The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - Local Hour: Pablo's Kevin Love Scoop

Episode Date: February 7, 2025

It's the Friday before the Super Bowl and Pablo, David and Amin's tenure as our substitute teachers is coming to an end, so of course we start with the Miami Heat. Pablo has a mini scoop about Kevin Love's now infamous activity on Instagram during the Jimmy Butler saga and it stuns the gang. Would Jeremy Taché be the funniest possible person that could be running Antonio Brown's social media? Then, the gang discusses the beef that unfolded last night between on social media last night between Kevin Durant and Kendrick Perkins. Plus, Josh Allen won the NFL MVP over Lamar Jackson last night and the gang discusses whether the media should have as much power as they do in voting for awards that could have major impacts on players' earnings in their careers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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This is the Don Leventor Show with the StuGuts Podcast. I'm gonna miss this. David. Are they gonna change the intro now that we've been here for a week? Okay, so I tried to start with good vibes. Just wondering whether they will. David whispered to me during the SNL open of your guys program that we're not in it.

Me and him, we're not in it. I mean, I wasn't in it. And. Just feel like that we're here from time to time, we do weekly things. What would you be doing in the intro video? What would your bit be? I'd like to run through, Lucy got mine. I don do weekly things. What would you be doing in the intro video? What would your bit be?

I'd like to run through, Lucy got mine. I wouldn't need to be at the end, but I like the idea of running through a finish line. Well, that's already taken, so you need to pick something else. We saw it just this morning, what David should be doing in the montage, which is running as far as possible from your dog.

You sure you're gonna miss this? You know those songs that are for parents about kids growing up? You're gonna miss this is one of them. There's the Darius Rucker, It Won't Be Like This For Long. Those songs wreck me. Now that my daughter's eight,

if you play one of those songs for me, I will start weeping. You have 10 years. Because it's true. It won't be like this for long. Every stage you think this part's hard, oh your kid's less than one. Is that how you feel about the show? Is that why you're springing this up? Well, I mean no because he said you're gonna miss this so like they made me think of that song

You're gonna know your kid more as an adult than you do them as a but that's what that's why but that's like It's sad almost like obviously it's happy But there's a sadness in your kid getting older because you're just like oh, but that I can't go back to that I watched a new movie on Amazon called You're Cordially Invited with Will Ferrell. Is it good? And he gave a quote. No.

He gave a quote and I don't know whether it's true. That you see your child 92% of the time you spend with your child is before they're 18. Oh, because you just, after they get past that, you don't see them a lot? Well, they move on. They're adults. Also sad. Is there a chance that's the right stat?

Why is there a sadness with this? I want everything to be happy with my child. It's like the jelly bean stat. You kind of also reflect on your parenting after seeing your child grow up as an adult. Like, did I do the right thing? What type of person is your child? Did I screw this up?

Should I hide this kid? We have a lot to get to. I regret giving the steering wheel to David Sampson this early. I apologize for that. We have Dan Patrick and Dan Lebatard, I guess, a retrospective on a thing that just happened. They reflected on this on the microphone. I want to play for you in a bit.

We have Willow, Jess's dog, running around, which I love. Looks like a horse next to David Sampson. Truly. I just wanted to spice things you in a bit. We have Willow, Jess's dog running around, which I love. And David Hayes. Looks like a horse next to David Sampson. Truly. I just wanted to spice things up on a Friday. I knew it was like the last day of trade deadline week. I'm like, ooh, I'm gonna bring Willow and see what happens.

Had I known, I would have told one of the people here to go get one of those three point hats. Would have told Pablo to lend your blazer to Sampson, get on and then put your hand in your pocket and let's take a picture. Got our own Napoleon. Oh yeah. Kids these days don't appreciate the hand tuck.

David, I wanted to start today with a scoop. I've been trying to find out stuff, Pablo Torre Finds Out is a show where I find out stuff. I've been trying to- Where can we find that? You can find it on YouTube, also the Draftings Network, and also wherever you got your podcasts, incidentally. I've been trying to find that you can find it on YouTube also the draft things network and also wherever you got your podcasts incidentally I've been trying to find some stuff out for you guys exclusively and I have something I have something we'll get to New Orleans

We'll get is it breaking news Perkins. It is breaking news Can you put them heat mouthpiece in your mouth that Dan puts in his mouth? No, no, no I am NOT a mouthpiece for the heat. I am what's the opposite of a mouse of a mouthpiece? But a cup. Oh, wow. I don't know if we have we have a butt plug sounder. Sure. I'm on it.

