NBA Finals Shocker: Are the Knicks Exposing Wemby? Brunson’s Clutch Takeover Has Spurs on the Brink

SCP-June7 === [00:00:00] Jose: All right, it's time to talk basketball. I'm Jose Salviati, editor at thePeachBasket.net. He is Steve Purciello, a longtime educator, vice principal, high school basketball coach, athletic director, and the host of Celtics Chalk Talk. Celtics Chalk Talk is a pod dedicated to the latest news and opinions surrounding the Boston Celtics from a lifelong fan. Steve, that pod drops new episodes every Monday, but again, this is the Shot Clock pod, the best 24 minutes of NBA random thoughts online anywhere. This podcast was born out of the contents of Steve's 13 Rules random NBA thoughts articles, which he publishes weekly. Steve and I have exactly 24 minutes to discuss what's on his mind around the NBA. Today we'll discuss his latest 13 Rules random NBA thoughts article, where he shares his random thoughts after game one and game two of the NBA Finals, as well as his overall thoughts about the series. It's it's always a good article, but this one I thought really hit on some key points. We have a lot to talk about today.[00:01:00] Now, if you're listening to this, we're grateful, thank you. You're listening to one of the independent fan-driven shows on the Peach Basket Podcast Network of shows. We're not owned by a big media company, which means what you hear can sh- come straight from fans like Steve and I. If you believe voices like this should be heard, and you believe in independent fan-driven content, the best way to support us is simple. Keep listening, tell a friend. When this episode ends, head over to the Peach Basket Podcast Network, check out more fan-run podcasts, head over to thePeachBasket.net, read some great content, and help this independent network grow the way it started, organically, one hoops fan at a time. We appreciate your support. Thank you. Steve, are you ready? Steve: Ready Jose: Let's do it. Now, like I said, you broke this up into recap game one, game two, and then overall. We're gonna take 'em one by one. Let me start the clock. Boom. We go back to game one. All right? Now, the Knicks were coming off a long delay, [00:02:00] right? They hadn't played basketball in over a week. We talked about this last week. That's a trap game. I really thought San Antonio Spurs would win game one. I thought the Knicks might take game two. But that's not what happened. Now, before we dive into, in, into the overall series, let's talk about game one. You called out, or I should say better said, you identified the NBA's best closer after that game. Who is it and why'd you call that out? Steve: It's very obvious it's Jalen Brunson. He's done it all year. And in that game, I believe he scored eight straight points by himself. San Antonio didn't score and it-- and that broke open the game. It was a tie game at the time, and he broke it open. He's done this many times. If you watch the Knicks on TV, which I try not to, but I see a lot of their games he does it all the time. Fourth quarter, get out of his way and let him go, and he did it again. He's just incredible. And then really think about it, he's 6'1" [00:03:00] and he's able to go into the paint and get open shots all day. He's got a variety of moves. His footwork is tremendous. He's just a... Pound for pound, he's as good as anybody in the NBA Jose: Yeah. All right, outstanding. Every single topic has got a rabbit hole we can go down, so I'm gonna be very careful not to go down too many of these, but I gotta ask this question. Becky Hammon, a former San Antonio Spurs assistant coach, said of the guy you just called the best closer in the NBA, a guy who's proven it, a guy who took his team on his 6'1", which you know in the NBA means he's closer to probably 5'11", shoulders and willed them to a win. She said of him, "He's too small to lead an NBA team to the NBA finals." Do you agree? Steve: That was a stereotype. I- I don't know if you ha- if you have his talent his footwork and ability to get a shot at any time, I don't know if you can agree with that. [00:04:00] I think that's predicated on the fact that if you're 6'1" and you're gonna go in the way of the tr- big people, you're not gonna get your shot away. He's got a fallback, he's got footwork. He's able to get around people. He just does so many things well and more importantly, he's a tremendous shooter. It probably is right, and I would say he's an exception, he's the exception to the rule in every way as a basketball player Jose: Okay. And I'm gonna keep going down the rabbit hole, but I promise we're not gonna go any deeper 'cause we got a lot more to talk about. But is ~Jaren, Jared my gosh I'm all of a sudden lost his name. Is is ~Brunson better player than Allen Iverson? Steve: Different type of player. Iverson let it rip and he just, he d- had no conscience, literally. Brunson stays within a team fram- framework. and also I think as a coach, I'd rather coach Brunson Brunson is more [00:05:00] coachable obviously, and he likes to