The Bill Simmons Podcast - Denver’s a Mess! Plus, Live at the Masters With the Simmons Crew

Episode Date: April 9, 2025

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is in Augusta, Georgia, and he is joined by Joe House to discuss the Nuggets’ shocking decision to fire longtime head coach Michael Malone and general manager Calvin Booth with a week left in the regular season (2:16). Next, Cousin Sal joins Bill and House to peruse some NBA playoff and NFL draft odds (23:51). Then, Bill, House, Sal, Nathan Hubbard, Dave Chang, and James "Baby Doll" Dixon do a quick 2025 Masters draft (57:14) before discussing walking Augusta National Golf Course and more stories from the week so far (01:09:16). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Joe House, Cousin Sal, Dave Chang, Nathan Hubbard, and James "Baby Doll" Dixon Producers: Kyle Crichton, Chia Hao Tat, and Eduardo Ocampo Presented by the all-new 2025 Nissan Armada. Learn more at https://www.nissanusa.com/vehicles/crossovers-suvs/armada/html The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to the Bill Simmons podcast presented by Fandle. Fandle Sportsbook is the best place to bet on the NBA. We have these fun little Tuesday, Friday player performance stuff. We have same game parlays. We have picks for me sometimes and boosts and all kinds of fun things. Get ready in the playoffs. Download the Fandle Sportsbook app today to get in on the action. And by the way, the Ringer is committed to responsible gaming.

Please visit theringer.com slash RG to learn more. Listen to them to this episode for additional details. It must be 21 plus presidents like States game problem called when I had your gambler or visit RG dash help.com. Coming up all hell breaks loose in Denver. I'm at the masters. This podcast is nuts. It's next.

This episode is brought to you by Verbo private vacation rent Rentals. With Verbo you always get the whole house so you and your fellow fans can cheer on your team in peace. What's worse than watching a game with somebody who's not rooting for the same team you're rooting for? Nothing. But that's why if you book a vacation house with Verbo, you know all the people in your house.

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passed away. So we want to pay homage to him. I am at the masters right now. I have a bunch of people we did not expect when we were walking off the course and got our phones back today that Denver had cleaned house. So I'm going to talk about that at the top with Joe house. We're going to talk NBA. We're talking Western finals odds and a whole bunch of stuff with Sal and house. with Joe House, we're gonna talk NBA, we're gonna talk Western Finals odds,

and a whole bunch of stuff with Sal Endhouse. And then we did a bunch of master stuff. We created a little draft that you can bet on on Fandel's sports book, and a whole bunch of other fun props, bets, and then last but not least, James Babydoll-Dixon, he comes in, we've talked about him on the podcast a bunch, and we talked to him and Chang and Sal about Augusta

and smoking and some of the stuff that makes Augusta what it is. So that is all coming up. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right. We're recording this on Tuesday, early evening in Augusta, Georgia, East coast time. We're here for the masters. We brought a whole crew, including Nathan Hubbard, your fairway rolling partner, cousin Sal.

He's going to be joining us later. David Chang and baby doll James Dixon, who's still talking. You can't hear him, but we're into a bunch of segments for this pod. We did not expect what happened when we left the masters because when you leave the masters, you have to give your phone. You're not allowed to have your phone on the course. We didn't have our phone for six hours, so literally anything can happen. And we're thinking we leave the course and we're going to find out the

market has dropped like 150 points or just or just another day that ends in Y. Yes, some sort of some sort of bad tariff news. And instead all these texts about, oh my God, nuggets, can you believe Denver? And they fired their coach and their GM. And we're going to be one of many podcasts who talks about this tonight, but a true stunner. I don't remember. I have a bunch of thoughts on this, but to fire your coach at GM with a week to go in the season, when you have a chance to be like a top four playoff

seed, this is like the NBA we grew up with. The NBA is like, like going nuts again. Well, I mean, it is, and it isn't like there, there is no precedent for teams firing their like we have it now in 10 days, two playoff teams with legit aspirations for getting to the Western conference finals, firing their head coach and Denver Memphis, Memphis being the other one. Yeah. Denver went a whole step further.

They're like, we don't like the internal turmoil of this identity crisis fight that we've been having for what feels like to me, 18 months now, at least between Calvin Booth and his instinct to try and build a team with young guys. And Mike Malone, who has in front of him, most of the pieces of guys that won an NBA championship a couple of years ago. Right. Uh, and this tension has been affecting this team for two years now. Well, but think back to the eighties though.

I remember didn't Larry Brown, like he was coaching the nets and he just left for Kansas city with, or for a Kansas university with like two weeks ago in the season, they fired him, but it was the kind of thing that would happen all the time with the league we loved in the league, even though it still has your Sacramento's and these. But now I feel like here's my theory. I'm going to throw this theory. I'm listening. The league is so deep now and there's so much talent.

It ties into something we talked about when we did the over under pods with Roussillon, it's like, shit, there's going to be some unhappy teams, teams that thought they were going to be really good teams that some unhappy teams, teams that thought they were going to be really good teams that have max guys, teams that have this model that used to work of, we have three stars, we have two really good stars. And they're going to be like two games under 500 in February, wondering what that will happen. And I'm looking at the West because the West is a way deeper conference than the East.

The East is more like a traditional, you have the really good teams, you have some good playoff teams, some mediocre teams, and then crappy teams, right? That's the motto we're used to. The West, like everybody's talented and everybody thought they were gonna be in the mix. So look at all the teams that were unhappy just this season.

Dallas traded their best player, one of the five best guys in the league. They just said, fuck it. We don't like where this is going. They trade them. The Lakers were unhappy too. There was, they were trying to do all kinds of stuff mid season. They make a trade.

Memphis fires their coach. Denver just fired their coach at GM. Sacramento fired their coach, traded their best player. Phoenix tried to trade everybody on their team with Devin Booker for four months. Um, they fired their coach last year. They're probably firing them again. That's six teams in the West house. Well, you left out Golden state and Golden state who knew that they needed

another piece and went and paid, you know, high price, but at least that's not like, okay, all right, that's not a hail Mary. This Denver thing is a hail Mary. This is it's a, what the hell is going on to me. We're going to the playoffs and we're going to get smoked and everybody wants to play us and we're in a situation where in Saturday, Sunday teams might be tanking to try to get a matchup against us. That's the level Denver was at with the way they were playing lately.

That's true. So what does firing the coach and GM have to do with the performance on the floor? It's a good question. I'm going to try to answer it. Good. I think they thought their season was shot. I think they decided. I think they're right. This coach GM situation, they were going to get rid of both of them.

Josh Cronke basically said that in the press conference. We're going to do something after the season. Why not now? Why not? See if we can save it. This is a Hail Mary. Well, again, let's do it precedent wise. Point to a team. That's done this with a week to go?

Yeah, in the last 30 years. Point to a team that's had Jokic as their best player during like this half decade he's having. That's one of the great half decades anyone's had Jokic as, as their best player during like this half decade he's having, that's one of the great half decades anyone's had offensively in the history of the league. So I don't, they have one title to show for it. I don't begrudge the instinct of wanting to do something to change the trajectory. But the problem is it's the players.

They're not good enough. They don't have a team that's good enough to compete to your observation earlier with the depth. Well, they have their top five's the players. They're not good enough. They don't have a team that's good enough to compete to your Observation earlier their top five is good enough it They don't play defense. They haven't played defense in two months That's why they have a losing record over their last 25 30 games It's why they have a their five and nine over their last 14 games their last three games I think five and nine over the last 14 games. Their last three games. The last 14. Yeah.

Yeah. I saw their 12 and 13 last 25. Yeah. They don't play defense 19th net rating 22nd defensive rating in their last 25 games. And we like looking at the net rating stuff. It's a nice little snapshot. You know, sometimes you can overreact to it one way or the other.

Sometimes you have teams that are in the vicinity of where their playoff spot's gonna be. Maybe they cool the Jets a little bit. Other times, it's a real sign either something's going really wrong or really right. Like with the Clippers, with Kawhi back, all their net rating stuff is really good here for two solid months now.

And it's like, let's take this team seriously. Detroit, who I think is gonna be a sixth seed, I'm not taking them 100% seriously, but the math is the math and the math says they're a pretty good team. Denver, the math said this team can't guard anybody. The on-off stats with Jokic, which I mentioned Sunday with Rosillo, and are the case if you're going to talk MVP for him, which I think, I think today probably hurt that cause a little bit. Um, but the on off for him where they were the best offense in NBA history when he, when he's on the court and their 30th in the NBA, when he's off the court.

That's all you need to know. And there's never been a disparity like that in the history of basketball. That tells you. It's all that you need to know about the team building effort. And look, I think this is, well, when you say team building, though, do you blame Mike Malone at offer? Cause you and I both watch a lot of Denver. I don't blame him one bit.

No. I mean, when you have the best player on earth and you have most of the nucleus of a title winning team, then the appropriate thing to do is try and in the first place, defend that title. And then in the second place, try and win as many as you can while you have the best player in the world playing at the level that he's playing at. That seems like the right kind of decision. And I think that head coach, you know, built a game plan for the season, these last two seasons around the, uh, that, that thesis around the idea of we should try really hard when we have this guy to be as good as we can in this moment, they just, I do think that this new collective bargaining

agreement is a real culprit is a real, the apron stuff. Yeah. Cause they were, so they were like 5 million under the second apron, but next year they were going to get killed by the apron. And I think they seem really scared of it. And you know, there's some real money stuff with this team that has to be mentioned. I think around the league, if you talk to people who know shit or who have a

vested interest in it, they're like, thank God Denver's not spending more money. They have this incredible asset and they seem pretty good being middle of the road. It's the same thing people felt about the New England Patriots during the last 10 years of Tom Brady. Thank God they're not spending more than they are. Then you look at the Philadelphia Eagles in your division, and they're super aggressive, and they're trying to maximize the moment.

I think that's what most fans want. I would not say Denver's doing that. I wouldn't call Denver middle of the road. I wouldn't characterize. I'd say middle of the road they have the best player in the league and they're not even a second apron team. Well they're going to be middle of the road this season they were not middle they went for it last season and I think they paid the price I think they flamed out the way they did because they they saw the one seed as a viable possibility they played balls to the wall at the end of the regular season and out the way they did because they saw the one seed as a viable possibility.

They played balls to the wall at the end of the regular season and it took a toll on them because Minnesota ran them out the gym. I have a couple other theories in this. The play-in I think puts a crazy amount of pressure on these teams. Not only do you not want to be in the play-in, you're in a situation where you could just lose two play-in games and then you're not even in the playoffs, which was a real thing for Denver, right? So this is why it's not a panic move,

but it's a total panic move where you're like, five days left, everybody wants to play us, our defense is in shambles. We lost a catastrophic game in overtime to Minnesota that really feels like that tilted their season in all these different ways. Like, does Malone still have a job if they win that game, maybe. Well, they didn't play to their guys that game, right? I mean, I know, but it was just how they lost and how bad Westbrook was.

