Pardon My Take - Myles Garrett Tried To Kill Mason Rudolph, Rick Ankiel, We Pranked Florio, Week 11 Picks

Episode Date: November 15, 2019

Myles Garrett tried to kill Mason Rudolph, who is bad at quarterbacking but we wont say that because he almost died. Recapping a wild ending to the Browns/Steelers with an all time fight on the field. (2:08-15:45) Carmelo Anthony is back. (15:46-18:22) Week 11 preview and picks including a loser leaves town Sunday Night game. (18:24-38:06) Fantasy Fuccbois. (38:07-41:15) Rick Ankiel joins the show for a fascinating interview about his career, having the yips on the biggest stage imaginable, then fighting back to the big leagues as a hitter. (43:56-1:20:00) Fyre Fest of the week, (1:23:53-1:31:03)  Astros cheating scandal, (1:31:04-1:37:30) and we got Mike Florio again to talk about his fantasy team. (1:37:31-2:00:11)You can find every episode of this show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube. Prime Members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. For more, visit barstool.link/PardonMyTake

Hey, pardon my take listeners, you can find every episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube. Prime members can listen, ad-free, on Amazon Music. On today's part of my take, we have Rick Ayn Keel, awesome interview with him, we have Mike Florio, we pranked his ass real good, and oh yeah, there was a huge fight on a football field and holy shit, Miles Garrett, you lost your mind, you're gonna be suspended for the rest of the season. Just a little news there.

Holy fuck. We stayed up for this one. We stayed up, so we're gonna recap it all, we have the week 11 preview, our bets, we have Firefest, we have Fantasy Fuckboys, holy shit, this is gonna be a great show, and we're brought to you by the Cash App. Cash App is the simplest way to send and save money, and now it's the simplest way to try to grow your money, introducing Cash App investing, unlike investing tools that only let you buy whole shares of a stock, Cash App lets you purchase slices of shares, this

way when your favorite company stock is just a little too expensive, you can still own a piece with as little as $1, and because Cash App is directly connected to your bank account, there are no four to five day waiting periods for your inbound transfers, so you can start investing today, brokerage services are provided by Cash App investing, a subsidiary of Square and members SIPC, and of course when you download the Cash App, enter referral code BARSTULE, you'll receive $10 and the Cash App will send $10 to the ASPCA, so do it right now, save some animals, get some money, download the Cash App in the App Store, Google Play Store today.

Okay, let's go! Welcome to part of my take, presented by the Cash App, go download it right now, use code BARSTULE, you get $10 free and $10 to ASPCA, today is Friday, November 15th, and holy shit Miles Garrett almost killed Mason Rudolph, all hell broke loose at the end of the Steelers Browns game, now this is the only game I've ever seen a team win that they actually lost, they lost because the Browns have their biggest win of the season, they're back in it, they feel good, they beat an arch rival and then oh yeah they lost their best player probably for the rest of the season because he went absolutely insane and tried to smash Mason

Rudolph's skull in with his own helmet, with Mason Rudolph's own helmet, can I just say and I don't want to make this about us or you actually had the Browns but I think that everyone should be refunded who had the Steelers because I wanted to start this show by saying Mason Rudolph has a huge fucking face and is a terrible quarterback and is not the guy in Pittsburgh and he's the classic quarterback where every time he drops back if you're a Steelers fan or you bet on the Steelers you're like oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck, only bad things can happen but I can't say any of that stuff because he almost died because he got hit in the head with his own helmet, he robbed me, now here's the thing, I was prepared

to say something similar, I was going to say I'm not going to say it now, don't say it but say what you want to say, I was going to say it, I'm not going to say it, that Mason Rudolph is at best a perfectly average quarterback under the best conditions possible, so like if he was playing in a dome when it's 70 degrees and all his relatives make up the entire stance it's only his relatives watching, he's playing against Baylor's defense, against a big 12 defense, he can be a perfectly average quarterback but I can't say any of that right now, what I will say is unpopular opinion, you shouldn't be allowed to take another player's helmet off and try to kill him with it, maybe that makes me soft, maybe I'm a snowflake, pacification

of the NFL but actually Rodney Dell is probably going to throw the rule back at him because he made illegal contact with Mason Rudolph's helmet, not the part about him hitting in the head with it, and Mason Rudolph by the way is coming off a brutal concussion like a month ago, the whole thing was insane, we actually were about to tape and in my gambling degeneracy I had bet the Browns second half was like hey can we watch the end of this game, I want to make sure that I win this and then all hell broke loose, and it was absolutely insane, so if you didn't watch, if you fell asleep early, go watch the highlight but we'll explain the highlights, I'm sure a lot of Browns fans turned the game off, yeah they might have,

so it was 3rd in I don't know 25 or whatever, there's no time left, there's maybe 8 seconds left and Mason Rudolph drops back to pass, gets hit by Miles Garrett, now Mason Rudolph did sort of push Miles Garrett in the face, he tried to take Miles Garrett's helmet off, so he definitely provoked it and Miles Garrett then ripped Mason Rudolph's helmet off and I think if it had stopped right there, it would have been a oh that was not nice, like that wasn't good guys, that's AFC North football, yeah like alright well maybe a fine, maybe each everyone gets a $15,000 fine, but no it did not stop there because then Miles Garrett took Mason Rudolph's helmet and smashed Mason Rudolph over the head like full contact, to

his credit he hit him with the open side of the helmet down, so he could say like he was trying to, he was concerned for Mason Rudolph's health, so hey man it's not safe to be out here without your helmet on, let me very aggressively put it back on your head, get it back on your head, yeah, and then pouncy, pouncy happened, Mike, shout out Mike Pouncy, Mike Pouncy, the Pouncy brothers, they have to be the most ride or die guys in the world, because let's just go back in time here, the Pouncy brothers after I think Erin Hernandez was in jail already convicted, felon, murderer, they were like wearing free Erin Hernandez hats at the club, like they stuck with their guy a little too late, a little too far, so Pouncy just goes

insane on Miles Garrett, hits him, kicks him, which by the way hitting a guy with a helmet on is always just a really stupid thing, but that Pouncy again credit to him for being ride or die, I actually think that Pouncy could injure somebody by punching them in the face mask, I think that's within his heelsight, Mike, then he shouldn't be suspended by the way, because I feel like he should just be like hey that was ride or die, and also he shouldn't be suspended because if we're looking out for Mason Rudolph's head and concussions, we can't let that offensive line get worse, well also if I'm Roger Goodell, I don't want to suspend Pouncy because then I have to deal with the Pouncy brothers at that point and

then I'm not safe, correct, so yeah, I'm willing to overlook Pouncy's aggression in this because he had his guys back, Miles Garrett probably gone, I would imagine he's gone for the rest of the year, you could make the argument this was attempted murder, so this was, so there's six games left on the schedule, so now the Browns are what, four and six, we looked it up, Albert Hainesworth is the closest corollary here, he got suspended five games for stomping on Gerrard's head and making him bleed, Sue, who by the way, Nagamata Sue is off the hook as dirtiest guy in the league, immediately, he got suspended two games for stomping on a packer, so I think this is going to be six, and it's like a perfect, alright you're suspended

for the rest of the year, so like we said at the top, the Browns won and now they're basically their season's over, because they just lost their best player on defense. There are definitely some Cleveland Brown fans that went to sleep with a win that are going to wake up tomorrow morning and somehow have lost overnight after a big win, and here's a fun little stat, this was the first time that the Browns have ever beaten, yeah beaten Pittsburgh and Baltimore in the same season. Wow. In the history of the Browns.

The new Browns. Well, yeah. No, it's the Baltimore. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The history of the Browns. Ever, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because they weren't the Baltimore Ravens. This was, this, somewhere Greg Williams is watching and he's like, these are my guys.

Holy shit. These are my guys. It was, it's insane, I don't know what you do as a Browns fan because you actually did just finally get a convincing win. And again, we're not going to bash Mason Rudolph because Miles Gerard already did that for us. But Miles, Mason Rudolph is a very bad quarterback. If we were to bash and we'd say you threw foreign receptions, you look like a joke out there.

Duck should be starting and your face is too big, but again, not going to bash. And again, not to not pile on him, but I also think that if I was coaching that Browns defense on that final series, I would say no matter what you do, do not hurt Mason Rudolph because we get to play him again in two weeks, two weeks, which is awesome. Yeah. Reflex that game. Yeah. Reflex it to another Thursday night.

I don't know. Please do. This feels like a nice nightcap for a Thursday night game as a brawl. Yeah. I'm going to be disappointed for in every single Thursday night football game that ends without an all out fight. Do you think that the size, now I don't want to do the Stephen A Smith, we have to ask the provocation, but do you think the size, the sheer size of Mason Rudolph's head had

anything to do with it because that's a big target to hit? No. Yeah. I think that we might have to consider that. Absolutely. The gravity pole, the gravitational pole of his fucking huge ass head. Right. It's like a planet.

His Miles Garrett's hand was drawn into the face mask and then he got stuck on the face mask and he tried to take his hand off because you shouldn't be doing that to a quarterback. Then he tried to put it back on, but he couldn't get rid of the helmet because it was stuck to his hand. Unbelievable. I mean, in the game kind of sucked. To be honest, it was pretty bad. It was, am I not allowed to say how bad Mason Rudolph was because he was absolutely.

No, you, you, you, you can't, but you can't, but you can say that you, if you, if this hadn't happened, what you would have said, I don't even know that what happened to even effects it because he was that bad. No. We don't do that. That's crossing the line. Hank, he could have been severely injured. So we don't say that if he was, if, if we were able to speak freely about Mason Rudolph,

I would agree with you. He's a fucking terrible quarterback, but we're not going to do that. Okay. He was attacked. He was assaulted. Are you, are you going to blame an assault victim? He's an assault. He was trying to pull Garrett's helmet off.

There you go, Hank. There you go, Hank. I think this is going to be, by the way, Brown, I can't wait and, and I'm not even going to be mad at it because this is just what sports fandom does to you. There will be a large push of Brown's fans tomorrow, getting in everyone's mentions being like, that was Mason Rudolph's fault. We're going to get some freeze frames. We're going to get some stills.

We're going to get some, some photo shops done with arrows. Actually, it's probably just going to be screenshots people take from their phone and then attaching that little emoji sticker with the blue arrow, please see his hands on his helmet. God, I think, I think what should happen in Cleveland, the judge who is adjudicating the guy that, that tried to punch Miles Garrett in the face and traffic, let that guy off. Yeah. That guy should go free. Who knows?

And he was coming back, trying to save Mason Rudolph. Terminator. Yeah. Exactly. So we don't know. I say, let that guy go. The, um, so the other thing we should talk about here is the Browns have solved their red zone offense, which has been completely buried by the fact that Mason Rudolph was terrible

and then got it assaulted. But they were awesome in the red zone. They seem to have figured out how to use their offense against a good Steelers defense. Although again, Mason Rudolph turned the ball over like a million times, so it didn't really help their defense. But the Browns, like they, it wasn't even a question they were going to be able to score from the red zone. I don't know what happened.

They were winning. I don't think their play calling was that great throughout the game. Well, they used to sneak. They finally used to sneak. Yeah, they used to sneak. They punted a lot. Their, their play calling when they weren't in the red zone, I think it was pretty bad. Yeah.

Like the guy that drafted Johnny Manziel got demoted from general manager to offensive coordinator or whatever. Yeah. They were, they were unimaginative for the most part, but they won. They were going to get out of there with a win. Swagger Jr. is two and oh. Yes. As mascot.

S.J. You know what? This was a revenge game for Swagger Jr. against Michael Vicks last team, so a little bad blood was boiling over even before kickoff. So Joe Buck credits Joe Buck. We have finally, it's been 15, 16, I don't even know how many years we are finally able to move on. He said this is the ugliest thing he's ever seen take place on a football field.

So Randy Moss doing a fake mooning in Lambeau, you're officially off the hook because Joe Buck has a new thing that he's disgusted by. And actually Joe Buck's a good friend of ours. It works here. Yes. Like that call works here. It just makes it look how ridiculous it was that he said that about Randy Moss doing a fake moon, but this was probably the most like we all were just kind of sitting here

like, are you serious? This is really happening. Holy shit. It was crazy. It was really bad. And the thing is the Browns could have put them themselves in a position to win another five games going down the stretch. Soft schedule.

Soft schedule. And then we would have gotten an entire off season of Brown Super Bowl hype again, which would have been a lot of fun to deal with. Does it matter if Mason Rudolph passes a concussion protocol? What do you mean? If he's okay? If he's okay, you think there's no suspension? No, not no suspension, but I feel like it makes it less of a, Hank is firmly on Miles

Garrett's side. And I'm with Hank that like, if this hadn't happened, this would have been a bash Mason Rudolph podcast all the way through. I had a whole list of things that I was going to say about how terrible he is, but we can't do it, Hank. But you didn't say, yeah. We cannot do it. He really does remind me like as someone who's watched a lot of quarterbacks play for both

the Bears and the Wisconsin Badgers, when that court, when you have that quarterback who every time he drops back, nothing but bad things can happen. Yeah. It's the worst feeling in the world. It's bad. But you know what? I like that feeling compared to a quarterback that doesn't make you feel anything. That's worse.

Yeah. He looks like Johnny Hecker when he throws, like the interception that he threw. You know what it is? The Rams. Yeah. Last week that was Mason Rudolph. Every time he dropped back. You know what it is?

