The Ringer’s Howard Beck Talks NBA Playoffs, Lakers & More | Full Interview | The Rich Eisen Show

The Ringer’s Howard Beck Talks NBA Playoffs, Lakers & More | Full Interview | The Rich Eisen Show

and hi to my friend Howard Beck with whom I covered the Lakers back to back to back we spent I spent more time with you easy guys than I did with Rich for many many years calm down all of you this is a family program thank you very much yeah Howard and I literally we flew on Planes together we sat there and we did the dance no he never drove with me you never drove with me did you Howard I don’t think so no you probably had some like you know fancy limo service that we there we go Howard you know I really did cuz cuz Fox Sports n really love paying the big bucks for all the fancy bells and whistles I did have I did have at one point a SB 900 turbo convertible and I remember coming out of practice one day and Shaq saw the car and he tried to get in it and he couldn’t sit in the front seat he’s like well if I had this car I would take out the seat I was like please don’t ruin my car hi Howard good to have you here Susie great to see you again good to be here always fun to start an interview with with you this way all right here’s the question we have today with all the ascending stars in the NBA do you have to win a championship to be crowned as Superstar I’m gonna say no I’m not in the uh the Rings zzzz Rings culture uh sect I I don’t I don’t really believe in that um we have seen plenty of superstars over the decades who are alltime greats and we all know they’re alltime greats and we all know that under different circumstances especially if they didn’t you know weren’t blocked by Michael Jordan maybe in the 90s or blocked by Tim Duncan for parts of the 2000s or sha and Kobe or now blocked by LeBron and Steph Curry there are other guys who could have broken through so I don’t I don’t hold that as some like absolute standard but it’s interesting because we are in this moment where you know Steph Curry and LeBron who have been the standard bearers in the face of the league that that kind of mythical title that we love to use they’re nearing their Horizons whenever those May and so we’re looking to Anthony Edwards and we’re looking to Luka donic and we’re looking to Jason Tatum and you know let’s even throw Tyrese halberton in there because hey he’s got his team in the Conference Finals we are looking around and saying who’s next and you don’t have to win a championship right off the bat to clinch that status you need to be an absolute stud athletically of course you need to win a lot of games you need to be in a lot of postseasons you need to have moments it helps if you have a lot of Charisma as some of them do um but the Rings part of it I feel like it’s it’s more part of the the Legacy discussion Hall of Fame discussion but it’s again I I don’t think you have to have it to clinch that status as one of the faces of the league but there’s certainly an opportunity for some of the young players I just mentioned to go ahead and grab that in the next few weeks which certainly helps the cause I mean we’ve had a great time watching the comedic stylings of Anthony Edwards and Carl Anthony towns after their win but as we look ahead at this series how competitive can they be against Dallas how do you like this one it’s a really fascinating Series right because the Timberwolves haven’t been this far in in 20 years and the current stars were you know probably in the proverbial Diapers at the time or not very far beyond that if anything and the Mavericks you know they made a Conference Finals a couple years ago against the Warriors I don’t think anybody thought they were really ready to break through then they might be ready to break through now um but this is one of those Series where you look at it and you could talk yourself you know in circles as to who should be the favorite or how long this is going to go um this is this is an opportunity for Luca in particular right he finished third in the MVP voting he’s been a perennial MVP candidate for the last several years and he’s got a phenomenal co-star now in Kyrie Irving who a lot of us certainly I was skeptical that that pairing was going to work and it’s worked fabulously um that’s an incredible and very lethal onew punch they’ve got some great role players and Defenders around them uh so that all said the Mavericks are more they’re a little younger in their process right like Kyrie just got there you know 14 months ago or whatever it was this is their first full season together Derek Lively the starting center is a rookie Daniel Gafford and PJ Washington who we’ve all raved about how great a contribution they’ve made since the trade deadline got there at the trade deadline so they’re still a little new the wolves on the other hand this is two full seasons now with Rudy goar this is multiple Seasons with uh towns and Anthony Edwards that core has been together for a bit their coach has been there everybody’s been in place