It was and how great Yocage was. It was agonizing. So you have that piece. You know, a lot of times when we're hinting at stuff and pods and we're talking about stuff and we're talking about scuttlebutt around the league and people go, where's that coming from? And, and shit gets aggregated, but it always seemed hazy. This booth Malone thing. I mean, I talked about it. I, everybody who's had a podcast has alluded to or talked about it.

I almost, and I really regret I didn't do it. I had it, you know know you have the tweet lined up and you have the draft. There was something, Malone got something for, like he won the most games in Nuggets history. There was some sort of ceremony and it was like a short video and it was Calvin Booth giving him something. And I had this really sarcastic tweet and it was like

rare footage of Calvin Booth and Mike Malone interacting. And I was ready to tweet it out. And I was like, you know what? That's not worth it. That's going to become a thing. People will be mad. Like, and I was just like, I didn't do it, but that's how bad it was. I had this tweet lined up like, because just that they interacted, seemed like it was an amazing event.

I don't like that whole kind of storyline and that dynamic because at the end of the day. Which part? The media part of it or the coach GM part? The coach GM part. The media part of it is perfectly fine of course. You know we're getting the now they tell us piece. TM Brian Curtis.

You know that's coming. It was an open secret. You know. Ramona kind of wrote it in the beginning of season. I think Zach, if Zach had been writing for ESPN, I think Zach would have had something pretty major at some point. You know, Matt Moore at the Action Network,

who does a pod on Denver, has been talking about, it's not a secret of that. No, all the Denver fans. Internal tension, they've been observing it, but really, the reason I say- It's more than tension. They didn't fucking talk. I don't like it because that's on Cronkite.

That's on Josh Cronkite. They're like, you somebody needs to be the boss. He owned it today. The boss is the boss, right? You see guys not getting along. You need to sit in a room and reconcile whatever the differences are. Because again, you have the best F-ing player on the planet, on your team, playing at his absolute best. So the thing to do is try and capitalize on that.

That would be my instinct. So how can everybody get along? So you don't think his Zeek-Nagy extension? Reggie Jackson? Peyton Watson, who could be something eventually, maybe someday. There's some really bad team building. We knew there might be signs of trouble. Uh, Kevin O'Connor, when he was writing for the ringer, did that big piece about the nuggets and their team building and Calvin Booth gave all these secrets in the piece, which is like GM 101.

Don't do that. If, if you're doing stuff, that's working. Don't talk about it. What is the upside? What's the upside of, of here, let me tell this reporter. All of these things we're doing that we think are cutting edge. How are you winning with that? Now you're just giving your secrets to the other 29 teams in the league.

Again, he does this whole link thing and it was just weird. Cause it felt credit grabby. And anytime something's credit grabby, you know, like, well, why is this guy doing it? Obviously he had a thing with Malone and it was already there jacking. Where's the boss? When that story came out on the ringer, which is what 18 months ago, 16 months ago. Remember he tried to disown it after he was like, I don't know. I thought I was off the record.

Oh, right. Yeah. He's ludicrous. And it was fucking bullshit because KFC did a good job with that story. Anyway, so this thing was a problem all year. I think it affected the team and then they finally acted. I'm going to throw this at you. The great NBA asset wastes.

Oh, no. So remember when we were kids and Kareem was just on shitty teams for like seven years? Yes. He was on the Bucks forever. They had nobody like basically Bobby Dandridge and that was it. Oscar was washed up. Um, and they were, he was still great. And then finally he's like, I'm going LA. Goes to the Lakers, but they trade a lot to get him. Then the Kermit Washington fight happens.

And it's just, it felt like there's seven years there. It was like, Jesus, is Kareem, he's the best player in the league. Is he going to be on a really good team? And then magic shows up and, um was like Jesus is cream. He's the best player in the league he's gonna be on a really good team and the magic shows up and The rest is history, but there's been some good ones over the years like even LeBron in the mid-2000s on those Cleveland teams Was like, oh man, they're trading for Ben Wallace now. Oh They're paying that much for Anton Jameson Kobe mid-2000s partly his fault because your check out for Anton Jamison, Kobe mid two thousands, partly his fault. Cause it's your check out. TMAC for basically the entire two thousands.

That makes me sad. That was a good one. Moses, when we were kids on the Rockets. TMAC could have, but Yow broke down on them. Yeah. Yeah, broke down. But TMAC for all that Orlando run when Grand Hill was hurt. It makes me sad.

Um, and I don't think this Jokic thing is as bad cause I, Gordon's obviously really good, Christian Brown's been good. Murray when he's healthy is good. Turned out to be good. Porter's a good three point shooter. It's not, it's not that bad, but at the same time, their entire, their entire fate is tied to Jamal Murray's health. And we said this at the outset of the season, I know,

I'm not sure if I'm the only one, but I went under on them getting the 51 wins that this this season Because you went over on the Sixers. I'm just saying we're talking about the Denver Nuggets I didn't want you to applaud yourself because you did go no, by the way, I went I went under on the Clippers and under on the Lakers Why are we going through this? I don't know. The observation I'm making is that the concern at the outset of the season for me was Jamal Murray. Do you trust that he's going to be able to play at the level that this team

requires through the balance of the season for them to get into like the mid fifties and wins and I didn't trust it at any time that he's not, he has been excellent Jamal Murray for a good stretch and they were, they won eight games going into the all star break. Welcome to the season Jamal Murray. Yeah, but you they were they won eight games going into the all-star break. Welcome to the season Jamal Murray. Yeah but you know it's like okay so Denver is legit so we love Denver at this level playing at that that you know and then Gordon went out with with some injuries and Michael Porter Jr. has been doing Michael Porter Jr. stuff and we have too much time and too many high leverage moments where the basketball finds its

way in Russell Westbrook's hands. Well, he just shouldn't play in crunch time. That's true. I almost don't blame Russell Westbrook. I don't either. I don't blame him. When my son leaves the pantry open and, and the dog, my, my, my beloved dog, Murph is just like, cool, I'm going to eat all the potato chips.

Is that Murph's fault or is that Ben's fault? That's right. That's right. Russ, sometimes in crunch time, he's just going to eat all the potato chips. And it's like, you left the potato chips. Is that Merce Fodder's at Bentz Fodder? That's right. That's right. Russ sometimes in crunch time, he's just gonna eat all the potato chips. And it's like you left the pantry open. He has to be on the floor doing that though, because they are trying to do this rotating rest thing. I get it. With their guys. I get it too. They're just not good enough. Here's Russ's value. We're giving everyone the night off. Russ, can you do everything

and try to keep us close for this game against Charlotte? Who's thinking anyway? Sure. Can we bring in conspiracy bill for a second? I'm here. I'm listening. He turned his hat backwards. It's like an over the top slice on conspiracy bill.

I wonder if Jamal Murray is healthy. Oh, okay. And if they feel like they're going, teams going the wrong way in the playoffs and Jamal Murray is not a hundred percent healthy and they lose. And then that becomes the excuse for why they fell apart down the stretch. And then it becomes harder to clean house and fire everybody. And now you just do it now. So there's no excuse. clean house and fire everybody. And now you just do it now. So there's no excuse.

You 50 50, maybe he's going to be where he was in December for the playoffs. Maybe not, but either way it's a queen. It's a reset button either way. It's just, listen, I'm not saying conspiracy bill. It feels like still conspiracy bill. You're feels like I'm back. I'm out. That good. Listen, conspiracy bill just came in.

I'm not saying he's always right. Sometimes he's crazy, but something doesn't pass the sniff test about the timing with this. I don't, well, because it's ludicrous. The timing is ludicrous. The timing's ludicrous. There's nothing, I mean, Josh Crocky said four times, we're gonna see what we can squeeze, squeeze the juice.

We're gonna see if we can squeeze some juice out of it. There ain't no juice, buddy. Your team ain't good enough. He needs to squeeze the PED juice out of it. There ain't no juice buddy. Your team ain't good enough He's the PD juice out of it. He should be squealing He's all the way around he needs to be squeezing the leadership juice He should have squeezed squalls, you know before the season started and went down He needed it needed to be squeezed before the season started. They needed to come up with a game plan And not have this internal Turmoil, they got a best-case scenario out of Christian Brown this this this season needed to come up with a game plan and not have this internal turmoil.

They got a best case scenario out of Christian Brown. Does this, this season, they got a very good scenario, dodging the KCP bullet. They got a very good scenario out of Jamal Murray. Honestly. Yeah. That could mean considering his injury history, they pay, they have Matt three max contract guys, they can't keep all three. They can't keep Aaron Gordon and Michael Porter Jr.

And Jamal Murray and stay, you know, where they want to be. Flag, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I still wonder why would, didn't we hear more about them and with Miami? Why, why did it was Miami not interested? Miami wanted any part of Michael. It must be, it must be right. Would you trade it for Michael Porter Jr. Would you pay him 40 million?

He's redundant for that team anyway. He doesn't help them. Um, we're going to, we're going to take a break and bring in cousin Sal and we're going to do the West where Denver fits in and whether we think there's any chance that Denver fits out or where Denver fits out. Let's go. Let's take a break and then Sal's gonna come in. Swing into the biggest golf event of the year with Fandle where every putt and drive can bring you closer to victory or in my case closer to all the putts and drives. Speaking of Fandle, our friends over there have some amazing offers for the first

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America's number one sports book and swing for some green. Must be 21 plus in president select states or 18 plus in president DC. Opt-in required bonus issued as non-retributable profit boost tokens. Restrictions apply, including any token expiration and max wager amount. See terms at sportsbook.fandr.com. Game prom call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. This episode is brought to you by Nissan. If you're planning on an adventurous 2025, you're going to need a car that can keep up

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The masters, your agent, James baby doll. Dixon is here. What a day. So much fun. Uh, we'll talk about that next segment. We're going to talk about the Denver nuggets and the West and basketball and the NBA playoffs. Can I just first, uh, thank you guys for giving me some winning futures

in the beginning of the year. I heard you talk about how you bet your own futures and lost. Maybe you should come to me after your podcast so I could tell you who to bet. Houston makes the playoffs. Yes. Pelicans, no playoffs. Yes. Denver underwins.

Yes. Spurs underwins. Yes. Suns over the loss. Wizards under. Yes. We did above average on our locks. I'm really upset about how we handled the Pacific.

The LA teams, Sacramento and Phoenix. Phoenix and the two LA teams ruined my over-enders. Yeah. Anyway. It just went over, those two went to crazy transformation. So it's not really. Anyway, so the Denver nuggets. Yeah.

We have Fandol, I introduced these to you, kind of buried on the Fandol sportsbook MBA page where they have two advance each round. And I don't remember seeing those last year. I was incredibly fascinated by them. So round two, to make round two, that means you're winning in round one. And we're taping this before a couple

of the Tuesday night games. There's gonna be some standing shenanigans. We have five teams that have 32 losses. Denver's one of them who just fired their coach, Jeab. Is Denver in a post Malone time period right now? This is good. Come on. The Cousins Sal is here.

Where's the drummer? The Cousins Sal is here. OKC is minus 1300 to make round two house. And that jumped out to me immediately. Because what if they played Minnesota or the Clippers? I think OKC would beat either of those teams. But I don't think they're 13 to 1 favorites to beat the Clippers if that was the series or Golden State.

