The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ep. 9: Casey Wasserman

Episode Date: October 15, 2015

HBO's Bill Simmons talks to Casey Wasserman about Los Angeles' 2024 Olympic bid, the NFL in L.A., Los Angeles being the next great American city, and the evolving role of agents in the NBA. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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You don't need cable or satellite to watch HBO anymore. Download the HBO Now app and start your free one month trial today. Okay. Hopefully this is the last podcast I will ever do that doesn't have entrance music, because I think I figured out the entrance music. One more guy says yes, and we're ready to go on Friday, but for now, no entrance music. But I do have Casey Wasserman, my old friend. You went on the podcast once before. How many years ago was that? Must've been five or six, but nothing has ever elevated my popularity like your podcast. Oh, is that true? That's unbelievable.

It was a bump? Among 18 to 24 year olds, I got infinitely more valuable and popular. Oh, that's great. Well, now you're going to be more popular because... So, all right. So I'm conflicted on this because I don't think any American city should have the Olympics except for Los Angeles, which is actually built for the Olympics, and it makes a ton of sense. And I was in the middle of this whole thing because I'm from Boston. Boston won the bid over Los Angeles,

and I knew it was going to be a disaster. I know you can't say that much, but Boston's the most provincial place on the earth. It doesn't have any of the infrastructure it needed And it made no sense whatsoever And everyone in Boston realized this pretty much immediately And got rid of it They threw it out like they did with the British

And you were sitting there waiting You're running the LA bid for For the 2024 Summer Olympics And now you have a chance So who do we have to take out? Paris? First I want to thank you for Saying all the things you did about Boston during that time. Because it was all the things I was thinking and couldn't say.

So it made me feel infinitely better that at least someone was saying them. I was being politically correct and you could not be, which was very helpful. So it's LA against, and we are the official U.S. city. Yeah. Paris, Rome, Hamburg, and Budapest. So four European cities and us. And September of 2017, I think we should do the podcast from Lima, Peru, which is where the announcement will be. Oh, no.

How good is that? Lima, Peru? Come on. That's where it's going to be? That's where the announcement... So you have two years, basically. Two years. You have 26 months.

Correct. It's two years. And it's really two missions. One is over the next two years to develop a fully baked Olympic bit in every sense of the word. Venues, traffic, security, infrastructure, venue agreements, all the stuff that it takes to actually put a Games on. Yeah. And on a completely parallel path. There's roughly 100 IOC members who we need to connect with, be humble, earn their trust, earn their respect,

because what they decide in 2017 is to give you their most valuable asset for seven years. And once they give it to you, it's yours to bring to life. And that's a big decision for them to make. It's arguably the most important decision they all make. And I believe that they're going to pick the city that they trust and respect and that they believe will do for the olympics what they want done okay so let's go through the other cities so paris hasn't had it in a long time correct so and it's one of the great cities in the world and it would seem like that would intrigue them no question same for rome i would say london, Paris, and Rome are probably the three most famous non-American cities.

Budapest, I'm not feeling. I think they're on the outside looking in. Yeah, look, it's a great city. This is a big undertaking for any city, but for a city like Budapest, really massive, without the economic infrastructure that a Hamburg, a Rome, or a paris have outside of la obviously look the the interesting thing is uh it's the 100th anniversary of paris from 1924 that's not good that cuts both ways though 1996 was the 100th anniversary of athens which you would think would have been an obvious choice yeah and they took it to atlanta right not exactly uh does atlanta hurt this because atlanta i think was considered to be um maybe not a roaring

success whereas in 84 los angeles was considered to be a success it was 2002 despite the hiccups they had getting there was a big success in salt lake yeah uh obviously uh the united states is important market for the ioc that's not why they would us, but it's just an important piece of the puzzle. Paris is clearly the favorite today. And our job is to be consistent and relentless over the next two years. Make as few unforced errors, frankly, as possible. And put ourselves in a position to succeed. The dynamic, if you want to play game theory, for European cities, there are 45 IOC members in Europe. Oh, so you're saying it's almost like the Oscars,

where you have three people from the same movie, they take each other's votes. That's part of our hope, and we need to do a good job. If we don't do a good job, none of that matters. But we need to be your non-typical American bidder. We need to do this with humility, which is important. We can't assume it's America's time because, frankly, there's no such thing. We need to go earn

this. It's a tough competition. It'll be an interesting two years. It'll certainly be a wild ride, that's for sure. So you have how many IOC members? In the United States or total? Just total. There's 100 total. They have the ability to go up to 116. So the next time they will move some in and out is in Rio. They have a, if they call it a Congress around the Olympics. So some people age out, they bring in new members. So I'm sure it'll grow a little bit, but roughly 100 members.

And most votes wins. Most votes wins. The low vote getter until there's a majority gets removed from the process every round of voting. Oh, that should have happened to Lincoln Chafee. And a few Republicans. Yeah. A few other Republicans could have could have suffered that same demise. So, you know, to be fair, the last two American bids lost on the first round. They were removed on the first ballot, so to speak. And we need to keep that in perspective. It just shows you how much work we have to do. So but this isn't like FIFA, right? Like FIFA, everyone knew at all times was the most

corrupt thing going on. And it made no sense. This is like there are real rules and regulations and laws they have to follow, right? There are. And the IOC has done an incredible job of, I think, distinguishing themselves from FIFA. The other difference is when FIFA votes for World Cups, they do it through their executive committee, which is 22, 23 people. You don't need to influence that many people to win. And influence, you can deem to be whatever you want it to be and whatever was assumed to have happened. The IOC, it's every member gets a vote. So hard to influence in that kind of way, 50, 60 people without it being really obvious and really public. And we should mention just your background a little bit. You grew up here.

I did. Born and raised in LA. I was 10 in 1984. So I remember those games well. So you went to those. I do. I have some really embarrassing pictures of some Michael Jackson-esque attire I was wearing in 1984. Awkward shorts. Shorts, the vest. Crazy hairdos. The vest, yeah.

So you were, I mean, your grandfather was one of the most powerful people in LA. I'm sure you had good seats for some of those. He was one of three co-chairs of those Olympics. So went to a lot of events. It was, other than Carmageddon, the least traffic there's ever been in Los Angeles. So it was a fun time to be here. So you think people cleared out? They did. It was amazing. You could have walked down the 405 naked and no one would have hit you.

Oh my God. That's been a dream of mine for years to walk down the 405 naked. So I was living in Connecticut that summer because my parents had gotten divorced and my mom remarried my stepdad. And so I was in Connecticut, kind of going back and forth there in Boston. But I remember watching most of those games in Connecticut. The Russians didn't show up. They didn't. The boycott was, people forget that. That hurt.

It hurt. But it's also one of the reasons I think the games were such an extraordinary success in this country. Because Americans like to win. Because we won everything. So, you know, winning is good. It's good for business. What's interesting is the Russians boycott was the first time the Chinese government sent a full team. Yeah.

Also the greatest expansion in 1984 of women's participation. They used to actually limit, show you how much the world's changed. They used to limit that women couldn't do distance events in track and field and swimming. So first time the marathon was in the Olympics was in 1984 for women. Joan Benoit won. I remember. Because they didn't think women could run a marathon. It was crazy.

So L.A. It was a little sexist back then. In addition to a lot of other things it did for the Olympic movement, embraced the Chinese team warmly, expanded the women's program dramatically. And so LA has a lot to be proud of from 1984.

Well, and then the other thing that happened was there's no Olympics in 1980 because we don't go. The one that happened before then was 1976. Which bankrupted Montreal, essentially. Yeah. But that was the first one I remember. I'm 46 now. So I was in on Nadia Comaneci and Sugar Ray Leonard and Bruce Jenner and all that stuff.

