This is the Crossover and NBA show hosted by Sports Illustrated. It's Chris Mannox and Howard Back. It's a whole new level for you and me. Chris, this relationship, I can subscribe for the best weekly NBA content. These two are capable of what did that mean? Could be the best duo ever. I'll see how you can beat that. Here they are Chris Mannix and Howard Back, and we are back Crossover NBA podcast, Chris Mannox and Howard Beck and Howard we have officially entered the dog days of summer when it comes to NBA content and frankly content in general. Um, you made this point right before we came out to record, and it was that, you know, during the day on one of the debate shows, there was a lot of chatter, maybe too much chatter about the dunk that Lebron James' son had in a high school tournament. So like, if you could, if you need to squeeze fifteen minutes out of something Brawny James does to fill time on a nationally televised show, Uh, you're struggling for content right there. That's that's for sure. I don't know what's beyond silly season, stupid seat, stupidity season, in anity season, uh, desperation season, whatever it is, that's where we are. Um. I kind of thought we'd already reached a couple of weeks ago, because even you and I have had to rehash Kevin Durant um multiple times, and we're gonna do it again today. But at least we have a little bit of new stuff to talk about too. But I mean, again, I don't remember if I said this last week or not. It is the strangest of phenomena that we have simultaneously an off season in which we might have four all stars traded Durant, Kyrie, Irving, Russell Westbrook, Donovan, Mitchell, and and then we will look back on it as one of the most momentous or or one of the most you know, just active at at a high level off seasons. But to date, we got nothing to date, like almost nothing has happened except speculation, rehash, rumor, whispers, spin and then nothing. It What's what's really happened so far this offseason? There's a whole lot of nothing. A whole lot of nothing is right, but always just enough to fill time on a podcast and just enough to be mildly interesting. And we will start with one Kevin Durant, who has been at the center of all the speculation about player movement this offseason. Nothing tangible howard to report when it comes to Kevin Durant, other than, for the first time since this whole saga began, Durant directly addressed UH something that has been written about his future, specifically the idea UH that he could retire rather than play for the Nets. This was something that Mark Stein, our friend who writes over as sub Stack, floated UH. He quoted a league executive um suggesting that Durant responded on social media saying, you know, effectively saying, there's no chance that I'm going to retire, and I don't think anyone, including our friend Mark Stein, believes that Durant would ever retire. He's going to be thirty four years old next month, He's got four years at close to two million dollars remaining of his contract, and he loves to play basketball, so he's not gonna walk away from the game when he's still playing at the highest of levels, regardless of the situation that he's in. But it did make my ears perk up Howard, because look, Durant is on Twitter constantly. He's clapping back at Stevo six to four, who is like criticizing for something. You know, I don't know why he does it, but he consistently has been doing it. He has not shot down any of the reporting up to this point, really, you know, from the trade demand to the meeting with Joe si the owner of the nets in London, to what reportedly was asked or talked about during that meeting, specifically the jettison of Sean Marks and Steve Nash. This was the first time that Kevin Durant spoke out on this, uh, this topic. What did you make of that? So it's funny because one, this is like a bad game of telephone, the thing you used to play in like you know, kindergarten, where stuff gets distorted along the way. And there was some really bad aggregation out there of Mark Stein's piece. It's I wouldn't even call it necessarily reporting. Stein wasn't reporting that Kevin Durant will retire if he doesn't get traded. What he wrote was, and I'll read from the top of his sub steck which I'm subscribed to encourage you all to do the same. UM, as long as you first subscribed to SI dot com, of course. But Stein wrote during Summer League in Las Vegas, one of the most well connected team executives I speak to regularly insistent to me that, based on what he was here, Kevin Durant was more apt to retire than play again for the Brooklyn Nets. This was an early July. And then Stein goes on to say that he himself was highly skeptical of that and said as much to this executive. But it's not somebody saying Kevin Durant will, he's saying more apt to retire than play. It's almost like the hyperboles baked in, like he's so adamant about not playing for the Nets, I could see him retiring rather than go back. But that's not the same as saying that Kevin Durant intends to do this. So Stein wrote it fine like that, there's there's nothing in the way that he wrote it that was. But then it got distorted, as these things often do in our social media age. And so then Kevin Durant takes to Twitter to debunk something that didn't need debunking. UM says, I know most people will believe unnamed sources over me. But if it's anyone out there that will listen, I don't plan on retiring anytime soon. Shit is comical at this point. Okay, fine, Kadi, but that's not what mark Stein wrote, and he probably didn't read it. I'm guessing that Katie does not actually have a substep subscription to mark Stein. But you should, Kevin, he does really good stuff. Um So, then Tommy Beer, our good friend, weighs in and and they have a really interesting back and forth for a while, perhaps to Tommy Beer for engaging Katie on this and Katie deciding to to keep responding that. Then he's accusing fans of media saying we want to lock out, which is also ridiculous. Like I, this says more about the media age that we're in and the amount of noise out there and the way that people hear things and interpret things than it does about anything else. I don't think Kevin Durant actually revealed anything to us today with this. Um and you said it, Chris, like he for all the tweets he put out today sort of stemming from his trade demand, he never actually addresses any of the fundamentals about what he wants, does he want out? Does he wanted to bunk anything about the trade demand or about wanting Steve Nash and Shawn Marks fired? Where does he want to go? Would he would show up to like that? All the things that we most need to know from Kevin Durant, we're not addressed, and I'm not expecting that they would be. I'm not you know that that's unreasonable. But at the end, like a lot of stuff this summer, it's eventually just a whole on nothing. Yeah, it just did strike me as interesting that this was what Kevin Durant chose to respond to end up to piggyback on something you just said. There. I can speak for myself, and I think I can speak for you here. I don't want to cover a lockout. I did that that. No, I'm good staying at you know, outside in the lobby of a hotel or outside just on the street hard pass, No, thank you. I'd rather cover uh an entire season's worth of Orlando Magic games this year. Sorry, Orlando. I might choose a lockout over that. No, no, not no, that call. Maybe Houston Rockets games might be. I had some nights that I was kind of like punched, drunk up too late, eating bad pizza, and like at the Waldorf Historia that was actually more amusing than most of what the magic things got done, where guys would come down, most of them would largely ignore us and and you know, we get a little nugget. Uh. The most intriguing moment of what was that now is the two thousand eleven might getting that level lockout? Was all of us getting called in. Was it three in the morning when they made the deal at the last second and sitting across the table from Stern and Billy Hunter and Derek Fisher, was