JR SportBrief Hour 1

Worried about letting someone else pick out the perfect avocado for your perfect, impressed-them-on-the-third-date guacamole? Well, good thing Instacart shoppers are as picky as you are. They find ripe avocados like it's their guac on the line. They are milk expiration date detectives.

They bag eggs like the 12 precious pieces of cargo they are. So let Instacart shoppers overthink your groceries so that you can overthink what you'll wear on that third date. Download the Instacart app to get free delivery on your first three orders while supplies last.

Minimum $10 per order, additional term supply. Live Nation presents Concert Week. Now through May 14th, get $25 tickets to over 5,000 shows. That's up to 75% off a summer full of your favorite artists, like 21 Savage, Alanis Morissette, Cage the Elephant, Celeste Barber, Dierks Bentley, Fade, Hootie and the Blowfish, Janet Jackson, Kidz Bop Kidz, Meghan Trainor, Bissell Puma, Sarah McLachlan. Get tickets to more than 5,000 summer shows for just $25 on sale now through May 14th.

Visit livenation.com slash concert week to learn more and plan your summer with Sean Paul, Sum 41, 30 Seconds to Mars, oh and two-door Cinema Club. Man, that sunset is gorgeous. Grill, patio, sunset, hard to get better than that unless you're browsing Carvana's inventory while you soak it all in. Oh, burger time. So sit back, get comfortable. Carvana's got thousands of cars under $20,000 just waiting for you.

I could stay here forever. Carvana, where car buying meets comfort meets convenience. Download the app or visit carvana.com today.

It is the JR Sport Brief Show here on the Infinity Sports Network. Happy Friday to you. I hope you're good. I hope you're safe. I hope you're well. I hope you're happy.

I hope you're all of those good things on this Friday afternoon. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening to the show.

This is when I get started every single weekday, 6 p.m. Eastern, 3 Pacific. I'm coming to you live from Atlanta, Georgia. Super producer and host Ryan Hickey is holding it down for us in New York City. You can always listen on the free Odyssey app. You can lock in on your local Infinity Sports Network affiliate. If you got serious, it's channel 158.

And if you got a smart speaker, just ask it to play the Infinity Sports Network and boom, you don't have to do anything. We pop right on up. What a day.

It's Friday. It's going to talk about, we're going to talk about basketball, of course. New York Knicks having to defend themselves against these Pacers. Rick Carlisle fined by the NBA for whining like a baby. The Suns have a new head coach in Mike Budenholzer in about 20 minutes from now to talk NBA. We'll talk to a man who played in the NBA.

One of himself, a championship is now a broadcaster on television and radio. Antonio Daniels is going to come through and join us. We'll talk about how bad the Celtics have choked, or at least they choked last night. Luka Doncic goes off.

Hilarious. The Lakers want LeBron James forever. Rookie mini camps. They're open in the NFL. Guys are signing their contracts and well, we have some quarterback news. I mean, what a shock, right?

Caleb Williams has been named the number one quarterback for the Chicago Bears. Netflix is on its way to an NFL deal. What a shock. Michael Jordan and Anthony Edwards, they cannot, they cannot avoid each other.

Shaq and Shannon Sharpe are beefing like they got a beef going on. Huh? Interesting. We'll talk about it. We got a lot to get into. If you want to participate in the show, feel free to do so. The number is 8 5 5 2 1 2 42 27.

That's 8 5 5 2 1 2 42 27. You can find me online everywhere at JR sport brief, a simple question to the man holding it down with us. Ryan Hickey, how the hell you doing on this Friday? JR doing great, doing great today. Ready for a big game three.

Well, don't really know what to expect, to be honest. You're talking about the New York Knickerbockers. Well, actually both game threes, honestly. Denver as well. Denver and the T wolves. I expect Denver to bounce back. I think this long laugh is good for them in terms of getting back here and winning a game. But like, I mean, if they lose, would I be shocked?

No. So like both games, I'm very excited for it because I feel like I really don't have a good strong lean either way of who's going to win either game. I'm pumped. Yeah, it's going to be exciting. And we'll ask Antonio Daniels about this when he joins us in the next break.

But you're right. The New York Knicks are an intriguing matchup. The Knicks are going to get going in action in about an hour from now. And just to think how injured an injury depleted really their roster is. Jalen Brunson is going to play despite running around with that sore foot of the other night.

It's been reported that he's going to go ahead and give it a go. He scored, what, 24 points in the second half of the last game. We'll see how hobbled he is.

