Celtics insider Mego joins! What does Mego think of Joel Embiid and the confrontation with the media member? Thoughts? Did Embiid cross a line?
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00:00With a little insider knowledge from Meg. Oh, hello. How are you? I'm good
00:04I'm like, I think I'm like 95% Sauvignon Blanc, right?
00:09I feel like we need to ask everybody how they're doing emotionally today
00:14Yeah, you know, it's a it's a free and fair election and the people have spoken
00:19You can't argue with the people can is I mean you can but it makes you a jerk
00:24Ken is turning his office into a crying room. So
00:27It's a therapy coping corner
00:31No, it's it's crying when he arrives in it, well, it's tears of sadness or happiness
00:39Those happy tissues
00:43I would not want to be in a room with Curtis and Ken today
00:46Oh, I can't wait sitting in between them. I would find today to be a very awkward one
00:51I think a lot of people's Thanksgiving's just got a lot more interesting. Yes
00:55Yeah, yeah, all right
00:57well
00:57I'll tell you what's interesting is that Steve Kerr arrives in the city this evening and
01:02I assume that Jason Tatum has had this one circled on the on the schedule for a while
01:07I would think so the Steve Kerr presence again
01:11it's gonna be interesting from a couple different angles because both he and Steph Curry are more of the
01:18outspoken
01:20political
01:21kind of
01:22They're just politically outspoken even more. So the NBA is probably the most politically outspoken
01:28Professional league out of the big four and those are two of the most politically outspoken
01:32People in the league and they're both gonna be in the house tonight
01:34so I'm gonna go over there early because I'm sure he's gonna have something to say before the game about the election results and
01:41That'll be an interesting little wrinkle. But yeah, I don't think there's gonna be a whole lot of love lost
01:46For Jason Tatum and Steve Kerr. I hope Jason Tatum after every shot that he scores a
01:52It's just ice grilling Steve Kerr
01:56Talking trash. I know he doesn't do it but stay in his face. Just give him a look
02:02You don't need to say anything daggers, you know, I think that's not hate him trash talking is yeah
02:07I would say dial it up. Would you take the over 30 and a half points for Tatum?
02:12I would yeah
02:12I would and I think you'll know pretty quick because
02:15The way that they have been using Tatum so far this year is he's playing the entire first quarter and he's been really hot
02:22To start these games in the first quarter. He's averaging thirteen point three points per first quarter
02:28It's pretty different than the way that he was starting games last year
02:31So I think you'll get an idea right away of how he's feeling and what his production is gonna be like first three minutes
02:37Courtney, that's why you better hit that on Tatum first. Are you like becoming a degenerate?
02:43Like I'm really enjoying it
02:46She's in the poly world. Yeah different. You're not really a degenerate in that world. It's like the lottery, you know
02:52All you need is one to hit and you're right. I'd never see degenerates picking up scratch tickets
02:59No, I'm talking about more of the Powerball mega mega millions
03:04No, not really because Courtney's only doing a couple bucks on it, right?
03:07Fifty bucks a month is all I will I will put into my addiction for now for now
03:14Mega so this morning we talked about Peyton Pritchard six out of eight games so far. He's at 15 plus points
03:20I know you and I talked about it a little bit like before the season you didn't think there was really
03:24Much of a shot at that six man of the year now the odds on favorite at FanDuel
03:28Do you think he can maintain this? Do you think he actually has a shot now?
