LeBron Calls Out Memphis And Milwaukee And The East Gets Weird

LeBron Roasts Memphis And Milwaukee

Bulls Front Office Reset Explained

Wembanyama Injury And 65-Game Math

Lakers Injuries And Playoff Fallout

Framing The East Play-In Threats

Sixers Reality Check And Chemistry

Raptors Defense With A Broken Offense

Hornets As A Real Contender Killer

Magic Hype Crash And Leadership Issues

Heat Purgatory And Talent Ceiling

Who We Trust Most And Closing

Welcome to FRPC. On today's show, the old man of the Lakers yells about hotels, and then also he yells about cheese country as well. LeBron take a took a break from YouTube golf show and dropped a zero-star Yelp review on the entire city of Memphis, Tennessee, and then followed it up. He didn't hold anything back. He was like, any M City can get it. Any M City. And he was like, I'm talking about you, Milwaukee. So we'll break that down a little bit. We're also going to talk about the Charlotte Hornets and they're quietly playing with flamethrowers down in the playing bracket. And they are dropping threes like it's 2015. And we'll talk to you about that and why that is. And then the other thing, who do we have the most confidence in in the lower part of the bracket, and who we think can do the most damage in the Eastern Conference? You guys stay tuned for that. We got plenty more to talk about. But before that, drop the beat. What's good everybody? Welcome to Frontrunner Podcast Collective. We talk about everything that's NBA related. Anything that you think of hoop heads unite. We're going to talk like friends. We are going to argue like cousins and still walk out smarter than when we came in. I am Vince. I am your host. Your occasional hoops therapist. Your absolute favorite bad influence when it comes to completely reckless NBA over overreactions that are low-key make perfect sense. Twice a week we will come to you. We are setting the table. We are giving you big clear breakdowns. We're bringing in film room observations, and we are grown having grown conversations about players, coaches, and the front office that are actually moving. We're unpacking it all. On the court wins, timeline messes, and blank check contracts, the PR spin and the locker room rumors with actual verified receipts. We are bringing the jokes, the advanced math, and that exact barbershop ammo that you need to take straight into your group chat and completely nuke the argument. If you are NBA sicko who wants more than highlight talk, if you want content context, numbers, and a point of view, this is the spot for you. FRPC, let's get into it. Alright, so how we're gonna start this podcast today? Two things. One, there's a lot, there's a people talking mad junk right now. And one of the per people that are talking this kind of junk is is a gentleman that we now coin as the all-time leading scorer in the NBA, and that is one LeBron James. So, first up, an absolute air assault by LeBron James. He just called out the 901. We've seen superstars exert their leverage before, but we just witnessed from a 41-year-old billionaire on a YouTube golf show was a historical low for a franchise dignity. LeBron looked dead into the camera and said, if the city of Memphis had won the lottery in 2003, he quote might have called an Eli Manning and not shown up. He didn't just insult the team, he he took a flamethrower to the hotel accommodations complaining that about staying in a hyatt. At 41 years old, on a random Thursday, he is like he's being forced to sleep on a cot in a G-League gymnasium. He's acting like he's he yo, he's acting like this is the worst thing that has ever happened to him in his whole entire life. And then he says he plays city planner and tells them to move to Nashville, Memphis. You weren't the only one to get this smoke. The city of Milwaukee also got it too. He he doubled down. So when they talked to him about the comments that he made about Memphis, he went on to say that another city that he doesn't particularly like to go to is Milwaukee. What is up with the M Cities? The M Cities are just getting it in, and they're just getting it with double barrels. You know what I'm saying? It's really crazy. I don't know what LeBron is doing here. You know, I mean I know he's you know spitting his his truth. But I'm gonna tell you right now, the thing that you need to watch out for is the day that you actually do retire. The day that you actually say, Hey, I'm thinking about hanging it up. I want to go ahead and do my you know farewell tour and things of that nature, you might get a salty response in these two cities just so you know. Now, LeBron might be getting to that age just like we saw with old Kobe, uh, RRP, our guy, Kobe Bryant, but he might be getting to that stage of life where he just don't give a shit anymore. Who knows? Who knows what is about to happen. But a salty albron for the playoffs might be necessary, especially as we go through some of this baseline buzz that we need to get into. So, next on the wire, the Wendy City has officially cleaned house. The Chicago Bulls have fired executive Arturis Karnesovic and also Mark Eversley. They're gone. Now, we have been very critical of the Chicago Bulls for a period of time, talking about why are we still in the friend zone? Why don't we just rip off the band-aid and go ahead and tastefully tank on whatever? I know we can't use the tank word anymore. It's very, very sensitive subject, especially in the NBA offices in Manhattan. Chicago's been stuck in the middle for a long period of time. They completely gutted their core, uh, trading way Zach Levine, Lonzo Gall, Kobe White, Nicola Vusevich, and they failed to acquire a single first-round pick in return. Now, Levine wasn't gonna give you a lot of value because of the contract and because of the dude puts up numbers, but he doesn't really contribute to winning. Lonzo Gall was always you know hurt, so you weren't gonna get anything there. Now, the one that I would be a little bit salty about is the Kobe White piece of this. I don't understand why you couldn't get a first-round pay for Kobe White. And to go even further back, if you want to go further, because I got receipts, right? Chicago also traded our guy, Alex Caruso, to the Oklahoma City Thunder. And I then I said, how come they can't get a first round pick for Alex Caruso and taking back Josh Giddy? They didn't get anything for that. Now, here's the other thing that supposedly was happening with this deal. They've gotten Rob Dillingham from the Minnesota Timberwolves and it part of some of these transactions that they got, and they also got Jay Nivey. Now, Jay Nivey obviously has come under fire for his comments that he made via Instagram. He's been released uh after his social media meltdown last week, and CEO Michael Reinsdorf finally pulled a plug on that situation. Like, you ain't killing my money. You're not doing it. So the Bulls are hitting the reset button with$60 million of cap space, and a head coach, Billy Donovan, who might be heading for the exit door next. So I'm gonna tell you right now, it's it's bad in Chicago, but I hope what they have what they will find now is a player personnel guy who has a vision and can lead them in a direction of acquiring talent either A through the draft or B through um trades and what have you, making the right free agent moves. You don't need to hit a home run with your free agency. What I'm asking for are singles and doubles at this point. You know, saying that's what we're looking for. We're looking for can