Wemby, VJ, and the Mafia + Yaron Weitzman on the LeBron Lakers
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What are the highlights from the first week of the NBA season?
Welcome to the Saturday Slammin' Jam here on the Athletic NBA Daily, brought to you by eBay. On today's show, Alex and I are going to give you our good, our bad, and the what of the week. We talk to Jaron Weitzman, the author of a Hollywood ending. the dreams and drama of the LeBron Lakers. But it's an amazing book. And I promise, there's so many good little nuggets from this book that we discuss that aren't just Lakers. Maybe you're a Lakers fan and you want to hear about it. Maybe you're not a Lakers fan. There are so many things in this book that kind of affect the NBA in general that you're going to want to listen to the interview. It's great. And then we're going to do some trivia. But before we do all of that, Alex, tell me what happened in the NBA this week.
Andrew, the NBA is back! And we've had a couple of days of real basketball to enjoy. And while the basketball's been fun, when it comes to the top story this week, it's going to be hard for Vijay Edgecombe to top current head coach arrested in connection with years-long illegal poker scheme involving the Mafia. That's right, folks. It's only week one of the NBA, and we've got Portland Trailblazers head coach Chauncey Billups being arrested and indicted on charges of wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy. What was going on is Billups was acting as bait to lure wealthy people into poker games where they could play alongside famous athletes while losing all of their money because everything was rigged.
Now that sounds bad, but there's more. In a separate investigation which led to the arrest of Heat guard Terry Rozier, Chauncey Phillips does match the description of a co-conspirator who tipped off bettors that the Blazers would be arresting key players in a March 2023 game. For the time being, Tiago Splitter has taken over as the Blazers interim head coach. All right, back to Sixers rookie P.J. Edgecombe. Just an NBA player doing cool things on a basketball court not involving the Mafia. In a game against the Boston Celtics, Edgecombe had an historic... debut game. First, he scored 14 points in the opening quarter, breaking a record once set by LeBron James, but he kept scoring. He finished with 34 points in the game, the most in a rookie debut since 1974.
Now his full line was 34 points, seven rebounds, three assists to go along with five three-pointers. But he wasn't the game's leading scorer because Tyrese Maxey dropped 40 in the The Sixers will have their home opener on Saturday night against the Hornets, who won their own home opener against the Nets. Also this week, the Oklahoma City Thunder received their rings, raised the first championship banner in franchise history. In an effort to raise the stakes this season after winning 68 games last year, the Thunder have decided to try and win every game in double overtime. Please stop.
Please stop.
Yeah, please stop. Please. First, it was the home opener against the Houston Rockets, a game that should have ended in the first overtime after Kevin Durant called a timeout that did not exist. But it ended up going to double overtime where the Thunder won 125-124. Two nights later, on the road in Indiana, the Thunder did it again, winning a double overtime 141-135 behind Shea Gilgis-Alexander's career-high 55 points. SGA took 26 free throw attempts, which I haven't checked social media, but I'm assuming everyone's been there. Cool and normal about it. It is the most attempts since Giannis took 26 last December. But you know what's wild? In the last five seasons, there are only three other players who have had a game with at least 26 free throw attempts.
Giannis did it twice. Makes sense. MB did it once. Makes sense. Can you guess the third, listener? I'm not even going to wait. No, you can't. There's no way in a million years you would guess that it was Jeremy Grant. who took 28 free throws in a November 2022 game against the Knicks.
What shocking news involved a coach and the Mafia?
Now, speaking of the Knicks, they came into the first heavyweight matchup of the season down a few key players. No Mitchell Robinson, no Josh Hart.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What are the highlights from the first week of the NBA season?
0:06–4:16
2
What shocking news involved a coach and the Mafia?
4:16–8:33
3
How did P.J. Edgecombe perform in his debut game?
8:33–10:04
4
What was the context behind the Lakers' pushback on Yaron Weitzman's book?
10:04–15:00
5
What insights does Yaron Weitzman provide about the LeBron Lakers?
15:00–15:57
6
What was the significance of the proposed three-team trade involving Paul George?
15:57–17:20
7
How did Russell Westbrook's time with the Lakers unfold?
17:20–21:58
8
What trivia game do Andrew and Yaron play at the end of the episode?
21:58–1:11:36