Hour 3: David Locke Debated Utah Jazz & NBA Draft Prospects |Pablo Mastroeni Talking Real Salt La…
DJPK proudly presented by our title sponsor, Black Desert Resort. We are joined now by David Lock, radio voice of the Utah Jazz. David, good morning. What could be better than a little DJ and PK in the morning getting to chat with two of the legends of the business? There’s one thing that could be better, and that’s Janet Jackson as the leading when you’re talking to DJ and TK in the morning. You know what could be better? Not having and not having the fifth pick of the draft. There it is. The number one pick in the draft would be better. And yet again, number one slides to number five. And there is outrage. But David, the reason we have a lottery is so that the team can’t dump games, lose games, and get the number one pick. This happened literally for the reason that it was designed to happen, which everybody’s okay with, until they’re the one sitting in the number one slot. Then it’s terrible. That’s so funny. I just ended the podcast today and that’s literally the last thing I said is for all you out there that are like this is fixed. The NBA socks are no longer following the NBA. No, no. The whole point for the NBA is they do not want you to do what the Utah Jazz Washington Wizards and Charlotte Hornets did last year and they built an entire system to try to not make it advantageous and it wasn’t as advantageous as it could have been. So, yes, the NBA has no idea what they’re doing. It’s completely wrong. No, no, it’s exactly what they wanted to do. Well, yeah, but then I don’t know about that because the argument is to pre prevent it or make it stupid to tank and next year we’ll have the same teams tanking again. So, why is it so great? Yeah. No, 100%. Right. I I don’t know the answer here. And there’s some landscape things in the league that are changing that are making it. So with free agency really no longer being a viable way to build a roster other than really rare occasions. So then all of a sudden there’s really only two ways to build your roster. One is you trade, but since you’re good, you don’t want to trade your good players. So, you’re trading your draft assets for players, and the only other thing you do is you trade your players, if you’re not trying to be good anymore, to those teams who are trying to be good, for draft assets, which then makes your draft asset more important. These are the only two ways right now to build a roster in the NBA. And so, I I I don’t have a good answer for you. I I’m not I’m not saying they’re right. I’m just saying the argument that the league is fixed. This is all this shows how No, this is exactly what the league wants to have happen. This is exactly it. Then throw it open and there is no lottery. All 32 teams are in the lottery. Well, there are only 30 30. You know that. Um he’s anticipating Vegas and Seattle. Put them all in. That would be a TV show. That would be interesting. Are you weighing it at all or are they all even? No, everybody has the same equal chance and televise. Why not just go to the wheel? Whatever whichever way you want to whatever word you want to use and tele. Don’t do it in some other room. Televise it live as it happens. Can you do um could you build a system? I’m making this up as we go along where you cannot have the same pick within x amount of year without x amount of years. I I was going to say 30, but then by the end of it at the end on the 30th year, you just have everybody slotted into a pit they have had and basically by the 29th you have the same thing. So I it would probably not work. But do you have something where every 10 years you cannot draft in the same position you’ve already been drafted in? I’m not so concerned about that because we’ve seen players get draftwami brown candy wiseman here by the Warriors recently. Just because you have a high pick caner with the Jazz doesn’t mean you’re going to get a good player. They can screw it up. Yeah. I mean there’s a real catch 22 here, right? That on one level you don’t want people taking. So you’ve made it disadvantageous or less advantageous and then on the other side you go present this model of everyone has equal chance in the draft and say how do we possibly rebuild? So there’s a total catch 22 and that no answer seems to be a good one. Didn’t Detroit isn’t Detroit one of the teams that dropped from one to five one year? I mean, it’s happened multiple times. Multiple times in Detroit, right? And they rebuilt anyway. Look at them now. They’re a playoff team. They’re they’re good. They’ve got good young players. No, virtually everyone that goes and takes for two or three years ends up in the playoffs. Almost everyone go the teams who we quote talking about not doing it didn’t actually go down far enough. Sacramento lived between six and 10 all those years, but Washington, who’s been an incompetent franchise in regards to winning, did make the playoffs with John Wall and Bradley Beal for a few years. Almost every single team that has had a top five pick or finished in the bottom five in the standings for three years in a row makes the playoffs. There were seven of the 16 teams this year that were would fall under that qualification in this year’s playoffs. Do you think they’re going to draft fifth or do you think they’re going to trade up into the uh well not the first spot but second or third and get somebody that they really value? So I think there’s something really interesting. Three, four, five all. I mean, there’s five really good players in this draft. So, the Jazz are getting a really, really good player. And in my opinion, this