Wolves Win With Slo-Mo and Ant Defensive Strategy Switch!

[00:00:13] It's Wednesday, Front Runner Podcast Collective is back on the air. I am your humble host, Vince and we have a good show for you today.

[00:00:25] We're going to talk about game 4 of the Timberwolves and Mavs. Timberwolves push it to a game 5.

[00:00:33] We're also going to shift gears a little bit and we're going to focus in on a couple teams who are already in the off season.

[00:00:43] Atlanta and the Wizards. And then we're going to finish it up with some news and notes.

[00:00:51] So before we get to all that, we're going to break down the socials. YouTube, Front Runner Podcast Collective, The Clips, great.

[00:01:01] Usually they come from a podcast. I stick in notes that didn't make the pot and then stats usually and maybe some anecdotes that we picked up along the way.

[00:01:17] So usually you're getting some extra bonus coverage when you get those. So I would tell you to subscribe to the channel.

[00:01:25] And comment because I'm going to answer them and also share it. Don't get it out to the universe.

[00:01:33] We're trying to build the community and that leads me to the actual podcast itself.

[00:01:39] Be a friend, tell a friend which we definitely stole from Pat McAfee. Shout out to Pat.

[00:01:46] Especially because he does WWE and if you know me, I love the WWE.

[00:01:53] Shout out to Pat for that. But be a friend, tell a friend about the podcast.

[00:01:59] Make sure you guys are downloading the podcast and telling people about it.

[00:02:05] It is being done. I can see it. So thank you so much.

[00:02:10] But we got to continue this campaign. We got to continue to build our forces and to bring to light intelligent basketball conversations.

[00:02:21] Hopefully something that is illuminating to you guys that will allow you to go back and talk to your partners and your girls about what we talk about here on the pot.

[00:02:32] And then the last thing is X. So at Frontrunner PC, hit my producer up, Bunch of Funch at BFunch FR PC.

[00:02:45] Alright so we got all the socials out the way and now it's time to talk about game four.

[00:02:52] First and foremost, the Timberwolves play desperate.

[00:02:56] Now you can ask, did they find something? You can ask that did we see something defensively that was different?

[00:03:07] Now the answer to that question is yes. Ant did defend Luka.

[00:03:12] But I actually think we need to give a special shout out to Kyle Anderson, Slow Mo, Austin, and the other guys.

[00:03:23] Kyle Anderson, Slow Mo, also former UCLA alum. What's that about right? 8 clap all day right here UCLA.

[00:03:35] So he played great defense. He seemed like he was really antagonizing Luka but not in a way where with words it was just he seemed to frustrate Luka because Luka couldn't get by him.

[00:03:50] So they might have found something in this matchup with Kyle Anderson and he did play down the stretch against the Mavericks.

[00:04:02] So this situation now changes a little bit because clearly Jaden McDaniels wasn't working.

[00:04:10] They scrapped that project and they're using a tandem of Ant and Kyle Anderson on Luka Donchich and it seemed to have worked better.

[00:04:19] A couple other things that we need to get to with that is that even Luka with what we would call an off performance we would call this when you go 7 or 21 shooting.

[00:04:35] It reminds me of the show How I Met Your Mother and Barney Stinson.

[00:04:42] And there was a bit in the show where Barney couldn't take a bad picture in any situation whatsoever.

[00:04:49] And sure enough Luka scored 28 points. He had 15 rebounds and 10 dimes. This dude had a triple double.

[00:04:58] He played really good defense. He has been really active as the defender in the short corner on the weak side.

[00:05:12] And I have to commend him on that because the one thing we always talk about Luka is that his offensive game is so beautiful.

[00:05:21] And also he's just a darn sorcerer with the passes and what have you.

[00:05:28] To see him elevate his defense when it matters most is great to see. So I want to give him a shout out for that.

[00:05:37] Kyrie looked human for the first time. He was 6 of 18. He was also 1 of 6 from 3 point land.

[00:05:44] And hey again a desperate team plays way harder. It just does. There's no way you can match.

[00:05:55] There's no way for the team that's up to match that intensity of a desperate team.

[00:06:02] Now getting to Ant. I had a really cool analogy for this that I hope it lands.

[00:06:10] So for my people in LA you're going to get what I'm talking about.

[00:06:18] For my people in inner cities everywhere you're probably going to get what I'm talking about.

[00:06:26] For my people who are on the fair side and I say this as somebody who is actually biracial.

[00:06:33] Somebody who is black and white. If you don't get it don't worry about it.

[00:06:39] Get one of your friends who look more like Anthony Edwards to tell you what I'm about to tell you right now.

[00:06:47] So Ant Edwards reminds me of your freshman homie.

[00:06:53] And he's always falling asleep like an American Lit class.

[00:06:57] And you're wondering why. And then it comes to find out that your little homie is like working overnights to really take care of the family if you know what I'm talking about.

[00:07:11] So Ant Edwards is 22 years of age. This game of basketball is very hard.

