• 7 hours ago
Transcript
00:00Oh, we want to talk to Tim about that and much more.
00:02He joins us now on the River Islands guest line.
00:04His great work on the SF Standard and then also, of course, the TK Show,
00:08which you can find on the Odyssey app is great.
00:12And he just posted a conversation with Buster Posey now running the Giants.
00:16So we'll touch on that a little bit as well.
00:18Hey, Tim, how are you this afternoon?
00:20I'm doing just fine, guys. How you guys doing?
00:22We're good, man. This crossroads for the Warriors, though.
00:25I mean, like, how does Mike Dunleavy,
00:28how does he thread this needle?
00:31Yeah, I don't know that it's really possible if it means like,
00:34can you get this team to compete for a championship this season?
00:37I just don't know that that's an aroma possibility.
00:40Probably a little outside the envelope already going into the season,
00:44but you could think about it.
00:45And they go twelve and three to start.
00:47You certainly are allowed to say, look, get a third seed
00:51and a third seed where they won the championship in twenty twenty two.
00:53And well, that's out the window.
00:55Seven to 17, the last few few last month and a half or however long that's been.
01:01I think they have to be realistic.
01:02I think they're generally realistic.
01:04I think what we're hearing from Steph, Draymond and Curve
01:07in the last few days and various interviews is that they're really trying
01:12to hard to be realistic.
01:13And I know fans don't want to hear that.
01:15And maybe Joe Lacob is not on that.
01:17You know, he's always pushing for try to be as good as he can.
01:21But I don't know that the move is there that would immediately walk them back.
01:25I don't know what they could do where you could say, OK, this now is a team
01:29that's going to be one of the top three seats and have a real shot at home court
01:32advantage the first two rounds and all these things that you kind of need.
01:36You kind of want to feel
01:38if you're the Warriors right now and you're going to playoff.
01:42Now, obviously, you have the pressures of Steph.
01:44They're going to be thirty seven in March.
01:46You have, you know, how much more they can get a dream on all these things.
01:49All these pressures are there.
01:51They're real.
01:52But I don't know what they can what practically they can do beneficially
01:59other than just try to be as good as they could this year.
02:01It's not going to be great.
02:03And then make sure they don't blow it for some big move.
02:06If it's their next offseason, that's where this is.
02:10And again, fans really don't like to hear that.
02:12And that's OK. I get it.
02:14It's not great right now.
02:16But what you don't want to do is sacrifice
02:20the possibility of something bigger or that Jonathan
02:23Minka just turns into that something bigger.
02:25I don't know if that's going to happen, but there's a possibility of that.
02:28You don't want to sacrifice that for a marginal improvement this season.
02:33And I don't see anything out there other than marginal improvements.
02:37And Dennis Schroeder, I thought, would be a marginal improvement.
02:40And he's actually been not that he's been a marginal, maybe step backward step.
02:45So they don't have a lot they can do.
02:48And it's tough. It's a tough place to be.
02:50It's a tough place.
02:51Knowing that Steph Curry could still lead a team doing some really big things
02:56if he's got the right mix around him.
02:57They don't have the right mix around them.
02:58They've got the injuries.
03:00And I've said the coming into really froze this season because either
03:04he could have been really, really good and they would have changed
03:06the dynamic of the team or he can would have built his value
03:09and get a trade over something really, really good in February.
03:11And neither of those things was likely to happen with him.
03:14Maybe missing games all the way up until the trade deadline
03:17and at the best, he'll be back with a week or two before that.
03:20And he'll be trying to get himself in shape.
03:23And that's just not the way that you're going to maximize his value at this moment.
03:26It's just they're kind of stuck there.
03:27And it's not great.
03:29But I think some of this season is the acceptance of that reality.
03:33And we're hearing it, I think, from the top guys.
03:35Yeah. The five stages of grief, the Kubler-Ross model.
03:38They don't always go in order.
03:40But I do think that we've reached a little bit of an acceptance stage.
03:44I think about the offseason, Tim, and how are they poised to then at that spot
03:49make a bigger move that maybe they can't make at the deadline in terms of,
03:53you know, cap room or salary space and assets?
03:56Are they more poised in August than they are now in February?
04:01I mean, it's just the teams are more willing to make bigger swings in the offseason.
04:05That's when they tried to get Paul George, Lori Markin in the last offseason.
04:09You just set up the way the contracts go.
04:11They don't have cap room.
