The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Urban Meyer in Hot Water, Kyrie/Knicks Rumors and Kareem Talks NBA G.O.A.T.

Episode Date: August 1, 2018

Colin discusses the Ohio State University scandal regarding HC Urban Meyer, the New York Knicks interest in Boston Celtic G Kyrie Irving, Charles Barkley's recent comments about Los Angeles Lakers F LeBron James, and the biggest questions going into the new NFL season. Guests include Doug Gottlieb, Bruce Feldman, and T.J. Houshmandzadeh.  Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Wherever you may be and however you may be listening, live in Los Angeles, sponsored by Firestone, Complete Auto Care, Keep Your Car Running Newer and Longer. We have a Breaking News. here on a Wednesday as Joy Taylor is joining me today. Morning, Colin. I will get in a five minutes. We're compiling a lot of information here on the story out of college football, Urban Meyer, Ohio State. A very, very bad look for Ohio State football, Urban Meyer.

I'm going to have that in five minutes. So that's a real story that's breaking. And we're going to compile stuff here over the next couple of minutes. I do want to start with another breaking story today. Mark Stein. credible reporter. I actually recently tried to hire him for my podcast network. A very, very good reporter. Buzz is real. The Knicks are going after Kyrie Irving. They're going to go after him. This follows up other credible reports that Kyrie Irving in 11 months can go anywhere and he is interested in New York.

Okay, all I want you to know is this. That three weeks before LeBron ended up in L.A. Dante Jones told me off the air, and I promised not to use him as a source, he said, LeBron's going to L.A. Now, I didn't go on the air with that because Dante Jones gave me inside information. I could move my commentary certain ways, but Dante Jones knew LeBron was coming to L.A. And he said it. He goes, I think, I think it's going to happen. it was the kind of thing that a friend tells a friend, right? Stuff information that I wouldn't have.

Well, Dante Jones was on our show a couple days ago, and Dante Jones is connected to LeBron and a lot of star players in the league. And here's what Dante Jones said about the next hot NBA city. I think New York is going to be the new hotspot next year because they have a great coach. The organization is moving in the right direction. I think their culture, that city,

and the cap space that they could have, and you could play with who you want to play with. I think that's going to be the new hotspot. I think guys are going to be looking at that very seriously next year. All right. James Dolan owner, worst in the league is why the Knicks have been bad. It's not because people don't want to go to New York City. Don't look at Paul George and tell me, well, he chose Oklahoma City. He could make a lot more money in Oklahoma City, and Paul George is an outlier.

There's always players that do things that other players wouldn't do. Don't buy into this. Cities don't matter in the NBA. Here's three things we know that are happening. Players have never been richer in the NBA. Stars like to hang out with stars. And we also have a trend in the NBA where stars are joining each other. Okay, you can't deny those.

Tell me the four cities that stars have joined forces in the last seven, eight years. Miami, Bosch, Wade and LeBron. Boston, Ray Allen, K.G joined Paul Pierce. Houston, Chris Paul and now Mello, Joey Hardin, and San Francisco, Durant joins the Warriors. Miami, Boston, Houston, San Francisco. No Indianapolis in there. No Portland in there.

No Milwaukee in there. No Orlando in there. What cities did they leave? Cleveland. Minnesota. Oklahoma City. We got Boogie Cousins now. Where did he end up?

Silicon Valley like Kevin Durant. Like, don't buy into this. Forbes magazine just listed the most valuable franchises in the NBA. Six of the top nine didn't make the playoffs. Many of them, it wasn't close. Nick's Lakers, Warriors, Bulls, Celtics, Nets, Rockets, Clippers, Mavs. So these are real stories. By the way, ever notice how often you see Blake Griffin, Chris Paul, and Mello in the finals?

Oh, not actually playing. They're in commercials. You get more commercials. you make more money in major markets. Baker Mayfield played in Oklahoma. Baker Mayfield got drafted by Cleveland. Where did he spend this summer? Here in L.A.

Odell Beckham, where did he spend his summer? Here in L.A. So, and don't forget who's got all the cap space next year in the NBA. Lakers, Clippers, Brooklyn, New York Knicks, and the Chicago Bulls. So this story by Mark Stein and Kyrie Irving is a real story. You can read books. They're doing studies now. Small markets are struggle.

to get doctors. They're struggling to get kids at a med school. They don't want to live there as much. Society is more mobile. NBA stars are the most mobile. The NBA is a star-driven league. 70% of NBA NFL owners own homes in Los Angeles or New York. Don't buy it.

This Kyrie Irving Knicks thing is real. Now, he'd be leaving a great franchise to a bigger city, Boston to New York. But New York's different. Dolan's probably getting out of the ownership business. This is a real story. Keep your eye on it. But don't for a second tell me markets don't matter. What happens is small markets drafted some really good players. You know, Westbrook and Seattle had Durant, and they moved to Oklahoma City and Indiana

gets Paul George and yes. And those small markets, Tim Duncan goes to San Antonio and they look like they're dominating the league. But in the end, in an era when stars are joining each other, in an era when the NBA's never been more star-driven and mobile, and in an era when people are joining forces and moving regularly in and out of sports, don't tell me New York's not viable. Capspace next year, stars moving, they've already moved. Watch this story on Kyrie Irving and the Knicks.

It's a real thing. All right, this is a very, very ugly story. Brett McMurphy, another reliable source. He covers college football. used to cover it for the place I worked at. They let him go. He's really, really good and he's really, really reliable. According to his report, Urban Meyer, who after Nick Saban is largely regarded as the best coach in college football.

And after Alabama, Ohio State's largely regarded as the second or third best program in America, that the coach Urban Meyer knew about a 2015 domestic violence incident involving an assistant. So Ohio State had an assistant. a wide receiver coach named Zach Smith. His wife at the time was named Courtney Smith. Domestic violence. Pictures are ugly. Urban Meyer denied it.

Urban Meyer told the press. I don't know anything about it. This was an utter denial, front of camera, multiple times. Brett McMurphy is uncovered text messages to Urban Meyer's wife, regularly supporting Courtney Smith. Get out of the relationship. According to other text messages, multiple wives of other Ohio State assistance and staffers. Wives within the program knew about it.

Well, I got news for you. If my wife knows about something with domestic violence at work, she's bringing it up to me. So is every wife in the world. Urban Meyer, according to these reports, knew, and Urban Meyer went on and denied knowing anything. Now, I don't understand why you would do this for a lot of reasons. One, I've always said, how you treat women kind of defines you as a man.

There's a lot of things we think define us. What truly defines us is how we treat women in society. How do we treat kids? How do we treat women? How do we treat people historically not in power places? I don't understand the win for Urban Meyer. I understand when people lie because they're going to get rich. And they, I don't understand the win here.

I don't understand the deception here. I also know this, that in my years in covering college football, 10 years ago, 15 years ago, I went on the air and said the next great coach is Urban Meyer. I said this when he was at Utah. You know, I said, this is your next great football coach. He went to Florida. The knock on Urban Meyer was always this. He does not punish.

Aaron Hernandez turned a blind eye to stuff at Florida. Florida was a mess when he was there. Many off-field problems. Whether they were covered up or not, they were allowed. People stayed within the program. It was a mess. This story now validates people who think Urban's been very soft on really, really egregious behavior. Does Urban Meyer get fired?

I don't know. I will throw this out. Regardless of whether it's right or wrong, things that I'm going to mention do matter. LeBron just left the state of Ohio. The greatest star in the history of the state left. Three weeks later, would they fire the best football coach the state's ever had? In the state of Ohio, does that play a role in it? Is there now a huge group, a rallying cry to support Urban Meyer?

He's been a good guy. This is the first real problem. I don't know. I have no idea. But this is sound. of Urban Meyer from Big Ten Media Days denying he knew anything about receiver coach Zach Smith and the domestic assault, felonious domestic assault against his then wife. 2015, I got a text late last night that something happened in 2015 and there was nothing

unless once again there's nothing. Once again, I don't know who creates a story like that. Okay, so according to Brett McMurphy, his report disputes that comment. And that's where we stand with this. It is breaking. We're going to have Bruce Feldman on next hour. I don't know what happens. This is really ugly. I don't understand the deception.

