The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - The Big Suey: The Buck Stops Here

Episode Date: May 20, 2025

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Proximo. Cuervo.com. Please drink responsibly. Cuervo. 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 LeBattard 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. That if they're just there, that hasn't happened to you guys.

I've done it. And now here's the marching band to nowhere, fat face, and the habitual liar. This episode is presented by DraftKings. DraftKings. DraftKings. DraftKings. DraftKings. DraftKings. DraftKings. to you guys? I've done it. And now here's the marching man to nowhere, fat face and the habitual liar. This episode is presented by DraftKings. DraftKings, the crown is yours. I'm curious if any of you have the same problem I do as I've aged with the analysis of sports changing just because the hedge fund numerology involved with identifying inefficiencies make it so that all teams are now copycatting each other on how to get more information on how to maximize the numbers and it's distorting how

enjoyable everything is from an entertainment experience but from an analysis perspective one of the things that's becoming more difficult for me around sports and it has since Tom Brady we talked yesterday about bad takes in the history of the show Tom Brady had a Hall of Fame career just in the time after I wondered whether he would age like all other quarterbacks and so when it comes to Messi, for example, or LeBron, or Tom Brady, or even Damian Lillard coming off an Achilles making it so Giannis doesn't want to be there anymore, because why would I want to be there when he's taking up 58 million and I don't want to waste another year of my prime not winning the championship? How players age

is something with science that's becoming impossible for me to guess. When does Messi get old? When does Brady get old? When does Aaron Rodgers get old? When does LeBron get old? When all previous metrics suggest I'd be right every other time that I guessed three or four years earlier that those athletes would indeed get old or Diana Taurasi and they don't get old.

They play into their 40s because science has changed how it is that people age. I also think that in the case of LeBron and Tom Brady and Messi we've seen other people age at a normal rate and we keep wondering like what kind of science do they have? Well part of the reason is they're the greatest of all times. Like that might be their secret to aging is that Tom Brady, LeBron James, Messi, Serena, they're doing these unprecedented things because they were just that damn good. And are you already at the point where Messi is getting old? Is that what you think is happening? I just keep waiting for something to indicate to me that he's not the best player in the

world. I think look, he plays for the MLS. But after 35, yeah, but he just won World Cup. When he plays internationally though, he's still boss in the games for Argentina. I think we're not at that point yet. I think you look at an unproven head coach in Javier Marciano that is Argentinian that has a link to Messi and you can start poking holes

and say maybe that wasn't the right guy for the job. I mean, isn't the sign that he's aging though that he went to the MLS? Historically, you'd be right, but that's usually what happens with that league is they get older players. Did he come to the MLS as the best player in the world? Yeah he came a couple months removed from being the best player in the World Cup and having an all-time final with Mbappe matching him shot for shot. Yeah he was he was the best player in the world when he when he showed up here. Well part of this may be playing the result on my part but I've only thought the past couple of months that Messi looks slow compared to the game. Like I've seen Vancouver, I saw that,

might have been the Minnesota game where you're watching the game and you're like these younger players barely half his age are faster than him. Really? Yeah. He always kind of approaches the game with a stroll. He conserves his energy, which is what's true. Yeah, I mean, he essentially walks half the game. Which is why what was so shocking is we're about a month and a half removed from one of the craziest MLS games I've ever seen, which is in the CONCACAF Champions Cup against LAFC,

where he is sprinting the entire time. Honestly, if you want to look at what happened to Miami, it kind of dropped off after that performance because of how much they put into it. They're an older roster, and they went like crazy trying to get that result to advance in that tournament. It is interesting him speaking the way that he just did with, you know, fans gotta stay with us,

it's hard, yada yada. Has he ever spoken to the media before this? He does, but. He does, he does. He doesn't speak very much in English, and so they're. they never make him available. No. Never. That's a fault of Inner Miami. Usually hand-picked. Yeah they have like some media availabilities depending on the competition and they'll do like one-off like profiles on him but he's pretty guarded. Can you guys find for me please? I don't know what the rights issues would be but I remember seeing

