Jacob, i know you just said you dont read comments often but if you read this one, its been so nice watching your videos with more frequency recently. Hopefully you and rudy are doing well and keep up the good work. Found your channel in early 2020 and didnt look back
Hot take just because a player is not playing in a game and their team is winning without them it does not mean that the player has no impact. This can mean the team is balanced and does not always need to rely on a star player which is a good thing.
Case in point: the 2021-22 Grizzlies. 20-5 record without Ja Morant that year. The Grizzlies this year: 6-4 without Ja. Both teams had enough depth to keep them afloat, but somehow, the narrative was that they were better without Ja.
Hot take: People keep ignoring games played in the MVP conversation like it’s not a massive contributing factor to who is more valuable. 2 Players put up similar production on a per game basis but player A is playing 10 more games than player B, then player A is categorically more valuable than player B. This is secretly a massive reason for lots of MVP snubs, and I often see people mistaking “voter fatigue” for a player suddenly playing fewer games. Giannis’s “voter fatigue”, and Luka getting snubbed has often just come down to them taking games off that Jokic isn’t, and when Embiid won over Jokic, it was because jokic randomly decided to have an abnormally lower attendance than normal while Embiid played more games.
Also i feel like sometimes the people who vote on mvp pick a player because they feel as if that player SHOULD have an mvp on their resume. Like it seems as if they desperately wanna give luka an mvp award at some point because it would feel weird for a player with his talent to not have one on his resumé but he keeps starting seasons outta shape meanwhile other players like jokic are much more consistent in their production that they can’t justify gifting luka the award, especially after they gifted embiid the mvp that one year. Basically the people who vote on mvp seem to overvalue “narrative” over actual production
@ they didn’t “gift” Embiid that MVP award. He earned it. That’s my whole point, jokic played fewer than 70 games that season, it’s his only season (including lockout years and the covid year where there were fewer games) where jokic played less than 70 games. He played 69 games compared to embiid’s 66, although it was due to him actually having a quality surrounding roster, he had his lowest ppg by a margin since becoming an mvp caliber player, (ducking jokic or not) he lost the matchups with Embiid, and where as Embiid sprinted through the finish that year focusing on the MVP award, jokic took his foot off the gas to focus on winning a ring at the end. With similar levels of production jokic didn’t have the massive “games played” advantage he normally does over everyone else, which is why he lost that year.
@@bryanfoster326Unfortunately, Embiid haters don't want to hear that because they just want to spite Embiid. They just focus on Embiid's public comments about not winning the MVP award at the time and go off of that.
Between the 26th January 2020 and the 6th February 2020 Dame averaged 38.6ppg and 10.8apg Not 50ppg, no where near it but he did have over 10apg and he was shooting pretty great efficiency, though he did have a noticeable mid game against the Nuggets during this stretch (21/2/9) If it's a different time frame then let my know, this was the best time frame that I could find that matched your description. He did have a 60pt game like 4 games before the start of this run but that would still be less ppg and apg in general
Straight up. That’s NOT a useless comment. Shaq was at his all time peak offensively, while maintaining strong defense, and even being near DPOY in 2000. Best Center season ever, period. Hakeem on the other hand got DPOY’s, back to back MVP’s, and back to back FMVP’s, with otherwise the most “perfect” season in 94. They won 5 rings and 5 FMVP’s, and were completely back to back for every single one of them, absolutely dominating everyone in their way
Hot take: The Hawks easily have their best roster since 2015 this year and one of the top young cores in the league. Jalen Johnson and Dyson Daniels have both been revelations and Zacch Risacher has loads of potential to develop. These are the perfect guys to put around Trae Young and having Bogi and Dre Hunter off the bench makes them one of the deepest teams right now.
The real impressive part of Kareem's longevity isn't the stats that it accumulated or the accolades/championships he won in that stretch. It's the fact that he did this in the 1970s and 1980s. in an era in which injuries we almost laugh away nowadays were career enders due to medical science being nowhere near that of now and in an era in which we knew a lot less about optimal practice and the optimal way to take care of your body. LeBron spends a million a year on this and even if somebody was able to afford this back then, they wouldn't be able to do so, because the knowledge on this we have now, didn't exist when Kareem retired.
Hot take. Stats may say otherwise but Dennis Rodman was an excellent passer and him throwing the outlet pass was arguably the most valuable possession in the bulls arsenal. His basketball iq was off the fucking charts
@@chilldoc9638 KD was leading the league in scoring at 21 and Kareem was leading college in scoring at 20. I'm not saying Wemby won't get better, but he's not on track to be an all time scorer
Hot take: The NBA’s legends are the worst at devaluing the stars of today. In the Nfl the legends are very supportive and they almost never compare themselves to the players of today unless it’s to give the players of today their flowers. For example Eric Dickerson is actively rooting for saquon barkley to break his single season rushing record. I feel like if someone were to break a record of someone like shaq he would only discredit them.
While that is true for certain legends, other legends are also trying to uphold the same standard they were held to for the current players, a number of whom have not met that standard. Not to mention that a number of current players have been disrespectful towards legends.
HOT TAKE: As a Cavs fan whose been watching the things Ty Jerome has done, I feel as if he’s been VASTLY overrated as a player as of late mainly because no defense has given him any respect up until this point because no one expected him to perform this well. As the season goes on I expect defenses to take notice of his limitations (namely his reliance on 3s and slow floaters as his main source of scoring) as well as his habit of reaching for steals as weaknesses in his game and his efficiency and scoring will come down to earth.
Hot take. Rings in todays nba should be viewed way higher then in previous years. The difficulty to win a championship in todays game is at an all time high and winning back to back just doesn’t happen anymore. I think that 20 years from now when we are looking at players from this current era and their legacies we need to value their rings higher then we do for players that came before them simply because it’s more difficult. Winning 2 ring now a day is like winning 4 or 5 in the 2000s and before.
I was just thinking about that a few days ago. People discount Bill Russels rings because the league was much easier, so when do we start to change our thinking on today’s rings as the league is much more competitive?
Hot take: Giannis is the most underrated player right now. He’s led the bucks to the 6th seed over a 8 game stretch while averaging 35PPG, 11RPG, 8APG, and 2 BPG but people seem to have forgotten about him.
Giannis is averaging 32.9/11.9/6.6 with 1.9 stocks (blocks and steals combined) on shooting splits of 60.9%/21.4%/61.2% whilst having 3.3 turnover a game Not sure where you got ur stats from but they're wrong And Giannis gets ths flack because he has an average record in an extremely weak East whilst having Dame AND a championship caliber team around him. Giannis is 3rd itw rn imo but he can easily be overtaken, can even drop to 5th or 6th in mvp standing if he's not careful Main concerns are the Bucks win record (unbelievably weak East but not even top 3 with a championship caliber team and Dame), his efficiency (21.4% from 3 is atrocious but 61.2% from the line is even worse and borderline criminal) and that Jokic exists (every big man will be compared to him and looked down on because Jokic is just better in every way)
@ that’s a good point I forgot to mention these stats have been their last 8 games thus of which they’ve been 7-1. I also think you’re heavily underestimating his defensive impact on the floor. I’m also not saying he’s just as good or better than people like jokic, but merely isn’t being talked about enough or to the caliber that he should be.
Hot take: come up with some original thoughts people. I get that watching UA-camrs like rusty will help form your opinions on the game, but feels like half of these now are just directly quoting shit he’s said multiple times.
Hot take : people say Kobe (RIP) was a competitive as Jordan, but I disagree. Being competitive means wanting to win, and there were a couple of instances where Kobe put his ego ahead of his team's interest; : in the 2004 Finals where he shot his team out of a title because he wanted to get his FInals MVP award, especially after hitting that clutch 3 in game 2 to force overtime; in games 3 to 5 he took bad shot after bad shot instead of passing it to Shaq who was dominating Ben Walace. Chauncey Billups talked about that in a podcast - their defensive strategy was banking on Kobe going for personal glory instead of helping his team. In 2006, in the 2nd half of a game 7, he refused to shoot the ball because he had ben criticized for being too selfish so he wanted to make a point and prove his team needed him to shoot in order to have.a chance to win; I guess he was right because the Lakers lost the series; this is a far cry from Mcihael Jordan who fought the Bulls front office to come back in time for the 1986 playoffs and help his team when the Bulls wanted to shut him down for the rest of the season;. Even though everybody knew Chicago had no chance to beat the mighty Celtics, Jordan still wanted to compete and help his team (and he was fantastic). Yes he took a lof shots but his teammates were not good to say the least. PS : I love your content
HOT TAKE: Joe Ingles is the one of the best role players of the lebron era. Due to him being on a shitty team, his value is not seen as valuable. Any team would love to have him in the roster at his peak and he is the true definition of an all round role player.
Hot Take: Excluding any major late season injuries to the Mavs, this will be the most career defining season for Luka so far. The Mavs are 4-1 without him and dominated a good Knicks team without him. Klay, or Gafford. He is playing Batman for two of the best Robins in league history and the Mavs appear to have figured it out on defense(at least when Luka is off the court). Luka has ran out of excuses.
Hot Take: True shooting is EXTREMELY fallible and overused as a mark of total efficiency, as losses of the ball are treated equally, or not tracked at all. Getting swat blocked is a more efficient play than getting stolen from, but the stats will show the opposite. Bad shot 'diets' can lead to more efficient transition offense for the opponent. Bad hands and lack of cutting / rolling stalls the offense but does not affect efficiency. Gobert is more "efficient" than Jokic. It has also, sinfully, made players heave after the Buzzer to save their efficiency.
I mean yeah "plumbers" is exaggerating things, but if you actually look back in time to see who the Wilts and Bill played against you just can't compare that to today. They had basically no competition. And also most people are just using this term in an argument, cause the other side is trying to discredit an era.
I agree, especially in 2023 dame averaged 32 on 20 shots, where harden averaged 30 on 20 shots. When harden had his 36ppg season he was shooting 24.5 shots, if you were to bump dames shots to 24 he would be averaging around the same if not a little better numbers at 37-38 ppg
hot take: people treat Kawhi how they should treat AD, and vice versa. they have exceptionally similar resumès - both are generational defenders and top 15 scorers when healthy, both are quiet/humble off the court, both have been plagued by injuries their entire careers, both had ugly breaks with their original teams, and jokic owns both of them. the most notable differences are that AD’s stats look significantly more impressive and Kawhi has a heavier ring. and yet, fans and pundits alike seem to adore kawhi and abhor AD. i’ve never understood this. kawhi won two DPOYs based mostly on reputation, while AD was snubbed from at least one of them for the same reason. kawhi won a bogus FMVP in 2014 for guarding lebron, and AD lost it in 2020 for playing alongside him. AD was raked over the coals for leaving the shitty pelicans, but the spurs were criticized when kawhi left. people feel bad for kawhi when he’s injured, but call AD soft for the same things. i don’t get it!!
I said on a hot take recently that Kawhi is the most undercriticized superstar in the league. Players like AD get more flak than him for the same things that he gets passes for. I think that the flak for AD mainly comes from being associated with LeBron. I will argue that most of the criticism for AD is from people who either love LeBron or dislike LeBron and, by extension, dislike AD.
