NFL Respecting Lions (Hour 2)

All righty, hour number two of our radio program. That's right, Zach Gelb's show Coast to Coast on CBS Sports Radio. Coming up at 8 40 p.m Eastern, 5 40 p.m Pacific, Leroy Hord will join us.

And at 9 20 p.m Eastern, 6 20 p.m Pacific, Mike Trudell will stop by. Does a great job calling Lakers games. Part of the Lakers broadcast, he will join us. As the Los Angeles Lakers last night, they go down to the Golden State Warriors.

Lakers still lead that series three games to two. But as the series now shifts back to Los Angeles, we're all going to be waiting in great anticipation for tomorrow night to see if LeBron James is going to have Anthony Davis available. Because Anthony Davis did leave the game last night and he did have to be put in a wheelchair to get to the locker room and he was being evaluated for a concussion.

I guess they're still testing that goes on throughout today. But the early indications, I heard Brian Winhorse talking earlier this a.m on ESPN, that the thought is barring a setback that Anthony Davis will be available tomorrow night and we'll see how effective he can be. And also in the NBA world, we're going to see tonight if the Sixers can eliminate the Boston Celtics. That game coming your way a half hour from now and Denver's looking to close out the Suns tonight as the Denver Nuggets are going to Phoenix up three games to two and the Suns will not have DeAndre Aiden in the lineup tonight. And Hickey, I don't know the extent of his injury to be fair, but it seems like there's a lot going on with DeAndre Aiden right now because the effort has not been there. I know he's back on this new contract, but last year there was clearly problems, especially in that closeout game up against the Dallas Mavericks where that entire team didn't show up and Monte Williams and him got into it. But all we know about DeAndre Aiden, according to Shams Harani, as he's been ruled out for game six tonight versus the Nuggets due to his rib contusion, sources do tell the athletic and stadium. Now I'm not saying that the guy is not hurt, but it's just a bizarre situation with the Suns where even when DeAndre Aiden did resign, we all looked at it and said, okay, whenever the deal allows him in the CBA to get traded, we all anticipated that he was eventually going to get traded. But it always seems like, especially the last two years, there's something up with DeAndre Aiden and the Suns. And I feel like we're all missing something and we're missing what the actual truth is with this situation. And earlier, you said it to me off the air like, it doesn't even matter if DeAndre Aiden isn't out there.

I think it does. I know he's been basically irrelevant on the basketball court, but the Suns can't afford really to lose anyone else more than they've already lost because they don't have enough depth as it is. And it's important at least to still have his body on the court, even though he has not played well in this series.

And there has been effort issues a bunch of times and kind of desire issues an entire time throughout the series. One thing is clear last year when he was benched in game seven for that horrific effort and that led to a fraction that we thought was going to end in him being playing elsewhere, like you said, in the back of Phoenix. They're the ones who I believe matched or made the first offer that the Suns eventually matched. Whatever that issue was between Monty Williams and DeAndre Aiden, clearly this offseason, clearly during the season, has not been resolved because we're seeing basically a pickup from game seven last year against the Mavericks to DeAndre Aiden carrying that into the playoffs. And yeah, I mean, I think even though he's out and even though I was counting on him to have a big playoff performance and he was part of reason why I thought these Suns would win the championship this year, he has been a big fat zero, especially in this series against Nicole Jokic, who in the past he's actually matched up decently against for how, you know, for, for play, right?

He has done a pretty good job on Jokic and he is outside of like a motivated first half in game number two, done a whole lot of nothing. So I can't imagine what it's like to deal with a rib contusion. And we know he's a big fella as well, but I was reading earlier today that he actually suffered this early in the first half of game five, but he played through it. So it's like, how are you able to play through that? And then with the few days of rest and once again, I'm not a doctor.

It's like, you would think he'd be at least able to, to give it a go tonight. You would think, but you know, who knows does the severity of it? My guess would be the adrenaline helped, you know, um, muscle lessons. Some of the pain initially were initially hurts, but I'm going to play through it. And then after the game, the adrenaline lessons, you're sleeping, you wake up and all of a sudden I'm sure it hurts a lot more than it did during the game. And to your ribs, like as a center, you're, there's a lot of elbows, you know, there's a lot of, and it's tough to breathe, especially when you're, when you're that, that tall and you carry that much weight. And if you have something that disrupts your breathing to run up and down the court, it's, it's a totally different thing, but it is interesting. We suffered this early in the game and then he was able to go through with it, but it's weird because he, he probably is legitimately hurt.

