5-3-23 After Hours with Amy Lawrence PODCAST: Hour 1

Okay, what's the number one reason you should try Instacart? Shopping over 1.5 million unique products from over 1,000 retailers and get everything delivered right to your door in as fast as one hour. All in one app.

So you can spend more time with the ones who matter most. Visit Instacart.com to get free delivery on your first three orders. Offer valid for a limited time, $10 minimum per order.

Additional terms apply. That's BetterHELP.com. Okay, okay, okay, I made it. I'm here. I made it. I'm actually sure if I'm referring to just making it into the studio, or if I'm referring to making it back from Syracuse. I was a little disappointed because of our timing. We missed the window where the class could turn into a three credit. So instead, we condensed it for the first time. So that's kind of the idea.

We'll do a trial run. We condensed it for the first time into a four week. Actually, it was going to be five. And then because I drive to Syracuse, we turned it into a four week class. And actually, it was the last night of classes too for Syracuse students. So just because of the timing and my driving, it turned into four weeks. And I even took off the first two Sunday nights into the Mondays. And I was on vacation around those drives to Syracuse.

Hoy! I don't know if I could do that 11 weeks in a row. I really want the opportunity to expand into a three credit class, but I don't know if I can do it while I'm working overnights because that may be too much. I wouldn't want to use all my vacation to teach a class at Syracuse. And I certainly wouldn't want to miss our Sunday nights during the spring. And so I have to think about that to contemplate. Now this is all if Syracuse allows me or invites me back, I should say. If they ask me to teach again.

But wait until I read to you a text message I received from one of my students on Tuesday. It made my entire week. It underscored the fact that it was all worth it.

It was all worth it to make the drive. Sorry, I'm trying to clean while I talk to you. And I just dropped the, oh, not again. I keep dropping the wet wipes.

Is it me or are they always slippery little suckers? Anyway, got a text message from a student a few hours ago that reminded me all of the time in the car, which by the way, it was, well, I made five trips up there. So five trips, seven hours round trip in the car each time, 35 hours of driving plus factor in the shows that I did from Syracuse, which were great, but were also coming on no sleep. And April being the second busiest month of the year. Maybe I won't teach in April next year.

Maybe we'll try a different month. Oh my goodness. It was hectic. It was chaotic. I actually missed.

I never do this. And I'm so upset at myself. I have to write a very, a very impassioned apology to a friend of mine who asked me to teach, not teach, but to speak to his college class. Today, actually, and I got my dates wrong and I completely missed it every now and then we'll get a guest here who will stand us up. And it's frustrating because we, we plan our part of our show around the guests and when they're available.

And in some cases we promote them. And all I can think is this fellow professor. So again, he teaches at a small school and had asked me, we had connected over a conference, an educational conference, and he had asked me to speak to his students and I got my dates crossed and didn't even realize I was missing it. So I feel terrible because I do not stand people up.

I pride myself on being someone who keeps her word as well, as much as it depends upon me. I just feel awful. So all that to say the Syracuse class is done. I may have overloaded myself just a tad in the month of April, which is already extremely hectic and chaotic. And then I thought, oh, well, let's teach a class and train for half marathon at the same time because why not? Oh dear.

Well, this is why not? Because I made a major gaffe and now I feel terrible and have to apologize. But at least, at the very least, I've heard from multiple students and one in particular who sent me an incredible message on Tuesday.

And so I'm holding on to that because it was all worth it. I loved, loved, loved being a professor for the first time. Professor Lawrence for the first time.

Getting used to it, by the way, it's growing on me. Professor Lawrence. People keep asking me, are you leaving radio to do that?

Well, I guess you'll find out. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio, not Professor Lawrence here, just Amy Lawrence back in our lower Manhattan studios. So we are located in the southern part of the island of Manhattan. And even though we are in New York City, we have nothing to do with New York City. So I don't even know why I bother to tell you, but just so you have a point of reference, I made it back, made it back into the studio.

But barely, I'm telling you, barely. I would love for you to connect with us on Twitter, After Hours, CBS. And the reason I'm asking you on this show right now is because it's our hump show, which means you get to ask Amy anything.

