The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ep. 21: NFL + NBA w/ Joe House & Bill's Dad

Episode Date: November 5, 2015

HBO's Bill Simmons talks Week 9 NFL best bets, his new favorite NBA team (not the Celtics), Clipper flaws and NBA power rankings with Joe House. Then Bill's dad comes on to defend himself for briefly turning on Tom Brady, and to recap the Brady versus Bird argument. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Today's episode is also brought to you by HBO because they were kind enough to give me my own television show that launches next spring. Thank you, HBO. On November 7th, HBO is showing a boxing double header, double header, double header that's headlined by Brandon Rios battling Timothy Bradley. That's followed by a brand new 24-7 episode for the Canelo-Coto fight. Oh yeah, who doesn't love 24-7? It's un-American. HBO, Saturday night.

Be there. Let's hear it. Yeah. Clear enough for you. Joe House is on the line can you picture us he had a good week last week are you eating

chicken parmesan does it taste good it does taste good so I made fun of you last week about how I was killing you

in football picks and then proceeded to have one of the worst weekends of my life. And fortunately, I did not wager on it. Our big disagreement was the Broncos versus the Packers. Your rationale was just that the Broncos were getting points and chicken parm tasted so good. But somehow that was good enough. Congratulations.

It was good enough. I mean, the defense was the real rationale, and the defense came through. Defense did come through. I wasn't counting on the Broncos having their best offensive performance of the season, which was a nice bonus, but... Well, I forgot this. I should have remembered, because it was basically

November 1st when those Sunday games happened. November is when stuff shifts. There's two seasons. There's the September-October season, then November-December. That's when we find out who the good teams are. I don't know what to make of that Green Bay performance. I've been thinking about it for a couple days. It might just be a throwaway.

It might just be a let's not get too bent out of shape. It happens. National TV, Denver got off to a good start. They played well. It's Green Bay loss. Don't freak out. What do you think? We're going to find out because they're playing another very good football team this coming weekend.

You and I both have a little bit of action on this one, and I don't mean to jump right into it. But the thing that's concerning about Green Bay is they give up a ton of yards on the ground. They have one of the worst rushing defenses in the league and this split season thing, teams running the ball here as the weather gets cold and the playoffs come into view a little bit, they need to figure out a way to stop the rush. Yeah. Well, we're going to get to this game.

We've got to rip through the other ones first, but I'm in Aaron Rodgers' relax mode. I'm relaxed. Aaron Rodgers is looking at me right now. He's making making that hand gesture he's just like relax relax we got beat on a sunday night it's fine it's november 5th we're good we should mention we're taping this on a thursday because our producer uh tate is going back to carolina for the weekend and that means that we do not know what happened on this thursday game and there's a possibility that we do not know what happened on this Thursday game. And there's a possibility we might not ever know what happened to Tate

because who knows if he'll come back. So this could be the last podcast I ever do. I hope Tate comes back. What's Tate doing in Carolina? He's going back to see his homies. He's going back to do his thing. He's Tate. I hope he has a barbecue.

I love Carolina barbecue. He's young. If Tate says anything about me to any of his friends there, any personal stuff that turns up on Twitter, I'm going to fly to Carolina and beat his ass is what's going to happen to Tate. I'm just telling you right now. Tate, don't get Tate drunk. Don't make Tate say things about the new people in his life,

or I'll find all of you. One other thing I should mention, we did a podcast. I did a podcast with Gladwell, and we were talking about Grantland and all that stuff for a while. And I mentioned how they had hired three editors and Juliet, meaning Juliet Lipman. And that came off as like Juliet wasn't super important. Juliet's like the most important person in my life other than my wife right now. And she's a strategist slash big picture editor slash all these things.

And I heard it after the fact. I was like, damn, I kind of, it almost sounded like I was marginalizing Juliet. I'm not going to do that. I love Juliet. Don't diss Juliet. She's a savant. She's a cultural savant.

Yeah, she's the best. I love Juliet. So I just wanted to make that point. I love Juliet. And obviously I did because she was one of the first four people I hired. She's either employee one, two, three, or four. I don't know. We got to do, you know how the startups do the employee number blank?

So I got to figure out who is employee number one, two, three, and four. You should draw straws. Yeah. Anyway, Juliet for Life. And Juliet will be heard from on a podcast because we're going to put together a little pop culture podcast that we're starting in mid-November, and she will be on that. You'll get to hear her thoughts. There's a new challenge season coming up.

Oh, goodness. Oh, yeah. What year is this? I don't know. Just remember, we'll never be too old to either get excited for a nude scene on HBO or to be excited for the challenge. Those two things will always be in our lives. Don't ever let anyone tell you wrong.

I'm good for about one challenge per season now. I watch one or two of them, but I'm always excited for the new one, just to see the format. How many nude scenes are you excited for? Like 100 to 150? Infinite. I would say unlimited. It begins with an I and ends with a finit. Okay.

Infinite. Let's have a laugh and pick the Thursday night game wrong since this is a futuristic podcast people are hearing on Friday. I think the Bengals are going to kill the Browns. What do you think? I think the Browns

are going to cover on an 11.5 point spread. Okay. All right. Well, the Bengals are 11.5. We'll see. One of us is right now an idiot and neither of us knows who it is.

Sunday, quickly, Patriots favored by 14 over the Redskins. Seems way too high. I don't know why anyone would bet this. I'd be shocked if the Pats lost. Do you have any opinion? 14 is kind of exactly the number I would imagine.

The thing that concerns me with Washington is— That's your team. Our teams are playing. I didn't even realize. I know. But once the D.C. Gruden's, if Tom gets rolling, the Patriots might rip off 50 points and Kirk Cousins

on his best day is good for, you know, 30, 31, 32. You like that? You like that? I mean, I it's a stay-away game. I don't like the Patriots giving all those points, but I wouldn't touch it. I, it's a stay away game. Um, I don't like, uh,

all the Patriots given all those points, but I wouldn't touch it. I want to be up by 14 and then I tell Gronk to take off all his pads and just get away from the field and get away even from the part of the field where some a tackler might roll into his ankles, just get him out. He's sitting on the bench. Yeah. Put them in the stands, put them in like the second row. Saints, Titans. Saints giving nine to the Titans. New Titans coach.

I should mention, you guys out there shouldn't ever forget the part that I'm a huge idiot and I added wrong with the Ken Wisenhunt records on Monday. In Monday's podcast with Sal, I said he was 6-44 his last 50 games. I just added wrong. He's actually 4... He was 4-31 in his last 35 games. I counted his 2-14 season twice because, again, I'm a moron. He's known me since

18. There's a few people... Math is not your strong suit. Yeah, so he was 4-31. Now he's gone. No tears shed, I'm sure, by the Titans fans. That's a lot of points, though. Who'd you like in that one? I don't know who's playing quarterback.

Have they said for sure one way or the other? I think it's Vince Young. I think he's back. If it's Vince Young, then I like the points. I'll take the points. If it's not Vince Young, you're grabbing the points? No. I would only be interested in grabbing the points if Mariota was playing quarterback.

I think Warren Moon is playing. All right, quickly, three more. Giants, two and a half at Tampa. I don't know yet. I want to talk myself into Tampa for this. I do feel like this has checkers match potential between Coughlin and Lovie Smith because Coughlin four games a year just goes into a coma and Lovie Smith's been in a coma since 2013. So that scares me. I do

like the Bucs team a little bit. They're a little frisky. What do you think? They are frisky. I like the Bucs also. I wouldn't take them in this situation. The game's too important for the Giants. They can't lose back-to-back games with the position they're in in the NFC East. It's a pretty tenuous first-place hold that they have at the moment. They can't lose to Tampa. Yeah, so the Giants are 4-4. They have at Tampa this week, next week New England, then a bye week.

Then they go at Washington, Jets, at Miami, Carolina, at Minnesota, Philly. It can't be 4-6 going into the bye. And Brady might—well, I don't want to get too confident. I put it this way. As I watched Drew Brees score seven touchdowns against the Giants, I had some ideas. I'll leave it at that. Falcons minus three over Blaine Gabbert in the 49ers.

