LeBron James Continues Chaotic Free Agency Tradition

Lance Roberson, the host and founder of No Harm No Foul, discusses LeBron James' continued chaotic free-agent tradition. The podcast then plays a little game of No Harm No Foul, with the Jaylen Brown trade as the topic. Lance also talks about Adam Silver's new free-throw rule and finishes with a little "take-back take" segment.

Transcript

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No harm, no foul. No harm, no foul, no head, like the red. Welcome to the No Harm No Foul Podcast. I'm Lance Harveston, the host and founder of the podcast for Uncompromised Analysis of Commentary. The show built to counter the phoniness of the sports industry, but most importantly, I do the show for the fans who deserve the truth. So we are fresh off a crazy week in the NBA. But a little off topic. I just watched the match between Mexico and England. That's probably one of the better soccer matches that I've watched in years, but to be frank, I haven't really watched much soccer since the last World Cup. So take my word with a grain of salt when it comes to soccer. However, with the NBA, I'm not saying I'm an expert, but I watch quite a bit. And I'm excited to get into what we have for us this week. And uh maybe for the last time, perhaps not. I don't know. But uh we're gonna talk about LeBron James and French ahead of the show for our layup line segment. Uh, and then after that, we'll talk about Jalen, the Jalen Brown trade, which uh sent the NBA world in a frenzy, and I just couldn't believe the trade haul that uh that Boston didn't get for Jalen Brown. And then lastly, or not lastly, sorry. Then after that, we'll talk about a new rule which uh Adam Silver is thinking of rolling out in the NBA. He's already uh started doing it for this year's summer league. And then lastly, we'll talk about a prediction that I made that uh already aged like hot milk. But no further ado, let's just get into it, y'all. Um LeBron James, you know, he he went ahead and let the Lakers know that he is, quote, choosing happiness, unquote, whatever that means. I mean, when you're a guy such as LeBron with a lovely family and close to billions of dollars, like how are you not already happy? But I digress. Uh either way, he understands the algorithm. LeBron is the algorithm. Uh, this guy understands what it means to get free and see going. And once again, he does it. Uh, so he's already kind of narrowed down his choices. Well, at least his one of his best friends, Rich Paul, has, anyways. Uh, so in the show that the podcast that Rich Paul has, um, I believe on the ringer, actually, he kind of just made a chalkboard of selections and kind of broke them all down. Frankly, I didn't watch it, but I did see the the teams that he put. And these are the teams, the first tier at least, that have a legitimate chance at getting LeBron, at least by reports that I've read. Uh, so we got the Cleveland Cavaliers, the Golden State Warriors, the Miami Heat, the Minnesota Timberwolves, and the Denver Nuggets. Okay. And then there are some teams below that have been mentioned loosely, but between lack of cap space or even reports just pretty much stating that the teams are starting to think elsewhere besides LeBron James, uh, but these are the teams that have like a puncher's chance, anyways. Uh Philadelphia 76ers, the 2026 NBA Champions, New York Knicks, the Dallas Mavericks, and the runner-up to the 2026 champions, San Antonio Spurs. All right, so personally, what sticks out is the Knicks. Um, I'm not going to sit here and act like they're going to repeat. I don't think that's the case, but if they had LeBron James on their team, even 40-plus-year-old LeBron James, I would give them a pretty nice chance of repeating as NBA champs. Um, of course, the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Warriors stick out for various reasons. Firstly, um, in 2016, it would have been 10 years now that LeBron won the one and only championship for the Cleveland Cavaliers uh after the Cavs beat the Warriors, one of the best teams in NBA history. After going down 1-3, they came back and beat the Warriors in seven games. A lot has been said about that series. Um, that is one of the best series, at least from a theatrical standpoint, maybe not from the games, because a lot of them were blowouts, but that sticks out on my head as like one of the most important NBA Finals victories ever. And say what you will about LeBron James, but that was a heroic effort from him. Uh so of course they stick out. They have Donovan Mitchell, the Cavs that just stick out. They have Donovan Mitchell, they have James Harden. They just went to the East of Commons Finals. Yes, they got swept by the Knicks, but either way, you get LeBron James, even at the tender age of 40 plus years old. Uh, it's it will bring a lot of energy back to Cleveland. And honestly, with the NBA media, uh, and I think that will give the Cavs a legitimate chance of at least