Oji Ananobi, one of the Knicks, maybe probably the Knicks best perimeter defender. He's not going to be available with his hamstring injury. Julius Randall is already out. Bogdanovich is dealing with a broken foot. Mitchell Robinson is dealing with a busted up ankle. Like the New York Knicks are going to end up calling Hickey to just go play center form from backup minutes.

This is how ravaged the roster is, which made the comments by Rick Carlisle just so, so ridiculous. After they lost the game, I'll remind you, he complained. He complained about the referees. He complained about the calls. He sent 78 perceived missed calls over to the NBA office to complain and whine.

And then he even played the New York City as a big city. And we're a small town, so we get no respect. Listen to this nonsense that Rick Carlisle said. Small market teams deserve an equal shot.

They deserve a fair shot. No matter where, no matter, no matter where they're playing, no matter, no matter where they're playing, it's kind of nutty, man. He got fined $35,000, by the way, for criticizing the officials publicly, 35 K. I think Rick Carlisle can afford it, but it's just, it's pathetic that he had to go to those lengths to motivate his team. Not looking at how they missed free throws, not looking at their poor defense, but putting a heavy emphasis on officiating. The NBA said, give us $35,000 and shut up. This guy didn't tell him to shut up, but he pretty much found his comments to be trash. Josh Hart of the New York Knicks.

This man is six foot nothing, six, five, six, four. He's grabbing 12 and 13 rebounds a game. Josh Hart spoke to the media today before the game. He wasn't too thrilled with Rick Carlisle's comments. I mean, he said him trashing the refs. It was just disrespectful, not to the referees, but to us, the New York Knicks.

Listen. Rick's saying whatever he feels has nothing to do with us. At the end of the day, I think it's pretty disrespectful to us because at the end of the day, you know, we're out there playing and competing at a high level. It's not about officiating.

It's not about anything like that. Tell him to discredit how we're playing. I feel like that's pretty disrespectful. They go punch him in the mouth.

Not physically. I'm not saying punch Rick Carlisle, but go punch the Pacers in the mouth. They want to talk all this trash and they just go get him. I'm just afraid that at this stage of the next season, like how much more they got, right? Jalen Brunson is walking wounded.

How much do they have? They're going to need a career game from, I don't know, Miles McBride to help him out. Josh Hart has openly talked about getting ready to play 48 minutes because that's what's needed right now at this point. The Knicks to me, every game they lose somebody, they look cooked. But at least Rick Carlisle has given them a little bit, I guess, of motivation. Because Josh Hart, he didn't even care for his comments about, you know, small market teams deserve respect.

Josh Hart thought those were stupid comments. That's so stupid, bro. I mean, like, I mean, we say the big market always wins. The Knicks ain't want to chip in 51 years. So obviously that don't really hold much weight. So I don't fully understand that.

Sorry, New York, for the reminder. But I think that's just idiotic. At the end of the day, it's who's playing the best. And that's, I don't know, I've never seen a ref, you know, shoot a free throw or make it three or miss a rotation. Yeah, blame your players, man. It's one thing to play the game and a lot of coaches play the game.

It's another thing to be so, so blatant about it. And the bad thing is, unless there's a miracle like tonight from the New York Knicks, unless Jalen Brunson drops 50 on a bum foot and Miles McBride pops up and I don't know, Deva Chenzo and Hart end up dropping 30. Hickey, I'm not, I'm not feeling confident about the Knicks. Like I think the injuries are finally going to start catching up with them.

That's why I'm nervous. But at the same time with how hard they've played it to their credit, not just Jalen Brunson, but also other guys like Josh Hart, we just heard, or Dante Devon Chenzo, they've made clutch plays, whether it's late in the game or early in the game, Keith, a minute, like to their credit, they all have contributed, all have stepped up. So yes, I mean, this feels like this should be the game where the luck runs out, the injuries catch up to them finally. And I mean, Indiana, and this is when you talk about down 02 at home, this is, this is basically the last gasp for them to keep their season alive tonight. I still can't say it's a guaranteed win for Indiana, just because I feel like there's a chance here for some of these other Knicks to step in and drop 20 points and help lead to an improbable game three win.

They don't, they don't play defense. Like the Knicks can certainly still go out there and win. And I don't think there's a team that plays as hard as the New York Knicks.

I don't think anybody does. The Knicks are maximizing their talent. The Knicks are maximizing what they have. It's just a matter of how much further is it going to take them? I think if the Knicks want to win this series, especially knowing that OG and an OB with a hamstring injury, I don't know if we'll see him the rest of the series. He ain't playing today. There comes a point in time where everything has to even out and they just, they're running out of warm bodies to play basketball.

