The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - The Big Suey: Cecil Fielder

Episode Date: February 21, 2024

David Samson sticks around to discuss the issues with MLB uniforms and whether or not we'll see a little too much of our favorite MLB players, wearing cups, potential labor unrest, favors for owners, and his movie review. Then, Mike and Dan got ballsacked, the No Bull Tour and the legacy of "The Last Dance," and sneaker shaming. Plus, Amin tells how to feel about the Austin Rivers & JJ Redick saga. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to DraftKings Network. Welcome to the Big Sui, presented by DraftKings. Why are you listening to this show? The podcast that seems very similar to the other Dan LeBatard podcast. I'm sorry, I'm not going to apologize for that. In fact, the only difference seems to be this imaging. I have been tempted in restaurants just walking past tables to grab somebody's fries

if they're just there. That hasn't happened to you guys? I've done it. And now, here's the marching man to nowhere, that face and the habitual liar. Today's episode is sponsored by DraftKings. Stay tuned because you'll hear more about DraftKings and all it has to offer throughout the show.

DraftKings, the crown is yours. David, you mentioned the uniform thing, which we already talked about last week, but I keep hearing more and more about this. I've read long form articles about it. It does seem to still be an issue that fans aren't happy with uniforms, players aren't happy with uniforms. And then yesterday I saw this video

on the Mariners Twitter account of one of their players. And I'm not sure if you've seen this, but if you look at this player's pants, we have to take the lower third down and we'll play it as B-roll, but you can see through his pants and you can see his jersey tucked into his pants. So what's going on here?

Oh, this is what they're trying to do. Tony Clark met the media yesterday and said, you know, we've got a uniform issue and it's a big miss and I'm hoping they're going to take care of it. But Rob Manfred discussed it. The players are going to be fine. It is way too big a lift to switch out uniforms. You've got your licensees involved.

You have to clear the shelves because if it's not authentic, you can't charge the prices for authentic. You've got your licensees involved. You have to clear the shelves because if it's not authentic, you can't charge the prices for authentic. And so therefore it's sort of on-field authentic. And so if they change it, they have to reship everything and the union's not gonna pay for it. The league's not gonna pay for it. So I just expect some players to just have to wear

an extra layer of underwear. But yes, it is not ideal, but it is certainly not a major bargaining issue at all. So the pants will be see-through this season. So you have to really look carefully, and of course cameras are gonna be doing it. That'll drive ratings. You do not have to look carefully in this video.

David, not in this. I'm thankful for the jersey, honestly. The video made it look, yes, the jersey looks ridiculous. You can see how long it is almost, you know. It looks untucked because you can see the ends of it through the pants. And it really is telling you, would you like to,

just whether you want to or not, gaze at the package? Because- So there are no players who play without underwear. Some players just wear a jockstrap over nothing, but the majority of players wear standard issue. We give them sort of tight boxer briefs that they wear under their jerseys, under their pants. So I don't think we're in any danger

of any sort of penis capture of any of the players. Now, could there be somehow, someway, the next Fernando second all that comes out, maybe, but I just don't think that's gonna happen. What is the cup percentage in baseball? Way smaller than I thought when I started in the game. I am blown away by the number of players who both don't wear mouth guards or cups.

I didn't wear a cup. They feel like it hurts. They don't like it on the swing. They don't like it when they run. They feel they've got sort of rubbage. And a lot of... I have really tried to get players to do it, trying to explain to them that a ball on the ball

is a real problem. Is that like a spring training meeting? Like what's that meeting look like? The meeting where you're telling players to wear a cup. Is it just that? Is it a cup meeting or you tackle a lot of things in this meeting? It's a lot of things.

I go from cups to DUIs to let's play like champions to let's ignore the projections and let's try to win when no one thinks we can. So it's all mixed in one and we give every player a cup and what they do is they take it out of the jockstrap and they just don't wear it. Now catchers, there was once a catcher. Do you remember Miguel Alivo? Of course I do. He always swung at first pitch fastballs.