Look for the bright orange box, the yellow thought bubble. This is our longest running feature now. More than a decade we've been allowing you to ask Amy anything. Maybe taken off a couple months here or there. Once had a producer who annoyed me so much that I stopped doing it because I couldn't stand it. The way that he asked the questions and answered them himself, well that was who he was anyway, but I couldn't stand it.

And so I actually came up with some reason to table it during a summertime because I didn't want to do it. I almost couldn't look at him when he was asking me the questions because it was so annoying. Anyway, that's not the case with producer Jay. It wasn't Jay!

He's still here and it's not summertime and we're still doing it. And it's not Jay. For now.

For now. Right, if you do start to annoy me and all of a sudden the franchise goes away, I guess you'll know why. Speaking of Jay. Hi Jay. Nice to see you again. Jay tells me how lonely he gets when it's just him here on Monday night.

It's literally just me in here. It's like, what am I supposed to do? Work? What do you mean what are you supposed to do? You're supposed to work? That's a given.

There's no fun. Oh, I'll take that as a compliment. I got this tweet earlier on Tuesday. Are you ready for this? You ready? I'm going to try to do this with a straight face.

Are you ready? It said, and I quote, why doesn't Jay get more credit for the show? That's a great question. Is it? Is it a great question? Would you like some more credit for the show, Jay? Do you need some more credit?

Nah, I'm alright. I feel credited. You feel credited? Do you also feel well fed by the treats that I bring you every other week?

Those are nice. Yeah, huh. Do you also remember how I went to bat for you and was willing to tie my contract to your getting a full-time gig? Huh. Why don't you get more credit for the show, Jay? I didn't say it.

I'm content. Oh, you said it's a good question. That's what you said. I'm not going to put the gift horse in the mouth. Is it a good question?

Really? Is it a good question? It's a fair question. I told you people love.

No, it's not. You get plenty of credit. What am I supposed to spend all the time on the air talking about how much credit you deserve? Okay.

Seriously, knock it off or there will be no more treats for you. You do not need more credit. I hope that's not why you do this. If it is, well, we both know that that's not what happens with upper level management.

In fact, I'm not even sure they know we have a show. So if what you're looking for is credit invalidation, you are in the wrong business. Definitely not in it for the credit. Definitely not in it for the credit. Are you in it for the oatmeal caramel chewy bars, though?

Yes, that I'm in it for. This is what I do for producer Jay. And since I know he's not picky about his treats or what they look like, sometimes I try to tell him they're ugly cookies or ugly treats and he doesn't care. So when I have what I call a pile of rejects with all of my baking, not that they don't taste the same because they do, but I prefer if the cookies look aesthetically pleasing or if the bars actually look like squares or rectangles or part of the oatmeal crust didn't get stuck in the pan. So there's always a pile or in my case, a Tupperware full of rejects and I will eat them myself with ice cream.

Sometimes I'll put them in the freezer and share them with with family who doesn't care. But I always bring them to Jay as well. And I try to tell him, Jay, these these don't these are ugly.

They they're really ugly. No, doesn't he doesn't care. He eats all of the rejects and really enjoys them. I accept the rejects.

You accept I'm one with the rejects. Oh, I did not say it. I did not say it.

Why did Jay get more credit for the show? I don't know. I don't.

I really don't know. All right. Never mind. I'm never telling you anything like that again. Let's not get carried away, please. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio with Amy Lawrence and producer Jay on CBS Sports Radio. You can find us on Twitter after our CBS.

If that's your question, why producer Jay doesn't get more credit on the show. He's not going to ask that. Trust me, he's not going to.

Yeah, I probably wouldn't pick that one. I also have a dump button in here. And if you dare to ask that question, guess what's getting dumped. You do. I do.

Oh, my gosh. The host gets are the host getting so much trouble. The producers get so angry when we hit the dump button. But every now and then I do because I've worked with producers, not Jay, who are not quick enough. And they stare at me when there's something on the radio that needs to be dumped, meaning it was inappropriate and we wouldn't put it over the air. Every now and then you'll get a producer who just freezes up and can't function because something went horribly wrong. And that's why there's a dump button in here.

