You want to know what sports talk has devolved to at this time of year? Here’s Marcus Hayes explaining the Ben Simmons will totally get Philly sports fans* because his father played in the cauldron that is Australian professional basketball:

“He’s a legacy guy. You know, his dad was a very, very good player for 13 years in Australia. He wasn’t Dell Curry, and he wasn’t Mychal Thompson. But he was a very big-name in Australia. Sport in Australia is very similar animal to sport in Philly. It’s incredibly important. He understands that.”

The first three times I watched this I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or not. But no, Marcus Hayes would like you to know that if you can make it in Melbourne, you can make it anywhere.

Side note: I was looking up footage of Ben Simmons’ father, Dave, playing for the Melbourne Tigers, mostly to compare crowd sizes and prove Marcus wrong, but I never got past the fact that they were actually sponsored by Fosters, Australian for beer:

How cliché.

*I’m not implying he won’t. But I’m fairly certain him growing up as a privileged kid in Australia will have little to do with it.