ALARMING? Taylor Hendricks and Cody Williams Top 10 picks not contributing. ROUTE to Success

ALARMING? Taylor Hendricks and Cody Williams Top 10 picks not contributing. ROUTE to Success

The Utah Jazz have two top 10 picks that are not contributing. Complete bombs of a draft or routes where this may get better. Next on Locked on Jazzum. You are Locked on Jazz, your daily podcast on the Utah Jazz, part of the Locked On podcast network. Your team every day. How are you? I’m David Lock, radio voice of Utah Jazz Jazz NBA insider. This is Locked on Jazz. It’s your daily podcast in the Utah Jazz, giving you insight, expertise, geeky numbers, and hopefully making it way better to be a Jazz fan each and every day. Thank you so much for making Locked on Jazz your first listen of the day, and thank you for making Locked On the number one sports podcast network. You’re awesome. Appreciate it so much. On today’s show, we will do our Wills Wednesday. some interesting comments about Taylor, which is a huge focus of our show, as well as some comments about uh Walt Clayton and kind of his very good little run we’ve had here on Wills Wednesday. Uh we’re going to steal something from Mark Dagnel’s comments the other day about player development and put it into Cody Williams and Taylor Hendricks. Jazz, two top 10 picks that are not contributing right now and how big a deal is it that they are not contributing right now. We’re going to look at that. Uh, also we’re going to go back, we’re going to start this by going back to the draft and looking at these two top 10 picks and the drafts that they came from. That’s all coming up on today’s show, which is brought to you in part by our friends over at Game Time. Today’s episode brought to you by Game Time. Download the Game Time app. Create an account. Use the code lock NBA for $20 off your first purchase. Special welcome Danny Wilson, a new Everyday Dair Club all access member. So thankful. So fired up for this. Actually, this is one of the more exciting ventures. and Ryan Keel, of course, man. You’ve been the best forever. Uh, thanks so much for joining the Every Dare. Here’s where I’m so fired up. I’ll just quickly do this. I don’t want to get lost in the show. The All Access Club to me is going to get back to the community that Twitter and social media once was. It’s going to be a way one-on-one direction of communication through texting right to your phone whenever there’s a lineup change or something of that nature. So, you’ll know first an injury update. But also like there’s the rumor today that Indiana’s interested in Walker Kesler. I’ll probably drop you some note on that when I have a second to delve into whether I think there’s anything to it or makes any sense at all. Um any I’ll I’ll scan all things. So there’ll be all that communication when I’m doing prep for Memphis today. I’ll probably send out to you my um the kind of offensive profile sheet I do on Memphis so you have a little insight into that ball game. I’ll drop you notes inside a game. uh all the things we used to do on Twitter before the robots and everybody else took over. Plus, uh you get Leaf to Lean special exclusive draft coverage, breakdowns, AJ’s game last night, I’m sure he’ll have something incredible on that. Uh you get ad free, you get locked on Sports Today exclusive, your access to our Discord channel as well. We’ll try to have some exclusive bonus uh episodes for you as well. Bonus exclusive content. So, it’s all there. I think it’s a community we’re trying to build. It’s great. You can go to lock uh lockdownpodcast.com everyday. Also, if you just want the Discord channel, lockdown sports today exclusive and adfree, you can do that. That’s $5 a month. The other one’s $15 a month. Anyway, let’s get to the show. Uh but I I really am fired up about this. Super fired up. So, thanks to the guys who’ve signed up already. Uh glad to have you board. All right. We have two top 10 picks that are just not contributing. And it’s an issue. This has been part of the rebuild is that we wanted to, you know, we’re trying to get players and in the first two years of the rebuild, the earliest picks we took, Cody Williams and Taylor Hendricks at this moment in time are not contributing. So, let’s look at two things whenever on this. Um, one, we’re trying to figure out whether what is the route. Um, just so you have the data at this point, Taylor’s shooting 40% from the field, 33% from three, five points, four rebounds, and playing very few minutes. Cody is shooting 33% and 11% from three. Okay. The first thing I always look at whenever a player in a draft is not contributing is I have a thought about things that there’s a spot where every draft ends. Okay? And what I mean by that is and then at that point it’s a kind of a crapshoot. So every draft has a level where it just kind of there’s there’s players that are guaranteed, you know, Carl Anthony Towns goes one, it’s pretty much guaranteed