All right, welcome everybody. This is Derek Bodner.

She's joined by Rich Hoffman here live from... I always say live, but we're not live. This isn't going to be released live.

But we're in person. Me and you are sitting close to each other as we're record this podcast from a hidden corner of the Wells Fargo Center.

How you doing, Rich?

I'm good, buddy. We're taking a page out of our friend's Bo and Shields book, recording a podcast after a game. And I think they usually do it in Merrill Reese's, uh, announcing booth. We, uh, we are not there. We are kind of just in a random room here. We'll have to ask Zoo next time. Hey, can we record up in your booth?

I think he'd be okay with that. Yeah, he'd come on. Of course, the booth here isn't quite the same. You'd have all the workers, you know, putting the arena away, so to speak, taking everything down. It would be quite loud and probably not a great spot for it. Probably not great. I think we picked the right spot.

Also, in the right spot, the Sixers.

They are.

They're playing well, man.

They're now 17 and 8. They've won eight of their last nine games. They're 13 and 1 at home, with the one loss being to the gosh darn Cleveland Cavaliers, which you wouldn't have picked if you had a choice. They are playing well.

They're playing well post-Jimmy Butler.

Ben Simmons has sort of rebounded from an adjustment period in the first two games.

I posted before a game, I think he was averaging about 18 points a game on 60% shooting from the field.

Had another real good one tonight, 19.12, rebound, 6 assists, 8 of 10 shooting. A couple turnovers, but that is to be expected. He's playing well. The team's playing well, and I guess we'll start off there. What are your overall impression of how they're playing right now? Yeah, and I think Ben's almost the... He's kind of the barometer for how well they're playing. And tonight against a Memphis team that is not, I should actually look at them before they,

I say they're a good defensive team.

They're a good defensive team, top five in the NBA.

He comes out and he just drives the ball right down their throat.

And they jump out.

I don't know if it was like 10 to 3, I think it was, to start the game.

And, yeah, when Ben gets going in transition and he can find shooters and they're getting

stops, like, this is going to be a really tough team to deal with.

I think tonight I was really impressed.

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