Knicks-Pacers Reaction: Indiana BLOWS OUT Knicks, forces Game 7 in New York | Hoops Tonight

Knicks-Pacers Reaction: Indiana BLOWS OUT Knicks, forces Game 7 in New York | Hoops Tonight

[Music] e e e [Music] all right welcome to Hoops tonight here at the volume happy Friday everybody hope all of you guys have been having a great week so far we got a jamack show for you tonight the NBA Playoffs have not been very kind to us in the last few weeks I should say in the last week or so as we have yet another blowout tonight as the Pacers destroy the New York Knicks to send this to a game seven on Sunday we’re going to break that game down from the perspective of both teams but I want to uh I want to bounce around the rest of the league tonight since we had such a boring game so why don’t you guys drop some mailbag questions in the chat and Paul our producer is going to be texting them to me and we’ll get to them at the tail end of the show I have roughly about 101 15 minutes that we’re going to go over this game but then we’re going to get into a mailbag you guys know the drill before we get started subscribe to our brand new YouTube channel so you don’t miss any more of our videos follow me on Twitter _ Jason LT so you guys don’t miss show announcements don’t forget about our podcast feed wherever you get your podcast under Hoops tonight then keep dropping mailbag questions in those YouTube comments we can keep get to them over the course of the rest of the postseason all right let’s talk some basketball so wild a ation and effort have been the story of the series since game three game three was that kind of like pivot point where it felt like it could have gone the other way for the Knicks but unfortunately we get for the Knicks I should say the uh Andrew nard hits that three and it’s 2-1 and then we the injuries start to stack up it becomes a problem they get blown out in game four then the Pacers get blown out in game five and then the Knicks get blown out in game six it’s just been going back and forth the the Gap in effort was Apparent from the jump there was an early shot on the right wing it was like the third possession second or third possession for the Pacers Andrew nehar gets a pretty decent look at three at the right wing and he misses it Josh Hart closes out get a contest but after he contest he leaks out instead of going for the board the the ball comes short off the front of the rim Jaylen brunson’s standing right around the elbow like no one’s engaged with him he’s in position to go get the basketball but he’s too upright not in an athletic stance ready to go and so n Smith end ends up just chasing his own shot and getting the defensive rebound he gets worked back around Tyrese Halbert and hits a three in the chaos after it it’s like this is a opportunity to close out the Pacers and you’re not bringing that effort you know immediately from the jump that that that was just abundantly clear obviously Indiana was the one that was the team that was really scaling up there was a play that I thought kind of demonstrated that early too and it was we went to that action that the Knicks were spamming so much over the course of the tail end of this series which is having Duce McBride screen for Jaylen Brunson where Hal Burton’s either blitzing or hedging and recovering and then they’re getting good looks out of Duce McBride slipping out of that kind of the top of the key area where he can either shoot a three or make that extra pass if the defense rotates to him and one of the things that I noticed that was a little bit different and I don’t even think this is so much execution as it is just effort I shouldn’t say execution I don’t know how I don’t know how much of this is game plan it’s probably more just effort but in the Hedge and recover remember Halton when he Hedges he’s supposed to stop Jaylen Brunson from turning the corner but then he’s got to Sprint back and recover and in game five he just wasn’t doing it he just was lingering way too long and so the uh Duce McBride would catch there somewhere around the top of the key around the wing and he’d either get a clean look at three or a different Pacer would have to rotate which would allow Duce McBride to just make easy reads out of it one of the early possessions of the game halberton Hedges the ball gets dropped from Brunson back to uh to Du McBride around the top of the key but halberton Sprints back into the play and chases du McBride off the line which makes it so that a different Pacer didn’t have to rotate so they didn’t get the defense in rotation and Duce ends up taking like a contested mid-range two where halton’s offering some back pressure and it’s like that’s just better execution of a coverage that you’ve been running most of the series like it’s it really you know it’s funny I was thinking about this a lot after the Timberwolves Nuggets game last night because there were some tactical things that were done differently right like specifically there was a lot of double teaming of Nicole yic that was the main like difference schematically between what the the Timberwolves did in game five but the vast majority of what happened in that game was just the Timberwolves did a much better job they did a much better job of everything in terms of like running harder screening harder competing at the point of attack running fighting over the top of screens like every little detail even just little things like battles where Carl Anthony towns was trying to play bully ball earlier in the series he was getting stood up and flattened out and then all of a sudden he’s going through people and getting easy hook shots in game six right so like so much of this is just the the oscillations of force like athletic force that naturally take place as urgency shifts back and forth between the two teams I thought I thought that was that the story of this game the Knicks were really bad in transition defense in particular they kept like not getting matched up or not loading up their shell they gave up a easy early layup to Andrew nard in transition because they just didn’t have their shell set up and again like all of you who have played basketball at any level are familiar with what shell is it’s basically just your loaded up defensive principles whenever there’s just a guy holding the ball on the wing right like the guys that are one pass away are typically up in the passing Lane right the guys that are two passes away usually have a foot in the paint that’s like just the the very very basic version of what a shell is right and like every team’s going to have different principles depending on what type of personnel they have but like if you are not in your loaded up position like if there’s a guy like in this play Andrew nard was driving a close out in transition on the right wing if Andrew nard drives that close out but you have two guys digging