- 6 days ago
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00:00You said yesterday, you don't like it when people go,
00:03why didn't they have that on my bingo card?
00:05Sure.
00:06Why didn't they have Klay Thompson to the Warriors on my bingo card either?
00:09Nor did I, but the more I thought about it,
00:12and if you haven't read it yet, go to ESPN and read Anthony Slater's piece,
00:15which was really revelatory.
00:18It's really cool.
00:19It reveals a lot about Steph and his feelings,
00:22and even Cannon Curry and what he thought about,
00:25hey, Dad, if Klay's making threes, why aren't you playing?
00:28The whole idea of it makes me think, like,
00:31if this whole era is going to end this way,
00:35which is you're 12-13, you're a 7-seed, you get knocked out, whatever,
00:41why not bring Klay back?
00:42Like, if this is not going to culminate in anything really that successful,
00:49then trade Kaminga for Klay.
00:51Oh, boy.
00:52I mean.
00:53Honestly, I don't want to be too dramatic about it,
00:56but if we're going to do this, if we're going to do old guys playing mediocre ball,
01:00then bring them back.
01:02Okay, so first of all, let's give the full kind of background
01:06on where this conversation went and why we're having it,
01:10and Anthony Slater did do a piece that really centers on the emotions
01:14and the history of Klay Thompson, his departure,
01:19how things have not gone the way that they were supposed to go in Dallas,
01:23and how everyone feels about that now.
01:26And the article ends with Steph Curry basically saying,
01:32this feels a long way off,
01:34but if there were ever a way to have him kind of finish his career
01:38and be back with the Golden State Warriors,
01:41you're damn right we'd be all for it.
01:43So it was much more like I think you just said,
01:46it was much more of an emotional sort of an expression
01:50than a basketball one.
01:53No one is suggesting with the Warriors,
01:56or even with those big three or the Splash Brothers,
01:59that, hey, I know the acquisition we should get right now
02:01that will help us, Klay Thompson.
02:03But I think it's a perfect opportunity for us to talk with all of you
02:09about whether or not you feel like the Warriors are stuck in the past.
02:14If we really want to move through this conversation,
02:18that's the one we need to have.
02:21And so I don't want that to lead down the road of like,
02:24they should trade Steph Curry,
02:25because that's not happening,
02:28and that's a silly concept and everything.
02:30But I do hear a lot of people feeling that way on a Draymond Green front.
02:35I do feel there are people out there who see that they turned Andrew Wiggins
02:39into Jimmy Butler,
02:40and while they'll all acknowledge that Jimmy Butler is better than Andrew Wiggins,
02:44they can also see that Jimmy's a lot older.
02:47And so I have to be real with you,
02:51because when I used to work in L.A.,
02:54and I worked for the flagship station of the Los Angeles Lakers,
02:59this was a major criticism at certain points that I had of the Lakers.
03:04And that was that when Kobe and Shaq parted ways,
03:09whenever things weren't going well,
03:11all the things the Lakers tried,
03:13remember the year that they were like,
03:14Dwight Howard, Steve Nash,
03:17Pau Gasol,
03:18Metta World Peace,
03:20Kobe Bryant,
03:20that's our starting lineup.
03:22And they were on the cover of Sports Illustrated,
03:24because it was just like,
03:25I don't want to say five legends,
03:26it was four legends and Ron Artest.
03:30But they had this legendary look to them.
03:33Well, they were the eight seed,
03:34and they went 0-4-4 in their first round playoff series and got wiped out.
03:38It didn't work.
03:39Kind of like how it feels now with the Warriors.
03:42Like it feels, for the moment, like it's not working.
03:45And what the Lakers would do for years,
03:47and this was kind of, I think, a bus family thing,
03:50what they would do whenever something wasn't working
03:53is they would pull out a 1980s team photo
03:57and stare at it,
03:59and they would try to fix it in the family.
04:02So that's how Byron Scott becomes the coach.
04:05And that's how Magic Johnson gets more involved.
04:08And that's how Michael Cooper was always around.
04:11And you would have the press conference introducing somebody new,
04:15and the whole team would be there standing behind them.
04:18And it's just like you're reaching for something that's gone.
04:23Sorry.
04:24And they did it for years.
04:26And I mean years and years and years after it was over.
04:28Yep.
04:29All right.
04:29I don't want to see the Warriors do that.
04:32So it's nothing personal.
04:34The article's beautiful.
04:36Clay Thompson's relationship with this organization is in stone.
