REACTION: Memphis Grizzlies LEAP Into Playoff Race | Cavaliers TUMBLE Continues in Loss to Bulls

REACTION: Memphis Grizzlies LEAP Into Playoff Race | Cavaliers TUMBLE Continues in Loss to Bulls

It is locked on NBA Game Night for the night of Wednesday, December [music] 17th on today’s show. Don’t look now. But are the Grizzlies a playoff team? When that final [music] buzzer rings, you know it’s time for Locked On NBA Game Night. All the postgame reactions to every game across the league, every single night with insights [music] only the hosts at Locked On can provide. It’s the true NBA fans one stop for all the action. Every game, every night. It’s locked on NBA Game Night. Tipping off now. Welcome to Locked On NBA Game Night. Every game, every night. Thank you for making Locked on NBA your first listen every day. I’m Wes Goldberg joining me as he does every Wednesday night. It’s Tony East. Tony, a two game slate for us tonight. Uh we are not used to these on Wednesday nights. Uh so just the two games. You took one, I took one. We watched them both in depth and we’re going to talk about them today. So you took Cavs Bulls which was a bit of a stinker. I took Grizzlies Timberwolves and that’s where we’re going to start. We’re going to start in Minnesota where the Grizzlies got the win over the Timberwolves thanks to their big men. Here’s Joe Mullenex from Lockdown Grizzlies with more. Brandon Clark made his long awaited return to the Memphis Grizzlies coming off of injury. But it was another Memphis big who helped steal the show in a victory from the Timberwolves in Minnesota on Wednesday night, allowing for the Grizzlies to achieve their second victory over a team with a winning record this season. I’m Joe Molenax of Lockdown Grizzlies. And it was Jock Landale. A really, really impressive performance, not just in terms of three-point shooting, not just in terms of a double double, but he made winning plays. He made winning plays in assists. He made winning plays in terms of blocks. He was an active participant in a game where the Grizzlies didn’t have John Morant. They didn’t have Cam Spencer, Zack Edy. Memphis only had 10 players that were actively dressed for this contest. And yet, it was enough on this night. Jiren Jackson Jr. continues to finally look like the allstar of old. And you’re seeing contributions from players like a Contavius Cowwell Pope, a Jaylen Wells, a Cedric Coward. Guys are stepping up, helping this Grizzlies team get back in the playoff picture. So Tony, I know your game ended early. So you actually were able to watch the last few minutes of this one. And Jock Landale is the guy that stood out to you. >> Yeah. Just opening the corner, hitting some huge threes in a game like he’s not the big shooter, the big man shooter you expect to see on Memphis if anybody, but he drilled two and he took a lots. He took four I think in the last five minutes of the game. And I was like, yeah, he probably should be taking them. But what really stood out in that stretch is a couple of things you said. One is Jiren also hit a clutch jumper. And you know, this this extends beyond this one game, but Joe’s absolutely right. He finally looks better and more involved and more like the Jiren of last year. Like I watched a Grizz game a couple weeks ago and Jack Landell, who played well in this game, played more than Jiren and I was like, why? Why? You know, why is that happening? I think they finally have figuring out where to use him. And the other thing that’s happening in this game is no Tai Jerome, no John Morant, they have no like nominal point guards, but they really in this game figured out a way to have a lot of ball movement still. Look how many guys have three plus assists for this team. and Landale’s threes late were all set up by someone else. They really had a good flow to their offense despite not having some of their lead initiators in this game, which I thought was really important for their offensive execution late. That’s exa that’s exactly what stands out to me about this Memphis team and the way they share the ball. I mean, they were starting Cedric Coward at point guard in this game nominally. And they they’ve had stretches of starting Vince Williams as their point guard with John Morant out and Ty Jerome not playing for them because he’s hurt. Like all their point Sky Pippen Jr.’s hurt. All the all the guards are hurt. So, they’re playing these forwards at point guard. They’re playing these jumbo lineups. They played a lot of minutes. They started this game with essentially three centers. Um, uh, Brandon Clark, who welcome back to the NBA, Brandon Clark, he, uh, last played in March of 2025, uh, after offseason knee surgery and that coming after the Achilles tear the year before that. So, it’s been a journey for him. I thought he was really good in this game. He got credited for zero blocks. I thought he affected a lot of shots at the rim. The that that jump wasn’t quite there