The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ep. 175: Brian Koppelman and David Shoemaker

Episode Date: February 13, 2017

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons brings on 'Billions' creator Brian Koppelman to discuss Jim Dolan's Fredo complex (5:00), Phil Jackson's influence on the Knicks (14:00), the greatest moment in Knicks history (20:00), Season 2 of 'Billions' (28:00), and the potential of a 'Rounders' sequel (38:00). Then, The Ringer's David Shoemaker joins to discuss the Andre the Giant documentary announcement (50:00) and preview 'WrestleMania 33' (1:02:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by SeatGeek. That's our presenting sponsor since 1978. The NBA and NHL seasons are a full swing. SeatGeek is the smartest, easiest way to get tickets to your favorite team's games. Buy and sell tickets in just two taps on your phone. Have SeatGeek help you find the best seats at the best prices. Fully guaranteed. And if you're looking for concert tickets, even better.

I've had SeatGeek on my phone for two years and it is by far the easiest way I've found to shop for tickets thanks to their revolutionary grading system. Try it out. Download the SeatGeek app today or go right to SeatGeek.com. Just do it. How many times do I have to tell you? We're also brought to you by the Ringer University Podcast.

That's where you can find Teed Up, our excellent college basketball podcast with Mark Titus and Tate Frazier, who's producing this podcast right now. We are a month away from March Madness. I looked it up. I did the math. Those guys can help you with your bracket. They can help you with your gambling

on the conference championships. They can help you with both. Whatever else you need. Two young dudes who watch an insane amount of college basketball. Also, check out Titus' collegebasketball column on theringer.com right now. And check out our Ringer Draft big board that we have Jarks, O'Connor, Danny Chow.

I think those are the three writing it. Gotta get Titus in there too, but we've been doing this big board and every time they put Malik Monk four spots lower than he should be and it makes me mad. But our college basketball content has really heated up so check that out check out the ringer you podcast subscribe now

and check out uh titus's column on the ringer i also wanted to mention uh we're taping this on a monday and we announced our andre the giant documentary which is my dream sports doc project dating back to when I created 2000 in 2007, created 30 for 30. Andre the Giant was at the top of every list we made. Um, always impossible to pull off cause the WWE, um, just loved Andre and wanted to wait for the right time and the right situation, the right place. And it took a long, long time to get to the moment where we could announce it, that, uh, that we're going to do it. And I think, you know,

when you just talk about the footage, when you talk about the stories that people have about this guy, when you talk about the one of a kind character that he was like, really, you talk about unicorns now with Porzingis and Giannis and people like that. This guy was the ultimate sports unicorn. There's never been another. And we have a chance to make a really good movie about it. Great director named Jason Hare

doing this with HBO and The Ringer and the WWE, obviously. But we're very excited it got announced today. And I think it's in the right hands and it's time so we're gonna talk a little bit later we're gonna talk to David Shoemaker about Andre and about WrestleMania coming up first we're gonna talk to Brian Koppelman who is my longtime friend who is the co-creator of Billions and is a giant giant Knicks fan and we're gonna talk some Knicks and some Billions. So here we go.

On the line right now, my old friend Brian Koppelman, the co-creator of Billions, once upon a time wrote a movie called Rounders, which I've only referenced in 10 million different columns. Did a podcast for Grantland way back when, and is one of the top seven most tortured Knicks fans that I know, which is the real reason we're calling, even though Billions premiered last night, actually, in Showtime.

No, no, you're right. It premieres this coming Sunday night, February 19th. Oh, I already watched it. It was on demand. I didn't even know it was on demand. Yeah, you get it on demand early. Yeah, I love that the networks do that now. I watched The Missing early on Starz, too.

I watched that one on demand. That was great. I love when everything's just available and at my fingertips. But let's talk Knicks first. So 17 years at Dolan. And there's been some low points. I even thought we might have hit a nadir with Isaiah. And yet this feels even worse.

How are you feeling? Have you given up hope? Can you win? Can you even compete for a finals if James Dolan is your owner? Wow, man. It's so, first of all, you know, the thing you said a second ago

about that I had a podcast for Grant Lynn. I just want to say that you gave me, like you giving me that podcast was such a big deal in my life. I'm so grateful for it. It's still going. And, you know, it was great. And that started because I did this podcast with you years ago. So thanks for

that. It's called The Moment. And you gave me a place to vent. Yes. But and you gave me a place to vent about the Knicks. You know, I used to write about the Knicks for Grantland, too. Right. And even the last piece I wrote was called The Knicks Suck, and it was about how they'll always suck as long as Dolan is in charge. And I mean, I was thinking about it when the Oakley thing happened the other night, obviously, and I got hundreds of texts and tweets and heartbreak.

And I was thinking, well, how different is that from Van Gundy being dragged dragged by a lot of the morning across the floor just big to me of being and expand the pain and humiliation uh... is just at analyst so finals can they can they get to the final click that even that i can't meet out so uh... absurdly hopeful uh... that that that they could have a full jackson's fan uh... i believe phil's working hard at this absurdly hopeful. They have faith in him. And I'm a Phil Jackson fan. I believe Phil's working hard at this.

And I believe Phil is, you know, one of the smartest basketball people of our lifetimes. He's proven it. But I don't know if the Dolan, it's not even a Dolan curse. It's not as magical as that. I don't know if the evil of Jim Dolan can be defeated by any mortal.

You know, I was on TV doing the ESPN NBA show when they hired Phil Jackson. It was the second year I was on the show. And I was, listen, I've been wrong a million times. But I was a voice crying in the wilderness, just being skeptical about the fact that a guy in his been in his 70s who lived in los angeles who had never held a front office job before would suddenly be able to compete as a gm with these guys who have either been doing it for years like danny ange who has this whole full staff of people around him that it's just become like a clinic, how they put it together. Or somebody like Daryl Morey, who's breaking down all this advanced metric stuff and doing

a bunch of scanning. Or, you know, there's 10, 12, 13 pretty competent and good GMs who on weekends are like in Turkey watching some center prospect. Or they're at the Pac-12 championships. And I was just really dubious that he could pull this off just because he's the Zen master and always going to figure it out. And then he comes in, he,

you know, the Kurt Rambis thing was, was crazy. The giving up on Fisher as fast as they did, unless there was more to the story, that was weird. Trying to do a triangle when the whole league has moved to three pointers.

I didn't understand that and i gotta say i'm not surprised by any of this i'm not surprised by one thing that's happened over the last three years deep down you can't be surprised right no i mean i i am i'm not surprised because of the dolan of it all right but i i do see, so I've come to know Phil a little bit over the past year. Okay. And I see how much he, I didn't know him before, but I've had like five dinners with him this year. I know him now. Wow.

And I really like him and see how much he cares about this. He knows way more than you think he does about not only the statistical breakdown of these people, he knows all the players. He knows their strengths and weaknesses. He is obsessed. I would say that I thought from afar beforehand that it would be like, you know, like obviously you know on Twitter,

like I think Trump's a disaster and part of it is that he's this guy who's 70 years old so he's set in his ways. So I understand your point, but when I sit with Phil, what I see is you can ask Phil about Justin Holliday, and I'll talk about Justin, his brother, what happened, how they came up, the difference in the two of them, why they're players. So he is not clueless and out of it. I just think that that situation is

incredibly difficult. And I think it's difficult for tons of reasons, mostly because I also think Carmelo is terrible. You know, there's this narrative that Porzingis is, you know, Porzingis is so much to learn from Carmelo. But when I think of it, I think that Carmelo is like Denzel in Training Day, and that Porzingis is Ethan Hawke. And he has to find a way really quickly to recognize what he's dealing with and know he can't actually learn from this guy. Yeah, and I would say Porzingis, it's been bad for him to be on this team this year. And I actually think he might be worse at basketball than he was three months ago.

And I'm a huge Porzingis fan, but I have not seen progress. I know, you've named him the unicorn. I think you came up with unicorn, right? Yeah. Which to me is the best nickname for him ever. I just haven't seen progress, and I don't blame him 1% because he's on this team that has these two ball-dominant guys. And especially like the last seven minutes,

which is really when you need your reps, when you're going to be a special player. And he's just a decoy. He might as well be like Sam Perkins in the 1996 finals, just kind of standing 25 feet away. I've been thinking of Channing Frye, who was so great until Larry Brown ruined him. Right, right. And Channing Frye had a real chance, and then Larry Brown ruined him as a coach. And Porzingis is way, way, way more gifted, and I want him on the team forever.

But I think he needs to be out of sort of the influence of Carmelo. But really, it's an emotional, I mean, even when you rooted for the Sox who didn't win, or the bad years for the Patriots after Plunkett, and you've never lived through what we lived through, which is just this totally dispiriting, crushing, everyday something horrible and painful. You know, I have a 21-year-old son who's a diehard, lifelong, and it's just over and over, nothing but crushing disappointment.

And the emails I get every day from people who are like, you know, want to just continue to cut it. It hurts. Who are the other six, by the way? Who do you have? You said, I'm like around the seventh. Who are a couple who are as bad as me? Wait, Sammy's 21. I'm still reeling from that piece of information. What, what year, what year at Harvard is he? Is he a junior? Yeah. When is he going to, when is he going to win for the ringer? When do I have to start carving out a little spot for him?