04:12They don't have, you know, that isn't where they're playing with.
04:15It's just what can they trade?
04:17And you would have Cominga becoming a restrictor for agent.
04:21You would have, you know, other contracts that could possibly move.
04:24You would have some, you know, it's it's coming in as picks and Wiggins.
04:30That's all the names that we've heard.
04:32And maybe that gets you market.
04:34And maybe that gets you something more than market.
04:35We know what the pipe dream is.
04:37It's the guy in Milwaukee.
04:38But he's the pipe dream for a lot of teams
04:41and maybe teams that are better positioned than the Warriors.
04:43We'll see.
04:45But I just think that's when they have to really make the decision about Cominga.
04:49Again, he's a restrictor for agent in July, and they could either pay them,
04:53they could trade them, they could figure out what to do there.
04:57You know, there are some players that might become available.
05:00You know, there's always a good player.
05:01That's the price that becomes available.
05:04And it's much more likely that they'll be able to do it
05:06in the offseason than they would be in the trade deadline stuff.
05:09You got to match so many things all at once.
05:11You can't go four for one because the roster spots that they get.
05:14And it's just really hard to make something like that happen at the deadline.
05:18You can do it.
05:19That has happened. It's hard.
05:21And I just think I mean, marketing, you can revisit.
05:26You can revisit some Paul George.
05:27You can do some other things.
05:28Neither one of them feels that great right now.
05:31But it's on that level that they can try to line it up for next July
05:37and hope that stuff's good for another year.
05:39I hope that Dramon holds on for another year.
05:42That's what it's basically come down to.
05:44But what you don't want to do is do something that sacrifices
05:49something you're going to need the first round pick to first round pick in July.
05:54If you want to line up something big.
05:56By getting something marginal now, and I think it's all marginal.
06:00Tim Calcomi, SF Standard, TK Show, Odyssey
06:04with us here, Willard and Dibbs, 95-7 the game.
06:07TK, we all took note that
06:12the timing of Steve Kerr, Steph Curry, Draymond Green,
06:16all at the same time sort of saying, hey, we value the future of this organization,
06:23not just what happens for us in the next two or three years.
06:28Do you think there's some sort of coordinated PR messaging
06:32that's coming from those three guys?
06:36And it would be logical.
06:38I don't know that. I think they've been that way.
06:41That's what I've been trying to tell people for a while.
06:43They were there this way in summer.
06:45They're they've been this way all season.
06:46They they're in on all these discussions.
06:49Believe me, Steph, for sure.
06:52And they get it.
06:53They understand what's in play.
06:55They do. They want a big move.
06:57Absolutely. But they don't want a stupid move.
07:00And that's kind of where they're at.
07:02And I think maybe they're understanding the pressures
07:06that the front office might be under their understanding.
07:09People are worried about Steph's prime.
07:11And I and my joke is Warriors fans seem to be worried about Steph's prime
07:16more than Steph is worried about Steph's prime because he understands
07:20kind of like, you know, the steps you have to take,
07:23the moderate plans you have to make, the stupid things you have to avoid
07:28in order to try to just do the best you can with what you have
07:32and then make the play when you can, not when you're forcing it.
07:37So I just think the questions are being asked now.
07:39And so we're hearing what they really think.
07:41This is not a surprise.
07:43This is what's kind of been in the organization for a while.
07:45You do hear like, you know, pushing the button,
07:47wanting to go push and push and push.
07:49But he's also the one who the whole two time
07:51line thing, which people are barbecuing everybody for. That's fine.
07:54They did the two time.
07:55I think they happened to get the second pick overall.
07:57They were so bad. Everybody left.
07:59And they got the second overall picks.
08:00They decided it's a two time line.
08:01That's without the window when James Wiseman flailed out.
08:06But I just think they're rational people.
08:09They talk about this.
08:11There's never been a, you know, Mike Dunleavy Jr.
08:14does not do stuff without checking with Steph and Draymond.
08:17They're in this.
08:18That's I think Warriors fans in bulk don't understand that.
08:22They think that there are these helpless people
08:25when I'm watching the world go by and they have no control over.
08:29No, Steph Curry and Draymond Green, if they don't want someone to become the Warriors,
08:33they let Dunleavy know it doesn't happen.
08:34If they want somebody, they make a push for that player.
08:38This is the way it's worked for several years.
08:40It's a way it should work.
08:43If it all busts open and it's all terrible, maybe some of that changes.