What do you think the price is? Because those guys, both the Clippers if that was the series or golden state. What do you think the price is? Because those guys, both the Clippers and Minnesota, super short prices as, as dogs. It must be that they think Memphis is going to be the eight because Memphis is plus three 50. Yeah. And I honestly, that does make sense. I should have actually, I should have mentioned that too. So Clippers are plus one 30 to make round two.

Minnesota is plus one 54 to make round two. Memphis is plus three 50, but two. Minnesota's plus 154 to make round two. Memphis is plus 350. But OKC is minus 1300. It feels like- That doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense, right? If Memphis is even the eight at plus 350, Vandal screwed up.

Thanks for sending us out here, but they screwed up. They're not smart people. We love you, Vandal, but you added something wrong here. And then the Lakers are minus 17 72 gold states, minus one 52, Denver is plus one Oh six and Houston is plus one 14, which was another one that jumped out to me because they're going to have, we know they had, we know they're the two seed they're playing as well as they played all season. And it's two seven.

And I just think they're going to be favored. So if I get them a plus one 14, that's great. But I think that whole list, what shocked you the most out of those 18? So, I mean, that's weird now that you bring it up. If Houston is going to be a two seed as a underdog, right? If you're guaranteed, they're not guaranteed, but looking good. Two seed. Has that happened in a while? Were two seeds an underdog?

I mean, that jumped out every once in a while there there like Memphis had that year where they were the two seed, but nobody believed in it and there was good value in them. Let's price it cuz because let's say it's Houston against Minnesota. Right. They won't be an underdog to Minnesota. It'll be like very close to even odds. Don't you think? Right.

They'll be a tiny favorite. Because their home, they'll have one for. So right now Minnesota is seven and Memphis is eight and Houston's to argue. Be playing one of those gold state has two easy games. The next two Denver just fired their coach. They've lost four in a row and they're going to be playing the Kings. The Grizzlies at home and then at Houston in the last game of the season, which Houston might not care about because they'll have the two seed locked up.

So I don't know. I think Minnesota versus Houston, just fundamentally, if that's a two, seven series house, where would your money be in that series? I'm definitely betting on Minnesota. There's no two ways about it. That's how I feel about it too. I guarantee you. Because they definitely betting on Minnesota. There's no, that's how I feel about it. I guarantee you. Cause they screwed us enough. We have this big parlay that needs Minnesota to run the table losing wise to

pay off. And it actually might be over by now because it's probably Tuesday night. Yeah. Yeah. So we just want to figure out how much we want our teeth kicked in by Minnesota this year. What would you set that line at Minnesota? I think your house is right. Like Houston, only because they're home would home, you know, one would be tiny minus one 25 or something. So maybe that, that explains these prices. I guess the problem for Fandl and just trying to set these prices in

general is if you have one upset. One, anything happening. Yeah. You don't want to know all of a sudden I have Denver plus one Oh six, but all of a sudden they're in the seventh spot playing Houston and maybe they'd be favored in that series because of Yoke Hitch. That's a great question. Would who would you have favored in Denver Houston? Yeah. So now you're talking. I think Houston's good. I'd be, I'd be a little,

I bet Minnesota, but I don't think I'd put a lot of money on that one. I saw too many games with Houston where from the eight minute mark in the fourth quarter to the end of the game, they turn flaccid. Did you see anything? What they turned limp. Did you see anything of what Alman Thompson did to Curry in that game though? It was awesome. Absolutely. I thought that was, he just took out.

Now, Curry, the problem with Golden State and why they're going to be so hard to figure out is they're an older team. Their best three guys are either old or getting old. And they have a situation like they play two really hard Thursday, Friday games. And then they play Sunday against that young, big, powerful rockets team. And they just looked old. Yeah. Um, but at the same time, I thought the Rockets, they beat okay. Seeing going state in the same weekend. Nothing. They're good with nothing to play for. And they talk a bunch of shit.

They're good. I was talking shit to Steph. I mean, this just shows me that Fandel hates Houston to make them a plus number as a two seed most likely. And then we don't have to go on to the next round, but to make the West finals at plus four 70 playing the four or five seed, right. So Houston, sorry, the, the, the three 16. And my, I should have flagged this for you. Houston was plus seven 90, like five days ago to make the Western finals.

Two seed, they were basically getting eight to one odds. And if you just price that out, they're going to be the favorites are close in both series, right? Um, Houston's plus four 70 now. I think looking at the odds, the shocking thing to me is how much respect they give the Lakers and how afraid, and I'm not saying it's right or wrong, I'm just saying the Lakers are being treated almost like they're a defending champ type situation.

They're minus 172 to win around. They're plus 168 to win two rounds. And there's a chance they might, you know, maybe they don't even have home court in round two, right? Potentially they couldn't, but it just seems like a lot of people that might be respect. That might be different from you, Sam. There just might be a lot of tickets on the Lakers. Like right after that Luka trade, everyone must've just dialed into them and bet them the one in the West.

So they're so scared of that. Yeah. So there's a lot of liability there, but, but I do think for the West finals, all right, OKC minus 290, throw that out of there. If you think Denver's done, you got a nice opportunity to make some money here, picking either the Lakers or Golden State or the Clippers. Well, the problem is if Denver drops to seven out of nowhere and it's Houston versus Denver and a two seven. I think looking at the odds,

the best odds to me seem to be Minnesota to make the West finals. I think the odds have adjusted correctly, but Minnesota basically seven to one to make the West finals. I think the odds have adjusted correctly. But Minnesota basically seven to one to make the West finals, to win two rounds. I'm going to, I, we need to take a break for this podcast so I can go. I'll be right back. I got to go make a bet. I thought it was a bathroom thing.

It could be both. I could do it in the bathroom. We did eat a lot of pizza today cause I really wanted the clips to have better odds cause I thought maybe they would be the sleeper pick but plus 420 to win two rounds isn't there's no value at all. Yeah no no right and there might be underdogs both rounds that doesn't make sense and if you really wanted to get nuts do Memphis plus 1550 to win two rounds that's insane it's just throwing but there's a chance they could get the seven seed and be in the two seven, right? Yeah.

That Memphis Houston would be awesome. That would be an awesome series. That's two series at plus four 50 and plus 300. Would that be what they are in the first two series? So that's basically what 15 50 is. So how's it for that first round, the advanced around to if somehow the clippers are the eight seed and okay. Sees the one seed and you have okay. See at minus 1300 to advance around to I would be fucking nervous with that. Cause I think, I think, I don't think the clips can beat okay.

See, but I think they can make you nervous if you have a lot of okay. See money, right? Absolutely. Positively. I want no part of that. If you, if Kawhi, it seems like we're going to, I want us to knock on wood. There's some wood in this house, some fine marble. I see, but I'm going to knock on some wood because we want Kawhi healthy for the first round.

I don't think they're going to drop though. The Clippers are playing too, too well and their last three games are reasonable for them. So here's the real value. games are, are reasonable for them. So here's the real value. So to make the finals, this is three rounds. Okay. See is minus one 45 Lakers plus six 50. I just don't think that's.

They're going to be underdogs of those. It's you have to win three rounds to win the Western conference. Yeah. You have to Lakers plus six 50 gold state, seven to one Denver, 10 to one clip 16 to one Minnesota, 21 to one Houston, 24 to one, uh, and Memphis 70 to one. So the case for Golden state or the Lakers is this other than that they have famous players and a good infrastructure and all that stuff. What is your record have to be?

What's the worst possible record you could have to make the Western Finals? Little math question for you guys. I mean, including the play out, like all that? First three rounds, what's the worst record you could have and still make the Finals? One, four, three, four, three, four, five, six. Yeah, 12, nine.

12 and eight. 12 and nine. Yeah. Yeah. So if you think of it that way, it's like, could a team with Luca and LeBron go 12 and nine. 12 and eight. 12 and nine. Yeah. Yeah. So if you think of it that way, it's like, could a team with Luca and LeBron go 12 and nine over 21 games? It's like, yeah, that seems realistic. Kind of wrong. Could Golden State go 12 and nine for three rounds?

And it's like, yeah, they're going to have a game like they had Sunday, where they look old, Steph has three points. You know, even think of like when they played Memphis a couple of years ago and 22, and they got blown out in game five and they just won in game six. When you think about 12 and nine, it's just not that hard. I like the way you're going. It's funny because we usually look at this at this point of year,

like, all right, who's the toughest out? Who's the toughest to beat four times? Yeah. If you do it that way 12 and 9 is doable Yeah, I think about the Lakers like 12 and 9 Let's say there's three incredible Luca games. There's three. Mm-hmm. Let's give LeBron two incredible LeBron games All right. Now I have five right let's give Reeves One awesome game sure where they win just cuz Reeves is great. I know I have six of the twelve All right. Now, let's have a LeBron and Luca are awesome in the same game game. There's two more One awesome game where they win just cause Reeves is great. And now I have six of the 12. All right. Now let's have a LeBron and Luca are awesome in the same game game.

There's two more. You can get to 12 pretty easily. I think you're right. I think those odds are in flip. It's weird because we, we just said a lot of people might have Lakers tickets, but when we talk about the toughest out Oklahoma city is the toughest to beat four times, probably, but not six times as tough as the Lakers to beat four times. Well, so here's the case for OKC.

They're going to finish the season 68 and 14, 67 and 15, and then it becomes math. So over six months, they lost 14 times. And now we're going to get to the playoffs and they're going to lose nine times in 21 games. That's where it gets stupid. This was the case for the Celtics last year. At some point the math takes over. But OKC did get their ass kicked the other day against the Lakers. Lakers, yeah.

And it's like, why did they get their ass kicked? Were they showing anything? Or they just, did they call off the dogs or did this actually mean something? Right. I don't know. Houston seems to be, I would say most disrespected in the West. I think it's appropriate.

I think it's fine. They're going to be the two seed and they're going to have home court in the first two rounds. True story. 24 to one is a good price. The two seed getting the seventh best seed odds is remarkable. It doesn't make any sense. 24 to one, yeah.

Yeah, for all three of those categories, Houston's getting ripped. All right, Sal, a couple other things for you. Yeah. Who do you want Dallas to take with the 12th pick in the draft? Yeah, I want a lineman. I know there's like two.

It's just crazy. I know we're gonna screw this up. We're doing football now. I know we're going to screw this up. We're doing football now. I know. I kind of love it. Fun. We're talking about the Arizona receiver or talking about, like, this is a team that needs everything in my head. Like everybody roots for their team. Like, oh, we need like eight positions, not you house.

You free agent it every way you're waiting. No, we need eight defensive positions. Give us alignment. I don't know exactly which one is going to drop to us because, uh, you know, we lost one of the best in the game. So I was looking at the draft odds. Sadly, it seems like the draft has shook out in a way that's not great for the New England Patriots where Cam words one seems like Hunter's going to be two. He's minus two 80 now to go to Cleveland.

