THWC 403: Why The Knicks Will Lose in 7

What is up, everybody? How about with Cage episode 403, brought to you by Arena Club card ladder Use code Cage. Save yourself a couple bucks. And philly show episode 403. We will do a deep dive into why the Knicks will lose in seven. Might as well rip that band aid right off. It's fresh. You know, you got a bunch of people making comments and videos and content this morning. And, you know, Knicks are now up 3:1 after the improbable and historic comeback architect by Josh Hart missing and Jalen Brunson missing in the NBA, calling it in from the sidelines. So anyway, let's talk about it, but let's talk about what it means. Let's talk about some fun stuff, and let's bring it back to the hobby. Bring it back to the cars, and let's start here in a second, okay? You ready for this? First, let's give some credit to the Knicks. That was a hell of a comeback, a hell of a win. If you believe that basketball is not the most rigged and fixed thing in the world. Even if you don't believe it, the game itself kind of leads to that back and forth. You know, as hot as the spurs were in the first half, shooting from three, they were as cold. Why they were still shooting threes with 22 seconds left on the shot clock when they were trying to nurse a lead and bleed some clock. That's for somebody to discuss on a different kind of channel that actually has a, you know, a brain. But I don't. I'm gonna talk about something different. You ready for this? I know some people in the hobby. I know some people who are smart. I know some people who I thought were smart. I heard a take after the game last night, and this was the take. You ready? And let's keep in mind, I don't really have much Wemby left. I mean, I have a couple cards. So, you know, you're like. It's like the stock channel, right? When you start talking about, oh, you should buy Nvidia and how much of it do you own, pal? Like, let us know where this is coming from. So obviously, my hoard, my. To use that word that Ian didn't like yesterday, my stockpile of. Of Wimby is basically gone. I have some, but I have more, you know, Devonte Graham still. So which he was still in the spurs, right? He was. He played for a cup of coffee there, but here you go. The take was. This is Wemby's hobby goat status. Already done. The rise and fall of Wemby's goat argument is already over now that they're going to lose this finals. Okay, first of all, they're not gonna lose. But even if they do, the argument that was made was Michael Jordan is the goat because he was 6 for 6. And if Wemby can be the goat after losing in the finals, that means LeBron could be the goat because he lost in the finals. And we all know LeBron can't be the go. That was the whole argument. Wemby's done can't make him the goat. MJ's. As long as Wemby loses this finals, he's done forever as the goat. Okay, let's just dissect that for a second and completely dismantle it. Let's look at the NFL, but we had almost the exact same situation, right? I mean, there are some Mahomes fans out there who think he could still be the goat. He's obviously lost some Super Bowls. But let's go back one further and compare MJ to who the MJ of the NFL was before Tom Brady. Joe Montana. You hear anybody making the argument that Joe Montana is the goat anymore? No. When I was a kid, unquestioned goat, because he was undefeated, just like Michael Jordan was. Four Super Bowls, four rings, undefeated in super bowl play. And you know, Richard, when you go 4 for 4 in championships and you have the most, you're the winner. Now what did Tom Brady do? He won more. He didn't win them all, but he won more. And I think if you were to line up 100 people in a room right now and give them the choice between Tom Brady or Joe Montana as their goat, unless you happen to capture some of Joe Montana's family and those 100 people, you're getting high 90s, if not all 100, saying Tom Brady's the goat. And that just simply destroys the entire argument then that Michael Jordan is the unquestioned goat just because somebody lost in the finals. What happens if this team of 19, 20, 21, 22 year olds goes out and wins the next eight championships after losing one this year? And Wemby is a 4020 average in each one of those and multiple MVPs. Of course he could be the goat. Of course you make the argument for it. So it's funny because the narratives are hilarious. Now, is that going to happen? No. The way today's NBA is playing, you can get a mid level team that should not have had home court advantage in the playoffs for the last two rounds, like the Knicks, who were never in the running for a top five team in the NBA all year can win the championship because there's parity in the league. And the way the game is played now, your wins and losses are determined by who makes a run, when, who can play a little bit of defense at the right time, who has the maturity level to do it, and more importantly, whose three pointers are going in late in the game. That's it. Because that's the game now. That's the league. No lead is safe. Not even a 29 point lead in the finals. Not even the largest halftime lead in finals history. Nothing is safe. And when nothing's safe, nothing's guaranteed. That is why if you believe in some conspiracy theories, as I do, as you have to, if you are listening to this, you click the title that said why the Knicks will lose in