The Herd with Colin Cowherd - NBA playoffs, MLB, Baker Mayfield, Packers

Episode Date: May 27, 2020

Colin explains why he is for a World Cup playoff format in the NBA, why MLB fans need to relax, why Baker Mayfield is basically Case Keenum, and the Packers biggest weakness. Guests include Nick Wright, Matt Nagy, John Smoltz, and Kevin O'Connor. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo, and every episode, we're cutting through the noise,

breaking down the biggest moments in sports and giving you the real story behind the headline. And we're going straight to the source, the athletes themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions in the moment, and the stuff nobody gets to hear. Listen to Sports Slice on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Sliced Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok.

Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smigel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter.

Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On the Look Back at it podcast. From 1979, that was a big moment for me. 84 is big to me. I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a year, unpack what went down,

and try to make sense of how we survived it. With our friends, fellow comedians, and favorite authors. Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s. 84 was a wild. I mean, it was a wild year. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, what's good, y'all?

You're listening to Learn the Hard Way with your favorite therapist and host Kear Games. This space is about black men's experiences, having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anywhere, but you're having them with a licensed professional who knows what he's doing. How many men carry a suit or armor? It signals to the world that you not to be played with. And just because you have the capability that does not mean that you need to. Listen to learn the hard way on the IHard radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Thanks for listening to The HARD podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weekday from 12 to 3 Eastern, 9 to noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and FS1.

Find your local station for the Hurt at Fox SportsRadio.com or stream us live every day on the IHartRadio app by searching Hurd. You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. Ah, here we go on a Wednesday. We are live in Los Angeles. This is the herd, wherever you may be, and however you may be consuming us today. I-Heart Radio, Fox Sports Radio, FS1, and Joy Taylor is joining me. Yes, I have a tan. It was jogging yesterday.

It's tennis today. My little world is opening up a little bit. now. You can play tennis in my area. You can hang out in our area. Still a lot of older people walking around with masks, but it does feel, I feel a loosening, a little bit. Life is getting closer and closer to the new normal. Not normal, but the new normal. It's nothing to be a new normal for a while. But yeah, I agree. It's starting, it's starting to feel like we're reaching the finish line. There was traffic today driving to work. There was real traffic. You know, someone was saying to me the other day that like the best part of this, because

Los Angeles traffic is brutal. If you've never been in it, you can't explain it. It's like nothing else in the world. But they're like, oh, I don't miss L.A. traffic. I was like, I miss L.A. traffic so much. I can't wait till there's traffic again. Pray for the day I can just sit in traffic because that means everything's back to normal. Yeah, it will.

So, you know, all these leagues are kind of making it up as they go, right? Like, this is what's happening. We're all kind of making it up. We just had a golf tournament with two old quarterbacks. There's six million people watch. And the organizations like NASCAR and the UFC, and the NFL, which have shown an ability to kind of roll with the punches, do the best you can. Don't be paralyzed by perfect.

Nobody's going to be perfect. Rid guy, stuck in his ways, guy. This is a bad time for you. You got to roll with the punches. So the NBA came out with something yesterday that was really wild and really unique, and I'm not sure who likes it, but it's fascinating. Kevin O'Connor came out reported. A survey sent the general managers.

We know Adam Silver likes soccer. the commissioner of the NBA. And they're suggesting teams would break into 20 best records into tiers like the World Cup. So instead of the first round, Lakers, Memphis, best of seven, it would be group stage in the first round. And if you lose twice, the Lakers could lose twice, boom, you're out. Total urgency. So group one, bucks, jazz, sixers, grids. Blazers, Group 2, Lakers, Heat, Rockets, Magic, Pelicans, Group 3, Raptors, Celtics, Thunder, Maverick Spurs, Group 4, Clippers, Nuggets, Pacer, Nets, Kings.

Five teams each, four groups, you play everybody twice, and then the top two in each group advance. And then you go back to brackets. I love it. Does it feel sticky? We just watched two old quarterbacks play golf. Charles Barkley commented. It got six million viewers. Double what Tiger Woods got last time on a Friday at the Masters. Sticky in 2020 works.

Sticky is an event. This would be an event. It would be a World Cup-style event. It's basically the World Cup of basketball. There's two reasons I like it. First of all, the draw itself, just like soccer, you'd have to see the draw like, oh, my God, we got into a brutal. You got the Lakers are in with Denver and Milwaukee. You'd make it tough.

You'd make it difficult. And that alone would get lots of press. And secondly, it would create something that all these leagues outside of the NFL need is urgency. Rockets, Westbrook goes crazy for a game. One loss, one more you're out. I love it. And everybody's saying, you know, Colin, asterisk. Folks, 2020 is the year of the asterisk.

They're going to make documentaries about this year. The tragic Kobe death, David's Stern death, pandemic shuts down the league, the China mess to start, a World Cup stage. It's just you got to roll with the punches on this stuff. You just got to roll with it. The bottom line, a win, a win for the NBA now, getting back to play and having a champion. The rest of it floats. Don't care.

Can we start the season, not shut it down and get a champ? I'm all in for it. If you're sitting there parallel, now Mark Cuban said, well, it'll make the regular season irrelevant. Folks, let's be honest, 20, the regular season is irrelevant. We've had the Kobe, the David Stern deaths, the pandemic. Nobody cares about the 2020 regular season. It wasn't getting great TV ratings anyway. It's a completely forgettable regular season.

This can be viewed two ways, is that it's too sticky. Or 20 years from now, the NBA in a global, pandemic that got him right in the middle of the eyes. They finished the season and LeBron won another title. Like everything the NBA is doing, it's a life preserver year. You're just trying to save the season. I think it's smart. I think it's interesting and ask yourself this.

Would you rather see LeBron and the Lakers play Memphis in the first round? Or would you rather him see them play the rockets twice, the heat twice, Zion and the Pelicans twice. I'll take that one. I'll go with that one. New stuff, cool stuff, sticky stuff. All you're trying to do now,

start the season, not finish it, crown a champ. Everything else, I don't care. If the NBA does that, Adam Silver, give him a race. So let me shift to this, a football topic. So this is interesting.

Fox bet, and Vegas does this, Fox bet. They have the starting quarterbacks, and then their backups. And they tell you how many more points? How much is your starting quarterback worth? For instance, Russell Wilson is worth eight more points than if Gino Smith started. Average NFL games decided by four.

So Russell Wilson's worth double that. Lamar Jackson's worth eight points over our G3. Deshaun Watson a touchdown. Sam Darnald's worth six more than David fails. Kirk Cousins, who we criticize is worth five and a half points more than Sean Mannion. Teddy Bridgewater's worth six more. more points than Will Greer.

Ryan Tannahills worth six and a half more points than Logan Woodside. You know, Kyler Murray is worth five and a half points more than Brett Hundley. Aaron Rogers is worth five points more than Jordan Love. Feels like more than that, but that's still substantial. And then there's, oh, wait, Baker Mayfield is worth one and a half points more than Case Keenham. Joy, do you remember the quarterback, the comp I gave for Baker Mayfield when he came out? Do you remember? I think it was... It was Case Keenham.

It was Case Keenum. I said from day one, Baker Mayfield is Case Keenham with a slightly stronger arm. That is unfair! Since Baker got to the NFL two years, here is numbers, 29 starts. We wanted to get close to 30 starts. 61% completion percentage, 12 and 17. 85 passer rating, 49 touchdowns, 35 picks. Case Keenham will go three years, 38 starts because he didn't play much last year. Oh, he's better in every category. And I would argue Baker Mayfield's had better talent around him. No OBJ for Case Keenum.

The bad news, if you're a Baker fan, is we were right, and this is what he is. He is Case Keenum with a stronger arm. here's the good news because I believe I wake up in the morning optimistic. The good news is Case Keenum went 11 and 3 a few years ago with the Minnesota Vikings. And I believe the Cleveland Brown's roster right now offensively is much like the Minnesota Vikings roster for Case Keenum. Two legit receivers, legit tight end, legit running backs. Good, not great O line, but certainly improved. Baker Mayfield has never been ever a number one pick.

Number one picks are the kind of players you see in Carson Wentz. Some guys are number one pick talents. Deshawn Watson, Carson Wentz, Russell Wilson, where they are able to overcome a lot of average. Average O'Line, Deshawn Watson, Russell Wilson, average wide receivers, average coach. Baker Mayfield is Case Keenham. It's all got to be perfect.

But if it is, and Cleveland's offensive unit is really good, you can get to the playoffs, which is what I'm predicting this year for Baker Mayfield. He will get to the playoffs. Carson Wentz took a bunch of deck chairs and lawn furniture to the playoffs. Baker can't do that. Deshawn Watson and Russell Wilson run for their lives and get to the playoffs with below-average old lines. Baker can't do that. There are quarterbacks in this league to get to the playoffs with what I think,

Aaron Rogers, an average coach, Matt LaFleur. At this point, he's average. Baker needs everything lined up. That's the bad news. The good news, it is this year. Like Case Keenham's 11 and 3 Viking year, it is all lined up for Baker, and he will be a playoff quarterback this year. See, positive, Mr. Placian.

Positive. You know what, from now on, I am no longer Uncle Colin. I am Mr. Positive. So you, Professor Colin sometimes. Sometimes Professor Colin. Uncle Colin. But from now on, just call me Mr. Optimistic. That did take a positive turn that wasn't really expecting. It looked like it was going right into the sewer, and it ended up being a bouquet of roses. Just very optimistic. Baker's going to make the playoffs. But he needs all the ingredients. Coming up next, everybody freaked out yesterday over something, completely utterly freaked out.

And why, you baseball fans, just take a deep breath. I'll explain coming up. Be sure to catch live editions of the herd weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific on Fox Sports Radio, FS1, and the IHeard Radio app. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise.

Breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves. Their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

And for more, follow Timbo Sliced Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations. with so many incredible guests. I'm talking. Trip Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase

that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing. And we're still chasing it. And we don't know when we've done enough. Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth?

Are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro. Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me, Kear Gaines, is we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, Learn the Hard Way. Open your free iHeartRadio app. Search Learn the Hardway and listen now. Do you remember when Diana Ross double-tap Little Kim's boobs at the VMAs? Or when Kanye said that George Bush didn't like black people.

I know what you're thinking. What the hell does George Bush got to do with Little Kim? Well, you can find out on The Look Back at it podcast. I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick it here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill, waxing all about crack in the 80s. To be clear, 84 is big to me, not just because of crack. I'm down to talk about crack on day, but just so you know.

I mean, at this point, Mark, this is the second episode where we've discussed crack. So I'm starting to see that there's a through line. We also have AIDS on the table. right now. Thank you for finishing that sentence. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Really? Yeah.

For me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history. Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, guys? This is Clivert Taylor the Fourth. And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. Like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game. This linebacker walks up to me, he goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her.

What? Quarterback on office blue with 42. Hey, ref, my mama want you to wave at her. What? Hey, Ms. Parker. Listen to the Clifford show on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Good to have you in. Coach of the Bears, Matt Nagy, is about 50 minutes away.

Huge fan of him. He's Kyle Shanahan. I just don't think he has the quarterback situation quite right yet. Not quite right yet. So I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this because I think people are bored by revenue sharing. But of all the sports, the one sport that's airing its dirty laundry financially in public is baseball. And why are they doing it? Because baseball is getting rich for the last decade.

Now, we don't talk about baseball. like we talk about other sports. Major League Baseball is like the wealthy guy in your community that nobody knows is wealthy. Everybody knows the rich car dealer because you bought a car from him. Everybody knows the rich surgeon because somebody in your family's gone to him.

But the guy that owns the waste management company is worth six times more than both combined. But he's not cool at parties. It's not really a cool industry. And baseball isn't stylish like the NBA. We don't bet it like we do the NFL. NFL. It doesn't have like, you know, cheerleaders and bands and the student body, the goose bump feel of college football. And frankly, it doesn't give us the urgency of a big

fight or a big golf tournament on a Sunday. But baseball last year made $10.7 billion. Several billion more than the NBA. The Yankees alone made $700 million, a single team. Baseball's players have never been richer. owners have never been richer and the executives have never been richer. And the reason they're airing this public laundry is because one percent on either side is hundreds of millions of dollars. Yesterday, more stuff was leaked and the players are furious. According to Jesse Rogers, a full year $5 million salary, the owners are saying, we'll pay a

$1.65 million. $10 million a year player guy, we'll give you $2.95 million. 20 million you'll make five. That's not where it's going to end up. A 20 million guy will probably get close to 9 or 10, which is good considering we're not going to have many fans, and it could be less than half a season. But when companies air dirty laundry publicly,

it's called leverage, it's called negotiations, make the other side look bad, get a little break. Take a deep breath, baseball fans. going to get a sport. It's going to work out. Players will probably make 50, 55% of what they were scheduled to make. I'm pro players on this because they're the ones taking the physical risk. You can't have baseball right now in a pandemic without actual players. And since they're the ones, not in cushy press boxes, not up in suites, actually playing with other people touching and could get COVID-19. I think this is the year the owners have to cave a little.

But yesterday's freak out. We're talking a sport that makes $11 billion a year significantly more than the more stylish NBA, probably more than hockey and the MLS combined, I would guess. It's going to be okay. Nick right around the corner, Joy Taylor with the news. No, no, no, no, turn on the news. This is the herd line news.

Well, expectations for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Tampa Bay Bucks. Have started to rise since the addition of Tom Brady. And linebacker Shaquille Barrett thinks their new quarterback instantly puts their team in Super Bowl contention. I think James would have made a big jump, but I think what Brady just makes it's an automatic like contender for Super Bowl. With James, I think it would have been a playoff contender.

It would have been a, still a battle for sure and it's still going to be a battle now. But having Tom, I think we're going to be over the edge and everything on paper. it looks perfect. We just got to put the work in. Very interesting term he used there on paper because they are very interesting on paper. People, here's what happens. If you get fired as a head coach, we forget about you. We downgrade you. Todd Bowles got fired by the Jets. Todd Bowles is a great defensive coordinator.