It sucks. Let's see what the New York Knicks can do. They're in action against the Pacers in about an hour from now. And you know what? That's not the only coaching news or information that we got today. Rick Carlisle being docked $35,000 for trashing the refs and making stupid comments about favoritism of New York City. Yeah, right.

Sure. We got even more of an update about the Phoenix Suns. That's right. Yeah, they were in the playoffs.

You might've forgot. They got swept by the Timberwolves four to nothing. Anthony Edwards owned them and now they're gone. Well, yesterday we learned that they fired their head coach, Frank Vogel. And then we also learned that coach Budenholzer was pretty much first in line to take the job. Bud was fired last year by the Milwaukee Bucks. They bring in Adrian Griffin, try to get a new voice in there. They then fire him and bring in Doc Rivers.

Meanwhile, Budenholzer's just sitting around minding his business. He had two years this season and next left on his deal with Milwaukee when they canned him. This is a champion.

I mean, damn it. He got his championship by beating the Suns. It was Chris Paul was there, but he beat him. He's a two time coach of the year. Budenholzer can coach. Can he coach Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal and Devin Booker? Can he make something out of that? Well, that's to be seen.

Shyam Sharania, he was on FanDuel TV and he talked about this, whether or not Budenholzer is on his way in. Take a listen. The fit was never right as the year went on. There were issues. The players essentially lost trust in Frank Vogel and whether it was the offense versus defense just was not a fit. Frank Vogel obviously defensive minded coach and he was never able to fully maximize Devin Booker, Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal. So now I'm told that the plan is for the Suns to hire 2021 Bucks Championship head coach Mike Budenholzer as their new head coach. Really, in the next few days, I expect the size to hammer out a deal.

I'm told the deal is expected to approach the eight figures per year range. They view Mike Budenholzer as a clear choice that can really come in there and optimize those three guys. That's really where this all hinges at is the big three being fully maximized and utilized the right way. Offensively, they were never able to find cohesion with Bradley Beal or Devin Booker playing point guard.

How does the ball find Kevin Durant in his spot? So there will be roster adjustments as well. The Suns have two first round draft picks. They can trade on draft night. I expect them to be aggressive as they try to tweak the roster as well.

Come on now. They can be as aggressive as they want in retooling the roster. They need that more than they need a coach.

A coach is only going to be good as the men that are out there. You trust in Bradley Beal to play? Kevin Durant will be fine. He'll be good. But I mean, you're going to trust him to not get hurt? Played 70 plus games this past season.

Good for him. Am I going to count on that for another year? Welcome to the NBA. They just fire coaches and swap them around. You would think that this is a shell game in the National Basketball Association. Butenholzer gets a job. I wonder how long before Kevin Durant goes, I don't want to be here.

Hickey, what is it? A February? He says, I want to leave. Or is it going to be Devin Booker? I will give them one year. So next year, I don't think it happens at the trade deadline.

I think he asks out, let's say, probably mid-June of 2025. Wow. It's just ridiculous how Kevin Durant, whose resume was pretty much set and solidified about going to the Warriors. And you could say that's the most controversial thing. No one would ever take anything away from him. And we don't know how his career is going to end or what's going to happen. But these moves here, they just don't look good. And I mean, God forbid that Kevin Durant wants to move again, then we really know he doesn't care. He just wants to show up and play basketball, doesn't care about legacy, doesn't care about the jersey, doesn't care about the uniform, just wants to go out there and play ball. Didn't work out in Brooklyn. Didn't work out this first full year with the Suns. And I mean, damn it, what's he going to do next?

Ask to go to Miami? Ain't nothing else for Kevin Durant to do but to retire in peace. Rick Carlisle fined $35,000 for running his mouth about the officiating. Budenholzer got himself a new job, not official yet, on his way to being the head coach of the Phoenix Suns, three superstar names and I guess nine other scrubs. Matter of fact, on the other side of the break, we're going to ask this man about the Suns. We'll ask him about Rick Carlisle. We'll ask him about Anthony Edwards. We'll ask him about the Knicks. We'll get into it all because on the other side of the break, we're going to talk to an NBA champ, an analyst, a radio host. Antonio Daniels is going to join us. We have so much to get into the rest of the show. We're going to talk some NFL. We get into it all. I'm just getting warmed up.

Antonio Daniels on the other side, it's the JR Sport Reef Show, the infinity sports network. Worried about letting someone else pick out the perfect avocado for your perfect, impress them on the third date guacamole? Well, good thing Instacart shoppers are as picky as you are. They find ripe avocados like it's their guac on the line. They are milk expiration date detectives.

They bag eggs like the 12 precious pieces of cargo they are. So let Instacart shoppers overthink your groceries so that you can overthink what you'll wear on that third date. Download the Instacart app to get free delivery on your first three orders while supplies last.

