- 2 days ago
Marc Spears, who covers the Warriors for ESPN and Andscape, joins Willard and Dibs to recap the Warriors offseason to this point, to discuss what they should do next, and more.
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00:00is our very good friend mark spears espn and scape great work always topped in dialed in
00:06joining us on the river islands guest line as we still kind of unpack the warriors post
00:13lebron decision offseason hey mark what's going on man how are you oh man just living the dream
00:20out in uh temecula doing an interview and then going to la on nba today for basketball
00:27stuff yeah man your your your interviews keep happening right next to wineries what's up with
00:32that mark you know what um and hopefully nobody in temecula gets mad but it ain't the same as
00:43no no it is not it is not it's level true that true that hey first time we've gotten to
00:51talk to
00:52you obviously since lebron made his decision so what was your your reaction to that and and and
00:57also where does it leave the golden state warriors yeah you know like about two weeks before i got the
01:04sense that the warriors weren't confident that it was going to happen for them um you know in fact
01:11they were what i was hearing is they were they were expecting lebron to go to the you know eastern
01:16conference and you know i was getting fooled by the tea leaves man you know hearing him talking about
01:23his daughter and 11 year old daughter and every time uh she uh he leaves she's like daddy i want
01:31to
01:31come with you and so to me from a you know personal standpoint golden state made a lot of sense
01:37um
01:38and you know everybody's like well it's it's fun but i thought family wise it'd be great
01:43because he could just fly home after practice um you know he could be home an hour and have dinner
01:51and fly back the next day for shoot around and be home a lot and you got to remember that
01:56i guess it looks like his son's going to stay with the lakers so he's still in la and
02:00his other son bryce is playing in arizona so you you know like i just assume that was the one
02:06thing
02:07that was in the warriors favor was that he could keep him close to his you know and i'm not
02:12sure that
02:12i haven't heard anything that suggested that his wife and daughter were going to move but
02:17just to be close to home and uh so he couldn't have went further
02:23he couldn't have went further to go to philly so i i didn't expect him to go to the warriors
02:29i just
02:30kind of held on to that if he does make a decision for family reasons that's the best place but
02:36just
02:36didn't hear anything over the last two or three weeks that suggested he was coming
02:40um but the philly thing was a little surprising to me um i thought cleveland could be the spot i
02:49had
02:49heard that you know he had you know met with their owner quietly um and so i thought cleveland and
02:59and
02:59maybe miami nostalgically could be a great spot and i also thought that philly had enough
03:06like getting jaylen brown was huge and the one thing that um i always recall in my early days i
03:14covered nolan richardson and nolan richardson told me that the key to his success was that he'd never
03:21had more than three superstars on the team and i always kind of remembered that he said because you
03:26just need other people to do other things right you need somebody to play point need somebody to
03:31need somebody to rebound need somebody to do the dirty work and he would kind of pattern his teams
03:36around three stars four is a lot five is new territory um i don't know a team in nba history
03:46that on paper could start five guys that could potentially be all-stars i know detroit had some
03:53interesting team but those guys aren't the same caliber as this this is perhaps the best starting
03:59five that lebron james will ever be a part of talent wise on paper but does joel mb play on
04:06paper like
04:07who's going to be the point guard two guys are going to have to sacrifice who are going to sacrifice
04:13you know to me there's a lot of questions um on paper certainly outstanding but can you get all those
04:22five guys to sacrifice for the greater good or winning a championship and you know that's ultimately
04:28what nick nurse is the first world problem he has uh to work with a lot of high usage guys
04:36too out
04:37there mark and i i wonder about the warriors when they knew that they probably wouldn't have gotten
04:41lebron and what would their pivot be at that point and what's their pivot point now well you got to
04:49remember that lebron james is a unique free agent i've never known a player you know we only know a
04:55handful of players of that caliber and some might say only two him and jordan but it's just a unique
05:01circumstance in which you had a free agent of that caliber that was willing to take six million dollars
05:07or eight million dollars right uh total i guess is what he's getting in philly is eight million dollars
