit 25 threes tonight. Yeah, probably.

3:49 And I feel like the Celtics actually have a better chance of being the one to do it, but who knows? Literally, who knows? I do think it's like a lot more pressure when you're the guy that actually has to pick. You're just saying, take the opposite or whatever this fool chooses. Yeah, that's what I did again. I know you did. I know you did.

4:04 It was up to you whether or not you wanted to pick the Rockets first because I did that the last two nights. You pick first, I'll pick the opposite and see what happens. But you picked the Rockets first.

4:12 Considering the Celtics are coming off a back-to-back, it's got to hurt. For sure. But sometimes you're in the flow. You're in the good flow.

4:19 And they took care in the fourth quarter against the Magic yesterday.

4:23 Paul George.

4:24 flying high in that fourth quarter. Will he be playing tonight? He did play in both sides of a back-to-back earlier this year, so that's a good sign. Mitchell Robinson sat out yesterday to play tonight.

4:35 Oh, boy. So this should be a good game. All right, we'll decide it here.

4:39 Again, this is for October between Tass and Trey, who loses the month. Again, Trey needs the Rockets by five. Tass needs the Celtics to.

4:46 Cover that or outright win. We'll see. We will see. I had a million games to pick from because... Everybody's playing tonight. That's right. We've got a weird schedule this week. I don't think a lot of people realize. No, I didn't.

4:57 15 games on tonight. All 30 teams playing. Not a single game on tomorrow because of Election Day in America here.

5:04 Get your votes in. We have a million games tonight and then none on Tuesday.

5:07 Don't you worry. We've got something lined up for Wednesday. A special guest joining the show.

5:11 Did you say we have a full 15 on Wednesday too? No, it's 28. Okay. Easy. Relaxing night. Okay, that's looking ahead.

5:19 Let's look back. NBA weekend winners. Trey, we'll start with you. We'll do a couple rounds of winners and then eventually get to our losers.

5:25 Where do you want to go? Looking way back. A Friday night winner. Winner of the weekend for me, the Dallas Mavericks. They gave the Thunder their first loss of the season in the middle of the week last week. Followed it up with another big win on Friday, handing the Rockets their first loss of the season. in the cup it was all cooper flag and kairi irving in this one for the mavericks kairi went for 35 four rebounds and nine assists cooper 33 points nine rebounds six assists two steals and a block they were even better in the fourth quarter Kyrie had 16 points and four assists.

5:58 He basically got the Mavs back in the game, got him the lead. Cooper checks back in with four and a half minutes left, 11 points, two assists, slammed the door shut, basically just by hitting floater after floater after floater. So far this season, Flagg is shooting 94% from 10 to 16 feet. What? Hold on. 94%, man. He's missed like a handful of times. And I think 20% of his attempts are coming from three to 10 feet. So he's taken a ton of them and he's knocking them down.

6:29 Is he going to shoot nearly a hundred percent for the whole season? I doubt it, but you can tell that's one of the improvements he's made is if I can get into the mid range, into that in between game money for right now, I thought Daniel Gafford was also instrumental in this win. 18 points. seven boards, a couple of blocks in that fourth quarter. He was setting great screens. He was basically getting the men Thompson off of Cooper flag, giving Cooper just a tiny bit of an advantage to get into the rim and be able to finish more so with floaters than anything. 33 for Cooper.

6:59 You guys saw the stat. He joined LeBron as the only teenagers to average 25 points per game through their first five games of the season. Hmm. I thought pretty cherry-picked. Of course. But beautiful. Yeah, that's good cherry-picking. That's great cherry-picking. Tart, tart, delicious cherries. People are noticing the similar play styles between Cooper and LeBron, I would say. So I spent all week thinking about ways that Cooper Flagg is like LeBron.

7:23 I've got quite a few of them. All right, here we go. They were both the number one draft pick at 18 years old, had a birthday in December, turned 19, won Rookie of the Year while shooting under 30% from three. Okay. Okay. They've both scored 30 or more in a game that Kyrie Irving also scored 30 or more in a game.

7:39 They've both played for teams where Jason Kidd was a coach. LeBron on the Lakers. Jason Kidd, an assistant from 2019 to 21. Cooper Flagg for the Mavs last year. They've both played for teams that were coached by a Duke coach. LeBron with Coach K on Team USA and then Cooper with John Shire, obviously, in his one college season. Here's where it gets crazy. So eerie. They both have a two and three in their jersey number. 23 and 32. Okay. Whoa.

8:06 Flipped it, yeah. They both have 11 total letters in their first and last name, six and five. It's very much like Lincoln and Kennedy. I was hoping you were going to bring that up. Let's go further. Their first name is their nickname, LeBron and Cooper. Their shortened form of their first name is also their nickname, Bron. And you're starting to see more and more Coop. And finally, there's even a playful version of their first name nicknames.

8:33 Bron Bron and Koopa Loop. Koopa Loop. As you can see, Cooper Flagg is the new LeBron James. Okay. And he's the next American MVP. Book it right now. Wow. Wow. Maybe not this year, but you're saying. Probably not this year. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got you. But he'll be on the ballot.

8:48 Okay.

8:48 He'll be in the restaurant. Is Cooper his go-to nickname? I don't know. You don't hear Flagg as often as you hear Cooper. Yeah, I feel like I say Flagg, but either way, great stuff. Great breakdown right there. I think. You look awesome.

9:01 Yeah, the way that he is different is how he knows how to stop himself and do something within the Hesi dribble or the spin, whether it's a pass or a shot. I mean, I don't remember LeBron being able to do that. Like that, as you said, the mid range, those stats are ridiculous. He was 13 to 15 from two point land in this game overall. I mean, the Rockets couldn't stop him, but he can stop himself. You know, he's able to just stop right there and do what he's got to do. He's got the vision. I think at one point there'll be, you know, a, A quick Cooper documentary when he talks about his transition from first year to second year and how things slowed down for him.

9:40 And that's what's happening. He just stopped. He's able to spin. He just stops.

9:44 He knows either I'm just going to shoot over a guy and the Rockets throwing everybody at him or pass out.

9:49 So, yeah, he looks so, so good. And the Mavericks starting 4-2 here. Really impressive start.

9:56 And maybe are quieting those, will they trade Kyrie Irving? sort of rumors that we came into this season with a lot of people expecting like oh yeah he'll probably be traded around the trade deadline now you start to see the way they play see the impact he's having on them obviously some team success here you're like hold up maybe maybe you don't do that he's got a player option for next year so things would have to be decided but i do like the thinking right now of course like No, don't do that. Get either into the playoffs. Get into these play-in games. Get him the reps like a young LeBron eventually got. Do the same with Cooper. And Kyrie is going to help you at least help those chances to get into some postseason big

10:31 games and stuff like that.

10:33 Good start for them.

10:33 It's a good argument for what Masai Ujiri is going to do. He even grabbed the mic and introduced himself to the fans, talked to the fans pregame.

10:40 You know, there's that going on. And then, yeah, in the fourth quarter, hello. They both come up clutch and finish it off. Koopaloop. Koopaloop. Okay. Maybe a reach. Yeah. It has nothing to do with alley-oop. It's just a fun way to ride. It's just fun to say. Yeah, but I was surprised to see, I think it was like maybe on the NBA.com recap, it said, Kyrie and Koop lead Mavericks past Rockets. I was like, whoa, okay.

11:04 He's just Koop now. Yeah, I've seen the Koop more and more. Just Koop. Koop. Okay, Dallas Mavericks starting off the show here as a big winner. Where are you going?

11:12 I'm going with the Golden State Warriors. They started 0-3. They're now 4-3. Beat both LA teams this weekend. And their depth showed through. That was something that people were worried about coming into this season. But it looked bad to start the Lakers game on Friday. It looked like a Luka smash was coming that first quarter.

11:29 The pick-em game. Yeah. It was not looking good for you. No. Luka looked awesome.