I don't see the win in the deception. And in 2018, especially in the environment now, this plays really. poorly, it always plays poorly. But I think you're seeing more punitive action to mistakes like this. 20 years ago, I would have come on a show like this and said, he'll survive it. Ten years ago, I'd say, this is awful. He'd probably survive it. Today, we are taking more punitive action against men in power who overlook or deceive

in situations with women. I think this is a major story. I think this is an incredibly damning story. And I don't understand why there would be any deception here. By the way, the Zach Smith and Courtney Smith are no longer together. It should be noted. And in the text messages uncovered by Brett McMurphy, and again, I'm just reading this live, Urban Meyer's wife, Shelly saying, I'm with you.

A lot of women stay hoping it will get better. I don't blame you. Just want you to be safe. Do you have a restraining order? He scares me. Shelly apparently was a frequent texter to the wife. All right, there you go. That's the very latest we have on it.

And next hour, Bruce Feldman will be joining us, our college football reporter of note at this network. Joy, any thoughts on that? I mean, I'm with you. I don't see the win in lying in that situation. I also, it's impossible for me to believe that he didn't know that it was going on. Well, I mean, I'm just going to speak as a married guy. I mean, just as forget being a married guy as being the head coach of a team.

team. This is an ongoing situation, and then all of the wives know about it. Either you have no control over your program whatsoever, and you're completely unaware, which no one believes, or you knew and you ignored it. Yeah, this goes kind of falls into my Rick Bettino thing. Exactly. Exactly. It's your job to know. That is your job to know. If you run the company and you're one of your top lieutenants is in a situation like this. You don't get the leniency of being ignorant in that situation. I just, I think it's, you know, these college coaches, um, I, I, I really, I struggle with the, well, he didn't know.

That's kind of your job to know. It's absolutely your job to know. And if you're the highest paid state, you're the highest paid state employee. Right. And if you did know and chose to not do anything, then you're, you're liable in the situation. Um, I don't know. I don't know. I just know that the world we live in now, the action against men in power is much more punitive.

So we'll see how this plays out. Bruce Feldman joining us next hour. In Los Angeles. By the way, I really, really found a comment by Charles Barkley, fascinating on LeBron James. That as well, around the corner of the hurt. All right, big story today, obviously. Urban Meyer, Ohio State.

Brett McMurphy says there's all sorts of information that he knew of a cover-up in 2015. He says he didn't know. So is he lying or is it negligence? I think if anybody is listening to me for the last 20 years of doing this, I'm going to support the victim on this. I just, I'm not comfortable at all. I don't understand the cover-up, why there'd be any cover-up. I understand when people are deceptive because they're going to get rich and they're hiding a fortune.

Oh, I get the benefit to that. Changes generational family wealth. We've had politicians do that. Lots of them. In this situation, I don't see the benefit. I think there was a real victim here, and that victim should have been overwhelmingly supported, and I don't understand it. This story, we're going to get more information in 45 minutes from Bruce Feldman.

It's mystifying to me. If Urban Meyer knew about this and was deceptive about it and frankly was lied about it, I don't even understand that. There would be no reason in the world to lie about that. You get that coach out of the program. You support that woman. You protect that coach. I mean, listen, let me tell you something.

The lifeblood of college football is the wives. Okay, they're running these households because the coaches work 80 hours a week. You don't support those women. You don't have good coaches. The women, the wives of college football coaches, they are the lifeblood of programs. Because the dads aren't home. The coaches aren't home. They're in the office.

They're the ones keeping the programs on their feet. And I'm not being hyperbolic here. This to me would be a very, very egregious act by Urban Meyer. And I don't understand it because I know him and I like him. I don't know his wife well. I've met her once or twice. I'm just, I am baffled by this if it's true. And I did not support Rick Patino, who I don't know.

I've met him. Don't like him as much. I think he's too slippery. I think Urban can be permissive. I don't see him as slippery. I think he's an ethical recruiter. I don't see him as slippery. Rick Patino, I've always had a trust issue there.

Is this lying? Is it negligence? In either case, it's not acceptable. What's the fallout? How punitive the damage? That I don't know. The Ohio State football program is as glamorous, is as big as any in the country.

Alabama's hot now. Ohio State's been hot forever, and the fallout's going to be fascinating. And I don't know what it's going to be. But I can tell you this. If it wasn't Ohio and it wasn't Urban Meyer, a lot of head coaches would be fired for this, if true. A lot of head coaches. I could argue most head coaches would be run out of their program for this.

A losing coach, absolutely. A coach that's not popular, absolutely. A coach on the hot seat, done. But we know that stature matters and momentum matters. So let's see how it plays out. Another story that I think is interesting, Bruce Feldman next hour, Doug Gottlieb this hour, T.J. Hushmanzada, Eric Mangini today. So Charles Barkley was talking

about LeBron James and the Lakers. He's had several comments. I want to read you one because I do think it's very, very interesting. He said, I was hoping LeBron would stay in Cleveland. I look at the L.A. move strictly, strictly as a business decision. He's on the downside of his career.

I dispute that. He wants to be big Hollywood mogul guy. He's going to be driving by the beach every day instead of going through the snow, which I think is funny. And there is a psycho, a little bit a psychology to that, that it is a little easier in L.A. And athletes sometimes get a little softer in L.A. I do believe that is true. Denver West, our weather's better.

It's a little more laid back. It's not as urgent. That I believe. But can I just say this? LeBron's been a mogul for a long time. His first six years were showing off. His next five were winning titles. He moved into the mogul stage several years ago.

By the way, he was an early investor in Beats by Dre 10 years ago. He co-founded a pizza company and a production company in the last six or seven years. His wife opened a franchise smoothie shop and juice bar. He's got a lifetime deal with Nike he signed three years ago. He's got a production company. He was in a movie in 2015 that he shot in 2014. In the year he shot it, he ended up in the finals. This is not like a new stage. Remember, Kevin Durant loved tech. He loved technology. And then he moved from Oklahoma to the head of technology, the mecca of technology, Golden State, San Francisco, Oakland. And since then, he's been the NBA finals, two rings, back-to-back years.

Has it eroded his play? No, it's just easier in Silicon Valley to have meetings with tech people than it is in Oklahoma City. Because now they're your neighbors. Now they go to the same club. Now they're sitting front-roll at Warriors games. The difference with LeBron, what do you think LeBron James did in the last four or five years when he was sitting home and he had a game two nights away in Cleveland

and they didn't have practice. What do you think he did for the next 10 hours? Probably on the phone with his business partners. Well, what do you think he's going to do now? If the Lakers, he's at home for two days and they don't have practice and he's got 10 hours. He's going to walk down the street to his neighbor and have a meeting instead of being on the phone.

Moving to Los Angeles, if you want to get into production and Hollywood stuff, it's just easier. It doesn't mean you're distracted. It's just more available. Kevin Durant lives in Silicon Valley. He's not distracted clearly. Remember, football is different.

In football, you practice six times more than you play. You will practice for 18 hours a week in the NFL, and you'll play for three. In the NBA, it's different. You play six times more than you practice. For veteran NBA stars, you do a little shoot-around stuff. The rigorous practice stuff, it's over by like January. You're taking days off. Kevin Garnett, if you're Paul Pierce and Ray Allen under Doc Rivers, there are a lot of days off.

So this is not a rigorous practice sport for NBA stars. I don't buy that LeBron now came to L.A. just for basketball. I don't believe his skills are massively eroding. He's in remarkable shape. People forget before the injury, Kobe averaged 27 and a half a game. And then he had an injury and everything changed. But 17 years in, Kobe was still average in 27. seven and a half, and LeBron's bigger and stronger and better than Kobe.

Here's Joy Taylor with the news. No, no, no, no, turn on the news. This is the herd line news. So Cowboys running back's coach, Gary Brown, seeing a different Ezekiel Elliott. Compared to last year at this time, Zeke had an ongoing NFL personal conduct policy investigation and a lot of speculation about whether he'd be suspended. And Brown said it's a completely different Zeke than it was last year. He's in much better shape mentally.

He doesn't have all that stuff on his mind. He has a clear vision on what he wants to do and what he wants to be. He wants to be the best. We're going to get a good Zeke this year. He's on a mission. You know, when I really think about it, especially with this quote, Zeke was kind of the genesis of the Cowboys Meltdown last year. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Even in camp. It was a big story. Des gets a lot of heat. Dax, you know, take a step back. Sean Lee was heard. You know, is Jason Garrett really a good coach? Is he on the hot seat? All of this started because Zeke was completely, he's their best player.