And then Carter is now minus one 70 on Fand going to be two. He's minus two 80 now to go to Cleveland. And then Carter is now minus one 70 on Fandl to be the third pick. You were really hoping for Shador to sneak in there. And I don't think it's happening in Sanders. He's four to one to go third. He's 17 to one to go second. And I think the odds are probably better that he's going to fall. There's a team to draft.

Should or Sanders odds that I thought was pretty fun because you can really take it. I mean, Dallas is 26 to one. So you could take a couple of these. This is like a nice roulette thing, right? We put money on a few numbers. I never get it right though. Well, if people are right.

And, and I think it feels like as somebody who's watched a lot of this draft stuff and a couple of people have kind of like, I'm not sure you might be closer to Indy Dalton than people realize, but nobody really wants to come out and say, I don't think he's a top five pick. He's not good enough. Nobody has come out strongly, but I think that's coming. And if he does the Aaron Rogers slide into the late part of round one, right. And we start going into like, I don't know, um, Miami range, 27 to one.

Sure. Maybe even some before that. Colts 22 to one. Seattle, Colts. Yeah. Seattle 22 to one. Sure. Maybe even some before that. Colts, 22, Seattle, Seattle, 22 to one Rams 11 to one. That makes a lot of sense to me. Honestly, Steelers plus four 50, but it seems like there's some sort of value there that we're not seeing. Um, the other thing I was looking at was if the pets trade back, I think Gentie is, uh, seems like he's going to have some real juice as the draft gets closer.

Raiders are minus one 45 for him. They're picking six. And if the, if they get scared, somebody's going to leapfrog them. Maybe they just move up two spots with the pats. If the pats won't take a left tackle, but, uh, him going to the Raiders is minus one 45 saints is nine to one. And then your team South 15 to one. It's so funny.

Cause I would even look further down because to me, it's still like, all right. If these GMs wise enough or running back that early, just even in the first round, but that early should only go to a team. That's one piece away from making the playoffs or making a deep run in the playoffs. I'm sorry. That's not your team. That's not the Raiders. Probably not the bears. The only case for my team for sure. But the only case for my team is if they're like, this is a Peyton Manning edge James situation. We'll have our two guys. We won't be able to block for either of them, but we have, we, this is an

emits, man, Troy, like there's, there's a model here for this. I'm like, I'm pretty consistent with this. Like if you're picking that high, I need to get somebody that in free agency in four to five years is going to be like a $30 million a year guy and running backs don't make that much. You know, tackles do cornerbacks do pass rushers do. And I just feel like if you're picking that high, even if they took Mason Graham, it's like, that's a guy that will, if he's good, would be like a 25 to

$30 million a year player. A running back will not. But once you're in the range you're in, it starts to get more interesting. Then you're in that Jameer Gibbs range. Right. Right. Yeah. I don't think, you know, I think you got your player that everyone needs to be excited about and that's a coach.

Yeah. That's your coach. So now you don't have to, you know, kowtow to the fans. You could draft smart and go back to drafting smart like you do. I mean, I think like Denver at 75 to one, like kind of one ish piece away from, from doing that, you know, at running back by committee. Yeah. And it was not very successful.

Right. Exactly. So that makes it. I like that price a lot. The Dallas Cowboys are seven to one to take a running back to take a running back plus to take a running back first plus two 30 to take a receiver. Um, yeah, you can do that. Fando has all these positions.

That's a lot of fun. The kid from North Carolina has been getting a ton of bar. So they're starting to do this thing about, you know, is this a Bijon Robinson, Jamiro Gibbs kind of year? What position do you think Washington will take? I pray edge. I pray one of the guys at edge. That's plus one 70 on Fandel.

Make perfect sense. Right. Yeah. That's the lowest odds for, for the position. Yeah. The one that they don't have yet that I think they should have is who's going to be the second quarterback drafted. Yeah, they usually do. Dart, Dart, Dart versus Sanders is a really fun one. Cause couldn't you see the saints just taking Dart ninth out of nowhere? It'd be like, Whoa, like one of those. Yeah, for sure. Then Dart, like it's so funny cause now we see how many people show up.

Everybody reports on how many giants showed up for Shador Sanders pro day. You know, it's like 37 giants and we're 14 players and three front office guys that ends up being like ratings for this. And that affects the odds. Like how many, you know, so that's why people think, but yeah, the same thing for, uh, for what you're saying here, I could see it. Well, speaking of effect in the ads, you know, Fandall, they're, they've been an awesome partner to us that they're the reason we're here at the masters right now. And occasionally I'll, I'll text them and badger them and make them do props and stuff,

including some golf ones that we're going to talk about in one second. But, uh, I made them do an exact order bet. This is my dream scenario for the pats, which was cam ward Sanders Hunter. We get Abdul Carter fourth. So they put that up, they priced it. They had their trading desk price it. And it's plus $750 for that foursome. This was two weeks ago. It's now 17 to one. Did you make them change it? No, they're just dropping their increase in the odds. What happened? Did they send in some tariffs? No buyers. Was there a Shandor St. Anders tariff.

It wasn't, uh, did not turn out. Killed the market. Wow. What is it? What happened that made that go out that aside from no one's I think what happened is Sanders, it became clear. He wasn't going to go two or three. Okay.

But, um, for the, for the top five pick that was the other one I was looking at. Yeah. And Mason Graham is minus one 40. And I just don't see how he falls past Jacksonville at five. Either somebody, either the paths take them, which I'd be fine with. Cause then they would have an awesome D line with hopefully bar more healthy guy they signed from Philly. They spent a lot of money on, um, and Graham, that sounds great.

Let's have an awesome D line or Jacksonville takes it, but that's minus one 40 seems like good odds. It gets a little scarier after that. Like will Campbell, the left tackle, everyone thinks the paths are going to take. I just don't think they take them at one 35. I think they trade back a couple of spots if they're taking them because nobody else is going to take them. Is, is the NFL draft or the mock draft draft the biggest, all right, we're full of shit,

but you have no choice but to follow us. No, I honestly, I think it's like the Denver, the Malone, uh, booth thing. I think there's so much scuttlebutt and I think they talk to so many people. And I think these guys get real info. They end up six out of 32. And if there's one trade, it's sprues. No, but I'm saying info about who's kind of, who's looking for one. By now we know if Sanders is going to be a top four picker,

and he's just not, it's not happening. Right. All right. So maybe if you could- So we know stuff like that. You could outline the top three or four, but after that, like- Like we know Cam Ward, like Tennessee's taking him. Like we've done that for a little while.

Yeah. No, I'm just saying Joe Linaardi goes 67 to 68 gets death threats. And then everybody else like Kuiper goes seven for 32. It's like, yeah, great job. All right. Well, because the NFL has teams like Atlanta who drew draft Michael Penick's junior, right? Number nine.

Right. Yeah. Everything gets like, no, like, Hey, I'm zagging pretty good pick. No, but that's what I'm saying. You might as well be the first pick of this draft. It's a great pick. If you great pick, if you just spend 90 million on her cousin, you just don't care

about money. I'm just saying don't bet minus one 70 on anything just like because, because I think that's great advice. So absolutely. Cause I think that's great advice. So absolutely. With that said, um, Genti plus eight 50, I think is a really interesting bet for where for top five pick. Ooh, nah, I'm not doing it.

I'm not doing it. You can't have a running back. If he's Bijan Barkley that level and everybody thinks that and people think the Raiders are going to take him at six and they want to leapfrog him and get to four or five to take them. That's the, that's the path. That's how it seems like pretty good ads for that. That is a Raiders move.

It'll be fun. Get the hell out of there. You saw you like that one. Do you permit that? Yeah. Did any of the, since we did the NFO over underpods and we, so we did the sound. I did that. I listened.

And we told, we told house, here's the Niners price. And you would have thought I told house Trump's about to do tariffs. Assume all these short positions. I haven't heard house that excited about a win total probably in my life. Did it stay the same? No. It's down. Oh, it's still 10 and a half but there's minus 135 juice now. That's still not a bad price. I held, you know, I caught my breath and I thought about it. Yeah. And I don't think they're very good. And I think they're going to have with this huge overhaul. It's not going to be the same thing we're looking at and everything.

But I thought about it and I was like, and I still don't think they should be favored one of the division, but I said, boy, if you had your choice of being in any division with any schedule, you would want to play a fourth place schedule and against the AFC South and the NFC South. And that's what the Nets, that's what they're doing. They do have the easiest schedule as we sit here today. We haven't seen what the rest situation and all that is and how it will affect it. But I don't know who's on that team.

I don't know what the skill positions are. You took everybody from their team. It's Brock Purdy and it's Trent Williams and it's a McCaffrey on how many on, on half a leg on one leg. I mean, one leg does even have one leg in work. It's Fred Warner play defense. They, you know, that's it.

We're going to do some master stuff before we do the draft. We're going to do, um, we have a bunch of ringer specials that are on the Fandel sports book right now, including houses, frog frenzy, region parlay, which is Matt Siyama top Asian and McElroy top UK. Plus four 60. Why is it the frog frenzy house? Because those guys are teammates. They're teammates on the Boston common,GL team, the Ball Frogs. You might be the only person that knows this.

Hideki, I think, played in like half a month. I don't remember seeing him. So glad that's the explanation. It is. I've heard it on so many different ways. The Frog Frenzy. That's it. I thought you were going to get canceled for a second.

I thought something horrible happened. No, no, no. We keep it. Why did he frog frenzy it? I explained it when I put it in there. You know, anytime you have the ball frogs as a potential parlay, you got to do it. So, House, you have Justin Thomas winning the Masters. I do.

What's the case? Um, in the first place. By the way, 22 to 1. So that's the most important aspect of this. I think it's a great price for where he is in terms of his success this year. His biggest problem over this drought, this winning drought that he's in, he hasn't won in over two years, has been putting, he putted very poorly last season and his putting has greatly improved and his numbers. He's been competitive.

I mean, he, he choked down the stretch, uh, two weeks ago in Tampa, Florida. He had a three stroke lead going into the final five holes and lost to Victor Holland who birdied two of the last three or so. I mean, it was, it was a sensible loss, but I love where JT is in terms of his off the T numbers. I love where he is in terms of approach. And the key thing for me is the price because I don't think you're getting any return on Scotty Schaeffler or Roy McElroy, and I will pivot immediately.

If one of those guys comes out and shoots 66 on Thursday, but JT at 22 to one doesn't match up with the caliber and quality of his play thus far this season. So that's why I did it. And then Sal, you jumped on. Morikawa. A bandwagon. Why is that?

He's a bandwagon guy. I haven't heard anyone else take him. Bandwagon pick, so many people. Really? I love it. 16 to one on Fandor, what was your case? Fourth in the world, came in third last year. I have so many people. Really? I love it. 16 to 1 on Fandor. What was your case? Fourth in the world.

