PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Drafting Christmas spirit

Episode Date: December 22, 2021

On this episode, Derek is joined by interim vice mayor Espo to discuss an Angel Hernandez lookalike running amuck in Mexico and to Snake Draft the best Christmas movies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello and welcome to the PHNX D-Backs podcast right here on PHNX. I, of course, am Derek Montia, officially known as your mayor of PHNX, occasionally known as the mayor of Christmastown. And I am excited to once again be joined by somebody that isn't Jesse. I'm excited to potentially be replacing my vice mayor once again. And I'm joined by the one and only VP of content around these parts. It's ESPO. Espo, thank you so much for joining me, man.

It is vice mayor when I'm here. That's right. That's right. Interim vice mayor, Greg Esposito. Thank you so much. And by the way, if you're watching on video, this here, not my name. It's our producer, Leah Merrill. Her name is showing up there for some reason. So. All right. Well, joined by Leah, and I'm excited to let you guys know. Just what is that clear. Yeah, just clarifying that. But this show is brought to you, of course, by the fine folks at the Draft King Sportsbook app. Go download the Draft King Sportsbook app right now. And for betting $5 on. any NBA team to win, you will win $150 in free bets, should they do that thing? Should they win their game and be victorious? So get some extra jingle in your pocket this holiday season with the Draft King Sportsbook app. Espo, I'm so happy to have you here. I'm excited to pick your brain a bit because I have been in the full on holiday spirit.

I have been making Puerto Rican eggnog. I have been wrapping pictures on my wall to look like Christmas presents. I am fully on board with this time of the year. And I just want to ask, I mean, do you have any holiday traditions around your house that are a little bit, I guess, less known or something maybe personal for you guys?

Less known. We do an Italian, like breakfast bread called Casadil, which is a sweet bread with cinnamon through the middle that we do every Christmas and Easter. Nice. Nice. A family tradition.

I love that, by the way, because that is like the perfect meal so that everybody can just enjoy it instead of having somebody cook. I know I have gotten stuck with the cooking duties before, and you kind of feel like you miss being there at the table with everybody sometimes when you're playing chef. Yeah, that cooking happens usually the night before in a panic by somebody. Not me. I don't bake. I just eat, as you can see if you're watching the video version. this but yeah uh it's it's a fun tradition my grandfather uh well he it was handed down to him but he started it in uh in our portion of the family so it's a nice way to kind of stay in touch with our italian roots and then my wife who uh who is an italian she does a breakfast casserole that's uh

kind of her family tradition those so those are uh two of my favorite things at the holiday i like i like the food around the holidays. I love it. What is Puerto Rican eggnog, by the way? So it's called Coquito, right? And so it's not that different from regular eggnog, but the, it's made with a lot of like super sweet milk, like condensed milk and evaporated milk, right? But the main, the main difference is the use of coconut milk and rum. You know, like I specifically use Malibu coconut rum, even though it's not Puerto Rican and a lot of my traditional Puerto Rican friends and family members would totally flame me for using it. But I just like the taste of it. It's a smoother rum and it adds that coconut flavor to it. But really, it's just got that little taste of almost like a pinia colada

a little bit to your traditional eggnog. I just assumed it was from the Malibu section of Puerto Rico when you're in the Malibu rum. Yeah, that's right. That's right. Well, and I mean, they're, they're very big on like Bacardi and such. My dad took me to the Bacardi factory when I was way too young to enjoy it. But I would love to go back one day as an adult. I don't know. It's like we've been developing slowly our own traditions. I think like I feel like the customary like ride around the neighborhood to look at

other Christmas lights and stuff has grown into it. But I think the biggest part is Christmas movies, which we're absolutely going to talk about later, have just become part of our tradition. I used to mock the all day running of a Christmas story. But now I don't know what to do without it sometimes when they don't have these ridiculous marathons where they play elf for two days straight. I'm just totally on bored to leave running in the background. Or Christmas music starting on 99.9 in August. That's right.