seven. And you either clicked it because you are a Spurs fan, want to see the spurs win, or you think that I'm nuts for putting that title in there. Because clearly up 3:1, the Knicks have to win. Well, clearly up by 29 points, the spurs had to win that game, right? But that's not the NBA now. That's not the way it's played. That's not the game. And if you believe in the old call down from the league office, I mean, as sure as my name is Cage, the Spurs have to win the next game, right? Going back home. Embarrassed by this. Aren't you embarrassed? Embarrassed by this collapse. I mean, it is a game seven for them, it's not a game seven for the Knicks. You have to think the spurs win. And then just like after the spurs won game three and it was two one, you're in a three two situation. And I mean we saw three two, right? We saw three two with the spurs already. The spurs came back from three two already. Once you do the spurs then go on the road in New York where they know they can win in that raucous garden. I can only imagine what a series clinching game six will look like. All of the celebrities who couldn't spell the Knicks back in April are all out. I mean, Taylor Swift, I'm pretty sure she was rooting for the Cavs last. The reason she's out there with a Stevie Nick shirt on, jumping up and down, cheering like crazy. Good for you. It's an interesting thing. It really is a fun thing to watch. But here's my favorite part, right? Twofold. And let's bring it to Cards and sports. I love this quote. It was, I think it was John Madden. I'D have been John Gruden, one of my Raiders coaches. Probably both of them said it, they stole it from each other. That winning is the best deodorant. You know, winning is like spraying perfume on it. Winning covers up a lot of mistakes because just as I tune into sports radio this morning and hear morons calling in saying that the OG Anunoby tip in is the greatest moment in New York sports history ever, someone said it beat the David Tyree helmet catch, forgetting the fact that that is a one game decide all moment where if he doesn't make the catch, the game is over and you're beating an undefeated Patriots team with that catch. I liken this more to maybe the Bill Buckner moment, which, you know, is obviously iconic. But remember, that was a Game 6 and the Mets had to come back and win a game seven. Still, this was not a clinching game. I'll be at an amazing moment, but here's the funny part. There were other moments in the lead up to that game. Josh Hart had his Patrick Ewing finger roll moment. Man, was he ready to be the goat, the scapegoat that would have given him the lead. Dunk the damn ball. No, I'm just gonna throw it up there, back rim it. And if they lost, whoo. That would have been bad for Mr. Hart. He was on the ground. He was, he was upset. And then when the spurs go up by 1,5 seconds left, the shot is going to be taken by the New York goat, the king of the city, the guy who can't do anything wrong. And trust me, Bronson on fire, ice cold, ice water run through his veins. Just shot at the shot, at the shot. But when it came down to the shot, he missed. Man, we would have killed him. And it would have been Brunson, you know, Bronson who, when Brunson. But then OG tips it in and sprays some perfume on it, puts the deodorant on it, and the win covers the loss. You know, spurs still had a second left and they had a hell of a play drawn up. And Cat, who finally, late in the fourth quarter last night, scored his first fourth quarter points in the series. Man, what a crap game. He had foul trouble, couldn't buy a basket. But at the end, with a second left, when a play was needed, he got his fingertips on the ball, he played some defense and prevented this person even getting a shot up that defense almost as much, if not more than OG's tip and won that game. It's unsung, but that's some deodorant that's some perfume on the crap game that he had. It's funny how narratives can change because had they made that shot, it'd be two. Two going back to the spurs with two home games now, spurs probably be favored to win. And man, how many of these games have been decided by a point? They've all been basically one possession games. I know, you know, the first game was 11 pointer, but that was an overtime game. So that's even closer at regulation than one pointer. I mean, hard fought. If you were scriptwriter in Hollywood, you would be writing up this script. This way, just like Ben Stiller who shows up four hours before every game to document it and make a documentary and movie about it. And you even got the President involved. You got some craziness. You got people getting beat up outside the stadium afterwards. I mean it does art imitate life or vice versa because it is basically a movie. And guys who goes to AMC or Regal, who goes to the movies, pays for their ticket buys, their popcorn and their goobers, gets that jumbo sized soda that you all know I love from that freestyle machine with the fake flavors, my little Diet Coke with cherry in it, sits down and sees the Knicks win game six. No movie will have that. I mean, game five, Excuse me. In what world does Hollywood write the ending that it's 3:1 and then the Knicks go into San Antonio and win that game? No one writes that script and that's why that's not going to happen. And when it's 3:2, it's very different than 3:1 coming back to New York. Game