If I were you, I'd be locking him in pretty quickly. And by the way, he made me listen to the Durant. Him and my friend Jeff were like, you've got to listen to the Durant episode. And I did, and now I know no matter what, this is 17 levels of disappointment for people

because that's one of the best podcasts I've heard in five years. Oh, thanks. It certainly was an unconventional podcast. I've never taped a podcast at 1 o'clock at night. You guys got talking in a way. You guys got talking. You got him talking in a way. I've almost never heard a professional athlete talk,

and that was really a special thing. And if anyone hasn't heard it, they got to go back and hear it. And that was, you know, you did it like that was high level. You know, what's funny about it is he was better in the podcast than I was. I have a lot of regrets. I was like half awake. I'm usually asleep by 1230. It's like those NBA players, they're like peaking and they go to bed at like four in the morning.

But there's a couple of things. We're going to do it again, I think, next month. And there's a couple. I think you really know. I viewed it differently. I thought you were using your tiredness the way like a movie detective would, where you just kind of slowly were like, yeah, but isn't it? And then you got him going.

I thought it was like full Columbo, man. There was no. Thanks. Yeah. I thought it was like full Columbo, man. There was no... Thanks. Well, he was amazing. And the funny thing is he could have gone for three hours. But, you know, it was doing that pod with him on Wednesday and not knowing what was going to happen in OKC. And, you know, he knew he was going to get booed.

He knew it wasn't going to be a pleasant experience. But there was a level of, uh, of anger and hostility and vitriol in the arena that I thought it, it, I just thought it was a little too far. It just was too angry and it made me uncomfortable. And the only time I can remember a couple of times with Celtics games,

like the game after Ralph Sampson punched Jerry Sechding in the finals, when he came out the next thing in the garden crowd was so mad and it was, it was at that level and they're booing him and that sports. And it was the same thing the next year with Bill Lambert and the Easter conference finals after he had deck bird and parish punched him the next game and just real hatred for him. But the only time I ever remember feeling like the crowd was crossing the line in a way that made me uncomfortable in a Boston game

was the wife-beater chance at Jason Kidd in the 2002 Eastern Finals where it's going on and you're just like, wow. This has gone to a personal level that it just made – this isn't what sports is about. See, I like that one because i understand i understood that one but but but the problem is she you know the problem was she was there and right that's what pushed it over the top as she was in the third row she one of the games she was sitting right in front of me and it just it crossed some line that i just didn't make

me make me feel great and i did feel a twinge of that during the OKC. What I was thinking of yesterday was when, you know, because Dolan makes the big show of bringing Spree to the Knicks game. And I was thinking that the Garden, when Spree came back and was making the choking gestures at Dolan and got in his face, the Garden was like that. Like, I was at that game. And it was one of the only times we went full-throated.

Like, the entire Garden was full throttle, full throat on Dolan, behind Luttrell. And it was, you know, it was as electric in a dark way as the Jeremy Lin days were electric in a positive way. And it was all directed at, finally, there's an avatar for us, Luttrell, telling Dolan what we think of him. And so I want to see the movie of the day. I want the 24 hours that got Luttrell sitting next to him.

I don't understand. That seems to me like the biggest player move that Dolan has ever made. Like, to somehow get, what did he have to do to get Spree sitting there? Like, is there money Spree was owed in 10 years and Dolan said, I'll forward it eight years to you now? Like, what do you think happened? Did someone hand a bag to Spree? Yeah, I think it felt a little monetary would be my guess.

I'm sure he was compensated for his travel. I'm sure he was compensated for his first travel. I'm sure he flew him in. I'm sure he stayed at a beautiful hotel, first-class tickets, and probably, probably greased his palms a little bit. And you know what? Here's the difference for me with Dolan versus like some of the other terrible owners that have happened over the years,

like Dan Snyder. And even like, even though Steinbrenner had a lot of success, but just how irrational Steinbrenner was. And then you watch like what's happening with Trump now where it's just so unpredictable day to day he's going to change his mind on stuff he's going to fire people all that stuff Dolan's the opposite Dolan hires the person and then just completely trust him like he said I thought the Michael K interview that he did was that was one of my big takeaways was Dolan was so adamant about

look, I made a deal with the guy. I told him this was his team. What can I do? This is his show. I can't renege on my deal with Phil and I'm thinking like, well, first of all, you can totally renege on it. You're the owner. But I think in a weird way, his biggest

weakness is that he doesn't meddle enough does that make sense well i don't i don't i don't know i don't think that like uh some of the gms before phil would say that right i mean i'm sure you've heard all the stories and i've heard him too about the way the mellow trade went and i believe that dolan put himself right in the middle but they didn't really have maybe did't really have a GM at that time that really was empowered? Because the only two people that he really empowered were Isaiah and Phil Jackson. I don't remember him really empowering anybody else to that degree. You're right. I agree. Yes. No, not the way that he has Phil.

But who knows? Look, when you have a billionaire's son given a franchise like this, and it's this many years later, and he still hasn't done anything on his own except become a decent guitar player, it's time to recognize what he is. A disaster? Yeah, an unmitigated, horrible disaster. And, you know, there are good people. As I said, I think Phil has blown me away with his knowledge of all these players and the league and whether the results are on the floor is super present. I know Steve Mills. Steve Mills and I went to the same high school, who is, you know, the other guy there.

And he's been a Knicks lifer. And I just think it's gone. school is you know the other guy there being i'd admit to life or and i just think it's all i think it there was a different order there'd be a different atmosphere there would be a different kind of possibility of life i mean you know you can argue about whether william the uh... should get more playing time uh... but that's not you know it's not really about how they're managing this

group of players. It's about the entire vibe and feeling and culture that comes from above. So I've had it. As I said when I was on Seth Meyers one night, to me, Jim Dolan is like Fredo Corleone, but worse, because at least Fredo was banging cocktail waitresses two at a time. So that's, you know, and that is what I believe. So I've had it, I've had runs like you're having, not as long, not as depressing, but like the Celtics after Bird retired, when it was the old owner who was another owner's son, the rich guy's son, nine out of 10 times is a disaster because it's somebody who didn't make

his money his own way who basically had everything handed to him from day one and just doesn't think the same way somebody who become it's the difference between frank sinatra and frank sinatra jr right frank sinatra jr i saw him in the grammys and memorial montage it's like frank sinatra jr singer and it's like Frank Sinatra Junior was a singer because his dad was Frank Sinatra and I think that's the case with some of these owners but we had stretches like this in Boston

like the Patriots had terrible owners I think the difference with the Knicks is that it's been this way now pretty much continuously with some successful hiccups for 40 years. And people seem to think like, oh, yeah, the Knicks, they're one of the marquee franchises.

It's the Lakers, Celtics, and the Knicks. And it's like the Knicks have won two titles since 1946. You know? The Knicks have had – I think that's only people our age. It's only people our age who still think that it's – they're a marquee franchise. Knicks fans all have second favorite teams now, man.

You know what I mean? Like, Nick fans root for them. If you're Nick's fan, it's justified to have a second favorite team that you know you're going to be pulling for in the playoffs. That's just how it is. Like, you're just rooting for a specific player or something. Yeah, I get that. But the thing is, like...

Yeah, like, Sammy's rooting for LeBron. Like, Sammy will always root for LeBron. Right. Like, that's his... You know, because of the age he was. So it's like the Knicks, and when the Knicks are clearly done, you switch.

I've always rooted for the Mavericks for some reason. I like Mark, and I've been, like, rooted for the Mavericks. But, like, that, you have a second-favorite team if you're a Knicks fan. I think that's just part of it

because you can't have any faith. But the tantalizing thing... The tantalizing thing and the thing that keeps sucking people back with the Knicks, first of all, you have seven generations of fans, or not seven, seven decades of fans, which is basically like five generations. And you're talking about like, you know, the famous screenwriter William Goldman, who's still sitting there courtside, who's in my top seven most tortured Knicks fans. But he's been going since the 60s. Yeah, he's in his late 70s now. And his generation has been rooting for the Knicks since, you know, DeBuscher and Willis were there. And then you have people like your son and people younger than that. And you think about that,

you have a, there's just not a lot nba teams that can span 70 plus years of fans and the other thing i've noticed with them you know the knicks have had these moments over the years right everybody points to the riley's knicks and even like the net the incredible 1999 strike season the the run when ewing got to her can be all that stuff and you get it just a great couple years out of spreewell and that whole run. But you've also had these little hiccup moments. You know, like when Marbury was traded, I went to a couple of those playoff games. Like there was a three-month run there with Marbury and the Knicks when that was like a thing.

Bernard King for a year and a half, that was a thing. Like when you have the right team and the right player. April 27th. Come on, April 27th, April 27th, 1984. Yeah? That was the high point. That was it. What's that, Game 5?

Against Isaiah. Oh, my God. Yeah, Bernard against Isaiah. That's what it is. That was my 18th birthday. That was the night of my 18th birthday was that game. Watching that game on TV was my 18th birthday. And it was as good a birthday as I've ever had because of what that game was.