Whatever it takes. Our man, Brandon Buckingham, says, only answer to the best Christmas movie, die hard. And yes, sir, we'll get to that. We can't talk about it yet. We can't talk about it yet. We'll get to it. But what we do have to talk about actually is a bit of funny baseball. news. This one kind of just kind of pokes fun a little bit at one of our least favorite umpires

in baseball, Angel Hernandez. A video came out this weekend or yesterday of an umpire named Humberto Syes of the Mexican Pacific League. Basically, he was acting what you could say was erratically while on duty at first base. And by erratically, we mean stumbling all over the place and flipping off fans randomly in several videos. Several fans caught videos of him flipping the audience off. Apparently, he was removed from the game because of the rest of the officiating crew determined that he was drunk. When I said, Puerto Rican eggnog. Puerto Rican eggnog, having a little bit too much fun before the game. That's the way, that's the way that happens, right? It sneaks up on you. You're having a good time. You think

you're just going to have one glass. Next thing, you're four deep, and you have no idea that I put a whole handle in it. But this was just, just very funny to me because not only was this man exhibiting the exact type of behaviors, a drunk person who was officiating or umpiring a baseball game would exhibit, but people immediately took to comparing him to Angel Hernandez. And that is hilarious to me. Yes, he might have looked a little bit like Angel Hernandez, but the bigger thing that people were making the comparison is that he had the same ability

to make calls accurately in this condition. that Angel Hernandez normally does. And I just have to ask, I mean, I think every sport has this, right? Like, we have this hatred of Scott Foster when it comes to Chris Paul games. Like, it's just weird for an umpire to have such a bad reputation that the minute something like this happens, people are like, Angel Hernandez. I just love it. That's the great thing about sports is there's these universal touch points, right?

You make that joke and everybody goes, yeah, I get it, Angel Hernandez. is yep that's a good one and like universally if you've watched baseball you get the joke you're in on it and that's sports can do that unlike anything else in this world maybe movies to a certain extent but you know sports can have that universal just tie in where everybody is in is on the same page everybody speaking uh the same language universally i love it and and the bigger thing there too it's Again, it's kind of like how fast everybody in the Phoenix Suns community got to know Scott Foster. It does. It instantly becomes like a meme that people recognize.

It becomes that thing. There are people like, oh, yeah, that guy sucks. But it's also kind of weird to me, right? Because in any other profession, if you were widely known for being bad at it as some people are, you might not be doing it at that high of level that some of these guys have consistently done it as. It's not to knock them because in some cases, you know, guys just get a bad reputation when they're not necessarily bad at their jobs, right? Like the foster situation for us was more directly connected to Chris Paul. He's bad at his job, too.

He's bad at his job. Yeah, let's get to that. Look, to me, it's on this show. Yeah, it sounds like this guy also had a bit of Leslie Nielsen from Naked Gun in him. Remember when he's the umpire in that game because there's like a bomb throw. or something and he's making ridiculous calls and showboating and stuff. I feel like there's a little of that flare in this too. It's showmanship.

It's showmanship. I particularly like that they had to have like the, what appears like security come out to help remove him because after having a long talk at first base with one of the other members of the officiating crew, it was apparent he was not going to go down without a fight. And much like a pitcher that doesn't want to leave the game. I also love that altercation I love anytime someone doesn't want to come out of a game and we get to see a giant tantrum being thrown by adults that make millions of dollars.

But explain me. These guys have to, like most baseball empires have like a dressing room, right? Where they all get, you know, kind of their locker room, right? Sure. None of them notice this guy was drunk before they went on the field. What is his conduct usually like that nobody went, this guy's drunk? We shouldn't let him go, be the first base umpire. Something's wrong here.

Yeah, that's a good point. Like, nobody's like, maybe that's the problem. Maybe like, hey, do you notice Humberto's acting a little weirder than he normally does? No, man, Monday, he was like throwing balls and shit and just yelling erratically in the hallway. I don't know. That's a weird dude, you know. We drew the line at he flipped him off three times instead of his usual two. Like, it just

It seems as hard. Normally he flips the crowd off for a good reason. All right. Tonight he was just randomly targeting fans that didn't deserve to be flipped off. So I don't know. Yeah, I don't know what exactly where. I wonder where the red flags really started, right? Like, I wonder if they did know.

And they're like, well, let's see. Maybe he sober's up. Let's give him some coffee and some water. Well, they thought, man, this will be entertaining. Yeah, that too. That too. And they weren't wrong. they weren't wrong about that. But again, I know we have some definite snake drafting to do.

