Stephen A. & Kendrick Perkins RESPOND to Damian Lillard or KD debate + 65-game rule! | First Take

Stephen A. & Kendrick Perkins RESPOND to Damian Lillard or KD debate + 65-game rule! | First Take

More likely to win the title this season would you go Lillard or Durant M my honest answer is neither but since I have to pick between the two I’m going with liard in the Milwaukee Bucks here’s the thing about the Phoenix Suns okay I understand they had a a win last

Night against a Brooklyn Nest team that’s completely filled with role players okay but when it comes down to the Suns you look at them and they have identity crisis nerkish don’t show up every night he doesn’t anchor the defense like you want him to and I’m looking at the Bradley Bill Bradley Bill

Right now his body language because he’s not involved with the offense when I think about this big three they’re top heavy for a reason and in order for them to win a title Bradley Bill is going to have to be more involved with this offense and more involved with the

System now on the other hand you look at the Eastern conference with the uncertainty of Joel and B and his health status I believe that the Milwaukee Bucks now could beat has the upper hand over the 76ers right Boston is clearly the better team but it Slims down the

The teams that are in the East for them to compete against I have the Knicks ahead of them but they still could beat the Knicks in the seven game series so I have to get a slight Edge to Dame Dollar in the Milwaukee Bucks when it comes

Down to who’s most likely to win the title yeah the answer is Dame because he got Giannis I mean everything the perk said is true as he’s looking at the two sides um and even though the Bucks are not playing very well and now their lead

On the Knicks for that two seed is down to a single game and they’re still out on the west coast it’s going to be a rough go for them they by the end of the weekend they could lose that lead you the Bucks have been great at home and

They have Giannis um the fascinating thing about what’s going on with the Suns first off I don’t think the sun’s best chance to win the title is going to be this year I think it’ll be next year when they have a chance to get some some

Time under their belt and the chance to work on this roster but the the interesting thing about this you could almost Molly you could almost write a book about what’s happened to Kevin Durant in his career with rule changes and the rule changes in this CBA which

Came in just really a few weeks after he was traded to the Suns have really handicapped this team they’ve there all these rules that were put in that were being negotiated that they didn’t know were going to be in place when they did that deal that is aimed at restricting

Super teams and now the Suns have very little maneuver ability to improve this team either at the deadline next week or next summer and so really the only their only chance to to get there is for these three guys Beal Booker and Durant to become a Powerhouse together and they

Don’t have the Reps to do it and it’s fascinating because this is the third time in Durant’s career where rule changes that he wasn’t involved with have had a huge effect on him when he was at Oklahoma City they put in the luxury tax he got a phone call one day

And said hey KD guess what you’re making $3 million more this year I hope hope you enjoy it one of the strangest things that’s happened in the NBA in the last 15 years they increased his salary uh as part of the negotiation the the the Thunder were over over their spending

Limits and they had to trade James Harden then in 2016 famously the cap Spike where the union decided not to phase in the new TV money and all of a sudden Durant was able to go to a 73 win team he obviously benefited from that so while we count rings and analyze stuff

And say who’s going to win the next one I’m here to tell you that the the rule changes have been just as big on Durant’s career as anything else I’m going to go in the opposite direction fellas and here’s the reason why it’s by default I know that both of

Y’all are right none of us have either of them winning the championship this year we get all of that and and KP you’re absolutely right if we got to pick amongst one of the teams um we’re not saying that either one of these guys are going to win the championship and

When you talk about the best chance I’m going to roll with the Phoenix Suns in this particular situation it’s by default because the Milwaukee Bucks look awful it’s just that simple last night they lost to a 15 and 33 team just call it what it is um and even though Doc

Rivers has just gotten there and I have no doubt that he’s going to improve the team defensively they just don’t seem to have that level of synergy let’s let’s go away from Giannis and D for a second and look at Chris Middleton and where he’s going to be and how he has looked

