Jayson Tatum's Triumphant Return & Pistons Losing Streak Reopens the East

0:00Coming up, I'm Locked On NBA Daily. Jason Tato made his return to the Celtics over the weekend, have all of our questions about his return been answered already. Meanwhile, the pistons have lost four in a row, and some people are ready to hit the panic button. And do we have a new hottest team in the East? Locked On NBA Daily starts now. You are Locked On NBA. You're Daily NBA Podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team, every day. Hello, and welcome back to Locked On NBA Daily. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, now the number one sports podcast network. However you're tuning in on YouTube, or on your podcast app, thanks for making us your first listen every day. Today's episode is brought to you by Fandall. Fandall is giving you a way to turn that energy into even bigger potential wins with a college basketball parlay profit boost. at defandall.com to get started. That's fandall.com fandall play your game.

1:01I'm Wes Goldberg. And today we're talking about Jason Tatum's big weekend of pistons facing their toughest stretch of the season and our weekend winners and losers. We're doing it with the help of Locked On social experts. I too have the best with me is always from the Locked On Nuggets Podcast. Senior NBA writer for the action network. It's Matt Moore, Matt. Some of my dad's seven o'clock last night. I feel like a new person, like I've returned. I returned from the dead. I love, I love when the days get longer. It's absolutely. We're exiting winter. The playoffs are in a month. Everything is great. From the Locked On Bulls Podcast. He's a Bears and Bulls creator for Bleach Report. It's Hayes. Listen, the weather's starting to change. Starting to get warmer. NFL free agencies going on. This is my favorite time of year. Bye-bye to a Tungawa Loa. Big news out of Miami. Are you full about that, Wes? A weird way for what was the most exciting era in Miami Dolphins football for a long time to just sort of fizzle out. It's just a strange way for it to end. Just a strange way for it to end. But let's start with the big news in the NBA from over the weekend. Jason Tatum made his return to help the Celtics

2:02to a pair of wins over the weekend. I think everybody would agree that he looked great considering that he's been off for 10 months since recovering from the Achilles tear. Here's more from Locked On Celtics. He's not 100%. He was never going to be 100% without playing some game and getting those under his belt. But he is closer to looking like Jason Tatum. Than I expected him. I thought this was going to be a much longer, a much more obvious kind of ramp up. Like I thought we were going to see, okay, Tatum is a little bit more demonstrative of needing some time off the way they handle it, the way they put this plan together. This has been a great return for Tatum. Just in these two games, I think he's been, he's shown enough to say like, okay, this is, this is going to be Jason Tatum is back. So Jason Tatum is back.

3:06He looks back at Celtics won a couple of games with him back. What's set out to you? I mean, I thought he looked phenomenal. They looked terrific. I think one of the things is just like, Tatum is such a complete player in regards to, there are so many things that he can do. And when you break down his game individually, it's like does he have good handle? Yes, does he have strong drives? Yes, does he have good footwork? Yes, does he have good defensive principles? Yes, like he is just like a really well-rounded player. And he gets killed a lot, I think because he's not exceptional, he's not elite level in almost anything. And I'm sure Celtics fans will throw something at me that he's elite at. But in general, I think the best value of him is just like how good of an all around basketball player he is where it's like if you give him a lane, he's gonna drive and score. And if you give him a jump shot, he's gonna make it a decent amount of time. And like he's just got so much that he brings to the table. I think it's phenomenal, my honestly biggest thing

4:06because Tatum had a experimental different type of surgery and treatment for this Achilles. Like this could be a game changer for the entire league, for sports in general, but it's particularly in the NBA, where Achilles may not have to be the devastating setback and really permanent downshift in your career if Tatum's able to show this. Now, it's gonna be different in 10 days. I just went like, I understand that everyone's like, you said you were gonna struggle out of the gate. Now, I thought they struggled more than they have, but it's been two games. Like when he starts playing every other day and the exhaustion kicks in on top of the injury recovery, that's the hard part, but you could not have asked for a better start for his return than what they've gotten. Hey, it's about you. Yeah, I mean, it's about as best, like Matt said, about the best as a return as you can expect at this point. I mean, it looked better than I've expected and when we had this question, this conversation before I said, kind of let his return and how he plays in that return