Minimum $10 per order additional term supply. Live nation presents concert week now through May 14th. Get $25 tickets to over 5000 shows. That's up to 75% off a summer full of your favorite artists like 21 Savage, Alanis Morissette, Cage the Elephant, Celeste Barber, Dierks Bentley, Fade, Hootie and the Blowfish, Janet Jackson, Kidz Bop Kidz, Meghan Trainor, Bissell Foom, Sarah McLachlan. Get tickets to more than 5000 summer shows for just $25 until now through May 14th.

Visit live nation.com slash concert week to learn more and plan your summer with Sean Paul, Sum 41, 30 Seconds to Mars, Oh and Two Door Cinema Club. Are you a fan of mystery and adventure? Introducing June's Journey, the captivating free to play mobile game that will ignite your inner detective. Play as June Parker in a thrilling murder mystery adventure as you search for hidden objects to uncover the truth behind her sister's death. Step into the glamorous world of the Roaring Twenties with stunningly illustrated scenes and over 1000 mysteries to unravel. With new chapters added weekly, you'll never run out of clues to chase and suspects to interrogate. Plus, you can build your own island escape with beautiful gardens and buildings and even join a detective club to collaborate with other players. Experience the thrill of being a detective and unravel the mystery in June's Journey.

Download June's Journey now on your Android or iOS device or play on PC through Facebook games. You're listening to the JR Sport Brief, the JR Sport Brief show here with you coast to coast on the Infinity Sports Network. We're getting closer. We're almost there. We're almost to the conference finals and the playoffs for the NBA. The Knicks and Pacers will be in action in about an hour. Nuggets and Timberwolves will be back tonight. Both the Knicks and the T-Wolves have 2-0 series lead. We just talked about Rick Carlisle getting fined. We talked about the undermanned Knicks that got into the Suns. Well now it's time to talk to someone who played in the league for more than a decade. Won a championship with the Spurs. He's covering, well he's not covering, he's an analyst for the New Orleans Pelicans on Valley Sports. He also is a host on the afternoons on NBA radio.

I don't know when he sleeps. Joining us is Antonio Daniels. Antonio, how are you man? I'm awesome brother. How are you? I'm amazing. Thanks for having me first and foremost.

Oh, without a shot of a doubt, it's good to have you on again. What has captured your attention the most so far in this round of the postseason? Honestly, and I know it sounds simplistic, but two guys. The play of Jalen Bruns and Anthony Edwards to me is incredible. It's incredible. Just think, we're literally, and I say we as the collective we, meaning the media, are comparing Anthony Edwards to Michael Jordan. Literally comparing Anthony Edwards to Michael Jordan. We watched Anthony Edwards and the Minnesota Timberwolves completely dismantle the Denver Nuggets in the first two games.

Obviously the series not over, but those first two games are pretty telling. And then Jalen Bruns is doing something we haven't seen anybody do in quite some time. And that's really put that entire franchise on his shoulders. He is doing this without a second best player, without his best shooter, and, back down a bit, without his best shot blocker, and Mr. Robinson, and he may have to do it without his best defender in Occhiano. What these guys have done in the postseason to completely enhance the narrative surrounding them, to me is utterly incredible. Antonio Daniels is here with us, the JR Sport Reshow Infinity Sports Network.

Well, let's stick with Jalen Brunson. We know the New York Knicks, they have an opportunity tonight to go up 3-0 against the Pacers. You just discussed how undermanned they are.

At what point is this going to catch up? Do you still think that they can win this series, or would you favor the Pacers right now? I mean, the thing that's very, very difficult to do, no matter what, it's very difficult to win four out of five times. Getting down an 0-2 hole is, any way you look at it, undermanned are not that tough. Because if you're the Indiana Pacers, you have to win four of the next five. And that means you have to defeat Jalen Brunson, Daunte DiVincenzo, Josh Hart, undermanned for sure. But to defeat the New York Knicks four of the next five times when the Knicks still have two of those games in Madison Square Garden, again, just like Never Nuggets.

I'm not saying it's impossible, but I'm saying that's going to be very, very, very tough to do. Well, we know that the coach of the New York Knicks, Tom Thibodeau, he gets a lot of crap. He's gotten a lot of crap, whatever you want to call it, over the past 10 years about his usage and the stars and players and driving them into the ground.

What say you about Coach Tibbs? Here's my thing. This is the part that I don't understand.

We discussed this on our Sirius XM show yesterday. People got to make up their mind. Because on one hand, what people are saying about the league is it's soft. Guys don't want to play anymore. You know, there's a 65-game player participating in policy for a reason.