03:32I'm not sure because I think it will
03:34Depend a little bit on how they decide how and when they decide to bring Chris stops porzingis back because that'll change your rotation
03:41a lot so part of
03:43Peyton Pritchard getting the opportunity to take as many threes as he's taking right now is because of the way that the rotation is working
03:49I think they're still trying to figure out how they're patching up that big presence
03:53Which you would think shouldn't affect the guard in the rotation
03:57But it does because you're getting guys like Nene is Keita in there
04:00You're trying to figure out a Xavier Tillman is gonna play more minutes
04:04I don't think he should judging by the way. He's looked so far and then of course Al Horford managing him
04:09So it's very very early
04:11I don't know how again these futures bets work if you want to put some money down on that. I don't think it's the worst
04:18Prediction in the world. I just think that it's not totally like I love it. We changing his name
04:24You know how everybody's like white mama. No white Cobra cuz I love the way
04:29You know, you've been on Pete Pritch from a while
04:32But his confidence the way he's like he plays with a swag and you could tell he's got a little bit of that in him
04:40By the way, he talks and the way he carries himself and like when after a bucket
04:45He's one that he ain't afraid to talk. No ish. That's the white Cobra out there when he bite is deadly
04:50He's not afraid to run downhill either. Like he will he will chase down offensive boards
04:54He will chase that he'll get to the rim
04:56So it's not I know we all love seeing him with the daggers from the three-point line and the buzzer beaters that he embraces
05:04But he does other stuff to you have with the luxury that you have of waiting on poor Zingas
05:09When do you think you end up seeing him and is is there a risk in waiting too long and getting in getting him back?
05:16And the only risk I think in waiting him to waiting too long with him would be his conditioning. But again, like he's
05:22Seemingly been pretty active through this portion of the season behind the scenes in terms of what he can do
05:28So I don't really think that there's a downside to being quote overly cautious with him
05:34Yeah, you don't need him right now. Like we said this I think last week
05:37I really don't think that you need him for a lot of the teams that you're going up against and the only benefit would be
05:42if say you're seeing like an OKC or somebody who you're not gonna get to see very much of during the season and getting an
05:50Opportunity some point in the late winter early spring just to see how those matchups are gonna work if he's healthy playing
05:57Play him as soon as possible because I want to know whether it isn't I want to know whether or not he can make it. I
06:04Hold them out. I hold them out. Let's say you hold them out and then
06:09You find out he can't make it when you say he can't make it. You mean like he'll break
06:13No, like he gets hurt again, but you always say regular season doesn't matter
06:17It doesn't but in the case of poor Zingas, I want to know if he can get through it and not get hurt
06:23So I'd rather I think we know who Kristaps Porzingis is as a player and I don't know that he's he's pretty fragile
06:29No, but the longer we wait then he gets hurt closer to the playoffs and now you're like without him. I rather you
06:36Play him early if he does now you could say
06:39All right
06:39We're probably gonna be without him and let's build our team that way
06:43Rather than wait until he comes back later on in the season holding him off and then let's say he plays a month in
06:49Reaggravate something or gets hurt again
06:50And now right when the playoffs starts you're now trying to shuffle
06:54Because you're no longer without poor Zingas at least now if you play him and you go, you know
06:59Two three two and a half months then you feel pretty confident about you know him being able to at least
07:06Make it through the long haul
07:07I don't want to wait the last minute because
07:10Then it hits the team and now you got a kind of show
07:12You also have these months right now like he's definitely not gonna be back before December
07:16No, so you have these months of data right now of seeing what you can do without him right now
07:21Well, I'm saying as soon as December gets here plan what about Jalen does this injury worry you it's like a hip flexor strain
07:28Is something that you can aggravate pretty?
07:30yeah, Gary Washburn from the Boston Globe had the report that he got two MRIs on that hip flexor and
07:38That may seem more routine for like a professional athlete
07:42But just that it's so close to the core
07:44Makes me a little bit scared like that that level of injury just seems like the kind of thing that
07:49They should again be a little overly cautious with Jalen about about and I think they're indicating that they are because he didn't play in
07:56Atlanta that's his hometown
07:58He loves playing in Atlanta and he's not playing tonight and it's clear that there's some personal stuff with Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum when
08:05It comes to Team USA and Steve Kerr is a big part of that. So I look at that as
08:10They need to manage that pretty carefully
08:13Even though it's very early in the season because that's something that you don't want to start barking on and off
08:18Yeah, and the second half of the season as you're going into the playoffs
08:21Let me get to the important stuff who issued the code red on perk. I don't know
08:25Are we sure that there was a code red issue? I mean there was some sort of a lifetime ban or a
08:31Some like you ain't invited to the pot. I mean
08:34So I the look it's I heard you guys talk about it earlier
08:38Not the first time that there's been bad feelings with a former player there before it was with Ray Allen and
08:46Paul
08:49Kevin Garnett well
08:51again, I think it's the the question is is it between the current players and
08:57perk is it the coach and perk if there's anything like that because when it was Kevin Garnett and
09:04Ray Allen that was a very personal thing about the guys that were on that team and I don't think that that
09:10extended from like the
09:12Organization towards rail and I think it was more about those guys having stuff that they eventually sorted out with Kevin Garnett's banner night
09:19And that was great perk his job on ESPN seems to be to go on and be incredibly critical of the Celtics
09:26Because that's where he's relevant and at sometimes he gets personal with that. I think that's where it crosses a line whether there's a
09:34Bad feelings from the organization or from the current team
09:38I'm not sure. I read the same story that you guys did and the what was it the u.s
09:42Son, yeah, some of these organizations that get the Celtics reporting
09:45I'm like, I don't even know what this is or what is this?