practice, which doesn't hurt it. And it seems like Brunson has a good rapport with his teammates. I don't know what I, I- Iverson, I think everybody respected the ability, but they realized sometimes he can go off the reservation. Where this guy Bru- and Brunson has no problem at any time throwing a pass to somebody wide open. He just, he does everything right. Even if you don't like the Knicks, you have to sit there and admire this basketball player. And he Jose: Yeah Steve: What he does is for smaller people who play basketball, young people, it gives them a lot of hope that, you know what? If I do things correctly, I can go somewhere. Where before that, you had to be 6'4", 6'5", or whatever, as Becky Hammon said. That's not true if you can master the footwork and the work that he did. His father did a tremendous job coaching him growing up. Jose: Yeah Steve: and if you don't know, that's Rick Brunson, who's the f- [00:06:00] the assistant coach of the Knicks now. But Jose: Yeah Steve: It's remarkable. I I, I just amazed that he always gets his shot off. It always hurts you Jose: Yeah. Yeah and I agree with all of that. Listen, a-again, I'm just trying to be the devil's advocate here 'cause, Becky Hammon specifically called out AI. She said, "If AI can't win it, Jalen Brunson's not gonna win it. He's not better than AI." But you're you're calling out some key differences, right? Where AI was not necessarily known, to, for his assists and for... he was just-- he was world B free, but different, right? He, he was phenomenal. AI was phenomenal. But Jalen Brunson's probably a little bit more the overall player, right? Who again he's great in the locker room, seems to be well-liked. So if this is that turning point where all of a sudden somebody his size can win it all, m-more power to him and I'm happy. And I'm sure Becky Hammon will be happy too, but let's see how it plays out. We will stay on Game 1, all right? Again, this was a game that the Spurs led, [00:07:00] if you don't remember. Knicks came back, and then Brunson took over. Now, you called out one key component there for, on the Knicks side, you called out Brunson, which of course is fair. Now, on the Spurs side, we talked a lot about Wemby, and we're gonna talk about him a lot more today, I'm sure. But Celtic great, former Celtic great, Luke Kornet, is a good player. But you called out that the drop-off defensively from Wemby to Luke is pretty monumental, and that was a problem, wasn't it? Steve: Yeah. Y- you-- if you watch the game, when Cornet comes in, the ball pressure the guards overplaying, forcing the ball out, further out, away from the three-point line, makes the offense 24 seconds, makes the offense have to figure something out and move quickly. That kind of dissipates because, they don't have the guy behind them that if they get beat... Although Cornet has had his days and made a great block against Oklahoma City, Jose: Yeah Steve: they, it's not Wembanyama, and guys will [00:08:00] challenge Cornet and often win, where they don't challenge Wemby. So that's a big difference in all the overall team defense. And I think what it also says is most teams get-- centers now have evolved into becoming rim protectors first. And if they do that, their overall defense naturally gets better. Jose: So is this if I'm the Knicks is that my window of opportunity, right? When Wemby comes out, Cornet comes in that's when we attack. And I a- and I ask that question because it's a carryover to the next topic. A lot of people are saying the Knicks have figured out Wemby, right? Because his shooting is down. He missed a... they're saying they figured him out. Have the Knicks figured out Wemby, or are they just taking advantage of the non-Wemby moments? Steve: They move the ball well. They penetrate and then they kick. And the bigger thing would be they're shooting way [00:09:00] above what, what they usually would shoot from three. And they're getting open shots, so I guess a professional basketball player who's a shooter is gonna make them. But they're getting wide open shots off of that penetration and on the kick. So it I guess what the Knicks have done, first of all, on a roll. An incredible roll. But at some point you can't shoot 37 to 40% every night from three. You just can't. It's the the, the averages and they're doing it. So that's a lot. And they're getting guys like Landry Shamet who- whose, as they said the other night, he's a minimum player. He's making the minimum money for his, time in the NBA. He's shooting beyond belief and i- it's almost like all the gods have come together and decided this is the Knicks turn and we're gonna, make sure. Mikal Bridges, I think in the first half he didn't miss a shot. My goodness. I... He's a good shooter, but [00:10:00] miss sometime and that's the point. And they're just they're playing very well Jose: Yeah. Second best streak to the Golden State Warriors. I believe it won 15 in a row. I think they've won 12 in a row now. I might be off by one or two. But yeah. Is it 13? Yeah. So