It is the JR Sportbree Show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network.
I'm coming to you live from Atlanta, Georgia. Thank you to everybody tuned in and locked in all over North America. I hope you've had a tremendous Tuesday. And if your Tuesday has sucked, there's more time to the day.
Okay, make the best out of it. I'll be here with you for the next four hours. This is when the show gets started.
Every weekday is 6pm Eastern, 3 Pacific. Thank you for tuning in on your local Infinity Sports Network affiliate. If you got Sirius XM375, of course the Odyssey app, A-U-D-A-C-Y.
And if you got a smart speaker, ask the speaker to play the Infinity Sports Network. Man, the second round of the NBA playoffs is underway and all the higher seeds are losing. We got some more playoff action coming this way tonight.
How about this? In about an hour from now, we got the Indiana Pacers at the Cleveland Cavaliers. Tonight, game one between the Golden State Warriors and Minnesota Golden State.
Looking forward to trying to keep this role alive of the lower seeds beating the higher seeds. We're going to talk some basketball. A matter of fact, we have to talk about what we saw last night. What we listened to last night as I sat in the studio, shout outs to our producer Nico in New York City holding things down on the board. The Boston Celtics shot and shot and shot threes and then shot some more. Gary Washburn from the Boston Globe. He's going to join us in a few hours to talk about this Celtics meltdown, giving up a 20 point lead to losing overtime.
And then Chris Hine is going to join us next hour from the Minneapolis Star Tribune to talk about these Timberwolves and what we can expect from Anthony Edwards and everybody as they try to hold off the Golden State Warriors, the veteran Golden State Warriors with Steph Curry and that guy Draymond Green, who likes to hurt people. Anyway, you want to be a part of the show? You can. You want to talk to me?
You can do that, too. Here's the phone number. 888-710-4ISN.
That's 888-710-4ISN. You can find me online at JR Sport Brief and you can reach out to me. You know, you need a food recommendation in your city.
I've been around. I can give you a food recommendation. You need a beer recommendation.
I can I can tell you about a beer. Is your favorite team suck? I can tell you why they suck. I may not have a solution how they can get better. I probably do, but I probably blame the owner. Yeah, I got I got answers for most things.
So at least a response in most cases. 888-710-4ISN. That's 888-710-4ISN. Nico, how are you? You in a good mood. The Knicks won, huh? Yeah, pretty much everything went right for my teams yesterday.
So don't think I could have had a better day. Your team? What are the what are the other teams besides the New York Knicks? So like you said, the Knicks won. The Mets picked up a victory and even the Islanders won the NHL draft lottery.
Yeah, they did. Numero Uno, number one overall. You're just a winner all over. You know, none of your teams in action today besides the Mets, right? Yeah, today should be a much more quiet day, but that's that's fun. We get to enjoy the games that are on tonight. I'm excited to see how the how the Cavs respond tonight.
OK, yeah, we're going to find out in an hour. I'm very interested in seeing what will take place with Garland and Mobley and Hunter and to see their statuses. And so we'll keep you up to date on that one. That look, Indiana goes up to the doors, not shut on the Cleveland Cavaliers. But if they now have to worry about injuries, that is a that is a completely different situation.
Let's get into that. And then how about last night? It wasn't just the Knicks who came back from behind to ultimately win a game in overtime against those Celtics. Oklahoma City Thunder, they were off for nine days.
They took on the Kola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets. And what we saw was Aaron Gordon drain a game winning three. Not the guy you'd expect to do it. Maybe Jamal Murray, maybe Jokic, Westbrook.
Probably not. But Aaron Gordon. Yeah, that was that was a little interesting to see him knock that shot down. And so, yeah, things are off to a good start here in the second round. And we got the Warriors at Timberwolves. So we got a lot to do, a lot to discuss. Let's just get this the hell up on out the way.
Nico is going to be happy about this. As we sat here in the studio. The Knicks and Celtics, they were playing it close yesterday, looking at this game like, OK, evenly matched until you take a look at the New York Knicks bench and you go, OK, they they don't got enough dudes coming off the bench. And these Boston Celtics, they're just deep as hell. It's like that clown car, a silly clown car that pulls up.