But before we get to that, I want to remind you guys all, go over the Drafking Sportsbook app. Like I said, use our code of PHNX and simply for betting $1 on any NFL team, any NBA team to win. I'm sorry, not $1, $5. You will get $150 in free bets should they win. So not only will you get your money, you will also get that $150 in free bets instantly. And just a reminder that Drafking Sportsbook app, you can get your same game parlay on. Of course, like I said, I am not,

I am not claim any nicknames at all until I get back on the winning train with my betting. But again, Patrick Lyons, he is Big Papa Parlay. And he'll give you some good parleyes over at the DNVR. But get on the same game parlay train.

The more legs you add, the more money you can win. The bigger the payout. And you can get multiple games. You get multiple sports, whatever you want to do over at the Draft King Sportsbook app. Remember that it's safe, secure, and reliable. Best of all, you can deposit withdraw your funds whenever you want. And that code again to get that $150 in free bets for betting $5 on any team to win was

PHNX. 21 and over only gambling problem. Dial 100 Next Step. New customers only eligibility restrictions apply. See draftkings.com slash sportsbook for details. You know my parlay story? Let's hear it. Well, first of all, for those of you that might not follow.

Espo's betting and gambling, you know, escalates or whatever you want to call, excuse me, you have been betting quite a bit on Jay Crowder to score the first field goal in Phoenix Sun's games, and you have had quite a bit of success at doing so. It's pretty much solely betting on that. And I started betting like 100 bones on it because I was like, yeah, I'm feeling a little saucy. There's good odds here. It started like, I think it was plus 1,400, right? Yeah. And so I just kept hitting on it. I think in the last 15 games, he's hit like seven times on it. And last game, the same game parlayed it with him hitting the first shot and the son's winning against Charlotte for plus $1,700, $1,700. $1,700.

Good Lord. Good Lord. My taxes are going to hate Jay Crowber is what I'm saying here. This is going to be unique. That's not a bad problem to have. Let's see. You know. It is when you didn't realize taxes come out of it until you hit big a bunch. You went, oh, crap. That's not good. Why do they want to send me a W-9?

What is that about? This isn't like when it used to be under the table with my friends. This sucks. I'm excited. Crowders Cash Club. In again tonight. They play at 8 o'clock. We're recording, what is it, Tuesday night?

Yeah. Yes, sir. And, yeah, they play again tonight, Tuesday night. at eight and I got Crowder's cash club riding it yet again. That's amazing. That's amazing. Well, and, you know, we don't know still what's going to happen with the NBA. Obviously, the NHL has taken a pause. MLB is pause for, Lord knows how long, but with the Omnacron variant running rampant, it seems like they aren't aren't messing around with this again.

Let's not act like MLB is altruistically not playing for a while. That's a lockout. That's not a pandemic. Look, look, we don't need to negotiate during a pandemic. They might go off and get each other sick. Who knows? During the holiday season, we don't want that happening. We don't negotiate with terrorists, as in we don't negotiate with COVID, all right? I just didn't want to, I didn't want you to act like Major League Baseball isn't playing for a good reason. Yeah, we don't forget. It's lockout season around here. It's lockout season all the time. But speaking of which, it's time for us to move on to another one of my segments on the show, which we love to call snake drafting. Yes, we are going to do a little bit of snake drafting today because Espo and I, I brought Espo in specifically because I needed someone with

pop culture knowledge here. I needed someone that could take the ball and run with it, grab the brass ring, if you will, when it came to today's topic, which we are going to draft, snake draft, the best Christmas movies, best Christmas movies of all time. And I know I have a lot of I started talking about it at the top of the show, but man, I will say 100% the Christmas movies, despite the fact that I don't like to watch them, just like Christmas music, I don't like to watch them any other time. But when it comes to the end of Thanksgiving and up until New Year's, I'm all about the music, I'm all about the movies. And I don't know. I just can't get enough of it.

I really enjoy fully getting into this time of year. Can we be very clear, though? You call me in because of my knowledge, but you call me in about 45 minutes before the show. So the research, research not there. I have a list that I'm trying to scramble through to get my drafting strategy. I see how you do this. It was on purpose. The mayor wants to win, so the mayor is going to throw some roadblocks in his guest's way.

You're absolutely right. I do this with my friends when we draft, like our fantasy football teams. If I'm the commissioner, I wait until the last minute to drop to you when we're going to draft. Sometimes, I don't know, sometimes it's going to be at the start of August. Sometimes it'll be the day before kickoff. Who knows? I like to mix it up and keep people on their toes. I love this idea of Russian roulette drafting.

