The Shot Clock Pod - NBA 2024-25 Playoffs 2nd Round

[00:00:00] Alright, it's time to talk basketball. I'm Jose Salviati, editor at thepeachbasket.net. He's Steve Percello, long-time educator, vice principal, high school basketball coach, and athletic director. And this is the Shot Clock Pod, the best 15 minutes of NBA Random Thoughts online anywhere. If this is your first time listening or watching, welcome to this podcast was born out of the content of Steve's 13 Rules, Random NBA Thoughts articles, which he publishes weekly. Steve and I have exactly 15 minutes to discuss what's on his mind around the podcast.

[00:00:30] From the NBA. Today we'll discuss his latest 13 Rules Random NBA Thoughts article, where he shares his thoughts after the second week of the NBA playoffs in the 2024-25 NBA season. Steve, are you ready? Yes, ready. Let's do it. You're right. Clock has started. We start with something you wrote. You said that the Knicks have a shot against the Boston Celtics. And I'm curious because any NBA player,

[00:01:00] theoretically, theoretically, has a shot against any other NBA team, but how good a shot do you think the Knicks have on a scale of 0-10, where 0 is no way Jose, and 10 is better on the Knicks?

[00:01:12] Three or four. A lot of things have to work out. The two towns can't be the bad towns. He's got to be the good towns. And they've got to get a third guy, Bridges, or somebody's got to help out. Brunson's great. He can make a big shot. He can hurt you. So if they hang around, they can be troubled down the stretch.

[00:01:34] The biggest issue the Knicks have in this series is defensively. You can't hide two bad defenders, and Brunson and Towns are not good. Boston is going to screen and roll them to death. They're bound with Porzingis. But that'll force Towns to guard somebody, or they'll go at Brunson and force Brunson to guard somebody.

[00:01:53] Now, during the regular season when they played, whenever Towns had to guard Tatum, it was like a revolving door. Tatum went right by him and was making layups all over the court. So they're going to have a problem with that. Now, the one thing the Knicks will probably try to do if you watch the series in any screen and roll, they're going to try to get the guy through. In other words, if Adenobi's guarding Tatum and Porzingis sets a high screen, they might have Towns step out and hedge it.

[00:02:21] But that means coming side to the side. But if not, they're going to try to push Adenobi through so he stays guarding Tatum. If they get successful, they're in trouble. But the other factor in this is Porzingis, if he's shooting the ball, he didn't shoot well against Orlando. But if he's shooting the three well, now the Knicks have all kinds of problems because Towns has got to step way out. And if you give Tatum a step or two, he's going to kill you with a lamp. So that's a key to the series.

[00:02:50] But more offensively, like I said, the Knicks have to get a third guy doing something and they can't let Towns appear. I was particularly, I noticed, I guess a better way to say it, in the game against Detroit that they clinched it when Brunson made that three. Towns was out the line shooting two with a chance to tie the game with about a minute or two left. And if you remember, he made the first one easily and then he missed the signal.

[00:03:17] But it wasn't how he, that he missed, it was how he missed. He hit the very tip of the front of the rim and went, in other words, he short-armed it. And now you have to wonder, after what he did in game four and how great he was to win the game with some of the shots he was pulling off. So you have to wonder about this guy. I don't know. I don't know. Like, he's a great offensive player. But then the next day, he just doesn't have it. Yeah. I don't quite understand how, like, I don't understand him in any way.

[00:03:45] I guess would be the best way to put it. Yeah, you called him an enigma in your article. And we welcome everybody to read the full 13 rules around the NBA Thoughts article. We'll make sure to link that below to get all of Steve's thoughts on Karl-Anthony Towns because he did have more to say. All right. So three or four. So that gives a puncher's chance to the Knicks. But how do you see this playing out? Celtics in how many games? I would think six or six. I know a lot of people would say five. I don't know.

[00:04:15] You know what? Let's see what happens. Because, again, this isn't a series where the home court's going to be big or whatever for Boston or New York. They both can win on either court. And it's really coming down to games and what happens in some of those games. I think Boston will get an easy winner or two. But I think it will. And also, they didn't have to take away the three like Orlando did. But Orlando did it through a switching defense.

[00:04:43] The Knicks can't be a switching defense, as I just said. So there's factors involved. And if they let Pritchard, who didn't, or Hauser get out of the box, they're in trouble. Meaning if they hit a couple, they're in trouble. Because now you get guys you didn't expect to get hurt with hurting you. And Boston has so many guys that can go off on any night. We're the Knicks. Oh, I love them. They have four or three and a half, I'll say.

