THWC 393: So Wemby Sucks Now?

What's up, everybody? I'm with Cage, episode 393. We are coming to you on Wednesday, May 27th. Yesterday's episode was a little late, so I'm putting this one out. It's only been probably about 15 hours since that last episode. I'm vulturing views and that's not. That's not good because yesterday's episode was fun. You know, I. I got a lot of great dms. It's funny to think about this. Episode 393, brought to you by Arena Club, by Card Ladder Use Code Cage, Save a Couple Bucks. And by the Philly show, who's out there listening to this? And I get the best messages, you know, I mean, I get a lot of messages telling me I'm an idiot and a clown. And that's fun. I get a lot of messages from people. You know, I got a phone one this morning, you know, you know, talking about how they were overseas, they, you know, in Europe. And, you know, they basically, you know, are. It's not easy to get, you know, great TV over there. And they're just, you know, watching me on the. On the hotel, you know, on the hotel television. Sorry about that. To your spouse who's got to get stuck, you know, listening to and. Or watching my big head on some European hotel TV screen, you know, and I get the fun ones, but, you know, I'm driving to a show and, you know, just listen to six straight episodes on the drive. That's fun, you know, you know, try to be mindful, you guys, and keep it entertaining. The show two episodes ago where I gave my, you know, my story about the card show and trying to sell Wembies and just kind of the, you know, the back and forth with the dealers and, you know, my story of, you know, the kids trying to basically rip me off, that did a lot of that, did some pretty good numbers that episode. People seem to, you know, enjoy that one. And I got a lot of people who know who, who either go to shows who shared similar stories with me and dm, people who set up in shows, you know, telling me some of their stories as well. And, you know, that's its own kind of, you know, its own piece. The, you know, the. The big thing that I take from the messages I got in response to that episode were everybody is mindful of the. The repacking and the case hits and that just the buying and the selling and how that really does prop up the entire ecosystem. And know, while people ask the question of, you know, how Long can that last? You know, what happens if it goes away? Everybody seems to kind of agree that it's not going anywhere. You know what I mean? Like, there's no sign of that slowing down or stopping or anything like that. So, you know, that's an interesting thing. Also check this out. I got a sweatshirt on today. I figured I would put on a sweatshirt. It's a little chillier today in my house. Air condition's blasting. You know, it got to me 90 degrees and then all of a sudden it's 50 again. I put this on, I got a nice sweatshirt. I think I've worn this, you know, pl black sweatshirt maybe two or three times. I lent it to my daughter about a month ago and I put it on and, you know, then I realized, you know, having a daughter who paints and does art will, you know, your sweatshirt can become a casualty. Because I look down at my sleeve and it's got paint all over it. Got two, two, two wears out of this. So this will be the third wear and you know, you guys will have to, you know, deal with the fact that there's paint on my sleeve. It is what it is. Oh, man. What's fun. So yesterday the Yankees scored a ton of runs. Everybody hit home runs, 24 hits, I think. And Judge didn't hit a home run and the Dodgers scored a bunch of runs and Pa has hit a home run and Akika Hernandez at home run and Bets had two home runs, but Ohtani didn't hit home run. So you got, you know, these the two guys, you know, the repeat three peat MVPs. And you know, where are their home runs? I mean, Judge has some power and you know, Otani actually got hit on the hand by a pitch yesterday and then, you know, came out of the game. He's supposed to pitch I think today. So it'll be interesting to see it was his pitching hand as his right hand he got hit on. You know, hopefully he doesn't miss a start. But you know, it has me thinking as you watch, you know, Ohtani hit and pitch and you watch Wemby and OKC last night, you know, I come to you this morning, it's the morning after game five, a very pivotal game five because, you know, after, after four, it becomes a three game series. Two games in OKC and one game in San Antonio. And you know, that first game, game five is pivotal. If the spurs would have taken it, they could have gone home with a chance to clinch on their home court. And with OKC winning, the spurs go back to San Antonio now knowing that not only do they have to win at home, they have to defend their home court advantage, but then they got to go back on the road and win in game seven. You know, so the momentum, you know, which started off in Game 1 with the spurs, you know, stealing a game in, in okc, has swung back towards, you know, Oklahoma City. You know, we're not going to spend too much time talking about the refs and the calls because they're kind of work, you know, were fouls and, and flopping both ways. I