Enough Said: Lebron James coming to MN

I feel like sky's the limit. Like I said, I just show up, try to learn and do the best I could. So just don't come in. He's a guy that we think is going to elevate us. And hopefully we can help him a little bit as well. It's a night owl edition of the Enough Said program. My name's Dan Barrero, joined as always by Justin Gard. And for the 11th consecutive week, Natalie Brenninger, kind enough to fill in for, well, the former friend of the show. Who was that? Laurie Fisher. That's right. Laurie Fisher. Is it going to be emotional for you today, Natalie, or will it actually be a relief? Oh, emotional, of course. You know, but it won't be the last time. Yeah, we'll see. I don't know. We'll see. Laurie's supposed to come back next week. So you never know. Yeah. Fingers crossed. Yeah. Girls weekends. We'll see. Well, thanks for everything. If we don't say that at the end of the show, if we don't say it at the end of the show. Great job. Thank you for filling in. Hopefully now you get to enjoy a little bit of summer. Because up till now, you haven't been. I hope so. There's no guarantee she's going to get back. You might have to be on a week from tonight to having too much fun. All right. Well, the Timberwolves introducing their newest players this week, LaMelo Ball and Josh Green made their way to Minnesota for the big media day. The Wolves now have four first round picks from the 2020 NBA draft. So we'll see how it goes, right? Yeah. You know, it was maybe a bit of a letdown for Wolves fans who, you know, have been kind of waiting for the actual official introduction and perhaps hoping that LaMelo was going to come up here and, you know, blaze the airwaves and and give us a series of very entertaining quotes about I'm here to to win a championship, all that sort of stuff. Man, a few words. Yeah, fortunately, they didn't, you know, make the deal on the basis of how well he could speak or how, you know, loquacious he would be so much as how much he might add to this team, especially offensively. And for me, the best way to look at this, this this move at this late date, and we've analyzed it a lot already, is that often or too often the Wolves offense could be feel a little stuffy and a little difficult and sometimes just flat out really hard for, for example, Anthony Edwards to get good shots, right? What I think at his best LaMelo represents offensively is he's going to make everything feel a lot easier for Anthony Edwards and several other players if he just does what he does, which is what creates space. How does he do it? He's a six, seven. He's a huge guard who can get to the basket, who can get past the defense and has vision. So that's I think what there is to look forward to offensively is a lot of other issues we know related to this, Justin, but making the offense feel easier at times, not so. I hate to use this term because a lot of explosive diarrhea constipated in this case, the other end of that spectrum. I think that's what he represents at his best. Wolves have been a hard watch at times for as much of the success as they've had the last handful of years. They have been a hard watch offensively. I'm impressed, by the way, you mentioned it, that he's a man of few words. I'm impressed we actually found a soundbite that we could use at the top of the show. Yeah, we did have to support it with a little Tim Conley at the end because that was about the longest soundbite that LaMelo had at that press conference, six or seven seconds there. But as you said, he's not here to talk. He's here to play. He probably is a man of few words because of his father, right? I think everybody assumes that because LeVar Ball is so out there all the time and seemingly never stops talking that all the kids are like that. The kids are all more soft spoken. But I'm excited about the offensive stuff as well. And I'm excited to see what Chris Finch comes up with, because that is how, as a so-called outsider, a self-proclaimed outsider, Chris Finch broke into the NBA, right? He's supposed to be this offensive savant that people love. The offensive stuff that he comes up with, that he cooks up in the lab. He's got some nice ingredients now. And even all the critics of this deal, and we've talked about it now for it feels like about a month. For all the critics, all of them do eventually come back to saying, but it's going to be a really fun team to watch. The offense is going to move. The offense is going to be top five in the league at worst. Can they figure out the defensive stuff? I'm excited about that. And don't forget, LaMelo won rookie of the year in that 2020 draft class, as Natalie mentioned. Anthony Edwards was a part of that. Why did LaMelo win it? Because Charlotte was actually decent. They were. And he was a big reason for that. And we've already talked about how well he played this past season, which was one of Charlotte's best seasons in decades. Well, the Wolves still have holes to fill, and they don't have a lot of cash or capital to find a power forward. But you know, there is still someone out there that