Green Light with Chris Long - Ryen Russillo! NBA Playoffs & Worst NFL #'s. Joe Douglas! NYJ GM on '21 Draft Class & Favorite Football Movies.

Episode Date: June 11, 2021

(01:19) - Welcome, Layup Line, Good, Bad and Ugly from the Week. (37:02) - Joe Douglas on Mekhi Becton, NYJ 2021 Draft Class, GM's Role in the Organization, Scouting for the Baltimore Ravens and Favorite Football Movies. (1:16:08) - Chris and Macon Discuss the Like-ability of Final Eight NBA Playoff Teams. (1:30:04) - Ryen Russillo on the 2021 NBA Playoffs, Chris Paul's Importance, Boston Celtics Next Head Coach, Chris' Basketball Comp, Space Jam with LeBron James and Worst NFL Uniform Numbers. Green Light Spotify Music: https://open.spotify.com/user/951jyryv2nu6l4iqz9p81him9?si=17c560d10ff04a9b Spotify Layup Line: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1olmCMKGMEyWwOKaT1Aah3?si=675d445ddb824c42 Green Light with Chris Long: Subscribe and enjoy weekly content including podcasts, documentaries, live chats, celebrity interviews and more including hot news items, trending discussions from the NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, NCAA are just a small part of what we will be sharing with you. http://bit.ly/chalknetwork Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

And the other thing I love about Paul is he showed up and Billy Donovan in that year with Oklahoma City, they were like, okay, we're going to, you know, we're going to sit you a ton. We're going to make sure you're healthy. Like, do whatever. And he was like, nah, fuck that. I'm playing. We're winning and give me the ball. And I'm running shit.

Like, what are you talking about? Like, I'm here to ball. We're going to fucking play. And they made the playoffs. That Thunder team wasn't that good. They were bad. And the fact that he did that instead of like all these other guys are like, nah, cool.

I can just get paid and check out on this. that's why I will Cape See how young I sounded there making? You sounded super like lit there. Yeah, that's why I cape 100 for him. Propecia Pod

Joe Douglas Ryan Rissillo a bunch of good looking bald guys joining us today. Joe Douglas, obviously GM of the up-and-coming New York Jets also as a bald head coach and Ryan Rosillo, and Joe Douglas, by the way,

my guy. A lot of the reason I ended up in Philly. Ryan Rosillo, podcast uncle, Macon's favorite guy, we'll be joining us to talk NBA and more. Big ups to the fellows out there going through the propitia and the Rogaine ritual. I mean, bigger ups to the guys that just said like, I got a good looking bald head. Fuck it. I wish I had a good looking bald head. But some folks don't. And you need to cling on, hold on for dear life. Klingon. That's what my forehead would look like if I was bald, so that makes a lot of sense. Are we going to keep looking at each other through the hoop of your hydroflask here? It's a good-looking hydroflash. You know I stay hydrated. By the way, on the topic of hydration,

go check out Tom Segura's Tom Talks. I was just on it, episode 13. I haven't had that much fun talking to somebody I've never met in quite a while. I mean, and I like meeting people, but Tom, who is the self-proclaimed water king, we had to work it out. who's more hydrated, who cares about water more. It's a confluence, if you will. Me and Tom, check it out. Tom talks. He's also coming to Charlottesville this fall.

So we'll go see a show. How about it? Okay. Comedy. Speaking of okay. Yeah. Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. Hello.

Broken Arrow. I'm still, my dad says he's still seeing the royalty checks. They just flood in. Dog, did you know, have I called you dog multiple times? Yeah, not today. Howie Long was in Malcolm in the middle Yeah King of the Hill

Well hold on He was in a movie with Tom Hanks too Howie Long married with children Yeah no he was I can't remember that thing you do I think he was in a thing you do Yeah He had a good little run there But you know he sacrificed his acting career

His career as a thespian For his children And I appreciate that I really do Broken Arrow I still have beef We've talked about this with Dave Damashek I have a lot of beef with Christian Slater and his family.

Partially because Christian Slater kicked my dad out of a moving training, I had to see him die on the silver screen. Quite the friendship of him and Travolta had. But also because Christian Slater's younger brother at the time, who was a few years older than me, I don't know which younger brother it was, but I vividly remember I'm 10, 11 years old, and he's filming this movie, and we came in for a couple days. and Christian Slater's younger brother who's older than me and more mature asked me in front of a group of people if I know what a blow job is

because it's like kids like, hey, I just learned a word like, you know, and I just turned red in the face because I had no idea. And I said, is it like a vacuum cleaner? And everybody laughed at me like all the other kids. And I just, it was one of the most embarrassing moments of my young life. up there with when I went to a buddy's house when I first moved to Virginia as a eight, nine, 10 year old, maybe it was like 11 or 12

till the cool kids allowed me in their click. It was almost like a ritual. I went to Redacted's house and these five other little kids took me outside and showed me their maple tree and told me that Redacted's dad was growing marijuana. And they hyped me up to try to smoke a maple tree. And I was ready.

and at the last second they told me it was a maple tree. And 25 years later, I mean, I got a successful podcast so who's laughing out. Very addicted to marijuana drugs. Just very. Definitely not maple trees. You found the real stuff, huh? Yeah, but Broken Arrow also, not just a classic,

also a Neil Young song. I have no idea if he wrote it about the nuclear code, broken arrow or about the city in Oklahoma. Howie Long, which is an interesting name. Howie Long. Howie Matthew Moses Long. Moses is tight.

It's tight as fuck. Howie Long has one writer credit. You want to know what it is? Football for dummies. NFL Thursday night football week three, 2020 Miami Dolphins at Jacksonville Jaguars. That's random as hell. That was a barn burner too, by the way.

I lost money on that game. Was that the one where I almost picked the score? Yeah, you did. Almost picked the score. You were in that kind of rain-manish run of like actually getting everything right without watching any of the games. It was incredible. A Waffle House.

I know. Me and Reed were talking about it yesterday. We're ready. Okay, cool. Hey, Howie Long, love the guy. You know who else I love? My brother Kyle. And my brother Kyle got hurt in OTAs.

So it was a tough day yesterday just to hear he had some more bad luck. I mean, I don't know how long he's going to be out. I'm reading the internet just like you, but, you know, part of an exciting offensive line group in Kansas City. And that's why you have depth. I mean, because, I mean, guys get hurt in OTAs. I mean, it happens all the time. You know, San Francisco shut down their OTAs the other day because two guys got their ACLs torn within three plays. You know, and that can be pretty crushing. Like, guys were like shook up over that. It's hard watching people get carted off anytime. But when it's in the summer and you're in pajamas. The hardest thing about OTAs is people knowing how to practice, and I'm not,

I'm not saying I know what happened in Kansas City, but any time a lineman gets rolled up on, it's not his fault. You know, it's like when you're bracing, I would liken it to, if you just, if I told you to hold up a wall that's falling over, if you're listening, just imagine the walls falling in. And you're just holding it up and you're straining, and then somebody rolled a big gas like cannon ball, the size of, you know, your lower leg into your knees, your ACL is going to tear, you're going to break something, you're going to, you're going to have a fracture, you're going to have a soft tissue injury if you're lucky, could be a sprain, but if you're unlucky, it could be worse. And it happens all the time to linemen. And I just hate that for him.

And he's had bad luck. I mean, he works so hard to get off the couch, you know, after a year out of football and the run of injuries he had in Chicago. And for this to happen, it was crushing, man. Like yesterday when I heard this news, I mean, you're just, you're helpless. Number one, he's my little brother. He'll always be my little brother. I don't care if he's fucking two feet taller than me, 100 pounds heavier. I see the little kid. I've said this before. So, you know, it's really hard to hear about this. You know, I was in London the first time he got hurt and carted off in Chicago and I was sitting there with my mom at dinner. I'll never forget like the look on her face and I just knew before she even told me what was happening because we were watching

his game on the phone. And that was a bad luck thing too. You get rolled up on and so he's had a bad run of injuries but I just want to say this. He's worked very hard to get back and a lot of these injuries you can't control and you know anybody on you know who has something else to say about it can really just fall down the fucking stairs and have one of their own. But I love my brother. I'm proud of him. He's busting his balls to get off the couch and come back and you just have bad luck. Wishing him a speedy recovery.

Not that he's necessarily listening to the podcast, but if you're sitting around for a couple weeks or a month or two or whatever it's going to be, I don't know. Shit. Maybe listen to Greenlight Pod a little bit, my brother. Maybe come on the Greenlight Pod. There we go. Kansas City correspondent, Kyle Long.

for a few weeks. We love you and get well soon. Football is a motherfucker. But when I heard yesterday, I didn't know I had like, I think I was like in shock for 30 minutes. It was just the sheer bad luck of it. And I was just riding down the road,

gripping the steering wheel like white knuckle. And I didn't even realize I was driving 25 miles an hour on 250. Like people are behind me like, what the fuck is wrong with this guy? It just, it's hard to hear that about your brain. brother. It's hard to hear that about a family member. And that's part of why every mom, every dad, who has a kid in the NFL and has to watch them go through that for a decade plus

deserves like some sort of a medal. It's the most physical game. There is. I mean, I'm serious about that too. It's more physical than hockey. Hockey, I still contend those guys are tough with the like the lacerations and the teeth and, you know, pausing for a second from the bit. I actually do think football is the more physical sport. Well, in MMA, we just have Mike Chandler on, you can protect yourself. That's half the battle. Yes. You don't have other people darting at you.

The bodies are flying, dude. And, you know, like one of my worst injuries was a roll-up. You know, actually, both of them were roll-ups. The two injuries that kept me out of all the games I missed in the NFL were roll-ups. And so it's just the fucking, it's just bad luck. And when you play in the trenches, things happen. And so I'm wishing them a speedy recovery. layup line now layup line had a little little prelude smashing pumpkins which was delightful

i'm smashing pumpkins was yeah i uh maybe we go down that road someday you like siamese dream simi's dream is one of the best albums you know in the 90s period but layup line today layup line proper was the iconic uh philadelphia freeway song what we do which is not only an incredible tour to force, as people called our podcast, with Scott Van Pelt last week. Congratulations to us. It was a tour to force from Freeway, Jay, and Beans, Beanie Siegel. Three outstanding verses,

and probably my favorite Beanie Segal verse. I mean, you know, it's chalky, but I love the song. And what a great 48 hours in Philly. That's why I threw it on. We had the Frosties the other night. Listen, it's so simple. people do it with car washes they do it with all types of shit

but to see that group of fans at Wells Fargo just go nuts in the fourth quarter of a blowout because some guy on the Hawks missed two free throws and you're going to get a frosty it was like an antidepressant for me I was in a terrible mood and I found myself just

shit eating grin staring at the TV I mean the frosty thing I can't get enough of and then there's a guy on the Phillies that the name is escaping me the next day Luke Williams Luke Williams

Big shout out to Luke Williams He should ring the bell at the next playoff game Damn First game he's called up In the majors he hits a dong A decisive dong Big Dinger Got out in a hurry

So congrats to that cat And what a 48 hours in Philly Best Sports City on the planet Yeah shout out to J. Dub and Beanie and Segal and pow pow and all those other fellows Pau-Pow? Yeah, pow-pow. What's that?

Is pow-pow? Is that, uh, that's snow, right? No, but free pooh-h-hysty. Free? Pow-Pow is snow. Yeah. Is it also drugs or just snow? Yeah, pow-pow is snow, like people up in the, like, uh, a lot of the people that go out west

to do cocaine and ski, they like to call it fresh pow-pow. Okay. Yeah. And they talk like this, bro. Breckenridge and Vale. Uh, you've been up to the fridge, bra? I haven't. Some fresh pow-pow up there.

A-bay, Keystone, J-hole. Crunchy as fuck! Reed, you crudgy as fuck. Go to about 10,000 feet. Find some fresh gnar-nar-n-ar. Wow. 10,000 feet, find fresh gnar-nar-n-r. Last time I was at 10,000 feet, I was in Park City.

Park City. Roof-cress, Pock City. Some fresh tar-tar up there and then go up the hill and get some gnar-nar. Some tar tar at Ruth Chris Park City. Go up to hell, get some gnar-nar. Where do we get here? Layup line. Frosties.

Luke Wilson. Williams. He had a better day than Luke Wilson did. I guarantee you that. What a day. Imagine you just roll the ball out there and hit a walk-off dong. No doubt. You don't even like anything you do after this.

Like, just retire, dude. That's going to leave me to my good. Okay. Chris. What's your good? Well, Virginia baseball team, a guy named Devin Ortiz had a no doubt or he was also the starting pitcher to lift the Wahoos into the Super Regionals in the NC2A Division I baseball tournament.

That was electric as you would put it. Oh, it was electric. College baseball is electric. As I've always said, as I said first, as I said before, any other podcast in America or globally. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah, so let me, because I've been, you know, like, it's no secret.

I don't watch regular season baseball. I mean, MLB, yes. So you're 15 games so far this year, I'd say we're at. I need to update the Blue Jays schedule. How long have you been? It's not going to be bad, but it's not going to be accurate. So anyways, I don't watch, like, college baseball, like, at all until Virginia's in it. And I love it, but, you know, there's only so much time in the day.

And unless the Wahoos are in there, I'm just not watching. So what are the odds for us this year? Sure. Well, who started about 4 and 12 in the ACC or thereabouts? It was looking bad after being top five preseason. Here's the deal. It's a 64 team tournament, just like Hoops. Right, right, right.

HOOPS is now 68, which whatever. They're 16, 14-team pods. One team comes out of each. So now we're in the Super Regionals where there are 16 teams, best two out of three against. There are eight best two out of three series. Golly, dude, that's a mouthful. Yeah, I could have done that better.