we find the diamonds in the rough? Can we find the guys who might be a little undervalued, maybe they've been kind of buried by their their bench or whatever the case may be, and we can find some guys that can really give you some asset potential. That is the thing that we're looking for in Chicago. For the Bulls fans out there. I mean, this has been a long time coming. You guys have had a run, a string of front offices that you haven't been pleased with because they have not come with an actual direction, a actual kind of like this is our blueprint to success. Some of this is at the doorstep of Michael Ryansdorf. We've been hard on him, we've been hard on his leadership as a governor of the Chicago Bulls, because I think what happens is that somebody gets in there, whether it's Carnivis, Paxson, whoever, they start off a certain way. You know, okay, this is the way that we're gonna get back to success. And then a year in, you get Michael Ryan's door starting to tinker, starting to ask questions, starting to under undermine your authority, and then now we're we're spinning our wheels again. My hope is that there is somebody with a pretty strong personality that can come in and make the right and appeal to his better side. Say, hey, listen, we're gonna take a couple tough years, we're gonna do it, but we'll come out better for it. And that's what you gotta do. That's how you get better in the NBA. You don't get better by trading or whatever, I mean you can get better by trading, but usually you're not gonna fall into you know two different making superstars just like that. And here, the other thing is that do you have the assets to even pull that off? So there's a lot to do in Chicago, and we just hope that the right people are chosen, and then the actual ownership group can listen to who they put in in those player personnel positions, and then allow them to do their job. That's the hope. Now we need to move down to uh Texas and San Antonio to be exact. We gave so much love to Victor Wingwayama and the Spurs, and how we thought they they were actual uh competitor to the Oklahoma City Thunder, and that they could actually contend in the West to go to the NBA Finals. I still believe all of that, but we hit a snag because Victor Wingwayama left the game against the 76ers with a left rib contusion after a hard fall. Here's where the math gets uh fascinating that When we went to the locker room but came back uh out to cross the 15-minute threshold before sitting and resting the rest of the game. Why? Because playing 16 minutes counts as his second final near miss exemption for the NBA's 65 game rule. He's sitting at 63 currently, plus the NBA cup final, meaning he just needs to suit up one more time this week to lock in his eligibility for defensive player of the year and first team all NBA. That is elite calculated front office management right there. I will say this. Don't bring this dude back until he's healthy. I don't give a shit whether he is uh going to miss out on the uh the Supermax or not. You got plenty of years with this. Maybe there's something that you could do behind the scenes to like they're doing with Luca, and we'll get into him in a second, but don't bring him back just to get him to 65 games. Allow him to convales, allow him to get healthy because this team as currently constituted has a has a real run in them. And things are around the West are playing out maybe not not to their favor at this point. So you're gonna need the very best of Victor Wing Banyama if we're talking about a deep run in the Western Conference and then maybe ultimately getting to the NBA championship. So I don't think they should bring them back anytime soon. Get healthy, Victor. We love you, we we appreciate all you've done. Listen, if you don't get the defensive player of the year award this year, don't worry, man. There's several in your future. We all know you're the best defensive player, bar none in the league. We see how many times you embarrass people, we see how many times other NBA superstars make business decisions by getting out of the lane. So don't worry about it, my guy. Just go get yourself healthy, get yourself right, so then we can have you at full throttle when it comes to the playoffs. Now, speaking of a team that's going through it right now with injury and things of that nature, that'll be my Los Angeles Lakers, your Los Angeles Lakers, Lakers Faithful out there. Shout out to you. Now, the Lakers have been just absolutely inundated with injuries. Uh Luca Doncic is out, but we'll get to him in one second. Luca has a grade two hamstring strain, and he's uh seeking aggressive uh treatment overseas. He's trying to miraculously speed up the recovery process before the playoffs starts in two weeks for him uh to make matters worse. We also lost Austin Reeves. He has uh a rib issue, which is terrible. Um so if you're gonna lose both of these guys, and the prognosis is that they're not gonna be back for several weeks, umwhere in he has so he has a grade two oblique strain, Austin. I want to make sure that we get the actual right diagnosis in there. It's a grade two oblique strain, and I'm gonna tell you right now, they're in desperate straits at this point in time because if Luca doesn't come back, it looks like they're gonna fall to the to the number four seed right now, could possibly fly to the fall five seed. Either way, if Luca doesn't come back, they're gonna get bounced early. Doesn't look like Austin Reeves is coming back. This is a real bad strain for him in his oblique. It takes somewhere in between three to nine weeks to cut recover from. And if that's gonna be the case, this is it. This is it for the Lakers. And your playoff push just became a desperate race against the clock. Because you don't have the firepower, unfortunately. No shade to Marcus Smart and Lou Kennard and Rui Hachamore. But those guys don't put up numbers consistently enough for you to battle against who you're gonna end up going against, which looks like the Houston Rockets. So if that's going to be the case, you're probably an early first round exit, and then it's off to the offseason, and then what happens? We got a lot of decisions to make. What do you do there? Is LeBron coming back? Who knows? How much money is Austin Reeves gonna get? These are all questions that you have to to to answer in the offseason, and I'm gonna tell you right now, they are tedious questions to be sure. But we hope that Rob Kalinka and his ever-growing front office staff can make the right decisions and put the the collective group around Luca Donces to make a difference and get him to the promised land of the NBA playoffs. So now I got stuff for you. This is something that we wanted to do last week, but now we have the time to do it, and what this is is the capability of what we're doing here, is we're looking at teams in the bottom half of the Eastern Conference. And what we're trying to do and what we're trying to come up with is are these teams really scary? Or is this a product of TV saying, oh, Philadelphia's back, oh Toronto's good, oh, you can never forget the Miami Heat. We're gonna go through the bottom end of the Eastern Conference playoff positions. We're gonna go through each team, and we're gonna go through their chances of making a playoff run going getting past the first round. So we're gonna start in Philadelphia. That's where we're gonna start at, and we need to have a serious conversation about the 76ers anyway, and we need to do it without rose-colored glasses that