there a handful of others and just bleary eyed wondering, Um, yeah, I don't I don't need to do that. But I don't know, Like where Kevin Durant got it in his head that there are people in the media or fans of cheering for a lockout, people speculating about and I think it's he's taking it personally because people are saying it is maneuvers like Kevin Durance where he's trying to force a trade with four years left on his deal on an extension that he just signed a year ago. That issues like or instances like that and Ben Simmons doing something similar that those are the kind of things that are going to lead to players and owners having a big clash at the bargaining table and therefore potentially a lockout. Saying that, speculating that that's a possibility is not nearly the same as wanting it, cheering for it, or predicting it. It's just simply saying this is some stuff that's really gonna be difficult for the league. Owners and gms certainly are not happy about this emerging trend or or accelerating trend. And that's an issue. Of course, it's an issue. Doesn't mean the biggest the biggest issue, Howard, The biggest issue is like owners and gms have become soft, like just like I mean twenty years ago. Like if this situation came up twenty years ago, I know we're going down a different pathway here, But if the situation came up twenty years ago, like I feel like the pat riley of yesteryear would tell player X to just go bleep and play and not even entertain the possibility of trading a marquee player with four years left in his contract. It just wouldn't it, really wouldn't occur to two gms of that day age now because of social media, the sensitivities of it all, and just it's gone too far. And I blame more the owners and the GMS that I do this player empowerment fend. You know, guys exercising their leverage. I feel like they if they have a contract a GM can say play or don't, don't get paid, simple as that. Like, everybody's so concerned with, like keeping this fragile balance intact of having all happy guys in the locker room. Everybde's gonna be happy in the locker room to have any kind of team success. That hasn't always been the case, Howard, And you know it, Like there's been plenty of teams with guys that didn't like each other on there were guys didn't want to be there and had success. I mean you covered the Kobe and Shack years. Towards the end they had success. Um. I don't think it's necessary to have everybody singing the Lego song. Everything is awesome. Um, when you're taking the court with your team, it's phenomenal reference. By the way, that should be substituted for any time somebody wants to say everybody getting together singing Kumbaya, Like that's way too old a reference. Now, it should just be the Lego song. I'm in favor of that. Listen, Like, you're right on some level, but things have changed. The power dynamics have changed, and yeah, it'd be nice if if teams could just stand their ground. But we know that there is a reality that with players with the amount of power that they have now, with the money that they make, with their ability to to change teams um more often because of of shorter contracts and free agency, like, everything is just different. And I don't know there's any easy answer to that, but we just have to acknowledge that things have changed a little and I don't know there's any single thing that the teams can do short of some new wrinkle in the c B A. And that's where this speculation about a potential lockout comes. I will say this, and I agree with Kevin Durant wholeheartedly on this point. I think he made this point in his back and forth with Tommy Beer that people everybody's making too much money and that to to to have a lockout, which is true, like they're gonna across the ten billion dollar threshold this coming season. Um, that's up from I think it was eight billion as recently as a couple of years ago. Like this league, as as much consternation as there is, and I think legitimately is by teams, especially smaller market teams, but maybe all teams, about this trend of superstars forcing their way out with multiple years left on their contracts. You're not shutting down the league over that. You only do lockouts and actual shutdowns and actually lost games when it's financial concerns, and they do not have any financial concerns right now. Between the money that they're generating, the split with players that's down from fifty seven for the player for the players as recently as whatever eleven years ago before that lockout, Between all that and the revenue sharing that they have, there is no basis, no legitimate reason that they would shut down just to try to solve superstar empowerment or superstars forcing trades like I think that's far fetched. I think they'll let that issue go as long as they're still making, you know, just just just generating money like a machine, and they are, so I don't I don't think that will happen. I'm not and who's who thinks that there will be some sort of shutdown because of that, But it is a serious concern for the league alright. One of the other subplots that emerged this week to the Kevin Durant saga is that there was some photos taken of Durant and Jayson Tatum working out I believe somewhere in southern californiacent sure on that, but they're working out together, uh, at a gym. This all happening in with the backdrop of Durant being rumored to be a target of the Boston Celtics. And if you know, we talked about this last week, if you really parse it down and look at the most prime candidates to land Durant, Boston would have to be at the top of the list. Um. I want to play something that Jalen Rose from ESPN, longtime NBA player, Um. Something he said about the ripple effects of this picture being taken. There's in theory, quote unquote, nothing to be said to watch them be in the gym. But the one thing you have to be conscious of is the other fourteen guys that you leave. And you gotta always think about what is Jalen Brown going to say if he sees me working out with k D knowing that the trade um, the trade scenario is on the table, and a lot of times it's better to just step back right and allow the multi media scenarios play. Of course, like of course you go to n Wise, of course you go to Point Guys documentary, and you probably don't expect people to ask you about it, but they do ask you about it, and this is a time to keep the noise down, Jacoby. So clearly, Jellen Rose, who's been in many locker rooms over the course of his career, thinks that Durant and Tatum working out together and a photograph of that making the rounds on the internet could have a negative effect on, you know, Tatum's relationship with Jalen Brown. Do you look at that as being maybe a little bit too you know, micro analyzing, or do you think there's something to that. I think it's Jalen looking out for his fellow Jalen. There's a whole world of Jalen's out there now that he has to look after, since they were all named after him, and he's just understandably a little hyper sensitive to anything that might affect his fellow Jalen Jalen Brown. Uh No, this goes back to stupidity season. And I love Jalen Rose. Jalen's the best and he does great work on TV and analyzing this league. But if we have reached the point where we are now raising red flags because two NBA stars are working out together in the offseason and just there happens to be rumors of a potential trade and it might involve the like come on like that. That's not what Jalen Brown needs to be worried about, or what Jalen Rose needs to be worried out on. Jalen Brown's behalf um worry about if there are actually legitimate reports of traction and a deal because working out or not working out, Jalen Um, Jayson Tatum is not the one who gets to make that trade. That would be Brad Stevens. Kevin Durant clearly is not the one who gets to make that trade. That would be still to the chagrin of Kevin Durant, Sean Marks. So if Sean Marks and Jayson Tatum are working out together, maybe you start worrying. Uh. If Sean Marks and Brad Stevens are having a