The Bill Simmons Podcast - The Dolphins’ Sleeper Potential, New York Rivalries, Sunday Ticket’s Future, and Red-Hot Million-Dollar Picks | With Peter Schrager, John Jastremski, and Bryan Curtis

Episode Date: December 23, 2022

The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by John Jastremski and Peter Schrager to discuss the Dolphins being the annual NFL Playoffs sleeper team, along with other sleeper candidates—including the Chargers, Ravens, and Lions—before looking at their favorite underdogs for NFL Week 16 (3:25). Then Bill talks with The Ringer's Bryan Curtis about NFL Sunday Ticket moving to YouTube TV for the 2023-24 NFL season, as well as the three biggest media stories from 2022 (53:51). Next, Bill rejoins John Jastremski to discuss the Mets vs. Yankees offseasons, the Knicks finding their identity, and the Nets playing their best basketball (1:22:32). Finally, Bill celebrates getting out of the red and into the black as he gives out the Million-Dollar Picks for NFL Week 16 (1:49:56). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Peter Schrager, John Jastremski, and Bryan Curtis Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, if you love holiday food and why wouldn't you, go check out the Dave Chang Show. His last two podcasts are called A Very Dave Chang Christmas and A Year-End Visit from Restaurant Nostradamus. Why wouldn't you love those podcasts? Go check them out. The Dave Chang Show only on The Ringer Podcast Network. It's the Bill Simmons Podcast presented by FanDuel. Football is in full action. FanDuel's highest rated sportsbook is the best place to bet at all. We've been doing pretty well on million dollar picks this year. I love the first month of the season because you have to go into the season thinking,

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or visit RG-help.com. This episode is brought to you by Prime Video. You know me, I can't go a day without sports. I really can't. And now Monday nights are all about hockey. That's right. There's a new exclusive home for streaming Monday night NHL hockey.

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It's on Monday. It's on Prime. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where I will be putting up a new podcast on Sunday night. Cousin Sal and I are at Guest Alliance. We're going to talk about Week 16 football.

We don't care if it's going to piss off our families. The podcast never stops, especially Sunday night. So stay tuned for that and stay tuned for a new Rewatchables, which is coming Monday night. One of the biggest movies we've done all year. The last Rewatchable of 2022. And also on Christmas Day, I'm going to be doing a super boost for FanDuel Sportsbook.

It's either going to be NBA or NBA crossed with NFL. Not sure yet, but check out my Twitter feed over the weekend, assuming Twitter still exists. And I'll be tweeting what we are boosting for FanDuel Sportsbook. Coming up on this podcast, John Jastrzemski from our New York, New York podcast and Peter Schrager. We're going to go through all the week 16 football games or the ones we care about. And also, could the Dolphins be the surprise team in the AFC the way this is going? I'm going to give you a little history on that.

And JJ is a big Dolphins fan. Schrager obviously is covering the league as well as anybody. We're going to lay out all the scenarios for you. JJ is going to stick around. We're going to talk Mets versus Yankees and we're going to talk Knicks versus Nets. And then my guy Brian Curtis is coming in from the ringer, and we're going to discuss YouTube TV stealing Sunday ticket from DirecTV, which was one of the

four biggest sports media stories of the year in our opinion, and we're going to give you the other three as well. So that is all coming up next. And before we get to Pearl Jam, I wanted to wish my guy Wally Ramsey a happy and healthy 90th birthday. It was actually two days ago. He was one of the most important teachers I ever had. He was my basketball coach. He was the father of my buddy Gus. And the thing is, especially when you write for a living and you're doing creative, you need three or four teachers at some point in your life who believe in you, who make you think you're better than you are, who teach you stuff. Um, mentors crossed with influences and he was one of mine. He caught me at the perfect time in my life and was really the first person who made me think that I might actually be good at writing. So that's a whole other story I won't tell today, but happy 90th to Wally Ramsey. Most important thing he did just professionally for me,

he came up with the idea for the Hall of Fame pyramid. We were in the car, me and my buddy, Gus, one of my best friends, Wally's son. And we were driving to the first Mets Red Sox game, the regular season series that they'd had. So I guess that was like 1997. And we were talking about the hall of fame. And Wally had this idea for a pyramid and we just kind of innovated it on the car ride. And I started using it in columns and then it became the backbone of my basketball book. So he continued to influence me even after he was my teacher. Happy birthday, Wally Ramsey. Love you. We're going to bring in Pearl Jam and then we're gonna do the pod pro jab so

all right what a holiday treat for me. Peter Schrager here, as always, on Thursdays. John Jastrzemski, he's going to join us. He's from our New York, New York podcast. Giants Jets, obviously been following them, but also huge Dolphins fan. And Schrags, you were just on the sidelines for an incredible Bills-Dolphins

game in the snow that the Dolphins lost. But to me, I still feel like they're a little sneaky right now. So what'd you see in the sidelines? Tell us. Well, the sidelines are one thing, but I think JJ would appreciate my time on the production calls and before the game and speaking with the players. But most amazingly of all, Mike McDaniel. I mean, Bill, I don't even know if we as a national audience appreciate the greatness of this guy as far as a new personality in the league. He's like a stand-up comic.

He is. He's a gem. He's a gem. And I think the players at first, I was like, I don't know how that works in a bunch of alphas and this guy's quirky and always has a line at the end. They love him. They love him because it's a polar opposite of what Flores was. Flores guys would be walking down the hallway and it's like, okay,

I'm going to dip into this room so I don't have to make eye contact. Cause I just, there was no last year, there was just like this, like chill around the building. Now, you know, McDaniel is, is, is empowering them. And I'd be curious your thoughts on this. And it's a very 2022 thing. And Bill, you're obviously the head of a company with so many younger employees. McDaniel's whole thing is Tua's 24 years old. He's not a robot. He's a human being. And this is him and me talking. And Mike's like, Tua was told he was the greatest bust in the history of the NFL draft for two years of his life. He comes on the team. I'm telling him he's going to be all right.

He's in the MVP voting for the first half of the season. He's leading Pro Bowl votes. He has two bad games and he sucks again. And he's like, and how do you take a 24-year-old who's got emotions and feelings and tell him somehow to block it all out. It's like, the only thing I can do is empathize and try to put myself into his shoes and try to make him feel like he's got as much security as he needs and as much comfort as he needs and that I've got his back. So a lot of the stuff that Mike McDaniel is doing with Tua, yeah, it's the offense, it's building it.

A lot of it's from the neck up. A lot of it is mental health. A lot of it is talking like, I don't know, when you hear that and you're an old school coach, you might like say, oh, get out. Tua's making millions of dollars. Or the fan at home says, oh, poor Tua. I don't know. Mike McDaniel's like, the only way Tua's going to succeed is if we're all supportive of Tua and if we can embolden Tua and we can empower him. He's like, my number one job is to keep Tua confident and to keep him in his pocket and knowing that he's got me as his number one supporter. And I was like, that's a different approach to quarterback

coaching that I don't really hear in a lot of NFL coaching rooms. You know, JJ, I was watching pregame show a couple of weeks ago. I think it was two weeks ago. They always have those interviews where there's like 13 cameras and it's like Aaron Andrews or whoever. And it's like this four minute interview. And I never understand why they have them because I just want like gambling information and weather. And why did this line move? And Oh wait,

somebody's injured. And I just don't know who those interviews are for. And yet I had to his interview on, and he talked about what Schrager just said with McDaniel and how much it meant to him that McDaniel believed in him. And it wasn't bullshit. He was like, this guy actually from day one has just really invested in me and believed in me. And I feel like I owe it to him. You're a huge Dolphins fan. Have you been following this during the season? What's been the arc of this? 1,000%. I mean, last year, the coach didn't trust

him. I mean, it was as clear as day. They were basically throwing the ball 10 to 15 times. Flores was trying to win it 13 to 10, 16 to nine, trying to win games out of 1985 and 1995. And it's like, well, it's the modern day NFL. Sooner or later, you got to be able to move the ball. Sooner or later, you got to be able to trust your quarterback. Listen, they've trusted him by getting him unbelievable weapons. Mike McDaniel looks a lot smarter when you have Tyree Kill and when you have Jalen Waddell. I mean, Traeger saw it on the sideline. You get him a little bit of space,

and he's brilliant at designing plays to get those guys into space. You get the ball, Jalen Waddell, he's gone, man. Tyree Kill, he's gone. They have built an offense similar to what Tua was running at Alabama, and he's having success with it. And look, skill-wise. Do you trust him? Yeah, I do.

I do. Listen, he went to Buffalo where he was embarrassing two years ago. Playoff run on the line. He wanted no pour to play in that game. And let's be honest, his confidence was totally shook because you had Flores yanking him out of the games because he had the safety net of Ryan Fitzpatrick. Ryan Fitzpatrick got COVID. Tua had to play that whole game. Dolphins weren't ready. They lost the game by 30 points. I still got no sleep. I still was sick to

my stomach about a couple of third down calls, the two point play, going for two after the waddle touchdown. Schrager, I hate moral victories. I'm not a moral victory kind of guy. They played the Rasses off on Saturday. And now I'm ready to see them now go and validate it and win the last three games and do something they haven't done since 2016 and get in the playoffs. Yeah. And here's the thing with that. The whole storyline was, can they play in the cold weather? Can they play in the cold weather? And now before the game, I'm out there. And were they tough enough for a game like that? Yeah. Here's Jalen Phillips, who's a second year guy, first round pick. And it's such a cliche thing, but we're walking out of the tunnel together and he just takes off his shirt and he's

shirtless. And he's like, I'm going to go warm up shirtless. Guy looks amazing. And I'm like, all right. And I'm like, that's corny or cliche. And he's like, no, no, no, no, no. Like this, like, I feel like this is what we had. Like, and they were, they were not phased at all. They ran the ball. Most are at over a hundred yards in the first half. And they had this punishing style of football that they kind of went away from at the end. The thing is this though, they went into Buffalo and held their own in cold weather. And if they go to the playoffs, they're going to have to go to a Cincinnati at some point. They're going to have to go to a Kansas City at some point. They're going to have to go to a Buffalo at some point. They're going to have to win one of these road games if they're going to

do anything in the playoffs. And I think at the very least, they shut some people up with like, this team is too soft. They can't handle the cold. You know, it's funny. Sometimes you can have a loss that ends up being the most important game in a good way for your whole season. Cause I remember the O one paths, we lost to the Rams on a Sunday night, 24, 17, but it was a good game and we weren't supposed to be in the game. And we like physically and speed wise, we, we matched up. And I remember leaving that game being like,

Oh wow, we're good. That game last week, JJ, like I had Buffalo in a tease. I kept waiting for them to pull away and they, it just never had, I kept waiting for two to just,

he's, you know, he'll do it. He'll throw it into three guys twice, twice a half. Right. They never get caught. And it just like they, Miami just get, they hung around, they hung around, they hung around.

I was impressed. And the reason I want to do this as an opening segment, you know, there's always that one team. We have the top five that's established right now. It's Philly, it's San Francisco, it's Casey, Buffalo, and Cincinnati. And really that's it. And usually we have like seven or eight, but this year we only have five.

And the history says there's always, at least recent history, there's always one other team kind of lurking. So you go back to 2021. After 14 weeks, the Bengals are eight and six. Nobody saw them coming. Well, they finished 10 and seven. They get a four seed.

All of a sudden They're in the mix And they make the Super Bowl 2020 Tampa Yep They're 8-5 New Orleans You were going to mention You were going to mention

That last week It's like When they lost to Kansas City That Tampa team On a Sunday afternoon With Romo and Nance on the call Tampa Bay went head to head With Kansas City

And they kind of like Were able to match Which they lost the game But felt like something Felt like something And Romo said that I remember Romo said that At the end of that game He's like I think Tampa's found it head-to-head with Kansas City, and they kind of were able to match, which they lost the game, but it was the same way. Felt like something. I remember Romo said that at the end of that game. He's like, I think Tampa's found it.

He also said that about Tampa after what I saw last week. I don't necessarily agree. It turns out Romo just likes to say that after games. This was also 2020, Romo. A different version, maybe. Okay, go on. But the Saints were 10-2, and Tampa was 7-5. They were three games behind. The Saints end up winning the division. Tampa's a five seed, 11-5 to make the Super Bowl they win.

2019, Tennessee. They're 8-5 heading into week 15. They lose to Houston. They're 8-6. Seem like they're either done, maybe done. They sneak in as a six seed, nine and seven. They make their run. They get to the AFC title game, go toe-to-toe with KC, and they lose. I think there's three teams right now.

I love this. Who you got? That could be the sneaky teams. And we'll do Miami in a second. But the other two are Chargers and Detroit. Detroit. Yeah. Get in on Detroit. Well, so here's the case.

The Dolphins, so they fit a lot of models for this. They're eighth in DVOA already. If you go back to the Super Bowl and DVOA the last 10 years, every team for the last six years was in the top seven DVOA except for Cincinnati last year.

