The Bill Simmons Podcast - A Suns Sale, Pivot Trade NBA Teams, and the Future of Belichick and Kraft | With Rob Mahoney and Seth Wickersham

Episode Date: December 21, 2022

The Ringer's Bill Simmons quickly addresses the news that the Phoenix Suns are finalizing a sale (1:05) before talking with Rob Mahoney about NBA teams that after 30 games should be changing their goals—including the Lakers, Knicks, Pacers, Raptors, and more (7:28). Then Bill talks with ESPN's Seth Wickersham about another down year for the New England Patriots, Bill Belichick's lackluster track record in the last few seasons, and whether or not the Kraft family would consider removing the greatest head coach of all time (59:52). They also discuss the Washington Commanders owner Daniel Snyder and the mounting pressure for him to sell the team, as well as stories of other NFL owners, including Jerry Jones, Stephen Ross, Stan Kroenke, and more (1:23:38). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Seth Wickersham and Rob Mahoney Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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the Will Smith movie that just celebrated a 15-year anniversary. And over the last couple years, has really changed in context in some fascinating ways. Will Smith, COVID. It's a movie about a virus that basically wipes out mankind. Very, very, very fascinating

rewatch. And the first hour of that movie is just awesome. So anyway, go check that out. Next week on Monday is going to be the last rewatchables of 2022. And it is a very, very big movie. Can't wait for you to listen

to that one. One last thing before very, very big movie. Can't wait for you to listen to that one. One last thing before we get to the podcast. If you saw today, Adrian Wojnarowski, Sham Sharania reported that Matt Ishbia is finalizing a purchase of the Phoenix Suns and that the price is $4 billion. A couple reasons this is interesting for people to listen to this podcast. September 22nd, I told you I thought the Suns were going to go for at least $4 billion. I think I picked 4.4 as my final number, $4.4 billion. And that was three months ago, recession. Maybe I would have guessed 4.2 if you made me guess a week ago. But regardless, I thought I was going to go for more than four.

And you might remember from that podcast, go to like the 25-minute mark, the one name I mentioned was Matt Ishbia. And the reason that he was kind of floating around at that point was because

there had been a lot of buzz that he was closing in on by Mark Lazzari's stake of the Milwaukee Bucks, who he co-owns it with Wes Edens. They kind of flip-flop who's the governor of the team. And I think he swung from grabbing a piece of the Bucks

to once the Suns became available, jumping in on that. He's a really interesting guy. He played at Michigan State and made a ton of money. He's also involved with his brother, Justin, who's also a billionaire. He's with Shore Capital his brother, Justin, who's also a billionaire. He's with Shore Capital. So it's going to be those two guys. It's unclear how much of the percentage they took.

I've heard 60%, which means they had to put up about $2.5 billion. They did not buy 100% as far as anyone I've talked to. It was not all of it. This is important for a couple of reasons. One, I think the Suns, as I mentioned, that September 22nd podcast, I think the Suns are one of the eight teams to get in the NBA because of the city, the proximity to Vegas and LA,

and the history of the franchise, warm weather, all that stuff. Also, he could come in and bring somebody big in with him as a gm gm executive you know this is a team they've had james jones running them who i think did a good job putting together the core of the team but has also done some really weird stuff like the jalen smith drafting him and then dumping him after two years when halbert went two picks later. You know, I think he's done a good job. I certainly don't think like, you know, he's going to be there for another 20 years. So I, I always watch with the new owners. They always want to bring their guy in. So who is that guy? Could he go big? Could it be somebody like, you know, could it be like a Sam Presti type? I don't

know. Watch that. So that's one piece. The second piece, they have now established the mark for the expansion franchises, right? One of the reasons it was so important to get to four is now they could say, all right, Vegas, they know that Vegas expansion team has gone to the Fenway Sports Group in LeBron. I keep telling you this. So that's going to be 4 billion. And then Seattle will be like 4.5, 4.6, something like that. So they know combined that's about $8.5 billion. What's interesting about the expansion stuff and one of the many reasons I'm positive it's going to happen and maybe they'll wait until after they get the new CBA done with the players, but it's happening. The money goes to the owners.

When they do a deal like with ESPN or Turner or whoever, and it's usually a 50-50 CBA, maybe the percentages will tweak slightly. Maybe it'll be 51-49, I don't know. But it's usually around 50-50. And the players get half of it and the owners get half. And the half that the players get, that's how we have the salary cap and all the things that comes with it.

If you have two expansion teams, the money goes to the owners. So let's say it's 8.7 billion combined for those two teams. Every owner gets a $290 million check, all 30. And they probably work in some stuff where the media rights get delayed for a couple years, whatever. I think that's one of the reasons it was a good idea to buy the Suns. Even though 4 billion in this economy seems kind of crazy, what are the other big teams that are coming up? Maybe Charlotte, Indiana. I don't know. The Lakers are already tied into the Guggenheim investment people. I just don't know who else is coming. So not only do you get in with one

of the best teams to own, in my opinion, one of the best eight, but now who else is coming. So not only do you get in with one of the best teams to own, in my opinion, one of the best eight, but now an expansion is coming. You might get $275 million back just for being one of the 30 owners, plus the CBA and all the money coming in. I think this is a really smart purchase by them. Ishby is only 42 years old,

and he'll be the youngest owner that the league has, which I think is also kind of fun. The league's getting a little long in the tooth. Even somebody like Cuban who came in as a renegade, he's now in his 60s. So some fresh blood in that respect. And also they get Sarver out, which was the biggest thing because there was just another terrible story in ESPN about the workplace culture there just this week. So it was time for him to go. So there you go. $4 billion for the Suns.

We'll see. Watch when you read these stories over the next couple days and weeks. Watch to see what the actual percentage is. And then I'll be really interested to see when he takes over. And then when he does take over, what's his first big move? All these dudes, they all have to make their one first big move.

So we'll see what it is with him. Anyway, coming up on this podcast, we're going to have Rob Mahoney talking about what teams are going to pivot either as buyers or sellers. We're at the 30 game mark. There's a lot of questions right now. And who's going to be first market in both respects? And then Seth Wickersham from ESPN.

We're going to talk Belichick Craft. We're going to talk Daniel Snyder. All the weird NFL owner stuff that it just never ends. These billionaires, they're all nuts. Build your own fucking stadiums. That's it. That's the podcast.

First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, taping this a little after lunchtime Pacific time. Rob Mahoney is here. We're going to talk about pivot teams in the NBA. Rob, 30 game mark. What does that mean to you for pivot teams? I mean, I think it's kind of the ultimate test of an organization, right? Like, can you get an honest feel for where you are 30 games in? Maybe by January 1st at the latest, do you have like an actual look at where you are?

And some of these teams that we're going to talk about have been, you know, undercut by injuries. They've had issues that they've had to sort out. Maybe they've had like really good weeks that could make you foolishly think your team is actually good when it's not. I don't know. Like your accurate read on your locker room, on every level of your organization, this is when it comes into play to me. Can you make that read in real time?

And you want to be first in. Yep. If you're selling the Laker picks, that 2027, 2029 unprotected, those can only go to one team. So part of the conversations right now, if you're a team like Washington, that's on a big losing streak,

that looks like they're going nowhere, has a chance to get into Wimbinyama sweepstakes. One of the ways to do that is to trade some of your best players. But at the same time, you want to grab those Laker picks or you want to grab what other asset this. So we're going to go backwards.

I did a little power ranking of teams 30 to one. And we're going to go backwards. I did a little power ranking of teams 30 to one, and we're going to go backwards. I bet the 20 say I've watched it as the fifth worst team in the league right now. They're 11 and 20. Yeah. They cannot trade Bradley Beal until January 15th, which might be too late for the Lakers.

He also has a no trade clause. That's really one of the dumbest deals I've ever seen in my life. 50 million a year, and you could only go to teams that you agree to go to. $251 million for five years. Kuzma's a little more palatable at $13 million. He's got player option in 2023. They have Will Barton, $14.4 million. Porzingis is sitting there for somebody if they want to get nuts. He is a player option. They got Morris and Gafford. They don't really have a lot of crazy draft capital.

They owe the Knicks a protected first. That's it. Washington, to me, strikes me as a team that should be moving now to try to get into the Wambayama thing. Is there any reason they shouldn't do that? No, yeah. I don't even think it's if they want to get nuts with guys like Porzingis.

They should get nuts. Everyone should be pretty much on the table who is available to trade. Obviously, the BL case is more complicated. But Kyle Kuzma is a perfect example. Here's a rule of thumb. If you have a really good player who's underpaid, who is almost definitely going to turn down his player option for next season, and is basically batting his eyelashes at other teams, you should probably trade him.

You should probably try to get something for him. And in part because Kuzma is a really attractive player to good teams. He can do a lot that help the teams who are on the other side of this dynamic who are going to try to push in to get better, to climb the standings, to take advantage of some of the chaos in the league right now. Kuzma is like a prime candidate for those kinds of teams. So why? I mean, he should be in trade rumors every week. He should be like the subject of phone calls every week until he's dealt. There's just no reason he should be a Washington wizard by the end of the season.

Yeah, there's this list of dudes. And like Indiana has a couple. They have Turner at 18 million. Heald's 21.2. It's a little pricey. But when you have those guys in the 9 to 18 range, it's really easy for any contender to slap together contracts. Caruso is the best example of this.

Caruso is, I think, 9 million. You're going to trade the Bulls franchise player like that? I know. Yeah, Caruso's 9 million. He's an unrestricted free agent in 2025. So for a team like Golden State,

which I've discussed before, like, oh, we can add Caruso to this and buy us some more time. So with Washington, the Kuzma, and I think Barton, who isn't as good of a player as Kuzma, but is also kind of in that range. And they can go a variety of ways. They could go the mother load trade with Beal if the Lakers were

willing to wait. By the way, the Knicks are another team. Now, I don't know. The Knicks have reinvented themselves as a defensive force with the Quentin Grimes. But the Beal is another one. If they wanted to take a monster swing at a free agent guy, I would guess Washington is going to blow it up. So that would be our first one. The next one would be Chicago, who should blow it up. Oh my gosh. Now they can't trade Zach Levine until January 15th.

They're 11 and 18. The New Orleans game, I think, no, I'm sorry, the Minnesota game. Minnesota put 150 points on that. That was kind of a blow it up mission statement. With no Towns, no Gobert for that game. Brutal. Although, it looks like Edwards has

finally played himself in shape. Congratulations to Anthony and Edwards. You're finally looking good. So they have Vucevic at 22. Free agent. They have Patrick Williams, who's under contract for less free agent. They have Patrick Williams, who's under contract for less than eight. They have Caruso and then DeRozan.