So not many people remember him. He was not a cup guy. And what's funny to me is when you're catching that seems like you have to be. But I was a pitcher who did wear a cup and he was a guy named, we had him, that crazy guy, Jose Manzanio was a player who played for the Marlins, I can't remember what year, and he had a tick where he would hit his cup

before he was able to pitch the ball and he realized that he had to wear it because otherwise he'd be hitting directly the jewels. So he would wear a cup while pitching. Maybe that's why he was so ineffective. All right. I've got a number of different questions right now. That crazy guy. Please put it on the poll at LeBertard show.

Does a single player in professional sports play without their underwear on. Because David has said that none of them do. Also, I will tell you that many catchers have had fractured testicles, which sounds like the worst thing possible because of what David- Isn't it ruptured? No.

You can get that too. I think it's different. I think it's worse. Fractured? I think it's a fractured testicle. What's worse, put it on the pole. It's ruptured. Put it, much worse. It's what's worse put it on the poll all right sure but it's a tie put it on the pole at Levitado with the kid who ruptured his ball and he had to walk around like with a cane

for like for months because he couldn't walk it was terrible no put it on the pole at Levitado show what's worse fractured testicle or ruptured testicle and I don't think you got the player right when you mentioned Fernando Senegal. You were mentioning a player who accidentally took his pants off while on the field? No, no. Segnal was a player who was famous for having the largest penis in all of baseball history. I think that was Julio Franco. No, that's great. Great point. Second place. I don't think penis size matters if the pants are see-through. I think if we're gonna see ass crack a lot,

I think we're gonna see shirts tucked in, David. I don't think anyone was like, oh, we might see a penis. I don't think that was the case. I'll take the under on one ass crack. You're not gonna see it. The under on one? Yeah.

That's, I'm taking the over. On white pants, you are seeing everything. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. I don't think that's the case. under on one ass crack. You're not gonna see it. The under on one? Yeah. That's, I'm taking the over. On white pants, you are seeing everything.

You're just gonna see on these, that's a standard issue. Okay, nope. It's gonna be crackless. We're gonna see at least one crack before spring training's even over. Guys, please put in the lower third. Just put in Steve Lyons getting to first base

and forgetting when he slid into first base that he was in a stadium full of people and therefore he just pulled his pants down to fix them. And I don't, oh, Tony Clark is there. That's such an old man move. Old men love to open their belt, pull the pants down, tuck the shirt in, doesn't care who's around, pull the pants back up,

redo the belt look around. Oh, you guys see that? Pappy does that a lot. My father one time got so nervous during a heat game that in the living room out of nowhere in front of a girlfriend, he just pulled his pants down and then pulled them back up. We've all been there, big three era.

Big three era, we've all been there. Yes, I don't know. I don't know what he's been there. No, I've been there. Nope, I don't think anybody's been there. I just by accident play your pants down He was just nervous and crazed. He was nervous and crazy. He's got to change it up David Understand the you know, I don't understand that at all. What nerve what nervous tick is pulling your pants down I want to point out to the audience that the video in the lower corner that is Cecil fielder I said that that was Tony Clark and that could not, it could not

possible, no it's not, is it Jack Clark? It couldn't possibly look any less. It sure is not, it couldn't look any less like Tony Clark but Tony Clark you mentioned has spoken to the media and you think labor unrest is coming to to Manfred's tenure ship, correct? I do. I, I'm going to take the over right now. And I, and I haven't really talked about this on nothing personally yet.

But if you're asking me to take an over or under on 99 days, which I believe was the amount of days of the lockout this past time, I think, I'm think I'm going to take the over. There's a lot of bad stuff going on already between labor and management, and we're still years away, and all this uniform talk, it's just sort of a bait and switch

to be distracted from some of the real issues. Tony Clark spoke about deferral. You've got a block of owners who are furious with what the Dodgers did. You've got a block of owners who are furious that their local TV revenue has gone away while teams like the Dodgers and the Yankees are really becoming more secluded from payroll standpoint.

So the biggest concern you have back in 94 with the baseball strike that canceled the World Series is you had owners fighting with owners. And Bud Selig was really good about eliminating that by having favors with every owner to stop blocks. Rob Manford's been really good about that too, but there's a lot more new owners now. The prices of entry are a lot higher to buy teams,

whether it's Bruce Sherman or whether it's David Rubenstein buying the Orioles. The numbers are bigger, so you're seeing blocks of owners, and that's always a problem for negotiation. Give me the greatest secret you can on favors for an owner that Bud Selig would hold on to. Give me the best one that you know of where a commissioner is using as leverage power in another place.