going to the NBA Finals. I don't know about winning it. Uh, and then of course the Warriors. This has been Florida with for a while now, despite the heavy rivalry between the Warriors and the Cavs, and then of course LeBron James. I could definitely see LeBron doing this. Would I like it? No. Um, but I could definitely see him doing it just because LeBron kind of he does the opposite of what people think. I mean, he goes against the grain a lot of times. And if he's saying he chooses happiness, him and him and Stephen Curry may not may not be best of friends, but they definitely have a kinsmanship when it comes to being on the court, especially what we saw in the last Olympics. And what better way for him to go out than play with one of the best players of all time? And you know, he may not win a championship there, but they might make some noise in the playoffs, who knows? Um, and then moving on from that, uh, the Miami Heat, of course, LeBron James won two championships there. He started the wave of super teams, if you will, uh, way back in 2010. You know, even though he didn't get to not one, not two, not three, not four, like he said um in that parade before the season started in uh the 2010, 2011 season, they still made noise. Unfortunately, for LeBron, it wasn't just the Spurs that uh checked his ego, it was also Pat Riley. Um, Pat Riley gave an infamous speech after the the the Heat lost to the Spurs in uh in 20 uh 14 and essentially challenged LeBron to come back and finish business with the Heat. However, LeBron didn't like that and took his ball, uh took his ball back to Cleveland, so to speak. But yeah, the Heat do have a squad now with Giannis, though. Giannis on the Takumpo. They still have Bam. Um, so I could definitely see LeBron wanting to probably be in South Beach again. I mean, frankly, why wouldn't you? No state tax, and then also just playing with Giannis, which would be, of course, a you know, a two-time MVP, an NBA champion, NBA Finals MVP, and one of the most dominant players of all time. Uh, albeit kind of maybe on the latter side of his prime with all these injuries. Uh, Giannis has spent the last, I believe, at least two, maybe three postseason runs, not being able to finish it due to injury. But at the same time, it's like maybe he'll be healthy this year. Miami is definitely known for their training staff and just coaching staff, maybe a little bit more than Milwaukee. So we'll see how that goes. But either way, like that's another team. Uh, and then we got the Minnesota Timberwolves. Now, the Minnesota Timberwolves, that's probably the most compelling team of this of this list. Okay, they almost made it to their third Western Conference finals in a row. They got Anthony Edwards. Uh, they just traded from LaMelo ball. So they got the young legs to bounce off of LeBron if LeBron would go there. They also have one of the best defensive players and Jaden McDaniels on their team, and they still have Rudy Gobert. So, really, that's the most stacked team uh on this list, and the one that would, to me, change the uh the contender tiers. If LeBron joined Minnesota, I am significantly confident that that would make them top two, top three teams in uh the NBA this season. And then lastly, for tier one, we got the Denver Nuggets. So it was reported that the Denver Nuggets reached out to LeBron's camp. Nothing else was said of that. Uh LeBron has been in a lot of battles with Jokic, Nikola Jokic. He said a lot of great things about Nikola Jokic. So between the two-man game of Jamal Murray and Nicola Jokic, LeBron would be able to play off them pretty well. They wouldn't, the Nuggets would not expect uh LeBron to carry this team or the offense like the Lakers did in the first round of the playoffs with the Houston Rockets due to all the injuries that they had. So Austin Reids and Luka Doncha specifically. Uh, but LeBron would also give them Jokic and Murray, that is, a pressure release uh in tight moments where LeBron can still score and show his brilliance. And also just ball handle for when Jokic is not in the game, which I would probably say that would be the biggest thing. So when Jokic or Murray's not in the game, it's just another player to carry or handle the ball for the Nuggets. All right, so those are the main teams, the tier one, if you will. The teams that actually have a chance. And then these the second half is going to be, of course, the Sixers, the Knicks, the Mavs, and the Spurs. The Knicks really don't have much to offer unless LeBron went on a vets minimum. Uh the Sixers are reportedly pursuing LeBron. Don't know how much of a chance they have in doing that due to Embiid's large contract. And now they just inherited Jalen Brown's large contract, which we'll talk about later. Uh so that could happen, but unless LeBron really just takes a significant less amount of money, I just don't see it happening. Uh, and then the Mavs and the Spurs. The Mavs and with the Mavs, I could see it