isn't looking for money, just a place to win. That's LeBron James, and president of basketball operations, Tim Conley, made a public pitch for him to come here this week during that press conference with LaMelo Ball and Josh Green. So you never know. Well, you know what's hard about this, I think? The longer this goes on, or LeBron drags this out, I think the more attractive the theory that Wolves fans, some Wolves fans, are clinging to becomes. Which is what? Still hasn't signed. The longer this goes, the more I wonder. And I'm here to tell those individuals, I don't think one thing has anything to do with the other. I really don't. I hope I'm wrong. I will remain absolutely gobsmacked if he ends up here. Which is different from a debate that's broken out on our show, Justin, that absolutely also leaves me gobsmacked. That the number of people who seem to say, don't want him, not interested, too much drama, too much of a diva. And I'm just here to tell you, I'm going to try to be as nice as I can about this, that's stupid. LeBron James can still play. So if you have to hold your nose a little bit about the drama, that's fine. But he absolutely can play in this league. He showed it a year ago. He's ready to be not the main guy anymore at this point. And so this notion that, especially given we literally have no other viable options, that no, I don't want any part of him, is idiotic. And that last part, the fit and the role, I think people have to get their hands around. We're not asking him to come in and take the ball from Anthony Edwards and even LaMelo Ball now at this point, right? That's not, I think he even knows because he just did it. If you watched how the Lakers played last year, when Luka and Austin Reeves were healthy, he was, it seemed like, comfortable being at least the second wheel, right? Well, let me ask you a question about that. Yes. The comeback to that is, yeah, and he left the Lakers. Does that mean he actually wants the ball a little bit more? And the Wolves do have two guys who like the ball a lot. So is that, does that make it a concern? No, because my theory is the Lakers were very comfortable with him leaving, as weird as that sounds. I think they, and I could just be, you know, reading this how I want to, but I think they're ready to make it Luka's team. I don't know if LeBron fits perfectly with Luka. Luka, we saw it firsthand, the type of players that play around him, right? Guys that can shoot finishers at the rim. So I don't think they were like devastated that he moved on. Obviously you want LeBron James. You mentioned the longer it goes, we get to cling to delusions. You know what else makes it difficult? Is the longer it goes, more people, more national people are coming around to what we've been saying for three weeks. You know where the best place is? Minnesota. We played multiple soundbites from big time NBA reporters on the radio show this week and writers. And they are all starting to come to the same conclusion and saying, if he's really about the basketball, he needs to go to Minnesota. Which is, that I think is adding to what's going to be a big letdown because I'm still putting it at like 5% that he comes here. I agree it'd be a great fit. I think it'd be an amazing story. I think no fan base would celebrate him more, given we've had so little to celebrate here in the 35 plus years that the franchise has been around. But more people continue to say, Manny's the spot. And I'll say Manny. I don't like to say Manny because I'm one of us. They say it, the outsiders. Manny is the spot. And that's what's making it hard is every time that happens, we just churn ourselves up into a frenzy because it gets us excited. This would become as big as Favre. The only reason you could say it's not is because, of course, it's football, and football's king here. But given LeBron's reach, as if not the greatest player of all time, one of them, this would be a massive story. And we would no longer be, once again, as it happened with Favre, we would no longer be, for that period, flyover country. By the way, we're in the content business. I'm fine if he wants to take this to Labor Day. Yeah, just keep spreading it out. We've gotten three weeks out of this, and nothing has changed. Nothing has really changed in the last three weeks, and we've gotten three weeks of material out of it. So take your time, LeBron. As frustrating as this whole process is, I know we're driving Natalie crazy going long here, the fact is, it's not like any team. If he waits that long, they're going to go, no, don't want you now. Any of the teams that are in the locker room will still say, we'll take you. Well, the Lynx remain at the top of the WNBA. And this week, they added a couple more wins to their record. But there were some moments against the Sparks that had fans nervous when Olivia Miles went down with an ankle injury. She did walk herself off the court and later came back out to the bench, and she did do the electric slide after the win. So we're all hoping it's nothing serious. Justin, you were there. I was there, and that injury was 12 