The number one is when an owner gets approved. The number one way that leverage was used in my time was when Jim Crane had to agree to move the Astros to the American League in order to get approved as a buyer of the Astros. That is when that the ultimate leverage is when it comes to your approval to become an owner. Now there are situations where an ownership group is chosen. So for example, when Jeffrey became the owner of the Expos, he was basically told by Bud, all right, you can take over the Expos.

However, don't do anything to screw up baseball economics. And the first thing we did was give Graham Lloyd three million a year for three years and give a guy named Grady Sizemore, who's a name that some of you may know, we overpaid his slot when we drafted him with Montreal and Bud called me and said, get Jeffrey on the phone because that's not how you behave.

You're in this game because of me and like a parent. I brought you into this world and I'll damn well take you out. And of course, we were scared enough that we fell into line. That's why the payrolls were always so low because we fell into line. Guys, I have a shameful admission. Is this a safe space?

Is this a safe space? Sure. We played, we showed the video before of like that old time and Dan mentioned a player from the 90s. I have a shameful admission. I went most of my childhood being a very big baseball fan thinking that Cecil fielder was a position when I was like eight I thought it was like right behind the second base like like a floating outfielder I swear to God this is not a

lie this is not for not set not center fielder but right in front of them was the Cecil fielder I Go out and play Cecil! Where was the prince? We got 90 seconds left, David. What do you have for us in the way of a movie review? I had 30 seconds last week. Now it's 90 seconds this week. I want to get back to society of the scene.

I wanted to engage with you about this plane crash and what these people did when they started eating each other. Now they waited for people to die before they ate them, but they had nothing to eat. They were in the Andes Mountains, and it's become this major center of discussion. What would you do before starving to death? And the answer is, of course you eat people,

and you choose the largest people first, and you start with their ass. All that's clear. What I never understood is, why don't you cook the food? They all had lighters to smoke cigarettes, light up some clothes, put the meat on part of the tail and have a barbecue, but it looked as though from the movie that they ate it raw.

Now, of course you do what you gotta do, but I worry about salmonella and all sorts of things, but I was thinking about it and I would absolutely eat someone before Don. That's actually not true. It is true. Put it on the pole please. Dan, I'd start with you. Put it on the pole please at LeBatard Show.

Which cheek you going for? When eating- Left cheek, cause he's a righty. When eating humans- What he's a righty. When eating humans. What's your wallet side Dan? When eating humans do you start with the large ones and the ass. Yes. I'm not going to be deposed. The Dan Labrador Show was still got to sponsored by BetterHelp. A lot of us spend our lives wishing we had more time. The question is, time for what?

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This is the Don Lebatard Show with the Stugats. I think that as a show, we got ball sacked again yesterday or the equivalent. I'm just using that as a tell all verb. The Kid Rock story evidently was not true. Kid Rock did not have a, you can't cancel America tour that then had tour dates canceled in New York. We got got by that story. It feels like the internet got got by that story.

And I just want to ask you guys as someone who is You know in Miami and comes from exile living when my parents talked about the idea that propaganda Becomes news that you cannot tell what is real and what is not real and it is part of how it is that you get around Not giving people freedom We're definitely headed to the place, if we're not already there, where all of us are being fooled by everything on the internet, correct?

It's not just me, it's not just old people. I kind of feel like this one, you guys. Come on, you can't cancel America tour, it just sounds so dumb. It sounds so dumb. Like no way. You're surprised. It would sound dumb in 2024.

There's got to be some middle ground though. This is not a shark swimming in a mall. It's close. Dude, no, no, no. It's not close to that. A lot of retweets this had. Oh, there you go. I was told that this was from a not funny liberal website. That is where it started

Which one I don't know. I don't know how it is that it's spread That's the furthest I've gone on the reporting to the roots of our error I just want to remember for the record that Mike brought that story up So when I make like a big mistake in this chair, remember that Mike was the one that let that one slip Wait, so point fingers pretty adamant about it, too Mike was the one that let that one slip. Not the point fingers. He was pretty adamant about it too. Let's point some fingers.