being an option because LeBron has been leaked to Kyrie since like three seasons ago. So when there's smoke, there's fire, especially with LeBron. Uh, the tea leaves are there. Also, the Mavs could offer him, I believe, the uh non-tax uh payer mid-level's exception, which is around 15 or it is 15 million dollars. So Mavs could offer them that. Oh, offer LeBron that, so he doesn't have to take a vets minimum, which I find it highly impossible that a player such as LeBron takes a Vets minimum. And if he does, hands hats off to him, kudos to him, but I just don't see that happening. Uh, and then lastly, to Spurs, that's the last team. Now, the Spurs were maybe a little higher on that list, but then they, which is gonna sound funny when I say it, uh, signed for Tobias Harris uh this this past weekend. So that would be funny if the reason why the Spurs didn't get LeBron is because they signed Tobias Harris. But either way, they just made it to the finals. So with or without LeBron, I think they'll be just fine. Uh, so I just want to say off the top, like LeBron James is one of the best players of all time, arguably top three. If you say he's top two, even you could say number one, but I'm a Michael Jordan person, so I'm not gonna say that, but I will arguably say LeBron is top three to top five players of all time. With that said, I am tired of this pageantry of free agency. Now, I know I should probably be happy about it because it gives us content, but just the way that it's strolled out there, that Rich Paul is oh, well, this may be where LeBron is going. I don't want to be a pessimist, but I am a realist. I've seen the LeBron James playbook year in and year out, and I really think LeBron already knows where he's going. He just wants the main attention of free agency, which I guess I understand. I'm sure he can make he's making money off of this somehow. And plus, he just wants to be the talk of the hour. But really, I'm just ready for it to be over with and just let it happen. And as sad as it is to say, when LeBron retires, I might be okay with that as well, even though I I really started following the NBA around that time, albeit probably a few years before that. But I really started focusing on the NBA uh the year the year in which uh LeBron was playing for St. Mary's, I believe in like 2002, before you know, before the the draft. And that's when I started finding out about him. I in my young age, I was like 11 or 12 years old. I never heard of a high school athlete getting this, uh garnering this much attention from the media and just everything else. So I thought it was fascinating. I followed LeBron's journey ever since then. I was a big Cleveland Cavaliers fan in his first iteration with the team, and I just love the way that he fought to get them to the NBA Finals in 07. However, the well of my care, at least for the shenanigans of LeBron James, has far since expired. I mean, I still appreciate what he's done for the game and what he's done for the sport and just like the business of the sport. I mean, without LeBron James in 2010 free AMC, the talk of transactions in the NBA would not be a thing like it is now. And maybe that's that's the gift of the curse. But at the same time, it is, it has driven millions and billions of dollars for the NBA and and kept people's attention on it, whether you like his shenanigans or not. Um, but yeah, that's that's kind of what I have to say about that, about LeBron James. I mean, I'm again, kudos to the guy, but please just pick a team and let's just move on with the NBA calendar. Uh, and and let's just talk about the games that are to be played soon. And by soon I mean in October, but you get it. Like summer league's going. The youngins are, you know, they're we're trying to pay attention to them, we're trying to watch them play. And LeBron James has yet to pick a team. Well, at least not public. All right, y'all. Moving on. So, speaking of the Jalen Brown trade that we mentioned earlier, this one surprised the heck out of me. Uh, I was actually at work when it went down, and then I was like, some guy was like, Oh yeah, you know, Boston traded him to Philly. So I was like, oh wow, so they're Boston actually is gonna take a flyer on Embiid, the guy that spanked them in the uh opening round of the 2026 playoffs. Nope. Actually, Boston just traded only for two round picks, two first round picks, I'm sorry. And Paul George, uh the same player which the ringer of Bill Simmons, Bill Simmons company and podcast company, you know, written content and all that. They do an annual uh sports contract to the league, and the ringer picked Paul George's contract for the second worst in the NBA. So yeah, Jalen Brown. A lot to be said about this guy. So let's let's unpack. First of all, he had a really great season, at least from a county's uh county stats uh stats standpoint. You know, he had a career high in points, he had a career high in assist. You know, Jalen um I'm sorry, uh Jason