00:00Now this sucks.
00:02Not fun.
00:03It is not a good time.
00:06Because I tell you, guys, I was disappointed, but I wasn't like,
00:09Oh my God!
00:11I wasn't like that this morning, and then I spent one segment with Lyman,
00:15and I'm going, oh my God, this is a total disaster.
00:17Did you think they had any chance in the fourth quarter?
00:20No, absolutely not.
00:21No.
00:22If people are telling the truth, I had to stay because I was like,
00:25well, I'm up anyway, tired is tired, it ain't going to matter,
00:28so I might as well finish this.
00:30But I started looking at my phone more, started looking at the reactions more,
00:33started seeing that, was spending less time.
00:36I mean, when you go on an 18-0 run or when you're the victim of an 18-0 run,
00:41at least he called timeouts towards the end, I mean, the fourth quarter,
00:44at least he did that.
00:45There was a spot with eight minutes left, I think, maybe it was nine minutes.
00:48Jalen Tyson got a steal.
00:50He gave it to Schroeder, who immediately gave it back.
00:53Tyson dunked it, made it seven.
00:54I'm like, all right, and then they immediately went and hit a three.
00:57It was like, Ananobi hit a three, and I'm like, it's over.
00:59I know exactly where you were going with that, and I saw that,
01:03and I never thought that they were going to matter.
01:05I had hope for about three seconds.
01:08They spilled road paint all over the highway over there.
01:11We got to stop at 480 at transportation, so if you're on your way into work,
01:14you better give yourself a couple extra minutes.
01:16You don't want to get that stuff on your truck.
01:18No, I got it on my truck last Friday.
01:21Unpaid.
01:22I know that's what you were referencing.
01:23He did tell that story to us off the air.
01:25I bitched up a storm to you guys because I went home, and I got out of my truck,
01:31and I'm in the driveway.
01:32I looked down.
01:33I go, what the F is that?
01:34I go, you got to be bleeping me.
01:36Yeah, they were painting the freeway, and at the same time,
01:39apparently shoveling buckets of paint on the back of your truck.
01:43And so I went, I got ready to go to the insurance company, and I went,
01:48you know what?
01:49Can I unpaid testimonial?
01:51Yeah, for now, I hope they don't give you any money.
01:53Goo gone graffiti removal.
01:56I couldn't believe it.
01:57It was like I just wiped it right off, and it came right off.
02:00I go, no, this is going to mess up my truck.
02:02This can't be this easy.
02:04It's an amazing invention.
02:05And then the next day, a rock hit my windshield,
02:07and now I got to split on my windshield.
02:09Did you buy any crack gun?
02:10No, there's no crack gun on there.
02:13No.
02:14All right, so Tone, while things are bad,
02:18this is how you guys know that this ain't scripted because the acting is terrible.
02:23Tone, things are bad, and they're down 0-2,
02:25but Anthony, at least James Harden didn't have any turnovers last night, right?
02:30Right, right.
02:31No, I think it's actually indicative of what the identity problem is in the Cavs right now.
02:39And in the Toronto series, in the Detroit series,
02:42James was getting downhill despite all that length and athleticism at his old age.
02:48He still was able to get into the paint, and yes, he would turn the ball over.
02:52You know what he would also do?
02:54Find shooters that were wide open.
02:56Put a little bit of strain on the defense.
03:00You know, he'd get to the foul line.
03:02So I came on the air last week, and I'm like,
03:04hey, here's a justification of some of these turnovers, of which I'm okay with.
03:09There are also some turnovers that are just bad James Harden turnovers.
03:12To some extent, you've got to live with, because that's always been who he is, even at his best,
03:16even when he was a Hall of Famer.
03:17There are going to be some of these back-breaking live ball turnovers.
03:20Can he make up for it in other areas?
03:22When I saw the zero at the end, and I know the assist totals have been really, really low
03:27these last two games against the Knicks.
03:29I also think if they hit shots, you know, his assist totals look a little more normal,
03:32and he doesn't get credit for the hockey assists, whatever.
03:34We're all big boys.
03:35We can handle a box score.
03:37I think when he has zero turnovers, it shows that he's not having any impact on the game.
03:43He is not getting downhill.
03:45He's not getting in the lane.
03:47He should be able to do that against Brunson.
03:49You know, he should be able to do that with ease against McBride.
03:51He should be able to do that.
03:53Like last week, I mentioned to you, like when he had the game where he, gosh, what was it?
03:58Was it game six where he ended up, and he only had two turnovers in that game,
04:02and the 11 assists were a big deal.
04:03It's like you get the ball in your hands.
04:05That's what a guard's supposed to do.
04:06A guard is going to turn over the basketball.
04:08There's going to be numbers there on the box score.
04:10That's a bad thing.
04:11Castle for San Antonio in game one that they won had 11 turnovers.