Let me be clear in what I'm saying. You know, he is legitimately hurt, but there's always like something with DeAndre Aiden where you just don't know what to believe because we're always expecting eventually a divorce to transpire. Like we were both shocked when you found out that he was coming back to the Suns this past off season. Absolutely. And I will, I guess, double down or kind of go back to the same. Well, seeing how things progress this year, come on.

I will be shocked if on opening night, he is any Phoenix Suns uniform. Well, let's see if you learned your lesson here. Okay. We made a dinner bet last night and this was without knowing that DeAndre Aiden was not going to play and we made a dinner bet. I think Denver's closing out the game tonight. You believe the Suns are going to force a game seven and still go on to win this series, correct Amundo?

That is right. But the bet was just for tonight. Game six. I still think I'm even more confident than I was yesterday that Denver's going to win the game.

And this is a dinner bet that's on the line. Are you still rolling with the Phoenix Suns? You're going to say, okay, DeAndre Aiden's out. I'm going to peace out and say, all right, I'm not going to double, triple, quadruple down on the Phoenix Suns.

I'll give you an out here, free of charge. No, no. What did I just say two minutes ago? I think he's been a big, fat series.

Been irrelevant. Chris Paul two in this series, the two games they won on the backs of Devin Booker and Kevin Durant. I think we'll get another performance from those two tonight. You sure?

Two positive to force a game seven. Yes. No backing out.

No backing out. So if I win this bet, am I going to have to track you down and implore you to eventually get me dinner? Because the last time I won a dinner bet, and I won two of them off of you. One I just gave back to you because I'm a good dude. And I had some kindness in my heart. The other one I had to basically beg you for several months to basically eventually get me dinner.

And you did come through. So I give you credit for that. But if I win tonight, can we put like a limit here that this will be redeemed in like the next two to three weeks? Is that kosher? Is that cool?

Or is this going to be one of those things when you lose, I'm going to have to basically put out a search party to find you to make sure that you go get me dinner? I'll say the same thing before, and I'll say it here again. You tell me when you want it. That's all I've been saying. You tell me what dinner you want. That's it, then fine.

Then you get the dinner. You never told me. Okay. I never told you.

You have to track me down. I see you every day. You make it seem like I was evading, taking sick days. You were ducking me on dinner.

You were. You waited till the holidays to give me a gift card and say happy holidays. I'm hungry tonight. You know, I'd love to cash in my dinner, dinner chip now.

How many? There's at least twice a week where I walk into this studio and I got, it's five o'clock. I'm going across the street to Westville. One of those times you could have been like, Oh, I got you. I owe you dinner. It's on me.

It's on hot take Kiki tonight. And you sat there like Deandre Aiden. You're like a big fat zero, as you would say. And you did nothing for a while. That's what happened. I thought you were a man of your word for a while.

I have to track you down. I paid it. I paid it off. Yeah. It seemed like after twisting your arm, my way out of this and tried to, you know, get out of it. Scott free. I did not.

It is the Zach Gelb show on CBS sports radio. You want to bet you shouldn't have to do much work after that. We'll see what happens tonight. And by the way, if I lose this bet, I'm not going to do, tell me when you want it. I will talk to you and I'll get you a dinner, whatever you want from let's just do Westville. Is that fine?

Right? You don't have any preference. What's good with me? Westville is good. But he's a big Mac and cheese guy there. Of course, bacon, Mac and cheese is fire. They have great bacon there. I actually walked from my apartment on a Saturday because they only do breakfast on the weekends there. I don't get why, but I walked on, you know, I went for a walk on a Saturday and I walked over to the studio and then walked back and I had a like two or three eggs there. And they had some potatoes, some home fries, and they just brought out a few slabs of bacon. Man, that was delicious.

They have elite and I mean, elite bacon there. Okay. We'll get you some of the biggest stories of the world with some audio right now. We call this segment The News Brief. Time for your Daily News Brief.