You know, that was probably a C-minus, but you go from 64 to 16, and then eight meet in Omaha, Nebraska for the College World Series. So, Virginia's up against Dallas Baptist. So they just meet somewhere in the middle of America. That's right. They get right to the heart of matters.

Before they do that, they meet somewhere random. It's the heart that matters most. In the southeast, Columbia, South Carolina, is where we're playing Dallas Baptist. Yeah. And it sounds like a high school. Didn't know they had a Dallas Baptist play. And winner, again, two out of three is on to Omaha.

Who's also have a pitcher? A bit of a viral star here. Our boy, Scooch. Yeah. Now, I know the fucking guy's name is Shock, which is a cool last name, but I kind of like Scooch. Shock the Cox in Columbia, did he? Graphic. Scooch is good, but his name is shock.

I mean, he's kind of working with a nickname. When he gets here, let's ask him if he kind of likes Scooch. Kind of like Squatch. Like Squatch. We should check our Mark. Yeah. He probably doesn't care about us at all. He probably doesn't think about us at all.

APB for Squatch. How are we doing? Anyway, Scooch. Let me just say this. And you know the story. I do. Okay, there is a story involving myself and this electric,

as you would put it, character Scooch. At Big Donkey 47. Big Donkey 47. Listen, full disclosure. I haven't like I said I didn't watch baseball this year yet a few weeks ago they were like check out Kenny Powers this guy's a baller he's he's just he's charismatic he's he's everything and I said to myself like I love this more Virginia athletes like this guy the charisma on this guy so we start to

hone in on him and I'm saying I really want to get this cat on my pod and I message him and there is a we've met me and scooch we've hung out me and scooch okay There is the most ridiculous story about when and where and how, and we can't wait to tell it on the pod. I think we're going to get our boy scooch on here at some point. We'll wait until the season's over to do it properly. Yeah, I don't want to run him down. He's trying to get outs and shit like that.

Well, and he's done with his schooling so he can really let it loose when we'll get him here in Studio J. Yeah, we'll take it. We'll bring him to Studio J. Also, baseball related good news. The Charlottesville Tom Sox have You know, it's good to be a local Uncle Rico, man Sometimes you throw out the first pitch at Woodbat League Tom Sox, they run a brilliant operation here in town

Some good baseball played out there I don't know what else to say But I'll be there, what's the date? June the 16th. June the 16th on my redemption tour It's a redemption tour because the first time I threw out a first pitch It was in St. Louis when I was a rookie You guys probably have heard this story

if you listen to the podcast, but to refresh you, all the rookies came to a Cardinals game, baseball heaven. I'm throwing out the first pitch. I'm in the bullpen. I'm talking to the catcher. I'm like, what do I do? He's like, don't skip it. If you do anything, don't skip it. So he's like, all right, I'm not going to skip it. I'm pretty literal. Well, I take a full windup, you know,

and rifle that thing about 80 miles an hour, and it sails on me. Into the dome of a veteran of the United States military. Just missed a gentleman that had served in World War II, who presumably may not be with us anymore. So God rest his soul, thank you for your service, my brother. To cover all your bases. I'm just trying, hey, but when I say that ball whizzed by that cat's head who was unsuspecting and probably paying attention to something else, it was very close.

And had I hit a guy that fucking survived Iwo Jima and killed him, you could like put me on the terrorist watch list. I mean, that would have been my life could have changed right there. my life could have completely changed right there the ball was thrown so hard it hit the the brick backstop there and rolled the first okay so imagine what it would have done to a cat's head who was presumably 80 years old are you at all worried about doing this again not at all should we clear all the veterans off the field okay all the veterans off the field but we do want to invite the green light faithful there's so many of you that probably love this show enough to come out and cheer for me And we have Charlottesville High School.

This is the first time in my life that I've ever like solicited support. And I'm doing it. 6.45 p.m. Charlottesville High School, 6.45 p.m. Wednesday to 16th. Wednesday to 16th. Macon's not signing any autographs. Well.

We'll be there. Hey, Mike's. You want to go to our, uh, our newspaper reading correspondent briefly? Sure. Hey, if I saw it, but your name is on the, second page of the sports section there was a little blurb in there Chris throwing out the ball

and the Fossacks got a Tom Sox game and mentioned you in the last sentence is hosting Greenland with Chris and I assume we're on for tomorrow and he assumes we're on for tomorrow we have a standing Friday lunch

Oh good good good I love a good men's lunch Hey, it's great to hear Big Brad's voice. And he should send it. He should correspond with us more often. That's my dad. That's about 10 a.m. He thought I had already read the sports section of the newspaper I don't get.

And I must have must have seen our names. You can bet that's cut out. But dog, maybe. Our names are in the paper. Oh, that's cool. That's really cool. Yeah. And one more thing.

Like another good here. Merch. We put out merch every now and again. Yesterday. Did you see the thing with Ryan Fitzpatrick? I sent it to you, so it's a rhetorical question, yes. Well, not so much rhetorical because you send me lots of things, and it's just, it's a lot sometimes.

Yeah, well, I know. It is a lot. There's a brain dump going on continually, but Ryan Fitzpatrick. And I appreciate it. No, thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you for saying that you appreciate me texting you, like machine gun style.

Yeah. Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, like, it just, it doesn't stop. And I know that. I know that one sentence is one text. And, you know, like, well, yesterday I was just, shocked because Stephen. Yeah,

I was Stephen shocked because I feel like him going to a place like Virginia is the only thing keeping him from branding himself as the shocker. You know what I mean? I don't know, dude. He's doing pretty well

even at a place like Virginia. Yeah, I know. So anyways, yesterday Ryan Fitzpatrick making good content, not even trying. I mean, like typical.

He's just walking off the field and there's a cicada in his beard and it's just resting there like the bird and Peter Griffin's beard, right? And it doesn't move, and he walks off and Washington football team tweets it, and people like, oh, there's a cicada in his beard.

What can't this guy do, basically? Like, that's what has become. And it hit me that cicadas, they stay underground for 17 years. 17 years. They don't take flight until their 17th year. Took me two seconds to Google what year this is for Ryan Fitzpatrick.

What year is this? 17th. It's the 17th year, dude. It's the 17th year. And I might have been stoned in the office midday when this happened. Okay? I might have gotten a little stone in the office. I had my work done.

Interviewed my old GM, assistant GM, you know? And I want it online with some stores and Bickle. I opened my phone and I see, like, this is mind-blowing. This feels preordained to me. This shit is, like, nobody else was as blown away as me. and I thought, well, maybe when I'm not stoned anymore, I won't be blown away. I'm still blown away.

I'm of sound mind right now. There was a cicada in his beard. This is biblical stuff. Everybody in the Bible had beards, yeah? Yeah. Okay? This guy's got a beard. Cicadas.

Pestulence. There's a whole bunch of biblical themes here. One being to the Washington football team is going to take flight. On the wings of Ryan Fitzpatrick, he's emerging from underground. He's been in shit, situations. He's never had a situation where he had this much talent, this good a coach, and this

much of a clear runway to succeed. And I'm so excited. So naturally, within 30 minutes to be, to credit myself and my creative genius, if I may, we spit out those t-shirts. It's Ryan Fitzpatrick riding on the cicada. It says, year 17. It says take flight in script on the bottom. That t-shirt is fire, bro you need to get to I don't even know how to plug this thing or where to plug it read where can we get that's the next piece that's the only piece I can never get is like what's it how do I give you

the action item go to my Twitter I retweet it all pin the tweet right now we create the merch we just don't sell the merch no I think we're selling merch here until now read are we selling some merch have you been a lot of calls getting a lot of merch sold a lot of calls hey I heard about your cicada shirt guy reads.

Reese says there's a lot of calls. In the last 30 minutes, I've got six calls from Boise, Idaho. So a lot of people in Boise, Idaho calling about the merch. But you can go to T-public.com. Car warranty service center. T-public.

Here it is. T-public.com forward-slash-T-H-R-T. That's spelled S-H-R-T. You just spell shirt for the people? Yeah, I mean, I just want to make sure. Forward slash 224-371. Hold on. Dot, dot, dot.

I can't pin somebody else. us is tweet. So I'm about to tweet this and say Greenlight Pod merch. Now do I get a piece of this one? No, you're gonna get half of this stuff. Okay. The shirt is also pinned on

the Greenlight Twitter account. Yep. Which is either at Chalk Network or at Chalk Media. At Chalk Media. Boom. Yeah. Shark Network. Is it network? At Chalk Network.

He said boom. pointed me and said boom. I don't know my fucking listen if if if there's any more proof that I'm just in this for the love of the game but yep no doubt you can I'm not lying about that all right I'm tweeting now can I go bad please yeah that was good and there's a lot of good the bad is I got another wedding invite I feel like former players in Manhattan probably get invited to a lot of weddings like Rangers Knicks you know that type of thing

Yankees but they get paid I guarantee they get paid so if anybody's like here I'm just putting this out there I said this last week somebody found my email and invited me to a wedding you know somebody that lived near me and I was like you know

I didn't say anything because it doesn't really deserve a response of no offense well you don't know the person no offense we don't know each other and I barely like weddings of people that I like you know they can be great but they can be it's a mixed bag the biggest thing i hate about weddings is getting caught in uncomfortable conversations with people i don't know so i would i would deduce that i'd probably be caught in a lot of those

if i rsvp to any of your weddings oh how do you know tom well i don't i don't i'm just a washed up football player that the dad of the bride likes and the bride's like why the fuck is he here so anytime you're thinking about inviting me to your wedding, whether it's via DM or email or telegram or however you send out your unreasonable invites. Just know that, like, if you attach a price, I'll consider it. Like, I'm trying to get that, I'm not trying to get that, you know, former Yankee bag. I know this in Manhattan, but like, you want me at your rural, bucolic, you know, central Virginia wedding. Four digits. Yeah, at least four digits, man. Four digits. Yeah, four digits.

I mean, 7K for a night's work. Yeah, let's not negotiate against ourselves. Okay, all right. Hey, if y'all want me, it's yours. Three digits. I will respectfully decline, but I need no fee. Just stop. Like, if you're going to send me a wedding invite, I appreciate you.

I take it as a compliment, but just know very pragmatically, time is money. And I certainly don't do big crowds unless there's something in it for me. I didn't even know this was a thing at all. This is news to me. I've heard of like mascots being invited to a wedding. Yeah. Cav man, that's a party. But just a random person you don't know.

Like that would give me anxiety as a groom. The ugly for me, okay? My dog ate some human shit this week. That's a tough look. Yeah, went in the trash can. It's a trash can that rolls out. I got the text from my lovely wife at like two. I was at work.

You know, I know you're not trying to, but the dog ate shit today because you left the trash can rolled out. which begs the question who in your house is shitting into the trash can well mostly my two year old oh interesting you know sometimes you deposit a

well if you heard the story without knowing it was a trash can I think you'd first probably go to like why was the dog lapping up poop out of a toilet it wasn't soup it was a bowl it was a diaper and there was a diaper that makes a whole lot more sense yep so the dog ate human shit in the trash can.

And I can see why that was probably a roller coaster if you don't know the age of my kids or why there was something in the trash can. That was ugly. Didn't kiss the dog for about two days. How long do you go between not giving your dog a kiss when your dog does something like that? Like I used to, I love dogs,

and I used to not be a dog petter because I'm strange. I don't want to wash my hands to get pet dander off of my person as soon as possible. And now with the rabbit, I mean, she can do no wrong. She can be, she can be taking care of business

she can be cleaning things up back there let's do uh 30 minutes moratorium and then we're back to loving on each licking her own chalupa well that's offensive is it offensive is it dogs do that that's offensive to women

no it's offensive to men is like are you saying women are dogs you said what did you mean you're saying women are dogs what did you mean by what you said the dog's vagina right okay do people ever call our dicks like things that like you know other inanimate objects to compare them to like ant eaters and

fucking grain silos and i am taken back to a time when i i told you i'd rather not talk about such subjects as uh well the only reason we're talking about things like uh fecal matter space shuttles that are shaped like dicks or or private parts yeah the only reason we're doing that is because you balk so hard at me calling so he's it's don't say hey would you rather be me say the medical term, the anatomical term? Yes. Okay, so you have an ugly, right? My ugly is Ryan Rusillo. Just that's it. He's coming on the podcast. Well, he's on the show today. Yeah. And he and I, oh no, I didn't mean it like that. Yeah, no. Handsome fella. Just, but he and I have a bit of a rivalry stemming to a year-long co-hosting gig you had with him once upon a time. Yeah, yeah. And now it's

Like, hey. Not my best work. I wouldn't know. Didn't listen. But I'm glad. You know, now you and I sort of have something going. Yeah,

he's the X. Don't be the person that doesn't get along with the X when they drop the kids off. We're trying to keep everything cordial here. Okay. I can do that. All right. Talentless hack.

Numbers, dude. That's another ugly thing before we get to Joe Douglas. Julio Jones. Julio Jones. Tullio Jones is what we should call him because he's now number two. And that shit is shaped like a Z on the Titans uniform.

It's hideous to me. But I also reserve the right to not commit to this take because Julio could make almost anything look cool. And does Julio get any credit for saying, no, I'm good. I don't need the 11 from you. I think he probably does because it would have definitely looked better. But Julio deserves credit and so does A.J. Brown.

Right. For being so welcoming. Now, are you just anti-2 generally? I'm not, because Albert Breer tweeted at me. You know, like, I'm not. I hope nobody misunderstood. Now, some of these single-digit numbers are, it's a circumstance of like, why?