04:39It's nothing to do with the idea it's a larger concept.
04:44I do not want to see the Warriors,
04:47and you could argue they've already held on too long,
04:51I do not want to see them be that team
04:53that just keeps trying to find a different way
04:56to regenerate great days gone by.
04:59Doesn't work.
05:00Well, they're not at the point yet
05:01where it's totally, absolutely over, over.
05:06And I always think about the Spurs when we make this comp
05:08because they won the title in 2013-2014,
05:12and then the next year they brought everybody back,
05:15and you still had Kawhi Leonard,
05:17and you had Tim Duncan in year 17,
05:20Ginobili year 12, Parker year 13,
05:23and you were third in the NBA in the West, in Southwest,
05:26and then you got knocked out in the first round.
05:28Okay, let's try one more time.
05:30And then the next year, they went 67-15.
05:33The Spurs did with the same cast.
05:35They were a year older.
05:36Duncan year 18, Ginobili 13, Parker year 14,
05:4267-15, and well, the Thunder got you.
05:44And then the next year, you were good again,
05:46and that was the year that the Warriors knocked him out.
05:49That was the Zaza, Pachulia, underneath Kawhi year.
05:53But they went 61-21,
05:55and at that point, then they started to break it apart.
05:58My point is, when you get deep into a run like this,
06:02you go all in on your vets as long as you can,
06:04and then you get to a point where it's no longer working.
06:07Duncan retired.
06:08Parker went to, I think it was Charlotte.
06:11I can't remember.
06:13That sounds right.
06:14And then Ginobili left.
06:15And then Kawhi was still there,
06:17and then Kawhi went to Toronto.
06:18And so the whole thing ended in kind of a weird way,
06:22but honestly, the way that these things actually always end.
06:25They just end.
06:27I think that there's maybe even extra value in this particular moment.
06:32I'm sure all markets feel this way about their stars.
06:35I know that L.A. did about Kobe Bryant.
06:38I'm sure San Antonio did about Tim Duncan.
06:43I bet I could get just about most of you, not all of you,
06:47but most of you on this side of the fence,
06:50absolutely 100%.
06:52You cannot let Steph Curry finish his career in a different uniform.
06:54Right, period.
06:56Agreed.
06:56So that, to me, that's in ink.
06:59Pull out a Sharpie and write that down.
07:02Anything else is certainly possible, maybe even probable,
07:07and, you know, acceptable, I would say.
07:14But finding that time is the difficult thing to do,
07:18and I think that you, you know,
07:20a smart person can clearly make the argument
07:22that that time has already gone by.
07:25But it's tough.
07:26It's tough.
07:27And that is sometimes why I will both defend the way Steve Kerr has handled it
07:32because I think that this is a very, very difficult needle to thread.
07:38This idea of Steph has got to be the focus.
07:42He has got to finish his career here.
07:45All of these things.
07:46And then on the other side be like,
07:47and let's develop young players.
07:49That's a really, really hard ask.
07:52It's a very, very hard ask.
07:54So the criticism that we hear that Steve Kerr won't develop young players
07:59and he leans on the bets too much and he literally said to us the other day,
08:02well, Richard's not playing because he's a rookie.
08:04It's a fair criticism.
08:06It is a fair criticism,
08:08but that's why I brought up Steph Curry's name the other day too.
08:11I don't know how you do both.
08:13I don't know how you serve Steph and turn everything over to 23-year-olds
08:17and move them through the system.
08:19I just don't know how you do it.
08:21You don't.
08:22And that's, I mean, that's the reality of being where they are,
08:24which is we still think that we've got action.
08:26And last year, you know, if Steph didn't get hurt, boy,
08:29we could have beaten Minnesota.
08:30And then who knows against OKC?
08:31I don't really buy that.
08:33But the reality is when he played, you were up 1-0 on Minnesota,
08:36even though he got hurt.
08:37So they might have been a Western Conference Finals team.
08:41And, you know, maybe OKC beats them in six or seven.
08:44Last year, the Thunder were certainly vulnerable.
08:47Indiana had them.
08:48They had them in the finals.
08:49They were in a spot where they might have knocked them off.
08:51And then Halliburton got hurt.
08:53So if you look at that team, yeah, you've got vets.
08:57And then you double down on the vets.
08:58And I'm thinking about the Spurs where they had vets.
09:01They won the title.
09:02And they kept the vets.
09:03And they kept trying.
09:04And they won 67 games in a year.