three hour dinner together in Brooklyn Heights, maybe raise some concerns about an eminent trade Kevin Durant and Jayson Tatum. Like, come on, NBA stars work out together, including rivals, work out together all the time. Now, this is uh. I hate using this phrase because for some reason, I just like the word. It just it sounds weird to me. But this is the epitome of a nothing burger. Yeah, well, you're probably right. I would say this. Well, first of all, I think if you're a Celtics fan forgetting the dynamic of a Durant trade, like you love it. If Tatum's working out with Durant, you want Tatum around one of the greatest scores ever in it's like maybe the greatest score this league has ever seen someone whose body type mirrors that of Jayson Tatum. And if Jayson Tatum can take something from Durant's game, um, that's a good thing for the Celtics. At the same time, I can understand Jalen Brown being a little miffed, and not just because of this one particular moments picture situation. But yeah, look, Jayson Tatum when he was at the premier of point guards you know, made it a point to say he loved his team, but he also did comment on Durants that I love playing with him. Blah blah blah. Um. Jalen Brown, as we've talked about before, has been the subject of trade rumors for years. It this could be, I don't want to call it, a dog on the fire, maybe a stick on the fire, something that you're talking on the campfire, kindling on the campfire of Jalen Brown that might annoy him a little bit. Of course, you're right. I mean, Jalen Brown, I'm sure is out there working out with other NBA players from different teams, has been for some of the summer, which just hasnt been photographed. It's not as high profile as Tatum and Durant working out together. But I could see it through all this. You know, you see Tatum Durant practicing together, working out together. I know they've got a long standing relationship. Tatum and Durant where teammates on the USA basketball team a couple of years ago, so there's a history there between those two. But I could see Brown being a little annoyed by that. I could, I really could. Um, It's just again, just one more little thing that threatens to burn the bridge between Brown and the Celtics, the little thing, little little thing there between the two. So I mean again I I'm I'm more leaned towards your nothing burger take on all this, but I can't see how it might irritate Jalen Brown just a bit. So that is the latest tower in the Durant Durrette saga. Hopefully this has been your Kevin Durant minute. This has been your Kevin Durant fifteen minutes. All right. The other thing I want to get to, speaking of things that get dragged out, Donovan Mitchell back in the news once again. The Athletic reporting with the Knicks and the Jazz have re engaged on trade talks between on a deal for Donovan Mitchell. Um the report was quick to say, there's nothing immitate with this, no real traction here. So it was kind of just like, I don't know. Leon Rose picked up the phone and called Justin Zanec and Utah said, Hey, how's it going on. I mean, it could be anything as far as trade talks go. I maintain, Howard, as I have all along, that the Jazz are going to get exactly what they want for Donovan Mitchell what they're going to bring him back into training camp. There is no a pressure right now on Utah to make a deal. In fact, it's probably more prudent for them to bring Mitchell to camp. Let the seasons of potential Mitchell suitors start to unfold a little bit. See what happens in New York to start the season. Maybe they don't jump out of the gate fast and they need a compliment to Jalen Brunson. Maybe Miami kind of left at the altar when it comes to free agency and trades ponies up Tyler hero and multiple first round draft picks and whatever to get um Donovan Mitchell, maybe Phoenix, somebody else, somebody we've talked about over the last couple of months. It's just it's unless you get exactly what you want right now. If you're Utah, and if I'm the Jazz, it's probably R. J. Barrett and a whole slew of draft picks. But unless you're getting that back from the Knicks, why do a deal with them now? It just makes no sense. Donovan Mitchell is not barking about not showing up to training camp. He's not threatening to hold out In fact, most of the reporting out there suggests the Mitchell for now is comfortable with the situation that he's in. And if your Utah, even if it does alienate Mitchell a little bit, it's pretty clear he's not in your long term plans. Like one way or the other, over the next three years, Donovan Mitchell is going to get moved. He's gonna get traded to a team that they hope will he'll stay with for the long term as the Jazz go into this full scale rebuild. So, yeah, I guess it's news if someone from New York dials up someone from Utah and some kind of trade proposal is exchanged, or at least the parameters of is exchanged. But I still believe that unless Utah gets its asking price met to the player to the draft pick, they're not dealing Donovan Mitchell before the start of training camp. Yeah, and look, you and I discussed this before. You know, Danny Ainge is ultimately in charge there. Obviously, Justin Zanec runs the basketball ops, but Danny Angel is very influential in in the Utah Jazz operation. Now, um and he the in' call like he does like Justin Zannick is an excellent GM. But they brought Danny Ainge in as CEO of this team for a reason. He's gonna make the final call, right. What was the running joke for the last however many years with the Celtics and Danny Age. Oh, Danny Age. You know the Celtics were this close. Danny Inge couldn't pull the trigger. Danny Ange didn't go for Kawhi Leonard or Paul George, whatever, because he wouldn't put Jalen Brown in, or he wouldn't put Marcus Marten, or he wouldn't put the picks in, or he would Yeah, guess who you're now dealing with. The guy who was able to pass on deals for Paul George, Kawhi Leonard, and who knows how many others, And it was a running joke about him being too stingy. That's the guy who's now saying, I don't have to make a deal, because Danny Age always feels like I don't have to make it the deal until it's the deal I want. And he got a ransom for Rudy Gobert, he should get a ransom for Donovan Mitchell. And he's got all the leverage in the world. I've seen some folks on Twitter, Um, I'm guessing Knicks fans who have suggested that the Knick's leverage and I understand like this rationale. The Knicks leverage is that the Jazz really want to tank for Victor wembon Yama or Scoot Henderson or whatever. They know they need a tank. They've already pulled the plug. Gobert is gone. They need to finish the tear down, and they needed to jettison Donovan Mitchell. And that's the leverage that the Knicks have as they know that Utah needs to tank. Yes and no. There are a lot of different ways to tank, and we have seen them all. If you if you start the season with Donovan Mitchell on the roster and you're winning a little bit too much, guess what you could do things about that. You can curtail his minutes. You can put him out there with crap around him. He's gonna have crap around him anyway for the most part, all due respect to the guys who are left on that roster, but it's not enough to win a lot of games. You can start having guys get hurt. You can have Donovan Mitchell himself starts sitting games with uh you know, bruised pinky like there are ways to do this with him still on the roster. There is zero urgency for the Jazz to make a trade of Donovan Mitchell, and the report today from the Athletic notes uh in like the fourth paragraph, Utah has set a high price threshold for Mitchell, who is so far believed to be comfortable with either outcome of staying with the Jazz or being traded elsewhere. So if if that's the case, and Donovan Mitchell is comfortable with it, and the Jazz are comfortable, then there isn't any urgency now that can change in our heartbeat. You and I've seen this before, to Donovan Mitchell could wake up any day between now in the season and say it's time