the city of Philadelphia currently is wearing. The people that I've been talking to are trying to figure out is this team a sleeping giant? Are we are we really gonna put all our chips in the middle of the table for Joel Embiid once again? I'm looking at a house of cards in a windstorm personally. Everyone is looking at that 118 to 114 win over the Charlotte Hornets and acting like Daryl Mori has just reinvented basketball. Are we serious right now? Is this are we really falling for the banana in the tailpipe again? Are we supposed to just trust the process for a team sitting in the seventh seed right now with a negative 0.4 net rating and an atrocious 116 point defensive rating that ranks 17th in the league? Now, the Philly fans are currently tearing their hair out over Jalen Hurts and and what has dropped with the Eagles, demanding accountability and questioning leadership, but they are given a massive. Pass to a to a basketball team that has been built on hypothetical potential for half a decade or even longer. It is time to stop reading the cover of the book and asking the hard, uncomfortable questions about this roster before blindly picking them to upset the Knicks or the Celtics. So we're about to get into it. We're going to start with the absolute glaring red flag at center of the entire operation. Joel and B can have a level of s skepticism when it comes to the 76ers and his health risk. He is a franchise player cornerstone when healthy. 38 games with Joel and B. Half the season. Okay. We've done it again. Oh, if we can just get Joel and B healthy at the right time, we can make a run. You cannot be a foundational piece of a championship run when your regular season resembles the extended stay at a luxury medical spa. We're talking about 43 and 36 basketball team trying to survive the Eastern Conference, and their so-called gravity-shifting MVP couldn't even make it to the floor for half the season. Now the analytics uh department, the he's a darling of that, will confidently tell you that he actually plays, he's dropping 26.9 points, his true shooting percentage of 60.5, and his massive 33.5 usage rate completely breaks the opponent's defense tolerance buffers. That is fantastic spreadsheet talk. But what is good about broken tolerance buffer when you're sitting on the bench in custom street clothes watching your teammates garner through 82 games and you only available for half of them. I am completely tired of the arrogant narrative that the regular season is just an inconvenient dress rehearsal for the 76ers. We've been hearing it for about four years now. It is an absolute embarrassment to the competitive nature of the league. You do not get to use the regular season as a hospital ward, punt half your games, and then expect basketball world to blind grind just blindly crown you as a first-round giant killer. To be a powerhouse two or three seed like the Knicks or the Celtics in a grueling physical game, you know, seven-game series, you need absolute durability. You need a superstar who doesn't come with a fragile handle with care warning label slapped on his jersey. They want us to believe his needs are magically going to hold up for like two months in the crucible that is the um playoffs. Fans shouldn't shouldn't just be skeptical, they should be terrified. Gracing yourself for the inevitable heartbreaking injury update that derails your entire season again. Doesn't this sound like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football and Lucy pulling it away from him yet again? I'm just asking the question. I mean, listen, Joel Reed is a phenomenal basketball player. I will not take away as far as his talent is concerned. But we've seen this story play out over and over and over again. And at some point you have to just go, it's not gonna happen. And and you you can be skeptical until proven wrong. Now, people will say, oh, that's a shitty way of being. That's you shouldn't be that way. He's shown you enough with his play when he has played. The key phrase there is when he has played. And then we get to the grand experiment of the expensive savior, which is Paul George. Paul George sat out for 25 games after a substance of well wasn't substance abuse problem, but he the protocols of the NBA drug abuse program failed that. Now he's come back, he's been playing well. Now George has played 34 games. He stood in front of microphones apologizing about letting his people down, and now we're supposed to blindly trust him as well as an elite Robin to save a franchise. Now you want to hear some you want to hear some pretty good stats? Sure. Let's do it. His usage sits at a tidy 23.3% while putting up 17 point 17.7 points, 5.4 rebounds. But I have a very serious question. Are we getting a heroic guy who dropped 26 and 13 against the Charlotte Hornets? Or are we getting a drifting corner three to steal a win? Or are we getting a radic passive version who disappears for entire halves when the defense whistle gets tight? Scraping together a Measley 2.2 box plus minus. You can't be elite with that. Can't be elite with that. He's had a lot of playoff situations. We've seen him, you know, kind of turn around the narrative on his playoff situation because for the longest time there was snicker, there's snickering going behind his back about, you know, playoff P and what that means and all that. And really, there was a there was a vote of no confidence when it came to Paul George. We all know it. And we just don't know which one is going to show up. Now, here's the other problem with the 76ers that we need to talk about. The Sixers have a Golden State Warriors issue going on, but at least they have more talent when it comes to this. So the Sixers have a timeline that is completely an utter mess. You have a starting five with Embiid, Maxie, George, Edgecombe, and Barlow. They have played less than 300 total possessions together the entire year. Almost two years after Daryl Morin signed Paul George to this massive deal, we still do not know whose team it is when they are fully healthy. How in the world do you build a championship level connectivity in chemistry with less than 300 possessions? Spoiler alert, you don't. You don't. You just roll the basketball out there and pray for a miracle. This isn't an offensive system. It's an incredibly expensive pickup game. George is supposed to is supposed to be the ultimate safety net. But right now, he's just a massive, unpredictable variable in a franchise built entirely on variance. If he doesn't go, if he does, if he if he decides to go cold, then you're leaning on other other pillars that we need to talk about in one second. Now what happens if for some reason Joel and B and Paul George start feeling swagger, start feeling they're like superstar oats. What does that mean for the rest of the team? Are you a stabilizer or are you a disruptor? This goes for both Joel and B and Paul George. Which one are you? Because here's the thing that I think everybody wants to talk about. We're going to shift gears to talk about the guy who really stirs the drinks in Philadelphia. Tyrese Maxie, because this is where the schematic tension is going to hit in its absolute boiling point. The data from uh people that I know is that it says that Maxie is a cornerstone player. This kid has played in 67 games this year, grinding out 38.2 minutes a night. He boasts a massive 29.4 usage rate, and he's dropping 28.4 points a game and dishing out 6.7 assists per game. And he's a monstrous box plus minus of 5.8, which is