The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - The Argentina vs. Egypt World Cup Match Was RIGGED? | Local Hour

Episode Date: July 8, 2026

"Three carajos?" Dan found himself marveling at Lionel Messi's greatness as Argentina stormed back against Egypt for a World Cup victory. Mike was in attendance and has a breakdown of the moment, Greg has some words for those claiming the game was rigged, and a Spanish radio call led to about as much cursing as we've ever heard on the radio. And yeah, all of that is important, but HAVE YOU SEEN THOSE MIAMI MARLINS? Today's cast: Dan, Greg, Zaslow, Chris, Jeremy, Mike, and Tony. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Greg Cody is coming here a bit enraged today on two different subjects. One, he is calling Egypt's coach a crybaby. Yeah. Put it on the poll, please, Juju. Is crybaby redundant at Levitart show? But more relevantly, he's enraged because he's saying, how in 2026 can no one find out whether Tom Powers is alive or dead? Minneapolis Star Tribune columnist?

Because I'm supposed to be fined $50. if he's not dead, but nobody can find out. And here's the thing I tried to find out yesterday by calling a former colleague, Jim Cable, and then found out he was dead. I'm not laughing at his death. Damn, I missed a good one yesterday. And so the person that I would have called

to get this information is no longer alive, but me and Cody were talking about whether Pablo Tori should dedicate an episode to finding out whether Tom Powers is alive or dead. It seems like something we can answer by simply calling the Minneapolis Star Tribute. Yes. Who's on that?

Don't bring Pablo into anything, because then you're going to look, oh, he did this in his life, he was this at 14. It's like, please, don't do anything. You don't want facts, information, and biography. No, I want to let the death man rest. Never will want them to rest.

In peace. Cry baby. Is cry baby redundant? Yes or no? I don't think so. No. I almost associate babies with nothing more than crying. Like, if we were playing Family Feud right now,

top five answers are on the board. what do you associate babies with? Shitting and crying are two of my answers. Like, I don't know what else you guys would choose. Love, I suppose. That's third. It's the third answer on the board. It's got like 15.

It's crying is number one. Love, I suppose. This is the formal answer. Love, I suppose. Show me love, I suppose. Crying is definitely up there. Shitting is definitely up there. Emphatically, those.

How about cooing? The 100 people surveyed They never Not even too They never called someone a thousand years old Baby's coo They do They do coo that's true

But show me cooing Yeah, cooing Oh no What coos besides a baby? A dove, dove's coo You surprised yourself I know, I did It's just a good dove's cry as well

What about Young Way? That's right Whatever you just said The kicker, former kicker. Yes, and by my dad. Yeah, that was a good job. It was a good job. Ironically enough, his body position is good.

It's the microphone that's too low this time. I'm literally leaning into it. Yeah, but you can pick up. You can move it. You can adjust it. Move the microphone. Lower my seat. Oh, Jesus.

We're not on visually. That would be funny if we were on visually. Visually during that. Isn't it amazing? He is so much better visually during the Shadow Show when nothing is being watched than he is during the rest of the show. Here we go. Why are you so mad?

I mean, I can see why it is that Egypt's coach, Hussum Hassan, is mad. Well, cry like an Egyptian. The problem with that guy is that he thinks one overturned goal prevented Leonel Messi from doing magic and winning that game. Well, they're pretty valuable. The goals in these things. I know, but he... That's how you win.

He's acting like he's the only. only team that had a goal disallowed by VAR. It's happened throughout the World Cup. Yeah, but it's the only one I can remember being disallowed for a foul that happened near their own goal, and then the ball goes down the field in seven seconds, and they score, and they review it, and the penalty, the infraction was much closer to your own goalie than it was to the other goal. I haven't seen a lot of that in this World Cup. Yeah, I mean, there's been a lot of debatable calls. I thought Germany, which didn't advance nearly as far as it should have, I thought Germany had a goal disallowed for the worst call, the worst reversal I've ever seen. But so it happens. But in this case,

the problem is the conspiracy theories, there's ripe ground for conspiracy theories. Why? Because, yes, FIFA and Fox and much of the world would love it if Leonel Messi made the championship again. It would be best for ratings. Nobody can deny it. that. And so that's fuel to the fire when it comes to somebody like the Egypt coach, just being unable to just accept defeat and have to look for excuses.