they if I if I have to pick and I hate picking um I lean toward the wolves in this series only because I think there’s a little more continuity and uh just time together the chemistry is established but also they’ve got size right like that Town’s goar front court is a beast just ask Nicol who just had to wave goodbye a couple days ago and I I do think it’s going to be really interesting to see Lively and Gafford who have just feasted at The Rim off of of Luca lobs in in in particular are they going to get those same opportunities when you’ve got two SF Footers you know standing around the paint yeah and Jaden McDaniels and Carl Anthony towns and Nas Reed I mean you’re seeing that when Anthony Edwards talked about that when he had a slow game offensively he could trust his player around him to pick up where he left off I mean we saw that happen effectively so if we take that into consideration how do you like their game versus the Dallas game I think the first thing I’m I’m really interested to see is I assume it’s gonna be Jaden McDaniels on Luca but it’s probably gonna have to be a lot of people on Luca Anthony Edwards uh in the wake of that game seven win was already talking about and I love hearing this from a young Star right who’s like here’s this guy he’s got all this game all these skills Anthony Edwards is you know going to throw 20 25 30 points on the board and in a in creative ways he’s explosive he’s skilled he’s got great footwork but the first thing he’s telling the uh I think it was the TNT crew on Sunday in the wake of that win was and Kyrie’s my assignment that’s it I can’t wait to to go check Kyrie and he and he boasted about uh you know locking down Jamal Murray in the second half of of game seven that’s just awesome when you hear a young player just really enthused about the defensive assignment and I think Anthony Edwards He’s a great defender um if he can lock up Kyrie and the Mavericks can muster excuse me the Wolves can muster enough defense to throw at Luca you know it’s going to be a really tough uphill battle for the Mavericks right because all of their scoring is generated by those two stars and the Timberwolves uh were I think number one or number two in defense all year and they have the Personnel to sty just about anybody again Ask the Denver Nuggets at defending champs and so uh this is going to be a really tough test for the Mavericks but I don’t rule them out and it’s funny I just looked it up Kyrie’s 32 Anthony Edwards is 22 so he definitely grew up watching him and thinking to himself you must have imagined like he’s boxing with himself trying to think about who he’s going to match up against and then it’s probably Kyrie back then and it’s Kyrie right now you know we talked to Christopher Russo in the first hour about Kyrie and who he’s become here in Dallas what do you think of this metamorphosis of Kyrie Irving as he continually seems to reinvent himself it’s really fascinating Susie because at the time that Kyrie forced his way out of Cleveland I I just like my my jaw dropped like we were already firmly into this era of Superstar empowerment and guys moving around more than we’d ever seen before and I understood it and I support it but I’d never seen a player decide I don’t want to be with the defining player of my generation who I’ve gone to three finals and won a championship with I want to be somewhere else and he ends up in Boston and it doesn’t go well and goes pretty badly in fact for a couple of years and then he lands in my backyard in Brooklyn with Kevin Durant and do all to all kinds of circumstances that we do not need to uh reliver relitigate it does not go well uh here in Brooklyn either by the time the Mavericks traded for Kyrie Irving last year there were very very few teams in the NBA who really wanted to take a chance on him and it was viewed as a risk for sure all that Talent notwithstanding and everybody acknowledges his talent and everybody admires his talent but there was a risk because of his person personality because of things that had happened on Court and off and ever since getting to Dallas Kyrie Irving has been you know damn near perfect as a player as a teammate as just a general citizen uh there has been nothing really to complain about there have been no red flags there have been no distractions and unlike all those years ago when he forced his way out of Cleveland where it seemed like maybe he wasn’t comfortable having to play the co-star role with LeBron with some somebody who was you know you know a bigger brighter star he seems comfortable with that now more than that like you’ve seen even in this this uh this postseason run there’s times where it’s like he’s got nine or 10 assists and he’s not scoring much or he’s got 12 assists and he’s only scoring nine points or whatever there was a game like that just a week ago I think and that he’s comfortable being in more of an opportunistic score not needing to dominate the ball not worrying about numbers you know his ego seems to have um