where we’re used to seeing it, but it was there. He was still an athlete. So, they started him, Santi Alama, and Jiren Jackson Jr. alongside Jaylen Wells, who was also great in this game, and Cedric Howard. Um, so they’re playing these big jumbo lineups, but with these Grizzlies teams, because they’ve had to sort through all these different mixand match type of lineups, it just sort of feels like they don’t have any nobody plays any position. They just they have a lot of players of different kinds of sizes, but they’re all screening for each other. They’re all passing for each other. When they don’t have the ball, they’re moving, they’re driving, they’re cutting. Um I I kind of like what Solo has done with this team. It’s similar to me as to what Toronto has done under Darko in terms of just everybody is involved in the offense. It’s not one singular person. Everybody’s always moving. Everybody’s screening for each other. It’s very unselfish. And for the Grizzlies right now, it’s working. They’ve won nine of their last 12 games. It’s been a little bit of a soft schedule, no doubt about it. Uh, and but this Minnesota win is a good one. No Anthony Edwards for the Timberwolves, which is worth mentioning, but it’s still a good win on the road against a good team. Don’t look now, but Memphis has the same record as Golden State. And if the playoffs started today, they’d be in the playing tournament. That’s pretty remarkable considering where they were to start the year, Tony. >> Yeah. And how many guys have missed a ton of time, right? like a big the start of this turnaround that you just said where they won out of 12 was like, “Oh, Zack Gi is just amazing.” Like he’s just dominating all these games. They haven’t even had him recently and they’ve still found ways to do what you described of have some success on offense with goofy jumbo lineups. This game was particularly a good one to have this conundrum because the Wolves are also huge. So, you can get away with feeling like that size isn’t going to be just like beaten down by a low center of gravity speedy guy. Uh, but I, you know, those lineups didn’t look crazy or uncomfortable or anything and they still got enough paint pressure to keep their offense flowing. But the other thing that helped them a lot is their defense was quite good. They got 10 steals. Jaylen Wells, the guy you highlighted earlier was I love Jaylen Wells. I was saying like he should get rookie of the year consideration last year and like maybe not. I was wrong about Stefan Castle as I’ve said a million times, but he’s awesome and that like helps you get easy offense. Even if you can’t do anything in the half court without a point guard, great. Just get some steals, run out and score. So, some of that’s on Minnesota for not having amp, but they deserve a lot of credit for for what they’ve been doing. >> Let’s get the Timberwolves angle uh of this one. Here’s Ben Beacon from Locked on Timberwolves. >> The Minnesota Timberwolves fell to the short-handed Memphis Grizzlies by six on Wednesday night. I’m Ben Beacon, host of the Daily Lockdown Wolves podcast. This is a bad loss for Minnesota. There’s no two ways about it. A slow start, uh a better second quarter. Wolves up by one at halftime, but the bench was terrible in the third quarter. so bad in fact that uh Chris Finch really only played the starters plus Nas Reed, basically Nas and Bones Highland in and out for each other down the final quarter and a half because he didn’t trust anybody else after the poor bench stints in the third quarter. Minnesota’s offense was terrible late. Uh missing their first eight three-point attempts of the fourth quarter, not making one till the closing seconds of the game. And this is a John Morantless short-handed Memphis team that really only had like eight and a half rotation players at their disposal. The Wolves gave up 20 points to uh to Jock Landel in 30 minutes off the bench. A 20-10 game for Jock Land. Uh Minnesota without Anthony Edwards once again. Um that matters obviously, but still a bad loss to a short-handed Grizzlies team. And now the Wolves have the Thunder up next and have to bounce back from this this disappointing loss at home to a short-handed Memphis team. So Ben’s right obviously about the bench and the discrepancy there and not having Anthony Edwards and all of this, but I want to focus on Julius Randall. Tony, he has this unique ability to just be great and terrible in the same game sometimes in the same quarter. He he can carry you in a game and he can also make mistakes that take you out of it. And that felt very apparent in this one. He helped bring the Timberwolves back into the game after Memphis. They go on a 140 run in the third quarter and Randle helps bring him back. He’s making quick decisions with the ball in his hands. He’s attacking close outs. He just does these like rip and get downhill type of moves where he’s kind of already getting downhill before he even