And I'm willing to throw out Cincinnati as a complete fluke as Schrager and I, they murdered us a million dollar pick, but I just feel like Mahomes just makes one play. Cincinnati's not in the Super Bowl. Or if they give the ball to Eric McKinnon. Or the Titans. Yeah. Mahomes, any sort of

just that stretch, the three minutes before the end of the half, the three minutes after the start of the half, like just anything. Make one play and Cincinnati's not in there. But after that, it's really top seven all the way down. In 15, Denver was eighth in DVOA. And in 2012, Baltimore was 10th. So those are three teams out of 20 in the last 10 years that weren't top seven DVOA. Miami's eighth, so they're lingering and they could get in the top seven by the end of the year. The Lions, they're ninth. Since week eight, they're

fourth in DVOA. They're fourth out of everyone in the league. They're sixth offense, 13 defense, fifth special teams. They've won six of their last seven. JJ, they have good losses. They lost to Philly. They lost to Buffalo. They lost to Miami. They lost to Dallas. They lost to Minnesota. They lost to Dallas. They lost to Minnesota.

They lost to Seattle. They got killed by the Pats. That's the one where you're like, what the fuck happened there? Yeah. But for the most part, I'm kind of sold on the Lions. Says JJ, you disagree? So listen, I love this story. I want to see them in the playoffs. They're a

ton of fun. Campbell scares me in game. You saw last week against the Jets. He's kicking a 54-yard field goal. It's frigid, freezing cold to go from three to six. His team bailed him out. His offensive coordinator is a badass. And he can send some bouquets to Robert Sala for screwing up the end of the game.

I don't know what he was doing with the time management. Tough one for Sala. screwing up the end of the game. I don't know what he was doing with the time management. Tough one for Sala. That's my biggest thing. The Lions, to me, out of any of those teams trying to get in, in the wildcourts outside of Dallas, they're the most likely to win a game. I just don't know if they have enough to win their final

three, and they need to win their final three if they're getting in. Schrags and I factor in the three weird Dan Campbell decisions when we decide whether we want to put the Lions in the $1 picks. Fair enough. This week, they're at Carolina. Carolina,

I've finally given up on because you and House and Raheem talked about this on East Coast Bias Tuesday. Carolina's fine unless they're down seven and then you might as well turn the TV off. They're down seven, the game's over. Can I like they're down seven. Oh, the game's over. Can I give you a Carolina Panthers perspective as I'm watching that game, knowing that Bill and I had the underdog parlay and we were all in on the

fan. They, okay. So CJ Henderson, this is real deep Carolina talk. If you're a Carolina Panthers blogger, CJ Henderson goes down and it's like, all right,

you're your number two corners gone. They still are setting the house on every third down. And this guy, Keith Taylor, who is not that guy, is up against Deontay Johnson. Literally nine of 12 on third down. It was painful. Every time it was third and long, they sent the house. And Al Holcomb's sending everybody.

And they're just picking on him with Deontay Johnson. It was enough where you're like, all right, I guess Steve Wilks can't be the coach next year. If you're a defensive coach and that happens, that can't be. I think they got so excited to blitz Trubisky. I know. That they kind of completely lost perspective of the game. Because the only guy who could hurt them on the field was Deontay Johnson.

And he was. Who's by himself on the left side of the field just torching. Yeah, it was tough. And from a coaching standpoint, I'm not sure. But anyway, it's in Carolina. We haven't even talked about how bad the weather is going to be all over the place this weekend. If the Lions are a real playoff team, they have to be Carolina.

And it has to be convincing. So to me, we'll know after this weekend one way or the other. It's a rat line, guys. The Lions only favored by two and a half at that crummy Carolina team after last week. The entire world is on Detroit, too. But we had three rat lines last week, and we went two and one on the rat lines. I don't know this vernacular.

I'm not in this world. What is a rat line? I love this. Basically, it's like it just looks too easy. We've talked about it. We just call it something different. Basically, Schrager, it's too good to be true. For example,

Cincinnati last week went three and a half against Tampa. It seemed like one of those lines that was too good to be true. San Francisco, Seattle on Thursday night. Why wouldn't everyone take San Francisco? I ended up not betting that game because

it was such a rat line. I'm so scared. You missed out. You're right. That Carolina-Detroit. So anyway. I still like Detroit, I'm saying. Here's the other thing with Detroit. Now, I know Dan Campbell's going to have a couple of weird decisions. You mentioned the offensive coordinator, Ben Johnson,

who I am telling you right now, guys, is going to be hired as a head coach at 36 years old. Anyone text me about all these executives. What do you know about Ben Johnson? And, and here's the deal. They're getting contributions from rookies who weren't contributing. So like they added these players.

This guy, James Houston is a pass rusher who did not play till Thanksgiving, a rookie at a Jackson state. He's got five sacks in four weeks. Jamison Williams. They added him in the last couple of weeks. They are adding players as they go. So not only are they winning games,

they're getting better personnel and they're getting more momentum. I think Detroit rolls. And I don't think the Carolina fans are actually coming out in droves in this weather in Carolina to go cheer on the Panthers this weekend. Well, it's tough for them because two weeks ago when we had them, they had that huge start against Seattle. But second half, they didn't really do much. And then in that last game, they didn't really do much. And then in that last game, they didn't really do much either. I think the Sam Darnold thing becomes insurmountable

the more you watch it. I was surprised they couldn't run on Pittsburgh. But in general... Deontay Foreman was tiptoeing last week, and he is not a tiptoe-er. Tiptoeing to the line. It seems like I'm very passionate here.

I watched every snap of that game. Yeah, well, we were going nuts for it. The Lions, though, I still feel like I'm looking at Washington at San Francisco this week. Good luck. Washington's going to be spunky. Remember I said this. Washington's going to be spunky in that game.

And I love the Niners, and I'm invested in the Niners to win the Super Bowl. They just won the division. That's a kitchen sink game for Washington. Young is back. I think they cover. Just be careful there. Be careful. Definitely not going to be careful.

I was going to say, we can make the bet. You saved me some trouble, so I'm fine with that. Then they're home for Cleveland-Dallas the next two weeks. If they lose San Francisco and they're 7-point underdogs and Detroit wins, Detroit is now in the playoffs just needing to win out their last two. So I think,

what's the most fun scenario for the playoffs just in general from a gambling standpoint? It's the Lions making it. Having Dan Campbell and Jared Goff and just being able to be like, what do we do with this? Or is it Green Bay making this crazy run down the stretch?

Because if they beat the Dolphins and they win the following week, they play the Lions for what could be a playoff spot. And then all of a sudden, you've got this Green Bay team and the Rodgers storyline. I don't know what I'm rooting for. I think they're both very intriguing. I'm ready for Rodgers to go away. I'm with you.

And maybe that's because I have an investment with the Dolphins this week. Let's flip the channel on Rodgers. Schrager, how about this one? Tyree Kill returning to Arrowhead to take on the Chiefs. You want to walk our game. Oh, for week one. Oh, yeah. Wait, let's take a break.

Let's take a break, and then I want to talk about the Chargers. Hey, Santa Barkley is back, and this year he's given new Fando customers exactly what you asked for. Unwrap the gift of a no sweat first bet up to $2,500 back in free bets when you sign up with promo code BS. That is $2,500 back if your first bet doesn't win. Now's the perfect time to give Fando a shot. The app is easy to use. They're always giving you great promotions and when you win, you'll get paid instantly. I'm going to be doing a little Christmas boost on Sunday.

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at sportsbook.fanduel.com. This episode is brought to you by my old friend, Miller Lite. I've been a big fan of Miller Lite, man, since college days when I was allowed to have beer. I think nephew Kyle is a fan too. Miller Lite keeps it simple for us. Undebatable quality, great taste. Picture this, it's game day, all the gangs here, you're tailgating outside the stadium. It's a great time for beer. Or how about when you're standing at the grill and the smell of sizzling burgers is in the air? Moments like that are when you want a light beer that tastes like beer, that's delicious. You don't want to load up on those heavier beers and then you only have two of them. Then you feel tired. Your stomach feels full. Miller Lite, it's your friend. It just accompanies whatever else you're doing. You're super happy

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which I think are the most divisive team right now for, uh, for the playoff picture, because I want to get to that five seat if I'm in the AFC, because I get to play either Tennessee or Jacksonville. Tennessee is seven and seven. They play Houston this week. They no longer have Ryan Tannehill.

They have three of their five starters out in the offensive line. Everybody, you go across the board, and we always talk about this, Schrags. Every year, there's that team, when we get to December, they've just had too many injuries. That's it. They're depleted. And you pass the point of no return

where you're just not, you're not the team anymore. And it feels like Tennessee has hit that point. Malik Willis, I watched that game. I think we had Houston, and he just can't throw the ball. They can't really do anything with him. Burks, I watched that game. I think we had Houston, and he just can't throw the ball. They can't really do anything with him. Burks, I don't know if he's coming back.

I want to play them or Jacksonville. We're taping this before Jacksonville, the Jets, so we'll have a lot more clarity on how real Jacksonville is in the playoff picture tonight. But Baltimore or Miami or the Chargers for that five seed. You're talking about Tennessee, Baltimore. Baltimore or the Chargers. I mean, for that five seed.

You're talking about Tennessee, Baltimore. Baltimore is falling apart too. And the Sharks are in the water. Like Greg Roman can't leave his house, it sounds like. They're just going nuts there in the local market. This is another year where they have it all locked up. It looks like they're on their way. And then the offense just falls apart.

The numbers are crazy. The last five weeks, they don't have a touchdown to a receiver. They have the worst ranked offense. They just picked up Sammy Watkins. How sad is that? And he'll be like their number one. And the thought is, all right, so fine. We don't pass the ball. We don't do anything. Last week against Cleveland in that terrible weather, all of a sudden in the fourth quarter,

they abandoned the run and Dobbins was having a day and Edwards having a day. So the Ravens could be one of these teams that just falls off a cliff also. They play Atlanta at home. Again, 10 degree weather, raining. Can you watch that Atlanta team? Yeah, can't you see Algier just running for 200 yards and winning 6-3

in that game? JJ, there's a bet I love in that Ravens game. I want to go back to the Chargers. Sorry. You got two guests. We're all over the place. There's this bet I love in the Falcons game Falcons to win the first half Falcons to win the game plus 340

because that Falcons are another team if they're down seven the game's over they're gonna get smoked but I think they could run on Baltimore well if they're gonna win they're gonna have to win the first half or they have no chance anyway so why not take the plus 340 if you like them?

I don't hate that. I like Baltimore in the game. I feel like as crappy as they've been on offense, after they choked up a playoff spot last year, and I know Lamar's probably not going to play. We're sitting here, what, Thursday 3 o'clock? No, he's out.

It's official. He's out. I just can't see Baltimore choking for the second year in a row. And I got news for you guys. If they lose to Atlanta this week, they are choking for the second year in a row. So I think Baltimore hardball finds a way. The one thing about the Ravens is beginning of the year, they were scoring a ton of points. They were yucking up leads. The defense stunk.

Now they got their defense somewhat in order. And the offense is an absolute nightmare. I think it'll be a little better, because what does Atlanta have to play for in this game? I know you got to be careful with that. We saw the title. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Stop it. Stop it. I know from my dad, we still alive. Stop it. JJ, we're a game back. What league are you watching? Stop it. Stop it.

You can sell me on New Orleans, baby, two and a half against Cleveland. Then you can get the NFC title going with them. I can't with Atlanta. I can't. Baltimore's fifth in DVOA somehow, which makes no sense to me whatsoever because every week it feels like they either lost or they should have lost. And somehow advanced metrics like them.

So the Chargers is a team that the advanced metrics do not like. For the season, they are 23rd. They're in the bottom 10 advance-wise. And yet, the case for them, first of all, I don't think their quarterback was healthy from that week two KC game for two months. I just don't think he was healthy. I think he probably had what Mike White has right now

and was just playing. Mike Williams, he's played maybe two-thirds a year. He's awesome when he's out there. They're 6-2 and he has two catches, JJ. Keenan Allen missed seven games. Last four weeks, they're sixth in defensive DVOA. They're 8-6, but they lost to KC twice by three points each game. They lost to San Francisco and they have some shaky Vegas.

They lost to the Raiders after up 10, nothing. Yeah. Yeah. They have a couple of shaky losses, but for the most part, I don't know. Bosa and James are questionable this week, but in general, this is a Herbert play. This is just like, all right, what if Herbert just goes on a run now? We've seen this happen before. And I don't know, man, if they can pull off this week and kind of get some of it.

They're playing the Colts. Colts start Nick Foles on Christmas night. Chargers favored by four and a half. Feels a little like a rat line, JJ. But for the most part, are you buying the Chargers at all or are they just a stay away to you? So confession, I bet the Chargers at the beginning of the year to win the Super Bowl. And two or three weeks ago, I was completely out.

I said, this was a donation. I can't believe I got invested in this team knowing the history of this team. Well, what happens? They beat the Dolphins on Sunday night. They look amazing on Sunday night. Last week, I had Tennessee plus three. That game was not even that close.