They could make the most trades. I've made up a whole bunch of trades for them a couple weeks ago where it was like DeRozan and Vucevic to the Lakers and Zach Levine to the Knicks and Caruso to the Warriors. The thing with them, they have Orlando as their top four. Yep, top four. Yep. Top four protected first pick.

So there's no guarantee, right, that they could potentially save their own pick, but they'd give themselves a better chance if they bottomed out now. And if you look at it, there's only maybe four teams that are definitely going to bottom out, right? San Antonio, Detroit, Houston, probably Charlotte. I can't imagine even getting LaMelo back will make them that much better.

I would say Charlotte, although they did beat the Kings last night. They've had some good games. So Chicago, they know they have a chance to at least be the fifth worst, maybe get in the fourth worst, and you're looking at a little less than half to keep that top four. Those are very different things though. Like the fifth versus fourth worst,

when you have the top four protected pick, like that's an agonizing decision. And that's where that side of this gets really interesting. And maybe the timing of a potential Bulls deal matters as much as anything. For everything we've outlined, like the advantage of being the first mover

in this market is not just that you get the potential Lakers picks or whatever the biggest bounty is on the board or the best prices. Or really, you're just the one team selling when so many teams want to buy right now. But also, you're just going to lose games faster. And Chicago's losing plenty of games as it is. But if they trade one or two of their core guys, I think the bottom is going to fall out really, really fast. And they're going to get right in the thick of that tanking race in a way that maybe you feel okay about your top four odds. Well, and they have to get rid of Vucevic too

because he could be, even though he's a declining asset, he could be just competent once a week. That could be the difference between being the seventh worst team and the fourth worst team. The Vuce trade really is a disaster. And it was a disaster anyway, from the moment Franz Wagner turned out the way he did. And the fact that they have another top four protected coming, but just that Vooch just hasn't been that good for him.

And it seems like, you know, I like if Utah, let's say Utah was going for it or Al Bob. And I talked about this a couple of weeks ago. And Utah was like, we'll get Chicago. It's like, we'll give you Vucevic for a Linux and another piece. And if you're Utah, you're like, we'd much rather have a Linux at 12 million a year than Vucevic at 22 at this point.

And that's not where he was two years ago. So I think, I think that's an issue. And then DeRozan, I think I wouldn't say say DeRozan, as good as I think he is, I'm not sure he's a guy that fits on every team. He's a little bit of an unusual player, right? If you're a team that really prides ball spacing or you're an upbeat team or whatever, I'm not positive he fits in.

But I do like the fit of him on the Lakers. As weird as that would sound, that team needs three-point shooting. He's not a three-point shooter. But just like that, grind it out when Davis comes back with the Bron, half-court offense, vets. I do like that fit for him. Anywhere else

you would see for him that you would just like? I mean, that's the kind of spot. First of all, I applaud your willingness to will this trade into existence of getting the Rose into the Lakers because it really does seem more likely by the day that that's something that could happen. And there's reporting today in The Athletic

about some unease in Chicago in terms of the internal dynamics of the team and Zach Levine's position and how all these pieces are fitting together. And that's obviously bearing out on the court. But in terms of DeRozan destinations, what you want is, who are the teams who are struggling

in half-court offense? The Los Angeles Lakers are at the absolute top of that list in terms of teams that can be a good defense, certainly when they have AD, although that's now its own question mark. They can be a really good transition team, but they need someone like DeRozan

to be a workhorse in the half-court, to be grinding out pick and roll and ISO in limited space, which is something he's been very good at doing basically his entire career. And he can make gold of those possessions. And so I love him as a floor raiser more than a ceiling raiser for most teams, but

I mean, the Lakers need a new floor very badly. They need that kind of safety that comes with a player like him. Well, let's jump ahead to the next because I think that's of safety that comes with a player like him. Let's jump ahead to the Knicks because I think that's a good DeRozan destination. You put him with Brunson, who's this old school playoff type of guard,

and then Rando, who's a little bit of an unusual player too. Then you put DeRozan with them, basically in that two- guard spot, which they've been floating around on. I just think that'd be a really hard team to play. And I don't know if Barrett, Barrett, they have some issues because he's a poison pill guy. Yeah. But you can also get creative with that. If that team, if you're trading, like if Chicago trades other guys and they cut some salary, maybe it's a little bit easier, but I just like that. I don't think the Knicks are that far away.

17 and 13. I have them as number 12 on my board right now, which I couldn't believe as I was doing the teams. Defensively, they starting to feel a little bit more like a tips team. I think they're fun to watch. I think Brunson's been awesome for them. He's been great. And I'm honestly not surprised. Are you?

Were you like, oh my God, I wonder if Brunson's going to be good in the Knicks? Like I was all in on Brunson. I felt like, oh my God, I wonder if Brunson's going to be good in the next? Like, I was all in on Brunson. I felt like we got enough of a sample size with him in Dallas. I was still a little surprised that people didn't realize

how important he was to Dallas last year, just in a variety of ways. But if you had one more playoff score to that team, I don't know, that East is after the top two,

I just feel like it drops. I think what makes them tough to read is they've been playing great lately. Especially like you look over the last 15 games or so, their starters have been one of the best high usage lineups in the NBA. That's a great sign in terms of if you're banking on

what this group is moving forward, it's hard to give that up. It's hard to give up. You look even just recently in this game against the Pacers this week, I think that's as good as Randall and Brunson and Barrett have all played at the same time. And so you're like, okay, this is finally clicking. This is finally here. And so either

you're thinking trade to bring someone in to get better and potentially disrupt that very precarious balance you're starting to build or do we really trust that that balance is real? Is this something that is going somewhere where you would be dissuaded from trading away julius randall down the line or making some other kind of shake-up like for as good as the knicks have been and like this is a

this is a harsh thing to say for a team that's on a win streak but like i just still don't think this still feels like a team that needs to be reimagined to me even with as well as they're playing even with as good as they've been defensively like that needs to be reimagined to me, even with as well as they're playing, even with as good as they've been defensively. You need to be doing one of two things. Do you trust this team to be good and stable long-term or do you trust them to compete for a championship right now? And I think

they're closer to the former than the latter, but I don't really trust the long-term prospects of this group either. Well, what's fun about them for somebody like the Rose in salary range, they got Rose at 14.5. prospects of this group either. Well, what's fun about them for somebody like in the DeRozan salary range, they got Rose at 14.5, basically an expiring, and then Reddish at six. So I'm already at 21. I'm already like one more contract I can just get DeRozan. I don't really have to touch anybody. Good. They have a lot of picks. They have their own first for the next seven years.

They have protected first from washington walking detroit they have a top 10 protected first from dallas so they could just throw some stuff without really touching toppin or any of their guys that are playing for them and then save the other stuff for a second trade if they wanted to i I'm a little more bullish on the Knicks adding a piece because not even for whether you and I think it's a good idea. I just feel like the guys that run that team, they're in year three. It's kind of a shit or get off the pot thing with Tibbs.

Sure. And I think you kind of have to find out. Now, the way this can go wrong is the way it went wrong for Chicago, right? Where they're the same thing. Ooh, we're a little shit off, get her the pot. All right, let's go get Vucevic. And now you see where that went. Maybe they miscalculated that. In this case, I do feel like you can get somebody good without really touching who you have. And I think the fans want it. I think one of the things they have going for them is even if they can try to be a top five team in the East and get some home energy for these games.

And they've unlocked Randall is the most important thing that they did. I don't know what's going to happen with Barrett. He's been up and down. Every time I watch him, he either looks terrible or he looks pretty good, but he doesn't look like the guy from last year. But Randall does not look like the guy from last year. Randall is back pretty close to the guy from two years ago, right? He's had some really good stretches.

There were points defensively where you could really zero in on what he wasn't doing or being out of position and really pick at that. I do think he's been better. I do think, obviously, collectively, they've been so much better defensively. You're right. You are right if they can get a little bit more punch.

They can be a really solid team for this season. I'm just not sure if that's what you want to push in for with a guy like DeRozan, for example, who... What I love about DeRozan as a potential fit for them is he would be so good anchoring second units, like playing without the other stars for New York, without their other best players, and really elevating some of those groups.

Right. But the idea of, even given everything I said about him being very good in limited space, putting him alongside this starting lineup in the Quentin Grimes spot effectively, Barrett cannot shoot. Julius Randle is pretty up and down in terms of what he gives you in terms of spacing.

So you're really banking very hard on Jalen Brunson basically as being a good spacer in the situations where you actually want DeRozan driving your offense. And that's okay. It makes me a little nervous though. Can I give you RJ Barrett's destiny in this situation? Please.

I'd like to introduce you to the six-man award. Now go try to win it hey look at Tyler here and Jordan Clarkson you're going to come in Jordan Poole 12 minutes a half just kind of go nuts for us the Randall stuff since after Thanksgiving

it's 27 and 10 it's a bunch of 30 point games he's back in the mix. All right. We'll take a break, and we'll hit these other teams. Hey, Santa Barclay's coming to town. He's delivering $20 million in gifts this holiday season to all FanDuel customers. Doesn't matter if you've been naughty or nice.

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set credit or free bets. See Fando.com for terms and conditions. This episode is brought to you by my old friend, Miller Lite. I've been a big fan of Miller Lite man, since college days when I was allowed to have beer. I think nephew Kyle is a fan too.

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I would be really scared to trade for Levine. As sexy of a name as that is, just because of the knee stuff. I don't 100% know what I'm getting, and I'm getting a guy who we know he tore his ACL, and we know he's had surgery on that same knee, and he had the surgery before the contract. I would just kind of want to see him

look like the Levine from a know a year and a half two years ago for 10-12 games before I was willing to go nuts so that was the last thing on that Indiana I think they should blow it up in a way that blow it up mean for them blow it up means

we're not going to be one of the four worst teams we're probably not going to be a playoff team and we know who we want to build around we're not going to be one of the four worst teams. We're probably not going to be a playoff team. And we know who we want to build around. Yeah. And there's a chance that we could get real assets back for Turner, who's a free agent in 2023, and Heald, who's a free agent in 2024.