catches it. And with his size and his strength, he ends up just kind of rumbling into the paint and he’s almost unstoppable when he’s doing that. He does it on two straight possessions. And then on the third possession, he gets this offensive rebound for a putback to cut into that deficit. And he’s playing with that level of physicality, but also a simplicity that you love to see from him. So, he’s doing that in the third quarter. Let’s fast forward three and a half minutes to go in this game in the fourth quarter. He goes at Jiren Jackson Jr. inexplicably. He has the ball in the corner, tight corner, and he just start he just decides to go ISO against Jiren Jackson Jr. Gets stripped cuz he’s uh Jackson’s awesome. Uh Vince Williams gets to Landale uh puts uh uh Landale corner three puts Memphis up five. Then Randall uh on defense next defensive possession inexplicably again just leaves his man Jiren Jackson Jr. to blitz rookie Cedric Coward like 32 feet away from the basket. Coward just swings it back to Jiren Jackson Jr. That leads to him attacking the basket getting an open push shot on a mismatch. So that’s a weird defensive play from Randall. Then Randall drives to Jiren Jackson Jr. again, makes the shot and gets the and one opportunity. Like, oh, okay, back to good Julius Randall. The Wolves get the ball back. He fast balls a pass to Nas Reed, like delivers this pass way too early as Reed is coming off of this splash screen uh from Rudy Goar and it just bounces off of Reed. He actually jammed Reed’s finger with the pass his hand. He threw it so hard >> and it leads to a turnover and that kind of was the end of the game and the end of Minnesota’s opportunity to come back again. He just has this unique ability to just be great for moments and then terrible all in the same game. Can carry you in a game can also take take you out of it. It’s when he makes the simple play instead of over complicating things that I think he’s really good at it and he tends to play better. And ironically enough, that’s sort of the same problem that his teammate Anthony Edwards has at times. And I think that might be one of the reasons why this Minnesota Timberwolves team is so confusing sometimes. >> Dude, you just like nailed every point I would make about the Wolves. They’re very like every time I watch them, I’m like, man, they feel so disappointing and doomy and they’re 17 and 10 and like they sneak out wins they shouldn’t get. But their whole team’s kind of like this, right? Ano stud and McDaniels has been awesome this season and Gobear’s mostly the same guy all the time. And it’s like Randall’s either awesome or like what’s going on? And then they’re relying on a lot of either streaky shooters or like young guys who you expect to be inconsistent. And Dillingham and Shannon and Clark and like Bone Tylen’s been good for them. He was not good in this game. A lot of the bench guys Ben Beacon mentioned are same. They’re young. You shouldn’t expect them to be consistent, but they need them to be. And it just kind of their whole team where it’s like, “Oh, that was good. You just beat Golden State without Ant.” And then they have games like this where it’s like, “What what’s going on with this team?” >> We’re going to move on to the game you watched, Tony. Cavs versus Bulls. Bulls get the win. Things continue to get worse for the Cavaliers, but will they get better? We’re going to talk about that next. Today’s episode is brought to you by Robin Hood. Nobody knows your money goals better than you do. Robin Hood puts you in control of your money with tools that work as hard as you do. 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Three players scored at least 20 points. Josh Giddy, Kobe White, and Nikolus. Tony, what was your takeaway from this one? >> Uh the Cavs are sad. [laughter] The Cavs are very sad. Um that but if you have to start with the Bulls, something that I was actually thinking about during this game is the Bulls were playing like what I would call semicompetent to good basketball. They made shots in this game and their defense led to their offense a lot. Their transition game looked pretty good. Is Trey Jones was garden like he was playing good defense in this game. Isaac Aoro played his defense also pretty solid and those two guys played a good amount of minutes 24 plus for both. And I thought how are the Bulls playing when both of these players are available? because this is a team that I mean everybody knows the Bulls have been a disaster the last couple weeks like you just said their second win of the month and they have played an awful schedule and have lost to the Pacers twice, the Pelicans, the Hornets, the all these teams. So like horrible run of play from them, right? And then I look and I wanted to see this if both Trey Jones and Isaac Aoro are available for the Bulls this year. They’re eight and seven. So, I think some of this is just they I think they lead the league in guys who have