They should have won that game by double figures. They're a different team. They should have. You're right. When Mike Williams and Keenan Allen are out there, they can put up points. Now, they are the Chargers. This game against the Colts scares the crap out of me.

They played Denver at the end of the year. Remember, they played Denver in that ugly, hideous Monday night game. They should have lost that Monday night game. I could see Denver playing spoiler there. I think the Chargers are the sort of team. Schrager, if they get in, I think they're insanely dangerous. But you can't rule out the possibility

of Chargers things happening over the next three weeks. Well, Schrags, this is why it's important. They could sneak in and immediately be favored in round one against Tennessee or Jacksonville. Easily. And they immediately be favored in round one against Tennessee Jacksonville. Easily. And they could be healthy at that point, too, for the most part,

except for J.C. Jackson. Kyle Brandt's on the Good Morning Football show with me. He had a hilarious bit. He goes, bring up their schedule, and it says Colts, Rams, Broncos. He goes, that scares the shit out of me. If you're a Chargers fan, you'd almost rather see Bengals, you know, Bills,

Chiefs, because this is where the scar tissue starts to play and it's like, are you going to slay that dragon once and for all? Because this is real.

Some franchises are just snake bitten and this is real and this is a classic type of stretch where the Chargers would screw the pooch. But if they can get over

that hump, they might not have to hear about this anymore. They might not have to hear about Marlon McCree. They might not have to hear about last year, what happened in Las Vegas on week 18. This is a huge game for them. And if they come out and they beat the Colts by 20 points, which they absolutely should, the Colts should be completely done. They have nothing left to play for. Everything is over. Nick Foles is out there. But if this is another nail biter, like last week was, there's real scar tissue there. And I know I'm friendly with people in that organization and they get really pissed about it. They're like, what is something that involved Nate Kading in 2005 have anything to do with Cameron Dicker

and our team now? Why are we talking about old chart like that's ridiculous new coach new everything and yet there is almost this grim reaper that is like hovering over that logo and until they get in the playoffs i think every chargers fan knows you got to bite your fingernails because it's not a sure thing well as you know nobody believes in baggage with a franchise more than me i'm the number one i mean, the Pats beat them into the Rex Grossman year. The game was over. They had the game-winning interception.

Troy Brown strips it to get the ball back. It might have been the single flukiest play of the entire Patriots dynasty. And then the Pats go next week and they almost make the Super Bowl. They don't. But they've had... I mean, think about how many games Marty Schottenheimer, where they were like

seven-point favorites, eight-point favorites in the playoffs they blew. I still remember Sean Ellis running all over them and the Jets and Sanchez going in there and winning a playoff game. The Jets. Naked missing field goals. Last year, the freaking Raiders. I know.

Herbert saving them on fourth and 18. They still don't win. So anyway, it's the most fun, I think, if just for football, if they make it and Miami makes it and Baltimore doesn't make it because I think Baltimore is torturous to watch. I don't even think Ravens fans like watching them.

So if you had to say rock, paper, scissors, but two make it, I'm giving you the Ravens, I'm giving you the Chargers, and I'm giving you the Dolphins. What are your two, JJ? I think all three can make it, technically. I think all three.

Here's the team you've got to throw in there as well, and they're definitely not as sexy, but they have a big one Thursday night, that would be the Jets. Or your team. If your team by some miracle... No, my team's out. Shoot my team to the sun. They're done. I still have to throw them in there. But out of those three,

schedule favors Ravens, Chargers, but I think, feel-wise, Chargers, Dolphins. I think the Chargers and the Dolphins are better teams than Baltimore. So who gets... Who's the best favorite for the 5-seed then? I would say the Dolphins. No, I'm going to say the Chargers-Dolphins. I think the Chargers and the Dolphins are better teams than Baltimore. Who's the best favorite for the 5-seed then? I would say the Dolphins. No, I'm going to say the Chargers.

Because I'm going to say they slay some demons win their final three games. You say they sleep the last three, even though we know they're the Chargers and they're going to fuck up one of those games. I'm actually going to give Chargers some love here. Maybe it's my Super Bowl talking. I don't know. Maybe it is. I'm pro. What are the Dolphins have left after this? It's tricky because Packers

at New England, home Jets, final game of the year. That home Jets could end up being for a playoff berth. I will be there, Schrager. I'm going to need a lot of alcohol for that game. A lot of it. You know what's crazy? The Mike White injury. You think the Jets

could honestly be 9-5. It was huge. If he just doesn't get hurt on that second hit, I think they'd steal that game two weeks ago. And then last week, same thing. And now tonight, Zach Wilson, just never going to think they're going to succeed with him. But the Jets could end up being 7-8 after tonight. And I think they're legitimately one of the 10 most talented teams.

Bill, let me ask you, and JJ, I want to hear your thoughts too. So we're in this local New York market, the two of us, and I feel like they ask Salah every day, and he's got different lines about Zach Wilson, and at some point it's like, what are you supposed to say? How would you guide him if you're the PR guy for the Jets or you're a media trainer when you know the kid just might not have it or isn't there yet?

And the things he was saying this week was like, it's not instant coffee. And he also referenced that he had a bowl game where he went 18 for 18 in a game. And Jets fans are dying with that. They don't want to hear that. What would you tell Salah? How would you handle it?

Because I think the only way you can do this is empower him publicly. You have to be that way, right? They have no choice. But the problem is, and you know this, Schrager, he lost everyone after that New England game. That New England game, that was the moment people were like, screw you, man.

You stunk. You were not accountable. You didn't own it. You can never recover from that in New York unless you're going to go and throw five touchdowns and be Superman when you come back. And, you know, the crazy thing about the last week against Detroit for Zach Wilson, for what he is as a quarterback, it's kind of the best you could hope for. He chucked it down the field,

backyard football. But then if you go back and rewatch the game, he's missing wide open. Garrett Wilson is basically throwing his hands up every single time. Zach Wilson throws him a pass and Garrett Wilson's a stud. Who's a great pick. Sal has got to tell him to cut it out. And I am no Zach Wilson fan. He ain't it. The jets are going to have either Mike white or Garoppolo or somebody else

next year. But man, if you're Robert Sally, you cannot have your quarterback to mean like that. Like you're, you're talking about build them up. Shagger. You got to build them up within the locker room. I know. Even if you're Robert Sally, you cannot have your quarterback to mean like that. You're talking about building them up, Shager. You've got to build them up within the locker room, too, even if he's a jerk.

Bill, what about you? What do you do if you're the coach? I was so impressed that JJ answered that question, honestly, when Zach Wilson might be his co-host on the New York New York podcast next year. Bill suggested that earlier today. I don't know.

I don't think he's fun enough. Could we make him like that boy? Like he's just like at the end of the pod, he just weighs in. He's going to need a job. He'd be spinning my coffee. I mean, my Starbucks that I get over on Smith street, he'd be spinning every day.

Okay. JJ, how worried are you for dolphins green Bay? Because one of the million dollardollar picks I was looking at was a little parlay with the Niners money line and the Dolphins money line, which is basically even. I've been trying to stay straight up for the most part. We totally disagree on the Niners game.

I just think they're too big and too strong for Washington. I think Washington, they are who they are, but this top five class is just a completely different class. Washington couldn't even score against the Giants. They've been awful in the red zone, and I think they're horribly coached, like horribly coached.

And you just can't tell me they're just going to go into San Francisco and beat that team. I think San Francisco needs a game. They still have a chance to get a two seed. So am I okay? Just Miami just has to win. They just have to chance to get a two seed. Am I okay? Miami just has to win. They just have to win by one point against Green Bay. Am I okay

with that or should I go somewhere else? Let me preface this. Aaron Rodgers scares the shit out of me. He's one of those dudes. Schrager probably remembers this. The last time he played in Miami, he pulled the damn Marino and it was Joe Philbin,

who, by the way, is like my least favorite coach ever. I was queasy. I was queasy to throw the ball. I love that guy. Knowing who was on the other sideline. That was one of the rare instances where I watched the coach in hard knocks

and said he has absolutely no shot. I knew he had absolutely no shot watching him in hard knocks. So Rodgers scares the shit out of me. But the Dolphins have been money at home. They are a different team when they play in Miami. Clip it off. Defensively.

Defensively. I know there's going to be a zillion Packer fans there too. Yes. Look at their splits this year though. Home and road on defense. They get after the quarterback. They force turnovers. And yes, Rodgers is on the sideline.

And they've won back-to-back games. They beat the Rams and they beat the Chicago Bears. So it's not like I saw Green Bay go take down Cincy and take down Buffalo on back-to-back weeks. Dolphins, it might be tight. It might be a back-and-forth game. They'll find a way. Dolphins won in this game.

McDaniels lost three games in a row with these guys on the road, but those three games were to good teams. San Francisco, the Chargers, and of course last week to Buffalo. He and LaFleur have a fascinating relationship. I've gone through the Shanahan relationship with you on the podcast. He and LaFleur

is even interesting because they were in the trenches as assistants together under Kyle Shanahan and they were together in Houston. They were together in washington they were together in atlanta and mike had some stuff in his life and had to go to the tampa ufl team and and it was lafleur who kind of pulled him back out of oblivion and said let's get you back in the league like that's another kind of deal where not big brother type thing maybe but but like LaFleur and McDaniel have a real tight relationship. And if there's ever Jedi mind trick stuff, like I could see LaFleur having it over McDaniel a little bit. Now here's the other part. They haven't been home in so long. They're finally

home. That's one of the only locales this weekend where the weather is going to be good. And you have to think if Dolphins fans really love this team and they really Christmas day, come out there and support your team. Do not have this thing filled with green and yellow on, on, on a Christmas day. Do not. And I can, and I almost have a foreboding feeling and JJ, tell me if I'm wrong, this thing might be a lot of Packers fans in the building. It always is though. But Trigger, you know that there are like fan bases that travel like crazy and who doesn't want to be in South Florida when it's miserable, basically 40 states out of 50 throughout the country.

The Packers, the Cowboys, the Patriots, and I'm sure there'll be a zillion Jet fans in week 18 too. Like that's because basically Florida is New York South these days. But I will say this about the Dolphin fan, they're in on this team. They like McDaniel.

They like Tua. They like Tua. They like the weapons. They don't want their hearts broken again. Were you throwing stuff at the TV when he just abandoned the run in the fourth quarter and the snow comes and most starts nowhere to be found? Yeah, it bothered me to no end. Big mistake. And it killed them the two plays in the first half where they had to settle for field goals.

And then you had Shurfield dropping a pass. And I didn't even like going for two. Normally, I'm always, hey, go for two. Aggressive, analytics, blah, blah, blah. I thought it was too early in the game to go for two.

And that kind of set off like that weird chain of events at the end of the game. But again, everyone said they were going to lose the game by 40 points. They were right there.

Like, you're a playoff team. You're better than the Packers. You should win this game. They weren't scared to go in there, but the Bills do not like the Dolphins. Talking to the Bills guys, that t-shirt crap that McDaniel pulled where it says, I wish it were colder. That didn't go over great with the Buffalo team.

Then they come in there. They come out there with the bravado and all this stuff. That's a good rivalry for the next several years. But that's good, though. It's good for the sport. It's good. They took the crap out of them for the last six years. Good that they're sticking up to them. That's the way I look at it.

They haven't beaten them in forever. And everyone was giving McDaniels shit for wearing that shirt. Have they seen a team play in Buffalo for the last five years? It's like, oh, well, that's really going to motivate the Bills that much more.

How about the Bills just have owned them, have dominated them, and match up well? Come on, man. So do you like Dolphins or Packers in this game? Who do you think wins it, JJ? Dolphins win the game. I'm already betting three and a half. I'm pond committed.

We're not ruining Christmas, Schrager. We're not ruining Christmas. I'm not going to Christmas dinner until this game ends. Can't do it. When the Bill Belichick Patriots died, a part of me died too. But now the Bill's Dolphins rivalry is the one. I'm doing the Rocky IV speech.

This is it. This is it. No, it's the Bill's Dolphins is the, it's the rivalry now. It's going to be super fun. And I totally agree with you guys.

Just the thing on Green Bay. This will happen sometimes in the NFL. They lost seven of eight. The only game they won was that stupid Dallas overtime game. They beat Chicago by nine. Congratulations. They beat the Rams on Monday night by 12.

Game was kind of weirdly a little bit closer than maybe it seemed for a half. The Rams have nobody left. And I just feel like this line's too low. I feel like with Rodgers, and the Patriots have some of this too, because the Bengals should be favored by like six points in New England. What has New England done to earn anything?

The Bengals are way better than New England. But there's this Rodgers, Packers. Oh, there's going to be a lot of Packer fans, something. I think the three and a half is the steal. And the fact that they're only minus 190, you get to put that minus 190 with the Niners and get even odds on that parlay. I'm leaning that way for a million dollar picks.