[00:07:20] He finally had a really good game in game four and it was timely.

[00:07:30] They needed it on a desperate level. But he played well. He shot the ball not as great as he had been doing in the previous series.

[00:07:40] But he was 11-25. He was aggressive going to the hole which this is something that he did lack in the first two games.

[00:07:50] Which we started to see in the third game and then it ramped up obviously in game four.

[00:07:57] We're starting to see a better version of Ant.

[00:08:01] And also he's taken on the challenge of Gardner Luka Donchich which is one of the greatest offensive players in this era for sure.

[00:08:11] And maybe in any era that has ever donned the NBA logo.

[00:08:18] You got that.

[00:08:20] Now what I'm about to say right now.

[00:08:24] Carl Anthony Towns gave us the full experience last night.

[00:08:30] He gave us everything. He gave us the great moments.

[00:08:34] He gave us what the hell are you doing moments.

[00:08:38] He gave us the oh my god did he really just do that moment.

[00:08:43] He gave us the of course you did. Of course you did moment as well.

[00:08:48] So Carl Anthony Towns reminds me and you guys can look this up.

[00:08:54] He reminds me of this roller coaster that was at Six Flags. It was called the Wizard.

[00:09:00] So look this up.

[00:09:02] And the Wizard from 1976. Now I know we're going back so Google.

[00:09:07] 1976 to 1979 it had 11 incidents and then finally in 1980 there was some there was some sort of fatality on this roller coaster.

[00:09:21] Now it was a different it was a different time.

[00:09:24] Okay for our younger generation who might be losing their mind because of child safety.

[00:09:33] We had a more I would say cavalier attitude or a manifest destiny type attitude back in the day.

[00:09:45] So things you would be sort of deal.

[00:09:49] So I'm not saying that I provocate these type of things going on now.

[00:09:55] But I'm gonna tell you Carl Anthony Towns is a hell of a roller coaster.

[00:10:00] And if you don't have that seat built tied on to it is not it better not be loose.

[00:10:08] Just say that. I'm just gonna say it better not be loose.

[00:10:12] I don't know how anybody bets on him.

[00:10:15] Like I know you have these daily fantasy apps and you have the you have your your over unders that go on in Vegas and whatever the case may be.

[00:10:26] He's so bipolar with his game.

[00:10:30] You don't know what you're gonna get.

[00:10:33] And we saw it all on display all in the same game because Carl Anthony Towns hit two huge threes.

[00:10:43] Put a little distance between the T-Wolves and the Mavericks in that game.

[00:10:49] So he was critical to the actual victory.

[00:10:52] But my God the fouls that he the offensive foul on PJ Washington alone where he goes spastic for two or three seconds and then hits him with an elbow in the face.

[00:11:07] I'm like you don't you're three four inches taller than this man.

[00:11:12] What are you doing?

[00:11:14] That's Carl.

[00:11:15] That's what he does.

[00:11:17] And then he had another silly offensive foul where he just barrels into the lane.

[00:11:21] He's a two dribble guy.

[00:11:24] He anything past two dribbles is not worth the time or energy for Carl Anthony Towns to do.

[00:11:31] But he seems to find a way like a drunk elephant to stumble into the lane and cause all kind of calamity when he gets there.

[00:11:42] So he had a couple of those and I know everybody's talking about the Luca foul where he fouls out where he goes for the pump fake goes up.

[00:11:53] He doesn't go out completely vertical even though he's screaming at the top of the field.

[00:11:58] He went up vertical.

[00:11:59] He did not.

[00:12:01] And then Luca does lean in which they're supposed to officiate that out of the game.

[00:12:07] But it is a superstar getting a superstar call and Carl Anthony Towns fouls out.

[00:12:17] So again we had the full Carl Anthony Towns foul.

[00:12:23] So again we had the full Carl Anthony Towns experience.

[00:12:30] I hope everybody enjoyed it.

[00:12:33] Check your your insurance plans for game five and that will be tomorrow Thursday.

[00:12:41] So I want everybody to make sure get also check your blood pressure.

[00:12:45] Make sure everything is cool.

[00:12:47] All right.

[00:12:49] I would advise maybe some yoga in the afternoon tomorrow.

[00:12:54] Maybe some chamomile tea or something like that.

[00:12:59] Something to calm your nerves before Carl Anthony Towns graces your screen tomorrow because inevitably even if he does give you a good performance they're going to be three moments in the game where you're going to just be like I don't know what he is doing.

[00:13:18] There's going to be three moments where you're just going either gasping talking to your TV expecting your TV to answer answer you or you are texting your friend going did you see what this food does just did again.

[00:13:37] It will span the gamut for sure.

[00:13:42] But we do have a game five which we could not say about the Boston Indiana Pacers situation but I am happy to see that there is a game five.

[00:13:54] I'm happy to see and continue to play on this stage get this experience.

[00:14:00] And here's the other thing.

[00:14:02] That team is so loose.