feet in front of us. And it was scary, because she's been dealing, I didn't see her fall. I just saw the aftermath. And given she's been dealing with a calf injury, what is your first thought? Oh no, this is Achilles. It's over. The place was silent, and she obviously got help out. So when she came back out, that was really the highlight of the game. They ended up beating the Sparks. Sparks are just an OK team. But what struck me, Dan, from watching her in person for the first time. We've talked about her now for two, three months. But watching her in person, as you know, you like to think you can pick up some subtleties. The way she can control everything, and the way she's already controlling everything, the pace, the tempo, getting the ball across half court. She only turns it over. She turns it over because of herself, not because of anybody else. It's only because she's trying something that is impossible. And the ability to just hang on to the ball until the perfect moment that it needs to be delivered, where only something positive can happen, whether it's a pick and roll, or a pick and pop, or a kick ahead pass on the fast break, is pretty incredible. It's fun to watch in person. They've got another game Saturday. I'd be surprised if she played, given ankles are a little tricky. And obviously, you want her at her best when Nafisa Collier comes back. Hopefully, that happens soon, and obviously, in the postseason. But it was really fun to just experience it in person, because she is controlling everything that goes on there right now. Lynx had a pretty good point guard by the name of Lindsay Whalen, right? Wolves have had some good point guards. Never in the history of these two teams have each of them had the talent at that lead guard position that they do right now. I mean, there's just no question. It's not even close. And they're both young. That's the exciting part about this, even though LaMelo Ball, obviously, has played a lot more pro basketball than she has. Going back to the game before, this last game against LA, Miles had another great game. She was in foul trouble. That was the only thing that was keeping her from really taking over the game. Ended up having like 30 points. If she's making threes, I don't know how you guard her. Then you can't, you're right. I really don't. And that seems what people are still kind of daring her to step back on those pick and rolls and take a three point shot. You almost have to. Because, exactly. Because she can get into the lane. She can finish. She can create for herself. But if she's making threes, even at a LaMelo Ball 37% clip, she's almost unguardable. I really don't know what you do. Is the head coach showing off? Is she purposely holding the Visa Collier bag, saying we don't even need, I'm going to try to win a title without her? When is she going to play? Be nice. She just dropped a new shoe. So it'd be nice if we could see her wearing them on the floor. Yeah. And not just for the electric slide. Every American deserves to know that when they cast their vote, that vote will be counted accurately in a system. And that is to make that system secure. President Trump addressing election security in a primetime speech. The White House has declassified documents, he says, relate to foreign interference in the 2020 election. The president says that includes alleged influence by China. He says the public can go to the White House's website under a new election integrity page to view these documents. And now this all comes the same week the president endorsed Mike Lindell for Minnesota governor. And you probably remember Lindell claimed the 2020 presidential election was rigged and that Dominion's voting machines were part of it, Dan. And Natalie, you sort of nailed part of the president's problem going in last night. I hate to use the boy who cried wolf analogy, but it really does fit here. If you have never stopped pounding on that one issue ever really. Well, you never stop, certainly since you since you were elected somehow, despite all the the stealing and cheating against you the second time. It's going to be hard no matter what, quote unquote, evidence you have for people to believe you, because you have been on this over and over and over. That's on him. I, you know, what I'm thinking as I'm watching him last night is I'm thinking of a scene we've talked about on the radio before, Justin, from all the president's men. And they the Woodward Bernstein, it's early in their process. They think they've got their they're on the track of getting the big story on the White House connection to Watergate, et cetera. And so they hand the story to Ben Bradley, the crusty curmudgeonly world class editor. He reads it and he hands it back. And as he does, he says, you haven't got it. And that's my reaction would be my reaction to the president. Now, he'd probably fire me immediately and have me, you know, ushered me out of the White House for sure. But I just don't think he delivered the goods. What he delivered on was influence issues, which are fair and and should be concerning, but are very