Tatum was out for a majority of the season. He only played 18 games due to an Achilles that he suffered in the 2025 playoffs. So the fact that the Celtics earned the second seed in the Easter Conference, third best seed in the in the NBA in general, without one of the arguably their best players, second best player, however you want to look at it, you know, with Janler Brown leading the team, uh, at least from a points per game standpoint, that's a big deal, right? However, they got eliminated, the Celtics, in the first round against the Philadelphia 76ers. After being up 3-1, they went down in seven games to a team that was in the play-in and then made it to the seventh seed. So it's pretty embarrassing, right? Well, that's probably not the most embarrassing thing. After that game, Jalen Brown went on to Twitch, onto his live stream, which is not the most embarrassing thing. But then he started whining about Embiid being a flopper, which he is, but that's not the reason why they lost. Um, and then also said that the refs have an agenda against him, Jalen Brown. And also he said at one point that his favorite season playing basketball was his past season. Which, you know, without the whole getting eliminated in the first round thing after being up 3-1, you know, that that could be true. But you also won a championship in 2024 against the Dallas Mavericks. The same year in which you won Eastern Conference Finals MVP and NBA Finals MVP. So I'm just thinking that maybe that would be your favorite year. Um, people have also said that, oh, well, you know, it's because he did it as the leader and blah, blah, blah, which is great, but like from a team standpoint, probably not the best thing to hear, right? Like, what are Derek White thinking? What is what is everyone else thinking on that team about that? Not that I know, but reportedly, um, Jalen Brown and uh pardon me, Brad Stevens, uh team basketball president of the Boston Celtics, have had some run-ins in the past. And it the reports didn't really exactly say what, but you know, the public comments from Brown probably didn't help matters much. Um, but I digress. Anyway, so for the people that are like, hey, Jalen Brown just had a great year, statistically, at one point was thought of for MVP, even though I never seriously thought about him for MVP, but he was definitely in the runnings, at least top five, at some point in some uh media persons, media people's uh ballads. But why why the staying around his name? Why are people saying things about him? Like to the point where Bobby Marks of ESPN said that he talked to a scout that said, or a front office member that anonymously said, you know, Jalen Brown might be the seventh best player on the Celtics, to which NBA X erupted, you know, against Bobby Marks. But Bobby Marks didn't necessarily say that, but I think he knew what he was doing when he was waving that fiery flame in the air to Jalen Brown's uh name. But I digress. It is very important that we talk about the Celtics playoff flame out. And yes, Jason Tatum made it back and he was able to play, and it looked like you know, the substance was going to make a clean, you know, gentlemen sleep out of the Celtics or out of the Knicks, or my goodness, out of the 76ers, I'm sorry. Here we are. I'm still getting pumped up from the uh World Cup game. But instead, Jalen Brown laid down one of the most biggest stinkers from an on-off stats point of view. So I just recently did an article for uh on the Jalen Brown trade and have my thoughts on it. You know, I looked up some stats, which I didn't really have to look hard on because there was already a lot of people kind of rumbling over these on-off stats, and I had to look them up myself. So get this. The Celtics were the Celtics' offensive rating was a plus 26.9 when Jalen Brown was off the court. Okay, that's I mean, that's pretty dominant, right? I mean, so what was it when he was on the court? Like double that? Like, because the Celtics were up 3-1 at some point in this, in this series in the first round. However, it was it was quite different. The on-off stats, the bounce out, is a negative uh 4.5 difference between Jalen Brown being off and on. So that means Jalen Brown was a significant negative for the Celtics. Okay. Although he had a strong regular season, which is great, playoffs, playoff basketball is different. And you think of Jalen Brown as a you know, utility belt. This guy can almost do it all. Like, yes, we made fun of him not for not having a left hand back in the day, but I think he has since addressed that. He still doesn't have a strong handle with his left, but it's still a lot better than it used to be. Um, theoretically, he's one of the better defenders on the team. However, he just didn't have it this past year with uh against the 76ers. Okay, so the numbers don't lie. Furthermore, why would the Celtics trade a player that won NVA finals MVP and conference finals MVP over Jason Tatum, the guy that