The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ja Goes Off, Kerr Gets Mad, and Boston Survives With Haralabos Voulgaris and J. Kyle Mann, Plus Short QBs and a Draft Recap With Peter Schrager

Episode Date: May 4, 2022

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Haralabos Voulgaris and J. Kyle Mann to discuss Ja Morant’s 47-point performance in the Grizzlies’ Game 2 win vs. the Warriors, potential adjustments for the Warriors, and Gary Payton II’s injury (1:33), before recapping the Celtics’ Game 2 victory over the Bucks, Giannis Antentokounmpo looking awesome even during an off game, series predictions, and more (29:34). Finally, Bill talks with NFL Network’s Peter Schrager about his biggest takeaways from the 2022 NFL draft. They also discuss the A.J. Brown trade, what is going to happen to Baker Mayfield, division-winner odds, and more (57:43). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Haralabos Voulgaris, J. Kyle Mann, and Peter Schrager Producers: Kyle Crichton and Steve Ceruti Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, Rob Harviller from 60 Songs That Explain the 90s here to inform you that we are back with 30 more songs because the 90s were super long and had a ton of rad music. Please join us every Wednesday for more 60 Songs That Explain the 90s only on Spotify. This episode is brought to you by Prime Video. You know me, I can't go a day without sports. I really can't. And now Monday nights are all about hockey. That's right. There's a new exclusive And now Monday nights are all about hockey. That's right.

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Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. I popped on the rewatchables. We did Austin Powers' 25th anniversary. That went up on Monday night. It was also on the Prestige TV podcast twice. Just two shows I really

like right now. Winning Time, we did the second and last episode. Me, Waz, and Chris Ryan. And then also second episode of We Own This City. The spiritual, I would say, nephew of The Wire. It's only six episodes. It's on HBO Max. We love this show, so we broke that

one down as well coming up on this podcast me and Bob Valgaris and Kyle Mann are going to break down tonight's games which were really really really fascinating

and then our old friend Peter Schrager comes on to talk about the NFL draft our last thoughts on some big picture stuff like what it meant for wide receivers

what it meant for the New York teams, what it meant for short quarterbacks. We dove into it. This is a good podcast. First, our friends come to LA this week. Pearl Jam. All right. Taping this, it is 921 Pacific Time on Tuesday. Just watched two really fascinating basketball games.

Bob Valgaris is back. Welcome back, Bob. Ringer at this point. We are joined by J. Kyle Mann as well. Let's talk about Memphis Golden State first. Bob, you were talking about the speed before we came on. Explain what you saw from a speed standpoint in this game. I mean, this isn't like a real hot take or anything, but it just seems like Jaws just got way too much athleticism

for most of these guys. It's interesting. Golden State did get to more loose balls and did have a decent job of playing in some ways, but they obviously couldn't handle Morant. It's interesting to me that they never once tried to make him go right,

it seemed like, and they never once took the ball out of his hands to have either Melton or I guess a hobbled Bain beat them, which seemed to me like a pretty big mistake. But, you know, easy to say. Yeah. Kyle, I was waiting for the trap. It just never came.

Ja ended up, he was 15 for 31. He had 47 points. He had five threes, got the line 13 times. And I mean, the biggest play of this game was Gary Payton getting knocked out because that was their guy. I think the athlete that you're talking about that could at least stay with them

gets knocked out on a pretty cheap foul by Brooks. On the cheap foul, it wasn't like a 10 out of 10, but it was like a seven and a half. I think it was like a nine and a half out of 10. Maybe an eight and a half. Yeah, whatever. Pretty bad. But so he's out there.

And then Clay, who we'll get to in a second, just does not have the foot speed anymore to stay with somebody like Ja. What did you see, Kyle? Yeah, I mean, trapping him just seems like trying to grab like an eel with your bare hands. I mean, you can't get positional kind of leverage on him because he's so freaking quick. And you're right.

I mean, when Peyton went down, not that anybody really can stay in front of Ja. But yeah, I mean, I just kind of got this feeling throughout the game i was just like this just has like a star composure vibe to it and i know this was like his point total point total doesn't always tell the whole story you know efficiency all those other things but i just feel like his composure throughout the game you're right they didn't take the ball out of his hands and he just looked uh totally in control throughout that game and you're right. They didn't take the ball out of his hands and he just looked totally in control throughout that game and just kind of willed them. Considering

the lack of creation that they have, the fact that they couldn't get the ball out of his hands, I thought was just pretty tough for Golden State, I'll think. They didn't really try to get the ball out of his hands, though. Yeah. They just were happy to pre-switch and have Klay come up instead of Poole except for the third toto-last possession,

Pool fucked up. And so Pool had to guard him because they didn't pre-switch. And then they just kind of dealt with it and ended up being a blow-by for an attack to the rim. If you're Memphis, you have to be so fired up

that basically nobody else played that well in this game other than your one guy. Like, Zaire Williams was good. Five for nine, played 28 minutes, was in there at crunch time. This was a guy that led to some of the most polarizing NBA draft debates we had last summer about was this guy, what the hell happened to him in his one college or all that stuff. He's out there in crunch time. Melton, who only had three points, but was pretty destructive on the other end, had a huge block of Steph. But you mentioned how Bane looked like

he just doesn't seem healthy. Jaron Jackson followed up a career game. It was three for 14. This was really the Josh show. He is at this zone now where when he's feeling it like this, the guys are going backwards before he's doing anything.

It's a little like watching when Giannis has the head of steam and the guys are going backwards because they're just trying. But Ja's not Giannis. He's like, what, 6'3"? But they were just so worried about staying in front of him. I'll be really interested to see what they do in game three because I can't imagine this would be the game plan. I also don't think we're going to see Peyton again.

That reminded me of the Rondo-Dwayne Wade injury in 2011 where sometimes the arm just goes down and you can see the elbow going sideways. So even if he plays again, I think he's going to have

one of those arm braces. Was GP's a hyperextension or just a bang? I thought he just banged it. Or did he hyperextend it? I didn't see that on the replay. I think something bad happened. It reminded me of the Rondo thing.

I think his arm went the wrong way. So I would go hyperextension, probably something like that. Did you think Golden State was going to win this game, Bob? Like four minutes left? I felt like they were actually going to win. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I was...

Like if you were live betting, who would you live bet on? With four minutes left? Before the game, I thought Golden State was going Like if you were live betting, who would you live bet on? With four minutes left? Before the game, I thought Golden State was going to win. How about that? Me too. During the game,

I just wasn't thinking about that. I was just thinking. I was just enjoying the game. So it looks to me like one team was attacking a weak link and the other team was unable to. Like, here's the thing. Ja had the ball in his hands

for 85% of the game when he was in the game. And maybe more. I can look at it later. And the inability to hunt him and make him pay at the other end, you know, can pay... If you can do that,

it can pay some dividends down the stretch where he fatigues, he tires out. They tried to hunt him a little bit on the offensive glass with Wiggins. You know, they hit him on Wiggins. He basically never moved from the corner every now and then. But yeah, I don't know.

If I was watching it, it felt like Memphis was just a little bit quicker to everything down the stretch. Kyle, we were talking before you came on the Zoom about these situations in NBA history where the younger team, and it's hard to overstate how young Memphis is. I mean,

Ja is 22. They were NFL draft picks on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday that were two years older than him. Young, fast, athletic. This was something that used to happen a lot in the 80s. We would always see the next wave. There'd be those Mavericks teams and the early Pistons when they had Sally and Rodman and people like that. It's kind of part of NBA lore. We were trying to think of teams recently that were like that. And we were thinking of that one OKC, the early OKC, when it was like early Westbrook and early Harden and early Ibaka and early Durant, where it just seemed they had that one Spurs series where all of a sudden they just seemed faster and more athletic. I'm not ready to say that that's what's happening yet in this series

because I do feel like the Warriors, I like the shots that they got. They just missed them. Klay airballed one. Wiggins missed a wide-open three. I felt like Steph could get where he wanted. I'm not worried about them offensively, but defensively it feels like something's got to give. What did you see from that end, Kyle?

I think if you're going to play the variance game, are you going to get another five or 12 from three John Morant game? I don't know. I think I'll probably, you know, play the odds and live with him taking step back threes at some point. Granted, you can't keep him out of the middle either.

And also the variance thing with like Klay, the Klay-Pool thing is kind of an interesting dynamic that I've been keeping an eye on, like there back and forth. Because there's one sequence where Poole was just getting to the basket at will. And he just had one play where he fell down. And I forget if it was a turnover or nothing really happened. And Klay bent down and you could see him talking to him directly.

Which Klay obviously has earned the right to expect to get the ball. He's always kind of been like that. He's always been the guy like, to expect to get the ball. He's always kind of been like that. He's always been the guy like, I need to get the ball. I need to have my plant watered every once in a while. But yeah, that dynamic is interesting. I don't know if should Clay. Interesting. Like you're saying, like interesting in like a soap opera way a little bit.

Like Clay's a little threatened, pulls on his corner. Well, I think that, you know, the Warriors have kind of auditioned. popper away a little bit like a little like clay's a little threatened pools on his corner well i think that you know the warriors have kind of auditioned i was talking with tyler parker about this just the other day like the warriors have kind of auditioned these sort of like wild variable like offensive guys to add to their big three and it's like pool is the one that has kind of like earned the most trust granted they need him a little bit more now because clay is not clay anymore but yeah i mean clay likes to shoot the ball so i mean i'm sure he's kind of like earned the most trust. Granted, they need him a little bit more now because Klay's not Klay anymore. But yeah, I mean,

Klay likes to shoot the ball. So, I mean, I'm sure he's kind of just like, I'm still me. You know, I need to be shooting it. But should he be shooting more than Poole at this point? I think that's kind of a question to ask.

I don't even think it's a question. Yeah. I mean, Klay was 5 for 19 tonight, 2 for 12 from 3. Yikes. And he can't guard it. He can't guard the way he used to be able to either.

Yeah, he looks like he doesn't have the foot speed to keep up with some of these guys. I think there's some diminishing returns having those three guys out there all at the same time. I mean, they do stagger them at a decent level. I just don't

know who else they would play. That's the other thing. Like, okay, what are you going to... So let's say you decide to go defense. Who are you going to put it instead of Poole or instead of Clay? Like, I mean, you can't play Peyton. He's out. Damian Lee? I don't know.

Gets tough. Well, that's why they were playing Peyton so much. Yeah. Yeah. Today, for me, today was the day where the lineup of death two kind of died. Because it's now insulting

to the original lineup of Death. There's no way John Morant is just scoring at will against the 2015 Warriors. I just don't see it. Yeah, the original Death lineup with Iguodala and Green. I mean, there was nobody to attack. I mean, the guy to attack was Curry, and Curry's not even a bad defender.

Right. And this is like, literally, they're just walking the guy up over and over and over again and going right by him and fool. And then the other guy, like Clay, is doing his best. But this is too tough for him. I think that this is too much. But I don't know. I was curious.

Kyle's comment is pretty interesting in terms of those two guys together. I've never really thought about it that way. It's something to think about. Somebody pointed it out on Twitter and then I was really watching for it tonight. But yeah, I could see them kind of having like a weird dynamic just based on their outrageous confidence kind of levels, figuring out how to coexist.

Well, Golden State still has three home games left. I mean, they got the game they needed. I felt like they could have had this one. I saw Scott Foster at the beginning, and I was like, okay, the extender is here. Not feeling great for the Golden State. I did not bet on this game. But I

saw him, and for the most part, the fouls were pretty okay. The one that I didn't like was near the end, that Draymond push off on the job rebound. Why didn't they challenge that? Did they have a challenge left? Yeah, they did. In fact, they had a challenge left and they called timeout after the

free throw. So they could have challenged it, already pre-called their play if it was a failure after the timeout so they wouldn't have to call another timeout. Basically called the play and inbounded the ball. I mean, maybe they thought it was not going to get overturned, but you're kind of free-rolling. Are you really going to use your challenge

with 40 seconds left at that point afterwards so I think that was a I mean they only showed one replay one and a half you know one or two replays of it but it didn't look like a foul to me whether it would have got overturned with the extender involved like you said I don't know it was first of all it was a

touch foul at best second of all this was one of the most physical games we've had in the entire postseason. And in terms of all the shit that was going on in this game, that did not pass the sniff test for me. And that was a huge call because they were about to go the other way. Now all of a sudden Memphis is up three and the game kind of shifted.

I did not like that. Wiggins, so Wiggins had this big two-hand jam in the first half. And Wiggins. So Wiggins had this big two-hand jam in the first half. And Wiggins is one of those. He's like a cat where your cat might ignore you for a month. And then all of a sudden your cat's jumping on your lap. And you're like, hey, the cat. The cat's here.

And Wiggins is like that in some of these games where he's dunking. He's talking shit. And you're like, oh, Wiggins is here. Wiggins showed up for this. The Gary Payton thing made him mad and that lasted about a half hour.

By the end of the game, he was back to, I mean, he missed a massive three. I thought when Curry banked the three, usually that means that whoever gets

a banked three at a big moment, I always feel like that team is just going to win. I don't know what the stats are. I was like, oh no, bad sign for Memphis, but that was not. Without Peyton,

they're almost going to have to just quicken up the pace and try to outscore Memphis because I'm not sure they're going to be getting a lot of half-court stops. I don't know. What other adjustments do you think we'd see, Kyle? I thought it was, you were talking, I wanted to throw on there about the Draymond cheapy foul I thought that Zaire got away with a push yeah I thought he pushed Draymond in the back to play before and then the next trip overall I thought it was just a weird chippy whistle I don't know if the beginning of the game kind of set that precedent because I thought throughout the game the Warriors were kind of like poking and like swatting at people who had control of the ball. And it was a weird whistle for Memphis throughout. Yeah. In terms of like

adjustments, I thought it was interesting that Memphis wasn't the fact that Jaron Jackson, the foul trouble, you could tell you could kind of sense that after he had that big career night from three that maybe he was going to be a little over eager with the threes tonight. I don't even know if he broke 30 minutes tonight. But yeah, Jaron Jackson missed threes and Jaron Jackson fouls would have been two good overs for this game coming up his career high in both the last time.

Yeah, the fact that if he was going to be willing to continue to settle from three like that, I thought that that was an interesting thing that Memphis wasn't. Considering all the factors that, I mean, Ja really was like the, whatever the commercial, the flex seal. He basically was the flex seal for a lot of issues tonight. And we're going to remember this like star performance.

But the fact that Bane basically is like 98 finals, Scotty Pippen out there, like he can't attack closeouts. I was so new. I was, I was paying attention to see if he'd been over the waist throughout the game. I was like, that's,

that's like affecting the way golden state is able to like liberally help off of John. Not that it really mattered. Um, I don't know. I think the variance is probably going to be the thing that I would roll the dice on if I was the warriors, because I don't think that's going to happen again.

And we don't think Brooks gets suspended for game three, right? That'll be it? I'm guessing. They usually don't do the suspension on top of the suspension. Maybe for this game. Yeah. 40 seconds or something.

Bob, I have a jaw question for you. Okay. LeBron waited in. LeBron was hibernating for, I don't know, he went on vacation. He decided to wait in. He had a tweet about how stupid it was that Ja won most improved player.

Took a shot at some of the dweebs that vote for. Maybe drinking a little. You think LeBron was sipping some of his. He had a couple of glasses of wine before that one possibly. I was psyched because I did not vote for Ja for one, two or three for my most improved. I voted for Jordan Poole

because he was in the fucking G League last year. And to me, that's like the definition of most approved. You're like barely hanging on and now you're this integral part of a good team. I think I had Garland second, I had Desmond Bain third. I agree with LeBron's point. I thought Ja was good last year.

I don't think you should win most approved when you're already good. Like if you go from, now some people have said, well, if you go from good to great, that counts as most improved. But I don't know.

I don't know if that's the spirit of the award. What did you think, Bob? Yeah, I mean, I don't pay much attention to the not to not one, but I just don't. To me, he was great last year.

He's great this year. He's probably better this year. Most improved. Yeah, if a guy's playing in the G League and now he's closing out NBA playoff games with a three seed, he might be he might have made some improvements. Yeah, he might be a little bit

better. I don't know. I think for the adjustments that Memphis had, I mean, Bowdoin State has some adjustments they could make, for sure. Let's hear them. Okay, I mean, Golden State has some adjustments they could make, for sure. Let's hear them. Okay, I mean, this is something that's kind of like a pet peeve of a lot of NBA Twitter people. But I get that Golden State doesn't run a ton of pick and roll.

They don't target people. Their off-ball action, their split cuts, it works very, very well. But the top three team in the league in defending those is Memphis. And Memphis isn't really having problems with it. And so you're doing all of this stuff. And yeah, every once in a while, it looks great.

You got to cut to the basket. That's the layout. But Memphis is not... You saw what happened in the first few minutes of game one when they were using Gary Payton in the short roll. They're not great at pick and roll defense versus the team, especially if you're going to bring drop. They're going to have to string it out.

I just think they may have to adjust their offense a little bit. I know that's something that they have been really, really hesitant to do over the years, but I think they're just being a little bit too cute here. The stuff they're doing isn't working great on offense. They're not punishing anyone defensively

and their guys aren't really going off. Steph hasn't really... I mean, what was Steph tonight? He wasn't a bit... He was 11 for 25. Yeah, 3 for 11 from 3. Yeah, I mean, 25 shots, 27 points. That's not like a Steph night. It's not a great night. True shooting is not that great.

So that's what I would look at a little bit. Can you go to more traditional... If a team like Dallas or Phoenix was playing Memphis, it would be a completely different look to the series because they would just be habitually bringing people up over and over and over again, attacking them, wearing them down. And then it wears you down on the other end

too. Jod can just stand in the corner and just kind of chill on Wiggins. It's like, why not run a Spain pick and roll every now and then? Off-ball, try to run some off-ball screens to bring them up, force them to come someplace else. They did a little bit of it when they had the Draymond play where Draymond had the... Steph had the layup, Poo them to come someplace else. They did a little bit of it when they had the Draymond play, where Draymond had the, you know, Steph had the layup, Poole had the layup.

They did a little bit of that. But I think when they tried it, they weren't really that good at it because Melton broke up a couple of them. And I think it's just an example of them not really emphasizing it all year. Well, Kyle, one thing we know we're not going to see in game three

is apparently Gary Payton, because it just, word came out, he has a fractured left elbow. Yeah, I didn't want that, but I had heard that from someone that he was done so. Yeah, so that's a little different than the old hyperextended. We will not be seeing him and that's a shame.

That was one of my favorite stories, this guy that scrapped and plus getting hurt on a fluke play like that. Any other adjustments for you, Kyle, before we move on? Probably the most disruptive backcourt defender that they have. I think what Bob said is pretty on the money. Memphis' off-ball switchability,

pliability defensively, they have guys that are pretty positionally smart. Melton has incredible timing and hands. On that last play, I don't know why Steph tried to float that layup over him. I don't know why he didn't just bring the arc down on it because Melton sniffed that out pretty perfectly. But yeah, it's a team that just has a lot of big, rugged, switchable athletes. I don't even know if Iguodala would be...

I mean, he's obviously got all that... I mean, he's really clever. I don't know physically if he would be able to... It'd be interesting to see him in this series. That's one that I wish we could have gotten to see against Memphis. I have one more thought on this, but let's take a break.

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where Celtics bucks, which smart goes out and you think, oh man, the Celtics could be down to nothing in this series. If this, you know, if they start come out, they miss a couple of threes or whatever. The Celts win. We'll talk about that in a second. The Memphis ties the Golden State series, but more importantly, Ja has just a fucking awesome playoff game, right? Like really a moment for a guy that when you think about the league, just where it is now, where they're so dependent on some of these older stars. And yet this new generation seems to be emerging, right? Giannis is the king. Giannis is the best player in the league now. And you have the Jokic and Bede and you have Tatum and you have Booker. And now you also have this kind of underclassman class led by Ja, who's 22 years old, who it looks like this series is going to go six or seven.

He has a chance to potentially even make the Western finals if, you know, they only have to win three more games. But I still don't feel like, even though we all know who Ja is, I still don't feel like, even though we all know who Ja is, I still don't feel like somebody like my mom doesn't know who he is. My wife doesn't know who he is.

My daughter doesn't know who he is. You need the playoff games. I feel like Giannis in the finals last year gets introduced to this whole new audience, right? People know who Giannis, everyone knows who Giannis is now. And I think with Ja, him beating Golden State,

him toppling Curry, toppling Draymond, toppling Clay, and just sending those guys packing and moving to the next round, that would be an incredible feat for a 22-year-old. Like, LeBron didn't make

the conference final. Did he make the conference finals when he was 22? I think he was 23. But anyway, I just think this is, this could be potentially... This is a moment that's sitting here for this dude.

I'm shocked to hear that your mom doesn't know who Tom Aron is. Does he need to be on one of the national morning news shows like Good Morning America or something maybe to cross that threshold? But I think you're right that when you were talking about young teams,

there's this kind of thing, I always call it the you're in my way kind of series, where the young team is like, we're trying to climb. And there are these established teams. Golden State is a comparison that people have thrown around a lot for this Memphis team. I don't know that they... Golden State was right before like a paradigm shift in the league i don't know that they're necessarily that one of those is going to come again bob might have a better opinion on that but i think that's uh yeah i mean

in stars specifically have these occasions where we're like okay he went up i know the 80s has all these like storybook kind of instances of this, like the, the Pistons had to overcome the Celtics and the, and it just keeps getting the next, the next guy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And it's, it's jaw. I kind of feel like jaw is even exceeding a little bit, my expectations for him because, uh, I didn't expect this, this early for, from him.

Like his playoff composure, um, has been really impressive. Um, honestly, I didn't expect the three point him. His playoff composure has been really impressive, honestly. I didn't expect a three-point shooting in tense games. That's right. That was the rub on him was let him shoot. He's not, you know, let him miss from deep. They gave him dare threes early in the game,

which I get you can't stay in front of him, so why not? But to me, it seemed like it was... I don't know. I feel like there's other options if you're willing to take risks. I don't know. Like what? I would throw something at him. I would throw a double at him. Yeah, he's very... They had Kaminga out there.

I don't think that Kaminga is a second guy in a pick-and-roll. Can't disrupt something a little bit. Just try something. Just fatigue him a little bit. He's too easy. The guy's rolling the ball up to half't disrupt something a little bit. Just try something. Just fatigue him a little bit. He's too easy. The guy's rolling the ball up to half court. He's taking time off there.

He's taking three steps on defense to Wiggins and back in the paint. Then Wiggins back in the paint. He had an amazing game. And I'm not meaning to degrade him in any way. Not even a little bit. But you have to make a guy like that work hard. You have to give him the Trae Young treatment where you bust him on the other end. Because that's what's going to fatigue him because you're not going to stop him when he has the ball in his hands at all.

Do you think putting him in a crowd affects him the same way that it does Trey? Because it seems like Jha's like a Houdini when you put him in the... I know Ryan was talking about this the other night. He'll just be... He'll disappear into a crowd and somehow make something out of nothing.

Sure. Out of nothing. Yeah. But I also know that if he's going one-on-one against Jordan Poole, that's a layup. Yeah, well it worked. Maybe not. It's not going to completely shut him down, but we know what the

other side is doing. I get it. You play off him and you let him take those threes. But it's not like at the end of the game, it's not like they were giving him the three and then that was forcing him to take bad threes. He still was getting by people. They were still picking out who they wanted to attack and going after him.

With Peyton out, this is a really nice spot for him. I was thinking like the Milwaukee series, which we're about to talk about. They just decided nobody on Boston can really dribble that well. We're just going to make life a living hell for everybody who's dribbling the ball up. Who's it going to be? Derek White? Peyton Pritchard? Oh, Tatum?

Brown? Wait, Al Horford's going to dribble it up this time? Great. Drew Holiday apparently is just a marathon runner now. I don't know. He could just play 94 feet for 48 minutes and guard everybody full court. But they made a concerted effort from the first minute of game one,

which the announcers, I think, between the two games combined, maybe mentioned once that we're just going to make this really hard for you every step of the way. And you're going to be starting your offense at the 14th second mark. And we're going to put miles on you. We're going to try to tear you out. Jalen Brown, your hammy hurts. Well, good luck trying to dribble up. We're going to make you have to stop and start and twist and turn. And then you watch Ja against the Warriors. And as Bob said, they're rolling, balls rolling to midcourt before he picks it up. He's got a full head of steam. You can't really hit him because he's almost like trying to tackle a running back. He's just so slithery. He can just kind of find any spot. So it's not even like you could be that physical

with him. And then on top of it, you have the Draymond thing where Draymond's terrified he's going to get a flagrant every time now. Yeah. I mean, you could try to make him go right once. That could work. I mean, I don't know. Over and over. He loves to get, you're right.

He went left over and over and over. It's like, try to figure out which side he likes to kick from. I'm sure they know this. Like, which side is he more comfortable skipping from? Because you can't it's not like yannis like we saw tonight like you're not gonna wall jaw up it's not the same thing he's gonna slither around and get into the paint i i looked at second spectrum had a stat of where he was like per 100 it's like his paint uh attempts are like up there with like sinners like he's like a really obvious outlier in that way. So you're funneling him and you just pick the most. I think you got to dare Bane. You got to dare Melton. You got to

hope Jaron Jackson makes a dumb mistake. They have to try something different. Yeah. Because just bring extra help in some form or fashion. Bob, would this have been your favorite team to advise if you could have advised any team where they have all these players that you could just, depending on the matchup, just be like, hey, this feels like a Zaire-Williams series. No, I tell you what, I talked to the guys from Memphis at Sloan when I went this year, and I had never met them before, and I just wanted to tip my hat.

They are the best drafting team. Anytime we were looking at a guy whether it was a 48 rule guy that wasn't drafted, they... I mean, Conchar on draft. They basically have a bunch of spreadsheet players on their team. Melton, Conchar. And so I don't... What I like to...

I don't think they need me. They're good. No, I wouldn't like... I like working where people would actually value my opinion. These guys don't need me. I mean, they nailed the Bain selection. They nailed... I mean, Brandon Clark. They got Conchar. They've done everything, right?

I mean, it's really remarkable. Look at that. Look at the team they rolled out there. It's super impressive. The data community loved Clark and loved Bain. Both of those were inexplicable slips. But yeah, Memphis is to the point where if I'm like projecting a player and I have them higher than consensus

and Memphis moves up to grab them, it's to the point where I give, I'm like, oh, okay. You feel good about yourself before anything even happened. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Every, like our, I think our draft model is very, because I mean, these draft models, they're not, you know, there's only so much data from college and they're all using some form of adjusted plus minus and it just, like our, I think our draft model is very, because I mean, these draft models, they're not, you know, there's only so much data from college and they're all using some form of adjusted plus minus and it just becomes like a, you know,

how much you're valuing different box score stats. And so, but they do a very good job and they obviously have some people that are doing not just analytic stuff, but also eye test stuff that's very good. I think they're doing, I think they use some personality stuff because you think of the guys,

there's like a certain type of guy, certain type of personality they have because there's football teams that do this. The Ravens in football always have a certain type of guy that feels very Ravensy. Yeah, I don't think... The Bane thing is definitely true because this guy

seems like he's the toughest dude I've ever... They interviewed him and we didn't interview him. I wasn't involved in any interviews anyways, but I don't think I would have been able to identify it. Yeah, they're good. It's tough, competitive dudes. All right, Buck Celtics.

This was a weird one. The Celtics come out, they make everything for six, seven minutes and they take a double-digits lead that doesn't really ever change. Jalen has 27 in the first half.

At the same time, they can barely get the ball over midcourt, but then when they do, they get wide-open shots and make them no smart. Derek White and Pritchard are just awful in this game. I guess White was okay on the defensive end, but offensively, they had six points combined

at the point guard position, and they were all wide open shots. I think they were two for 12. They missed everything. The Celtics in general, in the second half, there was a point where they, in like 20 plus minutes, I think they had like 26 points. Not only could they not score,

the shots they were getting were at the end of the shot clock, hand in your face. They had 24 second violations. But this was a game I thought, I don't know what you guys thought, but I thought Milwaukee, this was a Middleton game. This is where nothing's going, where it's really nice to just have Chris Middleton making

those 17 footers just to kind of keep you around and lingering. And they didn't have that one kind of just reliable, oh, that guy will get us two points. What else did you see in the game, Kyle? I think the big thing, to speak two points, the first one is, maybe three, Boston came out offensively with incredible energy to start with.

I'm not trying to be alchemy, je ne sais quoi type thing, but they did, they came out with incredible energy. Big slashing kick vibe. Yeah, yeah. Slashing and kicking and re-slashing and re-kicking. It's a game of,

I think Emei was talking about wanting to have a lot of driving kick and make Boston like rotate and defend into the clock. But I thought the big thing too too, was in game one, the big difference was, Waz and I talked about this, Giannis was really, really good at seeing the doubles coming and just taking a dribble and seeing where the help is coming from,

which is something he's developed over the years. But it was similar to the Phoenix thing last night where Dallas has this bottleneck of dependable creation. Like they really depend on Luca a lot to generate offense and open shots. And right now without Middleton, you nailed it. Like Middleton accounts for like over a quarter of their pick and roll reps whenever, which is what, you know, they do whenever Giannis isn't doing his transition thing or his half board thing. And him not, I thought tonight you really could see it.

Like Chicago, horrible matchup, not that they weren't going to challenge Milwaukee to go into their bag. I thought tonight Giannis just wasn't quite as patient, I thought.

And it was kind of like Giannis' playoff bingo at different points. Like, he was settling for jumpers. He was just sort of not... It wasn't the same level of performance, I thought,

as game one. How about you, Bob? Yeah, I think it was... There was some shooting variants early on. I mean, a lot of it was the energy that the alchemy that... They just seemed like they were ready to... I mean, there was that clip of Jalen Brown warming up

three hours before the game, shooting threes. But you have a collapsing defense. That's their style. They're going to try to take away the paint and give you the three. And so Boston was like was like okay we don't need to come down and just walk into a three we can get the drive first collapse the defense get the threes and they're making them um yeah I don't know it's I thought the most interesting thing was and I'm not trying to be like a knob here but um I thought the most interesting thing was like okay they lose the best defensive player in the league, supposedly, in

Marcus Smart, and their defense didn't miss a beat, which is not to degrade him in any way. It just shows you how good... I talked about this a little bit on Twitter today. How many guys on that team are great defenders? And I think I rattled off six. It might even be seven, depending on your opinion

on some guys. And so my point is, that is a great defensive team, a great defensive scheme. And they didn't miss a beat at all without the guy who was voted the best defensive player in the league, which is pretty fucking remarkable. Yeah. The takeaway for me, just big picture, was just the defense on both sides, I thought was absolutely immense.

Because Milwaukee, there were a couple points where they could have rolled over and just gone behind by 20. It just would have been, alright, we already got one. But I thought in the third quarter and the first part of the fourth quarter, the defense they were playing and then all the stuff Boston was doing, the stuff

Grant Williams was doing against Giannis. I'm surprised it took you this long to say Grant Williams. He was unbelievable in this game. He was unbelievable. And actually, I thought he probably pulled a couple, like at least two more charges that they didn't call on Giannis. But Williams was all over the place. He looked like those old Bill Russell highlights. He was like challenging absolutely everything. I thought Tatum, you know, I thought he was doing some really good stuff. And then on the flip side, I mean, Bob, I think is the biggest holiday guy that I knew before holiday became kind of a cool thing before holiday got to a finals team. You were always talking about, you always had him as a

top 15 player in the league and shit like that. You really valued him the most out of anyone I knew. The stuff he was doing today, like he was doing this Oscar Robertson shit on offense where the 70s, he had these 70s spins, spins, spins, slow down, and all of a sudden he's getting a layup. It's like, what is this, 1971? And then on defense, he was guarding everybody. He was guarding everyone full court.

He was guarding Tatum. He was challenging everything. He was guarding everyone full court. He was guarding Tatum. He was challenging everything. He was hopping off one guy to fly there. I think he's been absolutely amazing this series. That's my Drew Holiday monologue. He's unreal. He's one of my favorite players in the league for sure. And I think he does have a little fire in his ass

about the Marcus Smart defensive player of the year. It seems like it. I don't think there's any question. It seemed like any question I would, I would love somebody to ask him, Hey, it seems like you're a little fired up. This series is, could it be the Marcus Smart thing?

I want to talk about Giannis. So Giannis, wasn't that great today? It's six turnovers, 11 for 27. He missed 16 shots. I thought he had, he only had three fouls.

He could have even more charges than that. They were confusing him. They were singling him. They were, you know, doing all these different things. The reason that he's the best player in the league, there's a bunch of different reasons for it. But one of the main reasons

if you're trying to think who is the best is when they're not even that good and they could still have a dramatic impact on the game. Like he wasn't good in the game today and he was still, there was a 12 minute stretch where he was dominating. I think he had 18 points at one point, like nine or 10 minutes. And to me, that's the last level of like a truly great player. If you're not even playing that well and you're still awesome. That's the level LeBron got to.

Jordan, the greatest guys. Tim Duncan could be dog shit, but he could still be doing 19 things. I was weirdly more impressed by a bad Giannis game than I would be by a good one. Does that make sense, Kyle? It does.

I think you really... I hate to say this because we in Kentucky, we've had a long kind of history with Grant Williams. I know that it's a pretty, you can go back and research this, but he was, I really think he, the success that they had in isolation, confusing Giannis, a lot of it was Grant Williams. I really do think so. I texted you at one point. Giannis normally, he looks up and is like, who is the malnourished

gazelle on the Savannah that I can go pounce on when he gets the ball off the rim? I swear to you, we can go back and find this. He looked over to see where Grant Williams was. Grant Williams has been trying to mess with him. He did this with KD last series a little bit, and you kind of just roll your eyes at him. I know it seems like the Celtics players do that a little bit too. No question.

The success, you talked about the run that he had. The run that he had was against Horford and Robert Williams in the third quarter where he wrapped up a bunch of fouls and things like that. I think that's what you're talking about. The ability to get to the line and generate fouls with Giannis, I thought got a pretty good whistle too throughout this game. He did. I think Grant Williams had a lot to do with it, honestly. He just kind of had him off balance and looking over his shoulder a lot.

It was a PJ, kind of out of that PJ Tucker playbook, where he's just really strong now. And it's really hard to go by him. My guess is in game three, I think Milwaukee is probably going to try to post up Giannis and try to get him near the basket, almost like back to the basket stuff if Grant's on him. Because he's got, what, six inches, seven inches on him?

He's not a dominant post player. I think they would welcome that. You think so? You don't think they could just jump hook over him and just try to get little five-footers on him. He's not a dominant post player. I think they would welcome that. You think so? You don't think they could just jump hook over him and just try to get little five-footers on him? Yeah, but it depends on how deep... Grant, he's like a tank. You're not getting great position. You got to get deep.

Yeah, that's fair. I think Grant Williams is the most valuable defensive player in this specific series for Boston because of the offensive matchup. And so it's interesting to me. They've done a really good job of keeping him out of transition. There's a lot of compound matchup. And so it's interesting to me. They've done a really good job of keeping them out of transition.

There's a lot of compounding effects. When you're missing shots, Milwaukee's getting defensive rebounds, getting out in transition, getting out in fast breaks a little bit. And so when Boston's making shots, the variance in this game will get even bigger because it compounds.

Shot goes in, it's less likely that Milwaukee's going to score on the next swing possession. Shot misses, it's more likely Milwaukee is. So you'll see lots of big runs, I think, in this series because of compounds. Shot goes in, it's less likely that Milwaukee's going to score on the next possession. Shot misses, it's more likely Milwaukee is. So you'll see lots of big runs, I think, in this series because of that. I think Middleton's a bigger injury than Smart.

Like, if Smart just doesn't come back for two more games, just... Yeah. They can kind of at least replace the defensive kind of cohesion they have.

They don't lose a ton with weight. And also, you know, there's no like, there's no awesome like guard in the series for smart to guard. Right. There's not.

Giannis is the key to the series, but like the Middleton piece, I still, that was why I picked Boston in the series to begin with. I just found it hard to believe that that wasn't going to matter. It didn't matter in game one. We'll see game three. I don't,

I don't know if home field home court advantage is even going to matter. It didn't matter in game one. We'll see game three. I don't know if home court advantage is even going to matter that much in this series. It certainly doesn't matter in game seven. If it gets to game seven, I can promise you that. That's not going away anywhere. Yeah. Usually home court matters as the series progresses in my experience.

The game six and the game seven is where you really start to see it. I agree. Game seven is where it comes into play. Do I think Boston could go in and win game threes is where you really start to see it. I agree. Game seven is where it comes into play. Do I think Boston could go in and win game three, game four? One of those two? Or even both in Milwaukee? And then Milwaukee could come back and win game five in Boston?

Yeah. The one thing that really worried me as a Celtic fan, well, other than the White-Pritchard thing. And they paid a pretty steep price for white. They gave up a first round pick. They gave up Josh Richardson, who was playing pretty well for them. You know, who I think compared to,

they didn't, you know, they can't play Aaron Neesmith. Like basically white's getting a lot of the minutes that Richardson was getting. And white at points in this game looked like when the ninth grader gets brought into a high school game because somebody was hurt and they

just had the deer in the headlights. Bucks weren't even guarding him. Been there. I mean, they were like seven, eight feet off him. And please, please keep shooting. Defensively, I thought he did some good stuff, but offensively, man. Yeah. And then Pritchard's last two shots were an airball

and one that hit the side of the backboard, it seemed like. So somehow during the game, he lost confidence. So that part worries me if we don't have Smart for game three. Do we know how long he's out for? I guess there's like, what is the details there? I think that they were hoping they would win today. Obviously hoping they would win today, Obviously hoping they would win today, but hoping that, you know,

Milwaukee got the game they were going to get. They weren't going to play as well as they did game one. Boston could steal game two, buy Marcus four days. Game three is until Saturday. So try to just buy him some time, see how it goes. We didn't mention Tatum.

I thought Tatum had a really fun game. He wasn't great, but he had to solve a lot of stuff. They were always throwing two people at him. Bob, what did you see? What's their strategy with Tatum? What are they doing to him? I think

they're willing to allow the simple screen, drop coverage with the big, which they do against every team. And if he wants to walk into a three, that's fine. I think they've been punished from that a little bit tonight. They're just trying to take away with all of these guys. They're just trying to take away the rim. I think they would love for him to take more mid-range

versus drive and kick threes, which Boston has not taken a lot of mid-range of late. So I think they're just trying to make it as tough for him as possible down low and willing to live a little bit with non-catch-and-shoot threes from him. It'll be interesting to see. At some point, Milwaukee will change their coverage. They won't continue to go to a simple drop coverage. I mean, they have a little bit,

but I think they'll come up with some different coverages here a little bit at some point. Because as you said, they're already picking bit, but I think they'll come up with some different coverages here a little bit at some point. Because as you said, they're already picking up. Their point of pickup is very high because of the lack of ball handling. Now you can start bringing in some more harder shows. You can switch a little bit more, be a little bit more

aggressive. Just allowing these non-natural ball handlers, once the screen is set to have all this room because the big is dropping back to take away the paint, and then everyone's collapsing, I think, was a little bit more easy for Boston to handle than it was the first game when they started bricking a bunch of shots and couldn't really gain any confidence.

Well, we're going Saturday, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Sunday now. When we get to Saturday, it's going to be every other day. You have the Celtics that basically played seven guys today. We did not see Tice. Tice was kept on ice. We had Milwaukee.

They played eight guys. And they, you know, Carter had three turnovers, but at least was able to keep the defensive pressure on with them. So, they're probably positioned a little bit better if Smart can't play. Carter had three turnovers, but at least was able to keep the defensive pressure on with them. So, um, they're probably positioned a little bit better of smart.

Can't play. I, the honest thing scares the shit out of me. It's a, it just sucks to go. It's been a playoff series. I knew it. I thought he was the best part of the week.

I still thought Boston was going to win. And then you're actually going to get set, dude. And he's just, he's just clearly the best guy in the league. Now who wins this series, Bob? I hate to pump you up a little bit more, but I'm leaning towards...

With a healthy Marcus Smart, I think Boston wins the series. Because of the defense? Because of his defensive player of the year ability. No, I'm saying the whole team defense. You think the Celtics defense? I think he's more valuable in the series on offense because he's not afraid to shoot

and he can bring the ball. Do you really want to have to rely? I mean, Pritchard's okay. I think it depends. You have to rely on a combo of Pritchard and White, and I think the White offense is just too catastrophic, and the Pritchard defense is a little bit catastrophic.

Well, I'm not, I'm just being. I'm laughing because it's true. I'm laughing and crying at the same time. What do you think, Kyle? Yeah, you just kind of have to pick your trade-offs, your levels of survival you're willing to accept. Like you was talking about. Yeah, I think the milwaukee thing the

fact that they've targeted something the fact that boston has targeted something this early that clearly has janice thinking this much you know we've had this happen over the course of his career where you get these guys who are positionally strong you know like i said he was picking on robert williams i think people a lot of times assume these like uber athletes are guys that can really guard on ball. But I feel like Horford and Williams together both are positionally pretty clever. And the lack of Middleton here, we really feel it earlier. I think they're going to have to mix up. I was noticing kind of their cutting offense kind of went dry a little bit. This might shock you, but I think Bud waited a little too long to get creative.

Like, I think they're going to have to mix up their looks more than they did tonight because they didn't have to this past game. And I think he just waited a little long. I think Boston,

I'm feeling pretty good about Boston. I was saying I thought a lot of the things that happened last game were correctable for them and they got an epic Giannis performance.

Their ability to sort of make it, change it up, and change the way he plays offensively is going to really – and Drew. We'll see what we get out of Drew. Because once you cut Giannis out, all his satellites just fall from the sky. The Grayson Allens, all the spot-up guys that just float around him like those little fish that follow a shark kind of a thing. They just die.

So their ability to solve that, I think, is going to be what dictates it. I think an underrated thing in this game was Brooke Lopez playing 25 minutes because of foul trouble. I think that was giving him another 15 minutes or 10 minutes or whatever will have a big impact because that was really... He was very impactful in game one.

They can defend a lot better with him. They can contest a little bit better. Portis isn't that guy. He's not a bad player, but he's not that guy. And I think that was a big fact, a big underrated factor in this game. I feel like he went out because of foul trouble. He had to come out.

The game kind of got out of hand already. By the time he came back, he picked up his fifth foul when they were making their run, came out, and the game was out of hand. And so, I think that's an adjustment that isn't really an adjustment, but it's a change that if he's not in foul trouble next game, it'll have a huge impact.

Boston, minus 134 on Fando. Thanks for boosting my confidence, guys. Who do we have from what you saw tonight? Who would you take? Life depend on it. Golden State, Memphis in that series. I don't know. I don't make these three. I do my best

preparation. But after tonight, hot take, I'm just 32-year-old, 33-year-old, 34-year-old versus 22-year-old. Whoop that trick playing in the building for a little bit for a few more games. I just think it's just... I don't know. I'm just just until i see golden state figure something out defensively

like that's why i've always said like gambling when you're gambling you're doing like don't predict what you think a coach should do you try to predict what they will do until i see them change their defensive coverage until i see them if they don't change their defensive coverages in the terms of getting the ball out of his, if they don't try to attack him more and pick and roll, I think they'll have trouble winning the series. But who knows? Maybe they will make those changes

and then it won't be that hard. Who knows? But if I had to bet right now, I would probably bet on Memphis and bank on the athleticism edge. What do you have, Kyle? I still kind of feel like I'm leaning towards the Warriors.

I talked about that shooting variance. I trust Golden State to kind of balance their stuff out more because the thing that Memphis had going for them with Minnesota was you could pretty much count on that Minnesota was going to beat themselves at some point. They proved that in epic fashion. I lean Golden State. They had a lot of... I do think the GP thing is big, but I just kind of feel like they are going to... Even with an epic Ja Morant... I'm saying epic a lot, sorry.

Even with a big Ja Morant performance, they still barely beat them tonight. I think it's an old school series where Golden State wins, but Memphis takes them every inch they can take them. And even though Memphis loses, it feels like a win because they have now arrived. And John Moran is a superstar in the whole thing. Bob, before

we go, same game parlay for tomorrow with your old team, the Mavs. Mavs adjust. You could critique this one. Mavs adjusted line plus 10 and a half. Oh, we're not doing adjusted lines. This is the biggest sucker thing in the world.

We're going to save your guys. No adjusted lines. Go with the regular lines. You're laying too much juice. I don't want adjusted lines. I'm sorry to be difficult. I'm learning. I'll give you the regular line.

I gave you two winners last time I was on here. Now you're throwing adjusted lines at me. Like, what is this? The cooler's coming in here and you're trying to mess me up. Like, what is this? It's like the cooler's coming in here and you're trying to mess me up. You're changing the deck. You're doing all these things. The pit boss is asking for my ID.

I just want a regular line, okay? Mavs plus six. Aiton to score 15 plus points. Aiton to get 10 plus rebounds. And Luka to get eight plus assists. Plus 486 on FanDuel. So you asked me what I wanted and you told me what you were going to bet.

I'm asking you to critique the bet. Do you like it? What would I bet? Hey, sounds like you got yourself a hell of a bet right there. You like that one? It sounds like you like the maps tomorrow night though.

I actually don't. I'll give out another two-game parlay for your fan. That doesn't involve player props, although the eight-point prop is probably a decent prop. It's 15 points. I would take Phoenix and the... What's the total? Total is 216. Okay. I would take Phoenix and the, what's the total? Total is 216.5.

Yeah. I would, I would take the Phoenix and the over. You would take the Phoenix minus six or the Phoenix money? I'm a point spread guy. I would just go minus six. I feel like if they're going to win, I don't know.

Maybe you could bet the money line if you wanted to be super nitty, but. All right. So we could do Phoenix minus six, the over, and eight and 15 plus points is plus 349. There you go. That's amazing. Bob loves the same game parlays. Kyle might get in on that.

I don't love the same game parlays. You just have to do the same game parlays. So what am I supposed to do? You're an old school straight up. You're just like, who am I taking? What's the line? And you go. Yeah.

The same game parlays that I used to love were college football when the team was favored by like 15 and the total was under 40 or something like that. You would just bet the dog in the under or the favorite in the over and it was correlated and it was a huge edge. And it used to be that every sports book

allowed you to do that. And then, then you would try to find the ones that still allowed it. So that was, this is like an old school tell, but those were the ones. Yeah. Yeah.

All right. You can follow Bob Valgaris on Twitter. You can see Kyle Mann on the, on the ringer. Just did a, another classic video this week and on the ringer NBA show as well. You were on there with Waz this weekend, right?

Yep. Sure was. And you're working on your draft stuff? All the time. You're either getting ahead or getting behind. That's what I was talking about. Who do you have number one right now? Jabari?

It's shifting, Bill. It's shifting. Who's it shifting to? What's going on? It's shifted a million times. All right, that's nice. We'll hold on. We'll hold on.

I'll write to you. All right, we'll hold on. Thank you, sir. Wait, before we go we just watched the Twitter clip we took a quick break Steve Kerr just really

went after Dylan Brooks talked about how he broke the code he thought he should get suspended he thought he tried to hurt him and all that I've never seen a coach

in recent history go after a player like that have you guys seen anything like that before? the only thing that comes to mind is like Jim Boeheim in that Georgetown game.

Remember when he, in the press conference, went off on, was it like Michael Brown or what was the guy's name? Oh yeah, like a million years ago. Didn't throw out. That's the only,

I can't think of another one like that, that specific. You think, Bob, you think there's some gamesmanship with that? He's trying to, I don't know, get one like that, that specific. You think, Bob, you think there's some gamesmanship with that? He's trying to... I don't know. Get him suspended for game three? I mean, there's a little bit of...

There's always gamesmanship in these press conferences. You always hear that. But listening to it, it sounded like he was very passionate about his player and very disturbed that his player is hurting and feeling a lot of empathy for his player being hurt. And so, I don't know. I watched the clip. The clip to me, I was like, that's a flagrant too.

But in terms of like, I don't think he tried to hurt him. I mean, I don't... Maybe, I don't know. Who knows? I don't... It's hard to say what the intent was. Obviously, I don't think he's like, oh yeah, I want to end this guy's season. And that obviously didn't happen.

But I do think that it was... He was probably like, I'm not going to make a play on the ball here. And if I happen to hit him in the head, oh, so be it. I mean, these plays are so bang, bang, it's difficult. But yeah, I'm not sure. Do I think he gets suspended? I didn't think he'd get suspended prior to this.

So maybe it's a relationship. I don't know. Perhaps. Who knows? It's very difficult. These guys will watch this thing a hundred times like the Subruder film. Well, you know, Kerr did say before the game, he was saying,

we expect this to be the most physical game we play this season. So I think they had a sense that the Grizzlies were going to try to hockey it up. And that halftime, they asked him about that quote. And he was like, well, that wasn't physical. That was dirty. I think is what he said or something to that effect. Yep. Well, there you go. Oh, the other thing we didn't mention was Doc Rivers,

the DeAndre Jordan. Bob, was that your favorite thing of the playoffs? Did Doc just trot DeAndre out in both halves? I don't know if it was just I was shocked because I really did think like, okay, yeah, this is an easy adjustment. I mean, look, they don't have a lot of moves. Yeah.

Regardless, what are they going to play? Paul Milsap. Paul Milsap is arguably more destructive at this point in his career than DJ. It's just because Paul Milsap is a lot more advanced. But then what? Paul Reed? I don't know. The thing is, they're not going to out-solid them in this series. That's apparent.

So why wouldn't you just gamble it up and go small and see what happens? I'm sure someone can handle Bam out of Iowa. It's not like they're guarding Prime Shack or whatever and they need a big body to bang. I think there's a little bit of, perhaps, Harden wants a role threat. That could be that. And maybe there's a little bit of perhaps Harden wants a role threat that could be that and maybe that's why but DJ just ain't that guy.

He's just not that guy anymore. The question is is Harden that guy anymore? That was just he honestly looks like a shell of himself and it's been that way for a couple months but against a Miami team that knew

that they had to just gear up against him it doesn't seem like he can go out by anybody kyle do you see is this it have we have we turned the table on the james harden era as a superstar god there were some games in that last series and i kind of poked fun at him in a video i put out about maxi where he just looks like a corpse out there i mean if you if you take if you take away his rim pressure he just doesn't the only thing that. I mean, if you take away his rim pressure, the only thing that's left is like the, if you took Luka's rim pressure away, he could still cook you in ISO.

Harden just doesn't have that gear anymore. When he gets to the rim, he's just kind of like falling over, jumping into dudes, the middle game. I don't know, man. It's tough. If you're a heavy pick and roll guy like that, you start taking away the gravity

that he relies on to manipulate. He's not going to beat anyone in the spread offense. But who could is Maxie. And James Harden can be the secondary guy. That's possible. And the Maxie cooked in transition. They have to beat this team with speed anyways. And so Is, they've cooked in transition. They have to beat this team with speed anyways.

And so, I mean, you're not, you know, it's not the idea that DJ's going to go in there and like shore up the defense of glass.

That's just not accurate anymore. What does he do at all? It wasn't accurate two years ago. He's been done. It hasn't been accurate for a minute. And,

yeah, I don't know. It was interesting to see. Look, but you know, they say that what they say, the series is never over until the home team loses a game. So who knows?

I personally think that series is an absolute wrap. I don't see any way that they win game two. And even if Embiid comes back, Philly would then have to win four or five. And I don't see that happening either. So I just don't see it. I don't see any way they could win Miami, like zero. So I guess we'll find out.

Miami's minus 590 for the series now. So it seems like Vegas agrees. All right, Bob, Kyle, great to see you guys. Thanks for coming on. What does possible sound like for your business? It's having the spend to powers your scale with no preset spending limit, more cash on hand to grow your business with up to 55 interest-free days, and the ability to reach further with access to over 1,400 airport lounges worldwide.

Redefine possible with Business Platinum. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Terms and conditions apply. Visit amex.ca slash business platinum. Alright, Peter Schrager is here from Good Morning Football and from Fox. We had the NFL draft last week. Want to check

in with him and see what he thought the big trends were. Takeaways, draft gossip. The big thing for me is just the receiver binge that we're on right now, where the market for receivers is starting to edge toward quarterbacks. We talked about this the last time we were on. Ben Solak theorized that the Christian Kirk contract that he got, making almost $20 million a year annually,

just basically threw a grenade into the salary cap system where every guy's like, wait, that guy's making that? Well, I want this. And we've had so much movement. The shocking one for me, the more I thought about over the weekend was the AJ Brown, who's only 24. It's not like a Tyreek Hill situation where he's about to hit his 30s. You can kind of see the Chiefs wanting to maybe save some money in one place, try to reboot, try to get some rookie contracts in there. But the A.J. Brown thing, if you can't make it work with him, what's the point of having a contender?

So what's your big takeaway with all this wide receiver movement? I thought the draft was interesting in that there were four wide receivers that were deemed by everybody as the guys. And you get these guys on rookie deals and it's Drake London and it was Garrett Wilson and it was Chris Alave and it was Jamison Williams. And I had multiple coaches who had picks in the 20s calling me a couple of weeks in advance being like, is there any way Jamison falls? And I'm like, no, he's not. Those guys will not escape the top 12. And they did not escape the top 12. And there was this four receiver draft. And there were two guys who were viewed as late first, early seconds. And they went 16 and 18. And that was Dotson and

Burks. And there's a big drop off. And then you start getting into the Christian Watsons and the Wandale Robinsons and the George Pickens and the rest. So those four guys were viewed as future number ones. And teams were willing to do everything it took to get into the top 12 to get those guys. When the Eagles realized that they weren't going to be able to get one of those players, they were like, all right, we'll do this deal with A.J. Brown. Now the Titans, from what I gather, Tannehill was surprised that they couldn't come to terms with him. Mike Vrabel was doing local media about two weeks ago. Three weeks ago. He said, yeah, no way. As long as I'm the head coach, he'll be on my team. But I think negotiations went in a certain way where they're like, we can't pay him what he wants. And for Howie Roseman and the Eagles to

thread that needle, to not only find a trade partner, which were the Tennessee Titans, to not only find the number one guy who's 24 years old, but also come to terms with a contract, all what seemed to be in a 24-hour span. This was not done weeks in advance. They were calling around, but it really accelerated on draft day. It was pretty miraculous. And I think Tennessee, who was the one seed last year in the AFC, I feel like the vibe out of that place is, yeah, we weren't able to pay him, but also shock and awe a little bit that if they don't pay that guy, well then what does that say about the status of our team? Well, then you had the Marquise Brown trade, aka Hollywood, which that was a jaw dropper for me because I was like,

wait a second, that guy's not worth the 23rd pick. Like, I don't get it. But then you, you see like how the Packers didn't even draft a receiver. And you think like, I guess the market just shifted so dramatically on the receivers that it wasn't even about Holly and I'm not defending the Cardinals because I thought that was a bad trade, but the market shifted so dramatically on receivers that all of a sudden, Hollywood Brown, I guess, technically was kind of worth the 23rd pick if you could get a third-rounder back, which they got the 100th pick back. Get him, they have him under a two-year deal.

You could make the case. His stats were better than I realized last year. I know it was a 17-game season, but he got over 1,000 yards. He could ostensibly be a deep threat. Wasn't like the Ravens were exactly, uh, bombs away last year. So there's a world you could talk yourself into it. So I kind of see it from their perspective more than I did Thursday night. And to your point, they weren't getting one of those top six wide receivers. So you're now

looking at the seventh wide receiver. And I knew going into this, they were taking offense, no matter what, with that 23rd pick, it was either going to be offensive line or wide receiver. The last two drafts, they took inside linebackers and Zayvon Collins and Isaiah Simmons. That's not what Cliff or Kyler necessarily played to their strength. So they were going to get a wide receiver. They went and got one. Now, from what I hear, it was a done deal for about a week, maybe several weeks. And they kept it quiet and didn't say anything.

And they knew that this was going to be the trade. They already came to terms with it. And they came to terms with that, the Cardinals, when they realized they weren't getting one of those top guys. And so Hollywood is not only Kyler's buddy, they were best friends at Oklahoma. And I know that this is not so much an olive branch to Kyler, but we're going to get you your guy. We're doing everything we can. They also might have seen this DeAndre Hopkins suspension coming down the pike that not everyone in the media might have known. That apparently happened five months ago. it and just make sure they got a number one. I'll say this with the speed that Hollywood Brown brings now forget whether he's a number one wide receiver or not. You add him to Rondell Moore, which they already have, you know, obviously DeAndre is going to be coming back. And then they also have, uh, Zach Ertz who they like, and then AJ Green's coming back. It's a pretty good receiver options for him. Now from the Baltimore side, you know, uh, Lamar's response was like

WTF and everything. From what I hear, Hollywood was pretty happy to get out of there, knowing that he was never going to get that huge second contract unless he left that system in Baltimore, which does not bode well for any wide receivers, let alone a guy that wants to be paid like a number one

wide receiver. If the pick they got back with Brown was like 70, I think people would have been like, Oh, all right. Interesting trade. But because it was a hundred, then it's like, wow, they didn't get enough. But you think like they're trying to keep Kyler Murray happy. If they're all in on trying to just repair that relationship, it's almost like they had to throw in an extra 30 spots just to kind of lock it down to try to keep that piece happy.

I there, I thought the trade by, I just don't understand the draft pick. I know they have the chart, but like the Minnesota trade confused me the most. Cause you just mentioned how you just mentioned like basically everybody wanted to get in the top 12, that 12 spot that they had was maybe the most pivotal thing.

Once those other three wide receivers went off the board, it was like Jamison Williams and then a huge drop off on everyone's board to Dotson and Burks and then off that. So that 12 spot was huge. Not only did they trade within a division, they traded and they didn't get a first round pick back. I thought it was very strange trade. And, you know, Questy's a first time general manager and everyone calls him the econ GM. Yeah. They're thrilled with it. They like what they got because they thought that they

didn't need that position. They wanted defensive backs. They got Lewis seen later on in the first round with that 32nd pick, but around the league, a lot of people were scratching their heads and everyone was complimenting the lions for being so aggressive in making the trade. But the Vikings clearly had a plan also, and they didn't see that as a major drop off and they still got their player the safety at 32 so they got detroit got 12 and 46 minnesota got 32 34 and 36 and then they traded 32 they traded back and got the two seconds. So they're just, I think, and I saw this in Peter King's piece and I heard a couple other people mentioned about people felt because of COVID because we had that goofy season. That was why we saw older players. That's why we saw, you know, the Ravens were trying to get all these third and fourth round

picks because they felt like this might be a year. There's crazy amount of value there. The part I didn't understand is just what you laid out earlier. It's like, you just want to be in the top 12 drafts drop off. This draft dropped off. It was 12. And then you had the guy, the Eagles traded up for, and then the safety at 14. And then it dropped off again, almost. But man, if I'm trading out at 12 to go back 20 spots, when has that not been a first rounder at least? Then you think like the Saints traded up with Philly, gave up next year's first round pick in that trade, and then they traded up again.

They gave up so much for the receiver they ended up drafting at 11. That has to be one of the biggest premiums anyone's traded up for, for a guy who wasn't even one of the three best receivers. And I could tell you that Green Bay sniffed around. I don't know how active they were, but they were asking. And then you had Kansas City sitting with 29 and 30. You obviously had Arizona. I think if Chris Olave, who's from San Diego and played in their backyard, was at 17, the Chargers would have taken him. There were a lot of teams that were in the market. So for Detroit to get that now from the Minnesota side of it, and I know a lot of Vikings fans are up in arms right now, it's like, all right, new GM, new head coach.

This GM is not one of those GMs who grew up living in a minivan scouting players at every college. He was working for Credit Suisse. He left that job to go work in the analytics group with the 49ers, worked his way all the way up. And he has taken a look at this thing in almost an asymmetric way as the GMs have looked at it in the past. Maybe his trade value chart is different and maybe they would look at their haul and say, hey, we have two wide receivers. So what we got, we're feeling pretty confident with and our defensive backfield is now solidified. But think if they had taken Jamison Williams. Like, oh my God, the threesome? Jesus, especially like with the way the wide receiver contracts are going, they're going to have an issue with Jefferson probably in a year.

Yep. You know, on top of all that, I thought that was fascinating. I, you know, the, then the Pats, obviously, who we'll talk about later with once we seem like once we got past like the 22nd pick, the draft got super drunk and people were all over the map with who they valued and what was going on. And people are trying to add receivers and like the Pats on the second round took the guy who was the fastest guy in the draft. Tyquah. The next pick was Pickens, who is the classic,

man, if this guy can bury the red flags, this is a superstar receiver. Of course, Pittsburgh takes him. Pittsburgh's drafted receivers better than everyone else in the league for 15 years. So they get that guy, and my dad and I were just the combo of that. You're not the only fan base, the Giants fans. They took a guy, Wandale Robinson,

out of Kentucky very early. And Wandale was at Nebraska, couldn't really get his grip, then goes to Kentucky, has a great year, but is 5'8 on a good day. And it really was like out of nowhere, had this amazing season and Giants, they took him over Sky Moore, who you'd heard a lot about over George Pickens, over a lot of these guys. So it's going to be interesting

because we go back and look at the wide receiver classes of recent years and like Andy Isabella was drafted by the Cardinals in the second round. He was taken before DK Metcalf.

You know, like we go through it all these years. There's always the question. Nikhil Harry over Debo. Nikhil Harry over Debo. We go through it all these years. There's always- Nikhil Harry over Debo. Nikhil Harry over Debo. Absolutely. So you have these like, but these teams have a certain need that they want to hit. The Giants drafted a 5-8. We'll see over some of these guys that were viewed

as sure things. And I think every team has a different board. And I'm not going to dismiss Tyquan Thornton, who runs a 4-2-8 for that Patriots offense, because they might need that more than what George Pickens provides. the speed guy thing that you spent the money on didn't work. It was the same thing. I went back. It's dark. We can talk about it in the next break. But some of the trade-up, trade-downs that the Pats had, they sent a lot of picks. They traded up, trade-down. They traded up for Dalton Keene and Asi Asi,

the two tight ends, who both were bust. But they spent a lot of draft capital on those guys and then had to do the Hunter Henry and I'm blank, John and Smith. Well, just to make up for all this other capital they spent on these two guys that were immediately bust. They broke the bank last year in free agency

and then they had a really good draft class last year. So there was this real positive momentum. Like, all right, here we go. And universally, this draft is raising a lot of eyebrows from the Patriots and we can go deep into the first round pick if you want, but it's, it's a shocker for me. I do all the work where I talk to all the teams. No one had that guy as a first round pick, whether they want to say he might've been early second and who knows. And he was not viewed as a top 40 guy and they took him where they took him

the trade downs for them just last five years have just not worked i went through i actually went through everything they did try to figure out what the hell was going on it's pretty grim it's this is now i i think balachek it is expired with at least being able to not question him about the drafts. I was going to say, where are you at that point with that? Because a lot of fans of Bar are like... It's five, six years of this now. Yeah, it's like, you can do what you want.

Hey, good luck questioning Belichick. I'll see you in a couple of years. And it's like, well... I mean, we had the Mac Jones and trading up for Barmore are the two big wins from the last five years. But you go through like the 2020 draft where they had a lot of picks,

they traded a lot of stuff, they brought, they basically moved up, down, sideways. And they ended up with Kyle Duggar, who I think was a good pick. Good.

Josh Uche, we'll see, was barely on the field down the stretch. Anthony Hardaway, not playing. Asi Asi and Keane, not playing.

Roe Bassler, the kicker didn't even make the team nope on Wenner the guard and Heron the guard the uh offensive lineman

those guys have at least played but that was they started out in that draft with 23-87-98 and a bunch of third rounders didn't really do a lot they had

the uh the 2019 draft was they kill Harry 32 they traded up for Juwan Williams 45. Vanderbilt. Who just hasn't.

Can't play. Chase Vinovich who they also made moves for. Yeah. Missed on a couple offensive linemen. Missed on the quarterback Stidham

who can't play. And Jake Bailey the punter was the best pick that year. You go back the year before Sonny Michelle at 31, Duke Dawson 56. The second best guy they drafted was Berrio, so they let go at 210.

Who's having a nice little resurgence with the Jets. In 17, they traded their first for Brandon Cooks. They traded 64 for Coney Ealy in 72. Coney Ealy didn't even make it. Alvin Kamara was 67. Cooper Cup was 69. And they ended up at 72.

They traded back again for 83 and 124. They took Derek Rivers, 83, who's not playing. There's a lot of these, is my point. I don't think Belichick can rest. Look, my favorite coach I've ever had, love the guy, six Super Bowls, the whole thing. But you just got to look at the last six drafts and be like, these were not good. And that's why they're in the spot they're in. And I think this year in particular, it's worth

using a microscope because you lose Dave Zieglerler who i think was a very important part of the front office casario is now two years removed uh mcdaniels is no longer there mick lombardi who's mike's son who was very important on the offensive side in the last few years is now in vegas with with josh mcdaniels like you lose a lot of the brain trust and there's new guys that you know ernie adams isn't there anymore. So now grow is getting a lot of Elliot Wolf, like there's names, but it's not like, Hey, the gang is back together and don't worry, trust us. It's it. A lot of those guys that were in his ear are gone. And, you know, you talk about like some of these picks and the wide receiver and it's all right. So who's coaching the offense this year? Is it going to be Joe Judge or Matt Patricia?

If so, I'd like some indication of what values they put on their wide receivers and what they're looking for, because that's a big pick right there to take the Baylor kid. And I'm not going to question it until the season starts, but I would assume that I'm not alone in saying both he and Cole Strange went before they were listed on most teams' boards.

Yeah, look, if Cole Strange is a great pick, fine. The question for me, and this is in basketball too, is could you have gotten him 20 picks later? Could you trade it back? Could you have done your version of that Lions-Vikings trade? Could you have moved back into the 40s, wherever you had to go, versus just taking the guy at 29? It seems like the word on the Patriot streets was Belichick felt like somebody was going to take him. And they were just like, we really want this guy. Yeah. There's an argument to be made that like, hey, if you're going to take him at 29

or 40, what's it matter? Just take him at 29. You got your guy instead of getting cute, but you better be sure that someone's taking him at 40. Well, here's the thing with the Pats, and this is what worries me, is Lombardi, when we used to work together, Mike Lombardi, we always talked about blue chippers, and then he would do the blue chipper tiers, and who's a blue chip,

who's like, I think it was a white chip, and who's a starter, basically. But who are your blue chippers? And over and over again, the teams that had 8 to 11 blue chippers or six to nine, whatever the number is kind of had a tendency to be in the running there in the final four and the final two. Like you look at the bills, how many blue chippers do they have? How many blue chip guys they have? They have a lot, right? You know, and they've missed a couple, they've missed on some running backs, but you go on both sides

of their ball and they have like eight or nine kick-ass guys. And to me, like with the Pats, this is another draft where they didn't end up with a kick-ass guy.

Last year, Jones and Barmore, maybe Ramondre, but... Ramondre was good for them, but he's not a blue chip. I mean, he's a solid player.

Yeah. Yeah, but I think what we're seeing with some of these other teams is the Chiefs are a good example. Like, they're prioritizing trying to get blue chips. And they went

and they traded ironically to the Pats to get the last good cornerback on the board. Right? That guy, I don't know if he has a chance to be an All-Pro.

McDuffie's a starter. People really like him. Day one, starter. Starter, like, worst case scenario. With a chance, maybe he's even better than that. So I guess that's the question for me is when you look at the division,

they're in, and the conference are in, in these teams that are stacked and we'll get to some of the ones that got better. The, the, there's just a lot of talent in the AFC. And at some point it,

it comes down to like, where are your eight to 10 guys, your best guys, rank against these other guys? I think for the Pats, it's pretty low. They don't have like, if you just go,

if we did rankings of one through 16 in the conference, and we went through every position, I don't know how, even including Mac Jones, who I love, but he's not like one of the best seven quarterbacks in the AFC at this point. No, you know, we did a draft on good morning football and like the doldrums of the off season of, all right, if you were to draft AFC teams right now and go one to 16, I think

the Patriots were like 10, you know, and that's, that's for a team that made the playoffs and had seven wins in a row last year. It has the best coach of all time. It's just hard when you look, are the Patriots better than the Broncos right now? Are they better than the Raiders right now? Are they better than the Dolphins right now? It's hard to be like, yes, yes, they are. right they Brady still at his peak Gronk out of control Edelman on the defense you had some of the younger guys were really rising up into big time guys

that was the year I think they had Revis yeah all the ones together where it's just you go around and it's like alright if we go through this

there's like 10 awesome guys in this team not to mention like a bunch of like the meat and potatoes guys. And I think that's where what worries me as a Pats fan. It just feels that the AFC is so much better than the NFC

right now. The NFC, you might as well take... You could put money on any 50-1 team and it's probably not the worst idea. And the AFC is like, god damn. The Bills are a fucking monster. Bills are a monster and the Bills got significantly better this past weekend. They moved up are a fucking monster. Bills are a monster, and the Bills got significantly better this past weekend. They moved up. They're aggressive.

They wanted Elam. They saw him as the same type of corner as McDuffie, and he's going to go. He's Abe Elam's kid. He's ready to play. They wanted Dalvin Cook's little brother, James Cook. Not everyone. Second round, 62 overall. Great. We got him. We added a really good running back who can catch out of the backfield. The Bills

looked at this draft and were like, let's get better in the areas we need and let's fill in holes. They even got the punter in the sixth round, which people rolled their eyes and say a punter, but the San Diego State punter is a freak show. And they got him and they got better at every position they needed to. I can't say that about the Patriots. I just can't. Well, we're going to take a break and then we're going to talk about the Jets because there's a world in which this is starting to flip a little bit all right so I don't want to have Sean Fantasy on and talk about this yet I don't want to jinx this for him frankly he's a nice guy we've worked together we've had some great times

he's a Jets Mets fan J. Jets-Mets-Knicks, which is not the threesome you really want to be if you're a New York fan. The Mets have a lot of momentum right now. The Mets fans are very excited. They're in the, shh, don't talk about this, but they're all talking about it with each other, the phase of this.

And then the Jets crushed the draft. You had people leaving the draft, experts who were like, that's one of the greatest drafts I've ever seen. Tell me what happened. Was it shocking? What was it like to be there for this? It was, you have a chess board

and usually the Jets are the ones playing from behind and just trying to play defense and they were the aggressors and it worked out exactly how they wanted. So speaking with those guys in the weeks leading up, it was, hey, if Sauce is there at four, that's the pick. And at three, the Houston Texans take a corner that isn't Sauce. So already that's a win for them.

They're like, all right, they're going to take Stingley. We'll take Sauce. We're good. Then it was, we need to get Zach Wilson a weapon. Wait, can you hold that for one second? Yeah. Why do you think they didn't take Thibodeau when Sal has that Niners DNA of like, it all starts with the pass rush?

Wouldn't that have been like the classic Sal a pick or is he not running this? Sure, no, I think he would have been fine getting Thibodeau. I'll tell you that they had Jermaine Johnson as high as Thibodeau on their board. Wow. So sauce to them at that point, corner is such a deficiency for them. They have nothing at corner. They were like, let's get that guy, bring him in. He could be the leader of our defense who is six foot two. And I mean, that's, that is their product. That's Darrell Rivas to them.

If you're taking them fourth overall, that's how you view them. So they got him. Thibodeau wasn't there at 10. I think it would have been a conversation. Giants took him at five, but it wasn't real debate there internally between Thibodeau and Sauce. They wanted the corner. So they get him. 10, they get Garrett. How much is that we wanted the corner just like, we're not getting out of this conference without a shutdown corner? Is that like 90% of it? I think that's a lot of it. I also think they looked at him as one of the true sure things in this draft. And for the Jets, they can't take a swing. They can't take any variables.

Sauce, to them, was their guy. I'm not so certain. I think Hutchinson they would have taken if he fell to four, but I'm not so certain they would have taken Sauce over Trayvon Walker also. That's how high they viewed Sauce going into this thing. So they get him. They get the receiver and then that's when it really gets interesting. So if they had just gone to bed and said, all right, we got Sauce and Wilson, we got our top corner and one of our top receivers, great. But Jermaine Johnson, who the red flag that I only

see is that his age, that he's 24, and he's got a little bit more tread on the tires. They loved him. They had him as a top eight guy on their board. So when he starts slipping out of the top 10, top 15, Joe Douglas is working the phones. He could not find a trade partner. They finally find one at 26. And I can tell you, they are way more ecstatic about getting Jermaine Johnson as a third first round pick than they were of getting the four and the 10 who they expected they'd get blue chip players. They viewed this guy that they were at the senior bowl. They saw what he can do. And they love his journey because he went from, you know, Minnesota high school to a,

to community college, to Georgia, to then Florida state. And then he bet on himself. He's like, I'm leaving Georgia where I'm not one of the top guys. I'll go then Florida state. And then he bet on himself. He's like, I'm leaving Georgia where I'm not one of the top guys. I'll go to Florida state. And he was the ACC's defensive player of the year. So they are thrilled about that. And then night two, they had Brees Hall as a first round pick as a top 32 guy. And he's a running back at Iowa state. No running backs were taken. Um, the rumor was that Houston was going to take them with the second pick of the second round. They call the Giants. They move around. They trade up. And they get in front of Houston and get Brees Hall, one pick before Houston. So to them,

it's like, all right, four first round picks. And then they get Ruckert, who's a kid from Long Island. He's from Lindenhurst. And he's like as Long Island as you get as their tight end, who will be their third tight end, where they've got Conklin and CJ Uzama. And yet, if Zach Wilson sucks, none of this means anything. And that's it, Bill. They're very happy, but they're also very, very aware of the situation. And I spoke to Salah after the draft,

and he's like, yeah, we got great players, but we haven't done shit yet. He knows. And Zach has to be good, and Mekhi Becton has to show up in shape because they passed on Iki Aquanu and these other guys. There's a lot of other things

that have to happen for actual wins on the field. But for a brief weekend, it's nice to celebrate that there's some competence with the Jets. By the way, speaking of the Pats, I was talking about the Blue Chippers.

This is their pro bowlers by the year starting 2010. They had eight, eight, seven, five in 2013, little dip, seven in 2014, seven, six, six, two in 2018, three 2019,

three in 2020, three in 2020. One was a punter and one was Matthew Slater. And then three last year, Jackson, Judon, and Slater, and Jackson's gone. And Mack was an alternate and did the gritty after a penalty was thrown. But that's the thing with the...

I'm not going to question them on whether they thought Jackson was worth the money. But at some point, you've got to pay money to somebody. I know. All these other teams are. Guys are worse stuff. I was thinking about the value of the draft now with how the market has shifted with free agents. Where if wide receivers are just worth more than they used to be, that explains all the stuff we were talking about with receivers.

Where the best thing you can possibly do now is to get one of these guys under a really set contract. And if you end up in a Jamar Chase situation where you have a number one superstar, but now you have him on this cheap, it's almost like the cousin of the cheap rookie QB. Yeah. So the inefficiencies in the draft now,

like what are the overpaid positions when the guy's actually afraid to see? Cornerback's number one, right? JC Jackson, all of a sudden, 82 million, whatever. Receiver's another one. So it almost is like the draft reflected where the money, where the too much money has gone, right? So those cornerbacks going three, four

actually make more sense than it would have five years ago, right? Yes, and if you look at what Houston's roster is, it's a blank slate. So they say, okay, we got tons of us, one of our tackles. We don't really have much other talent. We're not going to take another tackle, which is what everyone mock draft them to have. And they preferred Stingley over Gardner. So they took them and they're just like, all right, throw, throw daggers where you want. We're not, we're paying him rookie money right now. And we look at him as a number one corner. Jets did the same thing. And then the chiefs move up to get McDuffie. They felt the same way there. And, uh, you know, I don't know if, if, and it's funny because a lot of people told me that

both JC Horn and Pat Sertan were ranked higher than sauce and Stingley. It doesn't matter. Like it doesn't, it's not one thing's equivalent to the other because it's a different draft class. Whether or not they thought Ikea Kwanu was going to be great, Houston was like, no, we want a cornerback because we have our tackle. We're paying him that money.

We're not paying two tackles that money. We'll go and we'll do that and we'll spread it out and we'll have our corner for the next four years before we got to pay him. You're giants. Thibodeau.

Sorry to get in the Michael Strahan personality comparisons. Feels like there's a possible book. You might co-write his book. Who knows? Big personality, clearly wanted to be in New York. That was another one where

it was just so weird to me that Jets and Giants both seem like they, their fan bases were just super happy after the draft. But are we going to look back at this draft in a couple years and Giants both seem like their fan bases were just super happy after the draft. But are we going to look back at this draft in a couple of years and be like, wow, that guy went fifth and Trayvon Walker went first? What was going on that year? That was stupid.

Possibly. And it's not like he went 15th, which I thought might've been a case, like the way people were talking Thibodeau down about a month before the draft where the things that he said were chilling to some in the old school football roots. Oh yeah, God forbid you violate that. Exactly right. But I think some of the most insightful stuff I got were for some GMs who were like, Schrager, he's a defensive end. Who gives a shit what he says? Go get the quarterback. This is not the quarterback. If he says he wants to be the greatest player of all time, fine. Who cares? It's not like he's the quarterback. All that stuff that people shook their head about with Josh Rosen and Cam Newton, about some of the arrogance that they gave off or the smartest guy in the room,

that's one thing when it's the quarterback and everyone looks to that player. For Thibodeau, he has all that. His teammates liked him at Oregon. And the stuff that he's interested in, it's not like criminal stuff. What it is, is he's into NFTs and crypto. And I think that turned a lot of people off because it sounded scary. But do you talk to any 21 or 22-year-old kid right now and they're into NFTs and crypto? Thibodeau is going to be a huge media star if he develops and he's good. But what I loved about the Giants draft and Joe Shane's in his first draft here was they knew they had the five and the seven. They definitely wanted one of the offensive tackles if they fell to them. It just so happened that all three of them were on the board. They did the numbers game

with the chance. It's like a fantasy draft. When you do the math and you're like, oh shit, I can take this guy here and I'm still getting one of the other guys here. Spot on. So they, and this is true that they saw that sixth pick and they thought, okay, Carolina's at six. We've heard they want to trade back if possible. And if there's a chance someone wants Thibodeau, who we love, why even get cute with this thing?

So they keep the pick. They take the defensive end. Carolina's like, oh shit, Ikea Quan is a local product. He's great. We'll start him right away. And then the Giants took Evan Neal, who they probably would have taken at five anyway,

and they got both of them and they didn't risk anything by a team trading up to get to it. That's like, not that Gettleman wouldn't have done that, but that's kind of like Joe Shane's a younger GM, sees it as a chessboard and says, okay, like we would on a

fantasy draft say, well, the guy after me already has got his quarterback. So I don't need to take him this round. I'll take him next round. You know what I mean? So it was smart to see the NFL draft played out that way and not just get the card in, Evan Neal's available, go get them. And then you possibly miss out on Thibodeau. Well, the funny thing is the only reason it played out that way was because of what the Jags did at number one. Did you get any intel now a couple days later, now that people are starting to get a little loosey-goosey with what they actually think? If they don't take him at one, where does Walker go?

Is there a possibility he goes to the eighth pick? I think Detroit would have taken him at two. I do. You do? Detroit wanted pass rusher, and it was going to be either him or Thibodeau. And I think Detroit probably had Walker right up there the whole way leading up to it. Those final 48 hours, it was like, who's going one. All right. Walker's probably going one, but if he doesn't Hutchinson will. And if one of them goes one, the other one will go too. So I think Detroit would have taken him there. I think Houston would have considered too.

So he was that compelling defensive player coming into this draft because, and I hate to put this comparison. I mean, those nine and a half sacks or something. Nine and a half career sacks, right? Yeah. Because of what Micah Parsons did last year, and it's strange to compare them

because they're not the same player, but the versatility of like, okay, in 2022, if you could play a guy over center, outside, inside, and he's got this huge upside, like he's 270 pounds and he runs like the wind. And everyone says he's as dynamic an athlete in this draft. Now, would the safer pick have been Hutchinson? Yes. But Jacksonville not only did that, they went and got Devin Lloyd, their next pick. So Mike Caldwell, their defensive coach,

comes from the Todd Bowles, Tampa thing where it's like, let's send the house. Let's see what happens. What if they had taken Sauce Gardner and won? What would their reaction have been? I think there would have been a lot of, oh my God, a corner was taken first overall. He better be Deion Sanders. I think people have a lot better appetite.

Yeah, there's no way to win. Maybe they should have, my dream in this scenario is the team just lets the 10 minutes run and doesn't take somebody and has somebody so that they can slot them. They slot them in a different thing. I will say this though.

I give him a lot of credit because I don't know Trent Balky at all, but his history is he'll always take the athlete over like the college performer. So they took Anthony Davis, a tackle over Brian Bulaga when that was a big head scratcher. They took Alden Smith over JJ Watt and Robert Quinn. And he's a man who is true to his scouting. And now he goes and gets this job and you're the GM of a team. Do you want to sacrifice your convictions and what you do? Or are you just going to do what the mock drafts tell you? I mean, they obviously banged on the table for Trayvon Walker

when not a lot of teams probably would have taken him first overall. I have a game I want to play with you before we go, but can we quickly just tell me where Baker Mayfield's going? I don't know. I don't. Seattle made too much sense. And then we had Pete Carroll on the NFL network. I was doing day three and I didn't get the made too much sense. And then we had Pete Carroll on, on the NFL network. I was doing day three and like, I didn't get the overwhelming feeling that there was a chemistry or interest there. Um, Carolina not only has Sam Darnold, but they drafted Matt Corral, who I knew they liked anyway with that pick. So I don't know what happens with Baker bill. I honestly don't. And last year was the summer of Aaron Rogers. I could see this dragon on and on and on. Do you think it gets to them just releasing him?

I don't know if they would release him because... They can't bring him to training camp. They cannot bring him to training camp because... Or could they think, well, maybe Deshaun will get suspended for eight games. Yeah, that's why they have Jacoby Brissett, though. And I also think that's because... Did they see Jacoby Brissett play last year?

No. I was like his last fan, but he was horrendous last year. But Baker is such a personality where I don't know if, A, he would do it, and then B, if you could put the toothpaste back in the tube on that one, it might just be toxic to have him around. Yeah. It's a weird deal because...

It's a lot of money. They're not getting a pick for him. They might have to attach a pick to him. So if you cut him and then the Steelers can sign him or you name the team that you don't want to sign him, at least if you trade him, you kind of control where he ends up. But at this point, I don't have a suitor for him, which is really difficult because he was one of the good quarterbacks

in the NFL two years ago. In a vacuum, Dimes or Baker Mayfield for Giants could be next year. Just who would you rather want as a Giants fan, not media person? I would think Baker Mayfield. I think if you go through the list, there's 10 quarterbacks that if Baker Mayfield,

you're telling me he's healthy, there's just no way he's not better than. Like whoever Carolina starts next year, he's going to be better than that guy. Now they might not care because they might want to. Seattle has Drew Locke, Gino Smith and Jacob Eason. They did not draft a quarterback. And Pete Carroll's whole mantra is like chip on your shoulder, compete, compete.

It makes too much sense. And yet nothing did not did not even offer a seventh round pick. Like it's shocking to me. I actually think you could make a case that that Seattle crew is the worst group of quarterbacks. People have gone into the start of a season with who weren't trying to like intentionally tank a season. A couple of years ago after Peyton Manning retired,

Denver rolled out Paxton Lynch, Trevor Simeon and Mark Sanchez. And I remember being like, this is the, and at least Paxton Lynch was a first round pick. Right. And you're like, this is the nadir.

And it turns out, it wasn't. I think the Baker thing's bizarre. Strange. They made the final round of the AFC playoffs with him. Like, you can't be bad. I'm not a fan.

I wouldn't be like, oh, cool. The Pats traded for Baker Mayfield. It's going to be an open competition with him and Mac Jones I'd be like what but he's he's decent and his whole his whole career has been I'm the underdog meanwhile Heisman Trophy winner number one overall pick oh so like but now he actually is the underdog and it's like all right I I would roll the dice on Baker now I know his personality is a lot, but it's nothing that's toxic.

No one hates Baker Mayfield. It's just a lot. Plus they made a trade that I think if the trade is available two months later, the price is way more expensive. For what they paid for Amari Cooper. Crazy. And then how the wide receiver market explodes. Fifth round pick.

I'm going to say he probably should have gone for more than that. All right, we're going to play a game. I'm just going to go through every division. You tell me who you think is going to win the division. And then I'll tell you what the odds are on FanDuel. I love this. And we'll see if there's some value.

So AFC East, we both say the bills, right? Yes. There's no, we don't see anyone else in that division. No, they're only minus 180, which are pretty good. That's AFC East, we both say the Bills, right? Yes. There's no, we don't see anyone else in that division. No. They're only minus 180, which are pretty good odds.

AFC North. I'm going to say the Cincinnati Bengals will repeat this year. I like them the most as well. The odds of the AFC North. Cleveland, plus 185. Baltimore, plus 200. Cincinnati, plus 220. Cleveland, plus 185. Baltimore, plus 200. Cincinnati, plus 220.

Pittsburgh, plus 850. Why? So I hadn't looked at this until today. I assumed Cincinnati was the favorite. They brought everything back and got better. They added offensive line play. They also didn't lose their coaches. It's like purely Super Bowl hangover. That's like the

only thing where they factor that in now as part of the odds almost. The other thing would be that they think Lamar Jackson is super human and if he's on the field that none of this happens last year for Cincinnati, which is fair. But to me, Bengals got better and like they did win those games in Tennessee and

in Kansas City and those were real. Great kicker. The Browns being plus 185. The only way that makes sense is if Deshaun Watson, you're telling me I'm getting 17 games from him. I do not think that's going to happen. Even then, I still would take Cincinnati, I think. Me too.

All right, so there's one piece of value. Bengals plus 220. AFC South, Who do you have? I'm going to say the Indianapolis Colts. They're the favorite. Minus 105. Tennessee plus 145. Jags 7-1.

Texans 26-1. That feels like a stay away to me. I don't like that division. AFC West. Who do you have? This is another stay away to me. I don't like that division. AFC West, who do you have? This is another one that surprised me. This is the best division that football has seen in probably 10 years. I love this division.

I can go one to four any other way. I am going to say that they have the Kansas City Chiefs at the favorite spot, but I might go Raiders. Interesting. I would have said the Chargers were the favorite. Really? They are not. Chiefs plus 155, Chargers plus 240, Broncos plus 260, Raiders seven to one. I'm telling you, add Devante Adams and Chandler Jones, the two best acquisitions and a new coaching staff. I feel pretty good about the Raiders.

I think people are thinking maybe players 15 to 50. Yeah. Probably a little weak on the Raiders. They missed so many draft picks over a couple of years there. But yeah, you're right. The offense. The offense. You got Adams, Waller, Renfro.