I'd be surprised if we did. Right. I was hoping for the breaking news music. Oh, we can be playing it all week. Music. Hold on. That's music. It's a good song. Breaking news. Hold on. There it is. That's music.

It's a good song. Breaking news, exclusively reported by Pablo Torre finds out and the Dan LeBattard show for the week of February 7th or whatever it is today. Kevin Love isn't running his Instagram account. No. That can't be true. So for those unfamiliar, Kevin Love is taking the internet by storm. He's posting memes.

He's been chronicling the Jimmy Butler saga the entire time, and we've been praising it for being... Creative? Creative, bold, unapologetic, messy. Funny. Funny. Funny. And also, for movie buffs like David and I, like, oh, that's...

Good one. Well researched. He's got good, yeah, he's got good but there it is that's it coming out about that one that's a little late that's the breaking news sounder for Pavlatore he finds out yeah so he's not okay I was waiting it's beginning to hurt. For the audio audience, it's beginning to hurt. It'll get better. Mm. Um. Kevin Love's got a guy. Kevin Love has got a guy.

And Kevin Love, I, I, does any of this shock you? Does it disappoint you guys? Cause to me, I mean. Mm. You said shock. Yeah. It can be shocking.

To me, I was trying to get aggregated and now I'm just gonna get aggregated for butt plug sound. Yeah. Don't worry, we'll post this whole thing on Twitter. Great. Yes, I'm surprised, Pablo. I thought he was doing it himself but now I feel like an idiot

for thinking he was doing it himself. It makes sense. Is this an old person thing where he's actually curating it and he's coming up with the creative but he just has a team and he sends it to and they post it. The most generous defense of Kevin Love is the one that Chris just made.

And I don't believe that is the case. I mean, I'm sure he cosigns it. Has approval. Has approval of it. But it's funny, right? Here you have an account that has made a very messy, dramatic thing that has disappointed Cardboard Pat Riley.

And it has been praised, Kevin Love's thing, as being subversive. And in fact, it feels like it's not his account and also the Heat are kind of in favor of it, I am also told. Pablo, he retired from the run. He had a retirement post, said the run was over. Like, that's how epic it actually was.

Contract expired. Do you know who is posting? I cannot say that. Oh, here we are again. It's a mini scoop. I'm just asking. We're not asking who it is. We're asking, do you know the identity of the person?

I mean, I don't think that changes that betrays any confidence. You just gave away that it's someone else. All we're asking is, do you know who someone else is? So not to sound like Dick Cheney, proving a negative. I know it's not him. OK, so you don't know the identity. Could you stop? Dick Cheney, proving a negative. I know it's not him. Okay, so you don't know the identity? Pablo, could you stop?

Why are you trying to find out about me? I'm trying to help you guys find out about something else. Is it one person or did he hire a firm? I believe it's a person. Sources close to the sources, close to the situation. Report that it is one person. This wouldn't be the first time something like this happened. Antonio Brown has a very successful Twitter following.

He, it's confirmed, does not run his Twitter account. No. It's Jeremy. We were discussing that. It would be so crazy if Jeremy just randomly was running Antonio Brown's account. Is Jeremy Tashay the funniest person to be shadow operating Antonio Brown's Twitter account?

Oh, I thought they meant Kevin Love. Did you guys not mean Kevin Love because it was he relationship? No, no, no, it's funny. I thought I was putting it down so you understand the joke. Please do, bring it back, Desi. It was Antonio Brown's account, not Kevin Love. Jeremy Tashay shadow running Antonio Brown's account. Antonio Brown's account is horrifically inappropriate.

So we were trying to think of like, who's the last person? I don't know, we have to like really walk. Antonio Brown's a former wide receiver for no no football so football evolved really from the game of rugby yes and so over time they allowed forward passes he's very good at catching you Jessica some people get hit in the head a lot and they go a little crazy a lot of people think the Vikings also came before Christopher Columbus.

Some also say that Native Americans traversed the Bering Straits. And it ends in the game this weekend or something? There's this thing called the Big Bang Theory. I love that show. Whereas life, as we know it, was created from an explosion, a collision. Or an apple.

And from that we got Antonio Brown and Jeremy hypothetically running his accounts. In the beginning God created life. And he rested on Saturday. I don't know if we'll have time for awards again today because we gotta do other stuff. I am just continually impressed by just the vibes Roy has been bringing this week.

Great job, I'm with you. Roy Award. Early. Great. This is like people telling, saying that Steph Curry's the greatest shooter of all time. It's like, no, we don't have to wait for his career to be over.

