Joel Embiid Wins MVP (Hour 2)

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So you can spend more time with the ones who matter most. Visit Instacart.com to get free delivery on your first three orders. Offer valid for a limited time, $10 minimum per order, additional terms apply. Welcome to our radio program. Graham, we always love chatting it up with Antonio Daniels this time of the year.

Let's welcome in the Sirius XM, NBA radio host and also the 1999 NBA champion, Antonio Daniels. How you been? I'm blessed, blessed. Zach, how are you doing, brother?

Well, I'm doing fantastic and it's great to get you back on. I did not like what I saw from the Suns in the first round to the playoffs. I picked Denver heading into the series.

Denver last night goes up 2-0. How concerned are you with the Suns because they just have not been the team that I thought they could be before the postseason started? You know what this series kind of shows, and I think it's taught a lesson to many of us, how we can overrate talent.

And I mean that respectfully. The Phoenix Suns can't expedite chemistry. That's the part that's difficult about this league. In an era of super teams, what we automatically assume is if you put good players together, it's automatically going to work regardless of the amount of time that they're given. We saw what happened with Kyrie Irving and Luka.

We saw that. They missed the playoffs. They missed the play-in. And now we're seeing with Kevin Durant and Devin Booker that they only played together, what, six, seven games in the regular season. And then the last two or three games, they chose Mondy Williams and his Phoenix coaching staff chose not to play those guys. Now what you're seeing is what I call on our Sirius XM show a mirroring of what the Brooklyn Nets looked like last year versus the Boston Celtics. It's Kyrie's turn, then it's KD's turn. It's Kyrie's turn, then it's KD's turn. And you're seeing that now, except you're replacing Kyrie Irving with Devin Booker.

That's all. There's no fluidity to their offense. There's no chemistry, offensively. They won that first round back on pure talent. They beat the Clippers on pure talent.

And I said it would be really interesting to see how that series would have looked with a healthy Paul George and with a healthy Kawhi Leonard. But what you have in Denver is something you can't teach. That's camaraderie.

That's chemistry on both sides of the basketball. And that is visible in these first two games so far in Denver. I said Denver in seven going in. I'm ready to now move that to Denver in five. But where are you at at this series?

I know you're picking Denver, but how many games? Yeah, but the thing is now, I think a lot of it depends on Chris Paul, which sucks because it seems like we're constantly and continuing to have the same conversation every time of the year. You know what's interesting Zach? Teams all year long are so big on low management, right? Everybody low manages their players for one reason. So they can be healthy during the post-season. How did that help Kawhi Leonard or Paul George or Giannis Andrzejkounmpo or Tyler Herro or Chris Paul?

You know what I mean? You can go down the different list of stars that have been injured post-season even though they were low managed during the regular season. I do think Phoenix will get one in Phoenix because guys will play better. Cameron Payne will play better. Damian Lee will play better.

DeAndre Ayton will play better. Role players tend to play better at home. So I do think the Phoenix Suns will get one in Phoenix, maybe two.

Maybe two of them in Phoenix because being at home is just a different comfort level regardless as to who's on the floor. So I'll say Denver in six. And I love this story of the Denver Nuggets. We know what the Joker's done the last two years winning back-to-back MVPs.

It seems like everyone tries to take away from his game this year just because of how toxic that MVP conversation has been. But I think people forget in 2021 this team was really thriving. And they went in that long win streak and then unfortunately they lose two games. And Murray then tears his ACL. Murray's now back. And Murray has just been phenomenal.

And we talked about him beating a hard and played well last night. But we need Harden to step up if you're a Sixers fan. And if you're a Nuggets fan, it's like you have your closer in Jamal Murray and he's been so fun to watch and this has been great to see. Well the thing is Jamal Murray wasn't great yesterday. But for the most part he's been fantastic. And it's not just Jamal Murray.

It's great to have him back. But not having Porter back. Having Aaron Gordon.

Having guys that understand and embrace their roles. Guys like Contavious Caldwell-Pope. Guys like Bruce Brown. Guys like Christian Brown. Those kind of guys that embrace their roles which helps them excel in their roles, that is the key to championship teams. I'm not telling you something you don't know. There are about 20, 30 stars in this league.