And that was like the best moment we've had, man. That's one of the best round one playoff games of all time. And I actually remember where I watched that game because Bernard's running two-hand follow-up dunk in overtime was like the greatest non-Celtics moment of my life up to that point. And I went in my room and I just did it on my Nerf hoop for an hour after that. It was just, nobody had the two-handed running follow-up like that. But you've had these moments and the crowd is great. And now that Golden, like I went to Golden State's game on Wednesday night against the Bulls and that crowd has completely changed.

That used to be the most diverse, all kinds of classes and ethnicities and just everything. And now it's just the wealthiest crowd in the league. And it's not the same crowd. It's a good crowd. It's not the crowd that it was. And I still think MSG and Boston, when they bring their fastballs, and I hate to say it, but the right Lakers team with the right people in the stadium, that's a great crowd, too. There's some classics, but New York is at the top.

And Linsanity, those three weeks, the crowd, the way... I mean, that's what's frustrating about this, is when the Knicks are good, the NBA's more fun. Well, yeah. I mean, I wrote this thing for Grant Lynn called Carmelo Anthony Joy Wrecker about that night, about

Jeremy Lynn, that run, and how magical and how special that run was. And what it felt like to end, and it was the day that I was fired that I wrote the thing, knowing that that might be the last great moment while Dolan is the owner. I have to tell you, about two months ago, I was invited to play in one of those charity poker tournaments, and I get there and I go sit at my table, and sitting right next to me, like the other person who hadn't paid to go but who had asked to be there, was Charles Smith, who, you know, caused me as much pain.

And he's sitting to my left at the poker table, and I don't know what to do. I don't know, do I turn to this guy and say, you don't know, you're responsible for a week of sleep and nights for me and nightmares? And I limped out. I couldn't. He was such a nice guy. The problem was, you know, he couldn't get up there.

He couldn't be aggressive. And he was just such a sweet dude that I couldn't. It was killing me. I just wanted to say, you, and I couldn't. I failed. Do you think you could have, could you have stepped up in that moment and said something, you think?

Can I defend Charles Smith for a second? Yeah, try. I said he was a nice guy. He's trying to score. Go ahead, defend him. He's trying to score against two of the greatest athletes in the history of the league. He got fouled on at least two of those things of those things really badly like pippin at one point just hacks him and they're just not calling anything because it's jordan and pippin and i

don't know man there's that under the basket replay where it's like wow if that happened in the internet era now i don't think charles smith's a goat i think everybody's reaction is going to be how the hell did they not call? We have better pictures. The cameras are better. It's tough. This is amazing. If this was one of your players, there's no way you'd say any of this.

No. He just had to get a duty, a sacred obligation to get up to the hoop. But that's who he was. He was a finesse power forward. This wasn't Sean Kemp under the basket jumping up and dunking people. He was, ah. Well, the point is, I couldn't, I did last, I made sure to bust him out of the table,

but that's all I could do. You know, if you watch that game pretty carefully, there were lots of different ways you could have put away that game. But I will remind Knicks fans, because they seem to leave this part out. It was a 2-2 series. This wasn't like Bill Buckner. This wasn't even the Atlanta Falcons just completely falling apart in the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl. If you win the game, you're up 3-2.

You still have to go back to Chicago for game six. You're still going against the greatest player of all time. You know, I don't know. Come on. It was the moment you knew the series was over. Yeah, you weren't coming back and winning game six. To me, game six of the 94 finals is the one that would keep me awake at nights. Because that was so winnable. And God, man,

just the fact that your whole championship relied on John Starks having to make a three-pointer with a hand in his face, that you didn't have any better option than that was probably why you didn't win the title. The thing is, when I think about Starks and Mason, and I got to write Mason's eulogy

for Sports Illustrated, which is one of my favorite things I could have ever written. Out of all the movies, like everything, I got to write Mason's obituary for SI. And as you know, I'm not a sports writer, so just to get to do that was incredible. But those guys worked. Those guys played above who they were for so long. If you think about the idea in all these books now, like Daniel Kahneman and Gladwell about

everyone returning to the mean, like, of course, John Starks had to return to being a guy who was what he was, which was not even as good a version of Vinnie Johnson or something. He was just a guy who could get incredibly hot and be unconscious and worked so hard, and so did Mason. Like, those teams tried so – they gave everything. So I think, you know, when you lose, you are heartbroken. When the finger roll didn't go, it was devastating. But, you know, those guys were out there working so hard.

Whereas I look at this team now, and I see our leader is, you know, just not a guy who knows how to – yes, he's the 25th leading scorer of all time, but every coach who's ever had him would say he doesn't make the other guys better, he makes them worse. Well, you know, the other thing with Carmelo that's pretty much irrefutable is he pushed for that trade to happen in 2011 when he could have just signed with them as a free agent that summer. And he did it because he wanted to make more money, but they gave up a bunch of assets that actually would have helped him. If you know,

he was really serious about winning the title. He tried to have a boat. It was a bad poker player. Yeah. Dolan was a bad poker player. He didn't understand the hand that he was sitting with. He didn't know that Carmela's wife wanted to come that badly to New York. he,

or I think he probably did know, and he just couldn't. Like, just sit there at the poker table, let the blinds go, don't put all your chips in, like, let it go by, and then eventually wait for the right moment and make your move. And he did. You know, and it's funny because there's a couple much lower-level versions of this. The trade deadline's next week, right?

Orlando needs to trade Serge Ibaka. He's not going to resign there. They need to give more playing time for Aaron Gordon. And it's starting to come out now, like Serge Ibaka is available. Who's going to get him? If you just go through the rosters, there's 13 teams that have a winning record right now, right?

And you figure like those 13, maybe eight of them could use somebody like Serge Ibaka. If you just start crossing them off, like Oklahoma City can't trade for him because you can't trade for a guy crossing them off, like Oklahoma City can't trade for him because you can't trade for a guy that you already traded for. Washington can't trade for him because they don't have the contracts.

You get on the line, and there's really only two teams, Boston and Toronto, that have the contracts and the assets to actually get Serge Ibaka. So now this is like a poker match, as you said, with Dolan. Right.

Dolan didn't even have the second suitor for Carmelo. He was the only suitor. And Denver somehow negotiated a really, really good deal that at the time— Oh, yeah, you know what you just taught me? What? You know what you just made me realize? Is that he's not only Fredo. He's also the worst of Jack Waltz because he thinks a man in his position cannot afford to look ridiculous.

Right. And he's so afraid of looking ridiculous that he's going to go up against Don Corleone and end up with the horse's head in his bed every fucking time. So now you have, he's in a situation with Carbello where the Cavs just don't have the contracts and they'd be insane to give up Kevin Love for him. The Clippers, they've already said they don't want to trade in their big guys. The Celtics, either they're playing possum or they're genuinely not interested. All my intel says they're just not interested.

So now what do you do? You have Phil who's undermined him. I don't buy the whole, everybody's like, oh, Phil Jackson, what free agent would sign there now? It's like, free agents go to where the money goes. You think somebody's going to be like, I can't sign there. I saw that Phil Jackson tweet seven months ago. No, they want to come to New York.

Yeah, they want to come to New York. But I just don't know if there's a market for him. Do you think LeBron would trade Kevin Love for Carmelo? Short answer, yeah. But I think you can't make that trade unless you get a second asset. You got to involve a third team. And you have to get two players for Kevin Love. I personally wouldn't do it.

If you just flip Kevin Love for Carmelo and they play the Warriors in the finals, the Warriors would destroy Carmelo. All they would do for four quarters every game is figure out how to put Carmelo in pick and rolls. They would just torch him. So you'd have to get a second guy, I think. But for the Celtics, we have probably the best fourth quarter score in the league. The guy's unstoppable. Why do we need Carmelo?

Now we have to throw Carmelo the ball and everybody's got to stand around? Isaiah has just torched us, man. The league has moved toward guys like him. He's unreal. I still think if the Clippers figured out how to flip all of their side pieces into Carmelo, that would be the move. Back to compliment in one second. Quick break to talk about me undies.

You probably missed the Valentine's Day window. Don't forget, by the way, Tuesday's Valentine's Day. Whoever you're dating claims they don't care, but they do. Don't believe them. That doesn't mean, even though Valentine's Day has passed, that you can't splurge on some great underwear. It's the first thing you put on every day. It's the last thing you take off. Why settle for anything less?

Me undies. I think they were one of the sponsors for our first podcast. They sent me some underwear. I've been wearing them ever since. They're made entirely out of modal, a fabric that's three times softer than cotton. Unbelievably comfortable. I don't know how many times I have to tell you. The top drawer of my dresser is full of MeUndies. Once you go MeUndies, you never go back. The world's most comfortable underwear. And guess what? If you don't love MeUndies for whatever reason, I can't imagine what that reason would be. They will refund you and they will let you keep the first pair. And for a limited time, my listeners get 20% off their first order plus free shipping. They're making it so easy for you to buy some

great underwear. You have to go to MeUndies.com slash BS. Those are my initials. And you get that 20% off plus the free shipping. So just do it. Meundies.com slash BS. With the MeUndies Better Day Guarantee, you have nothing to lose. Don't wait any longer. Go to meundies.com slash BS right now for 20% off your first order. Again, meundies.com slash BS. Back to Brian Koppelman. Wait, we got to talk about Billions really quick. It's only season two. How many episodes did you do last year? 12 last year, 12 this year.

