What up. It's the Crossover Pod Friday edition. Now we'd beck so you're writer for Sports Illustrated. We have reached the mathematical midpoint of the season, not to be confused with false false midpoints, mythical midpoints, all Star break midpoints, not a midpoint the All Star break. I just did the math sev of the NBA season will be over by the time players head to Salt Lake City next month for the All Star breaks. So we're at the actual midpoint, which seemed like a good time to bring my friend Zack Low on the pod to discuss all we've seen in the first half of the season, what surprised us, what we were wrong about, what we were expecting, and oh yeah, what the heck is going on with all the individuals scoring binges, not just Donovan Mitchell's seventy one point explosion, but all the fifties, the forties, um. Something going on. We have theories. This is the second piece part of a Home and Home with Zach So if you missed it, you can hear us on his podcast The Low Post earlier this week, So go check that out if you haven't already. Before we get to the back end of the back to back quick reminder, Please rate, review, subscribe to The Crossover wherever you get your podcasts. You got feedback for me, please hit me on Twitter at Howard Beck. Okay, my conversation with Zach Lowe is coming up next, so stick around. 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 does that mean? Could be the best duo ever. I'll see how you can beat that. Here they are Chris mann X and Howard Back. Now please to be joined for the first time on this podcast. Big Welcome to Zach low Zach, how are you, sir? Yeah? I can't. I can't keep past. If you keep track, if you're like revolving podcast career, you're you're like the if you're like the Ish Smith of podcasts, just there, just jumping around from podcast So I can't keep tracking the titles. I haven't appeared on this one. I've appeared on every other one. I don't know what the hell is going on. I think this is literally the only the second one that I've had a hosting or co hosting role on. It just feels like a lot more. Um. I am still drinking from my full forty eight mug here as you can see, um my full forty coffee mug. It's um. Here's the thing I did. I did my bad Zach Low impression to introduce you, as I've done before on previous podcasts, where I try to do the welcome to and the pause, and then two things hit me. One is am I infringing on a trademark? Because the first thing that everybody asked me all the time, because they always ask about you. I just want to know about Zach Low? But I get hit with the what up back every time, and they say, can I do that? Is it is that allowed? Is there a charge? Is there a fee? Do I owe royalties to Zach Low? I can't remember if we've cleared this up before. Can you clear that up? For anybody who wants to invoke the phrase open source, baby, it's all for everybody. It's all for the people. I don't want any red tape. I want innovation, creative ideas, steal it all. That's fine with me, You've always been a man of the people. And then how cringe e is it when I try to replicate the dramatic zach lopause when I welcome you too, which was which was an accidental thing that happened on like my first couple episodes, maybe my first one all those years ago, when David Jacoby, god bless him, forced me to have a podcast against my will. Um, it's it's I think you do all right. It's like, look, I mean not everybody can do these things. You know, some people are just born with stupid random talents and and other and other things. Well, you explained why was it an accident? Did he say you just you need some sort of actual opening line and you this was just the thing that happened or no, I think I didn't know what the opening line should be, and I probably said welcome and then there was some awkwardness where I was like, what do I do now? How do I continue a pig? And then it just became a thing you have made an awkward pause, an actual uh like go to wonderful gimmick. That's that's that's phenomenal. I was a little worried the other day because when you did it. We're completing the home and home of our podcast this week. Um, but people should go check out the low post if you haven't already from a few days ago. Um, it sounds like you strained a little bit. And I sometimes do wonder in listening to the pod if you've ever actually like strained of vocal cord, because sometimes you're just you're you're really going all in on the Uh. The emphasis on the welcome to it sounds like like it's strange. No, but I have, UM, I have injured myself in other mundane ways, the most recent of which was a few months ago and I got my second booster. Um, I'm now because my wife told me to do this, and she's right. I'm now an expert helicopter you know with it with the shot arm. You got a helicopter so they you minimized the soreness. And I was helicoptering so aggressively that I pulled something in my mid section area from the helicoptering, and I was like, this is just a sad state of affairs. Wow, welcome to middle age, my friend. This is what happens. Sometimes it's only gonna get worse. I've been sadly it does. Sometimes I wake up and I'm like, man, I feel like I pulled a rib. What did I do yesterday? I could have possibly pull I have no idea. It's it's just middle age. It sucks. Um. Since we last podcasted mere days ago, Um, we had noted the next twelve game winning streak. You had noted that Ben Simmons had not made a free throws November twenty and lo and behold, the next winning streak is over since we last parted, and Ben Simmons made a free throw that night. Causation correlation, I don't know. Maybe maybe Ben Simmons not shooting free throws or making them was a good thing. Yeah. The Bulls continue to just have the strangest season where they beat all the good teams and least to all the bad teams. And they had a really nice win over Brooklyn last night at home, got a career game from Pat Williams, I would assumed, who played really well. And Ben Simmons was one of four at the foul line. Um one of four, So that's I guess. The four is good, the one is bad. That's the first one since November and it is now January five. So that has been the only red flag to me about the next complete dominance of the NBA over the last month. And I said to you the other day like that the next team of the last month, like this is a championship contender, Like we can sit here and say that we don't trust it, and and and and um and wait for the anvil to drop from the sky, because something always it's always something with them. But like this isn't just oh, look they've stabilized. That's cute. This is like, oh, and the only red flag has been We've seen it in the playoffs with Simmons. I'm having Kevin Herder on my podcast later today, and I rewatched parts of that game seven between the Hall and the Sixers because that was the past game, but it was also the Kevin Herder game. I was like, I want to kind of rewatch some of Herders shots and I want to see where he was when Simmons passed him at his stables, Like did he see it? What was his reaction? Um? And So we've seen it in the playoffs before, and you know what's gonna happen. There's gonna be hacker Simmons. There's gonna be Simmons catches the ball under the rim Simmons and transition like maybe it doesn't matter because Katie and Kyrie are so good, but like against the very very best teams, it's it's gonna matter. Yeah, UM, no question. I wanted to think, so I I sent you a list of of uh topics ideas for us to discuss today as we do for these things. UM. I did not send you this one because I figured, I know the one thing you hate talking about the most is yourself. But I wanted to do one quick little aside here before we jump in, um, having reread your last ten things column, and when we're recording this on a Thursday, so your next time things will be out by the time this this pops. People are very orious about your process, and I know a little bit about it, and you and I've discussed it at times over the years. But I and I might have hit this on one of my last seventeen podcasts that you believe I had, even though I only had I believe one the full forty eight. Um, that is that actually true? I'm pretty sure, I'm pretty sure I'm remembering this correctly. Yes, Uh, my podcasting career not that long, uh, not not as long as glorious as yours. UM. So there's you