more than double, you know, like two and a half more than what Paul George is putting out there, who's getting paid a lot of money, by the way. A lot. He's objectively become the heart and soul and the engine of this team while Joel MB and Paul George are taking turns sitting in the traders' room. He's carried the water for the Philadelphia 76ers. But what happens in the crucible of the NBA playoffs? Will Tyrese Maxie be allowed to be the true leader during crunch time? I will tell you what exactly happens, and it isn't pretty. When there's two minutes left to go in a brutal game six against the Knicks, and the season's hanging by a thread, the veteran eagle heart hierarchy is going to rear his ugly head. Will Nick Nurse actually allow Maxie to be the true undisputed leader that he is? Or will Joel and B, the former MVP, willing willingly set aside a heart, set a hard screen and roll to the rim, or is he going to demand the ball at the high elbow, stall the offense, and freeze Maxie out? Is Paul George going to accept standing quietly in the corner while the 23-year-old runs the show? We've seen this tragic movie in Philadelphia way too many times to fall for it again. And they have these dynamics blazing fast, young guards who get completely marginalized and pushed to the side. I'm gonna tell you right now, I see it all the time. I see it all the time. When Embiid is on the court, they play a completely different style. When Embiid is not playing, you know, it's Maxie's show. It's when the ball when Embiid is in the game, the ball sticks to Embiid's hands. We get a slowdown game, which listen, in the playoffs, it is a half-court game. But are we trusting Joel Enbi? When you have a guy who is a who's played damn near 40 minutes a game, played most of the games this year, and has a box plus minus of 5.8. Or are we going to succumb to the money? Are we gonna succumb to your$50 million veterans and get the young kids out of the way? Cause the other thing is this. You also have VJ Edcomb. And VJ Edcomb is 20 years old, and he's continued to play like a seasoned grizz grizzle veteran. Edgecomb had 10 assists against the Washington Wizards on April 1st. The Washington Wizards, congratulations, you know, to the Sixers. You successfully carved up a 17-win lottery team. But here's the thing about this. VJ Edgecomb has played outstanding basketball, shown the athleticism, showed the defensive chops. He's done it all for the Philadelphia 76s this year for somebody who is nearly playing 35 minutes a night and giving you 16 points, four assists. But again, this dude right here is your future along with Maxie. So does the future come now? Are we gonna prioritize what is going to be a decade-long run with Maxie and VJ Edgecomb, or are we gonna give the chance to possible glory? And when I say possible, I say that with a side eye for real. Possible glory of Joel Embiid and Paul George making one more magical run. It could be setting up for a recipe of disaster. And then you have calming agents like Kelly Ubre Jr. I mean, he can be a wild card, he can be a volatile asset, he can shoot you out of games in five minutes, but he can put you in games too. You also have Cameron Payne. Here's what I will say about all of this. The reality of the culture is trying to build in Philly is that the 76ers have to live with the mistakes of VJ Edgecombe. They have no choice but to let him run the offense alongside of Tyrese Maxie, allow the 20-year-old to who has incredible regular season and look like an absolute lock for all rookie first team, stepping straight into the prime time, and he's supposed to learn. He is supposed to learn. But let's keep it, let's take a step back and look at the bigger picture. Are we actually supposed to believe that the sheer amount of games missed by Joel Embiid and Paul George leaving them less than 300 possessions together, combined with the drastic style play differences when Embiid is on the court versus when he is off the court, will just resolve itself? Or are we going to believe that the 76ers can magically find cohesion and then use it as a weapon against the upper echelon of the Eastern Conference? I don't buy it. I don't. You can't simulate playoff chemistry, and the Knicks or the Celtics are coming. If you ask me my opinion, the 76ers are going, are not a sleeping giant, they're not taking time bomb of volatility on a big stage. The second they step onto the court at Madison Square Garden and run into a real connected playoff team and say what you want about the Knicks. I think when the when the lights are bright, I think the Knicks are gonna show up. I think the calming presence of Jalen Brunson, I think uh the fire that is Josh Hart, and you got to get something out of Mikhail Bridges. But I think the 76ers are gonna have a really nice vacation. One, two, three, Cancun. Hate to say it, Philadelphia fans. I know it's tough to hear, I know this is not what you want, but I just can't sit here and go, oh, absolutely, Joel MB back, everything's great. You're gonna play this style of play that's conducive to the playoffs, and then we're gonna um really take the ball out of Tyrese Maxie's hands in the in the uh in the playoffs with like five minutes ago in the games online. Yes, if you're thinking of Joel B like five years ago, then I understand. But we can't live in five years ago. Tyrese Maxie is the here and now. VJ Escombe is today and the future, and those guys need to be represented, they need to be counted upon when the times get tough. Yes, it's not for this year, but it's for the years after. And it might be a take or it might be a thought process that is uncomfortable for Philadelphia uh 76ers fans, but I know I speak the truth on this, I know what I'm talking about, because yeah. Did y'all really think? I mean, he has played well this year when he has played, but did you really think to yourself, hey, this is what we should be doing? We should be putting our our chips in the middle of the table for Joel and Bede. Sorry, can't do it. Now let's move on to the Toronto Raptors. The Raptors remind me of a difficult, completely infuriating Sunday crossword puzzle. You stare at it at it for hours, but nothing makes sense. The pieces seem to fit together, but the second you figure out the one crucial word, the entire board suddenly falls into place. The Raptors are a team that had has had a great season this year so far, especially compared to what this podcast, this very podcast, thought of them um six months ago. But dragging themselves into April as a sixth seed or a seventh seed, they both won to the top-tier offenses. They ranked sixth in the league, holding teams to 112 points per game, so their defense is stacked. I'm sorry, not the office defense is stacked, Scotty Barnes is doing a thing, but the offense is sitting at 17, scraping together 114.4 a night. Frankly, it feels generous when you watch them play. They go through these agonizing long stretches where their shooting just gets sucked into a complete and utter black hole. We have the data from trusted rival scouts and the tape breakdown of uh an executive that used to be in the league, and we're creating a picture that this team is squeezing blood from a stone. So let's open up the scouting files on a team that refuses to die. We're taking it to the six right now, boy. Let's go get it. Let's talk about the Toronto Raptors. To spearhead this team, we got Scotty Barnes, is the only word written on the permanent ink. A rival scout identified as a chaotic hierarchy in Toronto, but Barnes is the absolute 1A cornerstone and everything and the everything engine. Let's look at these numbers real quick. They're staggering. The kid is played in 76 games, all of them. He's playing a massive amount of minutes. His usage is 23.6, which is slightly below traditional numbers of a number one option. But his box plus minus. 