Came in third last year. Came in 10th the year before. Came in fifth in 2022. He's never missed a Masters cut, so you know you're going to see him Saturday, Sunday. He's going to be on the board. I think people are down on him because of that outburst with House. You say that's not even an outburst when he blew a three-stroke lead with five left in the Arnold Palmer last month, and he wouldn't talk to the

press he gives a crap don't talk to me I'll know when I win here the press because he was waiting for the winner to finish and he was waiting and he was waiting and he was waiting and the tour never got him said come you know here's how we're gonna sequence this he. He just left. Very misunderstood. Tour Apologist Joe House. I like, I'm a Morikawa Stan. He finished Inties the top 20 in all four majors last year. I think he's a great bet. I have some Morikawa exposure. I just love the price for JT. That's the reason that I went with JT. We did hit one bet already at the Masters that we'd run into Scott Van Pelt and he would take us to the Butler cabin. And we would get a group photo, which I put on my Instagram.

That was nice. That was like the Butler cabin. I haven't seen how static sighted probably. I I'm trying to think of a scenario where you would have the look on your face that you had. And I think it involves the word free massage. I won't go there. It was stunning. I'm not, I can't overstate how like the set of the sequence of events. First of all, we walked all the way up 10 to get to the top of the hill to where they're all the social scene is happening.

The media people, all that happens at the putting green or where one and 10 come together. It's a scene. Kudos to Nathan Hubbard, who's asleep right now because he had 14 pieces of pizza. But he was like, let's go up there, we'll run into someone. It was a good call.

We'll run into somebody. But we had to stop halfway up because the cousin Sal has never walked up 10. It's hard, it's a real walk. Forgot, it was like the Denver Nuggets bench with all the rookies. We forgot that Sal was a rookie and didn't realize we're just going uphill for an hour. Ridiculous walker by eating pizza and oysters.

That's how I dream. But we went the sequence of events went from from that moment. Yeah. And then we're up there and then like, hey, you know, there's SB Babydoll takes charge. It goes, oh, he knows me. He knows me. He's going to fucking love this. Yeah.

He has VP. Good job. Baby doll only got scolded three times for smoking. We're smoking. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, anyway, we ran an SVP, saw the Butler cabin, which was about the size of the

room we're in now almost, but cool brick fireplace. Amazing. It's a really, it's a TV studio. But cool brick fireplace. Amazing. It's a really, it's a TV studio. It is completely like floor to ceiling outfit for perfect TV, for video audio. It's like walking into a proper studio where you guys

know how to do TV shows. I was surprised by that aspect. Yeah, it's like there'd be a Ringer studio right outside Small World Ride in Disneyland. It's like, what be a Ringer studio right outside small world ride and Disneyland. It's like, what the, why is this here? It's also always fun to run into Van Pelt cause he's gigantic. He's so tall. It's like six five. You always forget how like tall he is and just famous.

What a homie. Great guy. Um, my master's winner is Roy McElroy at plus six 50. It's, it's, I always make fun of you for being sentimental about worry. What, uh, somebody that, uh, drove us around a little bit the last two days, Matt, who we've been fortunate enough to get to know a little bit. And he had some Rory Intel about Rory was kind of popping back here and play the course and, um, just making a couple of extra trips. Yeah. Gus, the native Matt, um, just making a couple of extra trips.

Yeah. Keeping his eye on things for us. Rory seemed to especially focus this year. And I just liked the moment. I mean, he's running out of time, you know, from, uh, from, uh, he's in an X his extended prime now, I would say. I don't think there's a lot more years where he's in the mix like this as a favorite. And this feels like to me, like, if it's gonna happen,

it's gonna be like, gotta be like this year or next year. So that's interesting because we are in this era where we see athletes, you know, extend their career. And he has been very fortunate in terms of avoiding injury. He does seem like with his swing, he's been able to get more out of it. He hits the ball even further than ever in his thirties and he doesn't have these injuries that pop up that much. Um, so I think there's a window of time that I would say it's at least like five

years. Um, but your point is right. There is not a long history of masters winners, you know, once you hit age 35. If he could avoid injury, like he avoided baby doll today. So 35, four years left. I would give him like six or seven. I mean, remember when we get in our forties, are we still on your prime at this point in golf? I mean, so basically he's got the 20, 20, 19.

He's got some time. I'm not ready. This is the moment though. This is a crucial moment. It's not going to be any better because he's never come into a Masters having won twice on American soil and his numbers are through the roof in terms of the quality of his. In our defense, House and I bet golf every weekend and we've had money on Rory blowing round four a lot. Right? I mean, that's the hesitation.

36 years old, Rory. Yeah. So I don't know. We're, we're around when it should, it should happen again. Pretty soon. It would be great. I'm rooting for it. I just didn't, I'll, I'll live bet it.

If he, if he comes out, his biggest problem has been Thursday. He hasn't hit play scored well on Thursday. Is he the number one player or a team you've live bet the most? Hmm. Oh, wow. That's a great one. I think for Sal, it's the Chiefs. Uh, it might be Alex Pereira, but it's funny.

We discussed this on Against All Odds. Like if you had assigned a point value from one to a hundred on guys and teams that you've, you bet on the most so Herrera McElroy chestnut My three I think mine are the Brady Pats. Oh, that's a good like halftime bed stuff like that. Yeah Oh, yeah, we're fucking yes. We're coming back man. I miss those days. Yeah. All right We're gonna take a break and come back and do a little master's draft. All right, for this last segment,

I always make fun of NFL pregame shows when they have too many people on, and we're about to have a six-person segment. But we only have four mics, so I think it's gonna work well. Dave Chang joined us. Hello, hello. Nathan Hubbard joined us. Hello.

And James Babydoll-Dixon is here. Yo, Babydoll, so glad to be here with you guys. We have never been at the Masters together. No, we have not. Never been in the Masters with Sal. I've been with Chang. I've been with Nathan. I've been with House.

Obviously, who no longer has a mic. Maybe that's a good thing. You guys don't need to share the mic. We're gonna bring Chang in. But I wanna share the mic. Chang has a bum shoulder. He's got a separated shoulder. They surgically removed his shoulder. Now he's leaning on his left side.

I just want to make you as uncomfortable as possible. Okay. And he's also cooking like a wild man with this really bad shoulder. It's impressive. Yeah. He's playing hurt. He's an inspiration to all of us and to everybody except Tiger Woods who's not here. But there's a lot of good golfers here.

Nathan, we didn't talk about we both picked Rory to win this Masters. What was your case quickly? He 10 years ago got 60% of his shots gained from off the tee. Last year 51%. This year only 37%. And he is still first in driving, which is to say the rest of his game has gotten way, way better. See that was much better and much smarter and more stat driven than my take, which is like more, Roy's now hitting his mid late 30s. It's time, if it's ever gonna happen,

it's happening right now. And Matt, our guy told us that he's been here a couple of times, that was my case, plus 650. We're gonna do a draft. You didn't trust Matt with your phone, but you do with the Masters pick, huh? No, I wanted to put my phone... I like getting my phone from the pub house. We all left our phones with Matt, but Simmons... I don't know where Matt's gonna go. What if his car gets stolen? Okay, we're doing this

draft and FanDuel is gonna put odds on it. And we are going to do a Thursday, Friday draft. The 48-hour frenzy, I think we're calling this. Each of us are going to be two golfers. Lowest score wins. And people can bet on this on Fandl Sportsbook. So if you like my pair more than everyone else's pair, put some odds on it. How's your number, Mike?

You can't talk. You talk when I talk to you. You sound like Alec Baldwin's wife. You're sharing baby's Mike. If you want to, do you want to share? You have something to say? No, just the tip of the very good show. Hold on.

Can I just say we haven't figured out what the booby prize is, but whoever comes in last has to do something stupid, something humiliating. And of course, I'm Friday. Friday. Yeah. I think you have to mix all of the sandwiches something stupid, something humiliating. Something humiliating Friday. Yeah, I think you have to mix all of the sandwiches on the on the course. Oh, that's pretty good. And then eat them. Egg salad, pork.

Great idea. I might have done that anyway today, but that's fine. Do you guys have trouble with that? All right, let's do the draft and then we're going to interrogate baby on some stuff. Chang, I'm going to give you the first pick of anyone for Thursday, Friday. So it's not to win the tournament. Just who do you think is going to be the leader Thursday and Friday or have a really good score? Well, I know you guys are choosing choosing Rory, but I'm going to go with Scotty Schaffler. Number one pick.

I don't I don't think he's going to win. But for the first, you know, two days, yes, that's my pick. OK, so make a case for Shafla. I don't see where is this guy coming from? All right, that's good. And it's the lowest combined score, right? Yeah. So you have second pick. All right. Well, I did the last half hour.

I said Colin Mara cow. I've not wavered from that pick. I like them. What are his numbers? Third last year, the last half hour, I said, column or cow. I've not wavered from that pick. I like them. What are his numbers? Uh, third last year, 10th of the year before fifth in 2022 never misses a master's cut. We had a buddy who said he had lunch with them yesterday. Delightful fella. Dead set.

I'm winning this thing. Welcome to team Sal column. Is that like a name drop, but it was like a mystery name. It's a mystery name drop. All right, Nathan, you go third. Give me Rory McElroy. It's his time. It's his time.

That was my terrible take. It's a bad take because Rory has struggled on Thursdays. And that's really the narrative of this tournament. If he plays Thursday well, he's going to win this golf. Thursday and Friday. Fair enough. Baby, you get to go fourth, who's your pick? I'm doing the Swede.

Aberg. Ludwig? Ludwig Aberg. It's kinda Oberg, isn't it? It's Oberg. Yeah, I mean, you gotta do it. I don't think if he wins, you shouldn't get caught for that.

Wait, it's freakin' Swedish. Uh-oh, Oberg, Aberg,, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh All right, House, you get to hold the mic down. You get two straight picks. Great. I'll take John Rahm. Oh. And I'll take Justin Thomas. Oh, jeez. You got the best spot in the draft. Want to make a case?

Want me to make a case? Yeah. John Rahm is a complete wild card because he plays on the live tour. Now, he hasn't finished worse than sixth on any of his live events, for the most part. But I like him this year as opposed to last year, he had a tide for 45th. Last year was the defending champion and he was in disarray. His game was in disarray. His life was in disarray.

I, he's calm now. Nathan gave me a very fine report of how he conducted himself at the press conference. He is poised. He's ready. He's locked in. I liked that he played Doral last week. Tough golf course played well, you know, let ready for a major. And then Justin Thomas is my pick to win this golf tournament because I love the

odds of 22 to one, but Thomas has been gaining strokes on approach for about nine months now and the key with Justin Thomas is that his putting is greatly improved now he is playing with a new caddy for the masters. I hope it's the guy that Ben Crenshaw used. We're on the 30th anniversary of Ben Crenshaw winning in 95. If he has that guy, you might have a chance, but I don't love the idea of a new caddy. Why is that? Why are people not liking a new caddy?

Everybody gets the sours on a player who has a new caddy. I think the caddy is actually dead, but... Oh, yeah. Crenshaw's caddy? Yeah. I think he changed doctors. He's actually dead, but. Oh yeah. Cranstoss caddy? Yeah. All right. RIP. Oh, well then he had to change caddies.

Okay. All right. I'm up. I'm taking Xander. God. Wow. Steady pick. Best guy on the board.