Why? Like, just because you can't doesn't mean you should. There's a lot of things in life like that, right? Like, eventually they legalize heroin. I'm good, okay? That was an extreme example. But the single-digit numbers, like Sterling Shepard, I thought he looked sweet in 87

G-Men and he changed his number to what? Three. You know, three is one of my favorite single-digit numbers for a receiver. I put it like up there with nine and one. But most of them are kind of cheeks to me and actually like 87 looked just fine. Jalen Ramsey's changing his number. That's disturbing.

It's a little disturbing. Still one of my favorite players in the world but why? He's gone from 20 to 5. and in our head pictures you see Jalen Ramsey's in a 20. That five is, I don't know. A quarterback?

Shout out to Ben James. There you go. My high school quarterback. My quarterback. That's my quarterback. I assume you love the deuce, for instance, on a Carson Wince in Indianapolis. The font's better.

I mean, I still, we talked about this when Carson changed his number. I thought it was like there were better options. But anyways, I just think like just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Let me ask you a couple. Upgrade or downgrade. Buda Baker, 32 to 3. It's a lateral move.

Hollywood Brown, 15 to 5. I think you're going backwards. Cowboys boy, KJ. Hamler, 13 to 1. I think any time you can go one as a receiver, you better make sure you have the personality for it, but it's not a bad thing. Cam Acres, 23 to 3. Nope, that can't be.

That is. 23 is cool, man. Jordan. Yeah. Patrick Peterson, 21 to 7. That one, although I get it because it was the LSU thing and that sort of thing. When I first saw it, I was like, what?

I mean, that's Taysam Hill's number, man. Two more. Matthew Judon, 99 to 9. I love that. Okay. I think about, with number nine, I think about there was a guy that played for you, Khan when we played. He was like an absolute

beasty tackle. I can't remember his name currently, but he was number nine. Anytime, although the Marvin Austin thing sticks in my head, he was a single digit guy. I'm not a big fan of single digit lineman, but I hate the number 99, like moderately.

Leonard Furnett, 28 to 7. Another LSU guy going back to... I'm not into the seven thing. Seven is a really awkward football number on a non-quarterback. And I said 59 was the worst number. The thing I Yeah, I got a little blowback. I got like people tagging Roosevelt, Colvin,

Danish Faithan, Seth Joyner, people are talking about London Fletcher. Man, I went back in my turtle shell there. I was like, you know what? I'd take it back because I was wrong. Well, there are some people... I was thinking about a center who has like number 59. That is absolute trash.

But a linebacker can make it look good. They just have to be good. You know what I mean? There are people who can overcome the bad aesthetic of a number. Including our guy, Micaheuser. those Rams numbers, I'm good with those. So I retracted that, a rare tweet that I just, I was wrong. And, you know, to Albert Breer, who said, I think Julio Jones will pull it off just fine.

He sent me an Oklahoma picture. He sent me a couple college uniforms of guys wearing two and looking swaggy as fuck. That's because college fonts are good and their uniforms aren't cheeks. I'm not saying I have a problem with two. I have a problem with the NFL uniforms. So that's fair. It's fair as fuck. We'll get Joe Douglas coming on in a second, and then we will talk to Ryan after that.

But Joe Douglas is legitimately one of the most down-to-earth cool guys with power in the NFL. I think power can be intoxicating. I think whether you're a coach or a GM, you're batting about 50%, you're batting about 500 on the douchebag rate. And I'm not saying who's who. I'm just saying that Joe Douglas is really cool. Joe Douglas never forgot where he came from. And Joe Douglas had a lot to do with a lot of those veterans in 2017 in Philly. So I've been, you know, saying, hey, let's get the big fellow on the show and cool of him to come on.

Man, the question you asked at one point, people should just stick around to hear that. There we go. All right. So this is my dude right here. A lot of the reason why I ended up in Philly was that's a good or a bad thing. I don't know. I'd have to ask him. But Joe Douglas joins us.

Joe, how you doing, man? I love your office. It looks like it's bigger now than the last time I saw your office. A little bigger. What's all, brother? How you doing? I'm good, man. The big question, two years in since you've been in New York, have you met Fireman Ed yet?

I have. Yeah. So the first training camp, we had fans, 2019. It was awesome. Fans were out in force. I've had a chance to stay on time, Fireman. Strong grip. Great hug.

Really? good like, is he a rotate the hand on top of your hand and the handshake kind of guy? He's a grab you pull you in. Oh, he's a pull you in guy. You guys hit it off quick, I bet. Yeah, awesome. Awesome, guys. He's so passionate.

I want to ask you, because you mentioned the fans, and he's like the mascot of Jets fans. But like, this has been a weird year last year. There was no fans in the stadium. There wasn't the same buzz. There wasn't the same atmosphere. And that affects the players. But for you guys, obviously, it's been talked about a lot. It was a unique year in scouting and evaluating players.

How different was it and what's the most creative you had to get to see a guy? I mean, obviously very different. Some of these teams didn't play football at all. Some of these teams had abbreviated season. Some teams didn't start to live through the fall. So I think it forced to force our entire scouting staff to be creative, be flexible. We're blessed here to have a great group of dudes, great group of guys. guys that have great connections throughout the data. And so there are limitations in terms of what

you could physically do in terms of traveling to a campus, going to a game. So there were obviously limitations, the relationships that our guys had with the game, that really helped us. Can you get the same, like if you don't have face-to-face with a kid, like, you know, you get the same idea of who he is if we're talking over Zoom like you and I are doing right now. It's much different than if we were sitting right there. But like, was there a deficit in how much you could really learn about a guy from a distance? Yeah, I know, we had two years of that, really, because obviously two years ago, we had the combine no probates. This year, we had no combine but the pro days. The same thing was everything, all the conversations and interviews with the show.

There's a little bit of news, not being face-to-face. How about, you know, with the rookies now in town, has anybody been like, have you been at any point? Like, holy shit, that guy's bigger and I thought, seeing him out on the field. And you're lighting up right now when I say the word big, because you love big dudes, man. But has anybody surprised you, whether it was like with an attribute or an energy or something where you hadn't gotten a chance to meet that kid

or see him play in person? Yeah, so, man, a lot of these workers that bring so much to choose and energy. There's two guys that we drafted in a day three, Hansenazer, doing genuine and children, both safeties at Florida State and Auburn, respectively. And we bring them in, and they're making the transitional lineback with it. They're doing great. But you stand next and I'm amazed by, like, their wingspan and their length, just how quickly they're closed to the ball.

That was not having those live games and really only having the senior bowl, getting these guys in and really getting up close and personally of these guys the first time. It's like, wow, okay, yeah, I'm glad this guy, too, you know, just to see some of those traits kind of slow. That senior bowl was a godsend this year, huh? With everything Jim and those guys do down there because I felt like that was the only big thing you guys got a real look at people. It was the only thing. There was no East West.

There was no NFLPA game out west that took together in terms of all-star games. So this was really one and the only chance that our scouting staff could really see these guys to play live for the most part. And Jim Nagy did a great job putting that together making it as safe as possible. There's nothing negative came out of it from an injury or COVID perspective.

So I'm really, really thankful for him and what he did. You mentioned your two safeties that are transitioning to linebacker, which is becoming more of a common thing that guys in the back end are moving up, you know, to that second level of the defense. And now you've got guys like Devin White running around and running like a four or five. And that's going to, is that the future of the NFL? Are we just about there? like, is that transition harder than people make it seem?

Well, I think it's transitioning into a space game. So I think you're seeing, seeing these athletes that, you know, back in the day, you know, when I was coming up in, you know, 80s and 90s, and that lineback position was a downhill hammer. Had to take on the ISO all the time. Yeah, well, now with the spread offense, and these guys have to be able to function in space, right? So I think, I think that there's been a real effort.

at the lineback position and obviously saw it with the Super Bowl thing this year. Guys like that have been running around, closing on battles like I thought. So that's really, I think you're seeing that the spread offense that affect these defenses. How hard has it been to kind of level set expectations for the second Michael Carter that you drafted? You know, you drafted a Michael Carter in the fourth and then you drafted a Michael Carter in the fifth. And it just so happens that Michael Carter, the second one you drafted. his name is Michael Carter the second. Does that guy have an inferiority complex?

How's y'all's relationship? Because you said it in the draft that you liked the other Michael Carter better. No, look, I love Michael Carter. Which one, both? I mean, who knows? No, it was important that, you know, we have Michael Carter. And Michael Carter is second. It's so weird.

I mean, both of them played in the same North Carolina. One dude, one UNC. It's kind of odd how that worked out. But both of them are a dynamic dude. man, you know, Michael, Michael Carter, the running back, outstanding back at the U.N.C. Ida productive can do so many things out of the backfield in terms of passing the end. And then Michael Carter second out of Duke, a guy can play safety in nipple, outside. Like, so both of them, you know, same name, same versatility.

I know you're very good at this, like, because you were very good at kind of like when we were in Philly. It was never like, oh, Joe's downstairs. It was like, yo, Joe's downstairs. It's like, good to see you. You got a football background. You get along with the dudes. Like, people respect you because you're a straight shooter. What's your philosophy on not wearing out your welcome downstairs?

Do you have like kind of a like, when guys get there, it's got to be exciting to get to know these kids you're talking about. But what's your philosophy on building a relationship with players? Because obviously you have a head coach player relationship dynamic. And, you know, with GMs, that's more variable. Some guys are like, we stay out of the picture. Some guys are more hands on. Yeah. I think each person has their own philosophy.

I think when I took this job, the one thing is like, I'm going to be me, you know, and I'm still going to try to build a relationship with the players. Obviously, it changes because obviously, you know, the person I was in Philly, I was the number two guy. There's just a different dynamic to that when you become the number one guy. So you might, you know, some guys may not be as open to you as they were in the past, but you're still trying to build that relationship. I think the one thing that I took from just being a player and then in high school and college,

obviously not in pros, but being around Ozzie too and Ozzy's velocity, you don't mess with a locker room. Lockwood is a player's next year. You try to build a relationship, but you stay away to know. That's the guy there. That's where the chemistry is being built and you get them no space. Well, another thing is it's like, and I don't know if I read this wrong, but when you were in Baltimore, your nickname was the Turk and you delivered the bad news. Were you the Grim Reaper at any point?

Yeah, my first few years with that talk to me. And so that's another thing is like you're getting close to people that you know eventually in the NFL. If there's anything that's for certain, there's only a couple ways you can leave a team. And the only way that's good for the players if you retire on your own terms. Otherwise, you're going to get a call or a meeting and it's going to say, like, see you later. So that distance might be part of just coping with that relationship. I know that like there's a philosophy you have, but that's got to be hard eventually

when you have to deliver that news to a player and you had to do it in Baltimore. Yeah, no, it was the worst thing, you know, just because anyone that's ever played any sport, you know, whether it's football, baseball, just to be, you know, just, you know, it's coming, you know, it happened for me in college. You know, it happens for other people at different points.

It's like, hey, it's in the road here. Love you. Love everything you do. You, you, it hurts because, you know, it hurts because, you know you know how much they put it to make this to you. You know what they sacrifice day in and they're out. So there's a, there's an emotional side to, I really want to thank this guy. But at the end of the day, in both parties, there's a business aspect too as well.

So you try to make it short and true. But yeah, it's a tough deal. So the no-noes are don't drag it out. Yeah. Don't drag it out. They'll make it too savvy. I think there's some guys, it's hard. hard, it's hard, man.

And I wasn't even in the Turk, but I remember when we cut Stephen News for killing. Like, that was brutal. Like, as hard as he worked, as much as he gave every single day. And, like, I had them. I was four-a-old-two. Like, that guy brought it every single day. So, like, there's, I think it depends on who it is and how long they've been with the team. Like, you want to handle it with respect.

I think it's funny because if a play, player was trying to guess the toughest cut you've ever made, they might think of some, like, you know, veteran who's a Hall of Fame or something, but, you know, you mentioned the first guy and that's Stephen Means, and that's a guy that, like, if you're a Philly fan, you saw him dominate preseason games, step in when he was asked to step in in the regular season, and as players, you saw him do all the dirty work, saw him bring it every day, kick really good tackles, asses, because they just did not feel like getting that headbutt to the jaw that he was bringing every team period.

I mean, those are the guys that it's hard to let go, I'm sure. I mean, you know, to your point. That guy's a warrior, man. Like, that guy was, first thing in the morning, he was working the bag drills. No one else was out there. He's out there that's dark

and Stephen Means is out there working the bag. So, yeah, that makes it harder. You really see and know how much time and effort he puts in and what a great thing. Do you look at guys as like having ceilings and do you ever communicate those ceilings to those guys? Like because I think communication is such, at least from my standpoint,

I just wanted to be shot straight. You know, like you know me well enough to know that, even if it's kind of ugly, I'd rather hear it. How do you communicate the, the ugly side of maybe that player's future with a team? I mean, anybody can do anything on a team,

but you know you guys have slated kind of ideas for a guy's role and that sort of thing. Yeah, I think the biggest thing is that we never want, We never want to be in a situation where a player leaves, whether he's cut or traded, and he's walking out of the building and they're like, whoa, what just how did this happen? So there has to be that communication, the lies, the expectations, you know, what, and like you said, not sure to go just straight into the point. And it's easier said than done, right?

but we've got to be up front of eyes because, you know, you know, got to smell BS a mile away. Well, I can remember, yeah, I can remember you were honest with me. Like, I can remember you were like, we might draft a kid. And I got to Philly. It was funny, you know, me, you, Ian chopped it up a lot beforehand with the whole Baltimore connection. Ian Yates Cunningham, who I think is going to be the next great GM in the NFL. He was like, you got to talk to Joe. He's my guy.

