The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo to discuss the 76ers’ arduous journey to retaining their first-round draft pick, the unknown ceiling of the new-look Lakers (15:26), criticizing NBA player criticism, what it means to be the “face of the league” (32:59), biggest red flags for every NBA title contender, how the Celtics match up with the Cavaliers (01:20:18), Bill’s latest internet rabbit hole (01:55:59), and more. Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Ryen Russillo 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. Order Michelob ULTRA today, available on Doordash! ENJOY RESPONSIBLY © 2025 ANHEUSER-BUSCH, MICHELOB ULTRA® LIGHT BEER, ST. LOUIS, MO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What are the latest projects from The Ringer?
Coming up Sundays, basketball, Rosillo, you know, the drill it's next. We're also brought to you by the ringer podcast network. We're having new rewatchables coming for you on Monday night. We did an Oscar winner. You'll be able to watch that as a video podcast on Spotify. You can watch it on the ringer movies, YouTube channel as well. Uh, if you love the Oscars, uh,
This is going up before the Oscars, but Sean Fantasy and Amanda Dobbins will be reacting to the Oscars, I think right after the telecast. So check out the big picture for that. We're also brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook, where I don't know if you know, but we're doing these player performance doubles with FanDuel. Two leg parlays already made for you.
Take an NBA player prop, combine it with a bet on that player's team to win. And starting this week, We will have a ringer PBT on a player performance bet placed on one of the Tuesday games. Rockets, Pacers, Warriors, Knicks, Bucks, Hawks, Nets, Spurs, Clippers, Suns. I'm going to tweet out my pick on Tuesday. Stay tuned.
Be sure to claim the ringer PBT in the carousel on the FanDuel Sportsbook page. app. Last thing to plug before we get to the podcast, Celtic City, the documentary series we did about the Boston Celtics. It's nine episodes over nine weeks. It is on Max and HBO. It premieres Monday night. Get ready for it. Once a week. It's old school. You can watch an episode. You can think about it.
Then the next week, another one comes on. It's almost like how they have with White Lotus. That's Celtic City. So please check that out. We spent a lot of time on it. Really proud of it. So Celtic City. Monday, March 3rd. Get ready. All right, coming up. Got a lot of weird basketball topics to talk about with Rosillo. Some big picture stuff, some alpha dog stuff in the league between the teams.
Cleveland had a big Friday. We're covering it all next. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, we are taping this a little after 1230 Pacific time. Just watch Celtics Nuggets that we're going to talk about later. The star of Shot Caller 2 is here, Ryan Russillo. You look great.
The listeners can't hear it, can't see it, but you got like a, it's like an early 2000s Red Sox setup guy, Fu Manchu kind of look. Is that a Van Dyke or a Fu Manchu?
Yeah, I don't know. I was looking at some old pictures of myself. Well, I usually break this out a couple of times a year and I did it when I got my license picture taken last summer. And the picture of my license is just horrifying. And so for whatever reason, I don't know. I just I used to do when I was in my 20s. I usually do do it every now and then. So we're we're back.
I love the bored with your face moments. Not just you, but me. I have them too, where you're just like, ah, fuck it. Grow a mustache. Didn't you do it for PTI? I did. We did. We did mustache week. Me and Levitard, we just both grew like big bushy, like buddy cop mustaches. Yeah, it's fun. Lately, I've been shaving.
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Chapter 2: What can we expect from the new-look Lakers?
It's almost like 80 points per game, I think, in February when I did the numbers for those guys. And then it's like, yeah, but everything else. Like, does it work? I know Bull Bull's had a really nice run here, but let me actually Laker minute rotation you. Scattering report. If he has a clean look on the catching three, he's probably going to reset himself and move. All right. Long.
Long length.
Long length. Which is one of my favorite things I've ever seen.
Be careful. Be careful attacking him long.
In November, the Lakers were 25th on defense. They were 8-6 that month. They were 25th on defense, right?
And it felt worse.
Yeah. You're looking at it going, probably going to be their thing. They're just not going to be very good defensively. Why would that be? Well, D'Angelo Russell for that month, 26 minutes a game. Cam Reddish, 21 minutes a game. He's making threes, but he's playing 26 minutes per game.
You look at where they're at now in their last 10, and then if I give you their number two defense in the NBA behind your Detroit Pistons, who are just their own story.
And they're like fourth in the last 20, I think, too. So it's getting better. Every 10-game stretch is better than the last 10-game stretch.
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