On the NBA Beat

Sports writer and scientist Brad Balukjian stops by to discuss his fascinating, thought-provoking and important new book,

Here are some highlights –

5:29-5:49: “The book really is about the line, the border

9:34-10:09: “I was trained on more of that participatory journalism style, which you don’t see as much of anymore, but I was reading Gay Talese and Hunter S. Thompson and Tom Wolfe and all these practitioners in the ‘60s of

25:25-25:54: “I’ve always been more of a process than

34:27-35:37: “As a writer when I learn more about the

42:35-42:59: “When I approach someone and I wanna try to

On the heels of the Dallas Mavericks’ 9-3 start, Jason Gallagher returns, and you bet the head of production at The Old Man and the Three (and ThreeFourTwo Productions more broadly) comes ready with analysis of the Mavericks’ scalding start as Luka Doncic has led the way with 30.7 points per game, the second-most converted treys after Stephen Curry, and the lowest usage rate of his career other than his rookie season. Jason touches upon the improved fit between Doncic and Kyrie Irving now that they’ve had adequate time to jell, teen center Dereck Lively II’s instant success, Grant Williams and Derrick Jones Jr. starring in their respective roles, Tim Hardaway Jr.’s sixth-man brilliance, ultimate team expectations and so much more.

5:05-6:08: “The second pleasant surprise and the second I said was that Dereck Lively needs to become the second coming of Tyson Chandler. Again, he’s not Tyson Chandler. However, he looks incredible. He looks so good that you actually see some of the deficiencies of not having more support in the big area. … But when Lively is healthy and when he’s in and when he’s not in foul trouble, they look pretty awesome. And then the third and sort of final one is some of these role players, they look incredible too. Grant Williams has been Steady Eddie for us, and he’s not only a good vibes guy on the bench, which every team needs; he is amazing from the 3-point line. He’s just a little bit more versatile than role players we’ve had in the past and same with Derrick Jones Jr. Derrick Jones Jr., who is an NBA journeyman, I can’t recall him looking this good, really ever.”

8:28-8:47: “If they’re playing a team, say the Wolves

12:55-13:25: “In terms of bringing in these huge stars, I’m sorry, the NBA is too good, and you have to have a training camp and you have to learn how to play together. And those are the positive signs we’re seeing from Luka and Kyrie and why I feel really good about this team, even

18:12-18:29: “When you watched [Doncic] last season,

24:33-24:48: “Now, in my head, Luka has to show that

26:39-28:17: “Being a big next to Luka, you just have a very specific job…and he’s excelling like crazy at that. … If I am, say, playing the Mavericks in the playoffs and I am scouting, the very first thing, the literal No. 1 agenda item is ‘get Dereck Lively in foul trouble.’”  

39:19-39:30: “In terms of growth from year over year,

Alex Kennedy, Chief Content Officer at BasketballNews.com and host of Running Up the Score, a biweekly live sports show airing every Tuesday and Friday night, stops by to wind through the Western Conference just as the league readies for tipoff. The Nuggets are Alex’s leading squad but far from the conference’s only contenders. Oh, and he has firmly taken a seat aboard the Wemby Train. Who’s coming with him?

2:44-4:03: “This is a [Nuggets] team that has been together,

9:52-13:19: “We haven’t seen a player like [Victor Wembanyama], ever. … LeBron James said he’s an alien. He was like, ‘I don’t want to use the word ‘unicorn.’ That gets thrown around too often. He’s an alien.’ Giannis said he could be the best player in the NBA. I mean, these are superstar players that are raving about him and talking about him coming in and just dominating the league. Giannis even said, he was like, ‘I need to start winning some championships now because Victor Wembanyama’s coming.’ … It was interesting; in the first preseason game that Victor Wembanyama played, we saw [Chet] Holmgren and Wembanyama match up against each other, and it almost feels like the future of the NBA a little bit – these huge guys with crazy length that are kind of position-less that can do a little bit of everything and are super-skilled.”  