down in the driving Lanes one pass away and then everyone who’s two pass away has a foot in the paint then there’s not a whole lot of room for nard to operate and he’s probably going to have to kick and then it’s going to turn into like a driving kick kind of closeout situation right but if you’re not loaded up then nard can easily kind of jump into the lane I think he went to a left right Euro Step for a right-handed layup in too much opening around the basket right not getting up was a big problem they gave seak a wide open layup on like the fourth or fifth possession of the game because literally just no one picked him up when they were back in transition and so like it was just a really poor execution and effort game from the Knicks uh Pascal yakum really carried the offense early for Indiana he has his short and mid-range game really dialed in right now Miles Turner had a big bounceback game after having a rough game five had a driving dunk earlier off the left wing that I thought really set the tone similar type of play in the early second quarter where the Knicks cut it to five and then he had like a tip dunk where he like was screaming and it just kind of like reasserted the team after they started to let go of the Rope a little bit and then from there in the middle third quarter Tyrese Alberton finally kind of got going as a score really got going with this pull-up jump shot and that is pretty much what put the game outside of 15 points where it became just insurmountable for a Knicks team that can struggle to score sometimes I felt like there were two chances in this game for the Knicks to kind of take some control and send it into something that could have been a closer and more compe comptitive game and in both situations the Pacers were the team that ended up taking control instead in the middle second quarter the game was tied at 46 at one point and the Pacers just really locked in defensively they held the Knicks to just two points over the following six minutes Brunson just went brutally cold from the field a lot of really good individual and team defense eron n Smith continues to just do an incredible job on him since switching onto that assignment in game three Andrew nard also got a couple of big stops on him during that run a big one on the uh left elbow where he uh forced Brunson to pick up his dribble and then pressured him and forced him into a really difficult kind of like pivoting Bank like kind of push shot at the end of the shot clock during that span that t that uh that run where they held the Knicks to only two points they ended up uh scoring 14 of their own and Indie ended up uh Indie ended up in Indie ended up going up by 12 points in that span and then the early third quarter was the other chance where I thought the Knicks had a chance they get a couple of buckets quickly out of the halftime right Brunson gets a driving layup there’s a back cut they get a couple stops it’s back to five right but then the Pacers immediately went on a 10 to two run and on the Knicks front they missed a couple of open threes in that stretch dece McBride missed two of them and Josh Hart missed a really good look at the top of the key feels like you kind of need to hit at least a couple of those to give yourself a chance to win this type of game in this environment yet on the other end of the floor uh halberton drives and kick kicks to nard on the left wing he hits a three there’s a play where halberton misses a step back jumper on the Baseline over Duce McBride and there’s a Tapout rebound and Halton just beats everybody to the ball and it gets tapped in the chaos it ends up working back to halberton and he ends up hitting a three miles Turner hit two buckets in that stretch he drove a close out on the right wing hit a little bank shot and then then that tip dunk that I told you guys about that kind of like reasserted the the Pacers control of the game so like these two stretches where it felt like if a couple things go differently then maybe we’re looking at a different type of game but in both of those situations the Pacers instead made all the plays and took control of the basketball game they deserved to win the night they brought the energy they brought the force the Knicks didn’t uh obviously Josh Hart’s injury is another Factor we got to to look at there it looked like he strained something in his abdomen uh the dead giveaway there was like when he was trying to pull that rebound down from cakam and like that’s just essentially a crunch right and and and you could just tell it was really bothering him and specifically with his play style that’s that’s an injury that’s going to be tough for him to play through the injuries just keep stacking up for the Knicks and like there’s some good news right like if they can survive game seven it looks like they’ll get OG and and Obi back in the next round against Boston but it’s going to be a lot to survive game seven now as we look through the uh the the situation here where we have basically three straight blowouts um some of them more dramatic than others but we these teams have not played a competitive game since game three right so like with that being the case it’s kind of hard to sift through the noise but I just want to kind of give you guys my overarching 30,000 foot view of the series as we go into game seven to try to help with making a prediction or trying to figure out what’s going to happen the Pacers have been the far better transition team per cleaning the glass coming into tonight 15% of their possessions have been in transition and they’re scoring 161 points per transition uh per 100 transition plays the Knicks are only getting out 133% of the time and only a 129 uh uh of 129 points per 100 transition plays so the Pacers have been a far more impactful offense in transition tonight for cleaning the glass as of three and a half minutes left uh in terms of the data updating but Indiana had a had scored at a rate of 200 points per 100 transition plays and the Knicks were only at 50 so there’s like a Chasm between the two teams in terms of getting out and transition and scoring that’s obviously the way the Pacers like to play but when they’ve been good it’s been getting out in transition the Knicks have been the better halfcourt team her cleaning the glass through games one through five they had a a five-point Edge per 100 halfcourt possessions a three-point Edge tonight as of three and a half minutes left per 100 possession so the Knicks have a size like a at least a clearly discernable Gap in their half court ability to score the basketball it really comes down to two things they’re rebounding 38% of their own misses through the first five five games and then Brunson has been a more reliable shot Creator in the half court Hal Burton has brought a lot of value in transition but when we actually get stuck in the half court