And what's amazing about the Colin Kaepernick era is that I feel slightly more confident picking Blaine Gabbert than I do about Colin Kaepernick at this point, which is just a cry for help for everybody involved. I feel bad. I feel bad for Kaepernick. I feel bad for Jamie Foxx because Willie Beeman. I feel bad for Kaepernick. I feel bad for Jamie Foxx because Willie Beeman was really the prototype to Kaepernick.

I feel bad for Niners fans. I don't feel bad for Jed York. I don't feel bad for Jim Harbaugh. But I kind of like the 49ers in this game. I'll talk myself out of it. Don't worry. Who do you like? So wait a second.

This was one of my games. Oh, it was? I have a line at 7. You said 3. Where did you see 3? I wrote it down. Hold that thought. We'll skip that one. Eagles minus 3 at Cowboys.

I mean, well. Take the Eagles. Sam Bradford versus Matt Castle or Sam Bradford versus Dana Whedon? Lordy, lordy. This is awful. It just doesn't matter. Poor Dallas.

You hate Dallas. I hate Dallas. You're a Washington fan. Of course you love this. F you, Dallas. I hope they lose every game. It is unfortunate they came in with a footprint that I thought was going to be successful this year. I kind of like Dallas to repeat as a division winner. And then the injuries

derailed the whole season. And I hope they lose every single game for the rest of the season. And I'm picking the Eagles. Well, at least they have some good guys in their team. I might talk myself into the Cowboys by Sunday. I do not have an opinion yet. All right, let's get to the games we do like. Every week we pick five games. I think I went two and three last week. Unfortunately, those are my only two wins out of the entire slate for the week. Yeah, you took it on the chin on the whole slate.

I took it right on the chin. Let's talk about a game we mentioned already. Falcons, 49ers, seven-point line for the 49ers. You just got an extra four points with Blaine Gabbert. So that's what – the crazy thing is the line opened at four and a half, and the public went bananas and pushed it up to seven. And normally you stay away. That's so much value being pumped into the line there.

Yeah. It's a fake line. Exactly. And, you know, the pure contrarian play, absolutely positively, is on the 49ers. There is no scenario under which you will find me ever, ever, ever wagering on Blaine Gabbard. He is 3-11 straight up against the spread at home as a starter in the National Football League. He has a nice losing streak, 7 straight up and against the spread losses

in a row in that home position. He is 1-10 straight up against the spread in those same games against teams that are 500 or better, like the Atlanta Falcons, the 49ers offense is dead last in the NFL. And there's a great Matt Ryan angle. Matt Ryan is 8-0 against the spread, playing with revenge after a straight-up loss as a favorite. Going all-in on the Falcons. Okay. I'm staying away. If I had to pick, I'd

probably stare at it for a while and then realize I was picking Blaine Gabbert and go the other way. But I don't like anything I'm seeing from the Falcons. They just seem really mediocre. And a team that's let a lot of mediocre to bad teams kind of hang around week after week after week

now for five weeks. That Titans game still in the mouth tastes bad. Still there. Yeah. Still tastes bad. A little aftertaste. A little like having that second Bloody Mary where they put too much pepper in it and just can't get that skank taste out of your mouth. I'm going with, this is one of my picks, the Bills minus three over the Dolphins in Buffalo. I like the spot for Buffalo coming off

a bye. They're getting a little more healthy. My whole thing with the Dolphins is this. I think if you throw weird looks at Tannehill, he just completely falls apart. Nobody is better on the earth at coming up with weird looks that may or may not work, but he's going to try them anyway than Rex Ryan. And they already beat this team once. I watched the game. I just think it's a good matchup for them, so I'm taking Buffalo in Buffalo. What do you think?

Yeah, I'm taking Miami because I think the line should be like one and a half or two at best. Okay. But Buffalo has been craptastic the last month or so. The defense has not been anywhere near what everybody expected it to be this season. And I like Miami playing with revenge after getting their ass handed

to them in week one with old Joe Philbin at the helm. So I'm taking Miami just because I think it should be closer to one and a half or two. Not one of your bets though. No, no, no, no, no. Here is one of your bets. Green Bay and Carolina.

We talked about it a little bit before. Did Aaron Rodgers get you to relax? He didn't, as a matter of fact, because he doesn't play defense. And as I mentioned before, they have a bottom five rush defense this season, the Green Bay Packers. I love Carolina getting points at home. Carolina is 11-0. Let me repeat that.

11-0 in their regular season over its last 11 games, and yet they're getting points at home. I like that position. I like getting points. I wish I liked anything I saw from them on Monday night. They gave up like 20 in the fourth quarter to Indy, 17 or 20. And, man, it's just their skill position, guys. Did you see that stat how Kaepernick, by old school traditional stats,

had actually better stats this season than Cam Newton? No, I didn't see that. But that Ted Ginn dropping the game-winning touchdown, you can't have guys like that in deciding positions. We've all seen Ted Ginn. We've watched Ted Ginn dropping the game-winning touchdown, you can't have guys like that in deciding positions. We've all seen Ted Ginn. We've watched Ted Ginn. That can't be like a guy who needs to make big plays for you. I'm telling you, this Carolina team has all spoken me.

They continue to have this tremendous run of winning games against bad teams. This is the first. Now, Seattle, winning the game in Seattle the way they did, that was a legitimate wow kind of win. And I love the way that they won it. I am taking Carolina here because they're the best rushing team in the NFL. They're at home getting points, and they are going up against a bad rushing defense and that's

it. But it would not surprise me one bit if Aaron Rodgers would just settle down. Everybody approached to it went out and beat the hell out of this team. You're just babbling for like about 12 seconds there.

I'm just saying. You know this is a wrong pick. You know it's a terrible pick. I took him. It's one of my top five. I'm going to go this far. I'm not making one of my five, but I am going to make this prediction. The Packers are going to win their next six games.

Carolina, home for Detroit, at Minnesota, home for Chicago on a Thursday, at Detroit on a Thursday, home for Dallas. They're about to Chicago on a Thursday. At Detroit on a Thursday. Home for Dallas. They're about to go on a six-game winning streak before they hit that at Oakland, at Arizona, Week 15, Week 16 vortex. So that's my little prediction. The Minnesota game is at home?

Yeah, it's at Minnesota. I'm not afraid of Minnesota. So it's at Minnesota? Here's how afraid of Minnesota I am. This is one of my picks. Rams plus two in Minnesota. I don't that Minnesota? Here's how I'm afraid of Minnesota I am. This is one of my picks. Rams plus two in Minnesota. I don't get Minnesota. I don't understand it.

The six and two. Are they six and two? They're six and two. Is that possible? They're four and two. Five and two. No, they're five and two. Five and two is ridiculous for them.

All due respect to the Viking fans, long-suffering bunch. My best man at my wedding, Jeff Gallo, diehard Viking fan his whole life. I always hope good things for the Vikings. I don't see it. I can't imagine them being 6-2. From what I'm watching, I don't see it. Well, Chicago gift-wrapped last week. Ten points in the last minute.

Gift-wrapped. Had the game. Over. Had second and 17 on the nine-yard line for Teddy Bridgewater. He goes 91 yards. I like this Rams team. In fact, let's make our little announcement, House, about the Rams. Oh.

Yeah. Oh. Oh. Are we announcing this? This isn't going to jinx it? No. We'll jinx it. Go ahead.

Announce it. You, me, and Sal have formed a startup company, and that startup company is called We're All In on the Rams at 20 to 1 to win the NFC. And we have made a venture capital investment in the future of the 2015 Rams. Not insubstantial

investment. No. We are in on the Rams. I believe in the Rams. I think they could get there. I don't like anyone in the NFC. You can't tell me there's a good NFC team. There's like eight teams that could make the Super Bowl in the NFC right now. So why not the Rams? Rams D, Todd Gurley. Todd Gurley is the most exciting running back now that Le'Veon Bell's out.

He's the most exciting running back in the league. Take us home, Todd Gurley. Yeah. Farewell year before Stan Kroenke moves them to LA. Or maybe he doesn't. Maybe this is such a great year they end up staying. So I got the Rams. I think they're a very good football team.

I don't love the quarterback situation, but I feel that way about half the teams in the league. I think they can run the ball, play defense, make some special teams, and kind of get going and get better as the season goes along. They really have two skill offensive players, and neither of them is not neither of them is a quarterback. Yeah, that's a problem.

Which is slightly concerning. Stop talking me out of this. It was fun venture capital. Stop talking me out of it. I'm making you take the Rams as well since we just took them at 20-1. You might as well take them in this game. I'm in. Next one. Steelers. Raiders. At

Pittsburgh. No bell. A lot of buzz now about the Raiders. At Pittsburgh. No bell. A lot of buzz now about the Raiders. Are they a playoff team? Wild card team? Raiders are good. Oh, my God. Look at the Raiders. They can throw the ball.

Who do you like in this one? I love the Steelers in this one. I knew you would. I can predict all your picks now. Well, I mean, you know. It's a great country. If you can pick them, you should beat me once in a while. Can I imitate why you took this one?

Go ahead. People are way too high in the Raiders, and people are way too low in the Steelers. And people are down on the Steelers because Bell got hurt and Roethlisberger's wearing a knee brace and they blew that game last week. And this is a perfect spot. Pittsburgh at home, you probably have some stat about how good they are at home after a loss, right?

Pretty good, yeah. You got it. You got most of it here. What did I miss? I think that you didn't miss anything. There's a little angle here. The Raiders are just 2-11 straight up and against

the spread in games after they've won two consecutive games, which is a pretty rare thing. When's the last time the Raiders won two consecutive games? Jack Gruden was coaching. Steelers' defense is pretty good. They just held the Bengals to the lowest yardage

of the season. I gotta say, I watched that game. I had all four TVs going. And the bell injury changed that game a little bit. Sure. It was a classic punch-in-the-mouth AFC North game. And the bell thing, it was a bummer. It happened right in front of one of the sidelines. He knew he was hurt right away, and it threw him off.

And then Dalton threw that pick near the end and it looked like the Steelers were gonna get momentum here's my fear with this and this is why i'm taking the raiders even though i know it's an anti-contrarian pick and i agree with your logic for everything first of all i think the raiders might actually be good and and people aren't baking this isn't one of those oh oh, they look good. Oh, let's get excited. Oh, they're going to kick us in the nuts. Second, I don't think Roethlisberger is healthy. He looked terrible in that game. Did you watch that game?

He didn't look right. This has been going on. We talked about this last week on the pod. Roethlisberger in his games back from injury is now 2-5 against the spread. There is this tendency, I think with him, cause he's such a big bear. He's such a big son of a bitch.

I love him. He probably comes back a little too early. He might. And I think that's what that stat's all about. He stunk in that game. I was not impressed, but I knew he was hurt. You could tell it was just like luck a couple of weeks ago.

You knew luck was hurt the way he was throwing the ball. So we disagree on this, but I will say, I think the Raiders are pretty good. One of the things that I like about them is that they can throw the ball. They can come from behind. If they're down 10, they can actually throw the ball and try to get back in the game. I have the Bears

plus 4 in San Diego. I got to say, I don't totally understand this line. I don't think the Bears are... Maybe I'm on drugs. Am I on drugs? I think you might be on drugs. Tate roofied my water. I don't think the Bears are bad. Look at their last four games. They beat the Raiders, which turns out that's a pretty good win. They beat the Chiefs. The Chiefs haven't lost since. They lost to the Lions in OT, and that was a stupid game.

I watched that game. The Bears should have won that. And then the Vikings beat the Bears in the last minute, and the Bears should have won that. They played well for four straight weeks. So why can't they go into San Diego? It feels like too many points to me. Yeah.

If it was just charged by two and a half, and I could talk myself into taking the Chargers. But the extra point and a half to the Bears doesn't seem to make any sense. I like the Bears also. The Chargers, home field advantage. And it goes in the other direction. We've talked about it each and every time. We've talked about San Diego at home.

It's zero. It's zero points. It's not two and a half for the Chargers. It should be zero. It's a home field disadvantage. Yeah. Here's this year. They beat the Lions by five at home.

They covered that. Did not cover Browns, which they won at home. They got killed by the Raiders at home and they got killed by the Steelers at home. Wait, before we have any more picks, if you're going to someone's house for Thanksgiving or Christmas, why not bring them a delicious porch pie? Are you kidding me? Yeah, that's our live read. Porch pie.

Oh my God. It's a Southern delicacy that might change your life. You know, has there ever been a bad situation for the word Southern delicacy? Because I can't think of one. No. No. Hey, House, do you like buttermilk pie? You've got me speechless now.

I had no idea this was coming. You said there was a surprise. Here's the thing about our friendship. One of the things that I like the most about our friendship, when you introduce me to something like this, you make sure that it becomes a part of my life. So every single time that I've been to L.A., since the Simmons house and Porch Pies got married,

there has been a Porch Pie in the house that I can come and savor. You've made sweet love to many porch pies. Especially buttermilk. Buttermilk. How about the chocolate chess? It's always, always, always 1A to buttermilk is number one. You know what I really like? The southern pecan.

It's a great one. Pecan pie. Another great one. Mixed berry crumble. Sweet potato is in season right now. These are the tastiest pies I've ever had. House, did you know this? They even have a monthly pie club.

Oh! You join a pie club, you pay a membership, and every month they mail you a pie. And they will ship. I know what I'm getting for Christmas. Yeah. And they'll ship anywhere to the United States. So go to PorchPies.com. Mmm, pies.

That was my favorite live review I've ever done. Really, really excited about that. That was mine, too, and I had no idea it was coming. PorchPies.com. I interjected myself right into there. You know what it is? PorchPies.com. It's pie season.

It is pie season. We should have to wear special colored clothing like the NFL does during October. For pie season, we should have to wear... What would be the color for pie season? A beautiful chocolate chest or something the color of crust. Crust, like a crust color. Yeah. We should wear crust colored ribbons for pie month.

So delicious. I can't wait to have a porch pie. I can't wait to have a porch pie. I gain like four pounds every Thanksgiving, which some people would say I need. Pie of the month, Bob? Are you kidding me? Pie of the month. Come on.

All right. A couple more picks and then we'll do NBA. Denver, Indy. Indy's getting six. I'm not going to sing this week. It's in Indy. I'm not going to do it. It's in Indy.

Indy's firing people. They're not firing the coach or the GM. It was all the offensive coordinator's fault. It was his fault they gave up field goal in overtime. I'm taking Indy. I figured. It's too high. Too many points. Too many points. That's it.

Luck is... I was trying to think of... This is how sad my life is. On Sunday night I was on YouTube looking for songs that had Backdoor in them to, to be like Andrew Lux theme music. And I came up with backdoor. I'm afraid of where that took you. That search.

Fortunately, it didn't take me into, I had a, I had the things on the red flags on. So it was only going to certain spots on YouTube, but backdoor man by the doors, I think should be Andrew Lux theme song. It's pretty good.

Because he has gone through the backdoor and covered, I don't know what the exact number is, but it's got to be over 10, right? In four years? Oh, sure. In the last two minutes of a game, 10 covers? One of the power stats for me on this thing, he's 7-1 straight up and 8-0 against the spread as a home dog. I like that.

That's a good angle. 8-0 against the spread as a home dog. I like that. That's a good angle. 8-0 against the spread as a home dog. And the other thing to remember with Peyton Manning and old quarterbacks in general, Gladwell and I talked about it a little bit this week in our podcast, but they can get there every once in a while, but there's also going to be games where they're an old quarterback, and maybe this will be one of them. I didn't like it enough to pick it, but I respect the pick.

