Well, so much for the Brooklyn Nets as a Super Team!

It is the Adam Gold show. I'm him. That is Victoria. Still with us.

Yeah, sort of an air cast on her wrist. Still with you. Are you still throwing up weight? What's going on? Oh no, I'm not allowed to throw up any weights for at least seven to ten days apparently.

So what are you doing in trying not to eat everything? Ah, yes. Yes, yes, yes. Those things are very difficult. Struggle.

Oh well. There's, I don't know, there's always water aerobics. Yeah. Oh yeah, I'm a big fan of swim.

I used to swim competitively in high school. Oh, did you? So I'm a big fan of that. Oh my gosh. Candace and I have that in common.

Very nice. Candace Cooper, our friend, from the Locked On ACC podcast. There's ACC news to, well it's not really good news.

I mean, we haven't lost anybody. ACC, the analytics have finally caught up with the fact that the ACC is kind of not so good. And we'll talk about this in a few minutes. According to Ken Palm, the Atlantic Coast Conference is now the seventh best conference in college basketball. Okay. Seventh best. Yeah.

Behind the powerful Mountain West. There we go. Exactly. Exactly. So is the ACC really worse than the Mountain West?

No, but the ACC has an unusual number of really horrible teams. And that is a problem. We will talk about that in a little bit. It's still Super Bowl week, right? It is. Guess what?

What's that? Once again, the sport of basketball doesn't want us to talk about the Super Bowl. We are going to talk about the Super Bowl anyway.

Mike Glenn is going to join us in about 20 or so minutes and we'll talk about the two offenses we are going to see. Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts and all that. But once again, the NFL does this to everybody else. It does. So it's okay for it to happen to the NFL.

I feel like these are siblings trying to get their parents' attention. Well, the truth is that the NBA in terms of interest is so far behind the NFL like every other sport is, right? So like during March, there's no NFL. Nothing happening in the NFL in March. March Madness is not about football. Except that the NFL still dominates.

Because we have the combine and we have the draft and the draft season is like two months long where we have all the speculation. So the NFL just constantly intrudes on other sports. Look, the NFL kicked college football off Thursday nights basically.

It did. Most of us, I was going to say grew up, but most of us recently can remember when Thursday Night Football used to be a big deal. You could argue that Virginia Tech's existence in football as a, not a national, but a regional power entirely based on their willingness to play a lot of Thursday night games.

And that became the Lane Stadium experience and all that. East Carolina's played a ton of Thursday night games, right? The NFL went, huh, Thursday night football.

We should do that. And now it's like we're playing a Thursday night game. Really?

Again? Nobody's gonna watch us. That's why I've been arguing that the Atlantic Coast Conference should be playing Friday Night Football every week until the NFL decides that, you know what, we should be playing Friday Night Football. So, but now the NFL is getting it turned on them by the NBA. Yesterday we had LeBron James breaking records.

He did. Right? We also locally we had North Carolina, you know, stinking up the Lawrence Joel Coliseum. But we had LeBron James breaking records. So it's only Wednesday. I mean, Super Bowl's not until Sunday. So we wait another day. Then today, NBA trade deadline and holy mackerel.

So let's go. So much for the Brooklyn Nets as a super team. So we had yesterday with Kyrie. Today or I'm sorry, two days ago, Kyrie was traded yesterday. Kevin Durant out the door. The Lakers also made a trade yesterday. And in the grand scheme of things, people are gonna be like Lakers in one.

OK, whatever. And I'm not sure even if it was the only trade, if we wouldn't have been there anyway. They swapped one Russell for another.

Yeah. This this Russell is a better shooter, the one they got. But I really don't think it tips the the scales in favor of L.A. being top six in that conference, to be honest.

But I could be wrong. Anyway, it really comes back to the fact that the Nets have completely dismantled their super team. Let's remember what happened.

Summer of twenty nineteen. Kyrie Irving leaves. Where was Kyrie Irving again? Was he in Boston?

I don't even remember. I think it was Boston left Boston. Remember, he left the Cavaliers to go to Boston where he wasn't a great player, wasn't available. He got hurt.

Blah, blah, blah. They did not play well. Leaves Boston as a free agent, goes to Brooklyn. Later that day or the next day, the Nets announced that they were doing a sign and trade with Golden State for Kevin Durant. And oh, boy, we had Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving teaming up. Going to bring Brooklyn all these championships. OK, so when at the time of the trade, at the time of all that, Kevin Durant still had another year where he was out with an injury.