We get you caught up on the rumors, reports and reconnaissance from the day in sports. Steve Kerr says the Warriors belief hasn't wavered despite being down 3-2. There's always that belief based on, you know, the success these guys have had and the confidence they've built up together, the continuity. So, you know, I think our guys were disappointed. We couldn't wrap up game four after playing pretty well for most of the game. But now we get another crack to go down there and, you know, try to even up the series. So, the guys will always have belief.

That's just, that's who they are. And let's get to LeBron James. All eyes on Anthony Davis if he's going to be available tomorrow. Left the game, got evaluated for a concussion. Early returns right now say that he should be okay to play tomorrow. But we're gonna have to wait and see what happens throughout the rest of today and also tomorrow. Here's LeBron giving his take on the unfortunate Anthony Davis injury.

I didn't see the shot. I just seen the aftermath. But, you know, the medical team seems to say he's been, he's doing better. So, you know, that's what matters the most. And let's hear one more from LeBron and Lakers mindset heading into game six. We have another opportunity. Obviously, they, you know, played exceptionally well here tonight. And, you know, we had some good moments. But, you know, not as close to 48 minutes as we needed to be.

But we had another opportunity on Friday and we look forward to the matchup again. And let's listen up NBA on TNT, Chris Haynes. He does detail the health of Anthony Davis after the game. AD went to the bench and he sat on the bench for a minute.

He was being evaluated. Then they wanted him to go to the locker room. But the way that the arena is here at Chase Center, the visiting bench is across the court from where their locker room is. So, he would have to walk across the court to get to his locker room.

So, they chose the very closest entrance or exit, I should say. And they took him and they took him in a room. Now, when they took him in this room, they had to look lightweight, hold him up. He was stumbling a little bit. He just, you could tell his equilibrium was off. Then about five minutes later, they brought a wheelchair in the room.

And from there, he was escorted to the room over all the way across the hall to the locker room. Now, I was told this that sources have informed me that the early diagnosis is that it appears he has avoided a concussion and is doing much better now. Let's listen up to David Benjamin, NBA Today on ESPN reports that Anthony Davis will play in Game 6. I spoke to a source close to Davis this morning who told me that he believes there's not any scenario that he can envision where Anthony Davis does not play in Game 6. The source added, quote, it's the playoffs.

So, certainly Davis will be, you know, continue to be monitored by the Lakers. We're going to speak to Darvin Ham in a few hours, get an update from the coach. The team has off today. They're not practicing.

They're not gathering for film or anything of the sort. Let everybody rest their bodies up for this pivotal Game 6. But things are trending in the direction that we're going to see Anthony Davis back in the lineup on Friday night.

Well, Hickey, it's pretty simple. Do you have the concussion or not? Because if you have the concussion, you can't play. But if you don't have a concussion, you're going to play. So, based off of that report and kind of some of the other things that have been said today, I guess I'm going to believe that Anthony Davis did not suffer a concussion last night. I would agree. The only thing I will say is we have seen, especially in the NFL, head injuries and concussions develop, you know, days after head trauma was, you know, that occurred.

So, sure, you'll be feeling better today, tomorrow if he wakes up. And it's really not even if you have a concussion. It's will we go into concussion protocol? That's where the big thing is. If you can avoid just the protocol itself, then you're clear, you know, obviously to play.

But if you're even just in and they're testing, that's when you're in trouble for, obviously, Game 6, but even to Game 7 on Sunday. Well, I have an update on that. I have news for the News Brief. Mike Trudell, who's going to join us later, he is at the Darvin Ham press conference. Here is Darvin Ham today on Anthony Davis. Quote, he's doing great. He's not in the protocol. He'll be listed as probable for tomorrow.

Close quotes. So, looks like Anthony Davis is going to be good to go for tomorrow. But the only thing I will say, Hickey, I never, never, ever, ever, ever believe the NBA injury report. Because how many times we see guys as doubtful playing, guys that are probable that don't play.

So, who the heck knows? And that's with normal injuries, right? Like hamstrings. And now for the playoffs too. Right. Now it's head injury, which is always, you know, kind of, you know, up in the air and confusing. Also in the NBA playoffs, yeah.

Can't trust it fully. Let's go to Jaylen Brunson. Played every minute of the game last night. Knicks win 112 to 103. Send this series back to Miami for Game 6, where eventually I would think the Knicks are going to go down four games to two.