give the impression, and I think this is a very positive impression. You get the impression reading your stuff, reading your tweets, reading your stories that uh that you you uh. And I can see your your your pod studio there. I do not see any screens behind you, but I get the impression that somewhere else in that room there are actually like twenty TV screens, all of them split into quadrants, so that you can watch every basketball game that's happening at all times, that not being the case. What is the typical week? How many hours? How many games? How often are you watching the next morning? I know you do. You'll tweet sometimes oh rewatching Wizard's Pacers for some reason. UM, And just notice this, like, how how much are you putting in UM in the course of an average day, an average week. I don't so I don't do those tweets anymore because I've disengaged from Twitter to the point that it's strictly a reading and link tool for me. UM. I don't know how many hours a week I work because it just feels like with with some exceptions where I put my phone away and play with my daughter. It just feels like it's sort of an ongoing, constant thing. Um. In terms of game watching, I think I've said to you before my religion such as I have one is two games a day, um, start to garbage time. Two games a day. I rarely, rarely, rarely miss that. Even if I have like a night event that vaporizes my whole night, the work event, um, I will try to make up for at least watch a game and a half the next morning. Uh. Sometimes I get to three. Sometimes I get to two and a half. But I do not. I have one TV in my office, um, and I am just not one of those people who can do the multiple games. I don't know if it's because I'm not My brain doesn't work that way. I need to focus on one thing and what it's. It's actually I'm like that way across all all life skills. Like I will literally be chopping an onion and my wife will say, hey, what about like planning a trip or like some some sort of like who's picking up our daughter from this and whatever? And I'll be like, honey, I can't have this conversation with you because I'm chopping an onion. It should be like you literally can't have a conversation because you're doing like I can't. I can't multitask, so I I just can't do it. I'm in capable of doing it. It's infuriating for her. But I just I watched one game at a time. I don't tweet during the game. I'll text during games because people will text me. But I just watched one game at a time. That's it. That's all I can digest. And like, that's why it's all very boring. People ask me about my process, and I'm like, it's really kind of just boring. Like I just work, I focus and work as hard as I can. UM, but you're you're definitely trying to get it would seem to me in part because you're doing the ten things column, which requires you to have and also just your job in general. You you you have to have a feel for all thirty teams at all times. I cannot do it to the extent that you do. It's something I greatly admire and envy. UM. I'm also kind of a d h D and so when I'm watching a game, especially if it gets a little bit draggy, and I look at the app and I see that there's another game that's closer, it's in the fourth quarter. I'm constantly doing the click around watching the last five minutes of a bunch of close games. I'm terrible that way. And so I also get sucked into the trap of, well, oh wait, the Warriors are on again. I want to see what's going on with them, or what the Celtics are doing, or what Luca is doing, or what Yokich is doing. And so I I'm some teams just fall off the map. Um. So that's the other thing. It seems like you you you make it a point to over the course of any seven day span, if it's only two games a night, only two games a night, um, you're you're definitely hitting a lot of them. UM. I also know this because we've sat next to week other, uh, particularly at Barclay Center for NETS games. Occasionally the game you're there's the game on the court, and then there's the game that's on on your laptop. Often uh to two things I know about Zach load during games One, there will be another game on on the laptop while there's a game on the court. To do not bother Zach load and of course of a game, Zach is concentrating, just as he is when he's chopping onions. Apparently, well that's I get. Does that count as multitasking? Because if I'm at a game. The thing about being at a game, it's super exciting, it's wonderful to see it live. But there's three minute commercial break, fifteen minute a halftime. Uh, this is stupid official review for no reason. Whether this should be a take foul or not. That takes six minutes. You add all that up, all that dead time. I can get another game and knock it out while I'm at the game, and then on my car ride home, if I'm taking a uber or a cab or something, I can sit in the backseat, dial up my WiFi and watch like part of a third game. It's just it's my whole life is just really actually sad. It's just about time management. That's the only the governing thing going through my brain at all times as time management. So that's why I don't That's why I watch a game during the games, and that's why when people say hello to me, I'm just like hello, and then I put my The headphones are the ultimate weapon for solitude, just put the headphones on Wave and continue watching Wizards, Magic. And I do watch every team. I've seen the last two Thunder games because it's like, I think it's important aid that fans in those markets feel like their team matters, because their team does matter. There's only thirty and be if you don't watch those teams, you can sit here and laugh at them and oh, that team's tanking and that team stinks, like they all have players who are gonna matter, and you're gonna miss stuff. You're gonna be late on stuff that's happening with those players and with those teams. If you're just checking box scores, like you're just not gonna see it. And I there's always something like even even the other day, Shay didn't play for the Thunder and I and I had the Thunder on my little thing. I was like, I gotta watch Thunders and I Thunder Celtics. And you're initially like, well, God, this game doesn't really matter anymore without Shay, and then then you're like, well, this is an opportunity for other guys, like let's see how these does. See how Jaleen Williams one looks Let's see how Jaleen Williams too looks. Let's see what Giddy does, see what Trey Man does, and low and behold they hang one fifty on the Celtics without s G A. And You're like, well, that was kind of a fun game. Uh, you should not have There should be a rule against two Jalen Williams is on the same team. This is like when we had didn't we have like seventeen Seawan williams Is at one point in the league and they were all on the nets. Well, what really is the problem? And the Jamichael Green Jeff Green era in Denver highlighted this is the box scores will go to great length to differentiate one from the other, like it'll be J. A. Green and g J. E. Green. But then you go to the lineup data on NBA dot com and it's just Jay Green and Jay Green. I'm like, well, this is like what do you how are you like? It's the stupid NBA updates It's app every year. It gets worse every time they update it. They're constantly tinkering with it. You can't figure out the freaking line up data so I can tell which jail and Williams is which in the lineup data. This is the kind of thing other people have real complaints in life, like like things that are actually like my priorities are so askew that this actually makes me angry. These are beyond first world problems. These are like, uh, first, you know, it's just it's just that I'm stupid, because like, the actual problems of the world are so intractable and intimidating and huge that sometimes I just like, I can't even contemplate global warming right now, So let me just direct my ire at Jay Green. J Green? Why not that? And the fact that UH Past Digital is still a disaster? Um. I was watching UH one of the Warriors games earlier in the week. I think it was the the first overtime game, the Atlanta one, and twice, because I had I had surrendered to the TV in the main room here we only have one. I was watching on my computer instead, which meant I was on League Past Digital and it went to one of those breaks where it's just a blank screen