It's tiny as heck. And the next thing you know, there's one clown that gets out and then two clowns and three clowns and four and five and six and seven. And then a giant obese clown gets out of the car. And then there's more clowns.
You go, OK, I get the trick. There's a lot of clowns coming out this damn car. That's the Boston Celtics roster.
So for these are not clowns. These are highly conditioned athletes. And they're damn good. Got Peyton Pritchard's sixth man of the year coming off the bench.
He'd start on a lot of teams going out there just jacking up threes. But unfortunately for the Boston Celtics, that was their problem yesterday. That is why they gave up a 20 point lead. They bailed out the New York Knicks.
The Knicks came back from behind 20 to beat them in overtime, 108 to 105. And it's tough to decipher when I'm sitting here on the air because despite what comes out of my mouth and what you think, there's a little bit of brain power that I have to utilize while I'm here speaking with you. And I can't just just key in on the game. I can certainly look at the score.
I can see what's going on, but it's not like I'm sitting at almost sitting around at the bar in my backyard. I got to watch the game and do the show. It wasn't until after I realized that these Boston Celtics, they just, they were stupid. They really took the modern NBA to the next step by shooting 63s.
They made 15 of them. At what point in time? And this is the worst thing about basketball. At what point in time do you just go, you know what? The three ain't fallen. We got a 20 point lead. Maybe we should just, I don't know.
This is a, a novel concept. This is go to the basket, slow the game down, get some points at the free throw line. No, they just kept shooting and shooting and shooting some more. They missed a record 45 threes. And thank God we've gotten past the everybody thinking they're Steph Curry era.
Thank God. We had too many guys out here thinking that old Steph Curry can shoot the long three. Then I'm going to shoot the three too.
We've cut that out. But the rate at which teams and holes shoot threes makes me want to shoot a hole through my head. And if you're a Boston Celtics fan, maybe you're used to this.
Jacking up threes and blowing a game here or there. Come on. The Boston Celtics is still one of the best teams in the NBA. I still believe that they will win this series. Sorry, Nico. I still believe that they'll win the championship again.
I think they will go back to back barring injury, but they go through some of these stretches. We're just like, stop shooting. Jason Tatum. Twenty three points. He went cold late. One of eight from the field. In the fourth quarter in overtime.
He was four of fifteen from downtown. Jalen Brown. He shot seven of twenty overall when it came down to knocking down threes. I don't know. Maybe he needs glasses. Maybe he just thinks every shot is going.
I don't know. He's so athletic. Go to the basket.
He was one for ten from downtown. And I get it. These are NBA players. They practice and they shoot threes all day.
You think they would. I'm not a pro. But at some point I'm going to go, you know what? At this moment. The shot ain't falling. I'm going to the basket. This is what we see at every level of basketball right now.
It drives me nuts. Whether I'm at a game here in Atlanta watching the Hawks play whoever whoever beat the Hawks or whether I'm watching on television, whether or not I'm watching a game in person, there's nothing worse. In the year twenty twenty five. And watching somebody get a basketball up the court on a fast break, there is nothing between this individual but air and opportunity and their decision isn't to take the higher percentage shot and go to the hole, go to the basket. Their decision is to pull up for three and then miss.
I know it's twenty twenty five. I know things are different. Can we get back to a fundamental? And so the Boston Celtics, all things considered, they're used to this. They had no problem with it. Listen to what Jalen Brown missed the one for ten from three. Listen to what he had to say about all these shots that they were jacking up. Some of them felt good. Some of them felt like we may be forced to issue and definitely our rhythm and our our timing was a little bit off. We got a lot of great looks, but, you know, it may be some truth to that. We got to look at the film and see kind of what happened in that second half.
There may be some truth to it. The man, the tee shot, one for ten. The team missed a record forty five threes.