But right now it's a 3-2 series advantage in favor of the Heat. Brunson was awesome last night. His 48 minutes, 12 to 22 from the field. 4-10 from 3. Went 10 to 12 from the charity stripe. Had a total of 38 points in the game. 9 rebounds and 7 assists.

He was awesome. And here is Jaylen Brunson saying the Knicks still have a lot of work to do. Nothing really to celebrate.

We obviously won. Get this another day. So, this is great.

But yeah, we'll get one down there. You know who he reminds me of, Hickey? He reminds me of Jaylen Hertz. Where you listen to him, and he never says, like, anything giving credit to the team or whatever.

It's always, yeah, it was fine. In a win, we still got more work to do. Now, Hertz is a better player in his sport than Brunson is in his sport. But Brunson is tremendous. He's just not an MVP candidate like Jaylen Hertz was this past year and got a team to a Super Bowl. The Knicks aren't going to the finals. They're not even going to win this series. But I see a lot of the leadership qualities and characteristics of Jaylen Hertz in Jaylen Brunson, which is a pretty damn good thing if you're a Knicks fan, just judging by the way that Jaylen Hertz has taken the NFL by storm the last two years. Absolutely. That's the exact mindset you want your star player to have.

It's game five on 3-1. There's no celebrating. There's no accomplishment.

It's okay. We're here to win another day. Now we got to go on the road and win a game. That's what Jaylen Hertz is like, where it's just kind of, we haven't done anything.

We haven't accomplished anything. You want your star players kind of thinking that way and having still that chip on your shoulder at all times. So in the last hour, we're talking about how Giannis Antetokounmpo just won't let his comments go away and he keeps on bringing up how he would say that this Bucs season is not a failure. Here is Karl-Anthony Towns and Paul George. It's on Paul George's podcast, the podcast Peashow, both admitting that the Timberwolves season, who Karl-Anthony Towns plays for is a failure, and also Paul George, who I guess you could say he still plays for the Clippers when he's healthy, saying his season was a failure as well. I view our season as a failure just because, you know, the roster we had, do you view this season as a failure for you guys?

Yes. I only say it's a failure because we made these big trades to succeed in the playoffs and the fact that we didn't make it out the first round. It's a failure for us because we want to win a championship.

We want to have a chance. So that's the thing. You hear Karl-Anthony Towns say his season was a failure. He was right. You hear the Clippers say, Paul George saying their season was a failure.

Yeah, because it's weird. Like I'm not going to crush the Clippers because they weren't healthy, but I understand what Paul George is saying. They weren't healthy.

Him and Kawhi Leonard, they think they can win a championship when healthy. So they didn't do that. So therefore he believes it's a failure. But Giannis Antetokounmpo's season obviously was a failure. And it's just, that's the weird part to me is you will get other players around the league admit their season was a failure and then you're the number one seed and you lose to the eighth seed and you can't say your season was a failure, Hickey. That's just one I will never understand.

I don't either. I can't defend him. And you're right. I just, everyone else is doing it.

It's pretty easy to admit. I don't know why Giannis is still, again, dying on a hill he should not be. Here is Charles Barkley right when he found out when the MVP was announced that someone did not put Nikola Jokic in their top five, only one person. We later found out today that it was Mark Jackson. You'll hear from Mark Jackson in just a second, but let's go back to, I guess it was a week and a half, two weeks ago when Charles Barkley crushes the one voter who didn't have Nikola Jokic in his top five NBA on TNT. There's one person, I don't even know this fool's name, didn't even have Joker in the top five. Like people like that shouldn't get a vote. You got to hope that it was just an oversight or some kind of a tabulation thing, and that guy wouldn't consciously say, no, he's not in the top five.

That's why I'm just, that would be my hope. I understand. For the last six months, we talked about Joker, Giannis, and Embiid. If you have a television or you actually watch basketball, if you don't think he should have been in the top five, you don't deserve to vote.

I mean, you could be like some of these fools, we'd be letting vote for president out here. I'm hoping it was some type of a clerical error or some, or some or some kind, there's got to be a good reason for it. Yeah, he's a damn idiot. So that was before Charles Barkley knew that it was Mark Jackson. Because right, don't you think right away, Hickey, when you heard this a few weeks back that it was going to be some attention-seeking writer that's basically just an attention-seeking whore that was looking to get a bunch of clicks and a bunch of downloads. That's what you thought it was. You never thought this was going to be a guy that played and was a coach and is on the number one broadcast team.