He wears number two. No good players. True. Matt Ryan is the best player you can probably name that's ever worn number two. It's not a good number to wear. Yeah. I mean, I guess he's got a, what are the better, what are the better number twos, sorry, what are the better quarterbacks, quarterback numbers that they should be wearing?

Five. Seven. Five. Yeah. Seven. Eight. Eleven. Twelve.

Twelve. Ten. Ten's a good quarterback number. Yeah. It's really good. Ten God. Six. Uh-huh.

Six. Seven. Two. I can't think of a good quarterback. Matt, seriously, Matt Ryan is the only one. He's the number two. Yeah. He's the number two king.

But yeah, Mason Rudolph, um, we're not going to say anything bad. No, of course not. Uh, yeah. I'm glad he's okay. I'll say that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Marcus Russell was two. Okay. Great quarterback. I think Jason Campbell wore two. No. For the Bears, I think he might have. Oh, at the end? Yeah.

He was good. He had the game that spawned Colin Kaepernick. Okay. That Monday night game was Colin Kaepernick's coming out party when Jason Campbell played the worst quarterback game of all time. Okay. Yeah. It was, uh, what an ending to that game.

I feel like I've been in a fight. Watching a fight does that to me sometimes. I know. I feel jacked up. And it's, you know what the worst part about it is? It's burying the big news of the night, Carmelo Anthony's back. Yeah. Hoodie season is back.

Trailblazers. Did you see, uh, Doug Gottlieb had a really great tweet. It was, uh, the, uh, the port, Portland trailblazers, Portland, no, Portland, Portland, I don't get it. He took out the D. Okay. I like that. Yeah.

Doug. All right. Oh, you got it, dude. That's solid. Man. Yeah. Carmelo is, I hope he sticks around because it seems like that contract is basically like, Hey, we're going to let you hang out for a week.

And then when you demand to play 30 minutes and get like 15 shots, we're going to cut you. Well, once he sees Dames start jacking up threes from like 30 feet, Carmelo is going to get in on the action too. He's going to be like, that looks like a lot of fun. But also if Dwight Howard, like he's basically on the Dwight Howard contract and I feel like that will help him where it's like, if Dwight can do it with the Lakers, he's with LeBron. I have to do it with the Blazers.

Otherwise I'm going to get shit. Anita. And he's been begging to come back. He hasn't played 300 days. Yeah. I need a, I need a playoff series where the, the, the Portland trailblazers play against the Lakers and Carmelo demands that he D's up LeBron. That's what I need.

That'll be great. That's what I need. Now is Mello, I don't want to get into the conspiracies, but he's pretty good friends with LeBron James. He is. Yeah. So he probably will want to D up LeBron and let LeBron score, get a little bit of that space jam money on the side and a little sheesh after the game who there's good wine

in Portland. Yeah, there is. There's really good wine. What else is there up there? Weed. Weed food trucks. Hipsters. Yeah.

They own a, own a food truck. Hoodie goodies. Oh, it'd be sick if Carmelo like to ingratiate himself, got like a, like a super deep hoop earring, you know, the barista kind where it's like, not, it's like a make your ear lobe all, all weird. I'm actually thinking his entire career, Carmelo has been a hipster. Yeah. He, he dropped out of college, went to go chill in Denver for a while.

Got real high. Tried to go to New York because that's where all the arts and stuff are at. Didn't work out there. Didn't make it in New York. So he leaves. He owns a bunch of really obscure records. His greatest, his greatest accomplishments all happened when he was traveling abroad. Yeah.

That's right. Yep. Those Olympic gold medals. So it's hipster Carmelo. He's going to get a bike. No, he's going to get a, a, a unicycle. Yeah. Unicycle.

He's going to learn to juggle. He's going to do slack lining. Yeah. He's going to do it all. He's going to be, he's going to get some carabiners. Blay on. Mm hmm. Yeah.

I really forget to play on, play off. Just fucking fall. All right. Let's do our weekend preview. We have week 11 of the NFL. We have week 12 of college football. I wish they would just make that the same. It's not though because it's week zero to begin, right?

No, but they're, they're always, they're two ahead. Week zero is two ahead. Either way. Because there's no year zero. Right. Screws it up. It just messes. Small brains.

We can't figure this out. So, so week 11 of the NFL. We're brought to you by a bet MGM. PMT is home for sports betting this year. Bet MGM. And if you're in New Jersey, you need to check out the bet MGM sports app. Download the app deposit and check out lines from anywhere, but you need to be located in New Jersey to place your bets.

It's awesome live betting as well. Every week. Bet MGM hosts special markets just for us PMT. They'll always price up and boost. I can't lose parlay. Post special odds for PFTs prime time field goals, special field goals over field goals in the Sunday night and the Monday night game, both in the Barstool specials tab on bet MGM.

And this weekend, Bet MGM has another special offer for our AWLs. New users get a deposit match of up to $250. If you sign up with bonus code PMT, that means if you make your first deposit of $250, you'll have $500 in your account to bet with. If you deposit $100, you'll have $200 to bet with. You've got to make sure to sign up with the bonus code PMT to take advantage of the offer. This is our juiciest offer with Bet MGM yet.

So if you're in New Jersey and haven't signed up yet, now is the perfect time. It's free money. We're giving away free money. Oh, you have a pick. I do. Oh. This pick is a type of car.

Jaguar. No. Good guess though. Good guess though. That would have been. It's not the Colts. Nope. Bronco.

Ooh. Good guess. Good guess though. Good guess though. Ram. Yep. Ram. Okay.

How many other teams are named after each other? We had a lot there. I could have kept going. Fuck. All right. So Larry has the Rams. You got to go to Bet MGM right now. You put in that promo code PMT and you can get a deposit match of up to $250.

Bet it on the Rams. The Chargers would be another one. Yeah. How about that? Bet matched in free bets. Must be 21 or older. Must be in New Jersey to place bets. Restrictions apply.

Visit betmgm.com for the full list of terms and conditions. Gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER. Go right now. Bet MGM right now. If you're in New Jersey, it's the best app to have. And here is my Can't Lose Parley. You ready? I'm ready.

Did the one last week? It lost. Okay. Just I want to make sure. It's one of the, actually the juiciest part of it won. The Steelers won outright. That was a risky one. The Saints, forget about it.

All right. Bills. The Bills are playing the Dolphins. Okay. Bills Moneyline. Panthers are playing the Falcons. Yeah. At home the Panthers are playing the Falcons.

No way the Panthers lose two in a row. I like that one. It's not happening. And no way the Falcons win two in a row at this point. Right. Right. Dan Quinn already saved his job last week. Correct.

And then finally the Raiders playing against the Bengals. That one is just put it, like listen, I set it up so you have the one o'clock, maybe sweat a little. The four o'clock Raiders, just watch your money grow. It is plus 135 regularly. Bet MGM has boosted it to plus 170. That's the can't lose parlay. It cannot lose.

I'm going to win this one. Let me ask you. I might take the reverse parlay of that. You can go fuck yourself. Complete fade. Yeah. Big Cat, what's your policy on when you're engineering your parlay? When you're sourcing your teams?

Do you like to spread them out and go early, late, and then night game? Oh yeah. I like that too. If you can keep yourself alive for as long as possible, then your chances are greater. I like to do it even one more, PFT. I like to go, usually I'll go Saturday, Sunday, like a four team parlay stretching all the time zones, just so that I can just watch it and feel good about it and be like, all right, here we go.

I got this waiting for me later on. Do you ever really fuck around with things and do a Thursday night game, early Sunday, late Sunday, Sunday night, and Monday night? Yeah. I'll get crazy. So that's my Can't Lose Parlay, Can't Lose Weekend Preview. We should start with, not to brag, but we called it because Adam Gase is safe. He's safe and sound.

And we did call it. They're not going to fire him. Because we said it was the Pat Shermer versus Adam Gase game was literally for their jobs. And also the fact that Sam Darnold said we can run the table. I think that helped Adam Gase too, because now even the Johnson's are like, we might run the table. Can't fire him now. Seems interesting.

I have an easy schedule. Yeah. I used the Playoff Machine, which by the way is back on ESPN. The Playoff Machine is back. You can do all the simulations. There's still a MetLife Super Bowl in play. We could get Giants Jets if everybody runs the table. That would be two tables.

No, that would be too much. That would be too much. Where's the, oh no, the Dolphins aren't going to have a home Super Bowl game. I had a dream. No, they could. They're still in it. What the hell? Where was it?

The Dolphins absolutely could make the Super Bowl. Mathematically. Okay. John Grunin and Mark Davis the first year in Vegas. Oh, that might have been it. That would be. I really did have this dream and I can't remember what team it was, but I dreamt that there was a home Super Bowl win.

That's very weird. And it was a future Super Bowl. So it must have been either that Vegas Tampa Bay, probably not Cardinals, maybe Cardinals Saints. Yes. Maybe that's what it was because the Saints are having a Super Bowl in like four years. That would be amazing. Also, LSU, I think the national championship game.

That's in New Orleans. That might have been it. That would be. I think we should go to that. This was the fun segment. Yeah. We definitely should. Yes.

This is the fun segment of trying to figure out my dream that I can't remember because talking about dreams is so fun. How about we talk about dreams that we can't remember? I think it goes. Inception. Yeah. It goes in order of things that other people want to hear about. First is your dreams that you had.

Second is your fantasy team. Yes. Yeah. And then third is dreams that you can't remember that everyone tries to figure out. All right. The loser leaves town game. It is the Sunday night game. The loser of the Rams Bears, I think, is out of the playoff picture.

Wouldn't you say? I would agree with that. I would say it's done so. But you talked yourself into it. You think that the Bears have a chance. Well, the portal is open. The time portal is open for me. And the offense.

I mean, the Rams offense recently hasn't looked much better than the Bears offense. I think it's going to be a very ugly game. I think both offensive lines kind of stink. Both defensive lines are good. So it's going to be one of those games that like third and longs, a lot of incompletions, a lot of punts, maybe the under. Maybe that's a preview for my pick. I'm a little bit concerned about the Rams quarterback situation.

When you have two studs like Blake Portals and Jared Goff and you're throwing passes with Hecker, your punter, give me a break. That's true. Let the boys that can air it out, air it out. So yeah, that game is officially a loser leaves town game because the loser really does. That's it. For the season, the Rams would go to what? Five and five and the Bears would go to four and six.

I feel like it's going to be tough, especially considering how the Seahawks and Vikings have been playing for those other two spots in the wild card. Now, where's the game? It's in. It's in LA. Okay. Not bare weather. Not bare weather.

Well, I don't know. Maybe there's maybe there's a wildfire going on. That's well. Yeah. That's smokey. That be bare? Smoky the bare weather. Yes.

I think for Carolina this weekend, I have them. They're the single part of a loser leaves town, so it's a can't lose game for Carolina. I think if they lose this game to the Falcons, their season's done. I like that. Yeah. We might put the Dunshane on them twice. A little fun stat here. It's Maddie Ice's first outdoor game this year.

It's the Falcons first outdoor game. Uh-oh. So I'm betting. I'm betting on the Panthers. Yeah. I like that. We have a hype train game. Uh, Lamar versus Sean game, which is going to be awesome.

The Texans are going to Baltimore. I'm very excited for that. I feel like we're going to get at least four to five ridiculous highlights from that game or where we get the gift. And it's like, Oh my God, how do they do this? Just pick a side. Both guys are going to do it. That's going to be a fun game.

And then I also had one. Are we sure they're good game? Which one's that? Bills at dolphins. Yeah. Hear me out. Hear me out. PFT's dolphins.

Kind of hot. Two in a row. Very hot. If they win this game. I don't know if we can definitively say, are we sure they're good? Cause the opposite of, are we sure they're good? No, they're bad. I don't know if we can say they're bad.

So they might be good. Are we sure they're good? Yeah. That might be the worst win in the history of the Miami Dolphins franchise. If they win that game. Right. And then the bills are on a two game losing streak. Not look, oh no, actually sorry.

They beat the Redskins in between the Eagles and the Browns. Not looking great as of late. This is a get right game for them. If they pound the dolphins, I think we can go back to confidently saying the bills are not only good, but they'll be in the playoffs. I think it's also a show me game. I just came over to it right now. I like it.

It's a show me game for the Raiders. Cause they're taking on the Bengals. They need to beat the shit out of the Bengals. If they don't, I'm out on the Raiders. I think the Raiders might be in the playoffs. I mean, they could. I really do. They could.

I'm kind of in on the Raiders making the playoffs because I just, I think they have enough Derek Carrs playing well enough. I actually think Derek Carrs very close to keeping his job in his house next to John Gruden in Las Vegas. So here's why I think Derek Carrs been playing better recently. He grew up in the shadow of David Carr, his older brother. First overall pick. People forget. He grew up as like the second fiddle in the car household.

You're like, you're, you're always like, you know, the second one to get brought up at family, get together. So how's, how's David doing? He's really lighting it up in college. Yeah. He's getting sacked a lot. Yeah. And how's your son who wears mascara? Yeah.

The other kid, the goth one. Yeah. The goth one. Is he still going through that phase? Is he listening to a lot of the cure still in his room or what's going on there? Yeah. AJ Soprano. So with Derek Carr, he grew up in that type of environment.