5:07really kind of dictate what the expectations are. I'll tell you what, it's hard to not let expectations get a little bit crazy right now because he looks so good. He looks, I would say probably what 85, 90% of Jason Tatum it looks like out there. It's pretty surprising how good he looks. I'm gonna be honest, Matt, I kind of had the same takeaways you, I think he's gonna be the new so-and-so came back in 10 months guy, right? It was Kevin Durant when we talked about the, Kevin Durant came back and he averaged 27 points per game and played 35, whatever it was. Adrian Peterson is that guy in the NFL for ACLs, has been for years, right? I think Jason Tatum is about to become the example guy that every time your star player who's under 30 goes down with a Achilles, hopefully it doesn't happen much more, but if and when it does happen, those fan bases are gonna be like, well, Tatum came back in 10 months and looked every bit as good as he was. Tatum is about to be the new example guy. In terms of how good he looks and how good the Celtics look, they beat the Mavericks or first grade, whatever, the Mavericks are tanking, that's whatever it is. Then they beat the Cavaliers who have been playing

6:08really well lately on Sunday. Matt, we're talking about maybe new expectations for the Celtics team. What do you think about the Celtics now as a whole with Tatum back? Do you think any differently of them than you did before? With the caveat that I think whoever's the favorite probably doesn't win at this point in the year, I think they should be the East favorites. I think they are the favorites to come out of the East. I think they're the best team. I think when you look at how they matched up with the NICS, I think when you look at it, we'll talk about the Troy NICS segment when you look at the entire thing. It is so incredible to me how Joe Mozilla has not only, it's one thing to get your team to find ways to sneak out wins. That's not what's happened with Boston. They have not snuck out wins. They have not pieced this together. They are not overperforming. If anything, they should have a better record than they do based off of the underlying stuff. They have Kedas and awesome defender. They started the year and I talked to Corralis in preseason and was like, what's the thing and he's like defense?

7:08Is that they're gonna be absolutely horrible defensively. They're top 10. This is the top 10 defense. What? How? How? It is incredible the job Joe Mozilla has done. As much as I love what Jordan Ott has done Phoenix, even I have been converted, it's Joe Mozilla for coach of the year. I honestly think that this team can make the NBA finals. I only think they can win it, but I do think they can come out of the East, 100% of his. Yeah, they're a well-coached team. They're solid on both sides of the ball. You're gonna play like Jason Tayden returning. We'll see what happens when Nikola Vousovitch there, but there's no doubt that this team can come out of the Eastern Conference. I have my doubts coming into the season if they'd be able to consistently play at that level, but they've shown and they showed that without Jason Tayden, you now get Jason Tayden back with a month to ramp up before the playoffs. Yeah, this team's gonna be really dangerous coming to playoffs, really, really dangerous. He's already playing 25, 27 minutes per game. I mean, it's a little bit of a minute restriction. They're being a little bit careful. I know the shooting percentage isn't great in these first two games back, but watching these games,

8:09I mean, he's moving well, he's moving side to side. He has had a couple of dunk attempts. The one that was a little iffy, the first against Dallas, but in the second half against the Mavericks, and then basically that entire game gets the calves, I'm just, I'm floored by how good he looks. I mean, I'm honestly shocked and yeah, obviously. And go ahead. To that point, you know, our job is to be critical when it's due. I have so much respect for the fact that Jason Tayden attacked his rehab this way. And it's, I don't wanna act like if you don't come back early, that it's a failing because I don't think it is. The hardest part that players have said that the recovery is the mental part. It's that you get into those dog days where it's like you can't really do much. You can do some, but not a lot. You start off and like you're attacking every day and you're trying to get back on your feet and you get the boot off or whatever. And then it slows down and becomes a real grind. And you're away from the game that you love. And Tayden, for him to have attacked his rehab, the way that he has, for him to have done what he's accomplished,