That social media rant was one we all needed but none of us deserved. Everything you said was facts. I’m halfway convinced mfs be bots or rage baiting but then I talk sports with ppl and they don’t know either. Sports more and more is being consumed passively no one watches games anymore that’s old school . A lot of the younger generation isn’t even into sports in general. Probably why ratings are down I don’t know many yn that’s gone watch a 3 hour basketball game 3 hour football game. Multiple times a week every week so you get a lot of uninformed opinions
Thats just the problem with online discourse nowadays: too many people just wanna troll or rage-bait people and not actually have a genuine opinion on stuff. Especially because it feels like a lot of nba fans skew younger (teenagers to early/mid 20s) and a lot are too immature to actually talk about the game for real
I don’t understand why Jokic has just been seemingly given the mvp award this year already in the same way he was last year. It’s like no one else is even in consideration as if Giannis hasn’t had easily as good (and in my opinion a better case) this year and last year, it’s like people are refusing to see what Giannis is doing even though everyone is saying “oh we’re just getting used to his greatness” but continuing to prop Jokic up so far above him while never putting Giannis in the conversation seriousky
Jokic is just simply better than Giannis, but more importantly, these last two seasons, not enough winning. I think Giannis is getting overlooked, but I don't think Jokic really factors into that very much.
@@Virgil191 Better scorer (although I'm fine if you give that to Giannis for scoring more), better passer, better shooter, better vision. More efficient, ironically even as a paint scorer. Can impact the game without the ball to an extent that Giannis just can't do offensively. And yes, Giannis is clearly better defensively, but Jokic is legitimately one of the greatest offensive players in history. I think Jokic's offense makes up for Giannis's defensive edge. Plus, Jokic is a far more transferable player that can work in a lot more lineups than Giannis. And I mean, it's hardly quantifiable, but I really feel that if you really watch the two of them play, Jokic is just better. The eye test isn't the most reliable, but... I mean, there's a reason Jokic beats him in basically every advanced statistic.
@ Giannis is a better scorer and is quite literally more efficient considering he had the most efficient 30+ ppg season from the field in history literally last year, passing I would say is equal if you ever watched the absurd kick passes Giannis makes on the drive, Jokic does have better vision however which makes him a better playmaker. Also I don’t see how off ball particularly matters considering how absurdly awful the bucks are when Giannis doesn’t have the ball and considering how good he is on it I think it’s kind of weird to consider that when he has been the main facilitator of the team for years now. Plus why does transferability matter when they’re not moving teams and we have never seen them move teams so how can you use something that has outright not happened as a point, plus KD is more transferable than LeBron but you’re never putting KD above LeBron at any point in their career. Also advanced stats can be used to make literally anyone look amazing if you use the right stuff. There are very few I take to be a particularly good reflection considering the amount of context they remove, but PER for example both Giannis and Jokic have been interchangeable as the highest of all time for the last like 4 so I don’t see how it puts Jokic above Giannis in any significant way ther
Hottest take: replace the NBA cup with a Champions league style tournament and after 3 years Basketball will become a truly international sport up there with football Basically the best teams play against the best teams across the world, and the worst teams can gain wins against weaker teams who dont make the Champions league, and depending on placement in the Champions league the team will get an appropriate level of wins to their regular season record And obviously the impact of overseas teams being seen will have an immediate impact, especially if there is a massive upset during the tournament. Not only will it be better for fans, but the money generated will be ludicrous
Hot Take - a big reason for the NBA's ratings decline is due to the death of college basketball. College football creates stars for the NFL, but college basketball isn't popular enough to create stars for the NBA.
Could it also be said that a larger percentage of top prospects play overseas than used to? No knock on any of them, but chances are fewer people have seen them play before they are drafted.
Hot take: The NBA should change the rules around free throws in the 4th. Too many teams have started fouling when up and preventing any 3 pointers. They should make it so that if you are behind the 3 point line with under a certain time, then it should be 3 free throws instead of 2.
HOT TAKE: Dwyane Wade in his peak was just as good if not better than Kobe. If you look at the regular season and playoff stats when they were both in their primes (IMO Kobe 03-09 and Wade 05-11), you'll see that Wade had the higher PER, TS% and BPM. Wade was the better playmaker, more efficient scorer, and an elite defender himself. Kobe is considered better because he had better circumstances, that allowed him to win more championchips, but I believe Wade was the better overall player, whose career is less fortunate.
I can see that. After Miami's first championship, they fell down the pecking order pretty quickly afterward due to injuries (Wade included) and poor rosters. Wade's bad circumstances certainly made the gap bigger than it probably should've been.
Hot take: the Mavericks will make the finals AGAIN and Luka Doncic will continue to prove that (despite his woes and even his playoff kinda-injury woes last year) he is the best PLAYOFF player in the world, Better than Jokic.
How can he “continue to prove” he’s better than jokic in the playoffs when he’s never proven it in the first place? Their career numbers aren’t that far apart. Luka has slightly better numbers for ppg and assists but jokic is much better at rebounding. Keep in mind all this is while luka’s usage rate is 36% and jokic is 30%. Rather go with the dude who elevates his teammates than the one man show luka
wait u said Jokic is either 1 or 2 offensively all time and that Lebron and Jordan are 3rd and 4th respectively. so whos above jordan and lebron other than jokic?
Steph's offensive peak is monsterous man, even as a hater. His gravity is so absurd that the warriors got away with playing 2 non spacers even past his prime. I'd personally take Jokic though
Hot Take: the $100,000 fines are not too large for instances such as Lamelo Ball’s comment. There was a clip of Draymond Green saying that there is no other job where you get fined $100,000 (unrelated to Lamelos fine), but Draymond has a $100 million dollar contract for 4 years. Considering the danger he puts other players in with his antics at times I think the $100,000 fines are often appropriate and that in other jobs (that regular people work) you would get fired for making a comment like Lamelo did so publicly or endangering people like Draymond does by snatching at ankles and such. (Also NBA Twitter got really homophobic after Lamelos comment - essentially utilizing his comment as a means to justify their homophobia, which changed my mind about his fine because initially I thought it was stupid but he’s young and I don’t think he meant it maliciously, but then I saw the influence he had and the way fans used it and I feel like to a fine was appropriate).
I won’t even demean this comment. This is just moronic and not good for the league. You should not ever have guys like Draymond running around and doing the things that they do. Essentially any comment could not match his outbursts and uncontrolled violence. He should be fined or punished more, LaMelo should have never been punished at all, or at least had done something tame
Not sure if this is a hot take but: Victor Wembanyama's MOST impressive part of his game thus far is his playmaking. We all knew the scoring and freakish tools were there, but his ability to play the low post role from much higher on the floor in addition to his height and patience allows him to see the entire floor with ease. Also the fact that he is so far away from the basket on his post touches opens up the entire baseline and corners, which are spots that, with a traditional back to the basket possesion, will become much more congested. Wemby has the potential to average 8-10 assists a game at his peak and could match the playmaking of a big like Jokic with a much stronger defensive precense. Legitamate GOAT potential
Hot take: One of the best things to happen to NBA media in the last 10 years is the mixtape renaissance thats been happening on Tiktok since the covid years. It reminds me a lot of the early internet era of edits before copyright rules became actually enforced on youtube and theres so many talented editors making insanely high quality edits which helps keep alive iconic moments or cool players that might otherwise start to fall by the wayside of history. (especially the niche roleplayer edits in that regard)
Hot Take: All around talent and versatility should play a more important role in all time discussions over longevity. A player like John Wall is almost consensually put below players like John Stockton in all time discussions. Wall's scoring is much better than Stocktons and I would argue his playmaking and defence is slightly better than Stocktons. Stockton is consistently put into top 5 PG conversations, whereas john wall is not even put into top 20 PG conversations. Apart from longevity what does Stockton and other traditional Point Guards have over John Wall?
I feel like your take underrates longevity. Being able to play at a high level over a long stretch of time is more impressive than being elite for a handful of seasons. Its kinda like what he said about tim duncan vs KG: KG at his peak was probably better but duncan was consistently really good for a longer amount of time
I notice a lot of people kinda overrate IT (the celtics one). I see a lot of people talk about him like he was some great player that the league conspired to blacklist for some reason and thats objectively not true: not many teams want a very short PG who isn’t a great playmaker and is primarily a scorer. On top of that people overrate his scoring, like somebody said to me once he averaged 30 ppg several times with the celtics when he actually averaged 19, 22, 29 in his 3 years in boston and only eclipsed 20+ ppg two other years of his career. he’s not a terrible player but in reality his run in boston was basically just Linsanity on steroids
Hot Take: The West isn’t much better than the East, just different. Teams like the Lakers or Clippers wouldn’t dominate in the East; they’d still hover around .500. The West’s aggressive play style forces teams to adapt, but that doesn’t make them better. In the East, the style is slower, and those teams would adjust. The "gap" between conferences isn’t about skill-it’s about how the game is played.
Playoff teams should be allowed to choose their opponents. The top 3 teams should pick in order of playoff seeding while the four seed plays the remainder. Put it on ESPN/TNT to announce the first round matchups, this would add some extra hype to the first round and create narratives in the league. Even if it is a standard playoff bracket imagine the one seed bucks loosing to the eight seed heat after choosing to play them.
The playoffs is the one aspect of the nba that doesn’t need tweaking because its the only time players actually play with 100% effort. You’re proposing a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist. Its the regular season and ASG that are a mess
Hot take: Centers that are actually versatile are a lot worse than a pure rim protecting because they'd be more on the perimeter, leaving an SF build PF in the paint
It's a debate between Shaq joker and Kareem. And I say Kareem because his skyhook was just unstoppable. I bet you've watched Korean games in his prime, and you'll notice that he goes on streaks where he makes four or five sky hooks in a row. And it just feels so inevitable. The same with joker too. So this is why I'll never come up with a definite answer to that
kareems akyhook was legendary but it's been made more legend than it really was, it's about 55% which is definitely one of the most unstoppable shots ever, and it's so unique and no one can do it but Jokic is rn shooting 60% on his hook/pushshot/floaters so kareems got company
Fun idea/Hot take: They should have a One on One tournament during the all star weekend. The participants can be voted in by fans and can be separated by position. This would shed some light on to how not skilled some seemingly skilled players actually are, but would be incredibly fun to watch.
Jaylen Brown is the best defender on the Boston Celtics. His versatility is unmatched, and while he doesn't have the hands of Jrue and D White, he can legitamately guard 1-5, and his length can create a tremendous amount of on ball pressure. When the Celtics decide to pressure ball handlers (especially full court) 9/10 times its Jaylen Brown who gets the toughest matchup.
Hot take: Pitty to see how teams with more elaborated well coached team deffensive systems could be the ones to get the bigger profit from the 12 guys deep rotation thing in the playoffs, but deffense oriented ciaches are usually the ones who rather play 7 men rotations.
Hot take: if the league wouldn’t be split in conferences teams like Miami wouldn’t get away to such a degree in ignoring the regular season. They can do it in the East but it would be a completely different story if the playoff spots would be distributed across the league, making regular season much more interesting and competitive
Honestly Jokic got like a top 8 ish peak all time. Offense wise it’s him and LeBron with Steph, Jordan, Magic and Shaq trailing those two in terms of totality of offensive skillset
HOT TAKE: Free throws shouldn’t be considered when debating who “the better player” is. Ex: Russ - 31.6ppg (32 rounded) on 8.8FTM (9). 32-9=23. The true points he scored was 23 points and when ranking should be used instead of 32. It removes the “NBA” or “Superstar calls” out of the game and levels the playing field between eras and “stardom”
Hot take: KD should've signed with the Wizards in 2016. He would've won at least one championship between 2017-2019, and him winning a chip for his "hometown" team (he's from Maryland, but right outside DC) as the undisputed "bus driver" of the team (shout out to Wall and Beal, but they're not Steph and Klay) would've done wonders for KD's legacy.
Idk how the Wizards would've pulled that off with Wall and Beal on the roster. KD took a huge pay cut to sign with the Warriors because they were already a title-ready situation; I don't think that he would've done the same for the Wizards, who finished that season at .500 and missed the playoffs. The Wizards probably would've had to give up depth to sign him, and he, Wall, and Beal probably would've capped them out (assuming that he signs a max). They would've been a great challenge for the Cavs in the East, but I don't think they would've won a title in that time span.