Right. So there's a lot of time, in my opinion, because this show's going to be on for a long time and it's a very enjoyable show. There's a lot of time for you to write the James Dolan proxy character, the legacy kid who deals with Axe, who basically had everything handed to him and is the Fredo Corleone, but also just happens to have a lot of power because his dad passed it on to him. This is your chance.

This is your chance to get James Dolan back, create the proxy James Dolan character for Billions. And there you go. That's season three. I mean, I just think that, first of all, you get me the problem is when I start trying to create a Dolan kind of character, any, you know what I mean? It's like Eddie Mush from the Bronx Tales. If you put it anywhere near the thing, it would ruin everything.

It would ruin Billions. I don't think that I can. See, Eddie, that's also what it is. He's also Eddie Mush. He would ruin, he ruins everything he touches. If I don't think that I can. See, Eddie, that's also what he does. He's also Eddie Musk. He would ruin, he ruins everything he touches. If I can't get him near billions,

this thing is going too well. The show's too strong. People like it too much. You got Lewis and Giamatti and these titans going at each other. And, you know, we certainly reference

all the stuff that we care about, but I think I'm going to keep the knocking across the streams. So like season five, when you're running out of ways to make this Lewis versus Giamatti thing work, that's probably when Axe buys an NBA team, right? And then you can just completely shit.

Right? What Dave and I say to each other sometimes is it's a season six idea. We'll be like, that's a season six idea. He buys the Brooklyn Nets. Axe is in the NBA. Wait, you'll write that episode. You can write the episode. When Axe buys the Brooklyn Nets

from Prokhorov, or tries to, and Prokhorov screws him off at the last minute, screws him over. Yeah, you want to write the freelance episode, do the first draft?

I just want to be in the... You can do the first draft. I just want to be in the writer's room for two hours as you plan it out. Or maybe... Okay. Maybe Axe buy... No, you know what Axe would do? Axe would

do like the guys who bought the Milwaukee Bucks and we're like, yeah, we're going to keep it here. We love Milwaukee. It's great. And then they got the team and they're like, hey, you guys have two years to build a stadium or move to Seattle. Got to do it right now. That's awesome. So Mark... Well, he said we could say Mark

Lazzari has given us some advice. He's a guy. He's a billionaire. Right. And he has given us some advice on what these hedge fund guys are like. Like, Lazzari is super smart. I mean, Lazzari said a couple of things to us that ended up as quotes. Like, basically, ideas that we, just ideas that then Bobby Axelrod was able to, uh,

put in stuff, you know, uh, have come from last year. That guy's brilliant, man. I guess rich people and all the people that work for, and in the periphery of rich people must love this show and come up with you

and be like, X reminds me of this. This reminded me of that. You must get that all the time. But the biggest surprise to us is actually like all sorts of people. First of all, I was surprised. I didn't of this, this reminded me of that. You must get that all the time. But the biggest surprise to us is actually like all sorts of people. First of all, I was surprised

I didn't realize this, but a lot of rappers love the show. Like, not famous and famous hip-hop guys are tweeting at me constantly

about how much they love the show and love Bobby Ackroyd. That's a surprise? I mean, lawyers. Why were you surprised by that? I didn't know that like, I knew New York and L.A. would love it. I didn't know, like, that the world, like, that all these people all across the country, like, lawyers,

love Giamatti and that Giamatti's trying to take him down. Yeah. And all these people are celebrating Bobby Axelrod, which, you know, I was interested in sort of seeing whether people would root for Axe, even if he does, like, worse and worse shit, but they do root for him a lot of the time. You root for Axe, right? Yeah. It's because he's got great, he's got those shirts.

He's got those power shirts. I have this one shirt that I wear that, um, in the ringer office, they're like, Oh, you're wearing your Axe shirt today. It's like one of those, what do you call those? The collarless tight shirts. Yeah, sure. Like, Oh yeah. One of those like –

The Axe Power shirt. Yeah, no, listen. I think people love shows and movies about rich people, and you guys are really smart to create this the way you did. I remember I had Andy Greenwald on a podcast like three, four years ago, and we were just talking about why isn't there another OC? How is that show just not on all the time? Like the soap opera set in a rich place.

And we were joking about a show called The Hamptons. And we didn't even really have the idea. It's just rich people in The Hamptons being rich. And now you look at not just Billions, but even The Affair. People like going to those worlds. And they like being at rich parties. And I don't know. I think you've mastered it.

If you look at the fact that before he was president, Trump and Cuban were the biggest reality stars. We looked at that. We were like, what is it about these guys? Cuban's a great guy and a force for good in the world, I think. What is it that makes success and influence suddenly stand in for quality of character? Americans,

we root for these people for some reason. It wasn't about showing the rich porn. That stuff's obviously in the show. But living in New York, Levine lives in Greenwich, and the two of us just looked at it and looked at the way these people were living. And we were like, it's no different than the guys in Rounders, really. It's like people living by their wits and considering themselves outsiders and gunslingers and them trying to, like, remake the world the way that they want to serve their needs.

And that's the story we want to tell. And luckily, we found a setting that is compelling and that people like. But first, dude, we still can't believe that we get to have our own show where every one of these references we threw in all the other movies. You know, in one episode, we can reference Goodfellas, The Godfather, Tracy Lourdes, and all this shit. And that people not only watch it but quote it back to us online.

I mean, it is like we're finally have this own franchise to make in our image to be the extension of all the stuff that we've been writing about for 20 years.

You know? Yeah, you have, you're in the rich guy world. You're also in the hedge fund world which I don't know anything about and has never really been captured in a TV show like this this and then you just have the mano a mano just two dudes trying to destroy each other world which has worked for god knows how many years of movies it's it's smart

that's right back to bruno bruno san martino against larry you know that two guys equally matched with a real grudge going at each other. You know, you probably didn't know. We just announced it like an hour ago, and I know you're busy today, but we announced the Andre the Giant documentary is finally happening on HBO. That was my dream project for 10 years. That was awesome. I did not know that. I know you love Andre. I'm directing it.

Jason Hare and the WWE is going to be involved, and we are going to, you know, this is my number one draft pick for 10 years. You did. I will tell you something true. I'm going to tell you something true. I did the 30 for 30 on Jimmy. Dave and I. Jimmy Connors.

Did the 30 for 30 on Jimmy Connors. One of my faves. Good one. Rolling Stone called that the fifth best one ever. But I want to tell you a statistic. I have two Andre the Giant t-shirts that I still wear to this day. Wow. I have two Andre the Giant t-shirts.

And Dan Soder, who plays Mephi on our show and is a great stand-up comic, he's a huge wrestling guy, and he has an Andre the Giant shirt. And there have been days when we both wore Andre the Giant shirts to set, and Damian Lewis looked at us like, what the fuck is this? Is that Andre the Giant? And you're not wearing them ironically? And it's like, no, we're not wearing them ironically. We're wearing them.

We're wearing them proudly, the opposite of ironically. Who did the S&M research for your show, you or Levine? Right? Isn't that a good question? One of you did it. All right, don't answer. one of you did it one of you did it all right don't answer one of you did it though i'll answer okay it came from the girlfriend experience when we were interviewing when we were interviewing the prostitutes the escorts for the government

experience they all of them would say to us at the end of like so you have your laptop open and they're telling you like this guy took me to mallorca and they're telling you, like, this guy took me to Mallorca. He's telling you these amazing stories. And then at the very end, to a person, the women would lean in, and they'd say, I have one more thing to tell you. And they'd say, what? And they would name some incredibly powerful, tight-knit business. And they would say, that guy wants me to peg him. And you'd go, what? And they would say, yeah.

And it was like, and we carried that idea. So we didn't end up putting that directly. We have a guy in a diaper in Girlfriend Experience. We didn't put it directly in Girlfriend Experience. But when we were thinking about this character, and then you think about Spitzer and all these prosecutorial characters who misbehaved in some way,

we were like, well, he's not going to misbehave. It's going to be with his marriage. But we're going to give him this thing, the idea being he has to find, he's in so much control, has so much power, exerts it all the time. Well, maybe the only way he can be present is if he is forced to lose all that and be in a sexually dominated position. And so that's where that came from. Well, it helps that the actress...

There was no personal research. Okay, yeah, yeah. It helps that the actress, no personal research. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Um, it helps that, uh, the actress is fantastic. That's been the revelation for me because yeah, I didn't watch her other show. So I, I, you know, you know, it's cool sometimes when you watch a show and you have no baggage with the, with the person playing one of the lead characters, you know, like one of the things with Giamatti for me is I've seen him in so many things. I always kind of feel like it's Paul Giamatti. And with Damian Lewis, it took me a while for him to stop being Brody from Homeland and being Axe. But now I'm there. He's Axe to me now. But Maggie Stiff, I had, I was a blank slate. I just know her as this character. Are you not a Mad Men?

See, Mad Men is my favorite show of all time. Yeah, but I didn't even, I never, I love Mad Men. I never really made the connection that it was the same. Mad Men's thrown me off. I think it's because She played Rachel Menken.