9:11for him to come back and look like this. It is an absolute testament to his work ethic and how good he is as a player. It reminds me of a completely different injury, but it's same as like it was devastating at that time. Reminds me of the way Adrian Peterson returned from his ACL in Tampa. He came back in immediately what ran for over 2000 yards immediately. So it's part of a Tatum's story, which we know he is very cognizant of, right? It's got an NBA struggle story now. Good for Jason Tayden. I'm not trying to be petty, maybe a little bit. Meanwhile, the pistons have lost four games in a row. We'll talk about whether or not it's caused for concern who should be and who should be considered the favorites in the East after what has been obviously a very eventful weekend. Stay tuned. Today's episode of Lockdown NBA Daily is brought to you by Quo Spring is a natural reset point. And if there's one thing that can quietly cost business his money, it's messy communication. Mr. Coles, scatter text, no clear thread of who said what? That's why today's episode is brought to you by Quo,

10:12spelled Q-U-O, the smarter way to run your business communications. Quo is the number one rated business phone system on G2 with over 3000 reviews trusted by more than 90,000 businesses. It lets your entire team share one business number so you never miss a call, a text, or an opportunity. The part that I love, everything lives in one clean thread. Calls, texts, voicemails, the whole team sees the entire conversation. So nothing falls to the cracks. And the AI summaries save serious time by logging calls and highlighting the next steps automatically. It just makes your business feel more organized and responsive. So make this the season that no opportunity and no customer slips away. Try Quo for free and get 20% off your first six months at Quo.com slash Lockdown NBA. That's QuoQ-O.com slash Lockdown NBA. Quo, no missed calls, no missed customers. Today's episode is brought to you by PrizePix. Shoot your shot on PrizePix and get $50 instantly in lineups when you play your first $5. That's right, PrizePix is now giving you $50 in lineups when you sign up and play your first $5 lineup.

11:12It makes every dunk, every assist, and every big play that much more exciting. PrizePix is the number one daily fantasy sports picks app. And it's super simple to play. Here's what I like about using PrizePix. It's easy. You can just pick more or less on two to six player staff projections. And if your picks are right, you cash in. You can build lineups across tons of sports, basketball, baseball, hockey, college hoops, soccer golf, and a whole lot more. And one feature that I really like is the early payouts. If your player gets an off to a hot start, you could have the option to cash out winnings before the game even finishes. It's a really fun way to test your sports knowledge and stay locked in on the action. So download the PrizePix app today and use the code Locked on NFL to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup. That's code Locked on NFL or Locked on NBA to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup. PrizePix, it's good to be right. Welcome back to Locked on NBA Daily, the best way to support the show, subscribe on YouTube. We are Monday to Friday, 1 p.m. Eastern wherever. You get your podcasts. Let's go to the negative story in the Eastern Conference

12:14from the weekend. Our favorite teamfellas, the Detroit Pistons. They have lost four games now in a row. It's their biggest stumble all season over at Locked on Pistons. Kukalil is asking if it's time to hit the panic button. Let's play the clip. In the time of hit the panic button, it's getting close. For me, it's getting close. Now, I am fully aware for a lot of people, for there's a good section of the fan base that no matter what really happens this year, that they weren't expecting too much anyways this year. So unless they just completely like fell, I don't lost every game the rest of the season, this is gonna be a successful season for those fans no matter what. And if that's the case, I'm not discussing them. But for someone like myself and for someone like, any of the other fans that had any kind of expectations, even as not just championship expectations, any kind of expectations for this team in the playoffs, I'm getting close to hitting the panic button. And... Hey, Kukalil is talking about panic button after a four game losing skid in March.