him on a Japanese television show doing amazing tricks one time because messi's availability is limited he tends to be not very interesting in interviews even when he gives them it's one of the reasons i'm skeptical of michael jordan being a broadcaster the same way i was skeptical of tom brady being a broadcaster he's never said interesting things why would he say interesting things on a broadcast? I don't think it's about Messi saying something interesting. I think it's about you're in MLS now and you're in a new country,

maybe get in front of the fan base every now and then and say a couple things. Oh, but it's his play that speaks for him and he doesn't have any trouble selling the sport. He's not gonna do it with words. Like, it's not, there's nothing Messi's selling with words I don't think. No the biggest thing that's stopping the league from growing is the fact that most of its season exists behind a paywall when it's not mature enough to

be making that kind of move. It is an interesting business decision a daring one and I believe a smart one internationally to make people in the streaming age pay for the right to watch Messi when everyone in the world who loves soccer wants to watch it. I didn't order it this year. I don't have it. Well, you probably get it for free if you have Xfinity or T-Mobile.

There's a bunch of corporate tie-ins that you get it for free. I was getting it for free with my season tickets, but I didn't renew this year. Yeah, I think it's proof positive that it's been a dumb strategy for MLS to do this before the World Cup. Internationally, they don't release these numbers. We don't know what their subscription model looks like. We know that Messi gets a cut reportedly of it, but I think it was really, really dumb

to put your domestic league, the biggest domestic league that you have, behind a paywall before the World Cup is here. You gotta make the game as accessible as possible as the entire world is gonna be traveling here next summer and then you start shooting your shots. But it needs to be way more accessible than it is right now.

You say it's dumb and it may indeed have been dumb for MLS, not dumb for Apple that needs to recoup its investment by making sure they charge for the fact that they got the best Player in the world to play behind a paywall and they make the fans pay for that It's an easy smart way for Apple to increase its subscriptions whether you care about the rest of what Apple is doing or not It's a it's a must. I can't argue for it or against it because I don't see the numbers I would say that it I don't know a lot of people that have MLS season pass. Oh, but I think this is an international play as much as it is an American play. And it's just to

get Apple subscribes. Like the reason Apple gets in the game, it's the reason that Apple's trying to get in the game with all the big brands. They do a documentary with Magic Johnson. They do a documentary with the Patriots. They're not, they're not doing the documentaries that untold is doing. They're just doing giant brands that have mass appeal. So people watch shrinking in Argentina. I mean, this is not my opinion. Apple is cutting back on, on, on their development budget because they spend so much money and they're not getting a lot of subscribers. Like their,

their struggles in acquiring subscribers, both domestically and internationally, are well reported on. So, I would venture to say there's probably some buyers or mores on the MLS deal, just because I don't know a lot of people that have it, I don't see a lot of people talking about it. I think the league has somehow dropped in its profile,

despite having the most famous soccer player in the league, which is just unimaginable. Let me take another approach on this though in the analysis of how it is that people age and where it is the science makes this difficult. The Untold series on Netflix is very hit or miss. Okay they've got one on Gilbert Arenas called Shooting Guards which is what you have to call that one. Thank you, Billy. They have one on Favre that doesn't have access to Favre, so it's gonna be more interesting than the one that did

or would have access to Favre because you trade something with the access. But they had a terrible one on Liver King. And Liver King, if you're not familiar, is- The dude that eats the- The testicles, and he says he lives a primal diet Primals that's what he calls people. He did he did the primal diet. He just was also doing steroids Well, this is the thing though. Yes. He was doing a lot of steroids it had doing both his body

But his body had nothing to do with the fact that he was eating testicles and livers, it had to do with he was doing a copious amount of steroids because no one looks like that. No human being, no matter their weightlifting, even if their weightlifting is often as Graziano and skip Bayless, no one can look like Liver King. But what I wanted to say to you in terms of what the average person knows, has knowledge of when it comes to science and sport, is very limited because it was obvious simply from looking at liver King. That ain't

natural. That's obviously not natural. How is that selling natural supplements? There's no way that the human body looks like that. A lot of bone marrow. It was a con, but when I talk to you about science, athletes aging, and how competitive these people are, because it's really nice to believe, Mike, what you're saying. Well, they're the best ever. So of course they would age differently than all other humans because they're the best ever. Or competitive people have learned that there's a fountain of youth.