if they match the Warriors, that means they sweep the Spurs. They're on a heck of a roll, un- undeniable. But I wanna key in on Wemby, right? You and I talked about it here multiple times. The key to the Spurs is getting Wemby the ball. He's your best player, get him the ball. He needs at least 20 shots. Make 'em or miss 'em that's who you gotta ride with. Now he's getting those 20 shots, he's not making 'em. So again, have the Knicks figured this guy out? And I'm gonna ask you another way. If Wemby can't lead his team to a finals victory on his team's home court, is he a superstar or is he just still on the cusp? Steve: I think the best way to answer that is he's 22 years old. And [00:11:00] then the second best way to answer that, was another pretty good player, and I wrote about it, that was 22 years old the first time he played in the finals, and they got swept. It's LeBron. So Jose: Yep Steve: patient here. will get better. Experience is the best teacher and he's going through something. He'll be fine. Just get him the ball. If you're gonna win or lose, you go home with him. I'm not going home with some-- any of the other guys, and there's some nice players there, but I'm not going home with them. I'm going with Wemby, and hey, if we lose, we shake their hands and move on. So I... That's my answer to that Jose: Yeah and I, again I don't disagree. My first thought was Shaq, right? When he led his Orland- young, very young Orlando Magic team against the against the the Rockets. And Hakeem Olajuwon showed him a thing or two, right? But nobody questioned Shaq's dominance. Nobody questioned whether Shaq was a superstar. He just needed, he needed to go through that to become who he was, and maybe [00:12:00] that's what we're seeing for Victor Wembanyama. All let's see. Let's move on to game two. The Knicks won game two. It was a shock. It was a shock to me for sure. I'm sure it was a shock to San Antonio and everybody in attendance. Game two, slam dunk. Spurs are gonna win. The Spurs are going to win. There was no doubt in my mind that the Spurs were gonna win game two. None. So much so that my wife said, "Hey, there's a street fair going on." Time of the t- the tip starts at the time of the tip. I said, "Yeah, let's go." It's it's, Spurs are winning. I'm not even worried. And then look what happened. I'm blown away. So let... You wrote about one, a lot of key moments in game two. One of them, Mike Brown apparently, and I didn't know this about him until I read your article and then I did a little digging, he has gotten a little bit of flack for holding on to his challenges. He doesn't call them a lot. He held on to one, and it was a crucial moment in the game. Tell us a little bit about that Steve: Anunoby had the ball in the corner, clock, shot [00:13:00] clock going down, threw up a crazy shot, but he got hit on the wrist and then he tapped it out of bounds. Jose: Yep. Steve: And Jose: Yep Steve: Tiven, the referee, was right there and he didn't call a foul. Okay. Now I'm thinking to myself, okay, San Antonio should want to get the ball quickly and get it in because there's a foul. It's an obvious foul. They didn't. Brown used his challenge. Now, what was interesting was I don't think the Knicks had scored for a couple minutes and San Antonio went on a run to cut that 14-point lead to nothing, to tie or whatever. It was a tie. What happened there was the Knicks got bailed-- not bailed out, it was a foul, they got bailed out by the challenge and they made-- Anunoby made all three. If Brown doesn't challenge, the Knicks were just-- the ball wasn't going in and they weren't getting great shots, so they were in trouble and that kind of saved their bacon [00:14:00] for that moment and really changed everything. Again, no challenges for Brown. He just got a bad call against him and what are you gonna do? But he did have a challenge and he used it and it was a big play in the game because it got the Knicks able to, muster something. It's very difficult when your team is not scoring while the other team's on a run. All you're saying to yourself is, "Just a basket and we'll be okay." And the-- or, "Just some points and we'll be okay." you don't get them, it's just more pressure each possession and that's what was going on there Jose: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, again, a little bit of a rabbit hole. You're a former coach. I coached a little bit, but we never had challenges. I don't know if you did when you coached. What would be your thought process? 