to put the pressure on. I want out and I really want to go to New York in particular, as we've all heard for quite a while, that could happen. It could change, But as of right now, the Jazz have no urgency and the Knicks have no leverage. And the leverage you you outline an interesting scenario, Mannics. If the season starts and the Knicks just have Jalen Brunson as their only pick up and and a team that couldn't even make the play in last year. I don't think Jalen Brunson is enough to get them too far up the standings. I'm not sure that there. I don't see them even making the play in as they are constructed right now. Then they're still gonna be under the gun even if they have Donovan Mitchell because of how deep the East is. That's not a knock on the Knicks. It's just that there's a lot of really good teams in the East now. So if then if the Knicks opened the season with this roster and no Donovan Mitchell and they struggle out of the gate, guess whose leverage is increasing. Utah's Danny Aingees and they know that too. The Knicks has constructed are not a very good team. They are not a five hundred team, and the Jazz can afford to wait there. They really have no urgency. Yeah, I wondered too on the Knicks urgency now. They have not done an extension yet for R. J. Barrett, I don't think they're going to, by the way, that's just my gut. I don't have any reporting on this but yeah, I don't I don't know. I had people close to Barrett tell me shortly after season end that they thought something was gonna get done, that the early talks were had gone well enough to make them believe that something was going to get done. Now, I don't know if at this point there far apart on money. R J. Barrett is probably looking for something like a max level extension. The Knicks maybe don't want to give him that level of extension. Or I should add this to Howard, like, if you give RJ. Barrett a big extension, it makes him makes trading a little more challenging because it makes it a lot more challenging. Yeah, I mean, you do that kind of deal, and now the team you're trading him to is stuck with the exact contract that you just gave him. And maybe if you trade the Utah, maybe the Jazz will pay him what he wants to be paid. Maybe they have a different idea for how they deal with him. You know, there's just more reason if you're looking, if you're willing to put r J. Barrett in a deal, and look, Ian Begley was on this podcast a couple of weeks ago. He said nobody's off the table when it comes to a Knicks trade. Um, if you're willing to put r J. Barrett in a deal, you don't extend it, simple as that. So it could be some of that as well. Yeah, and I think that that like that legitimately, UM could be holding it up right. You're not going to give him an extension as long as you think he might be a part, a key piece in a trade for Donovan Mitchell. But this gets more complicated than that, even, which is how much does Utah value r J. Barrett? Um? Never mind that he was the number three overall pick behind Zion and Jaw a couple of years ago. When I talk to people around the league, the optimists believe that RJ. Barrett will make a couple of All Star teams over the course of his career. Those are the optimists. Everybody else says, I'm not sure he's ever making an All Star team. He's a side with the optimists. I do side with the optimist. I think that he's got a ceiling high enough to be an All Star for a few times. There's there, and I like, there's some basis for that, but there's also no one thing that he does at an elite level. That normally, when you talk about stars in this league and guys you can be consistently at that level, there's always something you can identify that they do at an elite level one thing, and there's not one thing that he does at an elite level. Now, he's still young in developing, so that may come. That's fine, but at this point in his career, he has not shown that that you can rely on that, and that's why you don't give him a MAX extension. And that's why if you're Utah, I think it's more than just about the money or whether the Knicks would extend him. I think even if you are acquiring him on his rookie deal, now you're the one who's inheriting R. J. Barrett's camp saying, look, our guys, the number three overall pick, pay him like that. And now if you're the Jazz, you're saying, well, do we think he's gonna be a multiple time All Star who can justify a max or near max contract? So that that difficulty, that that uh conundrum becomes yours. And so I'm not even convinced that Jazz would want him in a deal because I'm sure he's a decent young talent, but he's not a guaranteed star, and he's gonna want star money the second you acquire him, if it hasn't already been extended. So um And like I said, like opinions around league on R. J. Barrett are kind of soft. Like like I said, even the optimist, if you say he's gonna make a couple of All Star teams, that's not a ringing endorsement of his of his trajectory. Um. And most people feel like, yeah, he's he's probably the guy you want to be your fourth best player, and they like him. Nobody's bagging on him. They're just saying that the ceiling is lower than you would have thought for a guy who's taken third overall. Um, it happens. But because of that, because the way that the league I think sees him, I think it makes it more difficult to make him a key piece in the trade, because, yes, that extension is looming, and he's gonna want max money or near max money that a lot of teams probably don't believe is justified. Well, the good news hour is that when we reconvene to do this podcast next this will probably still be a topic because I don't desarily happening between the Knicks and everything we just discussed will still be a topic. The latest Kevin Durant tweet. Hopefully we have a little bit more substantial things to talk about as we get close to training camp, close to the start of the NBA season. By the way, UM, you're speaking to uh schedule makers this week on the Friday version of the podcast. That correct? Yeah, everybody, for the people who love the schedule, all my fellow schedule nerds out there, and I know there are a lot of you out there. Uh. The scheduling czars Tom Correlli, Evan wash and joined by a third star this year, uh Gene Lee from the League Office. The three of them will be joining me on the Friday Pod to break down all the highlights, all the intrigue, all the conspiracy theories, all the grievances, everything on the Friday Crossover. So don't miss that. Can you have three czars? I thought like bar was singular. I'm I'm like some some historians, some political historians going to like stewer me at some point for my my uh generous bestowing of that title on multiple people at once. But yeah, fine, it's as far as I'm concerned on on this podcast, I get to make anybody as are fair enough and shout out to the NBA. And the schedule makes for uh making the election day and off day. I love that absolutely. I personally believe it should be And this is not political. I think election Day should be a federal holiday so everybody can vote. Like, you should be able to have a day your representative democracy. You should be able to have a day completely off everybody votes. The number of days we have off for other things, Um, we can do election day off as well. Good for the NBA for and look, this has not meant so much for the players. That is, the staffers and people that work all day on game days that may not have an opportunity to go and vote. Very cool by the NBA to do that. Very cool by the NBA. And also they're having all thirty teams play the day before election day and using that as a platform to then promote voter engagement and civic engagement and so like. That part of it is great too. So kudos to the NBA for all of that. Congress should take note. All right, Well, if you are a scheduled. Nerd tune in on Friday for the Friday version of the podcast from Howard Beck. Howard, we'll do it again, not next week, but very soon. Always a pleasure of my friends. See you in September. M hm hm