Yeah. Where like literally, you should find out five minutes before a draft and really make it interesting as to, you know, how to run a fantasy or snake drafting thing. five minutes before it just gets dropped on the participant. You don't know what the topic is until five minutes before. No prep time, only going off the top of your head. For this, though, for this, I'm going to step aside. And I'm going to allow you to have the number one pick in our snake draft. I know, that's very nice of me to do that.

So what we're going to do here is we're going to draft six movies each. And we'll throw it out on Twitter afterwards and see what people think. We'll see if we can maybe get a little vote on and see who decides which whose movie drafting team is better. But I will step aside and give you the first pick. Well, you're in luck on the fan voting because I'm convinced 95% of people hate follow me. Because anytime I'm involved in one of these votes, I finish dead last. And that's with sharing it with my social following.

So you are in luck tonight. But I am going to piss you off with this first pick. I know you are. first pick in the Christmas movie Steak Draft, I am taking die hard because die hard is a freaking Christmas movie and it's the one I watch every year. So yippie I-K-A, motherfucker. I'm taking die hard. Oh, man, that was a dark horse. I admit I wasn't going to take it first overall and I know why you did. I understand. Again, going back to the comments, it was the only movie that someone's brought up. and I'm sure you already have

Brandon Buckingham vote as to the best answer. I am going to go, I'm going to go in this draft with my heart more than any other logical kind of influence here. I'm not going to go with what might be popular. I'm not going to go

with what people might love themselves. I'm going to go with what I love. So for my number one pick, I'm going with National Lampoon's Christmas vacation. Oh, this movie sucks. Why does this movie suck? I rewerex.

Ironically enough, I rewatched it last night. Okay. Not knowing this, my wife just said, I've never seen Christmas vacation. I said, let's watch it. Okay. Because she's from Chicago even. She hadn't seen it. I said, let's watch it because I have been on this hill for a while, but I said, you know,

admittedly, I haven't seen this movie in a while. Maybe I'm just wrong. No, it sucks. Chevy Chase's humor has, has, has aged very, very poorly. And this is not a John Hughes thing because I love most other John Hughes movies. But Chevy's face, especially that scene where he's at the department store looking for underwear for his wife, has aged horribly. It screams me too in every possible way.

You know, the acting is just cheesy. I just, I did not find it funny at all. Yeah, I don't know what to tell you. I find it hilarious. I think the thing for me is that when I was younger, I did not like this movie. I did not like Clark Griswold. I found him to be, you know, the obnoxious, bumbling dad. And I just wasn't a trope I was very into when I was a kid.

And that hasn't changed. Like, I don't like Ben Stiller and Meet the Parents. That entire film just frustrates and drives me nuts, right? because it's just one slapstick series of unfortunate events after the next for this poor guy. And after a while, I just, I just check out, right? I think with me with National Lampoons Christmas vacation is I became Clark Griswold. Right. And so, yes, there are parts of it, like you said, that don't age well.

And I'm, I can't justify or, you know, defend them at all. But there's just so many parts of this movie that just absolutely crack me up. And I think they started to make me laugh once I made that association that I have become the dad, right? Like I had those moments where I find my daughter's pictures or my like pictures from my past when I celebrated Christmas. Like my parents were big on, you know, recording with the VHS camera every Christmas function we had and such. So I do the wrapped in a towel, teary-eyed moment in the attic quite a bit during this time of the year. I connected with that. Like the funny thing is I connected with the heartwarming moment or the feeling of the dad.

I just didn't connect with the humor. Like when he goes to force with the family and forgets the saw first off. So I don't know how they rip this out. But the kids in the family go, I think this is too big for the house, dad. And he's like, no. And then they bring it in the house. And yeah, of course it's too big for the house. Like, I just, I, when they pan back and the tree's like 40 feet tall, it's obviously too big for the house.

That's the joke. That's the joke. We know it's too big for the house. All right. So I'm going to move on because there's no convincing you on this. But I am going to go with my next movie, Brown Robin style. I'm taking elf. That's a good pick.