Let me throw two more games at you guys. Steelers minus two and a half against Vegas. It's going to be freezing cold. Awful. Nine degrees. Run the ball. Smash mouth. What makes us think Vegas can

fly across country? They should have lost the Pats game. They're alive now. The game was over. There's a flicker of a heartbeat now. That is not a smash mouth cold weather team. That's all the more reason

to like the Steelers, Schrager, that much more. This is my favorite bet of the week. I cannot wait to bet this game. You think the Franco Harris thing is going to play? Yes. Oh, I forgot about that. Anniversary of the Immaculate Reception. The passing of Franco Harris.

Motion in the stands. It's going to be five degrees. The Raiders are going to want nothing to do with playing that game. I saw that line at two and a half. I pounced. I love, love the Steelers. Are you doing that game, Schrager? I'm not.

I'm not. We originally were supposed to. I was going to be on the sidelines for it, but I'm not. I'm going to be at Fox on the weekend on Saturday. But we for NFL Network, it's an NFL Network game. We have been hyping it to no end before the Franco passing, and we've had all the Steelers legends and all this stuff. He passes at like 6 45 AM Eastern.

We go on air at seven. We basically break the news. It's tragic. And it's a gut punch. What we found out afterwards, they were going to raise his Jersey and retire the 32 before he even passed away this Saturday night. Like there's something, there's something I get the goosebumps. It's very eerie.

And you know, Mike Tomlin does not do good morning football. He's not that guy who's so weird. There's something, I get the goosebumps. It's very eerie. And Mike Tomlin does not do good morning football. He's not that guy who's out there. Mike Tomlin wanted to come on this morning and talk about Franco. I think Tomlin knows what this means to that fan base. I would be shocked if the Steelers don't come out playing their best game of the season. You know, the other thing, I thought the Steelers,

so I don't know what happened to them in that Baltimore game. I lost on Steelers games two weeks in a row, a million-dollar pick, and in real life. In the Baltimore game, all of a sudden, Baltimore just ran the ball down their throats in the fourth quarter. Well, and it just turned it over a zillion times because I had Pittsburgh, too.

Trubisky was inside the 30-yard line like five times. And a blocked field goal didn't help. Yeah. Last week, I thought their defense looked really good against Carolina and felt like they... I thought Watt had a little swagger back. I didn't know how hurt he was, but it felt like he was back to where he needed to be.

And just in general, I don't think they're bad. And the good thing with them betting on them, they're six and eight. They're somehow not out of the race yet. Right? If they beat Vegas, they knock out Vegas.

The Pats lose to the Bengals. They'll, they'll both be seven, eight with them. If the Jets loses Jax tonight, they'll both be 7-8 with them if the Jets lose to the Jags tonight they'll be 7-8 and if they can potentially get into some sort of tie situation with Baltimore they don't have the X next to them yet

so I don't know I think they'll have something to play for so that was one I was looking at the Bengals-Pats, I don't want to talk about it but let's just say the Bengals are going to show up a million dollar picks I've had it. We're spite betting against the Pats. Yeah, spite bet.

This is reverse jinx. I can smell this from a mile away. I know you hate the team. How is that line only three? The Bengals are way better. I don't disagree. The line is only three for the same reason your line is only three and a half

because there's Pats, Mystique, and Belichick. Nobody watches this team. This is not a Patriots team anymore. Well, Zola said it's the dumbest team you've ever had. It's the dumbest Pats team since Pete Carroll was the coach before Pete Carroll had his brain transplant. The other one I like. I mean, it's no surprise. It's no surprise.

The Eagles line to me is just bonkers. I just can't believe. They give too much disrespect to Minshew. The Eagles are the best team in the league. They are the best across the board. They have the most talent. Like I was looking at their third down, fourth down. They're 20 for 27 on fourth down this year.

It's fucking, that's impossible. That's like a video game. Third down, they're 50%. Their defense can do anything. They have playmakers all over the place. You really think like, oh, we don't have Jalen Hurts, so we're going to suck now? What has Dallas done the last couple weeks to make you think that they're even

good? Dallas, their defense doesn't get stops anymore. Last week, their opponent had 500 yards on them. Jaguars. Jaguars. They came back from 17. So, I just don't get this line at all. I think even with Minshew, you could tell me

alright, Cowboys 3, I get it. It's the backup. He hasn't played all there, but then you throw in my love for Minshew. I think the Eagles, this is a three-point game. I think the Eagles could win. Am I nuts, JJ? No, you're not. Okay. The only thing that scares me

is that I think many folks are going to have the sentiment that you do. As you can tell, sure, I like to go contrarian with a lot of these bets. But the line has been all Dallas money.

Dallas is blown up. I endorse the pick. This is not one of my favorite games of the week. I just think there's too much uncertainty with the quarterback change. Now, Minshew played at MetLife Stadium last year. Now, the Jets were not a good defensive team. He torched them.

I remember I did a pod right after that game, and I said, if I were the Eagles, he's my quarterback for the rest of the year. It's offseason. A lot of people were saying, after Jalen Hurts against the Bucs, they were saying, how do you not make this an open competition? Let Minshew fight for it. Here's my only thing on this game. The Eagles now are 13-1.

The next closest team is two games back of them. Is this one of those where it's a foot off the pedal? I know they hate the Cowboys and all this stuff and it would be great, but the Eagles, they've got that number one seed kind of locked up. They just need to win one of these next few games. I don't know.

Is this one of those where— They don't have the NFC East locked up yet. Yeah, but this is sort of game, though. You might play Dallas in the playoffs. To Schrager's point, hey, do we want to maybe take this skill back a little bit? Not that they don't try, but listen, are they going to throw the full complement of plays at Dallas knowing they might play in the divisional round? I have the best counter of all time.

Okay. If you beat Dallas in Dallas with Minshew, you've murdered their season. They're done. That is a fucking vampire cross in the heart. Write them off. We fucking beat you with our backup quarterback. Fuck you.

And I think they're going to care about that. I also think like in the heart. Write them off. We fucking beat you with our backup quarterback. Fuck you. Who's next? And I think they're going to care about that. I also think like... These teams don't like each other. The Eagles hate them. They don't like each other, but they have Saints-Giants last two weeks. If I'm the Eagles, I want to clinch everything. I want to get it done. I don't want to bring Hurts back. I just want to get ready. I have

two weeks left in the bye week. I want my guy healthy. Let's get this done. Let's go into Dallas. Let's beat their asses and prove we have a better team. I think they're going to have a ton of motivation. So you disagree, JJ? Yeah, I just don't want the spot. I think the history of the league tells us that for these teams that I know technically speaking, they haven't clinched the division and they haven't clinched the one seed, but they kind of have. You know what I mean?

So that sense of urgency, to me at least, is going to be there a lot more for Dallas, who's coming off that humiliation last week, more so with them than it is from a Philly standpoint. Again, I don't like the game. It is one of the games that I went through. I said, no, not taking it. I'm out. Schrager, what's wrong with Dallas other other than the injury defense their defense i mean micah parsons was was being talking

to the mbp in the first 10 weeks against the texans he didn't have a tackle didn't have a sack didn't have a quarterback pressure last week they're up 27 to 10 and you know boss man fat joseph over there the number one the the corner he's getting double moved by zay jones like crazy stuff happening on defense and dan quinn's defense prides itself on discipline and we're not going to get beat on stupidity. Like their defense has fallen apart two weeks in a row. Now I don't have LaShawn McCoy's thoughts on Dak Prescott. I thought that was, that was, that was a strong take. I'm not sure if you saw that one yet, but I would say that Dak Prescott, like you've said with cousin Sal, like he leaves a lot to be the desired in these big games.

And it's like, when are we going to get to that game where he says, you know what? I'll put it on my back and we'll be okay. Yes, they went 98 yards against the Texans, but can we not get in those situations? Where's his security blanket? Where's the second receiver? They never replaced the Cooper thing.

They thought they did, but they didn't. Who's their third and seven? To me, even them laying the five and a half, I still feel like you can get cheap touchdowns on them late. You look at their injury report, Sal's very upset about Vander Esch being out. He's out. He's a big deal. Lawrence is questionable.

Hurst is questionable. Parsons now is questionable. He's been sick. In general, their secondary is really banged up Anthony Brown's on injured reserve Going down the line And it's like It's just not the same Dallas team

That it was in week seven It's just not And the Eagles have way way more talent So I love grabbing the five and a half I don't think I would put them In underdog parlay Before we go

Not that confident See I thought you would for sure. No, I just like the five and a half. Okay. But if you like the five and a half, why don't you like them to win? Out of curiosity. I do.

I just don't want to have two bets on them. Too much liability? Okay. I love this gambling talk. Too much liability? Couple underdog parlays for you guys. Got Texans plus 144 against a legitimately destroyed Titans team. I don't totally trust the Texans plus 144 against, against a legitimately destroyed Titans team.

I don't totally trust the Texans, but Falcons are plus two 65. I'm out on that one. Stupidly saints in Cleveland, freezing cold weather, zero degree weather and 40 mile per hour wind shakes. Lowest, lowest total in an NFL game.

I think at like 15 or 20 years. 32 and a half. Is it Taysom Hill time in this game? I think it's a lot of Taysom Hill time in this game, but I also think it's a lot of Chubb and Hunt time in this game. Chubb's hurt. He's going to be playing hurt.

He's got some foot thing. I don't know. I don't think that Browns team, they're like the kind of small, fast defense that you can kind of overpower. I don't want them in zero degrees. To me, this line should be pick them. So Saints are plus 130.

And then the last one, you tell us, JJ, the Giants. I think they're going to be alive in the game. I really do. First of all, the Vikings, every game comes down to the wire. That's a guarantee. So you see in three and a half, four, I would scoop that immediately. And I think the giant defense has found something. Kayvon Thibodeau was a man possessed in that Washington game. He set a tone. They got Ojalary back like they have four guys who can disrupt., I'm nervous about their secondary in this game because Schrager was at the Giant Eagle game. If you have big-time receivers,

it can be dangerous against that Giant secondary without Adoree Jackson and without McKinney. I got a weird feeling the Giants have to get that monkey off their back winning the game in primetime against Washington. I think they play loosey-goosey.

I think they're in the game. I have no read on the Giants, Bill. I follow this team closer. This is my hometown, local team. JJ, wouldn't you not be shocked if they lost 31-0? See, but I wouldn't be shocked if they won a game either. I know. That's why you stay away. I wouldn't be shocked either way.

No idea. I can't beat this team. Yeah, but isn't that perfect for underdog parlay, though? Yeah. It's either they're gonna get blown out or they might actually win i'll say this with the giants i think they're exceptionally well coached oh he's coaching and i know there are a lot of great candidates sirianni's a great candidate o'connell's a great candidate they have the worst duo of wide receivers in the nfl like not a big

isaiah hodgins guy hodgins james Slayton would be like a number three or four receiver on a good team. And Dable is finding a way to make it work. He's incredible, guys. Incredible. Like, Seawords Giants on Sunday night basically came down to the coaching. Yeah. Right? I thought Washington was slightly better, but for the most

part, it just came down to game management and dumb shit. And the Giants have just been really good. And a Washington fan would say it came down to officiating, but you know. Well, and that too. Not great. Joe House would have something to say about that. You're not lying. Alright, so help me with the underdog. Which two do you like? Saints,

Texans, Falcons, Giants? I like the Falcons. I like the Saints. Falcons and Saints. Let's pick one of each. Let's go. There you go. One of mine, one of Schrager's. Falcons-Saints plus 613. Let's do it. Alright, I'm going to send you guys off.

I'm going to do million dollar picks. And then Schrags. So no game for you this week? No sideline for you? I'm in studio. I'm doing the Fox NFL kickoff on Saturday. I know. JJ will appear in any TV studio in the tri-state area on 10 minutes notice.

Yeah. I mean, that's the beauty. Schrager knows this. When you live in Brooklyn and the studio's in downtown, I'm in the car in 10 minutes. So yeah, you put a suit on, I got to do my makeup.

But my mom did not know that I was doing this spot with you and Schrager. My mom, Schrager, probably has no idea who you are. Probably sees you on TV all the time. But you know, you're the good looking guy on TV. She goes, I love that guy in the sidelines jacket.

You gotta get you one of those jackets. Look at you, Schrager. So funny. I was like, mom, what's wrong with my jacket? Peter King wrote about the jacket in his Monday column. And it's because Mike McDaniel in the halftime interview, there was like a very like meandering interview, which I loved.

And then he says, nice jacket on TV. And a million people thought that was hilarious. It's a $90 jacket from Eddie Bauer. Trust me, I'm not sponsored. You can get it online. Go for it, JJ. Nice. All right, JJ, you're coming back much later in the pod.

We're going to talk New York sports, a little baseball, a little basketball. Schrags, I will see you next Thursday. Happy holidays. Give us one. Give us one. Let's go for the road. For all the kids out there celebrating the holiday season, let's go. This episode is brought to you by Movember. The mustache is back with a vengeance. Look at Travis Kelsey. Before he rocked that Super Bowl ring, he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember. You'll do great things too.

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This message is brought to you by Metrolinks. Brian Curtis is here from The Ringer. He hosts a podcast called The Press Box where he covers media stuff. It's near the end of the year. We're going to do this quickly. There weren't like a ton of amazing sports media stories.