05:15for two years it's just i don't know that we'll ever see that again it was certainly unique but
05:20even before he made his decision i thought the free agency market was pretty bleak that there wasn't
05:28a lot out there anyway and the way the warriors financially were they just really weren't in a
05:33position to go after somebody i mean obviously they would have to be creative but to me maybe the
05:40creativity for them is at the trade deadline you know um draymond doesn't have a no trade clause
05:47anymore jimmy butler could you know be is expected to be healthy at that point and maybe he could be
05:56used to trade for something else you know so i i expect them to take care of staff and you
06:02know try
06:03to get staff to find a long-term deal expect staff to get a long-term deal but i you
06:08know it's funny
06:09are the washington wizards like their new role model like do they make some trades uh by the trade
06:15deadline to get like a trey young and anthony davis to kind of you know move things around but even
06:21if
06:21the team is like poor next season this this ain't no aj demands a draft like this is a complete
06:29opposite
06:29draft so even if the warriors struggle there's there's no cherry on the top to find at the end of
06:35the
06:35season so it's um it's very curious to say the least on on what they'll do and i think we're
06:43just
06:43going to have to grin and bear with whatever team they they put out there mark spears with us espn
06:51landscape with us on withered and dibs 95 7 the game how do you think the demar derozan situation plays
06:56out that's a good question um i would like demar in a warriors uniform um it keeps him in california
07:05which i know is very important to him i don't know that the warriors are trying to get him
07:09but like to me he kind of helps keep things afloat until jimmy gets back and then you figure the
07:17rest
07:17out later um continent professional great guy his age is just a number he keeps himself in impeccable
07:27shape lebron james has been a role model for him so i think he's kind of learned from a diet
07:33standpoint
07:33working out standpoint he patterns himself after lebron james in a lot of ways and so his agent
07:41erin goodwin is in the bay um but you know i i haven't heard anything that suggested he would be
07:49going to come to go to the state although i've long been a fan of uh him in any uniform
07:56what's the likelihood of the warriors still being active here in late july or august with a trade i was
08:02telling mark about the chris stapps contract and the possibility that that gets moved are we at a spot
08:08now where trading season's over i mean it's not really over but it's certainly slow and i think the trade
08:15deadline is probably the more realistic time because you could kind of see where you are i think the
08:21expectation is disappointment right i'm hearing rumors that you know they're trying to get and
08:27they've lost some season ticket holders and you know trying to trying to sell some season tickets
08:32and stuff like that in a way that you know never has been the case in recent years um so
08:39maybe some
08:39of the locals are getting restless with uh watching a team where steph has been hurt a lot and jimmy's
08:44been hurt and you know there's not a lot of championship excitement um but to me when you
08:52get to the trade deadline i think right now everybody's just like happy with their not everybody
08:58but a lot of teams are excited about their roster and want to see it and um then come the
09:04trade deadline
09:05it's chaos and people want to make moves so to me i i would guess that the picking for the
09:12warriors
09:12actually might be better at the trade deadline than than they would be right now mark spears with
09:20us talking out sort of the uh the post situation yeah mark i'm sorry no no i'm sorry i know
09:26you're
09:27looking for like you know rainbows and you know no i think everybody gets it blue sky no no mark
09:35mark
09:35when the draymond thing played out the way it did i think everybody got the message it is going to
09:41be
09:41just a run it back situation i'll tell you what a lot of people are talking about today though
09:46and and i would love your perspective on this which is there have been a couple comments made by
09:51reporters that sort of suggest that joe lacob is very activated by the idea of kind of showing
10:00everybody that that he can still put together a winner in the post steph era and that's great
10:08but at the same time it makes it feel like there's a slight dismissiveness of now what what's your
10:16perspective on that hey man i i melt the steph curry train until it's dry you know what i mean
10:24i mean
10:24kobe bryant's last years weren't the greatest but if you don't think uh that place still doesn't
10:34revel over what kobe bryant did i mean you're wrong i mean then you got people that couldn't
10:40even be lebron james fans and they were kobe bryant fans we're happy to see lebron go because