Like, we know it now. We already know. Yeah. By the way, speaking of awards, and by the way, just to rest the case, this was not a joke. Kevin Love actually is not running his Instagram account. This is a thing across, I mean,

I mean, what, the number of guys who are not actually who they say they are which is to say themselves on the internet We should just not assume anything at this point about that. Yeah, I mean I like I think Most of the time this is what I found people who are incredibly funny and witty and insightful on social media and quick Typically aren't normal people. They're people, like very rarely you get a shooting star like Josiah Johnson where it's like, oh, he's funny in real life.

He's actually funny and engaging as a real person, not just behind a keyboard. But the vast majority of the accounts that we really enjoy are manned by people who are just recluses who are socially awkward. And the exception who proves that rule, of course, is Kevin Durant. And I wanna get to this story, right?

So we'll get to New Orleans again, we'll get to the Dans, we'll get to their awards, they love awards even more than we do somehow in New Orleans right now with the NFL. But Kendrick Perkins, God bless him. God bless Kendrick Perkins and the oxygen that his massive lungs have been sucking out of the room that the NFL tends to own.

Do we have that tweet? Can we show that tweet? Video team, this is me filibustering. And play. What, it's not a video, it's just text that I have to memorize, great. You just talk and we'll put it up when we get it. Very good.

So Kendrick Perkins went on ESPN in front of Bob Myers and said something that caused Kevin Durant to retort. And we believe that- It's easy to get Kevin Durant to retort. Well, to a means point, absolutely. He loves to retort. Kendrick Perkins had made the claim though that the true leader in Oklahoma City

on that Thunder Team where it was him and Russell Westbrook and James Harden, was Kendrick Perkins. And Kevin Durant said something in response that I would like to show the audience. If you would have asked for this before the show, we'd probably have it. Wait a second.

Why did you tell him to keep talking? I do not. I have, is this our first day together? I'm gonna miss you guys. You should have said we don't have it. I'm gonna miss this. Kevin Durant said in response to Kendrick Perkins saying quote, it doesn't mean your best player

is your leader. When I was with the Thunder, it wasn't KD, it wasn't Russ, it wasn't James. I was the one leading and quote, KD quotes, quote, tweets this and says, I know this may be a reach, but this comment is by far the craziest shit I've seen this week.

And he sees some crazy shit. Yeah, including Luca Dacius being traded in the middle of the night. Including him not being traded. Him also being traded in the middle of the night. Including him not being traded. Him also being traded and then not, thank you video team. I wanna get to what it means to be a leader though. Right, like you guys and me and David, you both worked inside of these pro sports franchises.

Is this ridiculous? Is this actually crazy to contemplate that someone like Kendrick Perkins would be actually ahead of Kevin Durant in the leadership power rankings? Not at all. It's totally plausible. Leaders, the correlation between the best player on the team

and the leader on the team is not nearly 100%. As a matter of fact, I would say it's more than 50%, but under 100. Somewhere between 50 and 60% of the leaders on a team are also the best players. You don't wanna go into a season with your leader as a bench player. You want to have an assumed leader as someone who's getting major minutes

and someone who's going to be a big part of what you're doing. But as the season evolves, it tends to move and change. Things happen. And Perkins, I think it's possible. There's the problem though. We've seen and heard plenty of Kendrick Perkins

since he retired. Do you really think he fills the leader qualities? So this is what I said, cause I know Perk, right? And the Perk that we see, oh go ahead. The Perk that we see on TV. Chris isn't even gonna look at me the way that.

Oh wow, okay. Look at me, blue. You didn't have to say you knew Perk, you wanna hear what your point of view is. I wanna know who knows Burke. My personal opinion of him, knowing him personally, not from watching him on TV, he's playing a character on TV.

He's actually a pretty bright guy and he was part of a very successful team in Boston. So he gets to Oklahoma City and they're young. They don't know how to win so to speak. And so I can imagine there's a lot of stuff that he's imparted to these young guys. But look, this is how you do it. This is how we did it at the highest level. If you guys want to get to the highest level, you got to do it like that. The problem is what is he just brought up is Perks reputation makes it easy to make that joke,

because his reputation is what he does on TV, and what he does on TV is hot take gasbaggery. And so it's impossible for people to imagine, this guy, this guy's the leader, get out of here over Kevin Durant. And so it's easy for Kevin Durant to make that joke as well. Chris whispered to me while Amin was talking, and he said, sorry I was late with that sound,

I was trying to workshop a Kendrick Perkins impression. Well no, no, I mean, I would never do that. Roy was working on that. Do we think it was Durant who did the tweet back? Yes. He runs his own account. I mean his problem is that he's running accounts that aren't labeled as him. He runs his account and burner accounts mean his problem is that he's running accounts that aren't labeled as him.