Did Mike come into the studio with and told everyone that? So you all kind of took his word for it. Mike is very trustworthy. I had read the story as well, and this was on a day that Tony also came after Mike by calling him a boomer because he doesn't know how to speed up YouTube. Mike didn't know that you could watch YouTube faster. He knew YouTube.

We taught Mike yesterday on air. How? You don't know? No, how did he not know? I don't know. It was crazy. I accidentally speed it up all the time. Like, oh, I didn't mean to click that.

Do you ever do that thing where you hold the button on the side and all of a sudden the video speeds up? I didn't want that. I didn't want that. That's how I watch every video. I thought that was just the cocaine. I want to ask Amino Hassan, the Cortadito. I want to ask him about this story that I'm reading right now from

NBA Central. Are you sure? I don't know. I'm looking at Central. Yes, I'm looking closely. It's got, we have C-E-N-T-R-A-L. Okay. Yeah, I know there's a fake one out there. Yes, it gets a lot of people Scottie Pippin Horace Grant and Luke Longley are Embarking on a no-bull tour to share their Perspectives on the last dance story and their experience playing for the Bulls in the 90s This is had tipped to ball his life But the quote here as I see Scottie Pippin Longley, and Horace Grant on stage in suits is, quote, a lot of people wanna ask us about that bullshit documentary.

Yeah. I mean, in. No bull tour. Are you guys in on this? Because right now, what has been spawned by the last dance is the booing of a widow at a Bulls game. Like this great team can't produce anything good other than that documentary during the pandemic

because since then all it's been is poison. It's been poisoned sifting through the love lives of Michael Jordan and Scotty Pippin's ex-wife. It's been poisoned with everyone being hurt by that documentary that was in that documentary, and now three bitter old bulls are touring the country, touring the country to rip Michael Jordan. This is all the effort it takes, ladies and gentlemen, to figure out stuff.

Instead of going off of NBA Centale or whatever, you go... Do I have it wrong? You have it slightly wrong. You have it slightly wrong. The bulls' legends Bulls legends of Scottie people look longly horse Grant are gonna be on a tour called the noble tour They're gonna be going to Multiple arenas the problem is then it's in Australia They're not touring this country. They're doing a country. It's a look long these countries

This is according to nbl.com. Nbl is obviously the professional league over there. It's brought to you by Hungry Jacks, which I'm pretty sure this is copyright infringement. Hungry Jacks logo is exactly like Burger King's old logo. It just says Hungry Jack in the middle instead of Burger King. Like a bun, Hungry Jack in red, another bun.

That's Burger King, man. Don't worry about it. But yes, they're going on a tour of Australia. They're gonna be in Melbourne, Sydney, and Tasmania. And it's presented by Coca-Cola, your Pacific partners. I have a question for the room. And the answer could be no, in which case just say no. Are we ready to talk about the last dance being a little bit more well received just

because there was nothing else on TV than it really was as a documentary? No. This is what I'll say, Jessica. I watched it at the time and I knew that this was incredible. This is why it succeeded. Number one, you're right. Part of it was there was nothing on and this was the first sports thing to come on, right?

Nothing on. Right? Well there was- I was watching like marble racing. Tiger King was on. Like there was things on. No sports. No sports, this was the first sports thing.

But number two is it barters on the most powerful narcotic there is, nostalgia. Oh, remember when they did this and remember when it started with LL Cool J, I'm Bad? Everybody dance age and older. Oh, nobody can, they just started rapping along with it, right? And it automatically caught, yes you did.

Your old ass fell for it. Did you do it? Hot. I think like, I liked it, but I think. Number three. The timeline throughout the entire documentary was so convoluted. And I think even as we were watching it, but I think. Number three. The timeline throughout the entire documentary was so convoluted, and I think even as we were watching it, we were like, we know this is Michael Jordan's lens on,

you know, like we're seeing this through Michael Jordan's lens, we're not seeing this through, even though they're doing like a Scotty Pippin episode, or you know, all these various different kind of themes per episode, it's like. No, the bull started in 1985, we all know that, right? Like, it was in 1984 or whatever. But yeah, so what they were doing was,

cause it's supposed to be the last season, but they kept going back to the beginning of how they got here. But then they go back and then they go back again. Yes, they go back and forth. So but the number three thing, which is the second. And then they go back to the middle, and then they go back to the back.