and twice came back after a huge shot had been made in overtime. Well, you know what what I'm learning about this is that I also watched games on my laptop. Um, I like to watch games on my laptop. At games, I have no other choice but to watch other games on my laptop. And the world is meant for phones. Now, the world is meant for people who want to watch games on their phones. I bet that app works way better on your phone than it does on your laptop. It's not meant we're dinosaurs. It's not meant for us. It's meant for people who watching them on phones. It's too small. It's too small. Also, I have a smaller than average iPhone because I'm one of those people who never gave up on the idea of the size of the iPhone four. So every new generation of iPhone, I'm buying the one where it's like the se or the whatever, the iPhone Classic, whatever it is that stills the size of like the iPhone four or five. That's my that's my I can't can we talk about basketball because we're starting to sound like the two old guys on the Muppets Statler and Waldorf. Are they Statler and Waldorf who hate everything? I don't want to say. I don't want to be Waldorf. For Statler I became. Those guys are a long time ago. It's a lost cause. Although they were the best part of the Muppets was when they would just start heckling everyone that was the Muppet Show. Can we get the Muppet Show back? They brought it back a few years ago and it only lasted like like a half season or something. So I failed here. I am calling for the Muppet Show to come back, and they came back and I didn't watch it. There was like a one season revival, and I don't think I watched it because I think my my daughter probably aged out of it. We should have watched it anyway. Um, yeah, I bought her those those DVDs when when when she was small to watch all the ones that we grew up on. Do you have a favorite Muppet? Favorite Muppet other than the other than Statler and Waldorf. Other than Statler and Waldorf. Everybody loves Kermit, right, Like that's the the go to um. Kermit is like the whole Cogan of Muppets. Like it's like, okay, everybody cool, Like that's fine, Kermit's fine. Yeah, I think it's a kid. I really thought Fozzy Bear was hilarious. I think that was preparing me for a life of dad jokes probably, Um, like the dad jokes were like that was just waiting for me, like it was that was my wheelhouse before it was ever time to so fozzy. Yeah you uh Swedish chef and uh and you just maybe you can't go wrong with animal animal just just just making noise on the drums and and being crazy. Uh. Somebody did a I saw this video recently where somebody took it was one of those videos Swedish Chef I think is in animals in it and one other uh muppet. I think they're supposed to be singing like oh Donny Boy or one of these like sad dirges and somebody uh overlaid the Beastie Boys sabotage and it's the greatest thing I've seen, and I will see that out. You should find that alright. Alright, basketball Um, I feel like we are the only ones this week who have not yet weighed in on what the heck is happening with all these individual offensive explosions highlighted of course by Donovan Mitchell seventy one, which you and I did discuss briefly on your pod. Um. Before I get to theories, I want to just hit this to the extent that there is a surge in individual outstanding, eye popping, box score breaking performances. Good thing, bad thing, just a thing. I think it's just the thing. I think it's I mean, I don't I think it's just the thing. I don't think it's good. I certainly don't think it's bad. Like I'm not sitting here like, oh, the death of team basketball. All these guys that are using possessions at a record rate. I just don't like it. It seems to be working for all those teams. I mean, it's like, I don't know that there's I mean, I don't think it's bad for their teams. Um. And I don't think it's indicative of like those guys are playing selfishly or anything like that. So I think it's more good thing than bad thing. Yeah. And I didn't even think of it in terms of like selfishness or team play and all that. I thought of it more of a as like sometimes in this era, because of the pace of the game, which may be part of this, and because of the you know, three point shooting and spacing and all these features of the modern game, we get this hand ringing about a distortion of like the space, time, continuum and context, and whether how to compare eras and whether this is somehow now you know, like oh, you know, now every era has its stuff that makes it unique and that makes statistical comparisons impossible anyway, which is why I hate historical comparisons. So I was thinking of it more in those terms, like is this a just a big distortion that we're seeing? UM, so real quick, I just did the quick stat Head Basketball Reference UM run down before we came on. At the time of this recording, there have been fourteen games of at least fifty points by one individual UM, and we're about the mid season point right now. Last year there is nineteen total, so we're already at fourteen. There may not be five more for the rest of the season for all we know. So it you could say, well, we're on pace for twenty eight, which would blow last season out of the water, but like, we may not see another one. That's how these things sometimes go. UM. There have been two games of sixty plus last season, there were two. There have been eighty nine games of forty plus last season there were one nineteen, So again on pace four if it continued to blow that out of the water. Um, the forty one is the one that stands out to me. Forty used to be like an event, and now it's just you barely. It's like, it's a good game for MB. That's nice. Let's let's see how many points tyree s Maxie, like I do. You don't even linger on four anymore. We're number. We're numb to it. And and again that's why I kind of you know, not not that seriously asked, but the good thing versus bad thing. It's the baselines have changed quite a bit um in this era and and at a time like this where forty used to be an event and now forty is kind of like but then again, for me, the baselines have changed. I do think you have to factor it in, like like I catch myself just looking at stats and stuff and be like, oh, so and so is averaging like twenty one a game that's pretty freaking impressive, And like twenty one a game now is like eighteen a game in my brain from like, it's just the like you have to just dial up back your expectations a little bit for what that actually means relative to the league. Yeah, there was a time when twenty was the barometer, like anybody who was averaging twenty plus or especially this is a guy you're building around, and now it's it's fairly almost routine, and there's and there's a ton of them. So to the to the theories, if we believe that there actually is a spike, and again, we have half a season where maybe there won't be another fifty point or sixty point game, and maybe even the rate of forty point games will slow down. I don't I don't think it will. But um, is there any one thing that is striking to you about why we're seeing this And maybe we're just over reacting because there were just a flurry of them over about a ten days span, and again because one of them happened across the seventy mark, which we see very very rarely. Uh theories. Uh yeah, it's sort of a boring answer because I don't have a great answer to it. I just think it's sort of an acceleration of all the trends that have been ongoing for the last ten years. More threes, faster pace, smaller lineups, are more shooting in your lineup so that the floor is really well spaced for the best player on the team. To just get into the pain over and over again. The take foul elimination, which congratulations to the NBA for being ten years laid on that, but they got rid of it, and that has increased fast breaks and and and efficiency is obviously it's got high and fast breaks. I think all those things just sort of coalesced into a boom and scoring and then a boom in individual scoring. I will say, um, there's there's been a lot of talk about, you know, heliocentrism. I think Seth part now Um was the one who really introduced that term into the lexicon, the very smart and wonderful Seth part now Um, and that that discussion is mostly focused on like Rockets, James Harden, Current, Luca Donchech, Trey