[00:14:04] Word coming out of their practice like their walkthrough before game four was that they were cracking jokes.

[00:14:15] There were singing going on and was being an ant.

[00:14:20] You know what that means.

[00:14:22] He was being a full ATL.

[00:14:25] OK.

[00:14:27] And if you don't know what that means.

[00:14:28] If you have a friend that lives down there or went to Georgia Tech they will tell you what full ATL really means.

[00:14:36] OK.

[00:14:38] And then during the game you saw a lot of laughing jovial mood.

[00:14:43] The pressure is not getting to them.

[00:14:46] Now they are frustrated with their inability to continue to play make now ants aggressiveness kind of negates that.

[00:14:55] Because if he just goes when he gets the ball instead of waiting it's going to work out better for him.

[00:15:03] It's going to work better.

[00:15:05] It's going to work out better for the rotations because they're going to extreme collapse on him.

[00:15:12] That's exactly what's going to happen.

[00:15:14] And then the kick outs become very easy and then you can swing the ball to the open man and hit the three.

[00:15:20] So I'm hoping that those adjustments continue to happen.

[00:15:25] And we possibly maybe get a game six.

[00:15:31] I don't know.

[00:15:33] But Luca is still Luca.

[00:15:36] Kyrie will not have another completely terrible game.

[00:15:41] And I still think that the Mavericks are going to win.

[00:15:46] But I think that the Timberwolves could make this very interesting if they come out and punch Dallas in the mouth in the first quarter.

[00:15:55] Of game five.

[00:15:57] So we'll see how that all plays out.

[00:15:59] I told you that we were going to do off season reports and we started this kind of program earlier.

[00:16:11] But what I want to do is give it its full kind of do.

[00:16:14] But what we're going to do is we're going to take a couple teams today and we're going to look at them.

[00:16:19] And it's going to be a quick snapshot.

[00:16:22] I'm going to give you my thoughts.

[00:16:24] I'm going to give you some of the news and notes that's floating around right now on them.

[00:16:30] And then we'll kind of see where it goes from there.

[00:16:35] But the first team that we have in the front runner focus off season is the Atlanta Hawks.

[00:16:42] And the reason why we start there is because they have the first overall pick in the draft.

[00:16:48] Now they moved up tremendously to get this.

[00:16:50] Poor Detroit and Washington.

[00:16:55] They can't buy a break to save their life.

[00:16:58] But here we are Atlanta who had a 36 and 46 record who they were in the playing doing their thing.

[00:17:09] Now as we start to look at the off season what I want to do is I want to first tell you that Landry Fields is their exec.

[00:17:23] And then their coach is Quinn Schneider.

[00:17:28] He was the coach at Utah.

[00:17:29] And the reason why we bring these people up is because we're trying to give you a more of a more robust look at the organization as a whole.

[00:17:40] And where maybe their strategies will then trickle down onto the court.

[00:17:47] So Landry Fields takes over for Travis Slink midseason last year.

[00:17:53] He quickly brings in Quinn Schneider to coach the team towards the end of the season.

[00:18:00] And then he had a full season this past season.

[00:18:05] Now there were injuries.

[00:18:07] There were we're going to get into the play of Trey and DeJante Murray and whatever the case may be.

[00:18:13] But before we do that let's talk about what they have.

[00:18:21] What's going on and then what we think can happen or should happen and then probably not happen.

[00:18:31] Because a lot of this stuff is again I always say and I said it to Laker fans when we were talking about Donovan Mitchell.

[00:18:38] And now it's come out that Donovan Mitchell has a lot more power in the Cavaliers organization than maybe most people might have thought.

[00:18:50] And it does look like Darius Garland of the Cleveland Cavaliers is leaving.

[00:18:57] So when I was talking to Laker fans I said hey there's a 50-50 chance that somebody says no in this deal.

[00:19:05] And it's always the same thing when it comes to Atlanta because here's the first and foremost thing.

[00:19:12] What do you build around in Atlanta?

[00:19:17] And now you'll say oh Trey Young.

[00:19:20] Trey Young DeJante Murray.

[00:19:24] Well what has that gotten you?

[00:19:27] 36 and 46 very similar.

[00:19:31] Previous year the direction doesn't seem to be right.

[00:19:40] Too competent and I think this is the perfect opportunity for Landry Fields to put his mark on whatever this team is going to be.

[00:19:52] So I'm going to tell you what I see as the building blocks and I know a lot of people will disagree.

[00:19:59] But I understand that and this is why we ask you to follow us on X at FrontRunnerPC because I want to hear from you.

[00:20:08] If you don't like what I'm saying or if you disagree please let me know and tell me maybe some insight that I'm not seeing from 3,000 miles away.

[00:20:20] But from what I can see is that you're building primarily right now around Jalen Johnson.

[00:20:29] The 6'8 wing out of Duke.

[00:20:32] He's currently under contract for next year and the year after.

[00:20:35] Next year he'll be making 4.5 million.

[00:20:40] He's still on the rookie deal so you have that.