Yeah. She played Rachel Menken who was the department store on the first season. Right. And then, yes, then she did Some Bad Men

That was 10 years ago. after that, but Yeah. Yeah, I guess it was. We love her. Maggie, Maggie, a hundred women

read to that part when Maggie read it was like, holy shit she can do this she is really as smart as she was

with the Brock Science High School she's a fucking genius and it's so much fun being around her because she plays this character who's super smart

and she's even smarter than all of us and so you know last season I'm going to spoil last season because new season started

but you know she kind of wins last season and it was great writing that whole thing for her because we knew she would be able to pull off basically defeating both of those guys and driving off in that way.

It was super satisfying that people thought of this macho show about these two guys and that what Dave and I did was actually have the woman win at the end of season one. Well, I'm really happy for you guys. I've known you for a long time. I think I've known you since maybe 2001. I did on one of my first year at ESPN, I handed out rounders quotes as awards for something,

and you emailed me, and we became friends ever since. That's my last question. I always ask you this when you're on the pod. Rounders 2, how's it looking? Right today, I would say, you know the exact thing where it's like the extinction clock for the world or whatever?

Unfortunately, it looks today, it looks worse. We just haven't been able to make the deals. We all want to do it, but today it looks bad. Now, listen, as you know, we talk to Matt and Edward about it all the time. The four of us want to do it. Malkovich is in.

I think we could even, Matt said he could rope Turturro in. We just need someone to pass the right to script and make the movie. Then we could do it. So when we do... I don't have to be doing the off-season of Billions. Chris Ryan and I are doing Sports Movie Hall of Fame podcasts. When we do rounders, I almost think we have to make rounders like a three-hour pod where we do our thing for an hour, and then we bring you and Levine,

and maybe we just go for another hour, and we just really break it down. But I want to do it correctly. Levine and I are happy to do it. Levine and I are happy to do it, and we'll try to rope Maddie in, too. I can't promise it because he knows where he is in do it, and we'll try to rope Maddie in, too. I can't promise it because he knows where he is in the world, but we'll try to call Maddie in. You know where he is right now? He's walking around with his fist raised because he roots for the best quarterback of all time

and the best team of all time. That's where he is. He's walking around with his fist high up in the air saluting Mr. Tom Brady. Yeah, Levine is a Brady fan, too. And we were texting the next day, and I had to be me with, you know, I'm a Jets fan. Yeah. And Levine has been a Brady fan for a long time, and Matt obviously had his big victory.

Well, rounders, too. It was miserable. Here's my thing. Miserable you get to win that again. Miserable. I don't feel bad at all. I was so excited to's my thing. Miserable that you get to win that again. Miserable. I mean, I gotta be honest. I was so excited to tweet at you. I was so excited to tweet at you the next day. Well, you know

what? Somebody has to win, and it's usually Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. That's all I can tell you. I'm not going to give up on Rounders 2, and one of the reasons I think it's still possible is because it's on all the time. It's still on. I have every movie channel.

It's always on. And my theory with this is they're showing the movies on these cable channels because people are watching them every time they come on. There was a reason John Wick was on for a solid year. It's because people were watching John Wick when it came on. And Rounders is still on. We were really close. We were really close

two years ago. And a deal was kind of put on the table and then pulled. And Dave and I went and did this show instead. And, you know, none of us have given up on it.

We talk about it all the time. We know the movie we would make. I'm telling you, Edward and Matt would do it with us. Malkovich, too. I think we'd get to Turo. John Dahl would direct the movie. We all want John. We're trying to put the entire team back together.

But so far, no one's been willing to write the check. Affleck wants in. I know. I know for a fact. And I'll tell you another thing. If you have another version of the Welcome to the Chesterfield South scene and I'm not at the table in a cameo,

I'm never talking to you again. If I don't get to be in a cameo, just like just have me, like, whatever. I can have an Ace King and just get screwed in the flop. I don't care. But I need to be in one of those. It's so sad that you asked for the cameo, not just trusting that we would come to you.

It's a little bit sad. I just want, and we'll never figure out why he didn't have sex with Famke Janssen in that scene after his girlfriend had died. That's your scarlet letter. We gotta save this for the round. I mean, that's gotta be 10 minutes

of the rounders. That's your scarlet letter. That's the scarlet letter of your screenwriting career. It's the worst thing we've ever done. Matt David's like, nah, you know what?

I'm going to pass on this sex. Nah, I'm good. I mean, I know that I told you this when we did the long 15,000 word thing, but I mean, that night we were shooting that scene.

Matt did come up to Dave and me and say, now tell me again, why am I not sleeping? And I'm like, wait a minute. Am I doing bronchitis? What's going on? we can't answer it now

the only thing we can say is the thing that no one ever okay I can answer it the thing that no one ever takes into account is that they had slept together before oh so maybe there's some

maybe there's a reason he didn't want to I'm just saying they had slept together before you know it's different right if you've never done it or if you've done it he's rock bottom.

He has no furniture. He needs money. Like, sex is going to make you feel better for 20 minutes. It's true. He's sitting on his couch watching Eric Seidel lose to Johnny Chan. That's his entertainment.

He's watching some old World Series of Poker. I'm good. I don't need any sex right now. By the way, he's watching pre-Holcum, pre-Holcum World Series of Poker.

The worst kind. He's literally watching World Series of Poker when you're the worst kind. And then Fonka comes over and he can't do it. Luckily, David,

I've learned those lessons and I can promise you that there's no analog to that in this season of Billions, which is why everybody should tune in starting now on demand and then next Sunday night and be with us for all 12 episodes. And I can promise you that there's no analog to that in this season of Billions, which is why everybody should tune in.

Yeah. Starting now on demand and then next Sunday night. And be with us for all 12 episodes. All right. Congratulations. Sad of Levine for me. We have to do it. It's so tough for us to do a three-man podcast with two people on the phone.

We'll do it one way or another. We'll do it when you're in L.A. Yeah, when you're in L.A. And by the way, if you have time to write any angry Knicks pieces, uh, the ringer is waiting for you. We're always available. If you want to vent, we're here.

Well, you know, I just figured you'd ask. So that's what I'm here. All right. All right. Good luck with billions. Thanks for coming out.

Thank you. Bye-bye. All right. Bye. All right. We're going to bring in David Shoemaker to talk about Andre the giant and, upcoming WrestleMania, which I think is 33.

But, uh, before we do that, let's talk about my friends at Harrys.com. They sent me some razors last year and it changed my life. I do not get shaving cuts anymore. I don't get shaving zits on my neck anymore. I have a nice, clean, happy face.

Thank you, Harrys. If you're not using their state-of-the-art German-engineered razors, I gotta be honest, I actually feel sorry for you. I really do. I feel like genuine empathy that you're not using Harrah's. If getting Harrah's is a gift for your husband, your boyfriend, your dad, your grandfather, whomever, I feel it.

If you're not doing that, I feel even worse. On harrahs.com right now, my listeners can get themselves a free trial set that includes their sleek Truman razor handle with a German- five blade cartridge, foaming shave gel, and a travel cover. And guess what? Harry's is so confident in the quality of their blades.

They want you to try this shave set for free. You heard that right. Free. All you have to do is cover a small shipping fee when you sign up. And that's it. You can try Harry's and get a great shave. And then you'll go back and you'll get more Harry's And that's it. You can try Harry's and get a great shave and then you'll go back and you'll get more Harry's because it's great.

That's a special offer for fans of the BS podcast. Again, go to harrys.com slash BS right now and redeem your free trial set. harrys.com slash BS. Pops right up. It thanks you for coming. Mentions the podcast. You can't lose.

Just do it. Your face will be very, very happy. All right. David Shoemaker coming up right now. All right. We mentioned the Andre the Giant documentary that's coming with, when I was talking to Koppelman, now David Shoemaker from The Ringer.

Formerly of Grantland, the Masked Man has the Masked Man podcast on Channel 33, one of the world's foremost wrestling experts. I appreciate that. Also the art director at The Ringer, a man of many hats. Yeah, when I take the mask off, I have a full-time job. This Andre Dock, if we pull it off, I mean, this is like the number one draft pick for, I mean, for me, it's the number one draft pick for any sports doc,

but at least for wrestling, this was always the great kahuna correct yeah i'm glad you're calling your shot by just talking about it this far in advance because it's it's got to be good now yeah i don't see how it can't be good with what makes andre what made andre so great at the time and what makes him still so legendary to this day is the fact that he was bigger than pro wrestling which was which is just outsized and crazy to begin with right right i mean like you can't get anybody who ever met the guy to sit down from you know if you ask him about andre the giant you will get stories that blow your mind yes and that's usually we find you know doing all the 30s over the year when you have the compelling lead character and you have stories yeah and you have good footage that's it it's

impossible to screw up at that point you really can't if you have those three if you have stories and awesome footage and somebody's compelling you're good and andre i've always been fascinated by especially when youtube came around and the wrestling footage started going up on yes and it was like andre was just this hazy memory of i started watching wrestling i think like 79 80 somewhere in there when i remember when killer khan broke his ankle i really thought killer khan broke it oh yeah the hospital footage of andre with the thing it's like oh my god killer i can't believe killer khan did that and you know just following him through the years there and then some at some point realizing, oh, that was the guy who played Bigfoot in Six Million Dollar Man.