Him getting together with John Gruden who consistently nags him and hypes up other quarterbacks around him. I think that's when Derek Carr is at his best when he's getting overlooked by his own father figure. Oh, I agree with your theory. I'll throw on the practical theory on top of that. We forgot that John Gruden made rich gain in MVP and playing in the West Coast offense is pretty fucking easy. I'm going to choose to believe like deep seated. No, I agree with yours. I agree with yours.

But this is like, like Derek Carr is doing the right things where he doesn't have to throw the ball down the field all that much. He still can. But he's doing a really good job of hitting the short media, you know, medium passes and doing, you know, running the offense well. He's playing very well. Also, I don't think that the Bengals are going to be ready for him because they've got Andy Dalton running the scout team offense right now. Last year or last week, Andy Dalton simulated Lamar Jackson getting ready for the Ravens. That was his job was to emulate Lamar Jackson. This is probably more in a skill set.

I think Andy Dalton at his best right now is like Derek Carr with the flu. Yeah. I'll put it this way. He's like a mix between all three of the Raiders quarterbacks that they have. Yes, I agree. That he's like the perfect combination of Mike Glennon, Nathan Peterman and Derek Carr. What's their collective name? It's the shittiest version of that old YouTube video.

Does it blend? Yes. They just throw Nathan Peterman, Glennon and Carr into a blender and then whoops, pops out Andy Dalton. Derek then is what he is. Yeah. Okay. There we go. So yeah.

Nate. Nate. Nate. Nate Vid. Nate Keterman. Nate. Nate Vic Keterman. Nate.

Vic Keterman. I like that. Okay. So that's what Andy Dalton is. I think that the Raiders are going to beat the shadow. I'll put it this way. If the Raiders win by 20 points or more, I think playoff town. Yeah.

I mean on playoff town Raiders, I think, listen, there's going to be one of these teams. We talked to Warren Sharp about it last week, one of these teams that is in that 5-4, 6-4, You know five and five wherever it may be One of them is gonna get hot and the raiders have a pretty easy schedule down the stretch It's like them and the Steelers kind of staring at each other right across one of those higher nations Okay, let's do some picks Hank. Why don't you start with your favorite your favorite favorite my favorite favorite? I am going to take the Patriots. Okay minus three and a half minus three and a half It is the classic I think I wouldn't be surprised that they lose

So I'm going to take them because that means they'll probably win by seven plus This is a classic game. I would not be shocked at all if they lost this game Are you are you afraid of their uniforms? Are the Eagles wearing all blacks? No, I'm just saying like are you are you saying that you wouldn't be shocked because you still have flashbacks of the Eagles in those uniforms? Just the Eagles entire aura beating the Patriots in the Super Bowl. I mean, we beat them in the Super Bowl as well So it's really that that I don't even worry about that's just a complete wash in terms of Super Bowls I'm just focused on this season, but no, yeah, okay, so I That I'm Nick Paul's well

Here's the thing if you want to bet on the Patriots this weekend It's the perfect case where you can bet it and then if you lose Say did you see the numbers of Bill Belichick off a buy or off of a loss because it's the perfect storm? It's off a buy and off the loss and I think they're like 70% off of each Throughout the years one combined. Yeah, so you can just say well, it was the sharp play It was the right play if you look at the numbers. It was the right play. What do you want me to do? Material change. Mm-hmm. I also love every underdog again. I have a problem I got off and I was like, it's gonna it's not gonna hit and then like nine underdogs hit last week

And I was like what makes it out dumber to get back on. Yes, but then I looked at the board and I'm like, holy fuck Okay, your dog a lot of good underdogs. Let's get all the underdog I think I might do it with you just because I'm so sick of being opposite of you and having to deal with Your giggles on Sunday. That's that actually sounds kind of fun. Yeah, we should just do the entire board Here are some stats for you ready? Patriots are 49 47 and 9 straight up off a loss since 2003 40 and 16 against the spread off of buys including playoffs They're 24 and 4 straight up 17 and 10 against the spread. Okay, we got to do it then

I mean that's those are insane numbers So if you just say I play the numbers not the team there you go and by the half point And by that now you're getting crazy with it. Well now now you're introducing math I was fine with you talking about numbers But once you insert math into it, I'm out if you lose this now It will count as buying that half point on our very meticulous records We've been keeping all year that we're going to reveal to everyone week 17 understood Pft go ahead my favorite last week. What was it?

My double platinum lock with the saints and the Falcons the under on that one hit this week I have a triple enriched plutonium. It's radioactive. That's how much I like this favorite If you want to follow me on this one, you can 499 a month on my patreon Saints minus five at Tampa Last week for the Saints. I'm I'm chalking that up to an aberration. Okay. I'm not sure what aberration It was a separation is French for we lost another war that we should have every team gets a stinker Yeah, that's what you have to pay after you lose a war. Mm-hmm aberrations. Yes. You have to pay aberrations a lot of aberrations So I think that I think the Saints are gonna steamroll the Buccaneers. Okay The only makes me nervous the Bucs actually do have

One of the best if not get best run defenses, but that's just a Drew Brees stack game Yep A little secondary is terrible a little added bonus radioactive play for you is to take the over in that game too I like that over that's a bonus the Bucs Here's a stat for you the Bucs this season in their games. The total has been averaging 59.9 points. I love that Yeah, so the over 50 you got room to spare as they say I actually have that as oh, no I don't have that as well, but I like that over as well. All right, my favorite. I'm gonna take the Raiders minus 11 They're gonna steamroll that's gonna be a shit pumping if you will

Hank your underdog my underdog. I gave you the Falcons money line last week plus 400. No, you didn't yes I did you did. Yes. Really? Yes. I don't remember you said that on this show a hundred million percent I was like Falcons money line I love the Falcons money line if that was gonna take on it would be the Falcons money line Okay, and the problem with this is that Hank could easily go back and insert that into last week No, people can tweet at you though. I was getting I mean my my tweets were flooded with people thanking me You're notice. Yeah, you know these relate our opinion. So I feel responsible to give another plus 400 underdog this week the Broncos Okay, okay. Bye Brandon Allen. I actually don't mind that one. All right. All right. Yeah, Kirk Cousins

He always has to come back down to you know regular Kirk Cousins lovely to play him Well, all right, PFT your underdog my underdog is gonna be the Jets at the our words. I love it. Yeah, love it I loved it at Jets plus one and a half. I love it even more at Jets plus two and a half So load up on the New York football Jets This is absolutely like this is definitely what Jamal Adams He did it last week against Daniel Jones when he just took the ball out of his hands I'd expect him to do that at least twice against Dwayne Haskins this week Yes, Dwayne Haskins is not proven that he can control the ball whether it's on his person or in the air yet

So take them. All right. I like that. I'm gonna take the Texans plus four and a half I think that game's gonna be close I think that's gonna be one of those instant classic ones that comes down to a field goal in the witching out I hope so. Yeah, that game really needs to be later on in the day. I should have been a four o'clock game They should have flexed it out of the Sun. I I really would prefer not to have the Bears on Sunday A game like that deserves to be like one of four games going on at the same time It should not be lost in the mess early. Yes. Uh, Hank, you're over Sunday night. Bears rams absolute slugs The quarterbacks of you know and back and forth touchdown after touchdown lighting it up

Minimum eight touchdowns combined between the two minimum touchdowns What was the game you said over how many? How many uh interception returns are the bears going to score off Johnny? You did this last week where you gave us the special teams pick six all these Like lines for the bears over last week and it didn't hit nope Okay, but this isn't special teams. This is quarterback play quarterback all quarterbacks. Okay, lighten it up. All right That's my under by the way So I'll skip my under when we get to it, but I love the under in that game

I don't I do not trust either offensive line and I trust both defenses PFT you're over my over is very simple Eagles Patriots 25 same easy take it to the bank right now spin that money It's it's payday. You just got paid earlier. It's the 15th Go ahead spin that money because you're going to recoup it on the back end on sunday When it's probably going to be a 31 to 30 Patriots victory Okay, I like that over as well just because it's in that time slot where it's like hey Yep, that's late on sunday 90 percent of my logic. I would like to just bet it over and just chill out Yes, uh, Hank your under will finish up with that

Panthers falcons panthers falcons Okay, okay, you like the under in that one. Yeah, matty ice. Yep Okay, uh, my under is broncos at vikings. Okay, I just think I get the feeling that zimmer loves Playing low scoring football games when he runs up against another low scoring football team Yeah, that is the he gets in the mindset like we're going to run the ball and play defense Right, they they when vik fangio and mike zimmer meet each other at hat, you know at the middle of the field before the game They're like, hey We're going to do what we agreed on right like no points today. It's a gentleman's agreement. We're going to go 12 to 9

We're going to end up winning nobody gets embarrassed and then after the game we can just say that's good old school football Yeah, let's say let's just agree. Uh, no deep throws. All right. Yep. Cool. All right. Good to see you coach. See you later Uh, all right. My under is the bears rams game, which I think is going to go under easily Uh, let's do fantasy fuck boys and then we'll get to rick and keel What's up boys, it's branded fucking bowling Yo Brandon, my stardom this week is austin rivers He got teed up or no, he told his dad to get teed up. He said fuck his dad. Fuck your mother get teed up He doesn't give a fuck. He doesn't care that his dad sperm is the reason he exists. He said fuck him

He's starting on that's right. Let's go and a piss wreck style. My sit-em is paul bisson at Oh, I beat him up once. I'll beat him up again. He's chirping my boy. Hank on twitter. Fuck him I was wondering if you knew who branded bowling was so good that you do my sleeper is lions Not maddie p even though he's pretty good But actual lions there was a protest in iraq and they took they had The police told me about a geopolitical situation Fucking lion. I don't know about the geopolitics of it, but having lions to go against dogs is fucking gangster R.i.p. Cecil my man. Oh, man. Fuck that dentist. Fuck dentist never been never gonna go

What's up? Fuck has its mic to riko. I'm starting shorts. I'm starting shorts this weekend You see the story up in canadia. There was a winter peg blue bombers fan He hasn't worn pants in 18 years. He said he wasn't gonna do it till they won the great cup Well, then it's in my finals. So he should tell those shins Enjoy the vitamin d while you still can because I got a feeling the blue bombers are gonna win a great cup Love it. Love the shorts. Get those tender little calves burned where I'm from. We call that veal I'm sitting dk mecca. He's on a bi-week true. True. He's on a bi-week true sit them It last week. I don't know if you saw this guy try to turn

He looked like an aircraft carrier trying to steer himself upfield instead of going out of bounds What the hell was going on with that guy? He can't go sideways popcorn muscles. My sleeper is weighted blankets I'm bringing him back. I brought mine back out. He was like I'm getting a hug from a burrito. It's super comfortable I put it on. I'm calm down. I take it nice and easy. I don't care what's inside of him It could be any it's like eating a twinkie Just load me up with all the toxins as long as I feel good after we love it. All right. What's up guys? It's Lorenzo Linguini. My stardom is Zlatan. He retired from the galaxy or he left the galaxy I don't fucking know but all he said was you're welcome. You're welcome. That's my boy. That's how you leave and that's talking

Amen, Enzo. All right. My sit him is burner accounts Everyone just assumes every account on the internet is a burner account if I have to see another tweet saying Hey, we found this person's burner account. Shut the fuck up. Start a cooler account God was doing God used a burner account when that bush was on fire. He was just like chirping and he was like, hey Hey, what's up, man? What's up with you? All right, my sleeper is Mike Trouty. He won his third MVP this this day Today, who cares? I'm starting to think this guy's pretty good. Who cares? He must be good with my bare hands He must be good in the playoffs right? Are you talking about that guy that's always at the Eagles game on October 27th? Mike Trout Okay, Mike Trout, Mikey

Mikey fishes Seven fishes. Oh, I think I'm impressed. You didn't know who brain bull. I was like, what are you doing? No, I didn't I literally just searched paul businet fight. Oh, and it was yeah I should have said ryan reeves though because he was the one he dumbied him. What's what's up with biz? He's just chirping you we put up a picture on pmt That was like our uh from from picture day and he was like great picture minus Hank And then and then and then he came in with a chirp about my suit like two weeks later Like with the least unoriginal chirp of all time

I can't believe i'm saying this but I expected something more clever out of paul businet than just great picture minus Hank I mean, he's an all-time chirper right? He's a locker room guy. He's he keeps the boys loose You'd think that he'd be able to do that. You'll have to have him on the show to discuss disappointing this very disappointing Uh development here. All right, catch these hands. Let's get to our interview with rick ankill Fascinating interview fascinating guy. It's one of those guys. It's like I can't believe this story is real He was a pitcher he had the yips He then went all the way back down to the bottom of the minor league retired and then came all the way back up as a hitter Before we do that though

Simply safe a recent gallop survey shows americans worry more about burglary than almost any other crime more than mugging More than terrorism more than car theft and murder according to studies just over 10 percent of break-ins Are planned beforehand the wrestlers spur the moment crimes of opportunity in other words random Did you know most break-ins happen between 6 a.m. And 6 p.m. In the middle of the day According to the fbi the average loss in a burglary is over two thousand dollars. That can be hard to recover from There are over two million burglars Reported every year. That's one in every 13 seconds So simply safe is here to protect you and what's crazy is that only one in five homes that have home security

Maybe because most companies really don't make it easy, but simply safe does We actually have a friend who works here who had a burglary He got simply safe It was super easy to set up and now he sleeps well at night Because simply safe protects your whole home every window room and door with 24 seven monitoring for just a fraction of the cost Their police dispatch is up to three and a half times faster because they use video verification There's no contract hidden free fees or fine print. It's designed to blend right into your home. No wires No drilling. It's easy to order and easy to set up usually in under an hour