He's in fact tweeted. He runs his account and burner accounts? That was the whole thing. I didn't know that story. So David knows nothing about social media and I mean that not even insultingly. So social media was this creation where people can discuss.

Al Gore had this idea of a network that would connect everybody. It's actually called the ARPnet in the 80s and the Soviets were very interested in discovering what it was And the Soviets were very interested in discovering what it was because the Americans had it. Go deeper. The advent of the home computer

made this communication very possible as computers became more and more accessible. Humans liked to connect with each other in any way possible, and they created this for that purpose. Wait, did they even just say go deeper? There's a site called MySpace and you had top eight films. That was the opposite, no, that was the other half. Yeah, now you're moving forward at a time.

I was waiting for someone to come back with Big Bang Theory again. There was this thing called the Big Bang Theory. A billion years later, we got Young Sheldon. Bazinga. Bazinga. I think leadership, though, generally speaking, is an interesting topic. I think it is, I think, look. It's overrated. I must leadership though, generally speaking, is an interesting topic.

I think it is, I think look. It's overrated. I'm gonna tell you in a clubhouse, we had, you want them to police themselves, we prefer the players to police themselves, it just doesn't always work that way. There's cliques in a major league clubhouse, and I assume that, you know,

an NBA locker room is smaller than, but I assume there's cliques in there too. Yeah. And it's very hard to find players who move amongst all the cliques. You wanna find a player who speaks Spanish and English. We had a guy named Martin Perato who was able to go in between the Latin cliques

and the white cliques and the black cliques. And it's hard to get a leadership. There are black, enough black players to have a clique? Yeah, yeah. It's, wait, what's the definition of a clique? Can you have two people in a clique? Well, David, what happens is. Go back.

When a mommy in a click. We had a two person click. Oh man. So the answer is, it's very rare. Hold on, put it on the poll. Are we doing polls still? Can there be a two person click? It's called a couple of guys.

It's a couple guys. Yeah, I think it's gotta be four people for a click. Three, I think three's the minimum. It's a few people. Minimum. There's several people. But wait, if they can't have a group chat, they're not a click? Three, I think three is the minimum. That's a few people. Minimum. There's several people. But wait, if they can't have a group chat, they're not a click.

That's a rule we can all agree to. I think if you watch Mean Girls and you take out Lindsay Lohan, the three of them, they're a click, the Mean Girls. You're right, three is the minimum. But defined, a click being defined, I think, by its desire to hang out with itself and not the other clicks. A Click is like, we secretly talk shit

about everyone else here. No, I don't think so. We don't do it in secret. We do it on the show. How many Clicks are in this office? Are there a couple of Clicks? Oh my God. There's a back corner Click with like,

The limit does not exist. Coogs and Billy and Thomas. The limit does not exist. Wait, wait, wait, give it, map this out for me. Then the back corner, there's like a Taylor, Billy, Thomas Click. Billy's part of the back corner click? I think so.

I think not. No, he is. He is? He definitely is. He's like the little quiet ringleader. There's like a Jesse, Cynthia, Kirsten, Kristen. That's a click, yeah, for sure. Then there's just Ethan.

I thought that can't be a click. I just learned from you guys. I just had the shot of him by himself, so I thought it'd be funny. Mally? So when we're making the show sometimes, we make jokes about things that aren't actual, literally jokes, but we're trying to show something

on screen that goes along with something that we're saying to make people laugh. Is that the whole theory of Big Bangin', the Big Bang theory? I would watch Big Bangin'. He would. This is. Blood to a lemon.

Don Lebatard. Pablo leads all of podcasting in reading while smiling. If you listen to ESPN Daily, he sounds like he's having the time of his life. Stu Gatz. Coming up next, I'm going to tell you how the Savannah Bananas are changing things. How do you know I'm smiling? That's how I find my vocal range. Sometimes I just say Savannah Bananas! How do you know I'm smiling? That's how I find my vocal range. Sometimes I just say Savannah Bananas! Savannah Bananas!

This is the Don Lebatar Show with the Stugats! All of this reminds me of the actual leader of this show, who happens to have been on stage in New Orleans with another leader of a different show and how all those clicks have been interacting became a topic on the Dan Patrick show. Yeah shots were fired here by his producers let's hear what they're talking about the Dan and Dan thing the night before so let's hear it play. Dan LeBittard's entire staff was there. Yeah they were. Everybody was there. They talk while you guys are in the middle of talking, that's them?

