PTI - Is LeBron James MILKING his decision for attention?

Episode Date: July 21, 2026

Michael Wilbon and Frank Isola discuss LeBron James' decision, the MLB, and the MLS. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Pardon the interruption, but I'm Mike Wilbon. It felt so good to be back at work with Tony yesterday. I'm Frank Isola. Apparently Tony needed a day to recover, Mike. Oh, apparently so. And apparently you look like you're on Love Island. Where are you coming to me from? I am, Mike, this is your summer house that you're letting me use.

Your beach house. I appreciate it. I'm glad you're there, though, wherever that is. Welcome to PTI. Tony's in Turkey for his hair transplant. What can I tell you? So I'm joined by our great friend from the starting lineup on Sirius XM,

Mr. Frank Isola. Wow. He's in Love Island. He is. I'm just saying. Let's start with LeBron's indecision. Just days after Adam Silver said he'd like LeBron to make his decision

so the NBA can get on with his scheduling. His agent, Rich Paul, sit on the podcast last night. quote, we're not going to be rushed. Close quote. Paul said the weight is not a deliberate attempt to gin up attention. I believe that, Frank, do you? Come on, come on, Mike.

Just there's a little bit LeBron loves the attention. You know, Rich Paul, you know, he said he's not in a rush. No one's going to rush him. We're not arguing that. He also said it's LeBron's choice. No one's arguing that. I think we all just want it to be over with. And we're asking, what is the delay?

Is he waiting for money to? get freed up maybe by a team like Cleveland? Is he waiting for a deal to happen? Maybe Anthony Davis. Maybe he's got something cooked up with his buddy Draymond Green. It's interesting that it's dragged on for this long already, and we really don't have any indication. It sounds like there's four finalists, right?

Golden State, Philadelphia, Cleveland, and Miami. Maybe I'm going to be wrong. I still think it's going to be Golden State, but it's gone on way too long. And you cannot sit here and tell me, Lauren's lived this life forever, Mike. He loves the attention. There's nothing wrong with it.

There isn't. And that's why everybody needs to shut the hell up about how long it's lasting. What do you got to do? You got nothing. You got July and August in front of you with no sports news just like me. And let me just say this, Frank.

I'm tired of this thing. What is he waiting? He doesn't know. He doesn't know what he's going to do. How about that? No, because I actually had a decision like this in my life. In the prime of my career, I was LeBron's age, was it to go to the Chicago Tribune and move back home or stay in Washington at the Washington Post and do what eventually resulted in this?

I didn't know. And I can promise you it took me longer than the two or three weeks you all are whining about. Even Coronizer used to call me every morning. What are you doing? I'm taking my damn time. I'm figuring out it's my life. He's got a daughter. He's got a wife.

He's got a home. So take your time, LeBron. So what? What is it that you need? If I was LeBron, I'd call up Adam Silver. And I say if I decide on the eve of Halloween, you'll take the decision and like it. Shut up. The whining across America about LeBron's decision is really making me angry.

Mike, Mike, the guy's whole life has been planned out. You honestly are going to sit here. He knew he probably was going to be back with the Lakers for months. you really don't think that he knows what his next move. Not this one. This is the harder. In some ways, it's only two years, Frank, maybe. This is the hardest one.

You see him with his daughter walking around. His sons are already gone. But I know how that feels. You know how that feels. He's got to make a decision that's bigger than him. That was not the case with going to win five, six, seven. It wasn't. So now LeBron's got this thing.

He's other interests. He's got golf. Stephen A didn't know what a golf ball is. so he can't address it even though he says stuff like, well, the golf doesn't matter. Stephen A. wouldn't know golf from a hockey puck. And so there are decisions that LeBron has that are in front of him. And if he wants to take until Halloween, I'm with him.

Good. You know, at that sports convention that they had in New York last week, the one where you charged about $900 for a picture, he had four appearances. And a couple of those were his podcast. And he didn't say anything. Good. Mike, believe me.