You know what that means? That means there's 430 or 420 role players. The league is full of role players. For teams to be successful this time of the year, stars are going to be stars. Right? We saw what Devin Booker and Kevin Durant did last night. But what about everybody else?

Right? Stars are going to be stars. To be successful this time of the year, you need role players to step up and to outplay their expectations. Antonio Daniels, the Celtics, I didn't love what I saw from them in the first round. I still think that they should be in the NBA Finals, especially if you take Milwaukee out of the picture. But last night, Noam Bead, I know Harden's not played great in the postseason, but last night he was sensational. I'm kind of stunned that the Sixers ended up winning the game last night. Well, it's always different, man, because you don't really know what to expect from James Harden. You know, his playoff disappointments, I think we remember more of those than we do games like he had last night.

And I think that's where the surprising piece comes from. Not the fact that they won, it's the fact that James Harden truly did turn back the clock about eight years. Not to a postseason James Harden, but to a regular season James Harden. So if that James Harden showed up, I think that surprised many people. I didn't expect that. I am not going to lie to you. I will be a fool to sit here and say, I didn't think Philly could win the game, because I know how difficult it is sometimes for your opponent to prepare when you are down your star.

Down the star. I know, especially for one game, I know how difficult that is to do. But if you were to tell me that Philadelphia is going to win this game, there's somebody that's going to go off that the Boston Celtics can't stop, I would assume there would have been Maxie. I would assume there would be Maxie and not James Harden. And James Harden turned back the clock yesterday in a time when it was needed for the Philadelphia 76ers. And the crazy part about it, Antonio Daniels, no one beat in the game. Jason Tatum scores 39 points. Jalen Brown was 8-10 from the field. You get 20 off the bench from Brogdon.

If I would have told you those numbers before the game, I would have said how many points did the Celtics win by? Right. Right.

And that's the thing. That's why I get frustrated when people don't watch the game and they watch highlights and box scores. Because a lot of times the numbers don't tell the story.

They don't tell the story. It's small things that happen inside the game. In watching that game last night, I say something that drove me crazy. Even on the final possession where James Harden hit a huge shot over Al Horford. Understand that this is a resource driven league.

Right? If he misses that shot, people were all over Doc Rivers the same exact way that people were over Mike Boonhoser for not calling time out. But now that shot goes in, now it's a moot topic. But what drives me crazy watching these games is how you have a guy in Marcus Smart that's an excellent defender. Defensive player of the year last year. You have a guy in Jalen Brown. Excellent defender. And how easy they are giving guys the matchup that they want. So if I'm James Harden, I am searching for Al Horford.

I'm searching for him. And what guys are doing is they're just acquiescing to the switch. A lot of times it's not even a screen.

It's a brush screen. But they're just switching just for the sake of switching. And what that's doing is giving these guys that are extremely skilled and talented the matchup that they want. That's what James Harden wanted. He wanted Al Horford on him because he knew that he could get the shot against Al Horford that he wanted because Al Horford would give him a step.

Just acquiescing to the switch that easy in these games is driving me crazy, Zach. Antonio Daniels, so the Sixers are up 1-0. You have Game 2 coming up tomorrow night. Would you play them or would you rest them just to get back at home for that third game already knowing that you have one in your back pocket?

If Joel Embiid is well enough to play, I will play him. Because the thing you don't want to do if you're a Philadelphia 76ers is have that organizational arrogance. And you say, alright, you know what, we got what we came for. We got what we came for.

This is enough. And you see this tonight with the Miami Heat and Jimmy Butler. Right?

Jimmy Butler said I'm going to try and play because he's being greedy. Which is exactly the mentality you should have this time of the year. Don't be okay.

Right? Don't be okay with just getting one win on the road. If you can get two wins on the road and now go back home up 2-0, that's the mentality you need to have. Joel Embiid is healthy enough to get out there and contribute and play. I am 100% playing him. I would anticipate that the Knicks are going to win tonight, especially without Jimmy Butler. But I did think the Celtics were going to win last night and we know how that didn't go and Joel Embiid didn't play.

