5.2.24 - JR SportBrief Hour 1

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue. And guess what? Now you can call them on your auto insurance too with the name your price tool from Progressive.

It works just the way it sounds. You tell Progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget. Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates.

Price and coverage match limited by state law. Odyssey app. Thank you so much for locking into the show. Hello to my friends in Canada.

People in Mexico. Yeah, wherever you at. Thank you for tuning in. My main man is holding it down on the boards of New York City, the super producer and host, Ryan Hickey. You can always lock into the show on the free Odyssey app.

A-U-D-A-C-Y. You can tune in on your local Infinity Sports Network affiliate. If you got Sirius XM, ask it to play the Infinity Sports Network. If you talk to, you know, Sirius. And if you got a smart speaker, ask it to do the same damn thing. I'm used to talking to everything. That's my problem. I talk for a living. I guess that's a good thing. Anyway, I'm going to be talking with you, Roland, for the next four hours.

There's a lot to discuss. We got basketball games going on. And about 30 minutes from now, we're going to have the Bucks taking on the Pacers. The Pacers have another chance to eliminate the Milwaukee Bucks.

Pacers lead the series three to two. Last game, they could have got the Bucks the hell up on out of here. They missed that boat.

They missed that opportunity. Jimmy, well, not Jimmy, Bobby Portis, Bobby Jimmy, same damn name. Bobby Portis dropping 29, Chris Middleton dropping 29, and the Bucks stayed alive. And tonight, how much he's going to be able to contribute?

I don't know. We're going to find out. But Damian Lillard is going to be back in action. Sprained his ankle crazy the other night, dealing with an Achilles injury as a result. Damian Lillard is going to attempt to play in about 30 minutes from now.

There is no Giannis Atetokounmpo. Don't don't bet on Giannis popping out. The Bucks are going to have to do this, try to push a game seven with an injured or lame Damian Lillard. Let's see what he can do.

And then later on tonight. This this whole series is this might be the best series, I think, going in the playoffs right now between the Knicks and the 76ers. The New York Knicks blew their chance and their opportunity to eliminate the Sixers in Madison Square Garden two nights ago, and they screwed up royally. Seven points and twenty five seconds by Tyrese Maxey and the New York Knicks are forced to go back to Philadelphia to try to close things out tonight. Meanwhile, the 76ers, they want to force a game seven in Madison Square Garden.

We'll get into this later on in the show. Still pretty hilarious. Yesterday, we learned that the Philadelphia 76ers ownership is pretty much buying tickets and giving them away to teachers and first responders. And, you know, all the people in the community that we take for granted, they're giving tickets away to try to keep New York Knicks fans out of the building.

Hilarious, pathetic, sad, pitiful, shameful. We'll get into that later on in the show before the New York Knicks and the Sixers tip off in about three hours from now. That's right.

You heard that correctly. An East Coast game because it's a TNT doubleheader is going to tip off at 9 p.m. Eastern Time in Philadelphia. I am ready to go to sleep by then, even though I will be here on the air. And so we got a lot to talk about when it comes down to the playoffs. Sam Quinn from CBS Sports is going to join us in about 15 minutes. Speaking of a doubleheader on TNT, we got a guy who might be gone. We got a guy who might be done. We got a guy who might be finished with TNT. It might be Charles Barkley. Well, damn it, basketball might be done on TNT.

We'll get into that later on. Speaking of done, is Justin Fields done as a quarterback? There's word that he might be utilized at another position for the Steelers. Najee Harris has his option declined here in Georgia, right on down the road from me.

Kirby Smart gets all the money, is now the highest paid football coach in the land for the Georgia Bulldogs. We're going to get into Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods, well, what has he done lately besides be hurt and and not play?

Well, he got a he got an exception to play in the U.S. Open. We'll talk about that. The Phoenix Suns and their owner is absolutely delusional.

So we got a lot to talk about. Rashee Rice, I think we might have an idea how long he'll be out with the Chiefs. Maybe Ezekiel Elliott.

He's back in Dallas and everybody is is happy. And so if you want to holler at me here, it's very simple. The phone number is 855-212-4227. 855-212-4227. You can find me online at JR Sport Brief. Ryan Hickey, how the hell you doing, man? You good? JR doing really good. Got out to the ballpark today for the first time this season.

Got to see a little bit of a Mets win. Ready for these two playoff games. Let's have a Thursday.

Let's go. Amazing. Nice.