The story in Tampa that nobody's discussing, the last six to eight games last year, they were the best NFL defense yards per play. Tom's not going to a team that he has to outscore everybody. If Tom goes from the 30 interceptions of James down to 15, they added a starting safety in the draft. They had a very good draft, probably got three starters, very good free agency. If they just play smart football, not as athletic kick quarterback, fewer mistakes.

If you look at what Bowles was doing at the end of last year, they figured it out all their talent. So they were an elite defensive team. that's why they're going to be a Super Bowl bubble team. Well, I mean, the biggest change is going to be the mistakes. We know, like, not all turnovers are created equal, right? But when you have it, 30 interceptions and six pick sixes, that makes a huge difference. It doesn't matter how elite your defense is.

You're constantly putting them in a bad spot. It's almost impossible to overcome. They were seven and seven, week 14, and it was just mistakes. This is a team. You know, we always do this. We pay attention to one thing and it's another, right? The reality is with sports, we all get fixated on A, and it's often B, and we're all fixated on Tampa's offense. It's the defense that's going to have to carry them through September and October because Tom doesn't know,

nobody's played together on the offensive side. Right, but even though he hasn't played with anyone, he is not a, he's not a mistake prone guy. Like his football intelligence at this point in his career is going to keep him. from making those mistakes. It's not like he's all of a sudden go out there and forget how to play quarterback. He's just going to be a timing thing and rhythm and all that. But he's not somebody who's going to put the ball in danger.

He's never had more than 14 interceptions in a season. He has 29 interceptions over the past four seasons. That's less than James had all year last year. Like he had 30. Right. So he's just not going to put the ball in a bad spot, which doesn't put your defense in a bad spot. So like you said, if your defense is playing well,

just give him a break, give him a chance, and that's really what they needed. Super Bowl contention, I don't know if I'm there yet, but they're definitely a playoff team. So Jalen Ramsey's in the last year of his rookie contract and looking to sign a long-term extension. He said he will not hold out and will definitely report to Rams camp this year and he is confident that a deal will eventually get done. The Rams know where I stand. And I think that's all that matters at the end of the day. They know where I stand.

They've been in contact with my agent. Well, you know, they're on the same page as my agent. They know what's up. I feel like everybody knew what type of situation it was going to be once they traded for me. So I think, you know, it's kind of what it doesn't really need to be talked about that much. It'll get handled. Kind of a turnaround from showing up at camp in a brink truck. But like he said, they knew what the situation was when they traded for him.

This is what we expected. We knew when that trade was made. Okay, the Rams are going to pay Jalen Ramsey then. They're willing to do that. And as we know, the Rams are willing to spend money. less need as re-sign players to the biggest contracts ever given to a quarterback or running back and a defensive player

at the time of signing. So he's going his contract could reset the market. It's the largest quarterback contract in terms of value is Byron Jones New Deal, 82.5 million with the Dolphins. The area, Slay of the Eagles, has about 17 million per year on his three-year, 50.1 million dollar deal.

So, Jaylon Ramsey is going to get a monster deal. Yeah, he's a top three corner in the NFL with Aaron Donald and Jalen Ramsey. You have what every NFL defensive quarterback, corner coordinator wants. A great defensive lineman to create pressure from the interior and a great corner to shut down to number one. That's what most guys.

Safeties you can live with average ones. But I mean, the Rams are a little top heavy to me, but they moved off Brandon Cooks, thought they should have. They've moved off Todd Gurley. They've acknowledged, we whiffed, we've moved off. The Rams are, here's what I like about the Rams. They're the opposite of the Packers. They take risks.

Yeah. They take big, like Philadelphia takes big swings. Baltimore has taken big swings. Kansas City has taken big swings. Green Bay, very, you know, they put their money in their 401K. They pay off their house. This is a league now of young GMs that take big swings. Less needs one of them.

Well, you have to. We talk about it all the time. You've got to be aggressive in sports. And that's why I didn't really have a problem with them paying all the guys that they paid. Everyone was freaking out about the contracts being too big. They were in the Super Bowl. So you can say whatever you want about how they handled their team. You don't have to pay guys from time to time.

That's how it works. And obviously they paid a lot of people, but they still have golf. They still have their situation set. They're going to need some other pieces, obviously, and the division is rough. But Jaylon Ramsey deserves to get paid. Finally, Bleacher Report ranked the top wide receiver duos in the NFL. And Tom Brady's new teammates, Mike Evans and Chris Godwin, got the number one spot. You should be.

How do you like that going from New England, where all we could talk about is how he had no weapons. Now they have the top. By the way, okay, here's how good Russell Wilson is. If Russell Wilson wasn't the Seahawk quarterback, would Tyler Lockett and D.K. Metcalfe be number five? You've got to be kidding. I mean, one guy was a gadget guy. The other guy fell in the draft.

I mean, come on. The rest of them are great, great, great, great. Tyler Lockett. And I like Tyler Lockett. He's a gadget guy. And Russell's made him into a Pro Bowl level wide receiver. Well, I mean, other, I think you would probably argue about baseball. but that, you know, everyone on that list has high production quarterbacks.

I've got no arguments with any of that stuff. The rankings focused on a combination of past production accolades and room for growth, and it didn't include any rookies because there's too many unknowns. Right. There was also a what have you done for me lately factor consider. So it's not very scientific ranking, but it's, it's strong, though. Yeah. There's a, it's, I always downplayed wide receivers, but I've, I can't.

Yeah, what did you call them icing? They were icing on the cake. They make it taste a little better, but you can't eat icing. You can eat cake with no icing. I disagree. Can you eat cake with no icing? Yeah, olive oil cake. Best cake on the market.

I forgot about that olive oil cake stuff. It crushes. Absolutely crushes. Joy with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by. You know, I only get Nick Wright once a week. So there's a lot of stuff that I want to talk to him about like Thursday or Friday,

but I don't get them in Monday. So there's a couple of things I got to touch on. And he is joining us, Nick Wright. brought to you by Mercedes-Benz the Best or Nothing via the Coward Global Satellite Network. He's the co-host of First Things First. So I didn't talk to you about the MJ Isaiah stuff. So let me restate it. My takeaway is if Michael Jordan said,

I'm not playing with Isaiah Thomas, my takeaway is LeBron James said, I'm not playing with half my roster, and the Lakers in a salary cap league moved players. I mean, what do I care? If the Star doesn't want somebody around, I got no. It was a three-week sojourn to Europe.

Buses, dinners, lunches together. So let's start with that. Let me guess. You think Michael Jordan's a bad guy for not wanting to play with grumpy Isaiah Thomas. No, no, no, no, no, not a bad guy at all. Just a liar. Like, you be a fine guy, but he lied about it. This was the weird thing, and this is what is so concerning for me

as we further venture into this post-fact universe that we all have to live in now. We all knew what he had said. We all knew he said he wouldn't play if Isaiah would play. And the fact that he stared into that camera with his tumbler of tequila and bloodshot eyes and cigar and said, I don't know what the hell you're talking about, Senator. Like, I couldn't believe it. We all knew it. And then because again, we live in this post-fact world, we had a lot of people who should know better whose response was, see, Jordan never said it. You know how, I know it because he just told me he never said it. A lot of people didn't like Isaiah.

Probably because Isaiah beat them a hell of a lot more than they beat him. Isaiah regularly beat Jordan at a winning record against Jordan. Jordan loved being the bully. Didn't so much love when someone could bully him. We all know people like that. But just own it. Don't 30 years later

try to recreate history. So listen, Isaiah's not perfect and some people had good reason not to like him. But I don't know why he ran from the truth, especially when he was on tape admitting that truth less than a decade ago to Jack McMullen. Now, new playoff format is different, but it's got a World Cup feel to it in the first round.

First round of the NBA playoffs is ratings aren't good. It's kind of boring. It's total mismatches. I like the new format because my takeaway is this is the year of the asterisk. And if the NBA can start a season and not stop it and crown a champ, it is a massive win for Adam Silver, and he should be celebrated and elevated for the rest of his term. I'm okay with it. It's more fun. It creates urgency. It's different. The NBA's never been rigid. That's just not what they are. Do you like the new kind of soccer-esque World Cup feel in the first round?

No. You know what would also be fun? We could have in the first round, you could have Alex Caruso go on Anthony Davis's shoulders. And they could play a two. two-on-two match like that, probably get good ratings. We could do a three-legged race, maybe one of those, the spoon in your mouth with an egg on the end of it to determine who gets a buy. There's a lot of fancy, cool things we could do might even pull a rating, but they'd be unnecessary and they would undercut whatever integrity we have left of this regular season. Listen, I understand nothing can be perfect. We are in a pandemic world right now, and changes have to be made. But any of these NBA,

changes would be superfluous. We know who the 16 playoff teams would be under 1 through 16 or east west, each getting 8. It's the same 8, is the same 16 teams. Adding this would just be using the pandemic as an excuse to experiment with something.

Like I saw hockey. They just, they're doing a 24 team playoff essentially. They basically have to, as noted hockey expert Nick Wright can explain to you. You have in the Eastern Conference, you have the gap between the five seat and the 10 seed is one game. So I understand why they said we have to be more inclusive to be fair. The NBA doesn't. We know who the 16 playoff teams would be to use this calamity as a reason to just try to shake the snow globe seems unreasonable to me.

And there's nothing we can do about the fact that what the Bucks and Lakers earned was the number one overall seats and home court advantage. and they won't get the home court advantage. Listen, sorry, guys, that happens. But to further minimize what they earned in the regular season seems punitive and unfair to the two teams that took this regular season seriously. So, no, I just think it's, I don't think you're forced into it, so I don't think you need to do it.

Give us our four rounds of the playoffs, seven-game series, and let's go. Let's shift to something. As America's media icon, Joy calls me that, and she's right, I have become the foremost expert on predicting how college quarterbacks were due in the NFL. Some with, mostly I'm right. Baker Mayfield, Fox Bet came out, and they listed your starting quarterback,

and then your backup, and how many points worth are you more? Now, Lamar and Malmes and Russell and Aaron and Deshawn and Carson Wentz, they're very, very valuable. And then Baker Mayfield is worth Mike Komp when he came into the league a point and a half more than Case Keenham.

That's it. And as I said, he's Case Keenham with a slightly better arm. Can we now acknowledge that a first round number one pick for Baker was silly? He is capable of winning if you surround him like Case Keenham got a few years ago with a bunch of good players. But you were a little on the Baker thing. I've never been on the Baker thing. Can you acknowledge this may have been a rare opportunity?

I nailed it, maybe. Yeah. All right. So I was more than a little on the Baker thing in one of the major regrets of my career. I came on this radio, this television show one year ago

right around this time and had him ranked ahead of Deshawn Watson as far as players I would want for the future. I would like that one back. And right now you appear

to have nailed this. I am not yet, however, listen, I don't know as much about stocks as you do, but I'm trying to learn. I don't think you're supposed to sell your stock at its low point.

So I'm going to hold on to my remaining Baker-Mayfield chairs. I understand right now, some believe they might be going to zero and that I should get out while I can. I'm going to hold on to them. I'm going to say Freddie Kitchens is gone. I saw the Browns are doing a cool thing. They're going to let a fan call 15 preseason plays, which is a good departure from

last year with let a fan coach the whole team. So it should be good for Baker that he's got a real head coach. Odell should be healthier. Jarvis should be healthier. The most talented player on the team shouldn't bonk anyone on the head with their helmet. and we'll see how they do. But yes, right? If football stopped today, you would be right about Baker Mayfield.

I'm looking on a longer time horizon, however, and to see if at some point we can come back around. But yeah, so my long way is saying this might end up being one where Colin unfortunately was right. I want to go to Russell Wilson because I even made the Seattle Times and Seattle Radio, I talked about this last week, is that the fact that the Cam Newton rumor came out for Russell. The minute it came out for the Steelers, the general manager rushed to the media and said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

We're not taking camp in support of a sensitive Big Ben. He's shown a history of being sensitive. When the Cam Cam Newton-Russell Wilson thing came out, crickets, even though frankly, it should be noted, and I think this matters a little.

Sierra dated Cam and married Russ. It matters. I'm sorry. It does. You have to know that as a GM. It's not good. So my point being, Russell Wilson continues, I believe, in his front office, they don't quite get him. That and the fact he was drafted out of the first second round. We've always had this thing where he's got to prove it to us. Do you think my stance on he's the least respected great player I can remember in the league is reasonable

and that even suggesting Cam could be a backup was a lousy fit? Well, I had totally forgotten or was just flatly unaware about Sierra and Cam dating. So that's a great pop culture pull by you, Colin. But in general, yeah, I totally agree. I think he's the second best quarterback in football. I think what we have on the screen right now is Seattle offensive coordinator. That's Brian Schottenheimer. Russell is the wrong guy to doubt.

You know who Brian Schottenheimer should tell that to? Brian Schottenheimer. So maybe he'll stop running these horrible run plays on first. and second down and then being like, ah, worst case scenario, I guess we'll have Russell throw it. The Seahawks team has been top three in the NFL each of the last two years in rushing attempts. They run an offense like Blake Bortles is their quarterback, not like Russell Wilson is their quarterback. So yeah, I agree. He's underappreciated.

He's disrespected by the general public and by his own organization that seems to have, I can't remember the old football coach, but the old coach from the 50s, like, three things happen when you pass, two of a little. of them are bad. That seems to be the Seahawks mindset when they go into these football games instead of being like, hey, nobody throws it more than ever than the era we're in right now. We've got the second best quarterback in football. He's never hurt. He's never had a losing record. He rarely turns the ball over. He's a great leader. Why don't we build around him instead of, hey, he needs more help. Carlos Hyde come on down. So we have another running back to take the ball away from Russell Wilson. By the way, it should be noted. You and

are different on Cam, I do appreciate, I think Cam's been very smart, he is putting out videos regularly of him practicing. I think that matters today. It is something I criticize Kaepernick for for about a 12-month period where let me see how much you love football. You can tell me you do, I want to see it. Cam is all over social media, and I think it matters. But why is the market virtually zip bagel for Cam? Nothing. No interest. I think there's a lot of factors. I think one is it's an unfortunate time as far as given the pandemic. He can't go into work out with teams and they can see that he's healthy.