04:14And let me make the comparison here because Owen looked at us like we had turds crawling out of our
04:18mouth
04:19when we had said that because he thought it was one of the dumbest things ever.
04:22What you said is true.
04:23Let me explain it for that.
04:25Who do you want to be the starting quarterback of the Cleveland Browns?
04:29Whoever wins it at this point.
04:31No, you wanted Shador.
04:32All right, let me turn this around again.
04:36How much confidence would you have if they decided Dylan Gabriel was the starting quarterback of the Cleveland Browns?
04:410.0.
04:42Thank you very much.
04:43And I feel the same way you do when somebody tries to go,
04:45do you look at their stats?
04:48Do you see how many touchdown passes to interceptions that Dylan Gabriel threw?
04:51Yeah, you comfortable with him being out there?
04:53Are you?
04:54It's the same thing.
04:55You can have few interceptions, but if you're averaging five and a half per attempt and your long passes are
05:05still up in the air somewhere,
05:07they're not going to give anybody any confidence.
05:08I need the ball in James Harden's hand.
05:11I don't want the ball in Dylan Gabriel's hand.
05:14Yeah, when you think, and by the way, his minutes were pared back yesterday for the first time.
05:19It was down at 32, which I thought made some sense.
05:22Like, you're living and dying by having Harden play 40 minutes a game.
05:26He led the team in minutes in the playoffs up until yesterday's game.
05:30So some of that I thought made sense.
05:31I think it also might have been an acknowledgement from Kenny Atkinson, like, this is not a Harden series,
05:37which is going to be tough to hear.
05:38I get it.
05:39They traded Darius Garland.
05:40So why did they trade for somebody who in the—
05:43Yeah, but you wouldn't have the chance for it to be a Garland series.
05:44You wouldn't make it to the Eastern Conference Finals.
05:46So that's the catch-22 of this, and that's where I get back to there were no great options here.
05:52Like, even when I was guns blazing about why they needed to make this trade,
05:58I did admit, like, he does have his issues.
06:01He does have his problems.
06:02And at 36, like, you definitely see those bear out, you know, on a possession-by-possession basis.
06:09I don't really see a formula for winning this series with James Harden not being a creator.
06:14And that's what I saw yesterday.
06:15He was not a creator.
06:16I'm okay with some turnovers if he has the chance to create and get things going downhill.
06:22If he is just going to hold the ball and just get it out, and then, oh, I'm just getting
06:27it out of the hands,
06:27throw to whoever's closest to me, then why is James Harden even out there?
06:30Well, you better get ready for a fight.
06:31If you think this series is over, and a lot of people already do,
06:33if they think this series is over, then you better be ready for a fight.
06:36And I'll get myself ready for it, too.
06:38I was a proponent of the James Harden trade.
06:39We both were.
06:40Official show stance, I think it was.
06:42I think everybody – I don't know if John was with us at the time,
06:44but I think it was an official show stance that we were proponents of the James Harden trade.
06:47Well, you know, if you guys believe this series is over,
06:50that's one of the first things that get brought up.
06:53If Kenny is trying to admit quietly that this might not be a James Harden series –
06:57And as we get deeper into the playoffs and the mileage –
06:59First call we're going to get on Tuesday is then why did you trade for James Harden?
07:03And that answered what I just gave probably still isn't going to be good enough,
07:06but then I say –
07:06That they would have been bounced in the first round without him.
07:08Yeah, but again, what were my other alternatives?
07:10You weren't going to trade Darius Garland just for Giannis.
07:12You weren't going to trade Darius Garland just for LeBron.
07:15I would have loved to get Michael Porter Jr.
07:16It wasn't happening.
07:17You weren't going to do that.
07:18Dynamic Wings were not getting traded for Darius Garland.
07:22It was not happening.
07:23Trey Murphy was another one I wanted.
07:25It was not happening.
07:28You got the very best you got, and then that still comes with its hit.
07:34And I know you – people believe you sped up the clock.
07:37And I know we're talking big picture stuff here, and we just got off a game two,
07:40and it was a disappointing loss.
07:41And you've made me feel worse about it as the day has gone on.
07:44Glad to do that for you.
07:45Easily worse.
07:46Yet we still have to go back, and I'll defend that trade.
07:48I'm doing a poor job as Whammer right now, I got to admit.
07:51Well, there's nothing being said here about James Harden that makes me want to take back
07:55the trade whatsoever.
07:56So we're going to have ourselves a great big fight.
07:58I've seen people say he shouldn't even start, you know, the rest of this series.
08:02And to that I go, have you seen the bench?
08:05Have you seen the bench, ladies and gentlemen?
08:07There was a point yesterday.
08:09They have 13 points last night?
08:10Yeah, there was a point yesterday.
08:11They were 3 of 19, and I put together games one and game two.
08:16They were shooting like 23% from the field, the bench.