I can't argue with elf at all. That's a fantastic pick. Elf, I think, is for me, the perfect Christmas movie. I think that if you're not big, into Christmas movies, you can enjoy Elf. I think if you're an adult, if you're a kid, it doesn't matter, right? I did have this movie ruined for me just a little bit by talking to some of the players who interacted with Will Ferrell on the day where he came to all the spring training facilities

and did the bit where he was being picked up by all the teams because apparently he wasn't very nice to a lot of people. I can't say anything to that because I didn't interact with him personally and everything I saw him doing was pretty funny. But I also understand how, you know, as a player, you could be excited for a celebrity to come through like that and, you know, have it disappoint you a little bit. I just love this movie. I love his performance in it.

I really love watching the movies that made us documentary that kind of breaks down how they did a lot of the forced perspective stuff and things like that in the movie because, honestly, I didn't pick that up at all watching it through the first couple of times. So I thought it was pretty neat to find out how they made a lot of the movie. lot of that stuff. I just, I love all the callbacks to old movies and specials. Everything about it's good. And it's still a bit cheesy and hokey at the end, which is something I feel like every Christmas movie still needs to be. I loved, uh, a few, Zoe Day Chanel's performance is underrated in that movie. Absolutely. She's fantastic. James Kahn as the dad, like this, this,

sunny Corleone, all right? This guy that's known for all these other things play in the, the book editor dad was it was fantastic and then shout out to bob newhart as the uh as a head elf like just just just a fantastic christmas movie i cannot uh i cannot deny that one i'll give you that i also i also love phazon love as the gimbals manager where he comes in and he's like hey they must have said some people and we need to stick together like all the all the parts of that movie correct me up But man, Will Ferrell's just absolutely childlike portrayal of this character is, it was the perfect role for him. It was the perfect role for him, sir. One of the last really good Will Ferrell movies.

Oh, yeah, things got bad after that. All right, you go ahead. You got two choices. I'm going to take, I have to go with a classic here. It's a wonderful life. Yeah. It's spectacular. There's a reason that decades after it was made, it's still beloved, still shown.

It holds up pretty well. It is dark when you really consider it. Sure. But so is life. So I don't mind. I don't mind that. You're right. You're right about that.

So I have to go with it. It's such a good movie. It's long. I mean, it's really long, but it's such a good movie that it's one of those you can watch at any point in it. If you've seen it, you know, at least one time before. and get sucked right into it, which is a key for me for a classic movie as well.

So it's a wonderful life is my second pick. There you go. All right. What's your third pick? Whips back around. It stays with me. This one is going to be a little off the board. Somebody may give me a side eye, but I'm going with trading spaces.

Oh, my God. Trading places. Trading places is the really bad TV show. TLC show. Trading places is the good. good Eddie movie, Eddie Murphy, Dan Aykroyd movie that is a Christmas movie. If diehard falls in there, it's definitely trading places is a Christmas movie for sure. I agree. I agree. Yeah, look, you want to argue about it, but the fact is the fact. Die Hard trading spaces,

trading places, excuse me, you got me doing it now. Grumlins, these are all Christmas movies, whether you want to admit it or not. Yes, some of them just take place during Christmas. It doesn't matter. It makes it a Christmas movie. My next pick is probably, in all honesty, my favorite right now. But I knew it wasn't going to go very high, so I waited to take it at number three. It is Dr. Seuss's The Grinch.

But I'm going to be very specific here. I'm talking about the illumination version of Dr. Seuss of the Grinch, which would be the most recent one. It came out in 2018. It has an incredible cast. Benedict Cumberbatch plays the Grinch and he is awesome. But, Kenan Thompson

plays a character in the movie called Bricklebaum that just cracks me up. He's amazing. Angela Lansberry's in it. It's just it's such a better version of the Grinch than any other version. I feel like we have watched the other versions quite a bit because my daughter likes the Grinch. She is not

a fan of the Jim Carrey one. She thinks that one is creepy and weird. And also, it's weird because the Grinch is a really short story. So it's the way that they expand these movies into being longer. Sometimes the expansion doesn't make a lot of sense. Sometimes the ending, especially for the Grinch, kind of gets muddied and there's not a real lesson learned or anything, you know? And I felt like this movie kind of nailed it, right?

Like at the end, it was like after all was sudden done, no matter what a piece of crap, the Grinch was, you know, the town folk were still going to come. come and, you know, invite him. And I don't know. I've talked to people who apparently don't think very highly of this movie or were kind of like, yeah, whatever. But there was just something about it that I really enjoyed it. And I mean, the Grinch is a classic story.