You never thought it was going to be Mark Jackson. No. Yes. I thought it would have been a smaller name, like a jazz reporter trying to give love to the jazz for their scrappy season. And so, you know what? I'm gonna take Jokic off, put one of our jazz players on there too. I'll get the blowback, but also give them the attention they deserve. Click baby. Yes. So let's listen up to Mark Jackson.

He joined Sirius XM MBA radio, Justin Terminate, Eddie Johnson. And this is what he said about not voting the Cole Jokic in the top five of the MVP mistake. And one thing I live by you, you make a mistake, you own it.

I'm not a guy that does it for clicks or be trending. Absolute mistake made by me. You can tell I probably in thinking, how did I make the mistake? You can tell I put one center, two forwards and two guards.

So I wasn't even thinking. I apologize to the Denver Nuggets. I apologize to Nicole Jokic, who is not only in the MVP discussion and deserve to be on my ballot, but he's one of the greatest players in the history of this game and is a top 10 center of all time.

So I own it. If you want to take away my vote or do whatever more than welcome, I made a mistake. He deserves, in my opinion, to be clearly I would have still voted for Joel and beat the MVP, but with Giannis and Joker second and third, they deserve that incredible year by him.

He continues to make history. I own the mistake and I apologize. So what makes this so egregious is there could be two reasons why you didn't vote Nicole Jokic in the top five for MVP Mark Jackson. It's either you don't know how to vote or it's something personal.

And I don't know what the truth is, but just based off the answer he gave Sirius XM MBA radio, he must have thought that he was voting for the first team all-MBA when he says I voted for one center, two forwards and two guards. And there's only a hundred people that get to vote. So if you can't take the time out of your day to make sure you actually know what you're voting for and vote the right way, once again, I'm not Mr.

Cancel Culture, take away everyone's vote, but if you don't put in the time and you don't know how to vote, then you shouldn't vote. And him saying that it was a mistake and basically saying that maybe he thought he was voting for a different award shows you everything you need to know on why Mark Jackson should not have a vote for this. I know he has all the credentials, but he clearly doesn't care about the vote because he didn't get it right. And when you look at this award all throughout the year, there was three names mentioned, Giannis and Bede and the Joker. It's inconceivable to me, no matter what the explanation is, on how he didn't make sure that those three names were 100% in the top five.

And to have the Joker outside of the top five, whatever you say, it doesn't matter. You shouldn't have a vote anymore because either was something personal or you just messed up and you had no clue how to vote. So therefore you don't give a rat's ass about the vote.

So give it to someone that will actually care. Zach Gelb's show, CBS Sports Radio. You're listening to the Zach Gelb show. So the schedule officially comes out 30 minutes from now, the NFL schedule. I think this is one of the best sports talk radio days out of the calendar, out of the year. Hickey vehemently disagrees. He is not excited about this schedule release.

That's fine. I will say though, and we know a lot of these match-ups with all the leaks that come out, but it'll be official 30 minutes from now. But one thing we know with certainty is that the Lions are actually gonna get the prime time Thursday night, first game of the year to go to Arrowhead as the Chiefs release another Super Bowl banner. And they have a little Super Bowl celebration on the field for beating the Eagles in the Super Bowl.

Like Hickey, don't get me wrong. The Lions are a fun team. The Lions are an intriguing team, good for them for getting that national spotlight. And it shows how big of a deal maybe the Lions are gonna be this year. But I was really surprised that of all the potential opponents, that it's gonna be the Lions opening up the season on the road up against the Kansas City Chiefs. That's like a funky match-up. Especially when you look at the Chiefs home schedule where you have the Eagles, where you have the Bills, the Bengals, obviously Indivision, the Chargers, the revamped Broncos.

Like there are a lot of big games you could kind of kick the season off with. I actually like it though. I like the Lions. I think it's fun. Their team, we're talking a lot about. Their team, a lot of people are believing in. They score a ton on offense, which if the Holmes obviously and Co. pick up where they left off last year, should be a shootout. I think it's gonna be a lot of fun.

I like it. They're a good team. They're not great.