But then eight years passes. And I think people had forgotten how awesome the olympics was so that la olympics happened it was just tv constantly i remember watching like women's volleyball games at like 12 30 at night i'm thinking like this is great this is the greatest thing that ever happened to me for two and a half weeks it was it that was when the olympics arrived in america it felt like it did no question and it And it was a great moment for the Olympic movement. It showed what it can be, both for a city and a community and a country, but also how much success it can create if operated and done right. I mean, financially, the LA Olympics still generates benefits today. LA 84 is a $200 million foundation that exists entirely from the

profits of the 1984 Olympics that funds youth programs all over the city. It's a, it's this unbelievable legacy. The legacy of those games is touching people every day, as opposed to the legacy of the games in Montreal is a stadium, you know, that, that they struggled with or, or buildings that they didn't need. And we don't, we don't have that legacy in LA. And I think it's one of our great attributes is we've got an unbelievable sporting infrastructure here. I mean, unbelievable choices for venues. Yeah. Not just where do we spread out, but which ones do we use? Cause we have so many, there'll be unbelievable venues. We may not even touch. Yeah. Which is an odd thing. Um, and that's why I'm a big supporter of this because, you know, probably the highlight of my entire stint at ESPN was going to the 2012 Olympics in London and writing from those for

Grantland. I took my family. We were there for three weeks. The weather cooperated amazingly. Your team handball story was pretty epic. Oh, thank you. Yeah, I wrote eight times. I probably wrote 30,000, 35,000 words. And it was awesome. And, you know, I think one of the reasons it was awesome is because London is a big city that was spread out and it had a good transit. And you could kind of get from point A, there was a lot of walking. I don't think anybody realized how much walking there was going to be in the Olympic Village, but it was spread out and it worked.

And I feel like L.A. is the only American city that could kind of capture what London was like because it's spread out. And everybody's like, wow, the traffic. As you said, people clear out for the Olympics. They either rent out their houses or they're afraid or whatever. But the venues, no other city has this many venues.

Correct. And we don't even know about the football stadium, right? We think that's coming. And it wasn't even part of our bid because it's a pure bonus if they build it, which is an odd thing to think about a billion to billion and a half dollar facility, one of which will get built in the city that we didn't even put as part of our plan. Right.

And you're not paying for it. And we're not paying for it. And so the other benefit to it being really spread out and the sort of the infrastructure, not just of transportation we have here, but of hotels, is that, you know, if you go to events in Santa Monica, as visitors, you can stay in Santa Monica and never have to leave Santa Monica and see half a dozen events. Or if you want to stay downtown LA, you can see 15 events within walking distance and stay at those hotels.

So that's the other part where the traffic gets reduced is because we have hotels everywhere and infrastructure everywhere and restaurants and everything that people do when they come to an Olympics, you don't need to be trucking across town all the time to go to events. And it's a really valuable thing. It's what happened in London. So we're going to have this new football stadium that Kroenke's building.

We're going to have the Rose Bowl. We're going to have the Staples Center. You assume they'll knock down the convention center and build some sort of other something right there next to it, right? Well, they'll build. Part of the city's plan is to renovate the convention center, expand the square footage. Convention centers are really valuable for Olympics because a lot of events,

as I did in London, you have these big exhibition halls where you can have 10, 12 events existing for the Olympics and Paralympics. You're going to have the Coliseum. You have the Coliseum. You have the Forum. The Forum. You have the new L.A. You have the new LA football soccer MLS team building a new

stadium next to the Coliseum, which our plan has for swimming. Right. So you have UCLA. We have UCLA, which has a little USC. A lot of USC. You got the beach, which is extraordinary. I mean, beach volleyball and the place where it was invented in Santa Monica Beach. Yeah, yeah. You have Carson, California for...

I mean, do you even use those in this? We do. The plan we proposed to the USOC had rugby at StubHub Center, their velodrome, obviously, and then tennis at their tennis center. Wow. Which exists down there. It's pretty remarkable. I mean, 84 had no events in the Valley.

We have a huge aggregation of events in the Valley at Balboa Park. Equestrian shooting, archery, some really cool whitewater kayaking, really cool stuff. We don't even have to use some events they use in 84 because the infrastructure is growing so much. The Staples Center is obviously extraordinary for gymnastics and basketball. So the basketball is going to be at Staples, I would guess, right? It's interesting. Basketball will probably be at Staples for the finals. We've thought about embracing California a little more broadly for some sports like basketball.

Like doing something in Anaheim, maybe? You could do it in Anaheim. You could do it in Oakland, at Golden State. If they build a new facility, Sacramento. I mean, you know, there's a lot of infrastructure in this, let alone the country, the state, that we can use for basketball, men's and women's. I don't like that idea.

You don't? I want it to be at the Staples Center. I want it to be 20 minutes from my house. Zoom down there. I promise you the finals will be at Staples Center. How about that? Thank you. And gymnastics.

So we've got a great plan, and we'll continue to evolve and develop, and, you know, we'll put our best foot forward. And the TV ratings would be out of control. Out of control. Because you'd be able to control basically all the primetime, everything. Correct. And you can do, because of the weather and the environment, you can do things at night in primetime here that you may not be able to do in other cities. Obviously for ABC as the broadcaster, extraordinary opportunity.

Does the IOC, do they even care about like american tv ratings is that a factor to them or do they get like do they have any incentive they they don't nbc has acquired the rights already right through 2032 um so they are locked and loaded for a long so the ioc doesn't care about tv ratings no what do they care about? I think what they care about is that cities understand the values of the Olympics beyond 17 days of games. They want the Olympics to be a positive contributor to a city. They're trying to make people understand that Sochi was an aberration, not the standard operating procedure. That this $51 billion number that got thrown around with Sochi is not what the Olympic Games is about. And Thomas Bach, who's the president of the IOC, put forward Agenda 2020, which is a dramatic revamp of games, both in presentation and bidding, reducing the burden on cities, which is really

important. I think LA is a city that fits that mold well. I'm sure some of the others we're competing against do too. And look, they need to continue to stay relevant in a world where being away for two years between a winter and a summer or four years between two summer olympic or winter games is a long time much longer than it used to be you know when we were kids four years between 84 and 88 you know not that much happened now uh and in the minute the olympics is over there's there's stuff going on and so the the pace has quickened. It feels like the World Cup is on the corner a lot now, too. No question.

Every summer, there's something. No question. And so the Olympics need to continue to stay connected and relevant. They are changing the Olympic program in terms of sports. Tokyo will introduce new sports. In Rio, they're introducing golf. So you're going to have Ricky Fowler and Jason Day and superstars like that playing golf in the Olympics, which is a really cool thing. So they're modernizing their program while staying true to the ideals of Olympism.

And they want cities to embrace that. They want cities to be sustainable and not just sustainable environmentally, but sustainable economically. And doing that well allows more cities around the world to have the opportunity to host the Olympic Games. All right, let's go devil's advocate. So if I'm an American and I hear, oh, an American city's bidding for blank, your guard goes up because this has been screwed up a lot of times.

And in a variety of different ways, whether it's billionaires making people pay for their new NBA arena or something like this with the Olympics in a variety of different ways, whether it's billionaires making people pay for their new NBA arena, or something like this with the Olympics, where you saw what happened in Atlanta and Montreal and wherever else, where it's like, well, so am I going to end up paying for stuff here? Like, is this going to hurt my taxes? Why do we need this?