Young, the the guy, the the idea being, this guy runs every single possession. If you combine their scoring and assist rate, there for some sort of combined super usage stat. They they are running everything. And Corey I don't know if it's Yaz or Jazz. I'm apologies of him getting his name wrong. He does analytics for the Blazers and he pops into every Blazers broadcast with all these delightful tidbits. He's great and he had on last night's Blazers um Wolves game, he popped on and he said he was talking about this, and he said, if you look at the highest usage guy on every team across the league, what their usage rate is, it's higher now. I don't think you have exact figures, but it's higher now on average than it has ever been ever in the whole league. So it's not just Luke a tray. All these guys that we associated with, even the guys we don't think of, is like, wow, they're just pounding it, dominating every possession, Tatum, Janice Durant, even those guys, it's two or three percentage points higher than it's been in the past. Why is that happening? What is the thought behind that? Um? Why are teams more likely to sort of, I guess simplify and just say, well, that guy's that guy's are offense more than not. What is what does that mean? What does that say? I don't know the answer to that, but I thought that was interesting. I mean, it certainly it matches the eye test and everything that we're talking about, but it's interesting. So I'm gonna I'm gonna now pat myself on the back for being intuitive about something that I did actually did not know, because I had not done the homework on UM, but your guy Corey from the Blazers had. I had a list of things I jotted down on my word doc here, and one of them was individual usage higher than ever. That was intuitive, not quantitative. I did not know for sure, but I feel like that's a big part of this. UM. There's no question that it is. Yeah. I mean there was a time when so I there was a story I wrote a few years ago UM about Harden and his postseason you know, failures, struggles, whatever we want to call them, and and I had posited the idea that high usage guys, uh, there's a limit to how far you can you can go with this. And at the time I did just a very rough, very statisticians would cringe it at my methodology, but I basically just looked at everybody who had ever had I think a thirty five usage are over in the regular season according to Basketball Reference, And there's our estimates, not as precise as NBA dot com, but it goes back farther. It's easier to search NBA dot com. One of these days learned some lessons from Basketball Reference, I hope UM. And the fact was, like I looked back and like even Michael Jordan's in his best seasons did not hit thirty five usage rate I think maybe once or something UM and the higher usage rates in an individual season tended to correlate with not going that far in the playoffs. And so I was doing this kind of very rough thing of like, this is not a this is not a formula that works. And I had a a spirited debate with Darryl Morey about this because this was back when Harden. No, Darryll defended James Harden. No, that no way. Well, but it's it's more than that. It's more than that. We've been having an ongoing debate for years now about I kind of believe in this. This this basketball ideal of players sharing the ball and everything. This is this is the influence of two things. I covered Phil Jackson for five years, where it was all about the triangle, and yes, eventually it's all about Shacker, all about Kobe, or all about Jordan's, but for most of the game, the idea is that everybody is involved. It's a five man game, and then guys are feeling involved in better rhythm and feeling bad. So it's it's just this idea that that that it's you want, UM a certain spirit and a connection between your players, and it's not just about one guy above the rest, even though you need that one guy to win championships. And then I covered Mike D'Antoni teams in New York and he had come just come from Phoenix, where it was all about the ball finds energy. And so these are two things I've always influenced kind of my belief of basketball aesthetics and what's and what what works. So I've always been a bit of a skeptic of the uber helio centric James Harden or Westbrook when he was in Oklahoma, UM, even Janice now though they did win a championship, UM just a year and a half ago. UM. I I'm a little bit of a of a skeptic of of the leaning too far into this. But I think teams are more tolerant of it or more embracing of it. And we're an era where you know, you just brought it up the status there that it's it's individual usage. So if if we're going to lean hard into take your best player, let him do whatever he wants for the most part, within reason, and have skyrocketing usage rates. It's it does stand a reason we're gonna get more fifty sixty and even a seventy point game. Yeah. And as to the ceiling of that style, speaking of Phil Jackson, you know, that's one of the many, many reasons why the Warriors Rockets rivalry of as brief as it was, but of the particularly Durant was with the Warriors and Paul was with the Rockets, and it was kind of a fair fight ish um. That's why it was. One of the reasons it was so irresistible was the clash in styles and underlying that, like a really really deep philosophical disagreement on how basketball should look. And not only like that also influenced the officiating kerfuffle that happened when the Rockets produced their report about how they had been short changed x amount of points in Game seven, and I dug into that, I dug into that with league officials and team officials and all that, and part of that was like just the sort of human nature officiating of the Rockets were like slightly right to the very small degree, and that hardened didn't get quite as many calls as he likely deserved. But part of that is, like they're just he has the ball all the time, and so no superstar gets every call they deserved because if they did the games with the last three and a half hours, and that was just exacerbated by how much hard and had the ball. I had this exact conversation with the team official at a game recently and about like, what do you think of this, Like can you win? Can you win the way Dallas is playing right now? Can you win the way the Rockets played? And he kind of said, well, like the Rockets when they had Chris Paul as the number two guy, like almost beat the greatest team that's ever been assembled in the history of the NBA. Maybe look at Lebron's usage rates from his days in Cleveland when they won the championship there between thirty one and thirty five and he had Kyrie Irving as a second guy. Maybe it's not about the style as much as it is about the supporting talent around the style. And I don't think there's like a universal answer to this, but yeah, if it's Luca with Christian Wood as the second best player, you're probably not gonna get very far. If it's Luca with a guy close to his level that's willing to play off the ball, you could probably get pretty damn far. I don't know that there's I do think there's a fatigue thing um where you have to be a little careful with how you parse it out in the regular season, and we've seen it with Luca and fourth quarters, with every time that hardened craps to bed in a in an elimination game that the answer is always, well, he's tired from all the stuff he did in the regular season. It's like no one made him, No one made him do that stuff, like within the rules where he can not play that way all the time if he wants to. And I guess that we get to a chicken and egg thing too, right, because in the hypothetical where Luca has a Luca esque or at least a guy maybe a notch or two below him as a teammate, another true All Star, then the usage rage is probably not as high anyway, because by by definition, you're going to probably let that guy carry some of it, and you don't need to be at thirty five, thirty six, thirty eight usage um so there is there's some chicken and egg stuff going on there and and some other stuff too. But um but yeah, to the extent that you know, we don't have rooting interests. Um, but there's what stuff we like and stuff we don't. I enjoyed watching those Warrior teams again as another example of that ball movement. You know, everybody's involved. It's it's more to