And then the best one happened with about nine days to go in the month. Sunday ticket, moving homes, not to Apple. I just assumed it was going to be Apple. Now we're going to Google. We're going to YouTube TV and everyone is rejoicing because we can finally get rid of direct TV out of our lives. But were you surprised by this being the home for Sunday Ticket? A little bit, especially that it

broke kind of late. And I think as you look into it, I'm also a little surprised at some of the details. So you and I both had direct TV in order to be able to watch football games. And the price you pay was you had to pay a hundred plus dollars for direct TV. Well, according to the articles I'm reading today, you don't necessarily need to sign up for YouTube TV, which is like 65 bucks a month to get the Sunday ticket under the new deal. You can get it under YouTube's primetime channels thing, like you can buy the League Pass a la carte. That's an interesting wrinkle to me because

the whole point of having it on DirecTV was to get DirecTV subscribers to buy a bunch of channels. In our case, channels we mostly don't want. But YouTube is saying, okay, you can come in and buy this a la carte, not necessarily sign up for YouTube TV. I thought that was kind of curious.

Are we sure it's going to stay that way? Maybe not. That doesn't make a lot of sense to me in terms of the advantages that it would bring for Google. And by the way, they have more money than anyone. And I'm not sure that they're looking at this as we've got to make a profit. I don't know. We crunched the numbers.

We're a little short. Like they don't care. I think to me, it's more of a statement for them that, hey, this is a thing we have. And if you didn't have YouTube TV before, you didn't care about it. Now you have to. But you're right. It should be part of YouTube TV. Should be how it works. Maybe there'll be some a la carte thing where it'll be more expensive than getting YouTube TV. They'll try to do it like that. Or it'll be like four months for $300. There's some people crunching the numbers today. It was basically like impossible for them to make money, but I don't think they care.

Like Amazon Prime just did the Thursday Night Football thing. They probably lost money on it, but I think it was ultimately a good thing for them. It got people in the habit of going there for live programming in a way that we never have before. So if you're YouTube TV, I think that's what you want. And that's why these sports rights are so important. What else are we missing with this? Well, Peter Kafka, who we both know, said on Twitter today that this is probably the down payment for Google and YouTube getting more involved with the NFL in the future. And if you look when this deal runs out, it runs out just about the time that all those broadcast deals run out, that the NFL just signs a seven-year deal. So, you know,

this is, this is the, this is a little welcome gift, right? Hey, we got, we got Sunday ticket. Now, when that NFC package comes up in seven years and it's still the only TV people want to watch live, we're here. We're in business together. And there's proof of concept with the other leagues too, which is why it was important for Amazon to get into the game with the NFL and show that they could have a good production that didn't break down, that had real announcers. Same thing for this. And NBA is coming up soon. I really don't think there's much of a chance Turner keeps the NBA. I think it's going to be too expensive. And if they keep it, I think it'll be really, really, really abbreviated. And

maybe they don't get playoffs or maybe they get a couple of playoff games. That's it. But I think it's going to be ESPN. And then some second streaming thing will get a huge chunk of the games. And in that case, they're looking at, oh, how did YouTube do with the NFL? How did Amazon do? How did Apple do with baseball? And the answer was poorly. Apple, I think, fared the worst. Apple treated it gimmicky and they got gimmicky announcers and they just kind of treated it like a lark. And it got to the point where Judge is potentially going to break the home run record and people are like, hey, can we have a real broadcast for this one so i think uh i think apple probably failed the test i think amazon has passed but they also spent more money

than god um and i'm sure youtube will too i think there's some real opportunities for them though to to have a more fun experience because i just think direct TV was really bad. The last five, six years, like little stuff like the, the channel seven Oh one that had the four games on the same screen. Right. And they pick the games. Two of them always sucked.

There was a huge banner down the left side. And then there was a huge banner on the bottom. So the screens were shorter than they should have been. And it was just like the biggest missed opportunity ever. It's like, you have the chance to put all four games. Now, some people pointed out to me on Twitter that on the streaming version of

direct TV, you could have better control of what the games were and things like that. But to me, it's like, make the screens as big as possible. Give me the choice. And I'm good to go. Same thing for like alternative broadcasts,

which is something DirecTV never really cared about, but they would have the red zone. They had the fantasy channel that I don't know anyone to watch that, but could they do, could, could YouTube do more alternative broadcasts? It just feels like it's, it's a missed opportunity so far. Don't you think? I think so. And I think with Amazon, that's the thing they're still working on, right? Game looked great. Al's in there. Recognizable voice. We love Al. But what was the real innovation beyond the football game we could watch on Broadcast

Network? Well, we had Dude Perfect, whatever that consortium of people is doing the alternate broadcast. We had LeBron. That was weird. Super weird. Hannah Storm and Andrea Kramer. They kind of did their version of the Manning cast,

but it's like, you guys aren't the Mannings? You don't have three Super Bowls? And there's just nothing you're looking at going, that's an Amazon thing, right? Like that's different than broadcast television. You gave us the game and the game looked great, but what's the bell or whistle you're going to put on this that makes me think this isn't TV anymore?

You gave us Grumpy Al Michaels. You gave us Kirk Herbstreet, who had never watched a football game in the NFL before until this year and was learning the league on the fly. And they had no chemistry whatsoever the entire season. But the production of it was great. I mean, I was really worried. I was worried it was going to be stopping and I never really had an issue.

There was maybe one game early in the season, but other than that, um, but for the most part, I thought it worked. And I think for Google and YouTube, they're the big behemoth just in general, right? Like everyone always points to Apple, whether it's you're talking sports rights or you're talking movies or you're talking podcasts. But Google and YouTube, they have the most money. They reach the most people. They have the widest variety of ages, especially like the under 20 and the under 25.

They have the most diversity of their viewers. And whatever they get into, they're going to win. And it's been interesting to watch them kind of tiptoe around. And even YouTube TV, I don't feel like, do you feel like that's been a massive success? Because it's like, it's okay. Not necessarily, no. So this is a real opportunity for them to kind of point their flag in a bunch of different ways. Can you and I do a farewell to DirecTV?

You know, I really want to do that because I was thinking, I'm going back to 1994. I'm staying at Beth Barr's house in Vermont, high school friend, and her family had a satellite and I was, and it wasn't DirecTV, it was pre-DirectTV and flipping channels and found this Timberwolves game with Kevin McHale announcing. And I'm like, what the hell is going on? It was like, I felt like I was landing in a UFO in the future. And then DirecTV, I probably got, I think 2000. And it was same thing. It was like, this is incredible. This is amazing. I get to watch all the games. I get to get the games I'm gambling on. And it was a really cool innovation. It's just,

they didn't innovate on it really for the last 15 years. But I do think it was a really important thing. I don't feel like it, I don't think it's a negative for me. How do you feel about it? Legacy West? Well, I agree with what you said. And I also feel like that kind of weird in recent years because you and I still flip channels every once in a while because we're from the channel flipping era. And I'd be flipping through and be like, okay, there's a show, there's a show. And then you get to a channel on DirecTV and it would just say like Tylenol lawsuit. And that would be running all day. And I'm like, what is that?

And then you get a few more and it'd be like dental implants and it'd be running all day. This is like opening my mailbox in front of my house. What is happening happening these aren't these aren't channels this isn't even qvc this is just weird thing i don't understand and why am i paying what was a hundred plus dollars a month still to get tylenol lawsuit like well putting these old satellites satellite dishes on your house house, which will seem insane 10 years from now. But that was a big thing, especially if you're in more remote locations. I think DirecTV, the reason I'm not positive it'll ever go away is because in remote locations where the

streaming's a little iffy, you're still going to need it. And airplanes., like JetBlue should just buy DirecTV and take the thing. But it's certainly like when you think, what was the AT&T bought it for? Some crazy, crazy price like eight years ago. And it was immediately one of the worst media deals of the past 15 years, which is saying something. I think now I don't,

football was kind of the last reason to have it. And it's going to be a mass exodus. I was joking on Twitter today. I think they're going to be like the crazy ex that you want to break up with them and you just can't. They're just like, no, we fired all of our customer service people.

You can't cancel us. You're going to have to like change your credit card or cancel your credit card to get a new one just to stop paying them. And even then they'll probably find out what the new credit card is. I mean, the thing with DirecTV, they've had the worst customer experience of literally anything I belong to for the last 10 years of anything, name any sort of, I need customer help. DirecTV is the worst. And they kind of take pride in it. Like they own it.

And now it's, it's just going to be everybody canceling it. It's time to pay the piper, DirecTV. Are you and I going to be up on the roof taking the satellite dish down ourselves one of these days? Oh, they won't. They'll fire all those people. Take it down yourself or just be stuck to your house for the rest of the day. DirecTV, they did crazy stuff.

If your receiver broke and they mailed you the new receiver to put in, you had to then mail the receiver back to them or it was like a $500 deposit for some receiver that meant nothing. DirecTV was insane. I'm so glad to have them out of my life. I think I'm going to keep it through the basketball season and then that's it. But you're right. In the early 2000s, it was a really cool company.

It was awesome. In the early 2000s, it was a really cool company. And I think it really served a purpose for people like us, people that had favorite teams and didn't live in the cities. Yeah. And remember, what we're saying about them now is what we were saying about cable companies in the early 2000s. Like, here's some people we want to break up with forever. Right. Cable company who had to go and remember having to go into the office to do things and terrible customer service and you know you felt like you were getting ripped off all the time it was it was a huge advance over that well now we are moving back toward some weird version

of the same bundle where we're gonna have all these different streamers and then some of them have like hulu has live tv all that stuff we're basically in have all these different streamers and then some of them have like Hulu has live TV, all that stuff. We're basically in the same situation paying the same amount of money, but we're happy that we're not paying for really a lot of channels that we didn't need, I think. It still feels like we could do a lot better. I wish there was a czar in charge of all this.

Give me your three biggest, I asked you to give us your three favorite sports media stories of the year. We have nine days left. What are they? Let's go backwards. Number three. Do I do Jason Garrett's halftime teases at number three or number one, do you think?

Where should I put these? I think it could be one, two, and three. I'm going to go with the New York Times buying The Athletic. I mean, that seems like a million years ago, but that was 2022. If you remember. Um, and I put that on there for two reasons. One sports writing, where's that going to happen? What's that going to be like in 2023? And I think also the athletic, what's that going to be like in 2023? Because I know when I hear from people, it's like, is the travel budget going to be the same? We said at The Athletic at the outside, it's going to be beat writing, like the old school newspaper beat writing. Is New York Times going to want to fund that at the same rate? Are they going to want as many writers? Because New York Times is facing the same kind of headwinds everybody else is, even though they've got a lot of money and

they're doing well on a lot of stuff. So to me, that's the interesting one, largely because it's so unresolved. And, and, you know, and the other, I guess the bigger part is like the New York times in sports, that's always been kind of a weird marriage, right? Done good things. Historically, if you go way back in that department, but at the same time, they're not, they're a weird custodian for the future of sports writing in a lot of ways a lot of ways they're the best because they're the new york times they care about journalism they care about journalists but in another way journalism um they sometimes care about journalism um listen they overpaid for the athletic and i think they got rope-a-doped a little bit from

the subscriber count which is why you've seen in the last two months, the athletic is running all these subscriber deals where it's like a dollar a month, dollar 50 a month, half price off for a year. This is what they did before they got sold because you're trying to jack the subscriber numbers. And then you could go to the New York Times, you're trying to get bought and you say, oh, we have over a million subscribers. But if those, if like two thirds of those people are paying a dollar a month, that's not worth it for the budget you have. And I think there's real unrest with, first of all, they've canceled some of the beat, right? Like they're not even covering all the teams anymore, right? Like in the different leagues, it's, what is it like? I don't know what the exact number is,

but there's definitely every league has teams that just aren't being covered at all anymore. I think from an audio standpoint, why does the New York Times care about the audio piece of it? Like they bought the Athletic to juice their subs. They said that. They've said that in every interview they've done.

They've said it in every stock call that they've done is that we bought this because we have this goal to get to, what was it, 11 million subscribers or 12 million? Yeah, I can't remember. And the athletics are going to help us. So I don't know. I think there's real unease out there

for what that's going to look like because I think they do good stuff and I think they have some good people too. And I would love to know how committed the Times is going to be going forward, especially if the subs have been a little flimsy. And if it's not going to happen at the athletic, where's sports writing going to happen? It's not going to be going forward, especially if the subs have been a little flimsy. And if it's not going to happen at the athletic, where's sports writing going to happen?

It's not going to be ESPN long-term. ESPN's cut back big time already. Yeah, and you can see that's not a place going forward that's like, we care about words. So when local papers are local papers, that's not on the upswing. And Substack isn't nothing with this either. No.

Because they pulled people who have audiences who are now like, I can have my own audience. Yeah. And so you lose a couple of those people too. I don't know. I'll be really interested to see when you throw in the recession and whatever happens with the ad market.

