Eyebrow-raising Media Day quotes

Kawhi Leonard, Anthony Edwards, Joe Mazzulla, Isaiah Stewart, and more

Media day is generally a good time. Teams are brimming with optimism, players are in the best shape of their lives for the Xth year in a row, everyone’s lovey-dovey. A leaguewide honeymoon phase.

Typically, a team will run out the coach, the general manager, and a handful of players to field queries from assorted reporters and journalists. Most of the proceedings are a pleasant, low-stakes hum of anodyne questions and responses, but it’s a numbers game. There’s always something interesting.

Naturally, the most compelling theater happened with the Los Angeles Clippers.

“I don’t deal with conspiracies, or the clickbait analysis and journalism… I don’t think it’s accurate.”

— Kawhi Leonard, when asked about reports that he didn’t perform any services for his Aspiration endorsement money

In his typical monotone, Leonard rather softly denied the increasingly overwhelming reporting around his alleged illegal endorsement deal with fraudulent company Aspiration (also stating that “none of us did no wrongdoing,” which I expect is literally true!)

Leonard repeatedly pointed out that this was “old” news for him, and that it was years ago, as if that is exculpatory for some reason (although he couldn’t help noting when asked that Aspiration owed him “a lot more than” $7 million in outstanding payments when they went bankrupt).

Still, while it would have been too much to expect the perpetually apathetic Leonard to come out with a fist-pounding denial, the rest of the organization somehow seemed even weaker.

Team president Lawrence Frank had the worst performance of the bunch. When asked by ESPN reporter Ramona Shelburne (who, perhaps smarting from backlash to a perceived softball Steve Ballmer interview from a few weeks ago, asked excellent and direct questions all Media Day) if Leonard’s infamous Uncle Dennis had asked for improper benefits, Frank simply said, “Dennis knows the rules, Kawhi knows the rules, and we know the rules.”

Shelburne asked if that was a yes or a no to the improper benefits question. “Yes, we know the rules," Frank answered, with a smile that died before it reached his eyes.

I’ve grown to hate the phrase smoking gun. There doesn’t need to be a “smoking gun” for Adam Silver to bring the hammer down on the Clippers, and hopefully it’s Mjolnir. These guys are all guilty as hell, and if you’re the one poking specious holes in the argument, your priorities aren’t correct (and, perhaps, deserve further scrutiny).

“I was there the first time he walked, I was there the first time he ran, I was there for the first shots he took.”

— Joe Mazzulla, on Jayson Tatum’s recovery

Is that a parent talking about their child? No, it’s just Mazzulla channeling his vast and unknowable intensity into a media day answer about Jayson Tatum’s ongoing rehab process.

Is Tatum returning to the Celtics later this year feasible? The truth is that nobody knows. It would be highly, highly unusual for an NBA player to return to the court less than a year after tearing his Achilles — but it’s not unprecedented.

Dominique Wilkins tore his Achilles on January 28, 1992. He made his comeback on November 6th, 1992 — just 9.5 months later!

And Wilkins didn’t just return to the court; he returned to form. Wilkins scored 30 points in his first game back and averaged 29.9 points for the season, coming in fifth in MVP voting and making Second Team All-NBA.

Wilkins is the exception to the rule, but he was 32 at the time of his injury. Tatum is younger, and although you have to take social media videos with an ocean’s worth of salt, he does look remarkably spry already.

Of course, the Celtics can’t and won’t push Tatum to return. They lost Jrue Holiday, Kristaps Porzingis, Al Horford, and Luke Kornet from a team that was about to lose to the Knicks even with a healthy Tatum. This isn’t a championship year in any universe.

But the rest of the roster will change, grow in his absence. How does Jaylen Brown step into the #1 role? How do Anfernee Simons, Payton Pritchard, and Derrick White look driving offense in bigger roles? Can Neemias Queta or any of the Celtics’ other centers look like a true-blue starting-caliber big man?

If Tatum’s truly 100% — and I mean no doubt about it, this guy stepped through a wormhole from April 2025 — it would be interesting to see how he meshes with the rest of his teammates after such a prolonged absence. I don’t subscribe to the notion that Tatum returning this season is pointless. The Celtics will learn something valuable about their roster, and it would undoubtedly do the team and Tatum good to get all the swirl around his return out of the way before the offseason — the pressure Tatum puts on himself, the media hoopla, etc.

But it’s definitely not worth any elevated risk of re-injuring himself.

“…”

Steve Kerr and Mike Dunleavy, not appearing

Kerr and Dunleavy are usually pretty generous with their time. For neither to appear on Media Day (almost certainly to avoid questions about the Jonathan Kuminga contract standoff) was an unusually bad look. Even the Clippers’ head honchos were at their media day, and the Kawhi/Ballmer/Aspiration situation is way more toxic!

The Kuminga situation almost certainly won’t end well at this point, so Kerr and Dunleavy can only hide for so long.