And Jose Alvarado gets suspended this last weekend for 80 games and nobody gives a pleap because there's no actual consequences to this. You'll get the 80 games and you'll lose the salary. Obviously that is consequence, but Alvarado has already gotten all the money and is unhittable or has been unhittable. The entire time I've been watching that guy, I don't understand how anyone hits him.

The reason is, because he wasn't even very good last year, is because he's often behind three one or two oh, and then has to throw one of those pitches in an area where he's behind in the count. That guy is Totally natural Dan. I don't know what you're talking about. Look at him here. Look at his apps Just 10,000 crunches a day Dan. That's what you would look like if you did 10,000 crunches a day right there He does not look not breathing right very healthy

vascular though Like it that's from eating bull testicles right there Rocky Mountain oysters, Dan. I'll start using Jose Alvarado Suspended for 80 games. He is the closer for the Philadelphia Phillies. He was a setup man again. He's not he's a little inaccurate He doesn't always throw the ball over the plate But what I'm asking you guys is Jose Alvarado does not look like somebody that you would ever accuse of 80 game suspension without pay because he's using PEDs and so I ask you. Is that like D Gordon? He'd be the last person that you thought right? Or Peyton Manning when he's

getting you know his wife is getting you know Al Jazeer is allegedly reporting that his wife is getting human growth hormone. I don't believe that anyone talking about sports, covering sports, writing sports on any mainstream media outlet is versed enough in what cheating actually looks like at the most competitive levels where you have the economics to be the best ever. And you could do what LeBron James does,

which has like a team of Navy SEALs to work on his body. Once upon a time, a million years ago, when Jamal Mashburn was the one inventing exercise instead of jim fix at jamal mashburn made a big sp uh... a big show of traveling with his body mechanics guy paying whatever was a hundred or hundred fifty thousand dollars a year every city his guy is coming in stretching him no matter where he is

when he needs it and the economy around these guys has gotten so strong that Kobe at the end of his career is going to Germany for whatever it is the blood spinning is. Still passed to Weatherspoon. He did pass to Weatherspoon. There are no, put it on the poll at LeBotard show, are there any steroids that keep you from passing the last shot to Clarence Weatherspoon? Passing the last shot in a, it was a Knicks series, right?

I get Dan's argument and I'm probably naive, but I've seen plenty of all time great players try to do what Tom Brady did. I've seen Aaron Rodgers fail repeatedly trying to do it. I saw Drew Brees fail. Peyton Manning fell apart as his wife is getting reportedly stuff in the mail reported by Al Jazeera. I've seen the all-time goats fall short of those guys

so what you're saying why isn't it a universal rule? Why is it just these four athletes and Serena, Tom, LeBron and now Messi that have found the best stuff that no one else can find? And all at the same time? Right I just think I just think we're out of place yes with science and nutrition that's different and it's allowing all-time greats to be all-time great a little bit longer. You see physically what Jose Alvarado looks like we cannot do this that way anymore. I the way that I was doing it with Brady is every quarterback who's ever thrown a football starts his precipitous decline at 37 There's no such thing as something after that for a quarterback what LeBron James just did in that sport has no precedent That's not what Kareem was doing at 40. It was my argument is you could look at that and say man

Something's got to be going on over there But the something can also be that might just be the greatest athlete at their sport we've ever seen. Which could apply to all these people that I just named. Tom Brady also said he never ate strawberries. So I mean I don't know long-term studies on strawberry health. And look it's not a universal rule. Tiger Woods, arguably all-time GOAT, body fell apart. I think Mike has a point though because it's not always science, right? It's freaks, these guys are freaks of nature, these athletes we're talking about. And you see it in other walks of life.