Hot take: One way the NBA could fix the all-star game is by offering an opt-out for players where they still get the accolade on their resume but they do not have to play in the actual game. The open spots could be offered to "snubbed" players based on voting order until they find someone willing to give in-game effort. A distinction should be given to players that end up playing in the game but were not voted in as all-stars such as "All-Star Fill in" so they can be acknowledged for playing in the game but not given the full accolade of being an all-star.
Aligned with coaching I think truly exceptional players struggle to even comprehend the struggles of less competent players sometimes. How can you coach someone who can't do something that came easy to you?
Hot take: kobe's 08-10 playoff runs are super underrated in terms of all time runs and his own legacy. He in a 3 year stretch beat more 50 wins then Magic or Bird beat in their entire careers while almost 3peating as the number 1 option. And while his numbers aren't at a level like 18 Lebron or 95 Hakeem, they're still extremely impressive with his only 2 bad series (shooting wise) being against all time great defenses in both of the those Celtics teams. Really does need to be brought up more
Kobe really had a lot in common with Hakeem. Obviously the Jordan comparisons are valid because of their similar builds and aesthetic, but Jordan put so much more pressure on the rim than Kobe whereas Hakeem was a pure finesse scorer like Kobe, which may have capped their overall efficiency but allowed them to be essentially unschemable as scoring threats.
Great argument. Kobe won back to back and made 3 straight finals with Pau Gasol as his second option. Gasol was a solid player and allstar but especially when compared to the second options of many other all time greats, it showd Kobe’s last 2 championships in a favorable light.
He had a stacked team during a watered down era. There were too many teams and not enough talent to fill many teams. Gasol was easily a top 3 big on that time as well as Bynum. Artest was kawhi before kawhi and Odom was a jack of all trades. Along with Phil Jackson. There’s nothing underrated about that, they were expected to win. They Were Never Underdogs So beating 50 win teams when you’re constantly a 60 win team isn’t a flex. But Duncan doing the same thing while never missing the playoffs is. Duncan needs to be compared to jordan more.
@ Timmy also had a stacked team and a goat level coach during this same “watered down era” and he lost to Kobe in 08, lost to Dallas in the first round in 09, and got swept by Phoenix in the second round in 2010. Two questions, 1. If this isn’t as impressive for Kobe’s legacy as you think it is, how much worse would it be for Duncan’s? And more importantly 2. Who the fuck asked?
Hot take: The parody within the league that exists today is not because The gap between role players and top stars in the league is smaller than it's ever been it's because it's the widest it's ever been. We're in a time of transition and soon, this disparity will shorten, but currently, most top stars are carrying bad teams rather than the other way around. Most young players have been worked to the Bone and aren't able to progress much further on teams, and seasoned role players are suffering from a similar injury bug and starting to exit the league. Compared to people like Durant and Steph, who all look like they can play at a high level well into their 20th season. - BTW, I Love the videos. I hope you're having a good day.
Hot Take (REALLY long): LeGM has destroyed his chances at continuity in all his teams (yes, all of them.) while also not making his teammates better. Looking back to LeBron's first stint in Cleveland, LeBron joined the Cavs off of a season with Ricky Davis averaging 20ppg and Ilgauskas 17ppg while having Carlos Boozer (Rookie) and Dajaun Wagner average 10+ pts. For LeBron's rookie year, he averaged 20 points, while we saw Ricky drop into the 6th man role and still average 15. Jeff Mcinnis averaged 11 while Boozer took a 5ppg leap to 15ppg along with Ilgauskas dropping to 15ppg in this offseason Boozer was signed by the Utah Jazz. In the following seasons, the Cavs went from a 35-win team to a 42-win team. This comes off of LeBron averaging 27ppg, Ilgauskas (All-star season) 17ppg, Drew Gooden 15, and McInnis 13, with the rest of the roster not even passing 6ppg but featuring promising player Anderson Varejao and aging vet Eric Snow (averaged ten ppg the year prior but did half that this season.) The following season, we see the addition of Larry Hughes (previous season defensive first team and 22 ppg scorer), 15 ppg, to the two spots, along with Ronald Murray, 13 ppg, Ilgauskas, 15 ppg, Drew Gooden, ten ppg Donyell Marshall 9 ppg with LeBron's 31.4ppg along with this being his highest usage rate yet this will be a theme over his next 4 seasons in CLE. While still having Snow and Varejao on the bench, this 50-win team lost to the champions at the time, who then lost to Shaq, who won the championship with Miami this season. 06-07 was another 50-win season with LeBron regressing to 27 ppg while Drew Gooden and Ilgauskas both regressed to sub 12 ppg, and Larry Hughes stayed around the 15ppg mark and the roster as a whole, spreading out the scoring load more, allowing this team to make their way through an easy east in the Wizards, Nets, and Pistons while getting swept by Spurs in the finals. 07-08 saw James back to 30ppg while Ilgauskas had 14. Larry Hughes and Drew Gooden are putting up 12 and 11, respectively, and Daniel Gibson and Delonte West are putting up above 10ppg as young prospects. This team was a mixture of young guys and vets with much experience that caused an even scoring load throughout the bench. But they fell to the newly formed Big 3 Boston Celtics. The 08-09 season saw a 66-win Cavs team while he touted 28ppg and winning MVP. This team features Mo Williams having an all-star year with 18ppg, Ilgauskas 13 ppg, West 12 ppg, and Varejao having a defensive 2nd team season while the bench distributed the rest of the scoring load, which led to them getting bounced in the eastern conference finals. From 09-10, we see the Cavs muster a 61-win season, with them losing in the conference semis, but LeBron is having another MVP season while averaging just under 30 ppg. Varejao also had another all-defensive season, finishing 3rd in the 6th Man of the Year voting. This team featured aged Antwan Jameson and Shaq, combing for 28 between the two, while Mo Williams averaged 16 himself. The team also had 4 +8 ppg scorers as a whole. The Cavs owner didn't build LeBron's early Cavs teams were not built in the newer 2010s style of basketball, but these were far from bad teams and bad players, and I think they get ragged on too hard for not having 'help' when I see clearly as day that they did. Considering the 2010-2014 Heat will be omitted, I think they have enough coverage as not being bad; I have seen the argument made more often now. In Miami, LeBron refused the idea of a pay cut to help in retuning the roster and to continue what they were doing and had done in Miami and decided to jump ship and take the max deal in a sign and trade back to Cleveland to a team that had just signed Shump, Klove (2x all NBA and 5x all-star), along with having budding star Kyrie Irving and valued big man Tristan Thompson. along with the list of good role players they had that season: Deli, Richard Jefferson, Joe Harris, Mozgov, JR, and Mo Will. The Cavs were an excellent team built to play around LeBron 3 and D players with a ball-dominant scorer and traditional big men. They were a team not meant to succeed without a slashing playmaking wing. When LeBron took his notorious 2-week hiatus in December, this team went 1-7 without him. Did this make the team bad? no, it clearly shows they weren't structured to win without another 20-point scorer on the floor. 16-17 featured much of the same with new additions in the role player department and an even heavier focus on three and d players, adding Korver and Deron Williams, along with Mike Dunleavy to top it off, replacing Mozgov with Bogut much of what we saw in the previous year, a team made for LeBron's favored three and D play style of roleplayers but made of aging vets. Finally, in 17-18 where, we see the team built for LeBron at its 'weakest' featuring Jordan Clarkson, Jae Crowder, Jeff Green, George Hill, Korver, Nance Jr., Derrick Rose, JR Smith, Shump, IT, Tristan Thompson, and DWade. I highlight these players, knowing that many of them either were not as developed as they are now or weren't as good as they once were. most of these players weren't even 30 yet, but they also left this situation and had much better stints afterward. 2018-2019 Lakers LeBron didn't play 27 games this season, so that is why this Lakers team only had 37 wins (Sarcasm). This team was barely above .500 before the groin injury, and they were still above .500 afterward once playoff hopes were not within reach. LeBron took a backseat this season. This Lakers team had so much young talent that it was about to be so good. It hurts my soul to see all of it get traded away in the following years. All the guys that teams genuinely drool over having the right now traded for garbage, but that's just LeGM. Considering this team won a championship, I don't know how bad it was, but the bubble did wonders for LeBron and AD to rest and return at maximum charge and injury-free. In the years following, the Lakers have done nothing but disappoint and complain to the media. While the media complains about them not having another go-to guy, ball handler, or scorer even though they have a dame good roster, I think everyone is letting LeBron have his moment and allowing the media to do the blame game. In contrast, he does what he feels out of these few trades. Having any of these guys as role players or even the draft picks would put the Lakers in a monstrously better situation than they are now, but Rob and LeGM have done this to themselves, and I am here for it. the Los Angeles Lakers traded Lonzo Ball, Josh Hart, De'Andre Hunter, Brandon Ingram, cash, a 2022 1st round draft pick (Dyson Daniels was later selected), a 2023 1st round draft pick, and a 2025 1st round draft pick to the New Orleans Pelicans; the New Orleans Pelicans traded Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers; and the Washington Wizards traded cash to the New Orleans Pelicans. (9-30 protected, unprotected in 2022) The 2023 first-round pick was right to swap with LAL NOP's option to defer the 2024 first-round pick to 2025. $1MM $1.1MM 2022 2nd-rd pick is LAL own *PUKES* As part of a 5-team trade, the Los Angeles Lakers traded Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Montrezl Harrell and Kyle Kuzma to the Washington Wizards; the Los Angeles Lakers traded Isaiah Jackson to the Indiana Pacers; the Brooklyn Nets traded Spencer Dinwiddie to the Washington Wizards; the Indiana Pacers traded Aaron Holiday and Isaiah Todd to the Washington Wizards; the San Antonio Spurs traded Nikola Milutinov to the Brooklyn Nets; the Washington Wizards traded a 2024 2nd round draft pick (Kyle Filipowski was later selected) and a 2025 2nd round draft pick to the Brooklyn Nets; the Washington Wizards traded Russell Westbrook, a 2023 2nd round draft pick (Tristan Vukcevic was later selected), a 2024 2nd round draft pick (Bobi Klintman was later selected) and a 2028 2nd round draft pick to the Los Angeles Lakers; and the Washington Wizards traded Chandler Hutchison and a 2022 2nd round draft pick (Christian Koloko was later selected) to the San Antonio Spurs. Indiana also received a trade exception. The 2023 conditional 2nd-rd pick was CHI's own 2024 2nd-rd pick, which is the least favorable. The 2028 2nd-rd pick is WAS's own, and the 2024 2nd-rd pick is more favorable. The 2025 2nd-rd pick is a swap option; Brooklyn also received a trade exception for 2022 2nd-rd more favorable of CHI/LAL/DET
Joker is definitely in consideration for greatest peak in general. His defensive liability is way overblown. Fact is Denver is one of the best teams when he's on the floor and one of the worst teams when he's not. He lead the NBA in defensive box +/- and his greatness is shown by being in a league of his own in terms of PER efficiency and offensive and defensive +/-. The fact is of all the greats, he's the only one to do it without another all-star on his team. Not Jordan, Not Lebron, Not Kobe, Not Kareem, Not Magic, Not Shaq, Not Bird, Not Curry not nobody.. I mean he brought a Serbian national team full of nobodies to the brink of defeating the modern day dream team.
Hakeem won a championship as a 7 seed without another all-star on his team. The rockets became the first team to win a championship as a 6th seed or lower. They also beat teams that won 55 or more games in every round of the playoffs which was also a record at the time. They were also the underdogs in every series that year and swept Shaq and Penny's Orlando magic who were the number 1 seed I With the Best record in the league.