With LA, we have a lot of this stuff already. But what would you say to somebody who's like, this is stupid. Like we have so many other things to worry about in America. Why do we even need an Olympics? Look, need is a hard word to compare with. Does LA need the NFL? Does LA need the Olympics? It's not about need. I think we are a better city in many ways having hosted an Olympic Games in 84, and

I have no doubt the same would happen in 2024. Right. We are unique, to your point, relative to a place like Boston, to be able to host these games. Same, like Chicago, I feel the same way. I don't think Chicago would have worked either, and San Francisco would have been a disaster. That place is way too crowded.

That place couldn't have handled an Olympics. No question. So we're unique. We are a true Olympic city. We embrace the ideals. We have the infrastructure. Our plan is, you know, the architects we're working with and developing this plan who are doing Rio, who did London, and who are doing Tokyo, they said they've never seen a city more ready to host an Olympic Games than Los Angeles from an infrastructure perspective.

Because you don't have to build anything. Like in London, they had to build the giant 80,000-seat stadium. They had to build another soccer place. They had to build the whole village. And they knocked most of that stuff down after, right? Well, they're still trying to get West Ham to take over the soccer stadium or the Olympic Stadium to turn into a soccer stadium. Our infrastructure is really unique, and that allows us to focus on the athletes. So that becomes a games where instead of the seven years leading up to the games, people are talking about cost overruns and construction problems and

security and traffic. For seven years, I think we'll be talking about the greatest experience for the world's greatest athletes in a unique American city. And look, in many ways, Los Angeles is different than lots of American cities. I mean, you know, Boston is an American city. Los Angeles is kind of a global city. We're part of California, this really unique place in the world. Yeah. Not just in this country. And optimism and creativity that exists in this city and this state is unique in this country.

And we're really far from everything else. You know, people think about America, they think about the East coast. You've now, we've gotten you to the right side of the coast and the world, and it's a different part of the, this country. And we think differently and we operate differently. Our connectivity to the world is different and we need to embrace that and show the Olympic movement, how that can benefit them. So you've been here your whole life.

I've been here for 13 years. It's funny. There's a wave now of LA as the next great American city stories because LA is the second biggest city in America. And that's just a weird thing to say, but I can feel it being here. And you can feel like, you know, the way the city is now expanding where you have businesses that moved into Venice and Playa Vista, like Snapchat and all those people, they moved to Venice and Playa Vista has all those people. And now you have even like the Hollywood Vine sunset area.

You have Netflix going there and Viacom and a whole bunch of people, East LA, Buzzfeed's going to go down there. And it feels like the city's just, just kind of expanding almost like the Michael Jordan Wings poster. It's just getting wider. I had that probably in 1984 also. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you feel that, though?

It just feels like the city's getting bigger and more interesting. I totally agree. And if you think about the great cities of the world, New York, Tokyo, London, Paris, big global cities, LA's a young city. Yeah. And it's also the only city of those that I think will look dramatically different 50 years from today. I agree. I think New York will look like it does kind of today.

There'll be new buildings and different buildings. But L.A., when you got here 13 years ago, you couldn't get arrested downtown. Now people live downtown. They have supermarkets downtown. Venice was where you went surfing. Now one of the most popular companies in the world is there. We're building rockets at spacex you know right in la so la and maybe anglewood if the football stadium goes there total now that becomes yeah that becomes a place to think about that we've got uh we've got a

billion and a half to two and a half billion dollar football stadium being built in the city somewhere uh you've got a 10 billion dollar modernization project of our airport you You've got $30 billion in transportation infrastructure as Metro being built here, having nothing to do with the Olympics, having nothing to do with anything else. The biggest cultural project in the world is going to get built in L.A. in a couple of years with the rebuilding of LACMA. You've got this incredible rebirth of art and fashion and commerce and all this stuff happening in L.A. The food scene in L.A. – I'm not a big happening in LA, the food scene in LA,

I'm not a big foodie, but the food scene in LA is food. Seems incredible. Unbelievable. Yeah. It's really, it's gone to a whole other stratosphere. Different parts of the city.

I mean, you go to places downtown. I mean, even east of downtown, there's unbelievable restaurants. It's, it's totally changed. And I think 50 years from now,

LA will be a different city. And as the mayor likes to say the Olympics is one of those things that can elevate this city in a way like few other things can well it seems like we have a good mayor now I know you've been dealing with him uh my friend Kimmel's been friends with him for a while you know I've had some bad mirrors in my life especially like in Boston uh this guy actually seems like he's headed for bigger and better things. Isn't that bad for you ultimately? What happens if he becomes a governor or a senator?

Well, he's mayor for sure if he gets reelected through the vote in September 2017. And there's no question, I'm working for him on this bid. He is our greatest asset and advocate here. He's a remarkable guy. It makes you and I look like complete failures. Yeah, he's headed. He's going to do stuff. Road scholar, naval intelligence officer, speaks fluent Spanish.

I mean, you know, you and I are schleprox compared to this guy. Yeah. And his ability to be a leader in the city and to be an advocate for this city outside this country. He's done an awesome job. And I'm not a huge politics guy and i don't lean one way or the other really with stuff like that but he's just really impressive and he really seems like he cares about the city wait i have um it's time for the biggest mailbag question ever okay

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Go to stamps.com, click on the microphone at the top of the homepage, and type in BS. That's stamps.com, enter BS. Here's the biggest mailbag question ever. Where the heck is the Olympic Village going to be if LA gets the Olympics? There's no question that's our biggest challenge. Oh, so you don't have an answer yet? We have a group of sites we're exploring.

The site we talked to the USOC about was something called Piggyback Yards, which is owned by Union Pacific, right on the LA River, which would be a great location as part of the LA River redevelopment. Okay. So the program is you have to build roughly 4,000 to 5,000 units to deliver 17,000 beds. So a bed for every athlete for 17 days, plus the Paralympics. Couldn't you just use UCLA? Is that like a possibility or no? It's a possibility we're exploring for sure. UCLA and USC have both dramatically increased their housing.

In 1984, they had a split village, which you can't do anymore for security reasons, which is obvious. The athlete experience is fundamental to the Olympics. So having them in one place is vital. I think both UCLA and USC are real. Working closely with the city, we've actually got 20 sites we're looking at. We don't talk real openly about them because we don't want someone to go buy them and exploit us. So be careful, Bill. But having said that, it is clearly our biggest challenge. The good thing is twofold. One, there's clearly a shortage of housing in Los Angeles. So a private developer partnering with an Olympics to build housing that at least in some or in whole is for low-income, is a huge opportunity for the city and a huge need.

The second thing is we have no shortage of developers who are interested in doing this. If we had to pay for it and finance it all ourselves without an outside developer, without after-use in thought, we couldn't do it. So we have the use case, we have the need, and we have a lot of partners who are interested in doing it with us. And so now we've got to find the best site that works. Fortunately, we have a few that are really interesting. They're in the city center. They're close to where the heart of the games will be here. And now our job is to put together a feasible, deliverable opportunity as part of our bid.

All right, I'm going to have to ask this question. Who's paying for stuff? Which part? The bid part? Just everything. So the bid is completely privately financed. So we've raised $35 million. As soon as we got the call from the USOC, I started getting on the phone. Thankfully for you, I didn't get to you. I'm waiting. I'm here. We raised it in about a week, which is great. Great leadership from the community.

So that will fund the bid. That's the next two years. That'll pay for everything in that bid. What do you need to get to? Do you know? Probably a little more, but that'll take us most of the way. Good.

That's good. That's really good. And then here's what happens when the IOC picks their city. So September 2017, hopefully it's LA, but whatever city they pick, here's the proposition they deliver you. They give you their most valuable asset, the hosting of the Summer Olympic Games. They tell you for the next seven years you can exploit that opportunity in any way you want. Your commitment to them is to deliver those games, period. And then they give you a check for $1.7 billion.

