Breaking: Kevin Durant just got traded to the Rockets. Details here.

Tonight’s playoff game

1. Go Pacers

Indiana isn’t the origin of basketball. It’s not the most successful basketball state. But it’s definitely the soul of American basketball. 

Its history with the sport can be explained as such: They treat everything hoops-related like a cult. High school basketball is a cult. Bob Knight is a cult. There’s a cult around the movie ‘Hoosiers.’ The ABA Pacers were such a cult they convinced the NBA to absorb them. Their very midwestern catch phrase -- In 49 states, it’s just basketball, but this is Indiana -- basically cops to this. 

As an NBA town, it’s the most secure small-market franchise in the league. There aren’t relocation rumors or leverage plays from the owner every five years. The Pacers will not be moving to Seattle, Las Vegas or Nashville. They also won’t be paying the luxury tax, tanking, picking in the top 10, or providing brunch.

They’ve had exactly one career-long superstar since joining the NBA. He … 

1. Never won anything

2. Has murals, a statue, a permanent courtside seat for every big game 

The state of Indiana also pumps out NBA players; a few names born and raised there: Larry Bird, Oscar Robertson, Louie Dampier, Zach Randolph, Shawn Kemp, Desmond Bane, Darius Garland, Eric Gordon, Jeff Teague, Gary Harris, George Hill, Jimmy King, Courtney Lee, Dick Van Arsdale, Gordon Hayward, etc. 

They are, in a non-manufactured way, basketball. 

Oklahoma City, a great team that isn’t even particularly unlikable, is the opposite. The Thunder are hatched from a scheme to commit franchise theft. They stole their team from Seattle.

Before that, they tried to steal the Hornets from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Before that, in 1997, they almost got an NHL team, figuring it was the only realistic Big 4 sports league it could lure to a city sprung from a land run, which has been living on gimmicks ever since.

Nothing about their relationship to basketball is organic. They don’t care about the actual sport. A spring practice for the Sooners is a bigger deal than the Thunder in a down year. The team began as a ploy to make an irrelevant place seem big-time. The fact you even know the who/what/where/when/why/how of Oklahoma City means they’ve been successful in that ploy.  

But the Pacers deserve to win tonight. It doesn’t mean they will. And the Thunder won’t be villains if they do. But it will just be another NBA title in the record book. 

If the Pacers win, it will be the most shocking/meaningful/unlikely title in the history of the NBA. It will almost be unbelievable if they do.

2. Trivia

Quick hits

• Remember: Everyone at ESPN picked OKC to win, except one guy who picked Pacers in 7. 

• We will eventually get a BTS look at this game from Netflix. 

• Scott Foster is not on the call for Game 7. There will be no Game 8.

• Reminder: Finals Games 7s are historically very low scoring. 

• ICYMI: The Lakers are being sold.

Reads + Pods

• The NBA’s old ownership class is nearly extinct [Defector]

• Oklahoma City’s completely bananas Children’s Museum devoted to the joys of capitalism [Slate]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 398th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• A seventh team in seven years is going to win the NBA Finals 

• Last time the Thunder were here … 

• Mat Ishbia has chronic New Owner Syndrome

Tonight’s playoff game

1. It’s an equal opportunity league now

Adam Silver’s dream of parity in 11 words: The Thunder and Pacers are playing in the NBA Finals tonight. 

Or, anyone can win the Finals in Adam Silver’s NBA. Even the teams with the 12th and 26th highest payrolls. 

A clear reaction to Cavs-Warriors pts. 1, 2, 3 and 4 -- the last two featuring Kevin Durant -- the league has gone to work since 2018 on breaking up superteams via incentives for homegrown superstars to stay home and a new collective bargaining agreement, implemented last offseason, which kneecaps great teams trying to hoard depth. 

(The ‘second apron’ -- basically a payroll threshold which acts as a hard cap once you hit it -- has broken up the Nuggets’ 2023 team and will break up the Celtics’ 2024 team. Soon, it will force the Thunder to move on from tertiary but important players like Lu Dort and Alex Caruso.)

The result: Whoever wins this Finals will be the seventh different champion in seven years. That’s never happened before. 

That list includes: The Raptors (first-time champs), the Bucks (first in 50 years) and the Nuggets (first-time champs). The Pacers have never won in the NBA and the Thunder have won only once, as the Sonics in 1979. 

The league’s shift from super teams and dynasties has been great for small markets, and not-so-great for TV ratings discourse. 

[READ: Don't worry about NBA Finals TV ratings. Appreciate Pacers-Thunder for what it is.]

2. Daily GIF: Last time OKC was in the Finals …

June 12, 2012: Kevin Durant drops 36 and the Thunder beat the Heat in Game 1 of the NBA Finals. Tonight could be OKC’s first Finals win since.

[WATCH: 2012 NBA Finals Game 1 highlights]

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3. Trivia

4. This guy is not a good NBA owner

Within a day of becoming owner of the Phoenix Suns, Mat Ishbia traded everything, even the stuff that was bolted down, for Kevin Durant. 

The Suns have won one playoff series since. They’ve been swept in another. They didn’t make the playoffs this year and they just hired their third coach in three years. 

The initial overpay for KD began an ongoing sunken cost fallacy, which included all those coach firings and this awful trade for Bradley Beal. 

TLDR: Ishbia, a billionaire by inheritance, has been a bad NBA owner who can’t leave basketball decisions to his front office.   

He thinks he hasn’t been hands on enough, though. 

Via reporting from GoPHNX.com yesterday:

Sorry, Suns fans.

Quick hits

• Look at the numbers on the extension SGA is about to sign. 

• The NBA is changing the ASG format to USA vs. World. 

• Dan Hurley isn’t interested in the Knicks job. 

• The current Finals booth (Doris Burke, Richard Jefferson, Mike Breen) could look different next year. 

• Thibs was fired after meetings with ‘a select few’ Knicks players. 

• Adam Silver thinks Europe is ahead of America in player development.

Reads + Pods

• How the Gen Z takeover is changing the NBA [The Ringer]

• The cool athlete is no longer in production [Defector]

• The Paul George trade is about to deliver an NBA title [ESPN]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 397th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Gregg Popovich won’t be the Spurs’ head coach next year. More here. 

• Jalen Brunson is nasty 

• The Miami Heat are washed

Tonight’s playoff game

1. JJ Redick is just Darvin Ham with a thesaurus

You might remember JJ Redick. He’s the one who hosted a few contrived podcast episodes with LeBron last year, then woke up a few days later as the Lakers head coach. He got to that point by getting angry on First Take, being mean to Bob Cousy, tweeting like Nets-era Kyrie Irving, and generally positioning himself as the smartest guy in the room. 

When he got the Lakers job, he presented his BIG ideas, spoke like a thesaurus, lectured us about a college player who averaged 4 PPG, and threw shade at Darvin Ham, who had coached LA to a Western Conference Finals in his first season.

Redick’s first season as Lakers coach ended on Wednesday to the Wolves, in a five-game loss in the first round as the favored 3 seed. (Remember: 11 of 12 ESPN people picked them to win the series.)

Here’s how he handled it: Poorly. Redick stormed out of the pre-Game 5 press conference because someone asked him about an obvious strategic failure the game before. Watch it here. His disdain for the blockheads among him is palpable. 

During the Game 5 broadcast, we learned Reggie MIller had to ask him to stop acting like a child in a production meeting. After his season ended, Redick threw shade at Luka (which, fair) and gagged up these six words: ‘I can be a lot better.’ 

There’s no way he believes that, because he believes he’s perfect.

[WATCH: Charles Barkley roasts JJ Redick]

2. Daily GIF: Brunson FTW

To quote a Knicks fan friend: ‘Brunson absolutely shook his candy ass’

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3. Trivia

4. How much rope do these guys get?

As long as this newsletter is alive, we will ask this question: If the Heat have the best coach, a great GM and the No. 1 market advantage in the NBA, why are they .500 (or worse) every year? 

The gilded era of Jimmy Butler dragging this team past its reasonable ceiling is over. The underbelly is this: The current Heat are an underachieving franchise with two untouchtables guiding the team toward nowhere in particular, with supreme job security.

Why? You have to assume it’s those two fluky Finals runs. Otherwise, this is the body of work since LeBron left in 2014: 

• One 50-win season

• Three straight years as an 8 seed 

• 1.5-ish homegrown stars (Bam, Tyler Herro)

• 3 million non-trades for available superstars 

Pat Riley is on the precipice of self-awareness. Erik Spoelstra is a LeBron/Jimmy merchant. Here’s to five more years of those two doing nothing despite every advantage.