[00:05:09] He's a good, he's become a pretty good open shooter. But if you guard him, you don't know where the balls go when he shoots it. I've seen him throw some air balls up against Detroit. So he can shoot wide open, especially out of the corner with the three. But with pressure, he's in trouble. So it comes back to Bridges. Yep. It's going to be an entertaining series. Let's see how it plays out. You mentioned the Pistons. Great segue. The Pistons and the Magic. You mentioned both of them, actually.

[00:05:39] They're both out. Right. You called out your most recent article that both have a really nice future. So I'm going to ask you, what does each team, the Pistons and the Magic, need to make a jump next season? I think the Pistons should go in for a good second fiddle type player besides Cunningham. A scorer that can score, get you 20, 25 a night. And if they can do that, those role players that they have will be fine.

[00:06:08] And they're all, it was Cade Cunningham and a bunch of role players who played their roles well. So I think, but again, off the top of my head, I'm not going to say Zach Levine, but a guy who can put the ball in the basket is shootable. Will help them. That's saying, and I'm going to segue that into Orlando. That's saying that Orlando, or not Orlando, Malik Beasley re-signs. Malik Beasley is good. He can shoot real well against the Knicks, but he's a 40% shooter.

[00:06:38] Now, Beasley would be a perfect signing for Orlando because Orlando can't shoot. They just can't shoot threes. And Wagner's got that hitch that really is not helping him. Bancaro's a good player. Another thing that I was surprised about, Bancaro doesn't shoot the foul shots real well. They need the three-point shooter. Beasley would be great with them because he can come in and eat. Oh, didn't shoot well. Anthony Black didn't. None of those guys.

[00:07:06] Wendell Carter didn't shoot well. So Boston had to concentrate on the two guys. And they're going to get their 30, but you got to get more from other people. And they couldn't get that. So both teams, Pistons need a score, a legit score. While the Magic, they need a three-point shooter or two. By the way, Harnaway is also a free agent, I believe. So Detroit, what are they going to do?

[00:07:33] Because they do need, as well, shooting around Cade Cunningham. Because he can go to the basket as well as anybody. And as good a defender as Sar Thompson is, he can't shoot. And maybe he'll get better. He's still young. And by the way, and also Dennis Schroeder's free agent. So they've got a lot of work to do to figure this out. But they do have some money. They can do it, as do the Magic. Yeah, good future ahead for both of those teams. We've talked before about how one of the toughest jobs in sport is GM and building that team.

[00:08:02] And we'll see how these things play out for both of them during what will be an interesting offseason for both teams. Because you wrote... Go ahead. I think the Magic, if you compare the two teams, Detroit had a better record this year. That's because of any injuries. I think the Magic have a much better future with the two good players as comparing to one of them. And by the way, Bank Carroll is going to be a top 10 player in a year or two. He's not there now. Okay. All right. Make sure to tag that, everybody.

[00:08:32] Although I don't disagree with that. He's fun to watch. You wrote... And I thought this was really interesting about a problem the NBA has. And let me set it up and then you elaborate. Teams 1 through 8 in the West, fairly even matched. We had two game 7s as proof of that. In the East, it was a little different. There was only one series and went to six. So we had some mismatches. Okay? That disparity in talent leads to something from lower-seeded teams that you see as a problem in the NBA. What do you see there? What is that issue?

[00:09:02] If you think about basketball, and even when you tried or I tried to play it, if somebody's better than you, you're going to start pushing them and trying to get a little edgy. Orlando, as well as Detroit, knew that the other team had more talent. So what do we do? We get a little physical. Now, the old thought among coaches would be, look, the biggest thing is the fouls should be somewhat even.

[00:09:31] The fouls called. So if I'm a little bit more physical, I might get away with a lot. What the NBA referees have to do is to begin to call a foul a foul. A foul is a foul. And not say, Coach A is going to get on me because I'm calling more fouls. He's got to do it. Now, if you think about the playoffs, Jason Tatum and Jalen Brunson got roughed up pretty good. And so did Jalen Brown.

[00:10:00] If Tatum gets worse, it's hurting the NBA. If Brunson gets worse, it's hurting the NBA. And the wrong team is winning. If they win on the court, it's not a foul. But when you do that and you play it that way, it's got to be stopped right away so that we're not doing that tonight. We're going to play basketball. And a foul is going to be a foul. Anytime. As I said, anytime a player, a coach, they're letting them play, what they're saying is that was a foul, but they didn't call it.