Simply safe has won a ton of awards from sea net to the new york times wire cutter And prices are always fair and honest around the clock monitoring is just 15 dollars a month So go visit simply safe.com slash pmt right now You'll get free shipping in a 60 day risk-free trial. You've got nothing to lose Go now and be sure to go to simply safe.com slash pmt So they know our show sent you that simply safe.com slash pmt Okay, here he is rick ankeel Okay, we now welcome on a very special guest. It is former mlb pitcher and outfielder rick ankeel

Thank you for joining us. We appreciate it. You have a book. It is called the phenomenon pressure the yips and the pitch that changed my life Um, do we want to start there? I'm sure you get a little tired of that, right? It's okay. Um, I would say sometimes it can get old But because of recently what just happened Um, brinn had taught who won the bermuda event mentioned my book and interviewed saying that he read it and helped him because he went through the yips Um, I think that's fun and just You know being able to go through it with the yips and you know help whether it's mlb alumni Kids in the career summit that the alumni of you know, alumni puts on Um, you know, I think it all ties in. Yeah. Yeah before we get into, you know

The pitch that did change your life and how you kind of got out of it the ups and downs that you went through I got a question about you at your best as a pitcher When you were at your best, could you strike out you at your best as a hitter? Without even with blindfolded probably. Yeah. Yeah, I could definitely strike me out throw the hammer Hammer high fastball. Uh-huh. Yeah, I was I was reading some stories about um, you coming up as a pitcher And I would say that you as a pitcher definitely could strike out you as a hitter because of some of these like We actually let's start there because we'll get to the to the pitch that changed your life But how about your high school when I was reading your um, letter to your former self

Did you write that by the way or did the players tribune just write players being right? You know, you interview interview and they write Sarah cheater writes it right you talked to derrick one derrick now edits it Ryan does it goes into wordpress ryan duffy wrote it You said in that that one day you're gonna wake up and you're gonna be able to throw 94 And you were able to throw 84 the day before is that actually how it happened? So I grew Yeah, I was teeny in high school. Um and growing up. I was just always the smallest one in my class And I graduated 17 but you know over a summer I grew so I went from throwing 84 to 94 over summer. It was just like

That's crazy. Yeah, and you could just feel like oh my god. This is actually a thing now Yeah, well, so I was I was a good pitcher, right? It wasn't great, but I was good. I made my all-star teams Um, and when that happened it was like Whoa, yeah, this is this is real college is real Maybe pros who knows, you know, but that's when it started So the the stat that is insane to even look at you struck out 162 batters in 74 innings in high school That must have been awful. That must have been so holy shit. I'm trying to do the math right 162 batters

In 74 that's more than two strikeouts in any he didn't give up a single run or earned run in regular season That's correct. Yeah, it was how sick was that? It was it was unbelievable because you're you know, my junior year was good too, right? So now you have scouts there and it's like everybody there is watching and what I felt like I kept every time I had more success. I kept working harder and it was like Reinforcing that hard work is the way to go. You know what I mean? It just kept making me work harder and it kept getting better and it was incredible Right you played on easy mode. He played a video game on easy mode

But in real life was there anyone that you would face in high school that you were even slightly concerned about this? Um, you always read of course, right? So there's always the prospect list and when you're high school You're checking it, you know, I'll never forget like Troy Cameron He went to st. Thomas and that was a huge school back then there was ranked number one in the nation But anytime you'd play those guys, right? You're raising it to the next level like there's no way I'm gonna let this guy beat me You know, so yeah, I mean it must have been full I can't imagine being able to strike that many people out like just domination. Yeah, so were you also a good hitter at the time? I was so that's not fair. So you were you were just striking everybody out and you were slugging dingers

I wasn't as good as a hitter as I was a pitcher, but I could hit and there was a little bit of talk of we'll draft you to do both Um, the expo for one team that said that but I think that was kind of like a ploy of let's just get him in the system And he's gonna pitch Let you go a little bit. We're gonna be like, yeah, yeah, we can let you do whatever. Yeah. All right. Here's another stat. That's ridiculous in Single a you went 17.2 consecutive innings without giving up a hit So you threw basically two back-to-back. No hitters Almost almost almost. Yeah, because you know what they would put me on a hundred pitch

limit So it was like five innings five innings five innings and then the two and the guy who got the hit was Jerry Harrison jr. Who will never let that never let it go. I mean That must have been a lot of pressure though when you when you get to the third game and you're like, wait I still haven't given up a hit in three games. You know what though? I didn't look at it like that and the and the person who held the record before that was Dwight Gooden And growing up that was my brother's idol and and then I idolized him. So I'm like, oh my gosh I just beat dog Gooden's record. Like it was just this empowering

moment really of like I'm just gonna keep going, you know versus like I'm gonna give up a hit And then the last one I had to bring up about you know coming up as a pitcher I read the story that in uh, maybe it was double a that your catcher used to tell the hitters What pitch you were throwing just to try to make it harder for you Yeah, so I didn't know that until I wrote the book and his name was Keith McDonald Okay, they called him fact it but great guy But they were like we need to try to get this kid some adversity because nobody's hitting them

I'm still mad about it to be honest because I was still trying to put up records You know what I mean? I'm I don't know. I was six and oh or something and what are you doing, bro? So he would actually say like here comes a curveball. Yeah, he was later He told me he's like, yeah, I was telling the guys and at first they didn't believe me And then you would throw it and I and he was like, look do we need to get the kids adversity? Holy shit, that's you're so good. They had your own team had to cheat against you. They were trying Damn. So at what point during during the three consecutive no hitters where you're like, why don't they just call me up yet? Like they're wasting all these after the second one

Um, no, you know what in back then I was effect. I will call it effectively wild I was young and you know the strikeout was glorified back then So I was just trying to throw as hard as I could so it would be a lot of three two counts Right, not that that's good or bad. I still struck you out But when you look at it like that you have to understand too like in the big leagues You might not get the swings on those balls out of the zone as much as you're going to get them down there in a ball So like I understood that. Okay. Have you always been a soul patch guy? Um, pretty much. I had a little bit down here

Um, and then I had a smaller one of my wife's like, I like it keep it going. So happy wife. Happy life I think when I think soul patch, I think you I think um, the singer smash mouth He's got one, but yeah, you're you're like the longest standing ball player that I can think Tim Hudson too. Yeah It keeps like the late 90s early 2000s baseball players alive I like the soul. It does you are the soul of those years It really is because that was the look the fighting necklaces. We always talk about did you wear one of those? I had one, um, I had something similar to it. I don't remember it was an 07

Um, because that's when I came back to hit and I remember because my wife bought it for me And I you know, you know baseball players superstitious. Yeah, you start playing well. It's never coming off. Yes. That's what happened Yeah, there's the uh, the like copper bracelets That's one that they wear and then there was one postseason I remember when everybody showed up with a fight necklace and I thought that there was like one medical sales rep That got in real deep with the right people major league baseball Is made of killing that one year and then jetted no question right because you would come in and on your seat There would just be a couple necklaces, you know, like on your chair and your locker. Yeah, if you give me a free necklace

I'm going to put it on at least the first time. Yeah, um, okay So so let's let's talk about the transition your book the the yips and everything We are big time spin zone guys So I'm we would like to look at it from a different point of view You uh, the Cardinals won that game and Greg Maddox lost that game future Hall of Famer at the time Lost that game people don't talk about that enough. So the game won 2000 nlds you're up against Greg Maddox You pitched the first two innings fine

Greg Maddox gives up six runs in the first which is unheard of which we should talk about more Um, and then and then he switches whole game around that es being commercial. Yeah, because he said chicks dig the long Yes, which you were also better. Yes. So so yeah, I love it. You own Greg Maddox. We remember this game I don't think I own him, but I like it. What what exactly happened in that third inning like was it? Did you know right when I lost it? Yeah, would you know right away? No, um, I bounced the curve ball and then Um, let me take that back. I threw a cutter in that just cut and it wasn't even that bad of a pitch and at the time You know the entire season Mike Matheny was my catcher. He cut his hand. He couldn't catch So we brought in Carlos Hernandez. It was just a different catcher when I would try to throw

Into righties because I'm left handed. So I was kind of firing across my body. I'd cut it on accident sometimes So sometimes you have this 95 mile an hour fastball that cuts when nobody's telling you it's cutting But Matheny knew that from catching me But in my mind for whatever reason I'm thinking man, I just Freaking wild pitch right like my family everybody's watching and usually you shake that crap off and it doesn't even matter All of a sudden I spike a curve ball. It starts to unravel Um, I had no idea what was happening Everything that I had always used up to that point to get myself back on track wasn't working, you know, mechanically

mental thoughts You know the keys that guys have and you know before I know it I'm getting taken out of the game You know, it's like I would try to throw a pitch and all of a sudden it would launch off the backstrap Or bounce something and you know, I had no idea what that was going on So after that inning you get pulled after the five wild pitches Did you go out later on that day and just be like I've got to be past this by now the yips are gone and throw any more pitches or did you wait till the next day? Or did you take your standard amount of time throw after, you know, two nights sleep?

What was that like? Um, well, I remember saying to the media. I was a mechanical issue. This will never happen again I really didn't know what the yips was at that point. Um, not even sure I knew what the word anxiety meant Because I was yelling everything just came so fast. Um The next day I came to the field you definitely kind of have a little like all right, you know Because everybody's watching on the corner there. I like what's this going to look like, but I'm playing cat Everything's fine. I throw a bullpen the next day. I was lights out So tony la rusa calls me and it's like, hey, I don't I don't think we're going to use you You know, like I think we're just gonna I'm so I went going went somewhat ballistic like oh, shit. This is my time

I want this game, you know, blah blah blah. He's like, all right. You sure you're fine. I'm like, yeah, man I got it. So I end up starting the next game against the Mets and You know, one a few pitches, you know start spraying it all over and it was like It's this anxiety feeling where you know, I can definitely feel more nerves than I ever felt before warming up in the bullpen I remember walking from the bullpen to the to the mound in New York And it was like, all right, I got this and it's like you throw one pitch and it's kind of close That's fine. But then you throw one that's maybe not, you know, a strike but the catch can catch it And it's like my mind goes. Oh, no, here we go again

And then this feeling comes over where it's almost like I couldn't feel the ball and you go to fire it And it's like you have this mini blackout and you're like, where'd the ball go? Wow? Yeah, that's crazy Now Tony Larusa Said that that decision to start you game one of the nlds against Greg Maddox will haunt him forever Do you think that it was the moment or do you think this is something that would have happened to you regardless? At some point in your career. Yeah, great question. Um, and I think it's the the unanswered question that'll never be answered when I You know, I didn't go back and watch it for a long time. I did it and um recently

When I wrote the book when we did the documentary I sat down and just really tried to study it and You know, there were some pitches in there that Mike Matheny would have caught and maybe it would he would have caught it And I would have been fine and then maybe it would have happened next game It would have happened five years maybe never happened. I don't know But it's what what I do know is it's one of those things that sometimes we don't always know why And it's what the what are we gonna do about it? Right? Then what are we gonna do about it? So now we need to fix it Right. Yeah, it's it must be crazy to watch

Yourself in that moment when you finally did go back and watch it. Did it feel Like out of body. Did you or did you? You know, all the memories kind of flashed back to you and like, oh, yeah, I remember Thinking this was it like I was about to lose it So I was thinking that I was going to get this like pit in my stomach And the first time that I went back and watched it was with the writer tim brown Who wrote my book and we sat down because obviously we need to go over and write about it And um, I thought I was going to have this whatever and you open the computer and I felt fine

I watched it and I and I was actually surprised at how under control I looked On the mound as it was happening in the dugout after they took me out Um, I was like that's amazing because inside, you know, yeah my body and my brain Was going haywire, you know, you're going on my, you know, I just let my team down You have all these all those feelings you let the team down your town down your friends down You know, all those things that they come with that that was just, you know, that's what I was surprised by That's really interesting. So it's like getting out of your own head let you see the in the larger perspective that It wasn't as bad to everybody else as it was so you you were making it worse

By putting all that pressure on yourself in the moment, which I guess is like a natural thing Yeah, uh, but then what do you know, how do you how do you replicate that? How do you tell yourself like in the moment when you're going through something like that? It's not as bad as you feel right now You know, how do you regulate that anxiety and I don't know if there's an answer to that No, I don't know if there is either because when you you know, the the anxiety is such a powerful Um, it's such a powerful thing and and that's and the people who go through the yips, right? Whether it be golf whether it be whatever it may be

I think what some people don't realize is that it consumes you and especially with athletes, you know, most of these guys or girls Are obsessive about that sport and usually you're obsessing over how do I get better? What do I do you're thinking about that all day? You're in that world so now when you get the yips and you're going down that road now You're obsessing about bad and negative things and like it's taking you down a bad spiral. Yeah I was always curious, uh What what are your teammates doing in a situation like this because you said, you know baseball is obviously very superstitious Sport I would imagine baseball players thought they could catch the yips from you. They thought it was like cold or something

How what was the support like on a day-to-day basis when you're battling this? Um, you have both You have where you have guys putting your arm around you trying to support you Hey, what can you do and then and then the fear is real because if you know You would have been my teammate back then and knowing me at the at the time you would have thought this isn't something That would happen to this kid Um, and I think then the thought becomes real with everyone like this can happen You know, this is real So it is a scary thing because you know, I say this all the time when you watch hitters

