[MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] One is up everybody. Thank you all for joining me on the latest broadcast part of the CSG network. I'm of course your host, Jeff Morton. Okay folks, the nuggets prevailed over the Minnesota rituals for the third straight game in game five of their Western Conference semifinals. They won 112 to 97 and they're taking a three to two lead going back to Minnesota for a pivotal and potentially clinching game six. But that's not the story. And I'm going to tell you guys a little story and I'm going to give you an anecdote about my experience back when I was a credentialed media member covering the NBA for free. And I will let you know how lucky we are and I'm not going to do a take it for granted kind of speech because that's stupid and I hope people aren't doing that today. But I'm going to give you an idea of what it means to have a certain center on your roster. But first I want to talk to you about our sponsor bet online. 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But also get everything else you need, especially if you're not a novice like I would be and you would need to go in and maybe check up on something last minute before you place a pot prop bet or anything like that. Head to the website today or use your mobile device to get in on the action, bet online where the game starts. All right. The luckiest person in the NBA is Michael Malone. One of the things that maybe goes unsaid is when you have someone who is like Nicole Yokech, it really becomes a matter of not fucking it up. Which is the most advantageous spot you can be in as a coach, be it from Phil Jackson with Michael Jordan and Shaq and Kobe to Greg Popovich with Tim Duncan and David Robinson and then just Tim Duncan and the manager nobly and Tony Parker, Steve Kerr with Steph Curry when they were a dynastic team. There are just ways that you can be have the best catbird seat as possible as a NBA coach. The luckiest people and the luckiest coaches are the ones that basically don't have a, they're the limits of their responsibility or don't fuck it up. And that's not to diminish what they accomplish as coaches by themselves. It is more about having that guy and I'm more than that guy. You can see how this person in the way this, this person processes the game makes everything else easier and it makes playing with that person great. You know, Michael Jordan was different, Michael Jordan was, his motivation was through anger, his motivation was through getting, being aggrieved and he would often create issues, he would create motivations, this is well known about Jordan. Anyone who has read the Jordan rules, anyone who has gone back to even the last dance, this is well known about Jordan. He's one of the most talked about and examined players in our lifetimes. Michael Jordan was like that, but one of the things he did and when he finally processed that he needed to make his teammates better, which really began the year before Phil Jackson took over as coach and then obviously progressed even farther than that once Jackson came in, was the player that understands how he can make him great, his self-great and make his teammates great. And different players do it in different ways. The extensive gravity that Steph Curry has was a very modern version of a player like that, a very modern version of a player who is able to make his teammates better by just being who they are. And Curry's personality went itself to that. Tim Duncan was the ultimate coach's player. He, Greg Popovich, as I've said over and over again, was able to be a complete asshole because Tim Duncan allowed him to be that. There's different ways to do this, but the one trait that they all have is they both, all of these players made the coach's job a lot easier. And one of the luckiest guy in the NBA right now is Michael Malone. And when I talk about Nicola Yokech and what he's able to do, last night he put together a masterpiece of a game. And that really is the only way you can describe it. It was a masterpiece of a game of complete control. And the way he was doing it was something that was identifiable to people who watched the NBA. When you talk about guys who are like dominant in that way and you can, sometimes you, like with Tim Duncan you couldn't always see what he was doing because he was just a guy who just knew his game. And he was the self-awareness king, as I was the best way I was describe Tim Duncan and it allowed Greg Popovich to do what he was able to do. Nicola Yokech is different. And what you saw last night in the third quarter was Nicola Yokech identifying exactly how the Nuggets need to win this game and doing it in a way that was so obvious. And so it was really a flashback to the days of Jordan. It was a flashback to even Shaq and Kobe to where they knew that they were better and knew the weakness was through the best players on the other team. And Nicola Yokech in that masterful third quarter went at Rudy Gobert in such a relentless way and absolutely just brutal, brutal exhibition