[00:10:30] Yeah. We just said that the GM is one of the hardest jobs in sports. NBA referee is up there as well. Another thing that's always bothered me personally along the same lines is where you'll see somebody go to the hole and there's no foul called. They're letting them play like you said. But you also hear that's not a foul in the playoffs. Where is that written? That's a regular season foul, but not a playoff foul. That doesn't make any sense. I'm with you, man. A foul is a foul.

[00:10:57] And sometimes you're going to get teams that foul 25 times to somebody else's three. Any other coach is going to be mad. And I got to say, you're a coach, right? You would look at that disparity. You would definitely get into ref space about that. Of course it is. And different coaches coach in different ways. And I'm going to use Eme Odoka. His team is physical. They're physical. On everything. And they can test everything. They coach that way. And you know what? Okay.

[00:11:26] You want to be physical. If it's a foul, you've got a problem. That's the way it is. But instead, they get away with a lot of stuff that they shouldn't. You know, if you take last Sunday, that last play with Detroit Knicks when Hardaway got fouled from the three. Before that, there was question about a rebound under the basket. Somebody on Detroit pushed off. The NBA does a two-minute report every week, every game. Any closing.

[00:11:56] If you look it up, if those people look it up, they would find it. And they found there was no foul underneath where they thought a Knick got pushed by a piston. But the official, David Guthrie, after the game, admitted they missed a call. For the life of me, and I know the angle he was on. But for the life of me, you saw contact. You've got to go with it. Now, the Knicks did. I don't believe in a challenge at that point. They were out of timeouts.

[00:12:24] But let them challenge it. When you don't make the call, then it's over. You can't change that. That's why a lot of times in NBA games, you'll see a goaltending call. They'll call the goaltending and then go and look at it. Because you'll look at it if you don't have it. It's something to think about also with that game. Yeah. Interesting. It'll be an interesting offseason for a lot of teams. Might be an interesting offseason for the NBA as they consider some of these rule changes.

[00:12:54] At least some possible rule changes. We talked about coaching. Let's talk about one of the greatest to ever do. I love that you called out in your article a goodbye to Greg Popovich. You said that he, along with our back, Riley and Jackson, are on the Mount Rushmore of NBA coaches. Which, I don't think anybody would disagree with that. Together, I did a little research here. They won 29 championships, 38% of all the available championships in NBA history. Eight coach of the year awards.

[00:13:22] These are absolutely the Mount Rushmore of NBA coaches. And what's interesting to me, and you called this out in your article, they all coached a little differently. But I got to think that there's got to be some common trait between these four. They all treated the talent, their teams, a little differently, as you called out. But there has to be a common denominator, or isn't there one? What do you think? I think, first of all, times have changed. The boss was the boss, and you did what the boss said.

[00:13:52] Now we're a time where players have a lot to say, and oftentimes I've listened to the star players. So we're in a different time. What made our back, in a lot of ways, was a boss and an autocrat. However, we also heard, and players like player form, Riley was, oh God, he was the king. And he did it. He was so intense that everybody let him do his thing. And then you get to Phil Jackson. He was lucky. He had some great teams. He chose to coach.

[00:14:22] Yeah. Now you talk about Popovich. And it's really, he was supposed to have just great relationships with all his players. There's so many stories that you read about him. When he's out, if he sees a former player at some of the restaurant when he's eating, he'll buy dinner. He is known for taking people, players out to dinner. They're always caring about them. Derek White, who's a former, talks about how wonderful he was.

[00:14:48] Because Kawhi Leonard, who left under bad circumstances, still says, I'm thankful for everything he's done for me. Popovich won it in the way that he cared about these people. And players don't forget that. In today's world, it's not always the X's and O's that win. Because if you think about it again, coaches, if I'm watching something, if I were coaching and I'm watching a tape and I see some other coach do something that was really good, I'm copying it. So X's and O's, you can team.

[00:15:18] But the ability to get people to play for you, want to be with you, is way more bright. Popovich mastered that. Popovich always said that there's an interesting article in The Ringer about Popovich. Just talked about how he thinks he could size up a person in no time. And he wanted people that were regular people, not with any heirs. That was Popovich. And in today's world, that's what works. Popovich. Yeah. Yeah. Outstanding.

[00:15:46] So great to, for those of us who got to watch him. I remember when he took over the Spurs, and they weren't particularly good. He fired the coach. He was the GM. And he gave himself the job. And I thought, yeah, what kind of dad does that? Right? And I didn't, the coach was Bob Hill, I remember. And there was some talk of Bob Hill at the time being the Lakers coach. It didn't work out. But Bob Hill had some success with that team, but Pop fired him, took over, and the rest is history.