Brunson has been the best shot Creator in the series his his action where he targets halberton with those Duce McBride screens that’s probably the most reliable and efficient play for either team as a halfcourt kind of like get the defense in rotation and try to make something happen type of play at this point and so really if we sort through that it’s just going to come down to that battle the half court verse transition battle if the Knicks can get back in transition well first of all execute in the half court offensively and score right if they can get back in transition and kind of contain Indiana and keep them in the half court I think the Knicks will win if the Pacers get a lot of stops and they get out and transition a bunch that could be a death sentence for the Knicks so that the main battle that’s going to determine what happens in game seven is going to be who wins that physical battle are the Knicks able to strangle the pace and keep this thing in the half court as much as possible or the Pacers going to get stops and get out and run that’s going to be who determines the V uh the victor of game seven I believe the Knicks are going to win but we’d be foolish to not give the Pacers a chance obviously they got ran out of the gym in game five but they were they were very very competitive in both game one and game two of this series now both teams have kind of made a lot of adjustments since then it really settled into their play Styles but the Pacers are going to feel confident going into that game that they have a chance to win Josh Hart is obviously going to be a huge question mark there as well like if he’s out that’s a huge problem so yeah picking the Knicks we’re going to be covering the game it’s a it’s a 3:30 p.m. Eastern start my guesses will go live on YouTube after that game because we’ll probably be going with Colin uh in the evening after wolves nuggets so I’ll see you guys uh after the final buzzer of that game now before we get out of here let’s get to some mailbag questions uh keep dropping questions with Paul in the chat uh obviously we’ve got we’re going to go for like another 15 20 minutes so if you guys got anything interesting we anything’s fair game whatever you guys want to talk about drop it in the chat let’s see uh how can you differentiate a surprise playoff team like taking the next step versus an overachieving fake run to me that really just comes down to Personnel right like if you’re for instance like if I’m looking at a team that uh like the two examples that were given in this mailbag question are the 2023 Knicks versus the 2021 Hawks so one of the things for the Knicks in particular is like they’re doing this even though they’re they’ve got Personnel that’s unavailable right like it’s interesting I was talking with Paul our our our lead producer here he’s a big Nicks fan and we were talking about this earlier like before the show like I one of the things that’s a dead giveaway to me when the home team wins every game in a series is like neither team is particularly good now obviously the Knicks when they have everybody when the Knicks have ogan anobi when Josh hard is is healthy when they’ve got their guys in the lineup I think that they’re a team that’s much closer to the top tier than they appear right now and I actually think that if ogn and noi’s healthy this series is probably over already it probably ends in in six games right so like it just there’s just a certain amount of talent loss that they’ve experienced or injury that’s made them look like a different type of team but with a team like the Knicks no matter what happens in this postseason run you’re encouraged because Jaylen Brunson is clearly a top 10 player in this league uh there’s a lot of resiliency to his ability to score that we’ve seen over multiple playoff runs even dating back to when he was with Dallas and last year as well like brunson’s just one of those dudes now we just have to kind of consider him one of those guys and so brunson’s legit you’ve got a a real identity a good coach uh a lot of two-way Personnel you really just need an additional shot Creator right for to tie this all together and the Knicks are in beautiful position to do something like that this summer so like I do think there’s a lot of legitimacy there with the Hawks like I never have really looked at uh I never have really looked at Trey young as one of those guys now I know that that’s kind of a a polarizing topic that Trey young has a lot of fans and a lot of people think he’s really really good I think Trey young is more in that like 20 to 30 range of NBA player not in the 5 to 15 range like Jaylen Brunson is right so like I just think jayen brunson’s better so I think that makes him different again when I’m looking at the uh what I’m looking at like whether a team has a real playoff run meaning like the potential to take the next step to get into Championship contention I’m going to look at the same set of rules that I look at for every franchise do do you have a guy that’s good enough to be the best player on a championship team and I actually think Jaylen Brunson is capable of being that guy I think he’s on the very low end of that but I think he is on that on that level do they have a legitimate secondary shot Creator this year they don’t but I Nicks fans have heard this consistently from me I love this team they’ve got a a really bright future but I never gave them a legitimate chance to win the title this year because they don’t have that like really reliable secondary shot Creator if they get that next year then we’re talking about a more serious team and then there’s all these other boxes that we look at down the roster which the Knicks check with flying colors like Championship character basketball character coaching like two-way Personnel like depth of talent like uh competitiveness and spirit like all of that stuff they have in Spades there’s just this one hole which is and I’m talking about the healthy version of the Knicks but there’s this one hole which is they don’t have a reliable secondary shot Creator all right let’s look at another one here Denver has been sold as a high floor team but they’ve had two Duds is this just about the matchup with Minnesota or actual flaws that teams in later rounds can exploit if the Nuggets get through so I think the the really ugly losses have had more to do with the play Styles and I think I think we’ve seen this a little bit in Nicks Pacers as well right like the Knicks are a much better half court team than the Pacers but the Pacers are a much better transition team so like if they play a half court based game the Knicks win a lot by a lot and if they play a a a transition based game the Pacers win by a lot right for the Nuggets they they have an offensive skill advantage against uh Minnesota that is pretty substantial so when when Denver executes