Right. He had the Achilles injury that he suffered against when he was at Golden State for the last year. And he's going to miss an entire season. So the Nets did this deal with Golden State knowing that Durant was not going to be around for the 19-20 season. And Durant obviously had other injuries as well that have gotten in the way, as has Kyrie.

As it turns out, they really weren't good enough. Then last year, they go out in the beginning of the year and they get James Harden. Oh, my gosh, they got Durant. They got Harden. They got Kyrie.

It is going to be great. You know how many games those three guys played together? Would that be a goose egg? No, no, they played 16. Oh, wow.

Sort of a goose egg. But no. Yeah, they did not. None of those games were in the postseason. Tim Blegler, ESPN NBA analyst on this experiment.

We're talking about something that's going to go down. I think it's not just maybe the greatest underachievement in the history of the NBA. This is one of the greatest underachievements in the history of team sports, because when they put these three guys together, that should have been guaranteed titles.

I think it was the greatest collection of offensive talent ever assembled at the top of one roster when all three guys were there. And the reason that I felt that way about the Nets last week was because I think this was the best stretch Kyrie Irving had as a Net. He looked bought in.

He looked engaged. The Nets had run off at one point 18 out of 20 when Durant was still playing. So you're thinking, well, get him back and they're going to be right there in the mix with those top three in the East. The one thing, though, that they overestimated was guys willingness to buy in for the long haul and be committed to be in the foxhole together no matter what. And they made a huge overestimation there.

Sometimes the truth is really right in front of you. All the basketball stuff that Tim Blegler said there was 100 percent accurate. Irving was playing great. And when Durant was healthy, the Nets did look like they were trending towards the top of the Eastern Conference. No guarantees, by the way.

We should know this by now. There are no guarantees in anything. The Miami Heat had LeBron James, Dwyane Wade both not necessarily in their primes. Wade was sort of at the back. He was already on the back side of his career. LeBron James absolutely in his prime and Chris Bosh and other pieces around them and only won two titles in four years. So there was nothing guaranteed at all to go to to Brooklyn. But it obviously did not work out. What they really underestimated was the motivation for Kyrie Irving.

Everything was fine this year. Kyrie tried to get a contract. The Nets went, yeah, no, we're not feeling it. And then Kyrie's like, all right, I'm going to blow it up then.

Trade me. And once that trade happened, they basically had to trade Durant. I mean, they could have kept Durant, but clearly the Nets weren't good enough to win. Durant understands at age 34 and frequently injured that this is his time to grab it. They nearly traded Durant in the off season when it looked like they were going to trade Irving and Durant wanted out. And it was I think we said this yesterday or the day before that the Suns were the place that he wanted to go. Yeah, it's not the same deal that they would have made in the summer. But I mean, there's a lot in the the Nets got back. Mikael Bridges, an unbelievable defender and three point shooter, former Tar Heel Cam Johnson comes back in the deal to Brooklyn.

Jay Crowder, who by mutual agreement, hasn't even played this year. I don't want to play for you. You don't want to you don't want me to play for you.

So why don't I just hang out at the house? Sure. That's what Jay Crowder has been doing. They also get four first round picks and they can flip first round picks with Phoenix in 2028. So they got a lot for Kevin Durant who wants to win a title and maybe he can win a title with Phoenix this year. I don't know.

Devin Booker, Chris Paul, Kevin Durant, they have some other pieces around them. Maybe that's enough. I don't know. We will certainly find out. I do think that the West at the top is kind of not sure.

It seems a little soft at the top. It's I think it's pretty tight top to bottom in the West, except for the Lakers, who aren't very good. Anyway, if I were Brooklyn, I would actually keep selling. Yeah, like all the good players I just brought in. Who wants him? Who wants him?

Let's let's keep selling. Here's Nick Fredell of ESPN on the fact that the Nets did want to try and keep Durant. The Nets wanted desperately to keep Kevin Durant.

They love the guy. But when you trade for Ben Simmons and he does not live up to being the type of player that we saw for those years in Philadelphia, that is a huge problem. So if you're trying to make these moves in the last few days, try and improve your team now and try to get Durant to stay. I think it's also an acknowledgement that with Simmons, they're just there's not a lot of different wiggle room. And he never was the player that the Nets were hoping that he would be.

Who could have seen that coming? Ben Simmons has always been more of a dream than a reality. Always. I just sometimes it's pretty simple. If you don't want to shoot, then your value is less. Yeah, I don't care how good you are in every other area. If you don't want to shoot, then you have limitation. It's basketball. That's the point of the game.