And yet they had no idea from week to week whether he was going to be available or not. So obviously, that alone to me starts them off on a better foot than they were on last year. If you watch the Amazon Prime series, it is so obvious how Zeke's situation just weighed on the cowboys. Yeah. That's why this doom and gloom with the Dallas Cowboys this year, last year, we were in camp. I remember doing live shots at camp, and we were talking about the Ezekiel Elliott situation. And it was like, it was our. lead story on multiple days. This camp,

it is about football. Right. So I think this Dallas team, I think it was a very negative environment a year ago. I think it's a much more optimistic. By the way, DES is now out. So you don't have the high maintenance of DES. You don't have the Zieg story.

I think it's a different year. I think Dallas is very much on point and into football. Yeah. And we kept hearing from the locker room that we're just here to play football and, you know, have other good running backs on the roster. But every single week, that was the story. Because he was suspended and he wasn't suspended and all through training camp.

So it's definitely going to be a different year for them this year. Earl Thomas continues his holdout from training camp. And Seahawks said, Coach Pete Carroll said yesterday the team has had no communication with Earl Thomas. So this comes a day after he was critical of Thomas' decision to skip camp last week saying he should be there. I don't know about the Seahawks this year, Colin. Or like moving forward at all. companies are either, like, FS1, we're young, we're nimble, we're new. It's very optimistic in this building.

Place I used to work at has been there for 40 years, eroding numbers, new CEO. It's a negative vibe. Same with football teams. San Francisco right now has got Garoppolo and a new coach and a GM. It's very optimistic. The Rams moved to L.A. They win a bunch of games. Very optimistic.

Seattle in this division, Camp Chancellor retires, Cliff Abrils, gone. Richard Sherman's banging on him. Earl Thomas won't talk. The vibe in Seattle today. It is a heavy, weighted-down vibe heading in the camp. Well, they've completely lost their cultural and identity. Yes. So now everybody's pointing fingers and the pieces that are left are trying to hold on to what was or are in Earl Thomas's case probably trying to get out. I mean, he wants to be traded. Yeah. So finally, in true Cleveland fashion, someone wants to give Tristan a parade for allegedly punching Jemond Green. Did you see this yesterday? I saw the story. I saw the story, yeah. So they have a Facebook event invite that already has 2,200 people responding that they're going.

10,000 have said that they're interested. So this parade is planned for October 13th. That's Tristan's number at the queue at 3.10 p.m. So basically the story was that Tristan Thompson and J. on Green were at a party that LeBron is throwing at Club Delilah here in L.A. after the Espes. And basically, Draymond went up to Tristan and tried to apologize for what happens in game one of the finals. Remember, they had that little scuffle there at the end. And then Tristan said he wasn't interested.

And J. Mon kind of pushed back. And then Tristan allegedly punched J.M. on the face. So have you ever been done in a fight before, Colin? Yeah, I was in seventh grade. seventh grade. I've been in a fight before. It was a little after seventh grade. Maybe several. But anyway, the point is, if you get punched in the face,

you're not staying at the club that you're at. You're going to leave. Right. So I think it was more of a shove. I'm actually like almost positive. It was more of a shove than a punch. How disrespectful would it? If you're invited to a party, a private party that the world's best athletes throwing

and you get into a fight at the party, that's totally disrespectful. If I get invited to somebody's house and it's the most famous person in my industry, I don't have the dignity in class to not get into a fist fight at that guy's house. It's totally disrespectful to LeBron James. It really is.

And on top of it, it's Tristan, his former teammate, who's really only relevant because of LeBron James in the first place. But it just wasn't a fight. Like, it's just not, I mean, there may have been some pushing and shoving and some yelling and some calling of names, but there is no,

version in life where I believe that Tristan Thompson punched Draymond Green in the face. There's two rules when you get invited to a party. Okay, if you get invited to a party plus one, you can't invite extra people. It's not your party. That's rule number one. You don't decide, listen, I'm going to invite more people than I'm allowed to on the invitation. Secondly, when you're invited to a party by somebody that's superior to you, have a little refinement and a little class and a little dignity.

Shame on Tristan Thompson and Draymond. Green. You're lucky you even get invited to parties with LeBron James. You should be down at Applebee's order and an appetizer. The world's best athlete says, would you like to come to my party and you guys turn it into a fight? I would...

Lord. I just don't know if I'm going to classify it as a fight. It's more like pushing and shoving. All right, Joy Taylor with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping back. The Hurd-Ly We go to New York City via the Coward Global Satellite Network. My friend Doug Gottlieb, filling in first things first.

this weekend. Let's start with this, Doug, a lot of topics. Culpability for Urban Meyer. Says I didn't know, we find out text messages. He had to know. What's your take? Well, I think it's going to be what did he know, when did he know, and what did he do about it? Obviously, there's a little bit of a text trail here. Look, there's an Ohio State's locker room, and you can go online and find this. It says treat women with respect, right? And under no uncertain circumstances, and this would run directly counter to that. And look, I think what he has done at Florida and Ohio State on the football field is remarkable, but there was, you know, there was nonsense that took place off the football field at Florida.

There was turning a blind eye to many things. And maybe you could say, hey, look, he wanted to change these guys' lives. He wanted to improve them, and he would take guys that had issues. when you start to talk about Urban Meyer, it's impossible not to mention, you know, a guy who became somebody, you know, killed somebody in the National Football League, did play for him. I don't know. Look, the one thing I've learned here in only a year working at Fox, I remember what happened with Sean Miller, and I want to take a deep, deep breath and wait until all the facts come out. But if he knew that one of his assistant coaches was accused of and was in any way guilty of abusing his wife and he allowed him to remain on staff, these are fireable type of offenses. So he's got a ton of positive equity with what he's done on the football field and for the most part what they've done off the football field.

But this is the way it began with Jim Tressel. Grant, and that wasn't having anything to do with women. That was with gold pants. What did he know? When do you know? And what did he do about it? We'll take a deep breath, wait until all the information comes out. Brett McMurphy has done an outstanding job of uncovering some sources and some information. There will be more to come out and we'll be able to know at least a lot more than we know right now. I'm cautiously pessimistic, though, because this is the trickle that usually starts before the flood. By the way, Stadium, a sports media company, did an interview with Courtney Smith, who was assaulted,

the felonious assault against the wife. She said Urban's wife told her she was going to tell Urban. It's never been confirmed she did. We'll leave it at that. I want to segue to Charles Barkley's been very outspoken. Some think it's jealousy. I'm not sure it is because Barclay had a great career, been a great broadcaster, and I don't see him.

Maybe a little petty. I don't know if jealous. But he says that LeBron moved L.A. Just to be a mogul, and LeBron's teams of five or six seat at best. Let's start with a mogul thing. Do you think what percentage of the move was Mughal, how much was Hoops? Isn't this what you've been saying all year? Yeah, I think Mughal's part of it, but I think he's been a mogul for years.

No, I mean, but, but look, everything Charles is saying, I think is accurate. And maybe Charles, look, Charles has been able to climb to being probably the most prominent, opinionated broadcaster in the country for this very reason. He says what he thinks and what he thinks. he feels. And in many ways, he's taking what you've said and what others have said about the Lakers. Do I think it's 100% about post-NBA? I don't. I think he thinks he can win there. I don't think anyone believes he's going to win a championship this year. I think somewhere between the four-seed and the sixth seed is reasonable. I think they're a little bit better than he wants to give the Lakers credit. But I also think here's the one thing missing with Charles Barkley talking about

to move to Los Angeles. There wasn't any, hey, what would have happened had he stayed behind? That thing was a mess. The Celtics are going to be better. The Sixers are going to be better. So we do only look at it as, well, he went to the Lakers and it's about being a mogul. Sure.

I think he wants to be in Hollywood. I think he wants to do things outside of basketball. But I still think he wants to play basketball. Is he past his peak? I think that's reasonable. Is he on the downside of his career? It all depends on what you consider the side of his career. I would say three or four years ago, maybe even five, he was at his

athletic peak. He's probably at his basketball IQ peak right now. But at some point, his body will begin to fail him. And I think we're a little bit taken by the stats, but everybody's stats are better. You said it about football, Colin, and you're right, but it's because the rules have changed in football, the rules have changed in basketball. Hell, the way we play baseball has changed. Everything is driven by offense because that's what we as view of. as pundits, as fans, that's what we want. And so the stats would tell you that LeBron James is as good or better than he was three or four years ago. The reality is he takes more plays off defensively.

