The NBA season is winding down and the NBA Daily crew discusses which West playoff teams under the most pressure. Dave, Es and Zena discuss the weekend of basketball, a brawl between the Pistons and Wolves, and the games of the week.Host: Dave DuFourWith: Es Baraheni and Zena KeitaExecutive Producer: Andrew SchlechtAudio Producer: Grayson Moody Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Chapter 1: What happened with the Grizzlies' coaching decision?
Good morning and welcome to the NBA Daily. Coming up, I'm back. I missed a lot, apparently. The Grizzlies fired their coach. Cleveland and Oklahoma City both hit 60 wins. And we had a big brawl in Minnesota. And would you believe it? The Detroit Pistons were involved. Good morning, everybody. Good morning, guys. Good to see your faces. Welcome back.
Just sit here for 30 minutes catching up right before the podcast. You know, a little podcast magic there. Thank you guys for filling in for me last week. The shows were awesome. It was a lot of fun. I spent the week in the woods. very good for me. Shout out to our national parks. Yosemite National Park was a lot of fun. Beautiful park.
When I got out of the woods, guys, I was bombarded once I got cell phone service by just a bevy of news. First, sad news, I learned about Juju Watkins tearing her ACL and it really just put a damper on my trip because I was looking forward to catching some of her games over the weekend. And then I found out that the Grizzlies Fired Taylor Jenkins with nine games left in the season.
And guys, this obviously is a huge surprise to everyone. Keith Parrish, good buddy of mine, did Saturday Slammin' Jam. And he kind of, you know, went through the entire thing. And this is our first chance to sit and talk about it. Kind of unprecedented for a team in this position, you know, top six in the playoffs. I mean, they were a four seed when this happens.
I just kind of felt like it was out of nowhere. So at this point, some of the reporting starting to come out. I don't know. What do you guys think?
It honestly, it's surprising. And I think us being lost for words here kind of describes the feeling that we have because it's hard to explain the way that we're feeling. When it comes to this Grizzlies team, they were falling down the standings a little bit over the last two months. Since February, they were, you know, under 500. They hadn't beat a lot of good teams.
And I think a part of that was just their defense falling off a cliff. They've been 20th defensively since that time too. So it's, They haven't been able to be as good of a defensive team. You see that scuffle between Santi Aldama and Desmond Bain where Desmond Bain is asking to guard. So there clearly seems to be some issues. Yeah, play harder, right?
There clearly seems to be some issues on the defensive end. I guess the question, and I think this is what everybody is asking, why not do it Last summer, when you thought you were going to change your coach and you got in the coaching staff. That's the part that doesn't make sense to me.
That's the thing. If you've already made up your mind, like waiting until now, it's just kind of delaying the next chapter and also putting, you know, Tomas Iasalo in a really interesting position because now not only, yes, he is known for his offensive capability, he's also now responsible for trying to fix that defense that S was just referencing has fallen off a cliff.
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Chapter 2: What controversies arose during the Pistons vs. Wolves game?
What's going to happen to close out this year? Because guess what? Memphis Grizzlies are still in playoff position.
Yeah. And I will say Grizzlies GM Zach Kleiman came out and said this was his decision to make. And it it was and it is. Yeah. It was pretty obvious to me they were going to wind up doing it this summer. If you look at some of the changes they made to the staff last year, it signals a sign that things needed to change.
This whole offensive system change, this has been a slow-boiling sort of development. And I have knocked teams in the past when they wait too long. And so... I think it's better to just do it now with nine games left when you are clear, hey, this is the direction we're going, than to wait until the summer.
And now you at least get a look at a guy in Tuomas Isala who is moving up the coaching ranks very fast. He's a former player in Europe. He's got a really good resume. And if he's half as good a coach in the NBA as he's been everywhere else, he's probably going to be the new head coach of the Grizzlies. So I think you get him in there, you get him –
in a leadership capacity with these players that just set you up for success later on. Probably not this year. I mean, they look like a first round out to me all season long because they kind of got some warts, but especially now.
I have more questions for them now going into the summer, though, because... You know, Jaron Jackson Jr., he's going to be getting that extension, definitely going to be an all NBA level player. And like you have that money aspect to it, plus the team building aspect. And now you add on the coaching hire and what you might have to do that.
So it's just more questions to consider for this Grizzlies team moving forward over the next month and a half.