Hot take: Coaches can do dumb stuff, but many times the root of the issues is in incompetent roster construction. All the online coaches can only hate so much because their theories are never tested and found lacking
Hot take: Luka will never win a MVP until he wins at least 1 ring. His window was the last few seasons because now he has been in the league long enough for voters to start to knock him for not winning the same way they did guys like Harden. Jokic is pretty much the only player that has ever been immune to this effect in recent history.
hot take: giannis is the greatest PF of all time. I understand what the accolades say for the other great power forwards but none of them could give you the offense, playmaking, and defense even though it’s not as good as the others arguably
Hot Take: To increase parity, GMs should have more flexibility when negotiating contracts with unhealthy players. A team like the Sixers for example should be given incentive for risking taking on a max contact for PG considering his injury history. Maybe that looks like additional rules for what a max looks like (90% of money if 90% healthy over previous contract period for example).
Hot take: the mavericks are the strongest team out the west and making the finals again. they’ve went 7-1 in the last 8 games, all without Luka & Klay for the majority of it, and it’s not like they’re playing bad teams, beating OKC, the Knicks & the nuggets throughout that stretch. With a healthy Luka they are dangerous
Hot Take: A team where Trae Young is starting will never win a chip, Trae is an all nba talent yes but in terms of team success I think he'd be perfect as a 6th man as he's just too much of a weak spot in a starting 5. Maybe in a closing lineup but even then he'd be an easy point of attack
They don't involve voting, that's true. But they do lack tons of context such as minutes, efficiency, and obviously anything valuable that doesn't have to do with scoring. So a stat that doesn't even necessarily determine who was the best scorer in the regular season is on the same tier as all around dominance in the regular season *and* the biggest stage?
Hot take: People cite Carmelo Anthony, Dominique Wilkins, Bernard King, and a handful of other high volume scoring small forwards as some of the greatest players to never win a championship. While they aren't WRONG, that kind of NBA player cannot lead a team to a championship. The greatest small forwards in NBA history were either better passers, better defenders, and in some cases better scorers as well. Being a high volume scorer and a moderately good rebounder at the small forward position has not historically meant you're able to lead a team to a championship. ( Being a finals MVP does not inherently mean you're the best overall player on a championship team either)
@@mihacebin4341 but Durant is a better playmaker than the majority of those guys, and his height alone makes him a better defender. He's also the better scorer, AND he had the benefit of playing alongside Steph Curry, who was the leader of that team, not him. I get what you're saying but no, totally different situations for KD.
Hot Take: Rebounds have lost their significance in todays NBA. In older eras rebounds were harder to come across due to their being less threes taken and thus less long rebounds. The space Inside the arc and in the paint was always much more crowded with bodies than it is today, making rebounds much harder to secure. I’d say averaging 6 rebounds in the 80’s and 90’s was much harder than averaging 8 or 9 today. This also extends to assists to a lesser extent, as I think the increased spacing and prevalence of catch and shoot 3’s make it a little easier to collect assists now than it used to be
Hot Take Players with high usg% 35%+ cant win rings. Harden, Russ nowadays Luka because they dont have energy on defense, dont have teammates involved and dont play off ball.
It's a different case for Luka. His game has proven to translate well to the postseason compared to Harden and Russ, and his passing and shotmaking ability are far above theirs, so he could be outlier. I still agree, though.
Hot Take: If the NBA does Expand by 2 teams, both expansion teams should be Western Conference Teams and 2 of the Timberwolves, Pelicans, or Grizzlies should become Eastern Conference Teams. This makes geographical sense and would somewhat balance the disparity between the Eastern and Western Conferences.
Hot take:Rudy gobert will go down as the most underappreciated player with accomplishments ever, had jazz teams that were filled with cones yes including Mitch, and had them as a top 5 defense, he isn’t a great 1v1 guy but this is team basketball, he is a great defender 4 DPOYS aren’t fluky
How can a "two way player" at the center position, that can't stop the joker, be better than the joker? If hakeem or shaq couldn't stop the joker, hypothetically, who cares if they block shots more than the joker? This "two way player" narrative makes no sense to me.
@@hiphopotamus69 so that would make them, at the very least equal. Therefore the defense is irrelevant. Again, this "two way player" narrative makes no sense to me when it comes to the discourse about NikoLA Jokic.
Steph Curry is the only player that should be a lock on every ‘Best Starting 5 of all time’. If your talking about making the greatest team of all time, Steph’s gravity and off ball abilities and also obviously his shooting is a must have.
Hot Take: The Westbrook 2017 MVP was not as "stat paddy" as people make it out to be. The thunder were 34-8 when he recorded a triple double and 13-27 when he didn't.
Okay. That's good. But I will argue that Russ did not HAVE to get triple doubles in order for them to win; they could've had the same record or a similar record if he had played differently.
All Star hot take: Facts are players are afraid of injuries (legit), players want to hace fun on the midseason break (legit too) and fans don't care about the ASG anymore. Then, the NBA should keep the voting as it is now (10 starters by fans + players + media and 14 by coaches), then get ridículo of the All Star Game and make the selected players take part on the contests instead of "average joes": 6 for the dunk contest, 6 for the three point contest, 6 for the skills contest and 6 for the shooting contest or whatever.
Hot take: The play in should only apply to a conference if the 9th seed is 4 games or less behind the 8th seed so that a team that is much better during the season doesn’t get knocked off cause of one bad game
Agree. It doesn’t help the general public’s apathy towards the regular season to have a team who was 4-5 games better during the regular season get knocked out of the playoffs because they went cold from 3 for a half.
Hot take: to build on the All Star game take in this video. I think to make the ASG more competitive, the winning team should get home court in the finals; no matter the record. This should make teams play harder
I feel like thats been suggested a lot but i don’t think most players care about that especially if they’re on a team they know isn’t gonna make it to the finals. Like if lamelo made the ASG home field advantage won’t mean anything to him
Bring back the 2-3-2. I never understood the hate and it allows the lower seeded team to have inherent pressure built in to their advantage. Same way the higher seed having 2 up top and 2 at the end. If the higher seed wins 1 at the lower seed home then their advantage is immediately lost and the higher seed regains the advantage as 2H-2A.
the nuggets contracts of MPJ and Jamal aren’t going to end up being that bad. yes they are overpaid but i think denver is going with a 2A and 2B thing with jamal and MPJ. let jokic carry and whatever matchup/scheme either jamal or MPJ can attack will be the secondary option. MPJs height/shooting/rebounding is exactly what you need next to jokic, i truly feel that we are one bench piece away from being the favorites in the west.
HOT TAKE: luka doncic is being criticized unfairly by the media. People always complain about his on-court antics when most star players in the league act the same way or even worse, prime example lebron james. While other players like jokic act the same but in a less animated way. People call it passion for lebron, draymond, jokic etc, but everyone calls it childish and immature for luka.
hot take: the houston rockets are conference finals or even finals underdogs and should be taken seriously in any playoff matchup. they’re defense can smother any star player and with them only gaining chemistry as the season goes on with the offense becoming better and better as the season goes on and hopefully a little more reed sheppard shooting this team can go toe to toe with any team in a 7 game series and if you were to tell me the rockets at least made the conference finals i wouldn’t be surprised. obviously they’re not my championship picks and not even my pick to make the conf finals but it would be less surprising than most people think
I really hope you’re right but I just don’t think they can have consistent playoff offense against any strong teams and the West is packed with strong teams.
Hot take: the best ability isn’t availability, it’s durability. Sometimes even if a player is available they can’t play 100% because they are hurt. Also playing through injuries may sometimes shorten a NBA player’s career. So when GMs are building teams They shouldn’t consider who will be available, but who will be durable enough for the playoffs.
Hot take: Ant's high 3pt rate holds back his numbers and will diminish any future arguments regarding his place in the league, and it doesn't help that Randall allows for no space for Ant to truly come into his own as a scorer like how Kat did.
Can we just say jokic is even more valuable to the league than people think, he’s never had help he’s had players that he creates roles for himself, he makes there roll ,all they gotta figure out is how to put the ball in the basket, everyone on the nuggets is an exceeding role player due to how much better jokic makes players look everyone says Westbrook is back, ya cause of Jokic weather it’s finding lanes or just giving Russ his confidence back by getting him easy baskets, if jokic had someone like lamelo or Luka as a gaurd I think teams would litterly give up mid game.
Hot take: Wembanyama should NOT be going into the paint much more and the offensive trajectory he's taking to turn into 7'4 2022 Steph curry is the BEST outcome not only to prioritize his health but also to ensure that he will have the endurance and energy to give his all on defense. Yes, his efficiency hasnt been amazing, but if he can get it to settle at an above average rate (which he really has in the last 5 or 6 games) then he can truly be the greatest two way force the league has ever seen.
If Rudy Gobert had a better offensive production, his defense would be more celebrated, which is actually ironic
This one is actually true, which is just sad
I don't think that Rudy ever developed his offensive game because he probably never had to or was required to.
@@urbaindelva7869 yea it's hard for some to give all these hours to get marginnaly better at something that won' tmake them more money
@@urbaindelva7869 Nah he just has no hands, he's already at his max potential offensively.
Whatchu talking about... Golbert has the best offensive efficiency rating of all time. Aren't advanced statistics fun?
Jacob, i know you just said you dont read comments often but if you read this one, its been so nice watching your videos with more frequency recently. Hopefully you and rudy are doing well and keep up the good work. Found your channel in early 2020 and didnt look back
Exactly, rusty is easily my favorite basketball channel
Imma be real I thought his birth name was Rusty 😅
Hot take just because a player is not playing in a game and their team is winning without them it does not mean that the player has no impact. This can mean the team is balanced and does not always need to rely on a star player which is a good thing.
Is this a hot take? If so people are dumber than I thought
Good old fashioned critical thinking.
I hate on/off stats. I think they are a substitute for thought.
Case in point: the 2021-22 Grizzlies. 20-5 record without Ja Morant that year.
The Grizzlies this year: 6-4 without Ja.
Both teams had enough depth to keep them afloat, but somehow, the narrative was that they were better without Ja.
From the video "sometimes you guys have the most lukewarm takes and call it a hot take"
Hot take: People keep ignoring games played in the MVP conversation like it’s not a massive contributing factor to who is more valuable. 2 Players put up similar production on a per game basis but player A is playing 10 more games than player B, then player A is categorically more valuable than player B. This is secretly a massive reason for lots of MVP snubs, and I often see people mistaking “voter fatigue” for a player suddenly playing fewer games. Giannis’s “voter fatigue”, and Luka getting snubbed has often just come down to them taking games off that Jokic isn’t, and when Embiid won over Jokic, it was because jokic randomly decided to have an abnormally lower attendance than normal while Embiid played more games.
Also i feel like sometimes the people who vote on mvp pick a player because they feel as if that player SHOULD have an mvp on their resume. Like it seems as if they desperately wanna give luka an mvp award at some point because it would feel weird for a player with his talent to not have one on his resumé but he keeps starting seasons outta shape meanwhile other players like jokic are much more consistent in their production that they can’t justify gifting luka the award, especially after they gifted embiid the mvp that one year. Basically the people who vote on mvp seem to overvalue “narrative” over actual production
@ they didn’t “gift” Embiid that MVP award. He earned it. That’s my whole point, jokic played fewer than 70 games that season, it’s his only season (including lockout years and the covid year where there were fewer games) where jokic played less than 70 games. He played 69 games compared to embiid’s 66, although it was due to him actually having a quality surrounding roster, he had his lowest ppg by a margin since becoming an mvp caliber player, (ducking jokic or not) he lost the matchups with Embiid, and where as Embiid sprinted through the finish that year focusing on the MVP award, jokic took his foot off the gas to focus on winning a ring at the end. With similar levels of production jokic didn’t have the massive “games played” advantage he normally does over everyone else, which is why he lost that year.