Well, this is also one. You know, Peyton, one and two straight up, and 0-3 against his old team. Wouldn't have guessed that until I looked it up. Jets-Jags? So Jets-Jags, you're going to be mad at me. I'm going to waffle on this. The line that I liked very much was the line that I sent you this morning

that I saw overnight last night, which was 6.5. And you sent me back saying that it jumped all the way up to 7.5. And I like the game so much more at 6.5. Actually, I'm not going to play it. So why don't you jump on my Bears pick,

plus 4. Take that one. Okay, I'll be over there with you on Bears plus 4. I like the Jets. The power ranking has them as about 7.5. four take that one okay okay i'll be over there with you on bears plus four i like i like the jets there the power ranking has them as about um like a seven and a half point um favorite in this situation but six and a half is was the action that's where i was going to jump in with two feet i'll jump on the bears i like the bears in this spot all right so we will stay away from jets jags i don't know who he if itrick's hurt, but he's playing. That makes me nervous.

It also made me nervous. He's tired after his sex scene in The Affair on Sunday night. I don't know if you saw The Affair. I missed this one. Really vivid sex scene with Fitzpatrick. Fitzpatrick plays everyone thinks it's Joshua Jackson

from Dawson's Creek. It's not. It's actually Ryan Fitzpatrick. He's Cole. It's actually Ryan Fitzpatrick. He's Cole. Ryan. Yeah, he's Cole. Ryan Fitz. All right, so here are our picks. I have the Bills minus three at home over Miami, and I have the Rams plus two in Minnesota.

We both have the Bears plus four at San Diego. You have, here's our disagreement of the week, you have the Steelers minus four and a half. I have the Raiders plus 4.5 in Pittsburgh. You have the Falcons minus 7 against Blaine Gabbert's 49ers. God, I should have taken that one. We also disagree on Packers, Panthers. We do.

Aaron Rodgers has convinced me to relax. I'm relaxed. You're not as relaxed. You're going to join forces with Ted Ginn Sr.? I just like the best rushing team against one of the worst rushing teams. It's so hard to stop a rushing attack that can't pass.

See, now I'm making fun of the pick. You're going to beat me now because I did this last week and I swung the karma of the pick. It's a great pick. I'm probably wrong. And then you have the Colts plus six against Chicken Parm it tastes so good okay um well let's go to nba really quick sure and i have to call my dad my dad's upset he

he's upset that he hasn't been on the podcast yet he feels like i'm freezing him out he feels like he hasn't told his side of the story yet about on July 31st, 2015, when he turned on Tom Brady for one morning. Oh, no. Yeah, so he did. You've got to have the doc on. Is he upset that the Celtics are 1-3? No, because we were in every game.

I'll tell you one thing that's really exciting, both of us, to the point that it's actually, I'm more excited about this than I am to watch Celtic games. The Nets are terrible. They're 0-5. And we have their first pick and it's unprotected. And this is a pretty rare situation in this day and age because everybody protects picks so well. The Celtics have the Nets' unprotected pick.

I'm going to swear. Cover your ears if you're in a car with your little kids. Cover their ears right now. I'm going to swear. Cover your ears if you're in a car with your little kids. Cover their ears right now. I'm going to swear in three, two, one. Earmuffs. The Nets are fucking terrible. They're fucking awful.

They're abominable. They're awful. They're an awful team. And Joe Johnson, you can see the crows circling around his decomposing body. I don't know whether he's just washed up or whether he's just intentionally playing bad so they buy him out or whether he's lost the will to live. But I'm down to those three choices. And their best guy has been Brooke Lopez, who's either going to get traded or he's going to get hurt. They have Jared Jack as the creator.

This was the thing. There's a game a couple games ago where Shane Larkin came in. And the announcers were all excited about Shane Larkin. Oh, Shane Larkin. It's like, are you kidding me? This team's terrible and we have their first-round pick. I'm excited, House. We talked about the Nets

in the over-under pod. Did you just go Phil Simms on me? Huh? You just went Phil Simms on me. When you talk about the Nets, we did talk about the Nets. I didn't go Phil Simms. I don't think. We literally talked about them. That's what Phil Simms said.

You just said Phil Simms. We do. We did talk about them. We talked about Jarrett Jack and what an extraordinarily bad point guard he is. He's fine if he's your fourth guard. Yeah, all the advanced metrics are extraordinarily unkind to him. Very much so. They dislike him. All the advanced metrics are extraordinarily unkind to him. Very much so. They dislike him. In a lead

point guard position. You know, I looked this up. I took the over for the Nets. I'm going to lose that one. You took the over for the Nets? I don't know why I did. I don't remember the thinking. I think I made them one of my locks. You definitely took the under.

I know that much. Is that possible? Hold on. I'm going to go through their schedule just really quickly because I'm not kidding when I say this. I'm more excited about this than anything else. To just watch a team go down in flames over the course of a season and have their first-round pick. The last time we were in this situation, my dad and I,

we had the Seattle. This is sad. This story is a sad ending. Just be prepared. Get the Kleenex out. We rooted against the 1985-86 Seattle Supersonics for the entire year because they traded Gerald Henderson there, and we had their first-round pick. And they stunk.

And we looked at the box scores every night. And that was the year when there was like seven envelopes, and you could be any of the seven. There were no lottery ads. And the Celtics ended up getting the second pick. A couple weeks later, they won the title. The second pick is going to either be Brad Doherty or a man Lenny Baez. Yeah.

I told you. I know. It's a sad ending. But it was really fun to root against Seattle that whole season. So here's Brooklyn really quick. This is rough. Ready? All right. So here's Brooklyn really quick. This is rough. Ready? All right, so here's their winnable game.

They're playing the Lakers on Friday night. Winnable. My favorite thing is that the Lakers are on TV. I feel like they've been on national TV for everyone. I know, it's great. Hold the Lakers side. I want to talk about them. Okay, good.

At Milwaukee, this is their road trip at milwaukee at houston at sacramento at golden state and then they come back home for the hawks hornets celtics celtics again thunder cleveland detroit that's the end of their month. I mean. There's like two winnable games this year. Yeah. They're going to be like two and 15. Literally two.

With their first round pick. All right. They're really bad. And if I'm the Nets, I don't. We talked about this a little bit the last time. I don't really know what I'd do if I'm running the Nets because it doesn't help them to tank. So what do you do? You could argue you bottom out this year and you trade Lopez,

you buy out Joe Johnson, and maybe even trade Thaddeus Young, and you just completely gut the team and be terrible this season. Go Sixers for one season, throw away that pick, and then this summer try to regroup. But I don't think there's an answer. Do you think there's an answer? You have to use those assets to get picks because, you know, there is no scenario under which they can rehabilitate from within.

They can't wait around until they get picks again four years from now or whatever it is. So they need to get picks back for Lopez. And nobody's untradeable on that team. Are you kidding? They should trade everybody and try and get 10 first-round picks out of

all of it. They should definitely... They should get two. They should be able to get two. Brooke Lopez is worth a first-round pick. I would be mad if the Celtics didn't trade for Brooke Lopez, but I would not give Brooke and their pick back for him. I'd give him one of our other picks. And Thad Young, to the

right team under the right circumstances, could also be a mid to late first round pick. Let's talk about the Lakers. Okay. This team was assembled by somebody who was in a, like, remember in No Country Old Men the guy gets in the car accident at the end?

The guy with the bowl haircut? Yeah. And his bone's sticking out of his leg and he borrows some kid's shirt or something. He just kind of limps off. That's the guy who assembled this Lakers team. He basically has a severe concussion and thought it was a good idea to put D'Angelo Russell, Jordan Clarkson, and Julius Randle with Roy Hibbert and Kobe Bryant. You have to have a concussion to think that's a good idea to put D'Angelo Russell, Jordan Clarkson, and Julius Randle with Roy Hibbert and Kobe Bryant. But you have to have a concussion to think that's a good idea. Well, speaking of having a concussion, their head coach is Byron Scott. And look, their stated goal and intention at this point in the season is to win games. They're not going

to go out and let these young kids, these good young assets that they've pulled together here, try and get some reps and get their legs under them a little bit. That felt like a Julius Randle shot. Oh, no, I love Julius Randle. Get your legs under him. It felt like a dig. I'm sorry. My single favorite stat as it relates to the Los Angeles

Lakers at this moment in the season, Kobe has one more point than attempts so far this season. He's like, you know, 60 attempts and 61 points. It's the best thing ever.