I'll be really interested to see what happens with them going forward. All right, so that's your number three. What's number two? Consider Charles Barkley almost going to live just because Charles Barkley disappearing from television or at least NBA television is just one of the few announcer stories

that actually feels like a big deal. Like you'd feel like a missing piece there. I think everybody else, to a large extent, you could change around. But I went with the NBA's new media, quote unquote, push of 2022. Not because I necessarily think new media really, at the end of the day, is going to be something that's going to make people like you and I, you know, reassess our priorities or leave the business entirely. But it just is like, I mean, as a kind of front that opened up with athletes versus journalists and new ways to sort of be like, I don't want to talk to you anymore, or I will talk to you and then I will have my own postgame press conference as Draymond Green did during the finals.

What's interesting about these is I feel like the juice is based on how well the athlete or his team is playing. So like Draymond Green doing a press conference after the finals, especially when he had that really terrible game early on, you're kind of like, okay, I'm curious. But Aaron Rodgers this year on McAfee, when the Packers suck and he's not going to win his third straight MVP, it feels like, eh, okay. Well, it goes back to the old conundrum

of players and coaches just not being that interesting as interviews for radio stations. And this was a big Boston thing. We've talked about this, but when I used to be on Sean McDonough's show, he used to drive me crazy. He would get a big Boston thing. We've talked about this, but when I used to be on Sean McDonough's show, he used to drive me crazy. He would get like the BU hockey coach. And it was just 25 minutes of coach, you got to be proud of your kids. Who is this for? And it's the same

thing with the athletes. What's Aaron Rodgers really going to say? He might have two or three moments and then you get the soundbite out of it for the boat, but for the most part, he's going to be really careful. You know, he's not going to be like, they wave Sammy Watkins this way, right? Man, Sammy sucked. He, I can't believe how bad he was. Like, he's never going to say stuff like that. I also think there's too much of this stuff now and it all kind of feels vaguely the same.

So I still feel like takes and analysis and expertise is always going to win. And the players or the ex-players that have succeeded are the ones that have real insight on what we're watching. And if you're not going to have that, I don't think you're going to win. We've hit capacity on so-and-so tells a story about the time so-and-so and so-and-so almost got in a fight in the locker room. How many of these can we have? This is nine years of content now. So here's my proposal. Remember how American TV suddenly became like British TV and we decided everything needs to be a limited series with like 10 episodes rather than 35 episodes of ALF that you and

I grew up with? Yeah. What if it's like you and KD? It's like, we're going to do like five of these. Right. And then we're going to call it a day. Maybe that's where we go. You know, I still, I still feel like if the player is good and the player has real insight and the player doesn't give a shit, it's going to work. But when you start, like for instance, Draymond's podcast, we had to hear about how important the

new media was and he's the leader or whatever. And then something happened with him in his career where he punched his teammate and we had this whole incident. And it's like, all right, this would be a good test case for what does this podcast mean for the future of how this stuff is handled? And what did it turn into? The same crap as anything else. Puff piece, just kind of talking in platitudes and whatever. And then he does that TNT thing. And we never really got any insight into what happened or how it affected the team in real time, because he can't talk about that in real time.

So you're right. When the team is succeeding and you could be like, game three, we won. I guess that's interesting. I didn't personally find it interesting, but some people did. But now the Warriors just lost five of six on a road trip. Is he going to talk about like, here's why we suck? No. So I don't know where it goes.

The level of candor won't be the same, no. I do think though, on a positive, it's opened the door for a couple people who I think will be really good. And probably people, you know, like Jeff Green on Rosillo was great as a guest. I thought he was really good. He's really interesting you know, like Jeff Green on Celo was great as a guest. I thought he was really good.

He's really interesting. He's been in the league a while. He knows how to do it. He knew how to play the game. So I still feel like that stuff's going to be there. But in terms of like the biggest stars using a platform to give us real insight, even KD doesn't do that anymore.

KD did it with me four years ago because it was kind of newer, but it's not like he was talking eloquently about the Kyrie situation the last two months. He was, he turned into an athlete. He's been very careful, very careful. He's never going to win with content. Is the move more like people like JJ Redick, who is not the person, the first person that a network is going to look at during their career and be like, here's a future media star to go out and get reps, prove themselves, turn themselves into a personality. And then they get hired more easily or more quickly because they do that during their playing career. I think JJ is an anomaly though, because he was getting reps for, I mean, he was

with us for three years. He was with, I think his podcast was somewhere else before that for two years. Even it was uninterrupted for a couple months. But he had like five, six years of reps of how to do it and how to kind of tinker with it. I think when you're just asking people to come in cold, it's a little different. And, you know, in football,

like we're going to find out next year with Brady how he's able to make the turn. We might not, or we'll find out in two, three years. He's going to be playing for the 49ers and we got Greg Olson again. Right. I've listened to that Jim Gray-Brady thing a few times over the years,

and it's just not interesting. Like Brady doesn't say anything. No. I weirdly think he's going to get competitive when he gets in the booth, though. Maybe. It happened with our guy Aikman. Yeah, he did. He came out of a slumber.

He was ready, right? Got competitive. To me, before you do your number one, that's one of my favorite media stories is how everything kind of flipped with the announcers in the NFL. Okay. And how that as number one, because number one is announcer late shift. Oh, let's okay. Well, so we'll combine those. So you go and then I'll, I'll add if, if, if, if I have anything to add, we all wanted to feel like Bill Carter, when Jay Leno and David Letterman were trading places. Yeah. We finally got to do it by the way. What a great full

employment act for the sports media beat for a couple of months there when everybody changed places. 8-minute buck to Monday Night Football. Tirico steps in on Sunday night. Al Michaels Sunday to Thursday night on Amazon. We also had a bunch of weird ones. Remember in the late shift, I was like, oh, Gary Shandling almost hosted Letterman's show after Leno. We got a few of those with like Sean McVay, almost to Amazon. John Lynch, almost back to Amazon.

Aikman, almost to Amazon. It was really a fascinating period. Though I got to say, you and I have now watched almost a year of football with new announcers or reshuffled announcers. Did anything change for you about your NFL watching experiences here? I think everything feels worse. Really? Worse? Because I thought Michaels and Collinsworth were great together. And now I think they both suffered. I don't think Collinsworth has the same chemistry with Tirico.

I don't think Al and Herbstreet are good. And I just don't think Herb Street's interesting to listen to because I don't think he knows the NFL that well. And that's what I want to hear. I want to hear expertise from somebody who either played or somebody like Collinsworth, who has been so wired in for so many years that he has his... If you don't have a sense of history with what you're watching, then you're just reacting to the game. It's no different than if I'm watching with my son. I'm like, that was a great run. You have to levitate above the game in some way.

And I still think that's why Collinsworth is really good. But to me, Aikman and Buck are far superior to all the other teams now. Because of their chemistry. Because of their chemistry together. Chemistry and insight. And the fact that Aikman will go after people. And I think this is where Romo has really slipped.

I just don't think he's critical. And now the further away he's gotten from the game, he's kind of turning into Phil Simms. Like he's a more congenial, but it's the same thing. The ultimate insult. You're turning into Phil Simms. That's how I feel. Boomer Esiason on the radio is great.

I don't know if you've ever heard him, but his radio broadcast is really good. I think Jason McCourty this year, I don't know if you've heard him on Monday Night, I think he's Monday Night Football. He's fantastic. And by the way, he's really good on Schrager's show too. I feel like he's just gotten way better

over the four months, but as an announcer, thought he was really good. I think Mark Sanchez is good. I don't know if you've heard him, but I think he's done a good job. And I think Jonathan Vilma is good. All of those guys are better just analyzing a football game than Romo is at this point. And I think that's what he's got to fix. He's got to start doing the homework again. Here's the Romo thing to me. He comes into a game and he's totally interested in the two quarterbacks. Right. And if the quarterbacks put up 45 points, he is engaged and he is, oh, Jim, I got to

watch this, Jim. It's amazing. Yeah. But if it turns into like 2110, he just feels like he checks out a lot of times over the course of the game. Like he just, his energy goes down to here. He doesn't seem to be watching the offensive line, defensive line at all. It doesn't have that Collinsworth, you know, moment where let's look at this defensive

end, what he's doing to the right tackle over here. Well, this is a big Brian Curtis thing. You're like, you have to be good when the game's 28 to seven. That's the, that's the test, man. Anybody can call it. That was bad. And was the best at that. Yeah.

And Matt would just be like, I got this. I'm going to entertain you for the next hour. I got it. I got it. I will ramp it up, and it's 35 to nothing. I'm going to make this more fun now. Yeah, and I thought Romo had it, but I just don't feel like he's had it this year at all.

I feel like, yeah, I still feel he's good enough to be a number one guy, but I just feel he's not on lock. Dude, this is what Romo was like as a quarterback, by the way. This is exciting. Remember that? It was like, wow. Leave something to be desired sometimes. I think it's hard to find number one dudes.

You're seeing in the NBA now where they're doing three-man booths. You know how hard it is to do a three-man NBA just in general? You really have to lay out like Mark Jackson does. But they're putting Van Gundy and Candice. I think Candice is actually pretty good. As an actual game announcer, I think she has

real insight. I think she's smart. I haven't liked her as much on studio, but I think for the games, she'll be sitting there and watch it, but then you're putting in Stan who's got the high usage rate and it's just going sideways. I think Van Gundy's been really good.

But for the most part, like who is the ex-athlete who's played in the last 10 years, who's come on to either an NBA studio show or an NBA game and added real insight. I thought it was going to be Dwayne Wade, but I think he just made too much money and he just didn't care. But in general, it's kind of crazy that we don't have somebody every couple of years. These are some of the most eloquent

athletes we have. When you talk about the NBA rights coming up and potentially winding up with a bunch of bidders and maybe that second, let's say espn is the number one thing still but the second one gets divided up that to me is the most exciting part is that somebody can come in and be like we just need to reset this and also put pressure on espn to just rethink a bunch of things about the way they do the nba but they have jj's jj and van gundy are both excellent yeah but i mean i think Doris is good too. On the studio. Look, they have good announcers.

Breen's awesome. Like they have, it's not like rehire everybody. I just feel they need an artistic, you know, the production of the game. The theme music, which I guess is getting, which I guess got changed this year.

Just everything felt just a little stale for me about ESPN. I agree. Yeah, they're just kind of running it back. And, you know, as always with ESPN, the talent changes. The people behind the scenes, they never change. It's all the same people, just forever. It's always somebody else's fault. We'll leave on that note, Brian Curtis. Happy holidays. It was great to see you. Happy YouTube TV, no more direct TV day. Dude, I can't wait. I'm going to miss dental implants, the television channel, but it's going to be a great 2023. All right. Good to see you. See ya.

All right. He's the host of our New York, New York podcast. John Jastrzemski is here. It is a tumultuous, crazy, wild time in New York sports. I remember when we were creating the podcast, I don't know whether it was almost a year and a half ago. And we were thinking, you know, the Knicks might get better. Jets, Giants, they're kind of maybe on the rise. Who knows? Yankees, Mets, maybe that'll get interesting. And it went haywire. So we'll go in order. You've done some of this on your pod, but my audience, you know, they don't totally know what's going on at the New York scene. Number one, Mets,

Yankees switch places. It's very strange. Your buddy Sean Fennessey was on my pod 24 hours ago, and he's referring to the Mets as the evil empire. And BS, when you spend a half a billion dollars this offseason and you get Verlander to swap for DeGrom, you give Nimmo eight years, you get Senga,

you're just spending money like a drunken sailor. You're like, great, but the Braves are really good. The Phillies are really good. How did they close the gap? How did they put themselves over the top? To go and steal Correa from the Giants when there's some issues with the physical? Cohen swoops in. The news breaks at three in the morning. You know, this this was like a George Yankee type of move. And to do it on the day in which Aaron Judge is getting named Yankee captain, you steal the back pages from the Yankees. The Mets right now to talk in a town, and they're the biggest spender in all baseball. It's insane. I can't believe it.

And the funniest thing has been the Mets fans who have been bitching about the Yankees their whole lives, even going back to the 80s, before your time, when the Mets organically grew their 86 title team, when Strong, Gooding came up, and a bunch of the pitchers and a couple smart trades. And they're like, this is how you do it. George doesn't do it this way. This is how we do it. And now they're just George in the late seventies and the early eighties. And it's great. And I love it. And the funniest thing is the Mets fans who always hated it

are now like the divorce guy who's just like sleeping with 24 year olds. Like, Hey, this is great. Everybody was right. I never knew this world existed. And they just don't care. And they just love it. And they love that they've flipped it on the Yankees. But you raised an interesting point in the fantasy pod. The Mets didn't go after Aaron Judge. And there were some incredible conspiracy theories about this.