09:48But they probably look at him the the same way young guys look at any former player who played a long ago
09:55They probably have no idea who he is and they're probably like this guy's like a dodo bird goofball
10:02Go around on social media and they see that and they go what they know like who's this guy?
10:06He played it's not like his name is Kevin Garnett or his name is Paul Pierce
10:10So you got these younger dudes that are playing going? Oh, we know who this is or Charles Barkley a Shaq
10:16They're like who's this guy here that's criticizing us
10:20yeah, and I think it's a little strange because I think it was last year or the year before I
10:26covered an event where
10:28Perk was talking and he was introducing his book the education of Kendrick Perkins and he was having a whole local night in Boston
10:34And it's a little bit of talking out of both sides your mouth because he talks about how great his time in the Celtics
10:41Organization was to the point when when he got traded to OKC. There was such a worse
10:48Culture he said there compared to the Celtics and he's so much of like what he says
10:54That's relevant at times is so nice about the Celtics
10:57But then during the season on these TV he just gets personal his personal against the coach
11:03She gets personal about Jalen and Jason and their dynamic and I think that just that's the risk that you take
11:09We had a caller this morning though that called and said that he basically just talks poorly about the Celtics for ratings for like click
11:16Well, I think that's what keeps him relevant, right? And and look we all work in media like we understand there's controversy
11:22You got to come at things with a strong opinion
11:26You got to have your takes but when it gets personal when you're saying like you put
11:31Joe Missoula's brain in a bird and it flies backwards
11:34Which by the way is a line that he reused a couple times because he used it with Kyrie, too
11:39So that's the other side. It's like
11:41Very sharp. You better be coming up with new material every day, but I think for him
11:47That works because that's kind of who he is, right? He come a keys from Houston. He's from that area
11:54He kind of you know tries to bring that type of swagger
11:57He's not like a kind of a Richard Jefferson who's more of a you know, or a Tim Legler's just like basketball
12:04Like here's what we there's what they he wants to add a little spice and flavor to him, but that works for him
12:09I I look at it and that's why I said it's more of in today's world if
12:15You weren't a dog when you played and when I mean a dog, I mean like somebody everybody knew
12:22When you criticize
12:24It goes in one ear and out the other it's one thing when Charles Barkley sits up there and criticize or Shaq
12:29Yeah, cuz they're like he's wanted a grit 50 greatest players ever
12:33But when it's like so you're surprised that anybody is reacting to what Perkins but isn't that why this is exactly what he wants
12:40Like if these guys was like it's perk and they move on then nobody talks about him and it goes away the fact that they take
12:45It personally like these guys don't have a relationship with perk from playing with them, right?
12:50But it's it's difficult because a guy like perk is gonna get hit with those shots
12:54Remember Charles Barkley said you want me to listen to a guy that averaged, you know
12:59three, you know two points and two rebounds or something along those lines or you see you you seen was it
13:06Wasn't it Kevin Durant who basically was like he averaged the GPA and it's something along those lines
13:13So it's like it's got to be hobby. That's a good line
13:15It's got to be hard for a guy like you listen you cover this team you cover this team for
13:20Wei.com you're in there. You're in you're in the locker room. So I would ask you about Joel Embiid who?
