Tag: Eastern Conference (Page 1 of 4)

Jake Fischer Explores the East

October 20, 2023 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

Along with the Boston Celtics, the Milwaukee Bucks are one of the favorites to win the East after trading for Damian Lillard this offseason (@Bucks/X).

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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 got by adding Jrue Holiday to what they had. … I just think the Celtics’ top six is way better and stronger, and that’s kinda how I like to look at things, from a playoff standpoint. … The fact that Boston has its same core four basically of Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, Derrick White, Al Horford, you throw in Kristaps Porzingis and then Jrue Holiday, that’s a pretty strong, switchable, malleable group.”

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 the original offer of a first-round pick and a pick swap just hasn’t gotten there to close that gap for the Sixers, so I don’t think it will. The last call I had about this, before we were recording, was like 30 minutes ago, and my impression following that call is that [from] the Sixers’ side of things at least, they don’t seem to think much will change from a negotiation standpoint between now and the start of the regular season. So, if something were to happen, it would definitely be something out of left field.” Continue reading

Sarah Spencer: Hawks Have “Caught Fire”

April 28, 2021 / Loren Chen / 0 Comments

Trae Young’s growth in his third year has propelled the Hawks to a top-five playoff seed. (AlexanderJonesi/Flickr)

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Going into the 2020-21 season, the Atlanta Hawks revamped their roster, hoping a few high-profile veteran additions would help their talented young core finally make the playoffs. The plan didn’t exactly work out as intended, as the team incurred a slew of key injuries and fell to 14-20, which triggered the firing of its head coach, Lloyd Pierce. Under Nate McMillan, however, the Hawks have completely turned it around, playing high-quality basketball that’s put them in prime position to achieve a top-five playoff seed. And their veterans are excelling, including Bogdan Bogdanovic, Danilo Gallinari and Clint Capela, who was acquired via trade last year. In the process, they’ve learned how to close games, most recently registering a 41-point fourth quarter to defeat the Greek Freak-led Bucks Sunday night, all without the services of a banged-up Trae Young. Joining Aaron to discuss this spirited group, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Sarah Spencer makes her first appearance on the pod. Near the end, she also touches upon what beloved Atlanta-based journalist Sekou Smith meant to her and her paper.

18:26–20:02: “The biggest factor for them has been [Clint] Capela. He’s been a good fit on both sides of the ball too because he gives Trae Young another rim-running target. … They needed someone to kind of organize and get things moving. I remember having a conversation with Kevin Huerter about this, and he said, ‘We want Trae to do that on offense; we want Clint to do that on defense.’ That’s what you need. You need guys to be vocal. And this was a pretty quiet team last year.”

26:02-26:28: “In the first half of the season, the Hawks were really pretty dreadful in the fourth quarter – that’s how they lost a lot of games. In the second half, in the fourth quarter, it’s pretty much been the exact opposite, which has been crazy how dramatic that turnaround has been. And I think Trae’s been a part of that. He’s had a few games where he’s come alive and been really steady in the fourth quarter, and that’s what you want to see out of a guy like that.”

Jared Weiss: The Nets “Have a Giant Frickin’ Laser Beam”

December 23, 2020 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

For Jared Weiss, KD and the Brooklyn Nets will have to get by Giannis’ Bucks first. Still, he places them just narrowly behind in terms of their potential to wreak havoc this season (Globalite/Creative Commons).

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Just in time for the start of the season, The Athletic’s Jared Weiss broke down the most striking storylines around the Eastern Conference with an emphasis on the Boston Celtics, whom he covers so closely. Among a slew of timely topics, Jared discusses his favorites to emerge out of the East, Jayson Tatum’s next expected leap, how good the Heat actually are and the new-and-improved Atlanta Hawks who seek to get back into the playoffs after a three-season absence.

*Due to dynamic advertising, time stamps may vary:

5:14-5:40: “I think it was Ryan Ruocco. I’ll give him credit for putting them as…they’re basically like the Death Star. And the Death Star very famously had a major vulnerability that allowed you to blow it up. And so if somebody can nestle right in there between Kyrie (Irving) and KD (Kevin Durant) and make the chemistry fall apart, this team can really, really fall apart . But they’ve got a giant frickin’ laser beam basically when it comes to KD and Kyrie.”