Could you tell the audience about the conspiracy with this? Oh, I don't even think it's a conspiracy. I would go on record BS and say it's fact because Steve Cohen gets whoever he wants. He got Max Scherzer. He got Francisco Lindor. He gets Justin Verlander. The Mets were dying for power. Who's the biggest power bat on the market? A guy who plays in your city, plays right field for the New York Yankees, and you're not making an offer, you're not making a play for one Aaron Judge, leads me to believe- A death blow for the Yankee franchise. That's what I mean. It would be win-win. I mean, first of all, you'd help your team, and you'd enhance your World Series odds. Number two, you'd stick it to the Yankees in the absolute

worst way. So why did Cohen not get involved? I think it's pretty simple. I think Hal Steinbrenner was one of the few owners who came out in support of Steve Cohen getting the Mets. Cohen gets the Mets and maybe it's hush, hush, wink, wink, gentleman's agreement. I'm not going to go after your guy. Now I might upstage you when you're going to have your press conference on Wednesday, but I'm not going to go after your guy. To me, there's something to that. There's no other way around it. So like two mafiosos who are competing against each other, but they kind of agree to split up the corners a little bit.

Divide the territory. Yeah, exactly. Divide the territory. Because in this case, they spend, what, 315 on Correa to move him to third base, even though it's an excellent shortstop because they already have a shortstop. They could have just spent 360 on Judge and put him in the outfield where they actually needed

people and he has more power and made way more sense for them. I think you're right. Maybe you're right. It's not even a conspiracy. There's something fishy about it. The Correa Lindor thing, mild shades of 2003, 2004 Jeter A-Rod, right? I don't see it that way.

I'm going to tell you why. They're a buddy-buddy. And I don't think it's for games. I'm just talking about A-Rod moving to third base. Well, yeah, I could see that. And not only that, as good a shortstop as Correa is, his body type, I think is just like tailor-made to go and play third base. He's got the big, he's 6'4", 6'5". He's got the big arm. He played third base for the WBC team, the Puerto Rican team. And he's like best friends with

Lindor. So it's not a situation where A-Rod came to the Yankees. He's larger than life. Derek Jeter wanted no part of Alex Rodriguez coming to the Yankees. He's the origin of life. Derek Jeter wanted no part of Alex Rodriguez coming to the Yankees. He tried to play nice. He tried to be the team guy. But he hated the idea that this guy who spit on him ended up becoming his teammate. I think with Lindor, he's probably in Cohen's ear saying, go get this guy. Go get this guy. So I think Correa moving to third base, not going to be a problem.

Look, these 11, 12, 13-year deals, they don't work out. But when you have Steve Cohen's money, who cares? He can eat it. It's not a concern. It's not a big deal. If he's got to eat $100 million in payroll five years from now, and he's got to get new players, he'll do it. He's that dedicated to win. Feels like hockey when this started to happen with hockey. It's like a salary cap, luxury tax. They don't have salary cap in baseball. Luxury tax cheat code where you just extend the money, stretch it out a little bit, makes it a little bit easier with the luxury tax.

It's a thing. I think the Red Sox just completely missed because they missed it with Betts three years ago. They 100% missed it with Bogarts's endeavors last year where they could have wrapped up both of those guys. They just kind of didn't see, they just didn't see where the league was going. And obviously the league is going toward,

if you're an all-star and you're in your late twenties, early thirties, now it's an eight to 10 year deal. And that's just the way it is. And that's why I kind of see this last year. Oh, 100 percent. And the Yankees, you could make the argument they should have done this with Aaron Judge a year or two earlier, and maybe they end up giving him 250 million instead of 380 million. But the bottom line is that's why you got to keep a guy like Aaron Judge, because any of these guys who are out there, they're getting eight, nine,

10 years. Brandon Nimmo is a nice player. He's solid. If you would have told me a year ago, he'd get eight years at like $160 million. Or Xander Bogarts, who I really, really like, and I'm thrilled that he's not on your baseball team anymore. If you would have told me he'd get the contract he got, I would have said no freaking way. That's the way you got to do business now in Major League Baseball. And I think in many ways, Cohen is putting the pressure on a lot of these teams out there. He's putting the pressure on the Phillies to go and get Trey Turner.

He's putting the pressure on the Yankees and Hal Steinbrenner. Bill, I don't know if they signed Rodan two years ago. I don't because the Yankees were kind of in penny-pinching mode. Now I think the Yankees are seeing what the Mets are doing. And it's like, well, we got to keep up. We got to try to close the gap with the Houston Astros. That's the way it's got to be. And I don't feel at least a bit sorry for these owners. They got the money.

They can afford it. Find a way to make it work. Well, the irony of that is Rodon was the one. That was the contract I had the biggest issue with. And he's excellent. But if you think that dude, you're getting six years out of that guy. I mean, that's like a suicide mission. How many healthy seasons is he going to have out of those six?

If you get two or three and they win, you'll take it. That's all there is to it. I guess that's where we are now. What was it, like 120 for him? Yeah, the money actually, considering what kind of pitcher he is, wasn't crazy. I don't think the Yankees wanted to give him the sixth year.

They had no choice, though. Hey, you want to improve the team, you got to give out contracts like that. I mean, maybe the Yankees just got to sell more Heinekens than fried chicken at Yankee Stadium. That's all. Well, we had, I mean, the Red Sox,

anytime the Red Sox did that, it went badly. It was like the David Price, Carl Crawford. We're like, oh, fuck it. We got to do it for the most part. Those six, seven years for the guys who aren't like slam dunk. You know, I do think like the Verlander, when Houston, everything that happened to them with Verlander, right?

Which you've seen when they got him. It's like, man, how many years is this guy going to go? Like one or two. And then you look back, how long was he with the Astros? Like six years? He went in 2017. 2017 is when the Astros got him instead of the Yankees. Yeah. Missed one year at the OPA, but for the most part, that was just an amazing acquisition. I had forgotten how long he was there when he switched to the Mets. Now it feels like, I mean, not only is he going to be a hall of famer, but probably one of the generational pitchers we've had. Just before we move on to basketball, how much have you and the rest of the Yankee fans enjoyed

the complete incompetent shit show that is the Boston Red Sox? Oh, it's fantastic. My fear is though, that you're not going to buy the team anytime soon, because then you might turn into Steve Cohen with the Red Sox. So's fantastic. My fear is, though, that you're not going to buy the team anytime soon because then you might turn into Steve Cohen with the Red Sox. So don't get any ideas. We need you here at the ringer and it's Spotify. I don't if the Red Sox are ever up for sale, please just say no. Just say no. No, thanks. But in all seriousness, I love it because Bogarts is a Yankee killer. Sayonara. Your idea of getting better in the offseason is this Japanese outfielder we have no idea about, Justin Turner, who's a zillion years old, who will probably have a big home run or two

this summer to bother me, and we'll have the beard going. It'll be like 2013 all over again. He's 38. I mean, that's my thing. The Yankees are better. Toronto is better. Tampa is better.

And Baltimore is on the up and up. I don't see how the Red Sox are winning 82 or 83 games this year. And if I'm Cora, Cora wants to win at all costs. Cora won his first year. He comes back. They're in the ALCS his first year. He's probably saying, this is not what I signed up for. Let me go and be a front office type, or let me go manage somewhere else if the Red Sox are going to run their team like they did Kansas City Royals. It's weird because they, I think they were fourth in payroll last year somehow.

And they were a luxury tax team with an incompetent team that had kind of no plan that really only had two jobs, which was to extend Bogarts at a reasonable price and to figure out the Devers thing. Because the biggest advantage you have in baseball is locking down these dudes super early. You know, a couple of years before they have a chance

to become free agents. They didn't do it. And they give endeavors. Let's say they gave him 12 years for 250 a year ago. He's taking it. It's a lot of money. Oh man. Well, guess what? Now it's going to be 10 years for 350 because you waited a year ago. He's taking it. It's a lot of money. Oh man. Well, guess what? Now it's going to be

10 years for 350 because you waited a year. It's like have fundamental understanding of how baseball works. They're in the same position with bets. And I've talked about bets over and over and over again in this podcast, but to me it was the safest bet of anybody to play well in their mid thirties, late thirties, just because of the kind of athlete he is. I look at Judge. I know you guys had to do the Judge thing, but Judge at age 36, 37, I just want no part of it at all. I don't know what his body's going to be like.

He can't be Dave Winfield, where he's DH-ing, where he's a full-time DH at 30, 35 bombs. Dave Winfield was an amazing athlete, though. So was Judge, though. Judge is an awesome athlete, too. Dave Winfield was a high Division I basketball player and a baseball player. Judge could have been a tight end

if he wanted to. Put in until he's 40. You know, powerful. Yeah, true. I think Winfield was a better athlete. But yeah, maybe that's your best case scenario. I just feel like last year

was the only time I've seen him stay healthy for seven months. You know? Well, the year before he did. The year before he did. Oh, don't tell my fantasy team that. He would disappear for like, what, three? You'd have like the oblique?

Oh, there's always the oblique or the calf or the hammy. He's going to miss 30 games next year. That's a guarantee. He's not hitting 62 home runs. And I'm okay with that. That's fine. But you felt like you and Jacko felt like they had to keep him.

Yeah. There was no road where, but this is basically where the Red Sox were with bets. And we were like, nah, fuck it. And we end up, all we have left now is Alex Verdugo.

Let me ask you this. If they didn't resign him, what do you do? I don't know. That's my point. Brandon Nimmo, you give him eight years. See,

that's the sick thing about the free agent market. Go give up every prospect you have for Brian Reynolds. I like Brian Reynolds. He's a nice player, but you're trying to win. They have so much money invested in Cole and Stanton. And he's worked so much more to the Yankees too, beyond what he provides on the field. I mean, every kid in New York wears a 99 jersey and a t-shirt. And he's a great guy. He's so easily, like, an easy guy to root for. He's a Monument Park guy.

He's got the record. You're the Yankees. Don't nickel and dime a guy like that. You keep him. The Knicks. Now, they lost to the Raptors last night. But they had, you and Fantasy talked about this. That Dallas game, it really seemed like everybody was getting fired.

It's like, here we go. It's just the coach. And usually the coach gets fired before the front office, but it felt like that was where things were headed. And then they put together a little eight game winning streak. They found themselves with defense. And what's interesting is they found themselves with defense.

And so the nets is basically the same principle of like, let's rededicate ourselves on this end. Let's get rid of the guys in the rotation who don't fit in with what we're doing or limit their minutes and just kind of build around some sort of defensive identity. It's working better with Brooklyn because they have Durant, Kyrie and Durant's been just absolutely spectacular this year. But with the Knicks, they finally unlocked the Randall Brunson. The Grimes was huge. And when I watch them, they feel like a team that has an identity now.

Now they gave up 52 to Siakam last night, but for the most part, it feels okay. And it feels like they're at least in position now, JJ, for a big deal in the next six weeks, for a big piece, whether it's the, you know, whether you take on that giant Bradley Beal contract, the Zach Levine situation, could it be somebody we're not thinking of?

Could it be Miami craters and all of a sudden Jimmy Butler's available? But I do feel like they're going to jump on the opportunity with the pieces that they have all their picks. They have a couple of their protected picks from other teams. We had Rob Mahoney and I talked about pivot teams. I think the Knicks are a pivot team going toward like, let's, let's actually go for this.

The East is open. The West is open. Fuck it. Let's go for it. What do you think? I like the sound of that. Listen, they haven't won a playoff series since 2013 and you nailed it with that Dallas game. Tibbs looked like a dead man walking. The team played absolutely no defense. that. Listen, they haven't won a playoff series since 2013, and you nailed it with that Dallas

game. Tibbs looked like a dead man walking. The team played absolutely no defense. You're wondering what the direction of the team is. And right now, I got to give credit to Julius Randle. I would have done everything imaginable to get him off my team last year. He was a total dog. He played with no effort. He was disinterested. He was all out of sorts because they didn't have a point guard. Randall's back close to where he was two years ago. Give you credit on Brunson. You told me this. I thought the contract was nuts.

But you know what? I got to learn with these NBA and these baseball deals that all these contracts are nuts. You just got to add 40%. That's what it is. To wherever it is in your head, add 40%. That's what I mean. Because when they first signed him, I'm like, man, Brunson's a nice player. I loved him in college. He was really good with Dallas. This seems like a crazy overpay. It's not an overpay because he's the guy you want with the ball in his hands at the end of the game.

His basketball IQ is off the charts. The Knicks haven't had that at point guard basically in my entire adult life. And Barrett is basically like Mark Teixeira and Tino Martinez. He gets off to the worst starts imaginable where he can't shoot. He's all out of sorts. And then when you hit like December, late December, he starts rounding in the form. And Grimes has been a difference maker for them. Instead of that stiff Fournier playing, giving you absolutely no defense, being a one-trick pony, Grimes is giving you that 3 and D element. Robinson's doing his

thing down low, and they like playing with each other. That's what I've noticed, Bill. They have this kinship with one another that's cool, and I'm with you. I'm making a big move. They're ready. It's time. That's what the Knicks fan has been promised. The question is who?

You know, I had Zach Brazile on New York, New York, who covers the Knicks. Well, wait, it's not just who. It's how do they fit in with what's already working? Yes. Which is a very important thing. Like if you bring in Bradley Beal, all right, is Grimes losing minutes now?