missed a game this year. Like they have been really hurt. And I’m not saying that they’re gonna like bounce back and be a good team all of a sudden. But it did kind of articulate to me like yes, this team is broken and not very good, but there is something at least like they have pieces that can do stuff on the right nights. And tonight was one of those nights. Kobe White was on fire. Josh Giddy had another triple double. And like they have actual stuff that can do it. It’s just a lot of one-way guys that requires a lot to go right. Fortunately for them, tonight was one of those nights. Their defense led to their offense a lot and their guards were really scoring. Vuvich hit some shots and boom, they win. But, you know, seeing those two defend pretty well where like only Donovan Mitchell could break through and do anything was actually making me kind of intrigued by like not that the Bulls are going to be good. Again, I think they stink, but you know, okay, is this at least more injury related than I realized to their struggles of the last couple weeks? They did look a lot more similar to the team that they were to start the season when they got off to that hard start than they did lately. Uh they dominated in transition in this game, especially off of steals. Uh they were just getting out into the open court and that is the game that they kind of want to play, right? Like this game was played up tempo. They had 106 possessions in this game according to cleaning the glass. That’s really good. And it helps them score 68 points in the paint, right? Even with no Evan Mobley for Cleveland, that doesn’t really matter if the the Bulls are playing at this pace and just outrunning the centers on the other team. When Josh Giddy is getting downhill and on the open court, when Kobe White is making shots, this team is really hard to handle offensively. And so, um, that that’s what this Bulls team wants to be. And it felt like they got to their game a lot more easier in in this one. again, like you look at the Cavs, they were also dealing with a lot of injuries in this one. But I I just think when the Bulls are playing like this, this is when they get to their identity and it’s when they’re fun to watch. And two, like to go back to those players and their health with absolutely no offense. The same thing I said about the Wolves, like young players are supposed to be inconsistent. Like they’ve had to play a lot of Julian Phillips, Patrick Williams, Dalon Terry, etc. this season and in this game, no Phillips at all, 10 minutes of Williams, one minute of Terry. like that those guys maybe should play if you’re a bad team but you know if they play less you’re going to look better and like having more healthy guys and they didn’t even have Iumu in this game who’s another one of their good defenders like that makes that all more possible and realistic and then your offensive players make some shots bada bing bada boom hey look it’s the Bulls of the first six game of the season we were like oh is this team going to make the playoffs just kidding no they’re not but the other part of this is Evan Mobley was out and the Cavs are just some something something is wrong like I can’t it it I I don’t even they’re over 500 but it’s and their net ratings are good and then I watch them I’m like what happened this team was like could have won 60 did they win 60 games could have won 60 games last year like they were awesome >> so they get 32 points from Donovan Mitchell and that’s about it he doesn’t have any help in this game no Mobly no Garland like there’s guys missing but still like >> oh Garland played he didn’t do anything >> Garland played >> 15 points on 16 shots yes he played 30 minutes didn’t even notice that Garland played didn’t >> this wasn’t your game don’t worry you don’t have to know that he did play he like like he’s had good games this season, but he I mean I’m sorry I’ve been rambling so much about this game. Like you and I talked last year a lot and the Cows were rolling. How many times did I say early in the season I thought Garland was playing better than Mitchell? Like I thought he was their best player at times last season and that he hasn’t even been close to that this year. He hasn’t even been close to as good as last year. Like I get why he had a bad toe injury and the jaw thing and all that. Like okay, great. But like he’s they need much more from him and much more from lots of guys. And it it just it feels so weird. >> I can’t figure out this Cavs team. I don’t know if it’s the injuries because you’re you’re right when you it’s so easy to look at them in on paper. They’re missing guys. They’re shooting terribly during this stretch. They were uh I think 28th in the league in three-point shooting uh during this stretch where they’ve been struggling and they only shot 30.8% in this one. I mean, this team >> has not been able to make a shot, but Garland has been in and out with this toe thing. Max Drew