11:34 I mean, he was dropping threes, dropped 21 in that first quarter. He was even dropping the keep talking gesture to Yaxel Lindenberg. Just keep it coming at me, man. And the Warriors were giving the ball away.

11:46 They had nine turnovers in that first quarter.

11:48 Nine.

11:48 That's a lot.

11:49 And the Lakers were able to score 17 in that first quarter off turnovers while the Warriors just scored 15 points overall. It was 37-15 after one. We had Walker Kessler banging out shots, two of his five blocks in that first quarter. He's coming for Wemby with that leader in blocks one day.

12:03 We'll see. We'll see if he can do it for the season.

12:06 But then Luka goes to the bench, and that's when the Warriors changed the thing in the second quarter. They started on a 13-2 run, and they tied it by half. It was all tied. They lose the first quarter by 23. They win the second quarter by 23. And the Warriors crushed the Lakers bench. And I liked what they did in other ways. I mean, the scoring was great. Anthony Melton, three splashes overall in the game. George Nyang, three splashes.

12:31 Even old Al had a splash. They won the bench 50-7. And so what a swing that was. And then the Lakers depth, which is a question, and I'm sure we'll talk more about Luka in this game. But when he goes to the bench, the Austin Reeves show of taking over in that second quarter didn't work out. And he had eight turnovers, back-to-back games of eight turnovers. And I like what they did against Walker Kessler. Nobody else scoring.

12:56 I like what they did was with Walker just being able to hit the guy. They're calling him to go smash the guy, essentially, to hit him so he doesn't have as many alley-oops. They call it a blow-up. Frank Vogel, their assistant coach, is just saying, just go blow up the play. And it helped, obviously.

13:13 You're allowed to hit.

13:14 You're allowed to hit. We'll see what happens if the refs want to call it. Yeah, the Warriors just turned this thing around. They allowed 38 in the first quarter, and then bam, bam, bam, 57 over the last three quarters, so just 19 per. And then the Steph moves on Luka, which I'm sure everyone was seeing out there.

13:30 Oh, gosh. The cross-cross behind the back. Step back, step back. Luka's on the floor.

13:37 And then the, oh, my God, I can't believe what happened reaction from Steph Curry. And I like the other one, which came a little later. The Hesi cross, which I think is, that's the Steph move where he puts it up in his hand.

13:48 Is he going to dribble it? Is he going to just go up and shoot it? And he dribbles with the cross and then behind the back three. Great stuff.

13:55 And a very tough game from Yaxel Enberg after, you know, we've been talking about him trash-talking Luka. Bad in this one. But then you go up against the Clippers on Sunday and he's got to starve because the Warriors used their depth because they sat everybody. Steph, you're sitting to rest. Jeremiah Green, you're sitting. Porzingis out.

14:12 Butler out.

14:13 Moses Moody out, who both have started light workouts.

14:18 That's something.

14:20 But then Jax Landerberg just splashing threes, looking so good to start this game.

14:23 He looked amazing in this game. He's doing it. He's going for 50. He was getting close. Yeah. Yeah. 19 in the first half.

14:31 And then the Warriors doing a good job of Continuing to swing, swing, swing, getting everybody involved. He finished with 37 as he splashed six threes. The highest rookie game total since. Steph Curry had a 40-point spot once in his rookie year for the Golden State Warriors. For 37 points, it's great stuff. But again, the depth. Brandon Williams, 17.

14:52 Danathy Melton, six threes. He had 21 points. Horford blocked a dick in this one.

14:58 Grady.

14:59 And, you know, it was surprising to see the Warriors' depth come through. Yax Landerberg, the leader of it all, even though, as I said, a Neang, three threes. Here comes D'Anthony Melton. There's too many of them right now, so they're getting the most out of their guys.

15:18 Look, man, there's a reason why we call you Money Mellis. Last week you said hold on the Warriors.

15:24 You got a hold on them.

15:24 Everybody was panic selling, myself included. You said, oh, give me it. I'll take more, if anything. And they've come through since then. Literally since then, I don't think they've lost. But the Yaxl of it all. I know they're playing the Clippers, who I believe might be the worst team in the league, but... Nah, that's the Kings.

15:39 Well, yes, I know. But... They're second worst. They're second worst. They're bad. Yaxl was incredible. Like, he was... That was.

15:47 He was embarrassing Derek Jones Jr.

15:49 Yes.

15:49 No answer. And, I mean.

15:51 okay i don't know shit about college basketball but i know this guy was not a guy that was going out there giving you 30 i think he hit it once in like 100 plus games in college that's a lot i get that in college tougher for sure but you know a guy that's going to be a top pick is probably going to have a few of those under his belt he had one and he played a million games because he's an old rookie so for him to have two now early in the year 30 plus i mean he had the 30 and now the 37 is it's mind-boggling because the He looks very comfortable with his three-point shot off the dribble. That's the scary part.

16:22 It's one thing he's doing his little bully ball, his little push shots off the glass.

16:25 That's awesome. Love to see that.

16:26 I didn't think he had this part of his game. I'm not sure many people did. The three-point shot that he's flexing right now.

16:33 He looks incredible. I mean, we're two weeks into the season. He would be the rookie of the year if they did voting after eight games. But Yaxel was at the Valkyries game on– Saturday night. What a weekend at the Chase Center. Golden State could just be a winner. Absolutely. Three courts, three different wins. They had the Cup Court on Friday. They had the Valks on Saturday. And then they had the Standard Warriors Court on Sunday. Golden State won all three of them. But Yaxl was at the championship game, Game 7. They talked to E40, and he referenced the tweet about, like, I would love to hear E40 say Yaxl Lendeborg. He said it, but he said it in, like, his normal voice. Right? You know, just, like,

17:09 his normal talking voice, not his E40 rapping voice. But I'm watching... Yaxel last night, he starts 11 for 12. He's hitting shots, and I'm going E40 mode. Yaxel, when to boot? We still need to hear him say it the real way, and he needs to do it soon because this guy's been a savior for the Warriors. You draft an older rookie because you think he's going to be able to come in and play a smart brand of basketball right away. You don't expect him to be...

17:33 your second best player, and your go-to guy when Steph goes to the bench, but they were just, I mean, they were trying to get him to 40 points. He couldn't finally do it in the fourth quarter, but super, super impressive for Yax Wendable. That's a pretty good impersonation, to be honest. I had a lot of chances. Last night, he was shooting a ton. He was making a ton of shots. Yeah.

17:53 You know, we'll all debate whether or not he should have been picked higher than 11 in this past draft when a lot of guys, including his Michigan teammates, picked higher. mainly because they're younger. I think that's a big part of it. Yaxel's 24 years old here. But the reason why you hinted there, Trey, is because he's old and the Warriors needed him desperately because they want to transition to a good couple of years for Steph Curry with anybody that can help. And this guy is, he's helping.

18:26 My big winner of the weekend, the Witcher, Wemby. Victor Weminyama back rocking a Halloween costume on Saturday night because he had a, I guess they had it off last year, so we didn't see one from Wemby. Previous years as a rook, he was, what was he in the first year?

18:42 He was Slenderman. And then he did the no face the second year. Then he had the year off.

18:48 But this year, showing up Saturday to the arena dressed as Geralt. From The Witcher, his favorite book series, which, you know, this has been turned into a show as well, but he's a big reader. One of his favorite characters, one of his favorite series here. So he got the silver wig, the cape, the swords. I mean, he dropped the cape dramatically at one point. We just have a photo on YouTube, but really into character. Um, I guess, uh, this is a character or what that hunts sort of a monsters and demons.

19:17 I don't know what he does. Uh, that's right. Okay. Is he a big character? Like, is he a giant in the book or the show? I mean, in the first season he's played by Henry Cavill. Oh, okay. You know, a big guy. Okay. Not Wemby. No, no. But yeah, he's a, it's a video game as well. So yeah, I mean, he's, yeah. He's a big guy. So how do you think he looked? Like he was pulling it off? Yeah, he looks awesome. Okay, good. He does look pretty badass here.