But I think the thing that won me over in this one is his dog, Max. They kind of make Max the star of the film a bit, which they did also in the Jim Carrey version. But I don't know. I just love The Grinch. And that's my pick. That's my third pick. I got to get a cartoon on there.

I have not seen that version. So in honor, you're picking it, I will go check it out this. I need your thoughts on it. I will. And also, I need your guys' thoughts on our stuff over at go phnx.com. If you're not already a member, go sign up to become a member. You can get an annual membership and you will get a free t-shirt over at the phnx locker.com. I literally have stacks and stacks and stacks of them behind me.

I'm starting my own retail store over here at my house. Love it. You guys can go to the PHNX Locker and find yourself a shirt. To get that annual membership, you'll get yourself a free shirt. And also, if you don't feel like sign up for the annual membership, we offer you the first month for just 50 cents when you go to the month-to-month option. And remember, you can get in on our members-only Discord. We have members-only discounts over at that PHNX Locker.

We have all of our wonderful writing on the website that you can go read right now. Lots of coverage right now on the hockey situation with the coyotes and the NHL taking that pause. Lots of coverage of Booker coming back for the Phoenix. sons and of course what the hell is going on with the a arsona cardinal so go check all of that out over at go p hnx.com and become a member and we're going to move on here we got two three more rounds to go and i'm going to go with my next pick in this entire situation and i look christmas movies

uh are what they are and i know this one again you talk about one's not aging very well and i know a lot of people uh feel all sort of ways but I'm going with a Christmas story. Okay. I still love a Christmas story. And I feel like the farther and farther away we get from this movie and when it, you know, what it's about, right, like from about the 40s, like the less you can relate to this movie at all in any way, shape, or form. But I think, I think for those of us that grew up in the 80s, not only does this film kind of hold a special place in our heart.

But we also all remember that highly coveted Christmas item, no matter what it was. was and whether it was too dangerous, which happened a lot when I was a kid or, you know, too expensive. Those were the things, those were the two reasons why you never got it. So this, this movie has always hit home with me. And I don't know. Again, it's, it's one of those films that I could just leave on in the background and watch all day and, like, watch it, but only catch specific parts sporadically throughout the day and still piece together a whole watching of the movie. Ralphie, you'll shoot your eye out. You'll shoot your eye. Look, it's that.

It's the getting kicked down the slide when he goes to see Santa. The tongue stuck to the pole. The lamp that his dad gets. Like, there's so many moments in this that even if you don't fully know the movie, you know something from that movie. That's a great point because so many other, so many other TV shows and films borrow scenes from it or pay tribute to it. Not to mention the fact that, like, the mean,

like department store Santa that was obviously not Santa. Like that's a trope that we have in holiday movies now like forever. But that's like the first time I remember really seeing it where he was like, like a bad guy. You know, like, like me. I agree. I think that one will always be in the discussion when you have this kind of topic.

Even when we're old and our kids are doing stuff like this. Yeah. That movie will still be in the discussion. It's like a wonderful life, right? It's, there's a few movies, I think, that are going to carry on with time, but they, they will. The one thing I really like about a wonderful life is they keep remastering it. So, like, I was watching it on my, you know, 4K TV the other day, and it looked amazing. And movies that were shot in 2000, meanwhile, look like shit compared to how good a wonderful life looked.

They don't, they won't remaster that, uh, that crap that you're watching from the early 2000. Oh, man. You want to remaster the classics. I'm going to say the first Harry Potter movie, when you have a really high definition TV, looks awful. It looks awful. Like the,

it takes such a big leap from the first movie to the second movie. I have no idea what they were filming on. They might have been filming on like someone's camera back then for all I know, because it looks shitty. But anyway, that's what happened when you get really nice TVs. I can't believe that this movie is still on the board. Let's hear it.

I thought for sure this would be gone by, the time I got to my third pick. But it's home alone. Home alone is a freaking classic. Yeah. Home alone is a classic. It's like for me, an 80s kid, early 90s kid, that's the quintessential Christmas movie. That is our generation's version of this discussion.