08:47But it hasn't happened yet.
08:48Maybe they're on their way there.
08:50I mean, they don't look good, but I think it's held together
08:53because there's a communication, there's understanding,
08:56and they just don't do stuff that Steph doesn't want them to do
08:59because he's rational, too.
09:02And I think that's a larger picture here.
09:04And you hear his comments from yesterday, and it seems like he's rational
09:07with an eye toward the future for the organization, even after his time here
09:11is up. So I think about some of the big names that are out there
09:15and, you know, Jimmy Butler and Zion and other big names
09:18that people want to throw out when you look at those deals.
09:21Are they just too unwieldy?
09:23And maybe the fits aren't good enough for the Warriors to even entertain them?
09:28Yeah, the money's so huge.
09:29Just got to remember that they have to match the money.
09:31Absolutely must match the money.
09:34So you're giving up Wiggins plus Kaminga plus something else,
09:38plus something else just to get to the number that they're making.
09:42Just think of it that way.
09:43They're not getting these guys just for the salary and taking them.
09:46They have to add up players to get to the salary.
09:49How are they better?
09:52And with Butler, you probably have to give him an extension.
09:54And with Zion, you have to deal with a guy who doesn't play,
09:57you know, half the games every season.
10:00It just the equation doesn't work.
10:02Now, you want to go back to do it in the offseason with a chance
10:06to get a full breath and check out what Zion's health status is,
10:10or maybe Butler exactly get the number on what it's going to cost for an extension.
10:15Probably better than doing it in the whirlwind of the middle of the season.
10:19It's just not the wisest way to do this.
10:21It usually doesn't work out when you do it like this.
10:25It usually is a lot better when you have kind of a breather.
10:29You can take a whole offseason to adjust to the new player.
10:33You can figure out the money.
10:34You can make other deals, right, to compensate for the things
10:37you had to give up to get this player.
10:39This is what the offseason is for.
10:41I'm not guaranteeing something huge is going to happen offseason.
10:44They've tried it before and it hasn't worked.
10:46They've tried it before and it has worked.
10:48It's just, it's just so much more sane to do it when in conjunction
10:53with all the other things you can do in the offseason, including the draft.
10:56And maybe they're going to get a lottery ticket, fellas, by the way.
10:59And maybe they luck out a lot.
11:00You know, I don't know that they will, but at sitting in 12th place,
11:04that's where it seems to be headed.
11:06I think they're probably can wedge their way into that plan.
11:09We'll see how it goes from there.
11:11But it just it's so tough to start talking about $40 million players
11:17when you have to stack up those those contracts in order to get there.
11:20And are you better?
11:21Are you better without Andrew Wiggins and in Jonathan Mangan to get Jimmy Butler?
11:25I would say you're not.
11:27Are you better with those two players to get by on who may or may not be playing?
11:31I would say you're not like that.
11:32That player who's worth that package, if that's what it is.
11:36I don't see them being available on this market.
11:38Maybe it'll be available in July.
11:40Tim, what if we go down a peg like and there's been so much talk about Vujovic.
11:45What do you think the chances are that Vujovic is on this team in a few weeks?
11:49I think it's decent, although Chicago is a weird team, like in the Brooklyn deal
11:54making team. So when Schroeder is available and they can make it, they did it.
11:58Right. The first day it was possible to acquire Dennis Schroeder, they did.
12:01Chicago doesn't operate like that.
12:03Chicago was hard to tell.
12:04Like they might be pushing for the 10th spot in the East.
12:07They might be pushing for, you know, 11th spot in the East and try to get to nine.
12:11Whatever. If it was the Brooklyn you're talking to
12:15and they had Vujovic, I think it might already have happened.
12:18It's not going to cost the Warriors one of those, you know,
12:21probably wouldn't cost them one of those pieces you're going to need in July
12:24unless they're asking for a first round pick and you're not doing it.
12:28But yeah, I think that could happen.
12:30I think there are other names that are out there that theoretically could happen.
12:35Stretch five.
12:35If the one position that it's worth them giving up a little bit,
12:41it's stretch five because they're just cannot score in the front court.
12:44They cannot score.
12:45And it tightens up everything.
12:47Nobody wants to take a shot.
12:50That's I don't think a Nicola Vujovic makes them
12:54one of the top four teams in the West.
12:56I think that might make them one of the top five, top six.
12:59If all works out and sometimes it doesn't, as we're seeing with Schroeder.