You'll love him. And you did. You shot me straight. you told me, there's a small chance we draft to D.N. But I just want to underscore there is a chance, you know. And I was in Europe. You know the story. I was getting stem cell to get my house ready.

I woke up at the middle of night. And my phone is blowing up. And sure enough, you draft to D.N. And Derek Barnett, we became like best buddies. And I love D.B. But if it wasn't for you warning me, I might have been like, fuck this shit. You know what I mean? Like I'm 32, 33.

I don't need this. My number two told me that there was a small. chance and that's all I can ask for as long as I know you know what I mean pass rushers young pass rushers Derek Barnett was was one of your favorite guys I think coming out you really like Derek and I really like Derek and I think that when Derek's healthy he's extremely effective and I think people are too short-sighted with young rushers when they look at the sacks because the last few years in Philly he's led the team in quarterback hits on a team full of very active rushers he's made big plays along the way that

contributed to that Super Bowl how do you evaluate you success for a young Russia because that's a tricky position. Yeah. And everybody develops at a different rate, right? And so I think, I think you brought it up like quarterback hits. I think if a casual fan may just judge that based on sacks, but you know there's so much more it goes into it than just a sack.

There's so much it goes into a sack. Some of it may just be luck. Some of it may be great coverage in the back end. But really, I think, I think the one, some of the stats that really measure that consistently over time is that disruption and pressure that guys are getting just just proving that they can they can win consistently one-on-one matchups you know so I think I think that's that's one of the big things that we look at you know that's a

tricky position would you say that's high up on the list of position players I'm not talking about quarterback now because that's the trickiest of them all but when you look at it I have a feeling you're going to tell me you feel like big guys are pretty safe to have evaluate. What's the easiest position group to to not mess up? And what's the hardest one to not mess up? Yeah. You know, I think, I think for me personally, it was always easier for me to evaluate O&D lineman because that's the position I played my entire life. So I knew the ins and out of the footwork, a hand technique, the leverage you're trying to gain. And then for me, where I had to grow was an evaluator was on the back.

end of the defense and offense. You know, the DBs, the wide receivers. But just getting back to your original question, you know, I think we're the tricky evaluations, they're all tricky because it's not an exact sign. It's right. But I think where

the development process may take a little bit longer for positions, I think historically it's been corner wide receiver. I think you see most often the guys that come in and make immediate impacts are, I think, running back. I think of that position, guys have come out of college and they separate it and go. I think it's really the positions that involve the most technique, fundamentals, eye discipline.

Those are the positions that I think can be a little tricky in terms of the projecting how. how fast it would be with like. Is it true like 4-3 defensive end? Is that kind of like a dying, like a left end? I'm talking about like a guy who can stop the run and that sort of thing. Is that a dying breed or did we just get so enamored with some of the other schemes for a while? It's all cyclical. It'll come back.

No, I don't think it's a dying breed. I mean, I think, shoot, I think any good defense that I've been associated with who we have a chance to evaluate. Somebody has to play that role. It's a little bit of a dirty work role like we were talking about with Stephen. You know, it's got to be, you know, for us, we call it the big end.

And in Baltimore, in the early days, that was Rob Burnett, right? He was a dirty work. He was the left defensive end that we slide beside and be a sub-D-T. And, you know, I think, it's got to be a hammer. He's got to be wired the right way. And also, you're ultra-talented.

I think we had that at a very high level with BG. Yeah. I think he's power. Obviously, the Super Bowl winning play he made. He was reduced inside it, you know, and beat the guard for a strip sack. I mean, I don't think it's a bad. I think we very much shouldn't need that presence that could be in.

When you talk about O-Lyman, you know, I was, as if you needed me to text you a bunch, I was so fucking psyched when you all drafted Mackay Beckton. And then again, this year you move up to grab a guard. Like, there's no secret what you like. What I don't think people know for sure is what you like about what you like. So when you're looking at an offensive lineman, what are some non-negotiables for you?

I think today, non-negotiables, you look at, you look at feet, balance, lower, lower flex, they've got to be able to play on the feet. You know, guys that are top heavy on the ground, it's just they're going to struggle. So that balance, that core strength, that lower body flex, length is important.

You know, it's the right or wrong, it's a passing league. It's a league that's about creating explosive plays and then eliminating explosive players defensively. And so when we're going against these fruits of nature, that we're trying to hit the quarterback and really the game.

These guys have to have athleticism in the way to go against that. What's the most jaw-dropping thing you've seen Mackay Beckton do? Honestly, I think one of the coolest things that I saw him do is what the year is no OTAs, right?

No mandatory mini-camps. He came in in training camp and like that dude knew the labor. Like that, Every time our coach had a question for him, he answered it immediately. It was right. There was no tripping him up. So that was like off the field.

Like that was something else. Okay. That's pretty impressive. And then I mean, obviously the physical traits. And he takes his inside hand and he looks a guy off his pins and throws five years to the left. A grown man, you know, doing that to another one of man. It shouldn't look that easy sometimes. What's running through your head when he faces off with?

I think he had Nick Bosa pretty early last year before Nick got hurt. He held his own. Yeah, he had a chance to go against both of those of others. Yeah. We just saw that one. When we were watching the tape, that's a scowdyed light. We were seeing those Titanic matchups. Yeah, you want to see, obviously, want to see how you're about this time.

All right, so we talked about two Michael Carter's earlier. They got to be best friends. there's two other best friends. It's the most perfect pairing in the world. You're Robert Sala. I mean, you're over the tag team conversation when it comes to big imposing bald front office guys and coaches. But I got to know, is it just Barbasol capital of the world in that building?

Or what are you using to shave your dome? How often? And how about Robert? Could you all share some shaving cream at any point? Are you guys using different brands? I got to check with Robert on the brand. You know, I have the wall clippers that I basically take the guard down all the way to shave. So it's like, I'm like a special occasion.

So, you know, it's got to be like a serious special occasion. You know, like the ring ceremony. I bet for that. So normally I'm using the wall clippers. I use, you know, the Gillette gel. I like the gel. I go with the jelly. Smooth.

Smooth. Don't have the after the shaving burn. You know, I want to be moisturized. That's important. That's really important. And you might be moisturized with a big check. If people at Gillette hear you talking about their products.

We're rainmakers here at the Green Light podcast. As you know, hey, Joe, what would it take for you to actually just let that thing grow out? Like, what would it take? Like, winning a super. Super Bowl, maybe? If you win a Super Bowl, will you let that thing grow out for a little bit? Just like straight to you, Pat? I just let it grow out for like a couple months and see what happens. I've talked about it. I mean, we had one of our offensive lineman that he let it go a little too long.

You know, I couldn't refer to the Michael Bolton because a lot of these guys don't know what the Michael is. But I just call it the bullet, the ball mullet. And I think I think I could be talking to doing that. Okay, well, then we'll revisit when you guys are contending this year. And I wonder, with you and Robert, seem to have a great relationship. And I know where you are and head coach and GM's getting along. I think, you know, the lockstep thing is so important in our league. It's so underrated, like that relationship.

You and Robert seem to have a really good relationship. You know, I like seeing the relationship that's forming in Detroit between Dan and Brad. Like, you can tell there's just a chemistry. And you guys have that same thing. and I wonder when you do disagree on something, how do you resolve that conflict? Because football is, people don't understand. It's like constant conflict, even with your friends.

Like there's disagreements. There's, you don't see eye to eye. You have arguments. How do you guys get over that shit and move on? No, I mean, I think the first thing we do is we just talk it out. You know, we don't really hold anything back. We give our opinion. At the end of the day, we're going to do what's best for the Jets.

But I think that's the, that's really, the one of the more challenging things about the job, right? We're trying to create a consensus with a lot of different people. But there's got to be just straight talk when you have a difference of opinion in line. And Robert's sort of thoughtful issues or situations or just differences of opinion. And, you know, he always brings a great, great perspective. And so, you know, I think I think we just get in room. we'd have to have the issue, and we just come to a resolution,

and we've been able to really walk out of the room and be on the same page, which is what you've been awesome. Yeah, just not letting anything linger. Your wide receiver group is young. You guys have done a good job of, as you've emphasized, big guys. You've also equipped Zach Wilson with some weapons, who, by the way, could maybe on the topic of hair, could grow some facial hair maybe at some point that might help.

But you've got a wider receiver group that's younger. Your team, the average age is 24. You have 11 picks next year. It's going to get younger. When you guys sit down and you're like, we need to place veterans. I don't know if that's a conversation that's had, but like we need to place veterans. Which rooms are the most important to place veterans in?

Don't dunk on me here. But what's the point of diminishing return on the field when it comes to having a veteran? In other words, like how much do you need that veteran to produce? Man, I mean, that's such a good question because, I mean, ideally, you have that dude in every group. I felt like we had that in 17. I thought we had that veteran leader in every world. So, you know, you try to get a guy. We had such good leadership on that team.

thought. You know, from you and Seleck and pretty much, you know, our line was Sculler, Kelsey and JP and BG. I felt like we had those guys in just about every tour and how Sean like. So we try, in a perfect world, we've got one of those, one of those values. I think, I think having it up front is the O&B line, you know, having one of those guys. that's really going to be the more sharp. I do think that's important.

That's the tricky thing, the last part of your question, it's because you know, if you've ever been part of the team, you know the value of leadership and what that brings. It's hard for people that may be a casual fan to put a value on it, because they're not around it, but they don't see that. So that's really our job is to, okay, this player has such value to the team.

We have to make sure this person sticks around. And what's our job? So, okay, what's that number of us? And they got to be able to at least make some plays. I mean, like, that's one of the biggest things is I think people understand. Another thing they don't get is you can't just come in the room, start yelling. because you're old. I mean, like, people are going to be like, what the fuck, dude?

You know, so, and there were times where I used to butt heads with y'all upstairs and be like, you know, like, as an older player, if you are a leader, that means you have a track record, which means you probably played a lot more earlier in your career. And it can be harder to walk that line. Like, damn, I'm playing like 20 plays a game. And these kids are going to listen to me, which is a hard thing to sell a guy on. But it's also hard for you guys to, you know, because if you sign a guy as a veteran leader, that guy presumably has to contribute to.

be able to send the message. That's the tricky thing, right? This is, it's not a, like, it's not a tenure position. It's not, it's not a lifetime achievement position. You're right. The person has to contribute, contribute. And it's like, okay, well, Howard, Howard, Howard guys are listening to them, because that person is essentially the coach, you know?

Then why you, it's like, well, if you want me to be a coach, I don't want to fucking practice. You know, the coaches, can I stand there with a polo? I mean, that's the hard part I feel like about infusing leadership is you don't just pick the right guys. It's also the guys that you're going to be able to have the young players receive that message. That's why it's such a tightrope and something that fans don't understand. You've come a long way from, you know, now you've got a big huge office, your Super Bowl champion, all that stuff. You used to be a scout. You used to rough it.

Okay. what does roughing it look like for a guy who's just hitting the road nonstop and uh and's got a road map like back in the day i don't mean to make you feel old but you you were definitely map quest and shit were you not yeah back in the day i was i was a dude with the atlas across the street you know like trying to find the best route there was no GPS there was no map quest like so like back in the day like my second year, actually my third year in the week, so it was just 2002, we had this old contraction. It was called, literally called the box. And it was, all it was, it was like this giant stopwatch that was like, it looked like something made out of 1965. And it had

all these wires attached to it and all these pads. And we basically run like different agility drills with these guys. You've attached. a clip to the shirt and they would pull out of this giant box and there would be your time. They'd do all these agility. So this came over. I think it started in Dallas, like back in the field, Grand area. And then it traveled from the Browns to the Ravens. And so everyone who had to do that job, travel around the country with the box and work out all these players.

And that was basically like my job. I only had to do it one year. Some guys, they had to do it for, like, 10. years. I did it one year. And I basically crissed cross the country from the end of the combine until the start of the drive. I criss crossed the country and hit all these small students. Because back then we used this workout, not for like the big time players, the first second round players. We used this thing to really recruit on draft free agents. And so I was going Nebraska, Omaha. I was going to Nebraska Kearney. I was going to all these directional schools. And it was

awesome. If you're driving from Champaign, Illinois, to Nebraska Omaha, that's a halt. You know, that's a trip. You know, and then you know, roughing it is anytime you have to go to Shadron State for a visit, you're traveling.

All right, so what was the small school that you were like, oh, that's a diamond in the ruffs? Keep sending me here. I enjoy visiting this place, this area. You know, the area I like, Lane Johnson's party. I love this. I love that northeast Porto, section of Oklahoma,

like that Talakia area. It was beautiful, because when I, I was a kid, and I thought it was in Oklahoma, I thought fields, tornadoes. Yeah,

when I was 36, I think, Oklahoma, I think rattlesnakes. Yeah, and Talakas beautiful. Like,

that, that northeast section of Oklahoma, it's gorgeous. It's like the rolling hills. It's kind of got that, it's almost similar

landscape to like Charlottesville. There we go. Shout out from a Richmond spider. I loved it in those directions, schools. Those are always cool times. Because every corner of that home is completely different than the rest. It's like you're in a whole different area,

and if you're going that far, there's probably a kid that can play. Yeah, yeah. I remember going to one of those. I can't remember where there's more west, north-east. But Patrick Creighton, live receiver that played for a few for a while. he was there.

There's always times they were up. I can remember driving from Chadhorn State to Colorado, Febola, that was the hall. And,

you know, the Pueblo, got a chance to spend a day at Ryan and Jensen is with the Bucan drafted in the Baltimore. There's all

just, there's good football. Was he always that extra after the whistle? Oh, yeah. Jensen's come up on this pot a few times.

