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00:00Warriors, magic, and whenever you say the word magic, you go to our favorite magician, and that is none other than...
00:07And the pride of Orlando himself.
00:09Absolutely. A homecoming for Nick Friedle.
00:13So out to the River Islands guest line we go.
00:15On the line is Odyssey Sports NBA insider Nick Friedle.
00:18Check out all of Odyssey's newest sports podcasts on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
00:23Hello, Mr. Friedle. How you doing back home?
00:27I mean, I stayed at my mom's house.
00:30Mom, the meatloaf.
00:33Mom, the meatloaf.
00:34Yeah, you get it for the...
00:35We went to Hot Dog Heaven, the place I've been going for 35 years.
00:39I went to the dentist at 8 a.m. this morning, got a filling put in.
00:45I got a haircut last night.
00:47It was very...
00:47It didn't feel like I was doing some very home-level things, but it's always good to be back here.
00:54I mean, you're talking to somebody who's wearing the Horace Grant goggles.
00:56Oh, my goodness.
00:57To the Jack's many games back in the day.
00:59Slept in your childhood bed?
01:00Yeah?
01:01Fair to say?
01:01Oh, yeah.
01:02I mean, I got my Rhino poster above my bed.
01:05Everything is great here.
01:08I'm talking to the fact that, hilariously, then we're sitting in pregame a few minutes ago
01:13and Steve Kerr's telling us that Will Richard got his championship ring from Todd Golden in Florida at the T-Motel.
01:24Everybody was walking around, like, celebrating with him.
01:27So everybody's got a homecoming in the Orlando area tonight, that's for sure.
01:32Isn't it amazing?
01:33It doesn't matter how old you are, but mom and dad's place is, like, all of a sudden, you just morph.
01:39You morph back 40 years, and you're like, can you make me a sandwich?
01:42Like, it doesn't matter how old you are, Nick.
01:46Mark, you know what the coolest part about you saying that is?
01:48There is nobody happier to make me the sandwich than my mom.
01:51I'm 42 years old, and she's sitting there asking me as I walk out the door,
01:56hey, you want me to get you a public sub to have it in the fridge after the game?
02:00And I'm like, it's never going to change.
02:03But that is, everybody's from somewhere.
02:05Everybody's got a home from someplace, and Orlando is it for me.
02:09And by the way, the answer is always yes.
02:11Yes, I would love to have a sandwich in the fridge after the game.
02:14That's yes, exactly right.
02:15All right, let's talk a little bit about this game, Nick.
02:19And so glad to have you right before this whole thing gets started.
02:22Can you give us, as you travel with the team, a little bit of a sense of how they plan to play these next 36 hours as far as player availability?
02:34I think a lot of it depends on how the game unfolds tonight.
02:38Because, Mark, if they had actually had to play a lot in New Orleans the other night, and it was a really tiring game,
02:46I think they would have already chosen probably the Orlando game, and then everybody, all the veterans, I should say, would have sat in Miami.
02:55Because that game was so easy, and Kirk kind of hinted at it just now when we talked to them,
03:00I think they're waiting to see how tonight plays out, and then they'll make that decision going into tomorrow.
03:06If I were guessing in the last few days, I would have said, all right, everybody's playing in Orlando, and nobody's playing in Miami.
03:12Because you guys talked to Steve yesterday, and it was a very interesting quote in that this is the worst schedule he's ever seen.
03:20And it's the truth.
03:21I mean, they've been all over the place.
03:23They've got five sets of back-to-backs already.
03:26So, I think a lot of it is how much effort is being exerted tonight, and minutes-wise, where does everybody stand?
03:35But at least as we sit here before this game, if they're really going down to the wire tonight,
03:43and Steph and Draymond and Jimmy are playing a lot of minutes,
03:46it would surprise me if everybody didn't play tomorrow night.
03:50I think they've already looked at the schedule a few times over, and they pointed to this game at the end of a long trip.
03:57They already got three wins that we talked about last week that they really needed.
04:01If they get this one tonight, I think they're going to be sitting there feeling really good about what's going on.
04:07Yeah, I saw the comments that Steve made pregame about him being concerned about the increase in soft tissue injuries
04:13across the association, the wear and tear, the speed, the pace, the mileage.
04:18How much do you think that he's going to be kind of ahead of the curve on this, the league be damned as far as resting guys?
04:26Mr. Dibbs, he learned from Popovich, and Popovich set the tone with all of this.
04:34He knows that the best thing that you can have for a team is health going into the later part of the season.
04:42What I thought was most interesting about those comments that you referenced from pregame
04:47was Kerr saying he is sitting there in the meetings every year saying,
04:50hey, guys, we're playing too many games.
04:5382 is way too many.
04:56There should never be back-to-back.
04:58He said he didn't have an ideal number, but it was probably around 72, so you shave off 10 games.
05:03But he was laughing at me when I said, do you have support in the room?