And the fact that it sat there for as long as it did is surprising to me. It is a Christmas movie And I don't even It's not even up for debate I'm not going to say it is But I think with home alone The story kind of is what the movie is about So it's a little easy to forget

It's a Christmas movie Because you just think of the robbery And the kid being at home alone And all of that right But man I can't tell you how much I enjoyed this movie when I was a kid I think I talked about it One time on this podcast before

But like we went into a completely packed crowded theater To see it on like opening weekend and sat in like the third row and totally had the like looking up at the screen you know could barely see anything and uh it was around the time where i first started going to movies with friends by ourselves where our parents didn't come with us they would drop us off at the movie theater and then come pick us up when it was done and man like me and two of my buddies we laughed from the time that that movie started until the end like tears in our eyes

jaws hurt the whole bit because it was just so funny to us and i said i I mean, we were right in the demographic for that movie. But I also remember, you know, the one classic thing I think about movies that, like, you really grab onto is if you watch them, sometimes they're a little bit too old for you to watch. And it's not to say Home Alone was, but it was, it just had that John Hughes edge. Yeah, you know. Yeah. And Joe Pesci plays such a good villain in that, like when he's dresses the cop,

asking him about those first-as fans, and he smiles. Adam, that in and of itself is like such a good scene. This is another movie where there's so many little parts that that get referenced still. So Home Alone is my third pick. And then I'm going to go with it. I don't know that anybody else will agree with me, but the movie, The Family Man from early 2000, Nick Cage. Oh, that's a great movie.

It's kind of like it's a wonderful life, but set in modern times where he's a high-powered businessman, single guy, winds up in this alternate reality where he marries his high school sweetheart, and he's kind of a loser in it, and he wants to go back to being a high-powered guy, but he learns the value of family and then loses it all at the end. It's almost the reverse. It's a wonderful life where he's removed out of the situation at the end and realizes how much his life would have been enriched if he had lived the alternate reality. So I love the family, man. That'll be my fourth pick. All right. We got die. Did we?

I thought we missed one of yours. So for you, die hard, a wonderful life. Trading places. Trading places. Yeah. So we're up to five for you. And we got Home Alone and the family man. Okay.

Thank you. I missed counted. That was the problem. That's fine. That's fine. I just wanted to make sure that I wasn't screwing that up. Okay. So I got my final two movies.

And this isn't easy. This is never easy. I have quite a few picks. And I don't know if my next one actually qualifies as a movie. But I'm going to go. with it. It's my favorite thing to watch right now as far as like a new thing besides the Grinch, which I just got done saying. It's called a very Murray Christmas. It's on Netflix. The Bill Murray special. The Bill Murray special. And I, I love it. I love because I am a huge,

huge Bill Murray fan. And I think the thing about this is just the, the way that he acts, the way that everything kind of goes. It's, you know, it is kind of this like, a little bit callback to Scrooge, which I could have easily put in this, you know, same selection as well. But I just wanted to go with something that right now I can, I just can't get enough of watching. You know, it's the whole thing of him being trapped in due to a snowstorm in New York. He was supposed to do like a live special, but now the snowstorm caused them to not do the special. And he, you know, there's, it's basically like this kind of the old school holiday music special where the hosts would go around and have celebrities come in and sing

Christmas songs with them and do the whole thing. They just found a very natural way to do it. And I mean, there's cameos by George Clooney and all sorts of people in this, Rashida Jones. I love it. So it's my, like I said, my favorite thing. And I'm going to go with one more. I'm sorry, go ahead. So you say, I'll allow it. You'll allow it, even though it's not a movie. I thought you were going to try to slide Hawkeye in there. Yeah. I was going to be like, No, but that I'll let the Bill Murray special. All right.

All right. I appreciate it. And for my very last selection, this one actually is for a friend of mine. It's Jingle All the Way. Jingle All the Way, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sinbad. It's a terrible movie.

I'm not going to act like it's a good movie. It's ridiculous. But it's like it became a tradition for us. My friend Josh used to have us over at his house for Christmas parties over the last like, you know, five, six years. And every single time we go over there, he plays this movie. And it just, like, it went from being like, yeah, I've seen that to, you know, again,

we talked about it at the opening of the show. Like, it's like part of my Christmas tradition list now. Like, I have to watch it, you know. It's, uh, and again, I don't know. I find myself relating so strongly to these stories about dads doing anything for their kids. It's the Christmas trope that will get me any time because I've been doing that now for 10 years. And honestly, after a while, you start to appreciate how ridiculous, you know, how much people will do for their kids or like even my brother.