They're not very good. They're just a good team right now with the way that the Lions are set up. They're not gonna be a Super Bowl team this year. Right now, I would lean that they're going to win the NFC North, but it's not a lock because you know the Vikings are going to be right there and they're going to be competing side by side. One of those two teams will win the division. Bears fans, you got a long ways to go before even thinking about winning a division. The Packers, it's impossible to give them the benefit of the doubt just because we don't know what Jordan Love is going to be. So I'm not trashing the Lions and telling you the Lions suck, but I think because they've been bad for so many years and Campbell's such a likable guy, a lot of people look at them as the lovable losers and now we're rooting for the Detroit Lions. But for the first game of the season, you expect it to be a marquee opponent going up against the Super Bowl champs.

And from a storyline standpoint, there were just better storylines out there. Like if you look at all the opponents and I'll just give them to you in order, could you put the Broncos to open up the season? I guess you have the Sean Payton story, but I saw so many games of the Broncos in prime time, especially early last year, I would pass on Denver. The Chargers, Herbert Mahomes to open up the season, sign me up for that would have loved it.

The Raiders, no, I'd rather have the Detroit Lions. The Bills, those games are always a classic. I would have been fine if they went with the Bills. The Bengals and knowing the rivalry that kind of been built up between those two teams and you have the Bengals who said Burrowhead and then they lost that game after beating them three straight times prior to that, the Bengals would have been better.

You know what it should have been? It actually should have been the Dolphins. Now I know they're playing this game in Germany, which makes no sense, but that would have been the perfect opening night matchup for the NFL. You at least get two on the field for week one. You have Tyreek Hill.

You have also Jalen Waddle. You have a ton of stars on that Dolphins team. Last year they traded for Bradley Chubb.

This off season they traded for Jalen Ramsey. And you have the return of Tyreek Hill to Kansas City where there's a banner getting raised where they won a Super Bowl the year right after they lost Tyreek Hill. The Dolphins hickey, it's a shame that they're playing this game abroad, but it really should be the first game of the season. That's the perfect matchup and it's also like an opponent that's good, but it's not as if you feel like you're wasting the first game of the season. Like sometimes people go you rather see the better games later in the year like the Bills and the Bengals and maybe in division the Chargers if it means anything. You know if you don't want to go Super Bowl rematch, okay I can understand that. I thought the Eagles would have been better. You're not going to put the Bears in that spot who was also a home game this year for Kansas City, but through all those opponents that I just listed Broncos, Chargers, Raiders, Bills, Bengals, Dolphins, Bears, Lions, Eagles, they ended up the NFL going Lions-Chief week one. It 100% should have been the Miami Dolphins and they could have sent the Lions to Germany to go up and play the Kansas City Chiefs. That point I would not argue with you, but the point you said before I think is the reason why it's the Lions and not the Bills, the Bengals, the Eagles.

You want those games later on especially they already mentioned it or they already put it out there. The Dolphins aren't in that class yet. Chiefs, Bengals, what is it New Year's Eve which is I think like week 16 or something like that so the second or third week left of the year.

That could be a massive game with you know the number one seed possibly on the line. Bills same thing. But the Dolphins aren't in that category yet.

I know I'm not arguing. I said I'm with you on the Dolphins. Okay so then what you were talking about you know you'd rather see the Bills. You're talking about the other opponents.

The points you made before. I think it's better to keep those better teams later in the year because we're going to watch week one and the first game no matter what. Like you could I remember a few years ago it was Packers, Bears, and Mitch Trubisky. Everyone's watching. People watch especially that Thursday night game so I don't think you need the best match up possible or need a Super Bowl rematch right out of the gate. You can get away with a B-B matchup and still have a lot of people watching.

It is well you always get people watching. We're all addicted to the NFL. The NFL has done some awful terrible things and each and every year we sit down as we should.

We order our food. We place our bets. We set our fantasy lineups and we watch every single game. The NFL can do whatever they want.

They will always get us coming back for more but in this case I would have gone Dolphins over over the Lions and it's a shame an absolute shame that this game is being played in in Germany. It is Zach Gelb's show on CBS Sports Radio. Let's get to the latest CBS Sports Radio update with a man that does it all around here.

Hickey was almost late coming back from the break and Ack just bolts into the studio was getting ready to run the board. Trying to back up my friend. When was the last time that you ran the board in your life? Never. You never? Never. You never?

Never. You were always on the air? Yeah. Oh I didn't know that about you. Yep. I thought you started behind the scenes before you became a big update star.