He knows where he's going. And you knew where you were going to. We're not going in that case. All right. Let's move to baseball and two teams on the rise. The Red Sox beat the Orioles last night for their 14th straight win. The team's second longest in history, and that's a pretty long history. And the Brewers beat the Mets to pass the Dodgers as the team with the best record in baseball.

What's the bigger deal, Mike? It's not close. It's the Brewers. The Brewers. The Brewers were supposed to be in a rebuilding year. Yes. The Brewers will look at as a team. team that was sort of starting over.

They got some great building blocks. They still got yelling. They got the MIS. If you have an ace like the Miz, you can be in it. I realize that. And by the way, I thought they protected him pretty well last night. You don't have to go seven. You know, you don't have to.

It's nice for those of us who like starting pitching, even though we hate cheeseheads, to see the Miz doing what he's doing. I don't know how long you can continue 104 miles an hour. I don't. And I don't wish, why do I not wish him ill? I wish him nothing but health, even though he's a rival of my team. The Dodgers spin two. $200 billion.

The Brewers do not. I'm not going to say the Brewers are Billy Bean's money ball because I don't necessarily believe that. The brewers are terrific every year. They win 90 or more every damn year. For the Brewers to eclipse the Dodgers, I know it's temporary we've got a long way to go. That is the most important development in baseball last night.

And it's still hard to believe when you think about the Brewers. The last time they were in the World Series was 1982. I know. And back then, of course, they were in the American League. It's been a long time. But come on, Mike. It's the Red Sox.

No, it's not. And last night with Caleb Duren, the 5-foot-7 infielder, he's hitting a home run over the green monster, two outs, game-tied, beating the Orioles, who, by the way, came in with a seven-game winning streak. So? Orioles. Orioles.

Orioles. They had one seven in a row, though. It was a big deal. And Wilson Contreras, after the game, talked about the emotion in the stadium. He compared it to the world. baseball classic when he was on Venezuela and they've won. So good things are happening in Boston. I still think Scotland being there for the World Cup, there's a couple of good vibes from the

Tartan Army. But here's a couple of stats for you. Why don't you think about this? The last time the Red Sox won, 15 games in a row was 80 years ago. Ted Williams was on the team. It's a great season, great stretch they're having, no doubt. But it ain't the Brewers. They in first place or the Brewers in the whole damn league. The Brewers. But, but, but, but think about this now. Since 1961, there have been seven streaks of 15 or more wins. Stop. That's not a lot.

Don't give me analytics. Stop. Let me give you a number. First damn place. You like that number? For one day. Okay. Ahead of the Dodgers.

The Dodgers is who's been all the money who everybody says is going to be a three-peat. Ahead of the Dodgers. Don't give me this. The 19th team. to have eaten orange slices and then have a winning streak of six or more. Seventh, seventh streak of 15 and more. Since 1961, it's an impressive stat.

We're in our second day of World Cup withdrawal, Frank and me. MLS is running a really smart promo campaign that boasts will take it from here, which raises the question, Frank, what opportunities has this World Cup opened up in this market, our market? And how can MLS truly, take it from here. All right, so let's think about it.

The last time the World Cup was here in 1994, the MLS inaugural season didn't happen until 1996. So you still waited two years. Right. Now you're starting up with a league that's been in place for 32 years and Lionel Messi plays for one of the teams. Arguably the greatest player of all time. Still one of the best players in the world.

Had a great World Cup, not a great final game. I'll give you that. I think the biggest thing, though, for the MLS, if you think about Christian Polisic, Weston McKinney, great American players, they play in Italy. Chris Richards, Tyler Adams, terrific American players, they play in England. The kid Balagan, who, you know, with the red card,

he plays from Monaco. So, Mike, I'll give you a basketball analogy to this. You know, Palissel grows up in Spain, and Spain has a great professional basketball league. Right. His dream, though, is to play in the NBA. Luca Donchitz played in Spain. His dream.