19:47 You think he should have been allowed to play in the wig? 100%. Yeah. Halloween night. Yeah. Halloween night. Wig dispensation. For sure.

19:55 So look, he loves Halloween too. He always balls out on Halloween and he did that on Saturday night. He had 43 points, seven boards, six blocks, and four assists as he He and his team here started to find their groove after a little sluggish start to the year, but they beat the Wolves 121-111. Fourth straight victory. Now, tough spot for many. There's no Anthony Edwards. There was no Rudy Gobert in this one. I keep forgetting Dante DiVincenzo is on the Minnesota Timberwolves, but he's obviously not playing still. And then LaMelo Ball was in early foul trouble.

20:25 That sort of really screwed up their rotations too. But Didn't really matter in the end. Wemby, 17-34, was relentless in this game with shot attempts and looking to score. He had 24 points in the first half. And this guy has a signature move now, and it's throwing the ball off the backboard to himself and just dunking it.

20:43 You had a good run, Tracy McGrady. Yeah. It's going to be Wemby's shot now. It's his. I'm so ecstatic to see this.

20:49 I've said this before, so I'm going to sound like a broken record. But literally 20-plus years ago, I'm in the free Darko comments of their blog saying... What are teams and.

20:59 Guys going to figure out? You can just use the backboard as a sixth teammate. It's six on five. You just can use it to your advantage.

21:07 Just took a guy that was 7'4, 7'5, showing up that gets around the free throw line and can just use it as a teammate.

21:12 That's just giving you a give and go, basically, where he just goes and gets it. It's wild to see. He's a monster.

21:17 Tracy seemed further out, but I guess maybe because Yaxel's just also, Yaxel. Yaxel Wendable. Wemby's also just huge. So you say it's at the free throw line. To me, it looks like he's beside the rim, you know, because he's there.

21:32 Yeah, he starts to step near the free throw line. By the time he releases it, he's like at the restricted circle. But 34 shots for Wemby. Only eight of them were threes. Yeah, that's awesome. He's setting great screens. He's scoring off pick and rolls, whether it be a dump off or a lot of times an alley oop.

21:47 He's getting so many putbacks. But more importantly, he's getting the ball at the nail all the time. It's early days still, but lowest three point rate of Victor's career to begin the season. He's taken fewer floaters. He's taken fewer long twos. He's just more at the rim. which means the guy is figuring out how to get to his spots and what places on the floor he's going to be the most efficient at. So he's going to get better offensively.

22:09 Yeah, 27% of his attempts are dunks, the highest of his career. That's where he's hanging out, and it's awesome in every single way. I thought it was just a great weekend. Also great on his 60 Minutes interview.

22:21 I haven't watched it yet, but I've seen some clips going around.

22:23 Yeah, he was asked– what do you like the most about being an American? What do you like the least? And I like this question. The most is that he doesn't feel like he's ever questioned his ambitions or never questioned.

22:34 If he wants to go for it, nobody ever questions. Oh, that's too much.

22:38 So he likes that individualized strength sort of look or opinions. While he also said, you know, everybody is a little more shallow when it comes to social conversations. Well, around the world, it's a lot more deeper when you get into one-on-one.

22:53 Yeah. think you're right. I agree with you. The other clip I saw making his rounds, like a lot of feet talk. Yeah.

23:01 He's talking about, uh, you fool, you're wearing shoes, you're ruining your feet. And I'm like, I'm looking down and I'm like, crap, I got shoes on.

23:07 Am I ruining my feet? He might be right. When was he talking about this? Yeah.

23:10 He's like, he's wearing like slides or something. And like, he starts discussing, you know, the idea of like, obviously staying in shape and how it all starts with the foot and everything's connected and all that. And he's like, he sort of has this thing, like maybe people, the way we wear shoes is like having an impact on.

23:26 Our feet. Yeah. He said he showed up to a Spurs practice barefoot. And one of the rookies was like, I didn't even know you could do that. You don't have to wear shoes if you don't want, man, strengthen your feet. Fascinating. You do anything. If you put your mind to it, he was born to run. Uh, great book. Yeah. Fantastic.

23:43 I bet he has.

23:44 I think he has probably, uh, I do want to say, uh, you'll Mello went to the bench and they needed him.

23:50 Um, But they didn't. I thought their fight level was good. They did.

23:54 They could have been waxed in this game with the way Wemby was playing on both ends.

23:57 But you're right. They were in it. They stuck around. It was awesome. Yeah, it was.

24:00 Jaden McDaniels, very solid.

24:02 Even Kaminga. He dunked on Wemby. Yes. Yeah, right at the end. That was cool. Yeah, he did. Quick jump him, kind of. Yeah, yeah. I don't think Wemby jumped at all. He didn't jump. That's unusual. Yeah, he could have blocked that, I guess. Maybe.

24:16 This was Wemby's 10th career 40-point game in the regular season. He's just the fourth player in Spurs history to reach that mark. Can you guys tell me the three other Spurs players to have reached more than 10 40-point games in the regular season? I'm going to tell you right now, one is extremely difficult.

24:37 The two are gettable. So here we go. 40-point games throughout their career. They've had 10. 10 plus. I mean, we've got more than 10 here. Tim Duncan probably got there. He didn't. Wow.

24:47 Didn't.

24:48 George Girvin. 67 times. Okay, so that was one. David Robinson. There we go.

24:53 That was the second one I thought you would get. 22 for David Robinson. The last one is so difficult. I mean, it's like.

25:02 Is this a modern man that we've watched? No. Artist Gilmore. No.

25:06 Like, I'm going to say it like this, and we are... The ultimate sickos. I'm not even sure you know who this guy is. Cause I was like, I was like, who? He was a one-time all-star and he did it when he was with Cleveland. I think he only played for Cleveland and the Spurs.

25:20 What year are we talking? What year is it? I think we're talking in the seventies. Yeah. I'm going to give it to you. Mike Mitchell. Yeah. Nope. Mike Mitchell? You did it 10 times. That's a new guy.

25:31 New guy alert. I was like, who is Mike Mitchell? I didn't think you were going to get that. So, uh, yeah, it goes, uh, George Girvin, David Robinson, Mike Mitchell, and then Wemby is there. Wemby's got one in the playoffs, too, if you want to count that.

25:43 I'm not seeing much Mike Mitchell here in the stream team. No, I'm telling you. They must have missed that one. Mike Mitchell, yeah. I guarantee my dad's going to message me. Oh, yeah, I saw Mike Mitchell score 40 in 74. Probably, probably. All right, let's do another round of weekend winners. Back to you, TK. Tyrese Maxey is my second winner of the weekend. Could have been the 76ers. They actually had a great weekend. Beat the Knicks on Friday for the second time already this season, LeBron. 20 points, nine rebounds, eight assists. His first 20-point game as a sixer, but I'm giving it to Maxie for his performance against the Hornets on Saturday night. Back-to-back for Philadelphia, no LeBron, no Embiid,

26:19 no problem. Tyrese Maxie came out in the first quarter, scored 14 points, really set the tone for Philadelphia, looking like the fastest kid alive out there. 38 on the game for Tyrese, along with four rebounds and four assists. We talked about how he's going to be in the mix for Clutch Player of the Year, currently leading the league in clutch points. total so far this season. But I think even more important, he's going to be in the MVP discussion as the year goes on because of games like this. Full strength for the Sixers, the dude's the leader. But when they're in rest mode, which they're going to be in rest mode on these back-to-backs, he goes supernova. The team is good, and he is the...

26:56 straw that stirs the drink for that team currently second in the league in total points second in the league in points per game maxi a notorious fast starter a notorious fast guy as well i couldn't believe this he's third in the league right now in two pointers Just total two-point shots made. It goes Giannis, Scottie Barnes, Tyrese Maxey, Wemby, Pascal Siakam. What's different about Maxey between those four guys?