[00:16:16] That Spurs are the model for what every team wanted to be in the 80s and 90s. What's interesting is Pop's only head coaching experience before then was at Pomona-Pfizer, which I don't think is, that's the one school, is it? I don't believe it is. I wouldn't think. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And he has a military background. So it's really interesting. When you read about this guy and how everybody reveres him, they just think he's great.

[00:16:43] One of the Olympic players, Draymond Green, I believe, who won the Olympics with Pop, I believe he gave Popovich, he signed the sneakers he wore and gave him to Popovich after the championship. So the stories are everywhere about how everybody just loves him. And Tatum has always talked about playing for him was great in the Olympics also. And they became friendly. It's just everywhere in the stories. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:11] And his sideline interviews are Hall of Fame worthy in and of themselves. He's just an all-around good guy. I said 80s and 90s. I think that's the era I'm stuck in. But while he did start, interestingly, with the Spurs as an assistant, I didn't know this, in 1988, his real impact came when he took over starting in 1996. Who was the head coach at 88? You got to look it up. That's enough. Are you pop quizzing me? I don't know, man. Let me think. Gene Shue. Gene Shue? Gene Shue never coached him.

[00:17:40] He coached up in Baltimore. Okay. I threw out a name, man. What do you all think? That was weak. It was weak. Give you an all- This guy coached, won a championship on a college level, and coached in the NBA, and is considered one of the great coaches of all time. Okay. Okay. Another hand. Danny Manning was a star player in college. Okay. Danny Manning was at Kansas. Danny Manning was great until he hurt himself, and still great after that. I had no idea, dude. Brown.

[00:18:11] Oh, Larry Brown. Oh, Larry Brown. Larry Brown. What? Yeah, he's- Okay, Larry Brown. Given time and this pressure of the hot lights, I probably would have gotten that. Larry Brown was a lot of pressure. There was one other coach that's very interesting in San Antonio before Popovich that you'd never think he was a professional coach. He coached at UNLV and in California at Fresno. Tarkadia. Oh, that's Tark.

[00:18:41] Yeah, that's- Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, Tark's Tark. He was a San Antonio. But it's been so long that- It was in the early 90s, I believe. But, yeah. This is the one thing I know about San Antonio, and we're going way long, but it's an interesting rabbit hole. And Stephen, I do this regularly without the record button being on, so this is extra credit. But growing up, I think it was when I started to fall in love with the game of basketball, there would be- The Lakers would go and travel to- This is when George Girvin was a Spur.

[00:19:11] And it might have been Larry Brown that was a coach, actually, wearing those- Those Partridge family pants that he would wear. But this was the greatest thing in the world. The San Antonio, like the Clippers now have the wall. The Spurs had a section of fans that whenever the Lakers would be introduced, they would bring newspapers. Yeah. And they would literally just hold up the paper, not paying attention. It is the coolest thing.

[00:19:37] Everybody, the whole section would just be bored out of their mind when the Lakers were introduced, which I thought was the coolest thing ever. That was in the old hemisphere. That's what Duke used to do. The kids at Duke would put the papers up. Love it. Hemisphere Arena, which is where they played downtown in San Antonio back then. Love it. That's super cool. You don't see as much of that anymore. The Spurs had a good history. An interesting history. As an ABA going back to the ABA days. Right. All right.

[00:20:06] Outstanding. Like I said, this is probably the- You heard the buzzer go off like 10 minutes ago. We normally do not do this, but I thought this was an interesting conversation. And listen, any talk about Greg Popovich, I'm there for. I enjoyed watching him as a fan of the teams that I wanted to see him beat, but still had a ton of respect for who he was. And I hope he gets well, number one, and he has continued success as the president or I don't know what his new position is, but he's going to have some success there in San Antonio. But you saw it or you heard it. Our time is up.

[00:20:36] Thank you for listening. Thank you for watching. Make sure to read Steve's entire 13 Rules Random NBA Thoughts article. We'll link that wherever you are listening or watching this right now and get more of his thoughts on the 2020-425 NBA season as the playoffs continue. Join us next week as Steve shares his thoughts after the third week of the playoffs. We'll see how things go in the second round. And of course, please consider subscribing, liking, sharing, commenting. All of that stuff means the world to us. Join us next week on the Shot Clock Pod.

[00:21:06] The best 15 minutes of random NBA thoughts online anywhere. We'll talk next week. Thanks, Steve.