If you can open up the door, I'm gonna walk through it. I'll tell you what, Stugots tried to make the night about himself. Stugots? He sure did. He very well, you knew the minute he entered the building, you knew the minute he left the building because that was part of the day show.

I'm sorry, what's wrong with having a fast paced show? It's a little bit harder to keep track than the Dan Patrick show. It's a little bit more slow, a little bit slower paced. This one's fast and we have a superstar in Stu Gotz. What's wrong with any of those things? They sit in their big lazy chairs and I see you Marvin Prince,

you think you're sitting high on the throne? Get out of here, get out of here. I am dismissing formally the Dan Patrick show. You're dismissed on behalf of the Dan You're gonna go. I am dismissing, formally, the Dan Patrick show. You're dismissed. On behalf of the Dan Levitard show, I'm gonna carry the flag and say, they're dismissed. Who's with me? I'm with you.

There you go. I thought it was gonna be much meaner. We've threatened to beat them up before, I think. We have. I thought they were gonna come back with some venom. That's their version of venom. What do you think? Where does Fritzie get off?

We don't talk over each other. Where does Fritzy get off? We don't talk over each other. Where does Fritzy get off saying that we're gonna talk over you? Okay, I'll box him for charity. Let's do it. Yeah. You hear that Fritzy? Me and you.

What do you think Stugatz was doing? Trying to sell his book. Smoking? He was indoors. I got the scoop, he was trying to get Stu and Stu as the rival programming to the night. I'm just offended that the thought was that everyone was there.

Who are we? We have so many more people than that talking over We can talk over so many more of ourselves. Well you guys aren't in the open, so. Neither am I. Well wait a minute. They are. There's four people here in the open

that are not in New Orleans. It's true. I think if we did redo the open, I mean, are you in the open? I am. Oh, if we redid it, we should have it where you're on the toilet texting us you're gonna be running late next time.

What? We're a regular, I mean. Close up, are you flushing? We may be very messy when it comes to talking over each other. We are very regular in some deeply. As a group, yes. Deep ways. Yes, with the newspaper by the way, Roy.

Under my 20 CV, you come out with the newspaper under my arm. You know, eight o'clock was call time. Was it? Yeah. I never have received an 8 a.m. call time. Never, not once. Eight o'clock is call time for the techs. There you go.

Not for talent. Welcome, hey. I've been here a few months, I've never heard the phrase call time said by anybody until now. I don't think I've gotten a call sheet in three years. Have you guys been jealous, speaking of being left out?

Yes. Okay. My heart is jealous, but my liver's like, thank you, thank you for the week off. Well, I'm watching, I'm watching Eli Manning not get elected to the Hall of Fame. I'm watching everybody on the big set on Bourbon Street debate these things. I'm watching the NFL honors.

Did you watch Tracy Wolfson spoil the MVP? No. And then delete it? What happened? She got in trouble. She. And then delete it? What happened? She got in trouble. She tweeted it? 23 minutes early, Josh. What happened? There was an MVP thing that you tweeted.

Everyone tweeted the same picture of MVP Josh Allen and she tweeted it with 23 minutes to go. It had not been announced. Who? Someone named Tracy Wolfson. Tracy Wolfson. Oh, Wolfson, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, long time reporter.

Sorry, the producer was talking my ear, so. Oh, that's okay. Apologies, we were talking all over each other. Sorry, I was trying to produce the show because there was a photo that I wanted to show that they're now getting ready for us of someone on the red carpet, two someones on the red carpet last night.

That's a tease. That took the world by storm. So she posted it before they announced it. And then deleted it. Uh oh. And then it was announced, because what happened is that people thought Lamar was gonna win MVP.

He actually had become the betting favorite. But then. Hold on, the story briefly on that, it's interesting, this part. Lamar had been voted first team All-Pro, and this is seen as the biggest indicator as to who's gonna win MVP. He's the best quarterback on the hypothetical team

of first string best players in the league. It had been 1987, the last time that a second team All-Pro quarterback beat a first team All-Pro quarterback when they were head to head for MVP. How does that work? Because when I was an MVP voter in the NBA for the awards, my thing was always, you're all NBA first team. Look at me move.

You see, it starts with games. There's regular season games, and then there's people who evaluate. It goes all the way back to get a ticket. Hey, you caught on. Good job. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You get an award.