and I’m not this is not universal. I don’t have Jeremiah Pierce in that list. And I don’t have Coniple on that list. So, I have Trey Johnson, Ace Bailey, and BJ Edgecom as the three players after Cooper and Dylan Harper. And so if the Jazz have one of them that they think is dramatically better than the others and they offer Philadelphia the 21st pick, can they get the three? That seems like a reasonable trade to me. I’m Philadelphia and I’ve got tax problems and I don’t have one of the three guys that I think is dramatically better. That’s the key right there. Philadelphia can’t believe the same thing. and I can get another player at 21 and have Philadelphia’s got some roster money issues, maybe I’m willing to do that. If I’m Charlotte and there’s a, you know, let’s say Ace Bailey goes and we really believe that BJ Edgecomb or Trey Johnson or Jeremiah Beers is an elite elite elite level player and we offer the 21st pick to Charlotte, the other guy and Charlotte doesn’t believe the same thing. Seems like that’s a really reasonable trade. H yeah, I can buy that. I don’t know that we necessarily needed the results of the lottery to confirm this, but since it was the fifth pick, what’s your level of uh I don’t know if confidence, but maybe conviction that the record and the playing time and all that that we saw in the 24 25 season will reflect almost the same point in the 25 uh 26 season. Who are you? I’m not I didn’t follow. Who were I thought you were heading toward our draft pick? Who are you referring to in regards to play? Oh, I think our draft pick will play 30 minutes tonight. Right. So, the results that we saw on the floor this year will mirror what we see next year. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Meaning they have to go through at least one more draft before they can start to think about making a move. Yeah. People get really mad at me when I say this. Hopefully two more. Two more. What? I’m about to get really mad at you, David. I mean, my point is if you start down this road, the worst thing you can do is bail out. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. So, the teams that have bailed out is that has not that that almost has never worked. Um, so you do this for a few years and you start adding pieces around with veterans that are ready to play and bring support. And then the next step is the really hard one. The one after that is then you got like Houston did this for three years. They have a bunch of pieces now. They Fred Bibbley, Dylan Brooks are probably not championship pieces and I’m not sure. I think Thompson’s pretty special. I think he’s going to be like Giannis. So they probably have their guiding star for the future, but they’re that step at buildings really hard. Detroit J has Jaden Ivy, they have Jaylen Dur, they have Kate Cunningham, they have a Sor Thompson, they’ve got their four guys. They did buy shares Tim Hardway Jr. That’s not an answer. They got to do something different and build this thing around their guiding star Kate Cunningham. They’re in this now they’re in the most difficult stage. Orlando’s done it with Paulo and Fron Vagner and Jaylen Suds. They added Concavius Caldwell Pope fairly unsuccessfully. We’ll see what they do next. They need to do something and they’re pretty inactive. Memphis did it with Desmond Bane, John Morant, Jared Jackson Jr. and then they screwed up went after Marcus Spart might have derailed the whole dang thing. So it’s that’s the that’s the model. It’s difficult and it gets harder as time goes on. When you say two more years of this, do you mean sitting resting 23 year olds because they’re good enough to help you win and they’re afraid they might win the game or are you talking about being super committed to young players and that just naturally leads to I don’t know 25 and 57 seasons? I mean I mean the latter. Okay. I mean, I think if we start a roster next year, if our starting lineup next year is Kee George, Trey Johnson, [Music] um Taylor Hendris, he’s back. Lowry marketing and Walker Kesler. That’s where we start the year. that probably doesn’t win a lot of games. Understood. Is there anything that can be done now? I mean, the they having the lottery for everybody is probably extreme and they’ll never really do that, but can they do anything that can wait because they’re not going to eliminate tanking? It’s the curse of basketball in that all these other drafts, maybe football’s the exception, too, but football is such a big numbers game that a fourth round pick can be extremely valuable to you. And if you have multiple third round picks, they get all excited because of the number of bodies that you need to compete. But in basketball, guys can come in at the top of the draft or wherever they’re drafted if they’re good enough and make such a huge difference that the draft it takes on such a level of importance that I’m not sure is there in the other sports. Uh but you wonder because it’s it’s it’s so arbitrary and then you can have big time results that can last forever for a long time. And I’m looking at San Antonio. They win the lottery when you got Robinson and Duncan there and then they get a number one pick and then two years later they get a number two pick and it’s so random in a sense but yet it could be so helpful to the franchise and devastating to the people that are the teams that are competing with them. Can there be anything done that like you were talking about that you can’t get another pick so high or can they weight the system differently to somehow make it I don’t know that there’s any answers to it but it just seems that I don’t want San Antonio to