So we have one just in case as a last line of defense. So if Jay decides to sneak in a question about why producer Jay doesn't get more credit. Guess who's getting dumped on dunked and dumped on all dunk on your butt. So send your questions to either our Facebook page, which I barely looked at in the past 48 hours or to our show Twitter. And we will get to your questions because this is the hump show. And trust me when I say I have done a face plant right into the hump.

I think I've slept fewer hours in the last two and a half days than I did maybe all of last week. Gosh, that was tough. It was tough.

But hopefully the show didn't sound too ridiculous. Last night, I remember that we talked about ice cream trucks and I had three students in the control room with me. And we had a lot of laughs. We talked about how one of the students ate seven of my oatmeal caramel chewy bars. Seven of them. Jay, have you ever eaten seven of anything that I've baked in one sitting?

In one sitting? That's a lot. That is a lot.

It was a lot. Because your treats are like they're, you know, they're not they're they're rich. Like they're full of flavor and like they're flavorful.

Yeah, they're flavorful. I feel like seven is just that's that's aggressive. He was definitely aggressive, but he couldn't resist. He was so happy and so excited.

And you know what? It's their last day of classes and he was a grad student. So his run is done, which who am I to interfere with his happiness or his joy? Who knows how long he'd been awake?

Judging by the way he looked, the boring guy had been awake for a long time and needed a little sugar sustenance. Totally fine. It was totally fine. Hi, Aaron Rodgers. I'm so happy for how giddy you are. We've got Aaron Rodgers from the Pat McAfee Show earlier on Tuesday.

And instead of just listening to it, I went and watched it. The man is giddy. Aaron Rodgers is gushing about New York. Gushing. He can't stop. He was asked on the McAfee Show by his former teammate A.J.

Hawk. What was his favorite part? And he initially couldn't decide because it was all so amazing being in New York. But then he settled on how he had had been walking around the city.

I'm not sure. I think it was before one of the games that he's attended all of a sudden. Well, he always went to games in Wisconsin, too. He was a big fan of the Bucks and some of the other games that he would attend.

We would see him on camera or they would show him in highlights packages. But he's been making the rounds with both Rangers, who are now done, and the... That's what you get, Producer J. You deserve more credit.

How about credit for your Rangers? Aaron Rodgers curse? Aaron Rodgers curse. Is that a thing?

Watch out, Jets. It might be a thing. So he went to the Rangers game six, which is the one that they prevailed in and forced the game seven. Am I remembering this correctly? Sometimes these first round series, they blend together in my brain.

There's so many of them. And then he shows up for both Knicks games, these first two against the Miami Heat. And he tells A.J. that before one of these games, I don't remember which one, that he was walking around the city with a couple of teammates and they stopped various places, poked their head in here, poked their heads in there. And the New Yorkers that they encountered were all very kind.

Yeah, right. That's how you know it's not going to last. When New Yorkers are kind and are taking the time to talk to you, you know that it's really the honeymoon period. And so he said all the people they ran into were welcoming and kind and buying his pizza. Because, you know, Aaron Rodgers can't buy his own pizza. He probably hasn't gotten his first paycheck from the Jets yet, so he might be running a little low on cash. And so he was just giddy about the experience in New York. It's almost like a teenager who graduates high school, goes to college and realizes there's a whole world out there.

Go to a pub and have a Guinness. Yeah, he was released from Green Bay, which is the smallest market in the NFL. He's released from Green Bay where, and I love Green Bay, I love Wisconsin, you know me. My dad's whole side of the family is from there. There's not a lot to do.

Not as much to do. And he really didn't spend his off-seasons there. Even as I look up on the screen right now on TNT, I just saw his mug again. It was a who's who of New York sports figures as well as celebrities.

And it expanded beyond the New York market. Roger Federer and his wife were at Madison Square Garden. Really cool to see Federer, by the way. Carmelo Anthony, he was there in attendance. I'm pretty sure I saw Derrick Rose as well, former Nick, but also a Tom Thibodeau guy. A lot of former Knicks that were in town and were here at, well, by here. I mean, they were at Madison Square Garden, but they were in New York City for this game.

And the atmosphere was raucous. Against the Miami Heat, no Jimmy Butler. And certainly down the stretch that takes away from not just your shot making if you're Miami, but also the toughness, the tenacity on the defense and the rebounding side of things. That's an even series. And we also saw the beginning of Lakers and Warriors, which we will get to next.