Look at Brook Lopez and how he has looked look at Bobby Porters compared to how he’s looked in the past compared to how he’s looking right now look at the absent of Grayson Allen obviously look at the absence of Drew holiday and I think that when you look at the Eastern

Conference like you said KP uh before the New York Knicks have elevated I think that Joel embiid in the Philadelphia 76ers are just prioritized and making sure that this Brothers going to be healthy for the playoffs and I believe in Maxi because you don’t have the hard and distraction that’s going to

Go that’s going to come into the mix for the Philadelphia 76ers I think their energy will be there I think their focus will be there I think the coaching of Nick nurse would help they’ve increased in Pace of play in terms of speeding up and what they could do I think that

There are impediments to the success of the Milwaukee Bucks based on how the Milwaukee Bucks we expected them to look look compared to how they’re looking right now let me go to the Western Conference and tell you why I’m looking at the Phoenix Suns maybe it’s not really just about basketball it’s about

Me looking into the camera and saying you damn well better be a title Contender you damn well better step it up the hell y’all think this is you know that you’re limited as an organization because of the assets that you ultimately gave away whether it being players and picks or what have you

You’ve got Kevin Durant who post 35 years of age is averaging 28 against game third leading scorer in the league busting everybody’s you living know what we’ve got a guy in Devin Booker that can drop 21 night 70 to next 40 or 50 to next 62 to next this brother is

Something special and then we got a guy and Bradley billal that you just pointed out KP that looks a bit disoriented not necessarily involved but they’ve elevated in terms of offensive efficiency over the last few weeks they’re one of the top offensively efficient teams in the NBA they’re a top

10 team I think they’ll figure it out as time goes along we’re usually worried about a Frank vogle team offensively we know what he can do defensively if you give him time to do it so the level of faith that you have in that fact that they’ll Elevate defensively combined

With a big three that they have offensively nurkic although he shows up once every three or four games damn it we know he’s capable of showing up I’m just of the mindset even though I’m looking at Oklahoma City and Minnesota and Denver and the law Angeles Clippers

I’m looking at all of those things we all know that if you have a big three on the offensive side of the ball and they show up that they have the potential to knock off anybody again I’m not saying they’re going to win the championship

We’re all on the same page but in terms of the direct question is who I’m giving the better chance to meaning Milwaukee in the East or Phoenix in the west based on what I’m seeing and what I have seen thus far I would give Phoenix a better

Chance is it fair for players to complain about this rule hell no it’s not fair and and what they should be asking is how did we get to this point why is this rule in place and not one time did I hear draym say anything towards Greg papovich and the San

Antonio Spurs with load management because that was the starting point so let me read this out to you Bley a average of 72 games played in his career Malone average 81 games played through his career magic an average of 76 games played through his career bird an

Average of 77 games played through his career Jordan a average of 80 games played through his career and Draymond Green a average of 70 games played through his career the problem that I have right now is that everyone all the players are pointing the finger at the

In the wrong direction Joe dumor was was put in this position to to correct the mess that this generation of players have messed up right and hold them accountable you have to be available you got to want to play I’m not asking you to go out there if you’re you know what

I’m saying if you’re injured that’s one thing but again you look here’s the thing and I said this time and time again on this show it was torches that has been passed down and guys have carried these torches for Generations when you look at Magic when you look at

Bird and you look at how they held their end of the bargain of Isaiah Thomas they passed the torch down to Jordan Barkley car Malone who then pass the torch down to kg Tim Duncan uh uh Kobe Bryant and then all of a sudden they pass the torch

To this generation and look what direction it is going in Molly stepen and Wendy is going on a downward slope and you got people on a night on a night toight basis that appar that hard-earned money to come and watch these guys play the game of basketball regular working

People who paying their hard-earned money to watch them play basketball for guys for for them to show up to the arena to want to see their favorite star and all of a sudden you see oh damn he’s out for the night and he’s not injured it’s