I think another is you've got, I don't know what the number is, but maybe a quarter to a third of teams in the league that just aren't Cam Newton friendly, so to speak. They think he's too much of a star or polarizing or flamboyant to be the, quote, face of the franchise. I think that works against him. I think the fact that none of the older quarterbacks are retiring. I think that works against him. And I think the fact that for some reason or another, there are certain guys who you just say, will they get to be backup quarterbacks and nobody will bat an eye. I mean, Joe Flacco has stunk since Obama's first term. He just had neck surgery. He's not going to be healthy. He just said like, guys, guys, guys, I'm not going to be able to

play at the beginning of next year. Don't get that wrong. Jets are like, come on down. Philip Rivers already taking his job after football. Cults are like 25 million. Come on down. Nick Foles gets traded for. So I don't get it. I don't think it's just football with Cam. I don't think it's ever been just football with Cam. And I would encourage people to watch the playoff game from January of 2018 where Cam Newton with Brinton Burson, Kaelin Clay, and Devin Funches has a game-winning drive to beat the Saints in the Superdome, and Devin Funches can't catch the touchdown pass with 25 seconds left. And then the first 11 games of the next season before his shoulder got wrecked,

when he had a 104 rating and a 70% completion percentage, he broke his foot and he missed last season. I still think he's a top, at the very least, top 18 starter in the NFL column. Good stuff today, Nick Wright. Is that your house, by the way? May I say one thing? Yeah, sure, yeah. Oh, that's my house, but I have to interrupt you real quick, if I may.

Listen, once upon a time, Colin, you changed your hair. America responded. You changed it back. I'm changing my hair. America's responding poorly. I might shave it again. There has never been a hair change more universally loved and respected than what Joy Taylor has done. Joy Taylor came back from quarantine.

Joy, you look tremendous. Congratulations to you. Your hair change going over far better. than Colin or mine ever could have imagined. So congrats to you, my friend. Thanks for having me on you. You bet. And he's about the fourth person that has mentioned that.

It is universally understood that Joy Taylor in quarantine upgraded her hair with no hairdressers. So that in itself deserves high praise. Thank you guys. You're very, very welcome. Coming up next, there's a new analytic out, the Football Power Index from ESPN. And look at the good team that analytics

does not buy at all. That's next to hurt. Be sure to catch live editions of the herd. Weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened.

That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves. Their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real.

From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slices Life 12 and the TikTok podcast. network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me,

your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking, Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing,

we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing. And we're still chasing it. And we don't know when we've done enough, Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth?

Are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro. Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me, Kear Gaines, as we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose

on my new podcast, learn the hard way. Open your free, our heart radio app, Search Learn the Hard Way and listen now. Do you remember when Diana Ross double-tap Little Kim's boobs at the VMAs? Or when Kanye said that George Bush didn't like black people. I know what you're thinking. What the hell does George Bush got to do with Little Kim? Well, you can find out on the Look Back at it podcast.

I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill, waxing all about crack in the 80s. To be clear, 84 is big to me, not just because of crack. I'm down to talk about crack all day, but just so y'all know.

I mean, at this point, this is the second episode where we've discussed crack. So I'm starting to see that there's a through line. We also have AIDS on the table right now. Thank you for finishing that sentence. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Really? Yeah. For me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history.

Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, guys? This is Clever Taylor the 4th. And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. Like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game.

This linebacker walks up to me. He goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her. What? Time out. Quarterback on office, Blue, 42. A rep, my mama want you to wave at her. What? Hey, Ms. Parker.

Listen to The Cliverts show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. This is amazing. I just saw this. The owner of the D. Casino in Las Vegas, a guy named Derek Stevens. Yes. He just bought a thousand flights around the country. You don't have to go to his casino. You don't have to.

He bought a thousand flights, various cities, various airlines. So he said, fly for free to Vegas. Fly to free to Vegas. You don't have to stay at my place. We need you. That guy, Derek Stevens, I'm going to give him free publicity because I just like, I've never been to the D-Casino. I'm going to go in there.

I know if I've ever been there, but I know. The D-Casino Hotel in Vegas, located in the heart of downtown Las Vegas on the Fremont Street experience, which is kind of a fun place. I've been there. Fresh, energetic, fun atmosphere, Derek Stevens. How about that? Well, I mean, Vegas is. It's been hit really hard.

Yeah, no, Vegas probably more than any city because not only, there's small casinos everywhere you could drive to, but you have to fly to Vegas to go to their casinos. And a lot of people are, you know, reluctant. Well, also, I mean, not just the casinos. Their whole industry there is tourism. I mean, restaurants and shops. Conventions. Yeah. So no city in America, and it's close to my heart, Las Vegas.

No city in America is taking it worse than Las Vegas. So that is remarkable. That is, I mean, that says, don't have to come to our place. I hope you do, but you don't have to. Wow. Build a statue for that guy. You're in a pandemic. That's the kind of people that get us through it.

Risk takers, big thinkers. Yeah, swing big. By the way, so ESPN's football power index. This is an analytic, analytic, analytic, maybe antelitic too. Analytic predicting mode. Teams at the top you'd expect, Chiefs and Ravens and Niners and Saints and Eagles, Seahawks. And the teams at the bottom, Washington, Jacksonville. You know who's right in the middle?

The Green Bay Packers. That's it. They're an inch above the Chicago Bears, and the Bears don't know this morning who their quarterback's going to be in a quarterback league. Now, think about that. What does it tell you? Analytics, not sportscasters, not debate show hosts. Analytics think Matt LaFleur, B.

Aaron Rogers declining because this is a quarterback coach league and everybody knows it and everybody at the top Kansas City, Baltimore, San Francisco, the Saints, Philadelphia, Seattle, Tampa Bay,

getting a lot of quarterback coach combos there. Very interesting. You know what it makes me think about and so Matt Lafleur comes to Green Bay and the feeling is oh, he'll be the magic elixir. He'll solve all Aaron stuff.

Aaron's numbers went down, actually. Aaron's no longer, he's protecting his legacy. He's not elevating it. Is that Aaron, the last two years, has led the NFL in throwaways. Brett Farv was a gunslinger to the end. Aaron is not. He doesn't want to throw picks. And if you look at the NFC and you look at football right now,

the risk takers are winning. Andy Reid, Patrick Mahomes, big risk. Lamar, John Harbaugh, big. risk. Philadelphia, their front office, big swings. Los Angeles got to a Super Bowl, big swings. San Francisco paid a ton of money to Jimmy Garoppolo. They didn't know how good he'd be. If Houston say what you want, they keep winning their division. They've paid huge swings on draft picks. Seattle, John Snyder, Pete Carroll, draft, big swings, big trades, make moves. Green Bay has never been comfortable with discomfort. They don't have an owner, it's a small town.

they've always been sort of a, you know, let's put our money away, let's pay the house off, let's not have an expensive, flashy car. That's Green Bay. I would argue that's become Aaron Rogers. Last year, 24 touchdowns, 4,000 yards. He's got a superstar wide receiver. He's got a great running back. It's not like they don't have people.

He's got an offensive-minded head coach, 95-passer rating. The NFC especially has become a big swing, big risk. GMs are younger. They're taking shots. even Green Bay's draft. First two picks are backups, the third's a blocking tight end. They didn't have one dynamic player in free agency, and they didn't add one dynamic player in the draft.

That's not to say they won't make the team, but they didn't take any big risks. It was a great wide receiver draft, but there were a lot of guys that had some off-field risks. They had no interest. Maybe there was a time when Aaron was in his prime, didn't have multiple surgeries, that you could be less risky,

and Aaron would carry you. but I do think he's declined. Still a top five quarterback, still excellent, first ballot Hall of Famer. But I've noticed over the last two years, he, Farr was a gunslinger to his last throw. Aaron takes fewer risks,

leads the NFL in throwaways, doesn't want to have picks, doesn't want to throw it up for grabs. And I don't know in the NFC, analytically, the proof in the pudding. That's not going to win it. They were a bad 13 and 3 team last year. They would have been a great 9 and 7.

team, but a bad 13 and 3 team. Matt Nagy, coach of the Chicago Bears is right around. One of my favorite young coaches next. One more herd. The herd streams 24 hours a day, seven days a week within the IHeart radio app. Search herd to listen live or on demand whenever you'd like. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where sports slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to

hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to SportsSlice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slic Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kier Games.

And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking, Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the day, of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing and we're still chasing it and we don't know when we've done enough. Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you

hear on earth or are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro. Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me, Keir Gaines, as we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, Learn the Hardway. Open your free iHeart radio app, search Learn the Hardway, and listen now. Do you remember when Diana Ross double-tap Little Kim's boobs at the VMAs? Or when Kanye said that George Bush didn't like black people.

I know what you're thinking. What the hell does George Bush got to do a Little Kim? Well, you can find out on the Look Back at it podcast. I'm Sam Jette. Alex English. Each episode, we pick it here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill, waxing all about crack in the 80s. To be clear, 84 is big to me, not just because of crack. I'm down to talk about crack on day, but just so y'all know. I mean, at this point, Mark, this is the second episode where we've

discussed crack, so I'm starting to see that there's a through line. We also have AIDS on the table right now, so. Thank you finishing that sentence. Yes. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Really? Yeah. For me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history. Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, guys? This is Clivert Taylor the Fourth. And on my podcast, The Cliverts show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. Like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game. This linebacker, this linebacker walks up to me. He goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you.

to wave at her. What? Quarterback on office blue with 42. Hey, Brett. My mama want you to wave at her. What? Where's she at? Hey, Miss Parker.

Listen to the Clifford show on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Oh, here we go. It's hour two. We're live in Los Angeles. This is... The Hurt. Wherever you may be and however you may be listening.

High Heart Radio, Fox Sports Radio and FS1, Matt Nagy, coach of the Chicago Bears, who will be entering his third year. He was the NFL coach of the year in 2018. And I have a little quarterback battle. It'll be funny. He's got, you know, Trubisky's got a few years under him. Nick Bowles has a lot of years under him. How's he doing it? He's one of the really clever offensive guys.

Kyle Shanahan, Sean McVe, Matt Nagy, Doug Peterson isn't as young, but I think he's really clever as well in Philadelphia. That's kind of what the league is. There was a long time where the defensive guys ran the league, and now we're in a time, Joy, if you have any connection to a Sean McVeigh or an Andy Reid, you're going to get an interview, and Kyle Shanahan eventually is going to have a coaching tree. Sean McVeigh's already got a little bit of a coaching tree. Andy Reid's got an enormously successful coaching tree.

Matt Nagy's from Andy Reed, and I think that's a... That's the future of the NFL, and I think it's good for the fan. I mean, in the end, this is a television show. I'm a television show. The NFL's a TV show. More offense, better ratings, more captivating. It helps your fantasy team. I'm for it.

Well, it's kind of like what Danny Green was talking about with the NBA yesterday on with us. I mean, fans like more offense. Like, that's just shown in the ratings, the changes that you make to protect offensive players in the NFL have made the league more quarterback and wide receiver friendly. You know, it's almost like. Similar to what's happening in the NBA. When I got into the media. The written word 30 years ago was very powerful. Now the spoken word is where you make money.

Even Bill Simmons, who's a writer, I don't want to write. He goes to the spoken word and he gets rich. It's just like sports changes. Like it used to be. Yeah, I mean, like sports now, television money is so great that you have to as a league benefit the offense. It's more points, fantasy football and gambling. You want to engage fans. So these leagues, remember baseball has moved the mound up and down 20,

times. I think they should move it down again. Pitchers are now six foot seven. When I was a kid growing up in the 70s, pitchers through 92 miles an hour, that was heat, 93, and they were all like 6-6-1. It was normal to see an ace at 6-1. Now, ACEs are 6-6, and they all throw 96. So the ball's coming at a sharper, more acute trajectory from a harder thrower. Now guys, there's more guys on a pitching staff now. So the minute a guy's fastball moves down, they put another guy throwing 96. To me, I'd lower the mound, and it would make it more of an offensive game. I think baseball, all the complaints about baseball, my thing is,

give me more offense, give me more base runners, give me more doubles, give me more singles, give me more stolen bases. First to third, second to home. How? Lower the mound. It's all you have to do in baseball. You lower the mound, and I'm pitching right at you. But when you have a 6-7 pitcher comes over-the-top pitching down, and he's throwing

97, and they replace him after the fifth inning, and the seventh inning, and then the eighth inning, and then the ninth inning, and they're all throwing gas, from this and now you can defensive shift it. So Bryce Harper hits a seed. It gets caught because you have four people in right field. All these leagues can change it. And the NFL has just said, you know what? We're going to go offense.

We're going to Benet. Sean Payton, Matt Nagy, Kyle Shanan, Sean McVeigh. And that doesn't mean Vic Fangio in Denver, my Dark Horse team. Doesn't mean they can't win. Doesn't mean you can't find a good offensive coordinator. But the sports are smart. They're like, let's help. Hockey years ago had a real problem.

It was you could mug all. all the players. And hockey's like, stop the clutching and grabbing. I want our stars to be stars. So now hockey, if you watch hockey 15 years ago and hockey today, it is so fast. I mean, the sport is you can't have fighters on the ice. In the NBA, you can't have bullies on the ice. If you can't shoot, you're out.

In hockey, if you can't skate, you're done. I'm a defensive purist, I guess, but, you know, I grew up watching a lot of defense. So I like that. I like a physical defense. I think it's still super important. in all these sports. But the reality is we live in the internet age. What plays well on the internet?