There's a chance they could just get good assets back for those guys and still be really fun to watch and still be good. The other guy they have who is tradable is McConnell because Nembhard's come in and McConnell's just disposable. McConnell's $8 million a year and is somebody that could play in a playoff series. So my guess is that I think they're a seller, but what do you think? Definitely a seller. I mean, they should take calls on all those guys constantly and be pitching them to other teams, frankly.

For as good as Myles Turner has been, and he's been one of the best rim protectors in the league this season, it's been an incredible bounce back campaign for him in a lot of ways. I just don't really see anything to be precious about here. You have what you have, which is Tyrese Halliburton, Benedict Matherin. That's your future.

That's where you're ultimately going. Everything else is negotiable. So I would see no reason for them not to be a seller. They're far enough away and those guys are young enough that you're really not looking to move in right now

if you're the Pacers. Man, shots fired at Nembhard. He's involved. He's in Harvard and Matherin. He could have just given him a tiny bone there. He could be in the sidecar. He's here. D him a tiny bone there. He could be in the sidecar. He's here.

D. Smith, Duarte. They have two protected first-round picks from Boston and Cleveland, and they have all their own picks. They also have the ability, the moment that they just start benching dudes in the second half of the season, maybe they get to the top six.

But I think some of these other teams are going to have too big of a lead on them to get into that bottom four. I think Turner has a lot of value and you're also catching somebody who's playing for another contract, right? You always want those guys. So if you're renting somebody, I want to rent somebody who for the next five months has this vested interest to convince somebody to give him a hundred million for four years or whatever. The golden state fit for you. What is it? It's a every all like the super smart basketball people.

I know yourself included all kind of cringe a little bit when they think at Turner and golden state. Why is that? I think, I think Turner's a very good basketball player. I think he's very sharp playing in specific ways. Him as like a read and react flow guy, that's not really where I see his strong suits.

And a lot of that's just like from a ball skill perspective. He's not a big you want handling the ball a lot. He's not a guy you want necessarily running through a lot of dribble handoff. And yeah, defensively, you can see what he could be for them. But he's also someone who's used to a specific kind of style and system and would lock them into a particular style of play in terms of... I don't

really know that you want Miles switching out that much. You want him tethered to the basket as much as you can keep him around there. And he is dynamic and he is talented and he is effective, but I just think we've seen enough cases over the years of really talented

good players who have come to the Warriors and just do not fit with how they play. And I have some visions of that in terms of like a Miles Turner situation there.

So you're thinking like Lakers playing next to Davis would be... Yeah. ...would be a good one. Yeah, you could see something like that.

Davis healed. I guess my question is, do the Lakers have to make both of those picks unprotected in that trade? I mean, this is the call, right? This is the negotiation that they're having effectively. It's like how the gradations of the protections and what you are willing to give up.

And the Lakers, frankly, I don't know what they're doing if they're not ultimately willing to make those sacrifices. I'm not saying they should do it for just any player. I'm not even saying they should do it for Turner. But you have to be willing to do it.

If you're the Lakers, that is your job this season is to find a taker for those picks, to find a way to justify your entire situation in being a LeBron James team. What are you doing here if not that? 13 and 17. The Davis...

I do this every year in the podcast with somebody who hurts their foot. And I think I'm batting 1,000 with this prediction. It's going to be about a month. It's like, okay. Yeah. We'll see. Because with feet,

especially, it always seems like it's six weeks, eight weeks, ten weeks. For bigs, especially. For bigs, nobody's getting rushed back with a weird foot situation. And it doesn't seem like it's a sprained foot. It seems like it's worse. And he's a guy who, even when he comes back, even if he did come back at the earliest possible timeline,

the way Anthony Davis was playing, you need absolute confidence and comfort with your body to move like that, to contest shots like that, to be as aggressive as he was going to the rim. I think it's possible that even when he comes back, we're not going to see that version of AD for a while. He's going to have to ease back into things. What we're talking about in terms of the overall scope of the Lakers season is they need help. They need help in a really bad way and they don't really have the option to go the other direction. They have to be pushing forward. Counter, if he's gone for six, eight, nine weeks, you're 13 and 17 anyway, and your team now, LeBron is the hub of the team who's in year 20,

who has basically been missing 25 to 30 games the last couple years. The moment he gets hurt, your season's over. So why am I giving away my entire future to hold the fort so that I can get Anthony Davis coming off a major injury, semi-major, and then old LeBron? And where am I going anyway? Am I as good as the top seven teams in the league with that nucleus? You saw the other night.

Now, the Boston game was really interesting for a variety of reasons. Darvin Hamm says, fuck it. He plays Russian roulette with Davis and LeBron in the second half. Doesn't take him out. Davis gets hurt three nights later. Now you could say, oh, that's a total coincidence. Or you could say they oh, that's a total coincidence. Or you

could say they were putting a shitload of miles on Anthony Davis, a guy who has broken down over and over again in a variety of ways. And he broke down three days after that game. I remember this happened in New Orleans with Boogie Cousins when they had the Boogie Anthony Davis combo and they were just riding those guys and Boogie was playing big minutes and then he got hurt. And I, I just think you have to be really careful with these big, a little bit injury prone guys. So I already feel like they were pushing the RPMs to like seven Davis

already broke down. And LeBron is in year 20. If like, if I was a consultant of the Lakers, I would be like, dude, the new Orleans pick is a sunk cost. Okay, first of all,

no one should hire you of all people as a consultant to the Lakers. No, this is a great idea. They should hire me. I'll be totally honest with my thoughts. If I was an objective consultant, I would be like, what are we doing? The Pelicans pick is gone.

We're not getting it back. We're not going to win the title with the team we have. Now we're going to ruin the end of the 2020s? For what? We're going to be better than Milwaukee? I think my counterpoint to that would be, when was the last

time that the Lakers' future was actually their draft picks in any way? This is not a team that drafts players and goes through the long developmental process and those are our guys. Not since Kobe, effectively. That was really the standout case of that. But LeBron wanted to come

here and it wasn't because the Lakers had draft picks. And AD wanted to be traded there. And it cost draft picks to do it but ultimately the young talent is not going to stand in the way of things like that. It's not going to stand in the way of other stars right now. Even with everything as they are with the Lakers. Wanting to play there. Wanting to be a part of that franchise. Those are the facts of life for that organization.

And picks mean different things to different teams. I don't think they mean that much to the Lakers, frankly. Well, you know who hopes you're right? About eight other teams in the NBA. They certainly do. I hope Rob Mahoney is right in that they're going to be dumb enough to trade those picks. And that's the thing, ultimately. That's why you want to be the first mover. You want those picks. You want to be able to take advantage of the fact that that pick means more to your franchise than it ever would to the Lakers,

even if it's the number one overall pick. I just have serious questions about Davis being able to stay healthy for eight, nine months a year. I know his agent was taught, he was interviewed about it and was saying, if you look at each injury, each one was a fluke, he stepped on somebody's foot or whatever. But I just think if you're relying on him the way the Lakers relied on him to get back in the race when they were like two and 10, when he went on that run, he couldn't sustain it. He got hurt. He broke down. Some guys just aren't durable.

Other guys are. Giannis doesn't break down. Luca, as weird as he is in his slow motion, and I wouldn't say he's in the greatest shape ever, but he's durable. He plays big minutes and has a big usage rate. He doesn't get hurt. The fucking Joker never gets hurt. The Joker just gains steam. You might be an alien. And Davis gets hurt over and over and over again. And I don't... At some point you got to look at him and be like, is this a fluke or is this who the guy is?

I mean, the ultimate market inefficiency, move slowly, you know? Glide around out there, save your body, and if you're Nikola Jokic, still score like 40-something points and grab damn near 30 rebounds a game. Unreal. Now he's the favorite to win the MVP again.

Even though he's not the favorite, he should be. Pretty good. He means the most to his team. He has the best stats. And the reason cannot be he won the last two years. That's not the reason.

The reason is this year. We're voting on this year. And if he plays 80 to 82 games again and does all the stuff he's doing, he's got to be in the conversation. I've been a Giannis guy to this point. And then I watched the Nuggets Wizards game last week, where

the Nuggets scored 98 points in the paint. And it was just like how easy it looked for Jokic. I mean, he's been doing this stuff all season. This isn't an isolated thing, but the way he's just like spoon-feeding Aaron Gordon at the basket, everything is so

phenomenally simple when you have Nikola Jokic on the floor. And the virtues of that, I don't think they're properly captured because of how little he shoots right now. He just doesn't really care to shoot 20 times a game, and so he barely ever does, where some of these other guys will go and go and go

and rack up huge scoring totals because of it, but Jokic is unreal. Like, I don't see a way to have that MVP conversation if he's not, at least in the top three, on your ballot.

Like, he has to be there. Yeah, and 30 game mark is at least time to start thinking, like, who are the characters in the MVP play? And I think he was getting left out for a little bit, but now he's back.

And listen, I say this every year. To me, part of the award is, it's not just all the stats. What your stats are, even the on-off stuff. Are you making your teammates better? Are they better because you're on their team? All of the guys he plays with are better because he plays with them. And that's the case against Luka, in my opinion, to some degree.

I'm not positive he brings out the best of all the guys he plays with sometimes. A lot of times, they're just standing there watching him. It's the same thing as 17 Westbrook and 19 Harden. At some point, the guys on the team have to feel like, man, what a great situation I'm in instead of just feeling like spectators. Jokic, to play with that dude for a year has to be the highlight of your career to be like, oh my God, it was so much fun.

I just got layups and dunks and wide open threes. It was the best. Well, I will say this in defense of Luka. Those are totally different team models. Totally get it. I don't think Reggie Bullock running five more pick and rolls a game is a good thing for anybody.

And I say that with all due respect to Reggie Bullock. But Luka plays the way he does because the team is built for that. And he's very, very good at it. And that team should be better than it is. But they've been losing games for a whole variety of reasons we can get into if we want to.

But they're at an interesting crossroads themselves. Yeah, we're going to get to them in one second. The Luka thing is interesting to me because I think LeBron's been somebody else like this too, where they're building

specific types of teams for the strength of the awesome guy. But part of being an awesome basketball player should be pulling out the best out of whoever you play with. And I think that's where with those high usage rates are the guys like LeBron who like the specific type of teammates.

Like why wasn't Malik? Malik Monk was pretty good on the Lakers last year. Yeah. But why wasn't he awesome on the, why wasn't he like he is on the Kings this year now people say well the stats are pretty similar it's like actually the per 36 he's a little better on the Kings

but just in general like those heat check guys like that anyway that's a whole different discussion Dallas I think is pretty limited with what they can do it's wood they have all these contracts that nobody really wants the Kyrie piece if Brooklyn ever It's wood. They have all these contracts that nobody really wants.