I mean, it'd be like signing a designated hitter who doesn't want to hit. Yeah. Like, yeah, you know what? I just I don't feel like it. I just like hot dogs.

I want to hang out. I don't get it. So anyway, here's Kyrie Irving, because I'm sure he's not reveling in this at all.

Kyrie after his first game with Dallas on his former team and teammate. Well, it's not the first time we'll be in a competition as brothers. You know, I'm just praying for his happiness and praying for his well being. We had a lot of conversations throughout the year of what our futures were going to look like. There was still a level of uncertainty, but we just cared about seeing each other be places that we can thrive and whether that be together or whether that be a part.

There's never been one moment where I felt like he's been angry at me for decisions I've made or I've been angry at him. We've just tried to understand each other a lot better and grow as human beings, grow as brothers. His business changes so quickly. He's getting a little bit older. I'm getting a little bit older. I just love the competition now that we can be in the same conference and I welcome all that, you know, get to see him a little bit more and probably playing against Phoenix a lot more. And that's what I'm looking forward to.

Everything else in between. I just am glad that he got out of there. He escaped, right?

He is the Snake Plissken of the NBA. For those people, whoever's did you ever see the movie Escape from New York? No, a great, great movie.

Really is a great movie. All right, one final thing on this. This is quick. Does this deal make Phoenix now the favorite in the West? Jay Williams from ESPN. I think this team kind of challenges those 2017, 2018, 2019 Golden State Warrior teams as relates to talent. Devin Booker is one of the realest two guards in the league. CP3, you can say he gets older and he might get injured later in the season. That's the thing. But I like him orchestrating this team with DeAndre Ayton.

They still have to find, I mean, they have Tori Craig who played. He's stepping in, giving him great minutes right now. They're absolutely loaded. I mean, they're good. I don't know if they're deep. I don't know if they're deep enough and I'm not entirely sure they're great defensively now, but I mean, Durant and Booker, they can score.

They should be able to score and we'll find out. All right, to the Super Bowl and then we'll get to the ACC. I'm not even sure there's that much buzz right now.

I know. Around the Super Bowl. What, like, what were the storylines going in? We had Andy Reid coaching against his former team. Mahomes' injury. Right. And Jalen Hurts' injury. Yep. And Kelsey versus Kelsey. Yes.

Other than that, what is there? All right, so there is health to talk about. Albert Breer from Monday Morning Quarterback. He is the senior NFL analyst on Mahomes' ankle injury. I think he's going to be close to 100%.

Like, maybe not 100%, but close to 100%. You got to think, there's been 22 days out since he first got hurt. This is a milder, and there's no such thing as a truly mild high ankle sprain because this is like a big damage. But, you know, generally on the low end, this can be a four-week injury. He's going to be at over three weeks. And I just think, you know, you look at his history too, and like, look at like the, you know, like you just sort of like look back at like the way he came back from the injury during their Super Bowl year. I can't remember what specifically the injury was, but he's always been sort of this quick healer. And so, and he said himself, like, they're going to push him on, they're going to push it with them on, on, on Friday and Saturday to just kind of test it and get it going. And you wouldn't be doing that if he wasn't close to 100%.

So I think we're going to get close to, if not the Foma Holmes. Why are we acting as though we didn't see him play 10 days ago? Yeah, I know. I mean, we just, he played, he didn't get the high ankle sprain after the AFC Championship.

No. He, he got it. He obtained it, if you will, during the divisional round of the playoffs. So he finished that game, then played the following Sunday.

He's going to play and he's going to be like, most of these guys are not 100% anyway, but yes, it's going to limit his mobility, probably his change of direction a little bit more than it would, but he's going to play just like Jalen Hurts is going to play on the other side. Albert Breer on the Eagles mission. To me, like the key, if you're the Eagles is to try to limit possessions. Like I don't think the Eagles want this to be a game where Padma Holmes has 12 possessions. You know what I mean?

Can you keep them the seven or eight possessions? And you do that by keeping your offense in the field. You do that by chipping your way down the field. You do that like through the running game, which should be the Eagles should have a little bit of an edge there on the chief's defense.

So like, I think that's what's so interesting about it. Like I think there is that quality where it's like each team, each defense has trouble stopping the other team's offense. What's going to be interesting to me is to see the way the Eagles play offense and whether or not it's built to sort of shorten the game and make sure that their defense has to get fewer stops on my homes. And you know, again, the way to do that is to go on long dry not drives, bleed the play clock, all those sorts of things. So the key to the Eagles is running the football, which is the key to the Eagles every single week.

