The Ryen Russillo Podcast
NBA Trade Market Check-In With Bobby Marks, Plus NFL Divisional Round Preview and Picks With Ted Nguyen
Wed, 15 Jan 2025
Russillo welcomes Bobby Marks to preview the NBA trade deadline and discuss what could happen to Jimmy Butler, Bradley Beal, Zach LaVine, and Zion Williamson (0:42). Then, he’s joined by Ted Nguyen to break down all four divisional-round games, share where teams have the edge, and give his picks (52:51). Finally, Ceruti and Kyle join for Life Advice (80:39)! How do I handle my friend with money offering to pay for things for us? Check us out on YouTube for exclusive clips, livestreams, and more at https://www.youtube.com/@RyenRussilloPodcast. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Host: Ryen Russillo Guests: Bobby Marks and Ted Nguyen Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, and Mike Wargon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What are the key NBA trade deadline names?
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Today's podcast is loaded. We've got NBA, we've got NFL. We start with Bobby Marks, taking a look at the NBA names that are part of the NBA trade market. Can I interest you in some deal? Perhaps some Butler, maybe a little Zion, even a little, little bean. And then we're going to talk with Ted Wynn from The Athletic, who is just great on the film breakdown stuff.
I've enjoyed reading his stuff all season long. So he's going to help us look for some things in the divisional round for this weekend that he's going to pick all the games. We've got a lot of advice. Joining us to talk about the NBA as we're about the halfway mark, almost game 40 for a lot of teams, is Bobby Marks, former front office executive and one of my favorite NBA guests.
Okay, let's look at it this way. Let's look at all these headline things. Let's talk it out, all the different stuff. I have talked about Jimmy Butler, not a ton on the pod, but I felt like it's exciting. It's the big name. It's the next domino to fall with the drama. I mean, we're used to having these things happen, so this is exciting. So he gets suspended. He's eligible to come back tomorrow.
We know that there's a massive player option north of $50 million this summer. We can talk about the egos involved and that Jimmy's a stubborn guy and that Pat is somebody who's a pretty accomplished dude who's not going to be pushed around a little bit. I guess I've just never quite wondered why the Heat would still want to be in the Jimmy Butler business.
You don't want to sign him to a long-term deal. He's 35. He was always a pain in the ass there, but he was your pain in the ass. And when you were winning, it was worth it. Now it's not worth it. I don't really think the market for him would be all that great in looking at previous deals because I think sometimes you'd be like, well, how many picks or whatever? And it's like, I don't know.
It might be like one okay pick and one other pick that doesn't really mean anything. And then I wonder, as I promise I'll get to your bottom, but then I wonder, like, will we have a James Harden thing where Jimmy –
doesn't get traded before the deadline, rides it out, and then it's like, actually the best way for me to sort of protect my money is to opt in for the $52 million player option this summer.
And then they're stuck with me all over again because James did that strategically, not because he wanted freedom, because he knew he'd be able to kind of control where he could go and then what his next contract would be. So I just don't...
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Chapter 2: What does Jimmy Butler's situation look like?
What didn't work against Dallas? Um, what do we need to address? We got to get rebound and Hartenstein. We got to get another defender and Caruso. Like that's the approach for, for, um, for me, for, um, for Houston, as far as how I see that.
I also think, okay, see, um, didn't like the Meechich fit and went, hey, let's get off of this money too on the Gordon deal on top of everything else. So I think there was like another layer of that was like, oh, look, they're doing something that may not work out, but there's also potentially another smart reason why they're doing it.
Because they probably expected a little bit more out of him when they finally brought him over and given him an extension. Well, not an extension, but like a multi-year deal. All right. Maybe we make this the Golden State part and then we'll get the deal after this. Because I totally get it. Like you need to figure out with Steph at this age and still playing as well.
And, you know, I think this becomes kind of the noise on social media of like, they weren't a 12 and three team. They're not a very good basketball team right now. And there's some shooting numbers where you're like, everybody was making shots. They were playing absurd level defense. But now to watch Steph out there with a massive drop off to who the number two scoring option is.
And, you know, some nights Wiggins has it. Kaminga's had a couple moments. But when you watch them in all their clutch games, I think they played 24. They lost to Toronto the other night. And you watch what Steph is dealing with. Like Steph is not the problem with this basketball team right now. I can't believe anybody could ever come to that conclusion.
But you're like, okay, well, how do we help him?
When the options are the Beals of the world, not to say that they have a match for Beal, or the Butlers of the world, even though you would hate being in the front office and telling Lake up in ownership that, hey, we're going to wait for the thing that I can't tell you is going to present itself, but I'm promising you waiting for the unknown is still better than trading for the known.
And that's where the Butler stuff doesn't I still don't really think it changes who they are. And if you're waiting for this magical trade to change who the Warriors are and become a title contender, like you're probably waiting forever.
But some of these quick fix, like because somebody's a name, a Levine or these types of like acquisitions where you're like, well, you made the team better and now there's a better number two scoring option. Those are the things I would have a hard time saying yes to if you're in the position of running a front office.
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Chapter 3: How are the NBA trade markets evolving?
So the agent knows before that granted access of where your head is at financially.
Yeah, the pigeons are flying above with the notes, right? They're kind of dropping the notes as far as with that. Yeah, you have a sense. But I think it would be what I would want. I would want to talk to the player. It's one thing, you know, kind of back channeling with the agent. I would want to talk with the player. Yeah, that would be important to me.
I would want my coach and I would want my general manager to talk to the player.
Come on, man.
You can read through guys. I think the other thing, too, is it always says, what are we giving up? What are we giving up as far as are these core guys, are these expirings, are these guys that are hurt, not part of the rotation? Is it worth it? I think that goes into it too.