You know, load management, you know, all these other kind of things. And then you have a coach that actually goes out there and plays as players and he's wrong too. So where's the gray area here? Because if guys don't play, then people are mad at them. And if guys do play, then people are mad at them. Where's the gray area?

Help me understand this part. I see no issue on what Tibbs is doing. Because you know what the alternative is? They are the alternative is losing. That's your turn.

If I don't play these guys, like I do in the regular season, do you think they actually make it up to the number two seed in the Eastern Conference? Not a chance. Not a chance. He did what he had to do.

And I will say this, though. There is a particular type of player that works for Tibbs. That's right. Perfect for Tibbs.

Perfect for Tibbs. Like when the whole poll came out of players that would love to play for this particular coach, can they receive any votes? What that tells you, I think is more about the league than it does about the particular coach.

He's doing exactly what he needs to do to be successful. That's what this league should be about. Because when you acquiesce to the players, what ends up happening is you're Adrian Griffin and you're fired for winning 70% of your games. Or you're Darvin Hambs and you're fired for two seasons for being put in a championship or bus situation. Or you're Frank Vogel and you're fired after one year.

NBA vet, current analyst, radio and TV, Antonio Daniels is here with us. You talk about Frank Vogel getting the boot. We've heard about Mike Butenholzer likely to take that job for the Phoenix Suns. Do you think the coach is going to make a difference? It's the roster, no?

Well, this is my issue with that. With the whole situation in Milwaukee, the whole situation in LA, the whole situation now in Phoenix, is it's roster construction. I don't care who goes to authentic Lakers. You could have put Phil Jackson there. You could have put Red R back there.

You could have put John Wooden there. They were not defeating the Denver Nuggets. Last year, they weren't defeating the Denver Nuggets this year, the way those rosters were constructed. It wasn't happening.

Plain and simple. All year, you heard about Frank Vogel acquiescing, talking to the front office about getting a point guard. You know what they said? No, no, no, no, no.

You don't need one. But then when it doesn't work, Frank Vogel has to fall on the sword. So what he wanted, he didn't have. So they're asking him to make guys a version of themselves that never existed. You know what Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal, and Devin Booker never did? They never played the point guard position.

That's not who they are. They were put on this world to do a lot of different things. But when you talk about being in between those four lines, they were put there to score.

That's it. They were put in there to score the basketball. And what Frank Vogel wanted was a point guard to facilitate, understand time score, situation, where the ball needed to be, and how to get the ball to those particular guys. The front office said, nah, you know what, you're okay.

So then when they get swept in the first round, Frank Vogel is the guy who falls on the sword. For me, I don't grasp that concept. I don't. And I love Bud. Bud was my PD coach, my player development coach here in San Antonio. So I have a ton of love for Mike Boonhoser, his family, everyone.

I just hope the best for him in that particular situation. We know how it goes with players running the show. Antonio Daniels is here with us on the JR Sport Brief show. You know, earlier on, and I guess we're moving into a different space, because the Suns are out of here primarily because of the defense of the Minnesota Timberwolves. And you mentioned him earlier as capturing your attention, Anthony Edwards. I mean, the comparisons, as you mentioned, to Michael Jordan are there.

They're not just jokes right now that are running on the Internet. What is really impressing you about him? He's 22 years old. He hasn't reached his peak.

And you could say right now he's the best two guard in the game. I'll tell you what's impressed me about him. What's impressed me about him is the same thing that's always impressed me about him. It's not the physical attributes. It's not the skill set. It's the mindset. It's the mentality. Because in today's generation of NBA athletes, there's a low management mentality that comes along with it.

And it's very rare to find that guy that wants to go out and compete every night. And the thing is, that is contagious. When it's your best player, it's contagious. When your best player is held accountable by Chris Finch, that's contagious.

That's how Corcher's built. Being here in San Antonio, there's a reason that they have the same success for 20 plus seasons. Because their head guy, meaning Grant Popovich, could hold their star players accountable. So now if he can hold that star player accountable, everybody else was open for it. Now when your star player is not on board with the head coach, that's a problem. We see that in different places throughout this league. We talked about Milwaukee earlier with Giannis.

We talked about LeBron and Anthony Davis in LA with Darvin Ham. Listen, what they have going in Minnesota is only going because of Anthony Edwards. If Anthony Edwards isn't on board, no one else is on board. The fact that he has that mentality, that almost 1990s mentality, to go out and compete, and as he says, and I quote, to kill everything in front of me, that's contagious.

That's how Corcher is being built in Minnesota. So the most impressive thing to me about Anthony Edwards is his mentality. Yes, the skill set is what it is. The physical attributes are what they are. But his mentality is otherworldly to me.