me. That's just more fun to watch than those hardened Rockets teams. Well and they and they play that way for one reason and one reason only. You can give me all the reasons you want to talk about Steve coming from the Phil Jackson coach tree, they played that way because of Steph Curry. That's it. That's the whole thing. He is. Everything they have done there is because of Steph Curry stylistically in terms of what they accomplished. That's it. Um. I do think Luca not to sidetrack us here, but you know, I was having this discussion recently with somebody about someone said this on a podcast I think it was Wendy's podcast, I can't remember which one, about being really confident that Luca would welcome a legitimate co star be super happy to share the ball and play more of an off ball role. And that's the subject of a lot of sort of speculation around the league of like, so just say they got I don't know, I'm not I'm not even gonna say a name. So just a really good guard who could who has had usage rates near thirty in his career, but isn't as good as Luca. I I bet, I bet Luca likes that idea. I wonder how it would work in reality, because it's the same like we saw it with Harden, Like every time they got somebody, he'd be like, Oh, it's great, let's get this guy. And then after he'll be like, I don't want to play with this guy, Like and this guy doesn't want to play with me because I don't pass on the ball because I want to play Harden ball. Like does Luca want to play Luca ball or does he want to play And maybe it doesn't even matter because he's so freaking good at Luka ball that they got to the conference finals last year and they're kind of surgeon up the standings now. Um, we had a couple of leftovers on the low posts, some some things we kind of touched on, but we didn't really dive into and I kind of want to just circle back to them. We don't have to spend a ton of time, but um, I just thought it'd be interesting. We uh, we had touched on just briefly the mid season tournament because other innovations recently, including lottery reform and the play and tournament, have had a really positive impact on the regular season parody, competitiveness, all this stuff. Right. Of course, as we sit here at the in early January, at the mathematical midpoint, we are still pre uh pivoting uh season time. I don't know what I'm The time of the season when teams decided to pivot. Tanking can still happen this year. All the parody we're seeing, you can still get just blown up by teams deciding, you know what, uh, screw it, I know, the lot the odds suck, um forget to play and forget everything else. Let's just go for women Yama and that like that could still happen. It could change this entire discussion. But a lot of things have gone right, and the thing that is still looming on the horizon is the the the in season, the mid season tournament, which you and I think have both been skeptics on We have friends at the league office who have been are convinced that they're going to convince me. Um, and I remain a skeptic. But you you said, I think you said the other day when we talked, that you were warming to the idea. You were not not as opposed or skeptical as you were before. Um, when what's what's your your sense of what this might do and why it might actually because I think everybody agrees anything to energize the regular season is a good idea. I'm just not sure if this is this is the uh, the right wrinkle. So you know how every time your favorite website like redesigns itself out of nowhere, your initial reaction is like, I hate this, go back to the way it used to be. I don't like this interface talk about and then after like three days, you just forget that it happened. You're like, this is actually kind of good. I think that's what the mid season tournament is going to be. Like, I think there's gonna be this initial like, what is this thing? Does anyone care about it? Are we hanging a banner for it? This is stupid? It's a championship, but it's not the actual championship, and then in your three we're gonna be like, oh, this season tournament final for us coming up. That's kind of fun. I kind of like that if you don't want it, if you don't like it, so much of it is gonna be built into the regular season schedule anyway that you don't even really have to notice that it exists. And if you do like it, I think they'll be whatever, it's gonna end up being this final four, final two or whatever, they stop and play these extra games. When it's just the end of it, it'll be this kind of fun like, oh, this is kind of a fun like whatever two day, three day thing, and then it's over, Like I just think it'll be. I think it's almost like no harm, no foul, Like if you don't like it, you don't really have to care about it, and then it's just then it's just over and we go on with the season. It will give us one more thing to either discuss deride whatever on podcasts when it finally comes to pass, so you know, we can sit there and mock whatever. It's gonna be the David Stern Cup. Um, you know, oh, you know who. Oh, the Pacers won the Stern Cup. Who cares? Like it's not a chance? Who's gonna care? Though? You know who's you know who? It's gonna be cool for Like I don't know what the final negotiation will be, but there's gonna be like a non trivial amount of money for a lot of players. Like whatever the prize is gonna be like it Maybe it doesn't matter for the much for the max guy on your team, but for like the back third of the roster, it's gonna be a big deal. Potentially, it won't matter for max players financially, and it won't matter for championship caliber teams competitively because their eyes are still going to be on April, May, June. And that's my concern. But to your point, if the players embrace it and are excited about it and motivated and it and it makes those games feel somehow more vital, then that will translate to the fans, right Like we as viewers feed off of whatever the teams are projecting. If they embrace it, I think we end up embracing it. Now I'm not I'm not sure how I would feel about any The difficulty of it is like, I'm not sure how I feel about any team based reward that gets attached to it. So people haven't in the past floated you should get an extra draft pick or something like that, which is really that means the players are playing to give you another crack at getting their replacement, or maybe teams maybe if you win, you should be guaranteed a playoff spot in the real playoffs, And like that seems like for something that's going to be kind of mostly built into the regular season schedule, which is like random and has back to backs and home court advantage and injuries and load management, a lot of managing of the loads, it just seems like that seems like a pretty out of proportioned reward. So I don't know, I don't I don't know if there should be any team based reward then you get to say you won. I do think, because I think competitive incentives are better than financial incentives in a lot of ways. Um, I like the idea of it having some influence on the seatings or home court or something like, I don't know how you do that, And I know, as you're saying, there's so many other variables that may feel distorted, but that's something you could actually play for and you would care about. I'm not saying they wouldn't care about a couple of Let's game it out though, So like, what if the Celtics win it and they're already like a great team obviously in the playoffs they're a great team. Like, does it end up being the first tiebreaker overhead to head if they tie with the Bucks in the standings? What if? Okay? And then on the other hand, what if the Rockets win it? What are we doing with them? Are we putting them in the playoffs? No? Are we putting them in the play in? And if we do put them in the play in and we know halfway through the season that the fifteen place Rockets are actually in the play in? What does that mean for teams eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, and thirty? It just starts. It just starts to get it gets weird in a hurry. That's it's true. Um, all right, the other left over loose thread we had This could be a three hour discussions, but we're gonna do it in like five minutes. Um. I have been very very very very very much pro Lakers should trade the damn picks. Um, they actually have more picks. I mean, it