hasn’t played for them yet. Um you know, Mhm. So, I mean, these guys are just missing a ton of shots and so you like, okay, well, eventually they’ll get healthier. Eventually they’ll start making shots. Even if those guys aren’t always healthy, they’re not this bad of a shooting team. They were number one in the league in three-point shooting percentage last year. Now they’re near the bottom of the league. That just doesn’t seem sustainable. And then you watch them and you’re like, something just feels off. But then I go back to the point of, well, show me the team in the middle of losing a bunch of games and missing a bunch of three-pointers and being really injured. Show me the team that is that does have great vibes, >> right? >> There’s a chicken or the egg thing here that I can’t quite figure out with them. >> I do think they’ll figure it out. Like their underlying numbers suggest they do, but you get to a point with a team like this where it’s like if what you’re watching never matches the numbers, like are we not measuring something correctly? Like what’s actually going on here? And like they’re over 500, but they are a miracle comeback against the Wizards where Donovan Mitchell had 40 gazillion points away from being exactly 500, under 500. Like it’s a it’s a yeah, they’d be 13 of 13. Like how are you top 10 in both offense and defense and you’re 500? So something is just off. And in this game they started Jaylen Tyson and he was great. He made every two-pointer he took. He scored 21 points. like eventually they’ll start streus and I think things will feel good and they’ve you know we’ve missing all these guys we talked about but just I watch them and it’s like so often their offense is just like they trot across half court and guys go stand where they’re supposed to and they’re jogging and they don’t get anything and it’s like okay Donovan you save us and a lot of times you can but like you can’t play like that you just can’t do that >> they’re kind of Eastern Conference warriors one star at the top who just scores a ton of points >> injured players mixing and matching lineups the entire time and if the three ball doesn’t go in, they lose and they don’t really have another way of winning and but they both turn the ball over a ton. Cleveland 20 turnovers in this game which led to all those Chicago runouts. Yeah. I mean, whatever’s going on in Cleveland, I just I was saying earlier today, I think the Cavs will be fine. I think they’ll figure this out. I I just can’t believe that they’re this bad. >> Yeah. But when I say they’ll be fine, they’ll figure it out, I also don’t think that means that they’re going to make the NBA finals, which was the expectation of this team. I think they’re clearly a notch below the Knicks and the Pistons and maybe some other teams in the Eastern Conference depending on how all this shakes out. 100% agree with that. And like that maybe that’s part of it is they had that expectation last year and they got steamrolled and they realized they had to be better and when you’re not better it really hurts. It’s like hard to get out of that. And I think their defense has to be better, too. Like Mo’s obviously a huge part of that, but you know, you were sitting here while I looked this up before the game. Like they were eighth on defense last year. They were 10th >> on the season. They still are. I think 10th on the season, but their last 10 games, they’re 16th. And I get that Moley’s out, but the if you’re not hitting threes like we’re talking about, you got to guard better. And they just haven’t. Also to completely irrelevant to bad Cavs vibes. Sick DeAndre Hunter dunk in this game. If you haven’t seen the highlights of that listener, go look up uh Donovan or DeAndre Hunter’s nasty dunk. >> That was a minor fan dunk. There you go. Yeah, go Cavs. [laughter] >> Go Cavs. It’s the time of year where officiating is becoming a talking point. But does the NBA have a real problem on its hands? We’re going to talk about that next. >> Today’s episode of Locked on NBA Game Night is brought to you by Rocket Money. Ever feel like your money just disappears each month? It happens fast. A few subscriptions here, an impul impulse buy there, and suddenly the numbers in your bank account don’t match the numbers in your head. 