you know kind of been tamped down over this time and maybe those are just the lessons you learn after bouncing around for a little bit and realizing that the market has has the bottom has fallen out for you and like Kyrie himself um prior to his final season in Brooklyn on that media day I remember him saying specifically that he didn’t opt into free agency or pursue that route because he knew that there was really nothing out there for him so he knew he knew he needed to rehab himself and he’s done a fantastic job Howard Beck joining us here on the Rich Eisen show Susie Schuster in for Rich before we turn to the series for which Brock will keep a pale between his legs what do the Nuggets need to do to stay competitive in the west it’s getting tougher and tougher Susie um we are certainly living in an era of incredible parody in the NBA uh and you know a few weeks from now the NBA will Crown its sixth different champion in a six-year stretch that hasn’t happened since the late 70s and most teams that that are winning the title are built around you know not multiple super Stars we are long past the Superstar or the super team era it’s now you know usually one supreme star and a bunch of really well- calibrated role players around him right the Giannis bucks were like that the kawh ler Raptors were like that the yic nuggets are like that I’ll do respect to Jamaal Murray but he hasn’t even made an All-Star team yet so um your margin for error is a little bit thinner when it’s one Superstar plus a bunch of really good role players and so you know we saw that Within nuggets uh there’s obviously you know a little bit of attrition to when just you’ve had you know a long season and played into June last year there’s all of that um the new CBA makes it really tough to retain talent and to keep paying or adding talent and the Nuggets faced that last offseason when they lost Bruce Brown and Jeff Green to free agency they didn’t really have a bench to lean on and Michael Malone mentioned that uh more than once you know over the last uh few days of the of the postseason and during the regular season even so what do they do um they’re not going to have a lot of tools at their disposal to add in free agency this summer unless guys want to come there for minimum contracts which maybe you know playing with Yol it just is is a lot of fun and gives you a chance to to chase a title so that could happen the really interesting scenario would be do you trade one of your core pieces you know Michael Porter Jr is making a lot of money 35 to 40 million over the next few years and you know could you trade him for two to three pieces to help replenish the rotation but they also have you know another looming concern which is that cavius calwell Pope who was the the critical last piece of that starting lineup that they acquired before they won the championship he can opt out in this summer and almost certainly will and he’s a great three andd player who’s won championships with two different teams and who’s going to be you know heavily pursued and recruited so uh if they lose kcp they’re they’re going to have an even tougher uh uphill battle than than what you’re alluding to right now but it’s going to be tough regardless because Dallas isn’t going anywhere Minnesota’s not going anywhere the Oklahoma City Thunder who the Mavericks beat they’re very very young and only getting better and with plenty of flexibility to keep building so yeah it’s it’s it’s going to be tough for the nuggets the ringer Howard Beck right here on the Rich Eisen show Boston hasn’t won a championship in 15 years and before that the last time they won one I was a freshman in high school in Boston is this the year very well could be um I think we’ve all had them pegged as the Eastern Conference Champion since you know July so uh if they falter now against a Pacers team that was a six seed and that is Young and that was not even expected to be anywhere near this deep in the postseason that would be a colossal failure the question has always been if the Celtics get to the finals uh were they going to be good enough to beat the Denver Nuggets well that problem is solved are they going to be good enough enough to beat the Timberwolves or the Mavericks I think they could match up well with both of them uh and I think if Chris ABS porzingis gets healthy some at some point during the course of the Conference Finals and is ready to play in the finals I think the Celtics are going to be an incredibly tough opponent for either of the Western Conference teams but like I’m I’m I don’t know Susie I really don’t know the the the Celtics this is there six Conference Finals in the last I think eight years which which is incredible it it is the the most successful overall run of any team and the most consistent by far and that Tatum and brown tandem uh has been incredible at their best but they have these like glitches at times right sometimes it’s a quarter sometimes it’s a game sometimes it’s a series and they you know I I think