Chris Herring from ESPN joins Dan Devine to talk about all of the things that they love about the NBA right before the league heads into its all-star break.

00:00 - Count me in!

04:05 - Moment of joy - Dereck Lively’s “Happy Birthday”

07:40 - NBA Love Letters

08:20 - The MVP race without Joel Embiid

12:20 - New York Knicks role players

18:50 - Early season surprises still playing well

23:00 - Defense-first NBA players

27:30 - The new look Milwaukee Bucks

34:15 - Victor Wembanyama

39:00 - Amen & Ausar Thompson

45:15 - Minnesota Timberwolves

49:30 - The Closing Five

71:50 - Weekly recommendations

On this episode of Devine Intervention, Yahoo Sports senior NBA writer Dan Devine welcomes ESPN’s Chris Herring to the show to get through the “senioritis” that permeates through the week before NBA’s all-star break to talk about what each of them love about this NBA season.

We start with a moment of NBA joy, which Chris Herring used to talk about the Dallas Mavericks fans singing “Happy Birthday” to rookie center Dereck Lively on his 20th birthday, and then get into what we’re calling “NBA Love Letters”.

Dan kicks off by talking about how excited he is to watch an MVP race that won’t simple be between Nikola Jokic and Joel Embiid. It’s a bummer that Embiid is injured, but it opens up the possibility of guys like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Luka Doncic or even Donovan Mitchell getting into the MVP conversation.

Chris’ love letters center around the play of the Knicks’ role players, defense-first players finding a way to stay on the floor (Herb Jones, Kris Dunn, etc.), Victor Wembanyama’s dominant play against the Raptors and the Minnesota Timberwolves figuring out how to win with Rudy Gobert.

Dan talks about how happy he is that the early season surprise teams (Timberwolves, Pacers, Thunder, etc.) are still playing well and likely headed towards a high seed in the playoffs, the Milwaukee Bucks playing better under Doc Rivers, and the tenacious duo of Amen and Ausar Thompson.

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