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Thanks for making lockdown NBA game night your first listen every day. The Lockdown Podcast Network has a show for every team. Check out Locked on Grizzlies, locked on Timberwolves, locked on Cavs, and Locked on Bulls for more on tonight’s games. I don’t love talking about officiating, Tony, but it feels like this is a subject that has to be talked about right now. And it’s been a conversation around the league this week. You saw Emodoka uh get a $25,000 fine for his postgame criticism of the officiating, specifically of Zack Zarba’s crew the other night. Well, against Zack Zarber’s crew tonight, Chris Finch had some strong words toward the ends of this Minnesota game. So much so that the the feed that I was watching on League Pass actually picked up a lot of what Finch was saying and not there wasn’t a lot of it that was safe for kids, I would say. Um, like I said, I I don’t love officiating as a conversation. I kind of just think it’s a bad podcast topic, but it’s it’s in the forefront right now. You’ve got coaches being fined. Does the NBA have an officiating problem right now? >> Yeah, F. Well, Finch’s thing was weird because, sorry to bring this up, we didn’t get it there. There’s like no reason to talk about it because the game was basically over. Minnesota was trying to foul >> and Jane McDaniels did intentionally foul and they didn’t call it. And McDaniels is like, “Dude, I fouled him.” And then they blow a whistle when no one is fouling like at all. Like nothing’s happening and they just call the foul. It’s like, “Wait, if you’re going to do it, like do it.” When it was >> I didn’t realize you can just ask for the foul. You don’t have to even touch it. for weird and then he’s yelling at Zara and I’m like usually I’m like coach shut like not shut up but like you’re you’re you’re going over the top for what this is like that was not that was super super weird. I mean, yeah, it’s always going to be a thing where everybody thinks that there’s like x number of wrong calls every game, right? Okay. Like, whatever. You hope they don’t decide the game, and they very, very rarely do despite fans thinking that the refs are the worst thing in the world. But there has been a lot of stuff about it. And like to add to what you’re talking about, one, I mean, we just heard WMY grab a mic in front of the world and talk about ethical hoops as a phrase. He didn’t mean it like about foul baiting and officiating, but that’s a term that people use to refer to that all the time, right? and like so that brought it even more to the forefront. I don’t even know if you saw this. The NBA referee’s official account had a long long post today about a back court violation that happened in the Sixers Hawks game uh a few nights ago where they didn’t call back court and the Sixers thought it was and their announcer crew thought it was and the announcers talking about what his interpretation of the rule is and the NBA officials count’s like no here’s what the rule is and it’s crazy that you know nobody knows this. It’s like not even in the rule book though. And so there’s there’s no way anyone could possibly know this. Like why are you dunking on announcers? Like just explain it. Right? So there’s always this divide between what everybody thinks the rules are and what the rules actually are or how it’s been told to be officiated. And we now know that that like can change with emphases mid-season. So I I largely think NBA officiating is really good, which is like maybe the worst take to have ever as somebody who follows the NBA because most people just hate it. I largely think it’s really good if it’s consistent within a game that then even if it seems bad, it’s good. But there have been a lot of little things recently where it’s like there’s just a disconnect whether it’s of communication or actual I I don’t even know the right word like uh what they’re actually doing in game doesn’t match what they’re saying in a way that I think is frustrated now Udoka Finch whatever the masses you know ann like everybody and I don’t I don’t know how they fix it because their job is naturally like this different subset of the action that is going to feel annoying to players and coaches, but it has been really a big big big topic with lots going on recently. >> So, I do think that some of this and I I mentioned it’s the time of year where we start complaining about officiating and what I didn’t mean specifically mid December. I just mean once every season we have this big top conversation about officiating cuz it just comes up and it’s usually a few weird things or a coaches find or something newsworthy happens where it enters our mind cuz I would argue most of the time unless you’re rooting for a specific team nobody’s really thinking about the officiating right like when you and I get on here after game night >> right agree >> we never talk about officiating um but then a couple of weird things happen and then all of a sudden you start noticing a little bit more, right? It’s like somebody it’s like hearing a word for the first time and you’re like, “Oh, that’s a fun word.” And then you start hearing that word everywhere. Um it’s the selection bias starts to creep in, in other words, and so you’re like, “Oh, well that’s another bad call. Oh, that’s another bad call.” And then suddenly it snowballs in your mind and you think the officiating is worse. So, uh I’ll get off my psychology soap box here for a second and I’ll get to my other point, which is we talk all the time about how the schedule negatively impacts player health. I do wonder if this