Wow. Um, big year last year for him. Maybe it'll continue at the masters. So house has Ram and Thomas. I have beefy Bryson and Xander as my two. Baby, you're up. I'm going with... Say it right.

Always... No, this one's easy. I'm going with Kapka as my second pick. Aberg played so... Oberg played so impressively last year. Aberg or Oberg? Both of them played so impressively. Bergey.

Just call him Bergey. Berge Berger, Robert. Both of them played so impressively. Berge. Just call him Berge. Berge. Ludwig. He hits the ball a country mile, number one. He's got the short game. He finished, I believe, second last year, if I'm not mistaken. And I think he's one of the absolute future stars of the tour and will win many majors in his career. Koepka. Listen, I love on this podcast when people suck up to the Swedes. Yeah, right, in general. He's always a threat in the majors.

He's had a very good recent history, Koepka, in the Masters. I am not sure where his game is because I don't watch Liv, but I feel like he is always looming and could be a threat this week. All right, we got a lot of Liv guys already. That was two. Yeah. Nathan, you're up.

You have Rory and Hu. God, this is a tough one because the money says you should take Joaquin Nieman here, but I just don't trust him based on the way that he played at live last week. So I'm gonna go totally off reservation and go Shane Lowry. There's a small select group of guys who can actually win this golf tournament,

and it's people who come in with great ball striking. And Shane Lowry is coming in with great ball striking and he generally starts these tournaments decently well. So let's see how he does. All right. Speaking of great ball striking cousins, hey now I'm going with the shaggy dog Cam Smith, taking them right there. Ninth last year, top 10, top 10 in five of the last seven Masters and never missed a master's cut, which means he's going to have a nice score on Friday by Friday. And and he shaved the mullet.

He shaved the mullet. That worries me. Mullet or not, here we come. Welcome to Team Sal, Ken Smith. Dave Chang, you have the last pick. I asked our good friend, Chachi PT, to help me on this. And I asked, what if you were cousin south, but successful? Oh, at betting, at betting, especially when it comes to the masters and what would be the best long shot? I sort of did. and it also helped me with

alliteration so we got Scotty Scheffler and we're going to Sepp Straka who finished 16th last year we saw him today great approach shots he looked good and I'm trying to make cousin Sal look good okay good good luck with that I mean that might be tougher than actually winning all right so here's who we have Chang as Scotty and Straka. Sal has more cow and cam Smith. Nathan has Rory and Lowry. Baby has Bergy and Kevka.

I have Bryson and Xander and house has Ram and Thomas. Fan duel at some point tomorrow. We'll have odds on all of these pairings with our names. Yeah. And people can bet on this for Thursday, Friday. That's so fun. And I'm getting all the info from them. Who got bet on the most? All that stuff. I really want to have the most bets. You do? Yeah.

You're going to get it. You'll get that. People like you, I think. No, I, looking at this, I think House is going to have the most bets. I do too. Rahm and Thomas. Rahm and Thomas is a good bet. I think House will have the most action, which makes house public, which means he's not going to win. They're public.

So there we go. That's it for our draft. Check it out. The, I think we're called Ringer 48 hour frenzy. What do you call it? I think that's good. Yeah. And then we might do, we were talking about maybe something with the 16th hole number of people that's that hit the water. The ringer. There's the ringer, Thursday, Friday, something like that. Good times. That's where we go.

All right, we're gonna take one more break and then come back with some more master stories. And now for a special part of today's show, Forward Thinkers of the Game brought to you by Workday, in which we discuss the players who brought something fresh to the court. When you're a forward thinker, the only thing you're afraid of is business as

usual and workday is the AI platform that transforms the way you manage people and money today so you can transform tomorrow. Workday moving business forever forward. You know, they asked me to talk about a player that made me think of what I just said, uh, Steph Curry, If you think 21st century, what NBA player impacted professional basketball and basketball the most? The three point shooting,

the skill that Steph brought to it, not only revolutionized how they played basketball in the NBA, but then inspired this whole new generation of players in high school and college, and even affected the woman's game. Players like Caitlin Clark, it all basically starts with Steph when his career really starts taking off with the Warriors in 2013 and 14 and it changed the geometry of basketball. So that's one example.

Anyway, you can learn more about how Workday is changing everything at Workday.com. All right. Now it's just the four of us. Nathan and House have Fairway Rollin, they're taping tomorrow, they're doing their big master's preview. So I want people to listen to that. What you can't get on Fairway Rollin is what it was like to walk the course with Baby today. What a day. What a day.

So, Baby does- Was it fun? It was a lot of fun. It really was. I had a great time with you guys. I really did. So, baby, that's- Was it fun? It was a lot of fun, man. It really was. I had a great time with you guys. I really did. It was awesome. Yeah, because you wouldn't shut up.

You talked about your shot and your shoulder and your strokes and how you were as a 25-year-old golfer. I really was. You're right. I was very- The walking would have been easier if you weren't in my ear. But, you know, I do like talking golf with house. Yeah. But, you know, I do like talking golf with house. Yeah, we're we're we have.

I think we have a very similar handicap and also a somewhat similar passion for the game. He was listening. He was very intently listening. Yeah, no, no, I don't think he was intently. Listen, this is a real highlight of my day, because I didn't know that you were such a golf lunatic. Oh, I'm a lunatic. And number two, I kept on walking in front of you guys

with Sally here and I kept on telling her, Sally's like, this is insane. Because you spoke nonstop, relentlessly. Describing your entire golf history of how far you would hit every club in your bag at different ages of your life. I did. It was like the evolution, you know,

the evolution of my game from age 12 to 60. It was like a sports documentary narrative series that nobody signed up for. I didn't mean to annoy you guys with it. I just get so excited when I- You just get upset now. No, I'm not upset. I just, when I walk those hallowed grounds.

Yeah, I just I get like this this like energy about I just I can't help myself. I'm like obsessed. How do you know that House was enjoying listening to this? I think House was. I think House really loves listening to anyone talk about God. You got to give him a break tomorrow. All right. Tomorrow I'll walk with you guys tomorrow. Well here's the thing. Like you and we were here.

Let's say you can't keep up with Simmons. So it's gonna be someone else. His pace is very brisk. But he's talking about his golf game and everything. And this would go for 40 minutes and then we'd get a break from baby. Like, oh, thank God we don't have to listen to the golf talk. He'd go to the bathroom where you go to smoke somewhere or he'd go to a fucking pro shop for the fourth time in a day.

And they'd keep us waiting for four. So half our day was spent waiting for baby. Well, I only dropped what? 4K today? That wasn't bad. It was right around the over under. So Sal, baby does this thing where he's convinced everybody who's ever met him knows who he is.

Most famously when he accosted Oprah Winfrey in Jimmy's dressing room and did Oprah, Oprah, you remember me, you remember me, and she didn't, and then he was like, no, Oprah, you remember me. And it's a famous story. So we were wondering if he would do that today in the golf course, and you take it from here.

There were a couple, right? It was Cam Smith who's on my team. Yes, it was. Because it was a wake forest connection. Your daughter, my daughters went to wake forest. Yes. And, uh, he was eating a banana after his tea shot. And what'd you do with. Well, so can I, can I background?

So 17 and he's like, I'm gonna, I'm going to get Cam Smith's attention. Yes. Yeah. With the wake forest thing. Yes. And we're like, baby'm going to, I'm going to get cam Smith's attention. Yes. Yeah. With the wake forest thing. Yes. And we're like, baby, definitely don't do that. He's doing a practice round. He's trying to figure out distances. He's not going to acknowledge you.

He's like, no, no, no, I think I can get him. Yes. So he's walking by eating a banana and what happens? Cam cam wake forest. Wait. Oh, I said, first I said cam, uh, uh, Wake Forest. Wait, oh, I said, first I said Cam. We're rooting for you.

We're rooting for you. Best of luck this week. Didn't look up from peeling his banana. Working on the banana, right. And as I said, as I said, Wake Forest guy, Wake Forest connection, he continued to peel the banana and stick it in his mouth and look the other way. He seemed like he paused for a split second.

Yeah. But that was it. He at least might have paused and then there was a follow up. Well, so then there was another one that I thought was a better one. So there, Rory McIlroy. Chang, how dubious were you of this when Baby said I can get Roy to come over. I don't know. On the 18th, I can't express how I felt truly because I didn't know I'd feel embarrassment on that whole because you said you were going to do it and I didn't think you were going to do

it with Cam, but you did. And it was embarrassing, quite frankly, for you and us because we were there. I wasn't embarrassed at all. I was delighted. At least he'd be lucky to know me for that. Now I knew you weren't joking that you were really going to talk to Rory because you have had interactions. I have had multiple interactions with him.

Not today. I don't want to say we're neighbors at the Bears Club, but we're neighbors at the Bears Club. So you position yourself. He's always been a wonderful guy to me and very kind. I would say we're neighbors at the Bears Club, but we're neighbors at the Bears Club. And he's always been a wonderful guy to me, and very kind, he's a gentleman, all that. Can we unwind that for a second? I don't wanna say I'm neighbors with him at the Bears Club,

but I'm neighbors with him at the Bears Club. Yeah, because it sounds so ridiculous. His house is so incredibly beautiful. Does that mean you're neighbors with him at the Bears Club? I mean, he's around the corner, yeah. There's only 80 houses. Sounds like neighbor. That doesn't mean he knows you.

I didn't say he knows me well, but he knows... He doesn't know me well, but when he sees me, he knows who I am. How's that? So that Bears Club house, that was like the fourth Colbert extension? When you try to... When you try to sign the fees to the houses, you have to manage the Simmons wing. What do you complain about?

Cause it sells my outdoor grill. Come on. You know, that just means you're a shitty agent. So who is he playing with? I can't remember. Oh, amateur. I believe. Yeah. And he hits a bomb of a drive on 18.

And, you know, to Bill's credit, he got us to look at how narrow and how stressful it is to actually play 18. He doesn't really do it. Just, there's like five things you kind of have to see at the masters. And one of them is you have to stand behind the 18T to see how hard that is to just thread the needle with the amount of pressure that you might be facing on 18. It's like, it's easy to shake.

It's like dead uphill. Giant, giant trap. Only really one spot to hit it and 19 things can go wrong. Not to mention all the people lined up that you feel like. And it's 18. Yeah. And Roy's 18. Yeah.

Yeah. And Roy bombs his drive right down the middle. Three hundred plus. And, you know, you say you're going to talk to Rory and you have like this prime spot as he's going to walk past. Yes. And I had to turn my back to you. We backed off and gave him a back. Like I was like, let me give you some We backed off and gave him a back. We backed off. Like it was a yo mama fight or something. Let me give you some space, baby doll.

I just couldn't see this car crash. So, Sal, do you want to reenact what Baby said? But the other side of it, imagine if he came over how great that fucking moment would have been, right? Wouldn't that have been cool if he actually came over? But what did you say? You said, Rory, Rory, baby doll.