13:26Clearly did did not like something that again about him again
13:30Do we know what these lines are with media? And if you cross a line where you get so personal
13:35I'm guessing the Joel Embiid story you're talking about is the confrontation he had with the Philadelphia Inquirer
13:41Suspended three games for his reaction
13:43Really runs even further contrary to what the columnist wanted because his column was about criticizing how Joel Embiid never plays
13:54So he further is not playing but you talk about a player's family
13:58You talk about a player's deceased family member and their son and then compare that to their work ethic in
14:05The NBA that's such a clear line to me where it's very destructive for media members
14:11Not just in the NBA in the NFL who we want to be in the locker room
14:16we want to engage with with athletes in a respectful manner and
14:20I think we're all there for the same goal of putting out good content and getting good stories and that's just so destructive
14:27It's like he was he was trying to apologize to him in the locker room though
14:30Like Marcus Hayes was in there trying to be like, all right, I crossed a line
14:35But I don't think he went in there to apologize. I think he was the report figured out how pissed he was, right?
14:40But then he was sorry
14:42Just because you apologize doesn't mean like oh, well my feelings aren't hurt. Yeah. Yeah, I just I or you haven't disrespected me
14:50Yeah
14:50I think that the way in which people are taking this is that he was talking about his family members where he wasn't really he
14:57Was just saying Joel Embiid has made such an emphasis on the fact that he wants to leave a legacy for his son who his
15:02Son was named after his brother. He said he was not living up to a legacy for his deceased brother
15:11That's so disrespectful
15:13He was suspended for three games for that like the more I think of it like what the hell because they have to make sure
15:19That nobody else does it but I said this and this is why I always said like if you're gonna say things
15:24You got to be ready for whatever consequence showed up like
15:29calmness for showing up in person and being there but but if Joel Embiid takes it to another level where he's not willing to hear
15:36your
15:37Apology or if it gets a little heated and then he tends to you know
15:41Maybe push you what like you got to be willing to deal with whatever comes with that and that's the business that we're in
15:48I mean Courtney brought up me and Tuka when I was like
15:51Tuka leaving because he was soft like if Tuka felt like a certain way I would have to deal with whatever it comes my
15:59That's so different because you're you're talking about the player and their approach to the game or the job to me
16:05that is that is so many steps behind like
16:09Mentioning someone's family and a deceased family member and their kid, right?
16:13That's that to me is just nuts. Also if Tuka ever wanted to throw with you, you could borrow my glasses
16:19Yeah, but I'm not a thrower though
16:20I told you I only got a little bit of gas left in the tank and I'm I'm I'm not wasting it's coming out the
16:26other end
16:29If I ever got up if I ever got a throw handle
16:33By the way, I'm surprised by how many people tell me when I say who do you think is gonna be there in the NFL?
16:39End of January how many people suggest your commanders? Hmm? Wait, you you're talking Super Bowl. No, I'm talking playoffs
16:47Okay, I'm talking people who look at they are having a season your football. Yeah, why do you think that they wouldn't be in the playoff?
16:53I mean, I think how boys is totally disintegrated. No, like you got Philly out there
16:58They're good team, but I feel very strongly about them Jane and Daniels, you know
17:03legit to make the NFC championship
17:05I could see because you say are we talk to people and say Detroit's the bet they feel like it's the best evening, right?
17:11The Niners are getting the outline is they're getting McCaffrey base this week the line
17:18Wildcard team who the Niners no, no, no
17:20Washington no, no, but I think when you look at it
17:23They could potentially end up as the number two seed when you think about the NFC
17:27I'm not I wouldn't be concerned about the Niners. I think it's Detroit. Maybe the clear-cut favorite and then
17:35Washington could beat Philly on any given Sunday
17:38They could be who else is there, Minnesota, so I think that Washington easily be in the NFC
17:51Minnesota's good
17:54Donald sooner or later guess what the pumpkin Cinderella the clock's gonna hit midnight and we're gonna see Sam Donald that we seen
18:01Sam Donald so I don't I don't think there's a team other than Detroit if I'm a Washington
18:07Command this fan, which I know you are mega that would scam