[00:20:43] Now I know that Clint Capella is on the market.

[00:20:49] I don't know if Anyaka Okongwu is on the market but if they have the number one overall selection and they take Alex Saar.

[00:21:00] The kid from Perth who is French as far as that's concerned.

[00:21:06] The 7'1 center who says he's a wing by the way.

[00:21:12] He says that he wants to have the same type of impact that Victor Wimbayama did.

[00:21:20] I'm going to tell you right now this kid is nowhere near what Victor is or was his first year.

[00:21:29] The offensive game is not there.

[00:21:33] Defensively he could help you.

[00:21:35] Offensively there's a lot of work to do.

[00:21:38] There's a limitation there if he's the number one overall pick.

[00:21:43] And to me if he is the number one overall pick what are you doing with Okongwu?

[00:21:49] I mean yes, you always need a second big.

[00:21:51] I definitely understand that.

[00:21:54] And then this gives you an opportunity to bring Alex Saar in as a number one overall pick and put him on the bench.

[00:22:05] But I'm going to tell you right now.

[00:22:07] A number one overall pick to the bench.

[00:22:10] Your team needs to be stacked for that to happen.

[00:22:15] And usually it's an over 500 team that's doing that.

[00:22:18] It's not an under 500 team that's doing that.

[00:22:22] And I think that the Atlanta Hawks are in the middle of a complete makeover.

[00:22:31] I wouldn't say a rebuild, a complete makeover.

[00:22:34] I think they want to play different.

[00:22:37] I think they want to utilize their athleticism and their length.

[00:22:43] I think that the problematic situation would be is that if you do draft Saar.

[00:22:51] Now there's another kid that's in this draft.

[00:22:54] And his name is Zachary Rissachet.

[00:22:58] He's also out of France.

[00:23:00] He's 6'8", 6'9".

[00:23:02] So along the same body type, build type as Jalen Johnson.

[00:23:07] He can shoot the three.

[00:23:09] He also can defend.

[00:23:10] That's what he was asked to do in his Euroleague team.

[00:23:13] Which they're in the playoffs right now.

[00:23:16] He's been balling.

[00:23:18] He had one game where he scored like 29 points.

[00:23:20] Had like four steals, I think a block.

[00:23:24] And you'd think he shot, if I'm not mistaken, he shot five of nine from three in that particular game.

[00:23:33] He's balling over there and he's 6'18".

[00:23:36] Super young.

[00:23:38] Bouncy and everything.

[00:23:40] So those are the guys that are in like that first top tier realm.

[00:23:48] And then you have Donovan Klingon.

[00:23:50] The kid out of Yukon.

[00:23:53] Who is a 7' shot blocker, kind of a Walker Kessler type of dude.

[00:24:00] So you don't have any spacing with this guy when it comes to his shooting range.

[00:24:08] So these are the type of things that Atlanta has to think about when building this team.

[00:24:16] Because here is now the next point that we really need to get to.

[00:24:21] Woj, Shams, others that I've listened to.

[00:24:27] Some of the things that I have called about and kind of dug into a little bit.

[00:24:33] This is not a real big market for Trey Young.

[00:24:35] Now, all it takes is one.

[00:24:40] But at this point there's a bigger market and the NBA execs seem to be, have a heightened interest level for DeJante Murray.

[00:24:54] And that is interesting to me.

[00:24:59] Not because of, I don't think that DeJante Murray is so less talented than Trey Young.

[00:25:10] No. It's interesting that, I actually thought DeJante would be the guy who would stay in Atlanta.

[00:25:19] But if the offers are as good as, we've heard multiple picks and maybe a piece back.

[00:25:30] I can't see why you would hold on to DeJante Murray.

[00:25:35] So I do understand some of these things pop up and you go, hey this is a lot more value than I thought I could get back for him.

[00:25:44] Even though when I traded for him, I gave up like three first round picks, players and what not.

[00:25:52] But if they can get close to the value of what they lost, yeah absolutely do that.

[00:26:00] Because I think at some point the other thing that we have to talk about is that there's Kobe Buffkin on this team.

[00:26:07] Who we can't even tell you what he's going to be in the NBA because he didn't play last year.

[00:26:14] AJ Griffin and I have been beating the drum for a couple years on this.

[00:26:21] So I'm going to speak to the other 29 NBA execs out there.

[00:26:28] If you're looking for a project that, a distressed asset, if you're looking for an underutilized talent.

[00:26:38] Somebody go pick up AJ Griffin from Atlanta because for some reason he cannot get out of Quinn Snyder's doghouse and I don't understand why.

[00:26:51] Well people will say he's Adrian Griffin's son and if you caught Adrian Griffin's act in Milwaukee earlier in the year.

[00:26:59] Then this makes a whole hell of a lot of sense Vince.

[00:27:02] But from all accounts AJ Griffin has been a model citizen wherever he's been.

[00:27:10] Duke and also on the pros.