he’s he’s going to be he’s going to be really really good. And so you you get into these drafts and there’s kind of no question when when the draft and then at some point the draft ends. So, like some of them are funky, but if you were to take a look at this is a weird draft. I just randomly chose the 2018 draft. You have Aidan Bagley, Donic, Jiren Jackson, Trey Young, and then all of a sudden it’s like Mo Bomba, Wendell Carter Jr., Colin Ston, Kevin Knox. Oh, that that draft. Now, it turns out that 10 and 11 turned out to be really good. Um, but that draft kind of ended at five and then it was a crapshoot. And remember, after the 11th pick of a draft, the after the 11th pick of a draft, it’s or the 10th pick of draft, it’s 50/50 whether you get a rotation player. So, that’s kind of the data, but like where’s that line? Some drafts it might be at 12. Some drafts it’s actually at five. If you look at the Dante Exom draft, Andrew Wiggins, Jabari Parker, Joel Embiid, Aaron Gordon. Okay, then Dante, Marcus Smart, Julius Randall, the draft ended right there. because the next players are Nick Stouskis, Noah Vonlay, Alfred Payeyton, Doug McDermott, and Dario Sarich. Now, Zack Lavine ends up being a good pick later and Ysef Nerk. But, you know, inside the midst of that is TJ Warren, Adrien Payne, James Young, and Tyler. That draft ended at seven. So, the Dante Exom pick, which didn’t turn out well, really the choice was Dante X, Marcus Smart, and Julie Randle. But that draft ended at seven. And then not ended, but I think you get my point. It’s a little bit of an overstatement, but then from there it’s a crapshoot. There were, if you look at the 2019 draft, Zion Williamson, John Morant, R.J. Barrett, DeAndre Hunter, then Darius Garland, then Jarrett Culver, okay, he doesn’t make it. Kobe White, Jackson Hayes, Ruy Hashimmore, Cam Radish doesn’t make it. Whoa, wait. Three of the last five guys haven’t made it. Okay, that draft might have ended at five. This is This is not uncommon. and then it was a crapshoot. So, if you look at the 2023 draft of Taylor Hendrickx, this is always how when a players if a if a my point on this is if you draft a player and he’s in the part of the draft like where the draft is still hot, call it, and he’s not developing, then a little bit of my thought on that is like, well, okay, he’s probably coming around. But honestly, if I go look at a player that’s on the flip side of this and is in the aspect of, oh, the draft at that point was a crapshoot and the draft was over. And then then I start to say, oh, well then maybe maybe that’s a problem. Okay. Like that’s that’s a little bit of the way I look at it. So if we go to the Taylor Hendricks draft, Victor Webinama, Brandon Miller, Scoot, we’ll see. Remember the top 10 picks, usually two or three of them don’t pan out. Amen Thompson, Asuror Thompson, Anthony Black’s playing very well. Very step forward, shooting just well enough. And then Bal Koulibali. Uhoh. And then Jerice Walker. Okay. Taylor Hendricks. Case Wallace has been fine in a really good role. Jed Howard has not been fine. Derek Lively kind of okay. Grady Dick pretty good actually. Not bad but not great. Jordan Hawkins problem. Kobe Buffkin kind of out of the league. Then Keonte, which has been an incredible pick, and then Jaylen Hood Shafino. Oh, that there’s a chance. We’ll see. But there’s a chance that Taylor Hendrick’s draft ended at six. Now, Bal Koulali this year might be putting it together, but right now, Bal Koulabali is shooting 37% from the field, 27% from three, and might not be okay. and Jerice Walker is shooting 35% from the field and 31% from three and might not be okay. So, there’s a chance that Taylor Hendrick’s draft ended two picks before him. That’s not a great sign. The same thing is true on Cody Williams. Cody Williams, Zachary Reese, Alex Sar, Reed Shepard, Stephan Castle. Don’t really know on either of those two yet, but Shepard’s having a better year. Stephan Castle is still shooting 28% from three as a player. Then then we have Ron Holland who not sure yet. Tan Salon, who’s not coming together. Donovan Klingan, who’s not really coming together. Rob Dillingham who’s not getting off the bench in Minnesota and they desperately need him. Zack Ed who’s been good. Cody Williams. Bazullis who we’ll check on in a second. Topic who hasn’t played. Devin Carter who doesn’t seem to be okay. Bub Carrington who might not be okay. There’s a chance that that draft ended at four. It was a bad draft. Guzzellis is is probably but that but you’re Reed Shepard give him he’s 47% from the field 45% from three. Reaches only. Okay. There’s and there’s a bunch of guys in that draft that are putting it together. You could have had other picks certainly other than Cody Jaylen Tyson who’s older’s playing well. second round picks. AJ Mitchell and and Jaylen Wells are playing well. Tristan Dilva is now playing well, but you know, we’ll see on and Ron Holland is