and and I mean on both ends of the floor when they handle ball pressure well when they set good screens when they really get into their offense and then on the other end of the floor when they press up into Minnesota and make them uncomfortable you just see this massive Chasm and offensive Talent the games are slower but Denver just scores more reliable and they’re winning by what like somewhere in that 12 to 18 points range right like every one of those games from game three four and five kind of looked the same right in terms of like Minnesota’s offense really struggling I want to say five times in those six halves they failed to reach 50 points if I remember correctly I I need to go back and double check it might have been four times but they they were consistently being held under 50 points in a half like Minnesota just couldn’t score and Denver had a 128 or 127 and change offensive rating over those three games so like that was the difference right but in games two and game six games where Denver really struggles offensively and they uh are not bringing that same level of defensive pressure that’s where Minnesota’s athleticism Advantage just comes screaming off the screen and all of a sudden it’s like wow they just look so much faster so much lankier and like they just bring so much more like downhill Force Through Anthony Edwards running his Lane and like cat bullying his way to the basket nasri driving and dunking on people like there’s just like a level of athleticism that pops for Minnesota when Denver doesn’t have control of the game but as long as Denver can control the game the athleticism stuff doesn’t matter as much it’s just it’s very much been to me like when Minnesota wins those battles it’s just more extravagant of a deficit because their athleticism Advantage is so big does the winner of game seven in Minnesota Denver instantly become the title favorite so I one of the things that I I was high on I was much higher on Minnesota after game two of this series in the sense that I looked at they had a lot going for them offensively and there were a bunch of different things that were clicking that weren’t clicking in the regular season that had them looking really good on offensively cat was like consistently good on offense every night Nel Alexander Walker was consistently good on offense every single night cat’s three-point shot in particular was just like deadly locked in and ant was playing Super well but then we found out over the course of the series particularly game three four and five like ant has had some resiliency in his ability to score the basketball throughout the different circumstances of the series but the rest of his team is not and that has been pretty standard for what we’ve seen from Minnesota All Season except for it’s been even more exaggerated cuz ant wasn’t as good in the regular season right and so when I when I look at uh Denver vers Boston I think Denver is is to me clearly just the safer bet because they’re more consistently operating at their ceiling but if we imagine a Minnesota vers Boston final Boston’s going to be able to do a lot of the same damage to Minnesota’s offense that Denver has done to Minnesota’s offense and Boston also has this incredibly high-powered offense that can look to attack entry points one of the unique things that makes Boston’s offense so scared is when you have five starting caliber players out there when porzingis is healthy or six with or five when porzingis is not healthy and six when he is but when porzingis is out there with that starting group not only do you have five high-powered offensive players you have five high-powered offensive players that are all great at attacking matchups Drew holiday can really do damage to smaller guards in the post Chris alpenz can really do damage on switches in the post Jaylen Brown can do the same thing so can Tatum Dereck white obviously is an offensive initiator of a different type but can also do a lot of damage and so one of the things is like you can’t really hide Defenders against Boston the way that you can against other teams and like if if Jaden McDaniels is gonna guard Jaylen Brown and uh and Drew holiday is gonna guard or excuse if uh um uh Anthony Edwards is gonna guard Jason Tatum or however it is that they split up the matchups Conley’s gonna have to guard one of them you know Carl Anthony towns is going to have to guard one of them Carl Anthony towns like my guess is they’ll probably end up putting him on like Drew holiday and trying to let him roam around if they end up in that type of series but like that Drew holiday is a really good cutter and he’s he’s found ways to be useful off the ball he’s been a Deadly Catch and shoot guy in the regular season not so much in the playoffs but he’s made a few more as of late but like Boston has like a a plethora of shot creation ability that makes them a very difficult challenge in their own right so like I I’m going to stick with what I said right around the time that uh Minnesota was kicking the out of Phoenix which is like I look at Denver and Boston as the top two teams and Minnesota for me joined that tier with their performance through the first two rounds of the playoffs and so yeah I I think I think if Denver loses Boston becomes the favorite I think if Denver wins Denver stays the favorite but certainly all three of those teams have a really good chance when was the last time you were able to get practice with guitar so uh it’s actually kind of a funny story I I played a lot when I was a kid my dad was a a diard uh Almond Brothers fan so I would kind of grew up on Blues a lot of like Dwayne almond Derek Trucks you know Warren hannes DIY bats those kinds of guys and when I went to go play basketball in college I I I moved into a dorm up in uh up in Utah and so I didn’t bring my guitars with me and I just kind of stopped and like I stopped for a long time it wasn’t until I was probably I want to say I I want to say it was like 20 it was right around like 2019 2020 relatively recently two things kind of got me back into it one I discovered the John Mayer Grateful Dead whole thing where like I I i’ always thought of John Mayer as John Mayer you know and like I didn’t even know he was doing this kind of music and my older brother who’s also a big guitar guy and a big blues guy he ended up sending me a link one day that was like hey check this out and it was John Mayer playing ala and I was like holy this is awesome and right around the same time my brother-in-law uh who doesn’t play guitar gave me a guitar that he had sitting around I didn’t even I didn’t even have one I like my old ones I genuinely don’t even remember what happened to them and so I I it was just an acoustic guitar that my older brother my brother-in-law gave me and I played it for a little bit and I remembered that I loved it and so like two days later