You talk about mentality. Last night we saw the Boston Celtics fall to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Do you have any concerns about the Celtics? It's one loss, but some of the performances over the past few years, they're up, they're down, they're here, they're in the finals, they lose, they're good.

You just never know. They have so much talent. Yeah, for me, Boston sometimes, and I mean this respectfully to the Miami Heat, and I mean this respectfully to the Cleveland Cavaliers, I'm not taking away what Cleveland did yesterday, but sometimes it seems to me that Boston gets bored. You know, they ran through the regular season. They did what they had to do. They had the number one overall seed as far as home court throughout the entire playoff run locked up for like the past month, you know, for the last month of the season.

So I feel like there's a human element that sets into this, and realistically, they haven't been tested yet. You know, we can sit here and talk about, oh, it's Jason Tatum. Jason Tatum's not playing. Like, they literally ran through the Miami Heat. Miami Heat did win one game, but they ran through the Miami Heat. Cleveland Cavaliers won one game, and we'll see how it looks here on out. But realistically speaking, the Boston Celtics have yet to be tested, and they haven't done, I guess if I do, to answer your question, Jay, I guess if I do have one issue with the Boston Celtics. Obviously, it's depth.

You look at the health of Chris Sorsingas, and sometimes they can become too isocentric for me. As far as your turn, my turn, between Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown. Yeah, you gotta move that basketball around. Well, Antonio, we know that we're moving towards the conference finals before we get to the big one. The defending champs are down 0-2. Celtics are up and down. New York Knicks, short-handed. The Wolves are beaten up on everybody.

You got a young OKC team. At this point, who do you favor to hoist Larry O'Brien? Oh man, I don't. I don't. The thing is, I would love to revisit this conversation in about a week and a half. Because the thing that is always amazing to me about the postseason, Jayar, is just how much narrative changed so quickly.

You think about it. A team will be down 0-2, and then everybody's writing them off nationally. And then they come back and they dominate the next two games, and then the narrative switches back to, OK, now I'm favoring them again.

So the thing I don't like to do is jump to a conclusion that quickly. For example, for me, Denver's down 0-2. But I feel like because of what they did last year in the postseason, and even what they did this year in the regular season, they deserve some grace. They deserve some championship grace.

When you win an NBA championship, you deserve a little bit of grace. Am I saying that that series is over? Not at all. Not at all. Like, obviously, things change with the game today.

Again, narratives change from game to game, series to series, and home court to home court. I would love to revisit this conversation in about a week and a half, two weeks, and then I will gladly answer that question. Well, before we get to the finals, then come back and let's chat it up, Antonio. Hey, let me know when I'm here.

Well, listen, final question for you. Earlier this week, we talked about some of the best international players to ever lace them up. And I excluded your teammate, Mr. Tim Duncan of the U.S. Virgin Islands. Who would you say, based on the almost 80-year history now of the NBA, who would you say is the best international player?

Who had the best career to go ahead and lace him up from overseas? So does Tim Duncan not count? Yeah, I'm leaving him out.

Let's leave the territory. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. So he doesn't count. So who all counts?

Does Hakeem Olajuwon count? In Nigeria? Yeah, Nigeria.

Ooh, that's a toughie, man. You got Nigeria? You got Germany? You got Serbia?

I included Canada? Yeah. Yeah, but when I, like, off the top right now, I'm thinking Dirk.

I'm thinking Hakeem Olajuwon. Okay. And obviously, I'm not doing my research on it. I'm just thinking right off the top of my head. And I know how this works.

I'll hang up the phone right now, be driving my daughter to volleyball practice, and I'll say, oh, shoot, you know, I forgot to learn the blank. But right now, the two that really stand out to me, especially excluding Tim Duncan or Dirk Nowitzki and Hakeem Olajuwon. No, you're not going to forget nothing, because those were the two top guys that we had on the list. So, hey, you played in the league. You made me feel like a genius.

Okay, Antonio? Appreciate it, man. You do so much great work on the Radio Sirius XM, so much with Bali covering the Pelicans as an analyst. Where can people follow you online and all your musings, man? For me, I'm just ADaniel33 on Twitter. That's it.

That's it for me. Listen, AD, enjoy the weekend, enjoy the ball, and we'll chat it up when the finals get going, okay? For sure. I appreciate you, brother. Thanks for having me.

No doubt about it. That, Antonio Daniels, 13-year NBA vet, current analyst on television for the New Orleans Pelicans, as well as an afternoon host with Rick Kamler on Sirius XM NBA radio. Always a pleasure to chat it up with Antonio Daniels.