All right, real quick. Time you've been wrong when you were a scout young guy and maybe your name wasn't on the pick, but you were like, man, I almost don't want to share my opinion because I was so wrong about this guy. Or a time that you were really right

and you're proud of something, you know, that one of your draft takes early on. Yeah, I mean, I had a soul-crushing mess early in my scouting crew when I was doing basically Maryland Amendment. And this is about like getting getting the right information, right? And I got

bad information on a player. Like, it was Antoine Bataea out of Howard. I got the wrong information. And so I kind of cut it up, cut them up with some stuff that was not the furthest thing to the truth. And so

his rookie year, it was the 2006 season, and we were 13 and 3. We were 13 and 3. We were one of the best teams in the league. That was year McNeererer was a quarterback and we lost to the Colts in the division around we were the two seed and it's going to say I had a red zone interception that pretty much killed killed us in the game and we're going to talk about feeling low low low I mean that's

yeah that was for soul-crushing for me but you're like okay I've got to I've got to double check and make sure I get better information you try to work from it right so that that that That was probably the worst one because they ended up tossing. I viewed it as I cost a team. If he was a raven, he would have made that pick. We probably wouldn't sue him right. So that's kind of how I took it. And so that was that sucked.

And then, I mean, on the flip side, I was lucky to be the first guy in the CJA back at that way. I was lucky to be the first guy. I think anybody would have said that, you know, this guy's a pretty good play, but he's a pretty skilled guy. And I think you dug more on the story of how he ended up at Delaware and some of the things that happened for him to get there. And you're like, okay, you know, this guy's a real deal. You know, we need to know. We need some of the sky and to really, to really good deep on him.

Well, that one worked out pretty good. So lightning round before you leave here, these are quick answers. I want to ask you a movie question. Reed, can you play, I don't know if I should ask you a movie question. Can you play him a clip from his favorite movie? This is, I got intel on this. It's kind of questionable choice. Amy, a good gorilla.

Amy, a pretty. So the word on the street is that you really enjoyed the movie Congo. Yeah. Oh, dude, he told you that. I can't give you my son. sources. So here, here's the story. Here's the story. You know, you got your boys in UVA. I got my boys with you. And we, you know, a bunch of clowns in college, Congo's coming on HBO, you know, you know, we, we, that's like our thing, you know, we call each other Amy, we make the, we make

the sound, Amy want green drop drink, Amy good, real. So my boy, me and my boy, me and my boy, We still, we still, that's, we refer to it. And a young Joe Douglas, really, I mean, you were built like, yeah, I mean, I saw you in the replacements, by the way. We haven't even talked about this. I didn't know you were a movie star. That was actually pretty cool, man. Did you have a line?

No, I didn't. It's unfortunate. They missed out. No extra chatter if you did a line. Yeah, they could have had a GM in their movie. I kind of fell into that one because my buddy's brother was. dating a girl that works, but every,

every commercial TV show movie that came through Maryland, she like did the costume. And so we're up in Maryland. When Adam's Morgan, had a good time. I'm like right out of college.

And, like, hey, they're doing a football movie. You should try it out. And so a bunch of the slackies were right out. Like, we show up, like, I'm over at this hotel in Baltimore. Yeah, we're here to be out of your football movie.

And they're like, cool. our combine is Glenn Bernie High School and we're like what? Yeah, you gotta do this combine And so we go to Glenn Bernie High School And we literally do the 40 The short shuttle The part of the three coming

And some of these guys They hadn't worked out And they thought they were just gonna walk in And get the big guy roll And so like me and my buddies We're like we just got done doing a pro day And like we're 22 in shape And we're

It's the only time we probably look good So give me your best three football movies, not including replacements, because we're doing a big football movie summer thing here. That's a good one. Longest yard, this is a good one. A bunch of the guys that were leaving, that did the replacements, we're going right from Baltimore because we shot it in Baltimore. They were going to North Carolina. I don't remember the Titans. Obviously, a 24-year-old ball guy doesn't work at a high school in the 60s.

I had water bleed. Oh, okay. there we go. Shout out to our guy, Adam Sandler, and shout out to my charity, The Water Boys. It has nothing to do with one another, but it's always good to get a plug in. Brooklyn Nets, you are a fan, yes, you've been a fan your whole life, you're not being a bandwagon.

This is important for me. I'm a UNC basketball guy as much as you probably hate to hear that. No, it's all good. We've beaten y'all like seven and the last eight times. So, you know, obviously MJ, where are the others guys? I was a bulls. Okay.

There was no professional. team around Richmond when I was a kid. So it was, you were for anyone that, for me, that played the university professional. But I love a Derek Coleman in the community. I like those two. Let me find out, you know, Joe Douglas is a Keith Van Horn guy.

Yeah. So now you're supporting them because the Jets and Jets and the whole thing, and then the Nets and Jets, so you've just fallen right in line. It's a good time to be a Nets fan. Great time. be a next thing. That building's pretty nice too. Okay, last thing. Is your driver when you go play golf a regulation driver? You got that one for me. I got that one for me and tell us about your driver.

It's right. No, it's a long drive. It doesn't make me better. It doesn't make me better. So it's pointless cheating. So what's the point of the cheating? Here's what Ian said. There was a spring summer where he was trying to improve his golf game. We took lessons and he ended up getting a driver made from this guy who was a former long drive champ or participant. He'd build clubs out of his RV near the golf course and give driving lessons. After a few lessons, he had the guy fit him and make him a driver. He loved that thing. Like he couldn't wait to drive the ball on every hole.

I called it the cheater stick because he pulled the driver out of his bag. When everyone else had Calloways or Pings, normal drivers, he'd pull out as illegal driver with some made-up brand you never heard of, longer shaft, bigger head. He's still beaming my short game stinks. Hey, if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying. And he does the football stuff with integrity, but the golf stuff. Hey, Joe Douglas, man, best in the business. Love the dude.

I'm rooting for the Jets, man. Great to catch up with you, brother. Thanks for the time. That was great, wasn't it? You enjoyed sitting down for that interview with Joe Douglas. I'm speechless. Quite loud. Literally.

Yeah. Thanks for doing the heavy lifting on that one. Yeah, no problem. Terrific interview. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you,

thank you for your question. Yes. That's a callback. Callback. Let's talk about likeability of NBA teams. You know, one through eight.

There's eight left. There would have been too many to do this at the outset. We've thinned the herd. Who do we like on a personal level? Who do we dislike? Who do we not care for so much? And then we'll coast and

of Ryan Rosillo, who's going to be joining us from Vermont. Hmm. Yeah. My sole lake. Was that what the sign said? I don't fucking know. Weirdo. I'll start at eight, and I think you're going to join me in this garage, as you are

want to say, the L.A. Clippers. Yeah, the Clippers. Here I have written down the most likable player on the Clippers is a French guy. So that tells you everything you know. And Rajon Rondo, who has so a French. name. I really like, I really like Rondo. I think out of any basketball player, I might like Rondo's personality the best. He took in a Virginia basketball game a couple years back at J.PJ. I remember that faintly. Just, so did LeBron. LeBron Jain. Le Brons Jain. But Rondo, just his facial expression

did not change over the course of two hours. He's a fucking dog. He's a football player. Just nonplussed in the best of ways. He's a football player. He's a football player playing basketball. Yeah, I'll put the Clippers 8. I don't dislike Kauai. I don't know you. Barely newer.

You know, I just, yeah, the uniforms are dog shit. The whole, I mean, no. This is a very difficult exercise. Is it? I don't like a lot of these teams. Really? I liked a lot of them I found. I got a reason to like a lot of these teams.

Okay. The Bucks are seven for me. Ditto. Cream City. Yeah, Cream City. You know, I have written down what's to like. Janus, for me. PJ Tucker and Dante DiVincenzo for me.

I mean, I respect Janus, but it's just something about the bucks and something about like, I'm the last person who's going to get mad at Janus about other people's expectations. You know, like, who cares? Like, I don't hold that against Janus. He's still a top five player in the league, but he just doesn't, it doesn't move me. Six.

Six? I got the Hawks. I would the Atlanta Hawks at 6th. Oh, we're just... This is a weird... Yeah, well, Lou Williams. I mean, Lou Williams keeping them alive. And Trey Young, who torch my Knicks,

I don't have any issue with the cat at all. I think he's kind of funny. I like the way he just smiles when shit's like... You know what? He's really good. You know how I know he's really good and really confident because I buy his smile? Like when things are bad and people are booing him

and he's smiling or people are like yelling at him, some guys put on that fake smile and I know you're not happy. Trey Young, he just feels like he has nothing to worry about. He can pull up from 40 feet, ice cold. I've always thought of him as annoying, but I've been a very distant observer from afar at Oklahoma and Atlanta.

Now that we're getting eyes on him, he's having to come up. I'm impressed with him. Yeah, he does seem authentic. I'm impressed with him. He's a lot of fun. I love like a small guard who creates. Like that's just cool. And oh, let me be the first to say DeAndre Hunter, because I'm a big Virginia basketball

fan. So Drey Hunter is probably one of the main reasons I like the Hawks. And give us the breaking news on Dre Hunter. I don't have it. Okay. What did he do? Out for the rest of the post season. He got hurt?

No. He got hurt in the middle of the season, had a procedure. And I'll violate HIPAA laws right now by saying somebody fucked up because that was supposed to be a two-week deal and it's lingered the entire season and it stinks because Dre is a part of what they're doing. He was just on the floor like the other night, wasn't he? Yeah, they rested him even after they had a week off, and then he played in no moths.

I wish they'd arrested Dre against the Knicks because he was killing us for a few of those games. Yeah, good luck to Dre, get it fixed, come back next year. Okay. Put those uni's for the Hawks. Okay, on three, let's say to the same time, who's your team coming in at five?

One, two, three, Nuggets. You were close, we were close to having the same one. Okay. Nuggets for me. Yokic, he seems like a great guy, all right? I mean, how can you not love a throwback looking center that got drafted during a Taco Bell commercial and literally looks like he can man one of those green rocket launchers pretty easily?

This closet is just all fatigues. Nuggets by virtue of logo, Yokic, being counted out without Jamal Murray. I like the nuggets. And that's another thing. Jamal Murray, I counted him here, I really enjoy watching Jamal Murray play. I mean, there's something about it.

It's not a very, it's not an NBA, he just doesn't feel like an NBA game. Like it doesn't feel, but he makes it look easy. He really does make it look easy. When you can shoot the ball like that and create shots, like you're pretty rare.

And I really like Jamal Murray. I like bowl bowl, Paul Millsap. And perhaps I'm participating too fully in group think. Yeah. With Brooklyn here in my bottom half. But we got a, we got Kyrie who is not for me. James Hardin, who's not for me. Same garage.

Like a gray court. That's not for me. It's like a gray wood. All right. Now, Barclays is sick. Yeah, it's a beautiful place. The Unis, sick. Yeah, even the, even the journey's logo looking,

Unis I'm cool with. The Friends logo. And Joe Harris is awesome in Oahu. Joe's enough. Here, the nets for me are five. Katie, I love Katie. I know some people don't like Katie. And I know some people are like,

oh, he's a Twitter burner, how weak. I'm like, you're literally all eggs. Like, that's literally your existence is anonymous Twitter guy. And like, so what? He wants to fucking stir shit up. He's a confrontational cat. He likes confrontation. You want tough basketball players.

he's never shrunk. He has never shrunk in a moment that demanded toughness or confrontation. Like I said, he hit the floor the other day. It looks like they dropped him out of a six-story building against the Celtics and he just landed on his side. The guy's, no offense, he's not, there's not a lot of muscle on this cat.

And he got right up because he's a tough motherfucker. He's a dog, dude. I'm not speaking for him. But I love KD. Joe Harris, obviously. And D'Andre Jordan seems like a fun guy. We're not even talking about Blake Griffin. This team is like the evil empire

that it's hard not to actually like a little bit. Yeah, there's a lot to like and a lot to dislike, all in on with this club. Four for you. Utah Jazz. Okay, then that's where my four. The Jazz are my three. Okay.

Hmm. I love Donovan Mitchell, dude. Yeah. He's just, his game is awesome. He's so tough. He's so competitive. You know, you just watch him. and just the competitive spirit that he has.

I know it sounds cliche, but it's above and beyond what the other guys on the quarter bring in, at least through my athlete lens. I like watching them play. I love the unis. You got Ingalls. Gobert gets a sympathy guard for me.

I think Gobert kind of took one on the channel a little unfairly last year. What's say you? Yeah, he saved us all. That was the, oh, this is real. This is real. But everybody, all the same people in the media on Twitter that were making jokes about COVID,

basically tried to cancel him because he didn't understand the virus. The guy didn't ask to get sick, nor did he make a joke. He tapped a microphone. Like, I get it. We got to be mad at people all the time. But I don't think he meant anything by that. I'm with you. Some bad uni's in there too.

Yeah, but I like the one in their court. Man, the gradient is beautiful on that court in the free throw lane. Phoenix is three for me mostly because we haven't seen him in a while. I don't really love Chris Paul. I don't know. Oh, I love Chris Paul. I know. Who doesn't?

Me. You. I, uh, what? I don't know. Why? Yeah. I can't drill back far enough to remember why, unfortunately. Can I sell, Wake Forest maybe?

A little. Can I sell you on, uh, Devin Booker's cars? You can try. They're awesome. He drives a different one in the game all the time and they're classics. He doesn't like. like this like, you know, I got a McLaren, I got a Maserati, like that,

like great, you have money, just like everybody else with money. Do you have taste? He's got taste, okay? And it's kind of cool. They're kind of a fun, they've always been a fun franchise. When have you ever looked at the Suns

and been like, I'm not rooting for that team? Yeah, like the last two decades. Not for me. I'm saying if they're on, I'm not saying I'm not going to, I'm not going to like seek out their games when they've been mediocre, but you want the Suns to do well.

