00:00You know what the real way to help with tanking is?
00:03Cut back like four teams and make the talent so that more teams have talent
00:08is tighter.
00:09Shrink the league?
00:10Of course, it will never happen.
00:12What blasphemy are you talking about?
00:15Yeah, I'm saying, but if they actually wanted to do it, but when you don't
00:18and the talent is spread so thin, one guy can change everything.
00:22Yeah.
00:23I mean, one guy could change everything back then too,
00:25but at least you could offset it with three or four guys.
00:27Shrinking the league, shrinking the schedule or number of games
00:31are two things that have been bandied around for my entire life
00:36professionally about sports.
00:37I've never seen it.
00:38It's never happened.
00:40Nobody has ever shrunk their league or anything because at the end of the day,
00:45more money is always the best money for all these owners in every sport.
00:50It's amazing that the shrinking of the league, you know,
00:52it's been the same 82 games in the NBA forever.
00:55Back in the day, they weren't charter flights, you know,
00:59they didn't have the same physical therapy, and those guys played.
01:03Somehow now, with all the luxuries, somehow it's too much.
01:09I get it.
01:10It is probably too much, but it's just bizarre that, like, wait.
01:13And some guys like LeBron argue it's a lot harder to play in the league now,
01:1982 games now, than it was before.
01:21And I can assure you he got besieged with a bunch of old heads going,
01:25what are you talking about?
01:27Because it's definitely not.
01:28Now, I will say that today's athlete, especially NBA players,
01:32they are a far more athletically finicky Ferrari of a vehicle,
01:39where more things go wrong.
01:41They're in the shop more often because they're built to be faster and stronger.
01:46There's just no two ways around it.
01:47But I do think that load management is a scourge on not just the NBA,
01:52but on sports in general.
01:55However, it is true that these guys are getting injured more often
01:58because they're more athletically tuned.
02:00You know, you go look at the NBA of 30 years ago.
02:04These mastodons would be lumbering up and down the courts.
02:07They weren't getting hurt because they weren't as explosive.
02:10They weren't as athletic.
02:11So I don't know how you fix that element of it.
02:14As far as the tanking situation in the NBA, I have a simple proposal,
02:20which is do away with the lottery for three years.
02:25See what happens and then reevaluate.
02:28Now, I know that may sound crazy.
02:30Like, you can't do that.
02:31Teams are planning to get these ping pong balls.
02:34I'm like, listen, if you just want to try to change the dynamic of what's happening,
02:39then you need to change.
02:41You need to actually say, we're going to get rid of the lottery and see what happens.
02:45It may not work, but then you can reconfigure it again in a couple of years.
02:49So then in that case, like four or five teams would still be at the bottom,
02:53but you wouldn't have teams six through 10 as you're discussing here.
02:56Agreed.
02:57Yeah.
02:57Yeah.
02:57One of the unforeseen consequences of them flattening the lottery odds,
03:02where they kind of tiered it, where I guess the bottom three get a 14% chance
03:06and then it goes to eight or whatever the number is,
03:08is that it encouraged those teams you just mentioned, teams six, seven, eight, nine,
03:13right outside the top 10 to go ahead and give it the old college tank, as it were.
03:20And then there's teams that are fighting to get into the play-in tournament
03:23for reasons that nobody quite understands.
03:25Last night, Atlanta drilled Milwaukee with Giannis on the court.
03:29And a lot of people in Milwaukee are like, what are we doing?
03:33Like the team is garbage other than Giannis.
03:36And getting into the play-in game or play-in tournament is not anything
03:42that anyone's excited about.
03:44Why don't we just shut Giannis down for the rest of the year?
03:46And that's a valid argument right there.
03:48But my solution to tanking would be, well, first thing is get rid of the lottery,
03:52see what happens, reassess after a couple of years.
03:55And it won't happen.
03:56I know it won't happen.
03:57They need to do something.
03:58I mean, it has gotten incredibly ridiculous to the degree.
04:02I mean, Utah having, you know, benching, what is it,
04:05Laurie Markkinen and somebody else, to start the fourth quarter
04:09when they're like winning or whatever, come on, like that.
04:12It's one thing to say he's, you know, got the flu, not playing.
04:16But to have a guy healthy, playing, productive, nah,
04:19we're just not going to play our best players.
04:22Set them out for the whole fourth quarter.
04:23Funny thing is the Jazz almost won that game.
