Kawhi Leonard felt like an outsider with the Spurs just like me - Stephen Jackson | The Jump

Let's keep pace with Joyland and Benson, and speaking of magnifying other guys, they both struggled last night and then only had four three-shot attempts, all guys in the series. Joel Embiid averaged 17 points per game in this series, which is 10 points less than his regular season average. So which of these two guys are you most worried about, Matt? At the end of the day, it's playoff time. We don't want to hear excuses. You know, we know Joelle. He is a tough player. He has battled injuries his entire career, but people want to get sick. Listen to that, you know me, but to me, the one who is most important right now is Ben Simmons because he

just

needs to impose his will.

I know Gardner from Carvey, but Ben Simmons is also in charge of getting JJ Redick going and when JJ Redick plays well, this team plays. Well, I think obviously the transition really gets reduced and magnified in the playoffs, but you know for Ben to be able to come out, you know he had a couple of tough games against Brooklyn's front office, this is a higher caliber team, but when imposes. his will and it's close to tripling every game, it involves everyone else, everyone else goes that's when they're at their best. I'm more concerned about the simple fact that we know what Ben Simmons is going to do.

Give us that he hasn't added anything to his game since he came into the league. To me, I think you need to add a

jump

shot, don't blame the coach for him, but don't hold him accountable, but we know what Jimmy will bring, the energy and the leadership. That dog fight that every player needs, but I'm worried about the pace, he is the best player on the team, he only has twice as much, they throw a lot of shots at him and he gets his team going. I

just

think Marc Gasol is in his hair right now Marc Gasol has the experience he's been there, he's been in the league for a long time, he's really using his size and his brain to get to Joe and the beatdown is working in this one. moment, so I'm worried that he was able to win. play to maintain the series.

I think it's mental toughness, you know, I mean, it's well documented that you know the best players have played well, pretty hurt in the playoffs right now, if you're on the court, if you're good enough. being on the court that's the only thing that matters that's what we always say you have to perform and he's just not performing right now and if it's Gasol in his head you know the fans are going crazy and you know Drake is leading the charge. You understand that no, oh, it's playoff time. You know you have to keep that narrow focus in mind and if he plays well, they will win.

I'm okay with that because I'm not sure Marcus is all in his head, I mean he ran all over the place. Marcus, in the third game, will have the advantage if he feels like himself, it's a lot. I can't say that the illness is getting into his head because I don't know to what extent he may not be able to breathe as much. because they say lung infection or whatever, so I don't know how much of it is mental or physical, but that's clearly what bothers me for me. I think it's mental, you know, like I said, if it's hard to breathe, being sick sucks, you know?

I have three little kids and I get sick all the time when I hate it's like I said this is your time to shine there's no excuse you know you could get sick in two weeks sitting at home yeah now is your time to go and he has You have to go, you have to hear about it, for sure, let's go to Kawhi Leonard because you two have been very impressed with him, career-high 31 points per game this postseason and you overlapped in San Antonio with Kawhi, his rookie and his sophomore year. year in the league, what do you think about what happened to him here?

Well, I saw this, the same thing Pop saw when I first got there, when I came back, the kid was special, I mean, I had talked to him, he kind of gravitated. Me because it seemed like you know I was kind of an

outsider

when he was there, yeah, and he

felt

the same kind of way, he didn't want to go down that straight path like the rest of the Spurs players. I know he wanted to wear his braids and do things a little different and we gravitated towards each other but I remember one thing he told me that was working, he told me I want to be one of the best players to ever play his game and he always I approached the game that way, so it doesn't surprise me, right?

He knew they were holding him in San Antonio. I was retained my first two years there, so I knew they were retaining him and I knew he can do these things. We're talking about a Finals MVP, so going to Toronto was great for him. Every time you go to a new team it's a new breath of fresh air, but I know he can dominate. It doesn't surprise me at all. I think people forgot how good Kawhi was when he had to take the whole year off and I'm glad he took the year off because so often guys rush and get hurt again so he took a whole year off. rest, but when he was healthy, he was among the top three in the world and for me, without a doubt, the best two-way player in the game.

I remember with the Clippers we fought against San Antonio twice in the playoffs and we fought against him and I was the one defending him and I realized that this kid is a problem, yes, he will be a problem and I think he. you don't understand the cause of him because he's not flashy, he's just very efficient, we're New Balance Mill dunks, he's not doing all the fancy things that oh and our people, but he just comes out shooting efficiently and getting buckets. I mean, the efficiency is crazy. It's crazy, yeah, and that even in the first 10 games, if you look at everyone's first 10 games in a postseason, he's the only one who's scored over 300 points on 200 shots or less, it's crazy, I'll say, although it's partly responsible for why he's not in the conversation for best player in the league for most of the year you miss a quarter of your team's games people aren't going to put you in that same category but it's interesting to me because it's on top again the program it's the postseason that counts that's what you all care about so I wonder if more players will be like this maybe I'll give my body a quarter of a season to Let them rest and I can do this, that was just this. situation that were just situations that came out of the quadruple and all that.

I think they wanted to be very careful with that. I don't think next season will be approached in the same way. I think you play a lot more regular season games because he wants to. play the game, but this season he made it to the postseason healthy. I think that was his main focus. I think he would make it through the entire season next year. I don't care if he's left out if this is what he's going to get me in the playoffs. true, what Khawaja gave me in the playoffs he said this is his usual standard.

I'm not bad because, like you said, this is when it counts, you know this is your franchise player now and what you want him to be is the best now and If that requires 2025 games during the regular season to be fresh in every game, I'll take it as general manager and president, he looks good, that's for sure.