The Bill Simmons Podcast
An NBA Six-Pack, Belichick to UNC, and Million-Dollar Picks
Fri, 13 Dec 2024
The Ringer’s Bill Simmons cracks open an NBA six-pack of topics, including possible Jimmy Butler trades, next year out-of-nowhere contenders, an NBA rules tweak, and more (2:58). Then Bill is joined by ESPN’s Seth Wickersham to discuss Bill Belichick becoming the next head football coach of the North Carolina Tar Heels, why Belichick didn’t wait around for an NFL opening, how his philosophy might translate to the college game, and more (25:02). Finally, Bill talks with Joe House about some NBA Cup odds and the NFL weekend slate (1:21:13), before making the Million Dollar Picks for NFL Week 15 (1:59:29). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Seth Wickersham and Joe House Producers Kyle Crichton and Chia Hao Tat The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
What are the latest NBA topics discussed?
I was trying to think of another word that would sound less braggy, but hot is the word. Million dollar picks are hot. Joe House is going to be on at the end. We're going to try to keep it going. We're at almost $2 million profit of fake money, and we're going to see if we can bump it over there. But we've been on a good streak, and I really like the slate this week. So that is the podcast.
We're getting up early today before the Rams-Niners game as well. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, we're going to kick things off with a special part of today's episode. It is brought to you by Michelob Ultra, the official beer sponsor of the NBA, my favorite league. The NBA Cup, not only is it underway, the semifinals are this weekend in Vegas.
Michelob Ultra Courtside, ready to get fans closer to the action. Sign up for Michelob Ultra for a chance to win courtside seats, a trip to the Paris Global Game. That sounds fun. A trip to All-Star Weekend and other prizes. Check out MichelobUltra.com slash courtside for your chance to get closer to the game. than ever before. I'm going to open a six pack. Six things I've noticed.
Six things I want to talk about. We hit a little bit with Jacoby and Goldsberry on Tuesday night's podcast. Specifically, we talked about Jimmy Butler and Golden State and how from a Golden State standpoint, you saw it last night too. I think they have a two to three year window here with Curry and Draymond to compete for a title.
Whether they're going to win a title remains to be seen, but they need... One more offensive player, somebody who can take the burden. You saw in the game last night, they're up six with two and a half minutes left and just some of the worst possessions you could possibly have. They become very easy to stop at the end of the game.
So Jimmy Butler is somebody that makes sense for them and kind of fits in him, Draymond, and some role players. You can kind of see it. It's not nothing. So he makes $48.8 million this year. He has a player option. The player option is key because everybody thinks that he's either going to opt out at the end of the year and become a free agent.
Or he'll want to do an extension of Miami, which Miami Clear doesn't want to do because they've had a year and a half to do it. Okay, so we talked about some of the apron stuff on Tuesday and how hard it is to make trades in the NBA right now. And I was saying how, on the one hand, I kind of like it because it's a little more like the NFL. Guys are kind of stuck in their situations.
You can't just decide you're unhappy in a month and be, I want to go somewhere else. You look at Brandon Ingram, you look at Zach Levine. These are guys that are actually, well, Ingram just got hurt, but guys that were playing pretty well in situations that they weren't happy with because they didn't really have any other choice. And that could be how it plays out with Jimmy Butler.
On the other hand, we've already seen that he can get a little frisky if he's not happy. I think Miami's feeling that pressure too. And if you're Miami, where are you going? You're light years away from the Boston OKC Cleveland group. You're not even really a second tier contender. You're probably a second and a half tier contender. And maybe you could use Butler's contract.
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