I went down to a Guitar Center and bought like a cheap it’s this epone Les Paul that I have over here and then immediately it was like being a kid again I just felt love with it again and I got like super hooked and one of the things that that uh um about me that’s like kind of different than um than it was when I was a kid is like I really struggle to work hard on things that I that I don’t have a passion for and I just have a passion for guitar and so it’s like really easy for me to work on it but that said I don’t devote as much time to it as I do basketball right now my guess is whenever my knees fail me or whenever I have some sort of serious injury that causes me to stop playing basketball I’ll probably devote a lot more time to playing guitar uh but it’s definitely like something that I that I love to do and that i’ I’d like to do more and more as I get older I joke with my wife there are a lot of dive bars here in Tucson I’d love to be that like 50 60 year old dude who like goes down on a Tuesday and like plays cover band music at a at a at a dive bar somewhere just I I I just I just love that uh um that kind of music all right let’s see when is a good time to pull the plug when losing in playoff games if not down 20 with 5 minutes remaining in game 748 hours away then when I mean that’s really it is like I think when you’re I think when you get down 20 plus with like right around like seven minutes left in that fourth quarter you’re almost better off buying rest for the next game do you watch the MCU I watched the entire uh whatever you call it phase one with the the Thanos story everything through Avengers endgame loved those uh my wife and I a couple times over the years have rewatched them too was big fan I’m a big fan of like anything that’s like fantasy based and that has deep story building and like deep World building and uh the MCU has been like that for me but I’ve had a really hard time getting into it in the next phase it’s just the villains haven’t been as interesting the characters haven’t been as interesting I’ve just had I’ve had a hard time getting into it do you classify Jimmy Butler’s heat as real contenders or overachievers I look at them as kind of like in between I think they’re like the to me they’re like the bouncer at the championship Club but they’re not actually in the club what I mean by that is like if you’re fraudulent team and you run into Miami you’re going to lose uh when they have Jimmy and Bam healthy but every time they end up running into a team that actually has Championship ability whether it’s the Nuggets last year or it’s the Lakers in 2020 or that Celtics team in 2022 which I actually think was better than some of these other Celtics teams because they were so much more engaged on the defensive end of the floor they uh the heat just the heat just eventually run out of Firepower and so there’s a lot of guards available this summer whether it’s Deonte Murray or it’s Darius Garland or Donovan Mitchell or it’s or Trey young or whatever it is there’s a lot of uh there’s just a lot of guys available this summer I think Jeremy Grant could be available this summer Brandon Ingram could be available this summer so like the the the heat just have to get one of those guys they simply do and they have to give it a shot with Jimmy and Bam and one of those guys to see if they can get something let’s see do you think a good SGA player comp would be the late late 90s MJ with the way his offensive approach is along with the shot profile but not as great as an athlete you know I don’t really see MJ in Shay Shay is such a hesitation based like stop start kind of like methodical player he’s honestly like super unique and and even like his release it’s kind of like slow but then quick at the end like he kind of has like a long load up but then a quick snap at the end Shay is a very very unique player that I think uh is hard to find uh comps in NBA history and so like honestly that’s just kind of unique about him and one of the things that I think is really cool about SGA he’s another one of those guys kind of like Luca where uh I I feel like young players should watch him because his handle is a lot tighter than I think people realize and specifically like you will see Shay get into contact with Defenders and then hit a dribble combination and that dribble combination will just kind of get the defender to lose his like base and then he’ll wait for you to lean one way or to to maybe take a hop and like as soon as a think of it like this whenever an offensive player sees a defensive player come off of his feet in any way shape or form or get his footwork messed up he can’t plant to make the next slide so like that’s the perfect time to try to hit the Gap is like find those moments when the defender just kind of uh uh hesitates for a second right Shay has this move where like he’ll go between the legs slow but then right when it gets to his right hand then he’ll take off and it’s like a very it’s very much change of Pace oriented there’s a lot of like really good stuff in there for young basketball players to replicate and he’s unique and I think that’s what makes him kind of a a cool player in NBA history what are your thoughts on the Christopher Nolan Batman movies absolutely loved him dark Knight’s one of my favorite movies to watch it’s been a while since I’ve gone back to see him but really really enjoyed the Christopher Nolan Batman movies should the 76ers pursue Paul George yeah they should pursue again he’s another one of those guys in that long list of stars that I just Unleashed but like they got to get one of those guys right like I think embiid has a little bit more of a clock on him than people realize with his injury history and so you got to try to give it a go also if embiid’s going to make it to the playoffs and be ready to go you have to cut substantially down on his workload and make it so that he can load manage throughout the season and the only way you’re going to do that is if you get a secondary star because as we saw last year there was a moment towards the end of the embiid injury phase where Maxi kind of regained control and had them hovering around 500 but they dropped a bunch of games at the beginning so in totality they were below 500 for the uh for that whole stretch and so I think they just need a little bit more Firepower to be able to weather embiid being out of the lineup who has a better chance against the Celtics the Pacers are the Knicks with all the injuries I think it’s the Knicks no question I think that I think the Pacers would really really struggle to uh to um to score and to guard Boston one of the things with the Pacers that we talked about earlier is they’ve got really good perimeter Defenders but like they can only really keep two of them on the floor at the same time and so as a result they run into the same issue that