10:45they were kobe bryant fans right and i the longest steph can play a move i i think you you
10:53just try to
10:53figure it out around them um it's going to take creativity um but i know the day that he plays
11:01his
11:01last game in that jersey which i'm sure most fans would hope that that's the he doesn't go and wear
11:09another jersey it's going to be a sad day in the bay area joe montana departure you know uh kind
11:17of day
11:17and i just don't know that there's been a greater athlete that's been in the bay so i'm trying if
11:25i'm
11:25them my main thing now is trying to get in the contract extension and still just figuring out
11:31around them because think about what you have you have expiring contracts with porzingis right i mean
11:40a tradable contract with porzingis draymond's got a tradable contract jimmy has a tradable contract
11:46and you're gonna have teams that i believe at the trade deadline might be willing to make major change
11:52and i do think that jimmy and draymond are mature enough at this stage of their career where they'd be
12:00like i get it i understand i get it so that's why i think maybe for warriors fans the best
12:07thing to do
12:07is to be patient to see what happens at the trade deadline see where the team is like you know
12:13it's not
12:15about today it's about the end of next season sometimes and i know they want to want to be
12:22waived and it to be changed now but i think for dunleavy the way their roster is built and what
12:29they have
12:29now i think the patient trade try to make some big moves at the trade deadline it might to me
12:38is the
12:38better route to go it's not the pretty route not tomorrow it's not for the patient but i think it
12:45is the best thing to do and thinking about next year would it be in staff's and the organization's
12:52best interest to hold off on an extension that way no if they make moves but hear me out now
12:58mark
12:58hear me out that way he doesn't he doesn't have to take 67 million i mean does he want to
13:03win or does he
13:04win every last dollar that that arena ain't there if it wasn't for him but it's here and it's been
13:10built billion if it wasn't for him i don't know man i'm a i'm a step loyalist man i'm i'm
13:18put on 30
13:20till you can't no more man whatever whatever money they paying on he if they paying him that much money
13:26now how much you think he bringing in probably tenfold more my point is if they move him tomorrow
13:34how much money they're about to lose well they're not going to lose him about losing luca luca luca
13:38downfield and what that did to him you think like they're losing some season ticket holders now
13:45watch 30 go somewhere else man there'll be more people at the valkyries games than at the warriors
13:51game i'm not saying you let 30 go i'm just saying maybe he decides to take less because he's making
13:57400 million from his new shoe deal
14:02why to have a better team around him and win yeah i mean yeah but he deserves every penny he
14:11gives
14:12mark does yeah mark do you think he's ticked off by how this is playing out
14:20nah he has he has a wonderful life maybe you want something better maybe you're disappointed a
14:27little bit but the grass ain't always green he's never started over before right he's got four rings
14:35i'm not crying for him yeah you know what i'm saying yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah like he'll be
14:43okay man like he'll be fine
14:47his family's set for generations like you know he's good man but he wants to compete the rest of the
14:54way
14:54no i get it but that but what my point is is come on patience grasshopper like patience
15:01does he have time to be patient he's about to turn 39 january i mean february 6th february 5th
15:10whatever the next trade deadline is i'll be here in a blink okay i mean listen you're saying what
15:16people are hoping to hear but this is a lot of people are wondering what i'm saying to you is
15:23i think the ability to trade for better talent is available in february than it is now okay
15:31and you and you got expiring contracts and teams that are like you know what our team's trash
15:37you know we're gonna get rid of this guy then that's when you can pound so let's see what dunleavy's
15:42about i i think his options there's not really much now but i do think you know and they're under
15:50the
15:50second apron right like that there is some opportunity to do some big things at the trade deadline it's not
15:57sexy not what you want to hear but let's let's see okay okay no i think we can let's see
16:03how the
16:04rest of the league plays out and i i just feel like if you look at the trades over the
16:10last couple
16:11years to me the biggest willing and dealing takes place now at the trade deadline and not in the off
16:16season mark spears espn we appreciate you always man thank you so much all right fellas
16:24you too mark spears
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