04:26They had, I think they went to overtime in that game.
04:28So it'd be funny if they had won the game that they tried to tank anyway.
04:31But that's just the current NBA.
04:34Tonight, Trae Young makes his debut on the court.
04:37He was ejected before he ever played a minute for the Wizards.
04:40I would argue, Ben, that'll never happen again.
04:43I would argue that now Trae Young has a little sliver of trivial pursuit lore
04:50with this franchise.
04:52The only player to be ejected before having played a single minute
04:56in uniform for the team.
04:57He seems like he's really, really, really trying to integrate himself in here
05:03and be like, he's like, he's like Mr. Wizard.
05:05And I'm like, cool, glad you're like that way.
05:08But like, man, have you not paid attention to what's going on here
05:09for the last umpteen years?
05:10Like, nobody really, like, really, everything needs to start over.
05:16Hopefully next year will.
05:17But he's, like, acting like this is the place to be.
05:19And hey, good for him, good for them.
05:22He is going way out of his way.
05:23I'm surprised he doesn't have a Wizards tattoo already.
05:25Yeah, it's interesting.
05:26I find the dynamic such that athletes in today's day and age
05:32can handle just about anything.
05:34They're most of the time incapable of embarrassment,
05:37even if they do things that are dumb all the time.
05:40Like, Miles Garrett just got his ninth speeding ticket.
05:43You saw that in Cleveland.
05:44Yeah, ninth one.
05:46In what amount of time?
05:48Since he's been there.
05:49Okay.
05:49A handful of years.
05:52But basically, I don't think he really cares about that.
05:55The one time and the only time athletes feel it,
05:58feel it right in here, is when they get traded.
06:02Because it hurts them two ways, Ben.
06:04Listen, the first and most important way is the team they were on,
06:08where they thought they were a big deal, said,
06:11yeah, nah, we're kind of sick of you.
06:13That hurts them.
06:14I mean, it hurts anybody, right?
06:16Sure.
06:16The other end of it is the fact that there's other guys coming back
06:22that the team that just said, we're tired of you,
06:25would rather have instead.
06:28And that is a double dose of humility.
06:31And so I think with Trey Young,
06:33when he found out that the Wizards really wanted him,
06:37they're like, you know, you're part of our plans.
06:39That kind of like made him feel all right.
06:41That's good.
06:41And he figured he'd run his course in Atlanta as a player.
06:46This was a chance to be one of the stars on a team with young players
06:49who aren't stars yet but could become them.
06:51And they wanted him.
06:53So that's all that it took was to be wanted.
06:56Now, he's got to stay healthy,
06:57and let's get him and Alex Saar and all the young pups
07:01and let's hope a top three stud from college
07:07this coming spring or summer when the lottery is.
07:11May is the lottery, right?
07:13Yeah.
07:14Draft is June.
07:15May is the lottery.
07:15All that sounds fantastic.
07:18I mean, I think in Trey Young's case also,
07:19I think there's the looming possibility of that
07:21this team will extend him.
07:23And, you know, there's also that.
07:25There was nothing funnier than when all the rumors
07:27were about him possibly getting traded,
07:28and then he comes out and says he wants to go to Washington.
07:31I'm like, okay, nobody says that even when they had Wall and Beal,
07:36let alone now.
07:37But, yeah, like you said, they wanted him.
07:40They wanted him.
07:41Yeah.
07:41And also, I think he looked at us a very good point, Ben.
07:43He's like, okay, they are under the salary floor,
07:47and they're going to have to spend up to it.
07:48Right.
07:49So how many other teams are there?
07:51And let's also be honest, we've got a great city here,
07:54despite the crappy weather the last three days.
07:56I like the traffic is actually slightly better than Atlanta,
08:00which is hard to believe if you've never been to Atlanta,
08:04you've been to Atlanta.
08:05Yes.
08:05Not ideal.
08:07Not ideal.
08:09I am convinced Atlanta traffic is beyond everything.
08:14I think even L.A. traffic, which is, of course, legendary,
08:18there's a certain expectation baked into L.A. traffic.
08:23It's the Atlanta traffic that you go, what on earth?
08:27Where am I here?
08:28Where am I, and where are all these people going?
08:31Who designed these roads?
08:33What the hell?
08:34And why is it so hot here?
08:37That's the other thing.
08:38I think it's the other thing.
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