@@bryanfoster326Unfortunately, Embiid haters don't want to hear that because they just want to spite Embiid. They just focus on Embiid's public comments about not winning the MVP award at the time and go off of that.
7 game lead on the 2 seed then the worst discourse possible amd then Nuggets stopped caring as much, it was a gift
embiid literally dodged him in Denver for another szn and Jokic had a 70%ts
Rusty casually saying he doesn't love rudy by going on a speel about how we will never know anybody he loves
jacob canonically hates rudy, he is simply a means to an end for him
@CjH02222 Honestly fair. He has made it a point to hate on Rudy any chance he gets
Anyone else remember that insane run Lillard went on when he averaged like 50 points and 10 assists over 6 games in 2020?
That was in the bubble when he was trying to will the Blazers to a playoff spot.
@@urbaindelva7869 Wrong, it happened in late Jan - early Feb. Before COVID was even considered a pandemic.
Between the 26th January 2020 and the 6th February 2020 Dame averaged 38.6ppg and 10.8apg
Not 50ppg, no where near it but he did have over 10apg and he was shooting pretty great efficiency, though he did have a noticeable mid game against the Nuggets during this stretch (21/2/9)
If it's a different time frame then let my know, this was the best time frame that I could find that matched your description. He did have a 60pt game like 4 games before the start of this run but that would still be less ppg and apg in general
Peak Shaq from 1999-2002 and Hakeem from 1992-1995 were the 2 best peaks for Center that I’ve ever seen.
Best I've personally seen...
this is not a hot take at all
Straight up. That’s NOT a useless comment.
Shaq was at his all time peak offensively, while maintaining strong defense, and even being near DPOY in 2000. Best Center season ever, period.
Hakeem on the other hand got DPOY’s, back to back MVP’s, and back to back FMVP’s, with otherwise the most “perfect” season in 94. They won 5 rings and 5 FMVP’s, and were completely back to back for every single one of them, absolutely dominating everyone in their way
Hot take: The Hawks easily have their best roster since 2015 this year and one of the top young cores in the league. Jalen Johnson and Dyson Daniels have both been revelations and Zacch Risacher has loads of potential to develop. These are the perfect guys to put around Trae Young and having Bogi and Dre Hunter off the bench makes them one of the deepest teams right now.
The real impressive part of Kareem's longevity isn't the stats that it accumulated or the accolades/championships he won in that stretch. It's the fact that he did this in the 1970s and 1980s. in an era in which injuries we almost laugh away nowadays were career enders due to medical science being nowhere near that of now and in an era in which we knew a lot less about optimal practice and the optimal way to take care of your body. LeBron spends a million a year on this and even if somebody was able to afford this back then, they wouldn't be able to do so, because the knowledge on this we have now, didn't exist when Kareem retired.
Hot take. Stats may say otherwise but Dennis Rodman was an excellent passer and him throwing the outlet pass was arguably the most valuable possession in the bulls arsenal. His basketball iq was off the fucking charts
Hot take: Wemby's offensive ceiling is nowhere near people say. This idea that he's going to be KD or Kareem on that end is based off nba fan fiction.
So what are you saying? I’m a little confused. Is he going to be better or worse?
@@kokushibo6823 worse
@ hes worse. Hes never displayed the ability to score that well
@@ChibiMalzaharhe’s like 20?
@@chilldoc9638 KD was leading the league in scoring at 21 and Kareem was leading college in scoring at 20. I'm not saying Wemby won't get better, but he's not on track to be an all time scorer
Hot take: The NBA’s legends are the worst at devaluing the stars of today. In the Nfl the legends are very supportive and they almost never compare themselves to the players of today unless it’s to give the players of today their flowers. For example Eric Dickerson is actively rooting for saquon barkley to break his single season rushing record. I feel like if someone were to break a record of someone like shaq he would only discredit them.
While that is true for certain legends, other legends are also trying to uphold the same standard they were held to for the current players, a number of whom have not met that standard. Not to mention that a number of current players have been disrespectful towards legends.
HOT TAKE: As a Cavs fan whose been watching the things Ty Jerome has done, I feel as if he’s been VASTLY overrated as a player as of late mainly because no defense has given him any respect up until this point because no one expected him to perform this well. As the season goes on I expect defenses to take notice of his limitations (namely his reliance on 3s and slow floaters as his main source of scoring) as well as his habit of reaching for steals as weaknesses in his game and his efficiency and scoring will come down to earth.
Hot take. Rings in todays nba should be viewed way higher then in previous years. The difficulty to win a championship in todays game is at an all time high and winning back to back just doesn’t happen anymore. I think that 20 years from now when we are looking at players from this current era and their legacies we need to value their rings higher then we do for players that came before them simply because it’s more difficult. Winning 2 ring now a day is like winning 4 or 5 in the 2000s and before.
Calling a back to back worth 5 rings is the stupidest take I've read all month congrats man
One could argue WC finals should also be viewed higher than EC finals, because everyone says the west historically has always been better/tougher.
The nee CBA will make dynasties far less common and we will have to adjust our expectations for all time great players in terms of team success
I was just thinking about that a few days ago. People discount Bill Russels rings because the league was much easier, so when do we start to change our thinking on today’s rings as the league is much more competitive?
@ I absolutely agree
Hot take: Giannis is the most underrated player right now. He’s led the bucks to the 6th seed over a 8 game stretch while averaging 35PPG, 11RPG, 8APG, and 2 BPG but people seem to have forgotten about him.
Giannis is averaging 32.9/11.9/6.6 with 1.9 stocks (blocks and steals combined) on shooting splits of 60.9%/21.4%/61.2% whilst having 3.3 turnover a game
Not sure where you got ur stats from but they're wrong
And Giannis gets ths flack because he has an average record in an extremely weak East whilst having Dame AND a championship caliber team around him. Giannis is 3rd itw rn imo but he can easily be overtaken, can even drop to 5th or 6th in mvp standing if he's not careful
Main concerns are the Bucks win record (unbelievably weak East but not even top 3 with a championship caliber team and Dame), his efficiency (21.4% from 3 is atrocious but 61.2% from the line is even worse and borderline criminal) and that Jokic exists (every big man will be compared to him and looked down on because Jokic is just better in every way)
@ that’s a good point I forgot to mention these stats have been their last 8 games thus of which they’ve been 7-1. I also think you’re heavily underestimating his defensive impact on the floor. I’m also not saying he’s just as good or better than people like jokic, but merely isn’t being talked about enough or to the caliber that he should be.
Hot take: come up with some original thoughts people. I get that watching UA-camrs like rusty will help form your opinions on the game, but feels like half of these now are just directly quoting shit he’s said multiple times.
Oh my god haha, just saw you responded to my comment, it was all meant in good fun
Matthias just peaked
Hot take : people say Kobe (RIP) was a competitive as Jordan, but I disagree.
Being competitive means wanting to win, and there were a couple of instances where Kobe put his ego ahead of his team's interest; :
in the 2004 Finals where he shot his team out of a title because he wanted to get his FInals MVP award, especially after hitting that clutch 3 in game 2 to force overtime; in games 3 to 5 he took bad shot after bad shot instead of passing it to Shaq who was dominating Ben Walace.
Chauncey Billups talked about that in a podcast - their defensive strategy was banking on Kobe going for personal glory instead of helping his team.
In 2006, in the 2nd half of a game 7, he refused to shoot the ball because he had ben criticized for being too selfish so he wanted to make a point and prove his team needed him to shoot in order to have.a chance to win; I guess he was right because the Lakers lost the series; this is a far cry from Mcihael Jordan who fought the Bulls front office to come back in time for the 1986 playoffs and help his team when the Bulls wanted to shut him down for the rest of the season;. Even though everybody knew Chicago had no chance to beat the mighty Celtics, Jordan still wanted to compete and help his team (and he was fantastic). Yes he took a lof shots but his teammates were not good to say the least.
PS : I love your content
Excellent points
@ 🙏🏽
HOT TAKE: Joe Ingles is the one of the best role players of the lebron era. Due to him being on a shitty team, his value is not seen as valuable. Any team would love to have him in the roster at his peak and he is the true definition of an all round role player.
Hot Take: Excluding any major late season injuries to the Mavs, this will be the most career defining season for Luka so far. The Mavs are 4-1 without him and dominated a good Knicks team without him. Klay, or Gafford. He is playing Batman for two of the best Robins in league history and the Mavs appear to have figured it out on defense(at least when Luka is off the court). Luka has ran out of excuses.
Facts
Hot Take: True shooting is EXTREMELY fallible and overused as a mark of total efficiency, as losses of the ball are treated equally, or not tracked at all.
Getting swat blocked is a more efficient play than getting stolen from, but the stats will show the opposite.
Bad shot 'diets' can lead to more efficient transition offense for the opponent.
Bad hands and lack of cutting / rolling stalls the offense but does not affect efficiency. Gobert is more "efficient" than Jokic.
It has also, sinfully, made players heave after the Buzzer to save their efficiency.
Interesting
Hot take: if someone is using the word "plumbers" in an argument, they automatically lose the argument
I mean yeah "plumbers" is exaggerating things, but if you actually look back in time to see who the Wilts and Bill played against you just can't compare that to today. They had basically no competition. And also most people are just using this term in an argument, cause the other side is trying to discredit an era.
Bill Russel is the goat
What if the argument is literally about Plumbers.
An electrician stuck out Shohie Ohtani in the WBC.... lol
@@AustinMulkaMusicThat's the exception.
HOT TAKE: Peak Damian Lillard was just as good of a scorer as Peak Harden, he just didn't shoot it nearly as much.
I agree, especially in 2023 dame averaged 32 on 20 shots, where harden averaged 30 on 20 shots. When harden had his 36ppg season he was shooting 24.5 shots, if you were to bump dames shots to 24 he would be averaging around the same if not a little better numbers at 37-38 ppg
@@trikelikesfish
Harden is better precisely because it flows into his assisting, whereas Dame aims to shoot
hot take: people treat Kawhi how they should treat AD, and vice versa. they have exceptionally similar resumès - both are generational defenders and top 15 scorers when healthy, both are quiet/humble off the court, both have been plagued by injuries their entire careers, both had ugly breaks with their original teams, and jokic owns both of them. the most notable differences are that AD’s stats look significantly more impressive and Kawhi has a heavier ring. and yet, fans and pundits alike seem to adore kawhi and abhor AD. i’ve never understood this. kawhi won two DPOYs based mostly on reputation, while AD was snubbed from at least one of them for the same reason. kawhi won a bogus FMVP in 2014 for guarding lebron, and AD lost it in 2020 for playing alongside him. AD was raked over the coals for leaving the shitty pelicans, but the spurs were criticized when kawhi left. people feel bad for kawhi when he’s injured, but call AD soft for the same things. i don’t get it!!
I said on a hot take recently that Kawhi is the most undercriticized superstar in the league. Players like AD get more flak than him for the same things that he gets passes for.
I think that the flak for AD mainly comes from being associated with LeBron. I will argue that most of the criticism for AD is from people who either love LeBron or dislike LeBron and, by extension, dislike AD.