This is the Crossover and NBA show hosted by Sports Illustrated. It's Chris Mannox and Howard Back. It's a whole new level for you and me. Chris, this relationship, I can subscribe for the best weekly NBA content. These two are capable of what did that mean? Could be the best duo ever. I'll see how you can beat that. Here they are Chris Mannix and Howard Back, and we are back Crossover NBA podcast, Chris Mannox and Howard Beck and Howard we have officially entered the dog days of summer when it comes to NBA content and frankly content in general. Um, you made this point right before we came out to record, and it was that, you know, during the day on one of the debate shows, there was a lot of chatter, maybe too much chatter about the dunk that Lebron James' son had in a high school tournament. So like, if you could, if you need to squeeze fifteen minutes out of something Brawny James does to fill time on a nationally televised show, Uh, you're struggling for content right there. That's that's for sure. I don't know what's beyond silly season, stupid seat, stupidity season, in anity season, uh, desperation season, whatever it is, that's where we are. Um. I kind of thought we'd already reached a couple of weeks ago, because even you and I have had to rehash Kevin Durant um multiple times, and we're gonna do it again today. But at least we have a little bit of new stuff to talk about too. But I mean, again, I don't remember if I said this last week or not. It is the strangest of phenomena that we have simultaneously an off season in which we might have four all stars traded Durant, Kyrie, Irving, Russell Westbrook, Donovan, Mitchell, and and then we will look back on it as one of the most momentous or or one of the most you know, just active at at a high level off seasons. But to date, we got nothing to date, like almost nothing has happened except speculation, rehash, rumor, whispers, spin and then nothing. It What's what's really happened so far this offseason? There's a whole lot of nothing. A whole lot of nothing is right, but always just enough to fill time on a podcast and just enough to be mildly interesting. And we will start with one Kevin Durant, who has been at the center of all the speculation about player movement this offseason. Nothing tangible howard to report when it comes to Kevin Durant, other than, for the first time since this whole saga began, Durant directly addressed UH something that has been written about his future, specifically the idea UH that he could retire rather than play for the Nets. This was something that Mark Stein, our friend who writes over as sub Stack, floated UH. He quoted a league executive um suggesting that Durant responded on social media saying, you know, effectively saying, there's no chance that I'm going to retire, and I don't think anyone, including our friend Mark Stein, believes that Durant would ever retire. He's going to be thirty four years old next month, He's got four years at close to two million dollars remaining of his contract, and he loves to play basketball, so he's not gonna walk away from the game when he's still playing at the highest of levels, regardless of the situation that he's in. But it did make my ears perk up Howard, because look, Durant is on Twitter constantly. He's clapping back at Stevo six to four, who is like criticizing for something. You know, I don't know why he does it, but he consistently has been doing it. He has not shot down any of the reporting up to this point, really, you know, from the trade demand to the meeting with Joe si the owner of the nets in London, to what reportedly was asked or talked about during that meeting, specifically the jettison of Sean Marks and Steve Nash. This was the first time that Kevin Durant spoke out on this, uh, this topic. What did you make of that? So it's funny because one, this is like a bad game of telephone, the thing you used to play in like you know, kindergarten, where stuff gets distorted along the way. And there was some really bad aggregation out there of Mark Stein's piece. It's I wouldn't even call it necessarily reporting. Stein wasn't reporting that Kevin Durant will retire if he doesn't get traded. What he wrote was, and I'll read from the top of his sub steck which I'm subscribed to encourage you all to do the same. UM, as long as you first subscribed to SI dot com, of course. But Stein wrote during Summer League in Las Vegas, one of the most well connected team executives I speak to regularly insistent to me that, based on what he was here, Kevin Durant was more apt to retire than play again for the Brooklyn Nets. This was an early July. And then Stein goes on to say that he himself was highly skeptical of that and said as much to this executive. But it's not somebody saying Kevin Durant will, he's saying more apt to retire than play. It's almost like the hyperboles baked in, like he's so adamant about not playing for the Nets, I could see him retiring rather than go back. But that's not the same as saying that Kevin Durant intends to do this. So Stein wrote it fine like that, there's there's nothing in the way that he wrote it that was. But then it got distorted, as these things often do in our social media age. And so then Kevin Durant takes to Twitter to debunk something that didn't need debunking. UM says, I know most people will believe unnamed sources over me. But if it's anyone out there that will listen, I don't plan on retiring anytime soon. Shit is comical at this point. Okay, fine, Kadi, but that's not what mark Stein wrote, and he probably didn't read it. I'm guessing that Katie does not actually have a substep subscription to mark Stein. But you should, Kevin, he does really good stuff. Um So, then Tommy Beer, our good friend, weighs in and and they have a really interesting back and forth for a while, perhaps to Tommy Beer for engaging Katie on this and Katie deciding to to keep responding that. Then he's accusing fans of media saying we want to lock out, which is also ridiculous. Like I, this says more about the media age that we're in and the amount of noise out there and the way that people hear things and interpret things than it does about anything else. I don't think Kevin Durant actually revealed anything to us today with this. Um and you said it, Chris, like he for all the tweets he put out today sort of stemming from his trade demand, he never actually addresses any of the fundamentals about what he wants, does he want out? Does he wanted to bunk anything about the trade demand or about wanting Steve Nash and Shawn Marks fired? Where does he want to go? Would he would show up to like that? All the things that we most need to know from Kevin Durant, we're not addressed, and I'm not expecting that they would be. I'm not you know that that's unreasonable. But at the end, like a lot of stuff this summer, it's eventually just a whole on nothing. Yeah, it just did strike me as interesting that this was what Kevin Durant chose to respond to end up to piggyback on something you just said. There. I can speak for myself, and I think I can speak for you here. I don't want to cover a lockout. I did that that. No, I'm good staying at you know, outside in the lobby of a hotel or outside just on the street hard pass, No, thank you. I'd rather cover uh an entire season's worth of Orlando Magic games this year. Sorry, Orlando. I might choose a lockout over that. No, no, not no, that call. Maybe Houston Rockets games might be. I had some nights that I was kind of like punched, drunk up too late, eating bad pizza, and like at the Waldorf Historia that was actually more amusing than most of what the magic things got done, where guys would come down, most of them would largely ignore us and and you know, we get a little nugget. Uh. The most intriguing moment of what was that now is the two thousand eleven might getting that level lockout? Was all of us getting called in. Was it three in the morning when they made the deal at the last second and sitting across the table from Stern and Billy Hunter and Derek Fisher, was