The Kyrie piece, if Brooklyn ever wanted to just say, fuck it and get rid of Kyrie, maybe it's something like that, but we don't really talk about them. Miami is a team that's right around the Dallas record. Dallas with a losing record, by the way. Miami's 16 and 15.

It's weird. They have the Lowry piece. Lowry's at 30. And I think if they were going to upgrade, they could put together with him and Robinson, they could put together something. Right? Now you're in like the 50 million a year club if you wanted.

Whatever. Lowry's 28.3 this year. From a draft pick standpoint, they can trade this year. From a draft pick standpoint, they can trade this year's pick. They could potentially trade 27 and 29 and that's it. They owe Oklahoma City a 20-25 pick.

And they're just kind of middle of the road. I don't really know what to make of them, but I don't want to count them out either because we've seen when they're playing well,

it's like, that looks like a playoff team. Then you watch the next way and they lose to one of the five worst teams in the league by 10. The Lowry piece would be the piece I would guess they would upgrade, but I don't know. What do you think? Do they limp along and just kind of hope the button turns on or do they get ambitious?

I think they limp along and some of that is their young guys are good enough that even if you did make drastic changes and try to get worse, for example, I don't know that you can get worse enough at this point. Bam Adebayo is really good. Tyler Hero, for all his flaws, still a very good player. So trading Jimmy Butler, something that radical,

not really on the table. So you're looking at more Lowry-level solutions. Or if you want to talk about trading know trading some of the younger guys you can have those talks too but I kind of think they go with it and I'm honestly fine with it personally because I just categorically I'm not going to pull the plug on Jimmy Butler like that is a guy who is going

to show up I'm fine with that I'm going to kick around and see if my team can shore up a little bit like they're a team that could desperately use one or two more just like good players, and they could find those potentially. Or if you want to talk about places that might be willing to take on the risk of Zach Levine's

knee, I would love to see Zach Levine with the Heat. He would be an awesome fit with what they do. But I kind of think they ultimately end up more or less in the range they are, and probably end up being maybe just squeak into the sixth seed and dodge the play-in,

and then they turn out to be like a pretty formidable playoff team that ultimately can't go all the way. The story of what this team is and has been, frankly. My favorite hypothetical trade that can't happen because Denver doesn't have the picks

is Butler going to Denver for Porter and some firsts. And Denver doesn't have the firsts to pull it off, and Porter hasn't been able to stay healthy enough for long enough. But just in general, that would be such a holy shit moment. Like, oh my God, Jimmy Butler's going to be in the Nuggets with Jokic and Jamal Murray? Jesus, what's going to happen? Are they locked in?

But unfortunately, that can't happen. I do wonder. Jimmy definitely needs to be monitored, I think, the longer this team stays 500. As a trade candidate? As in anything. As just a quote.

As a post-game press conference guy, I just don't see him being a 500 guy at this point in his career. I think that guy, I think he wants to be in big playoff series. I think he wants to be in the finals again. And I don't think this is going to fly maybe two more weeks, but I,

I I'm just, I'm kind of watching. It's like a volcano. You just got to kind of stare at it from afar. And you're like, I was having a little lava leaking out. What's going on there? Um,

Atlanta, John Collins is now officially been available for three years. leaking out? What's going on there? Atlanta. John Collins has now officially been available for three years. I think he celebrated his three-year anniversary of being available. What do you get for three years? Is that like a set of steak knives on the trade market? I think it's salt shakers.

Deo San Antonio, they're 25 and 27 first. The Spurs could swap picks with them in 26. They have a top 15 protected pick from Sacramento in 24 for the Herter trade that drops to top 12 and top 10. That's not nothing. They have A.J. Griffin

if they wanted to get super creative. They have Jalen Johnson if they wanted to do a win-now trade. Either of those guys thrown in with Collins. They got Bogdanovich. He's got a player option. Capella, who knows? I don't even know

what this team needs because ultimately they haven't figured out the Trae Young piece of it yet. He had a good game last night. But for the most part, has just not looked like Trae Young all year

and doesn't have threes anymore. And I think they thought Murray was going to solve some issues with that and he has not. So, to me, they are not a, we need to jump the gun now team, more a, can we see in a month where we are team?

Dave, what do you think? I think so. I mean, they've looked really bad when they've had guys out. Another team that's just not very deep anymore after they, for example, just lost Kevin Herter. So they had trouble when John Collins was out, when DeJounte Murray was out. When their best players have been on the floor, they've been pretty good. And the offense, there's a lot to figure out.

You're right about Trey, absolutely. Frankly, we probably aren't talking enough about the fact that in the modern NBA, players do not get that kind of usage and shoot this badly basically ever anymore just is not a thing that teams are usually willing to allow there's not that many guys with that much rope Trey has been chronically inefficient this season it's been a huge problem but I think there's enough going on and there's been enough

guys in and out that they're probably going to play a longer game and certainly just after pushing in for Murray the way they did they're a team that's only going to be more and more aggressive in that direction they're not going that's only going to be more and more aggressive in that direction. They're not going to bail on the fundamental model that they have so much as yeah, they'll trade John Collins.

They'll talk to you about Clint Capello, whatever it is you want to do there, but they need to win. They need to be a good team. I think they have the bones of one, and you just have to hope that Trey can figure it out and that he and DeJounte can sort out some of those kinks along the way. I think we agree. I think they're a wait

and see potential buyer. Right now, Trey Young, 29.3% shooting from three. And that's seven a game. Unreal. His field goal percentage is down to 41. It was 46 last year. His free throws

are up, which backs the eye test. Because to me, he's just not shooting well. But other than that, he still seems like Trey Young. He's getting the line 8.6 times a game. So he's doing everything except just making shots. And I don't know, it could be a slump. It's only been 28 games for him, but that's a pretty long slump. But the thing we always forget with three-pointers, he is 58 for 198 from three. It's not a small sample size,

but it's also not a big sample size. He could go 15 for his next 30, and all of a sudden that looks pretty palatable. Getting Bogdanovich back too is a big thing for them because without him, they just weren't hitting shots. It was AJ Griffin hitting threes. DeJounte Murray has been

okay from that, but everyone else has been missing. So just having another spacer, not to mention ball handler, guy who can play with the second unit, all that stuff is valuable, but they just need room. And if Trey's not hitting, they really need room. Alright, so we think we wait and see. Let's do Toronto quick.

Yeah. I think they should be a seller. They're 13 and 18, and I just don't like their look. I don't think whatever they have going, it's just the pieces don't fit. And we've all rooted for basketball teams where you know it after a little while. Remember the 2019 Celtics were like this, the last Kyrie season. Where it's just like,

this isn't going to happen this year. These guys, something's off. And Toronto has been a something off team. The reason I mentioned this, they could go almost like what Portland did last year. And I think Portland's model last year of kind of tanking and rebooting, but not giving up on this subsequent year, I think was they kind of created a model I'd never really considered before. The McCollum trade, but that led to eventually the Jeremy Grant trade. They got some pieces back and then in nine months they were in

a better spot, but they also hurt their team. So they got a really good lottery pick. And I could see Toronto doing something like that. And the guy I'm looking at is Van Vliet, who's got a player option in 23, who I think would be a really interesting piece for a team I'm about to throw

at you. But I wonder, could that be a piece? And could Ananobi be the other one who's been a monster on defense and who's pretty cheap? Then Siakam would be the gold standard at 35.5 if you wanted to get really ambitious. But what do you think about that?

That's what's good about the Raptors' position, is if you wanted to start trading guys, Fred VanVleet can play anywhere. He can play alongside other ball-dominant guards. He can be your lead point guard if you have other playmakers. He can fit. OG Ananobi can slot in pretty much anywhere. He's one of the best defenders in the NBA.

Pascal Siakam is as versatile as forwards can get. Clearly, he can carry a really high usage load and role and be a really important part of your team as he's been for Toronto this season. And he can also scale down into other spots as well. So I love the flexibility they have as far as like having those conversations me too. I think I'm

in agreement that something is fundamentally off there and some of that to me is like I just for a team that is as long and as versatile defensively as they are. I don't trust their defense really at all like they're a team that that's been the shocker right that I think they're giving up more points

than they've scored this year, but it's really easy to score on them in the last five minutes of a game. And in macro, like you zoom out and the defense is okay by most measures, but then you'll watch and like Tobias Harris looks unstoppable or Jordan Poole has like 43 points.

You know, like these things happen with a frequency that is a little bit unnerving to me if I'm thinking about, do I trust this team? Is this a team that I trust to figure it out? And I'm getting more and more to the point with Toronto where I don't. And I'm not necessarily even saying that they could make a trade that's

kind of lateral and get a little bit better and just vault into the playoffs because all the other pieces on their team are already so good, at least the core guys. They might not be a buyer or a seller so much as just rearr into the playoffs because all the other pieces on their team are already so good, at least the core guys. They might not be a buyer or a seller so much as just rearranging the deck with good talent. I wouldn't trade Ananobi if I was them,

but I would really think about Van Vliet, who I like. And just like, one of the great things about Van Vliet is he's cheap, right? He's 21.2. So people could put contracts together, totaling 17, 18 million, you could get them, which brings us back to the

Lakers. They could get Van Vliet without trading Westbrook. They could just do, oh, here's Beverly and here's Kendrick Nunn and our 2027 unprotected first for Van Vliet. And if you're Toronto, you have to think about that because you're going nowhere anyway as it is. You get this great asset and then you could still trade in and open it in a separate deal. The other one I was thinking for Van Vliet

is my favorite buyer. Get ready. Take a breath. I'm scared. The magic of Orlando. Oh boy. Why are we doing that? I just think they're good they're like 65

to 1 to win their division they're in the division with Miami and Atlanta they're like 5 games back even they had the 6 game winning streak and you can look at it from afar and be like I can't believe the Celtics lost to these dudes well I watched the Friday game and then I watched the

fourth quarter on Sunday. Orlando's just pretty good. They have two forwards who can score and make plays and create and in the end of games are really hard to defend. They have weird players that have been playing well like Bol Bol. I don't know. If you just put

Wim Wlid on that team, could that team be a 7 or an 8 seed? They have so many picks. They have all their picks. They have that Chicago pick we mentioned. They have a top 5 protected pick from Denver in 25 that rolls over. They could kind of get ambitious and grab a player without

really sacrificing anything. And if I were them, I would think about it. I just think there's some kind of rule against trading any member of the Tampa Raptors back to Florida. You cannot make Fred VanVleet go back there. You just can't do it. It's very mean. And from Orlando's perspective, I do think he would fit there.