You are locked in to the JR Sport Reshow here on the Infinity Sports Network. We're going to take a break, and when we come back on the other side, it's time to have a conversation about a team that he says, they just get bored. Because last night, I don't want to say I was shocked, because they lay these eggs.

We're going to talk about the Celtics. Are they joke artists? Are they not prepared? Or, as Antonio said, do they just get bored?

We're going to talk about these shamrock people on the other side. Look around. You can find cars like these on Auto Trader, like that car riding your tail. Or if you're tailgating right now, all those cars doubling as kitchens and living rooms are on Auto Trader too. Are you working out and listening to this ad at the same time?

Well, multitasking pro. Cars like the ones in the gym parking lot are for sale on Auto Trader. New cars, used cars, electric cars, maybe even flying cars. Okay, no flying cars, but as soon as they get invented, they'll be on Auto Trader.

Just you wait. Auto Trader. Live Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC. Member NYSE SIPC. LegionAthletics.com.

Go to LegionAthletics.com to get 20% off your order now. You're listening to the JR Sport Brief. Hey, thank you so much to Antonio Daniels for joining us on the other side of the break. Man played in the league for more than 10 years, won a championship with the Spurs, played with Tim Duncan, played under Greg Popovich, is now an analyst. But that guy knows what the hell he's talking about when it comes to the NBA. So thank you to Antonio Daniels, really bigged up.

Anthony Edwards said it's his mentality that's driving this 22-year-old to be one of the best players in the NBA right now. And so thank you again. Also, it is official now. There's no more speculation. Coach Bütenholzer, Mike Bütenholzer is the new head coach of the Phoenix Suns. A five-year contract. $50 million.

That's it. Five years, $50 million. $10 million a year. He's been a winner. He won a championship with the Bucks. His Bucks beat the Suns. And now Bütenholzer gets to coach the Suns.

Hickey, you think he's going to be coach all five years? No. No. Oh my God. I mean, there's a few things here.

Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal, these guys are going to be gone. I don't know. It's funny.

I don't want to say it's funny. That's a lot of money. That's a long-term deal. You don't really hear about coaches getting five years?

That's a lot. Four years? Three years?

Okay, great. Five years? Is Matt Ishby a hickey? He's crazy, right? He's nuts. He's nuts.

He's nuts. And he's also rich. So you can afford after firing your coach after year one, you can afford then to give a guy a five-year, $50 million contract. I guess Mike Bütenholzer, his agent just stuck him up. He's like, you want Bütenholzer? You got to give him five years.

If not, just something else. Five years is a long time for a coach who hasn't done anything. It's one thing to say Bütenholzer has been there for five years and now we're granting him a five-year extension. He's just getting the job.

This is a volatile job. Kevin Durant ain't going to beat a man forever. He may not be in Phoenix forever. Devin Booker may not stick around forever.

I don't know. Congratulations, Mike Bütenholzer. This man got a guaranteed $50 million coming his way outside of that. It's nutty.

Congratulations to him. Let's see what they do with the players because as Antonio Daniels just told us on the other side of the break, the players are what matters. Don't matter who's out there for Mike Bütenholzer if he ain't got nobody to go out there and coach. Something else that was brought up with Antonio Daniels was the Boston Celtics. And what a pitiful showing they had last night as the Cavs smacked them 118 to 94.

This was embarrassing, okay? Tatum, who has a reputation of at times disappearing. 25 points on seven of 17 shooting. Jalen Brown.

People were talking about this man's handle last year and they were making fun of his handle last night going left. 19 points, seven of 17 shooting. Derek White, who's been lighting it up for the Celtics, dropping more than 20 points a game. He had 10 points on three of 11 shooting. Meanwhile, Donovan Mitchell at 29. Evan Mobley chipped in with 21. And the Cavs, they've tied the series up.

This is supposed to be a series where the Celtics just blow them out and run away. That was not the case. And Jason Tatum, it was a little bit of a defense of the squad because he said, listen, all y'all expectations. He said, we ain't no super team. We don't get treated like one.

Listen to this. The idea that we have a super team, twofold, right? We didn't have the coach of the year. We didn't have the MVP.

We only had two all-stars. So say we're a super team, but we didn't get rewarded like we are. But we know we got a good team. We're not perfect. We played the right way more often than not. And we know we gotta be better. But for, I guess, the same people that are spoiled for our success, we don't pay attention to those things. We just go out there and control what we can't control.

Oh, OK. I mean, they got a lot of talent on that roster. You're supposed to be the man.

Don't don't pull back on excuses now. Who cares about super team? Y'all got a lot of talent yet to all stars, man.