The postgame reaction is still coming in. Also, one of my favorite hockey players of the last 10, 15 years. With four goals in the opener of his team's playoff series against the upstart Kraken. And then the Florida Panthers trying to continue their march through the east. So we've got four playoff games in hoops and hockey. We also have the return of Bryce Harper.

A lot more quickly than what people were anticipating. And Aaron Rodgers on Pat McAfee. Because what's a Tuesday without a surprise appearance on the Pat McAfee show? And he wasn't the only one. Peyton Manning there as well. Apparently Tuesday is Pat's birthday.

And so there was a bit of a smorgasbord of high profile guests and celebrities. Hey guys, check it out. I just made my first TikTok.

Just made my first TikTok. Something's wrong with me when I know R drops. I have them memorized. But you know what? Producer Jay gets all the credit for that. Because he's the one who drops.

He presses the button. Why doesn't Producer Jay get more credit? I'm never ever going to let that go. It was too funny. I laughed out loud in my house.

In my house. Plenty credited. No, I think maybe I'll give you more credit and fewer desserts. No, no, no, no.

Not a fair trade. I do not want that. So on Twitter, after hours, CBS. Also on our Facebook page. We're glad to connect with you.

Send your questions for Ask Amy anything. We're going to dive in with Lakers, Warriors at the Chase Center. So the Warriors end up with the home court advantage for this series. What did they do with that home court advantage? And then we'll get to Knicks and Heat. And the star-studded crowd in attendance at Madison Square Garden.

We're just warming up. Me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. Attention, listeners. I'm pleased to announce that Radio Rental is returning for another installment of Terrifying Tales.

If you happen to be new here, I'm Terry Carnation, current proprietor of the Radio Rental video store, where I possess a collection of the scariest true stories you've ever heard, all told by real people. Mark your calendars for oh, apparently it's available right now. I'm a little late with this promo. Listen for free on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts.

You are listening to the After Hours Podcast. Curry gets it from Draymond. Left side, three is good. Stephen Curry gets it going.

105-98. He's now got his fifth three of the night. Ran him off two screens that time.

Schroeder off a screen. Gets Poole on his hip. Backs up into him. Shoots and he's roofed by Draymond. Clay Thompson gets the ball. Pass to Curry.

A beauty. He lays it up and in. Curry goes head over heels on the layup. Draymond up the floor.

Steps around Schroeder. Throws out to Curry. Curry up top to Poole. 25-footer.

Yes! It's a one-possession game with 2.45 to go. 11-0 for Golden State. Curry brings it up on Schroeder. Waits.

Comes middle. Gets Russell as his defender on the switch. Dribbles to the paint. Throws to Draymond. Back to Curry. Relocation three is up. And good! He was backing away to the sideline.

Flipped it up and in. We are tied! This is After Hours with Amy Lawrence. The voice of Tim Roy on Warriors Radio. Yeah, what a late run by the Golden State Warriors as they rattle off 14 consecutive points in the fourth quarter. And they stunned the Lakers to come back from double figures down so that the two teams are tied with 1 minute 38 left in this one.

It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. You could definitely tell the Warriors were feeling the fatigue. Heavy legs, if you will, from that seven game series against Sacramento. Just wrapped up 48 hours ago. Meanwhile, the Lakers had been off since Saturday night when they pasted. Was it Saturday night? I think it was Friday night, wasn't it? When they pasted the Grizzlies. It might have been Friday. Will you check real quick?

Producer J, so I can give you credit for checking and doing the research. So they had a really easy time of it. Not heavy minutes for the starters because they had been so far ahead of the Grizzlies in that game that really they didn't need to have their starters all the way through. Completely different from this opener against the Warriors where Anthony Davis played 44 minutes in the entire second half.

We'll let you hear from Darvin Ham coming up. But they'd had a couple of extra days off where the Warriors had played in Sacramento. No, not a long commute. But in Sacramento on Sunday afternoon and just had a 48 hour turnaround to get ready for this one. And remember, Steph had 50 in that one. He played heavy minutes in that game.