15:57-17:30: “And then in the playoffs, he (Jimmy Butler) flipped the switch. So I do think he’s gonna start performing like a top-10 player in the NBA or even top-five player, like he was last year, when we get to the playoffs. And Bam Adebayo will be better. He’ll hopefully be healthy for the entirety of the run, but Bam Adebayo, as great as he was last year, there’s still a lot of improvement for him to make. He still isn’t even a threat outside of 10 feet. Continue reading

“The Knicks of the Nineties” Book Special With Paul Knepper

November 9, 2020 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

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Author Paul Knepper takes us back to the 1990s, a time when the New York Knicks, led by Patrick Ewing, perennially made the playoffs and once came within a game of winning it all. Boasting a bruising, physical style that’s long since disappeared from the league, these Knicks are remembered fondly by New Yorkers who pine for a respectable basketball team (the Nets obviously don’t count for Knicks fans) again. In “The Knicks of the Nineties: Ewing, Oakley, Starks and the Brawlers That Almost Won It All,” Paul adeptly tells the story of these Knicks, and lucky for us, he’s here to provide the highlights of the narrative.

*Due to dynamic advertising, time stamps may vary:

6:17-6:53: “You get so immersed in this topic. It’s like writing a dissertation. It’s all I thought about for a couple years, and I’m just so heavily involved in [it]. So there’s these little nuggets of information or details that I pick up that I find really fascinating maybe, but I have to question: Is someone who’s not immersed in this topic like I am, are they going to find this stuff interesting, these little details? And these little details, can I make them work within the flow of the book?”

18:17-18:59: “If you give me a choice between talking to Patrick Ewing – especially Patrick Ewing, who’s very guarded – and talking to five to 10 people who knew Patrick Ewing well about Patrick Ewing, I’ll take the five to 10 people any day. I think they offer different perspectives. I think they are probably more honest than Patrick might be. I just think they see him in a different light. … So you start to paint the picture through all those different sources.” Continue reading

Eric Nehm: With Bucks, “Is There Anything That Really Needs Fixing?”

June 4, 2019 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo is primed to handily win the 2018-19 MVP race, according to guest Eric Nehm (Keith Allison/Creative Commons).

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On the heels of a disappointing Eastern Conference finals exit at the hands of the Raptors, The Athletic’s Eric Nehm is here to talk all things Milwaukee Bucks, including Giannis Antetokounmpo’s MVP campaign, the Bucks’ spectacular season, Mike Budenholzer’s inaugural year at the helm and the significant offseason looming ahead.

Some noteworthy clips (Particular time stamps may vary due to dynamic advertising.):

9:02-9:15: “I guess a less mature 24-year-old would just be angry and not really thinking about exactly how he gets better, but here’s Giannis, two days later, saying, ‘You know, I gotta find a way to be more comfortable in the midrange.’”

14:58-17:04: “I think Khris [Middleton] just really understands Giannis, and Giannis really appreciates guys that play hard, show up every night and can go out and actually take care of business … Giannis can help out with some of the rim protection, Khris can switch a bunch of different things; he also can defend other team’s No. 1s. And because he can defend the league’s best wings, guys like Kevin Durant, Kawhi Leonard, Giannis can stay on the back side and just be the free safety and attempt to just wreak havoc essentially. So it all just kind of works, and then on top of it, there’s just no frills. Khris doesn’t really have an ego. He doesn’t really go out there and demand more shots or anything like that.” Continue reading

Tom Westerholm: Giannis Will “Have to Work for Every Bucket” (Celtics-Bucks)

May 2, 2019 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

OTNB guest Tom Westerholm chats with Jayson Tatum prior to Boston’s Game 4 in Indiana (Keith Sliney/Boston Celtics).

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The Boston Celtics stole Game 1 in Milwaukee before the mighty Bucks answered Tuesday with a comfortable victory of their own. With the series all squared up and storylines aplenty, Tom Westerholm of MassLive delves into this fun matchup, which pits Milwaukee and Boston against each other for the second straight postseason. Only, this time, Milwaukee is coming off a 60-win season and the Celtics are able to suit up Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward. The Celtics severely limited MVP candidate Giannis Antetokounmpo in Game 1, but he responded with a strong performance in Game 2. How can Boston hope to corral the Greek Freak, and so many more questions answered inside.