Because you've just established a defensive identity partly because of Grimes. Does RJ Barrett lose minutes? Oh, that's not great either. So what type of player is it first? And then we can figure out the player. That's a really good question because you think about it,

Brunson's your point guard. If you go and get a guy like Beal, I've heard rumblings about DeRozan. That's going to take away from Quentin Grimes, right? If you go and get a three along the lines of Zach Levine, you would think Levine is going to take away some looks and some touches for a guy like RJ Barrett. That's a tough question, man. They're in a weird spot from this standpoint. All three of those guys are kind of high volume type of guys. Randall's high volume.

Brunson has turned into a high volume guy and he's distributing, but he's running your offense. And then Barrett, he can defend and he can do some of those little things, but you want him involved somewhat in your offense. Finding that right fit is tricky. And to be honest with you, my thought is shooting. That's my first thought when you talk about the Knicks. Can you get me a two-way player in this modern NBA that can shoot the ball at a high level and is not going to be a total liability on defense? The one thing that they cannot do, and I don't think they ought to worry about it now, I heard the Anthony Davis rumors on your pod about a month ago, and I almost barfed. Like, no, no, no.

I want no part of that. I don't care how good a basketball he's playing. You know and I know that has disaster written all over it if he comes to the Knicks. Disaster. No, thank you. Ma'am, I wouldn't rule it out. And that's scary. That's a typical Knick move from 20 years ago. That's a disaster. No, you can't change your DNA. That's who you are. I'm trying to be optimistic. I'm actually optimistic about the Knicks. Come on. I think looking at the team and watching them, there's a world where RJ could be reinvented as a six man.

I don't hate that. Like 26, 28 minutes a game. And you bring in like a Beal DeRozan. Cause I was trying to figure Beal is the one, you know, he makes so much money. It handicaps you the rest of the way with everything you want to do. Salary wise,

DeRozan is probably the smarter move. What do you think about Kuzma? Well, Kuzma would be ideal. I mean, he only makes 13 million, but he's a free agent at the end of the year. But yeah,

Kuzma would be perfect. That's what I was thinking too. I was thinking Kuzma. Yeah. Kuzma is a good one. Yeah. The other one I was thinking if they wanted to go a little smaller, which maybe wouldn't steal the back page headlines, but Caruso would be amazing. Oh, he's a winner. See, that's a guy I could play for my team any day of the week. You probably have to give up two of those protected picks. So the home run swing is

Beal, which I wouldn't do because I would save that 50 million 45 million a year slot for, you know, one of the best 20 players in the league if they ever became available. DeRozan's fun because he's a little cheaper, shorter term, and I do think he fits in with like the kind of high IQ stuff

that your team is doing now offensively. But that, yeah, the Caruso-Kuzma type, probably the way to go. Now, on the Brooklyn side, Durant's playing the best he's played in really the 2019 stretch right before he got hurt.

He had some moments in 2017, that first Warriors season, when he just was incredibly efficient and just awesome. And then his MVP season, but he's at least on par with that stuff. Now they feel like the Kyrie thing has quieted down. I'm going to hold my thoughts on that for one second.

And they found the big thing is Claxton's just been great. And defensively, um, defensively they can get stops. Right. And I think Nash and I still love Nash. I think his mistake was too much offense, not enough of a defensive emphasis,

which is ironically what was the problem with a lot of those Phoenix teams he played on. This team is like, we have two scorers, everyone else has to defend. If you're not defending, you probably won't play as much. And it feels like a real thing.

And yet, Mount Kyrie, the volcano, what's it been, a month? I just don't trust it. I think when it gets quiet and happy and it seems like everything's great and going well, that's usually when Mount Kyrie, the lava starts coming out. And I still think it's going to happen again. I don't disagree. Now, I got to give him credit because when all the Kyrie shenanigans were going down,

I thought the entire team was going to get blown up. I thought Kyrie is done. They're not going to play him again. I thought they'd look to deal Durant. They'd call Phoenix. They'd call this team. They'd call that team. Then they fire Nash. They bring in Jacques Vaughn and everything you said has come to the forefront here over the last couple weeks.

Also, really easy schedule. Easy schedule. They were able to bone up on some bad teams. You know what, though? They were playing an easy schedule early in the year, and they weren't beating those teams. They were getting smoked by those teams. Now they're starting to round in the form. And listen, Durant and Irving, as unlikable as they can be at times, especially Irving, they're playing out of their freaking minds. Durant, to your point,

is playing the best basketball he's played since he's been a Brooklyn Net. Irving, at the end of these games, is hitting big shot after big shot. The Nets, I didn't think they had it in them, quite frankly, to even get to this point where I'd be entertaining the idea that they could challenge Milwaukee and that they could challenge Milwaukee and that they could challenge the Boston Celtics. The way I kind of look at them is this. I think they're going to end up having a solid regular season. They'll probably end up at 3-4 seed in the Eastern Conference.

They should be in a position with the talent on their team alone to go and win a round. But as far as their chances of beating Giannis or beating your team, don't see it. Not after what I saw last year in the playoffs. Don't see it. Well, how about this? There are two games behind the Celtics. I know, which is

crazy. There are three games behind Milwaukee and what you have is you have Milwaukee, Boston, Cleveland, Brooklyn, where the gap between all those teams has really shrunk, especially because I don't know what's going on with Chris Middleton, but the guy has turned into like the small forward, Anthony Davis. Like he just can't stay on the floor. You have Philly as kind of the wild card and Philly's record is better than I think in my head, I thought it would

be because they've missed so many games. They're 18 and 12. They're right where the nets are. And then underneath them, you just have chaos. And the Knicks are probably the safest bet. But then it gets Miami, Indiana, Atlanta. There's already like Trey Young trade stuff was on Twitter today.

Can we make that happen in New York? I mean, that'd be fun. You don't, I don't think, I don't know if you'd want Trey. Yeah. I think I'd enjoy it. You're good. You're good with Jalen Brunson.

You're like a real guy. I know. I know. But Trey's fun, man. He's so much fun. But it really feels like just looking at the slate that the Nets and the Knicks

are not playing teams. I think both of them are in the top six. I don't see Miami being able to stay healthy enough, especially with the Butler-Lower thing. Indiana's not. They'll probably go the other way

and trade. Atlanta's a mess. You're going down the line. It's like just the Knicks avoiding the Butler-Lowry thing. Indiana's not... They'll probably go the other way in trade. Atlanta's a mess. You're going down the line. It's like just the Knicks avoiding the play-in is a huge win on top of what you had. Think about this for a minute. When you hired me in 2021, it felt like in New York we were waiting for the Renaissance. Well, you had two baseball

teams go to the playoffs this year. You actually have football teams playing games in the month of December that matter. And you're going to have at least one playoff team with the Giants. We'll see about the Jets. And if I can get two basketball teams, plus the Rangers and the Islanders the last two years in the conference finals, I got some topics, Bill. How about that, man? New York. You got some good stuff. I mean, even the Mets-Yankees thing, that alone could have carried us for seven months. But on top of it, like, now, do you think people care about the Nets

like when you feel like you talk about them? Is there an audience? No, and it's funny you said it because my producer, Stefan, was playing basketball the other day and he gets recognized by a Nets fan. The Nets fan was giving me the business. He's like, you got JJ hates my team.

He doesn't like to talk about him that much. If I led shows with the nets, it'd be crickets. Like there's the buzz and the pulse for them is just simply not there. Unless there's a cloud of dysfunction where everybody's kind of laughing at them. Now, again,

we haven't had Brooklyn go through that run in the playoffs that I think a lot of people thought they were going to have the minute Kyrie and KD came to the team. Like they had that second round year post-COVID, lost to Milwaukee in the second round, but no NBA finals, no conference finals. that to me will be like the indicator on the buzz and the pulse and what's going on with the Nets and whether or not they can really move the needle in New York City. The Kyrie piece is tough too. I don't think that's really helped. And that's a problem too.

That has not helped. They have those two guys, they're great players, they're great talents, they're future Hall of Famers. But I think most New Yorkers detest Kyrie Irving and they don't like Kevin Durant

because he ended up going to the Nets instead of the Knicks. Kyle, turn the TikTok camera on. Atlanta calls and says, we got to get rid of Trae Young. We want Brunson back. Give us some picks. We'll take Obi Toppin. We want some unprotected picks.

Make us a godfather offer for Trae Young. You're the GM of the Knicks. You're with Wes and Leon. What do you do? Well, I can guarantee you this. Wes and Leon are never in a million years making that trade. I mean, Bronson, think about this.

Yeah, true. Jalen Bronson's dad is on the staff. Great point. I mean, they basically tampered to get Jalen Bronson on the Knicks. Jalen Bronson is going to be on the Knicks for the duration of his contract. Now, the storyline for Trae Young. So maybe it has to be R.J. Barrett.

Yes, I would do it. I would. And I love R.J. Trae Young is, dude, Trae Young in New York? Come on, man. That'd be electric. But that's like the classic Knicks mistake. That's like the Stefan Marbury.

Oh, Stefan Marbury in New York? It's going to be unbelievable. The guy was in the conference finals, what, two years ago? He was in the conference finals because the Philly 76ers situation became one of the biggest car crashes in the history of the league. He still was there? Inventor Ben Simmons not playing for a year and a half. It was so damaging.

I understand that, but he still was there. And he was electric. And I know guys that would be electrifying at Madison Square Garden. He's one of them. It's electrifying just to win in Madison Square Garden. Well, listen,

I would take this low. I would go for Caruso and Kuzma. Both of them. I'm cool with that. If you tell me Caruso, Kuzma,

Knicks, I'm in. Done. Done. All right. JJ, it was good to see you. Thanks for having me. Happy holidays.

Million Dollar Picks week 16 holiday edition. We are back in the positive. I told you we'd be positive by the holidays. We're up $406,000. I'm not surprised. I had the confidence. I never wavered. We're back, baby. Holiday picks. We are betting $1 million apiece on the following things. Eagles plus five and a half against the Cowboys. Eagles want to get this done. They want to. It's in my garage. I just got the bat signal that Hertz was hurt, queued it up, drove out, picked up some pastures. We're off. This is a three-point game. The line is too high. Getting five and a half. Eagles have a chance to potentially win this.

I just like the Eagles. I think they could win it, but we'll play it safe. Plus five and a half. Eagles, million dollars on that. Steelers, home for the Raiders, who should be out of the playoffs somehow they're not. Cold weather, Franco Harris, the emotion in the air, they're retiring his number.

Come on, the Steelers aren't losing to the Raiders in zero degree weathers. They're gonna pound the ball. They won't let Trubisky do anything. Steelers minus two and a half, we're betting a million dollars on that. So long Raiders and so long Patriots doing something I never tried to do on million dollar picks bet against the Patriots,

but I'm just so disgusted by this season. I'm so horrified. We just lost last week on the dumbest play, maybe in the history of football. The Bengals are way better than the Patriots. They're way better. They're favored by three because people still feel like there's some sort of Belichick mystique that, oh no, this is the great Belichick spot. Those days are over. The Bengals are going to win this game. Might be a push, but we're going Bengals

minus three over the Pats, betting a million dollars on that. Last but not least, Niners, money line parlay with the Dolphins. Niners home for Washington. I just don't see any scenario where they don't overpower that weird Washington team that's very poorly coached

and clearly has the league against them. If you saw the calls last week, Dolphins home for Green Bay. They're an excellent home team. They've lost five games on the road, only one at home. They need this game. Green Bay, weirdly overvalued

because they've won two straight, even though they lost seven of eight before that. I don't think they're very good. I don't care how many Packers fans are there. I like this one too. It is minus 102. Niners, Dolphins, Maryland parlay. We're betting a million dollars on that. Last but not least, underdog parlay, holiday edition, Saints to win in Cleveland. The weather's going to be horrible. I think it's going to be a big Taysom Hill game. I'm not sold on the Browns defense in a game like this. And I just think the Saints are tougher. We've seen them bully ball a couple of teams. Saw them bully ball last week. We saw them bully ball Vegas a few weeks ago. I think every once in a while they can bully ball

and I think they're going to bully ball the Browns. So we're putting them in and we're rolling the dice with the Falcons. Falcons in Baltimore, that line's moved from 7.5 to 6. Lamar's out. I'm not sold on this Ravens team at all. And I do think if the Falcons can just get a lead, they're good to go. They can run the ball. They can protect the clock.

They're a good cold weather team. That's what they want to do. I love Tyler Algier. I think if you have been fantasy semifinals this week, you could probably start him. I think he's going to be a potential dominant guy. And I think Baltimore, at some point, the luck runs out with these stupid wins.

Saints-Falcons plus 613. We're putting 50K on that. And those are the million dollar picks. Holiday edition, week 16. Merry Christmas. Happy Hanukkah. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Schrags. Thanks to JJ. Thanks to Curtis. Thanks to Kyle Creighton for producing as always. Don't forget, come back Sunday night. Me and Sal, the podcast never stops. Enjoy the holidays. Drive safely. Open your presents safely. Be nice to your family.

Enjoy everything. And I'll see you Sunday night. Feel the air Twinkling On the wayside I'm a bruised soul I never was And I don't have To be