Mike, American kids grow up wanting to play. in Europe. So it may take a couple more decades until those players say, where I want to be is for the L.A. galaxy or for the Red Bulls, but a big part of it's going to be, are the owners willing to spend

the money? Because if you want to bring the big players and compete, you've got to spend. So starting, as soon as that promo went on Sunday night, and it's just brilliantly done, my first question is, okay, then take it from here, damn it, then let's do it. But I realize, Frank,

it still comes back to money. They can't just create more national broadcast money. And that's what we're talking about. Not local markets. And I realize some, you know, their local markets richer than others, New York, L.A., obviously. But Frank, so what I start wondering is not just those American stars you mentioned, but in the case of Jude, in the case of Holland,

these guys are young and they are in the prime of their careers. They're not entering yet. And they're so charismatic. Lemini, Maul, we can't even talk about him. He's 19. Can you get those kids interested in playing in the United States? And what works against us right now is we can still see them. We can wake up on Saturday and Sunday morning and turn on our TVs here and see them.

And it doesn't matter that they play for MLS. Can MLS dent that? Is that reasonable? That's, I think, again, I think it's going to take a long time. And to your point, you know, Paul Tenario in the Athletic really had a good article about it today. And when you think about those television deals for La Liga, there's basically three teams that everybody wants to watch. It's Barcelona, Real Madrid, Atletico, Madrid. In England, there's about six or seven teams.

Our American sports cultures, we want parity. Well, maybe some owners might not want parity. Disposes a couple, Frank. Exactly. You know, wild card Jerry Jones like, you know, 1989 version dudes, right? The Dodgers don't want it. That's for sure. I don't want parity.

No, they don't want Perry. Let's take a break. But coming up, Cal Raleigh makes the Reds pay for wanting to face him. What's the word for Cincinnati's decision? And Trey Turner combines two homers with four missed plays. The first ever All Electric, 2026 Subaru Trail Seeker is the EV for the Trail Obsessed, with up to 444 kilometers on a full charge and D.C. fast charging from 10 to 80% and about 30% in about 30 minutes in ideal conditions.

Plus, ample ground clearance and symmetrical all-wheel drive make the 2026 Trail Seeker the most capable EV Subaru has ever built. Test drive it at your local Subaru dealer or visit Subaru.ca. This episode is brought to you by L'Oreal Group. Beauty is a powerful force that moves us. That's why L'Oreal Group has built a business that is inclusive at its heart with 100% of its brands, championing to do you. diversity. With 25,000 professional opportunities for people under 30 worldwide and 54% of leading

positions held by women, diversity is a strength that helps L'Oreal Group create the best beauty products for all people. Visit L'Oreal.com to learn more. Time to trade words with Frank. What's first? The Reds walking the base is loaded to face Cal Raleigh last night was blank. All right, Frank, we got to pay attention here. Seventh inning, Reds are down three nothing, and they get to the place where they got to have an intentional walk to set up the potential double play, but it's got to come from Cal Raleigh. First pitch to Cal Raleigh, Frank, granny, get out of here. He had been hitting like 045, I'm exaggerating slightly.

He's like 10 home runs this season. What's the word for that? Mine is strategery. Yes, Terry Francona is going to say, you know what? We're always playing the percentages. We hire people now and pay them a trillion dollars to help us play the percentages. Strategry. All right.

I want to make you angry because your pool is dirty behind me, and you got me upset in the first block. I'm going to go with a word that you hate. What? Analytically sound. Analytically sound. So think about this. A year ago, Cal Raleigh had 38 home runs. He was almost a year to the day, and it was coming off winning the home run derby, right?

It's a huge story in baseball. You mentioned the 10 home runs. He's only hit two since mid-June. He's batting 163. And the batter ahead of him, here you had after him. Dominic Canzon had a 993 OPS against lefties. He's a lefty. Terry Francona was playing the percentages.

