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00:00All right, tonight it's the NBA Cup, Gilbert. I, you know, I'm not a huge fan of this, but at least we're getting two really good teams playing, and I think that we can say that with the Bucks taking on the Thunder, it seems like they care about playing in this and being in it. Total 215.5. OKC, one of the best teams in the NBA. Giannis now all of a sudden putting together an MVP resume again this year. Any opinion on tonight's game in particular? Who do you like in this matchup?
00:29Well, you know what? I'm kind of torn on this one, Craig. It's the second best team in the NBA and the second best player in the NBA. So it's a game seven type situation. Do you side with the best player or do you side with the best team? I'm curious at how the Thunder are going to guard Giannis Antetokounmpo.
00:45We know what he's capable of doing, but we also know that Thunder are a team who know how to neutralize stars. Luka Doncic had a tough game against them last week. They basically shut the entire Rockets offense down in the semifinals on Saturday.
00:59So I'm leaning towards the Thunder just because I think they have more depth than the Bucks are doing. I think they can. They have the personnel to make life difficult for Damian Lillard and Giannis Antetokounmpo. And now who are the others that are going to step up for the Bucks? I trust the Thunder's others more than I trust the Bucks others. And I also think that Shea Gillis Alexander is a lock to get 30 plus in this game.
01:21Yeah, it should be a great game. I think tonight. And by the way, you have a potential now for Giannis to even maybe win the MVP. He's jumped into the picture. He opened up 10 to 1, 15 to 1. Bucks weren't playing well. Now all of a sudden he's on fire. They're 7 to 1 now. He's 7 to 1, excuse me, to win the MVP. SGA is plus 280. But Gilbert, look who the favorite is again to win the NBA. I mean, how many years in a row? I feel like, by the way, you see the yellow. It feels like the white has been the same every year.
01:46Jokic is the favorite and Luka is like 5 or 6 to 1. Luka climbs up a little bit. Then something happens and he doesn't win. And then Jokic wins the MVP. I understand Embiid has been there in the past too. And it's not always Jokic. But my gosh, they can't get that guy out of being the favorite to win the league MVP. It's every year.
02:03You know, it's funny that Embiid year, I kind of like there are some voter fatigue involved. And I think coming in this year was when you probably would have gotten value on Nikola Jokic because we thought that there was going to be voter fatigue again. And I think the narrative and the conversation was Jokic needed to do things that we've never seen him do before in order to be in that conversation again. That's exactly what he's done. It was last week where he had that 56 point game followed by 48 point game and a 25 hour span.
02:28You know, he's leading the league in rebounds per game where he's right at the top there. He and Carlton Townsend have been going back and forth. He's right in the top three in assists per game and right in the top three in scoring as well for Nuggets team who has a lot of flaws. So they are where they are. Thanks in large part to what he's doing. I'm not going to say he's dragging this team, but he is doing a lot and carrying a lot of weight to help this Nuggets team. And they're hovering in that, you know, three to seven range in the Western Conference and is mostly because of how excellent he's been this year.
02:54And I do kind of think he's created such a gap between everybody else that he's going to run away with MVP again this year.