Highlights. What kind of highlights do we feel comfortable with watching? Offensive highlights because we don't like watching big hits. We don't like watching brutal collisions in the NBA. Hockey, again, like the holding. It's not as fun on highlights. And that's changed how people consume the sports. Yeah, I mean, the NFL has made a dramatic shift for more offense.

And the beneficiaries are all these smart young coaches. The Sean McVeigh would not have been given a chance 20 years. years ago in a defense-driven league. But all these offensive guys now, the Andy Reed tree, you look at Andy Reed, and you're like, Andy Reid's tree, we've talked about this. Belichick's tree, coaching tree hasn't been successful. Andy's, if you had a cup of coffee with Andy, for some reason, his mentor ability. He's a teacher.

He's a teacher, and guys hit it. Matt Nagy's one of them. He's joining us now via the Coward Global Satellite Network, coach the Chicago Bears coach of the year in the NFL in 2018. So, coach, here you go. you got the no OTAs. You are an offensive guy. You're a tinkerer. I would think guys like you,

you're sitting there in your beautiful house and you're thinking yourself, I want to talk to players. I want to tinker. Has it been tough for you? Colin, great. Thanks for having me on. No, you know what?

It started out a little tough just because it was new. But we've all adjusted really well. The players have been awesome. Our IT department, our coaching staff, the way we've handled everything has been really good. And I think that for us, just adapting that way, it's been fun. It's the new new.

And I think we're learning a lot through each other. So it's been good. So a couple years ago, I started watching your games. And I said, I said, I've been watching football for 40 years. This feels very Andy Reid, Kyle Shanahan, play designing. And I wonder, guys like you, and Andy's one of the masters at it, where do you get your inspiration? Do you watch college football?

Do you watch, I mean, I've had coaches tell me they'll watch small college football, see a crazy play and think, you know, nobody else in the league is going to watch this thing. Where do you get? Because every time I watch you, Matt, I see a curveball. I see something I didn't see the previous week. Where do you get it from? Is it just all working in that mind of years week to week to change stuff up? You know what?

For the most part, I think, number one, there's some DNA involved in that. We've all, you know, Coach Reed taught me so much from the first day I started working with him that you always need to try to be one step ahead of the defenses. And things change. Defenses usually catch up to you. Now, there's ways to go about it. Evaluating different players throughout the year in the combine. Sometimes you'll see great plays in college. And whether it's Division 1, Division 2, Division 1, you know, the FCS, SBS. And if it works and it's good, let's take it. You know, I don't care if it's high school. we'll take it. But there's got to be a why behind it. And that's the beauty I think I learned from Coach Reed is you better have a why. And if it makes sense and it works, then go ahead and do it. And if it's the first time you've done it, there's zero chance that a team is prep for it. And I think that's the other part that's pretty good. You know, Andy really is. He's one of my favorite people in the history of the league. You know, it's funny. If you look at Belichick's record, he's got winning

records against everybody. Then all of a sudden you look at Belichick against Andy Reed. And Andy doesn't have a system week to week, Andy's going to give you different looks like you, and that's hard to prepare for. When was the first moment as a young football coach with Andy Reed that you just, an epiphany, you knew, I'm, I am just, I got to be around this guy. He is teaching me things I've never heard before. How long did it take you to realize that with Andy? Well, number one, it didn't take me. So a good story for me to be able to give to others is being able to earn trust through somebody like a coach read. That I come into this with no experience in Philadelphia in 2010.

I had a couple internships with them. But coach would take me and we go out to the indoor complex in the evenings when everybody left. And we go work out his youngest son, Spencer, and throw some balls. And when I was helping him throw footballs to his running back son, Spencer, he's teaching me. We're running routes and doing things with our offense with his son. And I think what happened is we build a friendship and a relationship to where I have thousands of stories of him teaching me that it's okay to take ideas from others, you know, other coaches on your staff when you see things from other teams, whether it's college or in the NFL and to use it. But there's that trust element that has just gets so strong and you build that relationship. And then you just put your own little.

He always says, you know, let your personality show. And that's kind of where, again, the B you part for me is, you know, just be yourself. And now it's not always going to work. You know, last year we struggled offensively for a lot of different reasons. And so, but that's what motivates us. And we're really exciting and looking forward to getting going this year. So I have a lot of different stories. But for him taking me in as a young coach with his son and teaching me the game.

It was pretty cool. You know, for professional athletes, even the great ones, Alex Rodriguez, the baseball player, if he starts overthinking, he goes into a slump. Sports is hard for the greats. Forget the goods. And what I worry about with Trubisky and Foles, I don't worry about Nick's confidence, Super Bowl. I do worry that Mitch Trubisky could struggle with confidence.

You bring a new guy in. What do they think of me? Do you worry about that with Mitch that the messaging, the symbolism is, man, I got to earn my job. I'm 19 and 10 in the NFL. Do you worry about that at all? I really don't. And one of the things, Colin, that we've tried to do, and it makes life so much easier, is we've been really honest with both of them.

The simple fact of the matter is, is that we want to have the best possible team we can have in Chicago with the Bears. And so right now, we're presented with a great healthy competition. between two quarterbacks, they're going to battle their tails off. Now, they understand that. And, you know, the thing with Mitch is that he is very competitive. He is 19 and 10, like you mentioned. And he's, he's two to one on most ratio and wins the losses. But he also knows he can grow in a lot of different ways. And so the time is right now for that to happen. He's excited for it. He can't wait for the challenge. And then Nick coming into the same situation, he's had an interesting journey as well. He's been at the top of the mountain and he's also been at the very bottom. and so but they're both really good people and when you're in this situation when you have two good human beings that are doing it for the best of the team it will work out because we as coaches are very honest and open and now it's going to push both of them and it's going to make our team better and we're we just know we feel like we're going to be better because of that you know it's interesting you are in a my wife's a chicago girl so my family my cousins are in

Chicago. It's a great American sports city. It's got dynamic newspapers, dynamic sports talk radio. They love sports. They're critical. You can turn on the radio in Chicago. And Matt Nagy, your voice, they're talking about you. I mean, after games, you drive home. Your name is being mentioned

on every station. As a young coach, and you are in, I would argue, the best sports city in America, and the most vocal, and the most demanding. Michael Jordan was there, right? Walter Payton. Do you sense sometimes the young coach the pressure and urgency and intensity,

how big this year is for you and the Bears? Yeah, well, we all understand it that every year is different. And so it's been a really interesting journey for us in 2018 to come in. No quote-unquote expectations or standards for our team. And so we were young. And I think what they realized is that every single day we need to be able to put out our best. And we stayed very healthy. And we had a lot of success.

And so there was a lot of swag within our team. There was a lot of fun, a lot of, you know, you saw that creativity with bringing defensive guys in down in the red zone and the goal line. And we were successful with it. At that time, now all of a sudden you go to 2019 and we struggled more as a team. And but that's okay. We have fans in a city like you said that are very passionate, very loyal. They care.

Their care factor is extremely high. And so we would not want it any other way. And we're going to do everything we can. Myself as a head coach, I need to be vulnerable and understand that it starts with me. And whatever I didn't do good enough in 2019, I need to fix. And so I look that thing, you know, dead on and I understand that, you know, that's what we're going to do. And it starts with details, details, details, details. It starts with being, you know, active and aggressive are words that we're using a lot.

And trust, we've had two years of a great culture now. We never gave up after losing four games in a row last year. And that's a credit to our players and our coaches that we stuck together and gave ourselves a chance. And so we're really looking forward to 2020. You know, it's funny. Joy and I were talking about this that in every industry, ours included, there's fundamental changes.

And sometimes they work for your benefit. Sometimes they don't. My son's techie. The world's becoming increasingly techie. So I tell my son all the time, there's going to be a million jobs. You're just going to have to find which one you like because you're into tech. And, you know, if I was born now, I wouldn't be into tech. It was built for, you know, me.

You're a coach. And when you were 10 years old and 12 years old and maybe 20 years old, it was a defensive world. I mean, the Steelers, I think of all these great teams. It was defense. It was Ray Lewis. And then all of a sudden about seven years ago, there's a big sea change. And it's we're open. up this game. Go back to your early coaching days. And maybe it's Andy Reed, when you realize

that you are the future, that everybody's looking for you, and it was not that way 20 years ago, coach. Yeah, for sure. I go back to the start in 2013 when we first got to Kansas City with Coach Reed. And I'll never forget when he walked into one of our first staff meetings, just with the coaches. And he walked in and he said, okay, boom, and he puts down our two minute package. And he talks about how we're going to implement these plays to help us play fast. And really, right away at that time, you're thinking, oh, wow, this is going to be interesting. But what you come to find out is that there was a method to his madness. And what he was trying to do was basically get as many reps as he possibly could with a new team in 2013 in Kansas

city and still extra reps. And he just said that we're going to play faster. And but there was a method behind why he was doing it. And so in time then with Alex and doing some of the zone read stuff and the RPO thing, it just started growing. And Alex was good at it. Coach Reed loved it. It was staying one step ahead.

It wasn't as much West Coast as what we did in Philadelphia. And it's taking a life on, you know, of its own. And you look at now with what they did last year winning the Super Bowl, Colin, it's different than what it was two years ago when I was in Kansas City. Wow. And again, you know, there's different. Now, there's a lot of the similarities, but there's different plays that I'll call coach up in the middle of the week

and say, what the heck play was at? Because I don't remember that one. And he'll start giving me the chuckle about it was up on his, you know, up on his whiteboard and like all these different colors. And but that's what's so cool. And so, you know, I try to be the same way with what we do. And it keeps it fun for the players. It doesn't stay monotonous.

Now, you still keep the root of the good stuff, but you want to be different. You want to stay ahead of guys, and I think you're starting to see more and more of that. By the way, a minute left. You were your last year in Kansas City, they drafted Patrick Mahomes. So take me to the play that you went, oh, Lord, what do we have we have here? What was the moment you knew this is just not like a lot of other people that have ever done this? So it was the last game of the regular season, and we had already locked up a playoff in 2017. And we sat Alex, and Patrick had his first start.

And so he goes out there, and we were playing against Denver. And he goes in and starts making these throws on the first drive. And you kind of say, well, we've been seeing that in practice, but here he is doing it in the game elements. and we had a 14-point lead, and at the end of the fourth quarter, we pulled them, and we put in another quarterback. And we ended up giving up 14 points in the fourth quarter, and coach looks at me, and he says, we got to get Patrick back in there. So he puts Patrick back in, and what do you know?

Patrick's just good, all right, I'll go back in, and he just does a two-minute drill right down the field. We kick a game-winning field goal, and that was it. And I think that's the moment where we all just said, wow, this kid here now, there's something different to them. Yeah, well, you were right. Good eye, because it is. Matt Nagy, Chicago Bears head football coach, one of the really smart young guys.

Absolute pleasure. Can't wait to see you again. I go to Chicago as often as I can with my wife, Ann, and we want to meet you guys, and I can't wait, and I'm rooting for you, coach. Thanks a lot, Con. I appreciate it, man. You're the best and appreciate your show.

You do awesome things. Thank you. All right, Matt Nagy, Chicago Bears. Yeah, the Mahomes thing, you know, it's so interesting how often, Pat, you know, the late Kobe Bryant was not drafted one, two, or three, and Michael Jordan wasn't drafted one. And, you know, Patrick Mahomes, they had to move up to get him. And Lamar Jackson's the last pick. All this scouting, all these

smart people, sometimes you just got to, you got to see them live. How do they handle the bullets? How do they hang? Like, Mar Jackson, I said, he's a project. And then they put him in and I'm like, all right, that's better than the project. But you, Baltimore passed on him. Baltimore passed on him once. Baltimore let somebody in their division, Cincinnati have a chance at Lamar Jackson. You can do all the scouting in the world. You just don't know until you, and his story on Patrick Mahomes. And we put him back in. He's like, I thought it was Al go back in, two-minute drill, bang, bang, bang, bang,

touch field goal. Like so much of this stuff is, that's why guys get drafted later. Like they're not as tall. They're not as fast. You know, I said this about Jerry Rice yesterday. Jerry Rice isn't the fastest receiver, the biggest receiver. He's not the most athletic receiver. It's not just Joe Montana at 92 catches at 40 years old.

what is it with Jerry Rice? Man, whistle starts. He plays at a different speed. He comes at a break at a different speed. You just don't know. So much of this stuff is innate, it's instincts, it's toughness, who wants it more. When you can explain everything somebody does, they're good.

If you can't explain some of the stuff with Russell Wilson, that's great. That's the difference between great and good. You can't explain messy. You just can't explain Nadal. Like, there's just so. stuff that you're like, they just make it work. That backhand, they just make it work and nobody hits it like that.

Good stuff. Coming up next, my Super Bowl bubble, by the way, there's a new analytic chart out ranking the NFL teams. I see it differently. My bubble compared to their bubble that's coming up. Be sure to catch live editions of the herd weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific on Fox Sports Radio, FS1, and the I-Hard Radio app. Last night, a blown call changed the game.

This morning, the internet long. It lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, From buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down,

give you context and ask the questions everybody wants answered. SportsSlice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to SportsClyce on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Sliced Life 12 and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade. of my own experience in the middle health field

and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking. Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing. And we're still chasing it. And we don't know when we've done enough.

Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross. Because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth. Are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro. Absolutely.

And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me, Keer Gaines, is we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, Learn the Hardway. Open your free, Our Heart Radio app. Search Learn the Hardway and listen now.

Do you remember when Diana Ross double-taped Little Kim's boobs at the VMAs? Or when Kanye said that George Bush didn't like black, people. I know what you're thinking. What the hell does George Bush got to do a little Kim? Well, you can find out on the Look Back at it podcast. I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick it here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill waxing all about crack in the 80s. To be clear, 84 is big to me, not just because of crack. I'm down to talk about crack on day, but just so you all know. I mean, at this point, Mark, this is the second episode where we've

discussed crack. So I'm starting to see that there's a through line. We also have AIDS on the table right now. So. Thank you finishing that sentence. Yes. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Really? Yeah. For me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history.

Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up guys? This is Clever Taylor the Fourth. And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. being an internet famous referee.

We're in the middle of a game. This linebacker, this linebacker walks up to me, he goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her. What? Quarterback on office blue 42. Hey, rec, my mama want you to wave at her.

What? Hey, Ms. Parker. Listen to the Clifford show on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Tonight on on FS1. The NASCAR season continues live from Charlotte Motor Speedway. Catch all the action of the NASCAR Cup series sponsored by GEICO, beginning at 8 Eastern on FS1 and the Fox Sports app.

It was nice to have an NFL coach on. It's nice. We've had some good guests. A lot of different people appreciate that. We're apart these days, but how about being together? Geico's given the give back. The GEICO give back. 15% credit car motorcycle policies both. New or used? New customer? Old customer? Same. Full policy term will be represented. Go to Geico.com slash give back info eligibility. Here is Joy Taylor with the news. No, no, no, no, turn on the news. This is the herd line news.

Sponsored by Mercedes-Benz, the best or nothing. Well, Major League Baseball presented its economic proposal to the Players Association yesterday. It would implement a sliding scale to cut a portion of players' salaries and include bonuses for postseason games. Some players have already come out and oppose the plan. The Players Union is not particularly excited about it. The MLBPA is expected to reject the proposal and counter in the coming days. Reportedly, the counteroffer will include a longer season.

The proposal that they put forth yesterday at 82 games ending in September, but beginning, pretty much the beginning of July. So the counteroffer will include a longer season to help increase revenue available to owners and then provide players with a larger portion of their salaries. The sliding scale has the lowest pay, players would receive close to the full share of their pro-rated salary, and the stars would receive significantly far less than expected, basically around 20% of what they would have made. Yeah, that's not going to happen. You can't ask, you can't ask this. The stars are the key to this

whole thing, because when you have scarcity, like you haven't had baseball. We haven't had baseball in how long, like a long layoff. Stars get people back, not utility infielders. You can't ask you're Justin Verlanders and your Aaron judges to take big pay cuts. Like to me, this is the year, John Smolz is going to join us before the end of the hour. This is the one year where owners have to just say, we got a pandemic. The players are at risk. Pay up. I generally, I'm okay with owners.

Like, you can't have a business without capital. Right. I'm not anti-owner. A lot of people in the media are. This to me feels like the year you give the players a break. They're taking all the physical risk. Well, you're trying to be. more pro owner. I tend to be more pro

player, but in this situation, I think it's pretty clear. We both agree. Like, it's, this is not a situation where you have to put all of the losses on your employees, which is what the players are. It just, it's not going to work that way and especially at a scale like this. Now, I understand the concept of, you know, the players that are

making less money should receive more of their salary. But when you're talking about 20% of your salary and you're taking all of the risk, of course the players are going to reject this. Now, this is a negotiation, so obviously they're going to go to the extreme ends and then, you know, you're going to meet somewhere in the middle, hopefully. But they don't really have a lot of time. They pretty much have to get this

done by the end of June if they want to start the season, according to the proposed schedule that they have now. People that are pro owners, business people, older, successful business people, they're pro owners. And they always say, we're the ones taking the risk. And to that I say, risk is a very interesting word. Right. We've never had a pandemic in a season. So the risk this year is not on the owners. The risk is on the players. So if you want to use risk business guy, this is the one year the physical risk is on the players.

Most baseball season, the physical risk is you take a fastball to the ribs. For $9 million a year. Well, I mean, they are also, I guess, always taking the physical risk, but they're being compensated for taking the physical risk. You can't have them taking the physical risk they normally do. Right. On top of a pandemic risk

and then last. But they're going to negotiate this over the next coming weeks. It's not really, it doesn't sit with me well either that they're kind of putting this on the star players. Yeah, that's the, take care of your best. Oh, that's a business rule. Right. And especially in this time, people who are taking care of others in this particular environment are being rewarded. Like, and they're going to be rewarded moving forward.

There is a goodwill element to all of this. People want baseball back, obviously, and want the players to be safe. But, you know, just let's be a little more realistic about it. So Derek Carr is getting some offseason work in. He posted a video of a recent throwing session with some of his teammates in Las Vegas. Y receivers, wide receivers, Zay Jones, and Hunter Renfro, and tight end Darren Waller were all presents at the workout. So he posts a little video, just a little tossing the ball around trying to get some workouts in. But, you know, this is what we're looking for right now.

Hey, this looks so for my son play. I know exactly where this. I think my son played flag football a couple of years. years ago on these fields. Yeah? Yeah. This looks very familiar to me. No, I don't know what the weather is like in Vegas right now.

100. It's 100. Yeah, 98 to 102, yeah. Vegas summer heat is like. But it's dry. It's dry, but I don't know. I don't know what I prefer. I don't mind the humidity, like South Florida heat.

Oh, I do. I got used to it. Once you get used to it, it's good for your skin. Well, yeah, I guess night humidity I'm okay with. Day humidity is suffocating. Healy just told me it's a high of 106. In Vegas gets hot. It's the desert.

Not a dessert. It's the desert. Finally, the list of potential opponents for Mike Tyson in his comeback continues to grow. Raining WC. Heavyweight champ Tyson Fury said he received a phone call asking if he would be interested in facing Mike Tyson in an exhibition match. He said he did accept the offer, but nothing materialized from it. Oh, my God, I'd pay to watch that. I think I would pay big money. to watch that. I mean, I'm going to watch whatever

comes of this, but I don't know if I want to see Mike Tyson fight Tyson Fury. You know what? The key would be very simple. First two rounds. If Tyson would go for the, now, by round three and four, the younger athlete's going to withstand it. Right. But in the first two rounds,

Tyson lands a left. Oh, I'd pay for that. I mean, it'd be all on Tyson though, right? I mean, like, if Tyson well, I guess not, because if Tyson Fury loses to a 50 or 4-year-old Mike Tyson, that's not a very good look. But I just don't want to see a bad play in that situation. I would pay.

I would pay. How much would you pay for Tyson Fury, Mike Tyson pay-per-view? Goulet, what's the number? Whatever it is. Whatever it costs. All the money. Right now, just there's my monies and you can take it. And then I'm going to watch.

I think there's, I think you could charge $1,000 and guys would just invite people over. I would pay $1,000. People would pool in their money. I would pay $1,000. It would be great for social. If it's $1,000, we're all going at your house. Yeah. I would.

Party at Collins. Because for about three rounds, I'd like Tyson. After that, I'd take Fury. Well, Shannon Briggs claimed that he's going to be the next opponent. Tito Ortiz also said he was contacted. Oh, no. That's not. I don't want to watch that.

Tito is the lowest on the list. Vandah Holyfield also considered this for a charity exhibition. I've seen that. I don't want to see that either. Well, the Nevada Athletic Commission has approved the following events to take place in Las Vegas. So May 30th is a UFC firefighter. fight night. So that's soon and that's going to be in Vegas. June 6th is UFC 250. June

9th is top rank boxing and June 11th is top rank boxing. So I don't know if this is going to happen this quickly because that's only a matter of the next couple weeks. But they are having fights in Vegas again. So they are they are approving them. Yes, they are. It'll be interesting. Yeah, joy with the news.

Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by. The herd lie news. So ESPN's football power index came out. Season rankings based on analytics. It's an analytic model. And, you know, the teams that are good, you'd expect Kansas City, Baltimore, San Francisco Saints, teams that are bad at the bottom,

you know, Detroit, Cincinnati, Washington, Jacksonville. Green Bay is right smack dab in the middle, which means analytically, they're kind of out on Green Bay as a Super Bowl bubble team. Teams 15, you know, they're like Colts, Green Bay, Atlanta, could get to the Super Bowl doubtful. So I thought I would unveil. I do a Super Bowl bubble. I do it about every other week. I do it during the season.

I always feel there are about seven to eight teams, eight's the number, that could win a Super Bowl. And I think the NFL does a great job to make you think it's 22 and it's about eight. That's about it. So my Super Bowl bubble today, these are the teams that I think they have a little special sauce, dynamic players in an increasingly dynamic game, Baltimore, Kansas City, Seattle, San Francisco, Tampa, New Orleans and Philly seven. Chargers roster is so good. Denver's my dark horse team. Buffalo is well coached great defense. Dallas, Minnesota. We don't have – I'd probably put the Rams in Minnesota in there. I don't have Green Bay in there right now. I don't think they added any dynamic players. And I thought, you know, Devonthe Adams is dynamic. Aaron's dynamic. There's not a lot of next level stuff. So that's my Super Bowl bubble today. Kansas City, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Tampa, defense underrated in Tampa. New Orleans. San Francisco, Seattle, and then some hoverers. You don't have Green Bay hovering?

The game is increasingly about dynamic players. They didn't have a single, I thought they were one of the few teams with a poor draft. Three interior linemen, a running back and a quarterback who won't play, they didn't add any dynamic players. And I think when you look at the San Francisco, hell, their tight end is dynamic, George Kittle. Their coaching is dynamic. To get through the NFC, you have to have a lot of special. special. I don't think Matt Lafleur is special. I think Aaron Rogers is still top five, but he's

declining. DeVante Adams is special, but I don't see it. Dallas has some special, you know, I mean, Zique is special. You can't deny it. Their offensive line is special. There's some, there's some, DeMarcus Lawrence can be special. C.D. Lamb could be special. I don't see a lot with Green Bay. I don't have them in my bum. But you didn't like them last year either, though. No, I thought they were a bad 13 and 3. Not a bad team, but for 30, there were a 9 and 17, masquerading. That's 13 and 3. Yeah. John Smoltz around the corner, some thoughts about baseball.

I do think we're getting it back. But I want a players perspective. They're not asking players to take pay cuts. They're asking star players to make 20 cents on the dollar. I mean, that's almost, it's just to suggest it publicly is arrogant. I mean, it's one thing to suggest a pay cut. Lots of people taking pay cuts. But to say, you're a star.

You work your entire. life. 20 cents on the dollar. John Smolt's thoughts on that next. Imagine picking up your smartphone and turning on your grill. Checking the temperature of the meat in the grill on your phone. That's what you can do with Rect Tech Grills. Get them now from anywhere. Built by grillers, four grillers. They're fantastic. Customer service amazing. RecTechgrills.com. That's REC-TecGrills with an S.com. It's the Be sure to catch live editions of the herd weekdays in noon Eastern 9 a.m. Pacific. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind.

Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drives, the drives, the drives, drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered.

SportsSlice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to SportsClyce on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo SlicLife 12 and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host. and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of Mental Health Awareness Month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations

with so many incredible guests. I'm talking, Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing. And we're still chasing it, and we don't know when we've done enough. Because people scoreboard watch.

Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on Earth? Are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro. Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me, Kear Gaines, is we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, Learn the Hardway.

Open your free iHeartRadio app. Search Learn the Hardway and listen now. Do you remember when Diana Ross double-tapped Little Kim's boobs at the VMAs? Or when Kanye said that George Bush didn't like black people. I know what you're thinking. What the hell does George Bush got to do with Little Kim? Well, you can find out on the Look Back at it podcast. I'm Sam Jett. And I'm Alex English.

Each episode, we pick a here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill, waxing all about crack in the 80s. To be clear, 84 is big to me, not just. because of crack. I'm down to talk about crack on day, but just so y'all know. I mean, at this point, Mark, this is the second episode where we've discussed crack. So I'm starting to see that there's a through line. We also have AIDS on the table right now.

Thank you finishing that sentence. Yes. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Really? Yeah. For me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history. Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

What's up, guys? This is Clever Taylor the 4th. And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. Like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game. This linebacker, this linebacker walks up to me. He goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her.

What? Time out. Quarterback on office blue of 42. Hey, ref, my mom will want you to wave at her. What? Hey, Ms. Parker. Listen to the Cliverts show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Good to have you in John Smoltz.

Only player in baseball history is a Hall of Famer with 200 plus wins and 150 saves. It's it. History of Baseball. He's the guy. Hall of Fame player, 22 seasons, eight-time All-Star, Fox Sports Baseball's analyst. He is joining us now via The Cowards. Oh, not Rhett. Not yet.

Oh, okay, my bad. Okay, he was almost ready. Not ready. You know, it's when you were watching Brady and Peyton Manning. the other day play golf. Smoltz is arguably the best golfer. Like when he was playing in Major League Baseball, he was the best golfer. Think about if you're a pitcher and you just pitch yesterday,

you're not going to pitch for four more days. You don't even have to go to the park for two. What do you do on the road? You go golf. Like when I was at a college, I got a job at a minor league baseball team. And at the time, I'd never played golf. And I figured out I didn't have to be to the park by four. You learn to play golf.

Because at the time, the internet wasn't around and cable TV wasn't as big. You didn't have a million channels. So in baseball, especially if you're a pitcher, not an everyday guy. Because they also say golf can screw up a swing. But if you're a pitcher in baseball, what do you do the day after you pitch? You golf, unless you just are a voracious reader and can sleep all day. But to me, when I watch that, football players, I can understand not being great golfers until they retire.

Let's be honest about it. You have to lift a lot. I don't think lifting helps golf. You have to lift a lot in the off seats. And Tony Gonzalez, when he retired, I said, what's your favorite part of retiring? He goes, I'll never lift again. He goes, you're constantly lifting in the NFL

at every position to keep weight on. Because you are, everybody loses weight when they leave the NFL. Most of your athletes, like they just, you're, your brother. You just lose 25 pounds. Look at grunk. You just, it just falls. The physicality of it, you need to keep weight on.

Guys get fined at camp for losing. If you don't hit your weights, like guys get fined for being underweight. And having to put on like 15 pounds at camp is not a pleasant experience. Like I've talked to people who've had to eat like five foot long sandwiches in like a two hour period. That's not, it's not an enjoyable experience. Keeping on weight is really hard. Yeah.