The reality is he doesn't necessarily move as well. He's still an incredible player. He's still either the best or the second best player in league. But he's not at his athletic peak. And he's begun the down part of his career. That doesn't mean he's in the valley. That just means he's slightly past the peak. I agree with everything he said.

the only part to it I disagree with is there's this sense from Barclay that LeBron doesn't want to compete anymore. And I don't think that's the case. I think there's a joy in building. I think he loves the idea of putting things together. And I think he actually really liked this year the new energy he found when the calves made a trade and brought in younger faces. I think those younger guys grew up idolizing him. I think they're easier to manipulate. He likes seeing their growth. So I think it's a bunch of those things together. But I don't think he's wrong. I only think he's wrong if there's this negative connotation that he doesn't want to

compete at all for a championship in L.A. I don't think that's the case. By the way, the other day, I got to end with this because we're up against the clock. And I was just talking on. And I said, I don't want to get into ranking people, I said, but the eight best quarterbacks I've ever seen in my life, and I listed them. And I put Terry Bradshaw, people said, well, he works at Fox. And I said, no, I'm 54.

I saw him playing his prime. He was a dominant player beating other dynasties, the Shula dynasty, the Raiders dynasty, the Cowboys were great with Landry. Then I put on Drew Breeze and people said, where's Aaron Rogers? And I said, listen, I'm a big believer in what do you inherit in life? Drew Breeze inherited a laughing stock of a franchise. They were Cleveland. Whereas Aaron and Steve Young, who most people put ahead of Drees, Breeze inherited great franchise, momentum, terrific scouting departments, coaching staffs,

and there was a momentum to both franchises where they sat behind legends, they were well-staffed, good money, good staffs, good scouting, good players. Your eight, so my eight's, Roger, your eight is different than mine, and I'm looking at it right now. I don't have Aikman, I don't have Bradshaw. You don't have Aitman and you don't have Bradshaw. And listen, I understand that Troy, now he works for five. but I think he might go down as the most underrated of the superstar quarterbacks. But in addition to the numbers not being there, you want to talk about what you inherited.

I mean, look at that offensive line, look at the skill positions. He had one of the great all-time running backs behind him. And at the time, Norv Turner was ahead of the curve as an offensive coordinator. I mean, he was surrounded by the best, the best. He was deadly accurate. Tregman was a great player. And I think the rules and playing indoors and playing for Sean Payton, his hall helped Drew Brees. Breeze is the one that you got to kind of swallow hard because he doesn't really play indoors, right?

And he's really been helped. But the numbers are obscene. Marino's one that I am old enough to remember. They were playing backyard football before backyard football was cool, never had a running game, never had a defense, and only went to one Super Bowl. I would put Steve Young in. He led the league in touchdown passes, I think, four different times in completion percentage. He was a low interception guy, and he was a ridiculous athlete.

He was, he was, he was, he was the, he's the best of the athletic quarterbacks before we found Aaron Rogers. But I'm going to disagree with John Rogers. Rogers is the best quarterback ever seen play the position. And he hasn't been on the best franchise. He hasn't been, he hasn't had a great defense. He hasn't had a running game. He's played through his own injury. So I didn't see Bradshaw.

I know it was a different game then. I know they won four soups and that's a, but I, that's like me talking about Will Chamberlain or me talking about Bill Russell or me talking about Bill Russell or me talking. talking about Jerry West. I know they're different levels of great, but my opinion shouldn't really matter because I didn't see them live. Everyone else I saw live is unbelievable. I think Montana is still probably the goat because much like Michael Jordan, he never played poorly or never seemed like he played poorly in the biggest games. I know his coaching staff was great. I know that they were running the West Coast offense before everybody else ran the West Coast offense and he had Jerry Rice, but some of that was Montana. He was steely with his nerves, even if he lacked the big time

arm strength. He had incredible accuracy. So I would put Aaron Rogers. I would put Steve Young. I would leave Aikman off and I would leave Bradshaw off only because I didn't see him. But we both agree with Drew Brees and I love that. Doug Gottlieb in New York. First things first. Thanks, buddy. See you, bud. Coming up next, John Gruden, more wackiness. Mike Tomlin. Is he listening to the criticism? Interesting story out of Pittsburgh in the Steelers next to heard. By the way, we'll have more in the Urban Meyer story. Top of the hour, Bruce Feldman.

be noted that the wide receiver coach was with Urban Meyer in Florida and Urban acknowledges in 2009 he was aware that Zach Smith had been involved in violence against his then girlfriend. Urban acknowledges that. What he's saying is he didn't know about the same receiver coach doing it in 2015, although Brett McMurphy is uncovered text saying Urban's wife knew, assistant's wives knew, it was well known within the program. So Urban acknowledges, yeah, we knew of the guy's troubles in 2009.

What he's saying is six years later, I had no idea. Tax are unveiling people within the program, wives knew. Can you prove Urban new? That's different. We live in a more punitive time for men in power. I think if Urban was a struggling coach or an unpopular coach, he would be out of work today. Or he would be suspended. This would be a career-ending moment.

but we know the way the world works. Power, Ohio, football crazy, the Ohio State. Can you absolutely directly link knowledge to the lie? You can say some negligence. Can you find the lie? We've got texts now, Bruce Feldman next hour, in what is really a troubling story. And it just escapes me what would be the benefit of being,

it's completely avoidable. Of being deceptive in this instance. I'm not saying I don't get deception in life. Domestic violence, you're already established, you're the highest paid state employee. I don't get deception here. I think it is really ugly and really unfortunate. I want to say this. Another football note's interesting.

Mike Tomlin has a reputation as a players coach. And that's his reputation. I've been very critical of Mike Tomlin. Last seven years, he's three and five in the playoffs. Only face New England once, so don't tell me New England's the problem. because New England's not the problem. Seven years he's faced him once, he got blown out. Okay.

Last seven years with a Hall of Fame quarterback, great running backs, unbelievable receivers, elite offensive line and generally a pretty good defense and pass rush, often playing games at home, they're three and five. Two of their three wins in the playoffs last seven years, Matt Moore and A.J. McCarron were the quarterbacks. He lost to Tebow. I repeat, he lost to Tim Tebow.

When he had Dick Leboe's defensive coordinator and a Hall of Famer Ben Rothersberger in his prime. He lost a T-Boh. But it's interesting, and I've been critical of Mike Tomlin, but is he hearing the critics? Mike Tomlin came out yesterday and said, quote, Levian Bell, I hope he's in better shape than he was last year. There's a story out. Lavian Bell was at a strip club.

Personal opinion, I couldn't give a rip. He's in his 20s. He's a pro-athlete. He's got money. I don't care. It's pro-athletes do that. I don't. They do. I don't care. I'm not being a moralist. But I do think what's interesting is Mike Tomlin coming out and Mike Tomlin blasting a player.

You're blasting somebody if you say, yeah, I hope my quarterback's in better shape than last year. I hope my wide receiver and running backs in better shape. He's calling out a star player. And I think it's something. The AFC, by the way, is wide open. New England's got its weakest roster. Deshawn Watson is still a baby in Houston in developing. Andrew Lucks on a rebuilding roster.

Kansas City's got a new quarterback. The Chargers find ways to lose. The AFC is Pittsburgh's to win. And I think the media has often protected Mike Tomlin. Him coming out and ripping Lavian Bell is growth. I think he's now you're from Pittsburgh and Mike Tomlin's beloved. He's got Super Bowls. I totally get it.

And if you look at their schedule this year, it is a made-to-order schedule. They have all their tough games at home. They get Kansas City tough game at home. Atlanta tough game. at home. Carolina, tough game at home. Chargers, tough game at home. New England, tough game at home. They got to go to New Orleans late in the year. They'll have the playoffs wrapped up. This is really their year. This is the year for Mike Tomlin. There's no excuses now. You have Hall of Fame owners, Hall of Fame quarterback, Hall of Fame back, Hall of Fame receiver,

the next great receiver, one of the five best offensive lines, maybe one of the three best offensive lines in football. I totally agree with you. I think that the window is closing after this year. Because Leveon's not going to be there next year. And by the way, Andrew Luck's going to have better players. Deshaun Watson's going to have in a couple of years. And Ben will be a year older.