Quick hits

• LeBron is doing the thing where he takes no responsibility for anything. 

• Celtics are massive favorites against the Knicks.

• Tyrese Haliburton’s dad has been banned from all Pacers games.

• Interesting offseason subplot: When/if Luka will sign his $229M extension.

• The Suns quietly demoted/fired James Jones as GM. 

• Jalen Brunson’s series-winner last night got the rare double-bang from Mike Breen.

• Fact we just found out: Kevin Love’s dad, Stan, who just died, was the brother of Mike Love, member of the Beach Boys.

Reads + Pods

• This version of Jamal Murray could swing the NBA playoffs [The Ringer]

• What a championship says for these teams [ESPN]

• Big Lakers ambitions squished by, of all people, Rudy Gobert [Defector]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 396th edition of The Grip.

Play-in schedule

1. Thoughts on every series, East Edition

No. 1 Cavs (64-18) vs. No. 8 Heat/Hawks

Whoever emerges victorious from the annual Heat-Hawks-Bulls play-in invitational is going to get violated by the Cavs, who are a legit juggernaut.

Also: If the Heat have the best coach, a great GM and the No. 1 market advantage in the NBA, why are they .500 every year? Why haven’t they landed a star since Jimmy Butler? Why haven’t they won anything since LeBron decided to go there? The whole Heat Culture enterprise is stale. Dead, even.

No. 2 Celtics (61-21) vs. No. 7 Magic (41-41)

Point: There is some intrigue here, in that Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner are both healthy after missing extended time this season, giving leniency to the idea that Orlando is somewhat better than their record and seed suggests. 

Counterpoint: The Celtics are -8000 to advance. 

No. 3 Knicks (51-31) vs. No. 6 Pistons (44-38)

Knicks fans feel particularly down on this team, which appears to have a second round ceiling despite their all-in moves this offseason. 

A few names to remind those fans of where they came from, though: Allonzo Trier, Damyean Dotson, Ignas Brazdeikis, Mario Hezonja, Mindaugas Kuzminskas, etc. 

Also: This is how Mikel Bridges kept his consecutive games played streak alive. That’s kinda lame!

No. 4 Pacers (50-32) vs. No. 5 Bucks (48-34)

Giannis’ stats this year: 30.4/11.9/6.5 on 60.1% shooting.

1. We’re all taking him for granted. 

2. Apparently, Dame Lillard has made a miraculous recovery from a blood clot and might actually play this series. 

Also: The Pacers won 50 games this year after a 10-15 start. That’s a 40-17 finish. They’re pretty good. Maybe even upset-the-Cavs-in-the-second-round good. (A hedged half-prediction. We’re so back!)

2. Trivia

3. Thoughts on every series, West Edition

No. 1 Thunder (64-18) vs. No. 8 Grizzlies/Mavs 

Did you know the Thunder are the seventh team in NBA history to win 68 or more games in a season? Did you know they have the best net-rating ever? 

They’re also the youngest team in the league. The last time the youngest team in the league won the title? Never. 

SGA is 26. Chet Holmgren is 22. Jalen Williams is 24. You’d have to go back to the 1981 Celtics to find such a freshly-microwaved contender who actually won the title. 

Also: We’re eagerly waiting to see how far Ja Morant will take his weapons-themed celebrations.

No. 2 Rockets (52-30) vs. No. 7 Warriors (48-34)

If you’re a regular season flake, you might be shocked to hear the Rockets are the 2 seed in the toughest West since the mid-2010s.

Quick primer: They’ve won on defense. They’re average on offense. Their best player is probably All-Star Alperen Sengun. Their funnest player is Amen Thompson. And their most over-involved player is Fred VanVleet; get ready for 30-foot step-back air balls as the shot clock expires!

Also: GSW has Draymond Green. Houston has Dillon Brooks. So, that will be fun.

No. 3 Lakers (50-32) vs. No. 6 Timberwolves (49-33)

All 11 ESPN people picked the Lakers to advance, which is hilarious because they’re only -180 to win the series. But if the Lakers win and the Warriors win, we’ll get the sixth playoff series between Steph and LeBron. What do you think is the league’s desired outcome?

Also: Oh my god, the Lakers have Luka Doncic. 

No. 4 Nuggets (50-32) vs. No. 5 Clippers (50-32)

This series has Clippers-Spurs 2015/Bulls-Celtics 2009 potential as far as first-rounders go. Kawhi Leonard is playing as well as he has as a Clipper and, if you’re in the market for a new nerd-friendly Balkan to talk about this postseason, meet Ivica Zubac. 

Also: The Nuggets fired Michael Malone a few weeks ago and no one on the team seems sad about it. 

Also, also: Nikola Jokic became the third person to average a triple-double in NBA history this season. His take on it: “I didn't do that before. I don't know. I don't know what to say. It's good”

Quick hits

• The three players who have averaged a triple-double all did so while averaging 30-plus points. Wonder if a non-prolific scorer will ever do it?

• Ja Morant is expected to play tonight despite an injury vs. the Warriors. 

• The Phoenix Suns are a new kind of bleak. 

• Adam Silver is still debunking Luka trade conspiracies. 

• Remember former Timberwolf Nikola Pekovic? He’s a Balkan gangster now.

• Dirk is out on the Mavericks. 

• The Pistons are trying to stop Knicks fans from coming to their home games.

Reads + Pods

• NBA nicknames are getting out of control [GQ]

• Missed 3s are taking over the NBA. Where should the league draw the line? [The Ringer]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 395th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Giannis has lifelong fans in us from this Olympics alone 

• Kevin Durant is six points from an important milestone 

• Noah Lyles vs. the NBA, explained

Tomorrow’s Olympic Quarterfinals

1. Giannis is worth getting up at 5 AM

Sometimes, the highest form of athletic observance is watching a dominant team steamroll its competition through the fact of overwhelming talent.

Other times, the highest form of athletic observance is watching someone who is ultimately set up to fail want something so fucking badly they’ll drive themselves to unhealthy exhaustion trying to do it.

The second one is for the sickos hooked on watching Giannis drag a terrible Greece team into the quarterfinals of these Olympics.

The roster is … 

• Giannis

• Three other former NBA players who all played less than 100 games, none more recent 2018

• Euro League players of varying skill 

The team’s strategy is somewhere between Caitlin Clark at Iowa and the ‘Pass the ball to Tucker’ episode from Hey Arnold.

That is to say … it’s just Giannis gamely trying intensely hard to win for his country.

In three games, he’s averaging 27 PPG (first in the tourney) on 68.9 percent shooting and has played 100 of a possible 120 minutes.

The result: A 1-2 record in group play -- they beat fifth-ranked Australia and barely lost to No. 2 Spain and No. 7 Canada -- which was just good enough to advance to the knockouts on point differential.

They play Germany (-7.5) tomorrow in the quarterfinals (at 5 AM ET). Germany, which won the FIBA World Cup last year, has the power of ample NBA talent and well-developed chemistry. All Greece has is the power of how profoundly Giannis cares.

The true sickos will be up at 5 AM.

2. Daily GIF: 1 vs. 4

Here’s what we just wrote about Giannis in GIF form.

[READ: Giannis’ Greece highlights]

3. Trivia

4. Noah Lyles shutting up the entire NBA, explained

In August 2023, Noah Lyles introduced himself to the mainstream sports world by mocking the NBA for considering themselves ‘world champs,’ when they are really just champions of the United States.

Here’s the clip. (It’s hilarious.)

Here are his exact words:

(What made it even funnier: A few weeks later, the US lost in the semifinals of the FIBA World Cup. Obviously, Lyles took that and ran with it.)

Essentially every NBA player/fan on Twitter started making fun of him, which has created a Cold War between the NBA community and Lyles.

In the days leading up to the 100M final yesterday, Lyles underperformed in his heats and in the semifinals, leading to lots of trolling by NBA Twitter, which definitely collectively didn’t understand how the 100M structure worked.

Then … Lyles won the 100M final on Sunday by .005 seconds, earning himself the title of ‘World Champion’ and ‘Fastest Man Alive,’ leaving NBA Twitter in shambles.

The funniest possible outcome: Team USA hoops not winning gold, followed soon by the biggest theoretical victory lap by Lyles in American history.

Quick hits

• Gordon Hayward just retired. The final six years of his career were a complete disaster but that man at his peak did not play like a Gordon. 

• Steph Curry has been pretty bad these Olympics. 

• The fans in Paris have been booing Joel Embiid non-stop because he decided to play for Team USA instead of France. 

• Our men’s 3x3 basketball team absolutely SUCKS. 

• Kemba Walker retired in July. If Bismack Biyombo retires this offseason (he played last season for the Thunder and Grizlies), that would close the book on active pro players who played for the Charlotte Bobcats. (What would you do without this newsletter?)

Reads + Pods

• Behind the scenes of the 76ers’ go-for-broke summer [The Ringer]

• USA basketball is still an awkward fit at the Olympics [New Yorker]

• A universe in 10 seconds [New Yorker]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 394th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Aprons and penny pinching, explained

• Olympic basketball is going to be a treat

• More ranting about Bronny James

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Elevate Your Everyday

1. Socially liberal, fiscally conservative

If you follow the NBA’s offseason tangentially, you’ve probably heard the term ‘apron.’ As in, this team is over/under/near the first/second apron.

You might be an idiot for other reasons, but not understanding all the apron talk is not one of them.

Essentially … Most teams are not in apron territory, but if your payroll hits or exceeds $178M, you’re in the first apron. If it hits or exceeds $188M, you’re in the second apron.

What happens when you’re in either apron: It severely constricts your team’s ability to trade for high-salary players or mortgage your future via draft picks. Here’s a full list of specific constrictions, but, basically, the goal is to make it so expensive teams can’t get better.

Now, ask yourself, are NBA owners — who fought for this specific rule in the new CBA — using it to act in good faith?

No! They are not. They are using the constricting nature of life in the aprons to justify getting under them.

You might have noticed this: The normally deep-pocketed teams are using the aprons as an excuse to shed massive payroll. 

• The Clippers let Paul George walk for nothing. The Warriors cut Chris Paul and let Klay Thompson walk. The Nuggets let Kentavious Caldwell-Pope walk, opting not to match what was a reasonable deal. 

The only owners who are YOLO’ing: Suns owner Mat Ishbia, who’s an idiot, and Celtics owner Wyc Grousbeck, who blacked out, gave every Boston starter a nine-figure deal, then put his team up for sale.

2. Daily GIF: Wemby to Rudy

The teams who have to face a front court of Victor Wembanyama and Rudy Gobert in the Olympics this summer are going to have a serious case of megalophobia.

[WATCH: France vs. Turkey highlights]

3. Trivia

4. The justification is a stretch

In the frantic defense of LeBron’s nepo play, LeBron apologists have made two consistent points: (1) The NBA is run by nepotism, so who cares and (2) where was this energy for Thanasis?

The first one is just whataboutism, which is deflection. We all do it.

The second one, while also whataboutism, is particularly stupid:  

1. Thanasis -- Giannis’ not-very-talented brother, a member of the Bucks since 2019 -- is a walking punchline. He is not a serious member of the NBA community. Is that what LeBron wants for Bronny? For him to check in, get dunked on, then clowned on Twitter?

2. For the entirety of Thanasis’ Bucks tenure (2019-present), the Bucks have been a title contender. Nepotism is about leverage. Giannis could make Milwaukee sign Thanasis because he has the ability to bring the Bucks a title. The Lakers are not title contenders, which is another reason this makes LA look kind of pathetic. They are bending the knee for LeBron for … what reason? A photo op? 

3. Thanasis is 6-foot-7. He was drafted by the Knicks in 2014 after Giannis’ unremarkable rookie season. Thansis was drafted on his own merit/potential. At one point, he was considered a prospect. Bronny -- say it with us -- is a 6-foot-1 non-shooter who averaged 4.8 PPG for a bad college team. 

Again, if you want to think this is a cool story, that’s fine, but the justification is confusing. LeBron let a bad college player, who is also his son, skip the line so he could play with him. How you interpret that fact is up to you.

[READ: Bronny James didn’t ask for the attention, so give him a break]

Quick hits

• This is a real quote from JJ Redick on Bronny James, who averaged 4.8 PPG for a bad college team: ‘Bronny has earned this through hard work’

• LeBron leaked that he would take a pay cut for three specific players. The Lakers signed none of those players, and now he has signed a max deal. 

• Look at this statline from Giannis vs. Dominican Republic. 

• Klay Thompson and Draymond Green hated that the Warriors extended Jordan Poole and Andrew Wiggins. 

• Banned NBA player Jontay Porter is facing a federal felony charge. 

• Kemba Walker has retired from basketball after an unsuccessful year overseas. 

• Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese both made the WNBA All-Star roster, marking the first time since 2014 two rookies have made it.

Reads + Pods

• Searching for the star of the NBA Finals [New Yorker]

• How Klay Thompson’s 13-year run with the Warriors splintered so unceremoniously [The Athletic]

• Paul George’s arrival changes everything [The Ringer]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 393rd edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Why is Bronny James in this draft?

• We miss Jaylen Brown dunking on people

• Brooklyn’s haul for KD is historic

Tonight’s NBA Draft, 8PM EST

1. This is a sham and everyone should be embarrassed

Beyond the obvious, there is zero reason to think Bronny James is an NBA prospect. 

• He played 25 games as a freshman for a 15-18 USC team, averaging 4.8 PPG on 36.6 percent shooting. He’s 6-foot-1 and doesn’t dribble or pass particularly well. 

His best attribute is that he appears willing to try on defense. As such, he has (or has been told to) sell himself as a Jrue Holiday, Derrick White or Davion Mitchell. (His words.) So, a potential Hall of Famer, an ace role player on a title team, or an excellent college player on a national champion who was picked in the lottery.

The measurables, the stats, the comparisons -- this is all, of course, insane. Bronny James should be getting reps at a mid-major college. Instead, he’s going to get drafted tonight or tomorrow, almost definitely by the Lakers, a team shadow-run by an aging legend with legacy brain rot and a power-hungry agent in Rich Paul who represents both father and son.

Side note: In the past week, Paul has said Bronny won’t sign a ‘two-way’ deal -- standard practice for second-rounders -- and has casually admitted he has the power to ‘force LA to take (Bronny) at (No.) 17.’

Who is this good for? Not Bronny, obviously, who is the only sympathetic figure in any of this. Is it good business for the Lakers? Are they hoping to boost their G-League revenue? Is he good enough to be a G-Leaguer? (Probably not.) Is he going to be shoe-horned into LA’s 15-man roster next season? Will JJ Redick (he’s the new coach, btw) be forced to play him? What happens when he gets exposed by actual NBA players? When his dad retires in two years and he’s washed out of a league he wasn’t ready for, what’s next? If the one reason driving this is ‘it would be cool,’ that is not good enough.

Again, this is a sham and everyone should be embarrassed.

(BUT, if it’s going to happen, the Celtics should draft him at No. 54 and hold him for ransom.)

[READ: The Ringer’s final NBA mock draft]

2. Daily GIF: This was cool

No higher reason for this section. Just doing some reminiscing.

[WATCH: 24 minutes of Celtics propaganda]

3. Trivia

4. The Nets’ haul for KD is breathtaking

The Nets traded Mikal Bridges to the Knicks yesterday. The upshot is that the Knicks get to play their buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy Villanova cop movie for a few years, which could definitely lead to an NBA Finals berth or something close to it.

The remarkable-ness of it all is (1) what New York gave up for Bridges and (2) the final haul the Nets got in the KD trade.

Bridges-to-New York specifics: 

• Knicks get: Mikal Bridges

• Nets get: Four unprotected firsts from the Knicks (‘25, ‘27, ‘29, ‘31), a protected first originally from Milwaukee (‘25), an unprotected pick swap (‘28), two seconds (‘25, ‘26) and Bojan Bogdanović

KD-to-Phoenix specifics: 

• Suns get: Kevin Durant, T.J. Warren

• Nets get: Four unprotected firsts from the Suns (‘23, ‘25, ‘27, ‘29), an unprotected pick swap (‘28), Mikal Bridges, Cam Johnson

So, by our math … the Nets (so far) have received nine first round picks from 2023-31 (eight unprotected), two unprotected pick swaps in the same year (we have no idea how that works) and two second round picks for Durant. (They can still turn Cam Johnson into more assets.)

That haul is breathtaking.

[READ: Did the Knicks just get fleeced on the most expensive reunion ever?]

Quick hits

• Also last night, the Nets and Rockets made one of the most confusing trades we’ve ever seen. Good luck parsing it. 

• Here’s David Stern trying on LeBron’s suit during the 2003 draft. 

• The Warriors have entered the Paul George sweepstakes. 

• If you live in Denver and want to be the next Rocky, inquire within.

• Stephen A. says the Suns want out of the Kevin Durant business. 