Whoa. And that is your share of sponsorship and television revenue for that games. Okay. Today, they've told every city to budget $1.7 billion. So you take all of that money and that's how you pay for the games and your goal is to not go over that number? No, because then we get to sell tickets and sponsorships and torch relays and... Oh, so it's even more than that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think a city can generate $4 to $5.5 billion of revenue. Wow. Depending on the city, depending on the environment you're selling in. Just for some markers, Tokyo, their budget was... They got a guarantee actually for $ 1.5 billion in sponsorship revenue. It's not for a long time and they're already well over that.

Rio will do about 1.3 billion in ticket sales. So those are very realistic numbers, which is what gives us a lot of confidence in our ability to deliver these games with as little risk as possible. And you're ready for this whole, like starting around a year before the Olympics if LA gets it, hey casey uh can i have tickets i was thinking bill and casey's ticket broker

house could be we'll get nathan that'll be nathan harbour's next job done how good just be just own all the tickets for that um yeah i mean you're gonna have a lot of people hitting you up for a lot of stuff but you're ready you're used to that a lot of people hitting you up for a lot of stuff. But you're ready. You're used to that. We're ready. You have Clinton on your side with this? We do. He's supportive. Obviously, his wife is focused on a job search right now.

So we're being respectful for that. It would be wonderful if she was president in 2017, because I think she'd be an unbelievable asset for us to convince IOC voters to trust America and trust Los Angeles. But we all know Lincoln Chafee's going to win. I mean, do you have a relationship with Lincoln Chafee yet or no and uh we do you might want to build that we do joke about donald trump being president that might be a little scary it's i'm not it's not even as much of a joke anymore i think it's it's a problem it's not mid-october talking about a humble american bid and donald trump is the president doesn't quite work it might

not work might be in trouble. Now, what about, so Obama's going to be out of office in like a year? Correct. Is that somebody who could potentially be involved with this or not? Obama has a complicated relationship with the IOC, given that one of his first things he did when he got elected president was go to Copenhagen and speak on behalf of Chicago bidding for the games. Sitting American president goes to pitch for the games for his hometown,

and they got knocked out in the first round. So there's a little history there. That's not good. It's not about blame. It's just a fact. It is what it is. And so in 2017, I'm not sure that Obama will be at the top of our list. He's obviously will be out of office.

He's going to want to go to the games. Who knows? He might be living here by then. um we'll be out of office um he's gonna want to go to the games who knows he might be living here by then maybe or be in hawaii or new york probably you think i think i think he'll stay in washington for a couple years because of the kids and then maybe who knows maybe he'll be here who else do you need what other what other power brokers well i think i think the good thing about la is we have a lot of people here who have connections to the world in very meaningful ways. So, you know, our ability to reach people around the world and connect ourselves to them. L.A. is a place that IOC members and people love to come visit. Yeah, well, telling people our strategy about connecting with 100 members is probably not a really good idea.

But we'll deploy you. How about that? Well, I'd like to be involved. I really think the LA Olympics is going to be a huge success. But I don't think, as I said, I don't think any other city it would have worked. I agree with you. I really think it would have been you pick a city it would have gone badly and uh and just from what I saw in London it's so hard to pull off

the degree of difficulty the amount of people um how malleable the city has to be how much distance you need from different places you know and the thing with the Olympics and I realized this and I wrote about it about halfway through when I was there in 2012, is you're never going to get to everything. And you realize that eventually. It's like, oh, I can't go to the gymnastics and then the boxing and then the cycling

because they're in three different spots that are an hour away from each other. There is distance. And that's why I think LA works more than anything. The football stadium's kind of a godsend, though, you have to admit. You would have had to have built that stadium. Probably not. You don't think so?

The cool thing is, if it's the stadium in Englewood, and if they do, in fact, put a roof on it, it allows you to do some pretty interesting things in a place like L.A., in a facility that's that new and that unique with a roof on it that you otherwise couldn't do. You were always rumored with NFL teams here, and now it seems like we're getting two teams. Or three. Or four. There's going to be football there constantly on Saturdays and Sundays.

You were not involved with any of these NFL stuff, or you are, or maybe, possibly? No, look, the thing that's happened, which is the thing that always should have happened, which is why there's more traction about the NFL coming back to L.A. now than there has been a long time, is to attract a team to L.A. without actually owning a team is a really hard thing to do. And so now what you have is you have three owners who have said, we are moving our teams to L.A. And the proof that the NFL understands this now is, whether it's true or not, this sort of concept of a flip tax. They want these owners to move their teams and own those teams in those markets. And the proof that the NFL understands this now is, whether it's true or not, this sort of concept of a flip tax. They want these owners to move their teams and own those teams in those markets. And if you're an owner, if you own the Oakland Raiders or the St. Louis Rams or the San Diego Chargers,

why would you move to arguably one of the most valuable places in the world and then sell your team? It's illogical. And so owners have now exhausted most of their opportunities in their existing markets. The teams that, in theory, were in challenging situations before have resolved their situations. Minnesota, Buffalo. And so now you've got three teams really focused on this challenge. They all have interesting connections to LA in different ways. So you don't see any of those teams actually selling if they moved here?

I don't. I think it's important that they don't because I think those NFL owners want those people who moved to L.A. to be committed and focused and not use this as a way to enrich themselves because it's very hard to convince, I believe, 31 owners to allow one or two owners, so maybe 30 or 31 owners, to move a team to L.A. based on your vote and your support and then go sell that team and keep 100% of the proceeds from that opportunity. They want their owners committed and focused on this for the right reasons for the long term, not as a means to just get rich quickly. So what's your prediction for which two teams? Do you have one? Of course I have one. I know you have way too much inside information probably on this. I think you have an interesting dynamic. Two owners coming together. Obviously, the NFL is a three-quarters vote league,

so eight owners can stop anything. Having two owners together is an interesting voting dynamic. Stan's economic position and ability to eliminate a lot of the risk from building the stadium is obviously fundamental with the Rams and Englewood. Dean Spanos is a highly respected owner in the league, and so he's got a lot of friends who would like to see him benefit from his commitment to the league over a long period of time and doing this the right way.

People like Spanos. People do like Dean, and he's a wonderful guy. So I don't think you've seen the last move in sort of which teams come together at which location. Is it bittersweet for you? Because you had always wanted to bring a football team here and build a stadium. And now it just seems like Cronky's doing it. Well, it's bittersweet, except I grew up going to football games.

I love the NFL. I love professional football. And there's a whole generation of people in the city who have never gone to a professional is that amazing it's crazy it's crazy and it's also crazy that people think that it wouldn't work here i i'm the opposite i i feel like first of all the suites and all that stuff would be sold out to the gills like you're gonna sell all those but then there's a whole blue collar middle class element and those are people that would love going to these games i mean look at freaking soccer right and think soccer sells out left and right nobody in los angeles has ever seen a professional football game in this city true in a modern stadium right the only two locations they've ever seen professional football are the rose bowl and the coliseum not the greatest experiences and to me well the rose bowl is a great experience, but it's not.

It's the least modern experience. It's basically just rows that go up for a million rows. And to me, the proof point is your favorite team, the Clippers. The Clippers went from begging a thousand people to go to game at the sports arena to selling out at

Staples Center. So I think people in LA are cynical until they're not. And given a world-class experience, they will be totally embraced. Now, the other thing, let's just do the math. There's 15, 20 million people in Southern California. If it's a 70,000-seat stadium, everyone buys two or three tickets. You only need 20,000 people to buy tickets. It's not that complicated. They'll definitely sell out.

To sell out every game. It also opens up Super Bowl every five years. Super Bowls are important. If Stan builds his stadium with a roof, you'll have a Final Four in L.A., which hasn't been here since the 60s. I mean, think about that. That's amazing. It opens up World Cup possibilities again. Massive, massive event opportunities.