luck into Robinson and Duncan and then get one by and then two years later get a second pick and who knows if Dylan Harper might be the greatest thing since whatever and we’re looking at another great run by them and what did they do to get that? They lost. it just doesn’t seem right. So, I agree with you. Um that the Spurs propensity for luck is a little overwhelming. Um we’re in the epicenter of it right now. So it feels very very you know I think for us what I kind of keep going back to like if you’re the league and you’re trying to fix something and we keep going back to that kind of concept as though something’s broken and has to be fixed like it’s broken to us right now as Utah Jazz fans because of the fact that we didn’t get the number one pick. It’s probably broken to Washington Wizards fans, but I’m not sure it’s actually broken in the league at all. It doesn’t have to be broken. Can’t they improve it though? But I but I think you’d have to get them to understand why they’re what are they like I don’t think it’s bad for the league the Cooper flag went to Dallas. No, it’s great for the league that he goes to a big market team. That’s the point. They have a 1.8% chance. it it’s actually good for the league that he went to a good team. Like he could go to Washington DC, which is a mammothly big market, but if he’s just dueling on a team that’s not any good, that’s not great for the league. Yeah, I don’t know that this was great for the league. I don’t know that this was great for Dallas. I mean, in the short run, sure, but he’s teamed with a 32 and a 33 year old. The 32y old is routinely injured. The 33y old just tore his ACL. I think this could lead to Dallas being stuck in the middle and we got new ownership. We don’t know how wellrun that franchise is or isn’t going to be. We got the Dantage trade which seems like a pretty big red flag, but it’s still just one moment. Yeah. I just So, I mean, back to PK’s point, I guess you have to like we’re from a league standpoint, you got to figure out what you really think is broken. And I I just don’t think that it’s like even this year when we were going through whatever the tank, whatever you want to call it. And like and everyone was like, “Oh, they can’t have this. It’s terri.” Like not sure it was that bad for the league, right? It’s not great for the Utah Jazz on that moment. And certainly the lottery wasn’t very good for the Utah Jazz, but when we talk about trying to fix something or change it, it has to be bad for the league. And I don’t think that what’s going on right now and any of this is actually that bad for the league. Then why’d they find him if it wasn’t so bad for the league? Um I think that was a shot over the bow to make sure it didn’t get any worse. Okay. Well, if it’s worse, that means it’s got to be bad. Yeah. No, the league. Okay. So, that was not good for the league and the league find them, right? So, that’s that’s an example of the S. The league deemed that as bad and they took action. I’m not sure the league sees what we’re talking about as bad and worthy of keep taking action. I think in these discussions it’s best to just follow the money and the TV networks and streaming services just gave the league $76 billion over 11 years. So, the league’s doing just fine. And I would say for people and I would say for people worried about the whole how does a small market rebuild Oklahoma City, uh, Indiana, Minnesota, these are not glamorous places or massive markets and they’re doing just fine in the playoffs. I mean, we really like we’re about to have Indiana, Oklahoma City, and I mean, hope not. Go Denver. Um, but we’re about to have Indiana, Oklahoma City, and Minnesota as the four the three of the four final teams. It’s pretty hard to argue that market size is dictating performance. Yeah, I’m not I don’t know that people are arguing that. I mean, that that then you get into the real big- time uh conspiracy theory. I mean, I I don’t know that they’re just fine is good enough. They want every last dollar. That’s true. Yes, they do. But but to the to the dollar point, which I don’t disagree with at all. The TV networks gave all the money or the I don’t they’re TV networks anymore, right? Like streaming services. Yeah. The ser the services gave the league all this money. If Charlotte, Washington, and Utah are losing lots of games, that has zero impact on the streaming services. Yeah, understand that. But you’re still you’re still trying to grow. You don’t want to stagnate. Absolutely. I mean that there’s going to be another negotiation one day and there’s already a commissioner and there there multiple clubs thinking about that and you want to win. Winning’s fun. It’s just great. I’m like, hey, I’m like literally texting Alan Horton, the Timberwolves playbyplay announcer, last night asking if I can do snacks for them if Denver beats Oklahoma City. Like I like Allen a lot, but I don’t like him enough to go to Oklahoma City. So, I’d go to Denver. Um, but like I’m literally trying to figure out how I’m going to a Western Conference Final game if Minnesota’s playing Denver. It’s amazing. I’m watching that game last night just going, “God, I want to be there so badly.” So, I mean, I’m with you. But like, we’re trying to have a reasonable conversation about fixes and this and that and broken. We got to get out of the lens of just looking it up from the Utah Jazz. We’re trying to fix the league. We got to look at it from the league. I don’t think it’s broken. Do you like any of these players more than others at five? Um, so I really think Ace Bailey has a chance to be really, really, really good. Um, I really