different than stealing elections. In fact, one of his spokespeople that the White House made available afterwards even admitted that we really don't have that much evidence that any of the last two or three elections were influenced by any of this or that the data systems, right, even if they're they're they're compromised, that that it could be done enough nationally to actually turn elections. So, again, to me, it was to that extent. He just didn't come close to delivering the goods. And he's got that problem because he's fixated and never going to stop being obsessed with this one issue and only thinks cheating goes on when he loses. Right. Which is another part of the problem. Well, on the influence thing, I almost think like that that's on us. Right. As we are being influenced, we're being influenced by Russia. We're being influenced by China. We're being manipulated by social media. That shouldn't be any surprise. I watched it. I've tried to read every opinion and watch every opinion that I could on it. And I kind of left more confused than when I started. If we're worried about the Chinese influence, if we're worried about the machines that, by the way, Chinese premier, he raves about. That's the other thing. And the Venezuela, you know, hacking that really can't happen here on Lindell real quick. I think he's got enough issues on his own right now to sift through. Right. That it's probably not fair to him if you're thinking about voting for him to make him try to run a state when he's clearly got some other things that need to be tied up first. Well, the World Cup final is this weekend. It'll be Spain versus Argentina on the pitch on Sunday. Spain shut out France this week and Argentina had a comeback win in the final minutes of the match against England. So it should be a really fun one. Well, I'll just say, you know, we've celebrated this event almost from the beginning on the radio show. And we certainly talked about it some here. I know that drives some anti-soccer people crazy. But the more I've gotten into it, the more I've enjoyed it. And I think it's like anything. If you start watching matches early, you do get more invested in it. You've got more to play off of. And you've got obviously great individuals, superstar players, including, you know, Messi this time around. Right. And then you got these machine, these machine like teams, including La Roja, the Spanish team, which again reminds us that soccer, like a lot of sports, often you can succeed if you just are good defensively at at at discouraging those other explosive offensive teams. So this is a great matchup with with with great history. And I think this whole event for me has been eye opening. Not necessarily. I'm going to watch soccer right every right every year for it may just be the next time I watch the World Cup. But I think the whole thing's been magnificent. I really do. Smashing success, I think. Yeah, I can't wait for this weekend either, particularly Sunday. I might even watch the third place match because usually people go, oh, what are we doing? Third place, everybody gets a trophy. But I do think this last month has taught us that it does mean something to play another World Cup match and to maybe and to improve your standing. I know we just celebrated the 250th anniversary of us breaking away from England and, you know, creating our own nation. And we like to think of them as adversarial at times. As Minnesotans, can we empathize, sympathize with what just happened to England in the semifinals where they've got the match? We think seemingly in pretty good spot, right? They've got the lead. They go into the prevent defense, which was a complete meltdown and a complete mistake to lose that way when this is your game, right? I mean, we talk about the English Premier League, how big it is. You know, they don't have professional football. They don't really have professional basketball like we do at this level. This is what they have to lose that way. And it seemed inevitable once Messi kind of got his feet into the match that it was going to happen. Felt very Minnesotan. I think Minnesota fans could recognize some threads. What we learned is defense in soccer is often possession, right? In a way that it can't be, obviously, keep the basketball where the other team's going to get the ball after you score football, etc. in soccer. That's a big part of it. And and that in itself, I think, is a large reason why Spain is in the position it's in here now, having upset the, you know, the unbeatable juggernaut France. Well, Major League Baseball is officially back after the All-Star break. The National League won the All-Star game in which the twins Joe Ryan pitched a scoreless inning, and the twins are coming back from the break in a good position. They climbed to within a game of 500, and now they return with the series against the Cubs. What if the All-Star break ruined our momentum, Dan? That's what we're going to hear now, right? If we don't come out hot because the All-Star break was at the wrong time. Yeah, because we had won eight of nine, right? In terms of