shooting 40% from the field and 26% from three and might not be okay. And Bob Carrington’s doing the weirdest thing ever. He’s shooting 43% from three and 35% overall. Might not be okay. And there’s a chance. But my point is on both these guys, there’s a minor chance that this these draft the guaranteed part of the draft ended prior to their pick. Which to me means like when we keep talking to them as I did to open the show as a top 10 pick, we might have been in drafts that didn’t have 10 players and they were top 10 picks or 10 guar, you know, right? And so in that sense, we are just in the middle of the mosh pit of maybe hit, maybe don’t. In the case of Taylor, certainly hit on Kee at 16. Holy cow, but may not have hit at nine on Taylor and on Cody at 10. May not have hit on Cody at 10, but really might have hit at 32 on Flip. I mean, Flip is really good for that draft class. And we’ll see on Isaiah Collier because once you cross over the line of where a draft is what I’m calling dead, it’s a little bit of a coin flip. 50% of all it there is no greater success frankly 11 through 15 than there is 25 through 30. It’s minimal at best. There is there is but it’s not it’s not what you think. It’s 50% of the players from 11 through 30 in the first round of a draft become rotation players in the NBA. That’s because most drafts usually die at nine. But the fact is a lot of drafts die earlier than that and then it’s a 50% chance and it’s a it is not there’s not a massive difference between success 11 through 15, 20 through 25 and 25 through 30. It’s pretty much the same route. All right, we’re going to get into what a really interesting comment about Mark Dagnel and Cody Williams, excuse me, Mark Dagnel about player development and how it applies to Taylor Hendrickx and Cody Williams to create a route for them to have success next on Locked on Jazz. I love Wednesdays because on Wednesdays I get to tell you about Steve Carter and Intercap Lending. And one of the reasons I love that is because Intercap has been with us for over seven years. And it’s just I’m flattered that we have been together for so long and that they believe in what we’re doing. And the other thing is that I actually am 100% guaranteed that if you go to Steve Carter, you’re going to have the greatest customer service experience because that’s what’s happened to every single lockdown person who’s ever done a mortgage alone something with Steve. So here’s what Steve’s got the latest from Steve over at Intercap. His rates are slowly coming down. 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You can also do locked onjazz.com/supcast.com, but just go to lockdownpodcast.com everyday. That’s okay. You’ll get there. All right, let’s do it. Cody and Taylor, the route. Let’s start with Taylor. So, the biggest issue with Taylor at this point is his minutes. And that’s why last night he played 30 minutes in the G-League. And it’s great that he’s doing that. And he should do it every single time he possibly can. Um if you start looking at minutes played by Taylor he’s at,00 there it is there you you just cannot find guys who three years into their NBA career that are first round draft picks that play have played,00 minutes that actually go on to have very good careers. Okay. So he’s he’s on the wrong side of the data just simply on minutes played. Almost 26 of the kids in that draft have played 2,000 minutes. The rest of them that are under 2,000 minutes, it’s I hate to say it, the decisions been made on them probably that they’re not going to make it. Julian Phillips, Andre Jackson Jr. may be in Indiana now. Ryan Rupair doesn’t make the Portland rotation. Uh Maxi Prosper is out of the league. Mo Gay maybe possible um in Atlanta. Jed Howard probably not. Jordan Walsh probably not. We’ll see. You know, guys can turn it. But that’s they’re on the wrong side. All those guys are on the wrong side. If you’re not at 2,000 minutes in your third year at this point, you’re on the wrong side of it. And if you’re not, frankly, if you’re under 3,000 minutes, it’s a little questionable. The guys under 3,000 minutes right now are Jaylen Wilson, Chris Murray, Jordan Hawkins, Ben Shepard, Bryce Sensah, Trace Jackson Davis, Derek Lively, Nick Smith, Marcus Sasser, Jerice Walker, Cam Whitmore, Noah Clowney, Julian Strather. I think those guys are probably 5050 on whether they’re going to have NB lengthy NBA careers. So, the very first thing we have to do with Taylor is get him minutes. And that’s what they did last night in the G-League, which is great. I think he played 30. Um, they actually lost finally. Rick Higgins team has been incredible. Mark Dagnel when I talked to him about developing players was the model that he used that he talked about was that they narrow down the role for a player by which they can be efficient and impactful. So let’s narrow the role down by which you can be efficient and impactful. the player will tell you. And then his