a lot of teams are going to have with Boston where it’s like just give it to one of the guys that Tyrese halberton is guarding like they’re just going to like one of the things with dece McBride is you can put Tyrese on Duce McBride because de McBride is not just going to come down the floor and run pick and roll all game long but if they put him on Derek white or Drew holiday you bet your ass that Boston’s just going to to look to attack him every single time they get a chance and get really good looks out of it um the Knicks for me they represent a cou like when they’re healthy and OG and anobi is allegedly going to return but when they’re healthy to me the Knicks kind of represent some of the Celtics weaknesses in terms of like physicality and uh like the Knicks can really grind games down into the mud and make teams not shoot well with from jump shot range and so I think they can play the Knicks or the Celtics into some cold shooting stretches and then obviously with Madison Square Garden and and that just the how borderline unbeatable the Knicks have been there I think that gives him a chance to win some games at home I’ll pick the Boston Celtics to win that series probably in five or six games but I think the Knicks have more of a chance to keep it competitive than Indiana does are the Spurs the next Dynasty with wemi and vasel here’s the thing I think Victor wanyama is just a clear Bonafide top tier Superstar like he’s probably going to be that by halfway through the year next year and is certainly going to be that within two to three years so like we’re going to do a lot of stuff with wemi this summer I plan I didn’t spend a lot of time on wemi during the regular season just for obvious reasons as I primarily focus on the top 10 15 teams in the league and so we’re going to do a ton of Wy film study this summer and just kind of dive into what he’s good and bad at right now and and where is opport areas of opportunity are and I do think the Spurs are going to end up doing something uh in the trade market this year to try to bring in some more ball handling to make things easier for him so like I mean here’s the thing if wemy stays healthy for 10 years and is a spur for 10 years then they I mean dynasty is a lot just because there’s so much talent in the league but I think the Spurs are going to be a perennial Contender uh at some point in the next five years how do you approach watching film when breaking down a player or team what are the top things that you look for so for instance if I if I’m looking at uh I I look at it in two different ways if I’m and I’ll start with a player so like for instance I’m going to scout draft prospects when we get out of the NBA Finals like as soon as the NBA finals are over we’re going to turn all of our attention to the draft right and uh so I need to try to scout a player in a short period of time even though there are draft guys that do it year round right and so I look at a couple of different things I look at I think it’s very important to watch full games at least one or two of them and the main reason why is like a full game is going to give you the best view of all of the little things that a player does like does he e inlow in effort does he e inlow in aggressiveness how is his game management like identifying doesn’t matter how like what your points per possession and ball screens are if you’re not good at identifying when to be aggressive versus when to be playmaker in the flow of a basketball game right like all these little details leadership details are do they get uh can players get in their head and get them emotional like there’s all these like different things you look at defense is a big one there watching full games you get a much better view of uh of what it looks like for them and help in recover situations what they’re like on the defensive glass you know all all that kind of stuff right so you got to watch a few full games just to pick up the little details then from um then from the uh from like the individual Play Type data just depends on what kind of role they’re looking at so like if I’m looking in Lottery at Lottery stuff and like let’s say I’m trying to figure out a uh let’s say I’m scouting you know Trace Jackson Davis right like I’ll literally go to uh to Synergy and I’ll just watch every single ball screen that he’s involved in and I’ll look at how well he screens how good his hands are at catching in the pocket how good his decision- making is there and I was really high on Trace Jackson Davis out of Indiana if you guys remember because one of the things I talked about with J he played Jaylen Hino there in like the when he would catch on the rooll trace would catch on the rooll just completely swarmed because he was one of the best players in his conference and so kind of similar to what yic deals with now where teams are swarming him on the rooll it just there’s a lot of uh uh there’s a lot of traffic that he’s running into in terms of what the game plan is is dictating right and so what I was excited about for Trace Jackson Davis with the Warriors is like he’s going to be rolling to the rim largely unimpeded compared to what it was like for Indiana and so for him he’s got so much practice already making reads out of the role I just thought he’d be a good fit there right similarly to like uh uh like when I Scout a a ball handler like I’ll look at every single ISO they run every single pick and roll they run every single you know like a back to the basket player will look at all their post UPS so like I’ll look at Play Type data to dictate to learn more about their shot creation ability and then obviously I supplement that with actual data in terms of what their efficiency was in those situations and then the last one I’ll look at a lot is like close out attacking so like uh spot up situations are are too often like to me oversimplified down into like what’s the catch and shoot percentage and so much of it is like good defenses will chase you off the line so what do you do when you get chased off the line are you capable of hitting a one dble pull-up are you capable of hitting like ripping through to beat the close out Defender kind of slowing down waiting to see the play develop and then like change your angle and get into the middle of the floor for a floater or driving a kicking to the next guy in line like spot up situations to me uh need to be examined in a more full sense than just catch and shoot jump shooting but in terms of players it really just comes down to a combination of full game and play types teams I uh exact same kind of thing but one of the things with teams that I primarily focus on is like looking at a phases of the game so like bench units I’ll look at a lot of like First beginning of the second quarter beginning of the fourth quarter type of stuff but when it comes to starting units I feel