Do you anticipate the Knicks to win tonight against the Heat? I didn't see. Is Jimmy Butler out?

He's out. Yep. Okay. Yeah.

So that's surprising to me because from what the reports we received earlier, if he was moving well during shoot around and you know that he was going to give it a go. I would assume, yes. I would definitely assume, especially after getting one in New York. I'm not saying that the Miami Heat will just completely take their foot off the gas because that's not in their culture. But to win without two of your best, probably your two best playmakers and shot makers and Jimmy Butler and Tyler Herro on the road against New York. When New York is down a game, understanding the significance, if they lose this one, yeah, I'm with you, Zach. I would expect New York to win today. What do you expect with LeBron and Steph Curry in this series that gets underway tonight, Lakers and Warriors? You know, I picked the Lakers in seven and I'm not comfortable with that, but I wouldn't be comfortable picking Golden State either.

You know, this is one where I have played tennis with this in my head for quite some time. LeBron just constantly going back and forth. And it's a toughie, man.

It is a toughie. The one thing I think that makes the Lakers extremely dangerous as opposed to in years past is LeBron James doesn't have to be great for them to win. Steph Curry does. You know, LeBron James can go out and give you 20 and give you 20 and 10 and six and they can win. He doesn't even have to be Batman. Right. Anthony Davis can be Batman. LeBron now trust guys like Austin Reeves. He trust guys like DeAngelo Russell, guys like Malik Beasley, guys like Jared Vanderbilt to do their job. Right. So LeBron does not have to be great like he had to be in years past.

And we saw that in round one. Think about Steph Curry. He's in a completely different position, though.

Completely different position. Because if Steph Curry is not great, if Steph Curry is good and Klay Thompson is OK and Andrew Wiggins is OK, they're not winning. Steph Curry actually has to be great to propel the Golden State Warriors to victory.

You think about what he had to do to win that first round series versus Sacramento and you had 360 percent of Sacramento starting five didn't really show up and it still went seven games. So if I'm the Golden State Warriors or a Golden State Warrior fan, that is problematic for me. That's a cause for concern. Not knowing what you're going to get from Jordan Poole after the way he played in the first round. You know, not knowing which Klay Thompson is going to show up versus the Lakers. That's a cause for concern. So, yeah, I picked the Lakers in seven, but I can't say I'm 100 percent kind of confident in that choice. Daniel, it's kind of funny to me the conversation.

Let me preface this. I love Steph Curry. He's one of my favorite players in the game.

He's so fun to watch. But for the last 10 years, all people want to talk about is who's the greatest player of all time. Is it LeBron James or Michael Jordan? And now you have people today saying that Steph, you could argue, has had a better career than LeBron. And this conversation is all over the place. Listen, this this is a prisoner of the moment culture.

That's what we do. So you think about how impactful Steph Curry's game seven was, Zach, because it started conversation after that game and the next morning that wouldn't be had that wouldn't be had otherwise. And I'm sorry, I can't change my whole thought process around the player for one day. Steph was great against the Sacramento Kings in game seven. But understand, that was the first round. That was the first round. We're not talking about game seven of the NBA Finals that you're putting another ring on the finger. That was the first round. And for that first round game seven performance. Now people are saying he's the greatest point guard ever. So the question that I would ask is hypothetically say Steph Curry didn't go for 50 and he went for 30 and they won.

But we still be having that conversation. No, we live in such a prisoner of the moment culture where it's almost like after every big game, there's a quick overreaction. And I am a huge Steph Curry fan. Huge Steph Curry fan. It's going to take a lot more than him performing in a game seven of the first round of the playoffs for me to change and say, okay, now I put Steph here, even though I had him here 24 hours ago. So you still have Magic as the greatest point guard of all time?

Yes. Wrap it up with Antonio Daniels. I want to ask you two more things before we let you run. What's been your view on this entire Dylan Brooks situation? Oh my gosh, where do we start? I call him Bum Brooks, by the way, because he bit off more than he could chew.

No question. And here's my thing about them. There's two things with this. First and foremost, Dylan Brooks all year played a character, right? He played a character. So it was like, okay, this is the guy that I want to be. And then he said some things. And then when his foot got put to the fire, he backed down.