Come on now. And then there was a reporter on the other end who wanted to ask his counterpart, his teammate, Jason Tatum, about about fouls. And maybe if you went to the basket, you know, this listen to the question and listen to Jason Tatum's response. How do you not let your frustrating with lack of calls prevents you from attacking if you don't think you're going to get a call? Is that is that connected at all?
No, that doesn't connect. I mean, it's the playoffs. Like, you know, we probably should just play without the refs. We have physical it is.
So, you know, that don't really cross cross my mind at all. Man ain't not. Maybe he should talk to his coach first. I mean, Jason Tatum is the dude who drove to the basket. He is the guy who ended up on the floor.
Missed the game because of a of a bruised wrist. And his coach was at the other end of the basketball court yelling at him to get up. While his coach told the trainer, don't go help. Like, don't ask him about the referees. Ask him about his own coach. In a way, his guys coaching out there, maybe Joe Mazzola, he wants them to drive to the pain. He wants them to feel a little bit of pain. I know he also wants them to shoot threes. This is this is the process that the Celtics do for the past couple of years, just jacking up threes, jacking up threes, jacking up threes. Well, last night they missed forty five of them. They went blank towards the end of the game.
And then Mr. Personality, Mr. Joe Mazzola, he answered a question about missing three pointers and he says something like this. Listen to Joe Mazzola. Probably a combination of both. You don't have to have better play calling. You have to make shots, have to make some better read. So it's probably a combination of all those things. Yeah, got to be better.
That's the slowest I have ever heard him speak. Maybe it's because they lost. I don't know. They'll be better tomorrow, OK? New York Knicks fans, be happy, be thrilled. You took a game. Maybe you take another one tomorrow. Kristaps Porzingis did leave the game with some some illness. Every now and then this guy's sick. I don't know. Does he got need iron? Is he need to eat his vegetables?
I have no idea what's going on with this man. I mean, I'm not seven foot four. I don't have seven foot three, seven foot four problems like Porzingis. I don't know. Figure you that damn tall. It'd be a kneecap, not an illness.
Give him some milk or something. I don't know. Boston Celtics. There's no way in hell they could be this bad again. OK, they blew a 20 point lead.
They were too comfortable. They played some of the dumbest basketball I've ever seen in my life. Jalen Brunson, twenty nine points.
Oji Ananobi at twenty nine. Karl Anthony Towns at a double double. Mikel Bridges had that big steal at the end of the game that I was able to witness and tell you about right here on the radio. The Knicks won one. The Knicks will probably win another one. I'd be surprised if the New York Knicks if they win four. I don't expect it.
Jalen Brunson, he says, hey, we were down 20. Who cares? We're not going to stop believing in ourselves. We try to just keep believing and just keep fighting, sticking together and keep chipping away.
Now, what is it going to be? A 20 point shot where you can just come back. We try to keep chipping away possession by possession and then just find a way to keep getting stops and making plays on offensive one as well. Yeah, good. Good for him. He's the best player on the New York Knicks. Of course, he's going keep on shooting and keep on going, as he should.
Good for the Knicks for winning, because if the Knicks lost last night. Tom Thibodeau would have been the one getting ripped the shreds. People love to pile on Tom Thibodeau, making Jalen Brunson play on, you know, two bad ankles. Carl Anthony Towns has a migraine. Thibodeau's like, get out there.
I need you for 48. Mikel Bridges is like, I need my streak to continue on. He's like, good.
It will continue. Like people can't stand Tom Thibodeau. Folks are still blaming Tom Thibodeau for for Derrick Rose career. Like Tom Thibodeau took a bat to that guy's knees. The way he played basketball and took care of his body. There was no way in hell that Derrick Rose, his knees and his ankles and his legs were going to last.
He would tell you that. Anyway, Thibs is used to the criticism. Nico, are you one of these guys who can't stand Thibodeau? I wouldn't say can't stand. I think that's a stretch. I just also think that if you lose in the second round three consecutive years and there have been roster changes along the way throughout those three years, at what point do we turn and say, all right, well, maybe the coaching staff is an issue.