05:07Because his point is, it always comes back down to money.
05:10And no owner is going to sit there and say, oh, well, we'll give up some revenue to make
05:14the product a little bit better in the long term.
05:18I mean, it's just not going to happen, which makes the whole thing pretty laughable.
05:22But I would give Kerr credit this, because a lot of coaches might believe exactly what
05:28he does, but they won't say it.
05:29But Steve's got so much clout in the game and has been around so long that he has no
05:34problem giving his opinion on what he feels is right.
05:38But I don't think there's any doubt when you look at not only the injuries, but who is
05:43getting injured.
05:44I mean, guys, I'll give you anecdotal evidence just now walking in here an hour ago.
05:49You have kids and adults lined up in Orlando, Florida with Steph Curry jerseys all over the
05:58place, everywhere in Orlando.
06:01Everybody pays to see the stars.
06:04If you're going to an NBA game, as much as you might want to support your favorite team
06:08night to night, most people only get one chance a year to see the stars.
06:13And if the stars aren't playing, you have a really big problem business-wise.
06:18It's why, to me, when you look at what's happened with the league, the regular season just doesn't
06:23have the same feel to it, because people don't know night to night who's going to be out there.
06:29Nick Fridell is with us on the line, Odyssey Sports NBA Insider.
06:34Check out all of Odyssey's newest sports podcasts on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
06:40I don't want to get too ahead of tonight.
06:41We've got a lot of tonight questions.
06:43But going back a little bit to the player availability thing with tomorrow night, is Jimmy Butler back
06:49to Miami still a thing, or did that go away last year?
06:52I don't think it is for him, but Mark, any time that you have the breakup in life, any
07:00time, there's always that feel of, oh, that's the X.
07:06You're looking back going, ah, you left us.
07:10You didn't want to be here.
07:12So I don't think Jimmy cares one way or another.
07:16I do think there are plenty of people that have paid for tickets to that game that want
07:21to see Jimmy Butler, and you don't want to cheer him for what he helped accomplish down
07:25there, want to boo him because he wanted out, and he made it very clear and very known at
07:31the end, and things kind of imploded.
07:33So as long as Jimmy is still in the league, because of all the success that he had there,
07:41I think there are a lot of people that still want to give him a piece of their mind.
07:49And as far as Miami goes, and this, again, ties into a larger conversation about the league,
07:58you want that kind of matchup.
08:01You want to say, hey, Jimmy Butler's coming back to Miami with Steph and the Warriors.
08:06This is something that we should sell to the fan base.
08:10But Mark, as I'm saying that, let's remember something else.
08:13ESPN pulled that game a week ago.
08:15So either somebody knows something already, or they said, hey, this is their fifth back-to-back
08:22of a season.
08:23At the end of a 16th trip where they've been on the road for a week and a half, why don't
08:29we be a little forward-thinking and say, eh, it may not happen.
08:34So I think there are a lot of layers there.
08:36But as far as whether Jimmy is concerned or not about being Miami, I don't think he is at
08:41all.
08:41Yeah, and somewhere there's a kid lining up for that game who had a sandwich made by
08:45their mom, and they're probably going to be disappointed.
08:48Am I right, Nick?
08:49I mean, sadly, that's exactly what happened.
08:52Mr. Dibbs, when you buy these tickets so many weeks or months in advance, and you see
08:58the one time, and this usually revolves around Steph, to Mark's point, we use Jimmy here.
09:03But there's only one shot all year that Jimmy Butler is going to play in Miami, unless both
09:09teams get to the finals, which isn't going to happen, certainly not the Heat.
09:13But you buy those tickets because that's the game you want to see.
09:18And so now, there's a chance that that kid who his mom bought him a public sub is going
09:24to wake up and go, yep, Jimmy Butler, Steph Curry, Draymond, they may not play.
09:29And that is a very, very big problem for the NBA.
09:32Nick, real quick, Steve Kerr told us yesterday that he was hopeful that Jonathan Kaminga would
09:39play in tomorrow's game.
09:41What is his role when he gets back?
09:44He is the guy that comes off the bench who brings, hopefully, if you're the Warriors,
09:50defensive energy and can give you an offensive punch when needed.
09:56But, Mark, in the last two weeks, it's clear for anybody to see that the Warriors are just
10:01better with the way things are going right now.
10:05As Kerr has said, it's not that Kaminga's not going to get another chance down the line.
10:09He will.
10:10It's just that right now, when he comes back, whenever that does happen, whether it's tomorrow
10:14or otherwise, he is not going to have the same role that we've seen him have to start
10:19the year.
10:20Nick, enjoy the game, and enjoy that sandwich.
10:25Guys, I will.
10:26It's great to hear you, and I'll talk to you next week.
10:28Okay, sounds good.
10:29There he is.
10:29That's Odyssey Sports NBA insider Nick Friedle.
10:32Check out all of Odyssey's newest sports podcasts on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
10:38All right, let's get started.
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