[00:27:13] He did get some burn his first year but as soon as Quinn Snyder got up there he just came and got off the bench and it continued last year as well.

[00:27:23] To my NBA execs out there or to my analytics department run some sort of model that presents AJ Griffin in such a good light that your GM or your president player personnel guy will trade for AJ Griffin and we can free him from Atlanta.

[00:27:47] That is my, I'm getting off my soapbox now.

[00:27:51] Now there are still rumors out there that Orlando is in need of a point guard and if they don't get maybe into the DeJontay situation do they go after Trey?

[00:28:06] And maybe because the lack of interest in Trey they can kind of steal him.

[00:28:12] Now I don't know if I would want to do that for Orlando personally.

[00:28:17] I still think there's levels of development for Apollo and also for Franz.

[00:28:24] We talked about that in previous pods about Franz took a couple steps back here this year.

[00:28:31] The three point shooting was disappointing to say the least.

[00:28:35] And he just didn't seem comfortable so I'm wondering if there was an injury that we'll probably hear about in the off season or did he just completely lose his confidence?

[00:28:46] And he just needs to work himself back up.

[00:28:50] But he's got an Olympics to deal with I think that will help him.

[00:28:54] I think that will spur him on to next season.

[00:29:00] I am not really worried about Franz now we have two seasons of this.

[00:29:05] Then we're in the Josh Giddy territory and you know how I feel about that.

[00:29:09] I think that Josh Giddy probably will not be a Oklahoma City Thunder next year.

[00:29:16] I say all that to say that I don't think Orlando will be a good fit for Trey Young because I don't think the development pathway you don't want to take anything away from Apollo, Franz, also Anthony Black and Jet Howard who they drafted last year as well.

[00:29:38] Now could this be the landing spot for Trey in Miami?

[00:29:46] That could be.

[00:29:48] Now Trey isn't very heat culture-ish if you would say.

[00:29:54] I don't know how he's going to feel about Pat Riley's workout regimen.

[00:30:01] So these are things that are out there on the ether.

[00:30:05] We talk about them but the Lakers are not interested.

[00:30:10] I can tell you right now they are really not interested in that situation.

[00:30:15] Now maybe if they lose out on a couple other guys maybe the interest changes and we see something different.

[00:30:23] But as of right now in El Segundo there doesn't seem to be a lot of Trey Young buzz coming out of that place.

[00:30:31] So that leads me to what should you do with the first overall pick and what direction is this team going in and what I think they should do with this team going forward.

[00:30:43] And in my estimation I think the Atlanta Hawks have an opportunity right now to really remake their team.

[00:30:54] You can trade Trey for pieces.

[00:30:56] Pieces that fit around Taylor Johnson.

[00:31:02] Or if you say hey we identify this guy as the guy we want to lead our team.

[00:31:11] Trey Young can probably fetch you that guy.

[00:31:14] Now if we're talking about Giannis or something like that no.

[00:31:17] I'm talking about your guy who was on that come up.

[00:31:23] He hasn't gotten to the NBA level yet but he's knocking on the door type of dude.

[00:31:30] That's what I'm talking about along with picks or along with whatever that you do with De'Jonte Murray.

[00:31:40] So there could be something like that.

[00:31:43] Or you could just say hey listen let's get real good quality young players.

[00:31:51] Let's rebuild this thing the right way.

[00:31:54] Let's see the trends that are going on in the NBA and Landry Fields is a Stanford guy.

[00:32:01] He is big into that.

[00:32:03] He's big into analytics.

[00:32:05] He's big into specific player primary focuses on what am I trying to say performance.

[00:32:16] So there is a whole set up like that down in Atlanta for these cats.

[00:32:20] So there's a big push for development.

[00:32:26] Development of skills.

[00:32:29] Development of person to build a healthy happier Atlanta Hawks organization.

[00:32:37] So we'll see how that goes but I do believe that the first overall selection.

[00:32:44] For the Atlanta Hawks will give us a great indication on what they're going to be saying.

[00:32:53] Hey this is what our foundation is.

[00:32:55] This is what we're going to stand on.

[00:32:57] This is how I think we want to play going forward and I think that for the first time Chris Quinn Snyder has it in his favor.

[00:33:09] This is going to be a Trey Young run organization since Trey got there.

[00:33:17] And we reported in the past that Trey Young has a very good relationship with the owner's son.

[00:33:26] And if that's going to be the case then of course you're going to have some dysfunction.

[00:33:31] Look at all the coaches that blew out of there.

[00:33:33] So if that's the case, if that's what's going on then what are we doing?

[00:33:40] So I think we're now at an inflection point where major change is coming to Atlanta.

[00:33:46] And I think your team is going to look a lot different than what you ended up with at the end of this year.

[00:33:55] We'll see how it all goes.

[00:33:57] I could be completely wrong about these things we'll see but the tea leaves are telling me that major changes are coming for Atlanta.

[00:34:08] Now we're going to move on to the Washington Wizards or as I like to call them the Wizards.