Well, speaking of the Mets, that ironic, that's amazing Mets. I didn't intend on that, but it just happened. You saw the walk off with Lindor? No, I did not. I had to leave to get here.

So I don't know if that counts. Like, you know, did you see the win? I left when it was tied. I'm going to still say I saw the win. I'm counting on my fan record.

All right. That's a W in the books. What a no this year. That's not, not bad. Oh, this is the first game.

First game of the year. Even with how fast these stupid baseball games go now, sometimes about two hours, you still didn't see the end of it, huh? No, I know.

I was hoping for a quickie. On the train? Did you see it on a train? Yes.

Oh yeah. Had the whole game streaming. So I still have my phone, just not in the stands. And does, I guess I've been gone too long. The whole subway isn't decked out with internet.

It can lose out, right? You can't stream the whole game on the way in, right? Don't get me started with that. That's ridiculous in this day and age that that is the case. You're right. But most of the subway in Queens outside. Ah, that's right.

Got the local. So it was on there a little extra longer. Listen to me. I was getting ready to say over ground. That's not, it's not, it's not what it's called. It's above ground, above ground, above ground.

So what happened? The, the, the stations, the internet only works in the stations, not in the tunnels. I thought it worked in the tunnels. I thought they wired the tunnels.

No. Well, they may tell you they wired the tunnels. I can promise you if someone takes a subway every single day, they do not. It is horrible.

It's 2024. We are like 10 feet underground. If that, how the hell you cannot get a signal when you're on your phone and the subway is ridiculous. Ridiculous. Well, maybe fans can complain about that and, and, and something can change.

I don't know. You can lead the charge for it. Even tonight, when I leave here to watch the next game, I'm going to lose half the game on my, on my phone because of the subway. You can't watch it.

It's absurd. There's perils of living in New York. You have to go into the subway where you might get attacked by rats or you might get attacked by worse.

And then you, you don't have wifi. It's a terrible situation. Hey, the world is always open if you want to move Hickey. Okay. That is true.

Quite the endorsement for anyone looking to move to New York City. JR just told you, come on down. Yeah, there you go. Knock yourself out.

Anyway, speaking of a desirable place. Well, I guess the Miami heat, they don't have to go far. I mean, we're going to talk basketball tonight. I told you about the two games that are going to take place tonight, but the bucks and the Pacers, you got the 76ers and the Knicks last night.

Thank you so much. And I was able to say this on my way out the door. Thank you to the Boston Celtics. Thank you for getting the Miami heat the hell up on out of here. There's nothing worse than having a series that is just a complete waste of time.

I'm sorry. And there was no Jimmy Butler. He was running around with puffs in his hair and I don't even know why they bothered to interview the guy. Yeah, they waxed them one 18 to 84 yesterday and the Miami heat go into another off season with Jimmy Butler getting a little bit older, a tally hero, proving and letting you know that he pretty much stinks. Can't count on this guy in a big moment. He was six of 19 from the field yesterday for only 15 points.

And bam out of bio, they got some work to do around this dude. And meanwhile, the Boston Celtics, they move on. The stars didn't even really need to play a lot. Tatum had 16 points. Brown had 25 points.

Derek White had 25. Man, Sam Houser came off the bench and gave you 17 points. And so for the Boston Celtics, they wait. The Boston Celtics, they get a chance to relax. They get a chance to kick their feet up. The Boston Celtics and their fans can just say, hey, we can go to the finals, especially with our next damn opponent being either the Cavaliers or the Magic.

That is the night night series of the entire NBA playoffs. The Cavs currently lead three to two and the Celtics are just going to pick the bones. And despite the success, Jalen Brown says, listen, man, we can still get better.

I think we still have tests to go through throughout this playoffs, especially now with KP being out. But I think we're up to the challenge. I think I'm up to the challenge and I'm excited about that.

And I'm excited about that. So we're graduating. We haven't graduated yet. Oh, OK. They're graduating. They haven't graduated yet. And I guess when you graduate, I mean, I guess that means you have won the entire championship and Jalen Brown kind of understated, relaxed about the situation.

