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00:00And I am going to tab this a leadership game and here's why our friend Ramona Shelburne
00:07put out a feature article on ESPN that launched today and basically the concept behind it
00:15was a deep dive on the Memphis Grizzlies who are a complete and total mess if you ask me.
00:24How on earth are you the five seed getting ready for what is supposed to be some sort
00:29of a playoff run and you just fire your coach and then someone asks you why and you're like
00:34well because you know there's stuff like reasonless I'm sure it wasn't but when nothing
00:42is that evident from the outside but something is that deeply wrong on the inside you've got
00:49something rotten to the core in my opinion. So her article titled Inside the Grizzlies
00:56Shocking Firing of Taylor Jenkins I think it's paragraph three and our girl knows how to write
01:04a feature now. Yep. It is paragraph three guess whose name pops up? Who? DeDe. Wait Draymond Green?
01:12Draymond Green. In fact let me look about this. It's paragraph two actually. It's paragraph two. Yep.
01:20Paragraph two. It's actually paragraph one. Hang on. It's the opening sentence. You're right it's
01:26the first sentence of the article. So much has been said in the war of words between the Grizzlies
01:31the Warriors forward Draymond Green and the Grizzlies it's hard to believe just how close
01:36he came to signing there in 2023. A source close to Green tells Ramona quote very. Close to signing
01:48with Memphis. How close were you signing with Memphis two years ago? Quote very. To the point
01:55where he called Steph Curry and Klay Thompson and said I want you to be ready for my departure.
02:01I'm joining the Memphis Grizzlies. Why? Because the Memphis Grizzlies knew that as a budding
02:07playoff performer a team that had what just been beaten by the Golden State Warriors in a
02:14frustrating for them six game series what did they see? They looked at their own roster and
02:19they went you know what this Dylan Brooks guy he's a great agitator but not quite the emotional
02:30leader that we need on this team. So we are going to with full force this offseason go after free
02:38agent Draymond Green. He is the missing piece to the building Grizzlies empire. He's a better
02:47agitator. Like he's better at everything. Right Dylan Brooks is great but Draymond Green is elite
02:53one of the best all time at being a good basketball player and being a good quote agitator.
03:00Green said after the Warriors beat the Grizzlies in 2023 quote Memphis is going to get their
03:07reality check and I believe we've arrived. And so why are we telling you all this? I think that
03:14this is relevant to both franchises and especially in a game like tonight. You have one team that has
03:21fired their coach. They no longer have now Dylan Brooks or Draymond Green or Marcus Smart who's they
03:28that's who they tried to bring in to be their agitator. They've got none of them. So instead
03:33who are they looking to for leadership as you come down the stretch and have major emotional
03:41matchups like you have tonight? Who are they looking to? The answer is I have no idea and you
03:47can look in the standings and see their recent record and in my opinion see their leadership
03:52problem. Meantime for us Warrior fans that was a contract the one that kept Draymond from Memphis
04:00a four-year 100 million dollar deal. Well Draymond drove to Joe Lincoln's house and
04:05all of this. It largely frustrated many Warrior fans and to this day I still hear Warrior fans
04:10say boy I can't believe that they chose to pay that guy and then they'll go into takes about
04:18Jordan Poole and Chris Paul and Jonathan Kaminga and Klay Thompson and all of the other things.
04:25Yet here we arrive with the Warriors going on another potential playoff push and I would argue
04:33through all of his faults and there are many that Draymond Green is the Warriors even with
04:39Jimmy Butler on the team he is the Warriors emotional on and off court leader and I just
04:47want to use this matchup to highlight what Memphis doesn't have that the Warriors do
04:55and the importance of it. So when he goes out and gets eight points and five rebounds and four
04:59assists and you ask yourself what the hell is this guy doing for the Golden State Warriors?