like you actually learn the most about them in crunchtime situations that’s when uh uh that’s when you actually see them against a defense that’s fully engaged that has scouted all your plays through the game to that point and is probably going with whatever they’re going to try to do to win the game and so you can learn a lot about a team watching uh a watching crunch time but again what film for a team is more of a big picture type of thing like I need to watch a team 30 40 times during the season for an entire game to really get a good feel for him before we get to the postseason who is higher in current player rankings Booker or Kyrie so you know Devon Booker had a postseason that left a lot to be desired obviously although he had a big game for but I still think that Devin Booker with his height and his shot making ability brings a little bit more to the table than Kyrie Kyrie’s one of those guys too where like if you put him in a situation where the rest of the team can do everything else and he just needs to focus on scoring You could argue he’s the best at that you know what I mean uh but Devon Booker I think is a is a a higher level playmaker in ball screens I think the thing with Devon Booker that’s been an issue is his hamstring injuries like he just continually deals with these soft tissue injuries that seem to affect his his explosiveness and then he’s not as good getting to his spots and getting lift right so like obviously it’s tough but uh I I would probably lean I I I think Deon Booker has the edge there for sure had the Warriors gotten the first pick in the 2020 NBA draft and taken ant would the dynasty have extended or of ant’s development slow they of course it would have extended don’t overthink ant he’s 22 years old he’s already better than most of the players in the league like he’s just awesome but at the same time like he wasn’t available that’s just the reality right like like even as it pertains to the uh the wisan pick like that draft in particular everybody was a high-risk pick and I think there’s a lot of like there’s a lot of like uh what do you call it like there’s a lot of revisionist history in the sense that like so many people want to pretend that you know one of these some of the some of these things were obvious and it’s just not the case like Golden State kind of needed a big now should they have taken a Lamela ball maybe but like Lamela Ball’s had injury issues right so like so much of it is just like it was a weak draft everybody was risky even Anthony Edwards even though he was the clear number one Anthony Edwards came with a lot of question marks coming out of Georgia right and so now all those question marks have been answered resoundingly and I think you know I think Anthony edwards’ series actually reminds me a lot of Lebron in 2008 against the Celtics where it’s like he’s clearly playing the best team in the league and like like he has this like superpower that has kept him in this series but like Denver’s just better now a has an opportunity on Sunday to etch his name in history if a goes in on game for game seven and he goes for 35 Plus and he shakes the foundation of that Denver team and they win and they advance to the next round you’re talking about going without homecourt Advantage as a substantial Underdog to be the best player in the world on his home floor that would be one hell of an early feather in the cat for Anthony Edwards especially since that that puts them into a Conference Finals series where I think they’d probably be the favorite against whoever comes out of Dallas Oklahoma City so huge opportunity for ant on Sunday I don’t think they’re going to win but that’s the type of opportunity that lays in front of him do you watch anime so I what was the show with the superheroes that was anime um Paul if you could think of it let me know it’s uh the one where the kid has the dad um no not my hero Academia what was the it’s the one where like the kid’s dad has the has the mustache and he’s like Superman and like and there’s a moment in the first season where he beats the out of him I I can’t remember exactly what that show was called but like I watched I watched the uh um that doesn’t count as anime or it’s just animation I guess Invincible that’s what it’s called Invincible to okay so anime is like okay I see what you’re saying so I I watched you know when I was a kid you know like I watched Yu-Gi-Oh when I was a kid right or or Pokemon when I was young but like haven’t been into anime uh very much I did really enjoy the Star Wars Visions uh shows uh where where they went to a bunch of anime Studios and had them make a bunch of Star Wars stories I really really enjoyed those there’s a a part of Star Wars that I’ve always enjoyed just in terms of like I’ve always been fascinated by The Sith and like their kind of like overly D dark Aura and like that mixes with anime extremely well and there was a lot of really really cool stuff from Star Wars Visions with that see I’m going to be in trouble now because I just called Invincible anime and that doesn’t count all right any more questions before we get out of here also I uh I know I’ve mentioned this a couple times in the last week but like I uh um I have a podcast that I have on the side uh two sons podcast this one that I do with my buddy Luke and we cover basically TV shows and TV series and major movie releases and stuff like loved Fallout we covered Fallout loved Shogun we covered Shogun we uh just did kind of a preview of the acolyte acolytes less than a month away we’re going to be hitting the acolyte every single episode we’re going to be hitting a house of the Dragon every single episode I saw the trailer today for rings of power super excited for that we’re going to have uh breakdowns for all of those so you can find that where at my other podcast at two sons let’s see and someone gave it a description of anime for me thank you I apologize I didn’t mean to to disrespect the the the format I I I I have a brother-in-law a big anime guy and he’s always trying to get me to get into it but I just haven’t been I love that you went to Star Wars yeah I just I one in doubt I’m always going to go to Star Wars that’s just how it goes how close is Indiana to being a true Contender I think part of it is like tyres Alberton just needs to get a little bit better as a score right like I think they need to get uh they need to get kind of like that nard neith piece like a I think one of those guys can be the fifth best player on your lineup but I think you got to upgrade one of those guys and then um if Tyrese can become a more reliable scorer in the postseason I think that’s enough for them to really enter into contention I’m a huge believer in halberton I I think like I think he’s got a very unique shot creation ability that goes under under the radar so much focus on his scoring in this series