I mean there was only one Albert Einstein, you know, there was only one Sebastian Bach. Understood, but Michael Jordan didn't play till he was 40. Like Michael Jordan's game became jump shots, like and he was the greatest there's ever been. It's easier to live in the space you guys are it really is to not be skeptical and just think how those people are aging differently than any other humans ever and that provides you cover the idea that you can say well They were already the greatest but when I think of you say Messi looks slow Suarez's looks slow the entire time I've watched him like Suarez doesn't have knees. But I'm saying that at 35 years old, we were talking about Giannis, is he still in his prime?

I think of an athlete's prime as their 20s. I do not and have never thought of an athlete's prime in their 30s. Paul O'Neil is one of the few baseball players ever who got better after the age of 33. It's just super rare. I don't think of the 30s as the prime of an athlete's career But maybe I have to rethink it because Yanis is coming off of the best year of his career at 30 I think the thing where you talk about prime is Athletically and physically yes the prime is in the early 20s prime But when your when your mind catches up to actually being able to read the game with that with that physicality That's where you really turn into your prime.

It's like, Jokic, all of a sudden, he can do things that people can't with his mind. His body's still lagging in that area, but that's a prime example. I think that the prime now, you have to say it's like 27 to 35. And similarly, lifespans are expanding. I mean, a generation ago, you lived to be 70.

Now, you expect to live to be 80. It's just, you know, it's physiology. Town elders used to be in their 20s at one point in time. That's exactly right. I don't believe that's true. That is true. We'll see. Put it on the poll. So there was no racist grandfathers back then because everybody was elder at 20. Put it on the poll at Levittard Show. Did town elders used to be 20 years old? Since I mentioned Yannis, I wanted to ask you guys how the Bucks should be handling this. Because, again, Damian Lillard is out for next season,

is making $58 million next season. And it makes it so that Yannis isn't gonna be able to win there next year. They're not- You can't win when you have $60 million dead money on your cap. You can't. They don't have the assets to do any of this also because of what they traded for him.

So they're stuck. And I'm asking you what it is that the Bucks are supposed to do here merely publicly. Because if I were the Bucks already and I didn't know behind the scenes of the problem I had on my hands I would just come out and say,

Yannis isn't going anywhere. I would just say it. We value this player too much, we have no intention of trading him, but that's not what they're doing. That's a part that's really interesting to me so far, because it kind of feels like this could be it finally for Yannis there, and you have all this chatter,

and when there was chatter here in the middle of this season with a super secretive organization in the Miami Heat who don't address rumors in this kind of stuff, Pat Riley put out a statement and said we are not trading Jimmy Butler yet you have all this talk going around now about Giannis and it feels like this could be it and no one's really pushing back in Milwaukee from all this conversation. So it kind of feels like this is a real thing that's about to happen.

And it looks like ownership kind of picked the GM because he extended before. You have all this commotion around the franchise with the early exit, but the GM kind of gets rewarded for the direction that they're either in or about to be in with a new ownership group, that's usually a pretty good indicator if they extend the GM. I totally get Milwaukee maybe thinking that this is the time to reboot between Lillard's

injury, between the fact that Yanis right now is still considered in his late prime. You're going to get as much for him right now as you ever would or certainly as you will in three years. It'd probably be the biggest hole in NBA history, right? What they could get for Giannis, I would assume. I think most every team in the league pulls its roster out, puts it in front of Milwaukee, and just says take what you want. Like almost every... that matches up the salaries. Doesn't it complicate things a little bit though, watching what just happened in Dallas? Like meaning, they have to frame it,

Milwaukee has to frame it in some type of fashion of Yanis wanting out. Because with what just took place in Dallas, and you know, Nico Harrison nuking the franchise, Nico Harrison not winning the number one overall pick, that's blind luck, alright? But you saw the way the fan base reacted and all that, the immediate summer after that, Milwaukee's gonna do the exact same thing?

It's why I ask the question, because I think it's a paradigm shift what happened to Lillard. What happened to Lillard informs what happens after that. The reason I thought that Lillard was coming to Miami back when I was a heat mouthpiece, before I became, you I became a journalist again. Go on. It's because if Lillard, a player of that stature, ever wants out, they get their way. This is the first time it hasn't happened. So what does Dallas do?