of dominance that even the biggest skeptics in the NBA had to tip their cap. Even the people who are inclined to not appreciate Nicola Yokech had to step back and say, "This is new. This is different. We've never seen this before from someone like a center. We've never seen it before." And those games like that, I mean, I'm not going to do, let's not take it for granted thing, but we need to understand how special it was. And it was special. It was special in a way that I think we all need to just kind of sit back, watch the highlights and relive the dominance, because it doesn't always happen even with dominant players. It doesn't always happen. In Game 6, the Nuggets could very well win, and Yokech could have a lesser game than he had, but it's these moments that we look at and we're like, "This is something that we can hang it in the Louvre. We can hang this moment in the Louvre." And I'm sure in the back of his mind, I feel like Michael Malone is self-aware enough to know this, that he's got to feel like the luckiest coach in the world, because he's got a guy who makes his job easy. Now, in that vein, I'm going to touch on the moment where I feel things change for the Nuggets. Obviously, I think to a certain extent, the way they were dominated in Game 2 was the catalyst for what everything that came behind it. But in reality, I do think that Nicole Yokech's teammates, very specifically his teammates, seeing the disrespect that he got, not only from Shaquille O'Neal, which was the most blatant and obvious, and the one that was done on national TV. But what was being said about Nicole Yokech, post-game 2, I do believe the teammates were everyone on the Nuggets team under who's not named Nicole Yokech was fundamentally to their core affected by the way people were talking about Yokech. And I'm going to get to this in the second half, but one of the ways this manifested itself was through energy and effort in a way that they hadn't done through the playoffs or even the last part of the regular season. But in talking about what it did to Yokech, I don't think Yokech cared, and I think this is where I think we just kind of -- we ascribe, we put our -- sometimes there's a tendency to put your own feelings, project your own feelings on to someone else. So I myself felt disrespected with what Shaquille was doing, and I projected that on to Yokech, obviously he feels the same way. I don't think he does. And I'm not saying he's a robot, and he didn't take offense, but that sort of thing doesn't ever seem to motivate Nicole Yokech. However, his teammates motivate Yokech. And the interesting thing about that day is that the Nuggets had set up this whole thing. They had an entire production done. His wife had narrated this video, and he was able to sit there and watch it. You know, they made him feel special. Jamal Murray was there with him watching this video, and all this stuff. There was just a production done that the Nuggets took great care to it. And I think there's one probably meant a little more than that when they went to Serbia the year before last in Tim Connolly's last year. This one was -- you could tell it touched Yokech, and the Nuggets did a really good job. It was that night. It was that very night that the disrespect from Shaquille O'Neal had happened. But to be honest with you, it began shortly after game two, and we've discussed this before. Honestly, and folks, we've got to put this in our minds here. None of this criticism that the Nuggets got was unfair. And it's stuff that would be said about the Minnesota Timberwolves should the foot shoe be on the other foot. This is just a natural reaction to specifically the surprising meltdown that the Nuggets had in game two. And it was a meltdown. It was a complete meltdown. And it was surprising because no one had seen that from the Nuggets. I do not blame people for looking at that and saying, "Oh my God, that is bad." And this spells a ton of trouble for these Denver Nuggets. But what came out of that on the week when I would say three and a half days that led up to game three was something that I think we have a tendency to downplay. We have Nicole Yocha, who makes Michael Malone's job easier. But we also had a buildup and almost a week's worth of discourse, five days' worth of discourse, that fundamentally changed the course of this series. And on the other side of the break, I'm going to talk to you about that on how we are maybe looking at it the wrong way. It's not Nicole Yocha that heard the noise, but it was definitely his teammates. And we'll get to that right after the break. The disrespect from Shaquille O'Neal was immense. If I felt disrespected when I saw that, there's no doubt Nicole Yocha's teammates felt that disrespected. And it was a slap in a face that was beyond anything that I'd ever seen. Because it's one thing to talk about Nicole Yocha saying he's not deserving when he is someone who doesn't really pay attention to social media and he only gets exposed to it if someone shows it to him. The other flip side