And the Warriors were really relying on their top guys to close out that first round series. Whereas the Lakers had had the two extra days off, right? They played Friday. Friday, yes. Thumbs up from the control room and producer J who gets all the credit as being our crack research staff. There it is. There it is. It's after hours on our Twitter, after hours CBS and then on Facebook as well.

You can send your questions for Ask Amy anything. So game was tied with one minute and 38 seconds remaining. Minute 30 to go. Here is D'Angelo Russell to the rim, puts it up and in. Lakers by two.

A stop and a score here, Michael. Could be huge for the Lakers, but they can't give up another three. That ends the 14-0 run. Here's Steph dribbling top of the key. Steph still dribbling, driving down the block by AD. Taking by LeBron. LeBron on a breakaway. LeBron driving fouled and tackled by two different Warriors.

This could be, could be. I don't think it's a clear path foul, Michael, but... It's a common foul. LeBron will go to the line for two to put the Lakers up by two possessions. It's 114-112.

105 remaining in the fourth. LeBron will go to the free throw line where he is two of two tonight. LeBron did make one of two free throws, which put the Lakers ahead 115-112 with time running out. But, of course, Warriors have a lot of three-point shooters they can turn to. LeBron with 35 seconds remaining in the game. Brings it into the front court. No timeout for the Lakers. They lead by three.

Score here. Ices the game. Here is LeBron out near half court. LeBron one-on-one against Clay. Three-pointer by LeBron.

No good. Rebound Steph. 18 seconds left. Lakers cannot give up a three. Steph's got it. He's double-teamed. They get it to Draymond.

Now Poole, three for the tie. No good. Rebound. Schroeder.

And they tie him up. What's the call? Timeout Lakers. They gave the Lakers a timeout with 4.7 to go. And, Michael, if they can inbound this and make a free throw, the Lakers are going to take game one.

John Ireland and Michael Thompson on Lakers Radio. Interesting for Michael who, of course, is a Laker himself. Won titles with the Lakers but is the father of Clay Thompson. And Clay's always wanted to face the Lakers in a playoff series.

He grew up in L.A. Remember, that's actually where he had his second devastating injury. Remember, he had torn his ACL in the finals in 2019. And then a year and a half later, he's getting ready to come back to basketball. He's playing pickup in L.A. and he blows his Achilles. That was, what, weeks before the season started.

Remember, they had a late start to that season, to the 2021 season. And so he's always wanted to face the Lakers in a playoff series. And I can imagine for his dad, it's one of those where you have the mixed emotions because he's a lifetime Laker but also his son's out there. So Lakers hang on at Golden State because Jordan Poole misfires on a three that was probably four to five feet behind the line. Steph was double-teamed. He was blanketed and wanted to get the ball out to someone who could get an open look. I had the timeouts left but I saw them double-teaming Steph at half court. So I knew somebody was going to be wide open if we could just get the ball out.

And Steph did a great job. He got the ball out of the trap and Jordan was wide open and pretty good look. And that's a shot he can hit.

So really happy with that possession. And again, Jordan had hit six threes already. So it's a great shot for us. Jordan Poole bounced back and we know that he is like this.

He's a streaky shooter. As for the Lakers, and we'll get more from the Warriors from Klay Thompson actually, as well as from Steph Curry. But for the Lakers, you have to think they feel a ton of relief after giving up 14 straight points at a building that was rocking for the Warriors. This is what the Warriors are capable of. And to lose that entire lead they had with 90 seconds to go and then to have the ball and a three point lead in the final seconds but be unable to run more time off the clock or score.

Yes, breathing a sigh of relief on the fact that they withstood that late punch by Golden State. Just think of us being solid, remaining solid, staying organized offensively and not getting disappointed or discouraged defensively. Came in with a game plan. We knew it was going to be ebbs and flows, peaks and valleys within this 48 minute game.