'Cause mine has always been to do what Mike Brown did. I wanna hold onto those when I absolutely need them, and you absolutely need them in the fourth quarter. You don't wanna waste one in the first. It doesn't make any sense [00:15:00] to me. Just generally speaking, do you appreciate Mike Brown's approach, or would yours be a little different? Steve: what you're seeing is some coaches will use them on an out of bounds play early that's a poor call. And they'll use it 'cause they know they're gonna win that, and then they have, Jose: yeah Steve: that challenge for later. That would be the way I'd look at it, and that's a common thing. What you're also seeing now is referees, guy goes to the basket and, and it gets knocked out of bounds, and he might have been the last one to touch it. They're calling that, where before they would give that guy the ball back and let them take it in. So what you're seeing is the referees are now doing a better job on those out of bounds, on those out of bounds calls. But that's where it is. And by the way, I just wanna mention something with the referees. If you're watching this is a thankless job. Every play there's banging and holding and grabbing and so on. Every play. you-- It almost [00:16:00] becomes negotiation because now you have to figure out is that serious enough or is that gonna change things enough to make the call. And you wanna keep... If you keep blowing the whistle, you ruin the whole flow of the game. So you Jose: Right? Steve: the game moving, and you also want to recognize the egregious fouls. So it's really a line that's a very difficult line for these guys. And I'm just gonna add, all three of the officials the other night all guys who were crew chiefs during the year. If you're a crew chief, you're one of the best 15 officials or 18, 20 officials in the league. So we're not looking at these guys like the guys during the season who might not be as seasoned and as good. Th- this is the top, I believe, 18 officials in the NBA. So This is what you're getting and it's hard to call this stuff because you see fouls every time. Any kind of drive, there's a push. Any kind [00:17:00] of ball handling, it's a push. And San Antonio is a very physical team, and the Knicks are playing very physically also Jose: Yeah. Yeah, and you called out the refs. I was gonna call that out as well in your article. It's a thankless job. And but I, I think so far it's been a well-officiated series. Let's hope that continues. Let's stay in game two. Again, tight match-up. Great game. Super fun game to watch. I did go to the street fair, but a couple of vendors had the game up, so I got to watch it, which was nice. Now there was a crucial moment at the end. The Knicks missed a shot. I think it was a tie game. W- or maybe the Spurs were down by two. Wemby got the rebound, drives up court, passes the ball. It was either Vassell or Cassell, I don't know who, and it hits him off his back. J- just a horrible mistake there. But the Spurs had a timeout. Now let's talk about that. We talked a lot about the deer in the headlights potentially for the Spurs, and we're seeing them make some mistakes, which is not unexpected. But the coach and the coaching staff [00:18:00] of the Spurs, the first time, this is, th- their first dance, too. That, in my opinion, was a mistake that the coaching staff made. What'd you see? Steve: I, I-- as soon as-- you gotta take in into consideration your team and so on. I know the trend in the NBA is to get the ball up the court quick and get the best shot you can, 'cause usually l- something will happen. But if you take in consideration two things. It was a tie game. have the ball, the shot clock's off. If you call timeout, you get the ball at the other end of the court, can run the clock down, and then get it to Wembanyama with about four or five seconds left and let him go. And option, if that's the last shot, the worst thing that could happen is you're going to overtime. That's the worst thing, and you have momentum 'cause you've come back from 14 down. everything is in your way. Why they didn't call timeout as soon as... My mind said timeout. As soon as Wemby got the rebound, [00:19:00] timeout to stop the Jose: So Steve: 'Cause again, we've got the ball up the other end of the court, which is good, and we just run that clock down and w- we leave either with a tie or we win. They didn't do that. I was very surprised about that. There's a couple things that Mitch Johnson's done in this series that have astounded me, or surprised me and not that would've changed, it might've, but it would've changed the series. The Knicks outplaying them and playing, mu- much better. But he's not giving his ch- team the best chance to win, in my opinion Jose: Yeah and that's tough. When you dig into his John Mitch Johnson's coaching staff, right? There's not a whole lot of veterans on that coaching staff. Now, one of his assistant coaches is the Orlando Magic coach. Now he just got the job, so obviously there's some well-respected people, but nobody with experience, nobody that, that might be able to nudge him a little bit and say, "Call a timeout here." It, it- Steve: Sean [00:20:00] Sweeney is a-- runs the defense. He's not an off- W- h- his responsibility isn't with the offense. So I get it. I get the whole thing but I just thought that a timeout would help. And then if we're gonna really not nitpick, but go after, I watch a game, and if your best player is only getting four shots at the half, we got a problem. have a real problem to the point where, as the