Someone who seems tense and tight. Wound up is Joe Mazzola, the head coach of the Boston Celtics, because if you recall last year, the Boston Celtics were supposed to be the team that goes to the finals in the Miami Heat beat them. And then they went to the finals against the Nuggets and they got smacked. OK. Joe Mazzola, after the game was asked, hey, was this a little bit of revenge? He said, no, it's not revenge. We just play game by game. We just try to win the game. We don't think about revenge. I don't really worry about what happened last year. At the end of the day, I like how we approached the series, regardless of who we were playing, had an intentionality to it, had attention to detail and had a consistent physicality. And that's the most important thing, is having that regardless of who you're playing against. And wake up tomorrow, you got to do it all over again versus another team.

So it doesn't really matter that what happened then. Hickey, I don't even need to know exactly what he's going to say to know how he sounds. Sad.

And the imitation of how sped up his voice is, you're getting pretty good at it. Oh, thanks. I mean, I get it. He doesn't want to sit down and talk to the media.

I mean, you just want a basketball game. Are you not happy? Are you not enthusiastic about that?

At least like you would think that that they have kicked his dog off the side of a bridge every time he talks to the media. Does Joma's we talk that does Joma Zula like his job? Does he does he like it? If you go by how he sounds?

No. When Emei Udonka was doing the you know what, with somebody he wasn't supposed to do it with, and then got fired. He didn't have to say yes to the job.

Like he could have said, No, I don't want this job. You would think that they held a gun to his head for him to be the head coach of the Boston Celtics, at least by how he sounds. Maybe it'll change if they win a title.

Maybe. Boston Celtics are probably the strongest team in the East to go out there and win a title. That's if Kristaps Porzingis comes back. Kristaps Porzingis, oft injured, typically busted up, now dealing with a calf issue, don't know when he's going to return.

Business as usual, right? You know how many times I saw Tatum on the floor? You know how many times I saw Brown on the floor? These guys were getting pushed around, but they still won, especially against this Miami Heat team.

And so Jason Tatum, he spoke too. He's like, Listen, I don't know why people say that we're soft. Is it the threes? Like, I don't know. The world we live in is it's got to be something wrong with every team. That's what they like to say. And, you know, you can see how talented we are. I think it's lazy or easy to say that, you know, teams can out-tough us, right?

And I never understood that. Like, what's the definition of tough? Like, having the louder guys on your team like that will make you tough. And everybody has their own definition of what toughness is.

It's playing the right way, showing up every day to do your job without complaining. I think that's being tough. Oh, okay. All right.

All right. Well, I would have to say this. There's something wrong with every team, right? There's nothing on earth that's perfect, right? If I think about the Boston Celtics, if I got to find an issue, it's not about toughness.

It's not even about health. I know Kristaps Porzingis, you're 7'3", you're 7'4". You ain't going to play every game. But what the hell do y'all do at the end of a game? Is this now the the general thing? Is this now the the Jason Tatum show?

Are y'all just going to be out there launching threes? And so that's that's something that's a negative I see with the Boston Celtics because yeah, you got to find something wrong. Go talk to Joe Mazzola, the head coach of the squad. This is what coaches do. They obsess over what's wrong.

You can highlight what's going right. But you got to find something to go out there and be better. And maybe that's why Joe Mazzola is so miserable all the time.

Maybe he's spending too much time just being miserable. Congratulations to the Boston Celtics, the Miami Heat. Oh, do something. This roster is not doing a damn thing. It was a shock that they went to the finals last year, went on a nice little run, waxing some teams teams like Giannis and the Bucks as Giannis was busted up and they went, this Jimmy Butler team ain't doing a damn thing.

I'm sorry to fill you in. Congratulations to the Celtics and congratulations ahead of time because you're probably going to wax the Cavaliers or the Magic unless another player goes down. And we don't want to hope for that. We've seen enough injuries here in the postseason. It's the J.R. Sportbree show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. We got a lot to do. We're going to get into Justin Fields and his potential new position. And we're going to talk about the Sixers organization buying tickets to give away. We're going to talk about how delusional the Suns are. We'll get into Tiger Woods.

It's like he's getting freebies at this point in his life. We got a lot to do on the other side of the break. We're going to have a conversation with Sam Quinn from CBS Sports covers all things basketball. So we got a busy show.

If you want to holler at me, you can participate, too. It's eight five five two one two forty two twenty seven. It's the J.R. Sportbree show on the Infinity Sports Network. Don't move.

Battle Creek, Michigan, 1963. Kellogg's and Post sworn serial rivals race to create a pastry that will change the face of breakfast forever. A wildly imaginative tale of ambition, betrayal and menacing milkmen sweetened with artificial ingredients. Unfrosted stars Jerry Seinfeld and his directorial film debut. It features a supporting cast of comedy greats, including Melissa McCarthy, Jim Gaffigan, Hugh Grant, Amy Schumer, Max Greenfield, Christian Slater, Sarah Cooper, Bill Burr and many more.