• The Knicks still hope to sign OG Anunoby.

Reads + Pods

• Caitlin Clark’s new reality [New Yorker]

• How many picks?! What to make of this monster Knicks-Nets megatrade for Mikal Bridges [ESPN]

• After all that, the Lakers hire LeBron’s podcast co-host [Defector]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 392nd edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Shout out to Jaylen Brown

• Payton Pritchard’s shot was the dagger

• NBA Finals ratings vs. the NBA rights deal

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One Pant, Endless Possibilities

1. Jaylen Brown is the story here

The end-of-Game-5 scramble had a clear strategy: Find Jayson Tatum. We saw him as the clock wound down and with his son when the game ended. He got the postgame interview and the preloaded commercial.

This was all preordained in ESPN production meetings and Jordan Brand pitch meetings, and followed a similar mold: Find the best/most famous player and zero in on him.

But all the surface-level Tatum hoopla missed the true story, which is the reclamation and redemption of Finals MVP Jaylen Brown.

In Game 7 vs. the Heat last year, when Tatum got Hurt and Brown had eight turnovers in the loss, there was an avalanche of negativity about him, which was amplified when Boston gave him the biggest deal in NBA history. 

• The far greater feeling was that Boston needed to trade Jaylen Brown or not give him all that money, and it lasted until the start of this postseason. Jaylen Brown as the new Tobias Harris was a closer reality to what’s unfolded over the last two months. 

• But, legitimately, he was the Celtics’ most important player over their last two series. He was the MVP of both and the calming presence, which is kind of miraculous. 

His success is also a testament to how much Brown -- a much less gifted player than Tatum -- cares about getting better. His career has been a series of choppy, often nonlinear mini-leaps, from draft reach to bit player to MVP of the NBA Finals.

Both of these stars have arrived, but Tatum, basketball-wise, was born on second and dutifully strolled home. Brown bunted himself on and small-balled his way around the diamond.

[READ: Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown put the drama to bed]

2. Daily GIF: The NBA’s first special teams player

In hindsight, the end-of-quarter-3-point-heave specialist hitting a halfcourt shot to go up 21 at home was probably the moment it was over. 

[WATCH: Payton Pritchard x Father Stretch My Hands]

3. Trivia

4. The NBA’s weird dichotomy of lower ratings and higher rights deals

This year’s NBA Finals, which had very little drama, averaged 11.31M viewers throughout its five games. That number is the lowest of the last three Finals, and part of an overall downward trend in viewership, which began in earnest in 2019 and accelerated when the pandemic hit.

Here’s the last 10 years in average NBA Finals viewership:

Why is this happening? The NFL is an ever-growing monolith. LeBron vs. Steph Curry was a needle-mover. Player empowerment/load management might have soured some fans.

Better question, though: Does it matter? Financially, the answer appears to be no. Any day now, the league is expected to announce a new TV rights deal which would pay the NBA $76B over 11 years, nearly tripling the current deal -- set to expire next year -- of $24B over 10 years. 

• That $76B deal sets in motion a reality where player salaries eventually eclipse $100M annually.

• And, unless something drastic happens to reverse a lack of TV interest, those ballooning salaries will take place under the backdrop of a league in cultural decline. 

Those two factors will combine to create thousands of think-pieces and some of the worst conservative cable TV segments you could ever think of.

Quick hits

• Seven Black coaches have now won the NBA Finals. Four of them came with the Celtics: Joe Mazzulla, Doc Rivers, K.C Jones and Bill Russell. Ty Lue, Lenny Wilkens and Al Attles are the other three. 

• The Pistons just fired Monty Williams after one season, which will cost them $65M. 

• Never forget: 9 of 17 ESPN writers picked the Mavericks. 

• Al Horford is not retiring. 

• Just five minutes of media members doubting the Celtics.

• Here’s Brad Stevens being about as emotional as he can be.

Reads + Pods

• As the first Dominican NBA champion, Al Horford’s Celtics win kindles Caribbean pride locally [Boston Globe]

• When my father talked about Larry Bird [Esquire]

• Al Horford earned it [Defector]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 391st edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Yes, Bob Cousy is still alive

• Block or charge?

• Jerry West, what a life

NBA Finals Game 4

You gotta give.

1. Get 18 for Cooz

One of the best recurring bits on the internet is when everyone either learns or remembers that Bob Cousy, a grainy black and white memory from a different world, is still alive. He’s 95 years old, still puttering around Worcester, where he’s lived since attending Holy Cross in the late 1940s.

That happened again yesterday, when the great Dan Shaughnessy called him up for a column, which produced this legendary quote:

Since 2008 -- the last Celtics’ title -- Tommy Heinsohn, Bill Russell, John Havlicek, Sam Jones, KC Jones and Bill Walton have all died. Dennis Johnson also died in November, 2007.

So, it’s nice to have Cousy still around, still present, still ripping off one-liners to sports columnists. (He’s being dramatic. He’s got a few more years left.) And it will/would be nice to have him around for banner No. 18.

[READ: 'I should have done more': Bob Cousy's letter to Bill Russell]

[The Grip Recommends: The Last Pass: Cousy, Russell, the Celtics, and What Matters in the End]

2. Daily GIF: Block or charge?

Was this a block, a charge, or the refs finally being fed up with Luka’s shit after seven years of non-stop bitching about obvious foul calls?

[WATCH: Celtics-Mavs Game 3 highlights]

3. Trivia

4. All the things that Jerry West did in his life

• Grew up poor in rural West Virginia and slept with a shotgun under his bed in self defense of an abusive dad.

• Won a high school championship, an Olympic gold and nine NBA titles as a player and executive.  

• Won Finals MVP in 1969 despite losing the Finals. His numbers that series: 37.9 PPG, 7.4 APG, 43.9 MPG

• Also in 1969, officially became ‘The Logo,’ when brand consultant Alan Siegel used a picture of West dribbling as inspiration

• Finally got his ring in 1972 after seven(!) Finals losses, as part of a Lakers team that won 33 in a row and 69 games in the regular season overall. 

• In 55 career Finals games, averaged 30.5-5-5.6.

• Helped build the ‘Showtime’ Lakers, then single-handedly built the Kobe-Shaq Lakers by trading Vlade Divac for Kobe Bryant on July 11, 1996, then signing Shaq on July 18, 1996. 

• Almost had a heart attack on live TV during the 2003 NBA draft lottery, when he lost out on drafting LeBron by one pick as Grizzlies GM. 

• Vocally opposed the Warriors trading Klay Thompson for Kevin Love as a Warriors front office member. 

• Helped lure Kevin Durant to Golden State. 

• Helped lure Kawhi Leonard to the Clippers. 

• Destroyed JJ Redick for questioning the validity of Bob Cousy’s career. 

• Died before having to see the Celtics win another title.

[READ: Jerry West and the burden of being the logo]

Quick hits

• ICMYI, Brian Windhorst going off on Luka Doncic postgame is must-watch. 

• Luka did the money sign at the refs last night, which, when you think about it, doesn’t make that much sense. 

• Xavier Tillman’s dad died last month. This must have been really special for him.

• Adam Silver is done trying to fix the All-Star Game. 

• Ben Simmons: Still lacking in self awareness.

Reads + Pods

• Boston reaches the brink of a title in the most Celtics way possible [The Ringer]

• Lakers’ messy coaching search revives the scoopster standoff between Woj and Shams [Defector]

• When things got tight, the C’s embraced the greatness of Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum [Boston Globe]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 390th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Luka had his worst assist game in years last night 

• Jaylen Brown dunks on everyone

• Boston t-shirt vendors have stepped their game up/down

NBA Finals Game 2

You gotta give.

1. The assists were the strangest part

The Mavericks played poorly last night. They were 7-27 from 3; Kyrie Irving was 6-19; the double-big Gafford-Lively combo had only 10 points; they allowed open looks for the Celtics all night.

But the weirdest part was the assist total: Nine in total and one for Luka, his lowest assist game since 05/07/2021, when he played 23 minutes. 

• The lack of Luka assists weren’t just missed shots by teammates, either. He had only 6.5 assist opportunities; Tatum had 14. 

• In the regular season, he averaged 14.6 assist opps per game, second in the NBA. 

In the post game, Luka explained why, very simply, in a way a basketball genius might do: 

AKA: The Celtics’ game plan is/was clearly to let Luka try to go off (he had 30 points on 26 shots) but not incorporate the role players. Solid one-on-one defense. No double teams. Others have tried this, obviously, but Boston might be the one team with the personnel to do it.