And meanwhile, Steph Curry has more points than minutes. Right. I mean, you know, it's astonishing. Kobe's. And meanwhile, Steph Curry has more points than minutes. Right. I mean, you know, it's astonishing. Kobe shooting 32% right now. I had a couple,

you know, obviously I'm ashamed to admit this, but I have some friends who happen to be Laker fans and a couple of them emailed me and they're like, can you believe this Kobe thing? And the answer is obviously, uh, yeah, I actually can.

It's, it's his 20th season. What did you think? This was going to end well? This is a classic. You should have retired, but you didn't. And now this is going to be awkward until you realize you should retire. That's where we are now.

He's 20 years. This is what's frustrating. If you're going to have if the point of this season is a farewell tour then then do it properly do it right you know announce it that way and then play the dude 14 minutes a game you can't trot him out and play him like you're gonna like you're gonna try and win games with kobe out there he shot two air balls last night that were grotesque. Awful, awful shots. He hit the bottom of the backboard with his shot last night. And defensively, he can't move

and he can't guard anybody. Look, whatever. The guy's making $25 million a year. He deserves the right to go out on his terms. But to have him out there and Hibbert, who's slow, but then you have all these other guys who are kind of fun. And it does seem like there's some lineup that they could throw out there.

You bring out that Tariq Black, you know, maybe a little Lou Williams. Like there's some sort of like small ball. They could play up tempo. Yeah. Of course. Where's that lineup? Of course they could. Right.

What is that lineup? Where is that lineup? I don't know. It's only been four games, so maybe we'll see. Yeah. I will say, though though within a week like you could do the blink test and and have a couple thoughts like we we both were in big on houston here's what worries me when i watch them you know it's ty lawson's team a lot of the time

and then the last four minutes it goes into james harden mode he does james harden things and ty lawson kind of runs over and stands in the corner. Not sure that's the best use of Ty Lawson. I don't know if I like those guys together. I like Ty Lawson coming off the bench as like a change of pace energy guy. As a crunch time guy, I don't know. I don't know if that, I don't know if that, when I watch him, I don't know if all the pieces make sense yet.

Now the flip side is that team is just poised to make some sort of monster trade in two months. So I'm not going to get too bit out of shape. But just the blink test is I didn't like those two together. What did you think? Since I want to be glass half full with Houston, we have a lot riding on it. Yeah, we should. My thought is, and I feel the same way about Boston, they're experimenting a little bit, which is what the beginning of the season is for. I don't expect to see Ty Lawson get all those crunch time minutes

as the season develops and as the team's identity kind of rounds into form here. I didn't like Houston losing all three of those first three games by 20 or more points. I did not enjoy that. I didn't like that. Body language doctor did not like any of that stuff. So I had Houston as,

I thought Golden State was going to be 1A and Houston was going to be 1B during the regular season. I thought Houston was going to have a monster regular season. Now it looks like the Warriors are even more motivated than we thought they would be about all the luck stuff. And Curry's like out of his mind. Like Curry's just clearly the best guy in the league now.'s not it's not even the guy game to game is just destroying people who's must watch tv clippers might be the second best team though and i'm not going to get

too bent out of shape about them what happened in the golden state game on wednesday night where they had the lead then they looked like typical clippers again everybody got tight and blake started overpassing chris paul was taking threes because there were no other shots and d'andre you want to get fouled like i've seen that play before i've been i've been in that broadway musical and uh the difference that the thing that scared me was so they needed a fifth guy for crunch time right and they go out they out, they get Lance, they get Paul Pierce, they can take a big swing on Lance and then Paul Pierce veteran. I'm not saying Paul Pierce isn't going to be that guy,

but obviously they want to ice him until April. But last night or Wednesday night, we should say, Austin Rivers is out there at crunch time. I tweeted about it too. They spent this whole summer revamping the team. I actually think Austin Rivers is a pretty good, like defensively he's been excellent. He can't shoot. He spent this whole summer revamping the team. I actually think Austin Rivers is pretty good. Defensively, he's been excellent.

He can't shoot. But if that's your number five guy in crunch time, that makes me super nervous. What do you think? It's the same thing we said at the beginning of the season in the over-under discussion. That is the big vulnerability of this team. They don't have another option for backup point guard to Chris Paul, and I don't know what the idea was behind having him out there with the crunch time crew. It

must have been some kind of defensive strategy. Pepe looked old. I think they want to get three months out of Pepe, and that's it. Yeah, which is fine. That's exactly what makes sense. And it is early in the season, so you don't need to be putting big pressure minutes on

him. But where was Lance? What's wrong with Lance? See, I couldn't agree more. Because if you're not going to throw out Lance in that game, it's freaking early November. You're in Golden State. Just see what you have. See how he responds. Put him in a big moment and see if he

melts down something. But I wanted to see him in that game. And I already know what I have with Austin Rivers. I don't know what I have with Lance. It almost feels like in a Golden State series, Lance could be the X factor potentially. I mean, remember, he's the worst player in the league last year for anybody who played like 25 minutes. But we've seen him do it in big games. Yeah, he's not afraid of big games. He's crazy.

He's out of his mind. Talk about, you know, irrational confidence. You talk about irrational confidence. What are you talking about, Lance Stevenson? What are you talking about? We were talking about crazy. Yeah, so Golden State, clearly the best team right now. It could change in a month, but just right now, if you did a tournament right now, they'd

be the one seed. I think the Clips would be the two seed. I like what I've seen from Toronto. I like they've kind of thrown the ball in the Jonas pile a little bit. They got rid of Amir Johnson. They basically switched Amir Johnson for Damari Carroll, put a little more burden on Jonas. I liked it.

I like skinny Kyle Lowry. I like the look of that team. I thought that was a good win for them. Come from behind on the road at OKC. That is a good quality win. Yeah. And then conversely, OKC, the defense on them, I don't know. I don't know if they can get stops.

This was a problem for them last year and they had guys missing. But now this year, their defense, they're not going to, I don't care how good Durant and Westbrook are, you still need to get stops. And they've got to figure that part out. Early, though. Yeah, it's early. Not worried yet about OKC.

The only other team, the Wizards. Yeah. Is Bradley Beal making a little, maybe a mini leap? Maybe a little tiny hop? This is another one. You know, this is one where I do the Aaron Rodgers, let's relax. Okay, good. Let's just take it easy a little bit.

Okay. Only because, now look, he has picked right up off of the terrific playoff show that he put on last season. He's playing at a level where it's clear that he intends to be in the conversation for the all-star game. He wants to be among the elite players at that, that shooting guard position. And he's, he's certainly playing like it.

The thing that's been the concern in the past is his durability, his ability to log, you know, 32, 33 minutes a game and play 82. He hasn't played 82 yet. So I am hoping that what we see over this first month, first 30 games, is a little bit of reduced minutes management for him

because the important thing for him is to be healthy come playoff time. But it's very exciting to watch a guy on the brink of making the leap. I'm not going to say he's making the leap. I'm going to say he's on the brink of making the leap. He's on the brink. That's why I said Lil Hop. And he's only, I think, 22, right? 22 or 23.

Oh, he's so young. It's so good. I love it so much. You like your team. I feel like you don't text me and tell me enough how excited you are about your team. You've been waiting your whole life to have a fun backcourt. It's four games. I just can't, you know.

Your backcourt's John Wall and Bradley Beal. Like, you've freaking won the lottery. Lost to the Knicks on Saturday night. Lost to the Knicks Saturday night because Whitface insisted on having Jared Dudley in the lineup in crunch time. And Jared Dudley's legs aren't under him yet. So he was throwing brick balls at the underside of the rim from three-point range. That's okay. That's a schedule loss.