3.9. It means that he is the entire system. He has supreme processing speed and pure junky DNA. He's playing the point guard position in a power forward body. He's grabbing 7.5 rebounds a game. He's dishing nearly 6 assists. And he's doing it on a career high true shooting percentage of 57.3%. When Emmanuel quickly went down, it should have killed them, but Barnes stepped in, uh became that primary of facilitation role, which is something that he's adept to anyway. 15 assists against the Orlando Magic not that long ago. But here is a tragic flaw. He's the most important non-centered defender in the NBA. But he is surrounded by a broken spacing environment and in the playoffs series, a smart defense just going to shrink the floor on them. So we'll see how it all plays out. But Scotty Barnes is the truth. I love this kid. I don't know if he's a number one. I don't know. I don't. I wish I could say that. I just the shot is the thing that just holds him back. And if Scotty Barnes is carrying the load, you want to talk about a team that makes incredibly hard generated to generate turnovers, elite defense competition. Let's bring in Brandon Ingram. Right now, and uh somebody that I trust in the league flagged him as an empty calorie risk. The math is brutal when it comes to him. He's played in 73 games this year, which is great. Because before this, he had never played in more than like 63.9% of the usage rate. He's taking all the bailout shots, getting you to 21.3 points a game or night, but his box plus minus is coin one. 0.1. So he is almost break even. He's playing through a brutal heel injury, but if you are commanding 27% of the team's possessions in the playoffs, you are absolutely you have to tilt the floor. The mask screens that he isn't, and then you have RJ Barrett. He's supposed to be the elite connector scorer, providing some group force and some rim pressure. This team desperately needs that. He's shooting a miserable 34.3% 34.4% from three. He's a left-handed dominant driver with a bad shoulder. Who can't shoot from the perimeter. This is a playoff scout's absolute dream when you want to scheme up against this team in your sleep. You know what I'm saying? This is what you're looking for. Like, yeah. We're gonna sag off of that guy. That guy is gonna be able to take all the shots he wants. No paint, he's not touching the paint whatsoever. You let him take that 20-footer or that corner three, and we'll see how it all goes. But if you give if you give them, if you let them get into a track meet, that's where the magic happens. Because if they turn you over, Toronto is hell to deal with. Brandon Engle has long arms. Emmanuel quickly can get in your grill. Uh Jakob Purdo is a good rim protector. I wouldn't say he's the greatest rim protector, but he's good. Scotty Guarns is the son that everything orbits around. Okay, he is going to get you in good positions to score the basketball. The problem is that I don't trust his team in the half court. And Brandon Ingram is still that guy who shoots a lot of mid-range jumpers. And yeah, RJ Barrett is grinding out 19.1 points a game over five rebounds a game. But I'm telling you right now, I just don't see it. And now the bench is where you get some love. Our guy Sandro Mahmoud Killishvili. This dude plays hard. He gets buckets, he's averaging 11.2 points a game on nearly five rebounds. Um he has a uh a positive 5.9 box plus or minus. His true shooting percentage is 63.7%. He comes in and he provides the spacing that you're looking for. And then they gotten something out of uh Jacoby Walter this year. But it's not enough. You don't have enough people on the court where the defense is going to respect what they do and how they do it. Alright. Now, the guy that I'm looking forward to and seeing what he does is our guy, uh Colin uh Murray Boyles. A rival scout literally describes him as a granite cue who can't shoot. But he's uh cultural on the floor. He grabs offensive rebounds at a massive 12.1%. He makes opposing wings absolutely miserable. And then you provide you you have him and you have Jakarta Pertle, who's holding down the paint, with an absurd 69.8% true shooting percentage. Now he has a minute, he has a 1.6 box plus or minus. They're paying him way too much money, by the way. I just I just wish they had another shooter, just one more, where it was like, I'm gonna shoot eight threes a game, and I'm gonna shoot 38 to 39%. They just need another guy that when the lights get big, whatever the case may be, I'm gonna go ahead and knock these down. Just chill, it's gonna work out. So my verdict for the Toronto Blue for the Toronto Blue Jays, the Toronto Raptors is uh this. I'm gonna take it from a rival scout. You say you look at this roster, you look at the injuries, and they told us to reject this team as somebody that you should be scared of when it comes to a first-round knockoff. Um they ranked 22nd in scoring without their starting point guard right now. Um and here's the thing: who are they gonna face in the playoffs? Are they gonna face Boston? Because if they're gonna face Boston, Steve has no shot. Now, we can talk about spreadsheets and we can talk about numbers all day. We can talk about the sheer energy and grit of Scotty Barnes dragging them into this big stage. Um, and they might not roll over in five games. And they might get lucky in one of these games, but their offense takes hiatuses seriously, and I just don't think they have the offensive firepower to be able to compete with a team like the Boston Celtics. So Toronto, it's it was a good run this year. It was a positive step because I honestly didn't think that you were going to make the playoffs this year at the beginning of the season, so shame on me. I'll say it right now. But to really expect that you do anything in the playoffs right now is it's a little far-fetched. Now we need to move down to North Carolina. There's a lot going down in North Carolina. Have you guys heard that Michael Malone is the new head coach of the UNC Tar Hills? I cannot wait to see what that looks like. I cannot wait to see that curmudgeon on a college basketball floor. I just cannot wait to see it. That's a hard-nosed guy. I want to see how he deals with 18 and 19-year-old kids. It's gonna be great. Now we talked about fake contenders and we've talked about mud wrestling teams dragging themselves into April. Now we need to talk about absolute nightmare scenario for every single top seed in the Eastern Conference. We need to talk about the ticking time bomb currently sitting in Charlotte, North Carolina, North Kakala. Because the Hornets are probably gonna make it out of the plan. If not, they if that if not the plan, they might actually be the sixth seed, which would be terrible for the Knicks. Terrible. The data suggests that they absolutely will, and they're going to ruin somebody's spring at some point. Right now they're sitting in the A C under Charles Lee with a 43 and 36 record. Somebody I trust said this. This is not your typical 8 seed Hogan for a lucky bounce. They're walking into April with a 5 uh plus 5.3 net rating, which is sixth best in the entire NBA. And they have a fourth rank offense, and