coach, I sit down at halftime and say, "Look, he got us here. are we doing? are we doing?" then I would also look at him and say, "When in doubt, shoot the ball. Stop passing stupid passes around the perimeter. Take the ball to the basket or just pull up and shoot. Who can stop you? Nobody's big enough to block your shot. Do what you please on the court." So Jose: Yeah Steve: four shots in the [00:21:00] first half, I- I, y- you wanna be positive in today's NBA, but at some point you look at your team and say, "Look, he ain't, you're not gonna do this," then I've gotta find somebody who's gonna do it because w- we're giving away too much here. I don't want my fifth player to shoot the ball. I want my first player to shoot the ball. Jose: Yeah. Steve: If Jose: Yep Steve: about basketball, if you think about basketball, got your five guys, and let's say they're taking 80 shots a game. In your mind, you wanna think about best player, how many shots did he get of those 80? 30%? That's 24 shots. And then work from there. He did end up with about 22, I believe, but that's fine. At least 30%, if not more, that you've gotta get out of him. And then you think about it, okay, De'Aaron Fox, 10 shots, 12 shots, that's great, but hopefully he's getting seven, eight assists. He's your point guard. Jose: Yeah Steve: so on. But then you look down the team and you f- [00:22:00] figure out how it'll, percentage-wise, how it'll add up to 100%. But I do want my best player taking the shots Jose: Yep. Undeniable, no notes. Let's talk about Win- Win Wembanyama shots. The the San Antonio Spurs' best player, 9.5 seconds left, the Spurs foul. Jalen Brunson, the best closer in the NBA, goes to the line. Unbelievably misses one. Luke Kornet gets the rebound. Now, the Spurs got a m- a, a chance here, right? I they're on their home court, they've got the best player in the NBA. Yeah, the m- the most unique player in the NBA, let's go that w- let's go there, in, in Wembanyama. And he, they get him that last shot, and it's a good look. A corner, a little bit i- inside the three-point line, a little outside of the of the free throw. I think a shot that this guy's gonna make, 75% of the time. Hits the back rim. A makeable shot, but he missed it. Steve: Yeah. Jose: okay with that whole scenario? 'Cause I [00:23:00] was. I thought that was the shot they wanted, they just it just didn't go. Steve: Of course. And, things happen. You just gotta look at it this way. You can, denigrate him for missing the shot. Again, 22 years old, never been in this spot. So y- you almost have to be patient and say the next time it'll go. It'll happen." And deal with it. But if you really think about it, do you want Wembanyama taking that shot, or do you want Ca- Va- his name? Or Keldon Johnson or any of those people? No. I'll go home with that satisfied we got Jose: Oh. Steve: shot. Jose: Yeah Steve: As a coach, that's all you can do is hope they get a good shot out of it. And they got it, just didn't go in. That's the way it works Jose: No I agree with that. It's a easier pill to swallow even though it's a tough pill to swallow. Now let's pivot back. We're still in game two. And but we're gonna talk about the Knicks now. You wrote about this and probably to me the biggest shock of this whole entire series has been the job that Karl-Anthony Towns is doing on Victor Wembanyama. I... listen, I don't know [00:24:00] that anybody saw this coming. Is Wemby, pardon, is KAT the Wemby stopper? Steve: No, I think KAT has played offense and done well, and San Antonio's confused on how they wanna defend that. For a while in the first half, the Knicks were running a lot of screen and rolls with, and screening Wemby, and Towns was diving into the paint. And he had a guard on him, and they were throwing the ball to him five feet out, and he was just turning and putting the ball in the basket. Good, good good move by the Knicks. Now, if I'm San Antonio, I'm thinking about putting somebody else on Towns, moving Wemby down to whoever is in the corner, either corner, and guarding that person, preferably Josh Hart, because then they can do this, but Towns won't be there because Wemby's there. So you're gonna take that away. That was my thinking. But Towns is making shots and he's doing well. He's playing great. [00:25:00] But the point being, there's gotta be a strategy. How do we stop what's effective for the Knicks? And they did it in the second half where Towns didn't go off, but he's holding his own. Now, offensively, you're talking about San Antonio, Wembanyama has gotta just shoot the ball. How many silly, and silly is a bad word, but stupid passes just around the perimeter that he makes. Do something with the damn ball. You're the best guy on the court. Do some- well, maybe you're second best with Brunson but do something. Make something happen. Even if you go to the basket, they, they defend, double up on you, somebody's open. something. Don't just catch it, dribble once, and throw it. Do, make something happen here, and he's not. And that's