100%. But he was so big that they never gave him the title. They didn't need to. They didn't need to. I mean, you're right about YouTube. It was almost like, I'm just a couple years younger than you, but growing up watching, you know, Andre versus Hogan and all that kind of stuff. When YouTube came about, it was almost like if there were, if like you're a kid today and you had no idea Barry Bonds was anybody except the slugger. And then suddenly you get all this footage of him like being a really good young baseball player

who could run and like do all this other stuff, you know, except way bigger than that. But yeah, I mean, Andre was, I mean, he was the quintessential division killer, which is what they call it in the business, right? He was like just too impressive to really hold a belt because once you put the belt on him, there's no real competition. Right. So it was always, I mean, from the very beginning, when he came to America in the 70s, he was wrestling, or came to North America, he was wrestling in Canada. And he was a huge draw for a while. And then attendance tapered off.

And eventually the promoter there kind of gifted him to Vince McMahon,cmahon vince senior um because he didn't know what to do with them and vince's vince senior's solution was to tour him around the country and uh and to you know make him quit doing drop kicks and stuff so he's just a giant but i mean you had to keep him moving because if he stayed in one place too long the magic sort of wore off as crazy as that is you know you show up to see how big this guy is but then you know there's a limit to the stories you can tell with somebody like that yeah this 1970s andre was so much more athletic and i missed that andre i was there for the second phase of his career which was he was still great he had the giant afro sure that's he was still athletic could still move, could still do some stuff. But there's some early 1970s Andre on YouTube where it's like, wow, this guy moves like

Porzingis. Yeah. He was the wrestling unicorn. That's right. How tall do we think he was? Because it does seem like he shrunk. Yeah. I think like his back started almost collapsing and he, but at some point he was like 7'2",

7'3", 7'4". He was listed at 7'4". But it was always list them they always listen yeah it's it's always a little fudging of the weight and the height and andre more than anybody else just because you could just add the inches and the pounds because who was going to question it he's also going up against guys like his first feud or first big feud in canada was this guy john don leo jonathan uh who was a giant there and who know I mean he was listed at 6'8 or something but he might have been way shorter so you you have to make Andre taller to put him next to guys like you know Hogan who they're listing at 6'6 or 6'7 or 6'8 and Andre

all of a sudden is 6 I mean 7'4 I don't know there's pictures of him on the set of uh of Conan where it doesn't look like he's you know he's he's not that tall like he looks like six nine well wilt chamberlain's what seven one yeah and they're all he's shorter than wilt and all their backstage photos so but it does seem like he might have shrunk sure that's part of the i mean i think that's part of the condition that he had the acromelogy or whatever that you you grow and grow and grow and then your bones start hardening and and you're and sort of like folding back over onto themselves and the afro made him seem bigger too the other thing vince used to do when the the old shows that they used to film in hershey pennsylvania and they would just bang out

all the different things but i think they did some some camera chicanery oh yeah and i think didn't andre stood on something to make it seem like he was just twice the size of vince if you watch those things he's like two and a half feet taller than vince that's a that's a Didn't Andre stood on something to make it seem like he was just twice the size of Vince? If you watch those things, he's like two and a half feet taller than Vince. That's a trick they still employ to this day sometimes. But yeah, the Andre shot, I think, is a real thing. I don't really remember him feuding with anyone other than Killer Khan for a prolonged period of time. He had the Hogan feud when Hogan came in early and was the bad guy. Right. The big Shea Stadium match. then there was like a big john stud he would

just kind of feud with big guys and they were always bad matches but it was like what the hell else could you do with andre he couldn't feud with like don morocco he just would have killed him yeah i mean some of the best booking that you that you can i mean it's really hard to decide what to do with andre you're right because because what the fans want that what the fans think they want to see is Andre versus Big John Studd. And then you put them in the ring together, and the fans immediately realize that's not what they want to see. There was a period where he was wrestling and where he was doing the territories,

and he was a tag team champion with Dusty Rhodes. They held the belt briefly. And Andre, the only belt, I mean, he might have had some singles titles, but I think he held tag titles around the country, but more often than not, just left and vacated them because, again, no storytelling. But you can do a good tag team angle with him. If you have just the on-fire baby face like Dusty Rhodes, nobody's more over than Andre the Giant, and then they can beat up the bad guys together, and Andre only has to get in the ring for two minutes a match.

And the other guy gets the crap kicked out of him, and he's trying to get in the ring for two minutes a match. And the other guy gets the crap kicked out of him and he's trying to get over to Andre and people are going, the best tag team match I can remember him having was the one with Snuka when it ended with Snuka jumped off his shoulders. Right, that was a great tag team too. One of the all-time best tag team moments. Yeah, no, I mean, there's a lot that, I mean, there's, the thing with Andre that I keep coming back to is the greatest stories

and even storylines about Andre were outside the ring. There's a limit to what you can do in a wrestling ring with a presence as big as Andre. But when you start telling quote-unquote real stories about him, that's when the excitement really happens. And he was also, I would say he had a 100% approval rating rating which is pretty rare for wrestlers and when he turned it was painful like it hurt my feelings yeah it's like oh my god no andre you're evil andre no it was it was so it was very by the book in its way you're talking about the piper's pit segment where he comes he they're giving out the awards. It was perfect. He's jealous of Hogan. And then, yeah.

And then he brings out Bobby Heenan. A lot of people are jealous of Hulk Hogan. Yeah. A lot of jealousy with that guy. And with good reason. Yeah. He was getting a lot of opportunities. But yeah, I mean, it was so by the book in a lot of ways, but it was so compelling.

Like, I think I probably cried as a kid. I mean, there was no, I was never as heartbroken as that moment. It was a complete betrayal. So much worse than Kevin Durant leaving Oklahoma City. Yeah, I mean, the crazy thing about Andre, about his career when you look at it, you were talking about him when he was young and athletic, but already by this point, his health was in serious decline. Yeah, he could barely make it.

I mean, he had WrestleMania II. He had the Battle Royal. And Big John Studd was in that, too. But after that, he took time off. He was already taking these huge breaks that he had back surgery uh killer khan when killer khan put him out i think that was a surgery too i mean best battle royal guy ever oh yeah oh yeah there's like if you if there's gifs all over the internet of him just like taking on four guys and he actually makes it look good he's like headbutting really quickly one guy after

another and knocking people's heads together i mean he's great he's just i mean it's he he's very good at that i don't yeah i don't want to spoil a lot of the beats and the stories that we'll probably have in this thing but it was just you're you know you're the best person to talk wrestling with i think the andre thing i remember going to see him at the worcester centrum in 89 yeah about two years after he'd become evil andre when he still had the black the one strap the one strap oh man he was he was just doing tag team matches and he could barely move and it was actually kind of sad to see him in person yeah this was like i'm gonna say 89 i remember i went with my old uh my old buddy the bird man and he you know they could hide it they could fudge it he's still amazing he was amazing to see, but there just wasn't anything you could do with him. And you could tell it was heading toward not a great place.

Yeah, no, I mean, it wasn't great. When he took on Jake the Snake, what WrestleMania was that? Oh, yeah, it was like five or six. Yeah, I think it was six. I was watching with my buddy the other day and and and i was just like he was like what what shape is andre in this match and i was just like just try to count how many seconds he's not touching either the ropes or his or right and there were no second like i mean he was just a walk from the ropes to jake and that was the only time he could stand up on his

own do you think wrestlemania 3 him versus hogan was the most important wrestling match of all time i mean you you can make that case i I think that, you know, the hardcore wrestling fans will always throw anything with Hogan into question and whatever. But I think, you know, you have to say that Hogan, I mean, if Ric Flair was the greatest ever, part of that was because what he did, most of that was because of what he did on the mic. You know, I mean, it's not all about what happens in the ring. It's the spectacle.

And that WrestleMania 3 match was just as big as it gets. You know, there was nothing like it. I remember Hagler-Leonard was right around then too. Yeah. I can't remember if it was before or after. And that was one of the biggest boxing matches that I can remember. And there was so much hype for it.

Sugar Ray, people forget just how massively popular he was and and for me hogan andre was like equal and it was it was wrestling but i just felt like i didn't know it was gonna happen didn't know if andre was actually gonna sell hogan and get pinned it was the only time i remember watching uh a main event wrestling match really not knowing what the outcome was going to be. Like having no feel at all for it. Are they going to squash this and do a DQ? Or is this going to go in some terrible place? Or is he really going to get pinned by him?