just came back from an Achilles injury? Well, I looked up uh on Subsack Tom Habistrow of ESPN, or I'm sorry, of uh Yahoo! Sports used to be with the SPN, now it's with Yahoo Sports. He put up a crazy stat. So check this, guys. In Brown's 10-year tenure with the Celtics, the Celtics are 90 and 36 when Brown doesn't play. Okay, so that's that's a lot of time. So it's like, all right, well, you know, the Celtics have a lot of great teams or really good teams, at least in that 10-year window. So it wouldn't make sense for them to still be good without uh Jalen Brown in the lineup. However, the last three years, they're 36 and 6 without Jalen Brown. Okay, yes, Jalen Brown is arguably either the first or second best player on this team, but in the same breadth, when you see those numbers that the success that the Celtics have had, and then you also combine that with the fact that the Celtics have lost in the first round against the 76ers, with Brown being the main player. And then you add on the fact, okay, that Brown still has three years left on his deal at $180 million. And in the, you know, the third apron, first, second, third apron era of the NBA, where super teams are no more, you know, franchises are forced to trade players more than they used to. But also, it's not even just that. It's not just the contracts. It's the trades that you're not allowed to make if you fall within, you know, the second apron or the tax, the luxury tax. It's the way that you can't make trades, you know, if you can't aggregate the contracts, whatever it is, right? There's a lot of stuff that I don't want to get into because I'm not trying to lose any more viewers because it becomes a spreadsheet of information to which I will poo-poo Adam Silver later for uh in the back end of the podcast. But in the meantime, yeah, Brown's contract and that he's turning, you know, he's gonna be on the wrong side of 30 here soon. And also just the fact that politically he's not getting along with Brad Stevens. And I mean, all three of those combined, I understand what the Celtics traded on. But here we go. The namesake of the podcast, no harm, no foul. Here it is, y'all. Let's just lay it out right now. The Celtics made a bad trade when dealing with Jalen Brown. No harm or foul. Hear me out. I think that the Celtics definitely made the wrong trade. Now, why would I say that? Okay, firstly, even though I said all this about Jalen Brown, about his inefficiencies in the playoffs, his large contract, his disgruntled, at least reportedly disgruntled ways of uh or a relationship with Brad Stevens. With all that said, why would the Celtics only trade him for two first-round picks when just a few weeks ago they were lobbying him to be a trade piece for Giannis, which arguably, well, not arguably, he did net more than just two first-round picks from the Miami Heat. All right? And not only that, they the Celtics burdened themselves with two years, 100 something million for Paul George, and Paul George is like 35, 36 years old. And another leg of Horde is that you traded Jalen Brown to the team that just outed you in the first round. What more ammo does Jalen Brown need besides the fact that you already trade him, but you also traded him to the team that just beat you in the playoffs? I mean, Sixers already have a plethora of really good guards between V. J. Eggcomb and uh Tyrese Maxie. Okay, but they also have Joel Embiid when he's playing, even when he's on one leg, he looked pretty dominant at times versus Celtics because even though they have Mitchell Robinson now, their front line still doesn't have an answer for that. But now, I mean, you remember when a couple years ago when Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown were in trade talks all the time, and it almost seemed like the media was kind of trying to pit them against each other. Well, now they will be against each other, and I find it highly likely that they will probably play again in the 2027 Easter Conference playoffs. So I just think the Celtics made a bad move. Now, I don't think they made a bad move in trading Jalen Brown. I think that's all fair in 11 war and in the business, but I will call no foul or no harm. Sorry, I will call it no harm for saying that the Celtics made a bad move in trading Jalen Brown, just off of the fact that they traded, that the Celtics traded Jalen Brown to the Philadelphia 76ers. That was probably one of the worst moves they could have made. Trade them to a rival and to a team that just beat you, and Brown, regardless of whether you think he's right or wrong for saying what he says on his Twitch streams, he has all the ammo he needs to go at the Celtics and to prove to them that they're wrong. But yeah, that's that's what I gotta say about that. Pretty questionable decision, honestly, on Brad Stevens' part to only get two first round picks and two second round picks, which the way that the second round picks are flying right now, I don't think it really