something that's gotta get through to him. You've gotta make something happen. And he's not and that's a problem Jose: Yeah. Yeah, undeniable. Which takes us... and you heard the buzzer go off, but man, it's the NBA finals. But we do this all the time anyway, we're gonna keep going, [00:26:00] we're gonna keep rolling 'cause we got one more thing to talk about. Sorry, s- had a little something in my ear there. All right. L- so let's talk about it. Now, y- the series is 0-2 for the Spurs, 2-0 for the Knicks. No NBA team has ever lost the first two games at home and gone on to win it all, ever. O- it's happened to, to two other teams, if I'm go- I'm recollecting correctly, and they both lost. So this is NBA history if the Spurs can make it back. Now, you wrote when, i- in your series overview, that the Knicks have been resilient, the Knicks have been the better team. Experience is bea- is basically beating inexperience. Now, the Spurs have got two games of experience now. They go into Madison Square Garden, which I don't know, can be a scary place to play, it can be a fun place to play. I, I don't know, I never played there, so I don't know. But the Spurs have proven they can win on the road. What do you think? Now let me ask you this way. Next week you and I have a show to do. Are [00:27:00] we gonna talk about the NBA champion New York Knicks? Are we gonna talk about game six and seven coming up? What do you foresee in New York? Steve: We'll be talking about the championship. For San Antonio, they've just gotta sit there and say, "We gotta get one." The one thing that you gotta think about, if somehow San Antonio can pierce this invincibility around the Knicks, you don't know what's Jose: Yeah. Steve: happen. you gotta get one, and it's gotta be this one tomorrow night. Because if they don't get the one, it's over. And I don't see it happening, and it's not because it's in Madison Square Garden. I just don't see it happening. I just I just think the... Everything's stacked against them. Jose: Yeah. Steve: And the crowd Jose: I love what... Steve: Go Jose: Yeah, the crowd's gonna be c- the crowd's gonna be crazy. No. I I'm excited for that because everywhere the Knicks play and I'm saying everywhere outside of New York, there's a Knick [00:28:00] crowd. When you play at Madison Square Garden, it's... there's not, there's gonna be one or two poor Spurs fans there. It's gonna be craziness, and that's fun to watch. But you called out something that I, that, that kind of, got me thinking. Pierce their, that air of invincibility. Right now the Knicks are feeling like world beaters because they've beaten everybody. You've gotta be able to punch them in the face once and get a little bit of blood, right? My first thought was Rocky, right? Remember those Rocky movies, Steve: Yeah Jose: When he fights Drago. And so right now the Knicks are Drago, and they're coming in, they're in Russia they're fighting, they're not gonna lose, and then Rocky just boom, and he tastes his own blood for the first time, and that was it, right? So it's a silly analogy, but that's what I see happening if things go right for the Spurs. They gotta not only... I think they've gotta, they gotta certainly win the game. Undeniable. But they don't got, they don't gotta blow out the Knicks, but they've gotta have an easy win. It's it can't be a game that the Knicks can go [00:29:00] say, a- analytically we won the Cavs did. This has gotta be a no doubter that leaves a little bit of doubt in the Knicks' mind going into game four. Do you agree? Steve: Totally. They have to just... Right now, the Knicks think whatever they do is gonna work, and they have to begin to think that, it doesn't always work. And have some doubt when they're playing. And right now they're playing free and easy and not worried and just take the shot, and guys are coming off the bench and throwing stuff in and it's just, it, just everything's working. So yeah. Yeah, San Antonio needs to stand up and just go right at 'em. And by the way, I know it's hard to win on the road, if you do get off to a nice start and you can stifle 'em, the crowd gets quiet. And that's what your goal should be coming in Jose: I'm kinda digging this Rocky analogy now, man. We're getting into the 4th of July. We got... i've already got the theme music playing in my ear. I know you do, too. Let's go. I'm ex- I'm excited. I'm excited. [00:30:00] Game three's gonna be fun. And I'm excited to talk about it next week. But that is it. Our time is up. You heard the buzzer go off. Thank you for listening. Thank you for watching. Make sure to read Steve's entire 13 Rules Random NBA Thoughts article. We will link it wherever you're watching or listening to this show today. And join us next week for more NBA Random Thoughts as we recap either the ongoing NBA finals or we'll celebrate the NBA champion Utah Knicks. Steve got his vote. I'm going in the other direction. I'm gonna say we're gonna talk about a great finals, and but we'll see. We'll talk next week. Thanks, Steve. Steve: Take care