Oh, boy. Well, I mean, Jalen Brunson's dad, Rick is on his coaching staff. Brunson is there. We see coaches getting fired all over the place. I mean, the New York Knicks going to get to the star player, get rid of the star players, dad and the coach. I don't know about that.
We'll see. But Thibodeau was certainly up for he's up for criticism all the damn time. And so he's used to this. He was asked about ignoring people like me and Nick fans who hate him. Some Thibodeau was like, I don't care what anybody says. I'm grouchy. What people say with social media, the series is this or this is what happened in the regular season. This, you know, that's none of that's important in terms of preparing yourself to win that next game.
If you get lost in all that other stuff, you're not going to be focused on the stuff that's really important. I told you he was grouchy. I told you. He's a tick higher than the Bill Belichick level of grouchy. By the way, Bill Belichick's book came out today. Make sure you get a copy so you can learn how to be miserable. Oh, no, it's about being a winning football coach.
My bad. I thought it's about being miserable. We'll talk about Bill Belichick at this point. He can write a few other books, how to date someone 50 years younger than you, how to alienate your star player.
This one is about winning, but he can write some other books anyway. Congratulations to the New York Knicks. Happy for you. I just don't feel good about your chances of winning three more games against the Boston Celtics. Sorry.
Just being real. Hey, we got the Pacers and Cavs. They're in action in about 45 minutes from now. Later on tonight, we'll see a good matchup game number one between the Golden State Warriors and also the Minnesota Timberwolves. I told you about Bill Belichick.
His book is coming out. We're going to have some great guests. We got Chris Hine from the Minneapolis Star Tribune. We got Gary Washburn from the Boston Globe. We got a lot to get into as we continue on.
If you want to be a part of the show, you can. 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. That's 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. You know, before we move on to what we'll see about 45 minutes between the Cavs and the Pacers, there was another great game tonight. And ironically, it ended on a three last night.
It was Aaron Gordon knocking one down for the Denver Nuggets. Are the Denver Nuggets really going to be the Oklahoma City Thunder? I'll tell you what I think on the other side. I'll talk to you. I'll talk to Nico. I'm going to talk to everybody. I'm here to talk for the next three hours and 45 minutes.
I'm just getting started. It's the J.R. Sport Brief Show coast to coast on the Infinity Sports Network.
It is the J.R. Sport Brief Show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN.
That's 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. Before we went to break, we talked about these Boston Celtics jacking up all these threes, blowing a 20 point lead yesterday against the New York Knicks. In a few minutes, I'm going to tell you about the other great game that we had last night, Aaron Gordon knocking down a big three, a game winning three for the Denver Nuggets to put them over the Oklahoma City Thunder. And about 35, 40 minutes from now, we'll see the Pacers and the Cavaliers.
We'll see them go out there and play a game to is just a lot of basketball going on right now before the NFL decides to pick things up a little bit. Let's go to the phone lines. 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN.
That's 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. Mark getting us started. Mark is calling from Ohio. Hey, Mark, you're on the J.R. Sport Brief Show. What's up?
Hello. Hey, I watched the Cavs game, the playoff game the other night in the fourth quarter. It was really close. And then DeAndre Hunter goes up for a dunk and a Pacers defender goes up at the exact same time trying to block the shot and get the clean block up top. But he's got his left hand on DeAndre Hunter's chest holding him down. And that goes to review because the coach Atkinson challenged it and they still let him get away with that. Like since when are you allowed to hold a man's chest down when he's going for a shot? And that ain't a foul. Like like where's the line there?
You can always put your hand on their chest when they're shooting. I just don't understand that call at all. OK. Are you are you asking me about a specific call from two days ago or are you just making the point or what are we doing? Well, well, well, they they acted like it was a clean block, like it was clear in the review that, like, I understand you have put his hand on his chest and it's done.
I don't understand. Is that the rule that you're allowed to like when you're going up for a dunk, you're allowed to like hold the other mark. I think I think you I think, you know, the rules of basketball. You hate the referees.
You think they suck. Well, yeah, for sure. I like that part of the reason why a basketball is frustrating to watch because the official I mean, it's a very fast sport, so I understand how it is difficult to appreciate.
