The Herd with Colin CowherdColin criticizes Luka Doncic for his shortcomings as the Mavericks fall 0-3 to the Celtics in the NBA Finals. He credits Boston for their dominant run through the NBA playoffs and finding themselves only 1 win away from winning the championship. Plus, UConn head coach Dan Hurley joins the show to talk about his decision to stay with the Huskies and refuse the offer from the Lakers to become their next head coach
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This is the Best of the Herd with Colin cowher on Fox Sports Radio.
All Right, here we go. It is a Thursday. We're gonna have an NBA suite. I bet live in Los Angeles. It's the Herd wherever you may be and however you may be listening. Things for Megan ass part of your day, Jordan Schulzen today for jamac Jordan on one day duty.
We love him.
Flue cross Country And you covered the NBA formally, Now, the NFL is what you cover, but when you cover the NBA, you find out it's a star driven league and stars are defined. Right East May and June finally right, and has not been a good couple of days for Luca, and we start with that. One of the things I love about Super Bowls, World Cups, NBA Finals, there pressurized situations. Okay, and in pressurized situations in sports are in life.
The truth comes out.
Every dad's a good little league dad when his kid's winning and hitting home runs. But what about when the umpiring's terrible and he strikes out? The truth comes out.
Add a little pressure.
To life in sports, the truth comes out. And the truth is. When I compared Luca to Carmelo Anthony, it sort of looks like it doesn't it a very flawed star, right, better than Carmelo, but a very flawed star. All the deficiencies for Luca are coming out in the finals. Number one, he never stops complaining to refs. It hurts his team. He's on the floor complaining. There go the Celtics down to the other end to Haattan twice last night. Another thing, He's been awful defensively in this series. In fact, there is data and video that illustrates he's maybe the worst defensive player in the Finals in a decade.
And like all.
Great scores, when Fitt hits the shan, he becomes isoball guy and doesn't play well with others. The man's only had fifteen assists last night. They're almost getting doubled in this series in assists, so Luke is an all time talent, but he's not a late bloomer. He was an all time talent at fifteen years old. He has been lauded, he has been worshiped, and when you're great at fifteen until now at twenty five, he's already been a five time All NBA Guy First Team. That's more than Steph. Is he now amenable to change? Is he adaptable? Because to be a champion, Michael Jordan figured this out. You got to look yourself in the mirror. I mean, Michael Jordan looked himself in the mirror and said, I can score sixty and not win titles or trust my teammates. Phil Jackson talked him into trusting his teammates. Michael became a champion. Lebron James was physically elite his first day in the league. He had to eventually the Spurs wouldn't guard him in the finals from the perimeter. He had to learn to shoot a three and add layers to his game. So it just wasn't about his physical superiority. I mean, I'm watching Luca unravel last night, get flustered and melt down. You can't do that against the Celtics. Celtics are smart. Horford and Brown and Tatum and Drew Holiday, They'll get into your head. This is a veteran team and they were toying with the younger Mavericks last night. They were toying with them. And by the way, it's completely fair. I don't care how good your regular season is. I don't care how good your playoffs are. If you melt down in the finals, it will stick with you until you win a finals. Magic Johnson had an awful finals. He was called Tragic Johnson in nineteen eighty four. He had to eventually win for them to disappear. Lebron James terrified to have the basketball against Dallas ridiculed, mocked, laughed at until he won the next year. And this is gonna stick to Luca and it should fairly awful defensively, been totally disengaged defensively, constantly melting down with the officials, not really engaging other teammates, swept by the Celtics. That's gonna stick to him. I mean when you when you got five fouls and you're trying to draw a charge and you're a bad defensive player, like what are you doing? This is gonna stick to Luca. It should stick to Luca. Pressurized situations and sports business in life, unveil the truth. By the way, Kyrie can score, but he wouldn't very good defensively last night either, you are seeing a deep, mature, smart Boston team toy with Dallas and their emotions. Here's Luca and Jason Kidd after.
We couldn't play physical.
So no, I don't want to say nothing, but you know, six following the NBA Finals, basically I'm like this, come on, man, better than that.
He is definitely got a bullseye on his chest, and so he's got to be able to guard and understand that we're there to protect him and help him if.
He does get beat.
But again, he's carrying the load offensively and they are putting him in every pick and roll and io, and so he's got to be able to play the game where he can rest on offense and let others, do you know, carry the load.