27:20 He's like 6'3. Yeah. Nobody knows how to guard this guy. He's so fast, but he has such good body control that even if he's going 100 miles an hour down into the lane, he's able to drop in these easy teardrop floaters. Really cool to see a guy with that speed and that touch. Pretty unusual combination. He barely does moves.

27:39 to get into the lane. He just goes right by a guy. Straight line driver, straight line speed, incredible touch. It equals 30 plus points per game. 38 in the win against the Hornets. Great start to the season for Maxie.

27:50 You called him fastest boy alive. You made me think of the Incredibles. Isn't one of the kids like.

27:55 Dash? Dash! That's a good nickname. I mean, he sort of plays like that. He's got superhuman speed. Tyrese Maxie. Can't wait to see Dash Daniels in the league.

28:05 Two dashes. But he is an MVP candidate. If the Sixers continue to win that 5-1 now, yeah, he would be there. They beat the Knicks and the Hornets, as you said. You don't have LeBron and Joel Embiid, and this guy comes out and does it all. I mean, yeah, he's going to get those extra votes and the extra headlines.

28:29 He's the only player to start every game for them as Jalen Brown was up for that first one. And then he was a game time decision in that second one. And he didn't really have it going, only 16 points. But he came out there and played 38 minutes to help out. Although the Hornets should have taken care of business.

28:43 They're up seven with five minutes left. They just need one of their guards back. They're still not playing with their starting backcourt. They could have held off and then we'd be talking differently. But yeah, if they keep winning, then of course he's got to be part of the conversation.

28:57 Tyrese Maxey, a winner of the weekend. Who's your second?

29:00 I'm going with point forward Franz Wagner of the Orlando Magic because that's what he's doing. Orlando needed this when Paolo Bancaro went out. And then Jalen Suggs also goes out in France. This weekend had 11 assists and 12 assists in the two games. When he's on the floor, he assists in 38.5% of the team's buckets. That's a high percentage. That's up in Trey, Halliburton, Tatum, and Jokic territory.

29:25 And Paolo was doing that before he went down And so Franz had to step in. And Friday versus Toronto, Franz did that against the Toronto Raptors. I saw the whole team, I think, look better under Sean Sweeney's dictatorial there. He said, let's not. just plunge into the key and let's move it around a little bit. And I think it really helped out Magic 30 assists on 39 buckets.

29:46 18 threes, you know, from guys like Bain, who had his biggest one, Anthony Black, Jamal Cain, each had three.

29:55 And the Magic also have some assholes. And I think you.

29:58 Saw that on Friday and that helped. Bain, number one asshole getting into with R.J.

30:02 Barrett. Number two asshole goes to Anthony Black, also getting into with R.J. Barrett.

30:06 But they needed that. And Franz is playing a different role, I think, helped season highs for him. Twenty six points, 11 assists, as I mentioned. And they went without, or with, I should say, Scottie Barnes going for a 41 in that game. And then on Sunday, they do lose to the Boston Celtics. Um, but I, again, I liked the, the role that Franz had 12 assists for him. And he had five threes from guys like Bain and Tristan Da Silva. And then the fourth quarter though, Jason Tatum stopped Franz Wagner's offense in, in terms of him scoring, uh, Tatum did an awesome job of guarding him. Um, And Paul George had a 10-point fourth quarter. Will he play tonight against the Houston Rockets?

30:43 A big question.

30:44 Tatum goes to the line 17 times. Anthony Black goes to the line 12 times. But either way, with Paolo out, they're now 2-2. They beat the Knicks and the Raptors. They lost to the Raptors and Celtics. So I think they're finding their way a little bit more so with Franz at the point-forward position.

31:03 He's always been a good playmaker, but the build of the magic means that he's not able to kind of harness his full point forward capabilities. But with Paolo out, they need somebody to create shots, not just for themselves, which Paolo's pretty good at, but also for the other guys who are more limited as creators as well. So it'll be interesting to see how long Franz is able to put up 10 plus points or assists per game.

31:25 But it's very helpful for him to be able to kind of balance these things. Right. Cause I don't think that, I think Paolo is probably a better just go out and get a bucket guy than Franz is the Franz's quality as that at that as well. But what Franz brings is a more well-rounded approach. And so when he's out there, especially with Suggs going down, like you need a little uptick in his playmaking as well. And if he's able to do that, that's going to be huge for Orlando. Hopefully, uh, they're able to do it against some decent teams as well too. Yeah. Yeah.

31:52 Cause when he was doing it up against Jason Tatum, you could see, Oh, he's like, you know, uh, A poor man's Jason Tatum in terms of what he's doing. It's a mirror, but Tatum's just awesome.

32:03 Yeah.

32:04 All right, got some honorable mentions here for another winner of the weekend. The Wizards held the Hornets to 79 points in Friday night's NBA Cup game, a game in which I think you told us the Hornets were going to wax.

32:15 Yeah, that was dumb pick. Sometimes I do things wrong. You know, the Hornets had already beat the Wizards, so the Wizards got them back. That's going to happen, and I should have taken that into account.

32:24 AD had a good game in this one, 25 points and 13 rebounds, which the Wizard had been struggling to rebound the ball this season and even AD himself. And you're like, come on, man, where's the effort there? So you like to see those numbers. The Grizzlies have to be included in any sort of winner of the weekend talk.

32:40 They improved to 6-0. Matches their 2014-15 season for the best start in franchise history. They are the only unbeaten team left in the NBA. Now their win over the weekend came against the Kings. Otherwise, maybe we're starting the show with them. But Cam Boozer, 27 points, nine boards. Beef Stew was elite. I love this guy on this team.

33:01 He's been good.

33:02 It's like the perfect team. I mean, well, he was arguably on the perfect team in the sort of bad boy Pistons. But then if he has to go to another team, go to the old grit and grind Grizzlies. It's perfect fit for him. And then Gigi Jackson hit all five of his three-pointers. And Cam Spencer did an admirable job filling in for the starting point guard in this game with no Ty Jerome, no Scottie Pippen Jr.

33:23 He had a bunch of assists. He had 13 assists, so he was just sort of setting guys up.

33:26 Again, it's against the Kings. Kings. But the Grizzlies 6-0.

33:30 Yeah, I think the hilarious pick for MVP that I had, Mr. Acuff, also deserves some love. He was good in this game because usually he's not efficient. He'll drop 30 on you. but it'll also be on 30 shots. This one was 38 points on 25 shots, nine of 14 from three. It's got three 30-point games now, but the Grizzlies' depth was too much for this Kings team.

33:50 Not surprising. Their bench won 81 to 20. That's a lot. Yeah, it's pretty amazing. They played 15 guys, and all 15 guys scored. Even Carson Cooper. Oh, Koop. Koopaloop. The new Koopaloop. But you tell my kids, yeah, I remember Carson Cooper. He scored one point against the Sacramento Kings once in the day. My dad did, Chinaman. He knows Mike Mitchell.

34:11 Of course he does. He doesn't remember him at all. He just knows his name. Jesus.

34:15 This guy is a forgotten all-star at the very least.

34:18 Mike Mitchell. Yeah. Carson Cooper is the next Mike Mitchell. He's the first Carson in the NBA. Really? Ever. You sure? Yeah, I just searched it. Oh, okay. Wow, that's surprising to me. Yeah. Carson.

34:32 There was a, no, there was never a last name. There was Essence Carson in the WNBA.

34:37 Cheater, Carson Edwards. Oh. C-A-R-S-N. That one, yeah. Mr. Saturday Night, Carson Cooper. Does that make sense at all? Does he need a nickname? Okay.

34:48 The Brooklyn Nets, they got their first win of the season. Show them a little love there off the schneid there, and we'll get into some Pacers talk about a rough weekend.