They go through the same thing. You see a hitter going through a slump and he's over 30 You could call it the yips. I mean, let's be honest They're swinging it. They could have a tennis racket and I hit the ball sometimes But it's a reaction and pitching like golf is an action right you create it So the hitter you can kind of mix into the slump. Oh, I had a mechanical thing Like, you know, eventually you get a hit or you relax you get out of it But it's about The minutes are the same thing and and maybe some guys are better at not taking it home with them

They can leave it at the field. I had no big deal. I'll figure it out. It's hitting three for ten is a hall of fame You know, it's different. Yeah But you know pitching because of the action, you know, obviously you can't hide and mix in the line You can go for four. Maybe you make a good play. You're still a hero. It doesn't matter, right? Pitching you're out there alone It's true because five five wild pitches would be kind of similar to like five strikeouts and five strikeouts happen You know guys happen. It doesn't happen often, but it happens. Whereas five wild pitches Whoa, you never talk about a pitching slump. You never use those words. It's just like, oh, this guy stinks now

You should get sent out. Yeah, you get yeah, he gets designated So when you were making your comeback as a hitter Did you find that the fact that you could fail, you know, two out of three times and still be successful? Was that helpful to you? That's a fantastic question. Absolutely. Yeah, because it was that that was it was like a relief like I go three for ten and i'm fine. I can go for four I make a diving play and like i'm high five and because I made the great play of the game It is definitely a different dynamic But it is a different grind on your body

Mentally, it can get hard also don't get me wrong But yeah, it but because of the pitching thing and then the ability to fail like you said Absolutely, it made it like I got nothing to lose. So this is just a very simple question But like I always wonder what it would I would prefer to be a pitcher or a hitter just from a chilling out standpoint Which one's better for like a chilling out you want to chill you need to pitch But but are you if you're a pitcher in the days that you have off Can you truly chill out or are you just thinking about the next day that you have to pitch? Well, I mean you probably got a tee time at pelican hill if you have to see

I want to go and then you're showing up and you got your regular shoes on because there's no chance you're going to get in the game And you know, yeah, so no you you could truly chill unless you're one of those Maybe you're a guy that they hit the um, you know the manager may use you to pinch here, right? Tony. He ain't chilling Right. Um, but yeah starting pitching. I should say you could just chill out So this would be some right? So as a starting pitcher, you know, I played golf a few days in between if guys were going or whatever As a position player, I tried that but because of the physical demand of playing center field I couldn't play 18 holes and then go out there and play so I was tired. Yeah, I couldn't do it What about when you have a bad outing and pitching and then you have to wait five days to play again?

That's got to suck versus, you know being in the center field. You're like, okay. Well if I suck tonight I have tomorrow like less than 24 hours and we playing again. Yeah, it's definitely different And like you said, and I think that's that that can be the hardest part is the the hour surrounding the competition Right until your next one And how you handle that and usually, you know, you know veterans on the team will try to help you with that Whatever, you know, you throw your bullpen. There's stuff you do Um, but you're right and as a hitter like you know, whatever I got tomorrow, right doesn't matter Right when you were making you come back as a hitter

Were you pissed off that you weren't allowed to wear that sweet jacket when you got on bass? Because that's the best part about pitchers getting on bass Tossing on the on the bullpen jacket for like 30 seconds that they're going to be on first Um No, because at this point now I was trying to prove that I was an athlete and I'm trying to steal second or third but Yeah, great point. Why do you wear those those jackets and just to keep your shoulder like 10 degrees warmer? Yeah, it's like they're going to keep you warmer now, right? But if I feel like recently you don't see it No, they've taken them away, which kind of does suck. I used to love that. Yeah

I I've got um, I'm kind of an expert when it comes to uh, busting through the yips and by expert I mean I interviewed Barry Zito on the show. We interviewed him like what a month ago He taught us about transcendental meditation. Did you ever try any of that? I did not um, you know And I know Barry went through some of the the years and stuff and I don't know if you guys got into that but he he went through a little bit that and um What a phenomenal guy, but no I I haven't but I have been Watching a few podcasts and kind of reading up on that Yeah, it seems interesting that in ayahuasca are the two things that I know you go to south america

You drink the tea you hallucinate and throw up for two days and then your brain's fine. Have you done that? I haven't done it. I've watched several documentaries Yeah, I could brainwash myself into being a great athlete. Maybe I could brainwash myself into being taller Bring the serpa here and you could do it on on tv. Yeah, I think they do that for barstool gold Yes, that would just a live stream of us throwing up for two days and crying in this room and then coming back and being slightly Weirder, yeah So I want to talk real quick about the comeback because the comeback is the best part of the story and it's incredible That you went through all this and then you became

Uh outfielder in major league baseball like basically reinvented yourself. It starts with scott boris, right? So he called you up and was like, hey Let's do this and did you have we like all right fine. I'm in or did it take some convincing? So he calls me the day that I retired from pitching quit retire whatever you want to call it I'm at home and it hasn't been two hours and I'm getting texas and phone calls. You okay? Hey, what's going on scott calls and he goes. Hey, are you ready to play? Ready to play what man every not like or not understanding like I'm done man. I just shut it down It's over. He's like no no go play outfield. I'm like, what are you talking about scott?

He's like, no, I'm serious like I'm serious. Do you want to be an outfielder? And it kind of stunned me. You know, there's a silence. I'm like, hey, man. I gotta I don't know man. I gotta think about this And I hang up because we coming to that decision to stop playing was a huge deal for me. I was my entire life um So now I'm in the house and I'm walking around and I'm laughing And I'm looking for a bat

Right find a bat. I'm now in my living room taking practice swings and I allow myself to to visualize myself making it back Into the big leagues and hitting a home run and this feeling like came over me of like almost like it was happening And I picked up the phone. I said, heck yeah, I'm in he goes and I'm gonna call the cardinals I'll call you back in five minutes and in five minutes my phone rang. It was actually Walt Jockety of the st Louis Cardinals who was the general manager at the time. He's like, hey, ain't if you're in on this Um, we're in we're behind you 100% show up tomorrow. You're an outfielder. Shit. All right, man. I'll see you tomorrow. That's awesome. And then and then it all happened. You hit the home run. You hit a lot of home runs

What coming back was there a moment when you were in the minor leagues? You're like, this might not work out like this actually might not be for me or Or was it similar to when you were going in high school where everything just kept on going as planned as you could work harder? No, you know about the first hundred at bats. Um, it didn't go as well as I don't but here's the thing I went into it with this might take some time I don't know what this is going to be because I always had power in BP But a lot of people have power in BP, right? They're just lobbing it to you crank as hard as you want to right? But could I hit for average and could I hit when the pitcher was actually trying to get me out?

Right here comes the sinkers and the cutters and the high fastballs or whatever not just the here's the fastball See what you can do with it. Um, I would say that first hundred at bats Um, and then after that my timing like really started to click and then to be honest I was kind of surprising myself I was starting to cover some stuff that whatever and I had a pretty decent first year. I think it was um, I hit I don't know maybe 26 homers or 21 homers with 276 and 300 some of bats and then that off season I trained with Chris Duncan and Gabe Johnson Who were in jupiter at the time?

And we were like crazy about it obsessive. We're all trying to make it at the time And when that spring training started Something happened to where like I mean it was crazy what I was doing the balls I was covering now in the home runs. I was hitting the spring training and I ended up blowing out my knee and I missed that entire year But tunnel rusa was like you were going to make the team right right then and there like like I was Leading almost everyone in the stuff we were doing right So that when I seen that moment

I knew like I can do this. I got it So even though I blew out my knee and missed that entire year when I came back the next year that what had happened in that spring training I was like, yeah, here's a really generic question. I'm sure you've been asked a lot But I am interested in like the real world application of it. So you come back as a hitter Having been a pitcher your entire career I assumed that gave you some sort of a leg up or an advantage over somebody that hasn't been in those shoes But I'm curious like what specifically those advantages were. Yeah, so You know as a pitcher and different organizations are different, right?

A lot of counts you're taught to do certain things and I mean The regular fan knows stuff to an account. You're probably getting a fastball. Yeah There were things at first for sure I felt like I could read people's body language a little bit But the more I got into it the more you realize Not everyone pitches like you pitch So they might not attack me like I would attack me And I started, you know, you start selling out or cheating for a certain pitch and you get crossed up a few times

And it really has to go back to Look fastball and adjust to the off speed because that's the only way you can kind of cover both Yeah, so you hit that first home run in major league baseball in mlb back at bush stadium I mean, was that did you even feel your feet touching the ground when you run around the bases? Man, I felt like I floated around on a magic carpet and um, I remember hitting it and when I hit it, um My you know, kind of my top hand my bottom hand came off the bat My top hand stayed on and you kind of stayed through it

So it wasn't that I crushed it, but I got enough of it to think oh my god I think I got it and I'm running the first watch of the ball looking at the outfielder You're judging it and as soon as I could tell that it was over it was like I mean the biggest burst of emotions you could ever have I could feel the ground Shaking from the people cheering And I remember when I was rounding second my third baseman, josek hendel I'm looking at him and I'm thinking oh my god. I did it like this just happened You know, you can't draw it up any better and um, it was incredible. No, I my whole body was numb

It was just a surreal experience. It's nuts. It's nuts. It's a crazy story and I hate the cardinals I'm a cubs fan, but the the cardinal fans. I'll give them credit and you called them the best fans of baseball um They it was they did have your back pretty much through the whole, you know, ordeal of going down retiring coming back Did you ever feel like they were? Uh wavering on you or do you ever think maybe hey if I was in social media age like I'd be kind of screwed here People would make a lot of jokes and people would be like just bum and all that stuff Um, yeah, of course. I've thought about that. Um, one. I'll just start with with cardinal fans. Um, no, you don't have to no

Okay, okay. Go ahead. We'll start Um, no, it felt like they always had my back and whenever I would show back up It was just just the ultimate support and still is it. I mean they treat me like I'm Willie McGee or a Hall of Famer or it's unreal. Um, the way that I'm treated there um You know When you look at the social media side of it I'll compare it to

Baseball so when I went when I was picking it to the yips when I was pitching went through the yips I couldn't I had to stop watching baseball I couldn't watch it at all because I would start thinking about He's okay, but he's doing that. I might try his mechanics to go outside and throw All these feelings. I had to like just give up watching baseball, which is my entire life So the way I look at social media now Um, yes, I think it would have been harder because of that, but I would have just turned it off Right because that's you would have to right what are you going to do?

You can't fill yourself in negativity all day and if that's what it would be then it's got to be turned off Yeah, because I I I just think I you know, I remember watching the game in 2000 and now looking back at it like the amount of jokes The amount of you know like clips that would have been shared It would have been crazy because that's kind of what we do is a society like someone falls Someone screws up. Well, it's it's a roach. It might have been but it might have been marketing genius Yeah, true could it spun it not direction and ran off. I mean, you know your comeback would have been incredible On social media like as much as you would have been roasted People would have immediately like felt bad. This is why sports are the best for having roasted. Yeah, right. It would have been way bigger

Oh way bigger because that's really what we are is like americans We like to tear people down then build them back up. Of course. Yeah, and then actually like we had something to do with Right The reason why ourselves on the back for good. Yeah, yeah, makes us feel good. Yes. Uh, what was it like playing with? Angel's legend albert pools. Um He's the best hitter that I've ever played with line-to-line. There's no question about it. So when he came up in 2001 Now he came out able right but in spring training you're looking at it and going What where did he come from right? It was like just bursted on the scene and I I think that first year

It was 40 something homers and 130 something rbi's and I always considered myself a hitter even though I'd like picture And that that hadn't happened yet, but I just I paid attention to hitting and I'm like That isn't who does that right does that their first year and the way he was doing it The power that he was showing to the opposite field And then somebody try and throw him in and he could pull his hands in and keep it fair I was just sitting there like I had finally watched someone where I was like I can't do that He's better than nine. He's better than better swing than I'll ever have that that's what you know, that's You always judging yourself against right or wrong. You just do man. Oh, I could be better. No, I'm not better than that

Yeah, did it help having joe buck as your announcer then just knowing that he was up there hating every other team that wasn't the Cardinals He's a good friend of ours. Yeah. No, it's all good. I love joe and I had jack at first I have I have a scorecard signed from jack in my in my office at home. So Um, you know, I know their family and you know, it's I think if you understand Cardinal Baseball Cardinal world Cardinal fans. It's really hard not to be a homer. It's just what everybody everybody's a Cardinal fan It's just is what it is. You grew up in st. Louis. You cheer for the Cardinals. That's about it. That's how it's religion It really is religion. Um, as much as the Cubs fans are how about the Ross too? Yeah, yeah Do you like that move? Love it

So it from a from a player's perspective If you had a manager because it's obviously tony louis is a little older If you had a manager who had played with you a couple years before don't you think that'd be a little weird? I think in some situations it would be in this one No, because david has always been that leader on the team anyway I played with david on the braves and this is when we had eric hensky and david ross basically kept the clubhouse together He's back tattoo. Yeah, awesome. A lot of work. That guy has put a lot of money on his back for a really shitty tattoo Yeah, I like eric a lot of work. I do too. He's a great guy