went into this on on the Crossover Pod with with Mannix when we talked about this last They have other picks. It not just that it's even this season. It's a swap with the Pelicans. They're going to lose a pick that could become Victor Webman Yama, but they get they do get the Pelicans pick. There's an option that the Pelicans can take either next year's or the year after, So that's locking up some picks, but they they will have other first round picks. The idea that the Lakers are are putting themselves in a position where it's all or nothing, championship contention or nothing. We can't we can't trade these picks. It's gonna sacrifice or future. I am of the belief and I've always have been. And this goes back to when Lebron was in Cleveland, and this goes to the Warriors when I thought they should have traded the picks that became their young guys. If you've got a special player, you're all in. You should be all in at all times, especially if they're in their twilight as Lebron is. You have been a pump the Brakes guy on any trades of those picks. I believe they should still go all out whatever it means, because if it makes them more competitive this season, it makes the season more relevant, more uh vibrant for for this season where Lebron is still playing it at least an all NBA level, then you do it, and it also helps you potentially next season because these aren't players that are just going to disappear. Um. But you have been a bit more of a a slogo on that one. Well, first of all, you have to make sure that they are actually not players who are just going to disappear. So you have to make sure there are players that are either have multiple years on their contracts or in the case of someone like Kyle Kuzma, you're willing to pay them twenty something million dollars a year on And and I know this is hard to hear for the Lakers with a little little the little shop that could, the little engine that could like maybe go into the luxury tax a little bit more aggressively like a lot um. I'm not sure they have more first round picks to trade because they owe so many and it's uncertain when New Orleans is going to take that pick that because of the stepping rule, I'm not sure they have extra extra clarify, not that they have to trade, but that they have coming eventually. It's not that they will be if they trade. Those were acting as though and and conversing about these things as though once those are gone they're screwed. I'm saying they have other pieces, and of course some of those picks will become trade eligible in future years. I'm saying they don't have more to trade now. But if those picks are gone, if they're out the window for healed and turner or whatever it becomes. It's not as though you don't have future picks to use for yourself in a post lebron for yourself, that's the key for yourself. You you you shoot yourself in the foot for your ability to ever trade those picks again because of the stepping rule. But they also have second round picks coming from um I think a couple of other teams, which is like yeah, hurrah, um so okay. My My thing has always been two things. Most importantly, what's the trade? Tell me the trade? Well, that's the tough part. And and and that's the whole thing. Howard that part that's their job. That's their job. And they could have done Healed and Turner over the summer. I think, so that's done. They didn't do it. Okay, So now it's January five, the Pacers are like four games ahead of them in the standings. Buddy Healed shooting from three miles, Turners really good. So that's gone. Probably probably, I I still I let's just pose it that it's gone. Nothing is ever dead until it's dead. And it's February tenth or whenever, the day after the trade deadline is well, let's pose it that it's gone. What's the trade? I have not been playing with the trade machine, and I don't know, but that is presumably the front office's job. It's my job is to is to say, I think you're screwing this up, because I'm just a media punt it off in the way I'm Statler and Waldorf up there, uh mocking their inability to actually make this season worthwhile. It's their job to, uh, as as on The Muppet Show, perform a little better so that Statler and Waldorf don't have something to mock them for. Okay, but if there's no trade, there's no trade, and well we don't know what we don't know, but like teams are going to maybe pivot in the next month and maybe different players become available. But so so there's that whole problem. Linked to that whole problem. Let's just take the healed in Turner trade, which I which I before the season, I was like, that's they gotta really seriously consider that's kind of a good trade. Let's let's think about what we've what we have learned or in some cases relearned in the interim. Number one, Anthony Davis is a center. They have to build around the entire assumption that Anthony Davis is a center. Myles Turner is a center. To yaka peardles a center. Go through all the centers, they're all centers. You can sit here and tell me that Myles Turner can shoot threes and maybe guard stretch force, so to minimize the sort of center overlapped like that's not ideal. Number two, Russell Westbrook's playmaking is like a real thing that they need. So if I take that away and I bring back no playmakers none, zero Buddy hild and Miles Turner or like anti playmakers, I have now have a playmaking deficit. On my team that I have to deal with. So that's all all that. The second big prong of this is I keep reading the and hearing this and it sounds awesome to say, and it's true in some like very basic literal sense. Oh man, if you just have Lebron and a d playing like his m v P self like he was for those fifteen games, and you know, just a competent like give me maybe trade for a Kuzma here in a Bogdanovitch there. Maybe we make two deals like they got a puncher's chance in any series in the Western Conference. Puncher's chance like, okay, that's awesome. A puncher's chance, like a puncher's chance is great in any individual series. Here's the deal. Number one, you have to get into the playoffs. They're not in right now. They're not in the play in right now. Number two, a puncher's chance to win every series. You gotta win three to get to the finals. So that means you got to connect on the punch in a deep conference three times in a row. That's like just basic probability of like what's the odds of flipping heads three times in a row. It gets it gets worse and worse and worse the more consecutive wins you have to add up. And all of that is based on the assumption that the best case scenario will play out, that Lebron will stay healthy, that Anthony Davis will get healthy, stay healthy and play like the m v P. You have to plan for contingencies that include Lebron getting hurt, which just happened every year he's played for the Lakers, basically, and Anthony Davis getting hurt, which happens every monthly plays for the Lakers, and Anthony Davis maybe not playing all the time like an m v P level guy that he was for fifteen games out of so far forty, Like, you can't just assume that everything else is gonna hit around this trade, and and I'm with you on that, and that's all fair. Um My feeling is simply that the puncher's chance means that you have added meaning to this season, whereat the moment there probably is none. And I would rather have puncher's chance and feel like, you know what, I did as much as I could to maximize Lebron's late prime, his twilight whatever this is at age thirty eight, year twenty, where he's still playing it at all NBA level. I want to be able to go to sleep at night, not just now, but in future years, knowing that I did everything I could to give him that puncher's chance. Because frankly, this is a year where the West you say it's it's really deep, but there's no super team. There's nobody. I reject that conceit. Yes, there's no superteam that's awesome like duranton on the Warriors anymore like there's no super team. That doesn't mean it's easier to win the West. It just means it doesn't mean it's easier to win three playoff series in the worst get super team. There's no great team. They're a bunch of really really really good teams. There's no great team. Fair, yes, but that that historically has not been a really good sign for a bad team chances of winning. We're trying to make them not a bad team. That's