there a handful of others and just bleary eyed wondering, Um, yeah, I don't I don't need to do that. But I don't know, Like where Kevin Durant got it in his head that there are people in the media or fans of cheering for a lockout, people speculating about and I think it's he's taking it personally because people are saying it is maneuvers like Kevin Durance where he's trying to force a trade with four years left on his deal on an extension that he just signed a year ago. That issues like or instances like that and Ben Simmons doing something similar that those are the kind of things that are going to lead to players and owners having a big clash at the bargaining table and therefore potentially a lockout. Saying that, speculating that that's a possibility is not nearly the same as wanting it, cheering for it, or predicting it. It's just simply saying this is some stuff that's really gonna be difficult for the league. Owners and gms certainly are not happy about this emerging trend or or accelerating trend. And that's an issue. Of course, it's an issue. Doesn't mean the biggest the biggest issue, Howard, The biggest issue is like owners and gms have become soft, like just like I mean twenty years ago. Like if this situation came up twenty years ago, I know we're going down a different pathway here, But if the situation came up twenty years ago, like I feel like the pat riley of yesteryear would tell player X to just go bleep and play and not even entertain the possibility of trading a marquee player with four years left in his contract. It just wouldn't it, really wouldn't occur to two gms of that day age now because of social media, the sensitivities of it all, and just it's gone too far. And I blame more the owners and the GMS that I do this player empowerment fend. You know, guys exercising their leverage. I feel like they if they have a contract a GM can say play or don't, don't get paid, simple as that. Like, everybody's so concerned with, like keeping this fragile balance intact of having all happy guys in the locker room. Everybde's gonna be happy in the locker room to have any kind of team success. That hasn't always been the case, Howard, And you know it, Like there's been plenty of teams with guys that didn't like each other on there were guys didn't want to be there and had success. I mean you covered the Kobe and Shack years. Towards the end they had success. Um. I don't think it's necessary to have everybody singing the Lego song. Everything is awesome. Um, when you're taking the court with your team, it's phenomenal reference. By the way, that should be substituted for any time somebody wants to say everybody getting together singing Kumbaya, Like that's way too old a reference. Now, it should just be the Lego song. I'm in favor of that. Listen, Like, you're right on some level, but things have changed. The power dynamics have changed, and yeah, it'd be nice if if teams could just stand their ground. But we know that there is a reality that with players with the amount of power that they have now, with the money that they make, with their ability to to change teams um more often because of of shorter contracts and free agency, like, everything is just different. And I don't know there's any easy answer to that, but we just have to acknowledge that things have changed a little and I don't know there's any single thing that the teams can do short of some new wrinkle in the c B A. And that's where this speculation about a potential lockout comes. I will say this, and I agree with Kevin Durant wholeheartedly on this point. I think he made this point in his back and forth with Tommy Beer that people everybody's making too much money and that to to to have a lockout, which is true, like they're gonna across the ten billion dollar threshold this coming season. Um, that's up from I think it was eight billion as recently as a couple of years ago. Like this league, as as much consternation as there is, and I think legitimately is by teams, especially smaller market teams, but maybe all teams, about this trend of superstars forcing their way out with multiple years left on their contracts. You're not shutting down the league over that. You only do lockouts and actual shutdowns and actually lost games when it's financial concerns, and they do not have any financial concerns right now. Between the money that they're generating, the split with players that's down from fifty seven for the player for the players as recently as whatever eleven years ago before that lockout, Between all that and the revenue sharing that they have, there is no basis, no legitimate reason that they would shut down just to try to solve superstar empowerment or superstars forcing trades like I think that's far fetched. I think they'll let that issue go as long as they're still making, you know, just just just generating money like a machine, and they are, so I don't I don't think that will happen. I'm not and who's who thinks that there will be some sort of shutdown because of that, But it is a serious concern for the league alright. One of the other subplots that emerged this week to the Kevin Durant saga is that there was some photos taken of Durant and Jayson Tatum working out I believe somewhere in southern californiacent sure on that, but they're working out together, uh, at a gym. This all happening in with the backdrop of Durant being rumored to be a target of the Boston Celtics. And if you know, we talked about this last week, if you really parse it down and look at the most prime candidates to land Durant, Boston would have to be at the top of the list. Um. I want to play something that Jalen Rose from ESPN, longtime NBA player, Um. Something he said about the ripple effects of this picture being taken. There's in theory, quote unquote, nothing to be said to watch them be in the gym. But the one thing you have to be conscious of is the other fourteen guys that you leave. And you gotta always think about what is Jalen Brown going to say if he sees me working out with k D knowing that the trade um, the trade scenario is on the table, and a lot of times it's better to just step back right and allow the multi media scenarios play. Of course, like of course you go to n Wise, of course you go to Point Guys documentary, and you probably don't expect people to ask you about it, but they do ask you about it, and this is a time to keep the noise down, Jacoby. So clearly, Jellen Rose, who's been in many locker rooms over the course of his career, thinks that Durant and Tatum working out together and a photograph of that making the rounds on the internet could have a negative effect on, you know, Tatum's relationship with Jalen Brown. Do you look at that as being maybe a little bit too you know, micro analyzing, or do you think there's something to that. I think it's Jalen looking out for his fellow Jalen. There's a whole world of Jalen's out there now that he has to look after, since they were all named after him, and he's just understandably a little hyper sensitive to anything that might affect his fellow Jalen Jalen Brown. Uh No, this goes back to stupidity season. And I love Jalen Rose. Jalen's the best and he does great work on TV and analyzing this league. But if we have reached the point where we are now raising red flags because two NBA stars are working out together in the offseason and just there happens to be rumors of a potential trade and it might involve the like come on like that. That's not what Jalen Brown needs to be worried about, or what Jalen Rose needs to be worried out on. Jalen Brown's behalf um worry about if there are actually legitimate reports of traction and a deal because working out or not working out, Jalen Um, Jayson Tatum is not the one who gets to make that trade. That would be Brad Stevens. Kevin Durant clearly is not the one who gets to make that trade. That would be still to the chagrin of Kevin Durant, Sean Marks. So if Sean Marks and Jayson Tatum are working out together, maybe you start worrying. Uh. If Sean Marks and Brad Stevens are having