everybody kind of looks at them with admiration for their talent and everything that they’ve done but with a little bit of skepticism or suspicion because they have these untimely Pratt Falls uh they had more Talent than the Warriors two years ago in the finals and and by you know a lot of measures maybe should have won that series and now they’re a little bit older they’re a little more experienced they’re a little bit uh I think deeper and Better Built and especially if they have porzingis they will be in much better shape to try to win a championship in a couple weeks than they were two years ago Hey Howard I’m I’m a Celtics fan so I watch these games uh with frustration and you know anticipation like you said they do a lot of dumb things they they give a lot of games away kind of careless the way they play at times do you what is the opinion of uh Joe Missoula do you think he’s done a g great job does he get enough credit um because he’s kind of coaching a quote unquote super team what is your assessment of him in in year two moua is in an interesting spot right because you know as we know you know you know two you know summers ago he’s he’s thrusted into the Spotlight into this job when Oka had to step down and he didn’t have you know much in the way of experience at the NBA level or period and it was a bumpy I think first year for him and I’m sure you like a lot of Celtics fans were ready to throw him overboard at times I think he’s acquitted himself really well in year two he’s more comfortable um he has I think managed you know a rotation that is filled with Talent right it’s not a super team by by traditional standards but to Stars a bunch of other guys who have been stars or have star capability and I think he’s managed it all really well um I think he’s grown into the role I think that he could probably stand to be a little bit more I don’t know loose personable in in his interactions with the media because I think part of the the the tension or the skepticism of him has been that the way he presents sometimes is a little uptight and very self-serious and that doesn’t necessarily matter for a head coach but you know public relations kind of matters too messaging matters and I think people when they see that they Wonder well my God if you feel this uptight um in your press conferences what do you like in the locker room and so you know but I I I think it also is a case where when you’re young and in that job and in that role with all the pressure and all the expectations and Spotlight that comes with that job in particular it’s also understandable and I think it takes time to get comfortable enough in yourself and in that role to maybe let your guard down a little bit well and you’re following up eeme who I always said he was the toughest player on the team and he was the head coach you know and he wasn’t exactly Mr Nice Guy Susie Schuster and I covered udoka in Laker training camp about 100 years ago so there’s that I mean we covered a lot of crazy stories together there how many how many do we have that were like we had we had some good JJ we had some good Jr writer stories we had a lot of weird stuff going on when we covered the team speaking of which uh the headlines out here are the same that LeBron is not involved in the Lakers head coaching search who are we kidding right that’s like ridiculous right of course he is you know there’s a lot of wiggle room in there you know what does not involved mean you know uh all right he’s probably not in Rob Pink’s office like putting names on the dry erase board but no he has a button that he presses and he probably shows up like a Jetson’s like on the screen in R Pink’s office who are we kidding I I like the the idea of like hologram LeBron just kind of Pops in every so often 100% um Rob LeBron is on the Hologram I I think it would be ludicrous uh to think in today’s NBA with as much power as Superstars have and have deserved most of the time that you’re not at least making a call and Consulting like before Rob pinka makes his list of finalists he’s it would be foolish not to at least if not talk to LeBron directly than at least to talk to the people who talk to LeBron and get a feel for you know somebody because you don’t want to hire somebody who he’s absolutely opposed to or absolutely has no respect for you don’t necessarily need to choose somebody at LeBron’s request either but the idea that he’s not involved at all yeah certainly strains credulity TJ Hey Howard what’s up I’m a Sixers fan and I’m a Clippers fan so it’s not always that great for me so I don’t want to talk about both of them right now I’m going to specify the Sixers they got almost $59 million in cap space next year right what’s the word man can can you help me feel good about this offseason who can you see the Sixers signing to help M be and Maxi go to the next level admittedly uh I have not dug that deep into it yet um but it’s funny that your combination of teams it’s the Sixers and Clippers who they Sixers might want to be