And by backed down, I mean, avoiding the media, gutless, not talking to the media and then blaming the media. No, no, no, no. You can't do that, right?

If you make your bet, go ahead and lay in it. Because here's the thing. You can say all these different things about the media this and the media that. No, people are responding to things that you have done in between the four lines, right?

Different situations that you have put yourself into. I found it ironic. Two things I found ironic. One is that in that Laker series, after he said, I want to poke the bear. I don't respect anyone unless they give me 40. That LeBron goes out and has a 2020 game. Right?

40. And then in the final game, game six, they lose by 40. But with all that being said, that I felt like what the Memphis Grizzlies did today was 100% wrong. Here's the thing. If you don't want Dylan Brooks to come back, just don't resign. That's all just don't resign.

But don't don't make it public that no matter what, you don't want to bring this young man back because now basically you're pushing him out the door with baggage that he doesn't deserve. And here's the thing about this league that when your baggage outweighs your production, teams have stopped rocking with you. And you saw that with Dylan Brooks, because the Dylan Brooks that we saw this playoffs was the same Dylan Brooks we saw last playoffs.

I said last playoffs, he was more productive. They was rocking with him because his impact outweighed his baggage. Now his baggage outweighs his impact and they they sever ties with him. What else does Memphis need to change? Because just getting rid of Dylan Brooks, and I've been as critical as you can be on him, isn't going to solve their problems. Like they're a good team.

I don't view them as a championship team. What do they have to do to change this direction that they're headed in? Man, that's a great question. That's a great question. And I don't think this is simply a Dylan Brooks conversation.

You know, when Taylor Jenkins comes out and says, you know what, we have to mature, you know, we have to mature more than what we are now. It's two guys that he was talking to. The difference is one of them can be replaced and the other one can't.

Right? You can replace Dylan Brooks. You cannot replace Ja Morant.

Because for people to think that he was simply talking about Dylan Brooks, you're fooling yourself. After all Ja Morant went through this year in Memphis, he was talking to both of them. That's the difference between being a max player and a role player. I don't know what the Memphis Grizzlies need. I would say they need some more veteran presence in that locker room.

But that's easier said than done. Because the NBA is getting younger and younger and younger. And a lot of these vets on teams don't want to go to teams and just be a voice.

They actually want an opportunity to contribute. So I don't know what actually makes sense for the Memphis Grizzlies right now moving forward. Before we let you run Antonio Daniels, I know you do the Pelicans games. I know you're very close to Zion Williamson.

Last year you gave us awesome stuff on that. Where are you at with Zion now? Because this has just been such an unfortunate story with him not being able to get on a basketball court. Some things have to change.

That's all. You know when you are four years in and it's the same. We're having the same conversation year after year after year as far as the if conversation. And what if I'm sitting here watching these playoffs against some of these teams and thinking how a healthy New Orleans Pelicans roster would stack up against some of these things.

And I'm confident. But the thing is you have to be available to see this come to. So whatever has been being done in the past as far as conditioning is concerned, work ethic is concerned. Some things need to happen in the summer to change. And that's life.

That's life. When you're trying something and it's temporary and it's not working, you need to ramp up or change what it is that you're trying so you can come back a different person than you were a year ago. And when this particular case, a different athlete than you were a year ago, an athlete that is prepared for a eighty two game grueling season. Hey, a sixty sixty five game grueling season because you have to be available. There's nothing more important than the NBA than your availability.

You hear it all the time. Your best ability is your availability. And I tell you what, when you have a guy like Zion, the amount of electricity and confidence that he infuses in his team and that fan base is unparalleled, unparalleled.

Because there's a time throughout the course of this season that how easy we forget that he had the Pelicans without Brandon Ingram in first place in the Western Conference. He's going to see how it works. Yeah, well, hey, we appreciate the time. Thanks so much. You are really my favorite voice when it comes to NBA and especially this time of the year. So I appreciate you carving out some time for us. For sure. Thanks for having me, brother. You got it.

There's Antonio Daniels. We'll take a break. We'll come on back and we'll discuss the future of Jordan Love.