He fits very seamlessly and easily into the way they play, into what they have. And certainly in terms of everything that you would give up having VanVleet at the point in terms of size. You have all this length behind him. I'm just reluctant to find the Magic. I agree that they're pretty good right now. I just don't want to take anything away

from the ecosystem and the young prospects you already have to the point that I'm actually okay with them having guards who are kind of constantly injured at the end of the lineup prospects you already have to the point that I'm actually okay with them having guards who are kind of constantly injured and in and out of the lineup. I'm fine with that because that just means like Franz and Paolo and Boll have the ball all the time. They get to try and read and do things all the time and like develop their games in that way.

And that's what your team is going to be. Like the strength of your huge passer, playmaking and ball handling forwards and bigs. That's what I want my team to be. And that's where I want to get the reps right now. So I'm cool with just being

a cool, fun, pretty good team What about bringing a nice pro in like Van Vliet? He's great for the vibes. Underdog. Everyone loves him. I have news. Orlando on Fandle

has dropped to 35-1 from the division there's been some action I may have been involved I am of the opinion when you have young teams where you clearly know like oh my god

we really have something with these two guys then the bowl thing is this weird discount Wimbanyama wildcard I would put a good guard with them I think it just makes them better I also thought these two guys. Then the bowl thing is this weird discount Wimbanyama wildcard. I would put a good guard with them. I think it just makes them better. I also thought they should have traded for Mitchell last summer. I thought that was the wildcard Mitchell team where they basically could have put together the same deal Cleveland did. But I like the idea of

some sort of veteran on that team. And Orlando, the other thing with them, they have Terrence Ross at 11 and a half. They have Harris 13 this year and next year. Fultz 16 and a half, 17. They have that Isaac contract that is really fun to trade because it's like basically

you can get rid of it after next year. You can buy it out for cheap. So they're also in the hunt for like a Bradley Beal type would be the other thing if they wanted to, if they wanted to get more ambitious. I am all in on Paolo and Wagner. Like I think those guys

have a chance to be really, really special as a combo. I'm so impressed by both of them. The thing with Paolo, maybe it just wasn't there in Duke or I didn't notice it or it was the way college is, but I can't believe how fast his first step is. Yeah. Like his first step, he's almost falling over. He's going so fast. And I was watching all these Celtics dudes who you would think on paper, the Celtics have all the guys

you would want to guard somebody like him. He was going by him. So that made me think like, shit, could this team be like a frisky eight seed? Like, why not? The Magic beat the Celtics. Let's get them in. Like, clearly they're contenders at this point.

Beat them twice in three days. Tatum didn't play the second day. Anyway, I do think with Paolo, with Paolo, like, you're right that he is a guy who, for some reason, looks even bigger and even faster at the NBA level than he did in college.

100%. It's so bizarre. We're not going to pretend he's unheralded, like this was the number one pick, but he just looks physically dominant against NBA pros in a way I was not expecting. I was not prepared for his speed on the perimeter. And if he showed this in college and I missed it,

my bad, but this is the NBA and you just shouldn't be going by people like this. And then Wagner just knows what the fuck he's doing. Really good player. It's really fun that his brother has become like a decent asset for them too. You know, I love when brothers play together. Utah is the other one. I guess we can end with them. You could tell me they're a buyer.

You could tell me they're a seller. They have a kajillion picks, but they also have the most tradable guys out of anyone in the league. Olenek at 12.8. Vanderbilt at 4.4. I wouldn't trade him. Connolly, 22.7. Clarkson, 13.3. Beasley's a free agent at 15.6. Even Sexton at 16 point five. Just all guys who could play in a playoff series, especially Vanderbilt. And you think if you're Minnesota and if you're a Minnesota fan, you gave up all that for Gobert,

and then you're watching what Kessler's done the last... Have you seen Kessler the last couple games? Yes. Kessler's legitimately good. It's not like, oh, this guy has something. He's like, no, this guy's an NBA player. Incredible shot blocker already. Yeah.

And if he can just get like 10% better as a finisher, just like a little bit more consistent in terms of just catching and dunking on guys, like getting good position, he's going to be a problem. Like he's going to be a really good starting center

for a long time. And like that's the range we're talking about is floor, very good contributor and role player for a team. Ceiling could be a very dominant defensive player, potentially. So I'm

curious to see where he falls on that spectrum. They need to send him to Zubat's camp to learn how to just roll to the basket and just whirl around on smaller guys and do little three-footers. That's the thing. Do not train with Hakeem Olajuwon. You will never be Hakeem Olajuwon.

Train with Avicii Zubac. Zubac is the guy. Learn the ways. Teach me how to do the three-foot whirlarounds. So Utah 17 and 16 and the West is just completely bizarre. And now we have the Warriors. Who knows how long Curry's going to be out.

And the Lakers, who everybody thought was just going to pass Utah and Sacramento. Now who knows? And they might be a playoff team. Probably too much time has passed for them to be in that bottom five and be in the Wimbanyama sweepstakes.

I think it's a tough one. I don't know what I would do. This is the only team I had that I would be like, I honestly don't know what I would do. This is a wait. Let's wait a month and then see what we got. My gut is you have a good team and you have

players who genuinely like playing together. At least it seems to be. And this might be a little bit of a precious thing to say, but I would be really reluctant to give that up. And you have enough draft equity that you don't have to bottom out. You can package that stuff together.

You could just draft really good players. You can be good enough down the line just with what you have in the door right now without getting your own very high-level pick this season. We call that the small market dream. Don't just give that up for no reason. If there's a great, great deal to be had,

sure, but I'm not kicking in those doors. I'm not really looking for those options if I'm Utah, I don't think. Plus multiple white guys for their fans to root for. Kessler, Olenek. I'm going to back away from the microphone very slowly.

The fact that Kessler is actually good, I didn't think that trade could get any worse for Minnesota. Just in general. It's tough. Holy mackerel. Where you have the Vanderbilt-Kessler combo for Utah is probably better in a lot of ways than what Utah had with Gobert.

I think they're a wait and see. Yeah, some of those big deals. We were talking about the Vucevic one earlier. They hurt, man. You see Franz Wagner pop. If you're a Bulls fan, that has to hurt. You see Walker Kessler playing this way. That has to hurt. I know the Wolves

want to win now. I know they have a lot of motivation and a lot of talent to potentially do that. But it hurts to give up players who are that talented and who can be that helpful immediately. The list of Utah draft capital is just staggering.

You're right. I mean, they could just wait and see. They don't even really need Wemba Nyong, but they have so many picks coming. And then who the hell knows what happens with Minnesota? Yeah. They might have stumbled

into something awesome. We think, to wrap this up, the seize the day, we have to jump on this market and start it before everybody else would be Washington and Chicago. Get out there. Get out there ahead of it.

Make these things happen. Will it into existence? You need to be first on that market. You wouldn't put Toronto in there. I think Toronto can be make these things happen. Will it into existence? Like you need to be first on that market. And you don't, you wouldn't put Toronto in there. I think Toronto can be more patient just because they're got, they have so many viable trade candidates that they can play the market against,

against one another in that way. You know, it doesn't even have to be like, what offers can we get for Fred Van Vliet? It's, we have this offer for Van Vliet. We have this offer for Ananobi. We have this offer for Siakam. Like there's so many routes forward. I think they can be more patient. Also, they won the title four years

ago. They can get as wacky as they want. Then the seize the day buyer. I think it's the Knicks. And you think it's who? You still think it's the Lakers? I think it's the Lakers. For sure. I think the Lakers are the most obvious buyer.

Atlanta would be a buyer if they had more things to trade, but I don't think they have a lot of equity left in that regard. But I think the Lakers are it. And New York, I mean, man, if we can keep the good vibes going, I'm all for it. I'm still skeptical. Even after all of these wins, even after this great surge, I just can't fight that nagging thought in the back of my head. Put that on the whiteboard, Tom Thibodeau. Rob Mahoney, I'm still skeptical.

Just write it on there, a magic marker. I would be flattered to be on a dartboard in someone's office someday. So whoever we need to trash on this podcast to make this podcast, let's do it. You're getting there. You can hear Rob on the Ringer NBA show. You can read him on the ringer.com. Excellent website. Good to see you as always. Thanks, Bill. This episode is brought to you by Movember. The mustache is back with a vengeance. Look at Travis Kelsey. Before he rocked that Super Bowl ring, he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember. You'll do great things too. You won't win the

Super Bowl, but your fundraising will support mental health, suicide prevention, and prostate and testicular cancer research. And if you don't want to grow a mustache, you can still walk or run 60 kilometers, host an event, or set your own goal and mow your own way. Do great things this November. Sign up now. Just search Movember. When you ride transit, please be safe. Yeah, be safe. Because what you do, others will do too. Others will do it too. So don't take shortcuts across tracks. Don't do that. In fact, just don't walk on tracks at all. Not at all. Trains move quietly so you won't hear them coming. You won't hear them coming. See?

Safe riding sets an example. Yeah. An example for me. Because safety is learned. It's learned. Okay. Give it up. Give what up? Really? Really really. Ugh. This message is brought to you by Metrolinks. Alright, Seth Wickersham is here from ESPN.

He is one of the most connected NFL reporters slash feature writers we had. Just wrote a great piece about Andrew Luck. How much you spend on that Andrew Luck piece? How much money or how much time? How much time? I visited him in February of last year for four days straight in May of last year.

It was in then in August and then in September in California. So I interviewed him, I think. Eight times total over the course of that time. Why do you think he wanted to tell his story? He was so reclusive. What made him kind of say screw it yeah i think that they always want to talk at the end of the day they just always do and i think that getting into the hall of fame the college football hall of fame he knew that people would come circling for him

and we had been in contact for years at that point. And I think that, you know, because of those reasons and because I extreme ski, apparently he decided to go with me. Wow. I mean, it is one of the great NFL what ifs of the last 10 years, right? Because that Colts roster was pretty good. And you figure they would have made at least one Super Bowl if he had been able to stay healthy. That's not why we brought you on, though. We brought you on to talk New England Patriots stuff and NFL owner stuff. But we'll start with Belichick and Kraft. And Belichick, who is 70 years old, I did a thing on Sunday with Sal about just old NFL coaches. Pretty rare for any of them to be successful even once they hit their 60s. And him and Pete Carroll, the two oldest. He has

now, this is year three without Tom Brady. And if you throw in the last Tom Brady year, it's been really four years since the Pats have been a relevant contender. There's some smoke now with Belichick and Kraft and how this is going to go.