Go back to the future. Then like the fentanyl to the narcotic of nostalgia is Michael Jordan, right? This worship of Michael Jordan. Michael Jordan could do no wrong. Michael Jordan was always the best. Every way he did it was the best way to do it and anyone who says otherwise will shut up loser, right? So it's all of that coming straight into people's veins intravenously, right? And then you have, okay, all of this archival footage Which is really cool of a time when nothing was available now We're used to seeing behind the scenes of all the time

I agree the archival footage was very cool, especially like the Bull Security Guard all of that that sort of thing That's my biggest take away it you that meme is the biggest takeaway from that doctor For people listening everyone. Yeah, we all did the shrug I thought it was Michael Jordan doing that when making his six threes against no Okay, bigger put it on the pole at LeBatard show bigger shrug And if Michael Jordan knew that that would be the bigger shrug he would have said cut that out of the documentary He would have shrugged harder. He would have come back. That is such a good shout by Jess That would not have made the cut.

He would have been like too much attention for that guy. This is my story. And like they got pretty good access in terms of the interviews for the rest of the, everyone else who's involved. So I mean, I don't think it was a great document. Like it was entertaining. It was really entertaining.

I agree, but your first part of that sentence tells me we're ready for this conversation. Because you just said, I don't think it was a great documentary. And I think that the public at large thinks that this is the greatest documentary of all time. And I think that that's just because we were like, really bored, there were great parts of it,

but it was just like, it was good. I'll tell you why the public at large thinks that. Because the public at large does not know what a good documentary is. They think anything that is just glazing for two and a half or five episodes. This was ten episodes. Ten episodes, whatever it was. The glazing, that's all. Oh, that's a documentary. Just because it's real people and not actors doesn't make it a documentary.

When you were saying the public isn't discerning about documentaries because I got in trouble at ESPN while on ESPN Talking about how that was a glorified sneaker commercial that it was Michael Jordan telling that story His way Dan it wasn't a sneaker Commercials are well made. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait. Wait. Nike commercials are well made Dan I'm not gonna sit here unless you call it a sneaker commercial, because it was a Haynes commercial and a Gatorade commercial too, and McDonald's.

How dare you, how dare you, Dan Levitari, just shove them aside for your sneaker fetish. Ballpark. To be fair, to Dan's point, after the last dance, Jordan's sneaker sales went from affordable to exponentially expensive. Like, you would get you would get Guys come on stop that no you stop that you stop that you could buy a pair of shoes for 180 bucks 200 bucks

That's not affordable. That's a if you're in the sneaker game. That's that's retail price. You're not in the sneaker game You guys come on. What are we doing here? Let's be honest Let's be serious put it on a pole at Levitad show. Is a $200 sneaker affordable? In this economy, it's affordable. Trust me. The poll economy is not affordable. Roy, you're wearing sketches right now. We can't talk about this, please. No, these are Nikes, dude. I don't know what those are. Those are not Nikes, bro.

Stop shoe shaming. Stop shoe shaming. Yikes? He's got air Yikes. Well, these are baseball turfs. They might as well be air yikes. Don't shoe shame him. Long story short, long story short, the same shoe that you could have bought for $200 in February of 2020 went up to $400, $500 in April of 2020 after the last few years. I'm really happy I started this conversation

No, I have a group chat where every time they try to fire up LeBron versus Jordan I just lose my mind and so I have a friend of mine Elite the producer who literally just all he does is just say so how would you compare this to LeBron and Jordan? And just and just walks away watching the implosion happen I want to talk about LeBron James in a just walks away watching the implosion happen. I want to talk about LeBron James in a second because I want to get your thoughts on him saying that he has never been great at accepting praise, calls himself the king and has a chosen one tattoo.