makes a difference about those, quite frankly. I don't I really don't think those matter at this at this juncture uh in the current CBA. Uh, but I digress. Uh moving on. So I know I briefly talked about Adam Silver earlier, about this whole CBA mess that he's he's uh I mean he didn't agree to it, but it's is in his hair. Now, there is one thing that Adam Silver has to do with that I frankly find appalling. Uh so the Summer League and G-League, they always experiment, experiment with things. You know, a lot of times they don't make it to the NBA, but I think this one could just because of the simple fact that this might seem like an easy fix for Emotiv or a lot of the NBA's problems with the lack of pace because of games being slowed down, to whether it's you know, fouls, foul baiting, challenging calls, referees having to look at reviews. You know, it just it turns a 12-minute fourth quarter into an hour fourth quarter, which honestly is not fun to watch. Especially like, you know, I just watched the World Cup and things are happening all in the last 15 or so minutes of the game, and you juxtaposed juxtapose that with the NBA finals last two minutes taking 20 minutes, which is insane when you think about it. However, this new proposed rule that is happening right now in the summer league going is, and let me read what the NBA put uh via X, right? So when free throws are rewarded, one free throw is worth one, two, or three points will be attempted. AKA, if it's a three-point shooting foul, you only need one free throw to make three points. Now, there's a lot to unpack on that. You know, the whole suspense of will he or will he not make three free throws in a clutch game is big. Especially, you know, hey, this guy's usually like around 80-something percent, but the guy turns around and misses, you know, two out of three free throws. But if the guy just makes one, he makes three, I just don't think that that you know, that takes away from the suspense of the game. It's it's not really fun, you know, because it's like, I mean, yeah, he made the one, but he probably what if he would have missed the last two? We don't even know. I mean, the game is not a science, okay? It's an art. And when you're trying to get all scientific and change the way of the game in this way, like I know it seems small, but those extra two points matter. You know, getting those two, like the Spurs, okay? Take the Spurs. There were plenty of missed free throws missed by the Spurs, okay, in fourth quarters of the NBA finals. Now imagine if they would have made those free throws, or they didn't even have to make them with this new rule. They would have just made one free throw out of two or out of three, and they would have got to two or three points, right? I'm not saying that would have caused the Knicks to lose automatically, but those games are really close. So that probably could have swung the series in the Spurs' favor. Now, you tell a New York Knicks fan that that rule is implemented and that same hat that same scenario happens with their team and their team loses because of that. How do you think they would feel, right? But also, what about the the bad free throw shooters, right? Okay, what what about the guy that shoots like uh south of 70%? He just he automatically gets two points because he made the first one. What if he would have missed the the second one, right? I just I just think there's a lot more to worry about in the NBA than than things such as this. What about the flopping? Okay, and I this next one's probably not gonna be taken care of because there's so much money tied into it. But what about all the gambling stuff? I mean, one of my favorite players of all time, Chauncey Bills, okay, is involved in in gambling, even for possibly the mafia, okay? And and I get it's just I'm flabbergasted that the game I love is currently in the same conversation with some of the biggest criminals in our country because of this, right? Because of gambling. But like this wouldn't have happened in David Stern's world. I mean, David Stern was, you know, for lack of a better term, stern about the NBA's reputation when it came to gambling. Okay. Like the whole thing in 2006, like, look how he handled that. Like he he did not allow that with, you know, and I'm saying 2006 with NBA Finals, where Tim Donahy, you know, supposedly rigged some games, and he had since admitted to doing so for other series as well. But Stearns didn't let that get out of hand. Like he pretty much extinguished that as quick as he could. Nowadays, it's like there's always talks of, oh, this doesn't seem right, this seems rigged, this seems compromised, whatever you want to say. So honestly, Adam Silver, like the best thing that you've done since becoming commissioner is kicking out a racist owner. And even then, that was an easy decision because the guy was, you know, it became front news with with his uh mistress, you know, outing him on hitting audio cameras and such, saying