📈 HIGH on Anthony Edwards or DOWN on Luka Doncic? 📉 Aftermath of Timberwolves 🆚 Lakers | First Take

📈 HIGH on Anthony Edwards or DOWN on Luka Doncic? 📉 Aftermath of Timberwolves 🆚 Lakers | First Take

The Timberwolves finished off the Lakers last night with a 10396 win in game five. Anthony Edwards averaged 25 points, five rebounds, five assists in a playoff series for the fourth time in his career. While Luca Donuch became the fourth player to average 30 points in his first five playoff games for the Lakers. Perk, tell me this. After this series, yes, I was going to say I just want to show before you asked Perk a question. I just want to say for the record, I mean LeBron looked incredibly disappointed. I mean, did you see him? He looked he looked incredibly disappointed. I mean, he really did. Don’t be a troll. He He just looked disappointed. I mean, I’m just saying he looked disappointed. Not Let’s go on. Are you done? He didn’t look that disappointed. It’s over with. Are you done? Look, he’s like, “Let’s get over with. Let’s go. Let’s go on vacation.” You know what I’m saying? I mean, we didn’t do it. Hey, Perk. Just Just ignore him. I’m I’m talking. I don’t know if he’s wrong though or not. Perk. If you see the way they defend If you see the way they defended, I might I might be tired, too. Molly, just Can I start the debate? Tell me. Yeah, go ahead. All I All All I want to know is how much time do I got since we got a stopwatch on today’s show. Just let me know how much time. Oh my god. Per I was I was actually looking at the watch and stuff like that. I was like, you know, the watch is pretty fly, but you know, I would like Perk to get me a watch. You know what I’m saying? You know, it would be He’s doing just fine enough with all that. It’ be nice It’d be nice to buy me a watch. That’s what his watch is doing just fine. Every time he take it out, I get blinded. All right, Stephen A, you’re the last person on this set that needs handouts. Can we get focused now as a group? Okay, perk, tell me this. You could treat you could treat after this series. Are you higher on a or down on Luca? Oh, I was high on it when I was on first take Monday morning and I told you he’s a better basketball player than Luca. Allaround basketball player than Luca and that he will win a championship before Luca. I’m more down on Luca because I don’t know if he’s gonna get better at the things he needs to get better at. I don’t know if he’s going to make the the necessary sacrifices that he needs to make in the off season far as getting into getting into shape, conditioning, cutting out some of the bad habits right outside of the lines. That is my concern when it comes to Luca. Look, Luca is a walking bucket. We all get that. But defensively that what he displayed and what he’s displayed since he’s gotten to the NBA, it is horrible and it is embarrassing. And when you look around the league and you look at all the young superstars at the wing position, K Cuttingham, John Mor, SGA, Anthony Edwards, Jason Tatum, Jaylen Brown, they all compete and play both ends of the floor. Luca is the only one that does it. I’m always going to tell you that I I love players who try to lock you up and light you up at the same time, per like that’s just how I’m built, who I am. And it’s I’m not an extremist. I’m not that type of person. But there are I do feel passionate about this. And maybe maybe the only other player because at least Steph tried at times in his prime was probably James Harden a little bit, but also the entire offense ran through him similar to Luca. I’ve never felt so excited about a player offensively and then so disgusted what you see defensively. Like some of these plays, if I were to watch tape with you guys, are really bad. Now, I’m not saying you can’t win a championship that way, KP, because you have to build the pieces around him and the deficiencies, similar to how Dallas has it, but I ain’t betting on that. I’m betting on the player that, especially when you give somebody the bag, they have to lead you on both sides of it. And that’s who Anthony Edwards is to me. So, I’m higher on Anthony than I am on Luca. Well, let me say this a couple of things. I didn’t you didn’t strike me uh as a moderate. I mean, I don’t view you as a moderate and I just want to say I mean one side or the other is going to be you as opposed to you know you you in the middle right there. I just wanted to throw that out. All right. Interesting. Having said all of that, having said all of that, I’m more down on Luca, but not Luca the person. Luca’s game on the defensive side of the ball. Luca’s need to ballhog because he ain’t trying to move but so much without the ball. See, Steph could come up the court and give it to somebody and run all over the place. Not to say that LeBron James is interested in doing that. But LeBron James resembled a wide out for a third of the season because once Luca arrived, hell, you know, you could put him in the post, you could put him on the wig, you can push the ball up the court, whatever, and he’ll make it he’ll he’ll do whatever he needed to do. Luca is phenomenal as he is is relatively one-dimensional. he’s got the ball in his hands, that’s when he’s effective. When it’s not in his hands, he’s not going to do but so much because he’s not going to have a lot of movement without the basketball. He’s not going to wear you down and he’s certainly not going to hurt you defensively. And when you look at the fact that he is now a Los Angeles Laker and he is the air apparent to LeBron James in Los Angeles for the foreseeable future. Obviously, there’s a question mark in