But when you go to review and you got a clear image like if he had blocked it, just go up straight and block it. That's one thing. But when you put your hand on somebody to hold him down.
And so are you let me ask you this. Are you more concerned with a call from Sunday and the referees or are you more concerned with the injuries that this team is kind of carrying right now? Well, the momentum completely shifted. Like I said, it was a very close game. And then when that play happened, like he went down hard after that and the momentum completely shifted in that game. The fourth quarter was close until that play.
And then after that, they pulled away. So I mean, I'm not concerned about the Cavs. I just think that the officiating in the NBA, you know, they need to look at that. Like, why even have a challenge if it's obvious like that and you can't fix that. I got to tell you, you may have to take a ticket and get in line.
Thank you for calling from Ohio, Mark. That ain't nothing new. Like officials being terrible.
Where's new in that? And utilizing replay review. I'm I'm on record on saying this plenty of times. I don't care what no referees do. Sorry. Referees are going to make mistakes just like you, just like me, just like humans. I guess the robots out here, they don't make mistakes yet.
Not yet. I did see one of these stupid driverless cars out here. He didn't know. Well, he wasn't going to break the rule. It was a driverless car.
He wasn't. Nico, you haven't seen one of these yet, right? Have you seen one of these driverless cars?
I have not. OK, we got a bunch here in Atlanta. They're getting them ready for passengers. So right now there's a bunch of driverless cars out here just driving around and making sure nobody dies in the back.
So that's what they're doing now. And I was on the street. It's two lanes. Well, it's it's two lanes, one one direction and another the other. They're going opposite ways, each a single lane. And so there was like a dump truck that was stopping and it was getting ready to back up into an apartment building.
Right. And it had a driverless car right behind it. And so the driverless car just knows how to drive. It's not going to use common sense.
It's not smart. It's just just drives. The dump truck couldn't back up because the driverless car only knows, I guess, how to go forward. Not smart enough to go. Oh, he wants to back up.
Let me just back up. And so this dump truck is now on a single lane street, could not back up into the spot that it wanted to because the way more the driverless car was there. And so this this dump truck had to now go further down the block and kind of find a spot in space as big as it is to move over. So this stupid driverless car could go around because, of course, the driverless car is not going to break any laws. It's not going to break any rules.
It was not going to cross the double yellow line to go around. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. I wonder and I have no idea how these things are made, but I wonder if there could be if they update it, they could make a feature where you could overtake the robot and like drive yourself like it gives you the option. Do you want to drive? Do you want to let the car drive itself? Well, what do you mean as a passenger? Well, this is a Google product.
Shout outs to Google. What do you mean person driver like remotely? Well, so do you sit in the driver's seat? The driver's seat is empty, bro. There's nobody in the car at all. OK. Oh, there's no human.
Listen to me. There is not a human being in the vehicle. These cars are driving around by themselves in the ultimate goal in a few months is to put them outside like they are Ubers with no driver. So they're testing them and they're just driving.
These cars been driving around for like months now. Oh, my Lord. Yeah. Yeah.
Wait until you get it in New York. I guess one day. Right. Maybe not. You couldn't pay me to get into one of those things.
A car that drives itself. Heck no. Why? Because that's I don't know. Maybe what if there's a malfunction?
I can't I can't trust that. What's it going to do? Send you into the ocean? I don't know. But it's like what if what if it like breaks down and then it doesn't stop and it causes an accident.
You got a great lawsuit on your hands. You don't think Google's ready for that? They got they got a I'm pretty sure there's a button in there to talk to somebody. Maybe. Maybe. Right. I don't know.
I would hope so. I'll take it a couple of blocks when it's ready. OK. All right.
You let me know how it goes. I'm curious. Well, I saw for the first time in Phoenix like three years ago.
You could actually call it in Phoenix. This was during the Super Bowl. I don't know.
Was it two or three years ago? I don't know. But you can you can use it. People are using these driverless things all over the place.