Some notable differences here, though
That social media rant was one we all needed but none of us deserved. Everything you said was facts. I’m halfway convinced mfs be bots or rage baiting but then I talk sports with ppl and they don’t know either. Sports more and more is being consumed passively no one watches games anymore that’s old school . A lot of the younger generation isn’t even into sports in general. Probably why ratings are down I don’t know many yn that’s gone watch a 3 hour basketball game 3 hour football game. Multiple times a week every week so you get a lot of uninformed opinions
Thats just the problem with online discourse nowadays: too many people just wanna troll or rage-bait people and not actually have a genuine opinion on stuff. Especially because it feels like a lot of nba fans skew younger (teenagers to early/mid 20s) and a lot are too immature to actually talk about the game for real
I don’t understand why Jokic has just been seemingly given the mvp award this year already in the same way he was last year. It’s like no one else is even in consideration as if Giannis hasn’t had easily as good (and in my opinion a better case) this year and last year, it’s like people are refusing to see what Giannis is doing even though everyone is saying “oh we’re just getting used to his greatness” but continuing to prop Jokic up so far above him while never putting Giannis in the conversation seriousky
Jokic is just simply better than Giannis, but more importantly, these last two seasons, not enough winning. I think Giannis is getting overlooked, but I don't think Jokic really factors into that very much.
@ but HOW is he better, also Giannis has simply just been injured
@@Virgil191 Better scorer (although I'm fine if you give that to Giannis for scoring more), better passer, better shooter, better vision. More efficient, ironically even as a paint scorer. Can impact the game without the ball to an extent that Giannis just can't do offensively.
And yes, Giannis is clearly better defensively, but Jokic is legitimately one of the greatest offensive players in history. I think Jokic's offense makes up for Giannis's defensive edge. Plus, Jokic is a far more transferable player that can work in a lot more lineups than Giannis.
And I mean, it's hardly quantifiable, but I really feel that if you really watch the two of them play, Jokic is just better. The eye test isn't the most reliable, but...
I mean, there's a reason Jokic beats him in basically every advanced statistic.
@ Giannis is a better scorer and is quite literally more efficient considering he had the most efficient 30+ ppg season from the field in history literally last year, passing I would say is equal if you ever watched the absurd kick passes Giannis makes on the drive, Jokic does have better vision however which makes him a better playmaker. Also I don’t see how off ball particularly matters considering how absurdly awful the bucks are when Giannis doesn’t have the ball and considering how good he is on it I think it’s kind of weird to consider that when he has been the main facilitator of the team for years now. Plus why does transferability matter when they’re not moving teams and we have never seen them move teams so how can you use something that has outright not happened as a point, plus KD is more transferable than LeBron but you’re never putting KD above LeBron at any point in their career. Also advanced stats can be used to make literally anyone look amazing if you use the right stuff. There are very few I take to be a particularly good reflection considering the amount of context they remove, but PER for example both Giannis and Jokic have been interchangeable as the highest of all time for the last like 4 so I don’t see how it puts Jokic above Giannis in any significant way ther
He is not unless efficency is ONLY 2pter
Hottest take: replace the NBA cup with a Champions league style tournament and after 3 years Basketball will become a truly international sport up there with football
Basically the best teams play against the best teams across the world, and the worst teams can gain wins against weaker teams who dont make the Champions league, and depending on placement in the Champions league the team will get an appropriate level of wins to their regular season record
And obviously the impact of overseas teams being seen will have an immediate impact, especially if there is a massive upset during the tournament. Not only will it be better for fans, but the money generated will be ludicrous
@@lolno6975 Crazy idea: the winner of the NBA Cup gets to play the winner of the EuroLeague
HOT TAKE: Luka Doncic will catch up to Nikola Jokic in MVP considerations.
Hot Take - a big reason for the NBA's ratings decline is due to the death of college basketball. College football creates stars for the NFL, but college basketball isn't popular enough to create stars for the NBA.
Never thought of this but yeah it probably plays some role
Could it also be said that a larger percentage of top prospects play overseas than used to?
No knock on any of them, but chances are fewer people have seen them play before they are drafted.
@@fortynights1513 Yes, this is also bad for NBA ratings.
Hot take: The NBA should change the rules around free throws in the 4th. Too many teams have started fouling when up and preventing any 3 pointers. They should make it so that if you are behind the 3 point line with under a certain time, then it should be 3 free throws instead of 2.
Absolutely cold take here, rusty is absolutely right about showing people you care about on the internet
HOT TAKE: Dwyane Wade in his peak was just as good if not better than Kobe. If you look at the regular season and playoff stats when they were both in their primes (IMO Kobe 03-09 and Wade 05-11), you'll see that Wade had the higher PER, TS% and BPM. Wade was the better playmaker, more efficient scorer, and an elite defender himself. Kobe is considered better because he had better circumstances, that allowed him to win more championchips, but I believe Wade was the better overall player, whose career is less fortunate.
I can see that. After Miami's first championship, they fell down the pecking order pretty quickly afterward due to injuries (Wade included) and poor rosters. Wade's bad circumstances certainly made the gap bigger than it probably should've been.
Hot take: the Mavericks will make the finals AGAIN and Luka Doncic will continue to prove that (despite his woes and even his playoff kinda-injury woes last year) he is the best PLAYOFF player in the world, Better than Jokic.
How can he “continue to prove” he’s better than jokic in the playoffs when he’s never proven it in the first place? Their career numbers aren’t that far apart. Luka has slightly better numbers for ppg and assists but jokic is much better at rebounding. Keep in mind all this is while luka’s usage rate is 36% and jokic is 30%. Rather go with the dude who elevates his teammates than the one man show luka
@@Other_Robots that's why it's a hot take
Hotter than the sun
wait u said Jokic is either 1 or 2 offensively all time and that Lebron and Jordan are 3rd and 4th respectively. so whos above jordan and lebron other than jokic?
Zach Lavine is fucking unstoppable
Steph.
Some guy named Jabar ..
@@JoiRandom he could be saying wilt or curry or kobe those r my other thoughts. all r wrong but yk
Steph's offensive peak is monsterous man, even as a hater. His gravity is so absurd that the warriors got away with playing 2 non spacers even past his prime. I'd personally take Jokic though
Thank you for posting today Rusty. My day was horrible and I needed this
9:15 imagine saying that Jokic is by far the most dominant player around the basket while Giannis is in the league
Hot Take: the $100,000 fines are not too large for instances such as Lamelo Ball’s comment. There was a clip of Draymond Green saying that there is no other job where you get fined $100,000 (unrelated to Lamelos fine), but Draymond has a $100 million dollar contract for 4 years. Considering the danger he puts other players in with his antics at times I think the $100,000 fines are often appropriate and that in other jobs (that regular people work) you would get fired for making a comment like Lamelo did so publicly or endangering people like Draymond does by snatching at ankles and such. (Also NBA Twitter got really homophobic after Lamelos comment - essentially utilizing his comment as a means to justify their homophobia, which changed my mind about his fine because initially I thought it was stupid but he’s young and I don’t think he meant it maliciously, but then I saw the influence he had and the way fans used it and I feel like to a fine was appropriate).
They fine for dumb shit too they look for any excuse to fine
I won’t even demean this comment. This is just moronic and not good for the league.
You should not ever have guys like Draymond running around and doing the things that they do. Essentially any comment could not match his outbursts and uncontrolled violence.
He should be fined or punished more, LaMelo should have never been punished at all, or at least had done something tame
Not sure if this is a hot take but: Victor Wembanyama's MOST impressive part of his game thus far is his playmaking. We all knew the scoring and freakish tools were there, but his ability to play the low post role from much higher on the floor in addition to his height and patience allows him to see the entire floor with ease. Also the fact that he is so far away from the basket on his post touches opens up the entire baseline and corners, which are spots that, with a traditional back to the basket possesion, will become much more congested. Wemby has the potential to average 8-10 assists a game at his peak and could match the playmaking of a big like Jokic with a much stronger defensive precense. Legitamate GOAT potential
Hot take: One of the best things to happen to NBA media in the last 10 years is the mixtape renaissance thats been happening on Tiktok since the covid years. It reminds me a lot of the early internet era of edits before copyright rules became actually enforced on youtube and theres so many talented editors making insanely high quality edits which helps keep alive iconic moments or cool players that might otherwise start to fall by the wayside of history. (especially the niche roleplayer edits in that regard)
:] You pretty much summed up my thoughts. Bench role players dont mess up the chemistry as much as a new #2 option does.
hot take Christian Braun is better than Austin Reaves
Hot Take: All around talent and versatility should play a more important role in all time discussions over longevity. A player like John Wall is almost consensually put below players like John Stockton in all time discussions. Wall's scoring is much better than Stocktons and I would argue his playmaking and defence is slightly better than Stocktons. Stockton is consistently put into top 5 PG conversations, whereas john wall is not even put into top 20 PG conversations. Apart from longevity what does Stockton and other traditional Point Guards have over John Wall?
I feel like your take underrates longevity. Being able to play at a high level over a long stretch of time is more impressive than being elite for a handful of seasons. Its kinda like what he said about tim duncan vs KG: KG at his peak was probably better but duncan was consistently really good for a longer amount of time
I notice a lot of people kinda overrate IT (the celtics one). I see a lot of people talk about him like he was some great player that the league conspired to blacklist for some reason and thats objectively not true: not many teams want a very short PG who isn’t a great playmaker and is primarily a scorer. On top of that people overrate his scoring, like somebody said to me once he averaged 30 ppg several times with the celtics when he actually averaged 19, 22, 29 in his 3 years in boston and only eclipsed 20+ ppg two other years of his career. he’s not a terrible player but in reality his run in boston was basically just Linsanity on steroids
Hot take Norman Powell is having a better regular season than PG ever had with the clippers
Hot Take: The West isn’t much better than the East, just different. Teams like the Lakers or Clippers wouldn’t dominate in the East; they’d still hover around .500. The West’s aggressive play style forces teams to adapt, but that doesn’t make them better. In the East, the style is slower, and those teams would adjust. The "gap" between conferences isn’t about skill-it’s about how the game is played.
*^*
Rusty, you’re my fucking favorite in the NBA UA-cam world. I love how you break shit down honestly. Keep crushing it, dude
Playoff teams should be allowed to choose their opponents. The top 3 teams should pick in order of playoff seeding while the four seed plays the remainder. Put it on ESPN/TNT to announce the first round matchups, this would add some extra hype to the first round and create narratives in the league. Even if it is a standard playoff bracket imagine the one seed bucks loosing to the eight seed heat after choosing to play them.
The playoffs is the one aspect of the nba that doesn’t need tweaking because its the only time players actually play with 100% effort. You’re proposing a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist. Its the regular season and ASG that are a mess
Nope. That could be taken advantage of.
It’s not even Tuesday! A surprise but a welcomed one!
Hot take: Centers that are actually versatile are a lot worse than a pure rim protecting because they'd be more on the perimeter, leaving an SF build PF in the paint
It's a debate between Shaq joker and Kareem. And I say Kareem because his skyhook was just unstoppable. I bet you've watched Korean games in his prime, and you'll notice that he goes on streaks where he makes four or five sky hooks in a row. And it just feels so inevitable. The same with joker too. So this is why I'll never come up with a definite answer to that
kareems akyhook was legendary but it's been made more legend than it really was, it's about 55% which is definitely one of the most unstoppable shots ever, and it's so unique and no one can do it but Jokic is rn shooting 60% on his hook/pushshot/floaters so kareems got company
Fun idea/Hot take: They should have a One on One tournament during the all star weekend. The participants can be voted in by fans and can be separated by position. This would shed some light on to how not skilled some seemingly skilled players actually are, but would be incredibly fun to watch.
Jaylen Brown is the best defender on the Boston Celtics. His versatility is unmatched, and while he doesn't have the hands of Jrue and D White, he can legitamately guard 1-5, and his length can create a tremendous amount of on ball pressure. When the Celtics decide to pressure ball handlers (especially full court) 9/10 times its Jaylen Brown who gets the toughest matchup.
Hot take: Pitty to see how teams with more elaborated well coached team deffensive systems could be the ones to get the bigger profit from the 12 guys deep rotation thing in the playoffs, but deffense oriented ciaches are usually the ones who rather play 7 men rotations.