The Celtics are picking on Luca. Their game plan was clearly make him work on the defense end. He'll unravel. Force him to work on the defensive end. He will eventually quit, He'll get frustrated, he'll complain to the refs that Boston game plan. They figured it out. It is working perfectly. Attack him, make him work. He'll turn into isoldball guy, complain about fouls and unravel and that's what you're seeing. So let's talk about the Celtics. They're actually bad for the NBA's broadcasting partners. They've won ten straight games, They're fifteen to two in the playoffs. The only time you see network executives really freak out is with sweeps the hockey series for ESPN's to love, and the Celtics are flying through the playoffs. You got to get to six games to make money. Boston's bad for business, and they're just too deep not to win a championship. But I've said they're too historically strange to be a dynasty. I mean, they can struggle at home in the playoffs. Their number one guy in the last two series. Isn't their number one guy in the last two series. It's funny. In the NFL, you can win just one super Bowl, just one, and be legends, the Legion of Boom, the eighty five Bears. All you have to do is win one. You can to name, you're identified. That's not the way the NBA works in the seventies. In the NBA, the entire decade is reduced despite great players, because all these teams won just a single championship. I mean, the Denver Nuggets win a championship, best player in the league get bounced this year in the playoffs. They're like yesterday's news. They're like a startup website that ten years ago that was a big deal. I mean in basketball, all the stories, all the legends are about decades and eras. If I say seventies, you're thinking Blazers and Sonics. If I say you know eighties NBA, Oh, it's the Celtics and the Lakers dynasty. If I say nineties NBA, oh, that's the Jordan here, two thousand NBA, Oh, that's the Lakers and Kobe and Czech NBA. We talk about the NBA in decades. In the NFL, you can just win one time. I mean, Seahawks win a Super Bowl, legion the boom.
Everybody knows what it means.
Eighty five Bears. They're still celebrating that in Chicago. Doesn't work that way in the NBA. So are the Are these Celtics the eighties Celtics where they're going to be a dynasty for like ten years, or they like the KG Paul Pierce Rey aln Rondo Celtics, where they won, but they're not league defining. Just moment in time they crushed. They got one. You don't talk about them. We don't talk about them. What are they going to be? I think something that needs to be discussed is that the Celtics. I've always said aggressive wins in sports, and when you combine aggressive with really smart, that's when you can get into dynasties. All right, So the Celtics did something that was very interesting. They stole Porzingis, they stole Derek White, and they stole Drew Holiday. How they do it because their general manager, Brad Stevens, a very smart guy, took advantage of three tanking teams Portland, San Antonio, Right and Washington and before the new CBA clicked in, which makes it hard to do what they're doing, they took advantage of it. Now that the Celtics now have eight players who can all shoot, who can all dribble, who can all switch defensively, who can all pass. Nobody else in the league has like five, they have eight, So they took advantage of three tanking teams San Antonio, Washington and Portland and stole Holiday and Derek White and Porzingis and coupled them with two really good players Jason Tatum and Brown. The NBA is trying to avoid what the Celtics are doing. They don't want you to have like six really good players with a new CBA and the second Apron.
They don't want this stuff.
They want you to be like Oklahoma City Draft develop, you stay put, you grow, your fans love you. They don't want like All Star, All Star, All Star tanking. Take that guy you watch Boston. Dallas just didn't have the players. They just don't match up on either end of the floor. I mean, Boston is now toying with Luca's emotions. Their game plan was attack him, he'll unravel. It's exactly to Luca. So I think Denver would have been a much better matchup. But I mean, what I'm watching is smart plus aggressive added to a really good duo in a moment in time, looks much better than the rest of the NBA.
Here's Jalen Brown.
After experience is the best teacher.
All year long, we've been hearing about the Celtics of the past you know, for the last six to eight months, that's all we've been hearing, is like we'ves you know, all the different shortcomings we've had in the past.
This is a new team, you know what I mean.
We've learned from those experiences, and in these moments you can see that, you know, we didn't run from it.
We stepped up to the plate and we found no way to.
Win three nothing. Dallas is surprisingly favored. In game four.
I'd like to see Dallas, you know, pick a game out of this thing, because I do love their story, their GM, their coach Luca. I like the story of Dallas or rookie from Duke's playing well. But if Boston is an absolute I mean, really Boston, these games have all been blowouts if not for Dallas. Boston had a little quick dry spell in the first game in the third quarter, and a little quick dry spell in the second game in the third quarter, and had a really bad fourth quarter for most of it last night. They've had bad quarters. But if you took the twelve quarters so far, it does feel like like nine of them, Boston has clearly been the better team, and so I think we're going to have a champion and gonna happen pretty quickly. Also, the Aaron Rodgers drama.