I don't like attention. But also LeBron learning that or saying he learned of that Golden State trade the rest of the same time that the rest of us did that he knew nothing of it until Ramona Shelbourne reported that he could have gone to the Golden State warriors. But before we do that, let's just put up Jess's meme from the last dance and this only became a thing because of his hair, correct? It's nothing else other than the security guard's hair. It's not his cockiness and it's not his shoulder, it's that. It's that his hair is flopping and he-

Teeth are great too. Teeth, glasses, the glasses. It's everything, he's a legend. It's all this. It's very 20 C strikes high. God rest his soul by the way, he passed away. He's a resting power. He passed away before he got famous?

Like, or since? I think it was before he got famous. No, I'm saying, I didn't know if he passed away rest of peace he passed away before he got famous like I think it was before before he got famous no I'm saying because I didn't know if he passed away like no no and the segment on the downer good job I mean all you him you're the one who told us he was dead you're the one who did that what is the matter with you? Don Lebatard. Don Grivers. You know Joel is going to tweet what he wants to tweet.

I'm quite frankly I'm fine with it. If anything I want to go to Miami too. Is that alright? I mean isn't Spose supposed to be in the front office by now? Hey I can hit the back nine right after practice. Oh he'd love that. Oh my god. Stugats. It's a bad man.

Me and Joel, let's go. I mean Stugats, it's a great question. It's a great question. If they win game six, that hurts my chances of coming down here. I'm being handcuffed with Joel. It's a real handsome question, Stugats. This is the Don Lebatar Show with the Stugats. MUSIC our show with these two guys.

Before we get to love is blind, before we get to the new college football measurement system, and before we get to the Beatles biopic that I think is out. Michelle Beatles has a biopic. It is not out already. It's been announced. It's coming out in 2027. Oh Jesus. Yeah, this is not close. Close. Wake me up then. At all. Who plays Michelle? in 2027. Oh Jesus. Yeah, this is not close. Wake me up

then. At all. Who plays Michelle? Okay. All right. Two years before Rob Manfred retire, the bio pic is coming back to that for a second. Michelle Beatle having a bio. Yes. And I'm saying I'm retiring in five years. Like I understand how these jobs work. It's not the same as like our jobs. But like, should I just announce I'm retiring in 35 years? This is just don't, I mean, come on. Incredible. Dan, well, what's the cutoff? Dan Patrick is retiring in four years.

Social security. Yeah. She's 50 50 on whether she's going to climb it up. I know it. Like she hasn't decided yet whether she's going to do a tour or just go out quietly. You, you are saying Jessica that it needs to be in a year or two. If you're announcing it four or five years from now It's not valid to you. It's like what Samson said because he could extend it Something could happen before that if five years is absurd. I understand again. I understand the nature of his job

It's not the same as ours. It's just silly Vince Carter did this thing for like years He said the next year is my last year and then when next year we get here So yeah, like I said next year is my last year and you just keep pushing it out. Put it on the pole, please, at LeBatard Show. Are you really retiring if you're announcing your retirement in five years at LeBatard Show? But before I get to Love is Blind, the Beatles biopic and the new college

football measurement system, I mean, take aside, please, on JJ Redick. We've been waiting for your appraisal of this. JJ Redick versus Austin Rivers versus Doc Rivers, take aside, please, on JJ Redick. We've been waiting for your appraisal of this. JJ Redick versus Austin Rivers versus Doc Rivers, take aside. Well, I think, first of all, you have to identify the different characters here, right? On the one hand, JJ Redick, great career, long career, played for a bunch of coaches, played for Doc.

Some would say some of his best years came with Doc Rivers. On the other hand, you have Austin Rivers, who played for Doc and played in his driveway as well. He worked hard. Yeah. And then the central figure here, the most polarizing figure is Doc himself, right?

So everyone has a bias coming into this. This is what I'm gonna say. Love guys who have played for dock rivers, you're welcome. It seems incredibly split between to hell with that guy and know that guy's great. From what I gather, I've never worked with dock rivers, I don't know, I've never met him, I've never said anything to him, right?