It was on the backside of a back-to-back. They played Milwaukee and beat Milwaukee, came back at the end of last week. But, you know, I try and be – I'm trying early on in the season here to just be low-key about it all. I think you should be more excited about the Beowall backcourt, and I think they need a nickname. And I think you're the man to come up with it. By Friday, next Friday, I want a nickname for those two.

There have been some efforts at it. I'll do some research, and I'll come up with my own spin on it. You got it. It should sound a little Chocolate City-ish. I got it. I know. I'm on it. I don't think it necessarily has to have their names in there. It should lend itself to a late 80s Costico Brothers poster. There's been stuff like Hustle and Flow.

I mean, you know, we'll get it. Don't worry. I'm not saying that's it. I'm just saying there's some vibe out there. Wall of BB? No. No, no. This isn't.

There have been efforts at doing this before. All right. I thought every Friday we'd talk about the Sacramento Kings before you left. Because they're my favorite team to monitor other than the Brooklyn Nets. They're 1-4. They just lost their last two games by double digits. And on Wednesday, George Carl Nets, he was benching Ben McLemore. Well, Ben McLemore

deserves to be benched. Yeah. Well, he's 22 years old and he was the seventh pick in the draft a couple years ago. And then they traded the guy they took with the eighth pick the next year. And now they have nothing to show for either pick because Ben McLemore's benched, they traded Nick Stauskas.

Willie Colley-Stein, he's playing 22 minutes a game. I'm trying to see, has he scored a basket yet? Yeah, I guess he has. He's averaging three. He's shooting 74% house on four shots. The only thing I would say about the last two performances for the Kings, DeMarcus has got a strained Achilles.

We can't get too crazy about it. McLemore was identified by all smart people as a true vulnerability in this lineup, and the guy who could have the shortest leash, and guess what? It was a pretty short leash. That would be a position that

sacramento because they're insane might go out and try and improve um somebody you know avery bradley what do you want in exchange for him i'm worried about ben mclemore because you know there's always only like four smart teams in the league? Yeah. Somebody's just going to steal him. Couldn't you see the Spurs stealing him? I've been saying this for like a year. The Spurs steal him for a protected first-round pick, some stupid deal.

And then two years from now, he's on the Spurs for 12 years as like a centerpiece of him and Kawhi and two other guys. All of a sudden, he's great. I can totally see that happening. That would be the very best thing that could happen to Ben McLemore. So your panic button for the Kings this week doesn't sound like you're ringing it yet. What are you, like a 4 out of 10? Yeah, I'm a 4. I'm not even close.

This week in the Sacramento Kings, I'm a 4 out of 10. On the Vivec meter? On the Viv meter. I'm like a 6.5. What? They benched their 22-year-old shooting guard after five games. I'm at six and a half already. I just want to give my 22-year-old lottery pick shooting guard a month

to figure out if he can play in the playoffs. Let the DMC get healthy. The DMC's got a strain of Achilles. Let him get healthy. DMC needs to stay on the court. Yeah, that's an important thing for this team's success this year. I'm looking at their boogies.

God, I love boogie. You don't think the Celts can get them, right? No. I don't. I don't think under any scenario at this stage now that Sacramento's going to trade them. They can't. Would I want it? Let's say they called the Celtics right now

and said they wanted the Brooklyn pick for him. What did the Celtics say? They wanted the Brooklyn pick and David Lee for him. How quickly? Are you kidding? I'm scared to give up the Brooklyn pick. He's a top 10 talent in the league. So the Brooklyn pick straight up for Boogie.

Done. D-U-N. Done. It actually would have to be the Brooklyn pick and David Lee for Boogie. The double capital D capital U

capital N. Without hesitation. Come on. What are you talking about? How are they going to replace my enjoyment of watching the Brooklyn Nets every night? It's my favorite thing.

My wife actually asked me the other day. She's like, what's going on with you? Did you bet on them or something? I was like, no, no, it's a long story. I'm basically rooting against a group of guys I don't even know three or four nights a week for the next six months. Don't ask. It's going to bring you so much enjoyment.

You're going to enjoy it so much enjoyment. Don't ask. You're going to enjoy it so much. You know, I tweeted Ben Simmons after Nets losses, and he tweeted back at me a screenshot picture of him having created himself in an NBA Live video game, and the team was the Celtics. Oh, that's so kind. Yeah, I love that dude.

That's very friendly of him. I love my Australian distant cousin's very friendly of him. I love my Australian distant cousin, Ben Simmons. We'll be watching him in LSU soon. Yeah, it's exciting. College basketball is right around the corner. All right, house. I think we're good.

Enjoy the weekend. Thanks for the best bets. Thanks for listening to me talk about the Brooklyn Nets. And thanks for listening to me talk about porch pies. Thanks for putting porch pies in the mix. And now you're going to go to bed at night dreaming about buttermilk porch pies. I might have to send you one. Yeah, it was chicken parm last week. Tonight it's porch pies.

Joe Haas, peace. Hey, good time. We're going to call my dad, who has not been on the podcast since we relaunched it. But first, thousands of people who want home security systems get ripped off every day. They write huge checks and sign long-term contracts that don't give them any outs. Come on, people.

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Half. And even better, you'll get their award-winning professional monitoring so protect your home with an alarm i trust visit simply safe bill.com and get an exclusive 10 off just because you listen to the bill simmons podcast that's right you get 10 off simply safe bill.com check it out alright as promised he's fresh off serving a four week suspension for doubting Tom Brady he's now officially allowed

back on the Bill Simmons podcast his name is also Bill Simmons my dad how are you I'm good but I don't like how I was depicted five seconds ago the day you quit on Tom Brady. I refused to go on the podcast

because of how I was inaccurately portrayed by my son. What was inaccurate about you saying, stop it, why would he destroy his cell phone? You sound like a homer. You yelled at me. You like scolded me. I was in an elevator in Chicago. You're yelling at me. But I think you misinterpreted. I was worried that what happened, what eventually happened, what happened because of the destruction

of the cell phone, that people would misinterpret that. And I was angry at Brady for destroying the cell phone. So you were angry at Brady. There you go. You were angry at Tom Brady. I was. I was angry at him for putting himself in the position that people wouldn't believe him because he, for whatever reason, destroyed the cell phone. Well, I was never angry. I never doubted that Tom Brady would certainly never do anything inappropriate with those footballs. I just wished he hadn't put himself in the position where the rest of the country doubted him more because of destroying that cell phone. And that's all I have to say on the matter. Anything else?

I was never angry at Tom Brady, and I always believed in him. So look, we'll agree to disagree. Okay. I don't ever remember being angry at my four-time Super Bowl quarterback. Like we've done many times. By the way, I'm very excited to be a guest

on your new podcast, now called the Bill Simmons Podcast. Yeah. And I'm happy to be a guest on your new podcast, now called the Bill Simmons Podcast. Yeah. And I'm happy to be, very happy to be a member of the HBO family. Oh, good. I'm glad. Good to hear that.

Am I paid for this, or am I still a volunteer? You're paid when eventually you just move into my house and my family's taking care of you full-time. Okay. 20 years from now. It won't be that far away.

We have a guest room ready for you. Okay, good. So house and I were just talking about the Brooklyn nets. Oh, how much fun it is. I know how much fun it is to watch them lose week after week. We just went through their schedule.

It looks like they're going to go 2-15 coming out of the gate. You and I haven't talked too much about the Nets, but obviously it brings me back to the 1985-86 season when every time you and I talked, whether it was

in person or over the telephone, we'd talk about what did Seattle do the night before because the Celtics had Seattle's number one pick. But, you know, I was thinking there was such a major difference at that time. There was no internet. And Seattle, if they were playing at home, played very late. And we couldn't get the scores, obviously, because you couldn't check them on the Internet or on cell phones or anything like that. But the Boston Globe used to have that scores hotline that you could call at six in the morning.