a three hour dinner together in Brooklyn Heights, maybe raise some concerns about an eminent trade Kevin Durant and Jayson Tatum. Like, come on, NBA stars work out together, including rivals, work out together all the time. Now, this is uh. I hate using this phrase because for some reason, I just like the word. It just it sounds weird to me. But this is the epitome of a nothing burger. Yeah, well, you're probably right. I would say this. Well, first of all, I think if you're a Celtics fan forgetting the dynamic of a Durant trade, like you love it. If Tatum's working out with Durant, you want Tatum around one of the greatest scores ever in it's like maybe the greatest score this league has ever seen someone whose body type mirrors that of Jayson Tatum. And if Jayson Tatum can take something from Durant's game, um, that's a good thing for the Celtics. At the same time, I can understand Jalen Brown being a little miffed, and not just because of this one particular moments picture situation. But yeah, look, Jayson Tatum when he was at the premier of point guards you know, made it a point to say he loved his team, but he also did comment on Durants that I love playing with him. Blah blah blah. Um. Jalen Brown, as we've talked about before, has been the subject of trade rumors for years. It this could be, I don't want to call it, a dog on the fire, maybe a stick on the fire, something that you're talking on the campfire, kindling on the campfire of Jalen Brown that might annoy him a little bit. Of course, you're right. I mean, Jalen Brown, I'm sure is out there working out with other NBA players from different teams, has been for some of the summer, which just hasnt been photographed. It's not as high profile as Tatum and Durant working out together. But I could see it through all this. You know, you see Tatum Durant practicing together, working out together. I know they've got a long standing relationship. Tatum and Durant where teammates on the USA basketball team a couple of years ago, so there's a history there between those two. But I could see Brown being a little annoyed by that. I could, I really could. Um, It's just again, just one more little thing that threatens to burn the bridge between Brown and the Celtics, the little thing, little little thing there between the two. So I mean again I I'm I'm more leaned towards your nothing burger take on all this, but I can't see how it might irritate Jalen Brown just a bit. So that is the latest tower in the Durant Durrette saga. Hopefully this has been your Kevin Durant minute. This has been your Kevin Durant fifteen minutes. All right. The other thing I want to get to, speaking of things that get dragged out, Donovan Mitchell back in the news once again. The Athletic reporting with the Knicks and the Jazz have re engaged on trade talks between on a deal for Donovan Mitchell. Um the report was quick to say, there's nothing immitate with this, no real traction here. So it was kind of just like, I don't know. Leon Rose picked up the phone and called Justin Zanec and Utah said, Hey, how's it going on. I mean, it could be anything as far as trade talks go. I maintain, Howard, as I have all along, that the Jazz are going to get exactly what they want for Donovan Mitchell what they're going to bring him back into training camp. There is no a pressure right now on Utah to make a deal. In fact, it's probably more prudent for them to bring Mitchell to camp. Let the seasons of potential Mitchell suitors start to unfold a little bit. See what happens in New York to start the season. Maybe they don't jump out of the gate fast and they need a compliment to Jalen Brunson. Maybe Miami kind of left at the altar when it comes to free agency and trades ponies up Tyler hero and multiple first round draft picks and whatever to get um Donovan Mitchell, maybe Phoenix, somebody else, somebody we've talked about over the last couple of months. It's just it's unless you get exactly what you want right now. If you're Utah, and if I'm the Jazz, it's probably R. J. Barrett and a whole slew of draft picks. But unless you're getting that back from the Knicks, why do a deal with them now? It just makes no sense. Donovan Mitchell is not barking about not showing up to training camp. He's not threatening to hold out In fact, most of the reporting out there suggests the Mitchell for now is comfortable with the situation that he's in. And if your Utah, even if it does alienate Mitchell a little bit, it's pretty clear he's not in your long term plans. Like one way or the other, over the next three years, Donovan Mitchell is going to get moved. He's gonna get traded to a team that they hope will he'll stay with for the long term as the Jazz go into this full scale rebuild. So, yeah, I guess it's news if someone from New York dials up someone from Utah and some kind of trade proposal is exchanged, or at least the parameters of is exchanged. But I still believe that unless Utah gets its asking price met to the player to the draft pick, they're not dealing Donovan Mitchell before the start of training camp. Yeah, and look, you and I discussed this before. You know, Danny Ainge is ultimately in charge there. Obviously, Justin Zanec runs the basketball ops, but Danny Angel is very influential in in the Utah Jazz operation. Now, um and he the in' call like he does like Justin Zannick is an excellent GM. But they brought Danny Ainge in as CEO of this team for a reason. He's gonna make the final call, right. What was the running joke for the last however many years with the Celtics and Danny Age. Oh, Danny Age. You know the Celtics were this close. Danny Inge couldn't pull the trigger. Danny Ange didn't go for Kawhi Leonard or Paul George, whatever, because he wouldn't put Jalen Brown in, or he wouldn't put Marcus Marten, or he wouldn't put the picks in, or he would Yeah, guess who you're now dealing with. The guy who was able to pass on deals for Paul George, Kawhi Leonard, and who knows how many others, And it was a running joke about him being too stingy. That's the guy who's now saying, I don't have to make a deal, because Danny Age always feels like I don't have to make it the deal until it's the deal I want. And he got a ransom for Rudy Gobert, he should get a ransom for Donovan Mitchell. And he's got all the leverage in the world. I've seen some folks on Twitter, Um, I'm guessing Knicks fans who have suggested that the Knick's leverage and I understand like this rationale. The Knicks leverage is that the Jazz really want to tank for Victor wembon Yama or Scoot Henderson or whatever. They know they need a tank. They've already pulled the plug. Gobert is gone. They need to finish the tear down, and they needed to jettison Donovan Mitchell. And that's the leverage that the Knicks have as they know that Utah needs to tank. Yes and no. There are a lot of different ways to tank, and we have seen them all. If you if you start the season with Donovan Mitchell on the roster and you're winning a little bit too much, guess what you could do things about that. You can curtail his minutes. You can put him out there with crap around him. He's gonna have crap around him anyway for the most part, all due respect to the guys who are left on that roster, but it's not enough to win a lot of games. You can start having guys get hurt. You can have Donovan Mitchell himself starts sitting games with uh you know, bruised pinky like there are ways to do this with him still on the roster. There is zero urgency for the Jazz to make a trade of Donovan Mitchell, and the report today from the Athletic notes uh in like the fourth paragraph, Utah has set a high price threshold for Mitchell, who is so far believed to be comfortable with either outcome of staying with the Jazz or being traded elsewhere. So if if that's the case, and Donovan Mitchell is comfortable with it, and the Jazz are comfortable, then there isn't any urgency now that can change in our heartbeat. You and I've seen this before, to Donovan Mitchell could wake up any day between now in the season and say it's time