Patrick Mahomes could be very good by then. We don't know. Patrick Mahomes is a baby now. He's a cub. So I see this as some growth. We also have a story about John Gruden. I'm just going to read this. This thing continues to be crazy.

We've got an, according to Ian Rappaport, The two sides have no contract talk since February. It comes out again today. John Gruden and Khalil Mack are not talking. There's nothing going on. Max in his final year of his rookie deal. He's a tremendous player. I think there's some things going on here.

We're not talking a ton about. One of them is, I think Gruden would like to have him, but the Raiders are the poorest franchise in the league. They don't have $100 million in the bank. They have the poorest owner. They were last in revenue two years ago, and they're even worse now because they're a lame duck franchise. The latest on Urban Meyer around the corner, hour one is in the books, hour two coming up. We've got Bruce Feldman, Eric Manjini, T.J. Hushmanzada in L.A. Hour two with Joy.

This is the herd. Welcome in. This is the herd. Wherever you may be and however you may be listening, live in Los Angeles, IHeart Radio. Fox Sports Radio FS1, Joy Taylor is joining me in 15 minutes. Bruce Feldman on the controversy at Ohio State Football and Urban Meyer. Did he know and did he lie about 2015 allegations proven to be true against Zach Smith, wide receiver coach, felonious domestic violence? Urban Meyer says, didn't know about it. Tex unveiled today.

He appears to have known about it, at least his wife did, and many on the staff did. Joy Taylor is joining me. This is a story that's developing. I've said I'm not in the calling for people to get fired business. I did break my own rule with Rick Patino. I said, enough was enough. If you don't know, there's a brothel, 25 steps from your office, and you've only got 12 players and five coaches. That's a you problem.

I've always defended college football coaches because you got 85 players, you got 20 assistants, you got 30 trainers. It is a much bigger company. Things can fall through the cracks. But when you have an assistant coach who was with you for five years at Florida, and you knew there was a domestic issue and violence in that situation, you acknowledge you knew he moves to Ohio State. There's more violence. And you're now saying, I didn't have any idea.

When we have text messages coming out from Brett McMurphy, a reliable reporter, it leaves me to be very cynical and very suspicious, Bruce Feldman in 10 minutes. Joy and I will continue to talk. about this story. I will say there's two other stories in sports that are more fun than that story. And the reason I like these stories, and I think this is important for what I do for a living, I like stories when you and I can take sides. I don't care what side you take. But I like stories that have two viable sides. It's no fun to talk about something we know that's going to be true. I don't talk about the Orlando Magic. They're not going to be good. It is fun to see if the Celtics

can win the title. That's viable. You say, No, I say yes, we can argue. Charles Barkley came out, and yesterday was very critical of LeBron, James, and the Lakers. He said he moved there just to be a mogul. They're nothing better than a five or a six seed. They're not going to win championships. Charles Barclay's a very esteemed player, a fantastic broadcaster. About once a year, I'm lucky enough to get him on the show.

He said, listen, LeBron came for mogul stuff. He didn't come for basketball. He's going to be driving by the beach, and he's not going to be about basketball. The reason I love this story is there's two very legitimate sides. Barkley's side, and if you're anti-Lebron and the Lakers, is side one. That is, they've got a bunch of young kids. They're not ready for this moment. They're not great players.

Number two is LeBron's the world's best player, but man does he bring a lot of drama to a bunch of kids who aren't ready. Three, then they put on a bunch of edgy guys, wackos, Lance, Rondo, Michael B, Javail McGee. This looks like a circus. And number four, the Labar ball factor. That's a very legitimate side. That is a very legitimate argument. Now, my side is side two, which is, A, I like their young players. Cusma, Ingram, Lonzo, Josh Hart. They're nice players. They're C players. I think all of them can elevate, especially Coosma, to B plus. I like their young players. Secondly, I think it's the perfect time to come to the West. The Warriors dynasty is showing fatigue. Dynasties generally don't last six and seven years. They last about three and then

players get worn out or move. Also, San Antonio, Minnesota dysfunctional and Houston's not as good as they were last year. I also think Rondo's actually still a really good player and is a perfect mentor for Lonzo Ball. And I think also, LeBron pretty much wins. everywhere and makes it work. He's not selfish. He's a giver. He's a good teammate. He'll make it work. That's my side. Here's the good news. There's four players, stars available. Clay Thompson, K.D., Jimmy Butler, and Kauai. If one of them chooses L.A., I win the argument. If none of them do, you win the argument. Because they're not winning a championship if LeBron's the best player and Kuzma's the second. Kuzma has to be the third of the fourth. So this will be decided probably in a

year. You'll be right side one. I'll be right side two. Because if they get Jimmy Butler and LeBron with these players, they're going to win a lot of games and they're going to get to a final. They are. If they get Kevin Durant, they're going to a final and winning it. If they get Kauai and LeBron, they're going to a final and probably winning it. They get Jimmy Butler, they're just going to go to the final because by that time, it'll be another year for Golden State, and I'm not sure Kevin Durant will be in San Francisco and Oakland. Here's what's going to decide. which side is right. What do they look like, October to the trading deadline?

Is it a party, a bar you walk past and think, I want to go to that bar? Are the Lakers on TV? Staples is magical. LeBron is energized. The players are all getting better. And it's the kind of vibe that's the talk of the league. Then I'm going to win the argument because that will attract players. Everybody walks by a bar.

You're with your wife. You're walking out of street. You look at a bar. You never want to go in a bar that looks dead. and your wife's like she's got heels on, she's got a beautiful dress, it's a Friday night, it's you and your wife, the kids are at home, you want to go to the party that looks like it's got energy, that looks like it's fun, looks like you can join it and have a great night.

Nobody wants to walk to buy the bar. It's the bartender, Sal, one drunk at the end of the bar, and you and your wife's all dolled up. Honey, you want to go to that bar? Nobody wants to go in that bar. So it's all going to be decided by four players. I win if we get one. You win if none come to L.A.,

And it will depend largely on acquiring that player based on what is the vibe October to the trading deadline. And if it's fun and energized, the players are better. Rondo behaves himself. So does Lance. They'll get a player because players like joining great parties. Rich people like joining other stars in fun environments where they can grow and have a great time. And if it's clunky and it's uneven and Rondo goes Rondo and Lance is too kooky. And Kuzma gets hurt and Lonzo's temperamental and Lovar talks, then they don't get the player.

That's why it's so fascinating. Their sides, we'll know in a year, and we may know by the trading deadline. Here's the other story. Good Lord, this thing changes every day. I swear to you, Joey, this story changes every day. Report. Baker Mayfield has floored Brown's coaches. The word they used is floored people at the training camp.

again a week ago a week ago the coach was like he's not ready to play now he's flooring people okay this is coming from the owner who wants to sell tickets and they're picked for fourth place um i'm going to make a prediction on this you and i are mostly on the same side on this story i don't think he's going to be a bust and most of you don't think he's going to be a bust but i'm going to predict how this story is going to work out. The Cleveland Brown's owner, Jimmy Haslam, doesn't really respect the coaching industry. In the last 10 years, Tennessee volunteer footballs had seven coaches. He runs that program.

Here's what's going to happen with Baker Mayfield. They open up with Pittsburgh and at the Saints. They're going to go on two. And Jimmy Haslam, the owner, is going to come down and say, I think we should start Baker Mayfield. We're at home. It's the Jets. It's a Thursday night TV game.

I want to buzz for the stadium. Hugh Jackson is going to push him back and get his way against the Jets. Tyrod Taylor will start and win. Then they go to Oakland and they're going to lose. And they're going to be one and three coming back home, Baltimore, L.A. Chargers. And Jimmy Haslam's going to lean on Hugh Jackson again and say, I want Baker Mayfield. And this time, Hugh Jackson will be a coach coming off at 0-16 season, who is one in three and he'll cave. and Baker Mayfield will start home game Baltimore.

That is my prediction. Archive it, John, put it on tape. That's what will happen. Is that when you watch all these stories about Baker, he's not ready, he's flooring people, not quite ready, amazing. That's coming from upstairs. Eric Mangini talked about this on our show earlier this week. Jerry Jones is an owner that puts his name on every quote.