Yeah. And you could get the scores of all the teams that played late. And I can't remember how many times I would call that hotline at six in the morning, only to hear one score. The Seattle basketball score. Yeah. I mean, we had so much fun that season. Rooting against Seattle, didn't we?

House and I talked about that. It has a sad ending. Yeah, well, very, very sad ending. Not only for the person involved in this family, but probably for the careers of Bird and McHale, and maybe it cost us a couple, two or three championships. Yeah, and some amazing games, too.

I still haven't gotten over that. We're heading toward the 30-year anniversary of that draft, and I still feel like I can't believe what happened. I think it's going to be one of the last things I think about on my deathbed. Well, and you guys, with your former employer, did that terrific 30 for 30 on the whole Len Bias story. Yeah. That was one of my first ones.

Although it was extremely hard for me to watch that for the reasons you're mentioning. Yeah. Well, Brooklyn, I hope it has a happy ending with the actual draft pick. But it's just fun to root against a team. And as you said, now you actually have League Pass, and they're on TV sometimes for where you are. I don't even remember if you have League Pass. But it's really fun to just root against Brooklyn down the stretch. I'm enjoying it.

I think somebody was going to get it as a Christmas present for his father, but I haven't seen it come my way yet. All right. I'll take care of that. I can do that for you as payment for this podcast. Since the last time we talked, the Pats I don't think have lost since we've talked because I think I talked to you after the Super Bowl,

and then we must have talked a couple times when I worked for my old employer. And now you're back. And the Patriots are 7-8 now? Or 8-0? No, they'll be 8-0 after this Sunday's game. Oh, that was way too confident. I didn't like that. There's a tremendous amount of excitement up here.

But I have to say up here, meaning Boston, but I have to say that there's also some concern because we seem to, differently than 07-08, we really have had the injury bug. As you and I have talked on separate occasions, I know other teams have the injury bug, too. We just seem to have it centralized in the offensive line, and that's exacerbated, obviously, by the complete change of our cornerback situation. Right. Everybody here was assuming and hoping that they'd make a couple of deals this week before the trade deadline for both a cornerback and an offensive tackle,

even if they had to give up a couple of high draft picks. But as you know, no activity anywhere. Yeah, Belichick, he just won't make a trade unless it's the right trade. Yeah. Maybe they made a couple of offers and the other teams didn't want to participate. But aren't you a little worried? You know, the schedule we've had, we didn't have the toughest schedule this year. Certainly the Denver game is going to be difficult.

I think New York and New York will be difficult. There's a couple of end-of-the-year games with Buffalo and Miami and the Jets, and those are all wild cards. But we haven't really played that Green Bay-type team where the quarterback could throw consistently at our cornerbacks and I'm not sure how our cornerbacks

would fare. People are worried about that. Are you worried about that? Everybody's flawed. I'm worried about the blocking. I thought that was one of the reasons I took Miami in that Thursday night game was I just couldn't figure out how we were going to block them. And even this week against Washington,

Washington's not very good, but they have a pass rush. And I guess when your quarterback gets the ball out in two seconds, maybe it doesn't matter, but, you know, I'm always worried. Clearly they're going to win the division. And they need to keep Brady and Gronk healthy out of everybody. And I don't know. The Denver game, I went from thinking that we had a real chance to go 16-0 just because of the schedule to really being worried about the Denver game because Denver looked so good on Sunday night.

Their defense, they really made a lot of stuff happen. And that scared me too, especially if our O-line's not ready yet. Their defense looks tremendous. Yeah, really good. You know, all three levels of their defense are playing extremely well. And, you know, I had watched Manning before during the season, and he looked pretty iffy. But he certainly didn't look iffy the other night.

Now, you know, it could be the team he was playing, but he certainly looked very confident. And he obviously, like everybody has seen, was able to throw the long ball. I think, you know, this was kind of the situation a year ago, though. And then during the last eight games of the regular season and the playoffs, he seemed to wear down. So, you know, we might see some of that. I'm excited for that. during the last eight games of the regular season and the playoffs, he seemed to wear down. Yeah.

So we might see some of that. I'm excited for that Denver-Pats game. I was excited. It's always fun when Brady and Manny play. But now, especially if there's some real reason to be scared with this offensive line over the next two weeks heading into that game, and it's in Denver. It's in Denver, yeah. I wonder if, like, let's say we over the next two weeks heading into that game. And it's in Denver. It's in Denver, yeah.

I wonder if, like, let's say we win the next two, but we don't look that good. And let's say Denver wins the next two. I wonder who's favored in that game. I would say the team that's playing at home. Yeah, you would think, right? Like Denver by one and a half or Denver by two? I don't know. Right.

Usually once a year we get points on the road and it's always a mistake. And it already happened this year in Buffalo. So, hey. The other interesting piece, and it was a discussion on Boston Radio during the day today, had to do with Cincinnati. And, you know, we have,

I don't know, has it happened before after seven games that three AFC teams are all undefeated? I don't know. We don't play Cincinnati, but I think Denver does. So something will obviously transpire. I think they play them, though, after we play them, if I recall. You texted me the other day. You were saying there was a Brady versus Bird argument.

Was that just you and your friends, or you heard that on the radio? No, it was friends of mine who texted me a simple question that was being discussed by a large group of avid sports fans in Boston. And the question was simply, Bird or Brady? And it's a tough question. You and I, I think, gravitate toward Bird and always will. But it's not so easy an answer. You know, do you think?

Well, it comes down to length of the career versus ceiling, which is always tough. The ceiling of Bird was higher. The point he hit in 86 was Brady never got to a point like that. But Brady's now been doing this since 01. It's 2015, so 15 solid years. Bird played nine years, missed a year, came back, was an all-star, but not the same guy, and then was banged

up for the last two years. He was done. Ironically, some of that goes back to something we talked about five minutes ago, which was the death of Len Bias. I mean, I'm convinced Bird's career not only would have been extended, but he wouldn't have played the tremendous number of minutes he did in 87 and 88. Well, remember, I mean, the internet would not have been kind to Casey Jones in 87 and 88. But these random games in January,

Bird's playing like 47 minutes. It was not good. He definitely put a lot of miles on those tires. But he didn't really have a bench. I mean, if you recall, Walton, after 85, 86, when he came back, he got hurt again for the 86-87 season. I would have wanted a little more Fred Roberts.

A little more Mark Akers. That was also, Red kind of lost it too around then. That's when we started the Brad Lohaus type of acquisitions were happening. Yeah, it wasn't too long after that that, well, it was four or five years

or five or six years we're not red didn't take tony parker and uh well that was way after but the one that the red flag one was michael smith over tim hardaway we were both confused by that one we didn't have a point card we were more than confused yeah i remember where I was. I was at Davio's restaurant watching the draft. And you and I had talked. You had championed Tim Hardaway. I didn't know much about him. And all of a sudden, we supposedly took the next Larry Bird. He only lasted about a year, if I recall.

He's now Clippers announcer. Yeah, I think the thing with Brady, though, is how long his prime is. I heard Chris Carter talking about this on the radio, and I thought it was smart. He was talking about how there's a lot of great players, but only a lot of great players now have a prime, like a peak. And he was like, the amazing about brady is that his prime has lasted this long i thought that was a good way to put it like bird's prime was basically i mean you could say it was 80 to 88 but he really peaked in 84 85 86 87 is like one of the best four-year stretches anyone's ever had he won three mvps and his stats were better in 87 the year he didn't win than the other three seasons. But Brady's peak has basically been from 06 all the way to now.

Because in 06 was the year we almost made the Super Bowl with Bershek Caldwell and Jabbar Gaffney. Those were Brady's greatest years. Right. And it's extended all the way through now. This is now a 10-year prime where his stats in year 10 of that prime are as good as they were in year one, which just isn't realistic.

