Follow The Money | August 11, 2026 | Hour 3

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
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**Pauly Howard** (0:40)
Welcome back, Pauly and Marc Malusis, VSiN eSports betting network. NBA schedule dropped today. For more on this, we talked to the great Frank Isola at the Frank Isola on X on the Progressive Guest Line, you know him from PTI and Sirius XM NBA Radio starting line up Monday through Friday 7 to 10 a.m. with Scalabrine. He does an excellent job and he joins us now. First thing, Frank, appreciate the time. Great triple header to start with the schedule and the league got it right with LeBron taking on the Knicks as they raised a banner.

**Frank Isola** (1:09)
Yeah, I think, you know, obviously NBC's got a lot, they get first dibs on which teams are going to play. And remember when LeBron was deciding what to do and Adam Silver had come out and said, I wish you'd kind of hurry up.
Yes, we want to kind of get on with the schedule here. So that was NBC's choice. Obviously, I always start from a Nick point of view, and I get NBC's only looking at it from a national point of view. But I think for the Knicks to have Boston be in their building while they're raising a banner would be pretty cool. I think, you know, having Pat Riley in Miami Heat there would be pretty cool. You know, Indiana has been a rival for how many years? About 25, really, or more than 30 years. And Indiana got to the final the year before. So I always thought that one of those teams, and just wait a little bit for LeBron, because it, you know, anytime LeBron comes into your building, it's a big deal. I mean, it's going to be huge anyway. And obviously they're going for the ratings on opening night. My only thing is I think they would have gotten it anyway with, you know, either Yonison Miami coming in or Boston coming in.

**Marc Malusis** (2:10)
Frank, one on Philadelphia. How do you think it looks? Pauly and I were talking a little bit earlier on. Do you think this works with the way that this team, Brown, James and Bede, Edgecombe, Maxey, do you think it works for Nick Nurse?

**Frank Isola** (2:24)
You know, the one thing is, you know, LeBron obviously won championships. Jalen Brown's been to the finals, won a championship. Nick Young coach, I mean Nick Nurse, coached the championship team in Toronto. So they have a championship pedigree.
You know, a lot of times with these teams, when they get together that first year, it doesn't always go according to plan. Even, you know, you look at LeBron's first year in Miami and they made it to the finals, but they were disappointing against Dallas and Los Angeles. Sometimes it takes a year. Hey, look at even the Knicks. You know, they made two huge moves the season prior. When they, in the summer, they got Mikhail Bridges in the right before training camp. They got Carl Anthony Towns and they made it to a conference files. Then it was the following year that they won a title. So that sometimes that's a factor. You know, NB is always going to be, you know, a seven foot question mark. And Brian Scalabrine, who I do the show with, his big thing is, you know, if you're going to have LeBron out there with Joel and B, you have two guys that aren't great defensive players. Now LeBron has an excuse. LeBron's 41 and B just can't move. And B just can't move laterally very well. So that could be an issue.

**Pauly Howard** (3:34)
Well, you said it earlier too. I mean, everyone's not, no one's talking about the Pacers.
And they knocked off the next two years when they were healthy and took OKC to seven. I'm fascinated by the depth of the East and you've covered the league for a long time. I've never seen depth like this where 10 teams are odds on favorites to make the playoffs. Two of them won't even make it. Someone's going to be a seven and eight seed and be very disappointed.

**Frank Isola** (3:59)