I like the Suns. Dan Marley, Thunder Dan, the old uniforms, Charles Barkley. Kevin Johnson. Kevin Johnson. They were a fun team in the 90s. NBA Jam, they were probably the best team. Yeah. Most fun team.

Well, no, take that back. Seattle Supersonics were the most fun team. That left shrimp. Oh my God. Sean Kemp. Band of Horses came out with a song called Detleff Shremf. I don't do this. You do the silent F.

Detless shrimp. I just cut it off a little quicker than you. Debtless shrimp. I know how to spell Detleaf Shramp, you know that right. You do? Yeah. You want to give it a shot?

S-C-H-R-E-M-P-F. Well done by you. Very good. Bitch. Nice. Where's Phoenix for you? It's in Arizona. Yes.

You nailed that. Oh, thank you. I appreciate it. Where are the suns on your list? Oh, they're number two for me. Okay. Nuggets number two for me for reasons mentioned. Okay, so who's the number one team for you?

Unfortunately. Let's play the sixes song in post read. I need that sixers song. Now I'm not saying that. I'm not saying I'm rooting for them. 76ers. I'm not saying I'm rooting for them. I don't know any of those words,

but I love it when they play it. There's just not a lot to hate about the Philadelphia and 76ers. How can they not make you happy, dude? Yep. They just like, even if you hate Philly, how can they not make you happy? Dude, the court, the stars. How flawless their uniforms look?

Joel. The fucking snake. Joel. The snake, it looks a little bit, don't tread on me, which now looks like code for, you know, I don't like black people and I'm also like a huge tinfoil guy. But, you know, there's still time to change your vanity plate. Yeah, they pull the snake off. They have a fight song.

Frosties, Embed is fun. One time I ran into Joel Embed in a club, dude. I was in L.A. It was like for the SPs and I just bumped into them in the middle of they were playing dreams and nightmares in the club and we got up in his section and vibe for 15 seconds that's the end of it i don't think he's ever thought about me again but i remember that joel and bd down to uh kansas and virginia when picking the college if you're if you believe joel mb picked kansas we're not really a one and done destination thankfully no mike scott mike scott five years at virginia is a 76er i will say

this though yeah mike scott is uh is is one of my faves got emojis tattooed all over his body. It's a rare Virginia athlete that I like more in the pros than I did in college. Like the guy has just ascended through the ranks as one of the most interesting personalities. Shake Milton, they got a guy named Shake Milton. It comes in and just chucks 40 footers randomly at the end of the third quarter and like gives you a lift, dude. I love shake Milton. Dwight Howard. Everybody loves him. Wait, wait, wait. Wait, what? People love Dwight Howard. Everybody loves Dwight Howard. In Philly, they rebranded Dwight Howard. They found a way to rebrand Dwight Howard. I've never had anything.

against Dwight Howard. I'll say this. Dwight Howard has been rebranded, man. People in Philly are constantly talking up Dwight Howard. What a positive locker room presence. He's still doing dirty work. He's still got game. He's different now. He's long-haired Dwight Howard. It's a different Dwight Howard. And Danny Green, friend of the program. Producer John has just linked a story. Lobsters doused with pot smoke to test pain during cooking. Yeah. I mean, there are times when the show has a formula to it. And we go from A to B to C. And there are times where John says that, hey, this, this needs some attention.

I just thought if this story was around, you know, two hours ago, it would be a completely different rundown show. It might be. We could have made this the main event. Can that make the show? Can John's voice make the show? Yeah, John's been on the show before. Okay.

I don't know. I don't consume the show. Yeah. I hope they're hotbox. those lobsters with indica you know I don't want them getting all paranoid before they go in the pot get it pot yeah I do get it all right without further ado let's get to the great Ryan Rosillo to talk some NBA hey hey Ryan hi hi Ryan hi hi hi Ryan what's up what's up life is better by the lake who's there with you this guy is making

My co-hosts. Oh, hey, what's up? Yeah, I remember you. What have you been up to? Hey, not much. I've noticed you've been calling me Mason on occasion, on purpose. Oh, wait, okay. That's the same guy?

It's confusing. The thing about podcast is this is audio, so nice to put a face with the voice, I'm sure. Oh, that's great. So, Ryan, some of these number changes are really, and we have an NBA number change, too. LeBron's going to six. By the way, they're not making him buy back his jerseys. He's doing it again. It's classic rich guy gets free shit thing.

I don't know about this LeBron character. Okay, but I don't know about the football number change thing going on. I don't know about Julio Jones wearing two. I don't know about. I definitely don't know about Jalen Ramsey wearing five. And we were going to do our ratings of our worst football numbers. Ryan, do you have some worst football numbers? Yeah, I think three sucks for a football player.

And I know a lot of this is really like, oh, somebody wore this number and then it was awesome. But three, I don't know that I can think of any. Like, I think like a lot of people, nine looks awesome. Nine looks so cool on a defensive end. We just talked about that. One, you know, goes out saying the receiver that gets to where you had an incredible tweet, Chris, the other day.

It's like, one doesn't even care if he's good. He's just so happy he had one. Yeah, if you're one. That was the Deshawn Jackson thing. Like Deshawn Jackson apparently, like when he wasn't going to get one, that's how he ended up at Cal. Yeah. What was it?

Was it USC? I'm serious. You're going to look this up. I haven't heard this. Whatever school Deshaun was supposed to go to, he was like, I want number one. And I mean,

look, you know Deshawn far better than I do, but I think I have a pretty good read on what's going on there. And he was like, I want number one. And they were like, well, you know,

you come in, you compete. And, you know, he was like, no, I want number one. And they were like,

no. And then he goes, I knew that place doubted me. And here's the thing about, here's the thing about number one receivers. I'm not talking about your primary option. I'm talking about dudes who can rock that that number. They're going to prove you wrong.

Like literally USC or whoever it was is probably like, fuck, we should just give in that kid number one. I think six might be the worst look. Six or three. I can't stand six. I disagree with you on three. I think three is really clean. Six, I'm not into.

Six is Johnny Hecker. Six, you know, you kind of do that old blink test, right? And four is pretty bad. save for Vic Hall, UVA legend. 44 to me is a dog shit number. I had here, 49 in the 40s being the worst number. 49 is that number in camp that like a fullback gets, and I hate to say this, shout out to Britt Miller,

one of the last of a dying breed. He wore 49. But like 49 is that number they give a fullback. And the reality is he might not make the team and fullbacks are kind of going by the wayside. Do you have any bad numbers? before we move into the NBA. 60?

I can't ever get on board with. Chris Samuels, dude. He looks sick in that number. 70? I have a problem with the zero, I guess, on the back half. 46? 70's tough. 70's tough.

468? 68 can be okay. A really good tackle can wear 68. 67's much worse. I don't like zero. Zero. That's the thing in basketball. I think about agents here.

I think about Gilbert Arenas. is everybody who wears zero a little bit different. Lillard. Although double zero for Parrish is like all-timer. And he was ahead of his time. Double zero? Does anybody do that anymore? I don't even think there's...

What do they say about him? The chief thing, that's the chief is... Quick story. Bartending, Martha's Vineyard. I wasn't even 21 back then. Just killing it behind the bar. Not a big deal. We'll get to that later.

Full head of hair. Full head of hair, full head of confidence. And there would be a massive, massive, of line because I worked at the only real like dance nightclub on the vineyard. Like there was only one in this one time. And here I'm thinking the vineyards all just milk toast. That's what everybody thinks. Everybody the the identity of what the vineyard is versus the reality of what it is are two completely different things. It's much bigger. There's more people in the winter. Um, there's a hundred kids in my graduating class. I mean, it's just people don't get it. So anyway, back to the summer.

There's a huge line. Robert Parrish is not waiting in line for the only dance club of Martha's in her. No. He's walking up and you just hear this slow murmur. Chief. Chief. Chief. Chief. Chief. It starts building. And we're talking like, you know, 10 years after we won a championship, it was actually crazy. Because when I think of it this way, World War II ended 30 years from when I was born. And yet I was born 45 years ago. So actually, my birth date is closer to World War II ending than today. That's a fucking mind better. Do you use that like on blind day? D. Blind dates. Dates? How many dates you think I go on? I don't think you try to go on to me.

I don't. Okay, so we just let him cut the line and then Chief just set up a little bottle of mow it on a little, little nightstand area and just set it up for Chief. And Chief would just get out there and he would dance. And you don't dance with Chief. He dances with the area around him. Solo. I respect it. Yeah, so I think you'd like him a lot.

I think I'd love Chief. His next name, Chief. What's the, is it, is it what I think it is? Yeah, just because the way he looked. Oh, you know, probably wouldn't go over, it probably wouldn't go over well now. Yeah. But that's, I thought it was because he smoked a lot of marijuana.

Well, you know, I can't, uh, I don't know. I didn't hang out with the Celtics in the 80s. So maybe there was an origin behind it. The Celtics, okay? Here's your hard right turn to the Celtics. Uh, Woge tweeted out a list that included a lot of former players, um, that Brad Stevens is looking into as the next head coach of the Celtics.

Was there somebody that stood out to you as being probably the best hire? Was there a name on there that surprised you? As far as the names, I only kind of vouch for somebody if I know them or not vouch for him if I know him. And I know Chauncey Billups. I've spent a lot of time with him and I love the guy. I think there's a presence about him. There's a basketball knowledge that is there. It doesn't mean that I'm anti-Sam Cassell.

I just haven't spent any time with Sam Cassell. I've spent time with Chonsie Billups. I would love for Chonsie Billups. I would love for Choncy to get the job. When it comes to former players coaching, what do you think the key is there? Like, what's the dynamic in Brooklyn with a Steve Nash? You know, like guys who are notable former players that their players grew up watching, what's the key to like controlling a room or the relationships that way? I'm going to probably kick this one back to you.

Although I think you're really fair about it. but any friends that I've had that have played, any sport, they are pretty short-fused when it comes to completely checking on the person that's in charge. And you're more likely, because there's always going to be conflict, right? Right. Your job is your position. You have a position coach. You know, the head coach is at times going to tell you things you don't want it to do.

He's going to critique what you're doing. And it's already hard enough to go out there for you running into a 300-pound plus guy. and then it's like, hey, Chris, your techniques a little, you know, you just, even if they're right, you just kind of don't want to hear it. All right. I think that's human nature. So when I think about the guys, like, look what happened to Nate Bjork in Indiana. He didn't have any credibility built up with these guys because he's not a player. So those guys are like the first guys that get checked out on, right?

Because as soon as you start to doubt that guy, then it's like, oh, he never really played. Like, I remember a couple of hockey buddies. There was this hockey coach who I thought was really good when I used to. watch all the time. And then I'd be like, oh, he's a pretty good coach. And then my friends be like, oh, he never played. And I'd be like, yeah, it's so unfair. Like that's so unfair of you guys. And then that coach went on somewhere else and had like success again. So I think the checkout is immediate. Whereas with Chauncey, in those moments of conflict, you're going to have a generation of players. You're like, okay, I may disagree with him, but like the, it's not even the message.

It's the messenger. And that might be the most important thing. I mean, most anyone, especially you get a staff of eight guys. You can figure out the X's and O's. You can figure out the adjustments. Rarely do I sit there and I don't pretend to know it better than NBA coaches. It'd be really arrogant. Yeah, there are things that I see. I'm like, why are you doing that? And sometimes it's explained to you and you're like, oh, I didn't even know that's why you were doing that. But it's a, you know, guys are more sensitive now than ever. Athletes have more access to hate. So I don't even mean the sensitivity part is a criticism. I think it's a byproduct of having that access to hate. People realizing like, oh shit, like even if you're awesome, you wake up. Like look at,

Okitch went in the MVP. The first thing they do is make up a shirt of all the stuff the haters said and half of it was like actually true at some point and then some of it didn't even make any sense. And like that was the first go to when this guy wins almost like unanimous MVP. So someone like Chauncey in those moments of conflict, I think will have way more buy in, even without 20 years as a coach than somebody who has all the coaching background, but doesn't have something that makes them special. And he is great in a room. When he is in a room and he is talking basketball, he has a a presence to him that is a hundred percent real. Yeah. And besides that, like, you know, me as a layman watching the Pistons back in the day, you know, the only team that could like vanquish the West and they did it as like a team. You know what I mean? Like they, they actually seem like the ultimate team, you know, group. And he was such a central part of it. I feel like that Pistons, uh, kind of toughness and that like we're all in it together vibe is something you have to respect from him, at least as an athlete. But I wonder, like, at some point, are basketball coaches in the NBA going to become like borderline paranoid about their futures or are we already there? Like, if you didn't play,

is it going to eventually devolve or, I don't want to say evolve or devolve? I mean, it just depends on how to look at it into a situation where the prerequisite to being a head coach is going to be unspokenly you had to have played. Yeah, it feels that way. From people who got mad at Nash, it's like, well, okay, but there have been so many ex-point guards that immediately got to become head coaches. I mean, Mark Jackson, Doc Rivers. I mean, Magic, the Lakers, like, just let Magic be the coach. And no one has ever said that that was like the best version of Magic Johnson as a coach. So I think the coaches are always scared.