You are listening to the Dan Levitare show, in partnership with the Drafkin's Sports app, now live in all 50 states. Put it on the poll, please, Juju. Did you feel bad for Egypt yesterday? Because My rooting interests in the last 10 minutes of that game flip-flopped in a way that really surprised me while I was watching the game. Obviously, upsets are one of the greatest things you will find in sports ever, but one of the things I like better than upsets is when an all-time immortal champion is desperate at the end of games,

and I get to watch the stakes of greatness being greater than it usually even is, even though the standard is very high. And there are very few times in my life that I've watched a sports team. And at the end of games, what I have is an appreciation for the immortality and the history that I'm watching, like in that game where Messi's down two goals, they end up scoring three goals and winning in regulation in 13 minutes. And in insanity, Mike was at the game and we'll get his thoughts from the game. He wanted Cape Verde instead of Argentina. That's true.

That's something that he did want. and Messi's team isn't any good. Messy's team should be eliminated from the tournament. Messy's team is still in this tournament only because it has Messi. Like, they've been big favorites in both of their last two games and barely escaped, and it's because they've got an immortal. But in my lifetime, the times that I have appreciated what it is I'm talking about the most, a desperate champion at the end of game,

Tom Brady, obviously, down against the Falcons in the Super Bowl. Those warriors, late in games, when they were down to anybody, The 72 win team, obviously they lost up 3-1, but when those teams were down to anybody late, it was a real pleasure to watch them play basketball. That game six at Oklahoma City is the one, right? Well, that's one, but they were down so infrequently late that I rarely got the pleasure of actually watching it.

But when it happened, it was a great pleasure. Michael Jordan's Bulls were the same kind of things. The University of Miami has had a few football teams like this, but it crept up on me yesterday. I wasn't expecting it to see it. I was not expecting at any point Argentina to be down two goals. Cody predicted before that game. He thought Argentina would win that game going away,

and they just barely heaped it out, and it's because Messi's better at this than anyone else, and he's old. Yeah, and I don't agree that Argentina is not a very good team. I think they are, but obviously they're carried by a man who just turned 39 years old. And I think one of the things that is special about that game and what Messi did is that he was probably 13 minutes away from his last World Cup game. Cristiano Ronaldo just had his last, and this is sure to be Messi's last.

We don't see him in a World Cup at 43. So he was this close to his World Cup stage farewell as he led that comeback. Very dramatic, just emotional stuff. And you saw it on his face. That very close-up shot of Messi, all but crying after that game. It was special to see. That's a still from it. Very special to watch.

The 2013 Miami Heat during that 27 game win streak, there were games like that where, all right, especially the game at Cleveland during that stretch was 20-something, and it's like, all right, they're down double figures, but they're definitely still going to come back and win. Speaking of 2013, John Jones versus Alexander Gustafson won. That was an incredible fight where John Jones, who was doing coke all night and didn't fight, was getting beat up in the first run, drinking Coke, everything. Chale versus Spider.

Yeah, so many great ones were a champion where you're looking at a legend and being like, oh, I think he's going to lose, then they come back in. And in soccer, Liverpool's, I believe they won the Champions League that year, having to come back from, I think they had to score four goals against Barcelona, and it was an iconic comeback, led to them winning the Champions League.

And U.S. men's soccer, if you can believe it or not, in 2009, went up against a world record holding Spanish team that went 35 matches unbeaten right in the teeth of their golden generation, their incredible run. The U.S. beat them straight up in a semifinal in the Confederations Cup. I think Spain had been writing a 15 match win streak. Forget on beaten. Winstreet. And the U.S. found a way to beat them. And if you remember that match, Tim Howard was getting pelted at the end.

Spain played so desperate, it was really impressive. So was that the first time or the first time since when that? you were watching a game and you changed your rooting interest. It happens at times like this when you're watching an assortment of things you're not normally watching, and I rarely go into games without any kind of rooting interest. I also have to nominate, and congratulations to Messi, for being the second-place finisher, when I'm talking about desperate champions coming back late and being immortal. that was second place yesterday to the Marlins last night against the Seattle Mariners.