17:49-18:13: “I still think there is a coming-out part to be had for Anthony Edwards, and I’m a huge fan of his game. I saw a ranking today. I think it was in Sports Illustrated. They were ranking the top five shooting guards in the league, and they had him at No. 3. I wouldn’t be surprised if after this season we’re talking about him as No. 2 and up there with Devin Booker, who I think is easily the top shooting guard in the league.”

33:09-34:13: “Everyone’s on the same page now. They really came together, and I think some of the drama that existed there…they’ve all acknowledged their role in what happened, and it seems like they’re ready to move forward. … This team has a ton of talent. They’re one of those teams that you kinda put the question mark, like, ‘OK, well, if they stay healthy, they can be very special. I hope that Zion [Williamson] can be healthy and have a full season. He’s so much fun to watch; we’ve just kinda been robbed of that as of late.”   

36:00-36:43: “I think the question is can they take that next step? Can they become a legitimate championship contender? And if not, we could see this be the last year where this core is together. Guys could leave in free agency. The organization could decide to blow it up and make a ton of different changes. So, yeah, I’m very curious. The Clippers have a ton of pressure on them to kinda make it work. … There were reports toward the end of last season that the Mavericks were starting to worry that if they don’t put a contender around Luka [Doncic] that he’s going to want to go elsewhere, and that’s so common in today’s NBA.”     

Jake Fischer, Yahoo! Sports senior NBA reporter and the author of Built to Lose, makes his fourth appearance to break down the Eastern Conference's biggest storylines as the season approaches. Tune in to hear why he regards the Celtics as favorites, his thoughts on Evan Mobley's next leap, rookies you should keep an eye on, Jake's dark-horse team out East and so much more.

4:16-6:30: “I am pretty bullish on the Bucks. … but I think that Boston is the favorite. I’m not so certain that Milwaukee got so much better as opposed to how much better Boston

10:18-10:58: “The Clippers haven’t put Terance Mann in any deal, and the draft capital that they’ve been able to figure out they could potentially send to Philadelphia in addition to

12:24-13:01: “Can he be a linchpin on offense? Can he be a legitimate stretch 3-point shooter that makes defenses guard him out to that perimeter and then he’s got opportunities to

13:53-14:34: “The Knicks could easily be the third seed and host playoff games and what have you. To me, the question marks are going to be there about Julius [Randle] in the

15:49-16:19: “Tyrese Haliburton was one of the most impressive players I saw in the FIBA World Cup. I’ve really come to appreciate him as a personality and a mind as much as a

22:24-22:54: “There’s an organization pressure, especially when you’ve got…right now, the Eagles are one of, if not the, leading candidates for the Super Bowl…the Phillies are six wins

*Our Built to Lose book special, Jake's previous appearance

Andy Liu of the Light Years podcast is back yet again; for a record ninth time, in fact. His task this time? Helping Aaron preview the Golden State Warriors as they attempt to bounce back from a 44-38 campaign in which just six games separated them from 11th-place Utah and they were eliminated by the Lakers in the second round. Andy and Aaron discuss last season’s challenges, summer acquisition Chris Paul’s fit, Draymond Green’s leadership, Andrew Wiggins’ value and Klay Thompson’s future, among

7:31-8:39: “They tried to downplay it. They tried to make it seem like they would get through it. But that was the punch that ruined the season. It ruined Draymond Green’s standing as a leader. Nobody respected him or wanted to listen to him after that. … It wasn’t 100% Draymond Green’s fault, but any time something happens that’s like

17:35-17:47: “Steve’s Kerr biggest job this season is to find a way to get Chris Paul to buy in on coming off the bench. Because if Steve Kerr can’t do that…this team is cooked.”

20:53-21:14: “I think this thing is tenuous. I do. … The first 10 games are gonna tell us a lot about where the Warriors are gonna be the rest of the season.”    