08:19You going to put Sam out there instead of him?
08:22You going to put Sam out there?
08:23I'm asking a question to everybody.
08:25Who are you going to put out there instead of him?
08:26You know, say what you want about James.
08:28He still is a ball handler, and Donovan doesn't want to do that.
08:32Donovan does not want to take over point guard duties.
08:35He's just not good at it.
08:36He's not great at it.
08:37He can be good at it, he's not great at it.
08:38And now he's banged up, so you're just going to make things even harder on Donovan.
08:41Right, more wear and tear.
08:42I know a lot of people think that the series is over.
08:45I don't think the series is over for what I told you at 6.
08:48I know a lot of people think it's over.
08:49You're not going to make it any better by putting pressure on Donovan Mitchell.
08:52If you take James Harden out of the starting lineup, if that's announced tomorrow,
08:56I don't think there's any actual evidence that that's going to happen unless if he were hurt.
08:59If James Harden's out of the starting lineup, then yeah, the series is over.
09:02Because you're just going to put more pressure on Donovan, and it ain't going to make it any better.
09:05You're going to put more pressure on guys that aren't used to having that pressure.
09:08Then we will go back to last year's results on it.
09:11Because I came in today, you made me feel worse about it just because of some of the things that
09:15Kenny Atkinson didn't answer to.
09:17All right, well, it does make me feel a little bit better that I can blame the coach,
09:21because nobody really wants to blame the players.
09:23But when you're not hitting shots, when you're not getting the ball to Evan Mobley in the second half,
09:28because you weren't able to get the ball to Evan Mobley in the second half.
09:30Now, I'm not on Reddit.
09:31You said you saw a Reddit thread where there were people saying that he was calling for the ball.
09:35So that is a Kenny problem.
09:37That's a team problem.
09:38He was hot as hell in the first half.
09:40He was, what, 5 of 8 with 14 points in the first half.
09:43It was all in the first seven minutes, it seemed.
09:44He was great in the first half.
09:46You don't get the ball to him at all in the second half.
09:48And I still thought some of that was explaining.
09:50But if you hit some of those shots, because at some point they're going...
09:55They should have been up 10 at the end of the half.
09:57Honestly, with that shot profile...
09:59So if you hit some of those shots that I do believe were wide-open shots, good looks,
10:04if you hit any of them, I think that you free up Evan Mobley, then you can exploit Evan Mobley.
10:08It puts more pressure on the Knicks.
10:10Yes, so it puts more pressure on the Knicks.
10:11It was, on Tuesday, it was an inexplainable 22-point lead debacle.
10:19That the only way it's explained is through emotion and vitriol and anger.
10:25Because it's inexplainable.
10:26This, I can explain this, and I'm not making excuses.
10:30You're down 0-2.
10:31It's the Eastern Conference Finals.
10:32There's four teams left in this thing.
10:34There's no excuses left for you.
10:36I can't say tired.
10:37I can say injured, but then we'll talk big picture stuff.
10:39So that ain't going to make anything any better either, Tone.
10:42So tomorrow, tomorrow is it.
10:46Tomorrow you win or that's it.
10:47I don't think it's over.
10:49I want to see them come home because I think they're going to win tomorrow.
10:52Because I don't think, one, I don't want to be that nasty.
10:54But honestly, I can't see them not being able to hit the broadside of a barn again tomorrow.
11:00Schroeder, Struess, and Merrill, all three of them, to shoot this poorly,
11:08it's tough to find any kind of a formula for them to, like, they are due to get going.
11:11Now, I would still, and you may not like this, and neither would, you know,
11:16maybe Dave McMenamin at 922 this morning.
11:18Also, we do have coming in hot at 945.
11:20Dave may not feel this way.
11:23I'd still like to do what they did to Jalen Brunson last night.
11:26I'd still like to put that pressure on another piece of their offense and roll the dice with that.
11:31You're talking about Josh Hart as a safety valve, three-point.
11:33I'd rather roll the dice with that.
11:35That's a good, deep team.
11:36I give them respect, but I'd rather do it that way.
11:38You know, Kenny, there is a difference between forcing the ball out of Jalen Brunson's hand
11:49and a little bit more of a fine line between that and just giving Josh Hart 10 seconds
11:54with nobody around him to shoot a three.
11:56There should be a middle road.
11:58You know how I know there's a middle road?
11:59I watched what Toronto and Detroit did to us.
12:02Our shooters did not have that kind of a window.
12:04And yes, Donovan Mitchell against them and James Harden, they were breaking down the defense.
12:09They got the ball moving.
12:11At no point were we getting that much time to shoot open threes.
12:15So why is that?
12:17What are they doing in their rotations?
12:19How many of their own rules are they breaking in those rotations
12:22to allow him to walk up to shots like he is just Saturday morning
12:27shooting around by himself in an empty gym?
