Good evening, everybody. This is Bart Winkler.
Welcome into the Winkler-verse. Game five is over. Pacers beat the Bucs, 119 to 118. I've got about 10 minutes before I start my show on the Infinity Sports Network, and I've got to just vent more to a Bucs crowd than having to national it up on the air tonight, although I may just do that when I get on the Infinity Sports Network. I am hot. I'm upset. For the same reasons you are. This is so stupid. This is so stupid. Giannis, I mean, I got to feel what is going on.
He's trying to get in fights with Halliburton's dad. Let me just say, let me get the Pacers thing off my chest first. You can't, this is two years now, and I can't say anything about the Pacers. You can't say anything about the Pacers. You can't say anything about any of these teams. You can't, in the playoffs, be mad about another team, because then their fan base treats you like you're doing something wrong for being annoyed with their team. This is how it works.
These are seven-game series, if you can get it that far. You play the same team over and over in a short span of days, of course you're gonna be annoyed with them. So if I want to say like, man, Tyrese Halliburton, I don't enjoy watching him play. I don't like when he gets all hyped up. I don't like when he does that against me. I don't like when he pretends to be dead, and then he pretends, you know, you shouldn't have tears when you beat this shitty Bucs team in five games. TJ McConnell, just so primal out there after every basket.
He shoots like a kid, but I can't say any of this stuff, because then if I publish it anywhere, it's cry more. Oh, you big mad? Yes, I am mad.
This is how it works. I like my team, and you like your team, and I don't like your team, and you don't like my team, but how come when I don't want to like your team, you got to like get all up in my face. Leave me alone. I am directing my anger at the team.
Not you. You root for whatever you want. You like this. You like this recipe of basketball that the Pacers play. Good.
Like it. I don't. Just like I'm sure you wouldn't like the Bucs, and probably don't. I mean, you kick their ass, but God, it just really bugs me. I never do that to any other fan base.
I never go look at videos and say cry more, or screw you, or LOL. I just, I don't do that to other fans. I, as a fan, should be able to not like a team that I lost to. Is that, well, I don't understand why that's part of the code.
That really pisses me off. This Bucs game, again, it's like we didn't need it to happen this way. Why does it always happen this way? This was the last way it needed to happen. Look, we went in there tonight. At least we didn't get blown out like the Heat did, but you go in there, not expecting anything, and then the Bucs have a 30 to 13 first quarter. It's like, well, and then they're, you know, trailing, and then they come back, and then they're making big shots, and you're like, whoa, and then they have a chance to win, and they blow it, and then Giannis has a chance to win, and he misses, and then they go to overtime, and then they're up seven points with 40 seconds to go. Can't run an inbound play to save their life, and then when they do, they're playing hot potato with it, can't hang on to it, and then don't guard Tyrese Halliburton. The one move you know he has is taking it to the hoop.
Do you stop him ever? What is going on? Like Andre Jackson couldn't have played on that final possession. Just get him out there.
Get somebody out there. Why do coaches not do the right lineup until their backs are totally against the wall? Giannis played 44, Portis played 44, A.J. Green played 46, Kevin Porter Jr. played 47, Gary Trent 48, Damian's out, so obviously K.P.J. played more who wasn't gonna do a dang thing in the playoffs, but why why didn't they go to this earlier? Torrey and Prince?
What? Kyle Kuzma? No, Brook Lopez, eight minutes in this game.
Still, eight minutes too many. From the jump you knew he couldn't play in this series, and I've been ragging on him all year because he's looked like this all year. It's just infuriating, and it's, I don't know what we did because we can't just lose. Like we can't just lose like the Heat. Oh, they didn't have it. They, you know, they lost. You'd rather have it that way than this. I'm almost more annoyed about this loss than I am a whole litany of other losses just because of how stupid this was. This did not need to be the way they lost this series to this team. It just, it just didn't.
It's just complete garbage. Tyrese Halliburton's dad coming up and yelling at Giannis, coming to him on the court. That's what got Giannis all heated.
And then McConnell's up there. I'm watching some of the video like, can't you just win gracefully? Why does it have to be this way? I don't understand it.
I don't get it. I'm so pissed. I'm pissed about, yeah, obviously like I'm pissed that the Bucks lost. I'm pissed that they weren't good enough. I'm pissed that Doc Rivers, you know, this happened. I'm pissed that Dame got hurt. I'm pissed that nothing worked out. I'm pissed that they doubled down on the championship team and it all kind of fell apart. I'm pissed that they could never get it together.
I'm pissed that we never saw Dame and Giannis. But I'm just like, this doesn't need to be this way. I shouldn't have any part of my brain that cares about the Pacers. And they're like the thing I hate more than anything. Not true, but close. I hate other things more.
Sports wise, the Pacers are at the top. I just don't understand it. It doesn't make any sense to me.
I don't get it. So a lot of people are tweeting, you know, last image of Giannis as a Buck is him trying to fight Haliburton's dad. A lot of last game as a Buck kind of stuff. There's just gonna be a lot of that. I don't know what's gonna happen.
I don't know. You know, I've already conditioned my son like, hey, we might trade Giannis, okay? And then he watched the game tonight. He's like, hey, we didn't trade Giannis yet.
I go, oh no, it'll come closer to the summer, buddy. If it happens. I mean, they've got no assets around them. You almost like, it's almost malpractice as an organization not to trade the one thing you have that's an asset, especially when you've got two guys making 58 million dollars and one can't play. So there's 120 million dollars. Now, would you pay Giannis 120 million dollars to play on your team? Sure.
I think we would all say absolutely we would. But also that's not feasible. And you can't build anyone around them. And it's not like we have young guys that we've developed over the years. Screw that up. It's not like they have draft picks that they can quickly replenish with maybe, you know, one down year and then strike again.
Screw that up. They went all in constantly. You know, what they did is they basically, they literally painted themselves into a corner.
They can't go anywhere. They are stuck because of all the moves that they made trying to get the championship. But they did try to get a championship.
They just, again, they just did poorly. Now, they are NBA Cup champions. Let's not forget about that. Let's not forget about that. Gary Trent Jr., I mean, he's got 12 points in overtime, 12 points in the fourth quarter. And we're going to remember him for not being able to hang on to the basketball at the end. And he led the way with 33 points.
Giannis had 20 boards. I mean, why don't, this whole series didn't need to be this way. But coaches, they wait until the last minute before they actually go and get, like, the good silverware. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. We got this the whole time. Oh, the secret weapon the whole time. That would have been good.
We had it the whole time. It's just, it's just pathetic. The whole thing's pathetic. The Pacers are pathetic.
The Bucks are pathetic. I'm pathetic. Sports are pathetic.
Sports are pathetic. Oh, God. You know how many national shows I've done now, like, immediately after? At least there's a little breathing room tonight. I've got about 10 more minutes before I go on air. But, man, Pete Alonso hits a home run right as my show's starting. That was fun.
At least the Packers lose on the weekends. Happy Play Sam. Promo code is Bart. Make sure you check that out. 25% each.
25% off each and every order. I haven't taken a gummy to do my show yet. I do have some in my car.
This may be the day that we, uh, I definitely need to mellow out at some point. HappyPlaySam.com. Promo code is Bart. All right. I'll have more thoughts on this on my show, the Bart Winkler Show. You can get those wherever you get your podcasts as well as this, but just had to get this out here to really... I'm probably just gonna re-rack everything I just said on the show, but I needed to get it out in a more pure form and be able to say fuck. All right. I'll talk to you guys later.