And we should talk about Kraft first and then tie it into Belichick. Kraft getting up there in age, won six Super Bowls, a hero in Boston. He's kind of the man. That's fading a little bit. The Celtics now coming in.

The Patriots pretty much look like a 500 team the rest of the way. They don't have an identifiable star. From the Kraft standpoint, how do you think he's looking at all of this? Yeah, I think there's definitely smoke. And I don't know what it was about that Monday night game against the Arizona Cardinals, but it really started to flare out around then. You had Peter King kind of writing about the idea that Belichick might end up breaking the all-time wins record for a team that's not the Patriots if things didn't change.

You had Greg Bedard, super connected, great reporter, writing about it. Tom Curran, exactly same type of guy. Albert Breer talking about it. And, you know, even little old me, I started to hear things from people inside the building. And I just think that, like, again, I don't know what it was about that game, but I think that like Kraft, I think he's kind of itching to kind of know what next year is going to look like. I don't know whether he's written off this year or not, but it seems like he wants some clarity on how things are going to be different next year

because things haven't gone very well this year at all, as you know. And I think that Bill's genius throughout his entire career is that he lets situations play out. So I don't think he's in some huge rush to announce to the world that Matt Patricia, you know, is not going to be calling the offense next year. And so I don't know what that means for the future. I do think, and I wrote about it in my book that, you know, the way that, that bill treats craft, um, you know, has not always been well-received. I remember, remember when Nick Casario was there, craft used to have to go to Nick Casario to find out what's going on with the team because Belichick wouldn't tell him. And sometimes Nick didn't even know because bill wouldn't tell him either. Right. And. Right. So I think that like at this point, Kraft's 81 years old.

I think he is getting itchy. And, you know, I don't think that Belichick is in any hurry, way, shape or form to announce how things are going to be different next year. I don't think Bill's job's on the line. But if Robert and Jonathan want changes to the way that the personnel department is run or the way the coaching staff is run and Bill doesn't want to make those, then I think, you know, something could happen. I think that's still a long shot, but I think that like, that's the scenario where I could see a parting of the ways after this

season. And I still think it's like pretty rare that would happen. Yeah, I think it's a little more realistic than rare. But let's go backwards because you've done the best reporting about this. This all starts with Garoppolo. And Kraft basically being all in on Brady and Belichick being in on, I just want to be competitive and good every year and do what's best for the team.

Brady leaves. Brady goes to win a Super Bowl with Tampa Bay. That's not going great. Belichick does the free agent spending spree, which was still one of the most uncharacteristic things, I think, of the past 20 plus years with the Pats. He never did that. That's the only time ever that he was like,

fuck it, and treated it like he was a guy in a fantasy auction or something. Spent all this money on all these guys. And I think the Pats have the most committed to receivers and tight ends this year and somehow don't have a number one target. So you have that. That doesn't work. And I wonder if I'm crap. I'm trying to look at it from the craft's perspective, right? Where they feel like they had such this great partnership and maybe it was a little uneasy at times with Brady and Belichick, whatever. But now they're like,

it's going to be 2023. We made the soup. The last super bowl was, you know, February, 2019, basically. How,

how long do we have to be beholden to this guy who barely even keeps us in the loop on anything? That's about, like, ultimately, Kraft's got to look at this and say, this is my team. I can't just turn the rest of my life over to this guy who doesn't even tell me what he's doing. So I don't know how that part plays out.

Yeah, you're right. I mean, remember that great scene in the two bills where Kraft just kind of stares at the camera and he was like, imagine managing those two. Talking about Parcells and Belichick, I mean, two assholes. Yeah. I'm not saying that Belichick himself is called both him and Parcells an asshole. So I'm not speaking out of turn there. I mean, I don't think there's any doubt that it would get old.

And to think that they've been married now for 22 years. This industry has not built the personalities who are successful and it's just not built for that type of longevity yeah that said think about how much impact belichick has had on craft's legacy his life you know his personal wealth i mean, how could you move on from someone like that? Even if, you know, he's not communicative, even if he finds the, you know, both Robert and Jonathan and I'm projecting here a little bit, but kind of annoying and it feels like it doesn't have to justify anything to anybody. And, um, you know, how do you move on from someone like that? But yeah, I mean, like you said,

there is a lot of smoke coming out of that owner suite at this point, even if I have a hard time truly believing that they would ever move on from Bill or even create a situation where he'd want to move on himself. But I think there's plugged in people who also would disagree with that and push back on it a little bit.

Yeah, and maybe part of this is the Brady thing, which is another thing that has gained a lot of smoke. And it really kicked into full gear when he went to the Kraft birthday party on a Friday night. And look, there's a scenario where Belichick leaves, Brady comes in, Bill O'Brien comes in as the coach, like somebody that's like a Brady guy, right? Bill O'Brien would be perfect. Bill O'Brien, by the way, you know, I think was a pretty good head coach. I think the problem came with him having the front office power, but worst case scenario, I think for Belichick is if Kraft is just like, we can't do this coaching staff again. This can't just be your cronies, cheap, lower level guys, and people you're related to.

Cannot be the coaching staff. This Patriots coaching staff, the only guy who would ever even have a chance to get poached for another coaching job is Gerard Mayo, the linebackers coach. And that's a name that's been floating around too. The thing with Kraft, he talks to a lot of people. He's one of those sounding board guys. He'll go, and it could be anybody. I know a couple of people that he's talked to this year, one during the Zappy Mac Jones thing, where Kraft loves Zappy. Kraft was just going around saying, I wish Zappy was the starter. I think he's good. I wish Bill would

play Zappy over Mac. And he would just tell that to random people. He would tell it to people at dinner. He would tell it to other people in Boston who are either owners or other types of people. He kind of doesn't give a shit anymore. So that's why this stuff comes out. And I think the other piece of this is somebody like Mayo, who I think that name has been floating around. And part of it is like Kraft telling people, hey, what do you think of Gerard Mayo? Just kind of get in their feel for it. So that's why I think there's a lot of smoke right now in a whole bunch of different directions. And maybe this is how the Belichick era was destined to end, right? Yeah. I mean, it always seems like that these things end poorly, right? And remember, Kraft is still not in the Hall of of fame yet so any decision he makes is going to impact his legacy with that constituency which he cares about deeply

but let's go back to brady i mean so the athletic a couple weeks ago kind of had a speculation that you know what if brady were to return to new england and that picked up a lot of steam um barnwell wrote i think monday you know about the future quarterback situations for a lot of steam. Barnwell wrote, I think, Monday, you know, about the future quarterback situations for a bunch of teams, and he mentioned either Garoppolo or Brady coming back to New England as a scenario. Yeah. And who was it? It was Brown, who

liked it on Instagram, I think. You know, one of the own Patriots. I mean, it's like, is that how bad things have gotten with Mac Jones? But my point of view, I cannot see Tom Brady coming back there. I think that like, yeah. Really? So you think no chance?

I think that like, if things don't work out with Mac, I think that Kraft will try to see if it's something that Tom will consider. I mean, I do think from Tom's point of view, I think if you asked him right now and he answered honestly, if he was going to play next year, he'd probably say yes. But I truly don't know if he knows. At least that's what I've been told, is that he hasn't truly decided yet. And maybe it's kind of the opposite of last year, where last year, around now, there was a lot of smoke that he was going to walk away. And then he announced it. It was kind of a surprise to everybody. I think right now, he's not feeling like he has to walk away. But maybe in February, he'll kind of a surprise to everybody. I think right now he's not feeling like he has to walk away,

but maybe in February he'll kind of look at his family situation, got a new dynamic now where the kids are now children of divorced parents. And maybe playing in San Francisco isn't as appealing as it was a couple years ago for him. But in terms of New England, I mean, in addition to the fact that he's, even though he and Bill are on good terms, I think that they're a little bit like, I don't think they're a divorce couple that's itching to remarry. I think that they're staying civil for the sake of everybody. But even if like they were to make it something that Brady would be interested in, who are his coaches? Is he

running the offense? Like he's not going to bringing in the Bill O'Brien thing, right? I think he would have to bring somebody with him. He'd have to, but I mean, is Belichick itching to have Bill O'Brien on his staff? I mean, I think he probably could have done that this year if he wanted, and he's not. I think that Bill O'Brien of 2022 is different than the offensive coordinator of 2009,

for instance. So I just think that it's one of those things that sound interesting now and i think that by february my gut tells me that brady's gonna walk away i don't have any inside info on that but like i just can't see it happening but like you know if there was a situation where somehow craft had to move on from bill this offseason and bill ends up somewhere else i don't know where he would go, but maybe Washington, because he has so much familiarity with that area.

If they end up with a new owner, but would he bring in Bill O'Brien as a way to tempt Brady to come back for one more try? Why not, man? I don't know. That seems like a lot of ifs, but why not? Yeah, part of the know. That seems like a lot of ifs, but why not?

Yeah, part of the problem with the Belichick scenario is I don't think he would retire this year. No. I said on Sunday night, I kind of wish he would because I think this Patriots season has been embarrassing. And I think if he, 15 years ago, if you put him in a time machine and showed him everything that happened this season, he'd be like, oh my God, I will definitely retire before any of this happens. And you could say, well, it's not his fault, right?

He's got a coaching staff, the players. It is his fault. But it is his fault because he hired the coaching staff. Like this team offensively is poorly prepared week after week after week. They make really dumb mistakes. They make dumb mistakes all over the place. I didn't even talk on Sunday night about how bad the block punt was where the ball got snapped and the guys didn't even know the ball was getting snapped. This is stuff that never used to happen with Belichick. And I think

the two indefensible things that I just don't understand. The free agent spending spree, which was just out of character for him. And then this year with the coaching staff, the fact that the Patricia Judge thing, which everybody, and the Pats have some of the best beat reporters, I think, of any team. And all of them were going to the scrimmages and the practices every day and going, wow, this team looks like an absolute dumpster fire. This is really bad. I've never seen a more disheveled Pats offense. And it's been that way the whole year. They have no idea what they're doing offensively.