Some noteworthy excerpts (*Particular time stamps may vary due to dynamic advertising):
3:54-4:57: “This is a strategy that they’ve employed against Giannis, basically all through last year’s playoffs – let Al Horford guard him one-on-one and then everybody else can get out to shooters. It really hammers home how good Horford is at defending that he was able to do that and that he is able to do that, because every once in a while in this series you see Jayson Tatum or Jaylen Brown, guys who are not small necessarily, get switched onto Giannis and he just blows by them and gets a dunk. It’s replicable just because the Celtics have a guy like Horford, who is as good at defending as he is and who is strong and able to move his feet and able to stay in front…Giannis is going to have a difficult series. He’s gonna have to work for every bucket, every free throw he gets. As much as the Celtics can hope for a win in this series, that’s gonna be what it rests on.”

11:43-12:26: “One of the things to keep in mind with this Celtics team is they do sort of have these stretches, and then sometimes during the regular season that would lead toward finger-pointing, that would lead to guys kind of getting upset with one another, and then that would really snowball, and then you’re talking about a few losses in a row and things can go badly at that point for them. I will say, though, in the locker room everybody was pretty accountable. There wasn’t a lot of, ‘Oh, the young guys needed to do this,’…It was more like Marcus Morris said they need to be setting better screens for Kyrie, and Kyrie said, ‘I need to be better at X, Y and Z.’” Continue reading

James Edwards III: Griffin, “Gritty, In Your Face, Bruising” Embodies Pistons’ Identity

March 30, 2019 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

Reggie Jackson has one year remaining on a five-year, $80 million contract before he hits unrestricted free agency (Keith Allison/Creative Commons).

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With the Detroit Pistons closing in on their first playoff appearance in three seasons, The Athletic’s James Edwards III joins the show. Among a number of timely Pistons topics he broaches, Edwards breaks down the Pistons’ chances of maintaining their playoff position and their shot of staging a first-round upset. He also looks ahead to the consequential offseason looming for the franchise. If it somehow misses the playoffs, could Detroit elect to blow it all up and rebuild from the ground up?

*Due to dynamic advertising, excerpt time stamps may vary per listener

According to James, the Pistons are all in on Griffin, but that sentiment could change in a hurry (10:23-11:07):
“They love him. The city loves him. I really, truly believe that he likes playing in Detroit. He likes this challenge of building an organization up and trying to get it to a height it wasn’t at before his arrival. But with that said, I would not be surprised if this team misses the playoffs…with those three guys [Andre Drummond, Reggie Jackson and Griffin] being relatively healthy, I think that says a lot. And I would not be surprised if they capitalize on how good Blake has been, and they finally begin a rebuild and they try to trade him.”
Continue reading

Howard Beck: Small-Market GMs With a Star Are “Always on the Clock”

February 12, 2019 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

Anthony Davis’ trade demand is the latest example of a changing paradigm involving NBA superstars, argues guest Howard Beck (Keith Allison/Creative Commons).

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Bleacher Report‘s Howard Beck has been covering the NBA full-time for the past couple decades, and he detects an unmistakable change in the way the league’s superstars are increasingly dictating where they play. He discusses this phenomenon with regard to Anthony Davis’ recent trade demand, Milwaukee’s ongoing efforts to retain franchise cornerstone Giannis Antetokounmpo for the long haul and how the trend impacted this season’s awfully busy and entertaining trade deadline. Plus, the All-Star weekend is nearly upon us, providing an opportunity to touch on those festivities in Charlotte. Beck bites below:

12:54-14:52: “Tobias Harris, as a guy who’s in his prime who is a borderline All-Star, that’s, on its face, the flashiest acquisition of those contenders in the East. But it’s also the one that I think came with the most caveats and potential concerns. Because you already had a team with three stars, Embiid, Simmons, Jimmy Butler, where there are some tensions…there’s just some underlying tensions there about power dynamics and role and all this even though they [Simmons and Embiid] seem like they should fit together perfectly. And then you throw Jimmy Butler and all the volatility that can come with him on top of that…and now you throw [in] Tobias Harris who’s a high-usage guy…So, yes, the Sixers, their starting five might be the best starting five in the East now and may be the best starting five outside of Golden State, but that’s on paper, and the chemistry part of it I think has to be at least a little bit of a concern.” Continue reading

Ian Levy: Oladipo Spearheads Pacers’ Newfound “Kinetic Explosiveness”

December 23, 2017 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

Victor Oladipo’s first season with the Pacers has been a smashing success. If he can sustain his superb shooting, guest Ian Levy believes he should be an All-Star (Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE via Wikimedia Commons).