09:07And they thought, OK, we might get another one.
09:09And that's where the Warriors are, where they think that with the vets,
09:13they can still, if healthy, if everything breaks right,
09:16they could still win another one.
09:18And if you want to go back to those Spurs teams and find the young players
09:22that they had, don't count Kawhi in there.
09:24Because by the time they won the title, he was in, like, his third year.
09:27And he's a superstar.
09:28But all the other young players they had, they weren't getting developed either.
09:32Because you had Ginobili and Parker and Duncan.
09:36And you had Danny Green.
09:37And you had all these other people that were going to play ahead of these
09:40youngsters.
09:40So, 888-957-9570 is the number.
09:44And Dub Nation, let's get engaged.
09:46Before every game, we ask you to vote in our engaging Dub Nation poll
09:50on 95.7, the game's Twitter page.
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10:03All right.
10:03So, in referencing the Slater piece that we're talking about today,
10:08about Klay Thompson and the Warriors,
10:11and the Christmas Day matchup that is coming,
10:13good Lord, is Christmas a week from today?
10:15Yep.
10:16All right.
10:17So, that's coming a week from today.
10:19Steph Curry was quoted as saying,
10:21I wish he was still here.
10:23So, it's a simple yes or no question.
10:26Do you want Klay Thompson back?
10:29Yes or no?
10:30You can vote now on Twitter.
10:32We'll share the results later.
10:34I bet if you're like me,
10:35most people answer that question almost with another question.
10:39Do you want Klay Thompson back?
10:40Well, it's two answers at once.
10:44I do.
10:45It's like from an emotional standpoint, yes.
10:47From a basketball standpoint, not really.
10:51Not really.
10:52And I guess that's fundamentally what we're talking about every day.
10:56What's the goal right now?
10:58What is the goal right now?
11:00I'm sort of done buying this narrative
11:02that the Warriors are trying to win a championship.
11:06I don't think that's what they're doing.
11:08And if you really look between the lines, they've said it.
11:12Steph Curry said meaningful basketball.
11:15And they got that last year.
11:17And then he got hurt.
11:19And so, it derailed wherever that was going.
11:22I don't know if it was going to the third round or not.
11:25But it derailed that situation at that time.
11:28But he was.
11:30Jimmy Butler came and they were playing meaningful basketball.
11:33Is that still on the table this year?
11:35Sure.
11:36Sure it is.
11:37Sure it is.
11:37But my gosh, the set of binoculars that you need to see what would happen
11:42for the Warriors to get to a point where they could actually compete
11:45with Oklahoma City in a seven-game series.
11:48My God.
11:49That is one high-powered telescope you all got if you can see that right now.
11:53So, that's not what they're doing and I'm okay with that.
11:59But I don't want you to lean into it that hard.
12:03I just don't.
12:04I don't want the Golden State Warriors to spend the next few years
12:09just sort of like telling a Disney story and reminiscing.
12:17Steph, yes, Steph.
12:19And then everything beyond that, it's like don't lean into it too hard.
12:23Don't start turning more 20-somethings into more 37-year-old somethings.
12:28You remember the movie Grumpy Old Men?
12:30I do.
12:31That's kind of what we'd be going for if you brought back Klay Thompson.
12:34And I'm here for it because otherwise, what are you doing?
12:37Like you trade Kaminga and you get $23 million worth of what?
12:43Probably not a player that anybody else really relies on.
12:45So, you're trading your young guy who's either good or not good
12:49depending on how you see him for a player who's probably not as good
12:53and maybe a little bit worse.
12:54And so, I don't think that there's anything that the Warriors can do
12:58between now and the end of Steph Curry's run
13:00that can make them a championship contender.
13:02So, why not lean into it and make this whole thing entertaining?
13:06Because it's not entertaining if it's not meaningful basketball
13:10and right now is proof.
13:13It just is.
13:14It's not...
13:15Well, it's entertaining.
13:16Like tonight is going to be very entertaining.
13:18See, sure, we're knee-deep in all of this.
13:22But, you know, you brought up about an hour ago Jimmy Butler's numbers.
13:26They're better this year than they were last year.
13:28Yeah, I guess.
13:29I mean...
13:30So, explain it.
13:31How come it doesn't feel better?
13:33Because they're empty numbers.
13:35They're coming in losses.
13:36They're not winning.
13:37Right.
13:37Right.
13:37So, not entertaining.
13:39Not like I'm not...
13:40I don't think anybody's here for losses.
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