Preemptively. Says, we're going to avoid the whole mess. We're going to do it on the other end of the extreme. And now what does that put Milwaukee, what position does that put them in so if you're Milwaukee you say the buck stops here okay so I thought I was good with money turns out I was really good at ignoring it like how am I spending this much on delivery or uber or that one shoe store that I buy too many shoes from then I started using Monarch money and dude it's a financial wake-up call Monarch's not just some budgeting app. It's basically your money command center

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I saw a post on Twitter yesterday how the Toronto Maple Leafs that they won the division. Guess what? It's been two years and that's two years too long. Stugats. You can take that ass too. We're taking two asses. This is the Don Lebatard show with the Stugats.

The thing is, Luca wouldn't have asked for a trade, right? Luka was completely content of being like a Dirk Nowitzki, I'm going to be in Dallas my whole career kind of guy. This was Nico Harrison saying, oh, I'm going to play chess while everybody else is playing checkers. I'm going to trade him away. I don't like his body. We have a win-now window of three years.

Let me get Anthony Davis. I like his body more. I'm going to quote here Sam Amick. We trust him, right? He's quoting the Bucks GM John Horst as saying he's gonna do what's best for the Bucks, not Yanis Antetokounmpo. Quote, this is from Sam Amick,

John is not going to just try to be on good terms with Yanis, he's trying to do what's right by the Bucks. And Yanis has said his favorite cities are in Florida. Yeah, he did yeah he did he did look at you look at the big smile that's all you've got yeah he did with a giant smile on your face you know i don't normally come out with the reports you know but i put on my journalistic hat greg cody last week and i came out with the reports is that the hat

the journalistic hat don't worry about hat? Don't worry about it. I'm just curious. Don't worry about it. You're taking me off of my point here. And the point is that Yanis' people have already reached out to the heat. I told you that. And now he's asked on Twitter of all the cities you ever been to, which city would make you the happiest to be there? and he could have said any city, and he said, Florida cities. Wow, is that your report? No, no, no. Oh, okay. Yand has said that.

You don't have to report something that actually the person does yourself. Struggling to keep up to that. Journalism, Greg. Yeah, I noticed in- You tend to take credit for stuff like that. In your journalism, the heat gear has come out of the trash or whatever,

now that Yand says he's interested in the heat again. Today's Panthers game day, you're not wearing a Panthers It was just wake up going on It was just waking up early and grabbing what I wanted to grab you don't say We couldn't have been able to tell we thought it was the wardrobe Is that that shirt and a journalist is that shirt like the you know They sell the vintage worn looking clothes now like there's no way that looked like that. Like you bought that, that's new. There's probably still a tag on that.

Of course I bought it. You're trying to make it seem like you have your weathered heat fan and you're all worn out from wearing it so much. Made to look vintage. Those classic 2017 shirts that you brought out. It's called vintage. Gotta have vintage.

That being said, I do think that that shirt is 15 years old. It's just made to appear evil. Were you here the day that he had his top five like throwback shirts and they were all from 2019? And my wife makes me give them to Goodwill after so long. What am I supposed to do? You're wearing one that looks older than the three.

No, I like this one. That's a 2023 shirt, but I've never seen one. No, this is a good shirt, yo. That's fake vintage. You bought three, you brought three shirts in that were meant to show that your closet is aged, fossilized, dusty and cobwebbed.

And all of them looked less old than the one that you're presently wearing. Yeah, but I look good today. You look like radio. I'm not sure that you look good today. You always look like radio. I love that you look like radio. We're in no position to make fun

of how anyone dresses or looks. You think he was talking about Del Rey? Oh my god, I'm a Del Rey guy now. Del Rey is having a moment. It is. You see the new disco that they have? We all got target of the evening. 70s themed bar.