You're listening to the Zach Gelb show. You know, I'm a little bit confused about the message the Green Bay Packers are sending. They move on from Aaron Rodgers. So that means they fully believe they're ready to move on to the Jordan Love era.

And there is a feeling from at least me. I just don't know what Jordan Love is going to be. But the Packers have been basically telling you by this action of moving on from Aaron Rodgers that they believe that Jordan Love could be the guy.

Now, they've tried to temper expectations and talk about how there's going to be some bumps in the road and all that. But they're telling you that Jordan Love is ready to start. And since Jordan Love is a first round draft pick and has already been in the league for three years, you now have the scenario where you have to make a decision with really without seeing him play any substantial amount of time. You have to determine if you're going to pick up his fifth year option or not. So it comes out today that the Packers actually reached a contract agreement with Jordan Love. And it was that the Packers and Jordan Love from Adam Schefter have agreed on a one year contract extension worth up to $22.5 million, including $13.5 million fully guaranteed. So they didn't pick up the fifth year option. They agreed to this contract. And Jordan Love's fifth year option, according to Field Yates, was valued for $20.27 million. Now, he only took a fully guaranteed deal of $13.5 million. So Field Yates points out, rather than picking that up, Green Bay gives Love a chance at more upside with a bit of protection for the team with less guaranteed money.

So this is such a unique and crazy fifth year option when you look at what actually ended up transpiring, where Love, yes, can earn more money. I don't know what the incentives are, but it doesn't make sense to me why you wouldn't pick up his fifth year option because you're telling everyone by trading Aaron Rodgers that you fully believe in Jordan Love. Like, I don't know about you, Hickey, barring that the Packers end up being a bottom five team in the NFL and they're in the Jordan Love sweepstakes this year or they're in the Caleb Williams sweepstakes this year, which I don't believe that they will be. I think the Packers, their low point this year is probably seven wins. Their high point is probably nine wins in that range of seven to nine wins this year. The defense could use some work. The offense, I think, will be OK. And I do think Jordan Love can be fine in the NFL. I don't know if he's going to be great.

I don't know if he's going to be good, but I think he could step in after being in that organization for three years and be OK, where there'll be some good moments and there'll be some bad moments. But I was kind of surprised that they didn't just pick up his fifth year option because there's not many scenarios that I could see where the Packers move on from Aaron Rodgers. And then, you know, you look at that fifth year that he wouldn't be on your roster anyway. So this just kind of shows me a message that doesn't line up with their previous actions. Like, I don't think this is a huge deal.

I don't think this is the end of the world. But I thought for sure that without a doubt, the Green Bay Packers would have picked up the fifth year option on Jordan Love and guaranteed in that 20.272, whatever it is, million dollar deal instead of giving them a chance to earn a few more million dollars, but then covering your ass if it's not all that great by only having to pay him 13.5 million dollars fully guaranteed. So I'm confused by the messaging here. For me, once you made the move to trade Aaron Rodgers, I think that's to me the sign of faith.

That's what you need. That, hey, we believe in Jordan Love because I don't think that you would trade Aaron Rodgers if you were skeptical about Jordan Love, if you thought he stunk. I think that's, you know, the sign of faith to the rest of the NFL, to the Packers fans, to the Packers, Jordan Love's teammates. We believe in Jordan Love enough that we're going to move on from the two time, you know, one year moved MVP and a guy that won us a Super Bowl.

You're right in terms of that first action shows you that they believe in Jordan Love. But this action today doesn't really show me that they're as in love with Jordan Love as they're giving off to believe, because then you would have picked up that fully guaranteed option of 20.272 million instead of just only guaranteeing him 13.5 million dollars. But you're giving Jordan Love a chance to earn more money, so technically a greater contract than he would have earned otherwise.

So you're giving him an opportunity to get more. Yeah, by two million dollars of all the incentives hit. But then you're kind of showing me some doubt there where if everything goes right, it's two million dollars. But if things don't go right, you're going to save a big chunk of change by only fully guaranteeing 13.5 million dollars. Regardless, he's going to be on the roster for this year and next year, bare minimum. And then after that, it's going to be has he proven enough to show that he's worth the big contract extension.