let me repeat that. Let me repeat that. The fourth best offense. You want a comparison? You want to blaze the internet? You wanna you wanna really turn it turn up the heat in your group chat right now? Listen to me closely. The Charlotte Hornets. This is the closest thing to like the 2014-2015 Golden State Warriors. Maybe like the year before, 2013-2014. I might have the years mixed up, but they remind me of the Golden State Warriors right before they made their championship run. There's nothing more terrifying than the young Golden State Warriors, and guess what? We might have another one. And let's give some credit where credit is due. Let's start at the top with the hierarchy. We're gonna talk, we're gonna start talking about LaMelo ball for a second. For years, the narrative around LaMelo has been all about flash over substance, taking 38-foot heat checks, the careless turnovers, the highlight reel passes that ended up in the third row sometimes. But you look at the tape from this year, and the maturation has been visible. It has been terrifying. He has played incredibly, he's played with incredible maturity, and his head coach Charles Lee has finally got through to him, and that sometimes less is more. Just to make the right pass. I don't need a flashy pass, just to make the right pass. He's carrying a massive 31.8 usage rate and generating a 4.4 box plus minus, but the real story is his role discipline. His shot diet of taking a handful of logo threes with 17 seconds on the shot clock has dwindled. He's also been valuing possessions. He is significantly turned around. The talent was never in doubt. It was ball's ability to harness what he had inside him all along. Kudos to Lamar Ball doing what he needs to do. Now the timeline will still treat him like a mixtape player, but he's operating like a surgical floor general right now. In a seven-game series, yes, his efficiency floor is a concern. He is at a 54%, he's at 54.3% true shooting percentage, which flirts with empty calories on, but no, don't don't trip. Defenses will dare him to finish at the rim and see if the maturity holds up. But I'm gonna tell you right now, when they swallow the whistle, will he be able to take the physical pounding that goes on in the playoffs? That's what we gotta find out. Who else is on this team that we need to talk about? Obviously, we need to go and talk to our guy, talk about our guy, Brandon Miller. His game is just smooth as butter. He's doing hyper-functional Paul George impersonation right now. He's at a 28.1% usage rate. He's shooting 57.4% true shooting clip. His box plus minus is at 1.6, but he's young. He's young. Giving you 20.2 points a game a night. Miller's ability to provide mid-range game and his willingness to probe the paint has helped the helped in the explosive nature of the Charlotte Hornets offense. Now, when teams try to blitz Lomella right now, Miller is a steady secondary release valve. And then there is the rookie, Khan Knipple. And I will tell you right now, this podcast was right in our pre-daft scouting analysis of Khan Knipple. Are you kidding me with this kid? We're talking about a 20-year-old who has torn up the NBA with his long barrage of threes. He's shooting 43% from deep on nearly eight attempts a game. That's crazy. He's given the Charlotte Hornets 18.7 points a game. His true shooting percentage is a blistering 64%. Are you kidding me right now? This kid is just incredible. Wait, what? Fifth overall? That's what I'm talking about. A rival scout graded him as an elite connected spacing guy with a massive 3.1 box plus minus. By the way, 3.1 box plus or minus for somebody 20 years old in his rookie year is incredible. He's leading the league in off-ball gravity as a rookie. It's a historic situation. He struggled of late. Okay, because now you're you're really people are honing in on you on the whiteboard. You're one of the top dudes when it comes to what's going on in the game plan situation with the defense. But I think he'll find his way. He's a tough kid. He can put it on the he can put it on the deck. You know, make really good decisions, wise decisions with the basketball. I love this kid. Lamello runs a pick and roll. It is instantly 20% more effective because of Con Kanipple. The defender's physicality cannot leave him in the corner. It is curry level spacing. Yes. Playoff coaches are going to hunt him on defense. But the tape says he's not a turnstile. And before we give the final verdict on the Hornets, we have to look at the other key producers that provide depth for this team and give them some grit and show us what they're capable of. Now, the first person you gotta talk about is Miles Bridges. Miles Bridges is a hybrid forward who's providing functional toughness with this roster that desperately needs it. He is 22.5% usage rate right now. Take a sip of coffee. He's providing 17.4 points a game. He is a physical bridge between the finesse of the guards and the grit of the interior. In the bench, one ex-executive flag, this unit is high trust. You're talking about Kobe White. You have Musa Diobate grabbing nearly nine boards a game and boasting a crazy 65.4 true shooting percentage because all he does is dunk the basketball. Musa Diabate is a guy who understands his role on his team. I am going to set hard picks and I am going to roll extremely hard to the basket. I am going to make that defender make a choice. You're not going to be able to sit there and hatch. You're not going to be able to sit there and kind of guard both with your center situation. You're going to have to make a decision because if you don't, Musa Diabate is going to be on top of that rim. And then you know what you say after that. Watch ahead. Watch your head. He doesn't need the game, he doesn't need to uh the ball to impact the game. He just provides pure rim pressure. And then you have Ryan Cockbrenner, the rookie out of Creighton, providing functional length, and he's oh 1.5 blocks a game. What's up? And then you got short bursts of Sion James bringing that ACC all-defensive pedigree to the perimeter. This is a team that is deep. And more importantly, Charles Lee has made their mark on defense with his discipline but love style of coaching. They play at a 97 a 97 pace, which is 27, which is one of the slowest in the league. They value possessions, and that is vital when we go into the playoff situation. So what happens when a ticking time bomb goes off in the playoffs? A front office cont contact stamp this roster approved for sure. This isn't a team hogging the sneak in. This is a team that's probably gonna be close to 50 wins, masking or waiting around as a play-in squad due to its early season's growing pains. They are the nightmare matchup for the Celtics or for the Knicks. They play slow, they protect the ball, and they shoot the three, and when the three-point swarm hits, they can erase a 15-point deficit in like three minutes. No one wants to face the Hornets. No one wants to face them. And if they make it out of the playing tournament, mark my words, Buzz City is prime to completely ruin a contender's April. Just letting you know, I have a lot of faith in the Charlotte Hornets. I think they are going to be an absolute nightmare to play. I think a lot of people are going to be really interested when it finally comes down. I'll tell you another team who will get a little bit afraid of them too. Boston. Not like saying that Boston is like, oh, we're gonna let it run down our leg or whatever. But playing a team that has that