I went up there with friends for dinner this weekend, couldn't get in, their line was too long. What? I gotta get up to Del Rey. All right, well maybe that's part of it. Trendy little spot. Can't access Del Rey in Milwaukee. All right. Where the hell's Delray? I know. I thought

the same thing. It's north of Boca. Their annual garlic festival just sleaze. I'm just saying Delray. It's a hot spot. You guys got it right. I got nothing else to say about Delray but I've done my bit. Is that closer than the distance between Milwaukee and Chicago? I don't think so. Like, I think, to be honest, can just be like, I'll just go to Chicago tonight. Yeah.

Put it on the poll, please, at LeBretard Show. Does Delray's annual garlic festival slay? Yeah. Pfft. Ha ha ha ha. I mean, because I don't think that's possible. I'm gonna go ahead and say that what,

I'm gonna go ahead and say that in the history of slay has never been a garlic Festival of any kind in any city. You don't think someone came from the garlic festival one time They said hey, how'd the garlic festival go and they said I should slayed I Don't bad breath going on there. Oh my god I don't believe it's got to be per square foot more bad breath than you will find anywhere in any plot of land. I also don't think, put this on the poll as well, at LeBotardShow, do you improve your wardrobe by saying I look good, yo, at LeBotardShow?

Who said that? You did. Oh, yeah, I caught that. Why did you throw a yo at the end of that? Age inappropriate. Just living my life. Well, slay is age inappropriate. I mean, I think we already covered this,

just like we covered that grandfathers on media are racist. We covered that you're too old to be using sleigh as a phrase. Sleigh is lit. Shit is gas. I mean, you know, I'm not making stuff up. Straight fire. Keep him coming. Is that someone feeding you? Is that a new saying? Keep him coming?

Is that you shouting into the other room? I've got no more. I've got sleigh and lit and fire and gas. Or did someone feed him to keep him coming and he thought that was a save? Billy was feeding him Yas Queen for like 20 minutes. What does that even mean? Just saying. What does gas mean? What does any of what you said mean?

Fuel. I mean, the wheels turn, right? Petrol. Speaking of fuel, I want to ask you guys, as the broadcasts in the NBA continue to add analysts so that the ESPN halftime show can be one syllable for each person because I don't know why anyone at ESPN

shows up to work for that halftime show because there's no time to say anything and there are too many people. But Draymond Green is being added in the Eastern Conference. Michael Malone is being added in the Western Conference. It makes me wonder whether Michael Malone would have been added in the Eastern Conference. Michael Malone is being added in the Western Conference. It makes me wonder whether Michael Malone would have been added in the Western Conference if Denver had advanced. I'd like to know who their second was to Draymond Green. Do you think Michael Malone would have been

added to the... I think it would have been really interesting, right? Because all of a sudden it's like this team that you were the captain of, that you won a title with, now has Adelman and he's the one taking him to a Western Conference final I think that would have been really intriguing and I wanted to ask the rest of you when you hear that Michael Jordan is back and that he's going to be a contributor to Peacock and NBC and that NBC is serious about doing what Apple did with messy We got to figure out how to get people behind our paywall at Peacock. It also is gonna be on NBC,

but we have to have valuable things that we can hide somewhere and make people pay for it. I am not enthused in any way to hear a single sentence that Michael Jordan has to say about anything. It's so hard to believe he's going to say anything. And by the way, he's gonna be on Zoom, right? He's not gonna be be on Zoom, right? He's not gonna be in the studio, right?

Zoom, that would be funny. Our friend Bailey tweeted out that this is the biggest indicator of a recession, that Michael Jordan has finally taken a TV job after all these years. I used to think that there would be incredible value in having the greatest of all time just there, and you could just learn at their knee. Wayne Gretzky is not that great.

I think he's all right. It's all right. He's gotten better though. He's gotten better. He was bad for years. I think we all just think it's cool to hear Gretzky. He doesn't actually say much. It's cool to hear Gretzky.

If you surround him by the right team, Turner has learned this. Plays with Biz well. But Tom Brady's the greatest of all time. And it's not going great. He's being used differently. And maybe Tom Brady would have more to say if he were part of a studio show,

but before Tom, I would always subscribe to the School of Notion. If you get the greatest of all time to do anything to talk about that sport with expertise, you go ahead and do that. Because they can talk about the sport in ways that nobody else can. And I would love to hear what Michael Jordan has to say.