They were up 4-2 and then they were down 5-4 and they win 6-5. And there is something special going on there. I encourage you all to get the value of Marlins TV for the rest of the season for 2799. That's 50 cents a baseball game. 2799 you can have for the rest of the season. you can watch the lowest payroll in baseball be legitimately good because the Marlins are legitimately good. If their pitchers at the top of their rotation can somehow stay healthy and if Sandy can somehow be what he's been closer to what he's been over the last month than he was the first month, they've got three strong starters at the top of their rotation and they mash.

Like they hit the baseball. I just can't believe that they, with that kind of payroll, they have turned into. something, Greg, that is special. I don't know if South Florida is paying attention yet because it's been super busy, but this team has the best record in baseball since the beginning of June, and it's not a mirage. Like, this is, this is not a hot streak. This is, this is not a Kansas City Royal getting 12 hits in 12 at bats because Tyler Tolbert gets a bunch of infield singles and is a pinch runner. This is a, this is real. The Marlins are good. I don't like the noises Jeremy's making here as you talk about this. He's making

like sexual noise. They're good. The Marlins are good. Hard stop. Yeah, I think there are no fluke. They're the story. You could argue they're one of the stories in baseball right now. They've been totally overwhelmed and overshadowed in their own market though by the World Cup, by Miami

having seven World Cup matches by the Janus thing, now by the LeBron thing. So it's tough to pay attention to the Marlins unless you're a super fan. But they are. They're legit. I want to see one thing now, and I'm challenging Bruce who has the lowest payroll because he doesn't want to spend. Be a buyer at the trade deadline now.

Before this June, before they dominated June, we were talking about, oh, Sandy's going to be traded by the deadline. Be a buyer now. Show that you're in the playoff race. Show that you think you have a chance to not only make the playoffs, but make some noise in the playoffs. I dare you, Bruce Sherman. Wow, you dare him. He's been dared. Bruce Sherman has been dared.

But not double dare. Yeah, I was going to say. No, not a double dare. No, I would never do that. I mean, they're not going to be sellers at this point. Like, Sandy Alconstra is the only guy who's been in trade rumors nearly as much in Miami as Tyler Hero was, where every year he's going to get traded. And Bruce Sherman just recently on Marlins' radio was talking about he's a franchise legend. They want him to be here.

That's what you said just before you trade. He wouldn't lie, right? Can I call Jeremy out, though, last night specifically? He was doing the postgame interview with Marcy. On Marlins.com. On Marlins.com. You got to stay in there for that Gatorade bath. He backed out.

He barely caught his ankle. We can show the video here of it. It's just, you know, see, we only got to shoot. You got to lean in there. Can I be honest? Stay in the moment. Can I be honest if I wasn't being approached

where I could watch the Gatorade be thrown at me? Because that's what's happening here. I'm facing Jacob Marcy. Otto Lopez approaches from behind Marcy. I'm telling you to be a pro. And throws it that way. But you just wanted to hit me in the face. Like if they were like the normal Gatorade bath

when you're watching this, it's like, oh, they sneak up from. behind, they try to catch everybody. This was an opportunity where I'm seeing it happen right in front of me. I would have stayed in there. I'm not diving out of the way otherwise, but this is one like, you can learn from this. Just watch the tape.

It really messed up my shoes. You can improve from this. Yeah, I think it would have been better footage if Jeremy had been soaked by the gatorade and then fallen backward over the dugout rail. That would have been really fun to walk. Yeah, that's a great idea. Yeah. Very professional.

Yeah. Thank you. I think in that particular instance, you want to go for performance over professional. Performance would have been It would have been better television if you had lurched out of the screen wet and embarrassed

than what happened which is just one of your shoes got a little wet. I'm a fair critic. I will give him credit for the post interview DAP with Marcy. I've never seen that before. That was impressive.