kind of firepower that can, you know, because Boston likes to shoot a lot of threes too. And you know what happens when the threes don't don't go in? Long rebounds. That means Lomelo is in the open. Court. That means that Khan Knipple is drifting out into a corner. That means that oh, if you attack LaMelo and try to trap him, he's gonna get the ball to Brandon Miller. This is a team that got a lot of answers to the test. Got a lot of answers to the test. Now, speaking of a team that answers to the test, we thought that that this team was going to take a huge leap in our preseason situation. The Orlando Magic. And in the famous words of that great philosopher Ferris Bueller, life moves pretty fast, and if you don't stop to look around once in a while, you can miss it. Well, let me tell you something. The Orlando Magic's collective heads must be spinning right now off their shoulders. Because life just hit them like a freight train. Let's rewind the tape to October. Preseason vibes were immaculate. The tunnel fits were elite. The culture was set. We all sat behind these microphones and handed their front office glowing platitudes for acquiring Desmond Bain. Sure. We gave them a side a slight side eye about the absolute king's ransom they shipped to Memphis to get them. But with Bain's shooting and high highly anticipated bounce back of Franz Wagner this year and the steady climb of Anthony Black and the return of Jalen Sus, we were actually penciling in the Orlando Magic as a team that was going to host a first-round playoff series. I am one to say that I was wrong. We fast forward to today. They're limping into April, sitting at 43 and 36, barely clinging to the ninth seed in the East. The vibes are completely dead. Teams are going on 30 31 to 0 runs against them. 31-0, I said it. In a professional basketball game, no less. This is a disaster. The magics are messy, and we are needing to break down exactly how we got this illusion shattered for us. Well, let's start with the loudest noise coming out of Orlando right now. And that is one inclusion that we didn't see coming. Paulo Ben Carroll, who we still believe in this podcast will not be selling any Paulo Ben Carroll stock whatsoever. But the Scouting Network has been screaming about this for months. That is getting increasingly impossible to fight off the analytics guys about Ben Carroll's inefficiencies. And you look at the raw box score numbers, they look great. 22.3 points a game, 8.4 rebounds, 5.1 assists. It looks like a superstar. It looks like what it's supposed to look like. But when you look at everything else, the brutal truth is this. A rival executive said this. It's like they force fed him as a one. He has a massive usage rate of 27.6, but his box plus minus is a pitiful 1.3. To be a true franchise cornerstone, the math demands a box plus minus of at least 4. With that type of usage rate. 1.3 means Paulo is absolutely grinding his gears into dust just to get those 22 points. He's operating in a horribly cog clogg lane and taking um taking on an offensive burden that is currently 56.7% true shooting percent right now. He can't support it. But the leadership aspect is truly alarming. Paulo isn't going down without a fight, but instead he's taking accountability. Check this out. He's out here lobbing verbal grenades at his head coach. Jamal Mosley is not on the hot seat. He's on the hottest seat. Ben Carroll's out here in post-game crashers just saying this is unacceptable. The offense needs to be better. There needs to be more imagination, whatever the case may be. You have a 23-year-old kid essentially going to management and complaining about your scheme because he's getting exposed. Is he the right guy to be your alpha? Is he is is Paulo Gancaro your Batman? Because right now he's acting like a diva who wants the coach to be fired because the front office has caught him padding empty calorie stats. The tragedy here is not in the front office. They made the right decision in bringing in Desmond Bay to do exactly what he's doing. To be a professional.9% in true shooting percentage. Box plus minus is only at a 1.4. Why is that? Well, part of it is Franz Wagner is what play in like 30 31 games or something like that. 31 games. If it's not one, it's the other one. If one's not hurt, the other one's hurt. And we haven't even got to Jalen Suggs yet. We haven't even got to him. Sugs is out here with grit, 13.7 points a game, 5.6 assists a game. He's your point of attack. Uh, watchdog, setting the cultural floor on the defense. His usage is 23%. Way too many shots from a guy shooting 55.5 true shooting percentage. You haven't gotten nearly enough on Wendell Carter Jr. Anthony Black has 61 games. He's battled abdomen injuries robbing you of that disruptive length that you thought you were gonna have, and his box plus minus is a negative uh 0.6. What are you left with? Goku Batate? What else? This falls at the feet of Paulo Gancaro and Jamal Mosley. They need to get their shit together. The other thing is this is that yes, Franz has been out for a long period of time, but guess what? You needed to figure this out. You had enough on your team to get this all figured out. You didn't, and now we're here. So do I think that the Orlando Magic are one of these teams that is going to make a lot of noise in the playoffs? They should. They shouldn't even be in this position, but they are. And yeah, Paolo is 6'10, 250 pounds. Desmond Bain is a is an absolute long-range assassin. Jalen Suggs is an absolute animal when it comes to being on that defensive end of the ball and just absolutely annoying your coin guard who's bringing the ball up. But the problem is that they don't play as a team, and Paulo hasn't reached that level of leader where he can just say, okay, we need to settle this down and go ahead and just lock into the things that we can do. And some of that has to do with whether he believes in the coach and believes in the philosophies, which he doesn't, because he has expressed that time and time and time again. So Orlando making any kind of run in the playoffs, I don't see it. I don't see how we can even sit here and deny that. Now, the Heat, we're gonna be very honest with you. We're gonna have a very uncomfortable conversation. The worst place you can possibly be in the National Basketball Association is not the bottom of the standings. At least in the bottom of the standings, you have the chance at the lottery, and that brings you hope. The worst place you can be in the NBA is in purgatory. And what that means is that you're good enough to make the play in, but you're not bad enough to make like the lottery. If you're good enough to make the plan, you can't make that leap to the like that next level where you're like a four or five C or whatever case may be, and you're just not getting the draft picks that you that you need to get to make a difference on your team. Now, as of right now, the Miami Heat are the mayors of Purgatory, they've taken that title over from the Chicago Bulls, who try who are now bottling out. Good job for Chicago. Now, is it commendable to be a bunch of absolute tryhards? Yes. Do I respect the fact that they have a generational highly gifted head coach in Eric Spostra who can extract every single ounce of wind equity out of his players' sales? Absolutely. Heat culture is real when it comes to effort. Will they play hard? Yes. Will they frustrate their opponents? Yes. But there's only so much air exposure can do when you look down the bench and you realize you