You could have college football kickoff games, which we don't have in L.A. There's a whole host of things. Maybe there's a way to get UCLA and USC to play some neutral site games, which would be really awesome. Oh, yeah. They do that in other big rivalries. So there's a whole host of things. Maybe there's a way to get UCLA and USC to play some neutral site games, which would be really awesome. Oh yeah. Um, you know, they do that in other big rivalries. So there's a lot that you can do.

WrestleMania. WrestleMania. Don't forget WrestleMania. Hosted by Bill Simmons. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. That'll probably be my next job after HBO.

Could be worse. It'd be great. It'd be a sideline reporter at WrestleMania. The, uh, oh, and then we left out, there's one other thing that would happen in a giant stadium. Oh, boxing. Boxing. And then concerts. And massive concerts.

Massive concerts. I mean, you know, now we're entering the era where who could sell out an 80,000 seat stadium? There's only like four or five people. At least one of them. Taylor Swift would. And U2. U2. That's all you need.

U2 comes out in walkers and wheelchairs well it's interesting very interesting time wait we got to talk hoops really quick i'm ready so your agency um when did you start when did you make your nba run when we acquired our intelligence business nine years ago uh so we had no nba business and you just have a slew of NBA players now that everybody's heard of. We do, Anthony Davis. Including the next great player. Anthony Davis, your guy.

The reason someone should buy the Pelicans, right? I was telling you. Russell Westbrook, Derrick Rose. We've got an unbelievable roster. Jabari Parker of talented NBA players. LaMarcus. LaMarcus. LaMarcus.

Just cashed in. You know, the Gasols. So it's an unbelievable group. You love the Gasols. How can you not love the Gasols? Those are your, those are the, you can't pick favorites, but you love the Gasols. How can you not love the Gasols? You love the Gasols. How's the best?

I do have a soft spot for Anthony, though. Yeah. He seems like a genuinely nice guy. He's a wonderful guy. He likes hanging out with my kids. He likes coming over. I mean, he's as good a person as you could imagine. And he's obviously an genuinely nice guy. He's a wonderful guy. He likes hanging out with my kids. He likes coming over. I mean, he's as good a person as you could imagine. And he's obviously an unbelievable basketball player.

People laughed at me because I was saying I thought New Orleans should be considered a legit contender. And they're like 50 to 1 or something to win the NBA title. I'm like, New Orleans, get out of here. It's like, look, the law of the league is when somebody is going to be great, like all time great, they have a year before you think the year is going to happen. And all of a sudden they're like in the conference finals. You're like, wait a second, this guy's 23. How is this happening? I think that could happen for him this year.

I totally agree. And we happen to have, I think, eight players on the Pelicans we represent. So it's like Wasserman East a little bit, Drew Holiday and Tyreek. Well, you have the whole Holiday family, right? don't you even represent their kids we do and lauren yeah so we've got the entire that's my favorite couple drew and lauren yeah they went to ucla so how bad can they be well but like she's the eighth best woman soccer player in america and he was a point guard good enough to get traded for two lottery picks and i want i want stock in their kids.

I completely agree. Don't you think? I'm in. I want stock in their kids. It feels like they might produce the next great American child because we could never convince Serena and LeBron to have two kids because that would have been it. It's over if Serena and LeBron just say,

screw it, we need to win every Olympics in 2044. What would that be? Drew's side of the family obviously has his brothers are good basketball players. I mean, it's a pretty remarkable family. So being in this whole agency business for a while, you've seen some shady things, some seedy things, some things that probably turn your stomach a little bit. What's the biggest misconception about sports agents that you feel like? Well, I think the one thing that's changed a lot about the business, and I try and tell our agents this,

and I try and tell our clients this all the time, the value of an agent in many ways isn't about success. When people are really successful, things are pretty straightforward. They get paid well. They earn dollars off successful, things are pretty straightforward. They get paid well. They earn dollars off the court or off the field. The value of agents and the experience that we have and the history of work that we have is about when things don't go well. And things don't always go well. Like with Derrick Rose the last couple of years. There are lots of ups and downs and being able to be consistent over a long period of time with your clients and give them advice

that's in their best interest because I own this business. We're not selling this business. We have no pressure to do things for financial reasons. We do things that's in the best interest of the client's period. Yeah. And you combine that with the experience we have in dealing with all sorts of situations, that's where you define value. Now, the challenge is when you're 20 years old, no one wants to talk to you about the bad things. They only want to tell you about the great things that are going to happen to you. And the truth is it's very rare that there's always a perfect straight line that goes only one way and that's up. And so our job is to be present. There are clearly going to be athletes we're not going to represent because that's not what they're looking for in an agent.

We think that the kind of players we represent across the board, and we represent 1,500 athletes in 30 sports around the world, have the character and the commitment and the perspectives that we share. And that's why we represent them. And that's why the relationship works. So you're not like, you're not on the Louis the Louisville campus helping out the hookers with extra stuff. You're not on that side. No, I think we'll stay far, far away from that. And look, that doesn't mean there aren't lots of weird things that go on in the world.

But it's getting weirder. I mean, you're talking about high school juniors are getting money now from agents and high school sophomores. And it seems like the whole business is shadier, shadier, shadier, shadier. It is. The challenge with the business is agents are the only ones who are regulated. Kind of an odd thing to think about. Yeah. Advisors, friends, none of those people are regulated or monitored.

There's, especially in football, there's just so many players on so many campuses um in basketball the difference is for the first round you've got 30 picks maybe there's 40 people who end up in those 30 picks there's not 400 people who become those 30 so there's a lot of scrutiny and a lot of focus and a lot of attention so i would actually argue while there's crazy stuff happens it's maybe less rampant in basketball than people assume. But football, there's a lot more opportunities. So I don't really represent football players except Andrew Luck. But there's a lot that happens out there.

And the challenge is then you've got other sports like tennis where there's no rules. I can go recruit a 12-year-old in Croatia today and pay him or her whatever I want. You should do that. And do their training. Yeah, well, fortunately, we'll stay away from that. But then that's a sport where there's no rules because there's no college infrastructure that changes their eligibility.

And so it's a really uneven world. Soccer, same thing in Europe. Professional teams, forget about agents. Chelsea signs 10-year-old players. It's crazy. So you've got a lot out there. It's really uneven. It's really nuanced.

You doubled down on soccer a while ago. We did. We're very fortunate. You had a lot of those dudes and ladies. We had eight members of the U.S. Women's National Team, which we're very proud of. We have a really strong women's sports practice in general. I think it's hard to be in the sports business

and ignore 50% of the population. And so we're very proud of. We have a really strong women's sports practice in general. I think it's hard to be in the sports business and ignore 50% of the population. And so we're very focused on that. Sylvia Fowles and Maya Moore from the WNBA champion links last night. But soccer, if you want to be myopic, you don't see this, but it's the biggest sport in the world, no question. And so if you want to be in the sports business and you don't want to be in the biggest sport in the world, I'm not sure what you're doing. for us that's all about the united states where we have a really big practice uh but also we represent a player on every premier league team every dutch team uh and and represent 400 players playing in europe and it's the biggest sport in the world and it's only getting bigger so what what happens with american soccer i mean you you're involved

with a lot of this stuff and it seems it seems like it's definitely a pro sport. It's respected. People still care more, I feel like, about Premier League and Bundesliga, all that stuff. But it's definitely above AAA baseball. It's not quite where maybe hockey is, but it's closer to hockey than I think people realize because now they're getting, you know, the way where they put the stadiums and the teams, they're getting good crowds. They're getting as many as like a hockey, as a hockey crowd. No question.