He kind of made up for dodging the Gatorade bath with the Dap. Have you ever seen that before, Dan, where the interviewer post game he daps up the player? Jeremy led it. As you see here,

Jeremy leads the dapp. Marcy was like, okay, I'll dapp here. Marcy's my guy. A little chummy. A little chummy. A little chummy. Yeah, a little chummy. It's Marlins.tv.

What do you expect? Can I get a ruling from the judge, from Judge Zaslow, our resident journalist to hear at the table. I need a ruling on whether Jeremy was unprofessional and too chummy with the postgame interview. All rise, the Honorable Jonathan Zaslow, now presiding with. prejudice. Key ruling here. I do have a question for the defense here before I make my ruling. Yes.

What was your, what was your goodbye? How did you end? Like, did you say something like, thanks, bro? What did you say at the end? I said, go have fun with your team because he talked about wanting to have fun. So I said, you know what? Go have fun. Jacob R.C., congratulations.

You didn't address him like as if you're friends. No. because I am a professional. Well, I'm the one. I'm the judge here. I mean, you might be the judge. Stand down. Oh, you're close to being in contempt.

You're the one with the Emmys. You're very close to being in contempt in his courtroom. Between the two of us, there are two championship rings and they don't belong to you. All right. Good job. Did Jeremy Tashay behave unprofessionally when dapping up Jacob Marcy? The answer is, Yes, he did.

Not journalism. I've never seen a reporter dapp up. Handshake, fine. Never seen a reporter dab up the player afterward as if they are friends. That's my ruling. Always prejudice. Not journalism. It sounds to me, though, that our judge is slightly prejudiced in that you asked him for an answer to a question.

You got that information. it was information that was not excessive. It was information that you got that wasn't unprofessional. It was not extra chummy and you took that information. It was just for show. You did nothing with it. Valid ruling. I'm sorry to do that to you, Jeremy, but Zaz's rulings are always final.

You can watch me be too chummy for the next five nights on Marlins.com. Less than 50 cents a game. Dan Levitar. Jessica thinks you're pathetic. I saw the look on her face. It can never be the lane to victory. I know. I think Jeremy's pathetic.

You should hear him back here. It's so sad. The most absurd theater kid basketball analysis line that I've ever heard from him. Jeremy Tache. My dad was talking about the adjustments that Spoh made and criticizing him last night. And Jeremy just back here, his adjustments were spectacular. It's just like they lost. They're down to O2.

This is the Dan Levitational. Getting back to, getting back to a. Lionel Messi, okay? They end up scoring three goals in 13 minutes, and I want to go to some of the calls here. This stuff is always better in Spanish. Telemundo, Andres Cantor, obviously, the most famous voice in the history of soccer, nails it. Personally, he's debil to the penalty that can't

hear the he's a man, Messi, that's a big that has 39

bigos are the trapos, who is Fondido who Messi respected

the partido to see it just just just just

it's emmoney emosionant he he met vertigo Argentina Personally

I don't have enough appreciation for opera to be be palpably moved by music, but that's about as close as

I'm ever going to come. That guy, that voice, framing the accent on that moment when Cantor's the one who wept when Argentina won the World Cup. He's crying in the box because he's not faking any of that. He goes and gets that from the Nether region.

His voice is cracking because he's been doing it for too many years and it's shot from too many goals in this tournament. And he's Argentinian as well. But the opera comparison makes sense. His last name is Cantor. That is correct. Let's go to another, though, Argentinian call

because there is blatant homerism involved with these calls. This is Pablo Gerald. Another center, man, Messi, he was pasted. Argentina. Argentina, Argentina, Argentina, Argentina. Argentina, Argentina, Argentina. Argentina, Argentina. Argentina.

Argentina. No, I can't believe. We'll get to go ahead. We're going to cry. Go to go ahead. Here's the champion of the world. Here's the champion of the world. We're going to be able to be able to be able to be able to be in my life.

Never get to be able to be a bit of my life. We go to my life. My Godo. Let me do you know more. We'll leave a little more. Go to say, Paul. This is no terminated. Not terminated until you're going to say I'm a carpalahua.