34:56 When we get to losers.

34:57 But my winner of the weekend, my final one here after a couple honorable mentions, I'm going to give it to a normalizing NBA MVP award tracker. And here's what I mean by this. After 10 or 11 games, that thing always looks funny. We brought it up last week. It was like a bunch of Grizzlies players. It was a lot of Rockets players. It's like obviously leaning towards teams that hadn't lost yet.

35:19 And that's fine.

35:20 But now, as we sort of get up to two weeks here, it's starting to normalize. What I mean by that is Cooper Flagg.

35:25 Okay, he's in there.

35:27 He's up to number seven suddenly on the award tracker. Wemby has made his first appearance. Again, slow start. Here he is now. He's ninth on this thing. But it's the top of the MVP tracker that deserves our attention here. Luka Doncic, number one with a bullet right now. He's averaging 37.7 points per game. He absolutely embarrassed himself. the Toronto Raptors on Sunday night and the show he was putting on. Hey, the Raptors made it a little interesting at the end as the third stringers sort of brought them back and had to sub the starters back in, Redick had to do.

35:58 But anyway, he's been awesome, Luka has.

36:00 So he's won. And then Tatum is number three on the award tracker. And this is despite Tatum not really having a consistent three ball to start the season, but otherwise everything's great. He's averaging 28, six and eight for the six and one Celtics. And he closed the door on that Magic game. You said defensively, containing Franz, yes, but then offensively, Desmond Bain had a steal and a layup that cut the lead to four with about four minutes to go, and then here's what happened. Tatum scored or assisted on nine straight points for the Cs. Splashed a pull-up jumper, hit another one on the next possession, just got to his spot versus Da Silva. I mean, he challenged it, but he still got his shot, hit it.

36:41 Then he found Keita slipping a pick-and-roll up top for the layup inside, nice pass. And then finally, the dagger was a little simple assist to Paul George, who hit a three.

36:50 But it was all Tatum.

36:51 And there's a big reason why, with the team succeeding the way they are, that he's sort of top three in the MVP race.

36:57 So Luka won. Ted Jerome's still there. Still three Grizzlies in the top ten. Yeah, and Ted Jerome's not even playing right now. But, you know, they're perfect. And then Tatum. So a more normalizing thing here through two weeks. Yeah, and I'm seeing people in the stream team saying Luka can't be MVP. He plays no defense. Five steals and three charges drawn. Au contraire. You know you're playing defense when they'll throw charges drawn right at the bottom of your chyron. I think that was pretty important. But, yeah, Tatum has looked great. He had the poor first game. Uh-oh.

37:26 Celtics blowing leads again, and since then they've been nails, basically. Yep. Any other winners? A quick one for the Nuggets. Cam Johnson comes back, and they look. Good. They beat the Suns.

37:38 Christian Brown, his best three-pointing shooting game ever. He was 7-9 from three. Jamal Murray dropping 38 or 39, I should say. And Jokic can just coast. So everyone may be falling into the right order. DeMar DeRozan, you're still coming off the bench. You're still figuring things out. That guy had a three-point bench game. He's got single digits his last couple games, but that makes more sense now.

37:57 The Nuggets at 3-2. You know, a little bit of that early season worry. Going the other direction, people are still worried about Jokic maybe being past his prime and not looking right.

38:08 Well, there's one name I didn't mention on the MVP award tracker yet. Yet. We would assume we'll see him there at some point. Yeah, but starting slow. Yeah. Starting slow. Any other ones? Well, the Nets got a win. Yeah, I said that. Oh, yeah. Nice. Well, I agree with you. They did. They did. On the ABA court, too. Exactly.

38:26 Won back the championship. Yes. Pacers beat them for the championship and now the Nets have it. I can't wait for the rubber match. Yeah, okay. I didn't think about it that way.

38:36 Maybe I'm wrong, but the 17 on Michael Porter Jr. 's back looks weird. Is it because it's ABA or it's because it's 17 on Michael Porter Jr.

38:44 's back? You mean on the ABA jerseys? Yeah. Those are chunky numbers. They're big. It must be that. They're big, yeah. Their standard jerseys are very slim. Yeah. The ones that are for sure. Yeah, yeah. 17.

38:56 That doesn't seem right as a basketball number. Kind of, sort of. But I guess, yeah, I guess it's probably the font. Either way, they win. Good for them.

39:04 Good for them. Oh, I'll also give a winner cup courts. They're looking good, right? No. Yeah, not at all. I thought they looked awesome. Some of them looked, I didn't think the Raptors. Not too busy. I didn't think the Raptors looked that bad, actually. Yeah, I like. In person, it looked better. I like the neutral colors of the main court, which there was lots of those. Yeah. Those look good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like the Raptors ones. But then. Then, yeah, you get a six or seven. I'm with you. They all look good. good. The Mavs, they were on the blue one, weren't they? Yes. Did I have that right? Yeah, yeah.

39:35 A lot of color. They're bright. They're bright, and they got the weird font, that obsession font. Yep. You can't read it? No, not really. It's not facing the way of the broadcast? No. They threw a few more words on there down in the bottom. What did it say? 30 teams, 8 advance... one winner or something like that.

39:52 Yeah.

39:52 Yeah.

39:53 Just so you know, the cup trophy does look cool. I don't mind the look of that and how that's incorporated.

40:00 Sure. Personally. Yeah, well, I'm a big Cup Court guy, so I thought they looked so, so good.

40:05 Okay.

40:05 Every single one of them, especially the yellows. Okay. I don't think they looked weird at all. They looked great. All right, let's go to NBA weekend losers. Trey, where are you starting? I got to give a loser to the Indiana Pacers. Tass was right about the Golden State Warriors, but I was wrong about Indiana by hold cell. I said hold the Pacers while they deal with these injuries.

40:26 I'm changing my recommendation. to a minor sell because I did not like what I saw from the Pacers over the weekend. Smashed on Friday by the Heat. Giannis went for 31 points, 18 rebounds, 10 assists. In the blowout, Indiana allowed 64 points in the paint. It's going to happen. Giannis and Bam, they're figuring out how to play together.

40:44 They were both in the lane like crazy. Klay Thompson caught fire. Whatever. Sunday was way more concerning. Losing the ABA championship. To the Brooklyn Nets, I thought it was a similar story. They were outscored in the paint. They were out-rebounded, only this time it felt like they were being pushed around by De'Ron Sharp and Mo Wagner. Not quite the same as Giannis and Bam. It just feels like this Indiana team, as currently constructed, not much toughness, not much physicality, too much finesse. Obviously, Zubats is out right now with a sprained ankle, but he's just one man.

41:16 Jay Huff, fun highlights, no resistance inside. Obi Toppin's not playing right now. Same for him, though. Jairus Walker, I feel like kind of the same for him. Not much oomph inside. And Siakam, as we saw last year, he's just not really able to be a floor raiser for a team in the way he was in his Raptors days.

41:34 So I'm not selling all of my Pacers stock, but I would sell a little and want to buy some at a low cost when Tyrese Halliburton and Zubats comes back because I was just like, this team doesn't seem to have a lot they can rely on right now.

41:47 Yeah, and missing the TJ McConnell and Ben Shepard as your backup guards, that hurts too. Just the depth-wise, maybe they can get a win against the Hawks tonight because the Hawks have not been clicking.

41:59 Started 3-0, I've lost 4-5. That only win against.

42:04 My enemy, the Cleveland Cavaliers, where the Cavs just decided we weren't going to win. And there's some banged-upness going on with the Atlanta Hawks too. They're missing a Jock Landale. Jalen Johnson might not play tonight either.

42:17 He's questionable.

42:18 I think that start of his season is kind of flying under the radar. Jalen Johnson not looking great for the Atlanta Hawks either. Tiny step back. So maybe they get a win.