[00:34:16] Shout out to our guy House from the Ringer Network.

[00:34:22] He lives in Washington and has to deal with this on a daily basis.

[00:34:30] Now for my Wizards fans out there it was a tough season.

[00:34:36] It was real tough. 15-67 we didn't have great hopes for you guys coming into the year at all.

[00:34:48] And you knew you were going to take it on the chin.

[00:34:52] You knew what it was going to be and you swallowed it and you were excited about it early on.

[00:35:00] Now I wonder by game 74 were you really excited about the tank?

[00:35:07] Now their executive group has changed completely.

[00:35:15] Michael Winger is in. He's been there a year now. He's starting to make changes.

[00:35:23] The first change is that you tanked last year which you never did before so that worked out.

[00:35:33] Let's get into some of the building blocks.

[00:35:35] To me I'm going to tell you right now not a lot there.

[00:35:39] Your building blocks right now are 2023 draft pick Balal Kullabalai.

[00:35:47] The 18 year old Frenchman who came onto the scene with Victor Wimbayama on that Metro 92 team.

[00:35:59] He's long 6'6, 6'7 like a 7 foot wingspan.

[00:36:08] He shot the ball pretty well early on. The defense does play for sure.

[00:36:15] The thing about it is that he's just so inexperienced.

[00:36:20] He's also needing to put on muscle defignment, all those type of things.

[00:36:26] He's still very young.

[00:36:29] But there is some problems there.

[00:36:33] Now the other building blocks are this year's pick, the number 2 overall pick and next year's pick because that draft is stacked.

[00:36:46] Expect another year of tanking, another year of suffering.

[00:36:50] And then hopefully with next year's pick because the draft is supposed to be a lot better.

[00:36:57] There are more difference makers in that draft.

[00:37:01] So again I have always told you, I am not a proponent of telling you that this draft is terrible.

[00:37:09] I don't think that way.

[00:37:11] What I'm telling you is that you need to look for the right things.

[00:37:16] If you're looking for role players, role specific players, somebody to be a fifth starter.

[00:37:25] If you're looking for somebody to play a defensive role.

[00:37:28] If you're looking for somebody to initiate offense and hit an open shot, you can do that.

[00:37:35] You're not finding a Robin to a Batman or just an all out Batman.

[00:37:46] Now we'll always be surprised about somebody in this draft.

[00:37:50] Somebody in this draft will absolutely surprise us and become more than what we think they should have been by our supposed scouting prowess.

[00:38:03] But with that being said, I didn't mention obviously Jordan Poole.

[00:38:10] I didn't mention Kyle Kuzma for a reason.

[00:38:14] And we're going to get to that right now.

[00:38:16] You guys could have another episode of the Poole Party going into next year and I'm so sorry to say that.

[00:38:31] And the reason why I'm so sorry to say that, they say, well Vince that's harsh.

[00:38:36] The man had a bad season.

[00:38:38] Well did he have a bad season or is this what he really is?

[00:38:42] And I do have a couple numbers to back this up.

[00:38:46] His career shooting percentage is 41.9%.

[00:38:52] He shot this year 41.3%.

[00:38:56] His career 3 point shooting percentage is 33.6%.

[00:39:03] There's no way you can be a lead guard, be a volume 3 guy and shoot 33%.

[00:39:12] I'm sorry you can't do it.

[00:39:15] Washington, the Poole Party as the tank commander.

[00:39:20] I'm sorry.

[00:39:22] I wish this could be better for you but it's not.

[00:39:27] But here's the thing.

[00:39:29] Help is on the way this year and you're going to probably be really bad again.

[00:39:36] And then help will be on the way next year.

[00:39:38] So enjoy Balau Kulubale.

[00:39:42] Enjoy Denny Avdea.

[00:39:45] Enjoy him because we're going to talk about him a little bit.

[00:39:50] And then just enjoy the whole deal.

[00:39:54] Enjoy your quintessential tank commander, General Jordan Poole of the tank commander crew.

[00:40:03] And see who, maybe you can get Cooper Flag.

[00:40:09] Cooper Flag is an excellent prospect.

[00:40:13] The Boozer Twins are coming out next year.

[00:40:16] It's going to be excellent.

[00:40:18] Hold your horses.

[00:40:20] Just allow the tank to continue.

[00:40:22] Let's move on to Kyle Kuzma.

[00:40:25] Kyle Kuzma was very happy in Washington D.C. last year.

[00:40:31] Because he was able to get up 19 shots a game.

[00:40:37] And I'm going to tell you right now.

[00:40:40] Kuzma already has a ring.

[00:40:43] He's getting 19 shots better than getting 12 shots on a team that has championship aspirations.

[00:40:54] Now for some players, this might be something that wouldn't mean a lot to them.

[00:41:03] Maybe they don't have a ring yet.

[00:41:07] Or maybe they want multiple rings or whatever the case may be.

[00:41:13] But Kuzma lived under the specter of Lebron.