So some of you might want a translation. And I'm pretty sure I heard in there your mother's a slut. I think I heard MF her there. Amongst others. But did he actually say, puttamadee? Did I hear that? I thought I heard that, which I can't believe. We might need a replay on it just to get ears on it again.

Well, Tony, you're going to have to, I'm going to need your help here. You translate as much as you can. Let's get all the Spanish we got in the room because it happens very fast here. But I heard your mother's a slut in the middle of that, and that seems like not what Al Michaels would have done during a historic 1980s call for the U.S. Olympic team. Do you believe in miracles? Motherf!

Do you believe in miracles? Puta Madre! Let me see if I've got this right. Let's write as much of this down as we can. No! No! No! No!

Argentino! Argentina! Argentina! Argentina! Argentina! Argentina! Argentina! No!

never to try to believe! No! Go to Argentina, carago! Go to go, go to God! You know! Here are the champion of the world! Here is the champion of the world!

We go! No, Jeremy, let me go to my life. Let me go to my life and my heart. Let me go to my son. Let me go to my ex for a more. Go to know, Juan Pablo.

This is no terminated. No termina until I'm from Paul, companion. No, about you're going. That's a professional broadcaster. No, you're right. I felt it. So never in my life, my heart.

He said, let's bleep and go, two to two. And I'm pretty sure he said, There was. There was three Garajos. What does that mean? Three Garajos? Garajos like, hmm. This one's tough to translate. How do I explain it to you?

Garajo is a difficult one. It's like, holy shit. Yeah. But it's got multiple, it's got multiple meetings. Because it could mean super far. I wish we could say things like that. Like something awesome happens. Like when Ray Allen hit the shot, Mike Ingo should have said, holy shit. That'd be great you could say something like that.

I don't think you can say what he did. Rebound to Bosch, back out to Allen. Bang! Motherf! That sounds like puttah mother. No, it is. That's exactly what you said. You can't say that.

If there's ever a time. That's his miracle on ice. Let's try and define though Carajo for a second because Casa Carajo is, you need the Casa to say it's far away. How do you spell it? C-A-J-O. So Carajo, the original meaning for Carajo was on a. old Spanish galleon boat, right?

You'd have the crows nest on top or you'd look to see where land is. That's called del Carajo. So people would be like, bette by el Carajo, which is go far away, up to the crows nest to go see if there's land. So in context, what's he saying? Carajo is a highly versatile and vulgar Spanish interjection. Its exact meaning spans from damn or hell to fuck, depending heavily on the Spanish-speaking region and the context in which it's used. Carson Beck with his legs, mother-f-dean.

Dan Levitar. I don't think strange for me, but like Mike Ryan. Oh boy. This is the Dan Levitar show. Those are two excellent calls, and I want to get into the other side for a second with you guys, because if you're Egypt and you've just had your next stepped on when you're that close to advancing against the defending chance, champion, the best player in the world. And afterward, your coach is basically making an accusation that you will never hear made during an NFL game, a basketball game.

I can't even imagine what the scandal would be in this country if a coach put his name on what this coach did, which is this game was simply rigged. FIFA wanted messy to advance. You've got the most corrupt sports organization there's ever been. This conspiracy theory is something that people, have been saying for a long time there's no disputing that the incentive is for Messi to advance and Egypt to not advance and then to have that particular call replay used that way to disallow such a beautiful goal that went the length of the field in seven seconds to go review a foul that was over in your own goal box

that is crazy and now they're saying that the tournament has been fixed this is something you do not see in American sports not like this Greg You do not see a coach come out and just say, yeah, that game was rigged. Yeah, and the fact that the Malagans red card had been rescinded by FIFA lends credence to that kind of an attitude that this whole thing is rigged. There's favoritism. I feel like the closest we ever came to that here in American sports was when Jeff Van Gundy commented about Yao and the way he's officiated.