No not at all. Where was your first job? My first job was WFAS in White Plains.

No, Ardsley. But your first big gig was in Chicago right? No I went to Charlotte from WFAS and then I went to Washington from there, Chicago from there, ESPN radio from there. Oh I didn't know you worked at ESPN radio. Yeah yeah yeah. And now you've been in this building for how long or with this company for how long?

Since uh 1997. Wow how about that? Where's my gold watch? They may give you a slap in the behind and say go get them sports.

That's probably the most you're gonna get. You're listening to the Zach Gelb show. Zach Gelb shows CBS Sports Radio two games tonight in the NBA. This hasn't tipped off yet scheduled for 7 30 p.m eastern.

Usually you know that's not going to be the case. It's now about 15 minutes until the top of the hour waiting tip off between the Celtics and Sixers. Sixers looking to eliminate the Boston Celtics tonight in south Philly up three games to two in that series and you have Denver going to Phoenix to try to eliminate the Suns tonight. No DeAndre Aiden for game six. Denver is up three games to two in that series and also no Chris Paul for tonight as well. He continues to be out with the groin injury.

Hickey it's kind of funny how quickly conversations and narratives can change. A week ago we would have all been sitting here saying James Harden needs to get out of Philadelphia and the Sixers should have to find a way to go get Damian Lillard. I do believe when we were saying that a lot of people still thought that if James Harden wanted to be back in Philly for next year he will be back in Philadelphia because we all know who's making that decision on the Sixers side of things.

It's Daryl Morey and Daryl Morey is like best friends with James Harden. So as long as James Harden wants to be back in Philly I think he will be back in Philly. The only thing is we've heard many reports throughout the year that he would not rule out a return to Houston and that is something that is of great interest. Now with the way that he's played so far in the postseason and this being kind of like an outlier where he's actually playing great in the postseason winning them games one and games four it's like you start to wonder and maybe you know I don't want to put the cart before the horse but it's like I do think the Sixers are winning this series. So when I say that I do believe James Harden's gonna be back in Philadelphia that's also operating that they find a way to win one more game and James Harden isn't a dud in game six or potentially game seven as well. So would you agree that that idea of Dame may be going to Philadelphia and James Harden leaving the Sixers this offseason is probably not going to happen? Probably not barring an epic epic collapse in game six and an even worse performance in game number seven.

I think they will win tonight. I think they will win the series but if they lose and then blow another 3-2 lead get him get eliminated in the second round again I still think sweeping changes for the Sixers will be made this offseason because again if you're not it's like what are you doing same thing over and over again and then you're going to be back in Florida and and to be that close and let it go I think we could see drastic changes especially if Harden plays very bad tonight and then again on Saturday. I think the only way James Harden is not back in Philadelphia next year is if he doesn't want to be there. That's what I'm saying.

Which could also happen to him. Which could be part of it but if I'm him I don't see why you would want to leave right now especially if you get through to the Eastern Conference Finals when in game one and game four you basically put the entire team on your back and won the game. I was surprised that the Celtics were two and a half point favorite tonight. I did plus the points with the Sixers so I do believe Philadelphia is going to close this baby out tonight. I just have not liked what I've seen from the Boston Celtics and this lack of killer instinct but now they have to show it tonight because now their backs are literally up against the wall where there's no more wiggle room for error that you did have before so we'll see what the effort is.

This game did just get underway. Ball was just tipped up into the air so we'll keep you updated on Celtics and Sixers. When we get to Dame's future because that's where I started this conversation I'm gonna put these five destinations out there. The first two hickey I'm gonna openly admit I don't think they're realistic but if Golden State needs to retool things and find another piece for Steph I'll always throw Dame out there.

I don't think it's realistic and happening though. The Milwaukee Bucks another team that I'll throw out there they don't have like any picks because it's every other year and they gave up I think like three or four picks for Drew Holliday as well so I don't think that is is all that likely but those are two teams that could definitely use Dame Lillard in the Warriors that they want to kind of revamp what they're doing with Steph and then also the Milwaukee Bucks to give Giannis another running mate not that I don't believe in Drew Holliday and Chris Middleton but if you feel like you need to change some things up Dame would be perfect. Would you agree that Dame would be great for both those teams but I just don't see how that deal would would get undone for either? Especially the Bucks it would be perfect but yeah I don't unfortunately foresee that happening for either Dame or Giannis' sake I'm with you there.