“Bringing in that three-ball could help us… I feel like it’s a weapon.”

— Isaiah Stewart, on changes to his shot diet

This is hardly the biggest news coming out of media day, but I was low-key fascinated by the beefy Detroit big’s transition last season from starting stretch four to off-the-bench defensive monster at center. In 2022-23 and 2023-24, Stewart took the same share of shots at the rim and from deep (~40% from each location). Last year, however, he cut his threes by more than half, functioning as a rim-roller who launched the occasional corner three instead of as a full-time spacing big.

Stewart had shown some shotmaking promise in his injury-shortened 23-24 season, nailing 38% from downtown (most of which were valuable above-the-break threes). The volume wasn’t enormous, but it was compelling enough that I was surprised when new coach JB Bickerstaff elected to abandon it.

The Pistons are a good team on the rise, but their big men don’t possess a lot of shooting talent (unless Bickerstaff wants to play Duncan Robinson as a four, which I do not recommend). Tobias Harris shot less than 35% from downtown last year, and he was really their only stretch option. I wonder if there isn’t a happy medium somewhere with Stewart’s shot diet.

Ausar Thompson and Jalen Duren are higher on Detroit’s priority list than Stewart, but neither seems likely to make shots from outside anytime soon. Stewart really only had that one good year from deep, so this might be wishful thinking on all accounts. But if he wants to play with the other two, the Pistons must let him try this more often:

Maybe defenses never respect the shot enough for the accuracy to matter. In my opinion, Detroit needs one more season to find out.

“I thought he was just a gunner. I thought he just shot the ball a lot. But I’ve seen what he works on, and how it transfers to the game. He’s a guy that doesn’t complain about not having the basketball, he just kind of attracts it.”

— Brandon Ingram, on what he’s seen from RJ Barrett

Even if you’re cautiously high on Ingram’s fit with Toronto (or at least shrugging and asking, “Why not?”), there’s still some uncertainty around the offensive pecking order. RJ Barrett, Scottie Barnes, Brandon Ingram, and Immanuel Quickley are all guys used to having the ball in their hands a good bit. Someone’s time with the rock will suffer. Barrett is the obvious candidate.

Ingram was probably speaking earnestly, but he might’ve been subtly preparing the way for his teammate to take a small step out of the spotlight. I’m excited to see what coach Darko Rajakovic can wring out of his guys.

“There’s an element of unknown with this team. It’s invigorated me. I’m embracing the unknown.”

— Erik Spoelstra, on the Miami Heat’s outlook this season

For the first time in the 2020s, the Miami Heat entered Media Day without any questions about Jimmy Butler’s hair or Jimmy Butler. Instead, Spoelstra focused on the future, highlighting his trips to EuroBasket and Las Vegas to see various players like Nikola Jovic and Norm Powell.

Without Butler, the Heat can’t pretend to be a dark horse championship threat in the East. But that doesn’t mean they are content being stuck in the middle, and this will be a big season for the youngsters on the roster — Spo stated that they need some younger players to “pop” this year.

For all of Spoelstra’s mystique (he was the subject of an Athletic article actually titled, “The Tao of Spo”), it’s fair to criticize some of his recent performances. The team’s offense (limited by a lack of high-end personnel) has been bad for a long time, the rotations have been inconsistent, and Spoelstra even memorably lost the Heat a game last season by trying to call a timeout he didn’t have!

Don’t get it twisted. Finger-guns to my head, I’d still pick Spoelstra as the guy I’d want leading my team in a seven-game series. But for the first time in a while, contention takes a back seat to development. It’s time for Spoelstra to put his teaching hat back on, and coach.

“How have you prepared for the season?”

— Anthony Davis, to assorted media members

No, that attribution isn’t a brain fart. AD tabled the turns on the reporters, asking them how they prepped for the year. (Answers were disappointingly earnest, besides Tim MacMahon’s “I have not.”) Davis does host a prank show, after all.

The NBA can always use more silliness (and the notecards Davis used to read the question made it even funnier).

“Greatness is boring.”

— Anthony Edwards, on his offseason workouts

Edwards had a host of entertaining and insightful answers during his media day appearance, touching upon what it would take to win MVP, his bond with Jaden McDaniels and Naz Reid, a new go-to move in the clutch (“You’ll see!”), and how he’ll stay motivated against bad teams (by trying to set a career-high in scoring).

But the crux of it all was a nod to the repetitive, mind-numbing nature of greatness. That’s true for masters of every field; there are no shortcuts to earning success.

Minny coach Chris Finch outlined what he wanted from Edwards. It’s a very good list, headlined by my two biggest pet peeves: Finishing at the rim, and closing games strong. If Edwards can fix those recurring problems and remain an elite three-point shooter, he’ll be a top-five player in the league.

The Wolves have been to consecutive Western Conference Finals, but framed another way, that means they’ve fallen two series short in back-to-back years. Edwards knows the path. We’re about to see how boring the league’s most exciting player can be.