Friday, May 3rd, only on Netflix. Hey, everyone, Boomer Esiason here. The NFL draft is behind us and your favorite team is now gearing up for week number one. The free Odyssey app puts you right in the middle of the pro football conversation with the biggest sports radio stations from across the country. The local voices who know your team the best, giving you their unfiltered takes on the current state of your squad. It's always football season right here on the free Odyssey app.

You're listening to the JR Sport Brief, the JR Sport Brief show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. We're getting ready to slide on out of the first round of the NBA playoffs. We have teams who have been eliminated. We have teams on the brink of elimination. And me, I'm ready for the second round already. I'm ready for more competitive basketball. I'm ready for the best of the best. So go at it.

Joining us right now to talk about the NBA playoffs, some of the additional storylines in the NBA right now is someone who covers the league for CBS Sports. Right now we're being joined by Sam Quinn. Sam, how are you, man?

I'm wonderful. I'm like you. I want to get to the second round. The first round usually is good for, you know, two or three good series. Second round is where we really get to dial in on the best teams. You know, I think I'm ready to be done with Cavs magic. I'm ready for the Yeah, we're listen, man.

We're in the same boat. Well, we got a couple of teams that can be eliminated tonight. Let's talk about the matchup in the game that's going to get started in about 10 minutes from now between the Milwaukee Bucks and the Pacers. We see that Damian Lillard is going to try to give it a go tonight against the Pacers and the Pacers are going to try to eliminate the Bucks. Do you think that the Pacers have enough in them to get them to hell up on out of Dodge or you think the Bucks are going to try to push it to seven? I think the Pacers are going to close it out tonight. I mean, I hate how often this postseason especially, especially after like a relatively healthy regular season, I found myself saying the words, I'm not a doctor.

Look, I don't know. I don't know how healthy Damian Lillard is. I probably wouldn't be playing with fire with an Achilles injury like that. The risk just tends to be so, so high. We obviously remember what happened with Kevin Durant in the finals two years ago. I just think the risk reward for them is not, it's kind of out of whack, you know, like you're down three, two, you got to win two, two more games just to get to the second round where you'll again be an underdog against the Knicks. And then after that, you'll be a huge underdog against Boston.

I'm sort of of the opinion that like the risk here is too high for the reward. The Pacers have looked so much better offensively at home. The Bucks kind of just punched them in the mouth in game five and look, that happens.

This is a young team that's never closed out a series before. I think on their home court, they're gonna have a much easier time controlling tempo. Look, Damian Lillard in the best of times is not a good defender. Damian Lillard playing potentially on one leg. That's just, you might as well just stick a bullseye on his back. I'm sure the Pacers are gonna gear a lot of their offensive game planter out.

Let's go with the guy who may not be able to move. So I expect Indiana to close it out tonight. I generally don't like picking against the home team this late in the series. So yeah, it's not great for the Bucks. I just think they're taking a really big risk here tonight, one that I probably wouldn't endorse. And Sam Cornish here with us from CBS Sports.

Sam, if that happens, in short, it has to happen first. What would this offseason look like for the Bucks? You bring in Doc Rivers, you have Giannis, you have Lillard. Everybody else is, these guys are older. This is a 30-over type squad just about. What could they possibly do to be as competitive as people thought that they were gonna be?

Anything? You know, these injuries, injuries are always a bad thing. Obviously, you always want to be at full strength, give yourself the best chance to win. The real danger long-term for the injuries the Bucks have had in this series is that it gives them an excuse to do nothing, where they can kind of look at this and say, oh yeah, we would have beaten the Pacers. We took them to six. We would have beaten the Pacers if we were at full strength. So let's run it back. Let's try it again. No, absolutely not.

You should not run it back and try it again. Just look at what happened in the regular season. You know, this is the worst rebounding year they've had at least since before the Mike Futenholzer era. Their point of attack defense has been maybe the worst in the league. Their offense dies whenever Giannis goes to the bench. There are a lot of really serious problems with this roster that they might just try to hand wave away and say, oh, we were hurt.

Doesn't matter. If they had been at full strength, they would have lost probably to the Celtics, maybe to the Knicks. This was not a championship team. It's not going to be a championship team next year. They need to make serious changes. And those are going to be the kind of changes that teams tend not to want to make.

Like, look, nobody in Milwaukee is going to want to hear this. Chris Middleton just had a very good series. His value is probably never going to be higher. It might make sense for the Bucs to say, can we trade him for some perimeter defense, balance out our roster a little bit and trust that in the second year of Dame and Giannis together, those two are going to be enough offensively where we want to have some balance, want to have some perimeter defense. That's something that I would consider.

I consider Bobby Bortis trades as well. You have to find some way to defend the perimeter if you're going to be a viable contender next year. The problem is what they're most likely going to do is just bring this group back and say, no, no, we're going to find the right minimum salary for agents. And that's all they're going to have. They're going to be a second apron team. They don't have draft picks to trade.

It's going to be shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic. They're going to come back next year with a slightly different roster. And the result is probably going to be similar though. Maybe they'll get hurt again. They're an old team, but even if they're at full strength next year, they're going to run into a team with good guards and probably lose then in the first or second round.

Jalen Brunson, I think this year averaged like 40 something points per game against them in the regular season. They played five times. I didn't think they were going to get past the Knicks if they had gotten past the Pacers.

I just, if I were them, I would be thinking a lot more drastically than, oh, we can make some minor tweaks. It'll be fine. We'll be healthy next time.

Yes. Sam Quinn is here with us covers basketball for CBS sports, talking about another team that has been eliminated before we move forward to another game tonight, the Phoenix Suns. We know that they're pretty much saddled with Durant and Booker, Bradley Beal, who is not going to get any better of anything. He might stay the same or get worse.

What can they do? Just hope that Durant asks for trade. There's no way in hell they get value for anybody except for Booker.

Yeah, I have no, I have no idea. I've been trying to look at this from every angle and it's like, okay, maybe you trade Durant. Okay. Then Bradley Beal is your second best player.

You're built around two smaller guards. Are you really that excited about that? Probably not. Could you try to trade Beal?

Sure. He has a no trade clause. Good luck getting value. Could you trade Booker? Well, yeah, you'd get a lot back for him, but he's also the only somewhat young and somewhat healthy guy on your team is a Beal Durant role players team with both of those guys in their thirties. Really all that exciting?

No, there isn't really a good answer. You can't even tank because the Nets have all of your picks. What are you going to do? Are you going to trade Durant and Booker and get a haul of picks?

Well, then you're just Brooklyn without the New York market and the kale bridges. You're just a team that has a lot of stuff, but none of their own pick. So it doesn't matter.

I have no idea. I think they're kind of, they're totally boxed in. There's no good move here. They're going to probably bring it back. That's what managed to be a set. They're going to bring back the starting lineup. Maybe there's a coaching change.

Maybe there isn't. I would probably expect that there will be, they'll do some more of those, you know, box fringe signings where they are only going to have the minimum as well. They're going to be a second apron team. They're out of drastic. They can't really make any trades.

Maybe you try to trade Nurkic for, you know, go down in salary a little bit, maybe take back two cheaper guys, but there's not a good path there. And I think a lot of these teams that went all in this off season, didn't know, or weren't considerate enough of what the second apron was really going to mean for them moving forward. They kind of had to do it this year because the new rules just really give them no flexibility in fixing this. This is their team. This is their roster. There's not some magical, Oh, we'll trade this guy and get our point guard or, Oh, we can fix our defense by doing this one thing. No, you're, you're pretty much confined to, this is your group. You're going to add a couple of minimum free agents.

Good luck with that. And a Western conference this young and this deep. I'm not even sure the sons are a playoff team next year. Like the Grizzlies are going to be back in it. The Rockets are presumably going to be a little bit better. San Antonio is a wildcard here, but if they decide they're ready to win now, they have the assets to do it.

Like nobody's talking about this. I think it's so hard for us to imagine a world in which say LeBron is not on a playoff team or Curry is on a playoff team or Durant is not a playoff team. They're going to be like 13 or 14 teams in the West that have rosters that we look at and say, Oh, this is a 500 or better team. Only 10 of them get to make the playoffs and only six of them lock in the other four in the plan. So we're going to be surprised. There's going to be some team with a lot of famous guys that doesn't make the playoffs next year. I wouldn't be that surprised if it was Phoenix.