In Game 2, how many assists Luka has will probably be a sign of who won and who lost.

[READ: The Boston Celtics aced their first NBA Finals test]

2. Daily GIF: This MFer dunks on everyone

Jaylen Brown had three certified platinum moments last night: This dunk. The 3 + steal + dunk. The double block.

3. Trivia

4. The shirts at this stand outside the Boston Garden, ranked

9.Jayson Tatum(?) Freddy mask 
8. Tatum-Bird-Pierce walking into the heavens 
7. Luka Sucks 
6. Kyrie Sucks
5. Fuck Kyrie 
4. I Fuck Like a Champ 
3. Godzingus 
2. Kyrie clown nose 
1. Certified beer-powered fuck machine

Quick hits

• The Sam Hauser no-dip 3 was a thing of beauty. 

• The Mavs’ leader in assists last night: Kyrie, with two

• Alex Rodriguez and Marc Lore just got Mike Bloomberg to back their mission to buy the Timberwolves. 

• Jrue Holiday saying ‘even our white guys defend’ so casually is hilarious.

• Here’s a good video on how effectively the Celtics targeted Luka on defense. 

• Not sure if this stat is actually impressive or a monster reach.

Reads + Pods

• Dan Hurley to the Lakers isn’t as risky as it sounds [The Ringer]

• Kristaps Porzingis rained hellfire on the hapless Mavericks [Defector]

• Twelve thoughts on the Caitlin Clark take-pocalypse [The Ringer]

• Boston’s big Game 1 win [Bill Simmons Podcast]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 389th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Joe Mazzulla, on the national stage

• The last time the Mavs were in the Finals …

• Some Mavs-Celtics notes

NBA Finals Game 1

You gotta give.

1. Who said it: Joe Mazzulla or someone from ‘The Dark Knight’?

A lot of people in the build-up to the NBA Finals are getting their first taste of Joe Mazzulla, the Celtics’ vaguely terrifying head coach who routinely says things like, ‘How could you not go to Fenway and think you couldn’t rob it?’

And he’s lived up to the hype (said enough insane shit) over the last week to warrant a new game: Who said it: Joe Mazzulla or someone from ‘The Dark Knight’?

Directions: Read quote. Click to guess.

1. ‘Sometimes the truth isn't good enough, sometimes people deserve more. Sometimes people deserve to have their faith rewarded’ 

• Joe Mazzulla

• The Dark Knight

2. ‘I would say this is not the end of the journey. The journey is for however long you’re alive’

• Joe Mazzulla

• The Dark Knight

3. ‘We're all villains in someone's eyes’

• Joe Mazzulla

• The Dark Knight

4. ‘You don't want to die, but you don't know how to take a life’

• Joe Mazzulla

• The Dark Knight

5. ‘What seems to be good might not always be good. And what seems to be bad might not always be bad’

• Joe Mazzulla

• The Dark Knight

[READ: LeBron James calls Celtics' coach Joe Mazzulla 'a f*****g genius']

2. Daily GIF: Remember when Jason Terry kinda outplayed LeBron in the 2011 NBA Finals?

The further we get from the 2011 NBA Finals, the more it feels like a dream.

Also: This is apparently the highest quality clip of this play on the internet. Don’t blame us.

[WATCH: Mavs-Heat Game 6 highlights]

3. Trivia

4. Five things about the NBA Finals

1. The Mavericks have completed 54 alley-oops this postseason. Denver has the next most with nine. Win or lose, Daniel Gafford, PJ Washington and/or Derrick Lively are going to yam all over Al Horford, Kristaps Porzingis and/or Luke Kornet.

2. The Celtics are favorites in Vegas’s eyes but underdogs in public opinion. FanDuel has them at -225 to win the series; 89% of bets at this book are on the Mavs to the series and the majority of ESPN writers are on the Mavs.

3. Kristaps Porzingis is going to start. The Celtics have no one on their injury list.

4. Al Horford is two games from sole possession of second place on the list of most playoff games played without a title.

5. It’s simply impossible to overstate the importance of this series for the Celtics. If they win, several numbers will be retired and several Hall of Fame cases will be stamped. If they lose, it will have been six ECFs and two Finals in eight years without a ring. Not sure how much longer you keep morale up after that many playoff runs without getting over the hump.

[READ: The three biggest Game 1 storylines]

Quick hits

• The new ‘Clipped’ show on Hulu probably deserves its own segment, but, for now, just know this is who they cast as Steph Curry and Klay Thompson. 

• Nepotism in the NBA comes in many forms. 

• Someone in connection with the Jontay Porter betting scandal was arrested trying to leave the country on Tuesday. 

• The Lakers are trying to lure Dan Hurley from UConn. 

• Former NBA player Chase Budinger just made the Olympics as a volleyball player. 

• Offseason Nikola Jokic update.

Reads

• The Detroit Pistons were my father's second family [New Yorker]

• NBA nears $76 billion TV deal [Wall Street Journal]

• The Boston Celtics and what greatness looks like [New Yorker]

• The seven commandments of scoring in the NBA playoffs [The Ringer]

• Lakers’ pursuit of JJ Redick gets even funnier, in that they are now pursuing Dan Hurley [Defector]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 388th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Luka Doncic went off last night

• ESPN is embarrassing itself 

• Snoop Dogg appreciates great trash talk

NBA Finals Game 1

You gotta give.

1. Shout out to the Brooklyn Nets

The Mavericks are going to the NBA Finals. Many people are saying they are the shadow favorites to beat the Celtics. One person is putting down the biggest emotional hedge of his life on the Mavericks to avoid being a completely broken and sad man by mid-June. Some people are even saying that person is who’s writing this newsletter, right now.

ANYWAYS, one immediately interesting thing about this NBA Finals is that it simply would not be possible without the liaising of the Brooklyn Nets.

This entire Celtics run was fueled by that draft night trade in 2013. Refresher:

July 12, 2013: 

• Nets get: Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, Jason Terry, D.J. White

• Celtics get: 2014 first round pick (James Young), 2016 first round pick (Jaylen Brown), 2017 first round swap (Jayson Tatum), 2018 first round pick (Collin Sexton), which was used by the Celtics to acquire Kyrie Irving from Cleveland, Keith Bogans, MarShon Brooks, Kris Humphries, Kris Joseph, Gerald Wallace

And the Mavs wouldn’t be here without last year’s pre-deadline deal, which was mocked at the time but has since blossomed into a few spare parts for a prime superstar.

February 6, 2023:

• Mavs get: Kyrie Irving, Markieff Morris

• Nets get: Spencer Dinwiddie, Dorian Finney-Smith, a second round pick in 2027 and a first round pick in 2029

This all seems pretty simple: If you want to be a contender, call up Nets GM Sean Marks and tell him how brilliant he is for landing Kyrie and Kevin Durant in free agency (he really likes that), then start talking shop.

It’s what the Mavs and Celtics did (although with a different front office), and it’s what the Rockets -- who are picking No. 3 in this draft thanks to Brooklyn -- did, too.

2. Daily GIF: Logo 3

Luka outscored the Wolves, 20-19, in the first quarter of last night’s Game 5. It was over from there.

3. Trivia

4. Is ESPN OK?

It’s been a particularly shameless week for the talking dickheads at ESPN. To recap:

• Kendrick Perkins got mad at the Celtics for not sweeping the Pacers, then got corrected, then got even more mad at the Celtics. 

• Stephen A. Smith got himself all lathered up, then yelled at Kawhi Leonard for wanting to play in the Olympics while calling him the ‘worst superstar in the history of sports.’

But nothing beats this pea-brained segment on ‘Get Up,’ which featured Mike Greenberg wondering why Jayson Tatum wasn’t happy for Jaylen Brown after winning ECF MVP. The panel nodded along while a clip of Tatum smiling and clapping for Brown played.

[READ: How ESPN ditched journalism and followed Skip Bayless to the bottom: A Tim Tebow story]

Quick hits

• Last night, Luka gave us an all-time moment: Asking a fan ‘who’s crying motherfucker?’ which spurned this reaction from Snoop Dogg. 

• Also, why can’t Luka have one little victory beer? 

• Last night could have been Inside the NBA’s final edition. 

• Anthony Edwards got the Chris Paul Suns-Mavs Game 7 treatment last night. 

• Dereck Lively didn’t miss a shot in the Western Conference Finals. 

• The Good Brother Isaiah Hartenstein is about to get paid, it appears. 

• Dennis Schröder is now a professional soccer player.