And for him not to fix that, I think, is crazy. So my guess is the crafts. I think Jonathan is a piece of this, too, because he's getting this team at some point, right? They're going to probably tell him, like like, you got to fix the coaching staff. And what happens if Belichick says, fuck you, I'll have whatever coaching staff I want, or you can tell me to leave. And then what happens if craft is like, well, maybe it's time for you to go. Like, I do feel like that's in play in a real way. Absolutely. And I think that, look, going back to the summer, I was backing Belichick on this offensive coaching staff thing.

I thought that it's clear he wanted... And I wrote about it in the book. If McDaniels had left to take the Colts job after the Eagles Super Bowl loss, I think that Bill would have had way more say in the offense. And I think that Joe Judge would have been sort of like the co-offensive coordinator. I think that Bill wanted to have more say in the offense for a while. Josh was so good that he had earned autonomy in coordinating it. And it seems like, you know, that Belichick wanted to run this year like a version of

like the Kyle Shanahan light offense, where there's a lot of outside zone reads and whatnot. And it just hasn't worked. Yeah, quick screen. I mean, it's like they lead the league in like the most predictable screen passes you can possibly throw. I mean, I don't know how they haven't gotten what Belichick was always just so good at, great at, was the ability to come up with new game plans that were opponent-specific.

And they just don't seem to do that anymore. They're very predictable, and everyone seems to know it. And when Bill was talking about what he wanted to do with the offense over the summer, a lot of the quotes were the exact same quotes that he gave back in the early 90s when he was with the Browns, and they had 15 coaches on the staff

and no offensive coordinator. We all pitch in. We all know how to do offense. We know how to coach this. And it sounded... I went for it. It sounded good to me, but I should have realized at the time

that nobody was ever talking about the early 90s Browns offense as lighting the league on fire. Right. Well, the other thing is they've made it impossible to know whether Mack is a starting quarterback or not. My guess is he's a backup.

But he's been so bad this year and just over and over again has killed him. And also, like, has acted really immaturely during games. I thought during the first half of the Raiders game, like, he was acting like a seven-year-old. You know? On one hand, yes.

On the other hand, you're the pilot of the airplane. Nobody wants to be on an airplane where the pilot's freaking out and dumping the trays of dinner and stuff like that. You kind of want to feel like you're in calm hands.

And Mac has not been calm. He's also been bad. He's turned the ball over a lot. He's overthrown guys all over the place. His red zone stuff, they're the worst red zone team in the league by far. And it's like my dad is like all in on where the fuck is Zappy.

Like Zappy can't be worse than this. And I just think it's impossible to evaluate. So I'm with you. I have no idea. This is the weirdest Patriot season since the, even in the late 90s, we knew we had Bledsoe. So you'd almost have to go back to the early 90s where it's like, I don't know who's going to coach the team.

I don't know who the quarterback of the team is. I don't know. Our owner's 81. There's real Patriots and fuck stuff. Now, people listening to this are going to be like, this is great. You guys deserve it. You had 20 years. It was great. And now welcome to being another team like everybody

else in the league. And that's the reality of this. They're just another team. Yeah, and they are. There are a lot of teams that might sneak into the playoffs now. They definitely don't have that magic that they had for so long. No, not at all.

And I think that Mike Shanahan struggled with this in Denver where a rebuilding year had to be like 7-9 or 8-8. And remember the year where the COVID year and Belichick was talking about how we sold out and that was the kind of year where they, I think they went 7-9 that year

with Cam and some other quarterbacks and they kind of year where they, you know, I think they went 7-9 that year with Cam and some other quarterbacks and they kind of had to, that was their year off. That was their get-out-of-jail-free card after all that success. And like, you know, you have to hit on everything if that's the way you're rolling.

And I think that like, look at the Niners. I mean, they had like a pretty good team. They had a bad year. They end up drafting Bosa. And then that just like changes the dynamic of their entire team because in a weird way, they just had such a bad year that they got lucky. And, you know, the Patriots, Robert Kraft doesn't allow two and 14 years or two and 15 now, whatever it might be.

And Belichick, you know, is questionable as he's had some of these decisions this year. I don't think he's capable of coaching a team to only two wins and so they never get to like reset like the other teams do and then like you said, what do you do with Mac? I mean, he's had two years now. Does he have a signature win? But

in the same sense, how do you evaluate him when Matt Patricia is calling the plays? How do you evaluate him? He looks completely uncomfortable. He hasn't looked in rhythm almost all year. And it's like, I think that he has a lot of potential. I don't know if he's like a playmaking quarterback like Trevor Lawrence or Justin Fields are, but I think he has a lot of potential still.

And the one thing that they needed was Mac Jones to continue progressing. And now this year has gone by. Maybe they'll make a run the rest of the year, but the year has gone by and you're still wondering, like, what have you learned more about Mac Jones than you didn't that you didn't know a year ago? Well, we were saying there's been smoke for a while dating back to the Zappy Jones stuff with all of this. And then Sunday, Sunday is the dumbest Patriots loss, not only in the history of the Belichick era, the history of the Patriots. So you have that. And the Patriots, even

if they sneak into the playoffs, which it's like a 22% chance, and I don't think they're good enough. I don't think they're going to make it. Although it did help that Mike White got scratched for this Thursday Jags game. So who knows? That's where we are with Patriots. That's where we are with Patriots. Like, oh great, Mike White got scratched.

I feel better about our playoff chances. I just don't think Kraft's going for this at age 81. And that's the most telling thing with this is the 81-year-old owner and the 70-year-old coach. And football history is against both of those things. Like just adamantly against. Now Belichick's the best coach ever. I don't know how much he cares about breaking the wins record because he's never really

talked about it, but you and I both know that he cares about his place in history and how history in the league fits together more than anybody who's coached, which makes me wonder if he's going to go for that record, whether it's here or somebody else. I think he should retire. I think it's time. I think he's the best coach ever. Even these last three years, what's the point? And it's only going to get probably worse from here, but it just feels like we're headed toward a cliff in some way.

And maybe we were due. And the hardest thing about watching the Patriots this year and about watching the Bucs is that, you know, Brady and Belichick defined themselves and were better than anybody ever at coming through at these critical situations that not only was the rest of the league not thinking about, but they had thought out to the nth degree. Right.

I mean, and now it's just so sloppy. And they don't have that mystique. And it like you know everybody says like who was more responsible for the dynasty and like let's be honest you can't have a dynasty in the nfl without a hall of fame quarterback you just can't do it but i mean they were everyone says like oh is the patriot way dead i mean it's obvious that there was no patriot way there was two really special people whose lives intersected at the most critical moments of their life where they wanted to be great at a game that they knew the fragility of. And, you know, they made beautiful music together, even if their personalities were different and they changed the way we think about coaching and quarterbacks and success in professional football and

Boston sports in general. And that is just gone now. I mean, watching Brady last week, I mean, as hard as it was to watch the Patriots watch, bring watching Brady, you know,

turn the ball over four times and just look slow. And, you know, he just, you know, I'm not sure, you know, how he would grade himself in terms of performance this year. Obviously, their play calling has been a mess too. But, you know, just the magic that they each had, that they had an abundance together, but they even still

grasp onto a part, especially Brady, it's just gone. I mean, think about how much, like if Brady had just stayed retired in a weird way, he would have retired the perfect way where like he rallied them down from 27 to three and the defensive side of the ball blew the game. You know, what better way to go out in a lot of ways? The sad thing for him this year is it just doesn't seem like he wants to get hit anymore.

Over and over again, he's bailing on these plays, you know, a second before he's going to get hit. And that, that's the thing. He never used to do that. He would, he would be smart about when he was going to get hit, but if it was like a third and eight or, you know, some big play in the red zone, he always took the hit and now he doesn't anymore. All right. We're gonna take a quick break. And then I want to talk about, uh, Daniel Snyder and, and all that stuff. So, Conspiracy Bill watched Giants-Washington on Sunday night and couldn't help but notice that Washington got hosed on three or four of the biggest calls of the game.

And I got a text from a friend of mine who's pretty connected in the NFL, and he did the whole, see? League sending a message to Snyder tonight that he better sell the team or there's going to be more officials. Who knows if that's true, but that's how bad the Snyder thing has gotten.

There's all kinds of stuff floating around about this, about Snyder's actually not going to sell. Maybe he just sells to 40% to a minority owner who's actually a minority and then looks at the league and says, hey, I just brought in a minority ownership. You're going to now have to go. Who knows what's happening? But what have you heard? You've covered this story impeccably over the last two years. What's the latest? Yeah, thanks. And, and it's interesting because the things that

when the owners all gather, you know, at owners meetings a couple of times a year, the things that they get most passionate about are money, like the Rams versus or the St. Louis versus Kroenke lawsuit was going to cost them all money

and officiating. So like it's actually not inconceivable that theyivable that Snyder especially, but that any owner would think that those horrible non-calls the other night were not retribution for something. There is no way. I mean, their mind just goes there.

Some of the smartest people that I've ever met are NFL owners, and I'm just baffled with how conspiratorial they get when they talk about officiating. It's really odd. And maybe it's one of these stories I should probably do one of these days now that I'm talking baffled with how conspiratorial they get when they talk about officiating. It's really odd. And maybe it's one of these stories I should probably do one of these days now that I'm talking about it out loud. But Snyder, I think that the league is cautiously optimistic that he's going to sell.

I think that they know that it's not going to take much for him to turn around and not sell out of spite, both to the other owners and the league. And it's obvious that from the league standpoint, I think there's 24 owners to vote him out right now. I really do. I think, but the league, for whatever reason, is really holding by patience, waiting for this Mary Jo White report

that they commissioned, which is kind of a do-over for the Beth Wilkinson report. And, you know, that report better have some, you know, the interesting thing is, well, that report, even if it doesn't have anything new, just convince owners to vote him out. Or, you know, even if it has indisputable evidence that they should vote him out. I mean, a lot is riding on that. And, you know, I don't know when it's going to come. The sort of unofficial word is that it's January or February,

which would set up voting him out in March if he chooses to not sell by then. But I think that's the landscape right now. And it's one of those things that's like, nobody talks about it in owners meetings, really. I mean, Roger does not want to touch this thing. And Don Van Atta and Tishon Thompson, I reported on in our story about how like owners are so frustrated that even in the privilege sessions, nobody brings up Dan Snyder to have any sort

of real discussion about it. It's never happened before, as far as I can remember, in any professional sport where the owners voted out another owner. Even you think like Donald Sterling, they could never get rid of him. Uh, George Shin, who got involved in all that,

uh, that Charlotte stuff, they ended up, he moved the team to new Orleans, I think, but they, they eventually like, I think he had to sell just cause his public standing was so bad.