David Stern, like almost had him killed. You find him like $100,000. And that was like a coach who was going to be. to say that a game is not on the up and up. I feel like that's the closest we ever heard something. Yeah, and after the Dallas... Yeah, Mark Cuban. Yeah, Mark Cuban got fine. How much? It was a record amount. I think it was a million. I think it's a million. Mark Cuban, but that's an owner doing it. It is, I guess it's slightly different. Maybe it's not. But a coach doing... He was right, by the way. Yeah. A coach doing it, though, after this particular game, what you have there, did you guys

feel bad for Egypt at all? Did it? Mike? You were at the game, Mike? Of course. You were at the game, Mike. course. I actually had a lot of interactions with the Egyptians that were there. They were vastly outnumbered, but I got their feelings on the matter. And it surprised you. The people that I had interactions with were pretty level-headed, which is like, you know, we got God by the greatest of all time. They weren't really lamenting the transgression that happened to them. But I also think in part, us in the stadium, we have a different relationship with it because they don't show us the replay. They don't show us a full offense. Did you have any idea what they were going a VAR for. No, I had no idea. I had to rely on the group chat. And I didn't, in the moment,

I was like, I guess I have to trust it because I can't see it with my eyes. After the fact, I can, I can agree that that goal shouldn't have come off the board. I haven't really seen a foul in the buildup called that early in the process. To me, kind of felt like they went into it fishing for a reason to bring that goal off the board. But guys, I scored 12 minutes later. If they have that goal, dynamics of the game change. We've already seen how Argentina chase is a two-goal lead. So I miss me with that cost them the game. Oh, meaning you think because they scored 12 minutes later that if they were up to nothing there, they may not have scored another because they play different? Correct.

Correct. Because their approach of the game changes. They set back a little bit more defensively. So you think they got it anyway. Argentina is more desperate. And hell, say you give them three goals. Still wouldn't have been good enough. They wouldn't have won that game if it goes to extra time. Egypt was great defensively, also exhausted late because of how they played defensively. And that goal, Mike, that goal and then the next goal came with the parking in front of the bus and then a breakaway where you're going the length of the field with just three guys because you've got everyone in front of the goal playing defense. The last two goals that Egypt scored, the one that was disallowed, were so beautiful, like in

terms of the precision of making your way down the field with just a couple of dribbles and a couple of passes to score goals against Argentina. I would be crushed if I were an Egypt fan and I would never forget or forgive the fact that that goal was taken off of the board. I see where they're coming from and now the discourse has gotten a little out of control. But like I said, in the moment, I guess maybe the Egyptian fans that I spoke to, I spoke to about a dozen, weren't fully aware of what had happened. But you scored 12 minutes later. That built up, by the way, was a testament to the selections that the manager made because Marmush is a player of high quality. It plays over in Europe, and they put in Hassan, who was making his first start, I believe,

and that whole buildup started with the managerial decision there. But you scored 12 minutes later. That's even more momentum. What happened at the end was Argentina scored that first one, and everyone in the building knew, except for me, because I was like, they're deader than disco. They're still dead. They're still dead. They cannot be.

They've never been more dead. And then Messi, who at 39 years old, who's completely mastered it, who, by the way, miss a penalty earlier on. It's one place in his attacking game where he appears to be mortal because he misses about half the penalties. Four of eight. Four of eight World Cup penalties.

People are saying it's like watching the world's greatest chef not be able to make a grilled sandwich. Like a grilled cheese sandwich. Yeah, he's pretty mediocre from the spot. There's a lot of pressure there. And I've heard some theories that he has to think, whereas the game comes so instinctively to him that it's easier when it's not that spot.

It's the one part of his game where he's a human. I actually had the thought of if they get into penalty, because you can't do it, obviously, but he's bad enough at them that I would consider the idea of not having him taken. No, he's taken. No, I know, I know, but you understand that there are not a lot of times in sports where you're going to end up doing something, where out of honoring someone's greatness,

you're going to choose them to do something in a critical moment that they seem to be bad at, not average at, bad at. He misses half of them in the World Cup. Yeah, but the entire team is made up a part just to feed messy and him to carry them to victory. It's why people have a problem with Venetius not taking the penalty. Best player takes a penalty. Even if they're not good at it, they rip the ball away. My team rides with me. And parenthetically, this has been a weird World Cup for penalty kicks.