I think a few things about soccer in this country. Number one, Americans like to be the best at things. So to me, I think a true inflection point is one of two things happening. Either the best player in the world is an American, which, by the way, means he's playing in Europe. But we could at least follow him now on ESPN2 at 6 in the morning, but we could at least watch him. No question. Or the U.S. team has an extraordinary result at a World Cup.

That's my final appearance. Now, neither of those things happen without the investment and the infrastructure that MLS has built over the last 20 years, but that's not entirely dependent on the success of MLS, right? They have invested in the sport. The other thing that is interesting about the soccer in this country, and obviously your kids and mine are beneficiaries of this, they can watch the best teams in the world, like you just said,

at a normal time of day. Game changer. And so waking up for our kids and watching Chelsea or Man U or Real Madrid or Juventus, whatever they care about, they can watch on channels they're used to watching. They know these players from playing FIFA on their video games. Their sports center now talks about soccer around the world.

Soccer has a huge advantage that no one talks about, which is the time zone difference. The best teams in the world play in Europe. The biggest untapped market in the world is the United States. Those games played at their normal times show up at very normal times in our country. Take NBA, for example. The opposite is true.

You play NBA at night in this country, which is when you should be playing it. It's in the morning at weird times in Europe and in Asia. And that's why they'll never be in London NBA team. Correct. It's a really odd thing. And so you flip that. For soccer, it's a huge advantage.

So MLS has built a great base and great foundation. We continue to develop talent. That talent will then continue to play in Europe. Well, two other things help too. HD and the widescreen, just the TVs. It's more fun to watch soccer than it used to be. Now you can actually see the layout of the formations and stuff. And then the fact that it's two hours.

I totally agree with you. The two hours thing is amazing. And it's two hours i totally agree with you the two hours thing is amazing and it's the biggest advantage they have yeah you you go to a game and for people who don't go to games you know we're used to going to baseball games or football games you get up you go to the bathroom you go buy some t-shirts i mean when i go to soccer games in europe the team store is not even open during the game right because literally you can't even buy a beer in the seats because they would interfere with the 45 minutes of the halves like you don't get up no one moves it's this for an american sports fan

it's a really crazy experience but that two hours is unbelievable and it's focused and you know what you're getting and and i actually think what used to be a disadvantage for soccer has now become a huge advantage and also um it's just nice to know, like with the baseball playoffs, right? Like Dodgers, Mets tonight. That might be four and a half hours of my life. It might be three hours. It might be five hours. Or you can have a 20-minute review

about a rule that no one knew about, like last night. Or you might have the eighth inning. I watched Astros-Royals game three, and the eighth inning took 17 hours to play. And it's like in soccer, two hours I'm done unless there's extra time and penalty kicks, which we had on Saturday. We at least had the extra time.

That was an awesome game. Unbelievable. The USA-Mexico. It was unbelievable. And that's the thing is they've figured out now how to have these little tournaments and games that mean something when the World Cup's not even happening. I like it. But here's something I don't really like.

Shaving. Do you like shaving? I hate shaving. When I was doing basketball, when the NBA countdown, and you had to shave on TV, and I would just... I'm the worst shaver in college.

In college, my roommates used to... When I would shave, they would come in and open the door because I'd be covered with shaving cream and it would just be terrible. So I hate shaving. I never know what shaving cream to buy. I never know what razors to use. I never know when to stop using one razor and move to a fresher one.

How do you know? I don't know. How do I know when my razor's done? I'm just bad at it. Well, Harrys.com is winning over people like me. It's a company started by two guys who are passionate about creating a better shaving experience for all men. Their starter kit is just $15, includes the razor, three blades, and your choice of Harry's shaving cream or foaming shave gel. See, I don't even know what to do there with shave cream versus the shave gel.

Nobody's ever walked me through that. Harry's will walk you through that. A superior shave for an incredible price they bought a razor factory in germany that's been crafting one of the some of the world's highest quality blades for almost a century and then when you travel do you like take all that with you or oh yeah i mean it's a whole thing that's that's that's harry's gonna help you that stuff uh as an added bonus you get five dollars off your first purchase with my coupon code bs that's an entire month's worth of shaving for $10, free shipping.

So what are you waiting for? Stop ravaging your face. Stop overpaying for your shaves. Harrys.com, use coupon code BS when you check out. You won't regret it. I've never figured out how to properly shave. I would go, when I did Countdown, I would go in and the makeup,

I'd have like all these cuts in my neck. They'd have to put all these weird balms on me and then cake my face and stuff. All right, so back to the agent thing really quick. So you see something like, can we talk about the DeAndre thing or no? Is that bad for you? Oh, we can talk about it. That's all right. So you see something like that happening.

You're not involved at all. Correct. You have Dan Fagan, who clearly has a good relationship with Mark Cuban. You have DeAndre and the Clippers, and then we all knew that that was pretty toxic. You have Chandler Parsons, who's basically the broker for the Mavericks, which is somehow the NBA has said that that's legal somehow. He's taking DeAndre out all over the place in L.A. He goes to a club one night.

Mark Cuban happens to be there in a back room. This was one of the all-time shady things ever. And he signs. Then he changes his mind. When you're watching this, are you just like, thank God this isn't us? Or do we need to change the rules here? What's your reaction? Or can you not comment? Certainly god this isn't us or do we need to change the rules here what's your reaction or can you not comment certainly happy it wasn't us because yeah that would have been that's a good place to start uh the thing that's actually most remarkable is usually when those

things happen it doesn't get undone like that's a really rare thing you know the the thing happens and you're like you talk about it but it sort of never undoes itself so that you can't figure out if it was shady or not or what really happened. And the fact that DeAndre, and I give him a lot of credit for this, sort of took a step back and really, on his own I believe, started to think about what was happening and his decision and how the decision came to be and the influence and all that stuff. He deserves a lot of credit because most players, one, wouldn't wouldn't do that and two don't have the guts to do that that was a really hard thing for a player to do to turn your back on a team on your own agent right it's a really there was a lot that happened there that was pretty remarkable and so he deandre deserves a lot of credit i'm not going to comment on on competitive agents um i figured but you, you know, it was a really interesting situation to watch. I was absolutely glad it wasn't me.

It was sort of like watching a soap opera from knowing just enough to make it really interesting. I thought the Mavs were really smart with, because I saw it at game seven of the Spurs-Clipper series, DeAndre didn't play the last six minutes, crunch time of the biggest game of the year, and you could see his body language. And if I'm the Mavs and I need a center and i have chandler parsons i'm spending the entire

month of june going yeah chris paul's a dick chris paul told a friend of mine that they can't throw you the ball and your free throw suck and you come to us we'll make you our guy we'll run they don't run plays for you they never posted you up you just do that for a month and after a while deandre's like yeah yeah chris paul's a dick you're right yeah they never ran plays for me yeah i should go and then i think like you said he he's like yeah all right i'll sign and then a day later he's like wait a second what did i do why am i gonna leave los angeles and i'm a single multi millionaire in los angeles having a great time why am I leaving it's true and I give

him a lot of credit it was a really fascinating thing and ultimately you and I both love the NBA it was good for the NBA I mean there's a lot of talk about it people got excited about it you know it's that's the thing Adam loves that stuff like he likes when they they had like a seven week stretch where nothing happened from basically the end of July all the way

through September I think he liked he probably likes having the calm but at the same time like He had like a seven week stretch where nothing happened from basically the end of July all the way through September. I think he probably likes having the calm. But at the same time, can you remember a time when nobody was talking about the NBA for seven weeks? And then the NBA erupted an emoji war and it ended up on TV. It was amazing. So you lost Arn Tellem. Maybe lost is the wrong word.