mean, Wemby was foul baiting. It looked like a little bit. You know, I mean, OKC does seem to get a lot of calls. You know, there were. There were times where the, the refs didn't even let him challenge calls that clearly went against okc and, you know, the refs didn't even let San Antonio challenge the call or, you know, it was easily a goal 10. Williams hit one off the cylinder. And then immediately following that, you know, where you could see the crowd, myself, my son, we were like, what's going on here? Then ball goes off of Chad's foot and they don't call it. They huddle up and they still make the wrong call. And then when San Antonio is trying to challenge it, they don't even let him. We don't need to go through it. It is what it is. You know, I mean, it's sad that after every game, everybody talks about the refs because, I mean, myself included, the flopping, Myself included, because these are probably the two best teams. I know there's a lot of Nick fans who listen to this and you think the Nick fan, the Nick team is great. They're a good team. Obviously, they're. They're on a historic run here, winning 11 straight games heading into the finals. But, you know, if you look at the records, you look at, you know, regular season play, the spurs and the, you know, the spurs and, and OKC were always towards the top of the West. You know, OKC is the defending champs with the defending MVP and the reigning mvp and, you know, they play good basketball and it's been an exciting series. It's been a lot of punch, counter punch. They have, you know, a fun matchup. It's fun to see, you know, the games within the games. Right? You know, Castle and his crazy defense against sga, you know, the Chet versus Wemby battle, Hartenstein playing his role and, you know, Jay Mitchell kind of, you know, you know, I probably said his name wrong, you know, coming out of coming out of nowhere, sort of, you know, I mean, he, he had a good season also, but, you know, playing his role and, you know, watching the coaches kind of, you know, punch a counter punch, you know, figure out a way to, you know, to get Wemby outside of the paint. This way, you know, the. They can go in there and drive. I will tell you, after watching, you know, five games of this series, Wemby is sort of a. He's a Gemini man. He's. He's. He's bipolar. You know, you get. You get two different Wendy's. And I don't know if, you know, just if that's part of the game plan to get everybody else involved. I mean, Champagne was shooting the lights out in the first quarter, so, you know, that looked like a, you know, recipe for success there. But the games that they win, Wemby is dominant inside. You know, there's a lot of offensive rebounds and second chance points and kicking it out for threes, and he is, you know, beating them up on the inside and giving his team second chances. You know, they're quick and, you know, those were the games that they, they won where Wemby had to be dominant. You know, Wemby had to put up crazy stats, you know, in the games they've lost, he seems to disappear. You know, when there are sets where, you know, they're. A half court offense is setting up, he goes into the paint and then runs out to three, you know, runs out and. And very rarely are they trying to, you know, to throw it in deep in the post and, and take it from somebody who watched basketball in the 80s and 90s where post play was huge. You know, it used to be you dribble up the court, you set up the half a half court offense, point go, would throw it into the. Into the post and Ewing would get it or Elijah would get it or Shaq would get it and they would back their defender down and they would. You know, Wemby is. He's bigger than everybody. He's taller than everybody. You know, you would think that he would be able to establish himself in the post. Give Oklahoma City some credit. They are pushing him off that block. They are. You know, I don't know if he's just not as strong as their big guys. I mean, for a while, Alex Caruso was. Was playing defense on Wimpy in some of these games and pushing him off of the post. You'd like to think somebody who's 7 foot 4 and has a, you know, a foot height advantage you, you send it to him every time. But it's hard for Wemby to dribble, you know, and put the ball on the ground that far out there, you know, with his back to the basket almost at the three point line. You'd want to get him in there closer. And I think you're going to see a different, you know, version of him in game six because I mean it's elimination game, you know, you gotta, you gotta go all out. You gotta just feed him. You got to get in there and feed them and, and, and see if OKC can stop him. And they, you know, they really haven't. You know, it's, it's a shame because he puts up 20 something points and 10 rebounds and you're like, wow, that's a good game. But it's not, you know, he was basically invisible for long stretches of that game when the team needed him. And you know, it's, you can blame the refs, you get blamed the stuff. But he's young. I'm sure he will add some size, I'm sure he'll add some bulk to his frame and make it easier to, you know, to