Would you? Well, I mean, they need, they certainly need some help on that roster and just like you, I don't, I don't know how the hell that they're going to do it. They were kind of middling throughout the course of this year, just flattened period. Sam corn is here with us, the JR sport brief show on the infinity sports network. You talk about a younger team or stars we saw the other night. I don't want to say a star was born, but he certainly had the performance of his career in Tyrese Maxey.

A lot of people paying him attention. We know the New York Knicks are down in Philly tonight trying to close them out. Do you think with the momentum having swung the Sixers way that they're going to come back and beat these short-handed Knicks? I'm going to be honest, and I probably shouldn't say this as a basketball writer on a sports show. I kind of don't care.

And here's why. This is a placeholder season for Philadelphia. The way they've structured their roster, it's, they're going to have a ton of cap space. This obviously they're going to have first round picks to trade. I think the moment that they traded James Harden, they kind of knew this wasn't going to be the year.

All we're trying to do is get through it in one piece. And what happened with Maxey was just such a significant long-term development where you can look at this year as a win, even if you don't make it past the first round. I mean, I think back to all of those playoff series over the years where Philly had Joel Embiid and kind of nothing else. There was that Toronto series in 2019 where they lost the minutes that Embiid rested by like over a hundred points. There's the Atlanta series where Ben Simmons was afraid to take the shot, obviously. There was the Harden year in Miami where he just says, oh, I'm sorry, nobody passed me the ball back.

What can I do? Just year after year after year, it's been Embiid with nobody else that he could really rely on. Now with Tyrese Maxey, he has that guy.

He has somebody that he can really trust to be a co-star in these games, maybe lighten his load a little bit. They have the two guys that matter and they're going to reshape the entire roster around them this off season. So look, whether Philly loses in the first round tonight, second, third, whatever, I think we all more or less agree they're not going to be a championship caliber team this year. They only have two viable shot creators. The perimeter defense is so based on scheme and not enough on talent. You know, it's just not a championship caliber team this year.

That's fine. They're going to go into the off season. They're going to try to add a third guy or they're going to try to add a bunch of depth. Getting Maxey up to this level now is what matters. It wasn't, it was never about winning it all this year. It was about feeling good that you had your two man core moving forward and game five for Maxey was really proof.

This is not just a sidekick. This is somebody that could be a true co-star for Joel Embiid, someone we can really, really build around. And now they know they have that guy. Well, Sam, you talk about this being a placeholder season. You mentioned also as well about the young players and young teams that are emerging in the West. When you look at who is left and who you expect to advance here in the NBA playoffs, who are you? Who are you comfortable crowning as champs? Dare I say are the Timberwolves with Anthony Edwards? Are they going to shock the world and keep on rolling? And what do you think about these young squads and who can win the crown?

Minnesota has a better shot now than I maybe would have thought a few weeks ago. Jamal Murray, we all remember the two game winners against the Lakers, was not great in that series. He does not look like he's at a hundred percent. Anthony Edwards, I don't, look, he's not the best player in that series. He's the best player in the world. I think this is the first time during this Denver run where they've gone into a series and looked the other way and said like, man, there is somebody there who could match Jokic shot for shot, who could really impact the game on a similar level. They have all that size to throw at Jokic.

It's weird. I mean, this is such an unprecedented situation. I hesitate to like really make a pick in that series until I know what the deal is with Chris Finch. An injured coach is a big deal.

If your coach can't be on the sideline with you, if he can't be making those in the moment's position, that's a scary situation to be in. So I hesitate to pick Minnesota, but I think this is probably the hardest series that Denver has faced since the beginning of last year's playoff. I think they have a reasonable shot. I think Oklahoma City has a reasonable shot too. We saw them kind of face the version of the playoff like demons that we thought were going to hold them back where, oh, first round they run into the big center that we don't think they can defend.

You know what I found? It's game one. He has a huge game. It's close.

People kind of panic. And then games two, three, and four, the Thunder just totally take care of it, win pretty comfortably. And now it's just, I look at this and I say, I don't want to say it's wide open, but I feel like any team in the West, except for the Clippers now, has a reasonable shot. If you told me that Luka and Kyrie just combined to average 65 points the rest of the way and Dallas makes the final side by it, I'm totally open.

I think it'll be Boston on one side. In the West, I have no idea. I don't know what to tell you.

Well, we're going to find out soon enough. Hey Sam, thank you so much for taking the time to hop on. Where can people follow you and your work with CBS Sports? At Twitter, Sam Quinn CBS, and then just go read everything we put up at CBS Sports. We've got a bunch of great writers there. We'll be covering everything tonight, coming everything to the playoffs. So check us out and thanks for having me. No doubt about it.