You knew he was going to leave. So I always thought Arntellum was by far the best agent. I actually thought he could have been like the president. Like if there was a sports czar, if Obama said, I'm going to have a sports czar, I think Arntellum is clearly the choice. I was always so impressed by him, especially the deals that he got for people that were just insane. It's like, wow, they're paying $50 million for a center who's averaging nine points and seven rebounds? Some of my favorite communication with you is about some of those deals. I just thought, like, this guy's the best. He's getting $20 million more for everybody.

So he leaves. That's got to be bad for you, right? How do you survive that one? So a couple of things. And one, this was Arne's decision. He's always had a passion to go run a team. You knew it was happening at some point. We thought it would happen.

And he obviously has a connection to Michigan and Detroit. And this is his passion. He's one of my closest friends. We talk all the time. I'm thrilled for him. He's happy. That's what matters uh but as a testament to arn thad fouché bj armstrong darren matsubara our basketball business you think about any other agency in any other sport

and the singular person left there would be no business left yeah none our business is thriving our free agency we did 750 million million of free agent deals after he left. So we have an unbelievable business. It's the business that Arne built. We're fortunate enough to have kept that business after he left. That's a result. You had no idea he was going to be this good, right, for you? I mean, when you hired him, you knew he was the best, but you didn't realize that he was going to immediately swing the balance no and and what arn did for us more than anything at the time we did

the deal was he changed people's perception about our business yeah um and we'll be forever grateful for that because it elevated us to a place where we weren't we were playing in an area in action sports and some of these niche things that people didn't frankly respect as much as they do today but aren't tell him elevated our company in a way that very few other people could have. He's one of the few true multi-sport agents at Success, so baseball and basketball, obviously. And, you know, the legacy he leaves behind is an unbelievable group of agents. Adam Katz and Joel Wolfe and our baseball team is unbelievable. We've got some of the best young talent in baseball, and I love watching the playoffs because of them. We're young guys like Javi Baez, you know, playing unbelievable and he's 20 years old.

You know, Gene Carlos Stanton. We've got this unbelievable team. Yes, we represent Chase Utley and we can talk about that if you want. We can talk about that if you want. But we've got an unbelievable thing and that's... You represent somebody else that we probably shouldn't talk about. Uh-oh. Somebody that might have signed with my favorite baseball team last winter.

We don't need to talk about that. Yeah, we don't need to talk about that. So, you know, his legacy is obviously the work he did, but in many ways his legacy is the people he left. It's the best agent ever. I think some people think David Falk was the best agent ever just because he had Jordan. But I think Ar arn if you

just went deal by deal what he got for people and and how loyal i mean you guys really didn't lose anybody when he was there we didn't seem right by the way we you know a few guys leave here and there after he left all to be expected yeah but unbelievable uh retention of clients all the agents are staying uh i think we'll have a very good few years ahead of us and prove to people that what we built as a company has been institutionalized a lot based on what Arn has left behind. And that's a really valuable thing for us. Is it weird to own an agency that represents so many basketball players that are that prominent, but you're also close with adam silver look i i'm a

huge fan of adam and and because i'm not technically an agent you know right you just kind of uh i think it's good adam and i have but you're inner circle with him a little bit right i mean he leans on you for stuff i don't know that he leans on on me maybe literally leans on me because he's so much taller than we are but uh look uh you can't have anything but a great amount of respect for adam as a person and as now as a commissioner he's done an incredible job he's been a friend for a long time and look he is charged with creating success for the nba and that benefits everyone in the nba players fans sponsors uh teams, and for us, we're a part of that. And I think these people who think that we shouldn't talk to each other or agents, it's crazy.

We're all here for the same thing, which is the success of basketball. And Adam is as good a person as we could literally have in that job. And that's good for the business of basketball. And any way that we can help that, that doesn't mean players and teams may not be at odds or the league and players may not be at odds at some point but that's natural and you can't be in a business that's complicated and connected and not have those moments but my view is you know we're not majoring in the minors here we need to focus on the big issues and the big opportunities and that's good for everybody and there's a real chance here for the nba to you know especially as as the NFL continues.

Although the NFL has never been more popular than ever. But the NFL has all these different weird obstacles and shady things going on. And the NBA really doesn't have anything. The NBA has probably never been in a better position. No question. The players, the teams, the ownership, the league, the importance of the league. Well, what about the marketability of the players, right? So, I mean, so I would say your most famous clients right now are Anthony Davis, Derek Rose.

Russell. But like, all right, let's take Marc Gasol, who's, you know, probably the best center in the league. I would say more people would recognize Marc Gasol if he walked into a place, like forget about how tall he is, than Mike Trout. No question. And Mike Trout is the best baseball player

probably in the last 40 years, offensively. And yet Marc Gasol, who's not even one of the 20 most recognizable basketball players, is way more famous than Mike Trout. Look, the same assets and attributes that made Michael Jordan who he is and is apply to all NBA players. And now the NBA is doing an unbelievable job of exploiting that for all its players, which

is they wear the same shoes that we can go buy at a store. We see their faces. They play a sport that's accessible and playable kind of anywhere in the world. And with the job they've done in marketing their players, forcing their teams to be better operators, the quality of teams have gotten dramatically better. And obviously social media has connected these players to fans in a way that never existed before. And Marc Gasol, for a guy who doesn't even want particularly to be marketed in that way, he's happy to play basketball and do his things and he's very committed to their foundation and the things that are important to him and pow personally he's as you said as recognizable player maybe the best center in the nba and that's a

testament to the system that the nba has developed and built over a long time and a foreign guy and that's the other thing is they they have this whole foreign population of talent now. Do you have Hazonia? I can't remember. We do. Oh, you do have Hazonia. Super Mario is- 18-1 for Rookie of the Year.

I love that. I can't bet on it, but I love it. Is he going to play 30 minutes a game? He's got to, right? I mean, he is a unique talent. He's unbelievable. I love Hazonia. I remember when you told me you signed him, I was like, oh, I like this guy.

I saw him on YouTube. He's a star potential. He's a human highlight reel. I bet the Knicks fans, well, I actually think Porzingis is going to be pretty good, too, because he's like Rick Smith, but can shoot threes. Hopefully his feet are better. Hopefully with better feet. But I do think there's a chance that Hozonia will do a couple things in that first month

and the Knicks fans are going to be like wait a second he went after uh oh and that could get ugly do you have Justice Winslow or no? he's another one who might be a star I like this draft class if you look back in five years this could be a draft class

that people are going to have a different perspective on I think and like even what Mario did in Summer League there were a couple of things he did in Summer League that were unbelievable. He's a guy who could win the dunk contest and the three-point contest. How worried should I be about Derrick Rose? Because, I mean, I didn't want to talk about the off-the-court stuff because I don't know all the facts and, you know, the legal system has to play that out.

But he's taken a lot of hits here. He was somebody that in 2011 i think was the most popular athlete locally of any nba player for their city and now it's like he keeps getting hurt he's talking about a contract extension like what like what do you tell somebody like that who clearly seems to be going through a lot of stuff look i think the challenge is people forgot why they fell in love with Derek in the first place because of the injuries. And you go back to 2011 when he was MVP, what he did on the court was remarkable. And how hard he played. That was like when you saw him in person, him and Westbrook

were the two where you're like, Jesus, these guys are going to get hurt. Stop it. Calm down. And so look at Derek, give him a full year of basketball give him uh time to get back into his element of what he loves and does best and I think a lot of the noise will go away the challenge is when you don't have the other stuff people focus so much more on things that otherwise wouldn't be a big deal and so he just needs three months of good games correct and I think you'll see that from him he's he's as good a shape. I've known Derek a long time. He's in as good a shape as I've ever seen. Mentally, he's really good.