05:05Why is he making 25 million dollars? Well hopefully the Warriors have more points than the Grizzlies
05:10tonight and we can come in tomorrow and say that's why. That's why he's making 25 million
05:16dollars and still a part of the Warriors at age 35 because he literally represents what some
05:22franchises in the league don't have. Which is winning and winning players it's not as easy as
05:28looking at the names and the roster and the stats and like John Morant and Bane and Jaron Jackson
05:34Jr. and even Santee Aldama who's a good player. You can look at the collection of players and
05:38think well their players collectively might be as good as if not better than the Warriors but
05:44Steve Kerr is a better coach than their interim coach and the leadership you talked about Draymond
05:49Green, Steph Curry, Jimmy Butler, the championship pedigree and Jimmy I know doesn't have a ring but
05:54he's been there a couple of times with an undermanned team and so all those little things
06:00they matter more in a best-of-seven than they do in a one-off but you look at yesterday as a good
06:04example where they had Boston they were going toe-to-toe. Yep. They had the champs. That's a
06:1010-point lead in the second quarter. Right and they were going nip and tuck and back and forth
06:14and then Boston never really flinched and they didn't have their second best player and eventually
06:18they realized that coaching, leadership, better talent would win out and they outscored Memphis
06:24by nine after the break and you went out there and you won comfortably and so now Memphis
06:29second half of a back-to-back with the five seed on the line and the Warriors coming in rested.
06:34I do like their chances and the Warriors are favored by four and a half tonight and
06:38I do think that when you look at what you're talking about the leadership aspect of the
06:43Warriors I think that's worth more in April, May, and June than it is just on a one-off in early
06:51April. No doubt. April 1st. This is when it matters like right now I believe this is actually the
06:59start of the two-week run to the playoffs. This is the playoffs. Right like and when people do what
07:05all of us have done which is look up and down the standings and there are certain teams we doubt
07:11and then there are certain teams that we don't doubt and it doesn't matter their seed because
07:15I hear more people doubting Oklahoma City than I do the Lakers. Why is that? Oklahoma City. Experience
07:21yeah which is nonsense by the way. Right but leadership like leadership that's what do we
07:27know about the Western Conference. I know the Warriors can do it. I know LeBron can do it.
07:32I know that Jokic can do it. Kawhi can do it. I know that Kawhi can do it and outside of that I
07:38don't know. Bubcas and that's the way a lot of people look at the NBA and I think to a degree
07:42that's fair. There's no question who the best team in the West is. We all know that but it doesn't
07:48mean they won't choke. It doesn't mean they won't choke. Three years ago there's no question who the
07:54best team in the West was. It was the Phoenix Suns. Gag. Gone. Dallas got them in the second round.
08:00Right so like could Oklahoma City do that? Until we know that they won't do that we don't know
08:05that they won't do that. We don't and I could run down the list of teams who have won 65 or more
08:10games and we could talk about how many of them have won the title and Oklahoma City will win
08:14more than 65. They could still win 70. They could be the third team ever to win 70 and only one of
08:20those two has won the title and we talked about it before but you go back to the the we believe
08:26Warriors when they faced Dallas in that first round coached by Avery Johnson they were 67-15
08:32and the Warriors beat them an 8 over a 1 in the first round so just because OKC's been amazing
08:39in the regular season you're right it doesn't mean that you can handle a best of seven against
08:43any of these other teams. You're going to get I mean here's something we also have not talked
08:48about I think very much because everything's so jammed up and the Warriors may well be this team
08:53like who is Oklahoma City Denver who are these teams getting in the first round there's no rest
08:59nope dude if you're OKC you're you're gonna get like most likely you're either gonna get
09:06Minnesota the Clippers the Warriors I guess maybe Memphis in fact Memphis is who I would want if I
09:13were Oklahoma City but you're gonna get a squad that can cause problems and so that's just gonna
09:20be the facts of the matter in the west there are eight really really good basketball teams
09:27and so everything's gonna be super challenging right out of the gate even for the top seed.
09:30And if you're OKC and you have to face the Clippers with you know Zubat and Harden and
09:37a champ in Kawhi for at least two of the seven games well he'll probably play more maybe three
09:42yeah he actually probably might play all of them although yeah odds aren't great that he would
09:47actually but if you're OKC you don't want to face the Clippers a team with what you're talking
09:55about the veterans and the championship pedigree I don't want to face the Warriors either and I
09:59don't I'm not really big on Minnesota that's a super talented team yeah but if I'm OKC I'd rather
10:05play Minnesota than the Clippers than Golden State agreed for sure I agree all right we'd
10:11love to take your phone calls show my mics on the line that's already going to be fun.