That's a good day. David Sampson, the award for beginning to get the show with two hours left in our stay of doing the show. I mean, what happened was, apparently, nine voters split their votes, and they flip-flopped, basically. I mean, wasn't there a year where Marcus Sol won defensive player of the year,

but didn't make all of the first team defense? Yes. Pretty much equivalent to that. I wasn't voting that year though. No. See the years I vote, we make sure. I go I ran up all the other voters all 99 other voters and say hey. I'm sure that's legal. But. Someone also voted Lamar Jackson in fourth place which didn't end up costing him ultimately but now people are very mad at that voter. You can't really get mad at Tracy Wolfen because like I'm pretty sure it was pretty clear that Josh was costing him ultimately, but now people are very mad at that voter. You can't really get mad at Tracy Wolfson because like I'm pretty sure, it was pretty clear

that Josh was winning when Lamar wasn't there last night. Well, there's also another thing that happened late right before the announcement is a huge wager came in. Like huge that came in on Josh Allen. Oh wow. And it moved the odds in a way that you had not seen. And it came in through not our partner, it came in through a different company.

And I'm totally against bets like that on things where Ernst & Young has the envelope. But in any case, so the lines all move, then the tweet comes out and then it was done. And they did this whole award, black tie, red carpet, the whole thing was building toward the MVP. It was the closest race in in theory, between Jackson. Are you okay?

And Alan. And then it was spoiled. And then it was announced. And then he gave a great speech. I think that might be a fine with the Venmo bucket presented by Venmo. He cleared his throat. He used the cough button.

He tried to use the cough button, but he cleared his throat so obnoxiously loud that it echoed through the other two microphones in the room. You sit me in a place without a button. Hey buddy. The button's way low. You're preaching to the choir. It's not right.

I said that seat needs one of these so I could talk to the guys in the room so I could turn my mic off. What, did we run out of money? That's when we ran out of money. Is we could only put two things on the table, not three. David's phlegm was talking over him. What's the Venmo?

Could someone send me the Venmo? Put it up on the screen. QR code outside, next to the door. I wanna talk about voting though, right? It's funny to me. It's funny to me how they're actually important, financially important, culturally, historically important, if you believe sports are culturally important,

which I do. Decisions being made by these panels, largely of media. Right? Like there are these voting bodies. This is the story of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, of the NFL MVP, of the statistic we've been citing all week for Luka Doncic, five time first team, all NBA, all star, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And if you think about those voting bodies, I think an enormous thing that athletes are not doing enough is acting the way corrupt politicians do. Going out and getting the vote? Quid pro quo. I mean, just like it is actually ripe to be rife with corruption and it's just funny. It's like, I mean, these are sometimes nine figure decisions.

Yeah, so well, now it's almost like six, seven years ago, when Anthony Davis played for the Pelicans, he was up for that super max. Yes. And he needed to make all NBA, and he would have got like 50 million more dollars to his contract. And Brian Winters was the one that said,

well, if I were Anthony Davis, I would just go to every one of the voters and say, here's a hundred grand. Absolutely. And then that would still be financially worth it for him to bribe them all to vote for all NBA, and then he'd still make out with the money. Being eligible for it,

it's not guaranteed you're gonna get it. What do you mean? Is this, I'm asking a serious question. If you're eligible for the Supermax, the team doesn't have to give it to you. All right, now that was louder than usual. That's another fine. You have to hit benchmarks. There are predetermined benchmarks in order to give it to you. All right, now that was louder than usual. That's another fine. You have to hit benchmarks.

They're predetermined benchmarks in order to be eligible for them. But he could pay off people and then not get the super max. Well, no, if he pays off the voters and they vote for him to be all NBA. It's like an episode of Mr. Beast. You can pay the money to bribe somebody, but there's no guarantee that they actually vote for you.

And I walk away with a hundred grand as an objective journalist and say, I don't know what you're talking about. I voted. Oh, you're talking about another layer of corruption, which is not telling the truth about your corruption. You just take the money and not vote for it. Exactly.