He's in a good place. New coach. New coach, who I think is going to be great, who we also represent. So that's exciting. The mayor. The mayor, yeah, absolutely. And so I think a good year for the Bulls

will make everyone take a deep breath. Russell Westbrook, has he pulled the stick out of his butt yet or what why is he so mad at everybody we all love you russell westbrook we love watching you play basketball stop it it's what makes russell tick you know he gets on the court and he's like uh clark kent and superman he becomes a different guy and he's not like that in in private though he's like the nicest guy ever right the opposite the nicest humble he comes to? Completely the opposite. The nicest, humble. He comes to our office. I mean, in the off season, he literally comes to our office every day and just hangs out. Literally hangs out and spends time with people.

Going to get Chinese food orders for lunch for the staff. Yeah, exactly. And then he gets on the court. He's like a different person. And he is a remarkable talent. And I think what you saw and i know you talked about it last year is that team really rallied around him when when kd was hurt and he put that team on his shoulders and did stuff that people didn't think was possible and

got that team closer to making the playoffs than anybody expected yeah i wonder um we really that's the most fascinating team no question durant had three surgeries last year everybody's just penciling them in as a title contender. I'd like to see him play for two straight months. And by the way, on the same injury, which is always a scary thing for players. And it was obviously misdiagnosed. And they rushed him back. And it's like the Dez Bryant thing.

These people, they break their foot. And they're like, yeah, he'll be back in four to six weeks. It's like, what? It's his foot. That just gets worse. Take your time. Take 12 weeks. And, you know, think about this season.

That team is so talented. They have a new coach, which will be Billy Donovan. It'll be an interesting character to watch. They've got a great staff. But they seem very tense already. The pressure around the Durant situation will be unique. And then what he does is not just about him because it will have implications. And I'm not even sure what they are for a whole bunch of other players, including Russell.

So there's a lot at stake. But they've already showed us that, I mean, we're not even in the season yet and he can't handle people talking about it. And, you know, the Stephen A thing, which everybody focused on the part that he threatened him, which he did. And how just bizarre that was and strange that they didn't disappoint him or any of that it was just like how is this happening but what he was saying before all that stuff happened was actually a really good point it's like these guys are too sensitive about stuff you're public figures people are going to talk about you you're on social media you have shoe contracts you have all these different things

you're going to be discussed you're going be criticized. And it seems like that team is just kind of had it with everybody. You know, stop talking about it. Stop talking about where Kevin's going to go. And it's like, no, where Kevin's going to go is the biggest story of the year. We're all going to keep talking about this. Like you got to get used to it. And I think what teams ought to do is, and it's hard, understood it's hard if you're the oklahoma city thunder it's a hard thing to do but you got to give them a reason to stay not be insecure about why they might leave and yeah the nba has done an unbelievable job because what the nba has now is 30 competitive teams financially operationally you know kevinant is as big a star as there is

and he plays in Oklahoma City. It doesn't matter where he plays. They should embrace that. They should own that. And he can be a big fish and his pond is not Oklahoma City, his pond is the NBA. And maybe even bigger than that

given the kind of person he is. And so if I were the Thunder, I'd be embracing this year because it's a year to show Kevin how much you love him and how much he can stay. And as we all know, that means a lot to players. And also, like 30 years ago, we see these guys four times a year during the season.

They're on two CBS games and maybe one USA game and one ESPN game, and that's it. Now we can watch them 82 times a year. When Russell Westbrook dunks over somebody, it's on my Twitter feed in five minutes in a vine. It doesn't matter where they play. And as you said, when the season ends, they're in L.A. anyway. No question. Or they're in Las Vegas or New York. It doesn't matter where you play.

If they're all happy there, they're all going to stay in OKC. My thing is, for them, I think the Harden trade, the fact that they both bought in and they signed deals and they signed deals under certain pretenses. And then with James Harden over eight million bucks or whatever, they trade them. That's the part I'm interested to see if that rears its ugly head, Because at some point, that's a real thing. You went to the 2012 finals. Those three guys were tight. Those three guys were like, yeah, we lost to Miami this time,

but we're going to have the rest of the decade to do our thing. And then they changed the terms. And that's the part I would be worried about if I was an Oklahoma City fan. But if they win the title this year, Durant's not leaving. No, and it'll be very interesting to see how this all happens. And what people forget is if you're a player, what matters to you is your teammates, your coach, and winning,

and your practice facility. I mean, where you spend 90% of your time is that thing. It's not all the other stuff. And so getting that right, which I think Billy Donovan has a really unique opportunity to do there and change the culture a little bit and embrace Kevin maybe in a way that's different and make you feel comfortable. That's what players want. Because as you said, in the off season, Kevin can live in LA, no problem, and have a great life. And then he gets to an environment where he's completely

comfortable and happy if that's what it is in Oklahoma City. And that's what i think makes players tick when you remove the stuff that used to exist which is oklahoma city is no different than la new york now yeah and they're there for seven months but they're on the road half the time correct season ends and they leave so it doesn't really matter i'm interested how it plays out i mean there might be let's be honest there might it might be time for both of those guys to have their own team. Westbrook might be like, you know what? I just want my own team where I get to shoot at the end of games. I don't want to defer to somebody else.

That's in play. It's possible. Or they might decide, you give me my best chance to keep winning 60 games a year and win the title. Let's stay together. I don't know how it's going to play out. My point is, I think we should be allowed to talk about this. Not just you and me, but just in general. This is going to be a dominant theme of the season. Where is he going to go? And whether they like it or not, it's going to be that way.

Yeah. All right. So LA 2024, you have a website yet? We do. LA2024.org. Our plans are up there there, ways for people to get engaged and excited. We're excited to be on this journey for two years. And I will tell you that one of the most important things that the IOC looks at is public support and public engagement. And so people in the community in L.A. being involved and passionate and caring about what we're doing is a really important thing for our success. Well, you know I'm on board. I'm an unofficial sponsor. Do you have official sponsors yet?

We don't. I was thinking, Sam's.com, maybe we could send medals to people when we win. Totally. You could measure them on a digital scale. Do you agree with my idea with the Olympic medals that they should be different sizes depending on how important the event is?

I'm not sure that's going to go over well with the ioc like if you win the 100 yard dash that should that should be like a flavor flavor but maybe flavor should design it too but like you know beach volleyball i don't know maybe a little bit smaller than the 100 yard dash let's figure out something out that all right i'll leave that to you thanks again to harry's.com for their support of the bill simmons podcast go to harry's.com right now get five dollars off with my code bs and your first purchase of their awesome razors h-a-r-r-y-s.com coupon code bs at checkout five dollars off their starter set start shaving smart today and also thanks as well to stamps.com for a four-week trial plus a $110 bonus offer, including postage and a digital scale.

Go to Stamps.com, click on that microphone at the top of the homepage, type in BS. Stamps.com, enter BS. Casey Wasserman, thank you so much. We'll be back on the Bill Simmons podcast tomorrow with Joe House, NFL, NBA. And I think we're gonna call my dad because he's upset that he feels like I

libeled him with my comments about how he felt about Tom Brady. But he did turn on him, just for the record. Really? So we may call on him, yeah. And also, check out, I did the Mike Francesco show, and I did Toucher and Rich in Boston, and those links are online. Those were really fun. I was finally able to do a couple radio interviews outside the whole ESPN umbrella.

Safe doing it from L.A. It's better than less. Talking about Boston Olympics like that. Oh, yeah. They agreed, though. to do a couple radio interviews outside the whole ESPN umbrella. Safe doing it from LA when you're talking about Boston Olympics like that. Oh, yeah. They agreed, though. Everyone in Boston won. Nobody in Boston won the Olympics.

It was terrible. Casey, thank you.