Most owners don't. They have directives to coaches, coaches make moves they don't want to make. And then if it screws up, the owner's like, fired. And the coach is like, you told me to do that. Jerry Jones puts his name on it. Jimmy Haslam doesn't. Mark my words.

They'll be 0 and 2. Hugh will be pressure to start Baker, and Hugh will win. He'll push him off. He'll go, give, we can win this game. They will, but they'll lose at Oakland. One and three coming home, two home games. Steelers are probably 4-0. Baltimore's looking pretty good.

It's a division game. You're already a game back of Baltimore. If you know shows already, mark my words. That's what's going to happen. By the way, Baker Mayfield's got a documentary. Part two of it is Sunday. It is incredibly compelling. I want to show you a clip.

I tried to show you yesterday. Do we have that, John? This is Baker Mayfield. Before he came on this show, I'd been very critical of him, and he had the guts to come on this show and confront me, which I totally appreciated. Here's a little minute. Behind the scenes of this I saw for the first time two days ago.

It's Sunday as episode two here on Fox at three. Roll the tape. I get to see my best friend today. I went on Colin Coward's show just to be myself. There's been a lot of skepticism about who I am as a person, and I wanted to address a lot of those issues that he keeps bringing it up over and over again. Got the hoodie? Undraftable.

Quoted by Colin Coward. I'm going to leave this on his chair. Oh, it's dirty. Ah, whatever. He doesn't need clean one. I knew he was a Sam Darnocker. old guy. Let's bring him on. Baker Mayfield. Look at this. He's got a support group. Oh, I got something for you. Quarters by you, right? Unraftable. That is great. I have a general rule. Don't like

my quarterback showing up on police video. Don't love this. There's a lot of regret to it, but at the same time, that was a rude awakening, just very eye-opening for me. By the way, that's the best answer you've given me in 10 minutes. That's what grown-up say. That makes me like you more. I went on there to prove my point of, you said I was undraftable. Well, I went number one. I'm proud of who I am. I got what I wanted out of it. That was a clip from now part two all the way up,

airs three Eastern on Fox this Sunday. A lot of behind the scene stuff. I did think Baker hit a home run here. We confronted him on stuff. He acted like a grown-up. I didn't like that he had two music people with him, Joy. Have you worn the hoodie yet? Yeah, no, no, I've got it.

Listen, I'm not rooting against him. I don't root for people to. fail. I'm critical of Cam Newton. I want to see Cam Newton be great because football is better when quarterback play is great. It's a very common misconception that if you're critical of someone, you are hating on them. Why would I want to see Baker whiff? Oh, because you'll be right. No, no, no, no. I've never said he's a bust. I said he's going to be Case Keenom. Yeah, I care far less about being right than I care about having entertaining football to watch. Listen, I want Baker to play forever because he's going to be interesting. Right. And if he becomes great,

people are going to go, coward, we'll be relevant. We are in the content business. We want to be interesting. We want to be interesting. Yeah, Lamar Jackson's interesting. I don't want to see Lamar Jackson out of the league in a year. I don't. As long as a quarterback can play, if he can't play like Tebow and you're stringing it along, I get bored with that.

Lamar can play. Baker can play. I don't think they're going to be as good as people suspect, but they can play. They're NFL quarterbacks. All right. Bruce Feldman around the corner on the breaking story at Ohio State. It is a very serious matter. Is the future of Ohio State football in Irvin Meyer in Jeopardy,

as we get ready for a massive college football season where Ohio State is seen as a potential top three or four playoff team along with Clemson and Alabama. Sunday on Fox. It's episodes three and four of the exclusive documentary about Baker Mayfield, where he appears right here on the herd to confront Colin. Follow the NFL's number one draft pick as he navigates his way through the complex world of professional football all the way up. Baker Mayfield Sunday at 3 Eastern on Fox or stream it on the Fox Sports app. Oklahoma's where he starred. my opinion is the biggest brand in college football not named Notre Dame smack dab in the middle of the country. Right now their coach, Urban Meyer, to me, the second best coach in college football after Nick Saban is under the spotlight for a receiving coach,

Zach Smith, who was also with Urban 2009 at Florida. There were allegations, no charges against this same receiver coach. Bruce Feldman is joining me on this incredibly serious situation. What is the most damning thing to you facing Urban Meyer right now? Now, you know, Colin, when they express that expression, it's not the crime, it's the cover-up. In this case, the crime, the allegations, and everything is really ugly. I mean, domestic violence is obviously a serious topic. But then you go back to that other piece of it, the cover-up.

Last week was Big Ten Media Days in Chicago. Urban Meyer and Ohio State had fired Zach Smith the day before he was going to go to the podium on Monday. And when he said this, I think this is the hardest thing right now coming out of this that he's going to have to address. 2009, Zach, was an intern, a very young couple. As I do, any time that I imagine most coaches are people in leadership positions, you receive a phone call first thing you do is tell your boss. Let the experts do their jobs. We're certainly not going to investigate.

It came back to me that what was reported wasn't actually what happened. And so Shelly and I actually both got involved because of a relationship with that family and advised for counseling and wanted to help as we moved forward. 2015 I got a text late last night that something happened in 2015 and there was nothing unless once again there's nothing you know once again I don't know who creates a story like that and then this recent one was you know you press pause it's something our team lives by e plus r equals oh you get an event you press pause get your mind right and step up press pause to gather information get your mind right to gather energy and and then step up to do the right thing that's the position of that's the position of you know that's the position of you know I hold and that's why we did that. Now, Brett Murphy has unveiled text messages that Urban's wife knew back in 2015. Urban saying I found out about it recently. What do we know of Zach Smith outside of this story, the coach who's been fired by Ohio

State who also had the incident in 2009? What do we know about him? You talk to a lot of people who have been around the program. They do not paint a very good picture of him character-wise. and some of that had been baggage that I guess that staff had kind of worked around for a while. Now, does that mean because he was a shaky character guy that he was going to be, you know, a guy who had had allegations of domestic violence? I mean, that's, you know, a separate thing.

But I think what you look at here is at Florida, when Urban Meyer got in trouble, it was always giving shaky character guys second and third chance. No question. Those were his players. In this case, it was one of his assistants, and it's also the grandson of the late Earl Bruce, who was one of Urban Myers mentors. And I think, you know, showing that clip from last week, which I think is really troubling for Urban Meyer is, with those allegations and with that story, he looked like he was just not prepared to handle it.

And what he does sometimes is he speaks in absolutes. Everything is a black and white where this could have been a gray area to some degree. and how when he said there was nothing there, you know, in his mind, maybe he's thinking, well, this was investigated a couple times. There was no charges. But the reality is you can't say there was nothing there when some of this other stuff comes out,

especially the documentation, as you mentioned, Brett McMurphy had reported on it. Yeah, his wife, Shelley Meyer, Urban's wife. His wife of the director of football operations, there was text from her. So, you know, it does not look good for Urban Meyer in Ohio State, especially in the wake of last week, saying, you know, I just found out about it last night.

Yeah. Football operations wife, his wife, listen, I'm married, you're married. If stuff like this would happen with the company I ran and I was the highest paid state employee, my wife would bring it up to me. What does Ohio State do next? What happens next in this? That's a great question here. So we don't know what Ohio State knew what and when also on this piece of it. And so, you know, will they have some kind of independent investigation to find out what they knew and when? I mean, we saw that with the Baylor scandal, with Pepper Hamilton coming in. We've seen it at other places. As we said, domestic violence is a serious, serious issue. And it is a hot topic issue because of men in power misusing and abusing that power

being uncovered in a regular basis. And I've said this earlier. If Urban Meyer was a lousy coach, you know, a lousy coach, I think he'd be fired. If he was a coach in the hot seat, you'd move him out. this is we've got a domestic violence narrative right now men in power abusing the power and this falls in that this time frame where we're more punitive we take it more seriously we are harsher on the men in power who say they didn't know but knew I mean it's his job in peril I mean Art Bryles didn't last Rick Bettino didn't last we've seen deniers well you know who also didn't last was Jim trestle and Jim trestle got called line to the NCAA, that involved, you know, tattoos, extra benefits stuff that I think we sit back and go,

that's nowhere near as serious as the issue of domestic violence. But one is lying to the NCA. The other one in this category feels like it more falls into the category, were you being truthful with the media? That's not the same thing in a lot of administrators' eyes and certainly the NCAA's eyes. Good point. How was Ohio State going to handle this? I mean, as you mentioned, you have a really, really volatile issue. And I'm not sure what the next step is for Gene Smith, the AD there, or the president in terms of how do they go through the fact finding. And also, what other kind of text messages, photos, what else does the ex-wife have that, you know,

may come out subsequently? Okay, so we have Urban Meyer's wife with text messages. That's been uncovered. We have multiple assistance wives? Staffors, yeah, the director of football operations. Okay, so the director of football operations, is that a woman? No, it was, it's the wife of his director of football operations from Florida as well. Okay, so, geez, gut, I don't even want to ask gut feeling.