Continues to play out.
God the Jets are noisy. JJ Reddick now is back, potentially in the lead. Jordan for the Lakers job that whatever you think about JJ Reddick and the Lakers, that it's a mess.
It's not a family business call. I'll tell you that. And I never really bought. I know, coach Hurley is coming on. I never really bought the fact that he was in play.
There.
I seventy million for him.
You need to pay him a one hundred and twenty to make him want to lead back to back And because the next iconic college coach, I know it's the Lakers, it's an iconic franchise. But to me, JJ Reddick is really interesting for a lot of reasons. But what's also interesting is the fact that the Lakers were now two weeks away from the draft.
They don't have a head coach. And we talked.
Earlier this morning, all these teams that are trying to ascend are hiring great assistance. Meanwhile, the Lakers are talking about and this is with a lot of respect to JJ Reddick, guy who's never coached a single game forget the NBA in college, high school, whatever.
So there's a lot of uncertainty.
And you said something earlier as well this morning Colin before the show, which was Lebron with all his greatness is masking a lot of problems for a franchise that really isn't getting enough criticism up until this point.
Yeah, they've won over fifty games. I think once in a decade. They're running through coaches, they're missing on draft picks, and again other teams now four other teams have solidified their staffs, So the best available assistants are overwhelmingly gone. I mean that's why generally the good team when Andy Reid go in Philadelphia, Kansas City's on the phone an hour later. Yeah, not just for Andy, but he wants Andy to be able to build the best staff. You want to get stuff going co wickly.
And you think about Andy Reed, that's an iconic Hall of Fame coaching himself.
He needed a great staff. He needed a ceespag Nolo.
If JJ Reddick is going to be the next head coach of the Lakers.
Lead staff, you need absolutely.
Joe Mizzoula last year looked overwhelmed at times against Eric Spoulstra Brad Stevens, the GM went out and fortified his staff, and now the Celtics with a young Joe Mizzoula and an old or more experienced staff, they look well coached.
What did Jalen Brown just say, experience is the best teacher.
Well, j J.
Reddick has no experience, So how is he going to be without an elite staff.
It's you're setting him up to fail.
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I'm entering the Noble Zone sponsored by Credible Great rates, none of the bull So Robert Slow, the head coach of the Jets, I don't doubt that Aaron Rodgers communicated with Robert Sala. I don't think there was some communication breakdown between Robert Sala and the head coach. And this is getting a lot of pushback. Aaron, you know I've said this before, never married, no kids, no pets. He's going to do his own thing on his terms, no sacrificing. Aaron's going to do Aaron Mini camp starts.
He's not there.
I thought it was one day now he's been on vacation. I'm told it's abroad. He may have a charity and may be something that's very important is his life. But generally superstars can get people to be more amenable to their schedule. But whatever, and I don't think five practices, three practices is the.
End of the world.
But it is interesting that we all acknowledge that quarterback is a leadership position, and according to this moment at a press conference, only Sala knew he was gonna miss Mini camp.
Tyrod said he had only found out that morning.
Is there any reason that wasn't communicated to him before.
No, it's a one on one conversation. It's not a team needed to know about. Aaron and I are on the exact same page. There's no issue between Aaron or his teammates for that matter. So, like I said, we addressed it yesterday. It's not it's more of an issue for everyone outside the building than it is inside.
He didn't give teammates a heads up. Tom Brady's career was being close to teammates like number four receivers. Aaron couldn't be friend DeVante Adams enough to convince him to stay in Green Bay. And you gotta be kidding me. The Jets have a new offensive line in an era of NFL football where veteran offensive linemen will not take snaps in the preseason. You have a head coach on a hot seat, an impulsive owner, two young receivers, and an old, beat up new receiver. Aaron only played four snaps last year, and you don't call your teammates, you don't give them a heads up. Now, I'm not saying mini camp is the be all end all. It's only three or four practices in mid June. I'm not saying it's the end of the world. But you know, leadership is defined a lot of ways. This doesn't feel like leadership. New o line, new receivers, coach in the hot seat, impulsive owner GM missed on a left tackle and a quarterback. You got to be all for one, one for all here, GM, your coach. Everybody needs your support.
And I know, I know.