like Trey Johnson. I got to tell you what, watching this year versus last year is just an incredible difference. I mean, last year literally, you’re watching players and you are trying to you are you are grasping for the tiniest littlest. If you remember, I came on the air with you last year talking about how much I like Cody Williams. The true plays I liked best by Cody Williams were turnovers. Literally turnovers. He burst through a double team, split the double team with an explosion, one threw the ball into the third row of the stands across the way and the other way he lost control of the ball on the dribble. And I thought those were signs of like that he was better than other players in the draft. That’s literally how brutal watching players was last year. This is so different. These guys are all like and the numbers are so different. The numbers on there’s very few players that red flag uh the BYU kid red flags on shooting but very few kids red flag. Last year folks every Stephen Castle red flag and I’m still not sure. Stephan Castle won rookie of the year. I’m still not sure. Like if I’m San Antonio I’m off him. They can’t like they can’t have De’Arren Fox and Stephen Castle in their back court. You can’t have two guys shooting 30% from three. So, like this is such a different ball game. Th this is Trey Johnson is going to score 20 points a game in the NBA. I’m certain of it. Um I VJ Edgum is just a world class athlete. Like the cop is Victor Oladipo and I don’t think it’s a terrible comp. U comps are never right, but it’s not a terrible comp. So I I think those three kids, Ace Bailey, BJO, and Trey Johnson are all terrific and so one of them’s going to be there at five. Um, I probably like Trey Johnson and Ace Bailey a little bit more than I like BJ Edgecom, but like BJ, you guys saw him. I mean, torch BYU, everyone saw that one up close and personal. That’s that’s your fifth pick. That doesn’t seem too terrible. Well, David, we’re going to leave it right there for now. We will talk to you again next week. Let you take a deeper dive into some of the draft possibilities. We’ll talk to you then. Have a good week. Thanks. Uh, talk to you soon. Bye, DJ PK. When we come back, Pablo Master, the RSL head coach, joins us next. Stay with us. This is Jake Scott and Ben Anderson. I will say I do think the Jazz probably do need to make a shift away from what they have been doing the last 3 years, which is this scattershot acquisition of talent, hoping to get the number one guy, and not really having any path forward towards team building of just let’s try a little bit of everything, which is I think of what they’ve been doing. And I totally understand it. Like we said, you’ve just kind of got a couple of chips on number six and a couple of chips on nine and one on black and whatever. You’re just trying to win somewhere. If that is what it looks like again next year, I think you’re really going to test the fan base and I’m curious if they have the stomach for it, which again, I think you can accomplish what you accomplish this year in a different method that might win over the fans a little bit better. I might narrow that down and reorganize my gamble or my investment approach. Here Jake Scott and Ben Anderson every day from 10 to noon on 975 the KSL Sports Zone. DJ and PK. It’s 975 the zone. We’re joined by RSL head coach Pablo Masterani. Pablo, good morning. Good morning guys. Pablo, congratulations on calling your shot. You have done it again. Early this season when the team was giving up three, four goals in in different games and you were asked about the defense. You said, “Well, there’s some things working against us right now.” and uh we’re gonna get that ironed out. And sure enough, you don’t have some of the schedule problems you had earlier. And you’ve only given up five goals in the last five games despite injuries and suspensions and all that. Whoever goes out there seems to defend pretty well. So, congrats on that. That that’s no no small feat. And at a goal a game, you know, that would put you in the elite in the league if you could sustain that. So, that that’s really good. But then to the other end of the field, you have not made any bold proclamations about uh fixing the attack and how many goals are scored. And I assume that that is just much more complicated and maybe you aren’t convinced you have all the pieces of the puzzle to fix that in the way the fan base would really like to see it operating. Yeah, I mean that that’s a great point. I I think defensive is really a collective mindset mentality, right? And I always talk about defending starts with the guys up front. And when you got 11 guys committed, it’s very difficult uh you know to score goals. And when what you need to score goals are are are our our players to unlock defenses, right? And so I I think to your to your point, you know, I I think we’re still, you know, trying to get Willie up to speed. I think Willy’s a guy that can create goals um for himself and for his teammates both by his movement in the box for himself and the movement in the box to create space for his teammates. And then the other part is um you know we’re just uh still in the process of of putting Diego in the best position to to be able to to get more goals and set up more plays. um and you know being more selfish in around that area where it doesn’t always have to just pass the ball across the top but we need to shoot and take more shots and and those are personal characteristics of players. You know, I think last year we had, you know, two guys in Chicho and Andreas that were just it didn’t matter where the where where