In cities. I didn't even know it was a thing. And now here you are telling me that it's three years that they've been doing this. Oh, yes.
Start, you know, mainly starting in San Francisco, the Bay Area. Now they've started to test. Google is called Waymo.
W. A. Y. M. O. And you can call it like Uber and you just get in the driverless car. There you go. My point being, ultimately, as a guy called up to complain about the replay review. People and machines, things are not going to work. Like I'm the last guy.
I think period. So listen, anybody complain about refs like we know referees suck. They should utilize technology more clear as day. And then, as you mentioned, when it comes to basketball, it is a fast sport. And yet even if you go to replay review, sometimes they're going to screw up.
Even replay review sucks. Who wants to go to a basketball game? Who wants to attend a basketball game? And I've gone to plenty.
I go to plenty. If I'm not here on the air, I'm at a basketball game. OK, who wants to get to the end of a game? And then he paused the game. Referees got to get together. Three of them standing around, hands on their hips, whistles in the mouth, talking and just, you know, security guard and the police telling the players to stay away, let them confer, let them do their job. And then they go to the stupid monitor, put on a headset. They talk to somebody in Hoboken, New Jersey at the replay review center.
And it's like Larry, Mo and Curly trying to figure out whether or not there was a foul. It's all flawed. OK. I personally don't care.
Well, I think that part takes too long. I'm always concerned more with the decisions that the teams made and less about the missed calls. OK, if you are a Saints fan and you played against the Rams and pass interference, then yeah, you got a gripe. It hurts. It sucks. But I just find it just personally difficult to believe. Oh, maybe maybe it's a matter of accountability. I'm not going to blame somebody else about what's going on. I'm going to look at things in totality. I'm going to look at all 48 minutes of the game and look at all nine innings. I'm going to evaluate all 60 minutes.
And I'm going to say to myself. What did I do wrong to put this in the hands of the officials? Because for everybody who wants to run around screaming about, oh, the referees robbed us and we got robbed and and boxing in certain cases here. OK, you've got three judges sitting around and people get paid under the table. It's much more difficult to do in team sports.
Well, this is so much. We got people running around believing conspiracy theories about the NFL and its script. And they favored the NFL has favored the Kansas City Chiefs and they're giving them calls and giving them. Why did they just win the Super Bowl? We was all that nonsense when the Philadelphia Eagles were whooping their ass. OK, where were the referees then? Roger Goodell didn't push the emergency button like it is tough.
It is tough calling any sporting event. And let's also be real. These guys, they're experienced. OK, they've been through some things. They've seen some things. But some of these refs, you think they're seeing everything? These refs and these professional leads, these dudes is like 40, 50. You know, some of them select their 60 years old.
You think the odds are good? You think they got good discernment when some guy six foot nine is running down the court and a six foot two guy slaps them? Come on, man, I could barely see what's in front of me.
They got they got eyeballs for everything. Stop it. And oh, we got some we got some bad news here for the Cleveland Cavaliers.
This is not good at all. Darius Garland out. DeAndre Hunter out.
Evan Mobley. Guess what? Out. It is not going to be good for the Cleveland Cavaliers as they try to avoid an 0 2 hole against the Indiana Pacers. We're going to try to run them up and out of the building here. We got some breaking news here with these Cavaliers.
You know what? We're going to take a break. We'll come back. We'll talk about the Pacers and the Cavs. They're going to try to run them up and down. We'll get into that that big game last night by the Denver Nuggets.
Could they go out there and knock off the Oklahoma City Thunder? Well, we got a lot to get into. I told you we got Chris Hahn from the Minneapolis Star Tribune joining us. We are Garrett. Excuse me, Gary Washburn from the Boston Globe. He'll be here as well to talk about these Celtics launching these stupid threes.
We got a lot to get into. It is the J.R. Sportbreeze show here with you coast to coast on the Infinity Sports Network. I appreciate you for loving me. I love you back. OK, I love everybody.
Most people. Anyway, eight, eight, eight. Seven, ten, four, I had to think about if I love everybody. I do.