Quarterback is like riding a bicycle, you never forget. Well, the problem is Aaron crashed his bicycle last year, so extra snaps probably help. Not to mention, they brought in seven eight nine new offensive players if you count the draft and free agency they got like seven eight five new starters, seven eight new nine new guys and still an offensive coordinator that's not universally respected. So you can do a lot of things remotely. You can interview for a job these days. Remotely. You can have a doctor's appointment, believe it or not. Remotely, you can order groceries remotely. You can't play quarterback remotely. Texts won't do. You have to hand the ball off and timing with your wide receivers, left tackle, tight end. It's not the end of the world missing practices, but if you want to be called a leader, like you're not going to give your teammates a heads up. You're missing mini camp. You're only talking with Soma, did the GM No? Did the owner know? Feels like once again, and Eran's already communicating with his media, SIKA fans so they can protect him. So once again, Erin's on an island, communicating with people that will defend him, separating from the team, doing what Aaron wants to do. I don't think it's the number of practices. I think there's too many football practices. I think there shouldn't be a lot of hitting. After about a week two weeks of it at camp. You don't need to hit during the season as a player. So I'm not here banging on people missing practices. But we're all basically judged on our life. Resumes Mad when he got drafted, Mad sitting behind farm, couldn't get along with the Green Bay front office, struggling with Mike McCarthy, putting Robert sala on an island. Why did Robert Robert Salah call it an event? Why did Robert Salas say it was unexcused? Is it a power dynamic thing, a friction thing, like it's the Jets can't do the easy things right. It just feels like not you can blame Sola.
Go ahead, you can blame Aaron.
I'm not blaming either, but I'm just saying, like, if you want to be the man that's like a twenty four to seven gig, you can't order back remotely. And once again sla is up there with the New York Press, which is fairly large and relentless, you know, just kind of spitball in it. And yesterday it's like, yeah, he didn't really communicate it with the team, you know, but he communicated it with us.
For solid to say it.
Was unexcused publicly, and for him to acknowledge that he didn't tell his teammates, that tells you I don't care what they say publicly. They're getting frustrated with Aaron, regardless of where he's at charity helping others, regardless of where he's at.
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We never have enough time to get to everything we want to get.
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Yeah, you blubber me.
Well, you know what it's called over promise. You should be good at it because you've been over promising women for years.
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Well, he's been in the news for the last six months, dominating college basketball up for the Lakers gig. People are saying, wow, so leverage playing Janny Hurley. Well, I don't know Danny that well, but there's not a lot of BS from what I know and what I hear, so I my takeaway was, you wouldn't have wasted your time in the middle of recruiting to fly out to l A even if the even if you got a nice shrimp donner. My takeaway was that you were interested in the job, that you wanted the job. Take me to what was going through your head when you flew out of LA back home to Connecticut.
Yeah, I was.
I was really excited about the job. I mean for us right now, you know, we're we've started practice with our you know, with our current team that's going to go for potentially a three p you know, we're also you know in the you know, heating up in a really really critical time for like recruiting, you know, the the rising seniors in high school. So you know that this was not a great time for me, you know, to mess around or to go for a leverage play. Already had the leverage back to back, back to back national championships, and you know, the way that we're doing it, uh and putting players in the NBA and and our culture and the way we play ball. I mean, that's that that's my leverage for me. You know, getting a chance to know Rob Polenka the last couple of years. Last year's draft, they really like Jordan Hawkins, so you know, got a chance to get to know Rob the really the last you know, two drafts, you know, because we've had prospects and I've just been super impressed with him, and obviously the the opportunity to you know, coach, you know, one of the biggest brands in all of the sports landscape in the entire world. For somebody that loves basketball was something that, you know, I really owed it to myself and my family to consider.
Listen, I I had told I said on the air sixty five thirty five, he's considering it. But I lived in Connecticut. It's family, it's church at Tradition, it's Yukon basketball. I said, this is this is a hard place to leave. But when I saw you at the Billy Joel concert with your wife, I'm like, come on, come on that that come on and not leaving that I lived out there, Like that's part of like New York, Connecticut. When you when I want to literally go to the Billy Joel concert because I don't think you've made your mind up yet.
I don't think you'd made your mind up.
I know you're putting your hands in your face, but I'm sitting there thinking, that's three hours with his wife.
That is that is Connecticut, that is New York.
I mean honestly, I I literally thought to myself, if he was on the fence, he's driving home tonight, I don't know if he can leave that, am I do I sound crazy?
Saying this.
Yeah, it was a nice break for me, you know, because on Monday of that week, I really had, you know, things with the with the Lakers that had started to heat up.