That Sam Quinn of CBS Sports. Yeah, it's looked that way. I want to say all season long, but pretty much it's like, hey, we got the Boston Celtics over here. And who's going to emerge in the West? Do the Denver Nuggets have enough depth? Is a team like Oklahoma City, are they too young?

There are a lot of question marks. And then you also heard Sam mention the Dallas Mavericks and Kyrie and Luka Doncic. They're getting along fun. They're getting along swimmingly. We haven't had a beef. We haven't had an argument.

This was their first full season together. And I mean, even Luka Doncic is like, my knee hurts, but I'm going to show up and play anyway, just to help out Kyrie Irving. And yeah, let's see if the Mavericks move on.

I expect them to. Matter of fact, we'll talk about just Luka and Kyrie and the Clippers. We'll get into that in the next break. We'll talk some football with Justin Fields potentially playing a different role instead of quarterback or in addition to QB with the Steelers. You're listening to the JR Sport Brief.

It's the JR Sport Brief show here on the Infinity Sports Network. Thank you so much to Sam Quinn for joining us right before we went to break, taking a look at the NBA landscape, what's going on in the playoffs or what might happen in the off season. Thinks that teams like the Suns, Milwaukee Bucks might think are here or there may not necessarily have a major move to swing them all the way back into being favorites for championship contention and thus is life.

Now, having said that, another team that's been eliminated. This has been reported in Hickey. We talked about this a couple of days ago.

Jovan Buhay, who covers the Los Angeles Lakers for the athletic. I believe there's an expectation that Mr. Darvin Ham could be gone by the end of this week. So that's only a few days. So we'll we'll see what happens.

No, no shock, no surprise there. And the Los Angeles Lakers certainly got a lot of tinkering to do. And then we got another team in Los Angeles. They might be done as soon as tomorrow, because last night the Dallas Mavericks beat the Clippers 123 to 93. And the Clippers, there's no other way to put it. They sucked. OK, they were historic.

At least one of the guys was historically bad. Paul George, 15 points. Hey, Hickey, question. Kawhi Leonard, he plays basketball, does he? Well, that's what he says he does. OK, he's missing again.

No shock there with with knee inflammation. Story of his life. And then the other guy, Hickey, he plays basketball. He just doesn't know what the hell he's doing from time to time. Right, James Harden?

I think some teams may prefer if he doesn't play in the playoffs, especially. Ah, James Harden, historically bad night. How? Listen to this, folks. This stat line is pathetic. This is this is a form of MVP.

Like I would think you're going to get your shots and do something. He had seven points. OK, fine. It sucks. Awful. Terrible.

Disgusting. James Harden was two of twelve from the field. Two of twelve from the field. He was one of seven from deep.

He had seven assists and four rebounds. Two of twelve? Like, isn't there a point where you just you just like stop shooting? I get it. Now everybody just has to, you know, trust yourself and trust your practice and shoot, shoot, shoot. Well, this is the live game. This ain't practice. The shot ain't falling. Go to the hole.

Get your confidence going that way. New age basketball sucks. At least for James Harden.

What a what a terrible night. He now holds the NBA playoff record. For most games with 10 plus shot attempts in two or fewer makes. This is the 10th time that he's done this in his postseason career. That's the record. That's not a record that you want. Every and anybody who's ever tried to tell you that this man is any type of good in the postseason.

They lie. James Harden sucks. He was at the peak of his powers in Houston when he got freed up from being in Oklahoma City and he was lighting the scoreboard up. But when it really matters, he stinks. Get the Clippers the hell up on out and get him out. And Kyrie and Kyrie Irving had a bad night himself.

14 points. But what does it say when Luka Doncic, you didn't even know if he was going to play basketball last night? They described him as not just having a sprained knee. They said he was sick. He said he's in the sideline hacking stuff up.

Disgusting. But Luka Doncic played 40 minutes on a sprained knee and had 35 points, 10 assists, 7 rebounds. Get the Clippers out of here.

And as of last night, they probably played their final game at the Staples Center. And so Steve Ballmer, who has all the money in the world. Picky, think fast. Who has more money? Steve Ballmer or Michael Bloomberg? I'll say Michael Bloomberg. Let's see.

Steve Ballmer net worth. Let's go real fast. Oh, my God.