42:29 Yeah, the Pacers without Zubats. You needed Jay Huff and or Larry Nance to give you something. A little bit, but it is. It's bad.

42:36 Like that game, three minutes left in the third quarter. Huff and Nance had zero points in about 30 combined minutes. And then you're right. Lack of rebounding and all that. So they've struggled. They've struggled.

42:46 The Pacers.

42:47 we were very confident with the Pacers over. A lot of us were with Halliburton back and they're get back to that free flow and offense. And yeah, it's been a rough start here, but a big part, again, the injuries with no alley and then no Z there.

42:59 And there's, yeah.

42:59 And these other guys, they're, they're rolling out some interesting lineups here.

43:03 They're super banged up for sure. But I was just like, Oh, this is too many skinny guys out here right now when I'm watching them play against, uh, Basically, Mo Wagner was just running wild out there. Mo Wagner is a crazy player, though, too. Oh, my goodness, yeah. He's a wild man. You're like, somebody's going to get hurt when he's playing. Him or somebody else. I don't know who it's going to be, but the way he was just flying around was pretty crazy.

43:27 Sticking his tongue out when he was on the floor. He's got a long lizard.

43:31 Of a tongue. Gene Simmons-like. Yeah, yeah. Very Simmons-like. Crazy floor. That was a crazy floor the Pacers were playing on. Plaid in the key.

43:40 Yeah.

43:41 Sort of. Wooden plaid. Yeah. White plaid. Yellow in the midrange. They got the old school logo at center court with a silhouette of the ABA trophy in the background. That was busy. There's a lot going on. Yes. A lot going on. We got a lot of good ideas. Throw them all on. Yeah. Chuck them out there. All right.

44:00 What do you got for a loser of the weekend?

44:01 Got to say OK Seed. Unfortunately, it's in a depressed manner because another injury. Chet Holmgren out for eight to 10 weeks with patellar tendon tear that's happening. It's a small tear in the right patellar tendon for him that's undergoing a biological treatment. You don't see that very often. It's going to be some PRP, the platelet-rich plasma therapy most commonly. Most likely, you know, where they throw the blood into the centrifuge and it spins around and they separate all parts of the blood and then they try and strengthen that up because the Thunder, not only with Chet out and Jalen out and Case and Wallace out, as we've talked about, but Alex Caruso also out right now.

44:46 They're four best defenders. Yeah. His ankle, unfortunately, is hurting him. And we know the last couple seasons....

44:56 Alex Caruso has also missed a decent amount of time, missed 26 last year and 28 the year before that.

45:00 He's 32.

45:01 He's out tonight versus Cleveland. So this is just bad times for OKC. They also did some book work this weekend. They exercised their options on Jared McCain for next season and Thomas Sorber as well, who hasn't played yet. But they exercised his option for next year. So people are starting to talk. What's going to be the future of Isaiah Hartenstein? If you've got Adai Mara, Sorber, Chet, Jalen, because they're already over the second cap for next year with how their salaries break down. So maybe they got to move on. They did move on from Nikola Topic.

45:36 They did not exercise his option for next year. So all that to say they look against the Houston Rockets, and they kind of, I think, were looking at a mirror where they're like, whoa, the depth on these guys is what we thought we had because they had a quiet game from Durant, 14 points, quiet game from Ben Thompson, 8 points. Shangoon, back from injury, looked okay with 16 points, but it's the other guys who came through. Jabari Smith, 30 points. And Marcus Smart, hello, this guy coming through.

46:03 Injuries didn't do him in. He has come back and looks great. Late in his career, 24 points on 7 of 10 from 3, starting in place of Fred VanVleet, who was sitting out that game. So bad start overall for the Thunder everywhere.

46:16 Everywhere right now.

46:17 Just a could be one of these seasons from hell's season from hell for them just with these injuries and like what do you do like has it just become one of these sort of wasted season you know what I mean like or it's like I can shake carry the rest of the squad to any sort of like title consideration I don't know I don't think so missing these guys in addition to all the guys that left in the offseason I A lot of changeover for the Thunder.

46:40 Last year, you thought they were banged up with Chet missing a little time, Jalen Williams missing a bunch of time, and then being out for the playoffs along with AJ Mitchell.

46:47 This year has been even worse. Maybe Shea can carry them to a bunch of wins until they're able to get Caruso back and then eventually Chet. I guess it'll be a couple of months before he comes back, so silver lining, enough time to get healthy for the playoffs, but it does make it hard to trade a guy like Hartenstein when you need to have a big guy out there. They tried playing Mara and I heart at the same time. Didn't totally work, but the goal for the thunder has to be stay in the top six.

47:12 We can consider our options. What moves we need to make, uh, come deadline time and then hope you're actually healthy going into the playoffs, but they are going to have to figure out a different way to win. They only forced 10 turnovers against the rockets. That's a tiny number for an OKC team. That means they're not playing in transition as much. It means more on Shea's shoulders in the half court. You saw way more double teams from Houston saying, can somebody else beat us? It wasn't able to happen for the Thunder in this game. They're going to have to kind of reformulate things after basically playing the same style for, I don't know, four straight seasons at this point.

47:47 Yeah, that was my concern too that I have in my notes. They're going to have to switch it up how they get some of their points in these games because you take away all your best defensive players. You got to assume like the turnovers generated, which they have those runs that they're just scoring in transition. I mean, Jay Williams too, or J Dub, he's like, he is one of the best transition guys when they get those stops and he's screaming the other way. So he's gone for the whole season, but then, yeah, that's like a lot of points just taken off the board that now have to come in more of the half court setting.

48:13 And you're already asking Shea to do a lot and Hey, can you do even more? And you're going to need guys to hit shots, but yeah, just a brutal, you know, devastating season here to start this at least.

48:21 Yeah.

48:22 And yeah, AJ Mitchell is kind of their guy that could do it in the half court set. Um, it's a, it's a huge change for a role for him and increasing a role for him if they go that route and had a bad game against the Houston Rockets, but it has some good ones, but maybe it's a write-off of a season when you're talking about this many months without guys. Um, But at the same time, as I mentioned, with a lot of guys potentially being cut or traded, Sam Presti did say in his press conference a while ago that some teams can go into the second apron when they think we're going for it. It's basically an avenue to be able to make trades if you want to get out of it. But if you go into it, it's, hey, this is our team. And so they may do that

49:05 next year after this year is terrible. which, you know, at this point, it doesn't look good.

49:11 Tough start, but a good start. I got to give some love to Jabari Smith. This guy looks like he's leveled up, I think, this season. 19 points per game so far. that's a career high two and a half assists per game that's a career high shooting 45 from three that definitely helps everything but he looks like he's playing with more tenacity more toughness and it feels to me like he's more comfortable going and getting his own shot rather than just hanging back and waiting for somebody to kick him out a wide open corner three. He's putting the ball on the floor, scoring in the mid-range.

49:40 I've been really impressed with the way he's playing early in the season.

49:44 A few other honorable mentions for maybe loser of the weekend.

49:47 Dylan Brooks, did you see him on Friday night?

49:49 He got ejected in a loss to the Nuggets for kicking his Canadian teammate, Jamal Murray, in the groin while attempting a turnaround jumper there in the third quarter. So he was called for an offensive foul on the play. because he kicked his right leg out and he caught, again, Jamal Murray right there in the nerds. The officials reviewed the play, and then they upgraded it to a flagrant two.

50:13 Automatic ejection. Do you think that was a little too extreme? Was that because it was Dylan Brooks himself? If that's another guy, if that's Tatum, let's say, maybe it just stays as an offensive foul?

50:24 What do you think? I think so. I think it's the Dylan reputation. Yeah.

50:28 I mean, they asked Jamal Murray about it. He's like, I don't think he was doing it on purpose. He was like embellishing contact. you know, and it caught me. So then I'm like thinking, maybe if you get kicked in the nuts and they go review it, at a certain point, the officials have to come to you, the guy that took it in the Hibberts, and ask you if you want the guy thrown out of the game or not. It sounds like Jamal Murray would have been like, nah, you know, foul's fine, offensive foul's fine, let him play.