But so they they kept the clubhouse loose and what they did was You know, they didn't let a superstar get outside of the team So at the time was like chipper jones who was older than everyone We know he's going to be a hall of famer like busting jokes on chipper but keeping everybody in line like you see somebody not doing what they're supposed to do Hey, you need to do that. Well, he was that guy. So I think when you understand What he was as a player who he was him stepping into the manager role It's not I don't think it's really going to be much different for him to be like, hey, man

We got it, you know, we want to get that done Right We're about the idea that if you're uh, if you're rookie coming up and you see your manager like yet He went through a world series run with you know, several guys on the team We would that be like a little like concerning shown favoritism dynamic a little bit off That way because I feel like if I were rookie, I would always have that in the back of my mind Like he'll always be closer with rizzo than he is to me. Yeah, um, I would answer that with you don't like it Play better right because you start playing good. You're going to be his favorite real quick and I don't care what team you play on

There's always favorites. I don't care what school your kids go to that teacher has favorites Like it's the way the world works. It's a good life lesson. Yeah, no it is. It's definitely true Who is tony larus's favorite? Whoever was playing the best alberpujos at the time. Um, but yeah, I mean that's you know, tony Kind of played mind games like that a little bit like if you weren't playing good Um, you know, you might not talk to you. That's just kind of the way it was. So it was funny So if we were losing, you know, usually have everyone on the rail and sometimes you'll have a couple guys Like maybe standing in the dugout back if we were losing and you see tony like starting to look this way

You would run towards the rail because like it would be your fault that we were losing if you've seen the back When you were playing in the outfield, uh, did you ever fuck around with your teammates and On uh hit the cutoff man with like a curveball and just screw it in and practice in practice. I did um never in a game Because it's a game, but um, we would always mess around in the outfield and I did this as a pitcher Sometimes I would just throw a curveball without telling them Yeah, you know, whether they could catch it or not and they'd be like, what? And I said, well, if you can't catch it, they can't hit it. So I just wanted to say Yeah, what about when you would throw someone out where there ever be a part of you in the back of your head? You're like

Maybe I still got it. Um, like I threw a strike there from fucking 150 feet away or whatever Well, that was a screwed up part about it. I was more accurate from 300 feet than I was 60s But when I got into that close range, there was just this Feeling that wouldn't let me do it. Did you ever ask tony if you could pitch from the outfield? No, um, I I actually talked about throwing out the first pitch to a cardigan from the outfield We did talk about that would be sick, but I have a story that's a problem So one one of the things that we did mess around with in the outfield. Um, chris duncan Who I loved um dearly

Um, you know, he had a little bit anxiety when it came to making plays and making catches So we we came we started messing around and making jokes. So the big joke became When the ball was in the air it'd be like watch out for the kayak like the craziest thing You could think of when the guy was under the ball trying to catch it Because hopefully we're thinking to take your mind off of whatever. So you're over there and you're like watch out for the baby carriage It became a running joke. It's pretty fun. That's I mean, that's kind of messed up of you to do that to other people Yeah

We did it to each other. So it didn't it was who could come up with the crazy Imagine if at one point though, there was a coyote in the outfield Really just got molded to death by the dog. Um, all right. I have one last question C-keek question promo code take go to a baseball game next year. Uh promo code take you $10 off. Thanks to C-keek You I was reading that you were talking about a comeback as of Like this past year. Mm-hmm. What what happened there and are you officially officially retired? Um, So I had to have a second Tommy John and then they did they gave me a procedure where you can actually come back quicker It's a newer procedure, but um, anyway, so I was along that path of coming back. I got to my throwing program

We got back to about 90 feet Um, I strained the flexor tendon. I took some time off. They're like really probably need about six weeks off And when you take a look at the season mathematically by the time I'd have been done rehabbing if I had zero setbacks from that moment um, the season was almost over I have kids that are seven and eight and honestly, um, I was really Felt depressed. I would say darkly depressed going through the surgery just sitting around not being able to be active is not Not my who I am and just going through that um, and then looking at it. I felt like you know what if I

Got for a bit of something happened. I had to have another surgery. I don't know if I could handle it I just didn't wouldn't want any part of it and it made me think you know what being with my kids They're seven and eight. I got a chance to coach. They're literally games. I was like, this is where it's at I'll go to tv and you know continue on fox midwest. So what were you throwing? Um, well, so I was only back to 90 feet, right? So you're not letting it eat yet But I love that I love we love when we had Barry's eater on there He was saying some stuff like letting it eat It's such a great picture thing and also the way you do this is like I wish I could fucking you got it

No, I don't you're like, yeah, you know, you throw the curve and you throw the five Like that's just a cool thing pictures do like where you did you get so before I threw in a tournament? That's the whole Comeback thing came about I felt strong. It felt good. I would it would have been coming out off. Shit. Yeah How old are you? Just turned 40 last year and do you play softball? Sometimes when I get a call that must be awesome. Yeah Monday nights every night. That must be like high school You just fucking dominate people just hitting bombs trying to hit it as far as you can That's not fair. If I was yeah, if I was going up against you and you stepped into the box

I'd just throw four outside. Be like go go chase these. Yeah. Yeah You know what most guys laugh about it because I'm not there to Be that guy. It's when you're there to hit box. Well, I live like Yeah, there's times I don't No, it's times I don't hit on runs, but I live across the street from the softball fields and sometimes Hey, there are times when I text a couple guys like hey, if you need a guy, I'm not doing anything tonight Guy can cleats on yeah, but when they're but when they need a guy, I'm like, yeah, I mean I'll come over Fuck it. Yeah, that's great. Uh, I have one last question when you were when you're going through all this or even afterwards

Did you ever get uh, I did you reach out to like anyone else that's gone through the names? I'm thinking of chuck knob lock He had a similar experience or did those type of guys reach out to you Do you have like a group text where you're like former yipps havers? Um, no, but there should be um, I didn't and what what happened was is I got with harvey dorfman who was my agent's mental guy And you know, we just worked on it non-stop Um, you know, I when I was going through that I felt like I don't give a crap about anyone else I just want to know how to fix it. Um, but one thing I would say

Um, and it took me a while to get to this is that talking about it does help So when you talk about a group text, I think guys that are going through it when you can just admit it And almost like m&m did and his movie when you just just admit it to the world like you're not hiding it Everyone sees it and I feel like the more you talk about it the more you can just kind of relax and be like, okay I'm going through this. So what? Yeah, let's let's try to fix it. Yeah Take the power away from the yips by by bringing it into the light Yeah, because you like you said it, you know, when you went into the dugout after the game one You're like, oh, yeah, it's just a mechanical thing. You're not saying like, hey, yeah, there's something else going on here

I was in denial. Yeah, yeah, interesting. Um, all right. Well, this has been awesome. Thank you so much rick ayn keel He's got his book the phenomenon pressure the yips and the pitch that changed my life Um, we appreciate that anytime you're around come come on through. Thanks guys. Yeah. Yeah, awesome That interview with rick ayn keel is brought to you by quip Quip toothbrushes quip is awesome. I've got one in my house It solves a lot of problems. It makes brushing fun It makes brushing something that I look forward to it makes brushing simple It takes care of all the guesswork for you

What actually makes a better toothbrush is it industrial strength power claims of miraculous trendy ingredients multiple modes Well, if you ask your dentist, they're going to tell you it's less about the brush and more about how you use it That's why quip was created by dentists and product designer designers to focus on what actually matters for your oral health And that's healthier habits quip has sensitive vibrations It's got a built-in timer and it guides gentle brushing for the dentist recommended two minutes With 30 second pulses that ensure and even clean it tells you when to switch sides It automatically delivers brush heads to you every three months. So you get clean new bristles Right on schedule. You wouldn't wash with a dirty washcloth, right?

You wouldn't wash with uh with one of those shower sponge luffa things that's covered in mud So why are you brushing with dirty bristles? The sleek intuitive design is simple to use and it comes with a travel cap that doubles as a mirror mount These thoughtful features make brushing something you actually want to do Twice a day. I really like how it's got the cap that doubles as a mirror mount. I got a pedestal sink They're the worst when it comes to putting stuff on there. There's no room But the quip has an attachment that allows you to store your toothbrush on your mirror Saves you all the space in the world. Good habits matter to live a healthier life

So help form fresh oral health habits with quip and quip starts at just 25. Yeah 25 dollars I thought it was more than that quip starts at just 25 dollars And you're going to get your first refill for free at get quip.com Slash pmt that's g e t q u ip.com slash pmt It's a simple way to support our show and you get the bonus of you start brushing better But you have to go to get quip.com slash pmt to get that brush for 25 bucks and your first refill for absolutely free The interview is also brought to you by movement. Holy shit. It's almost the holidays again But movement watches has you covered the season with hundreds of watches

Blue light glasses sunnies and jewelry styles to choose from you can stuff your stockings and press your family While your partners retreat yourself because we know that you're going to be dressing up with the perfect gift I gave away. I think three movement watches last year for christmas to my family members Oh, hell, yeah, huge hit the only problem. I there was one thing that was bad about it And I will admit this because I just don't want to endorse a product without giving the negative side to it as well I showed up everybody else in my family because they were like, wow, these are really thoughtful gifts and they're beautiful And uh, how come nobody else got us watches except for you Well movement is making it very easy for you to it's they are doing these beautiful curated gift boxes

His and hers gift guides and free and quick shipping right to your door just in time for the holidays I love their watches. I love their sunglasses the perfect gifts. I receive compliments all the time on the watch I just want to wear them. I love the sunnies as I said their jewelry is great And their blue light glasses are very stylish big cat looks like four IQ points smarter. So hot when he wears them Movement watches start at just 95 bucks Just 95 bucks. They've got a clean design It's minimal. It's really quality products. I'm telling you they've sold almost 2 million watches In over 160 countries. They basically sold a watch to somebody in every country on planet earth. I was thinking about that

That's not that's wild be the big winner of the holiday season with a gift from movement get 15% off today With free shipping and free returns. All you got to do go to mvmt.com Slash pardon. That's mvmt.com Slash pardon Okay, let's get to Firefest then we're going to do a little baseball talk then we have the much anticipated mike floreo talking calling cappernick But really we just pranked him to talk about fantasy football Um, why don't you go first big cat firefest when we go first? All right. So my firefest big is

Uh, I scheduled a dentist appointment for 3 30 on friday afternoon. That is the dumbest thing i've ever done Why is that like a month and a half ago because friday afternoon is like the end of the week Okay, so i'm just dreading it if you if you had a regular job That's actually the perfect move you schedule your dentist appointment in the afternoon on friday Then you just don't go back right but I have not a regular job and friday afternoon Is like the only time that we basically like shut it up shut it down for a minute And i'm going to a fucking dentist and i'm gonna get A root canals and cavities and all this shit because I don't take care of myself

It would actually be great though to do a podcast while you're still on the nova cane Yeah, and you couldn't talk well That's why I did it friday because it's like I can't I don't I can talk You know like I can't talk after for a while and our job is to talk so I did it on friday, but it was stupid And i'm probably there's an 75% chance I just don't go it would sound great if we if you just slow it down right now You slowed on this podcast a half speed This is what it sounds like after you go to the dentist

And you're slurring your words and you're speaking slowly Charlie bit me Charlie bit me My other firefest is that I legitimately 100% have bought into the fact that if the Bears beat the rams on sunday night. They're going to the playoffs. Yeah, your brain is a firefest right now 100% bought in they went on sunday night. They're going 11 and no 10 and 6 It's a very fine line between having your your brain be a firefest and just a dumpster fire

Correct You're dancing on the edge of that fault line. So I'm it's I don't even know what I mean It's gonna happen. They're gonna go to the playoffs. Okay done Hank pft. Okay. Yeah, we'll go next all right my firefest. I had this week fucked up school I have I wait now. I got it breaking moves I just saw this on the lower lower bar daniel jones has uh Put out the trademark for danie dimes. Oh, shit. Yeah, okay. Good thing. We already sold shirts and say that Okay, cool. That's good moves was brought to you by talking for real cover the taste real good

Dude, just trademark real swag is no swag danie dimes. Yeah, I feel like you shouldn't be able to Especially after the boy. He's been playing. Well. Yeah, and like there's gonna be a maybe do that after coming off a win Right like me if there's like a a point guard with the name dan or if there's another quarterback is better like you I don't think we're ready for that should actually be the patent lawyer Coke dealer or a coke dealer patent lawyer or the patent judge. However, these things work Should essentially say like You need to go to a pro bowl before we let you have this patent I agree the patent lawyer should be a sports fan. You have to be over 500

You can't suck right and get it and get a patent right also be sweet if he was like, you know what? Retroactively, I'm not gonna accept this patent application. We give it to dan marley because I'm a big sports fan. I'm gonna be sick All right. Hank. What was your firefest? I had a few ones losing to you guys in fantasy We talked about that later. It's tough You stink tough to uh, just have a fantasy football podcast and lose that way My other one was that I got we had picture day again And I got besides getting roasted by biz for no reason I got absolutely roasted because my shoes were a little bit dirty Uh, and it was just unnecessary the class shoes are for wearing

Agreed shoes. I'm saying better myself Yeah Shoes are for wearing. That's it. Your shoes were a little dirty Yeah, okay. Big big roasted. What did biz say? Hey Hey, what are those off-whites? Listen, I'm not gonna say it again. It's tough to come up with the firefest week in and week out My life is too good. I rack my brain. Yeah, it's true. Yeah, start fucking up You guys are just so easy to work with and so enjoyable to be all the time life is so good Uh, my firefest of the week is for all the kids that are going to be going to game day