they received the ball, they were putting it on frame. And more times than not, last year we we ended up scoring goals. And so I think it’s a combination between game model, which is basically how we play in the attack and and how we want to find our players in dangerous areas. But at the end of the day, you have to execute and you have to you have to be able to play in really really tight spaces to score the goals. And at the moment, you know, we’re we’re we’re getting, you know, last game we were inside their 18 quite a bit, but nothing came out of it. And so, just that polish on on the on the tip of the spear that that that we need to get right. Um, but but a lot of that has to do with individual characteristics. And so, um, you know, that’s something that we’re all we’re always talking about. We’re always in conversation about. Um, and uh, you know, I think that might take a little bit more time, but in the meantime, if you can hold a sturdy defense, you put yourself in any game. And the other part too, uh, DJ is, you know, this year we haven’t scored a an offensive setpiece goal. And and you know, that’s that’s an area where regardless of who we have as as a poacher up front, um, we’ve got to be able to find mechanisms to to unlock that statistic. How successful can you be in this league if you built the team around defense? Um, well, you know, I think uh I think you can be successful. I I think you can, but I but then you have to build it differently. Uh PK, you know, I think Minnesota is is a good example of this where they’re a team that have 30% possession, which is something that I couldn’t do um because I think the game is really enjoyed with the ball. But they do their they go about it their way. They they get 11 guys behind the ball. They defend for large periods of time, but their their their roster is full of, you know, players that are 61 and and taller. And so all they they do is they set up for set pieces. And they got, you know, two two jets up front that are really fast that can play in transition. So that you almost have to build your team that way, right, if you’re going to say we’re we’re not going to have the ball. Fortunately, we’re not. We’re a team that’s built to play with the ball to create a lot of chances. Um but unfortunately we just haven’t had the guy up front this year other than Diego Luna who’s who’s gone beyond his reach uh of scoring goals, right? Like this is not his normal space. We need one or two other guys. Uh and unfortunately at the moment we don’t have that those players, but but that’s what we’re working towards. When you said William Matada is going to create space, I couldn’t help but think of the goal that Diego Luna scored in Dallas, which was great. And a moment of individual brilliance, right? A shot is blocked and the ball falls to him. But the thing I noticed is there were three guys there. Well, the third one wasn’t totally committed to defending him, but there were three guys in the area and two guys definitely knew who he was. They knew what he wanted to do. They knew which foot he wanted to do it with. And the fact that he went to his less preferred left foot and, you know, kind of prodded and poked and tried to figure out, okay, where is the space here and then got that shot off, that was incredible. But you just, you can’t expect that. And the fact the other team, this isn’t a game where, you know, you can, you got to play a zone and then have like man principles inside that because there’s so much space. So, I can’t say that they’re going to double and triple team him everywhere he goes. And yet, they’re often two or three people not far away. So you got to do something else because this isn’t you can’t keep counting on this from him, can you? No. No, you can’t. And and that’s why, you know, last game as well and the last few games is, you know, so we’re set up to break down the middle and then once we get down the middle, obviously your wide areas are going to be free to to to play balls in and and I think you’ve seen it in the last couple games, whether it’s Go or Alex or or Dom, is we get in good crossing positions. And so the the the the just based upon our game model, the the the the easiest way for us to score goals is breaking them down the middle, sucking them in, playing it out wide, and then getting into the box. But what’s been happening, uh DJ, is either the timing of the run is a split second off, or the delivery isn’t in the correct spot to be able to take advantage of that moment. So, the last couple weeks, we’ve been working on that literally the last 20 yards of the field and how we want the runs in the box to be. um and how you know and and how we want those crosses delivered or not not how we want them delivered but how the players should think about delivering the ball. Is it behind the defense because the defense is turning towards their own goal and there’s there’s space to play it in behind or is it getting to the end line and then cutting it back to to a trailing midfielder or trailing 10. So that that that is the the way that you know we can score goals. And the other part too is when you put in dangerous crosses, it can rebound off people’s legs and backs and whatever and because we have numbers in the box, we gain percentages as far as scoring goals. So that’s really been an area of focus because you’re absolutely right. It’s impossible to continue to rely on Diego making plays like he did in Dallas in order for us to score goals. So you mentioned Go multiple times. He’s 18 years old. Wow, that’s so young. How do you coach him to make sure everything’s okay? You know, at this