series. Yeah. And now it's can the bullpen hold it together long enough to kind of keep because honestly, their starters, I think, have been OK. Their offense, as we've talked about for weeks now, has been fantastic. Derek Shelton, the manager, is getting rave reviews for how he's kind of handled this whole thing. The American League is a mess. The American League Central is probably worse. So everything is right there in front of them to take it. If they have the ability, if they actually have the ability to finish games, which has been kind of a wild card on the bullpen and his ownership, as we talked about last week, have the stomach to actually do what they said they were going to do as recently as spring training. When they feel like they have a chance to do something, go ahead and add. It's a big couple of weeks here for the twins. Do we know whether Tom Pollatt watches enough said? We don't. I don't know if he is watching or, you know, maybe later he'll or one of the poll ads is watching and tell possibly. Can I just say directly to Tom, if you trade Joe Ryan at this or at this trade deadline, you're done. Yeah. That doesn't mean you that you can't trade him later. But if you trade him under these circumstances right now. Yeah. You are toast. You are. You literally can't come back and do that. Yeah. If you want to be taken seriously, even though you're really not taken seriously right now, to me, that's that's a that's a hundred percent non-negotiable point here that has to be made. If you're going to even try to cling to the illusion that you are going to actually try to stay competitive in this thing this year, even if you don't have a great team, but you might say, let's just get in the tournament and see what might happen. That would be a very hard sell. Oh, you're right. And you know, they they might come back with an offer we can't refuse. Yeah, you can't do it. And that might be true. Yeah, that might be true. And it might be a great baseball move long term. But like you said, with everything that's happened, you can't do it in this moment. There's a time to do it later if it comes to that. Not now, man, or it's over. All right. Time for lightning round for the wild. A massive offseason gamble got a lot riskier this week. The GM is out for the Detroit Red Wings. And now there's questions about what this means about Dylan Larkin possibly coming to the wild. I think the I'm getting the sense that this probably makes it more and more likely that not necessarily that Larkin doesn't end up here, but that it's not going to happen before the season begins. Right. But, you know, because in a sense, he's while they're doing the search. Iserman's still a guy in charge, right? Ostensibly. I guess so. Yeah. And now maybe the search will be really fast. Maybe they have an idea pretty quickly here and they'll be able to move pretty quickly. So I wouldn't give up on the idea that even if you get to the regular season and Larkin's not done, that that means it can't happen. Well, I do say it would say Bill Guerin's always looking, right? Yeah, he's always paying attention. We saw that with Quinn Hughes last year, a couple of months before the deadline. And it can be quiet forever. And then, boom, something might happen. I rule nothing out with him. Well, the Open Championship underway this weekend. It's the last major of the season and right before the 3M Open. And some pretty big names are expected to go from the Open to here in Blaine. I would say that's that's the transition right there, Natalie, is that they've actually got maybe the best field they've ever had coming to Blaine next week, including Scottie Shuffler, world number one, finally coming here. So that's cool. And I would encourage people to go check it out, because it is fun to have a tour stop in Minneapolis. The one thing I love about when something's beyond the pond or above over there, you wake up and it's on. It's like living in Hawaii, right? And the things that are happening in North America, I do love that. Well, Suni Lee is making her Olympics comeback. The gold medalist announced her return to competitive gymnastics this week and announced her road to the Olympics will be featured in a documentary. So exciting. We're suckers here for comebacks, are we not? Comebacks and documentaries. What if you what if the comeback ends in failure? Do we do we still cling to the legend or does it take some of the legendary status away? That's the question. I think we'll have to tune in and watch. And we'll see one comeback athlete at the ESPYs last year. The ESPYs were this week. No Minnesota athlete brought home a trophy. The Knicks won best team. But what do you guys think of the ESPYs? I love the fashion. Do you? Oh, the fashion. Yeah, I gotta be honest. I didn't watch a minute of it. I haven't watched in over a decade. I don't watch it. I look for the pictures of the outfits. The only redeeming quality for the ESPYs, in all honesty, is when they do the Jimmy V Courage Award. Yes. Or the Arthur Abbott Courage Award. That's the Jim Abbott was this time. Look him up, kids. Enough said.