At Baylor, it's going to be Baylor against Oklahoma, okay And there are going to be tons of kids that show up with a sign that says okay boomer on it making fun of the Sooners And they're going to look at everyone else in the audience that has that same exact sign and be like, oh, shit I would I wouldn't be shocked if lee corso has an okay boomer shirt on. Yeah That's actually not unrealistic. You might put a you might put a mascot face on That's just an old man that says okay boomer on right. It's a it's a big-time firefest in advance I guarantee there'll be at least I'd say like 12 to 14 signs that you see on saturday that say okay boomer

In waco, texas the home of the original firefest might I add? Um, I know that big cat was getting a little bit triggered earlier about okay boomers Like saying that they're on the way out. What is it? I think you said that like Last week maybe earlier earlier than that say you're done with okay boomers. I think is what you said Uh, the okay boomer remember did I the okay boomers the new crying jordan? So if yes, I said that because if you get hit on the streets or I don't think I was I got I can't remember if I was if you say that you're done with okay boomers people can just hit you with an okay boomer

You know i'm saying that's how it used to be out in these streets with crying jordan's I don't remember if I was mad about it or not. I don't Yeah, I mean I I get what you're saying. It's it's it's just gotten too much. There's just too many of them And also I think it's when the boomers started co-opting it. That's when they ruined it. They took their word back. Right. Yeah, right And they're like I saw some like the gen Xers have feel ununinvolved. Yeah, that's the other one where it's like Someone had some op-ed and like new york times were like, okay boomer. How about okay millennials boomers have all the money Yeah, I saw that it's like dude, but that's the point. That's why we're saying okay boomer because you guys are fucking assholes

Who took all the resources on earth and left us with this shit pile All my other firefests. I forgot to give two picks during 50s ad reads. Okay. All right. That's a good firefest one of them is uh Larry's picks what they do after they score touchdown They celebrate They dance Oh, I don't I do I do not know. Um What do they do after they score a touchdown? They they have to duggy kikka

Field goal aura Pat the patriots. There you go Nice took us well to get there. Uh, and this one is a u.s. Currency Dimes nope the giants uh I don't know Shit bills. Nope. Oh, that's a good one. That's a good one Fuck I hate your riddles. I your riddles suck man same letter as bills bills

the bills The bees bang bears No, we already did the rams these suck The the people are yelling right now. Like how could you not think of this? How could you not think of this Broncos? Nope Damn it. Do you know? Bucks the bucks. Oh us currency. Gotcha. Gotcha. Okay box The buccaneers, dude. That's our currency the bucks the buccaneers

Uh, that really wasn't valid because it had two correct answers be all right before we get to the floreo prank We need to talk a little baseball because the astros this is getting deeper. It seems like they've been cheating a lot a lot and It's gone to a point where people are very mad although I think that the the only thing that hurts The anger is that it's the middle of football season. So literally by the time the first Game kicks off on saturday. No one will care. I'll say this about baseball

They do a very good job at timing their scandals to come out when it's not during baseball season Right. So when it's football and a scandal comes out It's usually like right in the middle of right and everyone's talking about it becomes an on-the-field story And baseball they do a great job of just kind of burying it if this was august It would be the only thing that people are talking about. Yep, but now it's like, okay astros you kind of fucked up We we probably won't remember until baseball starts again and then we're like, oh, yeah the astros So I had an idea that the punishment for the astros should be that a j hinch has to be dh For every al game next year. He played in major league baseball

He won't be he'll be terrible, but it'll be funny terrible And it's a competitive disadvantage to the astros to have that in their lineup every night Okay, and guys can throw at him. I like that part. That's the best part. I think yeah, what about Also having him pitch one inning a game or no pitch until he gets an out every game at home Oh, how about how about this? How about he has to pitch? How about he has to start every series as the pitcher until he gets an out? Okay. Yeah, I like that one So every new series he has to start and then he he can finish once he gets that out Also, I'd like to see the punishment kind of be spread out

evenly across all the leagues have a little bit of like uh The reciprocity with the nfl So when the patriots got caught doing this Hank, you're probably you probably don't remember this Uh, but they got caught taping opponent signals as well. What was the fine? They got was it $500,000? And it was and a first round draft pick. Yep. Okay, so they should find $500,000 and take away a first round draft pick from the new england. This is much worse. So they were cheating in game So two picks from the patriots. No, no Very funny very funny pft. Just saying let's make it even. I know disavow

I have a question for you guys. Are you guys in the camp of Who cares everyone cheats or are you in the camp of this is actually the worst thing that's ever happened to baseball? How could they we got to fix this? I'm in the camp of this is banner taking down territory. Oh Death penalty for the astros uh program. Yeah The only problem I have with that is then you'd have to raise a banner and clayton kershaw would get a ring I i'm down for that though Just to like eliminate could you imagine the twitter moment of everyone having to like be like hey He actually is clutch kershaw got over the hump. Yeah years later. Yeah, maybe this is what we do

Maybe we have clayton kershaw. We take the astros banner and clayton kershaw Has to raise the dodgers banner But he has to do it by like freeze soloing up the pole Knowing that it's a clutch moment and he'll just fall and die. Okay. Yeah, I'm down for that Or just put the banner up in louisville stadium in place of their old lads. I like that too. Maybe maybe maybe that is it rick patino has to get a dodger's tattoo. We should act. Yeah, we should actually make rick patino's back Just every banner that's had to be taken down. I like that like the like the scoundrels version of the trill ballons avatar Yeah, it's that actually vacated back. Yeah, that should be the deal rick. You can come back to ncwa basketball

You can coach but all banners that have ever been taken down like the fucking white socks You know shoe is joe jackson boom banner on your back. Yep. I'm down for that. Okay. Perfect. I think tell me why not rick I think we saw I actually think that what we should do is we should go back to some of the Astros games this year and we should get the footage and we should edit in Like basically a drum solo before an off-speed pitch and then release them on twitter from an anonymous account Yes, and because that's big right now people are combing through every astros game Every at bat with a fine tooth comb. Let's let's get real fucking weird with it. Stay woke They basically made a controversy that made people watch more baseball. Yeah, you probably have to go buy whatever major league baseball packages

To have access to every at bat from every single game. That's socks. That's a great job baseball going back and watching I mean I saw the clip of like the white socks versus the astros in the middle of august or whatever it was Like someone went back and watched all of that. Yeah, actually john boy does because he's he's done like every clip Which he is the perfect case of I understand if you're a Yankee fan You should be furious because the Yankees lost in 2017 in the alcs. They lost in 2019 in the alcs So they should be very very upset every other fan. I don't know who cares I feel better as a nationalist fan again. It makes it worth more for me. So I'm totally fine that this came out I also saw that there was one other thing that happened in baseball yesterday

I don't know if you know this but the winter meetings are happening soon. There's a tradition At these winter meetings where they award a championship belt like a wrestling title belt To the executive that does the best job at keeping arbitration numbers down when it comes to salary negotiations That's awesome. It's just been like a gentleman's agreement to say like hey, nice job not nice job beating a player in arbitration Right, they're not doing anymore because they think that it's a bad look. So they just now decided to stop officially Let's just say it's going to be dirt jeter anyways I would imagine scott boris would come in with like a steel chair and just smash that executive over the head Yes, take the belt. That's exactly what that should be the the the highest arbitration should be

The the executive who has won the belt versus scott boris in a ladder match or the yeah Or you can keep doing the belt If for the guy that that wins the lowest arbitration number But then the guy that fucks up the most scott boris gets to have a free shot gets a jump off a cage And just he's the guy's laying on a table and what's it called? Who's the guy that does a really high flying ones? Shane McMahon. Shane McMahon. Yeah, get scott boris to shano right onto that executive sternum. Yes Okay, let's get to mike floria

We had him on under false pretenses because we wanted to trick him into talking about his fantasy football team Which was hilarious. So you'll hear ronan tank do a little fantasy football Factory, yeah, and then we actually do talk to him about calling cappering and get to the bottom of what's going on with the But don't fast forward totally no his fantasy football advice because he does have a theory that we very much enjoy He has a take that is so spicy and so mike florio. We loved it We took everything in our body to not say anything at that moment Welcome back to the fantasy football factory. Usually we have guests from inside uh barstle inside our league But today we have a very special guest the first outside of barstle guests on the program

It is mike florio of pro football talk mike. Thank you for coming on. How are you doing today? I'm doing great. How are you guys? Fantastic. We're doing well. We'll jump right into the questions if that's all right um The the paramount position in fantasy football some people would argue that it's running backs But this year it seems so mercurial a quarterback and I wanted to get some of your insights on maybe some prognostication As far as going forward. Are there any quarterbacks that might be getting benched? And if so, what kind of backups can we be looking for to to really pick up that slack in production?

I think one that comes to mind most immediately is brandon allen in denver. He's just holding the spot I believe Until drew lock is ready to go the expectation is allen's going to be a quarterback this weekend when denver plays at minnesota But my guess would be sooner than later drew locks going to be on the field now I don't know what kind of numbers he's going to generate Whether he's going to be better than whatever other options someone has but I could see drew lock getting on the field not By way of a classic benching But more along the lines of hey, this is the guy we drafted in round two the season's lost

He's healthy now. Let's put him out on the field Is there any truth to the the chad kelly rumors? Is is he worth picking up in a league? Or do you think he's not going to see the field? I'd be surprised if chad kelly plays because he's now third on the depth chart in indianapolis chicoby brusette when things were going well and they were five and two He was an MVP candidate at least on the fringe to the discussion Then he has the injury misses most of the stealer game They lose miss the dolphin game they lose another five four They could be five and five to lose jaguar this weekend and nick holds in fact that's the guy that I grabbed

In both of my leagues not that anybody cares and let me just mention this I thought this whole thing was a setup by big cat you get me to talk about Oh, no, no So you guys can say nobody cares and hang up on I really did no I mean we I we've I've had to deal with that obviously I produce a part of my take big I'm PFT always say that uh It's something we've had to overcome because people do care about fantasy people want to hear It's what the the slogan of the show is that just because no one cares doesn't mean you shouldn't talk about it

You know what that's probably the best slogan you can come up with for fantasy football because nobody does care But we still talk about it. Yep as you're going down the stretch Are there any teams that might be quitting on their coaches any guys? We might see a dip in production from this year guys to avoid maybe we want to sit Yeah, you know the Cincinnati situation is strange to me because here they are at 0 and 9 They're already put Ryan Finlay out on the field in place of Andy Dalton and they Look at how desperate are they going to be?

To get a win to play hard. You're gonna have guys who are thinking Let's just stay healthy Let's pack it in Let's just get through this season and worry about next year Since there have been two teams that have gone 0 and 16 since 2008 I don't know that the stigma is what it used to be I mean, we just had the Browns do it two years ago in the same state where the Bengals are But i'm fascinated by that a jay green gonna play it at all this year. I doubt that he will what's the upside

So, you know, ryan finlay most likely continues to play But I don't know whether or not the Bengals are going to do anything that anyone Would really care about and another one. I'm just kind of keeping a weird eye on I don't think this is going to happen But if the chargers keep losing and Phillip rivers keeps looking as bad as he did last thursday night on that last drive When he threw seven straight in completion, you have to try to throw seven straight in completion with the game on the line They put tyron taylor on the field just to see just that just like Hey, we know we're not bringing Phillip rivers back next year. That would be the thinking Let's see what tyron taylor can do

And does he get a game or two down the stretch? I i'm kind of fascinated by how that one can go Yeah, I feel that it will be very interesting to see who are if you're looking at teams You know players to pick up with teams with easy schedules because they're playing cupcakes going down the stretch Who are some of those teams with players that you'd be looking to pick up? Well, I don't know how cupcake-ish any of the schedules are and that can change too I remember saying not that long ago the brown schedule gets very easy after week 10 when they play the build And now all of a sudden they got two games in three weeks against the stealers Who aren't the the easy win that they were several weeks back and the dalton's in between who have won two in a row

So I don't know that any schedule is quote unquote easy But one guy that Fascinates me when we get into the final weeks of the season Of course, you know every league is different on how many weeks it goes into the regular season some wrap up by 15 Some take it all the way to week 17 crazy I'd be tempted at some point to hold elie manning in my back pocket because I feel like he's going to get at least one farewell game

There's going to be pressure on the giants From the fans in the media standpoint and really if you're the giants What are the reasons people have to show up on december 29 for the last game of the season when they played the eagles Then to give elie manning one last game and maybe he comes out and rips it up in his farewell performance in the nfl Depending upon how badly eagles need that game So that that's one i've been watching ever since he got benched But if the giants aren't a factor and they're clearly not a factor Could there be one or two or even three games for elie down the stretch

They've got three home games in december and ultimately this is a business and you got to get people to show up And it will not surprise me at all if there's a quote-unquote injury to daniel jones that really wouldn't keep him from playing That lets elie manning finish out the season So the year end rush on elie manning we were going to keep our eyes on that now I want to pivot a little bit to how you kind of personally come at this At the your your strategy for your team So any strategies that you've used mike down the end of the season that have made your team's elite and taken those teams over the top Well, here's the problem. I suck at fantasy football

So my my late season strategy is survival If that's that or or raise nobody gives a fuck about your fancy Dude, we're here the whole time you fell for this god damn it mike Are you serious? Listen, we had to change the game The only way we're gonna get you is if we had hank and ron Lure you in for seven minutes about just trivial stupid fantasy stuff. Although I love the elie manning The elie game is gonna happen. But yeah, we don't care