So I think when I watched Manning and Brady, I was actually shy. Everybody was banging on Tom Brady and I'm like, I think he's waiting. better than I thought he was going to be. Well, let me just because it's Brady. That's why. Peyton Manning was actually, I thought, fairly excellent. I thought Peyton Manning was really good. I mean, Peyton Manning was a workaholic football player.

I mean, literally a workaholic. His offseason, remember when he played, it wasn't as pro player. There was multiple OTAs. Peyton Manning's not going to miss OTAs. He was like robotic. He was like Rain Man. He was not missing these OTs. When did he have?

have tons of time. It's not like Indianapolis is a golf mecca. Like he was playing in Indianapolis and he almost always made the playoffs, won a couple of games, went long, you get a month, boom. You're back to camp. He has had some time since he's retired.

No, no, since he's retired. But when I watched him yesterday, that wasn't like, oh, I got good since I retired. That was, oh, he's got a real style. He's got an interesting swing. But Peyton Manning to me to hit very few bad shots. His handicap, they say a six? A six handicap, I'm guessing here.

There's probably a stat for this. A six handicap has to be in the top 10% of golfers in the world. Almost everybody scores in the 90s and hundreds. A six handicap is a, that's a ball striker. That's a real player. I know two people that are six or less and one played college golf. That's a six handicap is a real golfer. But these guys are super competitive.

They don't want to go out there and be bad at golf. So they probably put a lot into it. John Smallt's top of the hour, I'm being told. So I saw this yesterday. This is my Joe Burrow segment today. So a day ago, Kurt Warner said he sees himself in Joe Burrow. So I want to officially, here are the list of Hall of Fame quarterbacks who have now been compared to LSU's Joe Burrow. Nice kid.

I believe a B-plus prospect. Tom Brady. He's been compared to Tom Brady. He's been compared to Peyton Manning. He's now been Kurt Warner's comparing himself to Joe Burrell. Oh, also, LeBron. Montana. Montana. Oh, Joe, my bad.

I'll only write that down. Joe Montana. You're right. So he's been compared to Brady, Montana, Peyton Manning, Kurt Warner. And Boomer Osias, and I think said he reminds him of LeBron. He'll have to save Ohio. Yeah. Can we stop?

This is incredibly unfair. to Joe Burrow. Now think about this. So LSU's team last year was regarded as maybe the best college team of all time in terms of talent. They had 14 players drafted. They tied an NFL record for the most players

drafted by the third round. A team that is so stacked in LSU that the best cornerback and the best receiver in college football that weren't draft eligible are also both LSU players. So it is, they're saying it's the only team ever that may have more NFL players than those Miami Hurricane teams. Joe Burrow quarterbacked it and now he's Peyton Manning.

It should be noted. I'm going to give you a list of what people perceive as the best college teams ever. 71 Nebraska, 95, Nebraska, 2001 Miami, 1987 Miami, 2004 USC. their quarterbacks were Jerry Tag, Tommy Frazier, Ken Dorsey, Steve Walsh, and Matt Liner. Now, I'm not criticizing any of them, much more talented than me. But quarterbacks tend to get overdrafted when they play with great players. By the way, the two best Alabama and Nick Sabin teams, 2009, they were 14 and 0.

The quarterback was Greg McElroy. 2012 Alabama team great a j McCarron can you argue both are like overdrafted i'm not saying i'm not saying i like joe burrow as a prospect better than um baker mayfield josh allen josh rosen marcos mariotta Mitch trabisky um paxton lynch um i'll be honest with you i only had to sean Watson as a B prospect. Didn't love his throwing motion. I have Burrow as a B plus. But folks,

one of the things that is true about NFL quarterbacks, this is not an opinion. Deshawn Watson is rare. He comes from a great college program. Right now, there's not a great NFL quarterback.

Not a great one. From LSU, Alabama. Think about all the great quarterbacks. Aaron Rogers, Cal. Drew Breeze, Purdue. Mahomes, Texas Tech. Lamar Jackson, Louisville. Russell Wilson, North Carolina State in Wisconsin. Philip Rivers, North Carolina State. Dak Prescott. Mississippi State. Carson Wentz, somewhere in the Dakotas. Kirk Cousins, Michigan State. Just start naming all the quarterbacks. Tyrod Taylor, Virginia. Tech. Derek Carr, Fresno State.

Who's the kid I like at Denver? Missouri. Drew Locke. So what do they all have? Matt Ryan. Boston College. Teddy Bridgewater. Louisville. These are almost better basketball schools than football schools.

Big Ben, Miami of Ohio. Why is that? Why is that? shouldn't it be linear? Five-star high school, you go to Alabama, and then your great NFL. Why doesn't it work that way? Hmm. It doesn't work that way because to succeed in the NFL at quarterback,

you have to have a history of dealing with discomfort. And if you play at Alabama or LSU or Oklahoma or Georgia or Clemson, or Ohio State, you are rarely uncomfortable. You drop back, you have NFL five-star linemen in front, Ohio State quarterbacks have five-star receivers, five-star linemen, world-class coach, nothing but time to throw the ball around against Purdue and Maryland and Rutgers. That is not what develops great NFL quarterbacks. Deshawn Watson's rare.

It looked at quarterbacks and write down where they went to college. college. It's non-football powers. It's non-football powers. What last year did Joe Burrow have? 14 NFL draft picks? The best corner and receiver not draft eligible are also from LSU. I'm not saying Joe's not going to succeed. But taking one year with that LSU roster, give me a break. It was completely NFL stacked. I mean, even Alabama looks a little slow. compared to LSU. Hour three coming up. Kevin O'Connor at the ringer.

John Smoltz, too. It's the Herd. Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd, weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific. Ah, here we go. It is Hour 3. We are live in Los Angeles, and this is The Herd.

Wherever you may be, however you may be listening, we're on IHeart Radio, we're on Fox Sports Radio, we're on FS1, We're also on Sirius XM Channel 83. I'm playing tennis today, Joy. The world's opening up.

You went to the beach this weekend. I jogged yesterday, so it's the world's opening up. I can go play tennis again. Very exciting. I love tennis. That's a big deal for you. It is. I love tennis.

So it's, and my next guest is a golfer. I told you before you, watch Peyton Manning and Brady play. You don't want any part of John Smoltz, who's got a nice little spread in Atlanta, and he can play golf on his property, and that's one of the reasons he's really good. And he's one of the smartest guys that is on television today as an analyst.

He's just unbelievable. He and Joe Buck, Fox Sports Baseball analyst. He's joining us from Atlanta via the Coward Global Satellite Network, John Smoltz. Hall of Famer. All right, so I see, John, I see the dirty laundry and baseball being aired publicly, and, you know, it's all leverage,

and, you know, you're trying to make the players look bad, and the players will release stuff. But I did think to myself, okay, they're asking players, star players, to play for 20 cents on the dollars. And I'm thinking, oh, there's a difference between asking for a pay cut and being insulting. And I wonder, as a former star player who talks to star players, you start insulting people, John, and you may create a wall you can't break through. When you talk to players, what did they make of the stuff that aired yesterday asking stars to forget pay cuts, just 20 cents on the dollar? Yeah, I think the interesting thing is that there is all of this negotiation and posturing going on. You know, I can remember back in 94, no matter what the reality of what we talked about and what we were ready to agree upon, you never win that PR battle as players.

It's just, especially today, I mean, times a thousand percent what people are wanting and going through. In no way can you compare in relative terms to the world. So the players and the owners are going to figure this out. I'm positive, but it is going to get ugly before it gets better. Or maybe we're at that point now because, you know, we can only speculate on what we're hearing. And certainly we understand, and I understand being in the industry now, removed 10 years plus, that what you hear is not always the reality. of what's going on. And both sides, I'm confident of. We'll try to figure out what is the

fairest opportunity to get this game played again because that's what players want to do. Of course, the owners want to do that as well. But we've never had times like this before. So the rules are going to be so far removed from what you typically are negotiating in a kind of a union way. This is this is times 10. This is going to be a battle that no one's going to win unless they're able to get on the field and play. And I really believe that's what they're trying to do. And to your point, when you hear some things like that, it's easier to react and try to talk about that

and maybe not be as it may not be the reality. Everyone is going to suffer. Proportionally, it's going to be different for a lot of people. And I think that if you can get to that common ground to where everyone understands we've got to give something, then hopefully this thing gets ironed out quicker than later. I can see a football player or a soccer player or a soccer player. Let's take soccer. MLS.

Give me a ball. Give me a net. I can do a lot of stuff myself. I can stay in shape. I can get on the treadmill. I can run. I can get soccer shape pretty quickly and stay in it. For a baseball pitcher. I mean, it's a skill-driven sport. Even a golfer. I can go to, I can play by myself up and down. How, in God's name, is a pitcher, stay in shape? How, who do you throw to? Like, seems to me baseball would need a month minimum of spring training style baseball to get ready. Or am I wrong? No, I think that everybody understands they were going to be given a notice to when to have two weeks. And then that would ramp up and allow you to stay.

Look, pitchers are going to play catch every other day. They'll take three days off. A lot of pitchers arm strength will come back because they're utilizing more long toss. But I would think, now I can speak for myself. If I or a veteran pitcher like today, I was dealing with this, this would be okay for me to really get connected on mechanics. You can do a lot of dry drills without throwing a baseball that help your mechanics when you get back. The arm strength and the ability to throw a baseball, you can do that in various ways. But you're right in the finite detail of command.

It'll take a while for that all to come back. But I'm telling you that once they know that there's going to be a spring training and there's two weeks to get ready, they'll have 10 days before then to get ramped up. The veteran guys are going to have a huge advantage. It's the younger guys who are more used to being able to get the ball fire and be at their best velocity-wise, maybe not control-wise. So I think you'll be surprised that players will figure this thing out. The timing of everything will be a little interesting

because that would take a little while, but I don't think they're going to expect everybody in the beginning to go seven, eight innings. I think you're going to see a more expanded roster and more usage of players in the beginning stage of this sprint, which looks like would be around 82 games. Baseball made almost $11 billion last year. It's not as stylish as the NBA. It's not as urgent as football. We don't bet it like we do NFL.

It doesn't have the pugilistic regulated violence like a boxing or a UFC. Sometimes it's not as sexy, but the sports making a ton of money. Everybody's making money. The owners, the players. Local TV ratings are great. Regional ratings are great. I do think the sport, I don't care about length of games. Get me around three hours, I'm good.

I never complain when I'm watching a great baseball game. I go to a park. Three hours is fine. I don't want four, but three is fine. I do think the tweaking should be an urgency. I think with our phones now, John, we're sitting on these things. You have to wake us up. We get everything.

We get our news in a minute. Baseball's got 162 game season. I think the urgency of this year, 82 games, is going to make me want to watch more. You've got to watch a weekend series Yankees Red Sox. You're not going to get five of them. Do you think it's possible that if this

goes well, 82 games, really intense, terrific playoffs, rested players, fewer injuries, that baseball may go, you know, we may have found something here. We may want to tweak fewer games. Do you think that's potentially it could happen?

I think there's some real potential out of this that could create some unique changes. Look, I've been a big advocate. I kind of in the past have been crushed for this, but I love a split season. The sprint of each half to get to a postseason play would be much more enticing and exciting for every market than the necessarily grind of 162 that historically we've been able to play. So I think you're going to see if they get going on an 82 game, it'll seem like a sprint. Yeah. Because the Canada of baseball and for the world, they're used to seeing a game every day that that makes things feel normal again. That's why baseball is so important to the country because it is the longest sport.

It is the calendar of every single summer and month and goes into the fall and spring that you're waiting for your team to get to the postseason. I have always been an advocate for shortening the season by a little bit and expanding the playoffs because then you have two races. You have two sprints from the first half to the second half to get to a place where you could win both halves and have an advantage by getting a buy. But I think you're going to see. some tweaks out of this, especially in the playoffs scenario, that will forever change the game in the future. And I think make more excitement for what we typically are seeing today, right? You and I both know that if a club's either in it or out of it, when they're out of it, they just seem to,

it takes longer. It takes seven years to rebuild a club. Because let's face it, for a lot of those clubs, they have computed both through analytics and from their roster that they can't compete in 162 games. They're trying to rebuild their roster and their fan base telling them seven years from now, we're going to be like XYZ club, and this is how we're going to win. But the sustainability of that is up for question. But I really maintain that any club can compete in a 78 to 80 or 70 to 80 season split that allows them to at least get a chance for one of those halves to compete for season. I think that's what you're going to see in this 82 game sprint. I really do. with the opportunity of two extra playoff teams, from what I understand, if they go that route,

that would make for what you just said, must CTV down the, you're not going to have this huge gap. The great teams are still going to be great. The mediocre teams are going to be able to compete. And this is what people don't understand about baseball. If all of a sudden you put everybody in the hopper and they all had to play a best of three to get to move on, a lot of those teams could win a two out of three. And in the season, they wouldn't even look like they could compete. a best of three. That's what's unique about baseball. And I think we're going to see some changes to

your point. Finally, I've got to ask you a golf question. You're a legendary golf. What's your handicap, by the way? Well, during this time, it's actually gotten a little bit better. So it's at plus three now. Okay, okay. And I'm trending that way. Okay. It's very, very good. So, I watched Brady and Manning, and I said, I was surprised, even Brady. I'm like, the guy's playing. football, you don't get breaks. By the way, a baseball pitcher after John Smolt's pitches next two days, you didn't have to come to the park.

You can go grab the clubs. When you watch Brady and Manning, I'm surprised you have a golf with Peyton Manning. Have you golf with Payton before? I have, and I've met him once, but I have not been a fortunate to play around a golf with him. What did you make? Because Peyton Manning looked nervous.

He said that's the most nervous I've ever been in my life. What did you make of the event? Your thoughts is a great golfer. Yeah, I thought it was great, but I don't think people at home who understand how much pressure that is when you're not been in that environment before.