So here are three realistic destinations or so I think and you tell me if you don't think they're realistic. One the New York Knicks they tried for Donovan Mitchell last year you could give up a big package and throw in some young players as well and attach a bunch of picks to Portland and I'm going to assume Portland's going to want a ton of picks if they're getting rid of Dame Lillard and maybe take a younger player and I don't know how they view an RJ Barrett clearly he's not going to replace Dame Lillard but I think they could grow with with someone like an RJ Barrett or Emanuel quickly then they could take that piece along with the bunch of picks. I think the Knicks would be a great destination for for Damian Lillard as they're looking for that other star to complement Jalen Brunson. And realistic in the sense of picks and players the Knicks have what you would need to get that trade done?

It's kind of like in a totally different space. Remember you know a year ago when all those teams were lining up for Deshaun Watson and then it's like okay we were having that conversation about Lamar Jackson a lot of the teams that struck out on Deshaun Watson and lined up a big trade package were the teams that we were talking about for Lamar and the Knicks in some capacity were willing to do some sort of deal for Donovan Mitchell so you think then that they would be willing to do some sort of deal as well for Damian Lillard and at least you have a foundation of what it's going to cost and you do have a fit even though you did not get Donovan Mitchell a year ago. The other team the Celtics you have one year left in that that Jalen Brown contract if you feel as if you need to make a change there and I know there's a lot of incentive for Brown to stay now making that all NBA second team so the price just goes up and up and up but if you feel as if you need to break up Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown you're not getting rid of Jason Tatum you go put Dame Lillard in a Celtics uniform you know that Portland would love to get Jalen Brown. I don't know if Jalen Brown would want to go to Portland but you could also attach a ton of picks and that you could send to Portland in order to go get Damian Lillard. I guess the tough part is if you're Boston you really wanted to part with a really good two-way player in Jalen Brown for an older star in Dame Lillard at that point and almost in a way shrink your window by doing so. It's a fair point but I'm operating under the belief that if you're willing to bring in Dame it's because Jalen Brown does not want to be in Boston anymore and maybe Jalen Brown he doesn't really I'm not saying he doesn't care about winning but he wants to go be the number one on a team so if he come like ideally if you're the Celtics you probably want to make this work between Tatum and Brown because they're both so young but if he comes to you and says I'm not going to resign with you and I want to go elsewhere I want to be a number one like when Kyrie was playing with LeBron and Kyrie's like oh I want to get out of the shadow of LeBron James and if Jalen Brown says that then what choice do you really have and the final destination that I'll give you to Miami Heat like I don't know how the Heat would get it done I put nothing past Pat Riley though but you have Jimmy Butler you have the location of South Beach as well the Heat are always rumored to be a destination and when Dame was kind of saying a little while back how he doesn't want to be a part of a rebuild again he doesn't want them to use these draft picks he wants him to go trade him for proven talent to go try and win that you know try to win that championship that he's searching for right away everyone came on out and said the Miami Heat so if Dame is available Hickey I do think those are the the top three probably most realistic destinations where Bucks and Warriors aren't that realistic but really the Heat Celtics and Knicks I would think it would be one of those three teams I would end up with the services of Dame Oler. Realistically I think you're right because you need picks you need players you need to be a team in title contention that you know Dame wants to go play for I think especially realistic wise those three I think would definitely be the top three. Oh the Celtics showing some heart Marcus Smart just drained to three I didn't even mean to rhyme there but the uh Celtics are up 13 to 3 right out of the gate as that building was raucous in Philadelphia at the start and I bet you that it's gonna just quiet down a little bit it's only a 10 point game right now but 8-10 left in the first quarter early early early stages in Philadelphia Celtics down in this series three games to two and they have actually showed some life right out of the gate with that 13 to 3 lead Nuggets and Suns will come your way at 10 p.m eastern 7 p.m pacific but when we come on back on the other side the NFL schedule one of the great days of the year where you can start to plan your road trips start to plan out your weekends come the fall when you get set to usher in another football season the NFL schedule is officially about to be able to release so we will react to it all on the other side come on back in five you're listening to the Zach Gelb show but where else right here on CBS Sports Radio