don't have enough, you don't have a true number one option. The ghost of Jimmy Butler is gone. The safety net is gone. And you're left with a 41 and 37 basketball team sitting in 10th place. And yeah, you're about to be in the play-in again. Well, let's talk about their big three. Norman Powell, Tyler Hero, and Damn Alabio. We have a roster built entirely on Robbins, and nobody's wearing that Batman cape. Norman Powell is having a phenomenal scoring season. He's dropping 22.1 points a game with a massive 27.1 usage rate, and he has an elite 61.1% true shooting percentage. This dude has really stepped up his game the last couple years. Norman Powell, I don't know. Scholars need to do studies on him. There need to be scientists that check this dude out because he was like 14 points a game, and he was like a really good six man. Now he's just put two years together where he is literally a legit number two option. You know, I don't know what that actually means because we're looking at a bunch of number two or number three options. And then you have our guy squeaking the number two options, or supposing number two options. Tyler Hero is easily clears the efficiency thresholds to be a high-end stabilizer. 60.5% true shooting percentage. He's giving you 21 points a game. He provides spacing. But here's the thing: his defense, not great. No bueno. And then you got the heart of the team. Bam out of bio. Let's be honest. Bam. Ourselves today. Bam out of fit great as a number three option next to a flamethrowing wing and an elite guard. He grabs 10 rebounds a game. He filled he facilitates. He anchors the defense. But the model refuses to stamp him as a 1A because he his true shooting percentage is 55%. How is this team sitting in 10th in the East with a positive 2.2 net rating? How are they scoring 120.8 points in a game a night, which is second most points in the NBA? They're running this offense that doesn't rely on pick and roll. There's a lot of movement, fast pace. A lot of people are really, you know, if you don't come in prepared, you can get run out the building. Structurally half court flaws. You got you got Davion Mitchell. You know what I'm saying? I like Davion Mitchell if he was a backup. He shouldn't be starting for you. Sorry. He brings toughness, he brings grit, he's dishing out 6.5 assists, but that negative point 0.9 box plus minus lets you know what the hell is up. We need to provide some real situations going on. You have Andrew Wiggins, you have Jaime Highcass Jr. They are connected wings. Wiggins is giving you 15.6 points a game and a 1.5 box plus minus. My guy Jaime Hatkass is chipping in with 15 points a game. They are nice solid pieces. But they're not difference makers on that wing. Now, the one blue chip that you got, and you still need to extract all of what you can out of him is Khalel Ware. Khalil Ware, his key statistic is that his interior depth that he has 22 minutes a night, he's bolstering a 61.3% true shooting percentage. He's grabbing 9.1 rebounds. He's providing just steady play in that center position. But Nikola Jovich is a miss. He has a negative 3.5 box plus or minus. He has a miserable true shooting percentage of 48%. You just don't have enough in Miami. There's not enough. On the high end, the dudes who are producing the most points, they're not they're not easy looks, and it's not like people are really like on them. They have to run this offense that is movement, movement, movement, just perpetual movement, and they're looking for the best shot, what have you. But what happens when the offense or when the defense says enough of this? And we want to put the ball in this person's hand and uh and say, hey, if you can beat us, fine. If that's Davion Mitchell, that's not gonna happen. Andrew Wiggins is definitely a guy who can have some connective tissue. But if you're saying, hey, go ahead and take 18, 19 shots a game, he's not your guy. Jaime High Cast Jr., I love him a lot. He went to UCLA. You know how I feel about UCLA. My whole thing is this is that if he has to take 15, 16, 17 shots a game, the defense is winning. He's not a high volume scorer. There's really nobody on your team except for Tyler Hero, and then he will not be as effective as he currently is with a with a small, you know, with a smaller role than he has, because they do have a bunch of dudes that can score. They need better talent. And that's what it all comes down to. So, do I think they have a chance of of really like pushing the team to like a game seven? No. I think if they played the the Boston Celtics or or somebody like that, they get their glow they'd get their doors blown off of. If you play the Pistons, you can't out tough the Pistons. I know Miami, he it plays tough brand of basketball, but that Detroit team plays a scary tough brand of basketball. So I think the teams that I would be like the most like, okay, this team I'll um Charlotte, I'm with. I'm with them. And it all depends in Philadelphia which which team is gonna be allowed to play. Are we banking on Joel and Bede, or are we gonna use Joel Indeed as a as a second option? Is Carl George gonna fall into his role as a third option? Or sometimes even a fourth option to allow VJ Escombe and Tyrese Maxie to do their thing, or is he going to command to be a second option? Because if you get the two guys who are making$50 plus million dollars to buy into a situation where they are okay with taking a couple less shots a game, understanding that these other two really athletic guards and wings are gonna be able to get you some easy points and whatever the case may be, then I think Philadelphia has a shot. But if we're saying that this is the Joel and B Paul George reunion tour, I'm out. I'm out, dog. I'm out. So that is our confidence level on the lower half of the bracket. I hope you guys enjoyed it today. And uh, you know, we just we we got we're glad that we can bring it to you. So, with that being said, we talked our talk, we emptied our clip, but before we get out of here, we need to say thank you. We know there's a million hoops podcasts clogging up your feed right now, and the fact is that you chose to spend time in the war room with us, which means everything to Frontrunner Podcast Collective. If you rock with how we do things and you appreciate thoughts over blind takes, do us a favor. Drop a like, hit the subscribe button or the follow button on your podcast platform of choice. Send this episode to that one person in your group chat who desperately needs to hear it. Pull up on us at on X and Instagram. Let's keep building this FR FR PC footprint together. But whatever you're dealing with out with uh with with whatever you're dealing with out there today, I need to leave you with this. The best part of you is still you, not your win-loss record, not your timeline, nor your algorithm. Just you. Surround yourself with people who actually give you just light, the ones who bring the insight, the joy, and the accountability. That is your real max deal. Appreciate them out loud. Don't wait for a later that nobody is promised. If you are still looking for your hoop family, you got one here with us. We may joke around, we may get loud, we overreact, but we will always respect your brain, and anyone can yell a take, but very few can actually defend a thought. I'm Vince, and until the next episode, keep your mind sharp, your heart open, and keep your circles tight. And remember, protect your peace like cap space, never waste it on bad basketball or bad energy, and we're out of here.