and like I’m not trying to underplay that the scoring matters but like let’s just be honest about the situation and acknowledge that like halton’s best skill is getting the defense in rotation and he’s done a lot of that in this series and he’s just generating easy your offense for his teammates should the Knicks trade Randall I think they should I think they should trade Randall and try to get a star forward to put next to OG if they can thoughts on bronnie I thought that a lot of people like here’s the thing one of the things that that sucks for bronnie is LeBron is just a super polarizing player right and I I I want to be clear like I feel like the majority of people who are basketball fans are pretty reasonable about this like they either like and respect LeBron or don’t like but respect LeBron but then there’s like 10% on the front end that’s like so like problematically obsessed with LeBron that it poisons the discourse and then there’s like 10% on the bottom and that’s like so like to like hates him in such a toxic way that it poisons the discourse right and so like I think like that turns it into this like shouting match about the bronny stuff and like one of the things for Bron is like he literally had heart surgery less than a year ago I want to say it was like n months ago so like everyone’s like oh his numbers at USC weren’t very good it’s like dude he almost died like come on like what are we doing here like this this is not that’s not fair to bronny or to to anybody involved right like to me it’s this simple he’s got excellent physical tools so the uh at 210 for a guard that’s like really stocky and strong and then in addition to that an outstanding athlete super quick first step great vertical athlete long arms he’s got like a 67 68 Wings span which for a guard is outstanding and so to me I keep thinking he’s like Jaylen Suggs he’s a he’s a guy that I think could be a primary point of attack Defender that can be a guard who sets guard guard screens and Pops a three-point line and can attack close outs and things along those lines and be a transition weapon that’s what I look at bronz and I mean here’s the thing like does does the fact that he didn’t put up great numbers at USC matter no but does that mean that he’s just like an automatic shoe in be an NBA player no it’s just my thing is he deserves his chance I think he’s got the tools to get uh to um he’s got the tools to uh to potentially be a good NBA player and as far as like the whole like nepotism angle here’s my thing like like would bronnie have gotten an invite to the combine if he wasn’t Lebron james’ kid maybe not but I mean probably not but here’s the thing he is LeBron James’s kid and he did get an invite and so he is going to get a chance are we going to sit here and be stupid and pretend like there aren’t people that get opportunities because of connections that’s just how life works and so if Brony is able to take advantage of that and parlay it into an NBA career more power to him you know you got to get lucky in life and like no one ever achieved anything without some luck you know what I mean and so I I think it’s I think it’s straight hater Behavior to to focus on what has benefit fitted Brony when the reality is is like if he goes to the NBA and he’s not good he won’t he won’t stay in the NBA so like he he’s gonna get his opportunity because of LeBron but it’s still on him to capitalize on it no coach is going to be giving Ronnie real NBA minutes on a good team if he can’t play so so just get over it let the kid have his opportunity let’s see what he makes of it um let’s see last question better at 23 Kobe or Edwards that’s tough I G here’s the thing Kobe at this age had already had a lot of of deep playoff experience so I think he was a little bit more reliable at this point and Kobe had like actually made plays in the NBA Finals so I think it’s foolish to give ant The Edge right away that said like Kobe’s role in his early 20s was fundamentally different as the second best player on his team if ant were to win the title this year like let’s say ant goes in game seven tomorrow or on Sunday Monday and drops 38 soundly outplays joic and wins the game and then he goes into the next round and soundly outplays Luca and wins the Western Conference finals and then goes into the finals and soundly outplays Jason Tatum and they Hoist the trophy he at age 22 would have the best case for best player in the world be the reigning Finals MVP and will have done it about a half decade earlier than the majority of the people that he’s getting lumped in with in terms of his potential right like Kobe was the second best player on those Lakers teams he was vitally important but he was the second best player on those on those championship teams right and so like I think ant has an opportunity again I expect the Nuggets to win on Sunday but I think ant has an opportunity to do something truly special on Sunday and that’s why we’re going to be all in front of our TVs to watch it which is going to be exciting all right guys um we’re going to head out of here I really really appreciate you guys for supporting the show I don’t say that enough um it’s been really cool to see uh the the channel grow over the course of the last nine months we built this thing from scratch uh back in October the new YouTube channel and I think we’re already up at like 66,000 subscribers and obviously the support has been insane and it’s open doors for me that I never thought i’ I’d get access to like I’m getting to go watch Team USA in their scrimmage in Vegas uh the the week before summer league and then I’m going to summer league and like there’s all these opportunities and things that I’ve been able to experience and I have you guys to thank for that so just I just hope you guys understand how much I appreciate you and I know that I wouldn’t have any of these opportunities if it wasn’t for you guys and I just appreciate you guys for supporting the show all right we’re going to get out of here for the night we’re not going to do anything in the morning again I don’t really think anything’s worth a film study at this point so uh we’re going to run this mailbag as a breakout in the morning and then we’ll be back after the final buzzer of Thunder Mavs game 6 tomorrow night live on YouTube I will see you guys then [Music]

Jason Timpf reacts to Tyrese Haliburton, Pascal Siakam, and the Indiana Pacers’ dominant Game 6 win against Jalen Brunson and the New York Knicks to force a Game 7 at Madison Square Garden in their second round series of the NBA Playoffs. Jason breaks down the game’s biggest plays and shares his main takeaways. Who is Jason picking to move on to the Eastern Conference Finals against Jayson Tatum and the Boston Celtics?

Timeline:
00:00 – Knicks-Pacers Reaction
15:18 – NBA Mailbag

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