13:16What do you think of this take? What do you make of this losing streak? I mean, it does suck. Detroit has been such a good team all this season, but you're gonna go on a losing streak at some point. It happens to every team just about, and it's not a surprise that, well, let me not say it's not a surprise, but it's gonna happen. Well, key is how they bounce back from it, how they prepare for the playoffs. It's still a damn good team. I still have them as a team that can legitimately make it out the East. You know, just some questions on, you know, the fact that this is their first time, how can they, how would they overcome that storyline and the battles that come in the playoffs? But this was bound to happen. You're gonna go on a losing streak at some point in time. You can't say that you're playing without money. People didn't expect it. And then, complaining when something like this happens is very, very miniscule compared to the success that they've had this season. I get labeled as a contrarian a lot, which is fair. And the reason that I kind of take that approach is not that I'm trying to do it for clicks or attention because trust me, if that was the tactic, I would be living in a much nicer home. But what actually it is is that the NBA season has taught me

14:17that just you're never as good or as bad as you look. Like you're always somewhere kind of a little bit lower than your high points and better than your low points. And then the pistons aren't as bad as they've looked over the last four games. Nor are they probably as good as they've looked over the entire course of the season. It's not to say that they haven't been great because I think they have been. And I love the way that they play defense. There's two separate questions here. The first is that is this an indication that maybe they're starting to slide? I think the answer is probably yeah, because they had hit such a high point. Like this team was what had the number one record in the NBA. They passed a thunder for a hot minute. That is too much. We know Detroit's not better than OKC. We have every piece of evidence that they're not better than OKC. So we knew they were gonna play it probably a little bit worse, right? And that's the kind of pattern of this. I worry about the whole peeking too early thing. That's always been a concern of mine. I don't know how to manage it or what to do with it. Like, oh, play worse. So we don't peek too early. That's dumb. But I do worry that like, look, timing is important. You have to not play so great that you don't have any other gear you can get to.

15:19The other question that was a playoff, right? They're gonna be fine. Like they're gonna finish Celtics or three games back. It's a little hairy. I think pistons probably stabilized and so get the one. The problem for me is just the offense. Okay, their defense has slid over this stretch. That's what's been a problem. But as our Thompson's been out, okay, K missed the other game, but it's fine. The offense is a legitimate issue. They are not good enough at shooting. They have, they are outside of the thresholds of what I looked at historically over the last 10 years of how good you need to be from an effective field goal percentage standpoint. And if you like, that's a lot of words, they don't shoot good. Like they don't shoot well enough. And you've got to be able to do better than that in order to make a deep run in the playoffs. I think Detroit is awesome. I love their story. I think it's been great to see this happen. I think their upside is still tremendous. But for this year, they don't have enough shooting for them to be able to make the kind of championship run that a number one seed you would expect capable of. You had those questions anyway, right? Despite this four game losing streak, I do think me, and you maybe,

16:21you've had your doubts about the pistons. Maybe some other people didn't have as many doubts. I do think that we are starting to see why people aren't picking them, right? To your point, Matt, like this is, this four game skid maybe just underscores some of the concerns that we've had about this Detroit pistons team all season long. Now look, these losses, you know, you can write off of each of these individual losses, right? To Cleveland, they lose by four points in Cleveland. Okay, you know, that's fair given the way that the Cavs have played since getting James Harden everything. You got panced by San Antonio in San Antonio, but the Spurs are great and have been the NBA's best team since the start of February. The loss against Brooklyn is a tough one, but they didn't have Cape Cunningham in that one, and then they play in the second night of a back-to-back in Miami in the next game, but they got panced in that one too. So I'm not trying to excuse what the pistons are doing here or this skid, but I'm not, I'm with both of you guys. Like they're not this bad, and I do think maybe this, if anything, just reinforces the fact that they are a little bit vulnerable. What I do find interesting though, after this weekend, Hayes, so the Celtics beat the Cavs on Sunday,