of that is what happened to his face. And I do believe he winced a little, but I don't necessarily think Yocha really cares about that. I think he likes Shaq a lot, to be honest with you. I think Yocha likes Shaq a lot. So if anything Yocha felt, it's probably a little disappointed that Shaq would just do that that way. Because I don't think Yocha thinks he's deserving above everyone else to win an MVP. All that being said, the people who did see it is Nicole Yocha's teammates. Everything that I have heard from birdies has been the nuggets as a team were very cognizant of what was going on. It wasn't just Malone's mixtape of disses. It was more than that. It was just the general aura of that way. They were frauds and very specifically Nicole Yocha's was a fraud. And I think it's hard to hear that sort of thing and not take it personally. And because Yocha is such a steady pulse and he's a guy who just figures teams out, you're not necessarily going to see it manifest itself immediately because he thinks like, "Well, how can I best make my team better?" That's the way Nicole Yocha looks at things. But what was happening is these teammates had seen that. I have no doubt, Darren Gordon, Jamal Murray, Michael Porter Jr., Christian Brown. Justin Holiday, Reggie Jackson, continues to call it a pope. All these guys had seen the nonsense. And I do think, and then sometimes, this is where the American-ness of the roster helps. Maybe not necessarily with Jamal who has got his own issues, but he probably got to him too. But as Americans, we are going to be more prone to hearing the noise and being affected by the noise. And I have no doubt in my mind that the nuggets fundamentally were offended about what was going on. And it has little to do with whatever mixtape Malone put in. Because these guys can see this on their own, folks. Players look at social media. They get on their phones after the game. They see what people say about them. You don't need to pull together a video of what people say. People say it. It wasn't just happening with media. It was happening with people on Twitter. It was NBA Twitter which can be a toxic cesspool, but it wasn't just that. But Yokech who isn't on these forums, he's not in these avenues of social media. He's not going to be paying attention to this, but his teammates are. And what I've seen the last three games is teammates that are highly motivated. And what that did was like Yokech making Michael Malone's job easier. In turn, his teammates made Yokech. That's his job. That much easier. What I've seen is a motivation and energy I have not seen in this nuggets team for quite a while. You know, they have shown glimpses of it this year. But not a lot. This year has been they won 57 games. And I would describe them playing, you know, nuggets basketball, hard nuggets basketball from maybe a third of it. It really was the most of this year has been like that Lakers series. The nuggets just doing enough to win. And I think there were times that they made statements. I've talked about it on this podcast, you know, the Boston games, the Milwaukee game at home. They said that various other of these games where they got up for them. And you could tell they were invested emotionally. Less than what the humiliation of game two was the discourse afterwards deserved for some of it. I would say the Yokech stuff was undeserved, but the talk about the nuggets being, you know, specifically Jamal, having a meltdown and really being not representative of what everything they had done before. That was completely fair. Yokech on the other hand was getting the brunt of something that he didn't particularly deserve. I mean, he had a bad game too, but everyone had a bad game too. That wasn't a Minnesota Timberwolves. And I think that when you, the ensuing avalanche of terrible discourse that just snowballed through the week and got worse and worse and worse got to the teammates. And you have seen a highly, highly motivated nuggets team. And in that vein, you have seen how dangerous this team is when they give a shit. And the nuggets have clearly given a shit. And I will say the person who has benefited the most from this, who actually had a terrible first two games and came out of it smelling like a rose was Aaron Gordon. Aaron Gordon has been the beneficiary of this new motivation. Aaron Gordon, when he has energy and he plays with fire, is maybe the perfect Nicola Yokech complimentary piece. You know, and we have seen that since 2021. We have seen that in the last three years, a guy who just gets Nicola Yokech in a fundamental way. And it helps that AG is a really affable good guy who just wants to have fun. And you need someone like that with Nicola Yokech sometimes. You need some people who are less psychopaths. You know, and Jamal Murray kind of goes to the competitive psychopath area a little bit too much. He's more like Malone that way. And when you have that balance, it becomes a lot easier. And the beneficiary of this motivation has been AG. And then from that, things got easier