And then you know, the WOJ bomb dropped on Thursday, and you know that that my whole life and our whole family, and and what that meant in terms of the intensity of the situation went through the roof for me. I mean, it was everywhere, man like in the media, and it's all people are talking about, and I couldn't really go anywhere around here, you know. And then getting on the plane and meeting Jeanie Buss and being blown away by her and everyone with the Lakers and the whole opportunity I needed like a mental break. And and then like Cooper flat you know, Cooper, you know, appreciate you. I hope you have a great year. Hope to meet you in the final four next year. But we had to cancel of going to a Billy Joel concert last September to accommodate Cooper and and Kelly and his family for an official visit. And as big a moment it was in my career to make a huge decision, I was not missing Billy Joel one of his last concerts at the Guarden.
Yeah, you know, I said this. You know, coach k was offered a big job in the NBA Laker job, but he decided to stay at Duke and then coach the Olympic team. So you get some of the flavor. And to me, it's like, oh, that's really smart that you get the relationships, you get the I mean, you get to be around the world's best players, which is I think guys like you intellectually need that. You need to be challenged because obviously from your career you're in a sending coach. Is it possible if the Olympic team came to you over time and said, hey, we want you to run this thing, that that would be enough, Danny, that would be enough to serve that because I get the itch, Saban had it, Spurrier had it.
I get the itch. Could that potentially down the road be the itch?
Yeah, I mean that would be an incredible honor, right, the greatest honor, and you know in coaching, would be to represent your country with USA Basketball. And that really the poll was the opportunity the Lakers, not necessarily LA but coaching the Lakers coaching Lebron James, you know, Anthony Davis like the coaching Lebron, Like the opportunity to coach one of the greatest players of all time, what that would look like, The challenge of doing that, how hard you would have to work, the level of expertise, the relationship building that you would have to bring to that position to make it work with one of the smartest players and the greatest players. Made it something that was drawing me to the job, not not away from the job, but you know, for me in the end, you know, the impact that you can have on eighteen, nineteen year old twenty year olds, you know, the fulfillment that you get from, you know, being a part of you know, the last group of people that could maybe change the lives of young people, you know. And then the opportunity obviously to come back to a place and to do something that hasn't been done you know since John Wooden and those great U c l a teams, The chance to go for history, you know, and what do you mean to the state of Connecticut and Yukon as a whole. Uh, and then all the family considerations as well. Just there's too many things that that kept me here.
Finally about a minute left, did you talk to Lebron? I mean, obviously Lebron is the greatest basketball player in twenty years. You talk or text or anything.
We had some text messages and you know he uh you know, incredible uh you know, message from him over the course of the weekend just just uh you know, talking about talking about basketball and and and some different things and and and letting me know, uh you know that uh you know that that if he was there in LA that I'd have his support and uh just like think about that man like that. That blew my mind. And and then we we we got into a text exchange, and then the exchange and even went through to when I chose to go in another direction. So you know, it blew my mind when I when you get a text message from the.
Hey, it's great seeing you kick button recruiting. I'm a huge fan and give your best of the fam. Thanks for coming on the show and Thursday, coach, I appreciate.
It, appreciate you mission here in Connecticut.
Brother all right, Dan Hurley, the great Dan Hurley, fourteen years as a coach, two national titles, a great basketball family. And I'll tell you when I saw when I saw he and his wife at the Billy Joel concert, and knowing how big of a deal I think it was the last Billy Joel concert. I just thought to myself, people don't understand I had the great honor to work right in Boston, New York area, the New England region. I considered it really the growth period of my life. I had my kids, put him in great schools. The people are amazing, tradition matters. I'm somebody that's bounced all over the country and it was the most bedrock foundational place I'd ever lived. People grow up there, they stay there. They vacation at Cape Cod, they go to Martha's, even vacation in the area. The prep schools, the tradition, the churches, the camps. It's hard for a lot of West Coast people to understand the depth of the East Coast, and I love it. I think it's amazing. I still spend a lot of my time in the summers I go back East. I think it's the most beautiful place I've ever been to in my life, especially in the summers and the falls. It's glorious, but there's a depth. It's not wider, it's deeper in the East. It's about your grandpa, your dad, the business, the church, the camp, your friends. People out west tend to be sort of live and let live, a little more flexible and amenable to change. That's good too, That's probably what I am. But I look at that Billy Joel Concert, I'm like, man, I know that those of and it's hard to pull yourself away from stuff like that. You know that you live in Connecticut.
Now, Yeah, and it's unbelievable what he means to that state. You know, He's stores has been completely rejuvenated in a post Calhoun, even Kevin Ollie world because of this man.
It's very hard to leave that behind.
Good stuff. Dan Hurley delivers as always