[00:41:18] And there was such a regimented type of thing.

[00:41:22] They wanted Kuzma to be this small forward type of dude when he really wasn't.

[00:41:28] And he was kind of wanting to get in his bag more.

[00:41:31] And they didn't want him to do that.

[00:41:34] And by the end of it, he was a defensive 3-and-D wing.

[00:41:40] And he came into the league with a little more creativity than that.

[00:41:45] A little more.

[00:41:49] I wouldn't say great offensive creation.

[00:41:53] But I would say good.

[00:41:55] It was good enough.

[00:41:57] And he is a trade piece.

[00:42:00] I think people will be interested.

[00:42:01] But here's the thing that I do want to talk about with Kyle Kuzma.

[00:42:06] And I also want to tell Washington Wizards fans, like listen.

[00:42:12] If I'm doing this homework, you know that other organizations are doing this homework.

[00:42:17] And Kyle Kuzma is a 33.7% career 3-point shooter.

[00:42:23] And that's all well and good in Washington D.C. right now.

[00:42:28] In a couple years that won't be.

[00:42:30] Because you guys will be on your way up.

[00:42:33] And you'll be wanting to do something different.

[00:42:36] And then Kuzma will have to go somewhere else.

[00:42:39] So if Kuzma wants to stick around and shoot a bunch of 3's and shoot 33% from 3.

[00:42:45] Go right ahead my brother.

[00:42:47] If you want to go to a team that has some chances at getting a ring.

[00:42:54] Or build your legacy man.

[00:42:56] That is also on the table for you.

[00:42:59] So it just depends on what you want to do.

[00:43:02] The other thing that I do want to mention about Kuzma as well.

[00:43:06] Is that his rebounds over the last couple years have gone down.

[00:43:10] His best rebounding year of his career was 8.5.

[00:43:15] And that was back in 21-22.

[00:43:18] And last season he averaged 6.6.

[00:43:22] And it's been steadily going down.

[00:43:23] I think the year in between that was like 7.2 or something like that.

[00:43:27] So he's starting to get to a point where he's not as interested in rebounding.

[00:43:33] As he was when he was a Laker.

[00:43:36] And his first year with the Wizards.

[00:43:39] And then the other part is that the 3 point shooting.

[00:43:44] It's never come along to the point where you can make it a real weapon.

[00:43:48] And you can count on him for starting minutes.

[00:43:52] In the sense of we can give him 32 good minutes out there.

[00:43:58] And he can make the right plays for us.

[00:44:01] Unfortunately if you can't shoot it.

[00:44:04] At least leave like median averages.

[00:44:09] Which is 36%.

[00:44:12] Then you can't shoot it.

[00:44:14] Which is 36%.

[00:44:17] Then this is not going to go well for us.

[00:44:21] That is what the Wizards have to look forward to.

[00:44:25] I think personally if Alex Sarr does go first.

[00:44:30] Rizashe would be a great pick.

[00:44:33] Ray Shepard would be also really good.

[00:44:37] I like that kid out of Kentucky.

[00:44:39] I think he can really play ball.

[00:44:41] I would say don't get caught up in the trap of Rob Dillingham.

[00:44:46] Dillingham is a completely explosive athlete.

[00:44:52] But cannot get off a pick to save his life.

[00:44:56] He dies on that pick.

[00:45:00] It's something to think about when you are.

[00:45:03] Especially when it's something like this.

[00:45:05] When you're looking at a guy.

[00:45:07] Who you are bringing into a situation.

[00:45:09] That's not the greatest as far as culture is right now.

[00:45:16] Because I'm sure Winger and the Brain Trust over there.

[00:45:21] Who are still looking for a coach as of right now.

[00:45:27] I'm sure they're looking at it going.

[00:45:30] What is this?

[00:45:32] Where are we?

[00:45:34] And I think just like Atlanta.

[00:45:37] You're in a same situation.

[00:45:39] You're looking for pieces to build whatever your identity is going to be.

[00:45:45] And I think this pick will go a long way in telling us what you think you could be going forward.

[00:45:52] But I also think you just need pieces at this point.

[00:45:56] Talented pieces.

[00:45:58] I would take the highest ceiling guy honestly.

[00:46:00] With a level of like okay there's a floor.

[00:46:05] And it's a pretty solid floor.

[00:46:07] So I would take a...

[00:46:08] If you think Reed Shepard has a higher upside than Zachary Ruffa-Shea.

[00:46:16] I would tell you to do that.

[00:46:19] I would always go bigger than small personally.

[00:46:23] So I would take the 6'8, 6'9 guy over the 6'3 guy.

[00:46:29] But Reed Shepard is a connector.

[00:46:33] He can shoot the hell out of the wall.

[00:46:35] And I think that he can demonstrate enough offense creation where I don't know if he's your quote-unquote central point guard.

[00:46:44] But he can definitely be a ball mover and run an offense.

[00:46:48] So I think that's what you're looking for in the draft.