Right. And a coaching hire also is a culture question of now having to reestablish or establish period. What is the Memphis Grizzlies culture too? And you've got John Morant that's supposed to be at the core of that. And who's he going to turn to, you know, to be able to help set that up?
Yep. Cleveland and Oklahoma City, both now over 60 wins. OKC is 62. Cleveland got its 60th win on Sunday against the Clippers. The Cavs have been struggling lately. They did not have a great March. They've not had a great last 10 games or so, you know, 12 games. Zena, are you at all concerned about the way that the Cavs are finishing the season? I mean, they've had...
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Chapter 3: Are the Cleveland Cavaliers peaking at the right time for playoffs?
And they probably needed this one. And they were up, too. They were playing incredibly well in that first half. Malik Blasey was on fire. It was a fun game from that perspective, especially from the way that the Pistons were showing up. But it was crazy that the Wolves were throwing hands. I was shocked to see them...
engage in this same sort of like kind of aggressive demeanor that Detroit has always had. But I appreciated what both JB Bickerstaff and Malik Beasley said after the game when asked about it. And it was really about we got each other's backs. And I get it. Like, you saw Nas Reid point his finger in Ron Holland's face.
And if you've been watching Ron Holland all season long, this is not someone you want to wag your finger in his face. Yeah, you don't want to test Ron Holland.
He has a bag of Doritos on his shoulder. Mm-hmm.
yes and this is one of the reasons why you love Ron Holland is because he's coming to the league with this like chip on your shoulder or bag of chips on his shoulder and you love the way that he approaches the game in that way but yeah it was just crazy to think like this is this today was a show of playoff intensity way early right like you would imagine this sort of like
spark going more so but now you're seeing okay yeah it's the end of the season things are getting a little testy we're gonna get some suspensions on this one um and we'll talk about that later on the week um also we we should announce the suns are cooked they've been cooked multiple times this season but i do think it is now official a 39 point loss to the rockets at home they lose kd to an injury in the game which we don't have an update on yet um
Seven games to go as they have the hardest strength of schedule remaining. Can they even go two and five, much less make this this up, make up this game that they're behind the Sacramento Kings for the last spot in the play. And I just don't I don't think they can even go two and five.
I think last night we've seen a lot of blowout losses in the Suns home arena over the last couple of years, right? Luka Doncic has been a part of a few of them, but they've been, you know, kind of like these makeshift massive moments for this Suns organization. Every single time they've had one of those massive blowout losses, they've gone out and done something to try and add to this team.
The Kevin Durant trade is a huge part of that. And I think this tonight was actually the nail in the coffin. Like this is over. It's finished. It's done. They are going to shift and go into a different direction. I would be surprised if Kevin Durant plays another game this season because of the injury, because of kind of what they might do this summer when it comes to trading him.
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Chapter 4: What are the implications of the Suns' recent performance?
Chapter 5: What are the playoff prospects for Memphis Grizzlies?
Chapter 6: How are the NBA playoff landscapes shaping up?
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Good morning and welcome to the NBA Daily. Coming up, I'm back. I missed a lot, apparently. The Grizzlies fired their coach. Cleveland and Oklahoma City both hit 60 wins. And we had a big brawl in Minnesota. And would you believe it? The Detroit Pistons were involved. Good morning, everybody. Good morning, guys. Good to see your faces. Welcome back.
Just sit here for 30 minutes catching up right before the podcast. You know, a little podcast magic there. Thank you guys for filling in for me last week. The shows were awesome. It was a lot of fun. I spent the week in the woods. very good for me. Shout out to our national parks. Yosemite National Park was a lot of fun. Beautiful park.
When I got out of the woods, guys, I was bombarded once I got cell phone service by just a bevy of news. First, sad news, I learned about Juju Watkins tearing her ACL and it really just put a damper on my trip because I was looking forward to catching some of her games over the weekend. And then I found out that the Grizzlies Fired Taylor Jenkins with nine games left in the season.
And guys, this obviously is a huge surprise to everyone. Keith Parrish, good buddy of mine, did Saturday Slammin' Jam. And he kind of, you know, went through the entire thing. And this is our first chance to sit and talk about it. Kind of unprecedented for a team in this position, you know, top six in the playoffs. I mean, they were a four seed when this happens.
I just kind of felt like it was out of nowhere. So at this point, some of the reporting starting to come out. I don't know. What do you guys think?
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