Everything and everybody's going to watch every shot. There's something to be said for competing casually. If they would have went out those four and no cameras, I guarantee you they would have played a little bit better. Now, understand the circumstances were pretty severe too. I thought, and I look at swings and I look at the opportunity that each guy had, in their nerves, once they got past the ninth hole,

and I know for even, you know, Brady, It seemed like he was a little bit more relaxed. But that is a tough environment until people can experience that. They'll never know what that's like to have a camera. And there's no redos. Like you don't get to say, hey, let's take another take on that. So I thought it was great. I thought that the camaraderie and everything that could go about,

obviously the weather, we wish the weather would have been a little bit better. But very envious. Would have love to see, you know, a few more of these kind of matches, especially when people think it's easier sitting at home. I kind of liken it to this. You know, you watch a game show, and at home you have more time, it seems like, to answer the questions right. And you see some of the most in crazy answers under the gun.

When you're under the gun, things change big time. Yeah. I used to do a game. I'd go play. Whenever I play golf, and if it's a good buddy, if he has a 10-foot put, I'll just put a 20 by the cup. They never, ever put as well. A $20 bill.

Even for somebody that's got a lot of them, It's just that $20 bill. You're not the same. There's no doubt about that. You're right. John, great seeing you. Thanks so much for coming on. My pleasure.

Thanks for having me. Yeah, you bet. Yeah, I agree with John. I think baseball, I think they're going to get it done. It's just airing their dirty laundry. There's millions at stake. Baseball made $11 billion last year. There's 1% a winner, 1%2%.

It's hundreds of millions. It's like these cable companies battling, the Dodger company for years. The Dodgers couldn't get on cable. because a nickel per viewer is billions of dollars over time, and that's why you're fighting over a nickel. Good stuff coming up. Also, later, Kevin O'Connor from the Ringer, the NBA has proposed a new World Cup soccer format for their first ground.

I like it. I think the Lakers could lose twice and be out. That's urgency. It's got kind of a loose World Cup March Madness feel to it. That's coming up. Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd weekdays in noon Eastern 9 a.m. Pacific. You know, I was thinking about this joy. Knocking down a sando.

So some people do not like change. I'm fascinated by it. Like the NBA has got this new idea. Some people don't like it. It's not an education thing. I've found very smart people that are very rigid and they do not like change. And then you meet people. I think I'm one of them.

I like change. I like new stuff. And I wonder if it's formed in childhood. Like if you grew up in a traditional household and you went to the same school and your parents, you know, no divorce, you had a very traditional upbringing. If you struggle with change because you didn't have it. Whereas somebody like me or you, well, I'll just speak for myself, I grew up in a less traditional family. So I'm always willing to roll the dice. Like I'll get in my car tomorrow and lives.

I love California. but if somebody said tomorrow, here's an opportunity here, it's unbelievable. I'm like, all right, let's go. And I think about that. It's not an intelligence thing. I've found people, you know. Obviously, your environment as a child shapes how you view the world in many different aspects. I think I could agree with that.

There might be some correlation there. Because when I would. As we're playing armchair or psychologists right now. Well, it's funny. When I lived out east, all these prep schools, the Ivy League, one of the things, I'd never lived out east. one of the things I figured out very early at ESPN. A lot of the prep school guys, they'd never been West.

They didn't have a great deal of geographical curiosity. Everybody West has gone east. Not everybody East, smart guys have gone West. They think it's the epicenter of the world out east. Very rigid. This is my life. This is where I go to school. This is where my kids are going.

And I'm like, I've lived in seven states. And by the way, it's helped me great professionally. I've moved to where the commerce is. Well, I mean, I think the more traveled you are, the more that you have flexibility. You know, different experiences in life, the more flexible you tend to be because you see things from a different perspective. And that's what I'm saying. When I moved out east, I noticed a lot of people were, this is my life. I've got it laid out.

This is where I'm going to live. This is where I'm going to church. And I'm like, you're edgy. You got like a master's. You're educated. You can travel anywhere. Opportunity. Nope.

And they actually, a lot of really talented people, I thought, not underachieve, but just sort of gave a ceiling, put a ceiling on their life. Like, this is what we are. This is who I am. Well, there is a certain level of comfort and familiarity with that kind of consistent lifestyle. And like you said, if you grew up and, you know, your parents did this and they had the same job. And your grandpa did this. Then you might tend to be that way. Yeah.

I mean, there's something to it. Looking back on my childhood and family dynamic, that probably played a little role in that. Yeah. No, I think I didn't, we weren't a traditional family. So I don't need tradition. I'm not, I'm not opposed to it. I like Thanksgiving, but I'm not, I don't think I like. I do like tradition and I like, you know, sort of an old school mentality, but I think it's you have to be flexible while keeping whatever your root values are. And I think that applies the same for sports. Every time I try to, I try to talk myself out of doing stuff and every time I do it, my son's the same way. I'm always like, I'm glad I did that. Like, my natural thing is I'm a homebody. I like being at home watching stuff, reading. I'm a home body. Now with my phone, I can watch.

But every time I talk my, like golf, buddy calls me. Let's go golf. I don't know. By the second hole, I'm like, this is so much fun. I could have talked myself out of golf. But I made myself and all of a sudden, I don't know, it's just, it's interesting. There's a new NBA proposal for the playoffs and a lot of people don't like it. And then there's part, there's guys like me that are totally.

into it. I think it's fascinating. And I wonder, what's the psych? Ask yourself if you're a person that's rigid. Why are you rigid? And if you're flexible. Because change is scary. Change is the unknown. But it shouldn't be scary if you're smart and educated and well traveled. Why would it be scary? Because it's the unknown. There's an emotional element to not knowing what's on the other side of a decision. When in reality, you never know what's on the other side of a decision. And once you understand that, then change doesn't become as scary. It could be the greatest decision of your life or the worst. But you got to make that decision and having the ability to make decision is what's the important part. People

overthink it. One of my best friends in town, his dad, he grew up in D.C., and his dad said, I'll pay for your college, but you have to go 500 miles away. How about that? And so, he went to USC. His dad said, I'm not paying for your college. You have to get 500 miles away. Roll the dice. Take a chance.

I'm not going to be there for you. I'll pay for your college. I thought that was a I never heard that. I was like, yeah. I didn't do it. You know, my kids, I want to hang out with him. Maybe I'm a bad parent. No, but I mean, he wanted to see him.

He wanted his son to have a different experience and having different experiences and being an unknown environment helps to, you know, shape you, especially at that age. My kids have traveled so much. I'd like to home college school them. They've traveled so much. Maybe they should just go, I should move next to a university, make them, make them walk home for lunch. My kids have just because dad's crazy and dad moves for his work. I don't know. I'm just rambling. Here's Joy with the News. No, no, no, no. Turn on a lose. This is the

herd line news. Well, the NHL unveiled their plan to resume play yesterday. It will jump to the postseason with a 24 team playoff. The top four teams in each conference will automatically advance to the first round and play a round robin to determine seating.

And then the other 16 teams will compete in a best of five qualifying round to complete the brackets. They're going to do two hub cities that will be selected to host each conference and the teams will be limited to 50 personnel in the Hub City with only a small number of support staff permitted to enter events areas.

Now, one of the Hub Cities right now? They've got a list of, don't we? So they have 10 potential hub cities, Chicago, Columbus, Dallas, Edmonton, Vegas, L.A., Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, Toronto, and Vancouver. I'll tell you, Vegas is becoming, Vegas is the fastest growing sports city in America. Yeah. Because to me, to get players at the T-Mobile, put them in Vegas. Well, also, because, I mean, we've talked about Vegas a lot when it comes to restarting leagues because they are in a, it's an event city.

It's designed around housing massive conferences and a massive amount of tourists. So, you know, most of the people that live in Vegas don't live in the area where you would house, you know, teams for a hub playoff, you know, set up. So that actually makes a lot of sense. Some of these other cities, I don't know what the logistics of keeping that many. teams, you know, I guess isolated would really work. Chicago could be kind of tricky. L.A. I don't know. But, I mean, even Pittsburgh, there's not like a huge downtown.

And if everyone's working from home, there's enough spaces. But there's a lot of teams to keep, you know, to keep in one space. So from 2015 to 2018, six teams made a worst to first turnaround in their division. but no one pulled it off in 2019. So USA Today listed last season's division losers by their chances to make the jump in 2020 and they have the Cardinals in first to go from worse than the division

to best in the division. Chargers were last last year? Last in the division, yeah. Yeah, I would take Chargers over Arizona. I think Chargers have a much better roster than Arizona. Miami's three, but I don't think they'll have a better record than the bills. I still see the bills winning that division.

The first three I buy, I don't buy the rest of them. I think Arizona, L.A. Chargers, Miami can absolutely win their division. I would not be shocked. I mean, you say Kansas City. Chargers, schedule works out. They go 11 and 5. Kansas City goes 11 and 5, and charges win the tiebreaker. We're not saying Kansas City wouldn't be good.

Well, remember this season, if everything, you know, goes according to schedule and they don't make a change, depending on what happens, there's going to be two wildcard divisions. So whoever wins their, who has the best record in the conference is going to be super important because that buy has become exponentially more important. So that's going to be something interesting to watch this year. So we'll talk more about this story this afternoon on JoyChat, 330 Eastern on caffeine, free app, and go subscribe to the Fox Sports channel. Finally, expectations for the bucks are high with the addition of Tom Brady and linebacker Shaquille Barrett

thinks their new quarterback instantly puts them in Super Bowl contention. I think James would have made a big jump, but I think what Brady is just make is an automatic contender for Super Bowl. But with James, I think it would have been a playoff contender. It would have been still a battle for sure, and it's still going to be a battle now. But having time, I think we're going to be over the edge and everything. On paper, it looks perfect.

We just got to put the work in. On paper, they do look like it. If you really think about the Buccaneers and James Winston and what happened with them last year, and what's really happened with James overall is that it's never that he wasn't highly productive for the offense. I mean, if you look at their receivers, their Buc's offense,

third and points per game. He just turned the ball over so much. It was impossible for their defense to ever keep them in the game. His college issue is his pro issue. Judgment. There's never been talent, size, arm, productivity. I am curious why, you know, the surgery, the eye surgery, why they waited so long to do that. I mean, was his vision that bad?

Like, a lot of people, everybody, you know, there's a lot of people in 40 that need eye surgery. But was it that bad? That's what I'm wondering. Like, is he going to take his significant jump? If it was that bad, why would be? wouldn't you do the surgery in the season? Vinnie Testiverty was colorblind, which I thought was fascinating. He played,

he was colorblind, so can you imagine that? Like certain times, like the Chargers uniforms may, if you're colored blind, look light and you're at home, so your uniforms look light. I don't know. I don't know. I just think it's crazy to me that James Winston had if his eyesight was that

significantly deteriorated that he wouldn't do the surgery sooner. Yeah. I'm never going to do that eye surgery. No? No. No. There's two places I'm never letting lasers go. One of them you can figure out the other's eyes. There's two places on my body. Lasers ain't heading.

I got to be honest. It does make me nervous. It just makes me, I'm not doing it. I'd rather just run into buildings. I'm not doing it. I'll wear contacts till 100. You know, when you get old in your eyes, I'll dry out and stuff. You can also wear glasses, you know. I'll do that. I'll never, there's never going to let a laser near my eyes.

Laser beams. You would? I don't. I mean, I've thought about it, obviously. because I wear glasses. What if you're literally doing the surgery? This is the laser. And all of a sudden, you get a phone call. Let me get that call.

I don't think it's going. Oh, I hit the laser. It zips across my face and pulls my nose off my head. First of all, I don't think they take calls during surgery. And I'm pretty sure it doesn't make a sound. It's not a haircut. I don't know. Somebody you know at some point the laser is just.

I'm actually pretty, I don't know much about it, but I'm pretty sure that it's just like almost computerized. so I don't even know that it's the human hand. Do you trust computers? Directing it. Do you trust computers? I'm not having the surgery, but I think I could be talked into it. Three times a week his board goes down.

Johns, you trust computers? You get an eye surgery. All of a sudden, you... I hear you. Yeah, not doing it. Joy with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by.

The herd lie news. Let's bring him on. First of all, with everything going on, you're probably worrying more than ever. Chill out. Go to MDrivevRlax.com. 50% out. MDriveRlax. com.

Take it in the evenings. Chills you out. Kevin O'Connor from the ringer broke the story. Joining us now via the Coward Global Satellite Network. NBA is doing a group stage. They're thinking about it, a World Cup format. I got to be honest.

I like the idea. I think the NBA playoffs are when people generally, the numbers go up. People are more interested. But the first round can be a little bit of a mismatch. There's not a ton of urgency. I don't think LeBron's ever lost a first round. round playoff series. So when you break the story, my takeaway was, I'm kind of for it.