Dare I say they're neck and neck? Oh, wow. Yeah.

How about that? Steve Ballmer Steve Ballmer net worth one hundred and seventeen billion dollars. Yeah, it's one hundred and seven funny money at this point. It's like Scrooge McDuck swimming through them coins at this point. Wow. Yeah. And Michael Bloomberg, let's see if he's still at 106.

Oh, only 106. He has about ten billion dollars more than Mr. Bloomberg. Anyway, what do you think they sit around and talk about? You know, are they friends or they hate each other's guts?

What do you think? Their rivals? Oh, good question. I would probably say rivals because one one guy is from technology space, right? Well, they're both in technology. Bloomberg is kind of shifted into buying politics, but, you know, he's Bloomberg isn't, you know, the tech with his trading company and and all the media that comes with it, the Bloomberg TV and the subscription and such. And I don't know what Ballmer does. What the hell does he do right now? Right now, I think.

I mean, didn't he get out of I don't know if he got out of Microsoft. Maybe. I don't know.

But I mean, I think he's there. Is he? I don't know.

I don't know. But he's all in on the Clippers, that's for sure. Yeah.

Making sure everybody has toilets. Well, anyway, good luck to him and his team because they are going to need it. They're just certain teams that I look at as a complete waste of time. And I actually like this because I think in the future, as we move forward, NBA teams are going to take a different approach to building out their squads.

No more. We need three superstars and we need this. You want to have two solid players and then you want to actually have depth.

And so I appreciate that. Maybe the league is going to have a little bit more more parity. We certainly know that the West is ridiculously competitive and I'm here for it, except for the Mavs. They got two stars and the rest of the team, I think is ass.

Anyway, Luca Doncic. He was ass last night, man. You got a bum knee.

How the hell you doing this? It's playoffs. You know, when you started the game in the playoffs, it's a different thing. You know, there's a lot of adrenaline, a lot of motion, so you just keep going. Hickey, you think they gave him a shot?

Maybe a few to make sure he's out there. A sprained knee. I don't know what it is. What is a sprained knee? What is that?

I don't know what that is. I don't know, but that rappy hat on his leg looked heavy. He had the Embiid wrap on his leg?

It looks a little more flexible, not like so rigid as like a brace, but it looked like there's a lot of layers on under his legs. Luca Doncic, he had one reason as to why he's he's marching forward. He's like, hey, this is the playoffs. And last night, a very big deal. Today, I think it was a very big game. You know, we win and now we got to win two out of, I mean, one out of two. So we got to go back to Dallas, play the same way. We know our friends going to be amazing at home. So we just got to win one more. Nothing.

We didn't do nothing yet. Hey, last night on the top six list, I said if I had to take one young guy, 25 and under, a future star of the league, help take me to a championship, it'd be Luca. And last night was an example why, with a sprained knee, the man went out and had 35 points, 10 assists, seven rebounds. He was 14 to 26 from the field. James Harden, what's his problem? I don't know.

Seven points, two of 12 from the field. It just just built different, I guess, right? Luca Doncic, gigantic shooting version of Jason Kidd. Hickey, is that accurate? A little bit? No? A little bit. I would say he's more skilled. But yeah, no, I like the comp you talked about yesterday.

I think it's pretty fitting. Yeah, more polished offensive game than what Jason Kidd had. And so Luca Doncic, whooping ass, even on a sprained knee. Let's just call this a wrap for the Clippers.

And this is sad. You got teams in the West that got a bunch of old veterans, and they're going nowhere. Phoenix Suns, nowhere. Clippers, nowhere. Los Angeles Lakers already at home. And it's going to be tough for them to switch things up in the offseason.

Good luck to all the loser teams. It's the J.R. Sportbree show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. Speaking of switching things up, there's a quarterback who's on a brand new team in the NFL this upcoming season.

Let me say this again. A quarterback. And now there's word that he might do other things on the football field besides throw the ball. The ball. I'm going to tell you what player might be tasked with doing a little bit more work and something that we've never seen before.

I'll fill you in. It's the J.R. Sportbree show on the Infinity Sports Network. Hey everyone, Boomer Esiason here. The NFL draft is behind us and your favorite team is now gearing up for week number one. The free Odyssey app puts you right in the middle of the pro football conversation with the biggest sports radio stations from across the country. The local voices who know your team the best, giving you their unfiltered takes on the current state of your squad. It's always football season right here on the free Odyssey app.