back defenders down or to establish a post cousins closer to the basket. It's going to be very hard to stop him then, you know, when he's able to kind of impose his will. But you know, the guys who you pay $5 million for their cards, you know, the, the goats of the game, the guys who are, you know, true transcendent players, it's rare for them to be invisible when the spotlights are on. And there are some games where Wemby, you know, he did not look like the best player on the, on, on the court last night. He looked like he was. I mean, I don't know if it's purposefully, but he looked like he was a decoy, you know, for, for some of the game it looked like he, you know, especially when your team is down and you are the guy, you'd expect to see a little more animated. Get me the ball. You know what I mean? You'd expect to see a little more animated, like I'm gonna set up in the post. Get me the ball. You can see they're trying to get it to him, but they're getting into him, you know, awkwardly, you know, trying to just like toss it up and, and you know, he's not ready for it. You don't really see too many plays being run to get him the ball. You would think that with his height and, and that team There'd be more pick and roll type of plays. I mean, I'm not a coach, but you'd expect more. You know, he's setting a pick at the three point line, you know, or, or, or slightly inside of it. And, you know, the role of that pick and a lob, you know, the lobs, it's almost like when they run them, they. You can't stop it. It's like the crane technique for Daniel LaRusso. You know, if you do it correct, you can't defend it. This guy's, you know, 11ft tall. You gotta figure if you throw it up around the rim, near the rim, he's gonna go up, get it and, and dunk it or get fouled. But you don't, I mean, they're not, I don't see them running a lot of that. So it didn't surprise me that they lost last night's game the way that they lost. You know, they really just weren't really in it. You know, after the first quarter and where they kept it, you know, kept it close, you know, it seemed like they were playing catch up. And this team, they don't really look designed to play catch up. Especially to a team like OKC that's very good at drawing fouls, very good at creating their own offense and opportunities, and good at shooting free throws. You know, it's hard to close on a team like that. It's hard to close on a team that is going to execute well. And, you know, OKC won a championship last year and is probably favored to win it again this year for exactly that reason. You got to play defense, you got to be quick, and you got to take advantage where you have the advantage. You like to think that Wemby is an advantage. And it was odd for me to see that they, you know, they weren't taking advantage of that. Speak a second on the Knicks. Wow. I mean, New York is all about the Knicks right now. It's, you know, a historic run. There are a lot of Nick fans who were not Nick fans last week and are Nick fans now. A lot of brand new Nick hats being worn out in public. Shiny Nick hats take the price tags off everybody. You know, we can see them. I don't think it's cool to keep the stickers on the hat anymore. Although somebody and I used to do that, you know, like, you know, keep the new era, you know, the shiny sticker on the hat, you know, and even if you want to keep the sticker on, you know, a little price tag, you don't you don't need to leave that on. You know, you're a lot of bandwagon, Nick fans, which is fine. You know, nothing excites the, you know, the, the city like, like the Knicks, you know, last year we were. In the last couple years, we're getting excited for St. John's basketball. So this is, this is good to see and you know, a little Brunson love. I don't, I won't collect Jalen Brunson. It's not an exciting style of play for me to get excited about. Obviously it works, you know, and you know, he's a leader. He gets, he gets the, you know, the guys around them to play well. And, you know, you could say that their path to the finals this year was, you know, kind of tailor made for them. You know, you could have, have a Drake May argument about the strength of schedule, maybe about the Knicks this year, but who cares? You can only beat the teams that are in front of you. And they have beat them soundly. They haven't lost, it seems, since, you know, forever ago. So they're gonna take some momentum into the finals. They're going to be the rested team going into the finals because no matter what, obviously this other series is going at least six. It could go seven. We'll see what happens. You know, and these, you know, OKC and, and, and, and San Antonio beating each other up. You know, there are some injuries on both sides, so it's, it's fun to watch. I can't wait for the finals to happen, but really, you know, just to kind of put a bow on it here, you know, I started off by talking about, you know, Ohtani, Wemby, the whole deal. It's funny, they won game for San Antonio and Wemby's cards, you know, they did not immediately shoot up. You would expect they would, right? You'd expect. Okay, well, you know, he had a good