But I think what David is trying to do and grounding us to a halt in doing so is trying to get to the distinction between he's eligible, but the team does not have to sign him to a super max, but if they choose to sign him, this is the Lucas story. If they sign him to an extension, it must be with this threshold that is now a raised floor because he's eligible for the super for the vast majority of

teams when you have a player who is super max eligible not not unanimous but for the vast majority you give him that money because he's worth it right the idea is that Anthony Davis cornerstone he's one of the best players in the league and we're a small market team we want to keep them here we want to build he's worth it, right? The idea is that Anthony Davis, cornerstone, he's one of the best players in the league, and we're a small market team, we wanna keep him here, we wanna build around him, you give him the money, right? Because he's worth it, right? Now, there are sometimes guys that are like,

okay, technically you're worth it, but I really don't wanna pay you this money. But that's a lot rarer because again, the benchmark isn't make all NBA ones, it's you have to have multiple appearances in the first four or five years of your career. The reason why this is all in my head is that Ben Simmons is now at the end of his five year super max

and they're working on a buyout, the Brooklyn Nets are working on a buyout of Ben Simmons and Philadelphia when they sign him, there's despondency. He didn't get a super max, but he got a max. And you can lose, you can get really screwed with these deals if you don't get it right. So Ben Simmons did not get a super max. Said he got a max.

Yeah, well you started with he got a super max. Oh, you said them both. So, but I just want to clarify to people who are doing, David said this and David said that, which one is it? Thank you, max. It was a regular max with some bonuses in there. He didn't achieve them.

The thing with Ben Simmons is you had a perfect storm of A, legitimate injury, and then B, a weird organizational decision to abandon him in the most vulnerable moment. So when he passed Allen at Dunk. Against the Hawks. Against the Hawks in game seven, instead of his head coach, his superstar,

his general manager also. Wait, what is it? I forget, what did his head coach, his superstar, his general manager also. Wait, what is it? I forget, what did his head coach sound like? Well, look, you know, it wasn't my fault and it wasn't Joel's fault. I'm not gonna say whose fault it was. It wasn't Darrell's fault either. Yeah, it wasn't Trey Young's fault.

It was painful, man. That presser was so painful. But to Pablo's point about the voting, I mean, like this, to me it ends up, it's going to have to be like a committee, kind of like the college football committee, where like you trust people to be objective. Like it used to be basically, it is hilarious,

it used to be basically us journalists, hey, we trust you all to be objective. Never once when I used to vote did I think this might make this guy more money, right? Now it's a lot more obvious. It's just one to one. Hey, if this guy makes it, he's going to be able to make that money. I don't want to

have to think that way. I want to just respect the game and let the chips fall where they may. So this is why for years I've been beating the drum. The NBA is silly to continue to have individual salary restrictions. We have a salary cap. We have aprons. We have all that stuff. All right, so I should be able to pay, if I want to pay Luka Dantic $80 million a year, I should be able to do that. Now I might go into the second apron and we see with these aprons how hard it is to continue to improve your team if you're not financially kind of fiscally sound, but that should be our decision.

Well, that's, so that last clause, right, it gives away the game, David. All of these restrictions, all of these gates on how much you're allowed to pay a player are to help, I mean, in the mind of the owners, it's to help protect the owners from themselves. It's also the union actually wants it more because they want the money spread. Because if you left it to the owners, they would give Luca,

hey, come to me for a hundo, and then all of a sudden you've got players eight through 15. Well, also that, right? Who benefits from the max salary. The middle class. And we did, you wrote a story years and years ago about Tyler Johnson. And we did a video that got pulled down off the GSBF.com.

Oh, that contract. Love that, love that. Still hurts. But the whole thing about it was LeBron gets restricted in how much money he can make so that the Tyler Johnson's of the world can make way more money than they should. He stands on LeBron's shoulders and gets to reach a height that he would not be able to get to

if LeBron was not tethered to the floor. That's a union. Yeah, and by the way, this is where it gets, it's so interesting, right? Like in sports, of course, like the, the class system inside of the organization meant to defend all of its members, vastly different incentives, but clicks, clicks, clicks, clicks for clicks to Izzy's point, though, the question of like, should journalists even have this power? Right. Like you are now making writers, yeah, gatekeepers of actual fortunes.

And it's based on made up awards, right? We just make up this series of awards and we put value to all of them. We could have. I mean, people say defense with championships, right? So why isn't the all defensive team being the one that's earning you all this money because the team's goal is ultimately to win championships? It's all based on these silly little awards that we just now can pay people more money for. It's just a weird system.

People are upset about the baseball writers with the Hall of Fame and baseball. But it's a major thing that why do the writers have the right and then they don't have to make their ballots public? That, I mean, the easy one to me is transparency of voting. You should know who voted on everything. I don't see a defense otherwise. I mean, we have that in the NBA.

You know who the hundred voters are, and it lists exactly what their ballot was. So you know exactly who they picked to be their first choice for MVP, second choice, third choice, et cetera. Otherwise we wouldn't have known Tom Brady voted for Lamar Jackson. Yes. Now, back choice, et cetera. Otherwise we wouldn't have known Tom Brady voted for Lamar Jackson. Yes.