So, you know. Well, it's an interesting argument because there was a similar discussion on the radio yesterday where they were talking about current-day quarterbacks. Yeah. And that four years ago,

you might have said that Brady was the top quarterback in the league. And nobody would have expected that four years later, you'd probably be saying either Brady or maybe Rodgers. You and I probably would say Brady is still the best quarterback in the league. And all these other quarterbacks who have been drafted have major flaws. Yeah. And now he's 38 years of age. So, you know, it's kind of funny when you watch Brady interviewed

and he says he wants to play 10 more years. He wants to be the next George Blander. Right. I'm not putting anything. He could be. Well, we talk about this sometimes just after Pat's games. It does seem like he's mastered a certain level of playing quarterback, the way he's able to read defenses, which I think he's better at than he was 10 years ago.

I don't think physically he's the same guy, but if I was a defense, I'm not sure what I would do. I don't know what the answer is, because it's like whatever you throw at him, all of a sudden Edelman's doing a little cut out toward the sideline or Grock's going up the middle. There's always an answer. And that's why I'm so excited for that Denver game,

because Denver's defense is good enough to really throw some legit things at him and it'll be interesting to see how he finagles that don't you feel like with gronk they've been very careful like there's never been a moment like in fast and furious when whenever you know they hit the the nas button when vin diesel like he needs that extra push it's that i feel like they've never hit the Nas button when Vin Diesel needs that extra push. I feel like they've never hit the Nas button with Gronk. They're just very carefully driving him through the season. But we haven't really opened him up on the highway yet.

Don't you get that feeling? I do, but I hope that it's intentional. Oh, I think it is. And I'm very comfortable with them doing it that way. But I think there's a couple of things in play. As we talked about the offensive line being beat up almost in every game in the first half you'll see gronk more often than not staying in to help block yeah then then they seem to free him up a little bit in the second half um that might not be taking place if the offensive line was not dealing with these injuries.

But I think the other thing, you and I talk about it all the time, every time he makes a spectacular play and he's going down the field. He's going to fall down. Yeah, just fall down. Yeah, fall down. Go out of bounds. Because doesn't it seem like these defensive backs over and over are going low in the knees? Right, his kneecap.

And I just, there's a slight part of me that stops breathing until he gets up. I know. We had that with, Ben Coates wasn't as good as Gronk, but in the mid-90s, Ben Coates was the same thing where he would be dragging three guys down the middle of the field every time. And he was like, just go down. Just stop. And then all of a sudden, he got old overnight. I think he was done when he was like 31.

With Gronk, I actually really believe that as soon as they feel like they have the game in hand, they don't run certain plays for him anymore. I don't think they want to expose him over the middle at all. I think one of their goals this season is to get him 19 straight games where he doesn't take a hit like that. It does seem like very rarely do they send him over the middle where multiple guys can go at him. Whereas the

last couple years, that was a staple play. Now they just send Edelman over the middle so he can take his daily head shot. I think it's hit the head every game. He's another guy I'm worried. Aren't you worried about him, though? Yeah. Well, I think he thinks his name is Julius now.

But, yeah, he takes one ridiculous hit every game, and it's like they just refuse to throw a flag on helmet-to-helmet hits on Julian Edelman. It's like it's his fault every time that he lowered his head at the wrong time. Well, the other thing that worries me, and I don't know if it's the post-deflate gate, it's us against everybody else mentality. I wish, as in the games where it's very clear we're going to win these games and we're in the fourth quarter, take everybody out, please.

Yeah. You know, we don't need to win by 20. More Jimmy? A little more Jimmy in there? Get a little, who's our four-string tight end? Get him out there? Yes. I mean, exactly.

But there's a mentality with this team that I fully understand, living up here in Boston, but it really worries me when you see the way there's some headhunters on other teams. And as we talked about Gronk, boy, they're really going after him low on the legs. Hey,

um, just quickly. Cause we got to go to Tyler Sagan, hat trick in Boston. Were you okay with that? Or are you just so focused on Brooklyn at this point? You don't even care? No, I was very focused on,

I was watching the Bruins game, and I don't know how many discussions you and I had within 10 seconds of that trade being announced. It felt very, it was like the Harden trade. It was just like, why? Why are you trading a dollar for quarters and dimes? What are you doing? And why do you give up on a 21-year-old kid with those kinds of skills

and that kind of talent, even if he's immature? Give him time to become more mature. Don't give up. And, you know, he's evolved into the player we all thought he would be, and we got nothing really of note back in return. So, yeah, it's killing most of us who are hockey fans in Boston. Have you been in on the Bruins, or have you had to wait until the Patriots lost a game?

I'm not in yet on the Bruins. It feels early. Depending on, I mean, I watched the Dallas game, to be candid, because I was curious about Sagan. Obviously, I'm in on the Celtics. They went to the game Sunday against San Antonio. What did you think of Aldridge and Duncan together? I hadn't seen Aldridge on TV before with Duncan.

I thought Aldridge was terrific Sunday, and they seemed to mesh very well. I understand that maybe that was his best game to date for this season. But that team has a lot of pieces. Kawhi Leonard took over in the fourth quarter. Aldridge was very good. Obviously, we always have liked Tony Parker. I mean, unless they have injuries, they're going to be there at the end of the season. Don't you think?

Yeah. I think regular season is probably Spurs, Clips, then Rockets. I mean, I'm sorry, Warriors, Clips, and then Rockets, Spurs are probably right underneath. But for playoffs, I think the Spurs are built for that. And they won't care. They'll throw away regular season games. He'll play Duncan 60 times. Can you believe you're still going to see Tim Duncan play?

Isn't that unbelievable? It is unbelievable. And it's still good. As you know, Sunday they had a special cocktail party before the game for season ticket holders who have had tickets more than 40 years. Oh, yeah. I'm glad you brought that up. Keep going.

Yeah, I noticed you put it on the Facebook page. It was a very nice function. It was funny. I read some of the comments from people who responded to seeing that up on the Facebook page. It was, it's 43 wonderful years with terrific memories. And hopefully Ben Simmons is playing for the Celtics next year, courtesy of the Brooklyn Nets. And we're in the mix again.

We're in the mix. Yeah, they had this Hall of Fame thing for everybody who's had tickets for more than 40 years. Now. One caveat on that though. Yeah. There's one caveat. And I do kind of want to get to the bottom of this.

Cause in some cases it was families. Cause it would be like somebody who had the tickets and then passed them on to his kids or her kids and, or they died or something like that. I feel like you have to be in like the top nine or 10 person, people who have had the tickets and gone from beginning to end for season ticket holders. Because what were you like?

You were like 26 when you got the first ticket, 25, 24, I think 24. I agree with you. I think there should be a Hall of Fame asterisk club. Continuation Hall of Fame. Where it's the same person who was sitting in that seat or whatever seat. Maybe seats have changed, but 40 years ago.

I think it would be a very small group. Yeah, because... All right, so you got your ticket when you were 24. So nobody got a season ticket younger than that. Maybe you might have gotten maybe 22, but it has to be in that range. So then at that point, now you're 68? You're going to be 68 this month. This month, yeah so anybody who's been going to the games for as long as you year after year after year would have to be like around 68 and

then older yeah you would see those people you will you'd see those people at the games if they're still in the room you're right you'd see them at the games they'd be older than you and they'd probably have awesome seats, considering part of the great thing about having seats for that long is you keep moving up closer and closer to the court. I did get to meet a man and his son who was at the game. His name is Andrew Marr from Worcester-Shrewsbury area. He got his tickets in 1971. And he's been going ever since?

He goes to a lot of the games. He's now going with his son. He's starting some musical venture. So, you know, that's the kind of person that I'd like to meet in a separate kind of event where there's a continuity with the same person owning those seats way back when. So you want the cream of the crop event. I guarantee they have somebody there

who started going when Russell was there and is still going now. That person has to exist. I'm sure so. I would bet so also. Can you imagine having tickets to see Bill Russell in like 1968, 69, and then Ben Simmons in 2016? I mean, it brings a tear to my eye.

It really does. Me too. Dad, good luck with the Patriots this week. Thanks for finally making your dramatic appearance on the BS podcast. All right. Thank you. I'll talk to you over the weekend. Best of luck with the new podcast.

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