I mean, they go through these guys left and right. And for the amount of money that you're spending on players now to eat a couple years. years to eat 10 million on a coach because I just hope the players I don't know I don't know I mean you tell me Chris do you think people over the course of your career were less likely to want to be coach at the end of it than the beginning of it or is just cyclical okay well go ahead yeah no I do think so I mean I can remember when I was very young there was a young coach who will go unnamed and it was like literally you guys five foot seven nothing against you but when you walk into a d line room and in that d line room I mean we're talking about 200 plus sacks 250 sacks

in this room. And I remember this guy who had just got a GA job, was the assistant to the D-line coach comes in and says, if you guys will stay after today, I want to show you some things that'll make you better. Stay after on your time, and I want to show you something that makes you better. And to tie it all together, what he showed them was just like absolute bullshit. Well, guess who that guy is now? He was a college coordinator as of two, three years ago. He might be a head coach soon. And that's the way it goes in football. Football is different than basketball. All types of coaches get access. And I would say that in the NFL, it matters less if you play because being good football player does not guarantee being a good football coach. No disrespect to NBA coaches,

but I do think NFL coaching there's a lot more to worry about. I think most people would agree. And it's way more cerebral. I mean, the schematics of offense and defense and then managing a team of 53 guys, 80 plus in camp, you just can't roll any old player out there. Whereas in basketball, and I don't mean this disrespectfully, it seems like more of a team concept. We're peers, you know, like we're talking to each other and the schematics are probably a lot simpler. I also don't think there's much of a comparison when, you know, you look at the NFL, you can bring in a coach and kind of overhaul things and move some stuff around. I mean, look, if you don't have a quarterback, you don't have a quarterback, but a coach can make a real,

real impact. There's just rarely, you could see a win total boost. like we saw it with Tibbs and the Knicks. That team wasn't very good. Right. We saw it in Atlanta. So he's not going to make a bad team good. No coaches coming in with the roster that can't get out of the first or second round. And then like now all of a sudden it's the exact same guys and we're in an NBA title.

I mean, I'm not saying it hasn't happened. But you get the point. Like the impact an NBA coach can make, I think is fairly minimal overlooking some exceptions. I would agree. So LeBron's not playing in the Olympics this year. I'm not going to ask you about Olympic basketball. I mean, there's only so many hours in the day. Ryan Rusillo can't, you know, keep up with,

I don't I'm trying to think of an arbitrary Eastern Bloc country in their basketball team, but Space Jam odds. Poland. Poland. Space Jam odds. Jordan had 44 in Space Jam 1. LeBron's odds to outscore him in the sequel, minus 300 for yes, plus 200 for no.

How many points do you think LeBron scores in the sequel? knowing LeBron I have a hard time believing he would sign off on the script where he wasn't at least tying Jordan or and then it'd be awesome because in five years you could be like well you know won the two most difficult titles 16 and then in the bubble outscored Jordan and space jam outscore Jordan beat the beat the goon squad I don't I've never even seen it I didn't even see the first one so I don't that makes three of us oh my gosh we were going to say like how is it I don't know I mean look it's a remake it's smart, good for them. You know, a lot of the movies, there's a lower number of movies being made. The studios just ended up looking at stuff being like, why are we buying so many movies

and buying so many scripts when only a certain amount makes so much money. So it's been more money on the money makers. And that's why you're seeing the line of movies that we see now. And with Space Jam, attaching Leron to it, I mean, you already have a built-in audience that understands Space Jam. And then, you know, the ad campaign for it's going to be massive because you've got ESPN running ads, the NBA, and the LeBron machine behind it.

So it makes sense. But, you know, I don't know. I just, that kind of stuff. I'm not, honestly, I'm not a huge real slash anima Mason guy. I mean, you know, I just am not. Like Roger Rabbit was good, I guess, but, you know. I only like real things. Yeah, he doesn't like any fake shit on TV.

That's free money, guys, if you're listening, minus 300 that he's going to outscore Jordan. I mean, no question. He's going to outscore Jordan. And by the way, the space. jam gear is pretty it's pretty dope if I'm being objective I mean like I may not watch the movie but I might buy the shoes his new sneaker came out it looks it looks pretty good I bought a pair of the Durants yeah my left foot isn't working and I'm just hoping it's the shoe when it's definitely not the shoe it's my foot I bought the new Durants and they look really weird

but I went for it but we'll see they could be a donation I might get some basketball sneakers join you on the on the hard courts the zions are out oh they look they look You look all right. Is there anyone's sneaker a Macon? Is there a player that has a signature shoe and you go, it's not the shoe, I don't want that guy's sneaker because I have a guy. Oh, you just won't buy, you just won't buy me. I mean, I know who yours might be. I'd love if Macon said something like.

He's pretty open with him he hates. Derek favors, yeah. You hate Derek favors. No, I don't. but Ryan once com to Derek Favors to Jesus Christ, and that's when I think I fell in love with Ryan for the first time. And so Derek Favors came to mind. No, I don't know if I have a guy who's shoe I wouldn't purchase.

Yeah, but Ryan might. I wouldn't wear Kyrie's. Yeah, I knew that was that Boston thing. Yok it. No, it has nothing to do with Boston. Honestly, it was so miserable watching him. And last year, I was thrilled he left. So that's what's so funny about the Boston,

Kyrie thing is like oh you're just mad he did this to you and be like any ask anyone who liked watching the Celtics yeah that was the most miserable year it was like all right it sucks you lose the asset but see yeah and i saw him in brooklyn up close to go up and i was uh visiting joe harris and uh and malcolm and i saw kairri up close and i thought to myself most electric basketball player i've ever watched in person when he's on i mean like it is nothing more fun to watch you know rod strickland who needs a podcast called pod strickland and he's I mean, Rod has always been, I said this to him when I met him at the Combine, which is, you know, always kind of the cooler part you do this long enough here on ESPN for 10 years.

You know, you don't seem like an insane person going up to somebody. But I was like, hey, I got to tell you, every time we've had like one of those old school point guards come by and talk about like the league, more guys will say like, you know, who was nice was Rod Strickland. Yeah. Man, like he worked us. And he was like, oh, that's really cool. It's really cool. And that's Kyrie's godfather, I believe. Isn't really?

Strickland recently was like he's the most talented player, the most talented offensive player ever. And the first reaction is like, you've got to be kidding me. But when you really think about this statement, he wasn't saying he was the best player ever. And then you watch Kyrie's game when he's locked in. He's the best handle ever. He's the best small finisher I've ever seen.

His shot making like difficulty is up. He's not the best shooter. Obviously, Steph's the best shooter we've ever seen. But there are components. to Kai Rhee's game offensively where what Strickland said isn't like it's not a lie. He's right because he does have the best handle. He does have he the way he'll show the ball and then take it away from you and then finish against size.

I said it five years ago on SportsCenter. He's the best small finisher I've ever seen. And five years ago when I said it, it was like, what are you on? And again, I think I said it next to the Gandhi. I don't know if it was him or not. But ultimately, like when you say small finisher, it's like, oh, I've ever heard of Iverson and be like, yeah, I remember Iverson. But it was a very short window when he was finishing at the rim at a great number.

And then when it fell off, it fell off. And here's Kyrie's been in the league 10 plus years and those numbers are still really good. So I would have said white chocolate might have been the best small finisher of all. White chocolate was not efficient. He's not an efficient basketball. I love him of white chocolate though. Macon, give me, because Chris is too humble. And it's not fake humble, but he's too humble.

I'm going to remind my friend. It's more self-loathing. I hate myself. That's not humility. If I like myself, I'd probably be arrogant. I don't want to hear that kind of negativity right now. Okay. Ah, that's a good one.

That's a good one. I get it. Talking about my lovely wife. Yeah. All right. Megan and her are actually pretty tight. Are we? Yeah, you guys FaceTime a lot by virtue of being on the phone with me at all.

No, I'm a Meg fan. I'm a Meg fan. I'm a big fan. I have a great. Like the oddity of the three of us getting our picture taken at the SBC's, and her being cool with it and not being like, what the hell is this guy's problem? And I was like, it's so bad and so embarrassing.

We're on the red carpet? Were we on the red carpet or were we? Well, when we went to the red carpet, Sean McVeigh's behind us and we didn't recognize him right away. Yes. Because he looks about 15. And McVeigh ends up being, you know, one of the cooler guys if you ever get any time with him.

And I've got to hang out with him twice. And I was like, ah, this guy's great. And I felt like such a dick because McVeigh's like, Hey, man, big fan. And he's not big either. and he looks young and you kind of turn and you're like who's this guy and then he's like hey sean macvay he just got in the rams gig and then i was like oh holy shit like Ryan nice to meet he's like and he can kind of tell and there he's by the way he's with like you know his gorgeous

gorgeous now i think fiancee and you're like oh like we just looked at you like you were well because he had like a pesky guy if you think he looks young he looks like to me one of those teenagers in the eastern block that's punching trees and lifting and stuff like he's jack He does look bad like. He looked a little young the first time I met him. But Meg let us take a picture in the whole nine yards. We had a great Aspe's weekend. Yeah, but we did have a moment where we were on the red carpet.

They actually were filtering Chris and his wife away, and they were putting me on like the loser path. They were trying to push you on the, the hall frame. Like you're in the loser area. And then I think we actually did go two different paths. And then we got to the end. And I go, we got to do a. picture with the three of us. Because instead of me bringing anybody, I was like, I just get credit.

And then I left, I think. You guys got to the green room. I couldn't even get to the green room at the SPs. And you guys did. You fucking help build the place. No, I went to the hotel, I think, and like watched, watched something on TV and like had a couple beers at the hotel. Hey, listen, that was better than what we did.

We sat in a sweaty auditorium and had to wait to get up in piss every time they, like, turn the lights on. and you couldn't get back from the back bar. Yeah, we had a good time. Great time later, and then we were all singing zombie. Cranberries. Big cranberries fan, Ryan Rusillo is, by the way. Macon.

Yes. We got it on tangent. Back to Chris. What was he like as a basketball player in high school? Oh, not very good. Oh, he could dunk. And when you're at a... Me a comp.

You're a... Ben Wallace. No, not Ben Wallace. Tyrus Thomas? Gerald Wallace. I was one of the Wallace guys. Gerald Wallace was actually very well-rounded there. Well, yeah, well, I wasn't well-rounded as him, but I wanted to.

When I used to play 2K, I'd be like, you know, I feel like a Gerald Wallace. No, you're not even close to a Gerald Wallace. What the fuck was I? I was a slasher, dude. I could dunk. I was a slasher. You can't even throw a baseball or a football, much less a basketball. Gerald Wallace played basketball.

I know, but relative to high school basketball. We're not talking about, we're talking about your skill set relative to the- Aaron Gordon? No, I don't know about Aaron. He has more balance than me. Who's just like a dumpy banger? Maddie Brust

from St. John's? Dumpy banger? I could go two hands 360. Here's my I'm going to turn the humility off for a second. I could go two hands 360. It's high school. I can't be the dumpy banger, dude. I was definitely a slasher who

couldn't shoot who was a dirty worker. You were a slasher? I could create. We weren't watching the same games. Well, you barely listen to our podcast. I doubt you were at the fucking games. Honestly, the score guy. The score guy.

I was like, I was, I brought the people to the games because we were, I was wearing the kilt and the no shirt. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We were the draw. Convocation crazies. I'm going to pick a random team. I'm going to go to depth chart and then. Matt Geiger?

Yes, Matt Geiger. That's very good and very close. Maybe Matt Geiger for you. Matt Geiger had a little post game. Could Matt Geiger really bounce? No, that's why I said Tyrus Thomas, because Tyrus, like, Matt Geiger, get the fuck out of here, dude. Google Matt Geiger.

He looks like Jay Buehner. I remember him. Maybe Paul Millsap on his best day for Chris? Paul Millsap, but I also think my football and basketball pro comp is probably Paul Millsap. The guy that was pretty good, and then at some point, people look up and tweet like he's still in the league. You were a layup line guy. Like our predominantly white Episcopalian school, private school. And there's a guy in the layup line who can dunk before the officials come out.

What the fuck are you talking about? We had two kids from Washington Heights. I'm just saying you were the guy who could dunk. Yes. Like, wow, we haven't seen that around here very often. Okay. Can I ask him a question about Yokic? Please.

Yeah. Barely know her. That made no sense. No, he's just on this thing where he just barely know her after. I love it. Yeah. No, I love saying that's what she said in moments where it doesn't make any sense. Oh, well, I mean, he just did that earlier as well.

But it made sense earlier. Yokic, MVP, not a shock to people, but to you, I was listening to you the other day, and you're talking about him as being, you know, an MVP, but not a top five player, right? I don't think he's the top five player in a league, but it also speaks to how deep the top of the league is. if I just did it right now you go all right, KD, who needs to be

probably considered the best. Fuck yeah. Kauai, who I think we got a little reminder of what this dude is capable of. Did you see them in the first round? He didn't miss any shots in the fourth quarter of the entire,

like I think in the seven, maybe game 70 did, but games one through six, he hadn't missed anything. I hate watch the Clippers, but yes. Okay. All right.

So, and I'm not going to do an anti-Lebron deal because they're out in the first round. All right. So you got Katie, Kawhi, LeBron, let's put Steph down. Luca. Luca is in the mix. Yonis, despite all this, is still going to be in the mix.

Hardin's in the mix. It's deep. You know, Anthony Davis, when he's right, is a top five. We haven't even mentioned Embed yet. Okay, so that's one, two, three, Julius Randall, obviously. Eight, nine. That's nine guys.

Eric Rose. Dame, 10. All right, you're being ridiculous. So. I haven't said Todd Gibson yet, but go ahead. You know, Yokic is closer to five than he is being past five. I would agree. I would agree there.