And I'm just going to be fascinated to see how this plays out. I don't know about you, but I said the floor is seven. The ceiling is nine this year for the Green Bay Packers. What's your floor and what's your ceiling for Green Bay this year? In a week NFC, we're outside of Philadelphia in the 49ers.

There's not many teams that you look at as great teams in the NFC. Floor, I would say five wins. Ceiling, nine. I think we did this exercise a month ago, maybe even less than that. I think it was like seven and ten is the schedule or the record I had them coming out to. We did the whole win-loss thing.

So it'll be right around five hundred. I don't think there's a big year expected from Jordan Lover. I don't think there's going to be a playoff push by any stretch of the imagination. I don't think it's crazy to say that they could maybe back their way into the postseason if all things go right. Where, you know the Eagles Cowboys are playoff teams. Vikings, Lions, you feel good about their playoff chances.

Someone has to win the South. You know the Niners are going to win the West. Like, I'm not expecting them to make the playoffs, but if you tell me that the last quarter of the season they're battling out with, let's say... Well, I think Seattle is very good too. But they're battling out maybe with one of those teams in the final wildcard spot. That's if all things go well. I don't think that would be crazy, especially where we've seen just the NFC. It's top-heavy. It's not really a deep conference.

But yeah, I kind of feel like the Packers are more so likely to go seven and ten or eight and nine than it is go what my ceiling was nine and eight for this upcoming season. I'm rooting for Love though. Because he's handled this admirably the last three years. And he got drafted the first round.

He should be very proud of that. Rogers isn't the easiest guy to work with. It seems like Rogers and Love though actually did have somewhat of a good relationship. But you haven't heard a peep out of Jordan Love throughout this entire process. And I thought for a situation that is extremely difficult and really at the time no Packers fans wanted Jordan Love.

That's not easy for a young kid to walk into. And he's handled it as good as you can. So I hope early on, even though he's not going to get onto the scene and just dominate, which I know Mahomes did that. I know Lamar Jackson did that. But I don't anticipate that here. I hope at the end of the year we walk away from looking at Jordan Love and go, okay, I can see signs of him being the guy in Green Bay for the foreseeable future.

You're listening to The Zach Gelb Show. So this isn't a surprise but Joel Embiid has won the NBA MVP. So after, I think it was back to back years finishing as the runner up. Now he has won the award. So congratulations to Joel Embiid who picked up basketball in his teenage years. He's been such a late bloomer to the game and unfortunately had a bunch of injuries to start out his career and has been one of the game's best players for the last few years. He finally gets his MVP. Definitely well deserved.

Hickey, I don't know about you, with how often this conversation seemed to be changing like week by week in the NBA this year. I'm not surprised Embiid won it. Everyone thought he was going to win the award towards the end of the season. But the fact that he won it in total points by 915 to 674, where for a while the conversation was Embiid, Jokic onto the Kumpo, pick one you can't go wrong. To see Embiid have 915 total points, Jokic 674, and then Giannis with 606. And the first place votes, the breakdowns were 73 to Embiid, 15 to the Joker, and 12 to Giannis onto the Kumpo. How lopsided these results ended up being, that's what's surprising to me. Not who won it, but by how much of a difference it actually was. Yeah, I definitely thought Jokic would be closer to Embiid than he would be Giannis for sure.

And to see that gap is surprising. But what was it about, I'd say two months ago probably, maybe even three by this point it feels like the narrative kind of shifted. And then it was all Embiid and from there it was almost like a runaway train. Well I don't actually agree with that because I remember about like a month and a half ago when Embiid missed that game. I think it was up against the Nuggets, people were like, oh he can't win the MVP now because he missed that game.

And for like a little stretch it went okay, maybe we're going to see Nicole Jokic win this three times in a row. And then it was really that last month of the season where I thought Embiid distanced himself from the rest of the pack. And then all that conversation of, it did feel like for a long time it was Embiid up against the Joker. And then Giannis would occasionally get thrown into that conversation as well.