point is, and he and frankly says it’s pretty evident over time. And if you think about one thing Oklahoma City has done is they’ve really gotten off players. So what’s the role by which you can be narrow and impactful and then his Mark Dagnel’s point is the player will tell you if they start to burst at the seams. So Jaylen Williams burst at the seams. AJ Mitchell is currently bursting at the seams. He said you put him in this narrow role. Now, this is difficult to get players to do this because a lot of players want to come in the league and they want to be big-time stars and they think they’re going to be all-stars because that’s what they’ve done their entire career. There’s no reason for them to think anything else in their career. They’ve been the best player on the floor in every game they’ve ever played. Why wouldn’t that still be true? And why can’t they be the one who goes, you know, they didn’t dream to be um TJ McConnell. They dreamed to be Tyrese Hallebertton or probably dreamed to be, right? But you got the concept. Russell Westbrook. Um, so what is the role by which you can make a player in efficient and impactful and then they work in that role successfully and then if they start to burst at the seams they get more. So in the case of Taylor, the player I kind of go to at this point is Robert Coington. Robert Coington was a 6 foot7, 210 pound uh out of Tennessee State and it actually took him a little while to get going in the league, but finally he was on the Philadelphia process teams that weren’t very good. And actually by his fourth year he’s one of the top 10 defensive players in the league and by his fifth year he’s defensive player. He’s a 30 minute a night defensive player and really Robert Coington played a super narrow game. He defended threes and fours very well on the ball. He was a moderate rebounder, not great, five a game, nothing super. He was a ball mover. He got one or two steals a game, which is what made him great. And he scored about 11 12 points a game. And the way he scored his 11 or 12 points a game is he took about four threes a night. Sometimes as much as six or seven because that’s kind of what he did. how many shots he took in a and he’d hit two of them. He was not a great three-point shooter. He shot like 33 to 35 to 36%. So he would get six because he was on the floor. So the narrow role that he played that Mark Dagnel talks about is he was an elite on ball defensive player and he impacted the game so much defensively that he stayed on the floor. And then inside of that, he then never really bursted the seams, but he found a role where he would because he was a corner three shooter and because he wasn’t a great shooter, they left him open to take six or seven a game and he’d have to make two to stay viable, he had to make two and some days hit three. And suddenly there was six to, you know, seven, nine points. And then he got out on a fast break two or three times a night and suddenly went to the free throw line maybe once or twice a night and suddenly scored 13 points a night and had five rebounds and ended up with a 10-year career and averaged by, you know, play a lot of 30 minute game. That’s a very that’s a very successful route here for Taylor Hendricks. That’s the route we’d like to see for Taylor Hendricks. So the narrow route for the time being for Taylor Hendris is can you impact the game defensively in an elite manner and then just bang down enough corner threes and he’s probably just needs the reaction time on the floor to get his minutes up so he can start to execute that. So that route seems viable and I think the fact that we looked back and saw that that draft might have ended before him probably should eliminate ideas that you know if you can get 25 minutes a night out of Taylor it’s a big win in that draft pick for Cody. The truth is there’s no statistical match at this point. There’s been no player that’s had a 100 day start of his career with this kind of struggle that becomes an NBA player. But I don’t think you closed the door on him. The reason I don’t think you closed the door on him is he physically was so outmanned last year. And I think you’ve got to let that process take two years and see whether you begin to see some ability to it. I think his narrow thing is very different. He’s not a good shooter right now. He’s 24% from three. He doesn’t have any confidence to it. He’s a pretty athletic guy. I think he’s a clo driving closeout guy. Maybe can see if he can pass a little bit off of that to create in a very narrow realm and I think probably 12 or 15 minutes a night and again with some sort of defensive impact. But got to figure out what he’s not a dog defensively. He doesn’t have that Javon Carter kind of dog defensively aspect to him. So what is he defensively? The nice thing about both these guys is that there’s no physical limitation in their metrics and their distance and their length that is going to prohibit them