But from what I gather, doc is a guy that sells a bill of goods. He tells you what you wanna hear in order to get you to do the thing he wants you to do. Sometimes there's a return on that. Sometimes there's not. I don't know. The frequency, all I can tell is like,

there are a lot of guys, it's not just JJ Redick. But you can support Doc Rivers in general and notice that he's not often publicly accountable on things Like he makes more excuses than the average coach and he does more in playing the media game Well than the average coach because he's got a ton of media friends has always had a ton of media friends And has made his way up the ladder at least in part because he's got a lot of strong allied voices. JJ Redick is now a member of the media, stronger than all those media friends in voice and he's coming after Doc Rivers in a way I've never seen publicly from a peer. Stronger because he played for him, right?

He's not the only one. Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson, not totally enamored with him either. And there's a lot of guys guys, guys with names, right? Because they played for them. They have a credibility that all the other media people don't. But like the old joke is, me and Zach Harbor do this joke all the time. Whenever we hear people laughing at a joke that's not funny,

we call it a Doc Rivers press conference. Because the media likes Doc so much that when Doc says something mildly amusing, everyone laughs, right? And the joke I do is when someone asks a question and says Doc Rivers will answer, oh, what a smart question that was. What an incredibly good looking question that was, right? Like, he always throws in like a little bit of like yo you're you know what you're talking about because that makes them feel good and so when they write about him they write about

him in positive terms this is what I'm gonna say about that he's a great coach make no mistake has he had missteps and downfalls and and and things not to be clout of is in the playoffs. Absolutely. But he's not a bad coach. Hold on a second. Redick isn't saying he's a bad coach. Right, he's saying he's not publicly accountable. Players don't like this, I mean.

Players don't like that they have to be accountable. No excuses, no excuses. And the guy leading the environment is somebody who's making public excuses. Going around at the All-Star game saying, why are you guys doing this, Daddy? Why are you guys doing this to Adrian Griffin? Like, why is it that you're putting me in this position before the All-Star game? So here's the flip side of that, right? So JJ says this, right?

Because JJ's the guy who's like, I don't know about this guy, right? Because he's probably felt the burn, gotten burnt, right? On the other end of the legend, let's not talk about Austin Rivers, Austin's gonna stick up for his dad. I don't know, no, no, no, no, no. Their relationship is complicated. It's complicated, but it's not complicated

to the point where he's gonna say, to hell with my dad, right? He's not gonna outwardly, overtly go against his father, right? A better comp would be Kendrick Perkins, who Kendrick Perkins jumped in the mentions under JJ Slade. But he won a championship with Doug.

It's not just that. See, it's not just that. But Paul Pierce will be on with us tomorrow and he'll probably defend Doug too. He will, he will, those are his guys. But I'm gonna say this about Kendrick Perkins in particular. Kendrick Perkins is a guy who came in this league, he was straight from high school

and it was like, is this guy a good pick or not? Well, not sure. And Doug said, I'm gonna make this dude one of the best defensive centers in the league. And he told him, you're one of the best defensive centers in the league and you're going to start. And the year they lost, remember that Doc was beating the drum. If Kendrick Perkins was healthy, we would never lost, right? He's basically given Perk all the confidence and success, not just a championship, but

to move on and go to Oklahoma City and other places and feel like, no, no, I am truly great at what I do. I don't know if that happens if Perk doesn't play for Doc Rivers, right? So for Perk, absolutely he's gonna be like, what are you talking about? You're not really taking a side, you're taking everybody's side.

Well, you know. No, but we need your help so we can pick a side. Oh, good do. Because I don't know who's side. They both make compelling arguments to me. I guess I lean JJ. I'm leaning Austin. Lean JJ.

Nepo babies stand up for other Nepo babies. I don't know. I don't know if there's a side. Like I think it's, this is all of it is tied into some very strong personal feelings. Like you said, Paul's gonna come here and Paul's probably gonna stick up for him. But I would say ask Matt. The criticism is fair. It's a fair criticism to level at Doc Rivers and the way that JJ Redick is getting attacked is interesting with

attacks on what his career was from Patrick Beverly, what his career was from Austin Rivers. But the criticism itself, you can like Doc Rivers and say this is fair criticism because it is fair. Everybody would say that about Doc. He's not great at accountability when it comes to giving good press conference. You telling me that there's some nuance here because I don't like that at all in my sports debates.