Those are really the only three names that we were talking about. But yeah, by the time the season did end it was expected that Embiid was going to win this award. Now there's only a hundred voters out there and the way that this works is you get five votes. So each voter, and there's a hundred voters, they get five votes. First place, second place, third place, fourth place, fifth place vote. Nicole Jokic wasn't in someone's top five. How the heck was Nicole Jokic not in someone's top five?

He has 99 total votes, 15 for first place, 52 for second place, and 32 for third place. I don't know if they released the identity of the voters and they tell you who actually voted this because then all these voters go, oh, I'm getting attacked and bullied on social media, like give me a break. I would love to know who the one man or woman was that didn't put Nicole Jokic in the top five.

Like if you want to tell me you didn't think you should have won back to back to back MVP awards, there's an argument to be made for that. But to say he wasn't in the top five hickey, I want to know who that jackass was. I will know. They did that for one reason, attention. That's it. They want their name out there. They will absolutely probably wear it as a flag. A badge of honor. Right, badge of honor. That was actually the term I was looking for. Thank you. And whether it's later tonight on social media, tomorrow on social media, not a doubt in my mind, we will find out the identity because they want to have their name out there and they saw this is the platform of I'll be the only person not to have Jokic in the top five.

That's kind of the fight I will fight. Do you think it was a newspaper writer? Do you think it was a TV broadcaster? Because for some reason that would be a very newspaper writer type of move. Let me get some clicks.

Let me get my name thrown into the headlines. But you never know with how many people have an outlet these days to give their opinion. So I would I would lean that it's a newspaper writer. But but I don't know on this one.

Someone with an agenda. Maybe it's a smaller market team that wants to get their team, you know, their players some recognition. So they'll throw maybe one of their guys in.

And OK, now I just can't throw for argument's sake. He's already won an award. But let's say Laurie marketing, who I believe was the most improved player, if I'm not mistaken, on the jazz on a jazz team that was not going anywhere this year. Maybe he goes, I want to give more recognition to what the jazz accomplished this year. Larry, you're in the top five and Jokic is out. That's how I'm going to get his name out there. The jazz name out there and my name out there. I love Kendrick Perkins.

I've always been a big fan of a big perk. But I thought he was ridiculous when he was saying pretty much that Nicole Jokic is winning the MVP because he's white. I don't know if Kendrick Perkins has an MVP vote or not.

I would think he does with the big platform that he's on and how much ESPN uses him to talk. NBA was this big perk who didn't vote. Nicole Jokic, like I would like to think the Kendrick Perkins that I know and Kendrick Perkins worked for Odyssey before he became a big star. He would come home with us all the time.

He was great. I love his basketball takes, but I would like to think the Kendrick Perkins I know, if he does, in fact, have an MVP vote. That even though he did not believe Nicole Jokic should have won the MVP this year, you know, based off what he was saying, I would like to think he would still put him in his top five. Like there is no reasonable explanation to not put the Joker in the top five. You want to tell me Embiid wins the award? One hundred percent, I get it.

Embiid was the right pick this year. But to not be in the top five, the fact that there was one guy or woman that didn't put him in the top five, that one doesn't make sense to me. I agree, and especially if it's an agenda thing as well, I think they should be stripped of their vote. But that's the tricky part.

Send a message. That's the tricky part because you go, oh, I'm going to take someone's vote away. Well, they're allowed to pick who they want to win the award.

It is egregious, but I think that's a trickery slope in taking someone's vote away. If they give you a legit explanation on why they didn't put the Joker in the top five, even though I don't think there's a legit explanation. I'd love to hear it.

I would love to hear the reasoning. Well, let's do this. Let's find out who this person is. And I'm sure you're probably right. I'm sure it's going to come out within the next 24 hours.

And let's see if we get that person on. And I will, I can't make that promise. I was going to say I'm not going to scream and yell at them because I do want to hear what they're going to say.

But we'll see how long that I could take the explanation before I do end up screaming and yelling at them. 13 players received at least one vote. How many of the 13 do you think you can name, Mickey? I will shoot for, I'm going to go for all 13.

Screw it. OK. I already got three. Give me the three.

Nicole Jokic, Joel Embiid, and Yanis. Correctamundo. OK. Quick question. Are there any teammates?