or limit what they can do. They both are so athletic, so long. Cody’s a terrific one-legged jumper. Like the base skills are there for both these guys to give themselves a route. But the it’s got to get our expectations on the reason I did the draft thing is because I think our expectations have to be that they’re now just a draft pick, not a top 10 pick. and you’re just trying to find a way for them to become a rotation player in the NBA. And if and then if they’re a rotation player in the NBA, it’s going to be a narrow very narrow little role of efficiency and impact. And for me, Cody’s narrow role is defensively, but I we got to see whether he’s got the physical prowess to do it. And then a little bit of a drive and kick game, maybe a drive and finish at the rack every now, but all of these are predicated on gaining strength and confidence. He has neither right now. So, I think on Cody, you’re still waiting well. and Taylor, you just got to get the minutes up. So, I think it’s a huge amount of patience here for both these guys still. The G-League is really perfect for them almost maybe up to the All-Star break and see whether you can get them then to start coming back out of the out of the G- League into one of these very narrow roles where if if Taylor’s playing 15 minutes of efficiency and impact, we should be very very excited of it. But I don’t think you you can’t be just going here you go. And that’s not what we’re doing in any way. You do want to give players space. You do want to give them conf. But let’s narrow it down into a very specific roles and then let them burst at the seams to try to create more. Will talk about Taylor Hendricks next and some interesting things on Walt Clayton as we continue on Locked on Jess. Today’s show is brought to you in part by our friends over at Game Time. It’s an exciting summer ahead of us in the game time world because the World Cup is coming to North America for the first time since 1994. And with 48 teams for the first time ever, it’s going to be massive. 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Download the Game Time app, create an account, use the code locked on NBA for $20 off your first purchase. That’s $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download the app, make an account, use the code locked on NBA for $20 off your first p purchase. Swipe, tap, ticket, go. Game time. All right, I want to do a little Wills Wednesdays. Two quotes coming up here. one about Taylor and one about Walt Clayton. Uh, by the way, thank you very much for making Locked on Jazz your first listen. I super appreciate it. Uh, let’s go to Let’s see if we can get Will queued up here. These are always a little interesting whether you guys get the sound or not on this setup. I think it worked well the other day if I caught it correctly. Um, this time sometimes I actually just take the mic and put the mic up on this one and hopefully it works. So, you guys need to tell me every day just text me and let me know. your mic saviors here on whether or not this works or not. All right. Uh, also sharing audio. We’ll see whether it works. Here is Will Hardy and talking about Taylor Hendricks. Minutes are so important for Taylor because he needs as many repetitions as he can get um at the reactive part of the sport that you just can’t you can’t replicate it when you miss a year. Um, you know, it’s it’s interesting like when you watch rehab in general, there’s a lot of it that’s scripted. You’re trying to get good at a certain movement and so you’re telling the athlete what movement they’re going to do, and that’s the way it is, but um I’m pretending like I’m a medical expert right now. Uh, our game is all reaction. Like I can’t I couldn’t tell Taylor when he goes in the game what movements he’s going to do and when. and he doesn’t know either. And so getting your body used to making those decisions and reacting and fully trusting your body in those moments, I think is where we’re trying to get to with Taylor. Um there’s conditioning, there’s feel for the ball, there’s all those things also, but um I think Taylor’s in a good place right now. Like it’s not a he’s not being demoted playing for the G-League team. Like I see this as a kind of an extension of his return to play. Like I said, we have 60 games left, so where Taylor is 20 games from now could be somewhere totally different, but the G-League is such a great tool and um we intend to maximize it when we can. I think the thing on Taylor we have to all remember is the day he got hurt, if you were with me and I did the show a few days later, I mean, I said it sets him back for an entire year. that there’s probably no evaluation Taylor until maybe post Allstar break this year and then maybe if there’s any evaluation it’s really taking place next year which backs up our timeline a great deal on him. This is where we’ll probably talk about this on tomorrow’s show where Keant’s burst is just a savior