17:23they get Tatum back. Matt already mentioned the record. The Celtics are only two and a half games back of the pistons for the one seed. They could catch the pistons for this one seed now with Tatum back, and the pistons are going to be without a Sartonson, by the way, for at least a little while more according to JB Bicker staff. Like Celtics versus pistons, based on what we've seen lately, I mean, are the Celtics back in terms of just being the favorites in the Eastern Conference? The Knicks look bad against the Lakers on Sunday, the Celtics whip the Cavs, the Celtics are the team that are riding high right now in the East. Yeah, I mean, I think they are the favorite in the East. It's funny how we go through the majority of the season to get right back where we were last season, the Celtics are the favorite to come out the East. I mean, look, styles make fights though, right? Yeah, that's true. You know, Knicks, Celtics lost to Knicks in the season series. Knicks have won the season series versus both Knicks. I'm sorry, versus both Celtics and Cavaliers, right? And it's like, oh, Tatum's back. Okay, but the Knicks also beat the Celtics last year.

18:23And a lot of Knicks fans I've talked to have actually had some, they're like, oh, yeah, we've got the Celtics figured out. I'm like, I don't know about that. But, you know, I think they're alive. I do think a lot of this is just gonna come down to, it's gonna come down to styles make fights, right? If you told me that the pistons were gotten to a second round series with Cleveland and were able to just out muscle an outpower and Cade reached another level, that made like, I'd be like that all tracks. If you were like, the Cavs shot the lights out and the pistons off as just couldn't keep up, I'd be like that tracks too. I do do a lot of this is just gonna come down to like, styles make fights in the playoffs. It's matchups, everything is matchups, which is one of the reasons why I continue to kind of lean towards New York. I feel like the Knicks, at least, have such a floor for their performance that I'm less worried about them in certain contexts. With the Celtics, they can get three point happy and that bit them last year. And with the Cavaliers, I don't trust them defensively. With the pistons, I don't trust them offensively.

19:25The Knicks, and I understand if you're like, how can you trust the Knicks defensively? It's been about a month now of them playing really great defense. I don't care about the Sunday game, it's a Matt and A game after they beat the Nuggets. By 40, guess what, that's LA Nightlife. That's who won that game. There is, I think, a higher floor for New York than the others. But I do think, look, we know for one thing for sure, Wes, would you agree with this? The East Winner is going to be Detroit, Boston, New York, or Cleveland. I don't think we're having the 2023 heat come out of the play-in tournament. I don't think we're going to have the 2005 Pacers come out of the five seed. Charlotte's interesting, but they lost to Phoenix last night, don't think they're ready. I think the East Winner is going to be one of those four teams that we can at least narrow it to those four. I think that's fair, and I think you could put those four teams up against the top four teams in the Western Conference and make a real argument that maybe the top of the East is wholly better than the top of the West

20:25when you kind of go for deep, as opposed to maybe just the top two teams. I think those teams are all legitimately good and worthy of making the NBA finals. At the risk of stepping on our next segment, though, there's some hot teams right now in the play-in mix that are going to at least try to make some noise in the playoffs and maybe upend one of these teams with an early shot at making the finals. We're going to talk about what might be the East hottest team next. Today's episode of Lockdown NBA is brought to you by Fandall. College basketball is non-stop big games, tight spreads, momentum swings every single night from early tip-offs to late-night West Coast shootouts, but there's always action on the board. And now Fandall is giving you a way to turn that energy into even bigger potential wins with a college basketball parlay profit boost. You can build any college hoops parlay that you want, rivalry games, ranked matchups, whatever fits your read. You can mix spreads, totals, player props to match, how you see the slate playing out,

21:27and then you can apply the profit boost and instantly bump up the potential payout. One of the odds I'm looking at lately, the Southeast Division winner, the Miami Heat, plus one 15 odds to win the Southeast Division. The Orlando Magic are still the favorites, the heat who are about to talk about here of one five straight games might be closing in on another division championship. Not that the division titles mean a lot, but for those odds, they commute a lot to you. Go safe, go bold, ride the team that you've been following all season long, it's your parlay, your style, now with more upside behind it. Head to fandall.com to get started, that's fandall.com. Fandall, play your game. Today's episode is brought to you by Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Workplace chaos, deadline stacking up, inbox overflowing, and the one position that you have to fill, still setting open. When the pressure's on and you need the right hire, this is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Indeed Sponsored Jobs helps you reach the people who actually fit what you're looking for, skills, experience, location, so you're not just hoping that the right candidate stumbles across your post. And here's a stat that says it all. In the minute that I've been talking to you, companies like yours made 27 hires on indeed,

