Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Welcome to the Saturday Slamma Jam here on the Athletic NBA Daily. On today's show, we're doing the good, the bad, the what? And buckle up, everybody. It's Wizards Week. Josh Robbins is here to give you all his Wizards knowledge and to entertain you. Let's be honest. And then we'll do some trivia. Before we get to Alex, I want to tell you about our friends.
who do an F1 podcast here on The Athletic. The F1 season reaches a dramatic climax this week. And for the first time since 2010, three drivers can still win the title. Follow all the buildup and all the fallout from the final Grand Prix in Abu Dhabi this weekend with The Race, wherever you get your podcasts. Go check it out. It's good stuff. With me, as always, is my good friend, Alex Spears.
Alex, please tell me what happened in the NBA this week.
Andrew, our top story this week is the situation in Milwaukee. After missing a four-game stretch during which the Bucs went 0-4 and dropped as low as the 11th seed in the East, Giannis Antetokounmpo returned to the lineup this week.
But unfortunately, the return of Giannis wasn't enough to avoid an embarrassing loss on Monday night to the Washington Wizards, who were drunk with power off their two-week stint on the Wheel of Fandom. All right.
Complicating matters, in the first few minutes of a game against Detroit, Giannis pulled up with a calf strain, an injury that is expected to keep him sidelined for another three to four weeks. The one bit of good news for Bucs fans this week is that the Bucs actually won that game against Detroit, 113 to 109, despite Giannis only playing three minutes.
The Bucs are currently 10 and 13, 10th in the East. Now, from a player potentially asking to leave a franchise to a player being asked to leave, Chris Haynes reported late Tuesday night that the Los Angeles Clippers were sending future Hall of Famer Chris Paul home. Get out of here. The move came just days after CP3 had announced that this would be his final NBA season.
Subsequent reporting from the athletic Sam Amick, Law Murray, and Joe Varden revealed that the reasoning behind the Clippers' dismissal of CP3 was essentially that Chris Paul was really annoying, arguably the one thing that everyone knows about Chris Paul. Now, here's a fun Chris Paul stat from friend of the show, Law Murray.
The Clippers have not had a losing season since acquiring Chris Paul in December 2011. And in fact, the other 29 teams have all had at least one losing season since the Clippers last losing season in 2010-11. Wow.
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Chapter 2: What are the highlights of this week's NBA games?
That means that the Nuggets have already had three different players with a 50-burger this season. With Murray joining Jokic and Aaron Gordon, the only other teams in NBA history to have three 50-burgers from three different players, the 1961-62 Lakers, Elgin Baylor, Jerry West, and... Do you know it, Andrew? Rudy LaRusso. And the 2018-19 Warriors with Steph, Clay, and KD.
And those were the top stories this week, Andrew. What a week it was. On court, off court. It was a good one.
It was. The off court stuff has been wild. It was just like all falling on us at once, it felt like.
Yeah, it came out of the blue too, late at night. Yeah, it did. I was so excited. I was hesitant to text people that I knew were in the central time zone because it was so late, but I felt like I needed to. I needed to wake them up.
We were recording Down to Dunk. It happened right after we finished recording. I wish we would have held on for just a few more minutes.
I know, I know. But that brings us to our weekly segment where we share something good we like, we share something bad we didn't like, and then we share something that maybe just confused us, good or bad, in a segment we like to call Good, Bad, What? Andrew, what is your good this week?
My good is Shea Gildas Alexander. And a lot of people want to talk about his three-point shot, his step-back three, which has been ridiculous. A lot of people want to talk about his passing improving. But there's one part of his game that has also improved that could be historic if he can continue at this pace. His pull-up shot.
Right now, he leads the league in pull-up points, period, at 301 pull-up points so far this season. He led the league in this stat last year. None of this is super surprising, but what is surprising is his efficiency. Last year, he was 44.6%. on his pull-up shots, which is good, but not like crazy elite. There were guys like Durant and DeRozan that had better percentages last year.
This year, he has the best percentage on pull-up shots of anybody that has at least 150 pull-up points at 51% on his pull-up shots, which, to put that into context, since 13-14... Whenever these stats started to be compiled on NBA.com, guess how many players have averaged more than 10 pull-up points per game and shot over 50% from the field on those numbers? Two. It's one. It's one guy.
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Chapter 3: How is Shai Gilgeous-Alexander improving this season?
Now, did they also lose games during the span by 30, 33, and 45? Yeah, of course they did. We're still talking about the three and 18 Wizards who per cleaning the glass had the 28th ranked offense and 30th ranked defense. Andrew, if the Wizards are our favorite team, who is our guest?
Guys, it's the week we've all been waiting for. Let's be honest. I know that Slammin' Jam fans have been clamoring for this to happen. The wheel has denied us too many times until today. Josh Robbins returns to Slammin' Jam. Josh, welcome back to the Saturday Slammin' Jam.
I'm so happy to be here. Now I'm going to earn my keep. I love the two of you, and I love the Saturday Slammin' Jam. Let's go. Thank you. Our tens of thousands of listeners. I mean, can we just, let me just tell everybody what's really going on here. Okay.
I don't know what this is going to be, but go ahead. This is a love affair.
This is a plutonic love affair. Similar to when Andy Kaufman would visit the Letterman Show or Bill Murray would Or Terry Garr would visit the Letterman Show back in the NBC days. Or when Diane Cannon or Angie Dickinson or that animal guy would visit Carson, Johnny Carson. Our younger listeners are loving this now. Keep going. That's right. And so that's what's going on here.
It's a love affair between the hosts and the guest. And because you welcomed me with such wonderful open arms... You have created this incomparable bond that I have with the Saturday slam and jam. and it means so much to me.
The telegrams and the DMs and the Twitter DMs and the blue sky DMs and the email messages and the strange text messages that I get rooting for me to beat the daylights out of Andrew in trivia, not in real life, mean a lot to me. We're getting there. So thank you to all of you. You mean more to me than... I can properly express.
And because of that, I have an announcement that I would like to announce at this time. Oh, wow. We're starting with an announcement. Okay, go ahead. Go ahead. The next... Is it correct that Oklahoma City is kind of the spiritual home of the Saturday Slammin' Jam?
Sure. Sure.
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Chapter 4: What is the current state of the Chicago Bulls?
That's what us poodles do.
Well, when you have the quality education like some, you know, see, I didn't have the benefit of a trainer. They just put me in the dog pound and said, well, maybe someone will come over and claim you. Whereas you, you got three meals a day of high quality, you know, this packaged food. I got the gravel instead.
That's what everybody's always saying about me.
Josh, another name in the top 10 all-time blocks, Wizards history.
Yeah, there sure is some pressure now.
It's heating up, heating up.
It is heating up. Okay, I'm... Total blocks. All right, I'm going to go with Gortat on this. Marcin Gortat?
Was number eight on the list.
Thank the good Lord. Back to Andrew.
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Chapter 5: Why are point guards becoming less essential in the NBA?
Thank you so much for that five-star review.
That individual, whomever she or he is, is one heck of a writer, and that's the person who should be the beat writer covering the Wizards. Because that individual is articulate, eloquent, and had me on the edge of my seat. That was some good writing.
Somebody else that I need to give a thanks to, Benjamin Miles, made our new drop for The Good, The Bad, The What, which is voiced by our friend, the L man, Luke Stevens, who's on the Friday show of Down to Dunk. And then Benjamin took it from Down to Dunk to... like took it from an episode and then turned it into a beautiful drop. So thank you for that. We will be using it this season.
I hope you guys enjoy your weekend and the basketball. And we will talk to you guys again next Saturday.