six, I could see a Hollywood script writing where MSG explodes. And for the first time in 53 years, first time in my lifetime, the Knicks are able to win a championship and bring one home. Maybe because this is going to be the only chance for the Knicks. The Knicks are not the best team. No one will ever say the Knicks are going to be the repeat champions next year. After the game is over, Vegas will come out with their odds for next year even before the draft. Obviously the draft will change it. Bagels come out with their odds for next year and the Knicks will not even be a top five odds, maybe five. But there will be several teams that will be favored to win the championship over them, most likely including the spurs team that they would have to beat to win. This would be the Hollywood ending of just give him their championship and then make them go away. Because the west is the West. And you know, more likely than not, next year is going to be thunder Improving and, you know, being there. Or a, you know, a. A Spurs and spurs and spurs over and over again. Dynasty like we've seen previously. Or Detroit getting a little bit better and learning from their playoff nonsense this year and moving forward. I mean, there are a lot of, you know, different stories to be written. None of them are the Knicks being a repeat champ. So I can understand why the league and the world might want to have the Knicks win. But here's the funny part. I was watching this game and, man, the Knicks celebrities, you know, your influencers were all, this game is rigged in the first half. I mean, I saw Moses the Jeweler, who I, like, I've met many times. This is a rigged game. I didn't see anybody saying it was rigged after they won. It was just as rigged in the second half for the Knicks as it was rigged in the first half against them. But, you know, the rigged analogy, the rigged, you know, this is. This is fixed stuff. It only works when it works, right? It only works when it works for your team. And. And let me throw this out there because I'm putting some innuendos in there about, you know, being fixed. I'm not saying that. I'm not. I mean, it's possible, but I'm not saying that. I'm just saying if you are writing a script, that script does not have the Knicks going to San Antonio and winning game five. And then it all comes down to game six. We'll see what happens. I will be doing another episode because that'll be next week, and we'll see. We'll see what happens. Now, bringing it back to cards, the Wemby stuff. If there are hobby people out there who allegedly have brains, who believe that this is the nail in the coffin for Wemby, and people really believe that, then his cards are going to be on sale. And what I believe in watching the games, I watch a lot of them, especially being as invested in Wimby as I was for the last couple of months. You're only scratching the surface with him. I don't like the flagrants. I don't like the dirty play. Although I will tell you, last night's flagrant was an unintentional act. You know, when you're seven foot five and your arms are as long as Alvarado's legs are, sometimes when you're trying to fight through defenders, your arms are flailing and, you know, cat has a humongous head, and it just got hit by an arm. That was not intentional. That wasn't called Intentional. I don't like the kind of dirty plays, you know, I mean, there's a difference between energy and, and playing tough and, you know, going into the flager fouls. And he's one flagrant away from a suspension, so that would be kind of terrible. Although no script has Wemby being suspended during the finals, so if we're talking scripts, that's not happening. He's 22 and tiny and he doesn't play like any seven footer I've ever seen. Now, it's great that he can shoot the three and actually is good at it, but you have to think that over the next year or two, he is going to put on some size. Think Giannis from his first couple years until his more recent play. I don't want to compare him to Giannis because Giannis was the same thing. He won his championship as MVP and was unstoppable, and everybody expected him to just win a dozen more. And he. He never did. And that's part of the story of today's NBA. But one of the things that amazes me is Alex Caruso being able to push Wemby out of the paint. You know, there is no one on Knicks who has any kind of size. If you watch, you know, Mitchell Robinson, obviously, but he can't stay on the court. If you watch Wemby when he is inside, he gets like Moses Malone style plays like he's just catching the ball and tipping it and tipping into himself and you know, three shots on one play, that's when he's already inside, you know, and he's getting offensive rebounds now, getting the ball into him. You would like to think, watch some Shaq film, watch Elijah on film, watch any of these big men that have a little bit of size to them, you know, they turned around, you know, they back to the basket and they backed the defender in. Because you got to think Wemby in the paint is a lot more effective than Wemby being pushed out of the paint. And the Spurs, I mean, they had this with Duncan, they had it with David Robinson. You know, you've seen a lot of these offenses do this. You'd like to think their offense with the three point shooting is going to get even better if they're able to run it through Wemby, even if he's not