I do. Eight, eight, eight, seven, ten, four, I.S.N. That's eight, eight, eight, seven, ten, four, I.S.N. This is not good. Not good if you're a fan of the Cleveland Cavaliers.
I just shared this with you. You just heard it from Rich Ackerman as well. In about 20, 25 minutes, the Cleveland Cavaliers are going to try to avoid an 0 2 hole against the Indiana Pacers. Unfortunately for the Cleveland Cavaliers, they will be without Evan Mobley. They will be without DeAndre Hunter. They will still be without Darius Garland, who is dealing with a toe issue. Both DeAndre Hunter and Evan Mobley, they were hurt in that last game, Game 1, where the Pacers took on the Cleveland Cavaliers and they stole a matchup from them.
They beat them 121 to 112. Donovan Mitchell? I mean, I feel like the scene out of that movie Taken, where the guy takes the young lady's, hold on, let me get the movie right. Nico, you've seen Taken, right? You know what I'm talking about? Yes, sir. I love that movie.
Yeah, what? Liam Neeson, huh? Yeah, Liam Neeson.
Great actor. Yeah, his daughter in the movie gets kidnapped and he's a badass, so he has to go get his daughter back from the kidnappers. OK. And at one point in time, one of the bad guys is on the phone with him. He's like, man, I got your daughter. He's like, man, Liam Neeson, I'm a find you and I will kill you. I have a unique set of skills and a crook because of course, a bad guy has to say something crazy to the good guy. He's like.
Good luck. And he hung the phone up. Well, I know bad guys in this story, but good luck to Donovan Mitchell. This man had to drop 33 points on about 30 shots in the last game just for them to go out there and lose. I don't know what he's planning tonight. I hope his cardio and legs are good. They're going to need Donovan Mitchell for every minute and second of this game. And Todd Jerome is probably like, yes, I get more buckets.
I get more shots before we even knew. That three of their stars are going to be out. Donovan Mitchell said, man, I worry about nothing. We didn't make shots and got to give them credit, but, you know, not easy to go 16 and also we had to find a way, you know, and respond. That's the biggest thing to hang our heads about. We'll be fine and we'll be better.
All right. Sixteen and oh, he's referring to how many wins it takes to go out there and win an NBA championship. Well, I mean, at this rate, y'all about to be 0 and 2.
You still go get your 16 wins. I don't think the Cavaliers are winning the championship, but yeah, injuries is the worst thing to happen in anybody. That's what a lot of folks don't necessarily factor in when it comes to playoff time. Who's in? Who's out?
Who's not playing? And people like to beat up on the sorry to the Milwaukee Bucks and all they haven't won since Vance passed the first round since they won a championship. Well, guys have been hurt. Giannis was hurt. Middleton was hurt. Now we got Damian Lillard hurt. Like, what do you want if guys aren't healthy enough to go out there and play? So, yeah, things not looking good for the Cleveland Cavaliers are right now.
And Kenny Atkinson, before we got the news that three of his stars are going to be out, he says what's easier said than done. They need to play better on the defense. Simple things like sprinting back, you know, winning the first kind of stuff we've talked about.
Ball pressure, you know, communication. There's a lot of things that go into it. Just sometimes you just got to go back to your fundamentals. Go back to fundamental.
Let me tell you something. All the fundamentals in the world. Don't help if your most talented players are not out there. You could have you can have all the fundamentals and do this and do it. Go crash the boards and outlet.
You can have all the fundamentals ever. But if you got me running the plays out there, then you do. OK, I'm not saying the Cavaliers are doomed because they got bums like me out there. It's just when you're missing Evan Mobley. I mean, let me check.
Check this real fast. I'm almost certain this man just won defensive player of the year. And when you talk about defense, OK, losing a defensive player of the year.
Is going to it's going to have an effect. I understand you still have Jared Allen. What's Donovan Mitchell going to throw him lobs all day? Is Jared Allen going to play defense for everybody? By the way, DeAndre Hunter, who's not playing due to a thumb issue, he's a damn good defender as well. All these let's talk about three and D and all.