That's just who they are. They put a lot of pressure on you to guard continuously. Second by second, minute by minute, quarter by quarter, half by half. That's been us since we made the acquisitions to our new guys. We've been able to be very resilient in games. Like I said, we've been playing playoff basketball for about two and a half months now just trying to punch our clock in to be able to play right now in the postseason. So we've been very resilient tonight versus a team like Golden State and our defending champions. We know how great they are on their home floor over the years. So to withstand that, it's another good step for our ballclub. Lakers take the opener. Big deal for them on the road. Game two is coming up on Thursday and we'll get more from each of these locker rooms following this victory for LeBron James and Anthony Davis. Huge game for him. 30 points, 23 rebounds, five assists, and four blocked shots. But he did play the entire second half. Some would describe him as fragile. So you need to be careful about what you do with Anthony Davis.

Wait until you hear Darvin Ham's response about AD's heavy minutes in this opener. You can find me on Twitter, ALawRadio, also on our Facebook page, After Hours with Amy Lawrence. Send your questions for Ask Amy anything. We're just getting started. Made it back safely. Survived my first experience as an adjunct professor and boy did I love it.

I might have the bug for teaching radio at the university level. You are listening to the After Hours. The emotional series with Sacramento. They felt that they might run out of gas in this game and it looked like they did in the second half. In the third quarter they make a nice comeback but they lose by five. The final 117 to 112 and L.A. holds game one in their head.

This is After Hours with Amy Lawrence. Highly anticipated hyped up series in the Western Conference between Steph Curry, Clay Thompson, Draymond Green and the Golden State Warriors that core intact still against now LeBron's Lakers. Anthony Davis though, the driving force in this one with an incredible stat line but it's not just the stats.

30 points, 23 rebounds, five assists, four block shots. It's also how he changes the shot making. Steph Curry can't get into the lane and go juke here, juke there, dribble around guys, get a shot, any shot he wants off the glass because Anthony Davis is patrolling the paint.

He is the long arm of the law in there. But Davis also can move around and he will help and he will create this imposing almost, it's more like a wall in front of shooters too. He did play heavy minutes in the second half.

That did not sit in the second half as the Lakers hold off the Warriors and grab the opener. This is what low management is about. If there's going to be low management then we have to manage their lows throughout the regular season in order for us to push them a little further during this time of year.

Post season, everything is at its peak. You have to pare down your rotation and you got to push your big dogs. Your big dogs got to be there early and often. Finally the answer we all desperately needed but didn't know it.

This is what low management is all about. Making sure that your star center is available to play 44 minutes in an opener of a second round playoff series. This is why fans go to games and superstars are sitting. Load management is all about the playoffs.

In theory, I get it. However, taking a game off in October. Well, that'd be early in the season. Taking a game off in December. Nah, it doesn't help you play 44 minutes in May. Stop it.

Don't be ridiculous. What it does is protect your star who's prone to get hurt. Load management.

This is what load management is all about. Now I do appreciate what Darvin Ham said about them shortening the rotation and using fewer players. And that's the case really in any sport.

You got a smaller circle, a shorter list of guys that you can trust in the big moments. But again, I'm going to point back to the fact the Lakers have been sitting around maxing and relaxing since Friday. They had a full three days off, plus most of Tuesday, though of course you got chewed around and got to get ready to go. It was a much quicker turnaround for the Golden State Warriors.

It's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. Certainly looked like the Warriors had heavy legs there, especially as the game wore on a lot of three pointers. Wait until I give you the number of three pointers that the Warriors jacked up. And you can always tell with deep shots when they're off, a lot of it has to do with the fact that you don't have the lift and the energy in the legs. Quick turnaround, but can't dwell on it because you got a really good team over there and they do things differently than the Kings, but present some big challenges and saw that tonight.

So the morale is not low. We know we let one slip away, but we got an opportunity to watch the film tomorrow and see how we can attack them better. The Warriors are used to getting more free throws than what they had tonight, but I'm not sure the last time I've seen a game in which one team only had six free throws. This is the freaking NBA.

The whistles blow every five seconds. You can't breathe on a guy these days without getting a foul called. And the Warriors only had six free throws.

What about that? In total, the Lakers committed just 12 fouls and not all of them, of course, were shooting fouls, some of them loose balls, some of them coming without free throws, obvi. The Warriors committed 24 fouls.

Now it stands to reason that they're tired, so they're going to be clutching and grabbing. There was more energy, more oomph, if you will, more get up and go for the Lakers. Plus they are a more aggressive team. While they will shoot threes, it's not quite the same as the Warriors, but I'm not sure I've ever seen a disparity quite like this. Six free throws for Golden State, 29 for the Lakers.