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The Indiana Pacers have bounced back from a subpar start to stand 18-14. In an Eastern Conference crowded with many solid, second-tier teams looking to separate themselves from the pack, Indiana is more than holding its own thanks to an elite offense led by Victor Oladipo. Ian Levy, NBA editor and columnist for FanSided and Editor-in-Chief of The Step Back, helps us break down the team he knows best. We’ll cover Indiana’s captivating comeback ability, the sudden emergence of Oladipo and so much more…Who’s your (Hoosier?) favorite podcast for interview excerpts?

6:42-7:28: “If he [Victor Oladipo] can sustain what he’s doing shooting the basketball, especially on those pull-ups, that sort of locks him into this tier where he’s, I’d say, a clear-cut All-Star [and] one of the best shooting guards in the league. So I think that’s probably the hope for the Pacers rather than him somehow getting better than he is now. He’s given them everything they could ask for. And that aggression and passion is such a different aesthetic than the Pacers have had the past couple years. Even when they were good, back in the Hibbert-David West-George Hill-Paul George-Lance Stephenson [days], back in those days, they didn’t have the same sort of kinetic explosiveness.” Continue reading

Duncan Smith: Drummond’s Game Sees “Complete & Total Shift”

December 4, 2017 / Aaron Fischman / 0 Comments

Pistons center Andre Drummond dramatically improved his free-throw shooting in advance of the 2017-18 season, and that’s not all, according to guest Duncan Smith.

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The Detroit Pistons have bounced back from an incredibly disappointing 2016-17 campaign to begin this season 14-8. In the process, Detroit is securing come-from-behind victories with great frequency – half of its wins have occurred in games it trailed by double-digits – the second unit is dominating opposing benches and Andre Drummond is showcasing a vastly expanded offensive repertoire. Duncan Smith, contributor to The Athletic Detroit and Bball Breakdown, operates as our tour guide on this exhilarating exploration of the Motor City’s NBA club. We’ll discover how good the Pistons are and where they can still improve. Duncan’s game was clicking on all cylinders. Some highlights are excerpted below:

6:09-7:03: “I think it’s concerning when your starting lineup can’t get you out to good starts, and you need your bench reserves, led by Ish Smith – everybody loves Ish Smith but he is one of the worst shooters in NBA history. When that’s what you’re relying on for stability, it’s a bit problematic, at the very least…When together, they just aren’t effective…I think that’s it’s going to have to be understood and dealt with before long.”

13:32-14:11: “It’s a complete and total shift. Basically everything that we thought we knew about Andre Drummond has kind of gone out the window. And I think that it really calls into question everything we thought about his ceiling. We don’t really know how good he can be anymore, and that’s really exciting too, because I think we kind of had an idea that maybe he would just be one of the best rebounders ever who also isn’t a huge drag on offense. Continue reading

Tag: Eastern Conference (Page 1 of 4)

Jake Fischer Explores the East

Sarah Spencer: Hawks Have “Caught Fire”

Jared Weiss: The Nets “Have a Giant Frickin’ Laser Beam”

“The Knicks of the Nineties” Book Special With Paul Knepper

Eric Nehm: With Bucks, “Is There Anything That Really Needs Fixing?”

Tom Westerholm: Giannis Will “Have to Work for Every Bucket” (Celtics-Bucks)

James Edwards III: Griffin, “Gritty, In Your Face, Bruising” Embodies Pistons’ Identity

Howard Beck: Small-Market GMs With a Star Are “Always on the Clock”

Ian Levy: Oladipo Spearheads Pacers’ Newfound “Kinetic Explosiveness”

Duncan Smith: Drummond’s Game Sees “Complete & Total Shift”

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