40% of them have been missed. That's a high percentage. So it's not just messy. It's not just anyone. I mean, they've been missing them. Goalies have been making great saves. It's been weird to watch, fun to watch. And then things got nutty on the Egypt sideline during all of this, and the sideline kept getting yellows, and then eventually it was two yellows, and I guess maybe it was the manager, the assistant coach, I'm not sure, ended up getting two yellows in a red. And then one of the assistant managers was... Yeah, don't make the gesture, yes. You can't do an X? Well, they're... The X comes from its derivative, there's different connotations. Like, I was wondering what that means. The manager is

apparently like a, like a Marino San and Marino did the handcuff gesture when Inter was trying to win a treble. Marino's always one to accuse officiating and governing bodies of a conspiracy against his team. And he was emulating that. When he put the X over his head, that's what that means. He was like handcuffed me. Oh. Like I can't.

My hands are being cuffed here. I don't have an opportunity. I think you should also look up though. There was some writing, there was some reporting done that there were some anti-Semitic gestures. There was a lot going on with the Egyptian manager. There was a Palestinian flag inside that stadium. Argentinians were seen holding up an Israeli flag. There was a lot of geopolitical stuff that was swirling around this. But what happened on that on that touchline was you saw a team lose its composure because they knew what was happening. In Argentina, I was kind of, you mentioned desperate

champion. Usually you see that. And what was so impressive about it was, I was like, I think they're dead because they're not really acting desperate. You don't see, like, they're all pretty reserved. And I think they keep all that in because the emotion makes you do some crazy things. And that's why we saw an outpouring of emotion from Leo Messi that we've straight up never seen, him being thrown in the air, him weeping. He said that he was weeping because he felt like he let his team down by missing the pen. But they were all crying because of all the emotion.

I think they held in to keep their nerve. And then it all came out after the match, goosebumps type of moment. When the Egyptian coach is claiming a conspiracy, claiming a rigged game, de facto claiming that the referee is on the take, what responsibility, if any, is he putting on his team, his defense for allowing three goals in 13 minutes? Well, no, he's saying it's an injustice. Like, he's not. They scored after. So it just, you miss me with all that. What happened was the greatest player of all time just didn't allow his team to lose to a lesser team.

We see big underdogs in that sport. We've seen that several times this tournament, a lot with the African nations. Big leads go way late. What happened there, you don't want them to admit that, you know, we just weren't good enough. I blew it, or our team just lost gas. It's easier to point to a conspiracy. But let's take this back to the conversation that we had about Balagan.

This is why optics matter in a sport that has been rife with fixing scandals and whatnot. Yeah, FIFA, which already there's a narrative about they make favors for Messi. how did Inter Miami make the Club World Cup? They just made up the rules as we go. And this is when the American politics injecting itself into it. And in Fantino's close relationship with our government, you just point to an article, Article 27, where it's like, wait a second, we knew about that article. That's not the interpretation of the rule.

So when, that's why the balligan thing was so damning. Because it seemed as though you were just straight up rigging the game, for one, and you've opened up the can of anacondas to now where everyone can openly speak to conspiracies. I would like you, though, to stop with, and I understand what you're doing there. It does change the way the game is played. But when you keep saying they scored again 12 minutes later, I think it was actually a little bit faster than that. When you keep saying that, what you're ignoring is that there is no fan base in the history of Earth that wouldn't have made the same kind of complaint based on what that call was if your rooting allegiance was Egypt. Like,

You can say what you think would have happened next or what did happen next and how it would have altered the game. But if that was your team, Mike, that had that goal disallowed, when goals are that valuable, any fan base that's ever existed would concoct complaints, crybaby stuff. There's not a human being alive who has cared about sports that would have a rooting interest in that game that was Egypt and say that was just because it didn't feel like it was just. Well, I think in the buildup to the third goal, Argentina had a foul similar in the buildup that people were pointing to and say, how is that allowed? I hear you, but I do think context matters. I do think Egypt's scoring the second goal, which was later in the game that effectively felt like they put this thing away, is an important thing. But you wouldn't be saying that if you were caught in the emotion of, I just got robbed. We play this game once every four years.

Egypt has never had a game that's this important. and we had the defending champions beat and we just got it taken from us. We got a beautiful goal taken from us from an irrelevant call that was literally 100 yards away. Yeah, I looked at that game. I'm like, make a 3-0.