But yeah, that's why, as I said, I would want, you know, I'd want my coach, I would want to meet with the player, you know, even if it's over Zoom.
I still think the Memphis one makes basketball sense. I don't know what pieces would be going out.
Yeah, well, listen, it's easy. It's basically you would have to trade Marcus Smart, Brandon Clark.
I'm not talking about the money. I'm talking about the one. Give me the one thing that everybody can look at Houston and say, well, yeah, but you're not getting Tariq. You're not getting any of those guys. Is there a player... Wells has been so good for them as a rookie, by the way, Memphis is front office.
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Chapter 4: What are the previews for the NFL Divisional Round?
Like now I got to deal with like this, you know, with this agent and that guy. And I'm like, so what?
what do you want me to do about it and stuff and listen it's you know the eight years in the nba four with the team it's open it's available to everyone right you can go out there and negotiate it and listen there's i was talking with jeff passon about this because about mlb guys and there's 44 mlb guys that have it like you know there's there's two in the nba lebron and bradley beal and we're probably not going to see another one unless it's
Victor down the road or something like that here. And the reason why they're so rare, Ryan, is that you can't include them in extensions. They basically have to be a free agent type contract. And how many guys actually hit free agency now?
Yeah, I wonder if we'll see a shift to that, though, where it started going from, I mean, however far back in the timeline you want to go, you wait until you're a free agent, everybody's stockpiling all of their cap space. This is going to be really exciting. And then the player's just like, what's the point? Just take the extension and ask for the trade later.
And then it was like, I'll ask for the trade for... A year out, no, I'll ask for a trade like halfway with a year and a half out. And then we had guys going, I don't give a shit that the extension hasn't even kicked in yet. I want out, which I think is part of the restrictive language for the trades in the CBA. It's not just the penalties.
It's not just trying to find a way of curbing spending at the very top. You now get to go to your star player and say, I know you're mad and I know you want to go there and I can't legally do it. So I think all that stuff is, and I know you already understand all this. I'm explaining it to the CBA guy. Like you don't let's, I still think we didn't, we didn't do enough on Zion.
What do you do if you're David Griffin?
Oh man. Well, we were, but Tim, uh, Tim McMahon and I wrote this article back in, uh, end of December. And really the, the theme was trying to figure out, um, like kind of what his value is. He's like the mystery man, the hardest guy to figure out, right. In the NBA, as far as what his value is.
I was shockingly surprised that his value was higher than it was when we just talked, we both of us talked to a ton of teams, um, that it was, there was value there, right? Like, But man, is he an enigma. And it ain't even on the court. It's like, you're out rehabbing, you come back, and now like... He's out two months.
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Chapter 5: How do the Ravens plan to exploit the Bills' weaknesses?
So she's a better runner than you, though. Typically, both at your best. Sounds like.
I think I would have beaten her. Okay.
If I was healthy.
All right.
So Cape Cod has to happen. Cape Cod has to happen. Cape Cod has to happen.
The redemption tour. Yeah. Yeah.
This is a real rivalry we got going on. Crosstown shooting out over here.
Right. Uh, anything else? Any, any snacks? Did you, did your stomach turn around that you could start eating Disney food or?
Not really, really the last day I was sort of feeling back to myself, but the whole time it was like, I would order a meal and like sort of pick at it, you know?
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Chapter 6: What adjustments are the Rams making against the Eagles?
Dude, I mean, I was telling Rudy before we started, we had to, with the Hollywood fire on Wednesday, we evacuated because they basically, they put an evacuation notice right up to Hollywood Boulevard and I'm on Sunset. So I'm like the next big street there. And we just saw everything that happened on Tuesday. So we're like, all right, let's just get out of here.
We went down two miles south to my grandmother's house. But I'm like pulling, I'm like pulling up shit just in case, you know, the house is gone. So I'm just like, all right, passports, laptop for work. you know, some clothes I grabbed by Drake made Jersey. That was probably a little silly, but I was just like, it's just brand new. I don't want to lose it. It's brand new. It's brand new, dude.
He's the most expensive one. Um, and the Mac Jones jersey did not get grabbed. Didn't make it. Uh, actually that would have been when I donated a bunch of clothes after, cause I knew people needed clothes. It's like, that's going in the bin in the closet. Um, But she spent the whole time getting these five rabbits.
Hurt my back, by the way, because it went in this huge fucking massive dog cage, and I'm trying to keep it level. But she spent the whole time just wrangling rabbits. And I spent the whole time getting stuff. And we get to my grandmother's house that's two miles south. She doesn't have a toothbrush. She doesn't have clothes. She doesn't have anything. She doesn't have a phone charger.
But she's got five rabbits. So that's the difference. It really opened my eyes that we view emergencies a little differently. And so if there's a bat in the house, I think we'd have different views on that too.
Yeah. I mean, if it's a crow, she'd probably adopt it. It's like, Hey, this is Cameron.
Like, I think we have the pieces to build an aviary in here.
Yeah. I think a cop is always, if it's four guys, they're going to, they're going to be disappointed in you. Just because it's like, there's other stuff going on other than a crow. it's four guys. So like, I'm sure, I'm sure you feel enough shame already that we don't need to add to it. I remember I had this one stretch where I felt like I was getting messed with, um, quite a bit a few years ago.
And somebody showed up to my, I think I've already talked about this. Like somebody showed up to my door and I couldn't, the camera wouldn't turn on right as it was happening. So I had no idea what was going on. And then, so I just called the cops. And then when they apprehended a dude who was just totally confused and pretty banged up, um, They kind of just looked at me like, you got to call us.
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