Hot take: if the league wouldn’t be split in conferences teams like Miami wouldn’t get away to such a degree in ignoring the regular season. They can do it in the East but it would be a completely different story if the playoff spots would be distributed across the league, making regular season much more interesting and competitive
Honestly Jokic got like a top 8 ish peak all time. Offense wise it’s him and LeBron with Steph, Jordan, Magic and Shaq trailing those two in terms of totality of offensive skillset
HOT TAKE: Free throws shouldn’t be considered when debating who “the better player” is.
Ex: Russ - 31.6ppg (32 rounded) on 8.8FTM (9). 32-9=23. The true points he scored was 23 points and when ranking should be used instead of 32. It removes the “NBA” or “Superstar calls” out of the game and levels the playing field between eras and “stardom”
Hot take: KD should've signed with the Wizards in 2016. He would've won at least one championship between 2017-2019, and him winning a chip for his "hometown" team (he's from Maryland, but right outside DC) as the undisputed "bus driver" of the team (shout out to Wall and Beal, but they're not Steph and Klay) would've done wonders for KD's legacy.
Idk how the Wizards would've pulled that off with Wall and Beal on the roster. KD took a huge pay cut to sign with the Warriors because they were already a title-ready situation; I don't think that he would've done the same for the Wizards, who finished that season at .500 and missed the playoffs. The Wizards probably would've had to give up depth to sign him, and he, Wall, and Beal probably would've capped them out (assuming that he signs a max). They would've been a great challenge for the Cavs in the East, but I don't think they would've won a title in that time span.
Magic coached briefly
Hot take: One way the NBA could fix the all-star game is by offering an opt-out for players where they still get the accolade on their resume but they do not have to play in the actual game. The open spots could be offered to "snubbed" players based on voting order until they find someone willing to give in-game effort. A distinction should be given to players that end up playing in the game but were not voted in as all-stars such as "All-Star Fill in" so they can be acknowledged for playing in the game but not given the full accolade of being an all-star.
Aligned with coaching I think truly exceptional players struggle to even comprehend the struggles of less competent players sometimes. How can you coach someone who can't do something that came easy to you?
HOT Take: Jeremy Lin’s Linsanity Run was better than MJ’s and LeBron’s Linsanity Runs combined.
When did Jordan or LeBron ever have "Linsanity runs"?
@ Exactly. So nobody remembers them. That’s how insignificant they were.
Hot take: kobe's 08-10 playoff runs are super underrated in terms of all time runs and his own legacy. He in a 3 year stretch beat more 50 wins then Magic or Bird beat in their entire careers while almost 3peating as the number 1 option. And while his numbers aren't at a level like 18 Lebron or 95 Hakeem, they're still extremely impressive with his only 2 bad series (shooting wise) being against all time great defenses in both of the those Celtics teams. Really does need to be brought up more
Kobe really had a lot in common with Hakeem. Obviously the Jordan comparisons are valid because of their similar builds and aesthetic, but Jordan put so much more pressure on the rim than Kobe whereas Hakeem was a pure finesse scorer like Kobe, which may have capped their overall efficiency but allowed them to be essentially unschemable as scoring threats.
Great argument. Kobe won back to back and made 3 straight finals with Pau Gasol as his second option. Gasol was a solid player and allstar but especially when compared to the second options of many other all time greats, it showd Kobe’s last 2 championships in a favorable light.
@@patrick05MorganGasol was more than just a solid player. He was arguably a top player at his position.
He had a stacked team during a watered down era. There were too many teams and not enough talent to fill many teams. Gasol was easily a top 3 big on that time as well as Bynum. Artest was kawhi before kawhi and Odom was a jack of all trades. Along with Phil Jackson. There’s nothing underrated about that, they were expected to win.
They
Were
Never
Underdogs
So beating 50 win teams when you’re constantly a 60 win team isn’t a flex. But Duncan doing the same thing while never missing the playoffs is. Duncan needs to be compared to jordan more.
@ Timmy also had a stacked team and a goat level coach during this same “watered down era” and he lost to Kobe in 08, lost to Dallas in the first round in 09, and got swept by Phoenix in the second round in 2010.
Two questions, 1. If this isn’t as impressive for Kobe’s legacy as you think it is, how much worse would it be for Duncan’s?
And more importantly 2. Who the fuck asked?
Thanks for making videos. Very sorry people choose to mean.
Hot take: The parody within the league that exists today is not because The gap between role players and top stars in the league is smaller than it's ever been it's because it's the widest it's ever been. We're in a time of transition and soon, this disparity will shorten, but currently, most top stars are carrying bad teams rather than the other way around. Most young players have been worked to the Bone and aren't able to progress much further on teams, and seasoned role players are suffering from a similar injury bug and starting to exit the league. Compared to people like Durant and Steph, who all look like they can play at a high level well into their 20th season. - BTW, I Love the videos. I hope you're having a good day.
Parity
Hot Take (REALLY long): LeGM has destroyed his chances at continuity in all his teams (yes, all of them.) while also not making his teammates better. Looking back to LeBron's first stint in Cleveland, LeBron joined the Cavs off of a season with Ricky Davis averaging 20ppg and Ilgauskas 17ppg while having Carlos Boozer (Rookie) and Dajaun Wagner average 10+ pts. For LeBron's rookie year, he averaged 20 points, while we saw Ricky drop into the 6th man role and still average 15. Jeff Mcinnis averaged 11 while Boozer took a 5ppg leap to 15ppg along with Ilgauskas dropping to 15ppg in this offseason Boozer was signed by the Utah Jazz. In the following seasons, the Cavs went from a 35-win team to a 42-win team. This comes off of LeBron averaging 27ppg, Ilgauskas (All-star season) 17ppg, Drew Gooden 15, and McInnis 13, with the rest of the roster not even passing 6ppg but featuring promising player Anderson Varejao and aging vet Eric Snow (averaged ten ppg the year prior but did half that this season.) The following season, we see the addition of Larry Hughes (previous season defensive first team and 22 ppg scorer), 15 ppg, to the two spots, along with Ronald Murray, 13 ppg, Ilgauskas, 15 ppg, Drew Gooden, ten ppg Donyell Marshall 9 ppg with LeBron's 31.4ppg along with this being his highest usage rate yet this will be a theme over his next 4 seasons in CLE. While still having Snow and Varejao on the bench, this 50-win team lost to the champions at the time, who then lost to Shaq, who won the championship with Miami this season. 06-07 was another 50-win season with LeBron regressing to 27 ppg while Drew Gooden and Ilgauskas both regressed to sub 12 ppg, and Larry Hughes stayed around the 15ppg mark and the roster as a whole, spreading out the scoring load more, allowing this team to make their way through an easy east in the Wizards, Nets, and Pistons while getting swept by Spurs in the finals. 07-08 saw James back to 30ppg while Ilgauskas had 14. Larry Hughes and Drew Gooden are putting up 12 and 11, respectively, and Daniel Gibson and Delonte West are putting up above 10ppg as young prospects. This team was a mixture of young guys and vets with much experience that caused an even scoring load throughout the bench. But they fell to the newly formed Big 3 Boston Celtics. The 08-09 season saw a 66-win Cavs team while he touted 28ppg and winning MVP. This team features Mo Williams having an all-star year with 18ppg, Ilgauskas 13 ppg, West 12 ppg, and Varejao having a defensive 2nd team season while the bench distributed the rest of the scoring load, which led to them getting bounced in the eastern conference finals. From 09-10, we see the Cavs muster a 61-win season, with them losing in the conference semis, but LeBron is having another MVP season while averaging just under 30 ppg. Varejao also had another all-defensive season, finishing 3rd in the 6th Man of the Year voting. This team featured aged Antwan Jameson and Shaq, combing for 28 between the two, while Mo Williams averaged 16 himself. The team also had 4 +8 ppg scorers as a whole. The Cavs owner didn't build LeBron's early Cavs teams were not built in the newer 2010s style of basketball, but these were far from bad teams and bad players, and I think they get ragged on too hard for not having 'help' when I see clearly as day that they did.
Considering the 2010-2014 Heat will be omitted, I think they have enough coverage as not being bad; I have seen the argument made more often now.
In Miami, LeBron refused the idea of a pay cut to help in retuning the roster and to continue what they were doing and had done in Miami and decided to jump ship and take the max deal in a sign and trade back to Cleveland to a team that had just signed Shump, Klove (2x all NBA and 5x all-star), along with having budding star Kyrie Irving and valued big man Tristan Thompson. along with the list of good role players they had that season: Deli, Richard Jefferson, Joe Harris, Mozgov, JR, and Mo Will. The Cavs were an excellent team built to play around LeBron 3 and D players with a ball-dominant scorer and traditional big men. They were a team not meant to succeed without a slashing playmaking wing. When LeBron took his notorious 2-week hiatus in December, this team went 1-7 without him. Did this make the team bad? no, it clearly shows they weren't structured to win without another 20-point scorer on the floor. 16-17 featured much of the same with new additions in the role player department and an even heavier focus on three and d players, adding Korver and Deron Williams, along with Mike Dunleavy to top it off, replacing Mozgov with Bogut much of what we saw in the previous year, a team made for LeBron's favored three and D play style of roleplayers but made of aging vets. Finally, in 17-18 where, we see the team built for LeBron at its 'weakest' featuring Jordan Clarkson, Jae Crowder, Jeff Green, George Hill, Korver, Nance Jr., Derrick Rose, JR Smith, Shump, IT, Tristan Thompson, and DWade. I highlight these players, knowing that many of them either were not as developed as they are now or weren't as good as they once were. most of these players weren't even 30 yet, but they also left this situation and had much better stints afterward.
2018-2019 Lakers LeBron didn't play 27 games this season, so that is why this Lakers team only had 37 wins (Sarcasm). This team was barely above .500 before the groin injury, and they were still above .500 afterward once playoff hopes were not within reach. LeBron took a backseat this season. This Lakers team had so much young talent that it was about to be so good. It hurts my soul to see all of it get traded away in the following years. All the guys that teams genuinely drool over having the right now traded for garbage, but that's just LeGM. Considering this team won a championship, I don't know how bad it was, but the bubble did wonders for LeBron and AD to rest and return at maximum charge and injury-free. In the years following, the Lakers have done nothing but disappoint and complain to the media. While the media complains about them not having another go-to guy, ball handler, or scorer even though they have a dame good roster, I think everyone is letting LeBron have his moment and allowing the media to do the blame game. In contrast, he does what he feels out of these few trades. Having any of these guys as role players or even the draft picks would put the Lakers in a monstrously better situation than they are now, but Rob and LeGM have done this to themselves, and I am here for it.
the Los Angeles Lakers traded Lonzo Ball, Josh Hart, De'Andre Hunter, Brandon Ingram, cash, a 2022 1st round draft pick (Dyson Daniels was later selected), a 2023 1st round draft pick, and a 2025 1st round draft pick to the New Orleans Pelicans; the New Orleans Pelicans traded Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers; and the Washington Wizards traded cash to the New Orleans Pelicans. (9-30 protected, unprotected in 2022) The 2023 first-round pick was right to swap with LAL NOP's option to defer the 2024 first-round pick to 2025. $1MM $1.1MM 2022 2nd-rd pick is LAL own
*PUKES*
As part of a 5-team trade, the Los Angeles Lakers traded Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Montrezl Harrell and Kyle Kuzma to the Washington Wizards; the Los Angeles Lakers traded Isaiah Jackson to the Indiana Pacers; the Brooklyn Nets traded Spencer Dinwiddie to the Washington Wizards; the Indiana Pacers traded Aaron Holiday and Isaiah Todd to the Washington Wizards; the San Antonio Spurs traded Nikola Milutinov to the Brooklyn Nets; the Washington Wizards traded a 2024 2nd round draft pick (Kyle Filipowski was later selected) and a 2025 2nd round draft pick to the Brooklyn Nets; the Washington Wizards traded Russell Westbrook, a 2023 2nd round draft pick (Tristan Vukcevic was later selected), a 2024 2nd round draft pick (Bobi Klintman was later selected) and a 2028 2nd round draft pick to the Los Angeles Lakers; and the Washington Wizards traded Chandler Hutchison and a 2022 2nd round draft pick (Christian Koloko was later selected) to the San Antonio Spurs. Indiana also received a trade exception. The 2023 conditional 2nd-rd pick was CHI's own 2024 2nd-rd pick, which is the least favorable. The 2028 2nd-rd pick is WAS's own, and the 2024 2nd-rd pick is more favorable. The 2025 2nd-rd pick is a swap option; Brooklyn also received a trade exception for 2022 2nd-rd more favorable of CHI/LAL/DET
The jockic glaze goes crazy
Some players are worthy of glaze🤷🏻♂️
@@gamingsquad2326 dats true.