that regard because of the liability he is on one side of the ball. plus his need to have the ball in his hands. And then we have to take into consideration again Nico and how Nico looks today. Yeah, that’s where I want to go right now. And I’m coming to you with that perk. Nico Harrison clearly rifted apart for trading away Luca. How do you view him now? How I viewed him when he made the trade? I said that. I said that I gave a slight edge to the Dallas Mavericks when Nico made the trade because if they were healthy right now, we would be having a different conversation about the Dallas Mavericks. That’s number one. Number two, he’s right. Defense does win championships. And I think what showed Nico was what Luca displayed in the NBA finals, right? The way that the Boston Celtics exposed him. And then you got to think about, let’s take like think about uh Nico history, right? Who he’s been around, who he was attached to, right? It’s a reason that this trade happened and nobody knew about it. Who was Kobe Bryant’s agent? Jay Will, Stephen A. Robinka. Okay. Who was Kobe Bryant? Nike rep Nico. And one of his best friends and one of his best friends. So he’s been he’s been around a guy that has a killer mentality and know what it looks like, right? And so when he see Luca and he see his habits and now we hear the reports about Luca gain weight while he was sideline with the Dallas Mavericks because of an injury and that was the that was the the the breaking point for Nico. We get it now because it’s unfair. And Stephen A, you just talked about it. How you’re able to be a liability defensively, but you get to dribble the oxygen out of the damn basketball offensively while guys stand around, but they got to cover and play their behind zone time and time again to make up for your liability defense. We also have to give credit where credit is due to Nico in terms of what he had around Luca in Dallas. If it were not for Daniel Gaffford, if it were not for Derek Lively, if it were not for those cats, if you didn’t have what what was Luca lacking last I saw Luca actually given effort sometimes on defense. It wasn’t effective, but I saw him actually giving effort at least sometimes on the defensive side of the ball, but the Lakers didn’t have a rim protector. Dallas did. And so when you look at it from that standpoint and you’re saying to yourself, if you are Nico Harrison and the Dallas Mavericks and you make this move, again, we all believe he should have gotten more for Luca. Some people are saying, listen, you can’t let it get out that you’re looking to move Luca because then you won’t be able to it’ll be a mess and that’s the reason they had to make the deal quickly, etc., etc. And I understand that level of thinking as well. But in the end, considering what Nico has been through, I mean, death threats, him, his family, what he’s had to be subjected to, and we are watching an NBA team where we looked at the Dallas Mavericks and imagine Lively Gaffford and Anthony Davis healthy with Kyrie, no torn a if Kyrie was okay. All right, with the knee injury or rather if if if if Kyrie’s healthy uh with Klay Thompson with those bigs with Jason Ker I mean they could have been in the Western Conference Finals. So we have to look at it. And the last point is this. We need to back off of Nico to some degree when a guy like Daryl my in Philadelphia who I like and respect but the job has not been done well. You still got your job and Philadelphia is an atrocity right now. He is lucky that he has kept his job. We look at Rob Pelinka getting an extension. I’m not hating on that, but what you did was acquire Luca. All the other pieces that needed to be around LeBron and Luca wasn’t necessarily there. I think that JJ Reic was playing to some degree with handcuffs. We’re looking at people and we’re not saying anything about other executives, but we’re pointing out what Nico didn’t do instead of pointing out some of the things he has done right. Mhm. So, make sure we I think a day like today is important to have the same energy. I’ll make my point short and sweet. Sure. When you’re with somebody every single day and you see the way they lead, when you’re around him, you see the way he shows up, how he works, how I lead him. Yeah. Yes. How you both work, how you lead him, how give it to her. Give it to her. She At the end of the day, you’re like, “Oh, I know you’re accountable. I know what standard you have.” That’s all I’m going to say. Like I don’t think Nico makes that decision if he doesn’t have the data to support that decision. And it’s just a reminder of the word. That’s all you’re gonna say. Maybe you are moderate. Maybe I mean you you should have been you should have been a bit more forceful than you was. So Jay, you want to fill in for me? You beat the club. Okay. Hey. Hey, look. I keep them guessing. KP. I keep them guessing. Wow. All right. Yo, Perk, I’ll be out there, man. I’ll be out there. I need you to treat me to dinner. So just why you asking for hand out that’s how you keep that’s how you keep somebody that’s how you keep somebody and it’s perks turn to treat and he’s going to treat me. Okay, just turn the treat. All right, Stephen A’s looking for a treat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause]

On First Take, Stephen A. Smith, Jay Williams and Kendrick Perkins join Molly Qerim to react to the Minnesota Timberwolves eliminating the Los Angeles Lakers in the 2025 NBA Playoffs.

0:00 Anthony Edwards-Luka Doncic comparison
3:44 Higher on Ant-Man or more down on Luka?
5:22 How do you view Nico Harrison now?

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