On the NBA Beat Ep. 122: "It's a Terrible (Eastern) Conference" With Kelly Dwyer

In the wake of LeBron James' departure, Kelly Dwyer discusses his Eastern favorites and why the conference is overall so bad. The online basketball writing pioneer who wrote for Yahoo!'s Ball Don't Lie blog for nearly a decade, among multiple notable gigs, is currently shining for The Second Arrangement, a project to which you can subscribe for as low as $5 per month.   Timing will vary due to dynamic advertising, but here are the approximate time stamps of some of our favorite clips (so many good ones to choose from):7:29-7:39 on the Boston Celtics' immense depth: “There’s so many arms on this monster that this could be something that lasts for a while, that really eases Kyrie [Irving] into his drop-off years.”9:49-10:08: “I think Leonard has to be more of a…he can’t be a let-the-game-come-to-him, 'look-at-me-how-sensible-and-savvy-I-am' guy. There’s got to be a whole bunch of ‘Kawhi Leonard’s looking to score this year’ stories happening. He’s gotta be the guy that turns them over.”17:18-17:26: “It’s a terrible conference. No one’s gonna surprise this year. We just want Joel Embiid to be on ice and Boston not to annoy us too much.”32:30-33:00 on Hawks rookie Trae Young: "He's fun and he's gonna bank in shots this year where he's not supposed to, and he's gonna be so tired that he can't get back on defense sometimes, and he's gonna have 10 times the responsibility of Collin Sexton. Young is gonna be an experiment; it's kind of like the lockout year...Young is sort of this ticket that you can buy on a lot of nights that gonna keep you entertained."Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices