The Bill Simmons Podcast - The DOA Lakers, Embiid’s Surge, Masters Bets, and UFC 273 Story Lines With Joe House, Nathan Hubbard, and Ariel Helwani

Episode Date: April 6, 2022

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Joe House to discuss the death of the Lakers’ playoff hopes and their lack of a clear path forward, Joel Embiid’s late-season push for the MVP, best Eastern Conference playoff matchups, and more (2:08). Then Bill and House talk with Nathan Hubbard about the scene at Augusta National Golf Course and their favorite Masters bets (31:29). Finally Bill is joined by Ariel Helwani to discuss the good and the bad from ‘WrestleMania 38,’ and story lines and subplots for the upcoming UFC 273 (1:07:16). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Joe House, Nathan Hubbard, and Ariel Helwani Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Did that one on Monday night. Die Hard 2. Pay tribute to the great Bruce Willis. Fairway Rollin' with Joe House and Nathan Hubbard. They're going to be on this podcast in a little bit. We're going to be talking about the Masters because we are here. So that's a thing that's happening. We're going to be talking about the Masters because we are here. So that's the thing

that's happening. We'll explain. Ariel Helwani is on this podcast as well. We're going to be talking about WrestleMania and the UFC 273 and whether he's recovered yet from the Bills loss to the Chiefs. So that is all coming up. House and I are going to talk a little bit about the NBA at the top. Not sure if you're following this Lakers subplot, but pretty interesting. Also, there's been some MVP shenanigans. So we're going to hit that. Then we're going to talk Masters and then UFC, WrestleMania, and the Bills. Action Pack Pod, live from Georgia.

First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, I'm here with Joe House. It is late here in Georgia. We're at Augusta. It is almost 1245 East Coast time. We thought we would be done with the pod way before this. We did all the golf stuff already. You'll hear that in a second.

As we were taping the golf stuff, it became apparent the Spurs were beating the Nuggets and it became apparent the Lakers might be knocked out of the playoffs tonight. With no LeBron playing, so we were like, well, we got to watch that. Watch the second half. The Suns dusted the Lakers' house. The Lakers' season is over. It's Tuesday of the final week. They didn't make the play-in game. LeBron was complaining about the play-in game last year.

They didn't even make it. Yeah, so. But seriously, I mean, Russell and I, we did a whole thing about the most disappointing NBA seasons ever, which, you know, a lot of the candidates in those are always teams that made it to the playoffs and had some disappointing exit.

There's a million examples of those. Rarely do you see the team flame out. Even more rarely do you see the team with the high expectations not even get a chance team flame out? Even more rarely do you see the team with the high expectations not even get a chance to flame out. And I think just watching this, when you think of we're in year four of the LeBron thing, how weird it is. He misses the playoffs twice. They lose in round one last year, and yet they win the title the other year in a year where there are no fans at the games. There's no and we're four years in this is like a presidential term at this point that's more

interesting to me than dancing on the lakers grave at this point we're not dancing the grave was already dug the tombstone was already up there's no more dancing the true culprit for the disappointing laker season was anth Davis. And you expressed skepticism about Anthony Davis early in the season because of what, by appearance, now we didn't have our own scale. We didn't ask him to stand on a scale or anything, but by appearance, he looked to have bulked up in the off season in some way because he physically wasn't moving with the same kind of fluidity that we've grown accustomed to and you were sort of i wonder what's going on with ad he seemed too big to me that you said that uh on this podcast and then he got hurt and that

was really the end of this laker season i mean we had lots of twists and turns and and lebron is going to win the scoring title and lebron is going to make an all nba team notwithstanding whatever direction you go with that i don't know how to feel about it those things are going to happen i would i would have to break rules that i've made over the years to put him in but do you but we're still a bit a good point that if there's not another good candidate you can't like force just throwing somebody in who we're gonna look back 10 my whole thing is if i'm gonna look back 10 years from now would i have regrets for certain things you know and it's like it's hard to regret somebody who averages 30 a game for 58 games at age 37. On the other hand, on the other hand, the Bill Simmons

on the other hand. Well, I mean, this is what he tweeted August 4th. Keep talking about my squad, our personnel ages, the way he plays,

he stays injured, we're past our time in this league, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Do me one favor, please, all caps. And I mean, please, all caps.

Keep that same narrative energy when it begins. That's all I ask. And then mean, please, all caps. Keep that same narrative energy when it begins. That's all I ask. And then he deleted it like six hours later. But we were saying this all summer. This team makes no sense. What are you guys doing? And I'm trying to think like, if you're going to play the blame game, which is going to happen, right? Vogel's out. Vogel made out the best out of this. He gets paid to leave. He doesn't want to coach his team anyway. He's a defensive coach. They put all offensive players. Palenka, I think, is out too. Is that right? I think he's out. I actually think they go full house cleaning. And I think they look at this and they go,

wait a second. We mortgaged 2014 through 2018 to get LeBron and Davis, plus all these picks with the Pelicans. you know, when you include Randall and Lonzo and D'Angelo Russell, just to create the cap space, all the guys they gave up and then all the picks they gave up. Now this Pelicans pick, which is going to be seven, eight or nine, unless it goes to the top four. You just got to look at this and go, we just need a fresh start everywhere. I need a fresh start with the person picking the players.

I need somebody who can stand up to LeBron. I need a different coach. We have to stop asking LeBron for player personnel advice. Fresh start, reset button. And yet the rumor that we saw this morning and shared amongst each other was Doc Rivers as a potential coach of the Lakers. Rosella and I started this thing two weeks ago about, uh, I'm hearing stuff was the segment

and I had the, I'm hearing stuff about the Clippers was that the tail end of the pod about I'm hearing George and Norm Powell and Kawhi, like they might all be back for round one and then Georgia. So I was going to do the Doc Rivers Lakers thing for I'm hearing stuff. And I just forgot. And Jake Fisher, all kudos to him. He had it in his piece today. That's been percolating in the LA area because LeBron and Doc, they have a good history. You bring a guy in who, you know, big, whatever. I mean, the piece that doesn't make sense is what if Philly does really well in the playoffs,

Doc, they're not going to let him out of his contract, but if the Philly thing ends badly and they want a fresh start, I could make sense for him to come back what's curious to me about it from for doc it would be a play where he wants to come back to california because he loves la he loves living he does love it well i'll tell you our country club loves him he loves playing golf but what the hell is that lakers team going to be next year that's the thing what's he coming here to coach so leads me to point b is presti why did lebron float him out i know we've been you've fixated on this what was the reason and people were like well because there were theories about well he knows cleveland's gonna have a ton of picks he wants his son to get drafted potentially down the road and or it was just major shade at Palenka, whatever it was. But Presti, all right, he's in OKC. They

have a million picks. It's going to be a long haul. That's it? That's going to be his career? Or is he going to take a swing with a marquee franchise? Mannix was on my podcast a while ago talking about how Presti is a Boston guy. He went to Emerson. It would have been his dream to run the Celtics. They never asked him because they promoted Brad. But at some point, as he looked at these big franchises and go, it's time to push my chips in the game.

And if you're the Lakers and you have no picks, you have no way to make this better. You're stuck. You're paying the luxury tax already next year with five guys. I think they have the same salary cup number this next year that they have this year. Do you have to get creative and find somebody who can find these gems out of nowhere? Who are the gems on this team? That's the more the guys that they pulled out of the G league. Reeves Reeves is the jam, but that's the thing. Reeves isn't even good. The Laker fans are like,

gotta love Reeves. It's like, do I? Would he play for any playoff team? Who extended THT? Who was that player? Well, that was Clutch. Oh, okay. Yeah, that was one of the

many Clutch favorites over the years. That's a fireable offense. Yeah. They gave him the money and then let Caruso go as has been documented. So that,

what you're describing in terms of the size of the challenge, the true legacy that he would forge for himself, if he was able to take this dead in the water situation and transform it into something, especially at this stage of LeBron's career, that's all career-defining, legacy-defining stuff.

And that makes sense. LeBron needs it. And this is the point that you kind of touched on uh a little bit ago that i wanted to pick up on what do you think and i you you need to have a true laker truther on this podcast to come on and articulate i think the laker fans are okay with lebron they that he brought him a title and i think they're okay with and i don't think they've turned on him and they definitely regard that title as the equivalent of a full NBA title. Yeah, and we would too.

If the Celtics won the bubble title, it would be the greatest title of my last 10 years. That's the title I would expect Washington to win so that everybody could say. The asterisk title? Yeah, like, oh, you want to survive? I call it summer camp. They won summer camp. Right. Well, they went all in on this team that was old

and had their best player at a ton of miles on them. He's not going to get to 60 games. Second best player is a guy who has had a checkered injury history who seems like an old 28 at this point. You think like Kamen Embiid and Giannis, those are his peers. He was 2012 draft. Giannis was 2013. Embiid's 2014. And Jokic was 2014 too. Those are his peers. He was 2012 draft. Giannis was 2013 and beats 2014. He and Yoka was 2014 too. Those are

his peers. He moves the worst. That's the thing. He looks the oldest and moves the worst. He moves the worst. It's not great. So, you know, that to me, it starts with him. Forget about LeBron. LeBron's getting old and he just shouldn't be the best player on a team anymore because you saw what happened this year he was the best part of the team that went 31 and 51 that's who he is at this point of his career he could be the leading scorer on a really good team if he plays every other game which is you know he'll end up playing right two-thirds of the game he plays 60 games he can be the best part on the floor some nights, but he is not what we saw Giannis and Embiid and Jokic and Luka and these guys that can be durable, they can play every night,

they can play at the highest level. He can do it sometimes. He's 37. Right, with 60,000 plus minutes on him. So they need Davis and they whiffed on that. They need a better GM who can find some diamond in the rough. They didn't whiff on Davis. Davis got hurt.

Well, I mean, they whiffed in the terms of like handing the torch to a guy who can carry the franchise going forward. Do you trust them to do that? They can't recover from the mistake they made with Russ. That's the problem. The true problem is they made... But that's done. They gambled and they lost.

But where to go? But could the second mistake be... Where to go now? Could the second mistake be? Where to go now? Could the second mistake be we think Anthony Davis is a generational franchise player, and now it's three years later, and I think the answer is no. He's going to be year 11 next year. We don't have an answer. I don't think we have an answer.

You think he's going to be turning it on in the next five years? Some number of NBA smart folks voted him into the top 75. Including me! Like a moron! I can't believe it. I know. I wish I could go back in time. But that there's still some time left to his legacy. I mean... He's going to have to change his body. He's going to have to

lose 20 pounds. He's going to have to get in unbelievable shape to move like he did five years ago. Not, as riscilla said not stop trying to answer the tnt guys who say you should be a center like be you anthony davis you're you're fucking you have the kevin garnett body i'll never forget how fast he was baseline the baseline how comfortable he was shooting the corner three well Well, some stuff that changed taping this late Tuesday night, so all the

games have happened. Miami has locked down the one seed, it looks like, and that is important because Atlanta lost tonight. They blew it against Toronto. So now Brooklyn is in the eight seed, and the way this is all going, it looks like Miami versus the eight. Boston, Milwaukee, Philly all have the exact

same record, 49- brooklyn's probably staring at them because cleveland is the 17 cleveland is just they just couldn't make it to the finish line of the season great job by cleveland amazing golf clap one of the few by the way you know uh we talked about my over under record and yeah so yeah it was really bad we were you had me on um for very early reactions when those totals were announced the two teams that we both loved so much were cleveland and phoenix right and cleveland it went up by like three wins so we decided we got scared off but brooklyn that could not work out better. They get Brooklyn at Cleveland. Cleveland probably won't even have their guys back.

So then all that Brooklyn wins at, all of a sudden they're the seventh seed, even though they've had the season from hell. And the seventh seed, I think Milwaukee will not be afraid to be the two seed. Milwaukee has Boston, Detroit, and Cleveland left. Boston has road games, Chicago, Milwaukee, Memphis. Memphis has nothing to play for. Philly has Toronto into Detroit.

So schedule-wise, Philly has the easiest. I agree. Milwaukee, if they just beat Boston, then they would have Detroit, Cleveland at the end. Cleveland has a chance to fall to the eighth seed. So they might even, you know, may be really playing hard,

but I don't think the Celtics team is wired to duck. Then maybe I'm wrong. You can throw this back in my face, but I don't see them ducking to get out of the two seed. I don't, I would be surprised if they did that. The way this is shaping up in the games that you just described to me, I think all three of those teams are going to try and win

all the rest of their games. So it'll be let the chips fall where they may. Yes, that's what I think. So that Boston-Milwaukee game, I think both those teams are going to give a shit and try. Milwaukee's tried this whole time. And Boston, you know, going against Brooklyn, if Simmons isn't playing,

I think they would have to be favored in that series. Oh, wow. I do. I think they would have to be favored in that series. Oh, wow. I do. I think they would have to be favored. I think they've played better this season. They're nine games better than Brooklyn is. They'd have home court advantage. Brooklyn gives up 120 points a game.

We do it the old school way. Brooklyn has the two best players. Do you agree or disagree? Oh, I think Tatum is the second best player in that series. He's not better than Kyrie. Kyrie's got a pretty good playoff record. Kyrie's great when he's playing once a week.

But anyway, Boston-Brooklyn. I think I have to go to every game of that series. Come on to the East Coast. I'm getting divorced series. Ooh, yeah. Come out to the East Coast. I think I'm getting, this is the, I'm getting divorced series. No. I'm going to the first team.

Your family loves you. I don't know if they'll love me as much if I'm just on the East Coast. You know, it'll be getting warm and I'll come up, we can play some golf out on, you know.

Oh, one of the Massachusetts courses? Or Massachusetts, yeah. So then Chicago also looks very tasty to play against. Chicago and Cleveland are the targets. Toronto is the team. Nobody wants one iota of Toronto.

By the way, super credit to Masai and Nick Nurse. We sat together in October of 2021, me, you, and Russillo, and threw up our hands. What is Toronto going to do? We just couldn't. Yeah, what is this team? Well, the Scottie Barnes pick, looking back at that,

when everyone thought they were going to take Suggs, including me, there was a minority of people who were like, Barnes is really good. And you think that, they got Siakam,

they got him right. Well, Siakam got right. That's the key. Ben Bleat's like, he'll probably make second team all defense. Siakam has a legit claim to making all NBA third team. After you put me up to calling him one of the worst contracts in the NBA,

I can't believe you did that. He deserved it at the time. He had an incredible comeback. It was a very, he's been on an unbelievable tear. Just kudos to the Raptors. That's all. And then in the other conference,

it's looking like Phoenix against whoever wins the Minnesota Clippers game. Memphis against the loser of that game, unless that team loses to New Orleans, which is not inconceivable. Golden State, Denver, and Dallas, Utah would be the other matchups that this season ended today pretty good playoffs

I mean Boston Brooklyn would be awesome Milwaukee Brooklyn, Philly Brooklyn, Boston Brooklyn those are epic round one series I'm rooting for the Philly Brooklyn just because you know that unfinished business of that trade between those two teams yeah the basketball fans win if it's Philly, Brooklyn, just because, you know, that unfinished business of that trade between those two teams.

Yeah, the basketball fans win if it's Philly, Brooklyn. Yes. Now we get a whole bunch. We get the Kyrie Harden thing. We get the KD and Bede piece of it. I mean, will Simmons continue to sit on the bench, put on these outfits like it's a fashion show? He's probably trying to get his 20 million

i know is it better for the grievance that he that he you know when he's doing the grievance are they gonna at any point during the grievance trial are they gonna point out that he tried to practice with a phone in his pocket it's not gonna come up that's how seriously he took it um we got to mention imbied so look at look I've talked about this MVP constantly. I think it's one of the most fascinating three-man races we've had. I had Jokic, slight edge. Then Giannis last week started coming on. And Embiid's always been lingering. Embiid's done the most over the last couple of weeks. He's kicked ass over and over again, kicked ass again tonight, 45 and 13. He's gotten to the point, like they put Indiana night, they put Cleveland the other night

when he's going against the undermanned or undersized team, he's demolishing them late nineties, early 2000s Shaq style where it's just like, Oh my God. Oh my, he might get 57 tonight where it's just like, there's just no answer at all. I think I have it even now. Like I really think it's for me, it's coming down to the last five days. I actually think I have been beating Jokic in a dead heat. And if I had to pick, it's going to come down to shit.

Like who had a better record in Philly's two games better? And not Giannis. I think Giannis blew it those last couple games. The loss to Dallas. Not playing the Clipper game, then losing the Dallas game on Sunday night. I think he had a chance to grab it by the balls. I think Jokic had a chance to grab it by the balls. They lose to the Spurs tonight.

He has a very uncharacteristic, high-volume shot game. And, you know, I think the Embiid-Jokic candidacies are just really similar. Razor thin. Yeah. It's just like you pull either guy off the team. The team is way worse. They both had a lot of dysfunction and weirdness or bad luck or whatever, where it wasn't the team they thought they were going to have. The guy was a rock on each team the whole time. Both spectacular offensive players. The stats are very similar. Embiid's probably a shade better defensively, but I think Jokic is just more fun to play with probably.

But then Embiid, like I was looking at my MVP from my book where I had the four MVP questions, and it's like if you replace so-and-so with an average player, how much worse would they be? I think if you replaced Jokic or Embiid with, I don't know, Zubac, what would the records of those teams be? They would be in the mid-20s for each team, right?

For sure. Zubac is an average player. We got to come up with somebody better for average. I'm just saying. Average center. Switch them with Zubac. This is an interesting one. up with somebody better who's average i'm just saying it would just switch center switch them with zoo bots um this is an interesting one in a giant pickup game who's the first player picked five five v five and they're all picking up sides i'm all i mean i want joel are you kidding me

but just out of anyone, who would you take? What do you mean? Would you take Durant, Giannis, Joel? It feels like Joel gets taken before Jokic. Anyone? Joel gets taken before Jokic. That was the question I thought you put on the table. But I'm saying like, but Giannis enters the chat room for that question.

In the whole NBA, do I know who these guys are? They're just all lined up. They're picking a game and you have money. Do I know who they are? Yeah. I want KD. Over Yannis. Oh my God, come on.

Okay. 10 years from now, who's the first player from this season to jump into your head? Might be Embiid. Just because of the... All the Philly dysfunction, the fact that we had so much invested in that dude, hoping that

he was going to stay healthy, that he was going to get in better shape, that he was going to go to another level, and he did. He did everything we wanted. Whereas Jokic is having a slightly better version of the same season he already had, but he's more valuable because the team was a mess. And then the last one was, well, if you were explaining your pick

to the average person who had no stake in it, would he understand the pick? And the Jokic thing, you really got to lean into the advanced metrics a little bit more and stuff like that. I really value Jokic, and I think he's, I think what he did with that really mediocre Denver team was incredible, but it's really close. You could, I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't, I knew pretty much every season what I was going to do by the last week for MVP. And this, this week, I don't, I, I'm glad that you let, back in he played his way back in he was third for me five days ago

I know I understand by the way if Jokic he's a six seed let's say Philly gets the two seed and Denver gets the six I want to see Philly go for the two seed and be like that's what I want for my MVP we're not afraid of anybody

who are their three games again? Toronto, Indy, that's what I want from my MVP. We're not afraid of anybody. Who are there three games again? Toronto, Indy, Detroit. Damn. Now they'll kill Indy. The Toronto. You won't be able to tank the Indy game. The Toronto game is the referendum. This is it.

It's all going to come down to one game for Joel. But seriously, let's say he puts up like 46 and 20 against Toronto. And it's just like, I'm not afraid of Brooklyn. Bring them on. But you might talk me into it. I will just say, my vote is available. Who's going to win it? Five days left. Denver,

they look like they're stuck in the 60s. Minnesota had a chance to threaten them tonight and decided not to. No, that's Washington. The Wizards dropped one on him. Yeah, you're stupid, Wizards. I love that team.

I think the hardest MVPs ever are still 90 and 93 because of the caliber of the guys. 90 was Magic versus Barkley versus Jordan. Oh, man. Three awesome seasons. Jordan should have won. I did all this in my book.

Magic ended up winning and it was a little bit of a he's magic. That's a good team. Why aren't the Bulls doing better? But now you look back, Jordan was like 34, seven and six, 55 wins. He should have won best defensive player of the league. I don't know what we're doing that year. And then the 93 MVP was same thing. Barkley, Hakeem and Jordan and Barkley one. We were all fine with it. He had incredible impact on that son's team. And then the finals happened and Jordan was slightly better.

I'm still okay with that. But that man, that was a hard one. You think like Barkley, Hakeem, MJ, the best player ever, one of the 12 best players ever, one of the 20 best players ever all having of the 20 best players ever, all having some of their best seasons ever. Pretty good. So this is not the case with Jokic, Embiid, and Giannis, but the Giannis has a chance to be a top 15 guy ever. Yes.

Embiid is the best center we've had in 20 years. It would just be wonderful. And Jokic is also the best center we've had in 20 years. I would love another couple years out of Embiid at this level. That's not a knock. As a basketball fan, I'm rooting for him to be able to play 70 games in the next couple years

and play at this level. So we have Philly, Toronto, and Milwaukee, Boston as the two awesome games left that I think will probably determine some of this. KD, I thought about it. I got feedback from different people about KD, 55 games, first team all-NBA. People are pointing out the record. Like Brooklyn, they're

only an eight seed. But his record when they play is It's insane, isn't it? I think he's like 40 and 26 now. Whereas LeBron, when he plays, he's like 25 and 31. Well, that's not the comparison. No, but I'm just saying, people are like, well, you can't leave LeBron off and then make Durant first team.

I'm still trying to figure out a more work in progress. The LeBron thing is really tough for me because I am just. I don't like the eye. With basketball players, I like us. And this has turned into an eye season for him. Even today, like now it's like, well, can he play two more games to win the scoring title? This didn't used to be what LeBron was about. Come on. He's going to win the scoring title and he belongs on all NBA teams. I'm going to ask you, who won the 2013 scoring title?

No idea. Who won the 1999 scoring title? It doesn't matter. It is part of his resume. He's 37 years old you know what else is on his resume this team is going to go 31 and 51 that's also on the resume davis miss you know i get it i just scoring titles like come on scoring titles fun fun to mention for a 37 year old okay you know that's that's that's a quality season his rebounds and assists are not trifling either. One of the things I loved about LeBron as a player was he never gave a shit about stuff like this in the past. I'm just going to say that.

It's fine for him to think about legacy and have both things. His legacy is established. He's the second best player of all time. The scoring title is going to push him over the top. He a scoring title he played 58 games for 31 and 51 teams scored 30 points what is that i'm not nobody's gonna care that was not the point or the goal of this season and that was not the goal was to make the playoffs and compete and for a championship all true that's right that was the goal we're in lockstep agreement on that. Well, I think a bead actually passed him. But what's funny is because the bead had like 45 tonight.

I think a bead might be slightly above him now. But hey, let's look. This is a bet. Right. Let's go ahead. This is why I bring this up. And then we're going to break. This is for us.

This is this is why I bring it up. Yeah. LeBron was 30.3 today and Joel was 30.2. So Joel is definitely at least 30.3 because he had 45 tonight. LeBron has this OKC game. Yes. That you're tanking OKC with no size at all and LeBron going for the scoring title. I don't know what that,

like what does FanDuel make that line for his points? It's got to be at least, like to realistically get people to bet on, it's got to be like 37. Oh, this would be a fun research project. Somebody, we can get somebody. I want somebody to look up what's the highest ever. He's not going to be 100%.

He's going to shoot a lot of threes. Is it really that hurt? Is he really? Well, if it wasn't really that hurt, why didn't he play tonight? They're playing for their playoff lives in Phoenix. So he's definitely hurt. He's resting. No, I hope he's hurt.

I mean, he's hurt enough to take the night off. Yeah. All right. Well, we'll see how hard he is against OKC. I'm playing the over. Whatever that point total is. Lakers money line and the LeBron over. Yeah. All right. Well, we'll see how hard it is against OKC. I'm playing the over. Whatever that point total is. Lakers money line and the LeBron over.

Wow. How about that parlay? We'll get FanDuel to boost that for everybody. Speaking of FanDuel, we're going to take a break and we're going to talk about FanDuel.

We're going to come back and Nathan Hubbard's going to join us and we're going to talk Masters. You're going to hear me do this intro again because I did the intro originally not knowing

we were going to talk about the death of the Lakers, but there you go. Golf's first major is a tradition unlike any other. And right now, new customers can get 31 odds on Jordan Spieth, Rory McIlroy, or Dustin Johnson. Two of those guys have won the Masters. The other one's Rory. He's won four majors. You can get 30 to one odds on any of them to make the cut at Augusta. That's right. If any of those players make the cut, you win big. We're talking about some of our favorite betting storylines for the Masters. My favorite storyline is that we put up a bunch of special markets. It's featured very prominently. Go to the FanDuel page. You'll see ringer specials. It's right there. Joe House, Nathan Hubbard, they picked some of their favorite bets. Colin Morikawa, I will say, is involved in a bunch of them. So hopefully we didn't jinx them.

But there's no better time to get in on the action than with FanDuel Sportsbook. Right now, the app is easy to use. So many different betting options. And when you win, you'll get paid fast. I am doing a same tournament parlay that we discussed on this podcast that will be available on Wednesday as well. Drive down Magnolia Lane, take a swing at betting the first major, download the FanDuel Sportsbook app, get 30 to one odds on Jordan Spieth, Rory McIlroy, or Dustin Johnson to make the cut at Augusta. FanDuel Sportsbook, official betting operator of the PGA Tour. You must be 21 plus and present in select states, must wager and designate offer market,

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All right, we are taping this. It is 11 o'clock Eastern time. We're in Georgia. I'm here with Joe House and Nathan Hubbard, the hosts of Fairway Rolling. We've been trying to figure out Masters bets all day. It looks like Tiger Woods is playing, fellas. This is a thing that's happening.

He said it. Tiger Woods to miss the cut. Minus one twelve. We've decided as un-American to bet on Tiger Woods missing the cut. What's it going to be like, House? What's it going to be like to right? But the sheer will of the masses, everybody's good intentions are so going to buoy his spirit. He will feel it. All of us will be, we can't say a word, right? Until after he's completed the shot and everything. Oh, a nice clap, whatever.

But holy cow, we'll all be screaming from the top of our lungs, emanating from our earlobes and our noses. Like when we got P.F. Chang's tonight and you were screaming at the top of your lungs when it arrived? Our champion's dinner. That was our champion's dinner. Yeah. Nathan, Tiger Woods in the house?

Those were the biggest crowds I've ever seen on a Monday. I think it's going to be chaos. I think it's going to be chaos. I think it's going to be a zoo. And I think that this secretly benefits a bunch of other players who have the penumbra of a shadow of doubt or negative energy that they would have had coming into this around the line of questioning that they were going to get sucked away by the Tiger oxygen that is only going to be in the giant crowds that follow him. Well, that's the groups. The grouping's on Thursday.

He's playing in the middle of the day. Sorry, Jocko Nieman. You are fucked, buddy. Oosthuizen's in there as well. And then they loaded the end of it. And we were trying... Our favorite pairing was was the zalatoris can't lay rom pairing but our guess is just everyone's just gonna follow tiger like it'll be like a fourth round tiger in the weed at the masters kind of gallery just traveling behind him well it'll be like, not fourth round anymore, right?

Like, I mean, any round that the Tiger... But that's what I mean. But I mean like in the old days when it's like there's only a few guys left. 10 deep, full on. Yes, people rushing. All very respectfully because this is the Masters.

House, do you really think Louis is going to handle this well in the group with Tiger? You said that Jaco is fucked. By the way, you also used the word penumbra, which deserves an A++ on the BS pod vocabulary meter. in the group with Tiger. You said that Jaco is fucked. By the way, you also used the word penumbra, which deserves an A++ on the BSPod vocabulary meter. I just want to put that out. That's the Princeton degree coming in.

I thought that was the dish we ordered from BF Chang's. A Princeton flex. I thought I got the penumbra chicken. I don't mind you saying that Jaco's fucked. We're talking about Jaco. We're talking about Neiman. I don't mind that assessment. I think Louis fucked. We're talking about Jocko. We're talking about Neiman. I don't mind that assessment. I have no, I think Louis Oosthuizen is up to the moment.

He's over it. He's a perfect foil for Tiger. He's going to mind his own business. He's chill. He's all the factor. I mean, on the tractor on his farm. Same, same deal. Well, one of the things we did,

FanDuel allowed us to make a lot of bets that they're promoting on their website. It was really fun to actually create bets for them. You guys did it. I just kind of looked at the final results because House and Nathan know way more about golf than I do. We have some fun ones on there. One of them is Tiger Woods to make the cut and either Brooks Koepka or Xander Shoffley win the masters. And that is 23 to one house. What, what made you like that one? What was it about it?

What made that tasty in your mind? Um, in the first place, I only want to root one way when it comes to Tiger woods and we're setting the expectations appropriately, which is just make the cut. That's a humongous victory for everybody involved it's an enormous victory for tiger woods right to make make the cut to get into the weekend

and you know his his return to golf at this moment this juncture in professional golf where most of the uh oxygen that was being deployed uh deployed was attributed to this rival golf league and Phil Mickelson. Here's Tiger back on the scene with the most positive energy coinciding with everybody back on grounds at the Masters, the first Masters in three years. Oh, yeah. Right? Everybody's back.

It's like COVID doesn't exist anymore, Nathan. There you go. Definitely does not exist down here in Georgia. What is your favorite thing about this Masters that's not Tiger, Nathan? Hideki's Champion's Dinner menu. What was it? So he did an assortment of sushi. He followed it with some black miso cod.

And then he finished with some maizaki wagyu, which... It just made you hungry? That was it? Yeah. Well, that's all he's reading coming down here. I mean, I assume Jordan Spieth, that's all he could talk about in the press conference. It's way better than pigs in the blanket or cottage pies. DJ served pigs in the blanket.

Danny Willett, cottage pies. This was a real meal. House loves Morikawa. There's a lot of Morikawa bets on these FanDuel specials that we did, including the one with Tiger where Morikawa finishes top five. Tiger makes the cut and that was 10 to 1. I was hugely skeptical of this when he

first laid it out. What's the case? Give us the Morikawa case. The Morikawa case is the press conference today. Can we talk about how much Nathan loves the press conferences? I'm all in with him. This is part of the diligence. Explain it. What are the tips of studying a press conference?

You're looking right in a man's eyes. Within 48 hours of him teeing off at the Masters, he's had a little bit of experience already this week, and you can just get a read on how the game is. Morikawa spent his whole press conference talking about how he's played the course all wrong. He was inexplicably trying to hit draws on all the odd number holes on the front.

The only holes he really needs to hit it on are like 13 and 10 or something. And how now he's figured out that he's fine with his straight ball or his five yard cut, which tells you that he's playing so well, he can intentionally hit a five yard cut. He just looked like a machine. The other guy who looked like a machine house was John Rahm. He scared the shit out of me today. Yeah, I we watched it. And I told Nate that press conference to me, you could have had he could have had a green jacket on his shoulders and given that exact same press conference. That's how good it was. It was the quality of a of a master's winner and that the points that he hit and the notes that he hit and that, you know, everything that That's how good it was. It was the quality of a Masters winner. And the points that he hit and the notes that he hit and everything that he observed, the way that he laid it all out, that he was talking champion talk.

And he's in the right place mentally. So we have Rahm as the favorite at 12 to 1. Plus 210 to make top 5. Plus 110 to make top 10. Minus 220 to make the top 20. And then we also enjoyed his best guy from Spain this weekend was minus 350, which is basically him versus Sergio as a minus 350. So Fando allows you to parlay some of this stuff. I'm not sure they'll allow you to do the best Spaniard bet. You can bet best European. He reminded us today that he showed up here Tuesday night last year and only got nine holes of practice in because he had just had a baby.

Plus 310 top European. That's pretty good. I'm writing that one down. I might want to parlay. I have a little Shane Lowry in my loins this week. I'm telling you right now. In your loins? What do you mean?

He's Irish. Do you want to see a doctor? Northern Irish. I want to just confess my Rory bias. This probably means that Rory McIlroy is a lock for a top five finish, possibly, to finally get his career grand slam. But Shane Lowry has been in very good form quietly. He's got a bunch of top 25 finishes worldwide.

And he's a major kind of guy. House, what about Morikawa for 11-1 top USA player? Rahm plus 310 top European. That parlay is, wow, plus 48-20. Will they let us do that? Yeah. On Fando they will. You win $4,820 for a $100 bet.

The Morikawa-Rahm-Euro-USA combo. To be fair, what you do is lose $100 when you make that bet. I just want to make sure it happens. I was just saying, I like throwing out the bets. That's what happens.

So can we surmise that Ram is the guy right now based on these odds or is it just people like the course for him? Kind of feels like he's becoming the guy. I loved his comments today.

He was slightly snarky about Tiger. He said he's asked Tiger for advice a bunch of times. Tiger doesn't give him anything. And then he looks over and he's given JT a dissertation, as he said. He's super jealous. He's the only one who's thrown any shade at Tiger this whole week. Is that because he's not a Team USA guy? I think that's exactly right.

It's like a Ryder Cup thing, right? Probably. I think that's probably right. But I... They know what kind of a foe he is, honestly. They do, but that's why I think Tiger is playing JT dirty this week. All of the haze around Tiger, he flew up with JT

to play the practice round. They played the practice round with Freddie Couples the other day. Oh, Was he doing the MJ Barkley befriending him? Yes. But that's what he's doing. I don't think that's... I have a slightly different take

because I do believe that Tiger would be thrilled if JT won. I think Tiger, more than anything, for this to be a success, needed a friend. And his closest...

I really do think this. What about his son? His closest competent friend. Charlie. He can't, he's not on the tour. The guy who's on the tour who can really win is JT. So JT is his colleague that he's leaning on to help him get through this.

And I honestly think, to Nate's point, it very well may cost JT an opportunity to win the Masters this year in his own stead because it's it's energy like brother syndrome he flew up here last week with Tiger on Tiger's jet and you know it created a furor because it was like oh shit is Tiger what's gonna play in the Masters but JT was part of that and he's been part of it um to the good point Nate is making all week long so it's shaping up at least from these odds and this being the first tournament

for this to be the year of rum. Last year was kind of the year of Bryson a little bit. Somewhat. Well, it's the year of Bryson because of... Year of Bryson becoming... The stories. Famous golfer. And the Bryson-Brooks rivalry

was like the most fun storyline of the year. Well, I mention this because one of house's favorite bets is Bryson to miss the cut at plus 142. What do you not like about Bryson right now? He's hurt and he acknowledges that he's hurt. He told us he's only 80%. He said in his press conference that his doctors wanted him to take four months off and instead he took two months off because he wanted to play in the Masters he's missed the cut two of the

last three times that he's played and he went 0-2-1 in the match play he would have missed the cut in that event as well except for there was no cut he's played five golf tournaments since the Ryder Cup he was awful in San Antonio he played San Antonio to Nate's point he couldn't hit driver didn't even try five golf tournaments since the Ryder Cup. The Ryder Cup was September of last.

He played San Antonio to Nate's point. He couldn't hit driver. Didn't even try to hit driver. Like, you know what? Yeah, what's that? That's like Steph not shooting threes. He wants to play in the Masters, which is fucking awesome.

He's going to play in the Masters with Tiger upon the return of Tiger Woods. Well, he already did with the Dude Perfect guys using hockey sticks and tennis rackets. So maybe that was his round. Was he 80% for that or no? He was 0%. Only... House is angry.

I was not angry. No, no, no. Maybe Bryson and House, you've been against Bryson for a while here. That's not true. I like Bryson. I just think he's complicated.

Eh, not really. Maybe he's trying to win you over by playing hurt, by doing the... I don't know. I don't think he's playing. No, but he's trying to win you over by playing hurt by doing the uh i don't know i don't think he's playing no but he's playing in the masters at 80 oh playing trying to do the the couple where he's like he's doing some stretching and just trying to it's like man can he even continue well when he's healthy he is um by the advanced metrics

uh shared with us by our good friend justin ray who was on the podcast monday the preview um the third worst putter of the last uh half decade and the two guys that are behind him are a combined uh 170 years old it's a jose maria Olathable and Sandy Lyle are the only guys that have putted worse than Bryson DeChambeau. That almost feels to me like when Ben Simmons shoots 34%

in the playoffs from the free throw line. It's in his dome. There's no doubt. Yeah, that's like combination not that good in any way plus the yips. There's a great explanation for it. It is the one tournament where they don't permit green reading books, right?

And then the tour has subsequently followed that rule, adopted that rule. So in no events are you allowed to have green reading books anymore, which is why it's taken guys a long time to make putts. But the theory is that he was using those books as a crutch and he was too devoted to it. They wouldn't permit it at the Masters. There's a local rule here at the Masters. And so he felt he was playing out there without his pants on and unsuccessful. I don't even know what a green reading book is. Would that have helped me when we played a couple weeks ago or no? Would it have helped you? I'm sure anything.

If you putt with it, maybe. Would I have thrown my putter if I had one of those things? If you putt with it, maybe. There's something that Morikawa said today that has me slightly concerned about our lean into the young guys. Okay. Let's hear it. Okay. And it is that he said, this is the first time that this course has ever played with

role, right? Because in 19, the course was definitely not in the shape that everybody wanted it to be. And last year, it was pretty wet too. And they had, he said, the dreaded word mud balls. We know that 17 of the last 19 winners have been 27 or older. So there's a lot of winners who see this course for what it actually is. We're high on these young guns, but they're going to see a very different Masters than they ever have this week. So should we be scared of the cream of some young guns guy that bet that you

made on Fando, which was Zalatoris, Hovland, Morikawa, all top 20 finish plus 550. I have a tweak for that that I'm doing for my same game parlay. We've acknowledged that Hovland is the weak link. He scared us today. And the press conference did not help. If we gave Jon Rahm 10 stars for his press conference performance, how many stars are you giving, Vic?

10 for smiles, three for confidence in the cream of some young guns bet. So I think for my same game parlay for Fando, which I usually do NBA, I'm going to do golf for this Wednesday. And I think I'm going to tweak your cream of some young guns. And I'm going to put Scheffler in there instead of Morikawa. No, Scheffler and Morikawa are in. And Zal Taurus. Oh, you're going to take Hovland out.

Hovland out. And drop in Willie Z. The Z spot. I'm putting the Z spot in. I like it. I like it too. Scheffler's minus 175. Morikawa's minus 110.

The Z spot's minus 105. Vic was watching Paul Casey to learn how to hit low controlled spin shots around the green today. That is not the carbon copy guy you want to be watching. Well, that parlay is plus 485. Maybe we can get our friends at FanDuel to boost it since they came through for us all week. They brought us to Georgia doing some pods. We get to walk the course.

My dad didn't find out until Sunday. He's furious. He's like, what time do I get there? It's like, no, you didn't make the cut this year. Kind of like, hopefully, like, about Tiger. I want to take a shot at Doc, but I love him too much. Well, he's, you know, he's, he's like Kareem in the late eighties. You gotta, you can't run the fast break because you got to wait for him to get up.

You have to remind, remind Doc, you can't have a Walker. I mean, you have to remind Doc you can't have a walker. They don't permit walkers. He didn't have a walker. No, he just wanted to hole up at the par 16. Yes. The par three and just kind of hang out all day. We want to walk around. Tigers were in foot joys.

Maybe if we get him in foot joys, he can walk the course. It's a great point. House and I had a great thing. We followed Spieth when we were here four years ago and we followed him on the back nine. And for whatever reason, the 10th hole, there's just not a lot of people on the 10th hole. So we were able to like get right there and walk down. It's downhill. It's a little dog leg. And we got to really like experience him, try to solve this hole. And it was just really cool. It was my best, I think one of my best memories of that.

Other than somebody drained, did we see a hole in one or an almost? Almost hole in one on 16. What was that par three? But by somebody good though. Yeah, yeah. I think it might've been Rom. I don't remember now.

I thought it was one of the older guys. I thought it was like Phil. It was like Phil or Tiger. Oh, Phil. Phil did hit it one in there. Remember when Phil, when we used to get excited to see Phil? No Phil this week.

No Phil this week. I don't know if you guys heard. Kanye's out of the Masters. Or Kanye's out of Coachella. Phil's out of the Masters. I don't know what we did. This is like the year of just people getting shoved to the side. Well, I mean, he kind of shoved himself.

He sure did. I wouldn't say that he got shoved. Do we miss him, Bill? You know, you asked me that today, and my answer was no. I'm not going to miss him. I'm not. A lot of people here will miss him, do miss him, Bill? You know, you asked me that today, and my answer was no. I'm not going to miss him. I'm not. A lot of people here will miss him, do miss him. Where do you stand?

Just telling you. I don't miss him. I'm fine with it. 29 years. Good run. All right. We're going to take a break, and then we'll talk a little more Masters. This episode is brought to you by Movember.

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Sign up now. Just search Movember. All right, so we made all these FanDuel bets for the Masters. It made me think, like, I think this is probably the most fun thing to bet on. I was trying to think, what is more fun that has a start, a middle, and a finish? It's confined. You can go into it with opinions. You're not attached too long. You can bet different things.

You can do top five. You can do top 10. You can bet to win, make, miss the cut. You can bet different things. You can do top five. You can do top 10. You can bet to win, make, miss the cut. You can bet guys against each other. Like one of the bets we like is, you know, cause Nate was studying that Hoblin press conference. Morikawa is underdogs against Hoblin. They have those head to head bets on FanDuel. Tournament matchups. Hoblin's minus 136. Morikawa's plus 108. So you can head to head against guys you don't like. Patrick Reed's another one. If you just want to go against him, go for it. But I think this is the most fun thing to bet on. What is more fun?

So this is when I sit down week to week, I bet on every single tournament most of the time my money is on the head-to-head matchups because that that's where they're rather than the odds associated with outright winning which are impossible and don't really compensate you for the amount of risk that you're taking on the head-to-head matchups tend to be the odds you know you can you can find um something where it's it's fair enough and if you have an opinion about a guy's fit for a course or his trend you know line coming into the event you know it's it's the roulette wheel of it's the roulette wheel of uh golf red or black yeah it's basically red or black but with with little odds either way and if you feel like something's even but you're getting a little juice, that makes it apathetic.

And you're supposed to show up with a little bit of research on it and have your own perspective. And then if you have a conviction, go ahead and bet that conviction. In the same way that I'm betting Bryson to miss the cut, I'm betting against him in every single matchup that he shows up in. There aren't a ton of matchups out there, but by contradistinction, I'm also betting on colin morikawa against every single person that they will create a matchup for except for john

rom i won't bet more against john rom so morikawa if he absolutely shits the bed this week i feel like house is single-handed to blame i'm going two different podcasts touting the shit out of them but the bright here's a good example on Bryson. They have a head to head Bryson against Luis who stays in. Louie's minus 164 Bryson's plus 130 in the matchup. I mean, you have to. That's a ton of juice you have to lay on Louie. I don't like it. But you could you could parlay that with a second bet and now have some fun oh right i is that true yes they'll let you parlay on the fan duel oh yeah okay they'll let you parlay can we

do the top senior player what was that what are the odds podrick harrington is plus 145 bernard langer is plus 300 i mean all we've done is watch bhard Langer compete in this. Win every tournament. Are we crazy? When's the last time Padraig Harrington was good in this? They won't let you parlay the matchups. Oh, okay. We'll talk to him tomorrow. So, I think Bernhard Langer, I like him every year.

We have to lay this because they put all the old guys out in the morning. If we don't have something to bet and cheer for in the morning, we're going to end up in the Excel. What do you look for in an old guy? Course history and current form. There's only two guys on this list. You like tall, short? I like stretchy, and that's

longer. Stretchy. Yeah, that's what I mean. He's like the perfect lanky guy. He's also a stud on the Champions Tour. He wins it every year. He's a machine. Yeah. Going through some of these, so we wanted to concentrate on Rahm,

Sheffler, DJ Brooks, Spieth, McElroy, Morikawa, Zander, and the Z-Spot. DJ looked great today in the press conference. 15 to 1. Did he? Yes. I liked what he was saying. He looks funny to me. He just doesn't. I liked what he was saying. He looks funny to me.

He just doesn't because he always looks funny because he doesn't like those situations, but he's getting no questions. He just gets to get out there, play golf. I like him better with a hat on. Okay. Let me ask you a DJ question. That's a hairline joke. So he's...

I think Tiger transplanted DJ's hair. DJ's 15 to 1, but he's minus 135 to make the top 20. Brooks is 19 to 1 to win the tournament, but he's minus 160 to make the top 20. So DJ has better odds to win, but Brooks has better odds to make the top 20, so to speak. So what is that? Is that just people betting that or do people feel like- High beta. like people just like betting DJ to win the masters because he's DJ, which is not a terrible idea. You know, he, he had a whole stretch of, of, he had five consecutive top tens at Augusta national until he missed the cut last year, um, which was kind of a bummer,

but he, uh, just finished fourth at the match play event down in in austin and really it's because you have to they do this consolation thing he lost to the guy who he didn't matter exactly um he tied the course record at sawgrass in his last round um that was on a on a monday in the players championship like like reminding us of what he brings to the table. Plus, he absolutely adores this joint. So some value on DJ, I think. He's a little like a Giannis where if Bud's going to play Giannis like 42 minutes in a game you bet against the Bucs,

you're like, oh, God. That's right. Oh, no. Any other DJ thoughts, Nathan? No, again, for me, it. Yeah. Any other DJ thoughts, Nathan? No. Again, for me, it's the retreating hairline, but the game seems to be a bit on the rise, and he looked, to me,

he sounded like he was very confident in the press conference today and happy to be out from the noise of Tiger. Shepard, 15-1. Give me your thoughts on Shepard. Looked awesome in the press conference. Again, number one player in the world. Just scary to me because I think Jon Rahm wants it back.

And I think Rahm's going to make sure that he finishes ahead of Sheffler this week. 3-1 top five for him. I mean, he's played it twice and he finished in the top 20 both times. Scotty Sheffler. Minus 175 this time around. Brooks is 19-1. He's plus 320 for top five. How healthy is Brooks right now? I think healthy. I do too.

As healthy as he's been in a long time. So why aren't we talking Brooks? What are we doing? He's inconsistent. And you always, with Brooks, try and make a narrative around the inconsistency. Yeah. Is it because he wasn't up for that event? Now, he played really well in Austin. Yeah. And he was head-to-head against DJ.

DJ beat him. Very close match. At the very end, yeah. The bark has been a little bit louder than the bite this year. I walked with him at Torrey, and he was not driving the ball well. But his driving stats have been better of late late and he's talking confidently coming in here. Spieth is 19 to one. House was looking at all kinds of Spieth bets about him leading after round one, all these different things. This is just

because he looked good on Sunday. Well, he had an unbelievable performance to close out his tournament in San Antonio. And he was a defending champ of that event, but like an, an astronomical ball striking performance. Yeah. A gained 11, uh, T to green lost seven putting or something.

I mean, he was awful, but he's, um, led in the first round and three of the eight, uh, you know, three of the eight, you know, three of the last eight masters. And if he's in form with the ball striking and returning to this place where

magical things happen, it's worth a flyer. Okay. McElroy, 19 to one. As you know, I've been out of McElroy for like four years. Where are you?

I mean, come on. You are the biggest, I'm the biggest speed truther. You are the biggest Rory truther.Elroy for like four years. Where are you? I mean, come on. You are the biggest. I'm the biggest Spieth truther. You are the biggest Rory truther. He seems to like the quiet of Tiger noise this week. Do you believe in him? No.

No. Which means he's probably going to top three. Is Shane Lowry or Seamus Power going to be higher on the Irish scoring charts than Rory? We can bet on this. I prefer Shane Lowry's odds to Seamus Power going to be higher on the Irish scoring charts than Rory? We can bet on this. I prefer Shane Lowry's odds to Seamus Power's. This is Seamus' first time at Augusta, I believe. I know. We might be due for something wild.

Rory backdoor top 10. The thing with, we discussed this on Monday's pod. If he comes out and has a good first round, he can win the masters. He is one of, he is whatever the stat was that Justin shared with us. Yes. Horrendous in his first round of majors over the last,

like it's like the reverse of Mark Hubbard. Yes. Yes. And it's a meaningful sample size. It's not like just the last handful. It's like over years now. Yes. He's,

he's way over par. Well, they have a bet top great britain or ireland player and ireland player you get everybody in both categories roars plus 280 shane lowry plus 550 fitzpatrick six to one stay away your guy hatton 750 casey's 850 hatton at 750 is like tiny i want to do something tidy you've quietly been playing make the case let's hear it um i it's my mind's eye i don't have all the numbers in front of me but he play he's been playing well he's been here in the states for a while he came over earlier

than usual for him and you know i've seen him on the leaderboards on sundays um it's a good conversation starter what are your bets this week well you know i studied the great britain irish field pretty extensively and i really like really like catten uh we mentioned morikawa give us the all right it's sunday night scott van pelt's on sports center and he's doing the 35 second monologue about how morikawa won the Masters. How does that go? It starts for me with what's happened the last two times he's won majors, which is he's been sitting there at odds that we should have known to take. And at one point this week on FanDuel, he was sitting there at 24-1. And when you have the best ball striker in the world on a course where the winners are the best ball strikers, sitting at 24 to one, you have to take him. And usually he never comes in firing on all

cylinders when he's won these majors. He's been slightly below the radar, but he's so good that from one week to the next, he can turn it on. We didn't see it coming and we should have. That's the line. Since his 18th place finish at last year's Masters, the 2021 Masters, he has finished eighth, fourth, and first in the majors that have followed that. He is the defending champion of the Open Championship and arrives here at the Masters at 24 to 1 odds was extraordinary value. I don't think he's still at that number. No, he's tried. that number, but no,

he's tried. We've been trying for four to five months to talk him down. It's true. Dads are still good. He's 22 to one. It's not like it dropped too much. Those are good odds. He's plus three 50 to make the top five plus one 75 for top 10.

It's the odds really that, that make it the compelling case. There's just, it's value for this quality of player. That's all. And then Xander's 24-1. It's like he let me down in one of those majors a year ago or two years ago. He stood on the 16th tee last year chasing down.

That's what it was. It was last year. I know. And he chose the wrong golf club and he hit it at the ball in the water on 16 and finished tied for third behind behind hideki and then the z spot he's at 32 to 1 minus 105 to make the top 20 we just like him we don't even need yeah i mean the the one there is if you look at all the guys who finished second at the masters they're all almost universally super high class players.

And so if you go from year to year to year, it's Tiger, it's Phil, it's Jordan, it's, it's, it's, it's. And suddenly they're the last two years, it's Cam Smith who won the players and then it's Willie Z. So if you follow that trend, this guy's going to be in the mix.

So who is this year's Willie Z? Do we have a candidate? Because every year there's the young guy like, wow, this guy's not going away. He's in the mix. So who is this year's Willie Z? Do we have a candidate? Because every year there's the young guy like, wow, this guy's not going away. He's in the second to last group. He's never been here before. Yeah. I mean, I'm ready to see Scotty Scheffler finishing the top five in a major. No, he doesn't count. He's done too well. I'm saying an out of nowhere guy. Look, the out of nowhere, we're due for a random international. We've had Danny Willett in 16. We had Charles Schwartzel from South Africa

in 2011. If you're looking at those kinds of guys, maybe you're looking at the Beezer, Christian Bazoot and Hood. You're looking at Cam Davis, the long-hitting Australian. Cam Davis, 12-1, top 10.

Beezer's 14-1, top 10. What's Garrick Higo? We've circled Higo a couple times here. Thomas Peters, Lucas Herbert. So Peters has a demonstrated level of success here. He was a first-round leader at the Masters. Our guy Higo is 35-1, top 10. 35-1? 35-1. Not a Our guy Higo is 35-1, top 10. 35-1?

35-1. Not a lot of Higo, actually. That's worth 10 bucks. At some point, we're going to get another random... I'm looking at the Champions Dinner picture tonight, and there's a few guys who just stumbled into that room accidentally. I'm just telling you, somebody completely random and young

is going to make the top 10 because it happens every year. Yeah. And sometimes even the guy will be in the last group or the second to last group and you know he's going to shoot like a 76. It's true. It's like, ah, this poor fucking guy. Doug Gimm at the players. It's fine. Leader after round one, which is Thursday.

Rahm is 20 to one. Everybody else is 26 to one or higher. DJ, there's been little action. He's down to 20 to 1. Everybody else is 26 to 1 or higher. DJ, there's been little action. He's down to 22 to 1. Tiger, 50 to 1, which would be the most unbelievable story of all time. I would recommend not betting that. And that's really all we have other than we didn't mention the Morikawa versus McElroy bet. Morikawa is plus 114 against McElroy.

So House's advice, back Morikawa. My advice, try to find the young guy and take the long odds because that's how you really win in gambling is you take somebody like Higo, who's 35 to one to win the top 10, and suddenly he's minus eight after three rounds or some crazy number. It's super exciting. Nathan, your advice is what? Study the press conferences. Yeah. Study the press conferences. More press conferences tomorrow for you, weirdo? No, we just got the part three. My advice is serve more pigs in the blanket at big, fancy dinners like TJ did.

So you're pro pigs in the blanket. Absolutely. When have you ever turned down a pigs in the blanket? Exactly. Never. You know, that's my favorite Davidid stern thing i wrote about it too you knew this story remind me he used to demand that pigs in the blanket was at every nba function yes and there was this one function where they didn't have it and he was laying into somebody at the function about i told you pigs in the blanket huge pigs in the blanket guy that david

stirred you know those would go fine down here like they they and and we know uh more than any other venue any other event they're always wanting to innovate here there is a breakfast sandwich that we're going to try on the grounds this is a new breakfast sandwich it is two meats and and cheesy egg all in a sandwich what kind of meats sausage and bacon the tradition yeah sausage bacon egg and cheese inside i think a nice soft bun what time do we have to get there to try that i think they start serving at seven okay are we walking the whole time or we're getting chairs we don't need chairs let's we'll walk tomorrow we'll see the golf course tomorrow with our feet

and then how much advil did we bring? We need to post up somewhere so that when Tiger comes through on Thursday, we're in a spot. We don't have to try and fight the crowd. It's either the 12-13 turnaround or it's 16 where they come up on 15, play 16, tee off on 17. The one thing that we didn't do when you were

here in 2018, BS, is go and stand behind one green and watch guys tee off on two. You got to go see that portion of the golf course. It's pretty, it's very quiet up there. There is not a ton of, of, of patrons up in that direction. Cause you're really not close to anything else once you get up there in that corner, but it's like worth spending a half hour. I think we should do that. What is your outfit going to be on Wednesday and Thursday? Oh, I have a whole fit.

It's all laid out up there. I'm not telling you right now. Can't wait to find out. All right, we're going to say goodbye to Nathan and House. You can hear them on Fairway Rowan on Wednesday. I'll be joining that one. We'll report back from the par three, tell you what happened.

So see you guys tomorrow. 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. All right, our friend RL Helwani is here. You can hear him on Spotify Greenroom on Friday before UFC 273 with the three-pack. The three-pock.

The three-pack. People pronounce it differently. And then UFC 273 right afterwards. This is, what do you think? Like eight out of ten for you, this card? What is it? Top three fights, by the way. Great to be back.

No Bill's hot takes this week. No, we're going to get to them. Just give us the quick UFC 273. What is it? Yeah. I mean, the top three get to them. Just give us the quick UFC 273. What is it? Yeah. I mean, the top three fights are fantastic. They really are. Rare that actually of the top three, two of them are title fights. And I would argue that most hardcore MMA fans are more interested in the non-title fight of the three. Hamza Chumai versus Gilbert Burns speaks to just how good that fight is. But the top three are fantastic. I mean, certainly worth the pay-per-view if you ask me. All right. We're going to get to it later.

I want to talk about WrestleMania. You went two night affair. You did some interviews. The two night thing is the stroke of luck of all time for WWE, right? I don't think Vince comes up on this on his own. I was gone when it was like seven hours and the crowd is just dying by hour five and they want to get everybody involved. Now it's like this two-night thing. I feel like it's reinvigorated it. Can I tell you something? I saw your tweet.

I've heard you talk about it. Don't love it. What don't you? Really? Tell me. I love it. I liked when it was NXT on Saturday. It looked different. It was the

up and comers. It was a little smaller, right? It was usually in the arena. So this time it would be American airlines. And then Sunday you see the big reveal, you see the set, you feel it, you take it in. I hear a lot of wrestling fans complain about the seven hour show. Guess what? Every UFC, every weekend is seven hours. Now I know it's not wall to wall great fights, but I'm sitting there for seven hours, 43 weeks out of the year. I don't feel bad for wrestling fans who have to sit there for seven hours, one Sunday night out of the year. So for me, you come back on the Sunday after a tremendous night one, and it kind of feels like we stuck around at the party a little too long. I like it the old way. I know they're making more money.

They are not listening to me. They don't care about me. But the old way was perfect. NXT, big show Saturday, and then the granddaddy of them all on Sunday. I prefer that. You're not factoring in the little kids piece of it, though, in the 10-year-olds and the 11-year-olds and the 12-year-olds when they're there for seven hours. Yeah, I guess. So I think we're both right in a way because I really like the NXT thing too. And I like the combo of those two events when the NXT was first. Right.

I do think there's a way that they could tweak it so that the first night is a little more of like showcasing the younger guns. Maybe you put one great match at the end and then the second night is more of the extravaganza. To me, it felt like Saturday was better than Sunday, which I'm not, I don't know if that was by design or not. To a degree, yes.

I'll also add my kids younger than yours, they couldn't make it till the end of Saturday. And by Sunday, they were like, man, we saw it. I was like, you didn't see Pat McAfee? You didn't watch? They didn't even tune in on Sunday. And so what if you start, let's say, I don't know, at five on a Sunday, it doesn't have to start at eight. Those kids, the 10 year olds, my son, 10, eight, they can make it all the way till 10. And then you're getting your five hours there. You don't

have to start at eight to go all the way till 1am or something like that. So again, 77,000, if that number is to be believed on both nights is a tremendous number. That's 150 plus thousand. So far be it for me. And I saw it with my own eyes. It was packed. It was incredible. It was quite the scene. I'm just saying, coming back, it's like, imagine going to the Super Bowl on Saturday.

And then on Sunday, you're going to the national championship. It just feels like, I was just here. You burned out. Interesting. What was the highlight? What was the best match? There's a couple of highlights for me. Obviously, seeing Stone Cold was huge. But you know what? I'll give you a different spin on it. Being a Quebecois myself, a Montrealer, to see a guy like Kevin Owens from a tiny, tiny place called Mariville, Quebec, headlining WrestleMania with Stone Cold, being in that moment was pretty damn inspiring because most people from where he's from don't get to that moment. I love that. I thought Logan Paul

was incredible. I thought the spot, the three amigos. So were you expecting that? That was about as good of a celebrity performance as I think I've ever seen in a wrestling match. Expecting it to a degree because he's talented, he's young, he's athletic. I spoke to him no more than a month ago. And unless he's working me in this interview, he was completely clueless about the whole thing. He didn't know the date. He didn't know when it was happening.

He didn't start training yet. He didn't have his outfit. He had nothing prepared. It looked like he just agreed to something and had no idea what it was. And then he shows up doing that. And then he does the classic heel spot of the three amigos. And then, you know,

mocks Eddie Guerrero was fantastic. And then on Sunday, I mean, I, I, I'm a huge McAfee fan. And I think that, uh,

what he continues to do was incredible. Like the athleticism jumping. And then like McAfee basically lived every single one of our dreams. He went from a match at WrestleMania, calling matches at WrestleMania, wrestling in a match at WrestleMania, calling matches at WrestleMania, wrestling in a match at WrestleMania, then beating someone at WrestleMania, then going up against Vince McMahon,

76 years old at WrestleMania, and then getting stunned by Stone Cold and taking the beer bath. I mean, it was like the trifecta of all trifectas. So the main event I thought was boring and predictable. I agree on McAfee. I think what was interesting about Logan Paul and McAfee together is just like two good

athletes, you know, like a lot of times, even Johnny Knoxville, like at least he knows how to take bumps and has a general feel for, you know, how to, how to sell something. But I think in the past when they've had the, uh, the people, the green people or the celebs or whoever, they're not like elite athletes, you know? And in this case, we had like Lawrence Taylor and there was, you know, going way back, Mr. T where you have like football player athletes, but you know, a little older or whatever. I thought to me, Logan Paul, from what I saw, like he could actually do this. He understood like the, how to kind of connect

with the crowd, how to like evoke emotion for them, just like little things he was doing, like standing at the top rope and peering out. Like, honestly, if you didn't know any better, you just would have thought he was a wrestler. So I was impressed. Fantastic. And there are some reports online that part of the deal to come back,

which I think is a fascinating window to who he is now, because I actually think he's a very likable guy and has grown a lot since that incident of a few years ago. There's reports online that part of the deal was that he had to end up being a face because initially when I watched this, I was like, why are you turning him so quickly? He got all this heat. He's such a good bad guy, but he's very likable now. He's doing likable things. He's mature. He's not Jake Paul. He's not the bad boy. He doesn't have tattoos. He doesn't have the crazy haircut. So I think that's really interesting as well. The Cody Rhodes thing, by the way, was obviously fun. It was great to see him back. I actually think if you can equate this to other

sports, like I was equating this to MMA a couple of days ago, it's one of the most fascinating business stories of all time. Because here's a guy who was disgruntled, who was pretty much an afterthought. He leaves, he creates his own competition, own leverage that not only he is able to use and benefit from, other guys like Daniel Bryan, CM Punk, they benefit from. Now there's competition finally in the world of wrestling. First time in 20 years, there's leverage, there's momentum. And then he uses that same competition,

that same leverage and momentum to come back and score a massive deal. Like imagine someone, like in MMA, that would be like someone, you know, leaving the UFC, going to Bellator, creating a, you know, a competition and then coming back to the UFC. Rarely, if ever has been done quite well like this. And I think it's, it's a fascinating thing, especially to see how they use it. Do they bury him now?

Like, do they bury the AEW guy or do they propel him? The next few months of his career, I think, are going to be incredible to watch. Well, I think they'll propel him. I mean, he's the right age, right? It's like when they got AJ Styles and he's like, you know, 37 around there. And this is usually when the wrestlers, when they have like the peak of their powers kind of stuff. I'm with you.

I thought rarely do they let the guy come back who didn't make it the first time. And if they do come back when they have this huge W in this other place, it's, you know, you're kind of bringing that other place with you to some degree, the shadow of it at least. And, you know, they seem pretty open about it. I'm more fascinated why he left. I heard Shoemakers interview with him right after I heard your interview with them. And, and it's like, there's a little bit of a, it's between me and Tony Khan, what happened. I mean, knowing nothing, it just seems like he was initially way more involved than maybe we ended up with Tony Khan.

Cause Tony Khan's like, you know, positioning himself as like the Vince McMahon figure, that whole thing, he pays for it. He makes the decisions. And I'm just knowing nothing, reading the tea leaves. It seems like something separate on that. I heard the decisions. And I'm just knowing nothing, reading the tea leaves. It seems like something separate on that. I heard the stuff he said about, look, I've wrestled everyone. I could wrestle there. How many times can I put people over? It's like, I don't know, man, you,

you had a lot of skin in that game and now you're leaving. Didn't add up. I mean, a hundred percent. It has nothing to do with the opponents. Let's be honest. We all know that, um, he built something. No one wants to leave something that they built and then go over to the other guys to try to beat that thing unless something happened. No one just says, oh, I've reached Nick, full disclosure, used to be my agent. I know him very well. He's now the president of WWE. And I don't think Nick likes the idea of being like the big bad wolf against the underdog. Because as you may know, Nick was always the underdog. Nick is the son of an immigrant, right? Nick is son of parents who had to come to America and make it in scratch and claw. He is a man who came from nothing.

Tony Khan is the son of a billionaire. And so this was the first to me shot that way after they've taken several shots. It'd be like, Oh, we're going to take a little piece out of this foundation and see how this whole thing crumbles. I think that had a lot to do with it as well.

I don't see a lot of rest of media talk about this, but, and maybe it's because they don't know Nick and, and I've never asked him this question for the record, but I just think like they were only going to take so many punches before they came back and threw a couple of punches of their own. This to me was a big haymaker WWE to AEW. They were missing one more really reliable kind of their own. This, to me, was a big haymaker, WWE to AEW. They were missing one more

really reliable kind of star, too, I think. Like, just a proven, almost like getting a QB that you know can go 12 and 5, 11 and 6, something like that. Also, who's Roman going to wrestle? Right. Like, he's ran out of guys.

Right. So this could be a guy. With the AEW piece, it's almost in a weird way a vindication for them that WWE went. I think they made a huge deal for him to bring him back.

And from the WWE standpoint, the one thing they had to do with that WrestleMania was make it feel like they took some swings. That it wasn't just like, hey, here's Goldberg again. Even bringing Stone Cold back

who's 57, at least that was something. You know, if you're going to play the nostalgia card, play it with somebody you haven't played it with 27 different times. I still feel like from where they were with NXT

four years ago, with some of the guys they were developing and that pipeline they had, to abandon that still makes no sense to me. I still don't understand it. I thought I really thought they had something with it and they just threw it away because it couldn't compete with AEW. I don't get it. That one I don't get. NXT is really, I mean, a bit of an afterthought. It was on Saturday, late morning, early afternoon. And you have to be a really hardcore fan to go to that show and then go to the, you know, night one show and then go to night two um they've got this young guy named braun breaker

i still don't get this one braun breaker in case you don't know is the son steiner right steiner yeah yeah how do you not call him braun steiner like how do you not use that name that's like calling charlotte flair charlotte smith like the name gets you over halfway. Why would you not use? It's one of the great names in the history of pro wrestling. And they call them brawn breakers. Sounds like some sort of like science lab or something like that. I don't get that.

And it feels like they've gone a little bit away from trying to get the indie guys. You know, the Nakamura's, all these dudes were known in the world of pro wrestling. Now they're trying to go for the blue chip athlete. Gable Steveson might be someone that they're really into. They really tried to push him. Did you see how many times they mentioned it? They did. Multiple times. Yeah, then he had his big,

he tried to look like a little bit evil. I don't know if he pulled it off. Seemed like a nice guy trying to- He's a very nice, he's a sweetheart. Yeah. Yeah, but I'm sure we've seen a lot of guys in that situation in four years later. The Miz is a good example. The biz watching him on the real world and being like, Oh, that guy. Oh, it's so adorable.

He wants to be now you watch him. That guy knows how to work like a 80,000 seat stadium. So he's amazing. I'm never ruling anyone out. It's fun to have two things going head to head. So I'm in a weird spot. You'll appreciate this. Okay.

My son's like 14. He's out. He doesn't care anymore. Totally out. I remember him doing the moves son's like 14. He's out. He doesn't care anymore. Totally out? I remember him doing the moves and everything. I know. He's out, but I don't feel like he's gone. It's just like, you know, there's girls and high school's coming.

I think he comes back like five years from now is I think how it plays out. I think I've lost him. Nothing this weekend? No watching? Didn't want to go. I was like, you want to go? He said, nah. Wow. Did he watch it?

Yeah. He watched some of it. He was impressed by Logan Paul. Bianca Belair is probably his favorite of all the newer wrestlers. The ponytail gimmick. She's a great performer, too. I would say that match with her and Becky Lynch had to be one of the best women's matches they feel uncomfortable. So that's really interesting.

And I think that what is happening is there's just a lot, like there's a lot of WWE. There's a lot of wrestling on TV. So people have to pick and choose. And sometimes too much of a good thing isn't necessarily a good thing. Where I thought you were going was,

you know, like it feels like WWE is great for the kids right now. And AEW is great for, you know, the 90s kids the hardcores right and so it's really interesting to see what they do over the next few months like they got Cody what are they going to do with him

obviously you know the build up to Wrestlemania is always interesting but now you don't have that anymore so you have the after effect Stone Cold's not around you don't have these great storylines so I think the next few months are going to be super interesting and also I'd like to see them I don't know you don't have these great storylines so i think the next few months are going to be super interesting and and also i'd like to see them uh i don't know i don't i don't i'd love to ask you this to me ronda rousey is like change the channel heat like i don't get it i don't think it's working that it's never worked ever yeah it's never worked once enough already she doesn't

seem happy to be there she seems like she's actually like mad that she's there and the crowd was not reacting to her at all like that that match was pretty dead and it wasn't because of charlotte in my opinion um so they keep pushing her and i think that that's a bit of a mistake but i think they're paying her a lot you could could you see her coming back ever to MMA or no? No, no way. That ship sailed. That ship has sailed big time. Um, those two losses really,

really affected her. Actually, honestly, the first loss affected her. She was never the same afterwards. And she really just turned on the entire sport. The buildup to the second fight against Amanda Nunez after the Holly home fight, um,

was one of the strangest things. She didn't do a single piece of media. Only time ever that the UFC excused someone, including like Conor and his bad boy Prime from going to any media beforehand, showed up at the press conference, ran up to the scale, ran away.

It was like that thing just haunted her. And then when she showed up to the fight, she was a shell of her former self. She leaves. Juliana Pena, who's the bantamweight champion of the UFC, cut a promo on her earlier this week and said she's a disgrace and she's a sellout. I just think she just didn't love it anymore. And that loss affected her greatly. So no, she just had a baby. I don't know how much

she even does this period. It just doesn't seem to me like she's very happy doing all of this. Yeah. There's three times probably in my lifetime where the big bad guy, or in her case, the big bad girl, where they unexpectedly lost, the bully got taken, and they really went in a crazy tailspin. The first one was Foreman, right? After Ali beat him, and within two years, he's just out of boxing completely. Tyson in Japan, and then Rousey. Each time, it was like the shocking upset

of the bully goes down. And it was almost like they lost their identity at the same time. These invincible people that we just never expected would ever lose. It was interesting because if you recall, Ronda and Conor lost around the same time. Ronda lost November of 2015.

Conor lost March of 2016. And I'll never forget, like no one has ever, and the internet was brutal towards Conor, especially because they love Diaz so much. He could have, I mean, let that thing affect him, break him, all that stuff.

No one has ever dealt with a loss in fighting better than he did that night. Showed up, put on his fancy suit, answered every single question, said, I'll be back, no problem. And then he, of course, he comes back and he wins and he's more popular than ever. He fights at MSG, he fights Mayweather. So it's just really like, I don't think people actually think less of you when you lose. It's how you deal with the losses. And we've seen this time and again, I've talked to you about this. There's some of the greatest, most popular fighters in MMA history that have 10 losses on their record.

And she never quite got that. I think she thought she had to be undefeated to be the superstar. And really, they love you even more if you lose, stumble, deal with it like a pro and come back and triumph again. And for some reason, she couldn't get over that. Well, the guy in UFC now, Hamza,

feels like he has the invincibility thing. If you go and there's all kinds of best of videos of him that you could just watch, you could get the general feel in five minutes. But he carries himself in that really unique way. When you're watching, you're like, how is anyone going to beat this guy? But at the same time, you got to put the body at work. How much of this is real and how much of this do you feel like he just hasn't fought a dangerous guy yet? So yes, he hasn't fought a top 10 guy. The guy he's fighting on Saturday is Gilbert Burns. Incredible fight, fascinating fight for many reasons. But Hamzat is legit. There's no doubt

about it. This guy is so strong. I was talking to someone who trains with him, Alexander Gustafson, former title contender. He tells me that sometimes he does five a days, five a days, not two a days, three a days. He does five a days. The guy is just a machine. He had COVID really bad and there was a period there where he was retiring already. He didn't know if he'd get over it. He got over it. So that was a little bit scary because he could have been the greatest like what if in MMA history. But he came back in October after a 13-month layoff and just steamrolled his opponent,

takes him down, beats him up, chokes him out. By the way, could win at 85 and 70 as well, which is somewhat rare because there's that 15-pound gap. And now he's fighting Gilbert Burns, who is a whiz on the ground. So the question is, Hamzat's wrestling is his power. What happens when he takes Gilbert on the ground?

Will Gilbert's grappling be able to negate the wrestling? I think Hamzat's striking is better than Gilbert. Here's the thing. No one wants to fight Hamzat and rightfully so. Gilbert Burns deserves a lot of credit.

I think he's ranked two or three. And he said, yeah, I'll fight this guy. I don't think he ultimately wins, but man, I give him a ton of props for doing this. His one hope is it's Mayweather Canelo. Mayweather caught Canelo on the way up, right? Just before he reached where he's at right now, I think Gilbert is hoping that he's catching him on the way up and then he could say, hey, I beat Hamzat before he became Hamzat. I think it might be too late for that. I think Hamzat is here already. Well, Gilbert, he already lost his title

shot, right? So this is his one chance to kind of pull himself back into the conversation. But the Hamzat thing, I just don't know what he's missing. He even does the thing where he picks the guy up and carries him to closer to his corner so he can, I guess, get advice from his corner. How many people in the history of UFC have just been like, I'm going to pick you up. I'd rather we did this over here and just did it over and over again. Famous fight. I think it was UFC 46 off top of my head. Frank Trigg against Matt Hughes. Frank Trigg is beating up Matt Hughes and then he's like enough is enough. And he literally, Matt Hughes, you know, the farm boy with that farm strength, country boy strength, takes him to the other side of the cage and just slams him.

It's one of the most iconic moments. And Hamza recreated that recently as well. No, the guy is incredible. And by the way, Kamaru Usman, who's the welterweight champion of the UFC, probably has to go and get by Leon Edwards, who's next. But there's a reason why Kamaru Usman, in my opinion, has been banging the drum to fight Canelo. And it's not going to happen. Canelo has no reason to take this fight. I think it's because no one wants to fight this guy. I think everyone is well aware of how good he is and feels like it's inevitable that he is going to fight

for the belt soon and maybe be the champion. And Usman, by the way, undefeated UFC pound for pound number one. Everyone is looking back and being like, golly, Gilbert, can you just do us a favor

and take this guy out to slow this down? Because if he gets by Gilbert, it's one more fight and then title shot if not title shot next how many nobody wants to fight this guy guys that we had over like the last 20 years because in boxing

you can count them on like two hands I mean there's been a few Khabib obviously at the top of the list um you know khamsat from chechnya khabib from dagestan khabib's protege islam ahachev is the next guy like that that no one wants to fight um and so there have been a few but there's always been like you know izzy has been great at 85 but then you know he moved up and the aura went away just a bit. But at 85, he's great. There's been a few, but Hamzat is at the top.

He had an incredible stretch where he won two fights in the span of 10 days on Fight Island. And then he comes back and he fights in a different weight class. Like the guy, and he's got this sort of, he's kind of like an evil version of Khabib. Khabib had this sort of triple G like charm with his trash talk. You know, like I will will smash you all this stuff. Hamza speaks like that but he's a little more evil when he speaks and he's got that, like, there's just something about his tone that's just

a little, like, he talks about, like, smashing you and eating you and you're like, yeah, I kind of can see it happening. Like, I sort of believe this guy. He's got that aura. He's got everything about him. I love this fight like this was one of those fights where I was like

is this really going to happen is this really going to happen and they only announced it a few weeks ago this to me is the people's main event on this card it is the fight that I'm most looking forward to

so he's like a 5 to 1 favorite something like that yeah he's a big favorite yeah so Burns was like plus 370 and then we have the Peter Jan thing

which I had that was a pandemic fight I actually watched that one when you just rarely see this especially in a big fight just complete cheap shot knee when the guy was kneeling Sterling

and the knee was down you never see the guy just unleash the knee in that situation for whatever reason he did And that was it. He lost. So that's certainly a big thing. And they have a huge feud. How much of it is real? And how much of it is just they're using this because of the way the last fight ended?

Oh, no, no, no. This is very real. These two guys have been talking about each other for almost two years now because Sterling won a fight, a big time fight in June of 2020. And then Jan won his fight in July of 2020. And then after that, they're like, all right, you guys are fighting each other. And then that fight got postponed of 2020. And then Jan won his fight in July of 2020. And then after that, they're like, all right, you guys are fighting each other. And then that fight got postponed in December. And then you get the March of 2021 fight. So basically, since July of 2020, they've been

talking about each other. So they get to March of 2021. And Jan won that. I mean, he was winning. This happened in the fourth round. Yeah, that fight was done. It was done. The announcers, I remember, weren't they talking about how long can this go? How long are they That fight was done. It was done. The announcers, I remember, weren't they talking about like, how long can this go? Yeah, yeah. How long are they going to stop this? It was starting to hit that kind of level. Never in doubt for a moment, total brain fart on his part.

Some said he didn't understand what the ref was telling him. It doesn't really matter. The guy was down. It was very clear. Where it got a little funky was, we have seen this before, where the champion is up big, brain farts, and hits the opponent illegally. He's down and he knees him on the ground. We saw it a couple of years ago with Jon Jones and Anthony Smith.

Now, Anthony Smith was rocked. And this was, if memory serves me correct, fourth or fifth round. He was done. It was inevitable at that point. Anthony Smith, being the gangster that he is, said, no, I'll keep going. He could have said, I'm done and won the belt and taken it away from Jon Jones. You get the rematch, you get the money. He didn't. And I told him, and I love Anthony Smith. I spoke to him earlier today and I've told him this a million times. I wish you just would have taken it. You had every right

to take it. You got blasted illegally, but he believes in the warrior code and you don't win that way and this and that. I'm like, yo, you got blasted clean illegally. It's not on you. It's on him. He didn't take it. Well, we see it with Aljo here, Aljermaine Sterling. And he said he couldn't continue. The problem is no one believed him.

Everyone thought he was laying down. Everyone said, look, Anthony did it. You should have done it. You should have kept going. And so everyone's been calling him a paper champion since. And he's lost a lot of fans. And the thing is, and i got into it with him with this and he got mad at me he he leaned into it the wrong way he tried to be the heel and rub it in people's faces but he didn't do it in like the right kind of way he was taking pictures with the bell when he said he wasn't taking the pictures it's just like it was a

little clunky so i think a lot of the fans just want Jan to dispose of Aljo and get rid of him. But they are forgetting he's a big favorite, Jan. And rightfully so because of how that first fight went. Aljamain Sterling is not a scrub. He is really, really good.

He's a very good fighter. I just think if you look at the first fight and try to think if it's going to go down the same, yeah, there's a reason why he's that big of a favorite. But this is 100% real.

These guys really, truly despise each other. So what's the third fight? Third fight is the main event. And by the way, biggest underdog ever in a UFC men's featherweight title fight, the Korean zombie, Chan Sung Jung, no one giving him a chance. Unbelievable nickname, Korean zombie. It's got to be top 10. Not only top 10, the greatest shirt. I wish I was wearing it. The greatest shirt in MMA history. It's like this cartoon picture of a zombie before,

you know, when they were allowed to wear shirts before they did this stupid uniform deal that we've talked about in the past. Also walks out to zombie by the cranberries, which is tremendous, right? I mean, how could you not at that

point if you're the korean zombie how many zombie songs are there he's he's so likable you got to do it but his opponent alexander volkanovsky is a total stud former rugby player once weighed 211 pounds is now fighting a 145 undefeated in the ufc had an incredible fight i don't know if you saw back in september against brian ortega where Ortega was choking him, and somehow he got out in the third round. He's a massive, massive underdog zombie. And, you know, Volkanovski, rightfully so, is the

man, but holy smokes. Last I checked, I think he was like a plus 800 or something like that, which seemed a little big. What is it? He's minus 800. Yeah. Peter Jan is minus 500. What's Oh, sorry. Peter Yan is minus 500. What's Volkanovski? Volkanovski's minus 800.

And what's Zombie? Zombie plus 520. Yeah, what the heck? I mean, look, Moneyline, Volkanovski's the pick, but I just feel like it's a little too big. He's got power. Hamza's minus 520. Yeah, I could see that. I mean, that's

a really interesting one because Gilbert is really, really good, and he's by far the best guy that he's ever fought. Again, to me, this is Canelo Floyd in that we all know that Hamza is going to be one of the all-time best, if he can stay healthy. Is he just catching him before he is one of those guys who's fighting the top guys for five, six years? It feels like Hamzah could be the guy, potentially,

because there's been other good ones that they've tried to annoy, and they've all been missing one tiny thing. I really feel like since McGregor, and I know people say, what about Ngannou? Israel? really feel like since mcgregor and i know like people say what about ngannou like israel this thing like that i i'm just talking total package where you could also have the people who are like i fucking hate that guy i can't wait till he you know what i mean like you have the people who are like this guy's a badass this is my guy and then you have the other people like that guy's arrogant i don't like he went too far like i I feel like he could provoke conversation in a slightly different way.

A hundred percent. You know what I mean? Also, um, and, and this might be getting down a whole other, you know, rabbit hole, but he's Chechnyan. He's very good friends with, uh, you know, their, their, their leader, Ramzan Khadirov, who's a very controversial figure. Who's a big MMA fan. This opens up a whole, like if the mainstream media ever, I mean, and we're talking about it

here, but like if people dig into it, like it could open up a whole other can of worms. So to your point, that could bring some heat, you know, old school Nikolai Volkov style, if we want to equate this back to pro wrestling. But no, he is amazing. And he's, I mean, right now he looks like the stats on the amount of punches that he has absorbed in three fights is absurd it's like five in three fights like that's how many times people touch him it's the craziest thing no one could touch this guy he goes in he goes out and what i think is really interesting he fights at 170 and 85 and like style wise matchup wise him versus uh israel adesanya is not a great matchup for, him versus, uh, Israel,

a desk on you is not a great matchup for Izzy because Izzy's the striker. You know what I mean? So like if he could win this title and then say, all right, now I'm going to go up to 85, which I think the UFC would be down to do. Uh, and is he still the champ man?

Then you're talking real superstar status. The fun thing about like, he has that fuck around ability. Like Luca's in that zone right now. We were talking about it on a basketball podcast a few days ago when the guy, when the guys just had peak command and they start kind of messing around a little bit, like he'll do the thing where he'll try to catch somebody to throw a kick and he'll just try to catch it to see what happens. Or he'll throw a punch and then come under and try to tackle the guy right after the punch. And he's like putting combinations together that I don't normally remember seeing.

He reminds me a lot of Julius Randle this year. How you feeling? How you feeling? Tough Knicks season. Can I just tell you something? You're just in sports hell through the Knicks in 13 seconds. God. Well, they changed the rule,

but it's like, who cares? Too late. And this is a strong statement, I know. Maybe the most depressing Knicks season of the last 20 years, and I know this is a strong season, if only because it ended so promising, right? Like, okay, we lost in the first round

before seed. It was like the most feel-good season. You could make a case that Julius Randall was the most beloved New York athlete last year. I can make a very strong case of that, right? Like this guy, you know,

uh, we're here, all that stuff, New York's back, blah, blah, blah. And this year has just been one big wet fart.

I mean, it has been, oh, like the Kemba thing was a disaster. I don't know what the hell happened to Tibbs. You know, he's not playing the young guys. RJ was fine. Julius has been the biggest disaster.

And really like great year for Derrick Rose. What's the difference between this year and last year? Derrick Rose wasn't playing. And he came last year and changed everything. So what a disappointment. And by the way, I hate the play-in. The play-in sucks. Come on.

Wow. What do you not like about the plan why what are we talking about the spurs and the pelicans are like 34 and 49 they should not be in the conversation this is crazy to me the lakers shouldn't be in the conversation like it was working was there anyone ever saying that oh you know by the way i always love the 9-8 matchup towards the end like you you're, okay, who's going to get it? It was usually like, all right, the East-West. It was usually kind of done by the end. Eight was set.

East kind of had a couple of guys in play, a couple of teams in play. Was there anyone ever saying, I want more? Or like, oh, this team. Like, no, it was perfect. It was eight. I'm pro. I'm pro for two reasons.

I think it has really helped the tanking situation. I think you have teams that would have thrown in the towel and just given up with six weeks to go that now don't do that the Spurs are a great example even like the Knicks

I think would have thrown in the towel a little bit sooner if they didn't feel like they had a chance at like to get the 10th seed so it has helped with the tanking then the other thing they did

was that they made all the odds even for the bottom four teams basically I just feel like it's more competitive down the stretch now. I really do think it's made a difference. So now you have a couple of teams that are just like, Orlando's like, we're good, we're done. And the Knicks even are like, all right, we'll start playing the young guys a little bit now. But for the most part, I think the thing that I agree with you on the 34 and 49 and stuff like that.

I just think it should be, if you can't, can't get to like 37 wins, you're not eligible. Like you, if it's. But then what if there's only nine teams? That's fine.

We just, we skip a playing game. We just, we, we have horse, whatever, but you have to get to at least 37 and 45 to be able to do my fix. And look, I think it's kind of cool that the Pelicans are going to play a playoff game.

And God bless, the Zion thing is weird. But I get it. I get it for those markets. But to me, it's just kind of embarrassing. This is not good for the league. The same way adding the extra team to the NFL playoffs, I don't think is ultimately good. Just feels like you're, you know. Well, you know, I like it. It's more gambling. I enjoy that part. I'm also very salty because, uh, you know, like I grew up a Montreal Expos fan. All

I wanted to do was ever see them in the playoffs once. And now like every team makes it to the playoffs. I couldn't, I couldn't get to see them one playoff game in their existence. 1981 was their only playoff series. And I wasn't born. I was born in 82 and I'm like, geez, Louise, now everyone makes the, Bills didn't make the playoffs for 17 years and now everyone's

making the playoffs. It doesn't feel like it's the same. The payoff isn't as great. Before we go, give us your state of mind with the Bills. It's been three months.

You have new quarterbacks in the conference now. Matt Ryan's there now. Deshaun Watson. Russell Wilson. The Chiefs are a little bit worse. But you come so close.

You flew so close to the sun. You flew right by it. Now you're the favorites again. I guess that's good. The Bills are the favorites to win the Super Bowl. But what's the state of mind of the fan base? Because I remember when this happened in 2003, Red Sox,

it was really rock bottom emotionally, mentally, like really feeling like, should I do this to my kids? Should I pass this team down? Like you go to dark places. Like, so what was that couple of weeks like after?

First of all, what a great promo I had on the show leading into that game. I thought it was one of the all time best promos and I felt like I really galvanized the fan base. Very few times in my life has a loss hurt me so much. Honestly, I couldn't move from my couch. My middle son was watching with me.

He went to bed. He came back in the fourth. He snuck down. I said, I'm not going to tell mom. Sit here and watch this with me. And when they scored that touchdown with 13 left, I was openly crying and I hugged them and I'm going to get emotional now again. And I was like, they are finally going to do it because I swear to God, Bill, I know

this for a fact, they win that game, they're winning the Super Bowl. No one can tell me otherwise. And it just hurts so bad. And that game hurt me. Like I watched the highlights afterwards and I remember watching them. I was in St. Louis for the Royal Rumble that following weekend. I sat and watched the highlights

when they played like the NFL films, behind the scenes stuff. And it hurt me like someone kicked me in the stomach. But I can't tell you this enough. I have never believed in an athlete on my team more than I believe in that guy, Josh Allen. I believe in that guy. You know who my favorite athlete is of all time?

I don't know if we ever talked about this. And I've always disagreed with you on this one. It's Patrick Ewing. You have your Ewing theory. It's a very famous theory. And I didn't agree with it because I was blinded by the fact, like I will go to my grave

thinking that if he had another guy on his team, blah, blah, blah. I don't think many people can argue with me on Josh Allen. There is no Josh Allen theory. He makes everyone better. And I really, truly believe that this will make him better. I felt last year going into the season, they were too cocky. They believed in their own SHIT a little too much. They got punched in the mouth week one against Pittsburgh. I don't think that's the case. I consumed every single piece of media that he did, Super Bowl media row, and it told me that this guy was hurt still,

that he was mad. He didn't want to be there. He was doing a sponsor thing. And then what happens in the offseason? Von Miller. Von Miller doesn't come to Buffalo. The Von Millers of the world don't come to Buffalo, right? Tremendous deal.

Brandon Bean, give him the Executive of the Year award now. to Buffalo right tremendous deal Brandon Bean give him the executive of the year award now tremendous deal they've signed a couple other guys like it very much also the draft

I think is going to be good I'm a little worried about running back I don't love the running back situation all to say I could sit here for hours and talk about it I truly believe

that this is going to be the year and I love the fact that Tommy came back please give me Tommy in the Super Bowl once and for all so we can freaking

lay the smack down on his candy old ass and be done with him. Enough of this. I mean, one of the old... Please, come on. You have to admit, it's one of the most disgraceful things you've ever seen, the way he's behaved this off season. He does the retirement. He doesn't give a shout out to the Patriots. If I were a Patriots fan, I would burn his jersey. The way he does the quote RT, oh, thanks, guys. That's it. Doesn't even give a shot. Then he comes back. Enough.

He's an egomaniac. I'm tired of him. Give me the Bucs and the Super Bowl. Bill's Bucs in February. Exercise the demons. Hallelujah. Thank you, God. I can't refute the Brady point.

Disgusting. But here's, you know, the guy won me six Super Bowls. You I, you know, I sports love the guy. He turned his back on you guys. Eh, it was time for him to go. Doesn't even thank you? Puts out a sex page. Well, he thanked us two years ago.

What did he thank you when he left? When he retired, he should have thanked you. Because I don't think he was retiring. I think there was like some Zodiac shit going on with that letter. Where it's like, if you read it carefully, it's like, I'm retiring, but not really. You guys are like squad lovers convincing yourself that he didn't really just spit in your face. This will be my saddest Brady defense.

I just don't think he has people around him that he listens to anymore. Because the part that never made sense is why are you retiring when you're retiring? Why not say I'm going to take a month and think about this? Like if you were on the fence or you might change your mind, what was the point of retiring? And then coming back 40 days later, why retire in the first place? Why not just say, I'm going to wait until we get to March before I decide. He just kind of was like flying by the seat of his pants, pretty big decision. And he's done so much. LeBron has hit this point too, where they can kind of do anything and there's no real backlash to it.

LeBron's been all over the place. He went to All-Star Weekend and he was talking about Sam Presti and he's talking about, would I come back to Cleveland? It's like, what are you doing? Yeah, it was weird. And I just think these guys hit a point

where they become so famous and they were so successful. And they have no peers, basically. They have three people they can even look at that they have something in common with. And at some point, I just think you lose perspective. So I looked at the Brady thing and it was like, man, there's not one person in his life that could have been like, hey, Tom, let's take a month. You don't have to announce you're retiring now. You're not even going to get the PR pop out of it.

There's a million things going on. Wait till the perfect day and we'll own the day. We'll get the message out. Everything about it was sloppy. Even the comeback, he did it on a Sunday night. He did it on a Sunday night during the selection Sunday. Right. The comeback.

Wait till like a Monday morning. Yeah, it's all of it's sloppy. So that's like my repeated look at, takeaway of this is just like, this all seems really like a guy who doesn't really know what he wants. Could I ask you though? Like, okay, I'm biased.

What do you think of my Bills take? Like, do you think this is it? Are we finally getting it done? I don't like that you're the favorites. It's that that never usually works. But I think you have the best team, and I thought you had the best team last year. And usually, NFL, it's three or four-year cycles, right?

Where it's like you have a chance year after year for three years, four years, five years. So you're in the mix with that. You know, with the Brady thing, and I think LeBron's going to be like this too, and we can leave on this. Because you see it with MMA, you see it with boxing, two sports that we love, and you even see it with wrestling. I think part of that, that's why I called him an egomaniac. Tom Brady's an egomaniac. Clip that off.

He's self-centered. He's a cheater, by the way. I mean, there's- No, he's not. He's not. He was completely absolved of that. He completely absolved. And not only that,

but they destroyed all their big evidence after the fact. No, but I think football quarterbacks and basketball stars, boxing, MMA, I think there's some sort of similarity with all four. How many boxers did we love that had to get the shit kicked out of them the extra two times before they finally left, right? Some of them would probably still be fighting if they could even get licensed.

And MMA said the same thing. These guys, it's fucking sad. These guys, some of the stars from the 2000s, Tito Ortiz is like still fighting. Yep. That's why, by the way, I say the greatest of all time is my fellow Canadian, George St. Pierre,

who went out as welterweight champion, took a four-year break, comes back, sees that Michael Bisping is the middleweight champion, goes up to middleweight, wins that belt at MSG, and then says, peace, I'm out of here.

Leaves on top twice. That's it. Jim Brown. Yeah. Jim Brown was another one. He left on top. How many guys do that? In the history, Vitaly Klitschko, he was up there. He wasn't quite as famous as

George. Lennox Lewis did it. Lennox Lewis. You could technically say Floyd did it because he hit a point where he's like, I'm just not going to get punched. I'll keep taking these fights, but it'll never be anybody that actually has a chance to hurt me. No,

I'll give him credit. Floyd did it a hundred percent. If you, if you're not giving him that credit, you're being a hater, but more often than not, no one does it. Um,

and Brady, by the way, I mean, he lost in a playoff game. You know, no one would have battered an eye. I wonder how much that report of him retiring played into it. Like, did he want to?

I don't know. You know what I mean? Like, did he feel the pressure that he had to do something? The whole thing was bizarre. The point is, give me Tom. Give me anyone. Give me Aaron. I'd love to see Aaron Rodgers in the Super Bowl.

I just believe in Josh so bad. And I've seen enough times where, I mean, just look at what happened with Mahomes and the Patriots, right? Where you get stabbed in the heart, you crumble. And I know we all thought last year's Chiefs game, like two years ago now, two seasons ago, was going to be the game that gets them over the hump.

This year, I think and I hope they remember that losses to the Jaguars, those bad losses to the Steelers, they come back to haunt you because we would have been at home for that Chiefs game. You got to win those games. Make it count.

And then in January, February, do your business. Then, man, I just want one, Bill. That's it. I just want one. Look at me. Knicks fan.

I'm pathetic. My baseball team doesn't exist. My basketball team is a joke. My football team is on the cusp. Just give me one damn championship. That's all I want. Yeah, losing the baseball team is probably the biggest My football team is on the cusp. Just give me one damn championship. That's all I want. Yeah, losing the baseball team is probably the biggest L out of all that.

Thank God for Vlade Jr., though, because I'm now allowed to... Yeah, it's true. You can just latch on to him. No, Blue Jays are my squad. I grew up watching his dad, of course, on the Expos, but it'll never be the same. I love the Blue Jays. Blue Jays are tremendous. We're going to win the AL East. I hope you know this. And I say we. I'm aware. I'm aware. You're the favorites Jays. Blue Jays are tremendous. We're going to win the AL East. I hope you know this. And I say we. I'm aware.

You're the favorites. It's tough. It's tough. All right. Ariel, we look forward to hearing you on Green Room. Yes. On Friday. On Saturday. We also spin those off onto the Ringer MMA. Keep going. Yeah, I'm going to give the plug. The full plug. Friday morning.

Do the full. Here it is. Do the Saturday morning WWF 1981 plug well you know something mean gene brother um saturday morning 9 p.m eastern 6 a.m pacific and i gotta give a shout out to the europeans for my guy pizzi 2 p.m gmt uh we'll be live on spotify green room best community best group of people come in. We watch the weigh-ins together. The weigh-ins are live at 9 a.m. So we see how everyone looks. As you know, from a betting perspective, that's when you make your pick, right? You want to see who makes weight, who doesn't make weight, who's sunken in, hydrated, dehydrated, blah, blah, blah. So we'll be on for two hours.

We'll take calls, all that stuff. Then immediately after that live show, I always remind people, the show goes up on our feed on Spotify, ringer MMA show, go check it out. You were worried we weren't going to do a lot. We're about to hit our quota in a couple of weeks, but I don't know if you've seen, we've done almost 50 shows. We're, we're, we're competitive guy. I want to kill everyone. Um, well you like, you like the community though. You love the people that I think you've enjoyed this even more than you expected. Honestly, if I'm being honest with you, 1,000%. Got people calling in from India, Israel, England, Ireland.

It's just, it's amazing. Nothing like it. There's no like post-game shows, pre-game shows on the radio. This is the closest thing to it. And then immediately following the main event and the post-fight shows are the best. You even called in back in January after. I did. I might call in after this one.

I'll get in the one Saturday night. Okay, perfect. You might have a Bill from LA call. Everyone loves that. Immediately, the second the post-fight interview is over, jump on Green Room. We take calls. We react.

Myself, Chuck Mendenhall, P.T. Carroll, producer Troy. And it's the best. I think we had like 15,000 people in January. It's always the biggest crowd. It's always the best takes. And there's nothing like it. Like the UFC does a post-fight show. No one watches it anymore because we're in existence.

Ringer MMA show, three pucks, Spotify, green room. We're killing it. And we got some big plans for late. We're going to have a little meetup in New York, by the way. Anyone who's in New York, April 30th for the, uh, Katie Taylor, Amanda Serrano boxing match. First ever female fight, the headline, a boxing show at MSG. It's historic. Jake Paul promoting.

We're going to do a meetup the night before with those people that you talked about the community. And then we're hoping to do it in July as well. It's become great. It's like a family. I love it. I look forward to these genuinely. Awesome.

Well, it's been awesome working with you. I will, I will, I'm sure text you after that fight. Maybe I'll pop on if it's a good post-fight show, but good to see you as always. Thank you. All right. Thanks to Nathan and House. Thanks to Ariel Hawani. Thanks to FanDuel

for bringing us to Georgia, to Augusta. We will be on the course tomorrow, Par 3. Looking forward to it. And don't forget about the rewatchables. Die hard to if you missed that one. Back on this feed on Thursday, I am going to be on Fairway Rolling with House and Nathan on Wednesday night

talking about our experience going to the par three, last minute master's bets and a whole bunch more. And that's it. See you on that podcast on Wednesday and this podcast on Thursday. I want to see them on the way so I never say I don't have feelings with them. On the wayside, on the way so I never say I don't have feelings with them.