50:56 Maybe he should be a part of it. The guy like on the ground, like, you know, rolling around because he just got kicked in the nuts.

51:03 Let him ultimately decide if the players ejected from the game.

51:07 I'm just throwing it out there. Yeah. He really said, I don't think you really tried to kick me in the dick, though. He actually said that to reporters. That's pretty funny. If they had this call back in the 90s, Carl Malone would have never finished the game. Oh, he would have gone all the time. Another flagrant two for Carl Malone.

51:24 Do you think Steven Adams would have said, yeah, you should eject Draymond Green when he got kicked in the nuts?

51:29 Well, great point. No, it's fine, mate. Just my Kiwis. I'm good. It's all right, mate. The juice coming out of the Kiwis are fine.

51:38 Someone else who had a bit of a temper boy on them this weekend, our guy, Hawks guard Kingston Flemings, suspended for a game. He will not play tonight for the Hawks because on Sunday night, was it Sunday night? No, maybe it was Saturday. He intentionally elbowed Bryce McGowan's.

51:57 In the head. He sort of did it twice. He did it during play.

52:01 He sort of caught him in the head. And then going back, he was frustrated with, I think, no call or whatever. And I don't know what's being said or whatever, but he blatantly throws an elbow.

52:10 Oh, yeah.

52:10 To Bryce's head. And I don't think he really connected. I mean, thank God he didn't super connect. But anyway, he chucked an elbow.

52:18 They saw it. And he's now missing a game. Out of character for our guy Kingston, though. He was out of character. Good guy. What the hell, though? I mean, a warranted suspension of being honest. Yeah. Yeah, strange.

52:33 And then my real final, or only, I guess, loser of the weekend. I hate to do it, but Toronto Raptors. They dropped both games this weekend. Friday night to Orlando. Sunday night to the Lakers. Now, this is a great defensive team. The Raptors are still a top five defensive team. when it comes to defensive rating. But a bit of a recurring pattern here over the weekend. I'm not sure if it was a case of bad luck. Effort, attention to detail, defensive game plan, I'm not 100% sure. But Orlando shot 18-34 from three versus the Raps on Friday.

53:06 And the Lakers shot 18-37 from three on Sunday night. And again, a good defensive team in Toronto gave up 252 points this weekend to these two squads. The Raptors are not going to win games that are shootouts.

53:19 They're just not.

53:20 Like they're not going to win a lot of these games that are in the 120s, 130s type thing. It's going to have to be where it's one with defense and they just get by offensively enough, especially without no Kawhi. So, you know, again, I don't know if you're like freaking out here, Tass, after these last two games or not, but obviously need to shore up the perimeter defense a little bit here, I think.

53:42 Too many open threes. Yeah.

53:44 They're still focused on creating turnovers, which they did. The Lakers had 22 turnovers. but you're giving up some open shots. And I think that's what's happening here.

53:53 They were also turning it over themselves, Raptors, on Sunday night, at least, early in the game. They had like nine or 10 turnovers in the first quarter. Scottie was trying to make passes that just were like, I don't, they weren't there. And like Lakers, they were just like, it was like easy.

54:09 Pick sixes. Oh yeah.

54:11 Like you could just see it coming from a mile away. And then they were like, okay, I'll just jump in there and take it. So it happened a couple of times when they were just scoring transition. Um, the only good thing the Raptors did is they made a Redick and the Lakers put their starters back in. Austin Reeves had to literally get his headband back. Uh, cause they were like, they're taken out.

54:26 They're up big. And then like Bronnie comes in with the Lakers and the Raptors like rip up, rip up like a 15, no run. Suddenly it's like a game again. Yeah.

54:33 So these guys who don't play a lot got in Alan Graves. I thought, man, he could have stolen that ball. This game was pretty much over, but he, Made a mistake that you don't usually make and you're not usually playing. And I think that's what kind of happened at the beginning of the game. Speaking of guys who don't play, Trace Jackson Davis got the start because the Yak attack wasn't playing. He's got bursitis in his shoulder, Yakup Hurdle.

54:56 So maybe Scottie thought, oh, this is where Yakup should kind of be. It's not that, but it's Yakup not being there, I think, kind of messed with him. And Trace Jackson Davis, not so good.

55:07 I didn't think he was that bad. But then Darko gave up on him. And we went, they went small, like for most of the night for the rest of the game. Um, and it didn't really work. And then like the problem was the Raptors was like, okay, well now we just got a bomb away. Raptors took way too many threes. They ended up hitting 17 of them, which sounds great, but they should, they shot 54 threes on Sunday night, 37 misses. So you're not going to win these games. I just haven't, I'm starting to have a real concern about the Raptors here about, are they same as last year where they're going to be able to beat bad teams and can't beat the good teams?

55:41 That's my concern right now. But again, Kawhi, when Kawhi plays, I guess we're 2-0, but when Kawhi hasn't been there, we're more of this average team.

55:49 I'm probably getting ahead of myself.

55:53 Well, that's okay. You can rely on Kawhi to be healthy. He should be fine. Slow start for quickly. I would be a little concerned about the way this guy's playing. He's what, 35% from the field, and he's playing very tentative to me.

56:05 This guy has somehow gotten, to me, worse and worse through his NBA career. you know, it's, I mean, it's, I know that sounds harsh, but he's just not like, he's not really what the Raptors need either. And sort of sometimes a floor general taking the smart shots.

56:22 There's a play. You can see visibly where Scotty was pissed or quickly just jacked a three. Like, was he open? Yeah, I guess, but he wasn't feeling it. He took a lot. He missed a lot. Scotty, I think thought he had his guy sealed.

56:34 You know, you maybe want to hit your guy in there inside and he just threw it up and you can see Scotty sort of did like the, okay.

56:40 All right, back on defense we go. Quickly, I just find frustrating as a player. He was a great sixth man for the Knicks, and that to me feels like perhaps his ideal position where he can just go out and get some buckets, doesn't need to necessarily organize things like you would expect from your starting point guard, but they also need ball handling and somebody to shoot threes in their starting lineup, especially when Kawhi is missing time.

57:01 So tough spot for the Raptors. They need to bounce back tonight against the Clippers. Must win. Our guy Will Liu was calling it already. Oh, yeah. Kawhi Duck and the Clippers.

57:10 Yeah.

57:11 Hate to see it. Clippers, I watched them. I watched them play against the Warriors last night. They do some good things. You're like, nice. This is perfect. Two guys on the ball. You get it to the man for the short roll. He hits the guy in the corner. But then you're like, wait, the short roller is Isaiah Jackson and the guy in the corner is Derek Jones Jr.

57:27 Limited players. Fine players. Exactly. They're playing hard. They're playing well together. The talent just isn't really there. Yeah. Isaiah Jackson did some cool stuff. He was doing the highlights. Yeah.

57:37 But he should be a support player. Kobe Sanders coming off the bench. He looked good, too. Walker looks okay. But they do lack a little talent at the top end. And I guess Brandon Ingram ain't going to be there for a while.

57:51 Forgot about him. Any other losers from the NBA weekend that we skipped over? Well, with the Nets getting a win, Kings are the final winless team in the league. Yeah, they are. How long is it going to go is the real question. Okay, they play Dallas tonight. Okay, let's talk it out here. Dallas. Okay, that's tough. Yeah, on the road. Lakers, Spurs, Heat, Magic, Blazers, Thunder, Suns, Lakers, Celtics, Spurs, Warriors, Timberwolves, Pelicans.

58:21 pelicans is winnable i think.

58:22 There was a win in there you had like a batch where it was like it was before the thunder you had a couple teams there like magic maybe or something.