Yeah, I mean, they did come back around to like the squashes or the DQs and the countouts. I mean, it's one of the things you have to do in wrestling, but especially with Andre to keep things interesting. Remember when he almost pins Hogan in the first two minutes because he falls on him? And I remember I had like a VHS rewinding it. He had some pain in the ass watching that 20 times being like, I think Andre thought

he won. I think this was a legitimate fight. Andre really seems to think he won this. If you talk to Hulk Hogan, you talk to any of the big names that wrestled Andre, this is the most central thing about about a match with andre the giant is that he would let you look good during the match but you could only do what he let you do right right so hulk hogan and a lot of these guys sort of have this vested interest in making wrestling seem real even though we all know it's fake now it's there's a second there's a second level on

which it's a real thing and andre the giant is is the the go-to like is is exhibit a for this right because hogan will always say you know he like you know he wouldn't have been able to slam andre if andre wasn't you know it wasn't in on it and it's sort of like this emotional victory or this like personality-based victory that's at the core of it um and yeah i mean if andre i mean there's some to a certain extent that's really true if andre wanted to just like put you on the yeah i mean if andre i mean there's some to a certain extent that's really true if andre wanted to just like put you on the ground i mean look what he did to chuck wepner i mean if he just wanted to like just take just get rid of you he could do it he was really that strong

there's i think one shoot one pseudo shoot match in japan where the guy took some liberties and andre just destroyed him yeah i mean he's like really and just killed the guy andre was like dad strength to another to like the nth degree he could like really and just killed the guy andre was like dad strength to another to like the nth degree he could like he he looked big and scary but he was stronger than the than what he looked like i think he is one of the all-time sports unicorns and he's certainly the all-time wrestling unicorn oh yeah and that's one of the reasons you know that this is such a good idea for a doc is just like this guy was never be another andre i can't imagine we would see this again and also like if you had that pituitary gland problem now you get it fixed you

get it fixed when you're 18 and it's just you know and that was part of what makes it so compelling is he had this condition that he's just he knew he was gonna have a long life yeah i mean he was in an era before i mean he as far as i know he wasn't into uh into like you know pain pills or anything but he was in an incredible amount of pain so he was just doping with booze and and of course the you know one thing we haven't talked about is some of the craziest stories of andre or his drinking stories the hundred beers in one night 136 don't drink against andre you'll lose oh no you'll die i mean it's it's a it's a crazy amount of booze that he that he could he could supposedly consume.

I mean, just a case of wine on a bus ride from one venue to another. I mean, just absolutely insane stuff. And that's another thing we'll never hear again, because even if, I mean, Wade Boggs used to drink, you know, he used to always drink like 40 beers on a plane ride. But like, you would never hear that about an athlete now. One, because they wouldn't do it. But two, because if they did, they would never let it get out you know um well all of those stories i my whole thing is like somebody like that everybody who crossed paths

with them is gonna have two stories and i have a feeling a few of them are gonna involve alcohol i think so and andre just putting passed out people in taxis like when i had uh schwarzenegger on he told this whole story about him will Wilt Chamberlain, and Andre going to dinner and Arnold paying the check, even though nobody was allowed to pay the check when Andre was there, and how mad Andre got and ended up just putting him on top of a car or something. And we animated it on Grantland

and, you know, everybody tries to imitate Andre when they tell the stories. He told me, no, no, boss, you don't do that. Hopefully Lee Majors will want to be involved in this can you just get Andrew Luck to come on to do the Andre voice I'll do the chat as Andrew Luck alright so that's coming

we don't have a release date or anything but we're going to be working on this for next year couldn't be more excited about this took a lot of time and energy you know this is a really important and special person I think for Vince and for his daughter. I think for his daughter, it was somebody that she just loved as a kid. And it was just her favorite wrestler there.

And I just think they've been very, very protective about this story because they know this is it. This is the best from a footage, stories, everything standpoint. And the fact that he was there really with Vince Jr. from day one. Yeah. Initially, he's an announcer and he's just selling this guy and then he becomes his boss. Yeah, I mean, you were talking about the YouTube era at the beginning and how that changed the way we look at Andre.

I could not be more excited to see what kind of footage that you get your hands on that I've never seen. Quickly, let's talk about WrestleMania is coming up. How many weeks away are we? Like six, seven? Yeah, four or five, something like that. It's the very end of March. So whatever that is.

So six weeks. Yeah. So Bray Wyatt won the title last night. He did. John Cena won the title two weeks ago. Then Bray Wyatt won it. So explain to me, what are the matches they're setting up here? It's looking like...

Undertaker Cena is now going to happen? No. Is that a rumor you've heard? That was the rumor for a long time. I'm guessing. No. The latest rumor that I heard was that they're actually going to do Cena and Nikki Bella versus The Miz and Maryse, which is an interesting look for for, you know, interesting role for John Cena at WrestleMania.

But, you know, that's a way to get that's a way to get the Miz who deserves a big WrestleMania spot this year. And Miz Miz really like the surprise star of the year. Right. It seemed like his career was on the downward trajectory and now has reinvented himself. And the part that's a little bit off our radar is that Nikki Bella and Maryse are both stars on the two reality shows that are a huge part of the WWE universe right now. It does, it does. And when I said this on the Masked Man show last week, they'll figure out a way to make,

to have The Miz and John Cena work a really good 12 or 15 minute match within the context of this match. You know, like it'll be one that we're pleasantly surprised by the next day. That's my guess, if they do it. Cena Styles at Royal Rumble was, I thought, and it seems like a lot of people felt this way who know way more about this stuff than I do,

but one of the best matches I've seen in his career. And we're now in like year 15. Like there's a little bit of like a Tim Duncan kind of career that he's having as a wrestler now. Yeah, I mean, you gotta give him a lot of, I mean, that's an interesting way to look at it. I don't think I would go young Tim Duncan with, you know, I wouldn't parallel young Tim Duncan with young John Cena. But, I mean, the way that he's reinvented himself as,

from a real wrestling nerd point of view, as a guy that you always want to see wrestle when he's, you know, my friends and I are just imagining all the Cena matches that are left that we haven't seen yet, you know, and then the rematches, this is AJ, you know, this is the third time he wrestled AJ Styles one-on-one to big on a, on a big stage. And this was the best match of his career. It was unbelievable. You wouldn't say Cena, Tim Duncan.

Well, I think the longevity is really there, but I, but like, I don't, I think that you don't think he's had, like, you don't think he's like in the top seven or eight all time at this point. I think the longevity is there and the, and the skill late in his career is there. I just think that like early, like Tim Duncan was the best player in the league by any metric, you know, for his, you know,

I don't think Cena was ever the best. I think he was the most, I think he got, once he got his big push, I think he, you know, you couldn't deny he's a star. It kind of goes back to the,ogan bit I was talking about earlier, that he's undeniably a major wrestler from that point forward. But I don't think he was one of the best wrestlers in the business at that point. I remember I got an email like two years ago, and this was after the Clippers beat the Spurs in 2015.

It was right before I left Greenland. And somebody sent an email about how Duncan and the Spurs had this ability to put other teams over that was very wrestling-like. You know, where it's like the Suns were trying to get past the Spurs. The Dirk and the Mavs were trying to get by them. And then you go like LeBron's trying to get by them. And then you have the Clippers and you have OKC and you have all these teams that once they pass the Duncan Spurs kind of hurdle, that's when they were legitimized. And I think Cena's been that guy in the WD now for what, eight years? I mean, yeah, that's true.

You know, back at Grantland, I wrote a piece that compared a bunch of NBA players to pro wrestlers. It was a giant piece. And the centerpiece of it was john cena is lebron and i think that in a certain way that still holds up because you know when lebron was in his first round with the calves there was something there was something missing right and it took him teaming up with wayne bosh and miami just sort of and that was sort of like cena if you want to make the parallel that's cena like finding cm punk and finding these guys daniel bryan guys that he could actually like compare himself to and achieve greatness by competing alongside them. Yeah, and in a lot of their cases, passing through that Cena thing was the thing that really pushed them and gave them the heat.

The most important thing he did during that, you know, the CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, even to this day with kevin owens and and uh you know all the guys that he's wrestled uh you know he's wrestling during the u.s open challenge he his most important aspect is that he makes the guys you care about look important by standing next to him i mean sells the shit out of them yeah which is funny because that's like a great sports tv skill too i always thought kornheiser was i've said this before but kornheiser was like cena you're doing tv with kornheiser he's selling the shit out of you and you're gonna feel like you did better than you than you did but i think seen his career i really felt like it should have been done by now and it seems like he's about as relevant as he's been which is why i was surprised

by the wrestlemania what so what what do you think the main event is i think that it's going to be i mean bray wyatt versus Randy Orton, their friendship finally, or their allegiance finally kind of comes to a head in this match where they... You think anyone cares about that? Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I think Randy Orton is always going to be an underrated giant star. I mean, it's from... I mean, the reaction that he gets from like most live crowds

is kind of hard to come... hard to wrap your mind around. I wonder how much the rko gif and like that whole run that that's big i'm sure that helped him it's big even my like that was my son's one of his favorite pieces of internet content ever yeah uh i mean and i love bray wyatt i think it'll be interesting to see how they go but but um but you know bray is one of my favorite wrestlers i just don't get to see him wrestle that much i'm sure he's wrestling house shows and stuff but like I don't you know he's just not he doesn't have that many like seems like a weird time to push him yeah I mean wasn't like a ton of setup

for it it seemed like they were phasing him out the Orton the Orton Wyatt storyline though was great like it's been it's been told really well over a long period of time and when you look back at it I mean that's what so much of pro wrestling is. I always joke that like, it doesn't matter what it looks like on Raw as long as it looks good on the video package on the next episode of Raw. And it's just the way they tell the stories. You can't really wrap your mind around them

until they're told almost, you know? So it's, you know, whatever. But the other side is more interesting. Well, Undertaker is still the wild card. But the other side of it is they've already announced Brock Lesnar versus Goldberg for WrestleMania. But at Fastlane in a couple of weeks, Goldberg is fighting Kevin Owens for the universal title, which is the big Raw belt. Oh.