And Messi finds a way to come back. I mean, he did. They did score three goals in the final, like, 13 minutes or so. What I don't like about... Well, but you can't do that. If you're saying that they wouldn't have gotten a third goal if they were up to nothing, the game changes.

You can't then also. say if it were three nothing, they still would have gotten three more goals of Argentina. Like the game would have been different, right? I mean, they were defending just as hard with two, up to that they would have been up three. And clearly they didn't have an answer for Argentina chasing that game late. What I don't like about it, and it goes back to the balligan thing, is what we saw was an all-time display by, and people are so hesitant to just crown all-time greatness when it's happening, because we're always comparing the ghost, because there's like a weird tribal thing.

thing that happens with Messi v. Ronaldo and Messi v. Maradona and Messi v. Pele. This is an all-time great player. He's the greatest player of all time. He just capped off one of the more improbable comebacks of all time inside of regulation. I hate that it's marred by that. We can all admit down two goals in a World Cup against a defensive-minded team. That's damn near impossible to win that game inside of regulation. He did it. It was his crossing. It was his finishing. He also did it missing a penalty in that match for one for one brief moment let's step back and say that at 39 years old he is somehow better than ever he put his team on his shoulders a team that as dan touched on has not played well this entire tournament he's the only guy doing anything it was only

until they were down to zero that guys like enzo woke up mccalister woke up they've had very few individual players step up and play well most of them have just flatly played poorly he is carrying this team to victory. It was probably the signature performance of his illustrious career. I know that's hyperbolic. This Argentina team has played three of the top five World Cup matches on the men's side I've ever seen, and they've done so in the last four years. He's incredible. Earlier in the tournament, Belgium beats Senegal in a very similar fashion, but it didn't get nearly as much attention, not only because it was earlier in the tournament. It wasn't in regulation either. They needed overtime. Like, it wasn't three goals in the last 13 minutes. But if I made a

controversial call decided that one. We're here. We're tracking back to a goal that was taken off the board and eventually Egypt did secure that second goal. The big controversy in the Belgium match was they got a pen that made it three to. Right. And the big controversy here is the complaint of the Egyptian coach. But that's off-putting to me because, as you say, credit Messi the greatest of all time. We overuse the word goat. He's the goat. And there's no question about that. And he showed why. And it was such an illustrious performance by him, scoring the first goal, assisting on another. He rose as high as he's ever risen on the mountaintop. And credit that. Quit complaining because your defense gave up three

goals. Well, Messi is the reason they gave up three goals. Similar to the Jalen Brown trade where like we couldn't find anyone, you know, within the 24, 48 hours afterward who was on on the Celtic side. Has anyone said, yeah, like, I think VAR was used properly, and that goal should have been disallowed, like they got it right? That happens. Again, the people that I, I had a wonderful interaction at the TSA line in Atlanta with this wonderful family of Egyptians.

And the little kid, the little boy had his face painted in Egyptian colors. Many of them were happy that they were there, happy that they had the lead, understood that eventually, the greatest player of all time got him. The Egyptian kid that I was talking to, underneath his Egyptian national team jersey, he was wearing a messy shirt. So he was really confused.

I ended up giving him my match day scarf because the dad offered to buy it from me. I'm like, no, you have it. To many applause from the TSA. A lovely, a lovely world come home. I was like, here you go. And everyone was like, yeah. And then his little sister came up to me.

His little sister came up to me. She's like, you know we have three of them already. I'm like, I'm an ally. Not the only. interaction you had at the Atlanta airport, right? Yeah, I was at the standby line. Very fluid trip for me. Off the train, into a plane, lovely public transit system that they have there.

And I was waiting for my standby assignment, and I was met by this producer. He's like, hey, are you Mike Ryan from the Levitard show? I'm like, yeah, yeah, what can I do you for? And he's like, do you do podcast interviews? I'm like, I pretty much say yes to everything. Just send me what we're talking about. He's like, cool, I'll book you down. You familiar with Adam 22?

Ha ha ha ha ha ha