moment, PK, I I I’ve I’ve I’ve stayed away, right? You know, I’m not one of these guys that has to be involved and and all these different things, but when I see the characteristics of what a good pro looks like, I just stay away and let him be. Right? It’s the moment that either, you know, his ego starts growing too big for him or he starts, you know, doing something that’s a little bit different, then I’ll help like bring him back in and do these things. But right now, you know, and Goza went through one of those times or, you know, LA late last year in preseason where, you know, he thought he made it because he’s with he was with the first team and he was training with us and we were in preseason. Had a conversation with him about just being humble. And the reason why you’re here is because you’re an unbelievable athlete and you’re a great teammate and you work your tail off and and so don’t think of it anything bigger than that. And what we’re going to do in the next couple years is really refine those those those tools. Uh the one v one aspects, the crossing aspects, the shooting aspects. And so he’s been all in on those three uh parts of his game and has has improved drastically, but he’s done that whilst giving the team a great effort, you know, commitment, great defending, uh great speed, and a threat behind. So he’s he’s he’s a he’s a bright young man. He’s a hungry young man. Um, and now he’s getting, you know, his real first feel of of first team football and and doing great with it. But, uh, you know, for as much as I’d like to credit, you know, it’s it’s always about the players. PK, these guys either you you know, you have that ability to to overcome those moments when you’re not playing and stay in the game and stay focused and stay committed so that when your opportunity comes like his did against San Diego, you know, he takes it and he runs. Now, now we have player decisions to make with him and Dom, right? And so now we’ve created competition. And when we talk about, you know, uh, winning through development, this is exactly what it looks like is one guy was flying, the other guy wasn’t even on the radar. All of a sudden, this guy’s on the radar. The other guy say saying, “What about me?” And when you say, “What about me?” is when you start teaching about, you know, mental fortitude and how to overcome these moments and and what what you should focus on as opposed to why why when am I going to get my chance? It’s it’s to double down on the work Tuesday through Friday. And and to be fair, Dom has been fantastic at that as well. So, there’s there’s a lot of good things going on. Um, but there’s a lot of teaching that has to go on as well with these younger players. you have a habit of giving the answers to the test and I always wonder how much players see and and how much they hear and really absorb whether it’s a film session, a training session during the game with Go and you always talk about I want the attackers to defend. I want the defenders to attack, right? You got to be a complete team and and an attacker who doesn’t defend. I don’t know if it bothers you as much as it bothers Jason Christ, but it bothers both of you a lot. I mean, it bo it bugs you both a lot. So, there’s a moment late in the game and everybody’s tired, right? They’ve been running for 75 minutes and Colorado ha or not Colorado um Portland has a throwin right in front of your bench and everyone’s I don’t they’re kind of standing around quite frankly and they throw it in and Gooo runs at the guy and he takes a bad touch and Gooo runs at him some more and the guy basically just kicks it out of bounds. It it wasn’t it wasn’t the most glorious moment for whoever it was. I don’t remember. and go’s momentum carries him out of bounds. As he turns and runs back in, you reach out and slap him on the butt. Do you think that players in that moment like he’s not kidding that 18-year-old is running and defending like it’s the fifth minute of the game and it’s the 75th minute. It’s like you gave them the answer to the test, but do you think how many people get that? Yeah. Well, that’s the whole thing. And that’s because again I think the what I’ll say about defending in in pro sports is it’s the one thing that is team. It’s the most selfless act because everyone enjoys playing soccer because we have the ball. Everyone enjoys the ball. Everyone hates def not not everyone hates defending but it’s like secondary tertiary. Like you don’t play soccer to defend. You play soccer to attack and win games. However, what I’ve learned in my experience as a soccer player is that defending the right way kills morale. It it stifles attacking plans for your opponents. It breeds doubt into their game plan. And so the more repetitive actions we have defensively where we’re winning balls, the players don’t realize it, but they’re going to our team’s now going to uh dictate the game with the ball, with how they like to play, with the spirit that they like to play with. But it doesn’t come without the graft. And so you can’t, it’s like everything else in life, like you got to work hard to enjoy life. Like it you just don’t vacation is not vacation unless you’re grasping, right? So like that those are the things that I’m trying to and I think that’s what we’ve done in probably the last five or six games is double down on the defending piece. One, we were giving up a lot of goals. So we you know we weren’t changing any mindsets for our opponents and on top of that we weren’t scoring any goals either. So, if we can just focus in on as a team, everyone doing their job in this particular phase of the game to win the ball