Yes, I did. That was it. It was just three words. And he heard real. He didn't not only did he stop, I think he sped up when he heard baby doll. Cracked a little smile. I don't know. Maybe I'm imagining like, oh, this is my prison cellmate from 750. So you're helping just in my defense. Yeah. He wins the players two weeks ago or three.

How many weeks ago is that three weeks ago? And you guys are neighbors. And I saw him in the men's grill. And I, of course, congratulated him profusely. And like a thousand people, he was sitting with Shane Lowry at the table. And I talked to him for a minute and did the baby doll thing. What is the baby doll thing? I think we saw it today.

He calls someone's name and they don't respond. I thought maybe it was semi-fresh in his mind. So that's why I had a modicum of confidence that he was going to like, Oh, baby doll. Oh, okay. I'll look, whatever didn't work out that way. Well, as it turns out, these guys are practice rounding and trying to figure out their shots and the distances on every drive, baby doll didn't really trigger him at all when you have been a little weirded out, you picked Rory if he like was so

unfocused that he did come over, I would have been concerned. I feel like they're actually, I know they're but like he's played this tournament, you know, 20 times, 15 times. It's loose out there in these practice rounds. All right. So he just doesn't like you. Yeah. I guess. So 0 for 2 is the legacy. I was 0 for 2. can you tell the origin of, can you tell the origin of the baby doll story? Cause you named him baby doll. I don't think it is much to it other than he says baby doll. He calls everyone baby doll. And I thought this was funny.

And then, so I started calling him baby doll. Right. Exactly right. I mean, it's not fair that he gets to call everyone baby doll. We don't call him back. That was really mean, it's not fair that he gets to call everyone baby doll. We don't call him back. That was really it. There's not much to it. You are the. You are the guy who.

But to me, this is like, I don't know why no one did this. I met him 25 years ago. Someone should have done this 40 years ago. This is like wheels on luggage, like luggage. Oh, he should have had wheels. Right. Not 1978, 1981. I like that. I like that metaphor.

Well, that's it. You should have been Babydoll. So you were hoping because everyone calls you Babydoll and you call everybody Babydoll. Correct. Somewhere in Roy's head as he's figuring out the course, how his swing is, the distances that the Babydoll would trigger like a Pavlovian response. Yes, I did. And he's like, oh, that guy I really like.

Right. Yeah, totally. Isn't that insane of me? But yes, that was what was going through my fucked up mind. Baby doll, I have to say upon reflection, your performance today was inspirational. Oh, this is why I love you, Chang. Thank you. You have to try. Failure is not enough. You just got to try. You don't know what you're going to get. And that's the baby doll magic is just not being afraid. That's it. You got to. Is that the Wayne Gretzky quote?

This one hundred percent of the shots you don't take. That's that's exactly it. You know, and and I know he's a he's a really like decent guy when you when you talk to him, he's a gentleman decent guy when you talk to him. He's a gentleman beyond belief. Why should we believe you? No, because he just is. And he's not some disengaged guy.

And he's always very polite and engaged. So I thought maybe, and it was relatively recent, that we bullshitted and Oh for two. What can I say? I tried. But that wasn't really the highlight sort of the highlight for me was we were talking to a member of Augusta National and Somehow you just let it be known that you were a board member of Wake Forest right off the bat. Absolutely. Which had nothing to do with the conversation at all. Let it be known that you were a board member of Wake Forest right off the bat Absolutely, which had nothing to do with the conversation. You're so proud of that. Why did I?

I hate to add context to this but we're talking about the LPGA and Wake Forest Yes, thank you for the refresher Yes, and I could he was talking about about the ladies amateur being held at Augusta. Which is picking up steam here. Which, which. I think one of the things I learned today is baby's very proud to be on the board of Wake Forest. I am. It's an honor.

It really is. It's an amazing institution. Weren't shy about it. You told the person who made us a pimento cheese sandwich. Pretty much everybody. What is it? We're shy about you told the person who made us a pimento cheese sandwich. What is it? Your grandkids, your family, Wake Forest board, John Stewart, and then way, way lower, all of those other clients. Okay.

I'll go with that. Not way down. Oh yeah. Okay. Jimmy's like under John Stewart. No, no, Jimmy's of course. But this Wake Forest thing shot to the top. I mean, you were really. Remember when the bachelor Matt James was in there for like.

Right, right. All that year. That's the best. No, when he was like right there with Stuart. Right. It's like neck and neck. He was gaining. You were dropping his name everywhere.

He was gaining, absolutely. Well, hey, you're only the bachelor once, right? There's one more baby. There's like so many baby dolls going. It's been a true joy getting to spend a day. It's only been one day. It's amazing. It feels like Christmas.

What's this going to be? So you disappeared quite often. You got in trouble for smoking cigarettes. That was also a highlight. Okay, fair enough. Yeah. But the real highlight was you disappeared. And I think amongst the five of us were like what's going on here?

Why are you not here? And you come back and we all had to sort of eat pro because you bought us all hats. Yes I did. And then it was worth the wait. But a funny can you decide what happened? I mean we had we waited like a half hour for it. Yeah. Right.

And like what then we said he needed a hat. Cause the sun was hot, and for some reason he was scared about skin cancer for once. Yeah. Interesting. And decided to get a hat. No, I actually wanted this exact hat. Is that what it was?

Yeah, cause they didn't have it at the, This was, he was in the pro shop for like an hour and a half, and then 40 minutes later, has to shop even more. Yes, I did. It was like worse than my wife. And then, yeah, so, then he comes out, and like Chang says, he starts throwing, he like gives us all hats. He's It was like worse than my wife. And then yeah. So then he comes out and like Chang says he starts throwing like gives us all hats. He's like, yeah, take a hat. You spend like $250 on talking to some fans of Bill this happening bills a guy smoking comes up talks the bills as high and baby

And I don't know what you said it but you had an extra hat Because so many of us had bought hats already 20 minutes before and you throw it at the guy and you're like, here you're smoking. Take a hat. You almost act the sicker. And he's like, you almost hit me in the head and you're like, well, you got a fucking free hat. Yeah.

What are you complaining about? I mean, come on, dude. Oh, the fucking hat hurt your neck. What happened? You know, I think one of the masters is so polite. Yeah. I mean, come on, dude. Or a fucking hat would hurt your neck. What happened? I think one of the masters is so polite. Yeah. And when people would get mad at Baby for smoking in areas

that you weren't supposed to smoke in, it wasn't like, sir, you're going to have to put that out. It was more like a disappointed, sir, can you please? Yes, they're all so gentlemanly kind. Yes, there's a designated smoking area over here. I can escort you. It's like, I just put it out already, okay? You don't need to escort me.

I'll be lighting one in about five minutes anyway. So it's all good. What's the worst, most depressing designated smoking area you've ever smoked in? Have you smoked in those airport ones where it's like almost your... In Europe where they used to have the like... You're almost saying it's like Andy Dufresne, like solitary confinement. It's literally a smoke chamber.

In a coma. Yes, I have smoked in there. Of course. I used to go like say to myself, why didn't they have this in America? You know, I love that they have this in, in, in, in smoke chambers. Yeah. Smoke chambers. It's like, they all have pet, pet walking relief areas.

Why not have smoking areas? Did you use to smoke like on airplanes, trains, everything? Absolutely. Really? And the people, did you ever like get an argument with anybody? You know, not really. No, because it was. It was legal.

Legal. Can you imagine someone lighting up next to you on a plane. Imagine sitting next to a baby on a train. Oh my God. You're taking the Accela from New York to Boston and he's just lighting up. But those were. You're like, oh, this cologne, I can't take this for a hour.

What the fuck, what is this, a cigarette? What is he doing to me? Those were designated smoking sections. So if you were, all the planes were the worst. Not the planes, but the trains. If you were in a smoking car, you know, not my problem at that point. Right. There are.

That was an amazing era where, cause I would take the train back and forth between my mom, my dad. And you're going to walk to the cafe car and you just walk through the smoking car and it's just like lung cancer for 10 seconds. Where the planes were one row behind was not smoking. Right. You could smoke pipes, cigars, cigarettes, and if you're one row behind, it's like, you're just getting the actual ashtray in the arm. Absolutely. I love that fricking, I love that ashtray.

I really did. They had them on the old cars, too, remember? But no, wait, you were asking me about most depressing smoking places. Depressing. Yeah. Or because sometimes the smokers get relegated to the kids table of life. Yeah, it's not fair. Yeah. I'll tell you the the idea that I could smoke in the office. Up until like wasn't even that long,

by 9, in 2000, you could smoke in the office. So 25 years ago, you could even as an assistant sitting in a cubicle in common areas, and I used to run like a fan under my desk to just kind of like spread the smoke. But yeah, that was insane to think that you could do that. Now, in New York City, it's 25 feet away from the building. So if you smoke near a building, you often get reprimanded. You've paid a smoking fee in a rental car

like 50 times, right? Of course, of course I have. And hotels. Good for you, man. Baby gets offended if there's some sort of penalty for smoking in a rental car. He just assumes. For the percentage of how many rental cars I've had

that I've smoked in and the times I've been nailed, I've done very, very well. Chang, what was it like to have a cigarette that your wife probably shouldn't know about with Babydoll this night? You know, every time I see Babyd was it like to have a cigarette that your wife probably shouldn't know about with Babydoll last night? You know, every time I see Babydoll, Baby gives me a cigarette, and it's just a joyous occasion.

I sucked that thing down, and it was awesome. Thank you, and you love that I have Marlboro Reds, right? I mean, listen, the only way you'd be cooler is if you smoke filterless cigarettes. Yeah, what do you do then? Oh, like the Italian? Yeah, you know, step it up. They get your fingers yellow. That's the Italian? Yeah. Step it up.

They get your fingers yellow. That's the problem with them. Otherwise I kind of like the film. If Baby's enough colors, he doesn't have to have yellow fingers. What is it? You have enough colors going on already. I changed my orange fingers. Look, they're pretty good for a show.

My fingers be orange. No, like another thing that happened, it's been total joy. By the way, is he going to come on Thursday night too? We'll probably have a thousand Mary Dolls there. It's going to joy. By the way, is he going to come on Thursday night? So we'll probably have a thousand. Yeah. So it's going to be the whole podcast. I mean, the ringer has a great podcast about TV shows and White Lotus. Yeah. I think last night I almost pissed my pants

because before we all went to bed, we were watching the last episode of season three, White Lotus all over again. Yes. And I just couldn't stop laughing watching the last episode of season three, white Lotus all over again. I just couldn't stop laughing because I think that we need to have. A all cast of you, a man in cast. That's the baby cast. It's like a rewatchables, but live. Yeah. Cause you were the only one saying it live.

I'm not right. I hadn't seen that. I'm not sure. Live you were the only one seeing it live. Yes. Right. I hadn't seen that. I'm not sure live would be the best idea. But maybe just it would need about 16 or 17 hours. Yeah. So we watch. But I think it would be good. We watched last night. We'd all seen it, but baby hadn't seen it.

So we watched White Lotus with you. There was a couple of wild. I liked when he told the guy to jump at the end. Tim Ratliff looking out. You were so young. Wild. I liked when he told the guy to jump at the end. Tim Ratliff looking out. Well, he's going to make them drink that shit. What the fuck you trying to kill your kids? It's like you've been trying to kill yourself for nine episodes. Just fucking jump. Get it over with.

