All right, John, we are back two weeks in a row of recording. Don't get used to it, though, because we're taking next week off because of my brother's wedding. But we wanted to make sure that we got you something here in September. And we still have so many amazing questions to get to. I've really been enjoying this format. But first, John, yes, it did happen. I think Thursday of last week, but it's the offseason.

We're still allowed to talk about something that happened in the last week. So the Donovan

Mitchell trade, Cleveland, not New York. What were your initial thoughts when you first heard

the news? I was surprised like everyone else. I really thought he was going to end up in New York.

There seemed to be motivation by all parties for him for that to be the landing spot.

And I wasn't really sure how far it made sense for Cleveland to go or for some of these other teams that were being mentioned and what

the salary match would be. Obviously, using a Sexton sign and trade as part of this was maybe not

something that was easy to envision because of what we, I mean, did we even know if Danny Age

even wanted to sign this guy? So I think that was the real surprise element, because that was really I mean, did we even know if Danny Age even wanted to sign this guy?

So I think that was the real surprise element, because that was really the key to the whole deal

coming together between Cleveland and Utah, was being able to use Sexton's contract in it.

And I overall, though, I feel pretty decent about the way everybody played their hand in this.

New York avoided overreach.

And I wrote about this in The Athletic when it happened.

Utah obviously got what they wanted in terms of an unprotected pick haul with some high upside scenarios maybe.

And then Cleveland is the one you could argue most that maybe they overpaid a little. But I also think in the situation they were in, there

were no easy outs to acquiring more talent of this level. So I thought it was, I thought it was

an okay proposition from their end, even though

it came with with some risk. I just think they're, they're at a point where getting beyond the

three star players they have probably entails taking on some additional risk. Yeah, I think so. And

the downside of those picks, when you in theory have control over, at a minimum,

Evan Moble, you would think, for six, seven more years.

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