[00:46:52] And then we'll see where the chips fall, where they may.

[00:46:55] This could be a real quiet offseason for the Washington Wizards.

[00:46:59] I think people will poke around on Kuzma.

[00:47:02] If the price is too high.

[00:47:04] Like that two first round draft pick nonsense that Michael Winger was out there throwing during the trade deadline last year.

[00:47:13] You could have just came out my man and said hey listen he's not available for trade.

[00:47:21] He could have said that saves some people some time.

[00:47:25] My man was out here saying yeah we need multiple first round Kuzma.

[00:47:28] My man was out here saying yeah we need multiple first round picks.

[00:47:33] And not any of these old top 12 protected for like the next three years.

[00:47:41] And then it reverts into a second or whatever.

[00:47:45] He was looking for real picks for Kyle Kuzma last year.

[00:47:49] So we'll see what the price is this offseason.

[00:47:53] The couple other things that we need to get to and then we'll get up out of here.

[00:47:58] And I do thank you guys again for joining us today.

[00:48:02] Is that we need to talk about Ty Lue the Clipper Coach got his back.

[00:48:09] Okay so he signed a contract earlier today.

[00:48:13] By the way happy belated birthday to the logo Jerry West you my man.

[00:48:20] A hundred grand I love you my guy.

[00:48:23] So happy belated birthday his birthday was yesterday.

[00:48:26] And I'm sure he enjoyed his birthday knowing that Ty Lue was going to sign a five year 70 million dollar deal.

[00:48:40] And why is this important ladies and gentlemen.

[00:48:44] I'll tell you exactly why.

[00:48:47] Monty Williams was making 13 million dollars a year.

[00:48:51] There was no way on God's green earth with all of what Ty Lue has gone through.

[00:49:02] Ty Lue looked like Barack Obama.

[00:49:05] Ty Lue when he first got to the Clippers his hair was black.

[00:49:11] Now since he's had three four years of Kawhi Leonard and Paul George.

[00:49:18] He is completely gray.

[00:49:20] That man has lost years of his life.

[00:49:24] Okay because of Kawhi Leonard and Paul George.

[00:49:28] So the very least that Jerry West and Lawrence Frank and Steve Ballmer and the crew down there.

[00:49:36] And I'm looking forward to getting my invite to the Intuit Dome in Inglewood.

[00:49:47] I want to be part of the wall of sound you know I'm saying.

[00:49:52] I think we could do a podcast up there if y'all want to do that.

[00:49:56] I'm just throwing out there you know saying I dream big because I want my audience to dream big as well.

[00:50:03] Five years 70 million Ty Lue is staying as the Clippers head.

[00:50:11] Man there was rumors out there that the Lakers were involved in this.

[00:50:16] I can tell you that that was not the case.

[00:50:21] Now I will say that the Lakers waited.

[00:50:25] They waited until they knew that Ty Lue was no longer.

[00:50:31] Maybe part of the coaching carousel because they started to move on.

[00:50:38] And James Borrego was in for an extensive interview today with the Lakers.

[00:50:47] And we know that still at this point from all accounts.

[00:50:53] J.J. Reddick still the front runner and the Lakers.

[00:50:57] And the Lakers according to Adrian Wojnowski.

[00:51:03] Probably will not be making a coaching decision until after the finals.

[00:51:11] I found that to be very interesting and this will be our last thought of the day.

[00:51:16] Before we send you off into the universe and have you go out and do things.

[00:51:20] But I find it very interesting that the Lakers are not going to make a coaching decision until after the NBA finals.

[00:51:30] Could it be that their head coach is actually the color commentator of ESPN?

[00:51:39] And he will be doing the finals?

[00:51:42] Just food for thought.

[00:51:48] Again thank everybody for downloading the podcast.

[00:51:52] Please get your friend groups to follow the podcast on Spotify, Apple Music, iHeartRadio, Pandora.

[00:52:03] Oh by the way you can get the podcast on YouTube.

[00:52:09] The podcast is available audio form.

[00:52:13] It just has the logo up there.

[00:52:15] And you can get the full podcast on YouTube.

[00:52:17] So if you are a YouTube premium subscriber.

[00:52:23] You can put it on in the background and do your thing and do it that way.

[00:52:28] So however you want to enjoy the podcast feel free to do so.

[00:52:34] Then again hit us up on Twitter at FrontRunnerPock.

[00:52:41] I almost gave you the whole name.

[00:52:42] At FrontRunnerPC and at Bbunch FRPC.

[00:52:50] Ok so that will do it for us today.

[00:52:54] Thank you guys again for joining us.

[00:52:56] And as always the best part of you is you.

[00:53:00] Make sure that you surround yourself with people that brighten your light.

[00:53:04] That do not try to put out your light.

[00:53:07] Go out and do good in the world.

[00:53:09] And we will see you back on this feed.

[00:53:12] Cross your fingers a third podcast in a week.

[00:53:16] We will see you back on this feed on Friday.

[00:53:20] Dose.