with Jamal. From that, Michael Ward Jr. has had two good games and three not good games. Saw two games where he was all right. Another person who's benefited from this, this container he's called a pope. And this, just this, this zest, this energy. And the teammates had seen everything. And the teammates saw what Shaquille O'Neal said to him. And I really do fundamentally believe that Shaquille O'Neal was, and which happened the day before the game, I think. Was it Wednesday that happened or was it Thursday? Anyway, I believe everyone saw that and was like, this is over the line. This is over the line and we can't let it go down like that. And the nuggets have done so much in turning and flipping the narrative on its head. I have no doubt in my mind that Anthony Edwards is going to be a super duper star in this league. Everyone knows that he's got a great personality. There are just layers upon layers of this that you just know. You just know a guy is going to be a superstar. You know, Nicole Yokich was a guy that we had to kind of find out about it. Sometimes you just know. And Anthony Edwards is a you just know kind of guy. You got to go through the steps. You got to go through disappointment. You got to go through these things. Who knows what's going to happen in the rest of this series? I'm not writing them off. You know, the wolves are a well coached team with a bunch of, you know, there's some players on there who I mean. Well, before I get out of here, I got to talk about Carl Anthony towns and the injury thing. That was the most pathetic thing I've ever seen. When towns is walking around injured and then suddenly he's better and then literally he's walking down the tunnel and he's suddenly limping again. That was, that just, that just, I just chuckled. I chuckled when I saw that. I was like, are you kidding me? You know, not questioning the veracity of someone's injury. I would never do that on this podcast. But I think sometimes players have a tendency to ham things up. And that was certainly a very hammy thing that was going on with Carl Anthony towns right there. But more than that, you know, the, I'm not going to discount Anthony Edwards and this Minnesota Timberwolves team. But what I will do is say that a motivated nuggets team came to play in game three. And what you've seen the three games from three, four and five is the nuggets sort of like regaining that swagger. Because, because Nicole Yokech's teammates saw the noise. And that noise was so ridiculous. And it was so asinine that I think the nuggets snapped out of whatever funk they've been in for what I would say is a majority of this season. Malays, it is one of the reasons repeating is so hard is you just give board because you know what it takes. And every championship team will tell you that the repeat is the hardest one. It is not everything else that comes with it. The repeat that coming back to try to do it again is by far the hardest because you fighting human nature. And the nuggets have been fighting human nature all year because they knew what it takes and they always had that switch that they flipped. Remember last year, folks in March, the nuggets basically stopped playing and then flipped the switch and were dominant through playoffs. They were beneficiaries of some, some seating luck. But that happens when you're the number one seed in the conference, you know, no one's, no one's, it happens, right? But this year, the nuggets seem to have to need to go through adversity, but they needed to also identify that the people around them didn't respect them in the way that they felt like they should have been. And that lack of respect permeates, permeated, I should say, to everything and it got absolutely asinine. You know, and it reached a crescendo with Nicole Oakich and what happened with Shaquille O'Neal when he was talking, was being interviewed by TNT. You know, I love Inside the NBA. I'm going to be missing the Inside the NBA. I'm going to do a podcast on this soon about how, like, if we're going to blame people for losing Inside the NBA, it ain't NBC. All they did was put on a bid and it's very clear that Warner Bros. Discovery is just not in the ability right now to be matching these sort of high dollar things. And another reason the Inside the NBA won't be continuing on is Ernie Johnson is a TNT lifer, and it would require him leaving Turner. And I just don't see Ernie ever doing that. Ernie Johnson is loyal to a fault. Anyway, thank you all for joining me on the latest broadcast. God, when's the next game? It's a Thursday? I probably do a podcast on Friday. It just depends. I don't like to get too rigid on these things, but I think I'll probably blow up a podcast on Friday. Thank you for watching the late, you know, watching and listening to the latest podcast presented by Bed Online. I'll be back soon with another episode. Bye. [Music] [Music] [Music] [BLANK_AUDIO]
Nikola Jokic doesn't need motivation to put up a masterpiece performance like he did in game 5. However other probably needed a boost.