some really heinous stuff about Magic Johnson and and just black people in general. So it was like it wasn't even really that hard of a decision for for Silver to make. Okay. And then, yes, the NBA in season, or not in season, that that one sucks, but the the play-in tournament is fun. Okay, that adds a little bit of a wrinkle uh to the NBA's excitement. But other than that, it's just bad idea after bad idea after bad idea. Okay, Adam Silver sucks this week, anyways, because of this free throw experiment which is going on currently in the summer league. And knowing him, he might think it's a bright idea to do it for the NBA when the terrible challenges, the flopping, that type of stuff is really what's messing up the flow of the game. And yes, I know the free throws kind of tie into that, but to automatically reward a player three points just off of one shot of a free throw kind of takes away the idea of what a free throw is, right? Then it becomes way too free of a free throw when it's, you know, one equals three. That's just that just baffles my mind. I really hope that Adam Silver does not stick with this moving forward. However, knowing him, he'll try to galaxy brain himself and just make it a thing. Uh moving on, y'all. So last week I made a prediction. This week, I am gonna, you know, hey, I messed up. My takeback take of the week when I said the Mavericks were gonna trade Daniel Gaffer to the Lakers for uh Jared Vender Belt and a first round pick. Well, since the Lakers let LeBron James leave to pursue uh for pursuit of his quote happiness unquote, the Lakers uh made a stiff overpay for Walker Kessler, a center for the Utah Jazz. Walker Kessler is a young center, so that's awesome. And them getting off DeAndre Aiden for their starting center is also a great addition to the team because let's let's face it, Ayton was never gonna be the future center of the Lakers, especially when you have a player such as Luka Donches as your star. You need a center that has a little bit more motor, that wants to go in rim run and get rebounds and play defense for their star. He just wasn't gonna work out long term for the Lakers. He was just a stop uh gap center. However, uh, Walker Kessler is a theoretically really good center. Like, yes, he's not bad, but there's a reason why a lot of you saw Jazz didn't retain him. I mean, they they probably know a little bit more than the Lakers do. The guy just came off of a five-game season. He played only 58 games the year before. The guy's played 75, uh, he's that guy's played at least 65 games only once in his career, and that was his rookie year. Um, and the Lakers traded a crazy amount for him. Okay, Pete this. So the Lakers traded a 2031 and 2033 unprotected first round picks, and then the Jazz also received a pick swap for 2028 and 2030. I mean, my goodness, that's pretty much four first-round picks for a guy that has not shown that he is a legitimate starting center in the NBA. I'm not saying he's not a good starting center, but to pay that much for a center that has not proven himself, that has not made the playoffs compared to Daniel Gafford, to whom is not necessarily a household name, but is a center that got his team, that helped get his team to the NBA Finals, okay, is on a cheaper deal. And in my theoretical trade, the Lakers would have only traded one pick, and that would have been the 2031 pick. There would have been no pick swaps, there would have been no multiple unprotected picks going out. Okay, so yes, I was wrong, but I still think the Lakers overpaid. Even though Kessler is younger than Gafford, he's only about two or three years younger. So it's not like he's five or six years younger. Uh, and also he has just as much, if not more, injury history than Daniel Gaffer. So I'm not gonna get all excited about the Lakers signing or, you know, essentially trading for uh for uh Walker Kessler. It's just it doesn't really ring any bells for me. And then also my ego is gonna say, hey, not a good trade compared to the one that I made last week. Uh, but I digress. Um, but yeah, that's uh that's gonna be it for uh this week's episode. I just want to thank everybody for listening, for watching, for sharing, for subscribing. Uh check us out on uh pardon me, check us out on YouTube, of course, check us out on Spotify, check us out on Apple Podcasts, check us out. We have TikTok shorts, YouTube shorts, and then of course I do have my sub stack of so you can find my written content, but I also post the videos there. Uh so if you want to do anything to do with uh if you want to have anything to do with my with my no harm, no foul podcast, please follow all those outlets, support and share. I appreciate the fans. Anytime you want uncompromised analysis and commentary, I'm the guy for it. Uh and again, signing off. Hopefully, we'll find out where LeBron James is going soon so we can stop talking about it. Again, peace, y'all. 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