back and and and what I’ve learned as a player too, uh, DJ, was if you know how you’re going to win the ball back, then it’s then the game is always easy defensively. It’s it’s easier to buy into. when it’s like ah you guys you guys win the ball and there’s no instruction as to how what our what our principles are then it just becomes this this game where you’re just getting rotated left to right left to right before the team penetrates you down the middle. So defending is a very huge aspect of the game. It’s probably the most boring aspect from a fan perspective but it’s so critical to affecting psychology for both teams. So when that’s going against you though and the other team is doing all the things that you just said and critical and psychological and all, how do you get your guys from the offensive standpoint not to get down? Yeah, that’s a that’s a great point. You know, I think there’s there’s moments and we talk about oftentimes uh PK, you know, we we’ll do a video session and it’s not about a particular play. It’s more about the feeling of these five minutes, right? And what’s the feel look like? And and how do we you know there was a game uh a couple weeks back where um it was it was uh they they turned up the screws in in in the second half. I forget what game it was and they were putting a lot of pressure on us and they kept you know running after the ball and what we kept doing is playing into the speed that they wanted to play at. So we started, you know, they pressed us, the ball went out of bounds, we did the quick throw, and then they pressed us again, and then we kicked the ball long. And and so in in in that little fivem minute segment, we talked about how do you slow the game down? If they want to speed it up, we have to slow it down, right? If they want to slow it down, let’s speed it up. And so that’s it’s like golf, right? It’s a game of opposite. You want the ball to go up in the air, hit down on the ball. Yeah. Um, and so it’s these it’s these it’s these same principle, the universal principles that happen in all sports and in life and and they become teaching moments as to how we’re going to get momentum back when a team is defending us really well. If they’re if they’re defending us and they’re going really slow and and they’re being really, you know, they’re willing to rotate, well then let’s rotate them three or four times before we penetrate down the middle. If you know, if they’re coming at us fast, let’s slow the game down, look for our pivots, switch the point of attack, and make them run, right? So, it’s just identifying moments and and more importantly, it’s not about one individual. It’s about the collective understanding how to overcome this moment when momentum is not on your side. So, you think I should hit down on the ball, huh? Huh? I think you should. Yeah. Well, only if you want it to go up. Only if you want if you want to go up. If you if you want to skull it, just try to hit under it and it the bounce will hit the ball and you’ll blade it across the uh like I often do. That’s always fun. That’s always fun. I love to be off the back of the green with another downhill chip, line four, thinking, “How am I going to make double B?” And then as that ball is just skulling across, which is a second and a half, seems like it’s 20 minutes. Yeah. Oh my god. It doesn’t stop. It’s never going to stop. I might as well write down an eight now and get to the cart. Here you go. That’s right. It’s always tough when you’re yelling four from the back of the green because everyone’s All right, Pablo, we appreciate the time. Good luck in Colorado. We didn’t ask you about facing your old team. You’ve done it enough. We just let it go. You’re welcome. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. Pablo Mastone, RSL head coach, former Colorado Rapid star and former Colorado Rapid head coach, but done this a few times now. Brian Taylor, real golf radio co-host, is going to join us at the top of the hour. PGA Championship. He’s at Quail Hollow. We’ll talk with him in about 15 minutes. Stay with us. Accessing. This is H Sen and Scott and J. Kurt Healing from NBC Sports and Pro basketball talk.com. Ultimately, if you’re in a market this size, you need a break and this lottery did not give it to you. And it hasn’t under this new system. I mean, look, Detroit turned it around this year cuz they’d gotten the number one a few years back with Cade and they made some smart moves around him. But this is the third straight year the team with the worst record has fallen to fifth. The league has to reconsider how they’re doing this lottery. I get that this was a reaction to the tanking of the 76ers and and the process. But if the team that’s got the worst record keeps landing this deep, it’s not okay. They need to do something to give these teams like Utah that are not perpetually trying to lose and give them a chance. Catch N Scotty weekdays from noon to 3 on 975 the KSL Sports Zone. I’m going to try to do this without cheating, but I got it right here just in case. Nominate the youth sports volunteer that you know for the Hercules Hero of the Week. Submit your nomination at kslsports.com/contest and then listen every Thursday afternoon to JJ and Alex for the winner. Help us celebrate the efforts of those volunteers making an impact with the Hercules Hero of the Week. And it’s sponsored by Hercules First Federal Credit Union and Beehive Meals. It’s an admirable effort. I give it a B minus. I got work. I’m never satisfied. I’m such a perfectionist. Oh my gosh. Question of the morning. Do you want the Jazz to make a move to get Aigor Deon? I do. Travis, I