So the rumors that stands now is that Goldberg is going to take the title and Goldberg versus Lesnar is going to be the main event for all the marbles at WrestleMania, which is a really weird decision to make, considering the last time they fought at WrestleMania, they got booed out of the stadium for both being about to leave. And for all we know, they're both about to leave now. I mean, I don't think they're going to get booed out of the stadium. People love these guys. They've earned our love and respect.

But whether or not... It's like Andre the Giant. Brock Lesnar and Goldberg doesn't need a title. Goldberg, to me, is like who wants to be a millionaire, a deal or no deal, where it's like fun, but then the network's like, this is great. Let's do these every night. And then it burns out in three weeks. And Goldberg, there's just not a lot to work

with it's great the chance good the entrance is good it's not like he's a good wrestler yeah and there's just not a lot of ways to go with it i would i would guess that it's better to use him like they did with lesnar where it's like you're just kind of parceling him out yeah i mean i think the difference with lesnar is that potentially is that goldberg is you know a little bit more interested in working a good match all the time i mean who knows lesnar was a little bit like andre and that like his mood dictated how good the match was going to be um they got their revenge on him by just having him get crushed for three straight months someday there's going to be an insider podcast in like a decade that's really going to be interesting about all that stuff he must have just they must have just been worn out by you know to me that the weirdest thing i've

seen in wrestling in the past couple years was him just knocking orton unconscious basically yeah and like legitimately beating him up like legitimately beating him up and it was like did was that in the plans did he just miss with an elbow? Because watching it live, I'm like, this is, it just felt real. It didn't feel like there was any sort of faking, hiding. No. Yeah. This is, when you,

I think I wrote vaguely about this years ago, but like when you put your title on Brock Lesnar, as they did several years ago, like you're making a really specific, it's like, you know, in case of emergency break glass glass it is a very specific decision to put your belt on the conquering monster because there's no one else that has the level of hype and you just have to do it despite not really trusting the guy you know I mean it's not he hasn't been trustworthy but he's not there every he's not there day in and day out it was a very specific move and uh it's a ballsy move and in some ways it really

worked for him you know he brings an air of legitimacy that he can make anybody look good if he wants to just like andre but you can you can lose that legitimacy if you have him get three to four guys like you can lose that legitimacy when he gets beaten 20 seconds by a 50 year old man you know i mean that's it's not like i love goldberg i've really enjoyed having him back but that's a it's a different it's's the opposite end of the booking spectrum. I think the biggest mistake they've made in the last year is just how many times Kevin Owens has lost. Meltzer had the win-loss records at the end of 2016,

and Kevin Owens was like 62 and 135. How does he lose in this way? He counts everything. Yeah, I mean, a heel champ in a non-title match in Poughkeepsie or something, like, that's not a bad place for him to lose if you want to send the crowd home happy. You know, that's always the way they make those decisions. But I agree with you. Bray Wyatt also was on a crazy losing streak in pay-per-views for the longest time.

And the logic is always he doesn't need to win. You know, he's the sort of, like, new undert undertaker or the mystical guy but it's like he does need to win everybody needs to win and win every once in a while i mean listen kevin owens isn't gonna go kevin owens isn't gonna his career won't be over if he loses to goldberg and and he might be the best guy to get a good match out of goldberg too i mean he was wrestling on the indies for so long and people remember his matches with el generico and like the, like the best, like these really high octane, great wrestling matches. But man,

if you worked the Indies long enough, you've wrestled your fair share of like 50 year old former stars who can't really move around that much, you know? Um, well, so AJ Styles has been the best free agent acquisition they've had in a long time.

He's been the best wrestler. And yeah, what a year. Yeah. Every match he wrestles is just super entertaining my son loves him he's he's so great he's gonna break his neck doing trying to do the 450 flip but that's fine like you gotta live and you gotta learn but uh that's terrible no but aj aj styles uh yeah he's the first guy that's been w in a while where i'm just a mess i'm like ben don't do that yeah

do not try that one that's too crazy right the hardy boys were like that way back then but ben wasn't around sure jeff and matt hardy reached a point was like all right um nobody else do this yeah it's like these two guys please they were finding taller ladders for them to jump off of they were just like making 28 foot ladders yeah it was it was yeah that was i can't imagine trying to raise a kid during the hardy boys era i mean aj styles is uh at least you can put you can point at aj styles and be like he's the greatest athlete in the world and he can do these things so don't try it you know and he's tiny yeah well i mean he's not it's like tiny for what you think he would be like i'm gonna say he was like 5 10 probably yeah

when i met him last year at the thing and you just you assume all these guys are gonna be like i'm gonna say he was like 5 10 probably yeah when i met him last year at the thing and you just you assume all these guys are gonna be like you know our size are bigger yeah oh i always say i always say that if an angel had come down from heaven when i was like you know in sixth grade and said like you're gonna be tall tall enough to be a major wrestler i probably would have tried but it never occurred to me that like six one was big enough to be a wrestler i thought they were all six'8". Because they lie about their heights. Sure, that's a problem. Hulk Hogan was 7 feet tall or whatever. He seems like 6'4".

AJ Styles is wrestling who? The rumor right now is Shane McMahon. Which is not a great use of AJ, but also you gotta factor in that in Vince McMahon's mind, that's like making him the greatest champion of all time. You get the match with Shane.

That's a big compliment. Who would have been, just from a pure wrestling standpoint, who would have been the best AJ Styles match? I mean, a lot of people would say put him up against John Cena again. I mean, part of it's we're constricted by this brand split where there's only the guys on SmackDown. I mean, I think that i think that aj versus undertaker would be one of the really most interesting ways to use the undertaker although

you always want to see undertaker against a quote-unquote young guy and aj is new to wwe but not a young guy he looked pretty banged up the undertaker at the rumble he looked yeah he's not the first time the first time where like i wasn't trying to defend him when people around me were making old jokes you know like he looked late 80s were making old jokes. You know, he didn't look great. He looked late 80s Andre-ish. Yeah. Yeah. And apparently he didn't feel great after the match.

I think that's what Meltzer said. So he's got... I mean, part of the difficulty with The Undertaker is that you've got to find somebody who can literally carry him through a match. You know, if he needs to be just carried from one ring to the other, There's not a long list of wrestlers who can do that. What was his best, you think, Michaels? The Michaels one from like five years ago? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I enjoy the Triple H.

I'm an irrational Triple H. You like Triple H more than I do. I like Triple H more than most people. I like him more off the, out of the ring. But Michaels is definitely the answer there, yeah. I guess Triple H had some good ones. All right. So, the Masked Man Wrestling Podcast. The Masked Man Show. is definitely the answer there yeah i guess my i guess triple h had some good ones uh all right so the mass man wrestling podcast mass man show the mass man show every week on channel 33 yeah

heavy rumors that we might spin this off onto its own podcast well i'm here i'm hearing it here first so heavy rumors no i just i read it's gonna be really glad because i meant whenever people ask me about it i just direct them to him on Twitter. All right. So I might make a cameo on your podcast. You got to come on for WrestleMania. Once they have the matchups, there's gambling for this. Someone told me there's a new site that's just like wrestling bets. This is crazy.

The wrestling renaissance. At the Royal Rumble, though, the odds went from what you'd expect to Randy Orton is heavily favored the day of, and there was no reason why. Yeah, it's intense. This is crazy. You can't take bets. First of all, it's wrestling. You shouldn't be able to take bets on this stuff. No.

But what do you think? You think it's like Vince McMahon or Kevin Dunn is just like, you know what? I'm going to put like 10 grand on that just for fun? How does that happen the way it should do it is they should they should accept wrestlemania who's going to be in the wrestlemania rain event main event bets and who's going to win should be taken like six months ago yeah before just guess it's like future bets basically like that's a great nfl title but when it gets close it's just the uh i don't know certainly not a bet i would make no no i mean and it's, I mean, I think when you go into WrestleMania, you get to a point where you can kind of predict.

Well, you can always, I can always predict what's going to happen on Raw the next night better than I can predict the outcome of the pay-per-view. Because you know where they're going, but there's two different ways. There's at least two ways to get there, right? It doesn't really matter who wins or loses. That said, there's always one big match

that they'll just change despite us. So, whatever. David Shoemaker, a pleasure as always. Thank you, man. It's a pleasure to be here. All right. All right, that's always one big match that they'll just change despite us. So whatever. David Shoemaker, a pleasure as always. Thank you, man. It's a pleasure to be here. All right. All right, that's it for the pod. Thanks to HBO and WWE.

So happy to announce the Andre the Giant documentary today. Thanks to SeatGeek, our presenting sponsor since 1963. Thanks to MeUndies. Go to MeUndies.com slash BS right now for 20% off your first order. Thanks to Harry's. Go to Harry's.com slash BS right now for 20% off your first order. Thanks to Harry's go to Harry's.com slash BS right now and redeem your free trial set. Thanks to teed up on ring university.

And thanks to Pearl jam, go to Pearl jam.com right now to find out all the details about PJ 25, their 25th anniversary. They're also a very good Twitter follow. I like how they tweet, uh, concert performances and stuff like that. It's at Pearl Jam.

Check it out. And thanks to Tom Brady. It's been a week since we won the Super Bowl. I still love you. Go Pats. Play us out, Eddie. I don't have a few years left in me On the wayside I'm a bruised

son of a I don't have a few years