That's what DeAndre Hunter does. And so me, I don't care. I don't like the Indiana Pacers. I don't like the Cavs. I don't got a horse in the race. I do not care. I do like a little.
My little adversity, though. And I'm not wishing for injury, but I am going to be rude and I hate the Pacers, but I want to see them go up to well against the Cavs because then I want to see the Cavaliers fight back, bounce back versus versus adversity. I want to see them, you know, push this to seven games. I want to see what Donovan Mitchell can do, because we know he's just going to have to keep shooting and shooting and shooting some more. We know the Pacers led by Halliburton, Mr. Overrated. He's going to try to run them out of the building.
Miles Turner, the teammate, Tyrese Halliburton is an officiary. He basically said, man, our chemistry is rolling right. The chemistry that we've been working on and building over the past three, four years, you know, this is where it starts to show, you know, being in situations like we've been in and being in facing adversity. I think that's a big thing in the playoffs that's underrated is that you. Yeah, it'd be nice to, you know, sweep every team, every series. But like, you have to go through some type of adversity.
Yeah. Well, your team ain't going through adversity right now. The Cleveland Cavaliers are. Pacers might win the series now just based on the injuries.
And we don't know what it's going to look like. Darius Garland, man, he didn't play since the last series. Come on now. Evan Mobley with an ankle? Dude, 7-1. He's flying all over the place and Duncan playing defense and DeAndre Hunter with a thumb.
I don't know what's going on with that man's thumb. I just know if they ain't playing, they ain't winning. Nico, you concerned if you're a Cavaliers fan? Yeah, I definitely would be, especially how good the Pacers have been in the postseason at home in every series pretty much against Boston last year. So if you go back to last year, they have been tough to beat in their own building. I'd be nervous about the idea of going down 0-2 heading back to Indiana for games three and four. Yeah, they could go up and go up 3-1 on them pretty easy at that point.
Yeah, it's a hard knock life. I mean, the Pacers, what they did against them in the first game, they shot 53 percent from the field. We talked about how bad the Boston Celtics were. These guys went out there and took 63s and missed 45 of them. Pacers were hot from deep. They knocked down 19 threes. They had six different players in double figures.
They just going up and down and up and down. And Rick Carlisle, their head coach, he's he's another curmudgeon. Have you ever met a happy coach?
Probably not. Rick Carlisle said, I love the aggressiveness on offense. We got to be in attack mode to have a chance to beat this team.
And so, you know, in those situations, you know, we just encourage our guys to play free and let it and let it ride. Listen, we might have an upset here. And it's always bad when it comes down to injuries. But we might have an upset here when it comes down to the series. Think about the Cavs. 60 plus wins in the regular season. Number one seed higher than the Boston Celtics. And you go to the playoffs and you bring in DeAndre Hunter and it looks like, oh, my God, the team is even deeper.
And now the guys are hurt. It's disappointing. Nobody. Nobody wants to see this.
Nobody wants to sign up for it. When you think about what we currently have in the postseason, a bunch of teams that were favored to go out and win. Just think about this second round. Oklahoma City. Lost Boston Celtics.
Lost. We got the Cleveland Cavaliers. They lost tonight. Are we going to see the Minnesota Timberwolves lose to the Golden State Warriors as well? This is the first time in NBA history, could be the first time in NBA history that by the time we get to the second round matchup. All the higher seats, all the home teams have taken an L. The Cleveland Cavaliers, they are trying to avoid taking two L's, two losses at home.
It's a wild world out here, folks. The J.R. Sportbree show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. We come back. I'm going to tell you more about some of these these losing teams. Unfortunately, the Cavaliers are in that space. Hey, we'll talk to Chris Hahn from the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Gary Washburn is going to join us from the Boston Globe. We'll talk about Steph Curry and Anthony Edwards.
They were friends during the Olympics. Now they're enemies in the playoffs. We got a lot to get into. Belichick's book is out. NFL players got numbers now. It's still a conversation.
It's a lot to do. The J.R. Sportbree show, the Infinity Sports Network.