Am I wrong, I mean? I love the idea of Dan saying, pick a side, also why it gets me fair? Am am I wrong am I wrong in what I'm saying that the criticism itself is fair they're not addressing the criticism they're addressing the critic yes of course because everything is partisan and so it's either your pro doc or anti doc this is an anti doc statement and I'm pro doc I cannot abide by it and so rather than attack what the anti-docs Criticism is I'm gonna say oh, yeah, what did you ever do before you got here?

He gave you more money than anyone would ever given you and everyone's anti-doc these days Dan times have changed Finally the place that we are in Is is basically do you like the person or not and And then let's form the argument around that. It's not let's have the disagreement or the argument about the criticism. It's like, do we like you? Do we not like you? And we'll take your side,

but I'm trying to address the criticism. For someone who works in the accountability business, Doc Rivers is worse at accountability. Not he gets fired, the accountability is worse at accountability. Not he gets fired, the accountability is forced on him. He's worse at holding up his hand and saying, my fault, my bad, I'm responsible for this. Worse than Phil Jackson? I mean, Phil Jackson doesn't have the resume of failure. But no, but it matters. No, no, no, but when Phil failed, did Phil say it is my fault?

Or did Phil blame everything else, including the way basketball is being played? I understand why you come by that opinion, and that is an astute basketball opinion that basketball people have noticed. But Phil Jackson forever will be known as a winner, even with what happened at the end with the Knicks. Doc Rivers is viewed by people like you in the basketball industry who know as a very good coach who fails in enormous moments and is known by a lot of his players as someone who will not raise his hand, but will also say it's not Blake's fault as you will also defend his players vigorously. And what I see happening now in the defense of doc is a bunch of guys who enjoyed playing for him

publicly supporting Doc because he's a coach who they feel that they like and that worked well for them. It doesn't make JJ Redick's criticism invalid. I guess when you say is he's the guy that's taking accountability the least out of any coach I'm like I don't know man and we just went through a whole George Carl thing this week it doesn't sound like he takes a lot of accountability like a lot of coaches surprise surprise don't take, man. And we just went through a whole George Carl thing this week. It doesn't sound like he takes a lot of accountability. Like a lot of coaches, surprise, surprise, don't take accountability. Did you guys already talk about Rick Petino?

Did it sound like he took accountability there? Did Deion Sanders sound like he took accountability when Colorado season went the way it did? This is a thing that coaches do. So I don't, while it may not be an unfair criticism of Doc, I don't think it's isolated. I think this is something that coaches do. Very rarely do they say, my bad.

I've heard it more about Doc from players and people in basketball than I have from others. It's how I arrive at the appraisal. I'm not arriving at it on my own. I'm not arriving at it because I remember, I'm sure Doc Rivers, I'm sure someone can play a press conference for me where they lose a 3-1 lead, one of many of them,

and he says, all burden on me. I did a coach harder. The way that coaches always say that. I did a lot more. Did a more film, less golf? I don't know. I don't know. Or maybe more golf.

Maybe I didn't golf enough. You are delicate with Doc. You don't. I'm delicate because I understand that everyone chiming in on this topic are people who played for him. And that's, when it comes to coaching, it's always funny to me when someone says,

so and so is gonna be a good coach. And I always say, how do you know? Well, because all these other guys, like so you don't know, have you ever seen them coach? No. All right, have you ever been a. Have you ever seen them coach? No. All right. Have you ever been to practice and watched them coach you in practice?

I mean, no. So you're just going over hearsay. Okay, hearsay, except what JJ Redick was reacting to was an interview game at the All-Star Game, when he's three and six that was filled with excuses. Like, that's what the reaction was to. Three and seven, that's a fine. But correct or incorrect? No, it's correct. Being was to. Three and seven, that's a fine. But correct or incorrect?

It's being interviewed and just giving all the reasons that it's not your fault. Doc had an insane all-star weekend in terms of interviews. He told Rachel Nichols that there were not one, but two other teams that tried to get him out before the Bucks. He told Sirius XM, he told Frank Isola that, oh, I told Bucks ownership, why are you firing Adrian?

How could you do that? And then he says the thing about, you know, uh, oh, I told Bucks ownership, why are you firing Adrian? How could you do that? And then he says the thing about, you know, like, oh, it's, it's hard and it's midseason and all that stuff. He's having the best all-star ever.