23:54-24:14: “That’s part of the game that maybe last season they weren’t good enough getting Steph the ball

28:46-29:21: “Look, he’s not gonna be the No. 2, but he’s such a good player as the No. 3. It’s very reminiscent of what Aaron Gordon did in the NBA Finals, where if you’re gonna leave him open, he’s gonna make you pay. And he’s gonna be so good defensively. He does all the glue stuff. Shout-out to the Warriors, 1 for trading for him, taking the risk, and then 2, identifying that he’s gonna be able to do all

37:17-39:04: “I think, moving forward with Mike Dunleavy [Jr.] and Kirk Lacob, they’re not losing the Xs and Os or the strategic path of where they want to go. I think they’re smart enough to do what [former Warriors president and GM] Bob Myers had done the last decade. What I do think that they’re losing is the relationships, the kind of mending of relationships that Bob Myers could do, how Bob Myers can calm Draymond down and build a bridge between Draymond Green and Steve Kerr, build a bridge between Steph Curry and the young guys and kinda get people bought in, get [owner] Joe Lacob bought in. … Now, one thing I do think that may happen is that if this Chris Paul thing doesn’t work, Bob Myers has never really shown an

41:34-41:40: “I think Klay will probably, most likely take a little bit less to come back to the Warriors.”

47:22-47:40: “All of these guys are pseudo-contenders, right? There’s just a ton of question marks for all of these guys, and I would hesitate to put the Warriors in a tier below the Lakers or a tier below the Suns or a tier below the Miami Heat. It just doesn’t make sense to me because everybody has the same questions.” 

Enjoy Ethan Scheiner discussing his new book, "Freedom to Win."

Here are some highlights: 3:23-6:23: “The thing that is so incredible about this story is that it is an unbelievable marriage of politics and sports. That really is the thing that jumps right out. … This communist country, Czechoslovakia, which had started to become free, suddenly got invaded by the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union said, ‘We’re not gonna allow this country to become free,’ and so all of a sudden the people of this little country were crushed. And they found that there was only one way they could fight back. … So they turned their whole world into

14:08-15:36: “It took me a little while to realize that I actually had to tell the story from a more personal angle. At first, I just thought the history of hockey in Czechoslovakia was so amazing, that it was this country where hockey was so central to fighting the Soviets. … I thought that was enough. … ‘The great narrative nonfiction books, the things that really draw people in, are really focused on individual human beings at extraordinary times, so you need to focus more on the individual human beings.’ Then all of a sudden, I said, ‘Oh, my gosh. This Holík family has had this extraordinary history that actually also at the same time tells the story of this incredible country, and it’s woven into this unbelievable story of hockey and sports fitting in with everything.’”

32:06-35:27: “At one time, the communists in Czechoslovakia had imprisoned the national hockey team and sent two guys and sentenced them to 15 years in the uranium mines. So people actually thought that the Soviets had forced their hockey to die so that the Soviet team could become good. And so as time went by and Czechoslovakia had a hockey team again, people thought they weren’t allowed to beat the Soviets. So this was all part of this sense in Czechoslovakia, ‘The Soviets are keeping us down, and they’re using the communists to do it.’ … The Soviets won the 1968 Gold medal, but Czechoslovakia was so happy to have beaten the Soviets. And people actually got a sense of ‘You know what? We actually seem to have real freedom now. We even are allowed to beat the Soviets.’ They actually believed that.”    

47:20-48:06: “We tend to think of democracies falling apart because a bunch of people in the streets start chanting and come in and run roughshod over those in power, and then suddenly grab the gavel and say, ‘OK, we’re in charge now,’ sort of Doctor Evil style. But more common, what happens is people gain power through free and fair elections, but then use the instruments of power to completely undercut democracy. And so that’s a big fear that people have [that] could be happening in the United States; that’s certainly what happened in Czechoslovakia.”   

58:07-59:07: “We’ve heard this chant before when we get to 1989, as now there are hundreds of thousands of people in Wenceslas Square, and they start chanting, ‘Dubček! Dubček! Dubček!’ over and over. And he steps out onto this balcony as 300,000 people are chanting his name. And so he hasn’t been seen for 20 years, and he’s this symbol of hope, and they’re chanting his name. And in this moment, he had planned on reading some remarks, but he’s so touched by the moment he pantomimes embracing the crowd. … It’s a stunning moment.”