You got the running backs They drafted another running back Out of Georgia Who I like I mean, Carr is a good quarterback I think the Raiders can compete I like the cornerback The Pats took

And the punt returner guy Yeah And the running back they got My new guy, Pierre The James White replacement Yep Do you see his pass catching stats? We didn't have a guy we didn't have a third down back last year. They're using

Brandon Bolden. Yeah. Brandon Bolden, by the way, along with Deron Harmon and Jacob Johnson and all those guys, they all came to New England. They all came to Vegas, and I kind of like that for the Raiders, too. Hmm. Well, Chargers plus 240. I just think they're going to be the favorite

by the time we get to the end of August. I think people are going to stare at that team. They're going to stare at some of the goofy losses they had, some of the dumb decisions the coach made. And they're going to be like, wow, is this team... Should they have won two more games last year?

And they did, yes. Are they two wins better than they were last year? Yes. And I think they'll talk themselves into it. All right. NFC East. Who do you have? Gosh, I would still go Cowboys

over the Eagles. I just feel like Dak is the best quarterback in that division and they're good enough. It's a disgusting division right now, but I would go rank them Cowboys, Eagles, Giants, Washington. All right. Cowboys plus 105. Eagles plus 240.

Washington plus 450. Giants plus 650. I like the Eagles. I do too. I actually thought they were going to be very close as favorites. And I think Dallas just gets... I just think they get a lot of, oh, it's the Cowboys. Just pencil them in. There's no way the Cowboys are better this year. There's no way. I have this taste in my mouth from obviously both playoff

losses from both those teams, but that Eagles Buccaneers playoff game, it's hard for me to come up and be like, well, now they got so much, but yeah, I got AJ Brown and Cam Juergens and a bunch of, you know, N'Kobi Dean, but I don't know. The Cowboys, at the end of the day, it's still CeeDee Lamb and Dak and those guys. And I thought that Dallas had no right coming back into that game in San Francisco, and yet they almost pulled it off. I don't know. I hate that division right now. Dak Prescott, aka Kirk Cousins with better PR. What is the difference between Dak Prescott and Kirk Cousins? better PR? What is the difference between Dak Prescott and Kirk Cousins?

I'm still waiting for somebody to explain it to me. What's the difference? They both put up a bunch of stats. You don't win in the playoffs with either of them. Kirk Cousins has won a road playoff game. Dak hasn't.

I don't know. If Kirk Cousins did what Dak did in that San Francisco game, we would be talking about it three months later and still making fun of him. But because it's Dak, it's like, oh, well, you know, it must have been the

sideline spot. Who gets a bigger free pass than Dak? It's a good take. It's a good take. It's not even a take. It's a fact. Him and Kirk Cousins had the exact same stats. I did this on my pod a couple months ago. They're the exact same. And Kirk Cousins takes a bunch of shit, and everybody

thinks Dak Prescott is as good as Patrick Mahomes. Who would you rather have, Cousins or Dak? I think it's an argument. It's fair. Look, I'm not a Dak guy. I've never been. Honestly, I don't really like either of them. Yeah. What about Tannehill? I think those

two guys and Tannehill are all on the same level. And Dak had a lot of weapons. And those weapons aren't going to be as good this year. They also have a weird Zeke Elliott thing they got to figure out. I'm on the record. NFC North, who do you have? Packers.

Then Vikings close, though. So, FanDuel does not have it as close. Packers minus 180. Vikings 3-1. I like the Vikings there. Yeah, me too. I thought that was going to be airtight between those two. The Packers are unquestionably worse than they were last year.

And the Vikings are unquestionably better. They got a great young head coach, and they've got a whole new vibe to them, and they did really well in free agency. I like the Vikings. Yeah, and it's possible Mike Zimmer retired like two years ago. NFC South. this is clearly Tampa. We don't need to go over this.

They're minus 320. Saints plus 500. Carolina 11-1. Falcons 19-1. That division is an atrocity. He's trying to figure out if the Saints, if there was a way. Michael Thomas comes back. Alave is good.

Thomas is bad. I know, but then you got honey badger. Like they don't think they're done. They, they drafted in a way with penning and that like that they think they're still in this thing. No Sean Payton, NFC West.

Who do you have? I have Rams one. I'm going to say they sound just like institutional, like whatever 49ers to Cardinals right there 3, and then big drop-off 4 Seahawks. You nailed it. Rams plus 140, Niners plus 185, Cardinals plus 310, Seahawks 10-1. Did you see the McVay reaction to the Cole Strange pick?

Did you follow all that or no? I took it as a compliment. I know, it was. I think he liked Cole Strange, and then everybody tried to be dicks about it. And then, and then, yeah. Um,

it was, he was, he was annoyed that they were bothering scouting him thinking that he could be around for the fourth. Yeah. And then Shanahan was like, that guy was good. I thought we thought he was first round talent.

So that made me feel better. Um, I think Rams plus one 40 is great value because with the Niners, I don't know, our dude Trey Lance, are we sure? Don't know. We sure he's going to be good? I have no idea what's going to happen with him. What if he's not good? So they swear he's good. I talked to guys there and they're like, no, no, no. But it's not the same. We swear he's good that you heard from Mahomes that first year where I was like, holy shit, Alex Smith is getting embarrassed at practice by this guy because he's so good. And Alex Smith knows it. It's one of those where it's like, no, no, you don't see it.

He did start three games and showed very little flashes. Now, the issue is Jimmy's still on the roster. Jimmy, he got the shoulder surgery before the combine. So his price on the open market just plummeted. And we know Jimmy Garoppolo is a different kind of cat than a Baker Mayfield or you name it. I'm not 100% certain that Jimmy's not around come training camp. They're not going to trade him for 10 cents on the dollar. And at this point, the draft is over. By the way, stranger things have happened. Jimmy just being the starter in September. Yes. And Jimmy being like,

oh yeah, sure, I'll compete. Let's go. Jimmy is as unique a dude as there is in that. He does not take this stuff personally. He doesn't. He just is like, I'll go out and I'll compete and I'll do what I do and you guys can shit on me if you want

and you could draft a Trey Lance if you want. Jed York said something very compelling at the league meetings. He was like, we had Montana and Young in the same room for years. Nothing is impossible with Trey and Jimmy, who neither one of them are combative guys. So Niners are fascinating because if they can't trade Jimmy Garoppolo for a premium pick and they have him on the books already, I don't know if they trade him at all. Yeah. And it's weird because there should be more of a market for quarterbacks with how bad some of the starting quarterbacks are, but

some people are just kind of all in on their chips with these guys that we don't, like the Giants. I guess they have to do one more year with Daniel Jones, but if I was a Giants and I could get Jimmy G for 50 cents on the dollar, I'm doing that. I like Jimmy G. By the way, he's another one. Jimmy G versus Dak Prescott. People would say,

Dak Prescott's better than Jimmy G. Kirk Cousins is better than Jimmy G. It's like, is he? Jimmy G won a few playoff games. Yeah, and was playing with a torn thumb and a torn shoulder and does it. I was impressed by him. Yeah. And was playing with a torn thumb and a torn shoulder and like does it. So I was impressed by him last year. He was fucking banged up last year and his toughest shit in those did as much as he could do in those in the playoffs through some terrible passes. He

did Green Bay and against Dallas. So does that Prescott and you're like, well, so does Kirk Cousins. He didn't hurt them in those spots. Now, if Jaquoski Tart intercepts that pass against the Rams, we could be talking about Jimmy G as a Super Bowl contender again. But it's fascinating because he's got a different personality than a lot of these other quarterbacks. And also in the offseason, from what I'm told, he's not reading blogs. He kind of goes off the reservation, just kind of does him.

So his ego is not going to be a main factor on this thing, where if they're like, hey, we couldn't trade you, sorry. And he's like, all right, let's go. Let's roll. I think he'd probably be happy to come back. It'd be interesting. Over going to some shitty city where he's going to go 5-11 or 5-12. Do you think he'd be willing to be number two?

I think he would. And he'd be like, yeah, just when my name is called, let's go. Yeah, and there might be some teams that take a look at their quarterback situation, whether it's in August or even after the season starts, that Jimmy becomes a little more appealing. Like Houston's a good example, right? Houston's good.

I mean, sure. Atlanta, like Mariota with no offensive line. When is he getting hurt? Yeah. Mariota and they got Ritter now, who you love. Ritter's my guy. I know. They took him in the third.

I thought that was a good team for him. Yeah, I was excited for that. Here's a question for you. Baker Mayfield or Jimmy Garoppolo? If you have to pick one straight up, who are you taking? Jimmy. Unquestionably Jimmy. Yeah.

Coming off a shoulder and significantly older. Just winner. Done it. Yeah. The Baker thing, the height thing with him, as I get older and I watch this stuff, if you're going to be short,

I need you to move around. That was where Wilson was for years. That's Tua. Tua's not a mobile quarterback. He's not. I just don't like the short. So tired of watching that stuff getting batted down. Russell Wilson, because he could move, was able to fang that

Alabama's got a kid, Bryce Young, who everyone says is going to be number one overall, but he's about 5'9". You have to be a crazy athlete to pull that off. Tyler is as crazy an athlete as he is. It does affect him out there. In the NFL, it's different, right? You know when I

learned this? Doug Flutie. Okay. Eighties. My dad, this is why I, when I loved Boston college before I went to Holy cross and I had to disown Boston college, um, we had season tickets the last two Doug Flutie years. So we went to a bunch of those games. Oh yeah. No, no, that was a, I think that was in Miami. Was it Miami? But we were watching that. And Flutie was so incredible. It was a slam dunk. He was going to be an awesome NFL quarterback. And it never happened. And then he had a little bit of a resurgence.

Yeah. Buffalo and San Diego. But for the most part, you have to be this Kyler Murray, Russell Wilson level athlete to pull off that height. And that's really the only time it's worked. And I just look at Baker. I think he's figured out a way to make it happen and you can patch it together if the team's really

good, but I'm still taking Jimmy. I just think, you know, at some point those games, like those cold weather games he was in where half the passes you were terrified, but there's a sturdiness to him that I'm just not getting with Baker Mayfield and seven degree weather, you know? And this is an intangible thing, but like to a man, all those 49ers guys would lay in traffic for Jimmy Garoppolo. I don't get that sense with Baker. Not that they don't like him, but like, and no Odell stuff aside at no point during this entire thing with Deshaun Watson, did we see any Browns player come out and be like, hey, they did Baker dirty? Not one. So that to me tells me something too. Well, you know the other thing? I was thinking about this. Everybody's getting bigger on both lines. Football players, who was the dude? I think it was the Ravens. They took a 6'8 guy. He's 6'8. 390 pounds. He's the heaviest player ever to be drafted.

Both sides of the ball, these dudes now are 6'3, 6'4, 6'5. But in our heads, like the quarterbacks have kind of stayed the same height. So Doug Flutie being 5'9 in 1987. Not as big of a deal as it is now where everybody else is 3, 4 inches taller and the hands are bigger. Thinking like wingspans, things have moved up 10, 12 inches. So I'll tell you, Bill, this is good

because you know, Cliff gets a lot of shit. Uh, you know, he does, he does, he's not whatever as a head coach, but that offense is built specifically for Kyler Murray and it's built like a lot of that for him to go side to side. Yes. And it's built around his height and around his, it's a negative at the height, but it's also a positive in that it's for his mobility. So when you plop in Kyler Murray and to say another offensive coordinator, another head coach, it might not be the same as an offense that was built specifically around him. Now, Lamar Jackson's taller, but Greg Roman has built an offense around Lamar Jackson

specifically so that he could excel to his greatest ability. But like with Kyler, Kyler, everyone's like, well, Kyler, if you traded him to Carolina, I don't know if Ben McAdoo's having the same success with Kyler Murray as Cliff Kingsbury, who's up all night drawing an offense up for the quarterback specifically to have the most success possible.

And I guess Breeze was technically short, but I think he's six feet. Yeah, he's also the most accurate passer in the history of the sport. So his thing was, I'm getting rid of the ball immediately. Wilson, who was shorter, but was just such a superhuman athlete at that position. And that's what was missing the last couple of years. We'll see if it comes back in Denver, but interesting topic. All right, Peter Schrager, good to see you as always.

We'll check in over the summer. I know you're going to take some time off, but we'll be rallying back here at some point. It was great to catch up with you. I love being on the pod and we'll do it plenty of times more before the season starts. All right.

Talk to you soon. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Bob and Kyle and Peter and Kyle Creighton for producing. Steve Cerruti and Dylan Berkey. We'll see you on this feed Thursday night. I don't have feelings within. On the wayside, I'm a person never lost. I don't have feelings within.