58:29 Heat magic blazers thunder i think a win happens within that run magic or blazers okay yeah nice first one maybe the suns november 18th the suns haven't been like the league on fire but i mean they gotta have monday november 30th circled on the calendar game 20 against the pelicans that one that's winnable But the Pellies are turning it around. And the Pelicans did beat them by 12 when they played already. Yeah.

58:53 Jeremiah Fierce starting now for DeJounte Murray's out for personal reasons, turning things around. It was a weird game against the Hawks. The Hawks shot 46 threes. The Pelicans shot 17. The Pelicans still won. Still took care of business because they were playing really hard defensively, forcing a lot of turnovers points off turnovers and all that i will throw in the jazz in there because i was also looking at their near future schedule they're one in five after losing to the blazers mark and did come back but he was cold two of 11 from three No Triple J, no Nurkic quite yet. And now at one and five, they got four road games, which don't look good. The Spurs, those hot, hot Pelicans, the Mavs and the Timberwolves even,

59:36 they could be one and nine pretty soon.

59:38 Yeah, yeah. Slow starts here for a few teams in the association. You tell us who we missed though. Winners, losers. Let us know in the stream team. Let us know in the comments, both on YouTube and Spotify. Love it. Love it. Love the night. Let's go into Luca to the dawn.

59:54 Awesome game 45 points as the Lakers beat the Raps 12 of 23 from the field 8.

1:00:01 Of 12 from deep I think his career high is 9 three-pointers made so he was knocking on.

1:00:05 The door there perfect 13 of 13 at the free throw line He added 15 rebounds, 6 assists, 5 steals, 1 block, 3 charges drawn. Really pissing off Scottie Barnes. Those two are like almost slap fighting each other at one point. And he did all this in 35 minutes. That's your early MVP front runner averaging 38 points per game.

1:00:29 Pretty good. Not bad. And yeah, man, he likes to start a game on fire.

1:00:34 That's what he does. God. It's like his first quarter stats are just like, what?

1:00:39 They're like games for most people. Mike Mitchell would be like, I love that. He does it in the first quarter.

1:00:45 It's crazy. No offense to Mike Mitchell fans out there. He was an all-star as I told you, but, uh, Yeah, what do you have, 21-5 in the first quarter against the Warriors? And I feel like he does that every four games or something. He does something like that.

1:00:54 Yeah, 21 against the Warriors in the first quarter. That was only the third loss in 18 games in which Luka has opened the night with a 20-point first quarter. So he's 15-3 when scoring 20 points.

1:01:06 Oh, pretty good. Yeah, that's really good. Sets the tone, usually. I turned that one on. I was like, oh, nice. Lakers up 20. But then I was like, wait a second. Don't I always say on podcasts, first half leads aren't real. And it was gone by halftime. First quarter leads are crazy. Yeah. Yeah.

1:01:22 Although John Schumann did a good breakdown of stats when you're up 20 or even 10 to some degree, but mostly.

1:01:27 20, that team usually wins. Yeah. But not as often as they used to. Yeah. I think he did. That's the key. He did. He did a breakdown of, uh, of the timeline, uh, It's not too bad. It's not too bad. Do it again, John. He did it. All I'm saying is do it again. Run it back, John. Run it back, John. And give us something about Mike Mitchell.

1:01:47 Remember when he finished 24th in MVP voting in 1981? 24th? 24th! So what? One person voted for him. Probably, yeah. Good for him. People forget Mike Mitchell was a problem. Hold on. Let me fix that. People forget Mike Mitchell. Us included. I mean, we had no idea. I had no idea, and I did the trivia. And I knew I was pretty confident they had no idea either. Jeez. I was going to say an alliteration name. I thought maybe that would help. But, you know. And then I was going to say, like, George Gervin again? Yeah, right, right. Good point.

1:02:19 Spent a decade in Italy. Mostly in Italy, yeah. The Mike Mitchell? Yeah, he was busy. 30 players got MVP votes in 1981. What was going on back then? I guess they didn't have League Pass. You couldn't watch the other games. Yeah, they were like, I see my guy. Yeah, he's good. He scores a lot. I'll give him a moment. Yeah, Kelvin Ranzi's having a great season. Incredible. Remember 15-7, Kelvin?

1:02:39 15th in MVP voting that year? Who could forget? Did you rhyme that on purpose? No, Kelvin Ranzi. 15-7, Kelvin. There's just names out there you never heard of. Truck Robinson. Okay, I've heard of that name. Give me some other ones. I've at least heard of him. Otis Birdsong. Heard of him. Have heard of him. The guy's last name is Birdsong.

1:02:59 Caldwell Jones. He was 30th that year. Putting up a big 7-10. Got an MVP vote. He must have been locking it down defensively. Must have been. George Johnson. Also a spur. Mike Mitchell and George Johnson got votes. No, Mitchell was on the cast. You're right. He was. He so was. James Silas, my bad, my bad. I don't know if they've been traded for us.

1:03:20 There's some guys. All right, we'll call it there. We're doing enough Mike Mitchell stats here now. Tonight, all 30 teams play. Tomorrow, all 30 teams are off. If you haven't voted, go and vote on Tuesday, election day slash night. So every team is off. And then they're basically all back again, as we said, for Wednesday. We'll have a show on Wednesday morning, though. Special guest joining us live at 10 a.m.

1:03:44 Eastern. We'll be back tomorrow. How are we going to tackle this one?

1:03:48 You know, before when this has happened, we've done like a, almost like a one thing about every game.

1:03:53 Sounds crazy. Sounds crazy. Could do that. Could draft games. Could just wait and see what happens. Hopefully it's exciting. You know, hopefully cool stuff happens. I like the one thing about every game. I sort of do too, because we don't have many chances to do it. 15 games divided by three. Perfect. Yeah. And you know, we can make it quick. Right? Right? Come on. You gotta love a...

1:04:13 I love it. Divisible number. I love it. Divisible number. Man. Fractions. All right. One thing. One thing about every game. I like that. I'm also going to talk about the Bears and Seahawks tomorrow. So they play tonight. They play tonight. Okay. NFC championship game preview, they're saying. Wow. So we're going to have 16 games to talk about tonight. I did see.

1:04:33 Was it the Bills or like the Bucks beat the Bills? Did you see this without completing a pass? What? Yeah. They won a game without completing a pass. I didn't know that. Yeah, it was like shit weather. Wow. That's crazy. Not since the days of Mike Mitchell. I think you're right. I think it was literally 74 or something like that.

1:04:54 Something like that. Wow. And then we sort of slipped it in there, but congratulations to the Valkyries. Begrudgingly beating our Atlanta Dream. Gabby Williams is probably my favorite player in the WNBA. She came through. She was awesome.

1:05:08 In a game where it's like a game seven, nobody can score type of thing. She went for 30 and like had that run there where she just bombing three.

1:05:15 Yeah. She was bad in the first half. Yeah. She apparently said, I'll break up. I'll break up. Unfortunately, the Valkyrie is a super likable. When your team loses, you would like to be able to cheer against the other team. But I was like, I know Gabby's good. I like Stokes as well. I'm with you.

1:05:34 Cool.

1:05:34 Look, obviously great support. Um, Yeah, so they got it. Then they had them there on Sunday, right? They brought them out. Big time. Yeah, they were all at the Warriors game. They had Veronica Burton on the broadcast. Yeah, that's right. She's got a future. I think she did the whole second quarter. Yeah, I think most of it at least. Yeah, she was great. Yep. All right, back tomorrow to talk.

1:05:52 About all 15 games from tonight. So enjoy all the action. Until then, Clipper Bros.

1:05:58 You heard it here first. Have a great time. Turn up. Love you guys. Awesome.

1:06:02 Thanks for joining us. And remember, Kyle Lowry is the greatest rapper of all time. And Cleveland Brown is the greatest family guy member of all time.

1:06:12 You guys are doing some great voice work today.

1:06:15 Both of you. Yes, wonderful. Praise the day, people.