Oh, that's a good question. Are there any pair of teammates? No. OK. So it's one player from each team. No duos. OK.

I will go in no order. Shay Gilgis Alexander. Yes.

Bang. OK. Shay Gilgis Alexander, he received six fourth place votes and 28 fifth place votes. Devin Booker. That name is not on the list. No. OK. Donovan Mitchell. Correctamundo. All right. Donovan Mitchell finished one, two, three, four, five, six in the MVP vote.

OK. Jason Tatum. I was going to say that was probably would have been my first guess after the three. Yes, he finished in fourth place. Did not receive first place vote. Did not receive a second place vote. Got one third place vote and eighty nine fourth place votes and eight fifth place votes.

Andreso had me a little concerned here, but I'll still throw this name out there. Steph Curry. Steph Curry is in there.

He received a fourth place vote and then two fifth place votes. All right. Hey, barely in there, but still in there. That's for sure. Let's keep that train going.

Same theme. LeBron James. You know what? LeBron is not on the list. OK. LeBron is not there. I think there is right now you have one, two, three, four, five, six names to go. One name.

There's a bunch you should get, but one I think is egregious. If you don't get him now, he was he was third to last, but he's in the news a lot recently. OK. Good NBA story this year. Jaylen Brunson. He was second to last, but Brunson was on there in there. He received one vote. It was a fifth place vote.

There was also one of the person that received one vote and it was a fifth place vote. This one will surprise you, I think. Let's see who else here.

Who else can I try to be calculated? My guess is and save some long shots for later. Let's go Jimmy buckets. Yes.

Jimmy Butler is on the list. He had three fifth place votes. Six. All right. So I got nine so far. Nine out of the 13.

Four more to go. You said his name's in the news recently, so I'm going to take a shot in the dark here. John Morant. He is.

That was the other guy that had one fifth place vote. I did lie to you. There is a there is one pair of teammates you have not mentioned either yet. OK, that's actually perfect. So I am at right now. Ten, right? Ten with three to go. And real quickly, the guys that you got. Embiid, Joker, Giannis, Shay, Gilgis, Alexander, Tatum, Mitchell, Steph, Brunson, Butler and Ja. Three more to go. I'm going for two teammates here on a team that I thought was going to pull off a first round upset.

The Sacramento Kings. Domatas Zabonis. He's one of them. De'Aaron Fox.

That was the one that I thought you definitely should have got was De'Aaron Fox. Now Zabonis ended up getting one fourth place vote in twenty four fifth place votes. Fox only got two fifth place votes. All right. One left. One left.

No teammates. I have a few names written down here. Tell me, would the voting give it away to like a fifth place vote or I know you said there's only one fifth. Four fifth place votes, two fourth place votes.

OK, so definitely lower on the ladder here. Oh, no, it's you finished eighth in the MVP voting eighth. This is not egregious. This is a big name in the league, a big name in the league. Is it Luca?

It is Luca. Wow. I was not sure.

Good job. With how bad that regular season ended. The only guy that you guessed that wasn't on the list was LeBron. And quite frankly, I can't crush you for that one.

And Devin Booker. Hand up. So two. Not bad.

That's a good job out of you, Hickey. Thirteen names, fifteen guesses. You beat nine hundred and fifteen total points. Joker 674, Giannis 606, Tatum 200 and 280, excuse me.

Shay Gilges Alexander 46, Donovan Mitchell 30, Zabonis 27. You had Luca with 10, Curry with five, Jimmy Buckets with three, Fox with two and then Brunson and Morant both in there at the end with one total point with one fifth place vote each. So those are the thirteen names that were listed as the NBA MVP voting results. Only a hundred voters. They get five votes each. And that's the way that the votes did play on that with Embiid running away with it with nine hundred and fifteen total points.

Seventy three first place votes, twenty five second place votes and two third place votes. Zach Gilb shows CBS Sports Radio. We will take a time out here when we come on back. We'll update you on some of the biggest stories in the world of sports with some audio. We get to the news brief. Donovan McNabb will join us 25 minutes from now and coming up at 9 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m. Pacific, NFL cornerback Xavier Rhodes.