I mean, that makes sense to me. So I don't think he's top five and he deserves the MVP. Yeah, and it's funny how that works because the award is called most valuable player. But I guess the question I would ask is if it is a literal definition of most valuable to that particular team, is there a player on like a bad team or a middle of the pack team that would more fit the bill there? Chris Paul. Yeah. What he does. I mean, this is four franchises in a row that as soon as you show up,

you're completely different franchise. And that's why I love him. That's why I argue for him. And that's why I call him the greatest winner of his era that hasn't won. Or I think there's other people that win that are losers. And, you know, I wanted to talk about Chris Paul. So I was going to ask you who you wanted to win a ring the most left in the playoffs. And that was a layout probably.

Yeah. Yeah. It's not. I thought I wanted to pick them so badly. but they were LA was like the worst matchup form of any of the teams and I still think they lose if Davis stays healthy but maybe not

I can't feel it certainly made it easier and now that they're through them and they're gone they look like a team but that's also the lesson of what the season could be because the Nets haven't looked like a team the whole time and they're still missing Hardin and they're still humiliating Milwaukee through these first teams if Milwaukee has any sense of pride whatsoever

they win game three and they show they show an edge I do think we saw a couple years ago. Like for all the heat, Milwaukee and Yonis take, like they did, they were up two games on Toronto. And they kind of figured some things out how to defend. Nurse is just so good as a coach. But, you know, I guess that when I look at teams and how they're talked about as failures, I am an easier, greater than the public where, you know, you bring this group together to the clippers

and they bomb out and blow a three one lead last year. And you're like, okay, but they didn't go like 40 and 42. Right. You know, they blew a 3-1 lead in the second round. and that sucks, but they're good. And now, as you mentioned, you like hate watching them. And there's plenty of guys on that team that I'm not exactly in love with. But when I kind of go through the league and look at all these different players,

I just think it's so hard to win in the playoffs. Like, Yolkich is going to lose this series to Phoenix. And then people are going to say, oh, this guy won MVP. And you're like, well, that's not what the exercise is. The exercise is not who do I think is going to go further in the playoffs and ignore the whole reason we played for five months. Yeah, and most of my hate watching is probably that GTA font that I've mentioned so much on their stupid. You hate that?

I hate that. You like that? Oh, I think it looks awesome. What? Yeah, my guys at Legends, I didn't mean to do this as a shout out on the podcast. I got some Legends gear. Shout out to Legends. I know.

Yeah, shout out to Legends and taking care of my guy. But their custom gear is so sick. And there's a few of those Clippers hoodies floating around with that L.A. logo that is so clean. and you can't get them. You can't get them. I have a couple, so I'll make sure I don't send one to you. If you saw it too, you would love it. You would love it if I send you a picture of it.

But now apparently you're out on that whole GTA deal. That was the best GTA, the San Andreas deal. Oh, yeah, that was a great GTA. Because when you had to take care of different neighborhoods and then you think you had it on lock and then all of a sudden you feel like, oh, there's a flare up and you had to go back and protect your turf, that was so much fun.

Yeah, no, I hate that font. I can't stand the font. If you send me some legends gear with the clippers with the boats or something, like some old school shit, I'd be down. I'm getting a boat. I know you are. Oh. I'm pretty excited about that.

How many feet? Probably 40 in that range, maybe 44. Are you familiar with the two happiest days of a boat owner's life? Yeah, I've heard the joke for like 30 years. What, the day they buy it and the day they sell it? I think that's right, yeah. I mean, you think it's right or that's exactly what it is? I think that's exactly what it is.

I think it is exactly. Yeah. It's hard to tell you. tell me that I nailed it. I know it's tough. Okay, so I was going to ask you about Chris Paul. Who just missed on Chris Paul? Who's like, we didn't bet on him for a fourth time transforming a franchise?

Houston sure as hell didn't. I mean, when you think about the price of a transaction and how dramatically it can swing in 12 months, think about that. Oklahoma City had to be given extra stuff to take Chris Paul for Westbrook. Oh. So Houston not only loses in the head-to-head player,

Houston thinks they're getting the better asset back, so they're paying for Westbrook, where 12 months later, Oklahoma City flips Chris Paul for more assets when it looked like they were taking the lesser asset. So it's well-established. They got the better player and more assets. Yeah, but it was kind of understood,

like, oh, if you're trading, you know, Westbrook for Chris Paul, and Chris Paul, some of the injury stuff, even though Westbrook wasn't exactly the healthiest guy ever either and the massive contract and Westbrook had the extra year that you're like, oh yeah, you know what? Like I got to give you Chris Paul on something else to get Westbrook. And then 12 months later, there's just like the only way Westbrook got traded is for the other horrible contract in the league and John Wall.

So here's an example. I do think there's a lot of people that watch basketball and it's on. And I'm talking about people that do this for a living. I'm not just talking about casual people because like this should be a release and not something we're keeping legal. Google pad notes throughout hours. I know somebody like that. Right. It should be something that's fun for you.

But if I were to ask you, like, who would you trust more to close a playoff game, Chris Paul or Russell Westbrook? If you say Russell Westbrook, like, I'm just not going to talk to you. Yeah. I mean, like, listen, that's to me, not taking anything away from Russell, but we're comparing you to Chris Paul. I mean, Chris Paul, to me is nails. I mean, when I think about clutch.

For years, I think for years, people, and then, you know, you can point to the one OKC Clipper series where Paul actually screws up a couple positions. is the end of one of those games. But Westbrook people, like, I think the funniest thing ever, I'm sorry, I cut you off, but the funniest thing ever is Thunder fans for years arguing their guy and then losing their guy, and then getting the guy they argued against for years in Paul, and then getting to see firsthand what he did with a really bad roster.

And the other thing I love about Paul is he showed up, and Billy Donovan in that year with Oklahoma City, they were like, okay, we're going to sit you a ton, we're going to make sure you're healthy, like do it. And he was like, nah, fuck that. I'm playing. We're winning. and give me the ball and I'm running shit.

Like, what are you talking about? Like, I'm here to ball. We're going to fucking play. And they made the playoffs. That Thunder team wasn't that good. They were bad. And the fact that he did that, instead of like all these other guys,

they're like, nah, cool, I can just get paid and check out on this. That's why I will cape. See how young I sounded there making? Yeah, you sounded super, like, lit there. Yeah. That's why I cape 100 for him. Hey, nah, because it's funny because I'll randomly text Ryan a basketball player that I just learned about who, if I was a closer watching fan, I'd know.

I was obsessed with the Dort guy. How's he doing now? Dord was probably, he was overlooked. You know, he was short, maybe a little stocky, but it wasn't like he was an older, you know, draft pick projection. But I'll admit, I kind of liked him. and not only has he proven physically that he can hang up hang in the league he's he's he's improved his shooting like I don't have it in front of me I'll look it up here again but I'm pretty sure we just had to give people the Dort minute because I know everybody's wondering how

dorts doing that's funny I'm giving out to lewdore awards now really weekly on the pod yeah we tapped into something here we're parking our cars in the same garage the door went from 30% from 3 to 34% so there you go that's four percentage points folks. Sixers and Nets. Collision course. Collision course. I can't wait to see this. I'm not putting the Sixers through and electric the other night at Wells Fargo. I don't know how many times we can say that word in one podcast. This feels like it's going to be competitive, but I haven't paid enough attention. Are these two teams, are they evenly match? Not from a player standpoint, but are they good matchups for each other? I love that Philadelphia has all the size. And you saw that size coming to

play to defend the pruner there a little bit. But, you know, Durant's on another level. And the weird thing is it's usually when you put this team together in your first year, you're kind of trying to figure out like the rest of the role pieces where like Miami's first year when they're all together, like they got better later on because you're able to plug in like, okay, we've had a year and this guy will take less to come play for us. He realizes it's hard to do that all in the same offseason. And the way the Nets put this together and having a couple pieces in place already between Joe Harris and Claxton and then Blake is like a completely new guy again. And Brown who's like kind of perfect and this weird inside out deal.

I feel like any time I'm picking against Brooklyn, I'm just picking against the idea that like Kyrie can do whatever he wants. And then if he wins a title, then it'll mean that everyone that criticized Kyrie or Hardin was wrong. And you're like, actually no, like Hardin. Hardin, I mean, did Hardin pull his hamstring because of his hamstring? Did he pull his hamstring because he decided to be completely out of shape and mail it in Houston and not care and throw passes out of bounds when he get mad at John Wall?

and then stomp his feet and just be an embarrassment and then get his way by the way and now he's hurt again so is that just because he's hurt or is it because he didn't give his shit and want to leave a team so i just don't like rooting for guys like that sorry no i mean it's honest of you and i'm sure a lot of your peers aren't very honest about players they don't like uh because there is a it's like a i feel like the NBA more than the NFL is like a big social scene like in the media and like from a player media relationship standpoint like people are afraid to criticize certain guys. Pippin came up in the news this week.

He's writing a book. It's coming out in November. It's a long wait for a book that I'm not going to read. But I am going to be interested in what he has to say about the last dance and that sort of thing. If you had to guess besides like, hey, Jordan wasn't telling the truth, what are you hearing about the way that that relationship and the dynamic within that team was relayed last summer? I've noticed a bunch of times that Pippin over the years. and I think it's softened a bit, but there was a time like where he was being honored by the Bulls

and all the trophies were behind him and he was like, we won these. And I'm paraphrasing here, but I don't know if you guys remember this moment where it was intense, it was pointed, there was a purpose behind it.

I know with Pippin, I've always had a hard time with him. I feel like people that were saying, oh, he was underrated, and that makes him overrated to me. Because in the last dance, there was that one part where it was the Pippin story. And they're basically trying to present

him as if he was discussed as the best player in a league once he kind of went off on his own. And it's like, no, I remember I was alive for that time. And it wasn't. There was never a stretch of basketball conversations. Let's let's be real about like a season or season to season. Because I think whenever you're the best player in the world, you have to put together multiple seasons where you're in that conversation. You can't just be the guy that's playing the best that year or even that stretch. And I don't even think Pippin was that. So I thought the way that was presented was very misleading and inaccurate, even though I, appreciate what Pippin was and all that he brought to the table.

But he was never tied. Dude, Barclay and all those other guys. Other guys were mentioned before Pippin was as far as who's the best after Jordan. It wasn't Pippin. Yeah, I feel like, you know, I guess you could say, hey, I've been practicing and being Robin so long that, of course, it can't be Batman, you know, the little short span that Batman's gone. I'm just not used to it.

But if you are the best player in the league, the cream would rise to the top. I mean, it would be obvious, and you don't remember that. And I don't remember it either. I was a kid, but I mean... No, they had a nice run. They won games that year without Jordan. I mean, you know, it was a better record than you would ever think losing Michael Jordan, but I think everything was still kind of in place and he's really good.

Yeah. But he was never... I just thought there was a stretch of that show, which was great. The documentary was unbelievable, but I felt like they were overselling his status in the league. Okay. I got a mailbag for you before you go, Ryan. This comes from Allie Royal. What hairstyle would Ryan have if he had hair?

No question. I do a Clay Matthew's deal. I'd do a real brave heart deal. I'd probably have it be a little uncomfortable. It'd be so sweet to just tie it up in a little knot and do squats. And then close those deadless. I'm telling you, if I knew this were going to happen, I know you did it. But if I knew this were going to happen, I just think it'd be hilarious to be 45 and have

long Thor like hair. And people would be like, what's wrong with him? I mean, enough people ask that already. But I just would like to step it up another notch. You could definitely do that and live in Charlottesville. I mean, you just can't. There's just some places you can't live with long-ass hair as a 40-plus-year-old dude. You can't have long-ass hair in Midtown Manhattan.

That's where I'd move immediately. Just throw people off. You could move to the beach and teach yoga, like the guy in the movie where he's, like, thrusting in people's faces recently, couples retreat. You know, the jack guy. Four Christmases? No. Do you just say that every time there's a...

movie. You know that, do you know the yoga guy? Blues Brothers. No, it's not, you're both doing a thing. God, dog it. I hate when you guys do this shit. You guys do it so much together. Dead calm. Shark Nato. Pavel Pod Colzine's a pretty good comp.

Yeah, he said he learned how to play basketball by by the controllers. All right. What are the buttons? Ryan Rosillo, thank you for stopping by. Come back soon. worry about my co-host. He's, uh, I think we got somewhere today. I hope so. He's like that. I'm looking, I feel like I ended this week with a real positive. Thanks, making.

Ryan's always just how you expect him to be. He is. We, uh, I, I, I try to make fun, but I really do like Ryan. He's a great guy. Let me tell you a quick story about Ryan. He's Waylon's best friend, like great with kids. He came up to Montana to visit me and Waylon lost his bucket hat on a boat ride. The thing goes floating up in the air. And this is when Whelon's like three years old and lands in the lake and it's gone forever. And there's nothing worse than when you're a kid watching like something you own sink in a body of water. It's just so lonely, especially if it's your favorite hat.

Ryan, the boat's going 30 miles an hour, disrobes naturally and dives into the water and saves the hat. Waylon's still talking about it. So I think a lot of people see Ryan and they think podcast guy kind of bedside manner is a little questionable. Seems like he might be a little grumpy all the time. But if you've ever seen him around kids, you'd have a whole different Ryan Rusillo experience. Yeah, people might just see a guy with a bad attitude who works out a lot and says he reads books and takes notes while he watches basketball games. Doesn't have a ceiling.

Doesn't have a ceiling. It doesn't have a ceiling. Can outwork you and anybody else. But we know him as. Uncle Rye, you know. Uncle Rye, our podcast, Uncle, my podcast uncle, that'd be like your step-uncle. Hey, y'all take care of and come on back now, Tuesday.

I don't know who the guest is going to be, but sure it's going to be good. Peace.