game and you know, they're extending the series and maybe, maybe they can still win. They're not down 3:1. The prices didn't exactly go up this morning. I checked card ladder and they lost last night, but the prices are up. It's, it's, it's interesting to see. It really is, you know, kind of the, the, you know, the Wemby market. I don't know what will happen, but this is one of those fun things that happens in, when you're, when you're buying active players. I did a whole episode about this, I don't know, early this year where I talked about how kids in this market, you know, chase excitement, that chase clout. They're not really out there buying Tom Brady cards. Even though buying Tom Brady sounds, you know, pretty smart, right? He's unquestioned gold. You know, he's not going to go out there and get injured. But they don't care about that because, you know, they want a little extra excitement. You know, you want to buy Wemby last month and, and own his cards as they go up 50%. That wasn't happening to Brady in a month because Brady wasn't out there, you know, scoring 40 points and leading his team to the Western conference finals. At 22 years old. You're baking in a lot of hype and a lot of hope and a lot of promise that this guy could be the next. What he could be is, is. Is baked into his prices. The downside to that or the flip side to that is what happens if he goes out there in game six on his home court and puts up a stinker, doesn't score a lot, and OKC just, you know, just knocks him out. You know, you'd like to think that he'd still be fine, the price will still be fine. You know, he's taking steps. The team was pretty bad his first two years, and now all of a sudden, he's turned it around. They got a great, young, solid core. You know, he's an all NBA first team. He's the defensive player of the year. He took his team to the Western Conference finals and obviously did not embarrass himself there with the stats and, you know, the stat lines and the games that he's playing. You'd like to think that, you know, his cards have established a nice little, you know, value to them and there's going to be some hope for next year that if he doesn't win a championship this year, next year going into the season, it's going to be, is he going to win the mvp, Defensive player of the year, Finals, finals, mvp, championship? Is he gonna just sweep the whole, you know, and fill up his whole trophy case? Sure, that. I'm sure going into the season, that will probably be the talk. But between now and then, if he loses, it's fair to expect you're not going to have him out there anymore. You know, people are not going to be talking about, well, did you see what Wemby did last night? It's likely that you'll see a slight dip. And then, you know, as preseason starts up, as we're starting to talk about, you know, the hype for next season. You know, the hype picks back up. Oh, do you see Wemby? He put on 15 pounds of muscle. He's going to be impossible to stop. Good luck, Hartenstein. It's sort of a cycle. So, I mean, it's funny. You guys have seen all of the. All of my Wimby purchases and how they've all gone up and I've, you know, I'm bragging a little bit about those, right? I'm putting them up on my story. Well, for the last couple of weeks, after the Lakers were knocked out, I started buying Lucas Silvers because people aren't talking about Luke. It was injured, you know, obviously the Lakers got knocked out. He wasn't even playing. And he's kind of out of sight, out of mind right now, and he probably will be for a little while to come. And, you know, when next season starts up, there'll be some more Luca talk about whether or not he's favored for the MVP and what's going on with that team and what's gonna happen with the Lakers. And look at. He looks in good shape again. Him and Zion are working out together, eating TV dinners. And likely the price of those cards will be a little bit higher than they are now. And the cycle continues. So, I mean, don't get crazy and don't, you know, you have to understand what people are doing, what people are buying, what they're selling, when. And, you know, if this is the game you want to play, you kind of take advantage of it and capitalize. So my title of my episode, wemby sucks Now. I don't think he sucks now. You know, I mean, sometimes. Sometimes you get lost in the game, you know, you gotta hope as he matures that doesn't happen. He's gonna want the ball. I'll bet we see a very different Wemby in game six than we've seen previously than we saw in game five. Maybe we'll get a glimpse of game one Wemby. And I mean, listen, if you're a fan of the sport, if you're a fan of the hobby, if you're a fan at all, you want to see this series go seven, and you want to see the refs let them decide it on the court. It'll be hard enough for San Antonio to win in OKC in a game seven, but, I mean, that'll be pretty exciting. It'd be fun to watch. And there's another episode, guys. I hope you enjoyed it. Habu Cage Episode 393 brought to you by the Philly Show. Arena Club and card ladder. Use code cage. Save a couple of bucks on card ladder and we'll see you tomorrow. Take care, everybody.