I told him about a toy for my daughter. And next thing I know, he comes back the next day with this entire story of how they were sold out and he had to drive to surprise and do all this stuff. And like, I don't know. Even I don't go through that anymore. But it was it was heartwarming to hear that someone was doing it for my kid. Let's be honest. Arnold Schwarzenegger would have kicked Sinbad's ass to get that toy. There is no doubting that at all. I mean, that's the biggest, that's the most glaring issue with that movie is that he would have just smashed his face it until he took the tour and then kicked him one more time. And Sinbad wasn't doing anything about it.

Let's go. You got one last pick. Okay. So first off, the list I'm looking at considers rent a holiday, movie, which is dark. Carbage that. Carbage that. No, no way. Redd, come on. What are you doing to us here? The musical All About AIDS is a holiday movie on this list. It's a heartwarming holiday movie. And before I, before I get to my final pick, have you seen 8-bit Christmas yet? Yes. Yes. Fantastic. Not top six for me, but a fun movie if you haven't watched it and you grew up in the 80s with Neil Patrick care, go check it out on HPEO Max.

But I'm debating between two here. Okay. Your aforementioned Scrooge, Scrooge, and Just Friends. Two very weirdly to include on here. Yeah. I think I'm going to have to go Scrooge because I love Bill Murray. So give me Scrooge, but know that Just Friends was in the running. You know the one thing about Scrooge that I absolutely love is,

is how well it stands up. Like at the time, some of the stuff that they were talking about, I don't think was, I guess you could say we, it wasn't as widely thought of. Like, at the time,

we didn't think of somebody controlling a television network as being some sort of evil CEO or something like he was, right? But man, it was an interesting way to go that now kind of, like, I don't know, it's,

none of that's that surprising to any of us anymore. And seeing someone that's all powerful like this, that just becomes disconnect. with their family and their friends because of how powerful they are is a pretty timeless, you know, tale. I thought that that modern day, you know,

telling of that movie is probably the best. Maybe next to Muppets Christmas Carol, but those two up there are fantastic tellings of that story. And I'm a sucker for Bill Murray. So I'll wrap that up. So I kicked your ass in this is what I'm going to do. I don't know. I don't know.

I mean, Christmas story. National Lampoons vacation. I mean, I believe the folks over at T&T would argue with you about that when it comes to my list. But we'll say. It's a wonderful life. I mean, come on. I love die hard as a Christmas movie,

but I think that's where you went wrong. You started off with that, and I know these people, these contentious people on Twitter, they are going to argue with you out of the gate. And I know you're going to argue back. I'm going to let you deal with that. I'm just going to sit there and take the votes. And you're a mayor. I'm a VP of content, right? And I go, what's going to

to cause the discussion. I don't need to win the election. I need to start the controversy, right? I don't even want there to be a conversation unless the conversation is how much do you think Derek will win by? But not a lot. We'll see what happens when we put the vote in there. Espo, you are the man. Thank you so much for joining me. I appreciate it. We thank you guys so much for watching. Of course, you can follow us all on Twitter. I am at cap underscore caveman with a K. ESPO is at Leah Morel on Twitter. And of course, the show is at PHNX underscore DBAX. No, he is at ESPO.

I believe it's Merrill, by the way. Yeah, Merrill. Did I say Merrill? I am terrible at names, so you'll find that out soon enough. But of course, all roads lead to at PHNX underscore sports. And that is on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. If you haven't subscribed already, please go to go phnx.com. Give yourself a holiday present and subscribe to our website.

And also use our code of PHNX over at the draft king. sportsbook app. Of course, you can subscribe to this podcast on your favorite audio podcasting app. Leave us a five-star review. Of course, I am not a five-star man, but ESPO is definitely a five-star man. So leave us a review for that and go over to YouTube, subscribe to us there, sign up for notifications so you don't miss any of our content. And you know what? Interact with us. Come to the show's comment, talk with us. We love talking with you guys, and we appreciate all of your support and all of your interactions. Again, we thank you so much. we hope that you're having a happy holiday season.

And on behalf of Espo, Leah and myself, we thank you guys so much for tuning in. And remember, kids, baseball is fun, but it's so much more fun when you vote for me.