Yeah. Every single week. They are fifth in the NFL in rushing. They are first in the NFL in rushing touchdowns by a lot at 32 rushing touchdowns this year, almost to a game. Second place in the NFL was I don't even know who was had 24. The quarterback himself had 13.

Jalen Hurts. So and remember, he missed the game, right? Missed two games. Yeah, he missed two games. Maybe it might have been three.

I don't know. So I'm not at all what the concern would be is if Hurts ultimately can't throw it enough to where Kansas City has to be aware has to be afraid that if they put eight or even nine guys near the line of scrimmage that they'll just throw over the top, right? That's to me if if hurts can't keep Kansas City's defense honest, that's when it becomes a problem for Philadelphia because I don't think there's any team in the league that is going to run against basically what amounts to a nine man front. Anyway, the there's just not right at this point. There's just not a ton of like, wow, we're talking about history here.

We are talking about the two number one seeds. Yeah, I mean that that's not that doesn't happen all the time. It is Andy Reid coaching against his former team. I would point out that it has only happened, I think, four other times in NFL history. I'll throw it out there. Who did it the first time?

Which coach coached against his former team the first time in Super Bowl history? Just throw it out there. We can even put put t-shirts on the line. 919-860-5326. All right now to the ACC.

Yes, which which Super Bowl coach coached against his former team first. Yes. All right, 919-860-5326. We'll get that answer a little bit later on. Anyway, or you could just tweet it to me or Victoria at a gold fan at V underscore V underscore Victoria underscore. I think I forgot it to in there. I don't even know.

I don't even people have your Twitter already. All right, so the ACC doesn't really have any great teams in it this year, right? We're that we're that league this year. So Ken Palm somebody did a look of conferences and Ken Palm has the Mountain West Conference. Ahead of the ACC. And and because the Mountain West Conference is ahead of the ACC than the Mountain West Conference is better than the ACC. Well, that is not real.

That is not true. But because there are a lot of factors for it, I guess there are a lot of ways where you can decide which teams are good and which teams are not. The ACC has five awful teams.

Awful like so bad. You can't believe it. Boston College who won last night at Virginia Tech.

How did that happen? Hokies? You guys were you guys were actually starting to become something again.

And then you go and do that. BC is bad. Georgia Tech is bad. Florida State is bad. Notre Dame is bad. Louisville is bad, bad, bad, bad, bad. Bottom half or worse of all of college basketball. It used to be that the ACC's worst team would be like number 115.

Well, that's basically where Syracuse is. And they're in the middle of the league. It's really, really, really bad. The rest of the league, though, is actually pretty good.

It's not great. Virginia metrically using the metrics is the best. I mean, I personally like Miami, but I understand why why it's Virginia.

Why the why the all the numbers point to Virginia. But my gosh, so many bad teams drag the whole league down. And what it does is it makes everybody's schedule look worse. And even the good teams don't look all that great.

Like Clemson, who's been leading the league since the beginning, is like in the around 70 in the net. That is so bad. So bad. Anyway. All right. Mike Glenn is going to join us on the other side. Let me go, Dylan.

Dylan and Riley, you're going for T-shirts, Dylan. How are you? I'm not doing too bad.

Happy to be here. All right. Who is the first coach to coach against his former team in a Super Bowl? First coach, correct me if I'm wrong, Super Bowl three.

Weeb E-Bank. Coached against the Baltimore Colts. Yep. That was the game. There you go.

Well done. Let's get let's get a T-shirt out of petty cash for for Dylan. Give him two T-shirts. You want two different sizes or you want you like you want to bust out of one and have a backup. Let's do a large and excel. Oh, a large. Oh, I see. So you're working out. I understand.

Yeah, this is like pre Super Bowl and then post Super Bowl. Oh, yeah. See, I was I was going more positively is that he's he's bulking up. And I think it's not in season. It's lean season.

We're trying to lean down. Yeah. Well, that happens. All right. Congratulations, Dylan. You win. Thank you very much. Dylan wins.

Weeb E-Bank. Yes, he coached the the Colts for almost a decade before before becoming the Jets head coach and then winning that Super Bowl, which maybe is the most important game in NFL history. Seriously. Yeah. Might be the most important game in the history. Not NFL history. I guess it was NFL sort of. But the most important pro football game ever, because that one was the one that got the NFL, the old NFL to realize maybe this other league has something. Yeah. And what we see today is what we see today.