Crazy yeah so Stephen A you were very eloquent about this yesterday uh perk I appreciate your passion there obviously Draymond is not a fan of it so let me ask this question and it’s a simple question I don’t think everybody including the players understand where did the rule come from the rule didn’t

Come from Adam Sila or Joe Dumars the rule was agreed to by the players players associ players agreed to this as part of the CBA negotiation which by the way the CBA that the players have just signed that is now in place it potentially is going to be a disaster

And I don’t think they fully understood what was happening when it was when it was passed and as the the weeks and months went past and everybody kind of understood what was happening as they saw the offseason play out the the the person who helped negotiated Tama tago

Resigned from her job less than two years into it less than six months after she you know there signature thing that she did to negotiate this deal this was put in place with the players approved Ral they signed off on it they voted for it and said yes we’ll take it and it’s

Not about who can win MVP that’s what we’re talking about today because unfortunately we’re probably about to get another Joel injury update that’s going to make it clear he’s not going to win it again because he’s going to be out at least five more games however

Long the reason it’s put in there is to not just force the players to play but to also Target players to get the supermax this is why one of the most important people in all this is Tyrese halberton which you talked about yesterday Stephen A Tyrese halberton has

A terrible fall that we we’re afraid he tore his hamstring off the bone and he comes back and they say oh he’s just week to week huge news for the Pacers he comes back immediately is clear he’s not ready to play and they have to put him

On the bench again and he’s probably still not quite right because he’s worried about getting that 65 game so he can get his extra $41 million and basically here the the CBA and I know that it’s not as much fun to talk about the intricate rules of the CBA because

It’s you know it’s more fun to talk about who’s winning tonight who’s better against somebody else who might win the MVP because of merits but this is a huge thing in the NBA and it is going to continue to be a thing and the reason the players the players have given up so

Much in the last few cbas and it’s been covered guys because of the medor rights deals have increased the salaries everybody’s getting paid huge money but they have lost a lot lot of benefits and this is manifesting itself in this situation well go ahead real quick per

Before I go in go ahead your point they they had no choice but to agree to this CBA all across the board and and Stephen now you and I have talked about this plenty of times on first take about when James Harden held out in Houston when

Ben Simmons held out in Philadelphia we was saying boy the owners are waiting at the front door they can’t wait for the CBA it’s going to be so many rules and stipulations that’s going to go in the owners in the NBA favor the players are not going to have any choice again they

Had to agree to this they had to well let me say this man listen we all know and I’m Unapologetic about this I got a lot of love for Draymond Green um I I think he’s a good brother he’s had some issues obviously getting himself suspended and things of that nature but

I got a lot of love for him as a man not just as a champion um but this ain’t his Brightest Day this ain’t his brightest moment we going to call call out Draymond Green right here on national television and if he wants me to I’ll

Come on his damn podcast and call him out in front of his own damn audience this is not his Brightest Day because you see when you talk about New Media the obligation is to tell a whole story he didn’t do that he complained but he didn’t highlight as you both articulated

The origin of all of this we’re not talking about injured players we understand legitimately injured players are legitimately injured players what brought all all of this about you can take me off the screen individually I want to look at Wendy and perk when I’m saying this stuff we’re talking about

Individuals who took advantage of the Privileges that were that were given to them by people who came before them why you think Magic Johnson tweeted yesterday immediately following our segment why you think that happened don’t get you lucky that Jordan don’t want to give quotes you lucky that a

Whole bunch of players don’t want to a whole bunch of former Hall of Famers don’t want to give qu y’all talk to them I talk to them you know how they feel He

On First Take, Stephen A. Smith, Kendrick Perkins and Brian Windhorst join to talk about the hottest topics in the NBA.
0:00 Damian Lillard or Kevin Durant?
1:30 Windy responds
3:30 Stephen A. Smith goes in the opposite direction
7:00 Is it fair for players to complain about the 65-game rule?
10:00 Backlash and fairness

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