Like, what was your initial reaction? And what are you hearing from people who have heard it? Well, I'm glad that you're with me on this call and I'm with you on the lasers nowhere near my eyes. I'm just what you were talking about. Because yesterday I heard you were a little bit hesitant on this. So I thought I would have to persuade you today. Today, you're all in. I'm happy. I'm really happy because this group stage is something. When I first heard of this, I thought this is the one compared to the 16 team format without conferences compared to just going back to the regular season. The group stage to me is something that the NBA could experiment with and perhaps move forward with as some type of in-season tournament or something moving forward because

look at it. I mean, you've talked about a little bit earlier, but taking the top 20 teams, it's a great representation of what happened during the season. And then you place those teams into five tiers of four teams and you're able to do a random draw that you see on screen there. You take one team from each tier that's randomly drawn into four groups. And then those four groups of five teams would face each other twice. So every team plays eight total games and that creates that World Cup style vibe that you're talking about, that March minus vibe where those 20 teams are playing 80 total games over two and a half weeks to a three week schedule. I mean, talk about something that for a fan will be a new experience and that would loop you in and get you excited

and for the league itself could ultimately a cash cow and not to mention it's safer because you're only bringing back 20 teams rather than 30 teams bring 30 like really increases risk especially for some of those teams that don't want to be there but for this type of format i mean from every single perspective i love it now there's another thing that's been thrown out there um the 16 team receding. I think ideally, in a league, you wouldn't want to have to do it. But Kevin, and I've asked Mark Cuban about this, I've asked everybody, that the West has better owners, GMs, roster, stars, they're migrating more West, LeBron leaves the East,

the ratings, it's man overboard. So I do think I'm for this. I don't think ideally leagues want to do it, but sometimes, you know, it's like college football, The SEC's just got more good high school football players in their footprint. It's just the reality of it. Do you believe that initiative is gaining support among owners and GMs? So my impression from conversations that I've had with people in the league office and people within teams is that this is something that has received a bit of pushback at higher levels within front offices. You talked a bit earlier with Joy about maybe open-mindedness or openness to change or resistance to change.

change. I think for team owners, they're looking at this and they're like, ratings are up for the match too. You know, that's setting records. The last dance is setting records. NASCAR is setting records. They're thinking, oh, no matter what we do, people are going to tune in and watch. And so maybe they

would rather not take a risk like this, but when I published the article on Tuesday on the Ringer, really detailing this, I didn't expect so many fans to support this and get excited about this. My own co-host on the Ringer NBA show. We record every Tuesday and Friday. We always disagree. We agree on this,

you know, 100%. And I think there is a bit of movement within the league office to push for this, but when it comes to the Friday's Board of Governors meeting with Adam Silver and all 30 owners from each team, it's got to be interesting to see what perspective Adam Silver takes and presenting this to those teams. There's not going to be a formal vote at this point, but this is a week in which teams and the players association are really figuring out what is the path worth going down most and exploring. And this to me provides the best of both worlds, despite the fact on paper, it's a bit of a risk, it's a bit different. It's something that to me is worth experimenting with because of the oddness of this whole year and the fact that this can best decide without having to play regular

season games, but still packing in a lot of games, who these best teams really are and who should advance into a traditional seven-game playoff series in the second round, once you take the eight teams from this 20-team round-robin, March Madness, World Cup style event. I want to ask you about the Jordan, Doc. It's interesting that I wonder how the league viewed it, because the league would rather elevate its current stars. You can charge more, tickets are better. But the documentary glamorized the NBA 20 years ago. Players were tougher and they were meaner, more about winning. And I wonder how it sat with a league. They loved the publicity, but it often sort of had it, you know, with load management, it had sort of a glamorizing the past.

That's my first thought. And secondly, what did you make of it? By glamorizing the past, though, I think it does put into perspective the implications of what's here right now and the present. LeBron James, we compare him to Michael Jordan. I think LeBron James is the goat. I thought that before the documentary, still think it now. However, it's a difficult argument in conversation to have, and sometimes I have issues when sometimes people fall so firmly on one side. LeBron's still in this, man. He's still in it.

You think about right now what we just talked about with this tournament idea. If LeBron brings the Lakers back and they win a title, his fourth and his career with his third team, and if he does it in dominant fashion again, and then maybe he keeps winning and keeps contending and maybe winning one or two more championships, the story and the conversation is going to change. We're talking about one guy who's the second or third best player at worst ever behind

Michael Jordan. He's still in it. He's still in it, man. And to me, watching Jordan, seeing him come back after taking the time off to play baseball, when at that point some people were calling him the goat and then he came back at one. We don't know what this chapter of LeBron's career is going to look like yet. So for me and for people in the league, I think that helped in regards to looking at the present by glamorizing the past.

Kevin O'Connor, NBA analyst, the ringer. I hope quarantine's been okay for you and the staff, and I hope your family's good. And last time we talked, I do not believe you had a beard. So that appears to be a new beard. I've let it go since December. This isn't a total quarantine beard. This is a New England winter beard coming back here since December to be with my mom. So it's not a quarantine beard, but I'll use it as that.

It's getting a little scraggily right now. That's okay, Kevin. Whatever it takes to get through it, buddy. You do great work. Thank you. Thank you so much, guys. All right, great stuff. We've all been spending more quality time.

Invest in something great for them, too. Summers here, Rect Tech Grills. They are fantastic, built by grillers for grillers. RecTechGrills.com. R-E-C-E-C-E-C-Grills with an S.com. Coming up! We tried to do it yesterday. We ran out of time.

So there's this new 16 team, 1 through 16 NBA seating where you can join the East and the West. You just take the best records, worse records. If you did it, how would it turn out? I'll predict each round all the way through coming up next. It's the herd. Be sure to catch live editions of the herd weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific. Get your free credit scorecard today.

Even if you're not a Discover customer, Discover.com slash credit scorecard. Limitations apply. All right, best for last. of the ideas to bring back the NBA season, one of the return formats is a 16-team playoff, regardless of conference. You just take the best 16 teams, and it doesn't matter what conference they're in. And then there would be receding after each round.

I think it's interesting. I'm for it. I'm for something different. If you can start the season and finish it and crown a champ, boom, all bets are off. Take that to the bank. So a little music, please. here we go. This is how I see it being unveiled. Buck's Magic, one verse 16.

Milwaukee beat them four times this year. Milwaukee's a great defensive team with easily the best player. Wouldn't be a competitive series. They beat them by an average of 17 points. Lakers Nets, again, mismatch. LeBron's never lost a first round series. If Kevin Durant played for the Nets, then you got something. He doesn't.

Raptors Grizzlies, despite losing Kauai, the Raptors, believe it or not, are the number one defensive team in the league. they'd shut down John Moran. Clippers Mavericks. I like the Mavericks where they're going, but they're really young. Their top ten guys are all under 30. Lucas 21. Clippers won both meetings, and they were both in Dallas.

I take the Clippers. Celtics 76ers. Brad Stevens has owned the 76ers. 33 meetings. He's won 23. I would take Boston. And again, 76ers are weird. Boston gives you good defense every single night.

And I think Jason Tatum is emerging as a time. top 10 player in the NBA. Nuggets, Pacers. Pacer's haven't gotten through the first round in four years. It's a well-run organization, but I think the nuggets are more dynamic and really well-coached, and they're about ready to pop. They're about a year away from popping. Jazz Rockets breaks my heart because I like so much about the Jazz, but once they lost Bogdanovich, they were an offense that struggled on certain nights. I take the Rockets, even though their history is, they can kind of unravel in the playoffs. I just don't think Utah has enough offensive firepower. heat and thunder. Miami's hot and cold. They have the best player in the series. Jimmy Butler.

I do like their coach. Eric Spolstra. I would take Miami. It would be an interesting series, though. Okay, so now this is the second round, the elite eight, and there would be receding, right? So the top seats face the highest remaining seat. So Milwaukee and the Rockets, you're talking about a great defensive team and one that's allergic to defense. That's the difference. No easy baskets with Janus protecting the rim. I'd take the bucks. Pretty handily. Lakers Heat. Again, Miami shoots a ton of threes and can get really streaky hot. But you're talking LeBron and Davis against Jimmy Butler. And I think in the end, I think Miami wins a game, but I think the Lakers win the series.

Raptors Nuggets. Interesting. I think I'd take Denver because I think this is where Toronto would miss Kauai. I got Jamal. I got Murray and I got Yokic. I got two guys I trust. getting a shot late. That would be a great. That may be the best second round series. I would take the Nuggets. I'd be very competitive. I think they'd miss Kauai at this point. Clippers Celtics,

again, very good series. They played a couple of times this year. Both were really close games. In fact, let me look it up here. I think I could be. Yeah, yeah, team split. Both games went to overtime. Doc Rivers against his former team. I'd take the Clippers. I think the Clippers have the best mix in the NBA of veterans, new players, and chemistry. All right, then we go. Lakers Clipper, then we go to the NBA semis. So I'm going to take Milwaukee over Denver. I think the obvious reason is Denver still feels like they're one year away.

It's baby steps. They get in, now they win a couple series. Now I think it's Milwaukee. Lakers Clippers, I watched them play every game and I watched every bit of every game. I think the Clippers are deeper. They've got more youth. They've got more bodies. At this point, I wonder, is Anthony Davis playing all the games?

He has a history of getting nicked up? I would take the Clippers there. I think the Clippers are not built for the regular season because they had some new pieces. I think they're built for the postseason. And then in the NBA championship, it is Clippers Bucks, and I would take the Clippers. I think they have, I've got Paul George playoff experience, Kauai playoff experience, Doc Rivers' playoff experience. I think Clippers are the best team in the league.

I don't expect them. I never expected them to peak. Paul George and Kauai, good wing players. They've got young, old veterans. I think the Clippers win the championship. Isn't that who you had in the finals at the beginning of the season? No.

Yeah. Nothing's changed. When I watched them play the Laker games, you know, you forget this. Teams that have like a veteran coach, Doc Rivers and veteran players, Paul George, Kauai, Lou Williams, that kind of thing. Patrick Beverly. When you have veteran players,

this isn't, you don't want. want this to be the case, but they flip switches. Like they know when the games matter. There's an intensity. It's hard to ask when you're asking professional like baseball. Guys can't go out and tie one on in 162 games. Sometimes guys go out in Miami

and they tied one on and they stayed out late and they had good food. South Beach flu. South Beach flu. It's same in the NBA. You're not going to get. Think about how tired. I can speak for myself. If I travel cross country, it takes me about two days to get past the jet lag. About two days.

came back from the Super Bowl. I had a cough for five, 10 days. I had a cough for 10 days. I just couldn't get it. Okay. So in the NBA, you play, you get in a plane, you travel. You play, you get in a plane, you travel. You don't get the same guy every night.

Like some guys are just tired. They're worn out. The clippers are not built to post this great regular season record. They had a bunch of new players. When you have veteran players, they pick their spot. Now, the Lakers are veteran players, but it's different. It's LeBron and Anthony Davis, and I think Anthony Davis looking for the big contract, wanted to prove something. I think LeBron, having missed the previous year with injuries, wanted to get back to MVP level.

I feel like the Lakers have really cared about the regular season, and I feel like the Clippers are playing it with an eye on the postseason. Yeah, they felt like they were concerned about the postseason the whole. Lakers played with more urgency in the regular season. I will say the way that the Lakers were playing before the season was. stopped was great basketball, though. Like the Lakers looked like they were rolling. Yes. At that point in the season.

Well, you know, the Lakers are funny because you're going to get your 28 from LeBron and your 27 from Anthony Davis. And then you hope Kyle Kuzman, Danny Green, one of the two gets you to 18 to 20. You need a third shooter. Danny Green's history tells me he'll do it somewhat regularly. Kuzma's history, I have no idea. The Lakers biggest issue in this, because I think they're going to, match up with everybody in the league except the Clippers. Everybody else, the Lakers, I take the Lakers over.

Listen, it's nothing against Chris Middleton, but I get Danny Green's been in the playoffs and been big. LeBron's been big in the playoffs. Anthony Davis could match up with Yonnis. Like I think the Lakers, Milwaukee, really works for the Lakers. I mean, they literally have a player, a component, deal with... Yeah, I mean, it's not that Milwaukee is a bad team, but in the seven-game series. The matchup favors the Lakers.

we have Anthony Davis against your best. You don't have anybody that can guard LeBron. Nobody. So I can neutralize to some level, Yonis. If you neutralize one of the stars, someone else is going to have to come up big as a star when you're going against a team like the Lakers. I don't think the Lakers have any answer for the Clippers. The Clippers have four.

They have two elite wing defenders. You could put Kauai on LeBron in the first half, Paul George, and the second half. I think the Clippers, and this is Jerry West and their brain trust, They are built to not only win the championship, they are built to beat LeBron. Milwaukee's not built to beat LeBron. That's not that they couldn't, but they're not built to beat him. What an interesting world L.A. is going to be if the Clippers won the championship. Yeah.

You know, they bought the – didn't they buy the forum? I think Steve Ballmer – yeah, Steve Ballmer bought the home where the Lakers really became. I mean, they've always been a big brand, but the resurgence, the Jerry Bus. Jack Nicholas, Diane Cannon, Magic, Steve Balmer bought it. And that's where they're going to put the new, from James Dolan. There's not a whole, a whole lot of places you can put a stadium in L.A. Well, there's a reason the football teams in New York and L.A.

are sharing a stadium. Right. We just don't have the real estate. Exactly. You just, and the real estate that's there costs billions of dollars. There you have it. With everything going on, you're probably worrying more than ever. Check out MDrive Relax.

Relax. MDrive Relax. Relax.com, taken in the evenings, chills you out, feel good. All right, we got through another one. Nick Wright, Matt Nagy coach of the Chicago Bears, John Smolt stopped by the Hall of Famer, and Kevin O'Connor with some of the new NBA stuff being proposed. I can't wait, fired up for it.

Feels good, actually. Hockey's coming back, basketball's coming back, college football, Pack 12 yesterday. They're coming back, practices June 15th. We're getting there. We're getting there. We'll see you tomorrow. Last night, a blown call changed the game.

This morning, the internet lost its mind, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where SportsSlice comes in. I'm Timbo, and every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the biggest moments in sports and giving you the real story behind the headline. And we're going straight to the source, the athletes themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions in the moment, and the stuff nobody gets to hear. Listen to SportsSlic on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slicalife-12. and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy,

not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app. podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. On The Look Back at it podcast. From 1979, that was a big moment for me. 84 was big to me. I'm Sam J.

And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a year, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it with our friends, fellow comedians, and favorite authors. Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s. 84 was a wild year. It was a wild year. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Listen to Look Back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple.

podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, what's good, y'all? You're listening to Learn the Hardway with your favorite therapist and host, Kear Games. This space is about black men's experiences, having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anywhere, but you're having them with a licensed professional who knows what he's doing. How many men carry a suit or armor.

It signals to the world that you're not to be played with. And just because you have the capability that does not mean that you need to, Listen to learn the hard way on the IHard radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an IHart podcast. Guaranteed human.