13:03But yeah, I could see that.
13:06Gary Payton plus Buddy Hill plus something else.
13:09If Chicago wants to do that, wants to get off of Vujovic's salary for next season,
13:13I think it would be smart for them.
13:15But it's just kind of hard to figure out Chicago.
13:17Sometimes they don't do the smart thing.
13:19They hold on to their guys or what?
13:21I don't always understand.
13:24Brooklyn is a team that's like, let's get as bad as we can.
13:26Let's let's take.
13:27I get that. That's what they did.
13:29Chicago, I don't know.
13:31It's really hard to guess what Chicago is going to do.
13:35But Vujovic is one of those.
13:37Yeah, he's one of the marginal pieces.
13:39It's maybe an extra win, a half a win, two wins, whatever it is.
13:44It's not ten wins, but I think they'd look better with him.
13:47And I don't think it would or should cost them something,
13:50you know, sacrificing the chance to do something larger down the road.
13:53And two wins now and maybe it's four wins next year.
13:56So it becomes incremental in the rebuild.
13:59You mentioned Brooklyn.
14:00They do have four first round picks in the upcoming draft.
14:02So we're going to see a lot of Brooklyn when the draft hits.
14:07Jonathan Kaminga, Tim, where do you think the Warriors are with Kaminga?
14:11Because he started to flash, then he got hurt.
14:14He's going to be owed in the open market between, I don't know,
14:1730 and maybe 40 million per year.
14:20Where do the Warriors sit in terms of their willingness
14:24to give him that big deal or maybe give him the Jordan pool
14:27treatment of a sign and trade?
14:31I think they'd be in the market.
14:34Thirty five, thirty six, I think they can afford it.
14:37They got some salaries coming off.
14:40You know, is he good enough?
14:42And Steve Kerr's estimation to to be worth that.
14:45They guarantee 32 minutes a game.
14:48And I'm still marginal.
14:49I think he was moving in that direction.
14:51I think they cannot lose him as an asset.
14:53The other thing is, you look around, there's not many teams
14:55that have that slot to offer them, so they can't even sign them
14:59to the restricted offer sheet.
15:00So, you know, Brooklyn is the one that has the max slot.
15:03And now there's word that they don't want to use it
15:05because they want to hold it open to see if they can do something
15:08to fit, you know, Giannis into some of that.
15:12There could be other ways that they could use that.
15:15So I don't know that this thing might be as controversial
15:20as we've all kind of thought it was going to be. I've written it.
15:22It's it's a weird valuing thing.
15:25And it's now frozen because of the ankle injury.
15:28Not a perfect fit in a Kerr system, but he also does a lot of things.
15:32As we're seeing in the last few games that they desperately need.
15:36So we can just take the ball and go to the rim.
15:37They do not have that.
15:39It's weird that their NBA team with all these good players
15:43or theoretically good players and none of them except for Steph
15:45can get to the rim. It's weird, but.
15:50He's got he's got a place on this team, you know, again,
15:52what the number is going to be,
15:54whether they think they should trade them instead, sign and trade.
15:58We'll have to see what the package is.
16:00But barring that, I think he's got a spot on this team.
16:05I think they could sign him.
16:06Doesn't mean they won't trade him after that in a year or six months or whatever.
16:10But I think the way this is headed is he signs with the lawyers,
16:14you know, four years, 125, something like that,
16:18about where his contemporaries have signed.
16:21And they write it out because you just don't want to lose that value.
16:25You cannot get to a spot where you cannot resign them.
16:28And he goes for nothing.
16:30That that would be a malpractice.
16:33And I don't think they're going to do that.
16:35That's interesting.
16:35Tim Calcami, SF Standard, the TK show is on the Odyssey app.
16:40He's joining us here on Willard and Debs.
16:41OK, the big five names, Tim, Joe Lakob,
16:45Mike Dunleavy, Steve Kerr, Steph Curry, Draymond Green.
16:49Are they all on the same page right now?
16:53Yeah, you can't all be exactly on the same page,
16:55and you have different pressures and different urgencies and different things.
16:59But I think generally they are.
17:01That's why I think that's a misunderstanding that,
17:03you know, that Steph would want one thing and Joe Lakob
17:06and Mike Dunleavy Jr. would want a different thing.
17:09I think Kerr has differing values about young players, but you understand that.
17:13And that's good.
17:14You don't want everybody to think the exact same thing.
17:17You want young players to prove it to him.