And that, that's the thing with Snyder that I don't know how many times you've talked to him, but I know you've been covering this story for a while. I don't understand what's in it for him at this point. If you're him, what's fun about owning the team other than that it's an asset, but you already have a shitload of money and you've already made money off this asset. What is fun about being like basically a pariah in the DMV? You're not a great owner anyway. The other owners don't like you. Is it just pure stubbornness and spite at this point? Yeah. Look, nobody knows his finances, but I do think that he's gotten debt limit waivers to buy out his limited partners and take out

loans. So how cash rich he is, I think is a question that owners ask themselves. But yeah, it's stubbornness. I think he thinks that he's a Joe Burrow away from that team being a contender indefinitely. And all of a sudden, you know, people may not love him, but the cries to get rid of him aren't as bad. I mean, as bad as the atmosphere was at FedEx Field earlier this season, it felt pretty alive the other night when they played the Giants. And so I think that it is stubbornness.

I think that he wants to pass on the kids, you know, the team to his kids one day, whether they want it or not. And you're right though. I think all owners would really prefer that he sells and, you know, we'll see what happens. I think that he's opened the door to it, which I think is a bigger thing than people realize, but he'll close it as fast as he possibly can. Or this is a strategy by him to basically buy himself some time and, I don't know, Jedi mind trick the owners into thinking he's selling, but he has no intention of selling. He's just playing the game. Yeah. Everything with him is about buying time right now. I don't think there's any question about that. Everything he's doing is about trying to buy time in the hope that, you know, minds change. But like I said, we reported in our story,

he's lost Jerry. Now I know that Jerry says that we're their friends or whatever. He doesn't want to be the first one or even the second now that Jim Irsay of all people still, it is still remarkable at the owner's meetings that we're hunting out Jim Irsay to see what he'll say about Dan Snyder as he lights up a cigarette. But, but, uh, you know, yeah. What do you like? I think that Jerry, when things get close is probably going to be the one that tries to like nudge Dan out into selling and convincing them that he had a good run, but it's best for everybody. If he, if he moves on, we'll see. Why does Jerry have so much power as an owner? I'm always amazed because you have these 32 owners and they're all wealthy in their own right.

They're all used to getting their own way. And that's why it's so interesting to watch how the commissioner and the NFL or the NBA just has to deal with all of these dudes. In every other aspect of their life, everyone just listens to them. They get to do whatever they want. And then in this aspect, they don't. So how does somebody ascend to power in that infrastructure where it's just, it's an old boys club,

bunch of rich, stubborn guys used to get in their way. And yet it always feels like in the NFL and the NBA, there's four or five guys that can transcend it. So what does he do other than that he owns the best team to own? Yeah.

First, I think that there's not as many who care and are also competent. A lot of these guys, like when Paul Allen owned the Seahawks, he was never coming to meetings. He wasn't going to go there and talk about how after 100 years of professional football, they still can't figure out what a catch is. He had much better things to do with his time. So Jerry, he cares. He's competent.

He's vocal. But, you know... Well, wait. Is it also that this is his only thing? For some of these guys, they're doing multiple things, right? This is his thing, his job to turn that asset into a bigger asset. It is. But usually, he's on the right side of what ends up getting voted through. And groupthink prevails way more in those meetings than people

realize. There's very few votes that are one or two votes being the difference. Almost everything is clear. And in fact, the only thing that hasn't been clear lately was in October in New York at the owners meetings in the privilege session, which is owners only, they held a discussion about whether to begin negotiations for Roger Goodell getting a new contract. And Jerry was the one who stood up against it. And when Robert Kraft tried to jump in, Don Van Ad and I reported, he looked at Robert and he said, don't fuck with me on this. And Robert was like, excuse me. And, you know, Jerry realized that he probably used a word to Robert that he shouldn't have.

But that referendum to begin negotiations on a new contract for Roger was a 31 to 1 vote. And Jerry was the only one who voted against it. So, like, he has a lot of influence because he's persuasive. Kraft has a lot of influence because he can be persuasive too.

And also those guys, they have stature. And, you know, frankly, like a lot of owners just, they're more checked out than we kind of want to give them, than we want to believe. Well, like one of the most interesting NFL owner stories the last five years were the

Cronkies, where they moved the team out of St. Louis and basically said, come get us. And St. Louis was like, okay. And ended up being, how much was that? Like 600 million, 700 million they had to pay? 700, but it got divided up so that they're actually not gonna be paying very much at all, but yeah. I mean, not very much relative to 700, but yeah.

Right, so you have that, but then they also built this new arena in LA that's supposed to be somewhere between two and a half and three billion bucks. It ends up being six. Ended up being six. It was more than twice as much as they anticipated and now there's this whole thing i i don't know if this has been out there but like the world cup um la got the choice between do you want to have the opening game

and all the ceremonies which would be team usa or do you want to have the final and part of the problem with the stadium they built, which is crazy because he owns Arsenal, is it's not quite big enough for soccer for all the stuff they need. So they have to blow out this super exclusive club that they had that's on the ground floor to make room for what they would need for the soccer. It's like, so this is going to cost more money on top of the 6 billion bucks. But they just seem like they're doing everything by the seat of their pants. It got them a Super Bowl. I don't really feel like it got them that much of a groundswell of ramspan momentum in LA.

I guess the smartest thing they did was they figured out how to have the Chargers as tenants in their own building. And I still don't know what the Chargers get out of that. But the Crocky stuff, it's kind of been a little under the radar, like how bizarre their whole thing has been, right? Yeah, Stan is a guy who, like, you know, I think that he's kind of a hidden influential owner.

I wouldn't say he's like a power player necessarily, but I think that, like, he holds a lot of influence and some sway. And he's arrived to it by bullying them. Like you said, I mean, Van Damme and I reported about it in the time.

I mean, he basically threatened to, he was going to LA. Nothing was going to stop him. He really, you know, did not care about whether the owners approved him going. He was going to go. And for that, you know, he obviously built this stadium at enormous personal cost got sued by the city of st louis which caused a you know a bunch of owners to have to go through discovery and all this stuff cost stan even more money in legal bills and settlement cost owners money and you know i'm not sure that like stan cares about the the NFL any more than he did five years ago.

But, yeah, I mean, he is somebody who, he seems to be on the right side of things. And I think that, like, you know, he figured out a way to get LA a Super Bowl, even though he has not figured out a way. That team, despite all of, you know, the success that they've had and the fact that they struck lightning with Sean McVay, it's embarrassing that they have to use a silent count at home not only in their biggest games, but in some mundane divisional games like against the Niners. It's unbelievable that they have to do that. Yeah, it's pretty crazy. So we had that situation. The Miami situation was pretty bizarre. That got crazy. Well, so we had that situation. The Miami situation was pretty bizarre. That got crazy.

And it's still like in kind of motion, right? How's that going to play out? I mean, I think that Stephen Ross will return when he's allowed to return and he can be pissed at Roger all he wants. But, you know, like in the way that the flakeate was kind of a makeup call for Spygate, it feels a lot like that the Ross suspension for tampering had much more to do with the things that Brian Flores said and the possible tanking, the tanking for Tua,

than it did the actual tampering with Tom Brady. I mean, that's the way it felt to me. And it definitely, I think that in the ownership circles, when they talk about it, they talk about that like it's an assumption. Like, Ross got punished for being so flagrant with the way that he treated Flo. And, you know, the entire, you know,

dangling the $100,000 for losing games than it was anything that he did with Tom Brady because as the years go on, I think that we'll discover that a lot more teams tampered pretty flagrantly with Tom Brady. You know, the Tom Brady tampering thing, I think everybody who

roots for the Pats and everybody in New England kind of see it, but we don't want to talk about it. It's like finding I don't want to talk about it. It's like finding out your dad had an affair or something. He was definitely out there throwing it around

that last season, batting his eyelashes at everybody. And the Miami thing was a real thing. That was our division rival. We were going against them and he was setting up

a whole, you know, giant whatever. And I think that falling through was another pretty good what if from the last few years. Tell me quickly before we go about, uh,

Denver, they pay all that money for that team and they stumble into the Wilson trade slash contract, which is the single worst NFL transaction in the last 10 years. And that's how you start your ownership reign. Like, like what's the word? The street Denver.

I don't think there's any question that Nathaniel Hackett will be replaced. I mean, I just, I think that the end game adjustments, you know, the fact that like, they just, they haven't looked prepared going into a lot of games.

And then like this season, frankly has been a huge referendum on how good of a coach Pete Carroll is because he ate all that shit for all those years under the let Russ cook, knowing that Russ could only cook a little bit, but just let it happen. Let that entire narrative happen. And frankly, like no matter what happens to the Seahawks,

the rest of the year, John Schneider should be executive of the year because of that trade. He pulled off. There was no other suitors for Russell Wilson and even Denver, which I still think hired Hackett, hoping that they could get Aaron Rogers. And still even as like, even as the Russell Wilson trade was going down,

still wondering if Aaron Rodgers would just pull the plug on green Bay and go to Denver. He still managed John Schneider still managed to pull out that trade. I mean, I know that Howie Roseman has done a great job, but I mean, how can you not, if you're grading on a curve to say that John Schneider is the executive of the year because of how, what he did to Denver. I mean, what he did to them.

He has screwed up that franchise for years unless Russell Wilson decides he wants out. That is another great what if from the last 10 years is just what if Rodgers just gets traded to Denver? Because I'm not sure he's going to be playing that much differently in Denver than we just saw this year in Green Bay. I don't know why we're always surprised when this happens with quarterbacks. It goes. It goes somewhere between mid-30s to late-30s, or in Brady's case, it took until he was like 44.

But it's going to go. We watched it with Peyton Manning. We watched it with Dan Marino. Watched it with Joe Montana. Elway was smart enough to get out right before it happened to him, but it's going to happen. It's the hardest position we have. So I don't know from a Denver's case, I don't even know if the Rogers thing would have been that much better. You must be working on some secret big story next that you can't tell us

about. Totally can't tell you about. Something in the hopper? We'll see. We'll see. All right. I look forward to reading it. Seth, good to see you. Thank you. Thanks, man. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Seth Wickersham.

Thanks to Rob Mahoney. Thanks to Kyle Crane for producing, as always. We'll see you one more time on Thursday.