I don't matter what you call yourselves, you're supposed to be out there winning. Joe Missoula, the man who talks a mile a minute in the softest voice ever. He was asked about his team's effort, and this is what he said. I mean, actually, this is a lot of what he said.

It's a montage of what he said. Well, the transition defensive byproduct of your offensive spacing and shot selection. So that's not an effort thing as much as it's an execution thing. And yes, so they beat us to a few of the loose balls, especially in that first half. Did the misses feed into some defensive lapses that seems to have been a tendency in the past?

Is this kind of like a thing like that that is kind of creeping back in a little bit? I mean, I don't know if it's creeping back in, but I definitely think there were times in the game where we went through tough stretches offensively that it affected our defense. Joe, was this loss completely tactical? It was nothing mental. You guys didn't. It was not effort. You guys lost like 28 points or whatever. What happened? I mean, I'll have to go back and watch the film, but I think when you lose a game like that, it could be a combination of tactics, combination of effort, combination of a little bit of all those things at times.

Not to say it was one thing the entire time, but it's probably a combination of those. And you guys haven't had your ass kicked like this in a long time. How do you guys respond from this in two days? You treat it as if you the same way you would have when you come in tomorrow, you watch the film and you get better for game three.

Damn. Every time he talks to the media, it's like it's like going to the dentist office. Like he doesn't enjoy and I get it. He lost.

But even when he wins, it's like he doesn't enjoy anything about his job. And so meanwhile, you got Joe Missoula, who's talking about execution and Jalen Brown is just saying our whole performance, especially on defense, was just crap. I think it was just a bad game. Obviously, we didn't shoot the ball very well tonight, but defensively it was unacceptable performance. And I think that's where, you know, we look at that and I'm the most upset and defensively, you know, we gave up 118 points and then on top of that, we lost the rebound battle.

So we didn't help ourselves tonight. Overall, maybe we missed some shots and we let that translate and it's the playoffs that can't happen. I don't care if you're missing shots, you got to guard a guy on the other end. Then that allows you to miss more shots if you're playing defense, but you can't miss shots and then allow them to make shots on the other end. That was unacceptable. Wow.

How about this? The players are a little more accountable than the coach. The coach just spits out garbage to avoid saying anything.

Jason Tatum, he had an answer about how they can bounce back after this blowout. Just get ready for Saturday. Nobody was in there defeated or deflated. I mean, never want to lose, especially in the playoffs. A lot of things we can learn from and we get it, right? The world thinks we're never supposed to lose. We're supposed to win every game by 25.

It's not going to be like that all the time. We don't expect it to be easy. It's a good team we're playing. It's the second round of the playoffs. It's going to be fun the rest of the series.

It's going to be fun. They should still beat their ass if they lose another game in the series. Even that is too many. It stopped there. Hickey, I don't like Joe Mizzou. I got to be honest.

I don't know him to not like him personally, but I just don't like the guy. It's hard to tell. Yeah, it's just like, stop.

Can you be normal? We get it. You're a coach, but I think this is going to backfire on him if they don't win a championship. That's it. He just is unbearable.

He sucks. It's the JR Sport Reshow here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. We're going to take a break. When we come back on the other side, and maybe I'll talk a little bit more about Joe Mizzou, but how about this? The New York Knicks and the Pacers, they're about to be in action in a few minutes.

There's one player in the NBA who thinks the New York Knicks, everything they're doing is a fluke. I'm going to tell you who it is on the other side. It's the JR Sport Reshow. We've got available dual wireless charging for our phone so we'll never lose touch with civilization and we won't lose touch with the primordial power of Mother Earth. So which is it? Waste the weekend or do something a little more epic and conquer it in the all-new Hyundai Santa Fe. Visit HyundaiUSA.com or call 562-314-4603 for more details.

Hyundai, there's joy in every journey. Listen as Selenia tells us why she chose to vaccinate her daughter. I definitely felt like the pros far outweighed the cons, the diseases that I am protecting my child against.

They're still here and at the end of the day it's my job as a mother to keep my child safe. Talk to your child's doctor and learn more at WhyVaccines.com. Brought to you by Merck. Tired of sifting through countless supplements? Unsure of what's actually effective? Introducing Legion, the choice of over 800,000 discerning fitness enthusiasts with all natural products, clinically effective ingredients, doses, and hassle-free money-back guarantee, you can achieve your fitness goals without the unnecessary guesswork. Say goodbye to wasted efforts and hello to results with Legion.

You don't need supplements to build muscle, lose fat, or get healthy, but the right ones can help. Visit LegionAthletics.com. Go to LegionAthletics.com to get 20% off your order now.