shooting every time, you know, the. The other defense will have to collapse on him and, and that'll create open three pointers. So you got to figure, listen, that was not the reason they lost last night. For some reason, they could hit every shot in the first half and couldn't hit a single shot in the second half. What that reason is beyond me. I'll leave you guys in Area 51 to think about the conspiracies for that. I'm just talking about beyond this season. You have to think this team is built to last. This team with Harper and Castle and Wemby has the nucleus of like a legit contender for a very long time. So bringing it back to Cards, I'm not, I've sold my Wembes. But if he does lose and people are quote, unquote giving up on him, the nail in the coffin for the Goat because he lost in the final one time as a 22 year old. So he can never be the Goat. As Pedro Serrano said in major league, bring that to me, man. I'll take it. You're gonna, you know, liquidate. I mean, you'll be watching Wemby play for the next 15 years at a high level. Who knows what he's gonna do, you know, and if he's, if he plays as long as LeBron, you got another 20 something years to watch him play. You know, it's gonna be an interesting thing to watch that. I'm not saying, you know, pay the prices that people are paying now because, you know, people are paying prices for Wendy's that they would pay for a comparable Steph Curry card. Curry's obviously done some stuff, you know, so I'm not saying that, I mean, you know, be better for his legacy obviously if he wins now. And I mean, I've watched these games, they all come down to a couple plays, a couple of minutes, a couple of who makes the final play. And I, I imagine the spurs are going to be favored in game five and then we'll see what happens. I mean, game six, the Knicks might be favorite, right? They're going to be up three games to two and coming home to clinch it. You know, first time to be able to clinch a finals in forever. I mean, the last time before the season that the Knicks were ahead in a finals, I was same age as my daughter. I was 17 years old. It was June of 1994 and OJ interrupted one of the finals games in his white Bronco. So now you have one of the Kardashians sitting courtside. I mean, it's been forever, guys. And that they didn't even win that series. Thank you. John Starks, I see you on the sidelines making a fool of yourself. It's great to see you back in MSG. Making a fool yourself like you did in 94. 3 for 17, I think it was. Sit down, pal. Let that. Let these guys win the game that you couldn't. Sheesh. It's been a while, so it'll be cool in game six, you know, to see the Knicks go in there and do their thing. It would also be fun to see a Game seven. There's nothing like a Game seven. It'd be fun to see the, you know, the Knicks fans then. And, I mean, I'm. I'm a contrarian in everything in life. And here I am sitting in New York hoping for a Game seven, because if it goes to seven, Knicks aren't winning. And that's the whole episode. So I kind of pulled you in a little bit. Why the Knicks were losing seven. I'm not saying they're gonna, but it's a hell of a title, and it got you here to listen for 20 minutes. If you stayed till the end, I appreciate you. Let me know how you think. I'm doing a little different, you know, starting 400, 401, 402. We were more hobby and, you know, psychology and that kind of stuff. Had to do an episode on the Knicks today. Had to do an episode on that game. Amazing game. You know, my son's going to school today. Didn't want to go because he says his Nick fan friends are going to just be impossible. He's like, can I just stay home? I'm like, all right, well, what do you care? You know, the spurs fan, like, they're not going to torture you. You know, you're not a fan of the Spurs. You just, you know, you're not a huge Nick, you know, lover. And he's. Yeah, but I know everyone on the team. These guys, they pretend to be Nick fans. They got, you know, their Brunson jersey, and they start, Nick, Nick Nicks. And I'm like, okay, name their roster. And I can name more. And I've watched more games than them. And I'm like, yeah, but I mean, this is. Let the Bandwagon fans have their moment. You know, let Taylor Swift take off the Cavs jersey and wear a Stevie Nicks shirt and celebrate. I mean, we'll see what happens, pal. That's. That's my. There's my deal. So a fun one. We got the 21, almost 22 minutes there. For you, mailman out there or anybody else, you know, commuting and needs a longer episode. You're welcome. Hope you guys enjoyed this one. If you didn't keep it to yourself now leave a comment I like to. I like to hate too Send me a dm let me know what your thoughts are. Tell me I'm insane. Tell me the Knicks have this one on lock the spurs just got gut punched and they're never coming back from this and game five is going to be a nick blowout. Tell me what your thoughts are and I'll tell you why you're wrong. That's another episode brought to you by Arena Club by card ladder use code cage to look up your Wemby cards Save a couple bucks on card ladder and by the Philly show Can't wait to see you guys soon man we got some fun stuff coming up with some shows can't wait to see a fanatics fest can't wait to see you guys at the national if you're going send me a message let's meet up let's I'll give you a high five Talk to you guys soon Take care everybody.