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Brian Windhorst: We’ve gotten really good response from live events in the U.S. and, to be honest with you, a few months ago, Pat McAfee was on an all-hands call and encouraged people to find ways to take their shows on the road because it’s been a great boon for his show. There’s so many positives with it and especially if you can get partnerships and I was already thinking of doing this but you know, there’s, McAfee, who has had a lot of success and so I definitely took his encouragement under advisement and we got this deal done.
Brian Windhorst on Anthony Edwards: He's excited about the team now. When he needs to be excited is a year from now when he signs the extension. And listen, if the extension was now, maybe he would sign it. Maybe he would be excited about this enough to sign it, and maybe he thinks LaMelo is going to be a perfect fit and maybe he will be a perfect fit. I’m not trying to be a jerk. I'm just trying to be honest. The time where Ant has to feel really good about the Wolves is a year from now.
Heat Central: Brian Windhorst says Pat Riley knows how to bring players back after sour exits when discussing LeBron returning to Miami: “Pat Riley over the decades has been able to have 2nd acts with all these great players. Alonzo Mourning left under a dark cloud and came back… Shaq after leaving with animist ended up returning to the franchise and got his number retired. Dwyane Wade obviously left in FA in a disagreement, came back now there’s a statue outside. Pat Riley knows how to bring guys back. While there was disappointment when he left in 2014, there’s never been the animist that existed in other places LeBron left. Miami has a pathway. Especially with LeBron saying he’s looking at multiple years. Multiple years have been the formula for him. He’s won a chip in the 2nd year everywhere he’s went. I think Miami would be at their best a year from now and LeBron can be apart of that.”
Heat Central: Brian Windhorst says the teams going after LeBron, believe Miami is the BEST basketball fit “If you look at Cleveland, the team the Cavs have is reminiscent of the Lakers team he’s leaving…. The Sixers have a number of ball handlers. The ball handling role is wide open in Miami. The history is there in Miami. The star power is there in Miami… As I’ve had conversations over the last few weeks, Miami continues to make more and more sense to me… The more you talk about this with NBA teams, even the teams that are recruiting LeBron, the team they see is the basketball fit, it’s Miami.”
Brian Windhorst: "Victor Wembanyama agreed to five years and 250 million. It is a great contract, but it does not have the escalator in it, what we call the Rose provision, which means if he had won the MVP award, won the Defensive Player of the Year again, or made the All-NBA team in this upcoming season, he would have gotten the bump from 25% of the cap to 30% of the cap. That is going to be worth potentially 53 million dollars, somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 plus million dollars a year."
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Heat Central: Brian Windhorst says LeBron James has been reaching out to the players of the interested teams: “Bunch of the owners are there and chatting. Some of the owners who are trying to get LeBron were talking to each other and were like ‘have you heard anything? Nope. Have you heard anything? Nope.’ LeBron is reaching out and talking to players on some of these teams and they report back to their Gm or coach ‘hey, LeBron called.’”
At 41 years old, LeBron James is still the NBA’s free agent of the summer. However, any teams involved in the highly-touted sweepstakes for James have reportedly been kept “in the dark” and haven’t heard from the superstar or his camp, according to ESPN insider Brian Windhorst.
Brian Windhorst: "I have a confession. I have been thinking for nine months about LeBron playing for the Denver Nuggets. I refused to talk about it during the season, but I just thought as soon as they didn't extend LeBron last year and they extended Luka, I kind of knew it was probably going to come to an end. I thought about the Denver Nuggets because him alongside Jokic is an incredibly perfect fit. They are so intelligent, the way they see the game. And here is the thing, it was all predicated on him taking less money. I was never ever going to allow myself to think about him going to a team whether it was Cleveland or Golden State for less money until I heard specifically from the LeBron operation that he was willing to take less money. So now that he has done that, I will open the window and I think Denver absolutely should get in front of him or get in front of Rich Paul and make their pitch."
Brian Windhorst: The Warriors still have the ability to re-sign Draymond Green to a reasonable contract number and to try to add LeBron James, but it's really, really narrow and they would really need to make some other moves to build up their team. Right now, I'm taking the Anthony Davis thing off the front burner. I do not have data that says that that's likely to happen.
Brian Windhorst: I like actions over words. The actions were that Draymond Green opted out of his contract. That gives the Warriors flexibility, but I don't think the Warriors think they're getting Anthony Davis. Do you want to know why I think they will? Because they signed Kristaps Porzingis. And this contract and Porzingis did not play a lot of games last year for anybody, much less for the Warriors. But you've got to have big men to compete in the Western Conference. They had to handle this business.
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Heat Central: The Heat are out looking for other teams to get involved to complete a Giannis trade, per “I want to point out, Giannis still could remain with the Bucks… but there is a belief he’s going to get moved by next weeks draft. The Miami Heat have been trying to get Giannis for months. They have been making offer to the Bucks for months. We have no deal. What we can take is the Bucks do not love what the Heat are offering and they are out looking for other options. They have been looking for other options. The Celtics ‘could’ get in there. We’ll see how that plays out.” -- Brian Windhorst
Brian Windhorst: There'd be quite a few teams that would be interested in Kel'el Ware if he got shipped to Milwaukee and they were willing to flip him. Tim MacMahon: He's a rim-running floor stretching big. Windhorst: If I were the Lakers and Kel'el Ware got shipped to Milwaukee, I would be on the phone because Kel'el Ware package of talent is not that different from Dereck Lively.
Arguably, the largest pushback on this possibility came from ESPN's Brian Windhorst, who spoke recently on ESPN's Get Up. Not only did Windhorst argue that the Celtics aren't ready to trade Brown, but he also said he thinks Giannis wants to join the Miami Heat. “The team to watch here is Miami. Miami would say ‘we've got Tyler Herro, who is a young player and been an All-Star," Windhorst said. "We got draft picks, including the 13th pick in this draft… And Giannis I think wants to be in Miami. There are more check marks on Miami. I’m not sure Boston is ready to trade Jaylen Brown."