the point of the exercise. I get it. I was tempted by that Pacers deal before the season. A couple of things have changed since then. A that deals maybe off the table. We certainly positive that just for the thought exercise and be the Lakers are worse than I expected them to be that most people expected them to be. But I do think there is a thread the needle thing here, which is that, as you said, you make a trade that not only bolsters you this season, but gives you a path that makes sense around Lebron and a D for next season. So that's why I'm sure they're watching the Bulls for Levine. I'm sure they're watching the Wizards for Beal. Although that contract is a lot, the rust contract is a lot to talk about a guy who's always hurt. Yeah, and and Brad's had a really good season, but he's been hurt a lot. Um, he just got hurt, came back and got hurt again against the Bucks the other night. Um, So I do think they'll look at deals like that, and that that makes you can sell me on something like Lebron Beal a D. All right, let's get ready and go to war with that. That's the use of our cap space this summer effectively, right by trading for Beal, that that's interesting to me. And if he stays healthy, that that the puncher's chance rule certainly comes into play with that group. So I mentioned we're at the mathematical midpoint and a couple more before that. You go here just kind of looking back. Um, we all make our silly preseason predictions and prognostications and rankings and things. Um, and I was looking back at some of mine. I think the one that made me cringe the most was I had Rudy Gobert as my preseason defensive player of the year. Um, probably not gonna happen. Race is wide open to I still feel okay about Clips over Bucks in the finals, though. There's like seventeen possible finals iterations at least, um and that one. You know what we'll see, Uh, anything that you firmly believed about a team, a race, a player, a situation before the season that at mid season you're going like, I may have been a little off. I was dramatically wrong about the Toronto Raptors. I thought the Raptors are gonna We're gonna be good. Whatever they're over under was the camera bo what it was? I was like, over over over, Um, there's sixteen and twenty two. Every possession is a goddamn slog and they're starting a homestand now that is going to make or break their season. And they started it with an almost miraculous comeback win, but lost to Milwaukee last night in another game where their offense was horrible. Their defense hasn't been as good as I expected it to be, and you're starting to feel the downsides of the kind of style that they've chosen of just all length, all size, all versatility. Well, you know, guards are good, shooting is good, and they don't have enough of those things. Centers are good, those those things that those downsides have come to Ruth. So I was that's the one I was by far, by far the most kind of wrong about everything else I actually did. I was probably a little too low on Portland's but they're just one game more front on it. It's not like they're blowing the doors off people. And I guess, you know, look, for all the opposition I had to the Golbert trade, I still thought the Timberwolves would be a good regular season team, and to date they have been a not good regular season team. And I guess that. I mean, Utah's the obvious when we were all wrong about. But those are those are the ones that stand out. Yeah, I had on my my quick hit list just underestimating Utah, Portland, and Indiana. Um, all those teams have been have been really fun and competitive and and yeah within reason, like they're not. You know, none of these teams are winning a playoff series, but uh, those have been been fun to see us be wrong about. I thought the Grizzlies would struggle to replicate their success of last season. And that wasn't so much a judgment about them. It was more about the depth of the Western Conference and you know, guys coming back in Denver and the Clippers and all like. I just thought that the situation would make it tougher that the the Jackson starting the season injured. Um and they yeah, I was I thought they were. I thought they were there. Downside was potential like, oh we gotta avoid the play and and they have been. They are really really good. Man, are really good. They're tied for first to the West as we as we record this and I've said this before. That's a team they hold their assets near and dear. They play for the big fish. If I'm them, if I can trade one little asset, one pick and one young player or something for like a medium sized fish, that can be my fifth to eighth best player. But as a proven veteran with the skill set that helps me. I think that team is good enough to do it now, like I think they should go for it now. Uh, I agree. Um, you start off with with the Raptors, which I also had on my list of teams that I certainly overestimated. You just spent a bunch of time as you do every holiday or you know, December holiday break, um, with family up there. Um, so you were in Toronto and you probably spent some time around the team as well. Do you have something coming on the Raptors that we should be looking for? Uh? Oh, I had hoped too, but the dates of my trip change to the point that I instead of seeing an entire awesome Raptors homestand I saw one right because Raptors. I think Tim Bontemps has something on the Raptors. I mean it's we all know the Raptors are facing across roads, right, and I think Tim has a story coming out. He was there for that whole homestand um, and we got to hang out a little bit. I think he has something coming on the Raptors facing across roads And what does that actually look like for them? Like it's you know, the blow it up button is easy to sort of look at and gon at. But the Raptors are particularly tricky case of like, okay, so if you just ask one follow up question like what does it wait, what does that actually mean? Like what does blow it up mean for the Toronto Raptors? Like literally, what do you do? Then it becomes a little harder. I don't think they're the classic blow it up like the Bulls of the classic blow it up team, like you're you're just you've maxed out. The Raptors are more like the the kind of pivot along the way thing where trade one key piece or maybe two and some pictures whatever it is. Um. I don't feel like they're all blow up because I think of blow it up as being like you're tearing down to the studs and tanking, and I don't think that's where they are. Yeah, and like like so what are they supposed to do? Trade? Like what? What? What is that? What is that doing? For me? Like? Um, anyway, I'll talk about the Raptors another day. As the crossroads approaches, do you worry about the backlash from spooky molder fans as you describe them in interrupt me? Is that is that? Well? I actually was thinking about this is that your most. We all have fan bases that seem to come after us the most, whether when we spend too much time on social media or wherever else. Is that is that your Are they the bane of your your existence? They're the ones who are gonna come the most. Is there is there another fan base out there that that that haunts you? Oh? I love Toronto fans. Um even the spooky Molder contingent is just sort of fun. Um. I don't even know anymore because I don't I don't pay attention. Um. I do know. I ran into someone in Toronto who saw me on the street and was like, oh, Zach Low, hey man, Like I said some nasty stuff about you on Twitter. I'm sorry, Like you're actually you're a really nice guy, like your work, Like Okay, I didn't see it, but but thanks. And I think that's just how most people are. It's like it's like it's the people who are mean on social media if they see you in realize like Kyrie Irving actually do his credit. Talked about this when the Boston fans were getting on him. Was kind of like when you try to engage him and was like here here I am, Like if you saw me in a coffee shop. You guy calling me profane names would probably come up to me and be like, hey, Kyrie, just like love your game, big fan. Like, people are just different on social media than they are in real life, and so I just learned to stop paying attention to it. And this poor guy was like, I'm side. I didn't even tell me what he said. God only knows what it was. And he was like, perfectly