I'm not in the position to call for people's jobs. There's just a lot of things here that make me incredibly uncomfortable. And I told Joy this earlier. I understand deception when there's a financial windfall. You know, we've seen politicians live. We've seen CEOs lie, but I don't understand the value of deception here. We had a real victim. Urban Meyer's legacy was established.

He's not, there's no reason for him to be anything other than strict and rigid on this situation. I don't get it. I'm confused by this. Yeah, I am too, especially if something like this is out there and you know it. At some point, you see a guy who is, as I said, this is the grandson of his mentor, Earl Bruce. Does he feel like he's being loyal to him? I get that it is not easy for these guys to speak in front of a podium and talk about personal matters, especially when they are, you know, Zach Smith's never going to coach again.

Now, if this stuff is true and with this level of documentation, Zach Smith probably shouldn't coach again. And I think when Urban Meyer is standing there, he's going, look, Ohio State fired him. But beyond that, it was like, okay, how seriously did you take this? what steps were in place? Because I think now we are, as you mentioned, we're in a new place in terms of how society, and I think rightly so, addresses some of these serious issues.

Five years ago in 2009, I think they shrug their shoulders at a lot of this and say, hey, we're going to keep this in house. I mean, you mentioned Baylor, a lot of the stuff that Baylor got in trouble for probably went on to some degree at a lot of other places, except, you know, these are happening in real time now. And I think that's what's so,

so damning in this case, and it's such a head scratcher, how he went to that press conference and just seemed like he was not prepared to talk about it and address it. And then he created more questions than he answered. Bruce Feldman, our college football guy, have known. Good seeing you, man. Good seeing you. Joy with the news. No, no, no, no, turn on the news. This is the herd line news.

So it's a good time to be John Wall. Last summer, he signed a four-year, $170 million extension, and now he's in a without a clear-cut favorites at USA minicamp. Wall told Bleacher Report, I think we have a better team now, and the East is more wide open. Now LeBron is out of the picture. Yeah, the problem is, Kauai Leonard to Toronto makes the Raptors better. Gordon Hayward and Kyrie back to the Celtics makes them better.

And Ben Simmons and Joe Elbeed are young and getting better. And by the way, Indiana at the end of the year was surprisingly cohesive. And Milwaukee's got good young players getting better. I still think Washington's a fifth or a sixth seat. I don't think the East is easier. I actually think. I think it's actually got its first great team in years, and that's the Celtics.

Right. Yeah, I mean, I totally agree with everything you're saying. It's me. It's Boston. It's Philly. And then it's everyone else. And all the teams that you just mentioned, the Pacers, like, yes, the Wizards could be good,

but it's not like, oh, LeBron's gone. We're at the top now. By the way, Joy, John Wall's never played LeBron in the playoffs. So LeBron's never been a problem for John Wall. Yeah, like John Wall's got issues. They're not LeBron. He's never faced him or played him in the playoffs. I mean, mentally, though, maybe that has something to do with it.

You know, he's a scary, scary got to go against. So the Houston Rockets have reportedly kicked the tires on J.R. Smith. Zach Lowe reported this news on his podcasts that they are looking into acquiring J.R. Smith. I feel, I feel like the last memory we have of him in the playoffs is him, you know, changing the course of time. Yeah, last memory and final memory of his career. I was going to take quite the recovery to come back from that. Like maybe hitting a walkoff in game seven of the NBA finals

might erase it possibly. I don't know if he's going to get that opportunity, but do you like him in Houston? The thing with J.R. Smith is, I feel like playing alongside LeBron gave him some... I don't want to use the word credibility, but stability is a better word. Yeah, no, I think...

Up until that huge... mistake. He just kind of rehabbed this image a little bit. Listen, here's something that's happening in the NBA. Golden State brought in Nick Young. And it was okay. And Javelle McGee, kooky guys. It was okay. The Lakers now have embraced kooky guys. Houston, Mello, J.R. Smith, considering troubled guy. The bottom line is NBA teams are telling you, if we trust our culture, you can bring in a peripheral guy who's a little goofy. Right. I think he would work in Houston. Yeah, especially in that DeAntony offense for sure.

So finally, Stefan Diggs signed a five-year extension with the Vikings on Tuesday, and that makes Kirk Cousins, not Kurt, Kirk Cousins, a happy man. The deal means Vikings have Diggs, Cousins, and wide receiver. Adam Thielen signed through 2020, and Cousins likes the certainty that comes with that. He said, I love it. Continuity to me is very important, and it's not a luxury we have in the NFL these days. There's a lot of change in year and year out, so I've come to expect that and understand that you can't use that as an excuse.

You have to, as the new players come in, we have to learn quickly and get caught to speed, and now we have to stay healthy and keep those guys in the field. Kind of sounds like a little bit of a shot at Washington that he likes the continuity there. Minnesota is a better run organization. Listen, I like the Vikings a lot. Minnesota is all freaking out because everybody in Minnesota thinks I don't like them.

I have them being a viable playoff team. But when you literally change quarterbacks, and he's not a superstar, okay? You're not bringing in Brett Farb to Minnesota. It's Kirk Cousins. When you change quarterbacks A and you lose a great, not a good, a great offensive coordinator, ask Matt Ryan, you come back down to Earth. And by the way, Brett, Aaron Rogers didn't play seven of the eight quarters last year.

So I think Green Bay beats Minnesota both times. And I also think Chicago's a little better. Detroit's got a new coach. The NFC's a little better. So I think Minnesota is going to be a viable playoff team. But I don't think they're going to get the breaks they got last year. primarily great O.C. And Aaron Rogers got hurt.

That's not going to happen. Well, I think sometimes the money that people gets confuses the mind as far as to how good someone may be because Kirk Cousins got that ridiculous contract. And then I don't like Kirk Cousins. I just don't have faith that Kirk is the one that's going to put you over the edge to get you to a Super Bowl. But again, Kirk can win a lot of games. He can win a lot of football games. If that's what you like.

Yes. I prefer to build for the ring. Yeah, so do I. I agree. Joy of the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by. The Hurd-Ly News. Don't be that guy in the room, long, sloppy-looking, untucket shirt.

Untucket shirts made to fall at the perfect length. Go to untucket.com.com code herd. Untucka.com code herd for 20% off. Eric Mangini's got a couple of great pieces of tape. I love when the coach comes on. The difference between Brady and Garapolo, he's got a couple of pieces of tape that are going to be so fantastic. You do not want to miss them. I want to go back to the Charles Barkley thing.

Charles Barkley has been very critical of LeBron James going to the Lakers. One of the quotes from Charles Barkley was, LeBron's on the downside of his career. Something that needs to be addressed. And this is true with not only athletes, but with human beings, the public. So when he says LeBron is in the mogul stage, I understand you're saying that I don't agree. But he said, LeBron's on the downside of his career.

Yes, if you're at the top of the top of, of Mount Everest and you begin scaling down your first four steps off the top of Mount Interest, you are descending. So I would argue, yeah, I don't think LeBron's quite, quite in his prime physically. But remember this. In the NBA, how do you treat your body for your career? Mello never in great shape fell off a cliff. Last year, he fell off a cliff statistically.

Charles Barkley went from 23 points, 12 rebounds a game in Phoenix at 32 years old, and two years old, and two years later, 15 points a game, all of his stats were down. Barclay was never a great practice player and never was in great shape. He was in good enough shape, but Charles Franklin is one of the few NBA stars who's an all-time legend, who I would argue underachieved. So Carmelo fell off a cliff. Barkley fell off a cliff. Shaq in Miami, 15 years ago, 2003, 28, 11 and shot 58% from the floor.