Now, back to the NFL honors. This was the photo that took the internet by storm yesterday. It was of a certain North Carolina football coach and his very young girlfriend. Now, this photo I believe was sort of a Rorschach test for just if you're a man or a woman I guess because I saw a lot of the Men on my timeline reacting and saying what a flex like you know young girlfriend

I got the Super Bowl rings and then I was also seeing a lot of women reacting and being like this is so creepy and weird Oh, I thought you guys said the woman said he's so hot No one's saying that I don't want to start an age Gap discourse, but I do appreciate the content. So thank you, Bill. It's the level of humor that I think I want to start with first is just that Bill Belichick, back in my day, Bill Belichick was the guy

who had no part of any of the things he is involved in now, right? Now he's on social media, he's appealing to young people, he's parading, doing red, he's doing step-in repeats. He's podcasting, he's doing all of this stuff. Is this I'm not in the machine anymore or is this I have a young hot girlfriend and she says, Bill, you should do this. So interesting, not a mini scoop

on the Kevin Love scoop that I got, but. A smaller scoop. Yeah, what's smaller than mini? Infantesimal. Samsonian. Micro. Samsonian scoop. We have the same brain.

You're not exactly a giant. You make a lot of size jokes. 5'10", 3 quarters? Oh! That's like 70 inches, David, and 3 quarters. Saying 3 quarters always makes it sad though, right? Like when you're like I need that three quarters. Yeah, just rounded sorry. I demand transparency of myself and others Bill Belichick apparently I mean like she is the person Jordan by the way Jordan j-o-r-d-o-n

Jordan Jordan Jordan his girlfriend is the person who runs his social media. Oh You Bill Belichick is writing these long-ass captions on his Instagram posts? And taking selfies. The point being, when Snoop Dogg comes out with the joke of the night, I don't think we should give credit necessarily to Snoop Dogg as much as just the inherent comedy of this. What did Snoop Dogg say? I'm glad you asked. Because I've been a football fan for a long long time. I mean I remember back when the Cowboys was good.

I remember back when the Chiefs was bad. And I remember... What was it? Bill Palachuk's girlfriend wasn't even born yet. Oh, dang. Oh, dang. Oh, dang. Oh, dang. I think that just proved that we just wanted a joke about that. Because we can all agree, that could have been written better.

Like, it was like, what was the joke? Oh, I think he was really high and just forgot the joke. I don't know. Oh, no, I'm going to tell you, I went to the ESPYs one year and I sat there. Look at me, Louie. And those, like, it's a tough crowd. It's not, first of all, they always like to bring in

not a comedian to do this for some reason. They wanna bring a sports person. Because of Norm. Because of Norm. It's always Rob Riggle. Well, I wish it was Rob Riggle. Put it on the poll, is Rob Riggle always hosting the ESPYs? Because there was some person, I can well i wish it was rather all is rob riggle always hosting the s p because there was some person i can remember what it was a famous person but they

weren't a comedian and they went up there and i was if in the mood uh... for for different reasons but i was so incensed by how corny the jokes are in that polite laughter we get there that i purposely would wait until it died down and i go that polite laughter we get there that I purposely would wait until it would die down and then I go oh I get it because Cleveland sucks as a city no one wants to be there oh I get it because

remember the Cowboys were winning a lot they haven't won in a long time I just kept doing that over and over and over again and I was causing a scene but that's not I don't feel like that's on the delivery there like that's he that was just not well written. It's hard to criticize delivery when you say, duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh. No, that's fair, that's fair. But I just don't know how that writer's room was like, that's it, that's our winner. I mean, the punch line.

Anything would have gone viral. What was the punch line? It was just like, I remember before she was born. Yeah, like the punch line is that. That could have been better. There was a lot of your mama's so fat that she's fat in that in that joke from Snoop Dogg Comedy writers across the country had to be like that's that was the joke wait. Oh, there's a viral clip a viral joke

What do you say about her? And it's just like oh the most obvious thing ever Can we bring willow in here for the next segment? Sure. Let's do that. Great Hey folks, it's Mike Ryan. It is big game week, and I've got just the thing to make your big game time a Miller time. From fireside conversations to football Sundays, winter means more moments with the coolest people in your life. Make these moments even better with Miller Lite, the great tasting light beer for people who love beer. A new year is a perfect time for friends, family, and great tasting light beer. Tastes like Miller time. Miller Lite is

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