Apologies in advance for presenting the unsuspecting reader with any portion of any conversation between Colin Cowherd and Enes Kanter, as nobody’s day necessarily needed that. But here is their exchange today on the subject of Zion Williamson:
Cowherd comes out full of praise for last week’s No. 1 overall pick, in order to set up his guest’s disagreement. “I kind of feel like he’s overhyped. I feel like he’s Julius Randle with hops,” Kanter said. “That’s how I believe. Some players are even scared to say it, but you know me, I’m not scared to say anything.”
The comparison isn’t an unflattering one, at least on offense. Randle is coming off a career season where he polished his brand of meaty, punishing bullyball and shot 34 percent from deep, a mark young Zion would be elated to hit. “Julius Randle with hops,” used here somewhat derisively, sounds a bit like a terrifying basketball player. But the working theory of Williamson is that he’d be something much, much scarier on the other side of the ball, unlike turnstiles such as Randle and (duh) Kanter himself.
“How would you defend him?” asked Cowherd. The answer, as is the case involving Enes Kanter and any player on the perimeter, is “not at all,” or on a good day, “by tottering backwards like a milk-drunk 10-month-old.” But Kanter answered this in the hypothetical, and tempered his diss with some praise: “Probably just let him shoot. But if he develops his shot, he definitely could become a Hall of Famer. It’s all in his hand, he just needs to work and go out there and show the whole world.”
Randle caught wind and had to get the last word:
A cursory fact-check reveals there wasn’t a whole lot of Kanter-on-Randle in that game; had there been, he wouldn’t have stopped at just 45. And Julius Randle with hops gets 60, easy.