Reads

• A first look at a Celtics-Mavs NBA Finals [The Ringer]

• The Mavericks have met the moment [Defector]

• Why the Boston Celtics' fallback isn't actually their history-making offense [ESPN]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 387th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Long live Bill Walton

• Luka is Luka’ing

• A humble man vs. a water bottle

Tomorrow’s playoff game

You gotta give.

1. The Grip Reads: The Breaks of the Game

The great Bill Walton died on Monday of cancer. It’s a blow to lose a true one-of-one person, especially at only 71 years old, but the comfort comes in the 100s of reverent tributes to him -- from the most famous people in the world to some Twitter guy who’s day Walton made two decades ago.

He has been the subject of many books, documentaries and conversations over the years, but the best portrayal of him, in our eyes, comes from David Halberstam’s “The Breaks of the Game,” which paints Bill Walton not as the beloved hippie grandpa -- a version of Walton which fucking ruled -- but as the counterculture, politically-inclined and mainstream-rejected version of Walton of the late 1970s.

The book centers around the Trail Blazers in the melancholy years after their magical 1977 title season, when injuries and shoddy team doctors turned Walton into a skeptical and depressed surgically-half-repaired version of himself.

Walton was interviewed about the book on The Press Box podcast three years ago. He started by saying he never read the book because it made him too sad. Then he talked about the 1977 Blazers for 40 straight minutes.

Buy it here.

[READ: Bill Walton let his joy flourish]

2. Daily GIF: OK

This kind of shit is the reason the Mavericks are never out of a game.

Edit: Luka missed the free throw and the Wolves finally won a game last night.

Minnesota’s also a 4.5-point favorite on Thursday.

3. Trivia

4. Struggle. Persistence. Triumph.

The best matchup of last night’s game was this fella vs. his water bottle.

Quick hits

• Look at Kyle Anderson direct this entire play, which led to a clutch 3 by KAT. 

• Bronny James, who averaged 4.8 PPG for a bad college team, is staying in the NBA draft and forgoing his college eligibility. 

• The 76ers are open to maxing out Jimmy Butler.

• Caitlin Clark dropped a career-high 30 points last night. 

• FYI: A Suns fan and a Mavs fan have been hurling the same point and counterpoint at each other on Twitter since at least April. 

• OKC GM Sam Presti on the Gordon Hayward trade: ‘I missed on that’

• Ant on Mike Conley: ‘Mike Conley is here, and he’s old as fuck’

• Mike Conley on Ant, who claims he’s always called Mike Conley ‘Bite Bite:’ ‘I’ve never heard him call me that before. Ever.’

Reads

• An honest scouting report of Bronny James [The Ringer]

• Its future in doubt, the freewheeling ‘Inside the NBA’ is on edge instead [NY Times]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 386th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• The first $100M-a-year contract isn’t far away

• The Pacers’ defense is very funny 

• A rogue All-NBA voter

Tonight’s playoff game

You gotta give.

1. Are you ready for $100M-a-year salaries?

Despite a decade-long slide in TV ratings and general fan malaise, Adam Silver’s NBA is about to silence the haters and losers with the coming announcement of a new TV rights deal, which will reportedly come out to ~$7B a year.

That is … 

• A shit load of money. (The current deal pays the league about $2.6B per year.) 

• A sign of a lush future for players, which will be conveyed through an exploding salary cap* and extravagant ‘supermax’ extensions for the best players 

Here’s what Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, after becoming supermax eligible on Thursday, is projected to make on his next deal:

• 2027-28: $65.6M

• 2028-29: $70.9M

• 2029-30: $76.2M

• 2030-31: $81.4M

Every year going forward, a new elite player will join the supermax club, which will lead to ever-inflating projections, which will lead to the first deal that will pay someone $100M in one season.

When this happens, it will cause existential pearl-clutching about overpaid athletes. But you must ask yourself: Would you rather your favorite player have more money, or your favorite player’s team’s owner have more money?

*The salary cap in 2015 was $70M. Jaylen Brown will make $65M in 2028.

2. Daily GIF: DE-FENSE

The Pacers generally take an interesting approach to defense, but they took ‘not giving a fuck’ to a different level last night on this possession.

[WATCH: Celtics-Pacers Game 2 highlights]

3. Trivia

4. A mischievous NBA awards voter turned his ballot into a Domantas Sabonis lovefest

Here is the ballot of NBA awards voter Ignacio Garcia from ‘Marca,’ a daily sports newspaper in Spain.

DPOY: 

1. Victor Wembanyama

2. Bam Adebayo

3. Domantas Sabonis 

MVP:

1. Nikola Jokic

2. Luka Doncic

3. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander

4. Domantas Sabonis 

All-Defense first team: 

• Rudy Gobert

• Victor Wembanyama

• Bam Adebayo

• Domantas Sabonis

• Giannis 

All-NBA first team: 

• Nikola Jokic

• Luka Doncic

• Shai Gilgeous-Alexander

• Domantas Sabonis

• Anthony Edwards

In every one of these categories, Ignacio was the only person to include Sabonis, a consensus top 20-ish player who has never been mistaken for Hakeem Olajuwon on defense.

You simply must respect the unabashed lionizing of someone who isn’t often lionized. You also must wonder if Igancio is Sabonis’s brother-in-law.

[READ: Every All-NBA team]

Quick hits

• Jaylen Brown, on his All-NBA snub after dropping 40 last night: ‘We're two games away from the Finals, so honestly I don't have the time to give a fuck.’

• Tyrese Haliburton’s status for Game 3 is currently TBD. 

• Oshae Brissett played 12 minutes last night and was a plus-18. 

• Charles Barkley, knowing that Inside the NBA has an expiration date, is unloading the clip. 

• The Cavs fired J.B. Bickerstaff yesterday. 

• After making All-NBA third-team, LeBron is now the youngest All-NBA player ever and the oldest All-NBA player ever. He’s also made 20 straight All-NBA teams. 

• The only team owner to vote against the WNBA’s expansion team in Toronto was James Dolan, who is currently suing the Raptors.

Reads

• Behind the scenes of the NBA’s most unlikely revival [The Ringer] 

• Derrick White and the immense power of small trades [ESPN]

• Have the Celtics learned from their past mistakes? In Game 2, they finally took care of business at home. [Boston Globe]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 385th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• It’s a great time to be a non-traditional NBA market 

• Rudy Gobert’s turnaround jumper was a bad harbinger for Denver 

• Magic Johnson does not know what a pun is

Tomorrow’s playoff game

You gotta give.

1. The parity is ripe

Dynasties are dead. Super teams have been kneecapped by the new CBA. The defending champ hasn’t made it past the second round since 2019. Kevin Durant is 0-2 in his last two attempts to ruin the NBA. We are in the golden age of NBA parity. 

• With Denver losing last night, the NBA will have a unique champion for the sixth year in a row, the longest streak since 1975-80. 

• The previous five champs have included two first-timers (Raptors, Nuggets), a first-time in a century team (Bucks) and two mainstays (Lakers, Warriors). 

• This year, we’re either getting another first-timer (Wolves, Pacers) or two first-time-in-a-long time teams (Celtics: 2008, Mavericks: 2011). 

This is a complete reversal from the 2000s, 1990s, 1980s and so on. The history of the NBA (other than the 1970s) is dynasties, a previous given that began to shift last decade, despite two repeat champions:

By June, the 2020s will already have had the same number of unique champs as the 2000s, and more than the 1990s, 1980s and 1960s.

What we’re saying: If you’re a small market team on the rise (Thunder, Pacers, Magic) or you’ve historically sucked (Knicks), you should seize the decade.

[READ: The 2024 NBA Conference Finals entrance survey]

2. Daily GIF: You knew Denver was in trouble when …

… Rudy Gobert started hitting 13-foot fadeaways to beat the shot clock.

For context: .012 percent of Rudy’s career shots have come from midrange (10-16 feet). Of that .012 percent, he’s shooting .224 percent. That thing had no business going in.

[WATCH: Nuggets-Wolves Game 7]

3. Trivia

4. Can someone explain to Magic what a pun is?

Twitter tweet

The pun here appears to be the correlation between Magic’s name and his use of ‘magical,’ but that isn’t really a pun, and his parenthesis placement suggests ‘today’ was the subject of the pun. Also, why can’t anyone nail the possessive when typing out a mascot? Whose magical run was it, Magic? It was the Knicks(’) magical run.

Quick hits

• Reminder: GM Tim Connelly built the Nuggets into a title contender then left to take Wolves job in 2022, where he spent a year building a team that could beat the Nuggets. Nikola Jokic talked about this after the L. 

• Michael Malone threw a hissy fit in the postgame presser.