to put the pressure on. I want out and I really want to go to New York in particular, as we've all heard for quite a while, that could happen. It could change, But as of right now, the Jazz have no urgency and the Knicks have no leverage. And the leverage you you outline an interesting scenario, Mannics. If the season starts and the Knicks just have Jalen Brunson as their only pick up and and a team that couldn't even make the play in last year. I don't think Jalen Brunson is enough to get them too far up the standings. I'm not sure that there. I don't see them even making the play in as they are constructed right now. Then they're still gonna be under the gun even if they have Donovan Mitchell because of how deep the East is. That's not a knock on the Knicks. It's just that there's a lot of really good teams in the East now. So if then if the Knicks opened the season with this roster and no Donovan Mitchell and they struggle out of the gate, guess whose leverage is increasing. Utah's Danny Aingees and they know that too. The Knicks has constructed are not a very good team. They are not a five hundred team, and the Jazz can afford to wait there. They really have no urgency. Yeah, I wondered too on the Knicks urgency now. They have not done an extension yet for R. J. Barrett, I don't think they're going to, by the way, that's just my gut. I don't have any reporting on this but yeah, I don't I don't know. I had people close to Barrett tell me shortly after season end that they thought something was gonna get done, that the early talks were had gone well enough to make them believe that something was going to get done. Now, I don't know if at this point there far apart on money. R J. Barrett is probably looking for something like a max level extension. The Knicks maybe don't want to give him that level of extension. Or I should add this to Howard, like, if you give RJ. Barrett a big extension, it makes him makes trading a little more challenging because it makes it a lot more challenging. Yeah, I mean, you do that kind of deal, and now the team you're trading him to is stuck with the exact contract that you just gave him. And maybe if you trade the Utah, maybe the Jazz will pay him what he wants to be paid. Maybe they have a different idea for how they deal with him. You know, there's just more reason if you're looking, if you're willing to put r J. Barrett in a deal, and look, Ian Begley was on this podcast a couple of weeks ago. He said nobody's off the table when it comes to a Knicks trade. Um, if you're willing to put r J. Barrett in a deal, you don't extend it, simple as that. So it could be some of that as well. Yeah, and I think that that like that legitimately, UM could be holding it up right. You're not going to give him an extension as long as you think he might be a part, a key piece in a trade for Donovan Mitchell. But this gets more complicated than that, even, which is how much does Utah value r J. Barrett? Um? Never mind that he was the number three overall pick behind Zion and Jaw a couple of years ago. When I talk to people around the league, the optimists believe that RJ. Barrett will make a couple of All Star teams over the course of his career. Those are the optimists. Everybody else says, I'm not sure he's ever making an All Star team. He's a side with the optimists. I do side with the optimist. I think that he's got a ceiling high enough to be an All Star for a few times. There's there, and I like, there's some basis for that, but there's also no one thing that he does at an elite level. That normally, when you talk about stars in this league and guys you can be consistently at that level, there's always something you can identify that they do at an elite level one thing, and there's not one thing that he does at an elite level. Now, he's still young in developing, so that may come. That's fine, but at this point in his career, he has not shown that that you can rely on that, and that's why you don't give him a MAX extension. And that's why if you're Utah, I think it's more than just about the money or whether the Knicks would extend him. I think even if you are acquiring him on his rookie deal, now you're the one who's inheriting R. J. Barrett's camp saying, look, our guys, the number three overall pick, pay him like that. And now if you're the Jazz, you're saying, well, do we think he's gonna be a multiple time All Star who can justify a max or near max contract? So that that difficulty, that that uh conundrum becomes yours. And so I'm not even convinced that Jazz would want him in a deal because I'm sure he's a decent young talent, but he's not a guaranteed star, and he's gonna want star money the second you acquire him, if it hasn't already been extended. So um And like I said, like opinions around league on R. J. Barrett are kind of soft. Like like I said, even the optimist, if you say he's gonna make a couple of All Star teams, that's not a ringing endorsement of his of his trajectory. Um. And most people feel like, yeah, he's he's probably the guy you want to be your fourth best player, and they like him. Nobody's bagging on him. They're just saying that the ceiling is lower than you would have thought for a guy who's taken third overall. Um, it happens. But because of that, because the way that the league I think sees him, I think it makes it more difficult to make him a key piece in the trade, because, yes, that extension is looming, and he's gonna want max money or near max money that a lot of teams probably don't believe is justified. Well, the good news hour is that when we reconvene to do this podcast next this will probably still be a topic because I don't desarily happening between the Knicks and everything we just discussed will still be a topic. The latest Kevin Durant tweet. Hopefully we have a little bit more substantial things to talk about as we get close to training camp, close to the start of the NBA season. By the way, UM, you're speaking to uh schedule makers this week on the Friday version of the podcast. That correct? Yeah, everybody, for the people who love the schedule, all my fellow schedule nerds out there, and I know there are a lot of you out there. Uh. The scheduling czars Tom Correlli, Evan wash and joined by a third star this year, uh Gene Lee from the League Office. The three of them will be joining me on the Friday Pod to break down all the highlights, all the intrigue, all the conspiracy theories, all the grievances, everything on the Friday Crossover. So don't miss that. Can you have three czars? I thought like bar was singular. I'm I'm like some some historians, some political historians going to like stewer me at some point for my my uh generous bestowing of that title on multiple people at once. But yeah, fine, it's as far as I'm concerned on on this podcast, I get to make anybody as are fair enough and shout out to the NBA. And the schedule makes for uh making the election day and off day. I love that absolutely. I personally believe it should be And this is not political. I think election Day should be a federal holiday so everybody can vote. Like, you should be able to have a day your representative democracy. You should be able to have a day completely off everybody votes. The number of days we have off for other things, Um, we can do election day off as well. Good for the NBA for and look, this has not meant so much for the players. That is, the staffers and people that work all day on game days that may not have an opportunity to go and vote. Very cool by the NBA to do that. Very cool by the NBA. And also they're having all thirty teams play the day before election day and using that as a platform to then promote voter engagement and civic engagement and so like. That part of it is great too. So kudos to the NBA for all of that. Congress should take note. All right, Well, if you are a scheduled. Nerd tune in on Friday for the Friday version of the podcast from Howard Beck. Howard, we'll do it again, not next week, but very soon. Always a pleasure of my friends. See you in September. M hm hm