It's like you forgot that we were in the room with you watching. Yes, I did. You were so I had a few glasses of wine. I was tired from the day. And yeah, there was a lot of strays on the white Lotus cast. Yeah. Yeah. But guy talk, you put some chest hair on him during the show. I told him to grow, grow a pair. Pussy. I mean, I've never seen a bigger pussy hold a gun, you know? It's like, come on. a pussy, hold a gun, you know? It's like, come on. Oh man. Okay. What other TV are you watching, baby, before we go? Any other favorites?

He watches on the couch. I watched the first two episodes of Mobland. I thought it was amazing. Have you seen the Mobland yet? I haven't seen it yet. How about 1923? Nah, I haven't seen that. A lot of smoking in that show. I loved Mobland. Mobland, okay.

Yes. Second episode, you know, a lot of set up in episode one gets, and it's good. Second episode, you see where it's going, it's awesome. Tom Hardy is incredible. Who for your money is the best smoker in movies or TV? Any questions? As an actual smoker. Yeah.

You mean like in real life? No, no. Who pulls off smoking the best? I'll tell you, Brad Pitt's pretty good at it. What? Really? Doesn't he smoke in like in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood? He does like the turns the hand.

I like the way he smokes. Really? Damon, we just did Good Will Hunting for rewatchables and Damon's really good. Okay. And Cole Hauser in that movie, Chris Ryan did a whole thing about how he gets rid of a cigarette, grabs a beer and waves them for the car on one motion. Oh, very good. I got to check it out.

De Niro is usually- De Niro to me is the goat. De Niro of Goodfellas. That's the best ever. Okay. fair enough. I'll go with that. Remember the scene when he's sizing up Maury, when he decides to kill Maury? Yeah, he's just kind of staring him down, taking a slow drag.

There's been some bad smokers too. All right. Who would be an example? Out of movies we've done a rewatchable, there's a really tough Keanu Reeves hardball scene. Oh, really? He's trying to smoke. He's like a degenerate, but it's clear. But Tom Cruise is the worst. I mean, you can tell who the non, the real non-smokers are who have never really smoked in their life or just smoking because the character. I think Keanu is a real smoker. You think? Yeah, he is. He screwed up the

hardball thing. I don't know. Constantly he smokes a lot. The people like the Cruz type of people are always my favorites. Could you be brought on as a consultant baby? You know there was a great smoker? I'm smoking consulting. Yeah. Yeah. You should. I'd love to. Like they have doctors. Is that a good job? Because I'm in baby. I think it kind of is. Yeah. Is that a human job? Because I'm in it. I think it kind of is. Yeah. Leo, Leonardo in Django Unchained.

Yeah. Playing Candy, Candy was his last name, but I can't remember his first name. Whatever, not a great character. But he smoked with that cigarette holder. Yeah. And man, he was good at it. He was really good at it.

You ever done a cigarette holder? I have tried them when I was a kid. They're fucking ridiculous. I mean, I don't even know what that is. Hey baby, did you ever go through a phase where you rolled your own cigarettes? No. Never did. No. Uh-uh. How could you recreate a Marlboro, a work of fucking art, you know?

You know my old joke, right? I'm tearing up there. No. You know the old joke. Is it offensive? No, not at all. Okay. Not at all. Baby doll, how much you smoke?

I smoke a lot. No, seriously, how much you smoke? I smoke a lot. No, like seriously, how much do you smoke? Well, let me put it to you this way. I go through two lighters a day. There you go. That was a Bill Hicks line that I adopted.

Oh, you just said that's your joke. No, well, I adopted it, may he rest in peace, but it does get people off. When you do that joke, they stop asking how much you smoke. It just diffuses the whole thing. We asked you yesterday, what joke? What celebrity did you have the most cigarettes with over the last 35 years? And Dennis, Larry's name came up, Bill Hicks was up there.

Hicks was up there. Who was the one we decided? Chappelle. Chappelle. Yeah. Oh, tons of cigarettes with Chappelle. I mean, Chappelle is like the one of the all time. He's the greatest smoker of this generation.

Better smoker or comedian? Oh, wow. Right? I mean, I, I'm going to go with comedian because that's a real talent. And he's, he's, uh, don't sell yourself short. But what I love about your pal is he smokes everywhere he goes. It doesn't matter. Hotel rooms, wherever lobbies of hotels, studio 8H on SNL, doesn't matter if it's a fire zone, he's always smoking.

Comedy clubs, you're not supposed to smoke in there anymore. He's got a cigarette going everywhere, and may God have mercy on the soul of anybody who tells him put that cigarette out. And you've actually spent real time with Ship House, so if you did the ship, Dave, Dave, it's baby doll. He would actually stop and come over. Oh, come on.

Yo, he come over for, yeah, no, Dave. I've known since. I think he should have thrown a hat at Rory like he did that other guy. Maybe he would have gotten his attention that way. Don't give me ideas tomorrow. There's always tomorrow. Baby, before we go,

what is your single favorite thing about Augusta? And try to turn toward these guys. So you're on the camera at least a little bit. Um. Just skim the side of baby's head for 20 minutes. I have no idea. But I don't know the talent. Hold on.

Let me think for a second, because I love so much of it. Well, I'll talk to Chang about it, as you for some reason think of your answer for two minutes. Chang, what's your favorite thing about Augusta? Because you're like a naturally kind of pessimistic guy. Yeah, we've been friends for a long time. This place really- And you see where I'm like happy. Yeah, this place like really-

But you said a whole thing in the car on the way to the chorus about how incredible Augusta and the operation and the whole thing, you've kind of been inside the gates. I'm one of the, maybe the only person that's ever had behind the scenes access because I filmed some stuff in 2019 when Tiger won. And I think that it's number one,

the best sporting event you can go to in America. Yes. It's the best run operation. 100%. business or anything Otherwise there may be out. It's flawless Everything is done with intention and it's executed at a high level Yes, and I think it's just I'm happy here. I just am and I'm not normally as Bill No, I'm right with you. I mean it's golf heaven when you step on that course

It's like no other but you don't have you have to like golf.'s golf heaven. When you step on that course, it's like no other course. But you don't even have to like golf to appreciate it. No, you don't. You don't. But if you love golf, like we do, it's just so unique. It's such a different. Everything about it is so, it's like if you died and went to heaven and that was that was.

Like Field of Dreams, cornfield. It really, it is that. And also like I just love being around anything golf and that is kind of the, this is the cradle and apex of golf and golf fans and it's just my whole vibe. You know, I love it. I was thinking, because I was thinking about it today because I went to the US Open.

I went to a couple golf tournaments in the last couple years. Sure, sure. And all these other courses, like basically every other course that has a tournament, there are also, the tournament comes in and out. It's the courses and built for the tournament. It's built for 52 weeks a year of having members.

And then they kind of shoehorn the tournament into it. And there'll be porta potties and weird cart pass and the parking's weird. And things are disjointed. All this place cares about is this week. Right. I mean, they have other stuff. They have the members and all that stuff, but it's all like a long game for this one week and every single thing has to to be perfect for the moment you show up to when you

walk toward the thing and you go through the gates, every single thing you see. They've really put thought into. And I just, I appreciate that. I think it was like a combination that has an immaculate feel of Disneyland and like central park. And there's like you said, and I think it's because they're not different events moving in and out. There's no wasted space. Forget about the greens.

You turn a corner and you're going to see a shade of green you've never seen before. That's great too. But even the pathways and everything like you're talking about, like it doesn't seem like there's any wasted space. It's all beautiful. Well, and then we talked about this every time we come, but the no phone thing is actually a real advantage. Even Sal, we were worried about Sal. I think I did okay. Yeah. I had withdrawal for the first, like you did.

Well, I went to my pocket like seven times. Yeah. You really were like jonesing for that. Then I felt like, you know, it was a little, like a little white Lotusy when Saxon starts reading halfway through the season. Right. And it's like, maybe there's more. Interesting.

Maybe that maybe, maybe I can test myself. And it's like, you were like, maybe I don't have to try to figure out how to bet on this practice. I think you're right. You have to just acclimate yourself to where you were and accept it and then go, okay. It helped that we were all talking to each other and making each other laugh. It's like when someone's sick and they're going to vomit, you're like, all right, if you talk to this person enough, they're not going to get mad at it. I don't have'm, I'm. It helped that we were all talking to each other and making each other laugh. It's like when someone's sick and they're going to vomit, you're like, all right, if you talk to this person enough, they're not going to get them out of it. I don't have to focus on it, but.

Chang, were you disappointed? Sauda, Neep more. What are you talking? What? Number one, I'm the course. I mean, on the course, but for those that don't know, Sal is not a big drinker. Right. And the fact that he started the day with the bloody Mara is like, this is an

auspicious size. It's going to be a good week. Number one, two. He ate a lot of food. Thank you. It was disgusting. Thank you. And then he hit the course. You ate a pimento cheese sandwich and I knew you were full. I knew you were disgustingly full.

But you still waltzed down. I was like, this guy is bringing. You're bringing your A game. Yeah. For about 50, he's not wasting that. People don't know the food here is amazing. It's affordable. You could buy 12 beers for $12. We're keeping that anywhere. Yeah, it's only 3000 to get in. But then they get for cheese and wonder bread.

They charge the master so different. Touch on what you said, Bill, which is, you know, it's obviously the only major that's always in the same location, right? So that alone sets it apart from all the other majors. And like everyone's just so fucking happy to be there because it is expensive and you have to get to it. And like it's a bucket list place that at least half those people, at least half are there for the first time. And everybody's just like, holy shit, pinch me.

I did it. Well, listen, I all I'll have to say is, as the great Terry Kuhn said in White Lotus, I'm happy to have a seat at the table, but I am going to make a mess at that seat with bread and rice and cheese and everything else when I get up. Thanks for having us. South finishes last in the picks so that we can load down a good chance. Mento pulled pork, egg salad, egg salad, chicken, biscuit, biscuit. What else? BLT. It's the master's club, which is like a BLT. I mean, that sounds great. Now I hope I finished last tune. You put it that way.

We're going to be back Thursday for more stuff. Yeah. Chang, you have a beautiful face. Sal, you have a beautiful life. Baby? You're just beautiful in general. So are you baby. Thank you. Thank you to you three. Thanks to house and Nathan as well. Thanks to Gahau and Kyle and Eduardo for helping us out today and the on the pod. And we're going to be back on Thursday.

Don't forget to check out the prestige TV podcast and the rewatchables as well. If you miss white lotus, if you missed our rewatchables we did on the St. Luke Balcomer and I hope you're checking out Celtic City on Max as well. We will see you on Thursday. I don't have a few years with him. On the wayside, on the front side of the river, I said I don't have a few years with him. Must be 21 plus in President-elect states for Kansas and affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus in President DC. Gambling problem? Call 1 RG dash help.com call 1-887-897777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit MD gambling help.org in Maryland hope is here

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