@@gamingsquad2326Like they say, if its true, its not glaze
Speaking of comments by teens 😂
Stick to making trash edits kid
Joker is definitely in consideration for greatest peak in general. His defensive liability is way overblown. Fact is Denver is one of the best teams when he's on the floor and one of the worst teams when he's not. He lead the NBA in defensive box +/- and his greatness is shown by being in a league of his own in terms of PER efficiency and offensive and defensive +/-. The fact is of all the greats, he's the only one to do it without another all-star on his team. Not Jordan, Not Lebron, Not Kobe, Not Kareem, Not Magic, Not Shaq, Not Bird, Not Curry not nobody.. I mean he brought a Serbian national team full of nobodies to the brink of defeating the modern day dream team.
Advocating for that defensive +/- ponzi scheme in big 2024 oh brother
Hakeem won a championship as a 7 seed without another all-star on his team. The rockets became the first team to win a championship as a 6th seed or lower. They also beat teams that won 55 or more games in every round of the playoffs which was also a record at the time. They were also the underdogs in every series that year and swept Shaq and Penny's Orlando magic who were the number 1 seed I
With the Best record in the league.
Hot take: Coaches can do dumb stuff, but many times the root of the issues is in incompetent roster construction. All the online coaches can only hate so much because their theories are never tested and found lacking
Coaches can only do so much
We're really having a topic on the most dominant player around the rim, and we're mentioning Jokic before Giannis? LOL GTFOOH
Hot take: Luka will never win a MVP until he wins at least 1 ring. His window was the last few seasons because now he has been in the league long enough for voters to start to knock him for not winning the same way they did guys like Harden. Jokic is pretty much the only player that has ever been immune to this effect in recent history.
Almost 25?!?!? Like 25 years being over 18???
hot take: giannis is the greatest PF of all time. I understand what the accolades say for the other great power forwards but none of them could give you the offense, playmaking, and defense even though it’s not as good as the others arguably
Hot Take: To increase parity, GMs should have more flexibility when negotiating contracts with unhealthy players. A team like the Sixers for example should be given incentive for risking taking on a max contact for PG considering his injury history. Maybe that looks like additional rules for what a max looks like (90% of money if 90% healthy over previous contract period for example).
Hot take: the mavericks are the strongest team out the west and making the finals again. they’ve went 7-1 in the last 8 games, all without Luka & Klay for the majority of it, and it’s not like they’re playing bad teams, beating OKC, the Knicks & the nuggets throughout that stretch. With a healthy Luka they are dangerous
damn i got called out 😢 i just figured he was in the finals so he must be decent
Hot Take: A team where Trae Young is starting will never win a chip, Trae is an all nba talent yes but in terms of team success I think he'd be perfect as a 6th man as he's just too much of a weak spot in a starting 5. Maybe in a closing lineup but even then he'd be an easy point of attack
I'm not a jokic hater but this guy is clearly extremely biased towards jokic
HOT TAKE: Scoring Titles are easily more objective than Finals MVPs/MVPs and should be ranked on the same tier as those awards.
They don't involve voting, that's true. But they do lack tons of context such as minutes, efficiency, and obviously anything valuable that doesn't have to do with scoring. So a stat that doesn't even necessarily determine who was the best scorer in the regular season is on the same tier as all around dominance in the regular season *and* the biggest stage?
Hot take: People cite Carmelo Anthony, Dominique Wilkins, Bernard King, and a handful of other high volume scoring small forwards as some of the greatest players to never win a championship. While they aren't WRONG, that kind of NBA player cannot lead a team to a championship. The greatest small forwards in NBA history were either better passers, better defenders, and in some cases better scorers as well. Being a high volume scorer and a moderately good rebounder at the small forward position has not historically meant you're able to lead a team to a championship.
( Being a finals MVP does not inherently mean you're the best overall player on a championship team either)
KD is the final boss of this archetype
@@mihacebin4341 but Durant is a better playmaker than the majority of those guys, and his height alone makes him a better defender. He's also the better scorer, AND he had the benefit of playing alongside Steph Curry, who was the leader of that team, not him. I get what you're saying but no, totally different situations for KD.
Hot Take: Rebounds have lost their significance in todays NBA. In older eras rebounds were harder to come across due to their being less threes taken and thus less long rebounds. The space Inside the arc and in the paint was always much more crowded with bodies than it is today, making rebounds much harder to secure. I’d say averaging 6 rebounds in the 80’s and 90’s was much harder than averaging 8 or 9 today. This also extends to assists to a lesser extent, as I think the increased spacing and prevalence of catch and shoot 3’s make it a little easier to collect assists now than it used to be
Hot Take Players with high usg% 35%+ cant win rings. Harden, Russ nowadays Luka because they dont have energy on defense, dont have teammates involved and dont play off ball.
It's a different case for Luka. His game has proven to translate well to the postseason compared to Harden and Russ, and his passing and shotmaking ability are far above theirs, so he could be outlier. I still agree, though.
Hot Take: If the NBA does Expand by 2 teams, both expansion teams should be Western Conference Teams and 2 of the Timberwolves, Pelicans, or Grizzlies should become Eastern Conference Teams. This makes geographical sense and would somewhat balance the disparity between the Eastern and Western Conferences.
Hot take:Rudy gobert will go down as the most underappreciated player with accomplishments ever, had jazz teams that were filled with cones yes including Mitch, and had them as a top 5 defense, he isn’t a great 1v1 guy but this is team basketball, he is a great defender 4 DPOYS aren’t fluky
How can a "two way player" at the center position, that can't stop the joker, be better than the joker? If hakeem or shaq couldn't stop the joker, hypothetically, who cares if they block shots more than the joker? This "two way player" narrative makes no sense to me.
I mean they would score effortlessly on Jokic’s defense
@@hiphopotamus69 so that would make them, at the very least equal. Therefore the defense is irrelevant. Again, this "two way player" narrative makes no sense to me when it comes to the discourse about NikoLA Jokic.
Steph Curry is the only player that should be a lock on every ‘Best Starting 5 of all time’. If your talking about making the greatest team of all time, Steph’s gravity and off ball abilities and also obviously his shooting is a must have.
Hot take: Giannis is the MVP
Hot Take: The Westbrook 2017 MVP was not as "stat paddy" as people make it out to be. The thunder were 34-8 when he recorded a triple double and 13-27 when he didn't.
Okay. That's good. But I will argue that Russ did not HAVE to get triple doubles in order for them to win; they could've had the same record or a similar record if he had played differently.
All Star hot take: Facts are players are afraid of injuries (legit), players want to hace fun on the midseason break (legit too) and fans don't care about the ASG anymore. Then, the NBA should keep the voting as it is now (10 starters by fans + players + media and 14 by coaches), then get ridículo of the All Star Game and make the selected players take part on the contests instead of "average joes": 6 for the dunk contest, 6 for the three point contest, 6 for the skills contest and 6 for the shooting contest or whatever.
The CBA is categorically failing if it still allows the richest teams (e.g. celtics) to pay more, but forces drafted players out of their poorer team.
Hot take: The play in should only apply to a conference if the 9th seed is 4 games or less behind the 8th seed so that a team that is much better during the season doesn’t get knocked off cause of one bad game
yea 2020 bubble style was the best
Agree. It doesn’t help the general public’s apathy towards the regular season to have a team who was 4-5 games better during the regular season get knocked out of the playoffs because they went cold from 3 for a half.
Hot take: to build on the All Star game take in this video. I think to make the ASG more competitive, the winning team should get home court in the finals; no matter the record. This should make teams play harder
I feel like thats been suggested a lot but i don’t think most players care about that especially if they’re on a team they know isn’t gonna make it to the finals. Like if lamelo made the ASG home field advantage won’t mean anything to him
Bring back the 2-3-2. I never understood the hate and it allows the lower seeded team to have inherent pressure built in to their advantage. Same way the higher seed having 2 up top and 2 at the end. If the higher seed wins 1 at the lower seed home then their advantage is immediately lost and the higher seed regains the advantage as 2H-2A.
the nuggets contracts of MPJ and Jamal aren’t going to end up being that bad. yes they are overpaid but i think denver is going with a 2A and 2B thing with jamal and MPJ. let jokic carry and whatever matchup/scheme either jamal or MPJ can attack will be the secondary option. MPJs height/shooting/rebounding is exactly what you need next to jokic, i truly feel that we are one bench piece away from being the favorites in the west.
HOT TAKE: luka doncic is being criticized unfairly by the media. People always complain about his on-court antics when most star players in the league act the same way or even worse, prime example lebron james. While other players like jokic act the same but in a less animated way. People call it passion for lebron, draymond, jokic etc, but everyone calls it childish and immature for luka.
hot take: the houston rockets are conference finals or even finals underdogs and should be taken seriously in any playoff matchup. they’re defense can smother any star player and with them only gaining chemistry as the season goes on with the offense becoming better and better as the season goes on and hopefully a little more reed sheppard shooting this team can go toe to toe with any team in a 7 game series and if you were to tell me the rockets at least made the conference finals i wouldn’t be surprised. obviously they’re not my championship picks and not even my pick to make the conf finals but it would be less surprising than most people think
I really hope you’re right but I just don’t think they can have consistent playoff offense against any strong teams and the West is packed with strong teams.
How you sleep and typing at the same time
Hot take: the best ability isn’t availability, it’s durability. Sometimes even if a player is available they can’t play 100% because they are hurt. Also playing through injuries may sometimes shorten a NBA player’s career. So when GMs are building teams They shouldn’t consider who will be available, but who will be durable enough for the playoffs.
I would say that it is assumed that availability is basically durability
Hot take: Ant's high 3pt rate holds back his numbers and will diminish any future arguments regarding his place in the league, and it doesn't help that Randall allows for no space for Ant to truly come into his own as a scorer like how Kat did.
Can we just say jokic is even more valuable to the league than people think, he’s never had help he’s had players that he creates roles for himself, he makes there roll ,all they gotta figure out is how to put the ball in the basket, everyone on the nuggets is an exceeding role player due to how much better jokic makes players look everyone says Westbrook is back, ya cause of Jokic weather it’s finding lanes or just giving Russ his confidence back by getting him easy baskets, if jokic had someone like lamelo or Luka as a gaurd I think teams would litterly give up mid game.
im sorry about the shit that was said about your dad rusty. Sad to see it from comments
Hot take: Wembanyama should NOT be going into the paint much more and the offensive trajectory he's taking to turn into 7'4 2022 Steph curry is the BEST outcome not only to prioritize his health but also to ensure that he will have the endurance and energy to give his all on defense. Yes, his efficiency hasnt been amazing, but if he can get it to settle at an above average rate (which he really has in the last 5 or 6 games) then he can truly be the greatest two way force the league has ever seen.