17:19And Kaminga is sort of doing that, sort of, you know,
17:23had not been doing that for a few months.
17:27You don't want everyone to think the exact same thing.
17:29You know, I mean, it's great when you have Kevin Durant,
17:33Steph Curry in their primes, and then everybody can't think the same thing.
17:36It's just that doesn't happen very often.
17:39So it's a little bit of conversations and debates
17:43and things pushing one way and things pushing another way.
17:46But I think they're generally on the same thing.
17:48You know, listen, in a year or two, if Steph is not the superstar that he still is,
17:54maybe a lot of that equation changes.
17:56And, you know, I think we're feeling some of that now,
18:00but it hasn't happened yet.
18:02And, you know, we know where the contract's in, you know,
18:05Kerr and Curry's contract ends in two years, well, no, Curry's three years.
18:08But it's going to come to an end.
18:12I think everybody understands that.
18:13How do they want that to go?
18:16Who do they want to be surrounded by when it happens?
18:18And then what's the next steps after that?
18:20I think everybody understands this.
18:22It's just how there might be differing ideas on how that happens.
18:27I don't think it's huge discrepancies.
18:29I just think there's things within, you know, percentages of do we try this?
18:34Do we really try this?
18:35Do we really, really, really try this?
18:36Or do we fall back on this?
18:38I think those are the conversations.
18:40I think we're hearing it again out loud in public, kind of where the warriors
18:43do things to kind of talk about it because they're asked these questions.
18:47And I don't think there's an immense amount of tension.
18:52I just think it's the tension of we got to figure this out
18:55because it ain't working right now.
18:57Tim Calcomi, SF Standard, and again, TK Show just released with Buster Posey.
19:02By the way, TK, since you talked to Buster, are the Giants done this offseason?
19:07Yeah, I don't think he was going to say they're done done,
19:10but I think their big stuff is done generally.
19:12I mean, you know, I don't know what else they would do.
19:15You know, maybe here or there, you know, what the kind of, you know,
19:19a backup outfielder or that kind of thing.
19:21But I think they're generally done.
19:23You know, you said they're not going to go up in their starting picture,
19:25which is kind of the other thing that they could go for.
19:28I don't know that fans want to hear this exactly,
19:30but I don't know what else they would do there.
19:31You know, Pete Alonso is the one out there, but they're not blocking
19:34Bryce Aldridge with a first baseman.
19:35They're not doing that.
19:37So this is essentially what they are.
19:40It's not great.
19:41But I think there's faith in Posey
19:45that William Thomas changes the dynamic in the infield.
19:48That Verlander, if he even if he gives them 15 to 20 starts,
19:52this changes the kind of the feeling on the rotation.
19:56And they go from there.
19:57And one thing that we learned from our anxiety, I know
20:00science fans always love hearing that name.
20:01The roster you're bringing to spring training isn't the one that you're going
20:05to end up having in July.
20:06Yeah. And the roster, even on opening day, isn't the one you're going to have in July.
20:09Let's see how this plays out.
20:11But I don't think anything dramatic is going to happen
20:14between now and spring training.
20:16No short term first baseman who can also D.H.
20:19Like nothing like that.
20:22I think that Lamont Wade Jr. is what that is.
20:24Oh, you know, I mean, look, I understand.
20:28I'm not the biggest fan of that kind of thing.
20:30But who is that? Who is that?
20:32That's the thing. Is that player available right now?
20:35I don't know.
20:37And I think they're going to say, listen, if Bryce Aldridge can come up here
20:42in September, in August, you don't want something
20:45sitting there making thirty five million dollars a year ago with this guy.
20:49Yeah. So, you know, I think that it is long range thinking.
20:53But I don't know that somewhat of some D.H.,
20:57you know, first baseman who gets twenty two home runs and looks like
21:01in a hurry, so layers that profile is going to make it better than the Padres
21:05or certainly the Dodgers.
21:07It's a little defeatist. I understand it.
21:09But I think it's more of a big picture fix than it is.
21:12Oh, my God, we got to match up with that team.
21:15They're not going to match up with that team.
21:16They're not. It's not going to happen.
21:19You try to play as hard as you can and be, you know, overall,
21:23it's it's kind of the overview of the thing.
21:25And maybe they just feel like a team on the right.
21:28I think that is the goal for them.
21:29That's a realistic goal.
21:31TK, you're the best man.
21:32Thank you for for joining this afternoon.
21:36You got to go.