Again, you've got multiple factors going in. Steve Kerr talked about it after the game, but in a final score determined by just five points, the Lakers had 25 points at the charity stripe, just five for the Warriors. That's a 20-point difference at the free throw line. Some fouls that we didn't need to, especially in the first half. We had, I think, three where on a jump shot, I think we hit Davis on a fadeaway 17-footer. I think we fouled a couple times when they were in the bonus when we didn't need to. They're going to shoot more free throws than we are. I think they were number one in the league, and we were last or next to last. My aggressiveness on both ends of the floor, I think I allowed the three fouls to kind of take me out of a rhythm and never really found it again, so just got to stay out of foul trouble.

It's kind of been a thing with me lately. Just got to stop fouling and defend better. Draymond taking some of the blame on himself, and he also got a technical foul in this game for arguing a call that he didn't like. Now, remember, the Warriors have made a killing over the course of this recent run, the last decade, by going small. And by going small, that generally means they're using a four-guard lineup. Now, their starters are Kavon Looney, Andrew Wiggins, Draymond Green. That's not small. That's not their small lineup.

And then Stephen Clay. But there have been times where we've seen them start Jordan Poole, and when Draymond was suspended, remember, he felt like what he saw with Kavon Looney was huge, and Kavon, another 23 rebounds. He and Anthony Davis both had 23 rebounds in this game. So they will mix and match, but small is usually giving them an advantage.

Why? Because they can push the tempo. They can get the ball up and down the court quickly, also can get back to defend. They've got more shooters on the court, and they like the way that disparity, that those matchup issues for teams that have big men allows Steph to find openings, allows them, again, to move the ball around, but also they can drive and dish if they need to, or just Steph can go down the lane. In this particular game, going small wasn't an advantage for them. But honestly, I do think it comes back to the fact that they had tired legs and their shots weren't dropping. But yeah, Kavon Looney's been a weapon to this point in the playoffs, especially on the glass.

So can going small create a disparity against L.A.? I think that's always been an advantage for us, but we're not just taking Kavon Looney out of the lineup. He's been incredible, so that's not on him. If anything, it was on me.

So yeah, I mean, that's something that we always have, and I'm sure we'll see some of that, but there's a lot of other things that we can do better, and we'll wash the tape, figure them out, and we'll be better. The three-pointers for the Warriors, oh my goodness, they took 53 of them. Now, they did actually make 21, so that's how they were able to come back in this game, but 53 triples, goodness, between that and watching the Heat and the Knicks, who it seemed like every single possession, all it was, dribble, I don't know, 50 feet, Jacoba 3. Dribble back the other way, 50 feet, Jacoba 3. Oh my gosh, it was, yeah, I don't love that brand of basketball.

It can affect my mood. I definitely don't love that brand of basketball. What we do get, though, is Steph Curry, LeBron James on the court again, casting character of thousands, lots of star power. They faced off in four straight NBA finals when LeBron was with the Cavs. Now it's L.A. You have to reflect on everything that we've all gone through since the 15 finals.

And just appreciate the opportunity to have another chapter in that battle and that competition. Obviously, once the ball drops, it's a different feel, just based on how the Lakers play versus the old Cavs teams and even just the different style that he's playing a little bit. He's trying to come at you a little differently, space you out a little bit.

He's shooting a lot more threes and stuff like that. It's just a little different vibe. But there is a reflection of just how awesome and special this battle is and the fact that we get to do it again. We want to come out on top. It's going to be a fun series all the way around. But there is a moment of reflection, for sure.

Just how cool this is all these years later. Of course, the cameras were keyed in on Steph and LeBron and their interaction at the scorer's table. I think it was in the first quarter, maybe. And the two of them kind of have either of their mouths covered. LeBron had his jersey pulled up over his mouth. He does that a bunch when he's jawed and laughing with an opponent. Steph had his hands over his face. So these are two of the best players that we'll ever see in NBA history. And it's awesome to see not just those two, but the other stars and the other incredible athletes in this series. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence, CBS Sports Radio. Visit us today at your local CSL Plasma Center for your generosity.