• This is the best work the Art But Make It Sports account has ever done. 

• Before last night, teams up 15-plus points at halftime of a Game 7 were 21-0.

• Among the 15 highest paid players in the NBA this season, only Rudy Gobert is still playing.

• Kevin Garnett’s ‘ready for war’ postgame interview is the greatest NBA player quote of all-time. 

• This Naz Reid mix goes insanely hard.

Reads

• Was Knicks Game 7 fanfest a new low for ESPN’s NBA Countdown? [Awful Announcing]

• The blistering arrival of the Indiana Pacers [The Ringer]

• Minnesota has the bedrock [Defector]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 384th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• No more Draymond Green

• Ant Edwards highlights

• Who would win, Nikola vs. Jalen edition

Tonight’s playoff game

You gotta give.

1. This guy sucks so much

Inside the NBA, TNT’s iconic studio show which can just as easily switch between hoops legacy talk and live rodent content, might be going away soon.

So it’s only wrong to have the dying embers of this formative institution peed on by Draymond Green, one of the least pleasant people in the world.

He’s been added to the panel for the last few days of postseason coverage. Beyond a cluttered aesthetic, he can’t seem to separate his ego from a meant-to-be fun studio show. Everything with this bozo is (1) about him and (2) a pissing contest.

Examples: 

1. Alex Caruso says DeMar DeRozan could’ve won ‘Clutch Player of the Year.’ Draymond interrupts to say DeMar didn’t win enough. 

2. Caruso says no one can guard Nikola Jokic. Here comes Draymond.  

3. The Celtics advance to the Eastern Conference Finals. Draymond uses the chance to trash the Pacers and Al Horford’s pick-and-roll defense. 

4. Rudy Gobert gets worked by Jokic. Draymond uses it as fuel for his personal vendetta against Gobert. 

Reminder: In 2023-24 alone, this guy choked out Gobert, punched Jusef Nurkic in the face, got suspended twice, and got his ass kicked in the play-in game. He’s also kicked several people in the nuts, stomped on another, sucker-punched a teammate, and so on.

He’d be great as a Warriors-specific media guy who can pander to his audience of enablers. But why foist him upon us?

2. Daily GIF: This guy rules so much

The Wolves beat the Nuggets last night by 45 points, which included a 27-2 run and a 26-0 run. This series deserved a Game 7, which we’re getting on Sunday.

[WATCH: Game 6 Ant Edwards highlights]

3. Trivia

4. The NBA’s future is Nikola and Jalen

The rise of Jalen/Jaylen/Jaylin in the NBA is well-documented and genuinely wild.

TLDR: The popularity of Jalen Rose -- his name essentially did not exist before his mom came up with it -- in the 1990s led to a Jalen boom, which led to a boom in NBA players with the name. 

• According to BBRef, there are currently 13 Jalen/Jaylen/Jaylins in the league. It’s undoubtedly the Dick of this era. 

But the Serbian Nikolas are uber prominent, too. 

• You know about Jokic. You might even know about Jovic.  But, sir, two more Serbian Nikolas are about to hit the NBA. Nikola Topic (No. 4) and Nikola Djurisic (No. 41) are both projected NBA draft picks this June.  

• Serbia has 6.6M people. Soon, four of those 6.6M will be Nikolas in the NBA. If you keep that ratio and scale it to America’s population, there would be 255 Nikolas in the NBA

Anyways: The NBA All-Star Game is washed. Replace it with a Jalen vs. Nikola game.

Team Jalen: 

• PG: Jalen Brunson 

• SG: Jaylen Brown

• SF: Jalen Williams  

• PF: Jalen Johnson

• C: Jalen Duren

(That’s one of the best teams in the league.)

Team Nikola: 

• PG: Nikola Topic

• SG: Nikola Djurisic

• SF: Nickeil Alexander-Walker (we’re making due)

• PF: Nikola Jovic

• C: Nikola Jokic

Quick hits

• Nikola Jokic spent the entire fourth quarter last night standing up, which was oddly menacing. 

• Ant on whether or not he told Nuggets workers he’d be back after the Game 5 L: “Hell yeah. I told em, I said 'I'll see y'all motherfuckers for Game 7.’”

• Strange but true: Luka and Kyrie are only averaging a combined 38.2 PPG vs. the Thunder but lead the series, 3-2.

• OG Anunoby is out for Game 6 tonight. 

• No one ever said rhythm was Celtics’ fans forte. 

• Dubbing Kevin Harlan’s ‘Is this the dagger?’ call over a meaningless shot that cuts into a massive lead is the NBA Internet’s best bit going. 

• Worst foul call of the postseason?

Reads

• NBC’s NBA nostalgia play [The Ringer]

• Bill Simmons is in the middle of an all-time flip-flop on Nuggets-Timberwolves [Awful Announcing]

• The unsuspenseful Boston Celtics [The Ringer]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 383rd edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Jamal Murray made the prayer of prayers yesterday

• The NBA lottery was a bill coming due

Tonight’s playoff games

You gotta give.

1. It’s definitely worth trying to win

‘The NBA regular season doesn’t matter’ is the new ‘baseball is dying.’ It’s the thing a sports fan says to their partner’s friend’s partner because that person also vaguely likes sports and you’ve run out of other talking points. It’s so en vogue that even NBA team Twitter accounts are saying it.

We’re here to make an important distinction: You might not watch the regular season. But it definitely matters.

IE .. you need to win 50 games in the regular season to win the Finals, full stop. Barring the Pacers or Cavs pulling off a miracle, this will be the 43rd time in the last 44 full 82-game seasons that a 50-plus-win team has won the NBA Finals.

More: Here are the eight teams remaining, ranked by odds to win the title with coinciding regular season wins. 

1. Celtics, -130 (64 wins)

2. Nuggets, +400 (57 wins)

3. Timberwolves, +750 (56 wins)

4. Mavericks, +800 (50 wins)

5. Thunder, 57 wins (+1200)

6. Knicks, 50 wins (+2800)

7. Pacers, 47 wins (+4500)

8. Cavs, 48 wins (+30000) 

The Bucks (49 wins), Suns (49), Lakers (47) and Warriors (46) -- the fraudulent pseudo contenders who sleep-walked through regular seasons of varying tumult -- are all gone. By next round, only serious NBA teams who won games and built chemistry from October through April will be left.

Please remember this next March, when you’re talking yourself into the 38-38 Lakers as true contenders.

2. Daily GIF: Right, right

This Hail Mary capped a 20-second 8-0 run to end the half for Denver. The final score was 115-107.

[WATCH: Nuggets-Wolves Game 4 highlights]

3. Trivia

4. What comes of these YOLO trades

The NBA draft lottery was yesterday, snuck in right before Knicks-Pacers Game 4. 

• This one had zero juice because this draft is projected to be very bad. 

• Alas … the Hawks won with a 3 percent chance, and the Pistons got the No. 5 pick despite a 14-win season and a 28-game losing streak. 

One interesting thing: Rent was due yesterday on three memorably bad/backfired/YOLO trades. 

• The Nets moved up to the No. 3 pick, which they owe to Houston from the James Harden trade in 2021. (BTW: That’s three No. 3 picks in eight years the Nets have had to forfeit.) 

• Conversely, the Rockets had to give their No. 12 pick to the Thunder as part of the Russell Westbrook-Chris Paul trade in 2019. 

• Perhaps worst of all: The Raptors had to send the No. 8 overall pick to the Spurs because of the Jakob Poeltl trade from the 2023 trade deadline, when the Raps zagged and became buyers despite a lousy roster they’d soon admit defeat on. 

[READ: Post lottery NBA mock draft]

Quick hits

• Jokic pulled a textbook chair on Rudy Gobert on Sunday. 

• ICYMI, the sideline view of Jamal Murray’s buzzer-beater is even better. 

• Before Friday night Denver was +1600 to win the Finals. Now the Nuggets are +400. 

• Bronny Jones, who averaged 4.8 PPG for a terrible college team, is expected to stay in the NBA draft pool.

• Michael Malone breaking down Jamal Murray and Nikola Jokic’s two-man game is great basketball nerd content. 

• It doesn’t seem like OG Anunoby will be back for this series. 

• It’s objectively hilarious that Kyrie Irving has suddenly turned into everything his previous three teams and fanbases wanted.

Reads

• The joy of defense [New Yorker]

• Exploding demand for preseason broadcasts catches WNBA by surprise [Front Office Sports]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 382nd edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• Obi Toppin is rad as hell 

• New must-follow NBA Twitter account

• Jamal Murray was somehow not suspended for his tantrum

Tonight’s playoff games

You gotta give.