Are you guys I can't fucking believe Because it was my first reaction when you texted me big cat you said sure. I mean I love talking about fantasy Yeah, sure sure it was and then you then you play this. Oh, I'm gonna be on your show the dafty. Thanks giving cards There's been a real podcast you guys do So can you get off speakerphone because now you're on the real we're gonna do pardon my take real quick We actually did so here's how everything went down. I'm gonna explain it to you. Can you get off your speakerphone? Yeah, I'm off my speakerphone. All right, so pft texted last night to the group He's like, hey, we should have floreo on pmt to talk cavernic for a few minutes for friday's show

And I said, that's a great idea. But hold on Let's have hank and ron Pretend that they're having them on the fantasy football podcast So we can get him to talk about his fantasy team and then punk him But still have him on to talk about cavernic. So here we are. I'm sorry mike. By the way, I'm sorry Ronan hank. Well ron maybe not so much but hank felt bad ron's a prankster Yeah, I look I knew this was coming and I knew it was done. It's something I swear and that was the quote I swear it's not a prank. I swear we're not clunking you. Thanks a great guy. Help him out

Please i'm coming on your show on friday after thanksgiving. I mean you you pulled every card I did because you knew that I knew it was bullshit. Well, you know what? It's not bullshit because they are gonna use that audio on their fantasy football podcast too. Yeah, so it's true We just happen to be in the room. Yeah Yeah, sure. Well and also mike you you can claim that you knew and that you had your your feelers up But you let them down because that comment you made like like 30 seconds into it You're like, I just want to say before we get going that I thought this was a prank But i'm really happy to be here with you fellas

Well, and you know what? I and it did occur to me because I knew you guys do a friday show I'm thinking four o'clock and that's too early. That's still asleep at four o'clock on a thursday. So yeah, they're not in there Hello, all right. Can we talk about cappernick though for real for like five minutes and put it on pmt So they came up on your fantasy team. Yeah, there you go. Can you start from? The beginning and just explain it like we are children. What exactly is going on with the nfl and cappernick? Well, what's going on between the nfl and cappernick as of monday night was absolutely nothing and nobody expected anything to be going on His agent issued a memo a couple of weeks ago addressing some of the false narratives as he called them that are out there about cappernick about He doesn't really want to play football and he

He is a vegan and he wants too much money And he never was really any good the first place all that crap It's been churning ever since he became a free agent in march of 2017 My my favorite one is he opted out of his contract in 2017 Or he would have been employed by the 49ers that year which is complete and total bullshit Because the 49ers were going to cut him anyway. John Lynch the jam of the team has told me that he said that another contact They were done with him So

He hasn't really had a fair opportunity with any team. He had one visit that was in may of 2017 with the seahawks Nobody ever invited him in for a workout the ravens almost did the ravens were looking at him in july of 2017 His girlfriend posted something on social media that ray lewis and steepa shawty Didn't like so they canceled it and he's just been there. He's been available There's been there's been nothing and now out of the blue months after he settles his collusion grievance with the nfl Three months into the season the nfl sets up this workout Doesn't tell him about it until it's set up leaks it to the media before they tell him about it Gives him two hours to make up his mind as to whether he's going to do it

He says I really don't think it's a good idea to do it on a saturday because teams are kind of busy on saturdays Can we do it on Tuesday the league says no Then he says well, can we do it next saturday not this saturday? So teams have more time to get ready for it and the league says no I mean it doesn't feel like a genuine attempt to help the guy out It feels like some sort of strategy whether a pr strategy or a legal strategy To make the league look better because they know how bad it looks right now For the nfl and its teams to have just ignored this guy over and over and over again

It's just so odd that now all of a sudden this deep into the season Somebody felt the urgency to do something about it. And I really do think that they are worried They're going to get another lawsuit filed by calling cappernick for this ongoing collective and individual decision to shun the guy and the second lawsuit can actually be Stronger than the first one because the second lawsuit would be hey Now you're ignoring me and not giving me a fair opportunity because you're mad That I filed a lawsuit against you and forced you to pay me somewhere between 1 million and 10 million dollars So that's where it all is in a nutshell. They won't tell him who's coming

They've gotten huge axon to come in and run this workout Reportedly, which I don't know that that makes it any more attractive at all 11 teams have committed to attending But here's the thing that drives me crazy about it the credit anybody can bring him in For a workout anytime they want last Tuesday 39 players worked out for nfl teams They fly guys in all the time for a workout. They don't need to do this If somebody's interested in calling cappernick, you're bringing it for a workout If you like what you see you talk to them about a contract if you don't you move on and

Since no one has for nearly three years I don't know why the nfl felt this urgency to do it now You're saying like without a doubt that the nfl set this up got all the wheels in motion scheduled it Before even talking to anyone with with Colin cappernick's camp or his agent or to him directly who's blindsided by this Yeah, they set it all up and then they dropped it on cappernick actually called people in the media last week a select group of reporters I was not selected but a select group of reporters were given a heads up last week that there would be something on tuesday That would be worth their while and news word and whatnot So the league knew this was coming the league laid the foundation for it and then on tuesday

They dropped it on cappernick and said you've got two hours to tell us what you're going to do and It just it it's not something that feels like a genuine effort to help the guy It feels like it's some kind of a chess match. It's some kind of a game It's you know, like I felt when you asked me to do this today Something else is going on here and it's ultimately not going to be In my interest to do this. That's pretty much how cappernick feels They might be punking cappernick and nobody's going to show up and then rogeri that was going to be like gotcha Well, and here's what I think here's what I really do think will happen

I think no matter what he does at that workout The assessment is going to be he doesn't have it anymore and we're going to have anonymous scouts Who leaked that to select reporters who they know will pass along that bs And then it's over. Hey, it's done. We gave him his chance. Our conscience is clean We gave him this workout and nobody signed him and that's that that's why I think they'd like to have all 32 teams there So they can all collectively decide we see what he can do We don't like it and we move on because think of it this way if he Works out and the scouts who were there are blown away and all of a sudden there's a rush to sign them

How glaring does that make it look that they've ignored him all these months? Yeah Like why wouldn't you just brought him in to see what he can do? It's obvious he can do it and you've ignored him for nearly three years So I really think that the end result is going to be well Thanks for playing along colin, but you just don't have it anymore. All those narratives out there about you are 100 Okay, so here's the only thing I don't understand in the entire timeline and everything you've said and how it's kind of a Farce is why did the nfl wake up? Whatever it was november 12th and decide here is the time that we are going to tackle this issue

Even if it's a fake, you know, uh ruse of a workout where we give no one any, you know Warning and we fly everyone in and it's it's it's all kind of thrown together Why did it happen now like what why did the nfl now decide this is when we're going to Make it seem like we actively want colin cappernick back in the league If this is an effort to take steam out of a second lawsuit that he could file for collusion and retaliation, etc I think that what happened was when his agent several weeks back Issued that memo attacking point by point the bs that's been out there for the last two and a half years My guess is that got the attention of jeff cash. He's the nfl's general counsel and that's when he decided we better do something here

Because the foundation has been laid for him to come after us again And we eventually may have to cut even bigger check Then the first check that was cut the colin cappernick for blackballing him from march of 2017 until february of 2019 When they settled that case and then it takes time to put the wheels in motion You get the teams on board with it. You come up with your strategy. You come up with how it's going to happen It's very carefully planned to best protect you Against the the liability that you're hoping to minimize but also

Ensure that people are on board with doing this and it just so worked out that this was when this was the week when All the pieces fell together that that would be my my theory because there's no rhyme or reason to it If you're going to do something like this somebody Suggested to me yesterday. This was part of the settlement of the grievance that was resolved back in february And I said it can't be and I've since found that it's not Because if you're going to do that His his lawyers aren't going to say yeah, let's do it in the middle of november You're going to do it in july you're going to do it when there's a chance to get this guy to training camp

When there's an opportunity to compete for a spot on the roster Everybody's got their roster set right now. The only way you're going to get a chance is if somebody has an injury Nobody's gonna say, oh, hey, you know what? Hey, we don't really like our backup quarterback Let's go ahead and cut him and let's sign colin cappernick instead Even though he doesn't know our roster. He doesn't know our coaching staff. He doesn't know our often Let's just go ahead and delve our backup quarterback and sign colin cappernick during the playoff run I mean the best case scenario for cappernick is if he really is great at this workout And then there's an injury like to lamar jackson or robert griffon the third in baltimore

Because that's the offense that he knows best greg roman was his offense coordinator in san francisco So you bring him in if that occurs But the chances of somebody just coming out of this workout saying well We must have colin cappernick and we're cut one of our current players and put him on the roster It's very very minimal. I'd be shocked if it happens But that's the that's my take on how I think we got to this point Somebody got scared that they were setting themselves up for more liability They put the wheels in motion and this is the week that it all fell together

I think the biggest piece of evidence Maybe how the nfl is overplaying their hand that they're setting him up to fail Is that Hugh Jackson is going to be coaching him up during this? That's you went a little bit too far without you You should have brought in like spagnolo or or jim haslett to run it somebody that's bad but not Like historically bad at coaching to run it now you mike you used to be an employment lawyer You dealt with employment law all the time Is it is it commonplace that somebody who sues a company successfully? For collusion or anything else for that matter would then go ahead and return to work for that company

Have you ever encountered like or have you ever encountered a double lawsuit where you sue for collusion? And then you sue again for continued collusion Yeah, usually in a normal workplace What happens is that first lawsuit is for some form of illegal discrimination based on age gender race Etc. Or if you've engaged in some sort of protected activity like one of the cases I handled Involved a guy who complained about a safety condition at an airplane at an aircraft maintenance facility that could have caused a serious problem And he complained about and then after that he was he was the guy that they couldn't wait to get rid of So here's what usually happens when you resolve a case like that

The the settlement will have a clause in it that says you won't accept future employment with this company And you won't seek future employment with this company Basically, everybody walks away and they don't have to worry about somebody who's already sued them once suing them again And I figured that when cavernic settled his lawsuit back in February that his settlement would have that term in there So they don't have to worry about calling cavernic. They buy out his employment rights for the remainder of his career

The problem is the payment they made was far too low to buy out his employment rights It would have cost a lot more than that for calling cavernic to go away for good And once the amount started to leak and it became clear that he didn't sign a term like that It's like well, you know what he still could sue them again And as I said the second lawsuit can be much stronger than the first because think of it this way If you've got somebody who sues for Some type of discrimination age gender race whatever usually in most workplace There are other people who have those same protective characteristics. It's very tough to show that there's a buy. It's always

Challenge they always have some legitimate reason or semi legitimate reason for firing the person But when the second lawsuit is you have a specific bias against me because I sued you and I forced you to pay money That's when people get it. That's when they understand why the employers pissed off at this person and most people think it's okay Most of them don't realize the law protects everyone against that kind of a situation where if you bring a lawsuit against your employer and And they don't like it and for some reason you're still working there Or you're trying to still get employed there and you haven't waived your right to get employed there You have a better case than you had the first time you have rights and it's easier to advance them

And that's kind of where Kaepernick is right now And it could be that the NFL's effort to make it harder for him to bring that second lawsuit Is going to blow up in the NFL's face and make it easier and and provoke him to do it He may come out of this exercise So pissed off about the way they handled it And maybe he wasn't going to file that second lawsuit and maybe now he will It's classic case of just like it's just the NFL just kind of fumbling and bumbling something huge like this. Um, Mike

Thank you. Uh, we care about your fantasy team. Thanks for appearing on both podcasts Everybody let Mike know what a great job. He did talk about fantasy football Yeah, tweet him and say hey good good call about Eli. We're gonna pick up Eli Everyone tweet Mike showing them that they're picking up Eli Manning. Yep. And also ask him your start sick questions on twitter. Mm-hmm You like the Eli Manning take though. I do It's great. Yeah, our faces lit up. We were like, whoa, Eli Manning Eli Manning for a well game Yeah, I can see it happening week 17 two more interceptions It would be a much better take if you didn't completely suck at this point

Yeah, but if week 17 the eagles maybe have the east wrapped up and then it's like Eli can go in They maybe do a handshake like when they groove the uh fastball to cal ripkin jr In the all-star game let him go out. Let him look like a hero one last time Ooh now Mike, what if Eli throws for five touchdowns? What if he has his own little matt fling game? Is there gonna be a demand? Is there gonna be a demand for Eli coming off week 17? Yeah, I think everybody learned their lesson in uh week 17 2011 don't get fooled by what a guy does in week 17 So I look in all seriousness. I don't think Eli Manning's gonna want to play for a second team He's never been wired to do that. I think he's done after this year

And uh, he just moves on and I don't think anybody's gonna want him Anyway, which makes it easy for him to walk away. Yeah. All right, Mike. Thanks so much man. We appreciate it. You're the best Great to have you on in football season. Thanks, Mike Yeah, hey, I think I've been waiting all year I've been waiting all year and last you guys have me like four or five times and this year not a single phone call A single request that's fine though, and I told you that's fine. I got plenty of other things to do But uh, that's good. I I appreciate having the chance even though you completely totally screwed me under false pretenses to get me on I still appreciate being on that's why we love you. Thanks, Mike. We love you, buddy. All right. See you. Bye dad. Love you guys

Did you get that love you guys? Yeah, that was me kicking us Hank make sure not to delete the love you guys this time You You You You You You

You