I think he did the right thing by walking Canzon to pitch to Raleigh. Right thing. How'd that work out? Bang. I mean. Doesn't always work out. You know, that's a real dilemma. That should have been one of our words should have been dilemma

because that's a baseball, 150-year-old dilemma. What's next? Trey Turner's night was blank. Trey Turner had the up-and-down nights of all up-and-down nights. I mean, he has a misplay than a double. Then he goes home run. Then he goes misplay, misplay again, home run, misplay. And after each misplay, of course,

in Philly, they're booing his brains out and then cheering wildly when he hits the home runs and the double. And ultimately, you know, they win the game. Frank, my word is going to be Philly special because their heads must have exploded because they couldn't just have a continuous rain of booze. It had to be interrupted somewhere with cheering,

which they're loath to do even for their baseball heroes, Philly Special. Yeah, they even give a bit of a mock cheer on the final out of the game. What's amazing, true, but Churnney had a huge night in terms of milestones. 200th home run, 300th career double.

I'm going to go, the plays in the field, and I watched a lot of this game, you could tell he was frustrated, but I'm going to go with net positive. Because guess what? As your buddy, Herm Edwards would say, you play to win the game. That's right. They won the game last night.

And that's part of it. And it's also a situation at the youngest age, they tell you when you make a mistake, just play through it. Keep competing. He's doing it at the highest level in a place like Philadelphia, no less. I give Trey Turner a lot of credit for the way you handled it. It is difficult to play through that there. What's next? Yep.

It's blank that New Kentucky football coach Will Stein says he thinks the school can win, quote, because of me, end quote. How about this dude, Frank? I know he has some success in the assistant in Oregon. I mean, a lot of success. But still, you go into the SEC, you go into that conference, which, my goodness, every year has a minimum

seven or eight schools where you have to be sitting there in the offseason and going, my God, how do we beat these people? The schedule's always loaded. And this guy comes in and just says, yeah, the difference is going to be me. My word is irresistible. Much more so than anything Arch Manning is going to do this season,

much more so than anything smug Greg Sanky has to say at these stupid SEC media day things, these things that anger me so much. I want to see this dude at Kentucky. Kentucky doesn't care about football. Are they going to pay enough people? Are their boosters going to switch over from basketball and leave Rupp Arena and pay these football kids, I want to see it. It's irresistible.

Thank God. You walked right into my word. Indiana Jonesing. Think about it. Kentucky's a basketball school. Yeah. What's the last basketball school to win the national championship?

Was Indiana? How did they do it? By mostly using players that are, you know, that are older than most NBA rosters through the transfer portal. And according to all these experts, Kentucky has a top 10. Think about this, Mike, Transfer Portal class.

So it can be done, including a quarterback from Notre Dame. You know what I like about this? These basketball schools could win, and it puts pressure on your school to win a national championship. There's no pressure. If Indiana can do it, maybe Kentucky, maybe Northwestern. On my school. Just, you know, get the stadium open,

and people like Frank can come and say, can I get a ticket into your nice new palace? And I'll say, probably not. And it's sweet. We'll see. That's enough. Bring some riches. That's enough word play.

Let's take one last break for still to come. The Angels snap of 106 game losing streak, we're going to tell you how. And John Harbaugh reacts to Cam Scataboo's fail flip. Oh, boy. Frank, you are part of the Northwestern Greater Family. Are you coming to a game to see the new palace or what? Hunt. Yes.

In the suite. In the sweet with you. Whether life serves you an ace or an unexpected backhand, the high-protein yogurt, Oikos Pro, is there to feed your strength and help you. you turn every challenge into a smash. Oikos Pro helps build strong muscles and support muscle recovery with high protein and contains no added sugar because true strength isn't about being able to take the hits. It's about being able to bounce back. Oikos Pro. Feed your strength. Visit oikos.ca for more details.