don’t like BYU, but I absolutely love Aigor. I don’t like I’d love for the Jazz to get here. I don’t like Jaor, but I love BYU. Travis is on board. Yayore. Yayore. I want to see literally Deon has bust written all over him. No, he don’t. I want to see him stacking paychecks. Eric, depends on which pick. Definitely not with a fifth pick. Now, if they can move up with that other pick, then I’m not opposed. Okay. Can they turn 21 into 11 or 13 or nine or something? I think they can if they really want to. To what what spot? I’m not sure obviously, but I know that they can move up if they were so inclined to do it and felt like it was very important to do that. Yeah. Monica. Yes. And whoever we get needs to like Utah. We lost Goar because he didn’t like Utah. Donovan Mitchell too. That’s Travis. You do realize Rudy still has a place in Utah, right? And he absolutely loves it here. He does. And no, Monica does not realize that. She just assumed that Mitchell was another story. He had bright lights. He was He was Hayward. He wanted the bright lights. Bright lights. Yeah. Big city, mega team. Yeah. And he didn’t really get it. Uh but I mean, what’s you’re in the NBA making millions? I don’t want to hear it. So now people are posting pictures with Goar around town where Gobar’s smiling. He’s got his arm around him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And Gobar talked about it when he was here. He did it in his media interview thing that the whole team went to his place the night before the Wolves played the Jazz. Yeah, we understand that. Yeah. So yeah, I saw where Jagor uh said that he can see himself living here. Let somebody else draft him and then bring him back. Well, next door next door to Travis H. even Yeah, he said he mentioned Travis. This guy and he and Travis, their families are tight. Yeah. I mean, Travis might as well be his uncle for sure. Yeah. If they were Polynesian, he would be. Well, they’re not as our good friend Jack when he says, “That’s my uncle.” Everybody, I can’t keep track. Uh so, yeah, that I don’t think that’s an issue. And if if we got Jayor on a Jazz this year, you Delaney Gibb would be cover would be at the games. Oh yeah, Lee Kamard might have to come up now. You’re just random name dropping people, seeing if you get the coach random name because you’re dropping names here trying to get to see if you get people to text you during the show. You’ve done it before and it works. It’s hilarious. Everybody’s like PK is a grump. Nobody likes PK. Yeah, except a bunch of people in power. a bunch of athletic directors, a bunch of assistant athletic directors, a bunch of head coaches, coordinators, and assistant coaches, but other than that, nobody likes you. And you have name drop people until they text you, and they do. I’m just looking for ways to help the ball club and the experience. You’re so full of it. It would be great for BYU, too. You were looking for ways to entertain you. Why not? You got to entertain yourself to get through life, right? I agree. It’s hard enough. Let’s not pretend you’re doing anything else. It would be a shot in the arm for BYU’s basketball program. Hey, look at one of our guys. Look what we did our first year and right up the street and then he’d be in the news. I think he has the potential to be a heck of a player, which is what matters the most. All the all the jokes and all that over size. If he can shoot and it’s not the whole boomer, you know, if he shoots 25%, yikes, right? And if he shoots 40% he’s going to be an allstar multiple times. But like could he just get to where he shoots I don’t know 36% from three? Just kind of a keep you honest kind of shot. That’s the goal. Yeah. Right. And if he if he has that then with everything else he’s got he’s going to be helping you whoever whichever team has him. You can’t deny the 69 the vision. And the thing I try to double team guys the way he got his hands on deflections and stuff. Yes. He shrinks the court at the defensive end. Just you just play defense. You just stick your arms out and you start taking away passing lines, right? And then when they try to double him, if he if he can’t be guarded, you try to double him, he just passes over the top. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, it’s so easy when you’re that tall. There’s so many easy answers that aren’t available to mere mortals. Now, he’s got to be able to shoot it. And that’s but but we’ve seen other players figure that out. Shooting for him becomes the word enough, right? He’s got to be able to shoot it and make it enough. He can’t be a brick layer out there. Reed, sure. Draft him, then send him to the miners at BYU. He’s a Cougar fan trying to get him back. Option him back to the college. Loaned him back to Provo. Loaned him back. Optioned him out. Oh, they’ve already stacked paychecks on another guy. Jared, he’s not even ready. So, the Jazz will probably go for it. Man, there are people so down. Well, Cooper Cooper Flag might be ready. But beyond that, beyond that, everybody, even Dylan Harper, who everybody’s in love with. That’s why we wanted the number one pick for the team because we believe that Flag can come in and whatever Flag does, he’s still going to be a better player in five years. So, even that. Yep. Brian Taylor, Real Golf Radio. He is at Quail Hollow for the PGA Championship. We’re going to talk with him next. Got some big names buried on the leaderboard day one, but big names making moves day two. We’ll get to that next.
Hour three of DJ & PK for May 16, 2025:
• David Locke, SEG Media
• Pablo Mastroeni, Real Salt Lake
• Should the Utah Jazz draft Egor Demin?