22:28according to Indeed Data worldwide. So if you're hiring, spend less time searching and more time interviewing candidates who check all of your boxes with Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all of your boxes, less stress, less time, more results. When you need the right person to cut through the chaos, this is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. And listeners of this show will get $75 in sponsored job credits to help get your job, the premium status that it deserves at Indeed.com slash podcast. Just go to Indeed.com slash podcast right now and support our show by saying that you heard about it on this podcast. Indeed.com slash podcast, terms and conditions apply, need to hire, this is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Thanks for making locked on NBA Daily, your first listen every day, the Lockdown podcast network has a show for every team. Check out locked on Celtics and locked on Pistons for more on today's top stories. It's Monday. We're going to end the show with Weekend winners and losers. Hayes, start with you. I guess one of the Weekend winners should be

23:28my Chicago Bulls. They're actually one of game going into the weekend. So that's that. That always feels good for me to see the team actually win a game. But I'll say outside of that, it has to be Jason Tatum, right? Like that's it. That's the answer. Jason Tatum and his return back to basketball and what he's done and how good he's looked. He has to be the winner of the week here. Matt. Magic probably a winner on a little suspicious of it. Palaban Caros turned a corner. Little interesting there. This Eastern Conference play in race. I know we're going to talk about is really interesting and how it's going to shape it up. Atlanta is another one. Yeah, the one I got to say is like the Spurs destruction of the Houston Rockets on Sunday was about as emphatic and definitive as you're going to find. Like that was a game and then it was not. And I understand Houston's going to be a loser here for me. I understand the Fred Van Vley and Stephen Adams injury. I totally understand. You lost your point guard that was going to set the table and you lost the offensive rebounding advantage that you had.

24:29That was a huge part of their identity. But the vibes are awful for a team that is this good. And like Rockets fans have turned on Emay Doka. I don't know where this goes, Wes. Like I they looked like a promising team that was like going to be a force in the Western Conference over the next five to seven years. Yeah. And now like we're reaching like I shared some some tweets from Jackson Gatlin about how Albert and Shengoon is playing who both my co-hosts thought was an all star this year. And like it is like it's a mess. To the point where Wes texted back was like would the bucks even want Shengoon in a Yannis trade? Holy crap. Yeah. It is a mess. But Santoni of demoralized them yesterday. I keep waiting for Santoni to come back to the pack and it just is not happening so far. I do want to mention that we were right. Alfred and Seguin wasn't awesome. He was technically an all star he did. For the world team as an injury replaced.

25:32It doesn't matter. He was an all star. Gross. History will show. Hey, I do think this is interesting though because Houston was the hot young team. Had all the good young players, the team that you would have taken, it was like would you take Houston or Oklahoma City's roster for the next blah, blah, blah years? Like we were kind of having that conversation. Now just in Texas, would you take San Antonio, Dallas now Cooper Flag and another high draft pick probably coming up or Houston? When you look at those three rosters and those three situations, which one would you take going forward? I mean, it's obviously San Antonio, but would Houston be at the bottom of the list? I guess it's the more interesting part. Wait, ask that question. No, because I still think you said between San Antonio, Dallas and Houston. No, I still take Houston over Dallas, especially if they, because what they have is more fixable. They can go out and find a point guard. They'll be perfect. I think they'll be right back to where they need to be. Dallas has to actually build a team around Cooper Flag. That's going to take a while. My problem is like, this is an internal conflict. It's clear they made a joke it doesn't like or trust Alprensch and Gunor Reed Shepard. And those are the two players that have the most upside

