It all comes down to this. The Lakers have played 82 games for this one. The first game,

I believe, debut in tomorrow. This weekend is on and popping. Lakers, T. Wolves, Luca Donchich.

He's looking to get the ever-elusive NBA championship trophy.

Joined by Slick Rick Dubuper again. Y'all know how I feel about this man on my left. If you're having a basketball conversation, you need him involved. One of the most knowledgeable

in all of the sport. Slick, let me start with you on this one. Who's most important for a finals run?

Luke or LeBron? Get a slick. Get a slick. Really difficult questions on this challenging questions, either or questions. This is not a hard question.

It is Luca Donjic. And what's really crazy for me, and the examples are more recently, Oklahoma

City Thunder, he gets kicked out of the game. They're right there. They're in it. He gets kicked

out of the game. Oklahoma City runs away with it. Conversely, Chicago Bulls, he has a bad game. LeBron has it going. Everybody has it going,

except Luca, they end up losing to a Chicago Bulls team. What was really crazy for me when I started to dig into this is,

and I think we have a full screen here that we can illustrate it with numbers. Don't get caught up in the numbers other than all of the numbers in the left-hand side are what he was doing in Dallas, and the numbers on the right-hand side are what he has done with the Lakers this season. Everything has gone up, his usage rate, his involvement in wins, both offensively

and defensively and overall. He has done more as a Laker and been more pivotal to their

success than he was in Dallas this season. Now you think about that. we think that in Dallas, everything revolved around him.

He was the son, right? And yet he has played a bigger role for the Los Angeles Lakers since he's been here than he did for the Dallas Mavericks.

That is why he is so important and why he is the most important piece that they have.

I like that.

I don't disagree, so I'm going to keep it short.

I don't either.

Yes.

Everything he said, yes.

Luke is the most important player in large part because I don't know at this junction in time.

LeBron James, is it by choice that he's taken a back seat or is it by health he's taking a back seat?

...