1. The efficiency is the most impressive part

There’s something admirable (minus the foul grifting) about watching Jalen Brunson play these playoffs. 

• He enters every game with the burden of ‘I better score 40 here or my team won’t win.’ 

• Conversely, the opponent enters every game with the mindset of ‘We just have to stop him from getting 40 and we’ll win.’

And yet … he keeps on getting 40. His streak of such games is up to four in a row; two more and he’ll tie Jerry West’s record.

Brunson is not the first guard to accept the burden of being his team’s entire offensive engine for an entire postseason run (Allen Iverson, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, Isaiah Thomas), but no one (according to our BBREF research) has done it more efficiently. 

FYI: 

• During Iverson’s legendary 2001 playoffs -- probably the most famous lone-wolf run -- he scored 32.9 PPG in 46.2 MPG on .389-.338-.774 shooting in 22 games.

• Brunson shot 16-56 in the first two games of the Philly series. Since, he’s averaging 42 PPG and 29.2 shots per game in 45.2 MPG on .500/.342/.823 shooting in five games.

The Knicks are down Julius Randle, Bojan Bogdanović and now Mitchell Robinson. They are playing 6.5 and trusting 5.  None of this feels sustainable, but nothing’s better than watching a guy with a 37.5-point over/under die trying. 

[READ: The NBA’s one-man band era is here]

2. Daily GIF: He actually did this

A between-the-legs dunk during a not-exactly-clean breakaway in an intense non-first round NBA playoff game is the new bar for artistry over efficiency. Shout out to Obi Toppin.

3. Trivia

4. The best Twitter account is this completely unnecessary watchdog of NBA player activity

Twitter tweet

We just thought you should know about @thenbaalert, our new favorite Twitter account.

Its only purpose is to spit out Twitter activity from NBA players, which occasionally reveals hilarious snippets.

For example, from this account, we’ve learned: 

• Myles Turner dabbles in conspiracy theories

• Kevin Durant appreciates bots making fun of Kendrick Perkins

• Bruce Brown followed @KnicksMuse on May 4, then unfollowed @KnicksMuse on May 6

• Woj is a liberal

• Our personal favorite: De’Aaron Fox unfollowed Dame Lillard literal minutes after the Bucks’ Game 6 loss 

Get lost in more meaningless/interesting NBA player minutiae here.

Quick hits

• Jamal Murray got fined $100K for throwing a towel and a heat pack at a ref on Monday. If the Nuggets weren’t down 0-2, he probably would have gotten suspended. 

• In case you missed the egregious phantom kick ball from Pacers-Knicks Game 1, here you go.

• The WNBA is set to add charter flights for every team for the first time. 

• The Celtics’ five wins this postseason have been by 20, 20, 14, 34 and 25. 

• There is a chance that Rudy Gobert is actually funny and we’ve all been hating on him for years for no reason.

Reads + Pods

• There was a model for Luka Doncic. He broke it. [The New Yorker]

• The Pacers Might Have an Unsolvable Jalen Brunson Problem [The Ringer]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 381st edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• What’s next for the Bucks?

• What a pro wants, what a pro needs 😶 🔫

• Pat Bev acted like a loser last night

Tonight’s playoff games

You gotta give.

1. It’s so over/they are so not back

The Milwaukee Bucks, whose season ended last night against the Pacers, have won one playoff series since beating the Suns in the 2021 NBA Finals.

They’ve fired two coaches since and hired another who’s been mocked non-stop since he got there. They got old last season, made a trade this offseason, got older, and then flopped this season.

Giannis is less invincible than he used to be. Dame Lillard doesn’t want to be there. The role players don’t have their 2021 magic anymore. The team owners, not the new-age deep-pocketed entrepreneurs of other franchises, probably won’t want to pay $100M in luxury tax for a 48-win team.

It was great for one summer three years ago, which is more than what a Milwaukee Bucks fan can reasonably expect. But it’s so over / the Bucks are so not back.

[READ: When does Giannis watch begin?]

2. Daily GIF: You can’t leave Josh Hart open

The irony of Josh Hart, the shoddy shooter who the 76ers actively decided to leave open the entire series, hitting the shot that finally ended them.

3. Trivia

4. The worst commercials from the NBA playoffs, ranked

(Remember when NBA playoff commercials were good?)

• 4. Apple’s ‘Don’t Let Me Go’

• 3. WingStop’s ‘No Flex Zone’

• 2. Google Pixel’s ‘Hit That Post’ (the panda man one)

• 1. AT&T’s ‘What A Pro Wants’

Quick hits

• Pat Bev updates: Threw a ball at a Pacers fan | Told a reporter she can’t interview him because she isn’t subbed to his pod

• Jalen Brunson scored 167 points in the last four games.

• Want to see a billionaire in denial?

• Joel Embiid is the only MVP to never make the conference finals. 

• Did you hear the Pacers fan yelling at every Bucks player last night?

• Knicks-76ers wound up having a differential of a single point. 

• Small market poster boy Tyrese Haliburton shouts out Indiana. 

• Rick Carlisle just won his first series as a coach since the 2011 Finals.

Reads + Pods

• Series clincher perfect illustration of what makes these Knicks tick [New York Post]

• The Timberwolves were built to destroy the Nuggets [The Ringer]

• It is happening again to the Clippers [Defector]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 380th edition of The Grip.

The Opening Tip

• More 76ers-Knicks, please

• An exciting Cavs-Magic moment

• The Lakers are still all-in on LeBron

Tonight’s playoff games

You gotta give.

1. Unfortunately, the footage of angry, shell-shocked New Yorkers on celebrity row is very funny

Patrick Ewing, moments before disaster

The Knicks and 76ers played a classic playoff game last night, which Philly won in OT thanks to a miraculous run by Tyrese Maxey of seven points in 17 seconds to close regulation.

Before Maxey went nuclear, with the Knicks up six with one minute and then 28.2 seconds left, the camera panned to a euphoric crowd, including famous former Knicks Patrick Ewing, Carmelo Anthony, LaTrell Sprewell, Marcus Camby, John Starks and Larry Johnson.

After Maxey went nuclear, it felt like a scene from right after the apocalypse in This Is the End (minus Michael Cera): Confused/angry famous people everywhere. Scenes:

• Jon Stewart staring blankly as Tyrese Maxey admired his masterpiece. 

• Tracy Morgan flipping off Maxey. 

• Ben Stiller hissing at Maxey. 

Anyways, us 76ers-Knicks nonpartisans are truly blessed to get at least one more of these games. 

[WATCH: 76ers-Knicks Game 5 highlights]

2. Daily GIF: This also happened last night

The first four games of Magic-Cavs could have been simmed without many people noticing. Last night was actually a good one, capped by a game-sealing savant-level block by Evan Mobley. 

[WATCH: Cavs-Magic Game 5 highlights]

3. Trivia

4. The Lakers are going to triple-down on 39-year-old LeBron

The Lakers’ season ended on Monday night. The front office has already made clear they’re still in the LeBron business.

According to reports …

• The Lakers are willing to give LeBron a three-year, $164M deal, which would take him through his age 42 season. 

• The Lakers are also ‘very open’ to drafting Bronny James, who averaged 4.8 PPG on 36.1 percent shooting on a bad USC team last year. 

Drafting someone who is not an NBA prospect to appease his legendary father is, of course, insane.

Paying a 42-year-old $50M-plus is also probably less than well-advised, especially when the current team isn’t close to a title contender.

But overpaying superstars for past performance and running a glamor franchise poorly only to stumble into a great player in free agency has long been the Lakers’ modus operandi.

[READ: Do LeBron and the Lakers even make sense together?]

Quick hits

• The Bucks last night became the first team ever to win a playoff game without their top two scorers. 

• Also from Bucks-Pacers: Pat Bev was +36 in 36 minutes. 

• Josh Hart played 53 minutes in Game 5, AKA an entire game plus overtime. 

• ‘Banchero … Feeling it … Spins … Stepback … Fadeaway … Airball!’

• Nick Nurse broke his finger while raging against a ref. 

• New Joel Embiid nickname just dropped. 

• JJ Redick succccccccks. 

• This is Art But Make It Sports’ magnum opus.

Reads + Pods

• The Phoenix Suns are screwed [The Ringer]

• Enter Bill Simmons’s no flex zone, if you dare [Defector]

• Slowing down has quickly become a favorite move for the league's elite scorers [ESPN]

That's the buzzer.
Thanks for reading the 379th edition of The Grip.