is starting to take a toll on officiating because we all know that the pace of the game is such that the wear and tear on the players body is greater than it’s ever been at any point in NBA history. Well, that also means that officials have way more possessions where they have to be dialed in and locked in. And I’m wondering if the schedule, the way it is, is also way too demanding on these officials and if after time over the course of a season, they just get blureyed and they just can’t they just can’t do it. And that’s why you end up with these weird sort of brain fart moments where Jaden McDaniels is fouling this guy very clearly, intentionally fouling him, and then there’s no whistle >> and then he just blows the whistle on purpose. on purpose. >> It just it was it was very very you get these like weird brain fart moments and I’m wondering if the schedule has anything to do with it. >> That’s an interesting point. I’ve never thought of that, but like I mean not to make this about us, but you know you you cover a team like there are times when you’re covering a team where you’re like I’m tired. Like if I’m tired, the players are tired and refs are doing a game every night or every other night, right? And they’re everywhere. They don’t stick with one team, one series, one region, whatever. >> They’re always traveling. >> Certainly even worse. Yeah, they’re everywhere. And so it’s brutal for them in that way. And I think your other point that’s that’s important here is like the pace is so high. Like what’ you say about the Bulls? It was 106 possessions. [clears throat] So not only is that more possessions, that’s more interactions between players of like things that could be a foul. Like okay, so that’s more chances for them to either mess up or or make a call. And you’ve probably heard this a million times if you’re a fan of the NBA or cover a team. a player says something, well, they can’t call all of them. I mean, the game would take forever, blah, blah, and that’s true. They can’t like it it would be horrible. And so, you just get to a point where there’s more and more interactions and more and more demand and that adds room for error and just adds to it. There’s just so many I could go on and on. Like again, I I largely think officiating is good, but there’s just the other thing I hate that they do is when like like the great you remember the Grayson Allen thing that happened a couple week like a week ago with that three-pointer he took with really weird footwork and everybody’s like here’s why that’s not a travel. And I’m like okay you’re explaining what the rule book says but if that’s what the rule is the rule sucks like that doesn’t help your case to me and what this is saying to me is you should change the rules because everybody who’s ever played basketball knows that that’s not how that should look right. So there’s just all there’s just always some sort of not perfect leveling even though it it’ll always you’re right it’ll always happen every year for that exact reason. >> My general take on officiating and all this stuff is the NBA has a adding problem. It likes to add rules and add layers to things and sometimes I think it just needs to subtract things and just it’s like to your point do we really need an objective rule of what a travel is and what a travel isn’t or if that clearly sucks as a basketball play just call it as hey that sucks the basketball play that doesn’t work we’re going to it’s a travel or it’s we’re not going to give you the foul James Harden or whatever it is just do the right thing to use Victor Wvenyama’s term ethical hoops I like your point he wasn’t talking about the officiating necessarily but everybody’s involved here Um, that wraps up Locked on NBA Game Night. Make sure you’re subscribed on YouTube or wherever you get your podcast. For Tony East, I’m Wes Goldberg. This has been Game Night. Thanks for hanging out with us.

In this episode of Locked On NBA Game Night, Wes Goldberg and Tony East break down whether the Memphis Grizzlies, led by Jock Landale and Jaren Jackson Jr., are truly a playoff contender after a big road win over the Minnesota Timberwolves without Anthony Edwards. The hosts analyze Julius Randle’s up-and-down performance for the Timberwolves and how his inconsistency mirrors the team’s struggles.

Attention shifts to the Cleveland Cavaliers’ ongoing woes, discussing if Donovan Mitchell and Darius Garland can lift the team out of their slump, especially with Evan Mobley out, and celebrating the Chicago Bulls’ rare December victory behind strong outings from Cobe White, Nikola Vucevic, and Josh Giddey. The episode closes with a candid look at NBA officiating concerns, spotlighting recent coach criticisms and the debate around how schedule demands may be affecting referees’ performance across the league.

0:00 Grizzlies vs Timberwolves
13:07 Cavs vs Bulls
22:34 NBA’s Officiating Issue

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