poaching a star from right um outside of the Paul George scenario it’s a little difficult you know cavius Caldwell Pope who I mentioned earlier would be a fantastic Edition to the Sixers he’d be a fantastic Edition just about anywhere and I think the one thing to keep an eye on you know uh you know Daryl Mor’s pretty shrewd about this stuff and he knows as well as anybody we haven’t seen a lot of superstars or even second tier Stars Chang teams in free agency in recent years most of those changes been via forced trades we are in an environment where again as I alluded to earlier the new CV that that kicked in a year ago and and more of those uh restrictions have kicked in since makes it really tough for the high Spenders to keep spending and so teams are going to have to probably shed salary and when you have cap room when you’re one of the few teams below the cap and buy a lot in the case of the Sixers you can make unbalanced trades in terms of the salary cap you can acquire a lot of of of salary so I suspect and I have not asked but I suspect that the Sixers are thinking yeah let’s go chase Paul George or cavius cwell Pope or whoever else may be a top tier or second tier free agent or a combination thereof but we’re also going to see an offseason here I think where teams are going to be forced to shed players that they would rather keep and the Sixers will be in a great position to say hey we are your cap relief you know we’ve got you know a couple of of smaller you know contracts to send you or some picks or whatever it may be and I I I will say with some confidence I I don’t like predictions but I will predict with some confidence that by mid July the Sixers will have restocked pretty well around embiid and Maxi I don’t know who it’s going to be it’s gonna be somebody so I should hold out hope then you should hold out hope for the Sixers I um I don’t know what to think about your clippers especially if your Sixers get your clippers second best player well we’ll save that for the next time you call in Howard I I got one last Lakers question it’s such a weird question do you think people even want that job the way they used to want that job it comes with a little bit of a headache don’t you think I I think it’s a really complicated question Susie I think it goes back to the old cliche that you and I have heard 8 billion times which is that there’s only 30 of these jobs and the Lakers among those jobs is even in the worst of times and this is definitely not the worst of times right like they’ve had some really rough periods but even in the worst of times the Lakers job is the Lakers job um it is still a glam team in a glamour City and yeah it comes with a lot of pressure and a lot of scrutiny and it comes with the knowledge that the last couple of coaches have not lasted very long uh one of them despite winning a championship Frank vogle so you know you go in Eyes Wide Open if you’re taking that job of course and you get whatever assurances you can but I will say this I have much more concern for the Lakers in terms of what they do with the roster than what they do at the head coaching spot I think darham for any flaws that people will point to and I know Laker fans will point to many darham was a perfectly capable Coach Frank vogle was a clearly capable coach and won them a championship that they both got fired is at least in large part due to the fact that the Lakers did not sustain the championship core that they had around LeBron James and Anthony Davis and so um I have much more concern with the way the front office has operated over the last few years both with regard to coaches and with regard to roster building than I do with who’s going to ultimately sit in that seat and draw a place yep yep I hear you Howard thank you again for your time love having you on as always Susie always a pleasure say hi to Rich for me I will do that indeed isn’t Howard look like he’s at a rave somewhere by the way in the in the background he’s about to head out clubbing for the night sure you I’m not I only wish you catch the rich eyes and show every single day on the Roku Channel 12 to 3 Eastern for free

The Ringer’s Howard Beck and Rich Eisen Show guest host Suzy Shuster debate if NBA players need to win a title before gaining “superstar” status, discuss how the Mavericks and Timberwolves match up in the Western Conference Finals, how Kyrie Irving has rewarded the Mavs after they took a chance on the controversial guard, what the Denver Nuggets must do to remain competitive in the West, the pressure on Jayson Tatum and the Celtics to win the NBA title this year, LeBron James’ role in the Lakers head coach search, possible targets for the Philadelphia 76ers in the offseason, and more.

Tune in to the Emmy-nominated Rich Eisen Show live for FREE on The Roku Channel at https://go.roku.com/thericheisenshow and also streaming on Audacy, Sirius channel 161 and XM channel 206 (Online channel 998) weekdays from 12–3 PM ET!

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