a nice guy. You're a better man than me for not looking at all those comments all the time. I probably had too much time, uh reading any of it. Um, yeah, people would you say different on social media? What you mean is that people are far worse on social media. Well, people just call you names like you're a fucking idiot, you idiot, more on and like, and then they see you in real life and they're like, oh, there's a he's a person. Yes, he's a person, and he's like walking with other people. By the way, I want to say this almost every time, guys, it's just sports. It ain't that serious. By the way, a criticism or negative remark about your team is not a personal attack on you. You are not your team. I hate to tell you this. You are not your team. It has nothing to do with you. All right, last thing, give me one thing you would change if you could grab Doc Brown's DeLorean go back in time, save one team this summer from minor error, catastrophic mistake. Uh, just whatever flight of fancy they took that they shouldn't have. Is there one thing you would undo on behalf of one team? Well, there's only one answer to that. There's there's multiple answers this question, but there's really only one, right, I mean there's only one, probably one primary. When I have a I have an alternate one. But I'm curious, there's there's only one and I and this was when I first guessed in talking to people around it at the time, and like the ultimate test is if Minnesota put Rudy Gobert on the trade market, now, what would they get back? And the answer is it would not be close to deep breath, Jared Vanderbilt, Patrick Beverley, Malik Beasley, four first round picks, the other first round pick they just drafted, the first round pick they just drafted before that, swap rights the next years, and they're like, it wouldn't even be close, wouldn't be close, It would not even I don't know if it be a half of that. I want to note that you did not read that. That just came off the top of your head. That was impressive. The there there are other candidates, right man, we can I'm sure you have alternate candidates, but like the list was impressive. Ye, that's the one. That is the one. Um, because I what I what, I sent you this question. I was thinking, like, what's the because you know me, I'm constantly going for the outside the box thing, and I went, I destroyed all box is on your podcast the other day. I let them on fire. Um. I was supportive of the fact that the Nicks decided not to go for Donovan Mitchell at the time for all the rationale that we know what they were gonna have to give up what they would have left, whether it they'd even be good enough with what they had left in all this, and I don't want to. I'm not being a prisoner of the moment. In the seventy one point game, I swear there's a part of me that thinks, you know what, you look at where they are. Yeah, they win eight in a row, they lose five in a row. They're up there, down there They're exactly what you should expect them to be. I thought they'd be about a five hundred team that would flirt with playoff play in whatever somewhere low in the stand in the playing or a playoff field, and that's where they are and that's probably where they'll be. And it's a renaissance season for Julius Randall. It's been great. Jalen Brunson has has proven it. He was exactly worth the tampering charge in the lost second round pick and the hundred million dollar contract. Oh that's fine. I don't know what would have gone out ultimately, because we never know for sure what would goes out ultimately in a deal that did not get done. We all all these hypotheticals and reports of what could have happened. There's a part of me that thinks, know what, maybe they should have. Maybe they should have. You see what Donovan Mitchell is doing in a night to night basis. I think he's even better than he was in Utah in a variety of ways. And you need the one star to get to the second star sometimes and the their ceiling with him, they maybe they'd still be a first round and out team with what else is there or would be there after a trade. I don't know. There's just there's a part of me that's thinking about that more now, just seeing how how great Donovan Mitchell has been in Cleveland. I'm not I'm not judging it, and I'm not saying I believe this firmly. But when I was thinking about other ways to go other than go Bear, that was the one I thought about. Yeah, that's that's fair. I've certainly thought a lot about that. And when the Knicks were on that eight game winning streak, I had Ian Bagley on and we talked about, like, no matter what you thought of the Mitchell trade not happening, happening, the Knick's decision to ultimately not do it, to the degree that they had made a coherent decision and weren't blindsided by the Cavaliers actually doing it. I don't think that eight game win streak either redeemed the Knicks reticence to do it, or that the following five game losing streak proved that the Knicks were idiots for not doing I think the jury is still out. And as everyone said at the time, they did not have already made nucleus the same way that the Calves did when they went all in, they were more ready for the next step. Actually, when I was thinking of alternates to go there for this question, I thought of the opposite thing, which is it's not one transaction, it's a prolonged sort of failure to anticipate a transaction. I thought about it from the other side of like, the MAVs should have figured out the Bronson situation in a way that would have him on their team today. And you can you can come back to me and say, well, could they have Brunson and Christian would would that be too expensive for a team that's already over the luxury Actually maybe, like you have to figure out some other things, but there's any question they'd be better off with Jail and Brunson on their team. And that was a totally attainable goal for them, had they had they done some things differently over the last eighteen months. Yeah, Now that that's one where if they could grab Dr Brown's Delorian and go back, I think they would they would handle that situation that contract much differently. Um, And that's one of my big curiosities for you know, the next month, we've got what is it about five weeks or something to go till the trade deadline. I don't know what the Mavericks can do. They feel like one of the teams that have to do something. UM. You know those you know the the there's the there's the Toronto Chicago category of the teams that you're wondering if they're gonna pivot away from being competitive. The Mavericks are one of those that I just feel like the clock is ticking and they gotta they gotta find something. UM. I don't I don't know how much right now they're playing their play. They might play their way out of feeling any urgency to help their team this year. UM, and and try to kick the can again two offseason and beyond once they have fulfilled the Knicks porzingis obligation and they have all their picks to trade. UM. They may be playing their way in back into that kind of holding pattern. UM, but you're always a four game losing streak away from feeling the same urgency you felt when you were previously on a four game losing streak. Indeed, Zack, this has been great, uh wonderful getting to do this twice with you in one week. UM, Folks, if you didn't hear us doing the low post. I don't know what's wrong with you, but go back and find us something. What's wrong with you? People? Constantly constant question? I'm asking people, um, go back and listen to that. Check out Zach's ten Things column, which will be up around the same time as this podcast. Zach, great scene you get, my friend. Thanks for the time, appreciate it. Hopefully I'll see you soon at one of the New York City basketball arenas where I will not bother you while you're looking at your laptop. Don't bother if my headphones on back, keep your distance, take care of my friends. Okay, that's it for today's show. My thanks again to Zach Low, Thanks to our producer Shelby Royston. Thank you all for listening. Remember you can hear Chris Maddox and me every Tuesday on the Crossover with all the latest NBA chatter on Friday's It's Me and a Guest. Don't forget to rate, review and subscribe to The Crossover wherever you get your podcasts, and hit me with all your feedback on Twitter at Howard Beck