26:34and have the best value for this franchise. And if they're not going to work out, what do you, because, and this is one of the problems with the Kevin Durant trade and they had to do the trade. They got a sweetheart of a deal, right? But this is one of the problems. I was worried about this at the time. You are now a KD team, because you're just like, well, he's our best player. Like that's our best player. KD is 37. So you're in this trap where it's like you've got to win now because KD is your best player, so you better build around him. You can't do that because you've only got so much of a window. This is a bad situation for Houston to be in. Because it's basically you have to just like, yeah, we'll be pretty good with KD and it'll be ugly and nasty and a lot of tension. And then maybe the other guys will develop and get better enough that we can win after. And KD's not going to be satisfied with that. It's it's rough. It's a bad situation in Houston. I don't think it's as bad as you let know, Matt. Like they were winning team before KD got there. They could be like, yes, you have to play a certain way when you have KD anytime you add a player that gravity.

27:36I'm not I'm not I'm not lost to that point, but I don't think it's as bad bad off as you're letting on for them. It like their young players are still developing. Jabari's taking really good strides this season. So the young players are still taking steps. I love Jabari. I think he has just been in a bad situation. Rocket fans are out. Like they want Jabari Smith Jr. God, they want him out of here. And I think the the bigger thing here Hayes is like, you might be right, but that's going to require a coaching change. And if you have a coaching change is Kevin Durant, how does Kevin Durant respond to that? Because I think you wanted to play for Udoka. This is the dynamic that I'm trying to get at is the problem there. And I don't know how you want to tangle it. I'm going to end with my winner here. And it's the Miami Heat, who started a five game win streak by beating these Houston Rockets that we're talking about right now. And as we were recording, news broke that they got a second round draft pick from the Charlotte Hornets in order to help rectify the tear rosier situation.

28:36I've got my questions and my concerns about that. I we could talk about that maybe later in the week if we get more information or unlocked on heat where it belongs. We're there. But the heat of one five game is in a row. They are up to seventh place in the Eastern conference in a virtual tie with their Orlando Magic. Now Orlando has a tie breaker over Miami. But the heat have a chance now to climb to six maybe even fifth where they're only a game behind the Toronto Raptors. They're playing well, Bama de Bios averaging 22 and 10 over the last month plus. Tyler Hiro is back shooting 50% overall, 40% from three looks like he has not missed a step. And you know, they beat Brooklyn a couple times during this win streak, but also Houston. They beat Charlotte on Friday. The league's hottest team at the time. And then the team with the East Best Record in Detroit on Sunday and they pants them. So right now, I think that he you can make an argument or the East hottest team right now. And that that bodes well for a heat team that does like to peak at this time of the year, Matt. They have snuck into the top 10 in net rating.

29:37That to me is like huge like they are. I pay attention to this guy's level. Like as a good example of this, they're better in point differential than the Minnesota temple walls. What? That's crazy. These play here's the thing. This is since all star, OK? Miami 7 and 2 plus 11 Atlanta 7 and 1 plus 12 Orlando 7 and 3 plus 10.9 Charlotte 6 and 4 plus 12. That race for the Southeast Division because there is like only I think going to be maybe two spots. But I think one spot for all of these squads outside of the play in tournament is going to be brutal. Philadelphia's got Tyree's Maxi's injury and they've been playing terrible. Obviously, you don't know when a bead's going to play. This is going to be fascinating to watch this last month of basketball in the Southeast Division between these four teams were playing their best basketball. Yes, it will. We'll see what happens. Miami and Orlando right now in a virtual tie for 6th 7th place.

30:42And that could very well, it could just come down to that to determine who comes out of that plan mix or has to avoid the plan tournament altogether. If you like what you heard today, subscribe to Lockdown NBA Daily, wherever you get your podcasts, including on YouTube. Thank you to Matt and Hayes for their expertise every day. Thank you for making the Lockdown podcast network your first listen. We'll see you right back here tomorrow on Lockdown NBA Daily.