um to make this season a success and you can let all these other things take place because of the fact that Keonte has had this burst um and done this. I thought that was really interesting about rehab also that you hear him say, you know, it’s a good point like rehab, we’re going to go onelegged up a stairs or we’re going to bounce from side to side, but then in basketball, who knows? The other thing is there’s just a bunch of fundamentals on Taylor’s game. He has to get so jumpy. He always is trying to block jump shots. He’s getting beat by on every pump fake. These are things he just needs time to be able to think through. Right now, he’s probably not thinking through these things. He’s literally probably just trying to survive every game. And so getting him to that point, I thought this was interesting about Walt Clayton has been the highlight for the last three or four games. Here’s what Will said about how Walt has stepped forward and why. You know, Walt made a huge shot against Houston in the fourth quarter early in the fourth um coming off the the high ball screen and just shooting his um off the dribble three, but I I don’t know if there’s anything else to it other than a little bit more decisiveness. I feel like, and I’ve said to you guys, I’ve said to Wall, I feel like he’s been pretty careful for the first part of the season. Um, you know, the last three games is as aggressive as he’s been in terms of just playing the game, not trying to be perfect on every play. Um, Walt has been a score first guard for most of his life. So, it’s hard. Then you’re a young guard and you come in and you’re trying to walk this line of, well, I got to get the other guys involved and I got to pass to Lowry when he’s open and I’ve got to do all these things. But my identity is I come off ball screens, I look at the basket, and if I’m open, I shoot. Um, so I think he’s done a better job of balancing those two things. I feel like early in the year, he was only thinking about everyone else and so all of his shots were kind of afterthoughts. Um, but it’s a hard balance. like I anticipate that there will be moments where it could go the other way like well you’re shooting too much. Um but we just have to try to help him navigate those things with Keonte. So that was Will Hardy on both Taylor and on Walt. Will gives pretty thoughtful answers. I like doing Will’s Wednesdays for you. Hope you enjoyed that as well. Tomorrow’s show we will look at how Keonte George’s burst changes everything for the Utah Jazz and makes this season a success. Also changes the trade landscape that they’ll look at. So we have that for you as well. Feel free to follow me on any of my socials. Dlock09. Love to have you as a part of the everyday club if you just want adree and lockdown sports today and part of the discord exclusive discord of the NBA which is super fun chatting about all the games are taking place your team everything else. All sorts of great channels across the discord channel. You can get that at the everyday club for $5 a month. If you want to be part of our lockedown jazz all access group, one-on-one texting back and forth, in-game updates for you, prep notes for you. uh extra episodes, Leaf to Lean’s exclusive college basketball breakdown and draft preparation breakdown of AJ from last night, I’m sure. All coming your direction. That is on the Everydayer Club, plus all access um extra episodes for you. That’s at lockdownpodcast.com/ everydayer. Please join in. We’d love to have you be a part of that. It is all part of Locked on Jazz, your daily podcast on the Utah Jazz. Thanks so much for tuning in. We now send you the first ever 247 national NBA channel, Locked on NBA, on YouTube or on audio. Check out Locked on NBA for your second list and game night.

Utah Jazz face mounting pressure as two top-10 picks, Taylor Hendricks and Cody Williams, struggle to make an impact while Keyonte George’s explosive rise keeps fans hopeful. Is it time to recalibrate expectations for Hendricks and Williams, or will player development unlock their potential before it’s too late?

David Locke explores the challenges of drafting in uncertain years, comparing Hendricks and Williams to previous draft classes and revealing why minutes played can make or break an NBA career. Insights include Lauri Markkanen’s influence on development strategy, G League opportunities for Hendricks, and the crucial role of elite defensive impact. Plus, Walt Clayton’s recent surge sparks discussion about balancing scoring instincts and playmaking. Can the Jazz’s youth movement deliver on its promise, or are they victims of unlucky draft timing?

0:00 — Jazz Top 10 Picks Concerns
4:20 — Draft Trends and Player Development
15:00: Efficient and Impact route for Taylor and Cody
17:11 — Taylor Hendricks & Cody Williams: NBA Path Forward
28:00: Will Hardy Wednesday on Taylor Hendricks and Walter Clayton

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