Giannis to Miami! An Urgent Gathering Pod With Chris Ryan and Justin Verrier

**Bill Simmons** (0:06)
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All right, we are recording this. It is 945 Pacific time. It's not an emergency podcast because this is an emergency. We've been waiting like 307 days for this. Justin Verrier is here from The Ringer. Chris Ryan is here from The Ringer. Just got back from dinner. I don't know if it's drunk house or relatively unsober house. What version of house are you right now?

**Chris Ryan** (1:36)
I'm legally allowed to drive, but I don't know if I'm legally allowed to comment on a Giannis trade.

**Bill Simmons** (1:41)
Yeah, that we've been waiting forever. All right, so Giannis going to Miami. It was Boston versus Miami for days and days and days. I thought it was going to happen today. Then everyone was like, it's not happening. Then after I took my contacts out, gave my dog a bath, just brought my dog out of the bathtub, and then all of a sudden Giannis was traded. Verrier, are you surprised it's Miami?

**Justin Verrier** (2:02)
No, it seemed like obviously it was going to be Boston or Miami. I always thought Miami's package just made a little bit more sense than what the Celtics were offering. I just never got just getting Dylan Brown back for a Milwaukee team that had just struggled for multiple years at this point, dealing with one superstar without the supporting cast in order to make really anything of it. So just getting a bunch of stuff, at least to me, I'm not sure what that stuff really amounts to. It's more of an opportunity than a sure thing in there. But I would rather that, and I think that's ultimately where the Bucks decided to.

**Bill Simmons** (2:33)
All right. So they, CR, they got Hero, Ware, Hakez, they got Hakeshonis. That's how you say it, right?

**Justin Verrier** (2:40)
Yeah. Like Hakeshonis.

**Bill Simmons** (2:42)
Hakeshonis. They got the 13th pick in this draft. They got 31 and 33 unprotecteds and a 30 swap. So they basically gave up everything they had except Bam out of bio.
What do you think, CR? Because I don't know what's left. I'll tell you what's left for Miami now. Now, they could patch this together if this was the good old days. But basically, Giannis, Bam, Wiggins, Davion Mitchell, Bobby Portis, they got in the trade as well. And then, Norm Powell, if they could re-sign him as a free agent. And then, minimum free agents, and that's their team.

**Chris Ryan** (3:16)
You know what the first thing that jumped into my mind with this trade was? Was the geek story slash quote about, if somebody's going to trade for me, I'm worried about how much they're going to have to trade to get me, and what I'm going to be walking into when I walk into that locker room. Is Giannis on a better team now than he was yesterday?

**Justin Verrier** (3:34)
I don't think so.

**Bill Simmons** (3:35)
I would say Bam's a better teammate. Maybe the front office is a little more motivated, but I don't think this team's a title contender. Do you, Verrier?

**Justin Verrier** (3:45)
No, but they're definitely in the mix, and I do like how they contrast some of the other teams that have ascended in the East here. The Knicks are obviously probably going to go into next season as the presumptive favorites, and you look at them, and they're more of an offensive driven team. I know they did a lot of work in the finals in order to win that, but you think about Brunson, you think about the blender with them. At the very least, the Miami Heat have an identity from day one, which is they're going to be pretty physical and pretty defensive minded. I think Bayam, Giannis, Andrew Wiggins is the core, and Evian Mitchell is really the core of the type of grounded out defensive team that I think fits Miami's identity for years on end at this point, but also maybe something that would be a contrast to a lot of these teams that are counting on high octane offenses.