When you're a mid-sized business, you need every competitive advantage you can get, like an AI solution that works for you, not against you. SAP Grow is built with AI embedded at its core, working across every system, and it's ready to go from day one so you can hit the ground running. Bring it with SAP Grow, AI Cloud ERP for any size business. Time to get happy people. Happy 26th birthday, Erling Holland. Holland has been an international star for years, but he was one of the players whose personality and play captured the imaginations of casual fans during Norway. World Cup run of the quarters. Holland scored seven goals during the tournament and added more than 30 million Instagram followers. He now has more than 72 million followers, whereas

the Man City Club for which he plays has a total of 56 million. As a souvenir from his time in the States, Holland took home a taxidermied raccoon holding a whiskey bottle. He loved every minute of being here in the United States. I got to go to one of the games and won against Brazil where he scored the two goals. Holland loves everything about the United States. We're talking about the MLS. I think at one point he will play here. Not going to be for a while, but I do think he'll play. Who loves the attention more?

Holland or LeBron? A not-so-happy anniversary to Clay Kirby. This is posthumous. But on this day, 56 years ago, the Padres righty was no hitting the Mets through 8 when manager Preston Gomez lifted him for a pinch hitter. Reason? The Padres were improbably losing one-n-nothing. San Diego fans booed the decision, which backfired because the Padres didn't score,

yet gave up two more in the night to lose three-nothing. Worse, the Padres were 20 games under 500 at the time. Kirby said years later, a no-hitter would have given the franchise a much bigger boost than one more win. If it had been the seventh game of the World Series, I could understand it, I guess. But we were in last place, said as manager Gomez, I don't play for the fans. play to win. A couple of interesting stats from that.

Cito Gaston was the pinch hitter that was used. And it took until 2021 for the Padres to become the last active team in the majors to finally get a no hitter. Took a while. Took a while. It took quite a while. Happy trails to the St. Louis Cardinals on a walkoff of the second straight night. The cards were up one on the Angels in the bottom of the ninth last night.

When All-Star Closer, Riley O'Brien gave up a game-time double Devon Grissom, O'Brien then intentionally walked Josh Lowe to load the bases and faced the slumping Joe Adele, whom O'Brien then plunked to force him the winning run. These were the first earned runs O'Brien had allowed it a month, and the Angels had lost their previous 106 games when trailing entering the ninth. All of this follows St. Louis's Sunday night, lost the Diamondbacks in extras on Max Kepler's double. They led 7-0 in that game. They blew a 7-0 lead.

By the way, Adele came into that game last night, 0-24 slump, but he did have a home run and a single. And they're talking about I see Joe Adele's name in trade talks, which is sort of interesting, giving his prowess to the outfield. No errors today. Let's get to the big finish quickly. The Twins' All-Star starter, Joe Ryan, gave up six homers to the Guardians last night.

Wow, Frank, your thoughts? Ten other pitchers have allowed that. in baseball's modern era. I'm going to give you Mike's cell phone. He'll give you the names of the other nine. Connor Bedard says free agent Patrick Kane returning to the black hooks would be quote incredible. You agree? Amen. They should have done this a year and a half ago. Yes. Get him back. Patrick Kane. The Yankees still have no timeline for Giancarlo Stanton's return. Your reaction? He's played only 24 games this season. He hasn't played in a few months. I don't think we're going to see him again. The Mystic snapped the Valky's nine-game winning streak. Are you impressed? Yes, but not like with a

Olivia Miles and 32 8 and 8. She could be the MVP, not just rookie of the year. Last one. John Harbaugh's reaction to Cam Scataboo's field backflip was due. At least stick it. You like that? He landed and then fell back. The poor kid, he's a great player, but he gets hurt

way too much. We're out of time. Thanks for watching. I'm Frank Isold. And I'm Mike Wilbaugh. We're on the deuce again somehow? Tomorrow, knuckleheads. Hey, y'all. It's Kelly Clarkson with Wayfair. Ever order furniture online and wonder what if? Like, what if it doesn't hold up? That sofa was four days old.

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