I'm counting on Michael Jordan to be the curmudgeon that can't bury the hatchet with anybody that just will use this platform to get out his grudges. I hope he's the Michael Jordan that we've heard about in private and not the one that was guarded in front of the media and its cameras in the 1990s. It's been a very long time

since Michael Jordan has ever had to speak to the media outside of NASCAR availability. Do we know if MJ is watching basketball? He is. He is? Oh, you say that, Dan knows. Is that a report? Is that a report? Just knows, is that a report?

Just Wright Thompson spends a lot of time with him and especially when he was the owner of Charlotte there's no indication in the results there but he's watching basketball nightly and my guess is like all the other old timers he will have his complaints about how it's played today. My guess is that you might end up being disappointed when Michael Jordan sounds like a grandfather? Complaining about what yesterday's games were because he's gonna sound like Shaq and Barclay biggest complaint He'll have Michael Jordan is what three pointers like go to the basket fit no physical play like the competitive Friends, I think everyone's friends. That's I think that's gonna be the biggest to find out

And what you just highlighted you were right to point out that everyone has that problem. That's on TV right now, analyzing the game. They're all the good ones, they're all older, and they all have problem with the modern game. But why do we think that a player who spent his entire career saying nothing is now going to be interesting and outspoken and honest? You know, time and time again, the all-time greats

have gotten the microphone because they used to be all-time greats, and it fails time after time. A local example is Dan Marino. He had his shot with CBS. He wasn't very good, and he's not anywhere near the mic anymore. Greg, you would concede the reason for optimism

is the last time we've heard him speak on things was in a really good documentary series, where he was his version of honest and he was really interesting in that documentary. I know other people were interesting talking about him, but every time they cut to Jordan, people were at the edge of their seat waiting to hear what his side of things would be. Like every question he was asked is completely fair, but I would say the executives at NBC, they've thought of that too,

and they've decided to go forward with, yeah, you know, we think this is a good idea. Think they made him audition? No, hold on a second. Send in your tape, we gotta hear what it sounds like. I've got a few corrections I've gotta make on all of the analysis here. One, television executives are among

the least impressive people I've met in any kind of occupation. They think they're responsible for the success of things when they often aren't. That stuff is often subjective. Takes no genius to say we should get Michael Jordan. That just takes money. Secondarily, I have a theory when it comes to being as great as the people that you're talking about.

To be that great, you end up being so lopsided that the detriment is you're not good at speaking at things on television. They're all terrible. Dan Marino, Wayne Gretzky, Tom Brady. Gretzky's gotten better because he's learned, but this is a skill that people don't understand, that it requires a different skill set from the things that made them great. The example I will give you, Pat Riley is an exceptional talker. He was terrible at television. They eventually had to get Bob Costas, the best ever, to just sit next to him and just be like, Pat, just stand there and look good. Smile and Bob will handle all the details.

This is a different thing from the things that you're good at. So I ask the question to all of you, the greatest athlete that there's been who's also on television being great at that is Barclay. Who's second? Like who's second at being great at both things? You can make the argument that Barclay's television career is better than his basketball career and has no slight on his hall of fame basketball career. But generally speaking, and you weren't asking Barkley to be anyone different, he was exactly the same person on television, and Trey Mon Green will not be this because he doesn't know how to be likable this way,

he's got too much edge and undercurrent, he says interesting things, but he will not be as likable as Charles Barkley. Who's second on this person was great at the sport, but also when they're talking, I have to listen because the morsels falling out of their mouth are smarter than everyone else. I've told you guys this story before.

It's one of the reasons these- Smarter and more entertaining than everyone else. Correct. Just at, yeah, just good at television. But I've told you the story before of Barry Bonds, the greatest- Wait, I'm just trying to learn the ground rules. You have to be considered all time great. How do you do that? Cause Cormier is really good.

Daniel Cormier is really good for the UFC. He was a champion for a long time. He's a Hall of Famer. Is he all time great in the heavyweight division? So Daniel Cormier. John Madden. Back then, I think he checked the boxes in terms of being like considered a great coach.

Like being coach count, player coach? Even though the championship count doesn't necessarily add up for John Madden, but his legacy grew with the video games. But at the time the sport was still young on television. I think John Madden would have been like, wow, this guy knows what he's talking about. I don't know. Greg, you were around that at that time. If coaches count, I would absolutely include Madden. Gabby Sanchez. Grudenuden john gruden also would probably be a champion there i i wasn't doing coaches i was doing people

or all-time greats at the athleticism at one because i think of them as all being historically bad at television it's not even mediocre a gretzky was bad dan marino was dan marino had a job for many many years where he was terrible at television with His job was only to be Dan Marino. Can we go local? Well, that's not gonna resonate in terms of the best ever, is it?

I mean, I always thought Denny Potfin was excellent. The Iceman, Scott Hamilton. You're offering excellent nominations, Billy. I appreciate Gabby Sanchez and the Iceman as your nominations. Scott Hamilton is an incredible example. He's the voice of figure skating. Agreed, agreed.

The Iceman. I was thanking you. You don't know him. I was thanking you. The story I was telling about Barry Bonds, I witnessed it and it's one of the reasons that he was a terrible coach. The greats generally can't explain it very well.

Is Larry Bird the greatest coach that there's been as a great player? There aren't many, but I'm in the clubhouse and I see that Rich Arreale, the shortstop for the Giants, is just he's just studying his bat over and over for an hour while I'm standing next to Barry Bonds and Rich Arreale is really suffering this and right before he goes on the field, Barry Bonds comes over to Rich Arreale and just sort of hits him in the back of the head and he's like, you still don't know

what you're doing wrong there? You gotta do this with your hips, you gotta do this with your toes, da da da da da, and he walks out. And Aurelia just whispers under his breath, asshole. Because he has a gift, and in this particular instance, he was able to explain it to Aurelia, but to do it in a sound bite,

Tom Brady still hasn't figured out how to do that in the right space and not be talking when the plays going on it's a different skill set entirely and these people don't have to learn different skill sets because they have to be the best that the one skill set they have refine that and to do it requires an obsessive compulsiveness that that knocks you out on like growing other parts of your personality. I honestly think that's a big reason why Inter Miami is hiding Lionel Messi. Doesn't want him speaking into a mic.

Because his greatness on the field, he's got no chance of matching that in terms of personality, in terms of what he says. He would come off as dull, the antithesis of what he is on the field. And why go through that? Why put him through that? Yeah, he also, he doesn't like doing it. Right. So, he's not going to do it if he doesn't have to. Smoltz, is he all-time great enough to be in this grouping?

As a player, sure, yeah. Yes, but people don't think of him as a good broadcaster. A lot of people complain, a lot of baseball people complain a great deal about John Smoltz's analysis. That's unfortunate. I don't watch him with a sound on, so I haven't for two decades at this point. But last I checked in about 20 years ago, I thought he was solid. Romo not an all-time great, but very good broadcaster? Yeah, well, different story, different list.

What do we do? Aikman? Do we do a combination? Aikman? A Hall of Famer? Romo's not a Hall of Famer. No. And he's a champion. What about Jimmy? I don't want to do coaches. I wanted to do athleticism. Jimmy was good at it. Aikman's great because he's a Hall of Famer. Aikman though had 120 touchdown past season. Oh, they found Messi on a Japanese television show Let's just let's just show this for people so that people can watch Lionel Messi and the absurdity of what it is that he can do

I thought this was AI the first time I saw it because I Can't believe even though this is the best soccer player there has ever been that this person can do these kinds of That these these kinds of absurd tricks. This is what you have to do, Zazz, when you have Messi on. Don't let him speak. Just allow him again and again to kick the ball during the broadcast. What is he attempting to do? No idea. It seems like he won.

It says clear there, so I don't know. Seems pretty clear. He kicked the ball really high and brought it down with his feet. And kept the thing going.