Two years later, he missed 40 games. down to 17 and 7. Shack, wasn't a great practice player, always a little heavy, put on weight. So when you are a great player, even a great player, Mello, Barclay, Shack, you fall off a cliff.

Now, let's talk about guys who were always in great shape. David Robinson, Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan, Kobe Bryant. Until Kobe got hurt, Kobe was averaging 27 and a half a night. Tim Duncan. Gradual.

Tim Duncan was past his prime, his last nine years in the league, maybe his last eight, and you were seeing tiny gradual erosion. LeBron's a smarter player. He's a freak as a body. LeBron's going to be a 27 to 28-point guy as long as he wants to. Now, if he wants to be a 24-point guy and elevate others, he can be that too. But when people say he's not in the peak of his career, he's not in the physical. peak, but he will never be a guy that falls off a cliff.

He is going to be like Kobe until the injury, gradual, minute dissension, and most of it, most of it on the defensive end. Coming up next, Eric Mangini lays out Brady and Garoppolo. You want to see the big difference? We got a piece of tape. The latest as well on Ohio State Urban Meyer and the accusations there. Eric Mangini is going to join me. And as I bring Eric Mangini out, I feel pretty good about myself.

I'm puffing my chest up today as the New England Patriots are working out Eric Decker, who had one touchdown and was hurt last year. Basically, this is my theory this year is that Gromks average at about 10 games a year. Tom's 41. They still have a great coach. They just don't have a ton of dynamic players offensively. Edelman's out for a month. So now they're working out Eric Decker.

They just cut Jordan Matthews an hour ago. and you still like them this year. Well, the people they did maintain were Josh McDaniels and Dante Scarnacca. Those are huge pieces. Being able to keep the offense coordinator, being able to keep the offensive line coach, that was a huge, huge win for them. And when you look at the wide receivers, New England is a finishing school for wide receivers.

They're like they're not a business that, or they're not in the business of buying franchises. They create those franchises. and every year players go there and they're not household names or they're players that have had some level of frustration over their career and suddenly they pop. That's the way it works. You've got to be part of the system. You've got to be in the right spot. If you do those things, you're going to get a lot of balls.

You're going to get a lot of opportunities and that offense is going to roll. So you've got three pieces of tape that I think are interesting. Brady is 40. You monitored him closely. I mean, when he came into the league, you were there. What is the first piece of tape you're going to show me about Tom Brady? Well, this is really Tom and Jimmy Garoppolo and looking at these two guys together. And so much has been made about Jimmy.

And I know you love him and you've got him in the Hall of Fame already after playing five games. Two more games. I've got him in. But the concern I have is this is one of the differences between him and Tom. And the great thing about Tom is his presence in the pocket. So typically what he's going to do whenever he feels any type of pressure is he's going to step up or he's going to slightly slide to the right or he's going to slightly slide to the left. And what that allows is the offensive line to understand exactly where they have to protect.

They've got to keep the pocket firm. And what it allows Tom to do is keep his eyes down the field. He never has to, the receivers don't have to adjust their routes. He can see down the field. He's able to place the ball down the field and that there's certainty with the offensive line. Now with Jimmy, it's a different situation. All right. Now, I'll show you why it works and why they're excited about Jimmy,

and then I'm going to explain some things that I'm concerned about. So this is the fifth play that he's in in San Francisco. The starter goes down. Fifth play is in, yeah. This is five seconds left in the game. The clock's running. San Francisco is going to run some slant routes over here to the left, a slant route to the right, and a little sit route.

They're going to try to catch and run and get it in the end zone. Here's Jimmy in the pocket. He looks down the field. There's nobody in a position. to catch and run. The defensive end is up the field. He's got some space over to the left. Lewis Murphy realizes that Jimmy's going to have to move or vacate the pocket,

so he's going to start moving to the left as well. So as Jimmy slides, you're going to see that Lewis Murphy now is in between four of the Seattle defenders. There's a box of defenders there, and he's moving to his left. And now he's got the defensive end and the defensive tackle in his face. But he's able to put the ball into a spot where the only person that can get it is Murphy. It's a great throw. It's a great throw. And when you look at this look as well as he's sliding, you can feel what he's feeling.

See how he's got to put it over the first defender in front of the second defender. God, that's great. And away from those guys on the left-hand side. So that's what they're excited about. Everybody's excited about that. And the other thing is he's moving to his left and his right-handed quarterback. All that stuff is exciting. Here's what I'm concerned about.

He's got seven touchdowns, and he's got five interceptions. So if you project that out, it's about Cam Newton's numbers last year. And it's a concern. It's a real concern. And take a look at preseason. Okay. Here's preseason with the Patriots. You see that same mobility.

He's able to make the defensive end miss. He's able to make the second defender miss as well. But now he's making some poor decisions. There's the first guy. Here comes the second guy. He thinks that he's going to be able to throw this receiver open and he throws the pick. So the question is, is he a make something happen player. And what it makes something happen player is, and we talk about this quite a bit,

is they make something happen for you that's really good and excited. but they make something happen for somebody else. And when you're talking about seven touchdowns and five interceptions, you can be excited about what happened, but those numbers are pretty alarming. So what you're saying is, and I think Andrew Luck did a little bit of this early in his career. He is athletic.

And when a player, you know, Chris Carter always says it's almost biblical. When you have a 45-inch vertical, you're going to want to dunk. When you have a great singing voice, you're going to sing in the car and sing in the shower. Garoppolo is athletic. Cam Newton is athletic. Andrew Luck is athletic. The key is harnessing it.

Like Jimmy likes to get outside, but it's fraught with peril. It's fraught with peril. And it's not just about getting outside the pocket. Aaron Rogers gets outside the pocket. But he makes really good decisions when he's outside the pocket. There's a difference between generating plays for you and understanding when to throw the ball away or that play that he had in the preseason where he's outside. the pocket, but now he's going to try to force the ball.

It's 13 to 10 at that point. It's the start of the fourth quarter. It's a really bad decision. So what's going to happen? Are we going to get more of these plays that we saw against Seattle? Are we going to get some combination where it's 60 good, 40 bad? And that's what's not known right now. Eric Mangini, he's been a head coach in the NFL twice, of course, worked with Parcells,

he worked with Belichick, he's worked with Jim Harbaugh. I, as a media person, don't understand a coach getting a new, job in Oakland, John Gruden, and not having multiple discussions with Khalil Mack. But you've been a coach. You've had players hold out. Every coach in the league has. Is it possible this is as much on Khalil Mack as Gruden? Yeah. Now, the way that I've read this is that Gruden has reached out to Cleo Mac and Khalil hasn't responded to any of those those outreaches. And I think the one thing that Odell Beckham did really well this offseason was he went and he showed up. And he he showed the new GM and he showed the new head coach, I want to be part of this program.

He went to the OTAs. He showed him that he was healthy. He showed him his work ethic. He showed him how he was going to operate in the team meeting rooms. And you saw their whole tone on O'Dell Beckham changed from the owner down in terms of their willingness now to redo a contract. With Khalil, when you don't respond to the head coach who's got a 10-year contract, who obviously has all the authority there, John's probably sitting back.

and saying, okay, if he's acting this way now, what's going to happen when he has all that guaranteed money? Well, what am I really getting here? And I don't think it's productive at all. Why not go have dinner? Why not go see what the similarities are? And then it becomes easier organizationally to say, hey, yeah, I want that guy. Yeah. I mean, in the end, Khalil Max, a great player. And I think the Raiders need more great players. So I hope they get it done because I think the Gruden story is fascinating. Carson Wentz is coming back to the Philadelphia Eagles. Is there any chance when a guy was coming back injured to your team, any chance he'd rush it?

Yeah, there's a lot of chance of guys rushing it. And sometimes you've got to save them from themselves because they're wired to be out there. They're wired to get back as quickly as they can. And sometimes guys do rush it and they re-injure themselves. and I think in his situation, it's a little bit unique in the sense that he's got someone that has been very successful at his position

the year before. There is a level of competition there that doesn't exist in most places in the quarterback position. And I'm sure in the back of his mind, he's probably thinking, yeah, I want to get there, and I want to establish that this is my team,

but that could end up being a big problem. By the way, we got five teams, rookie quarterbacks. think some are going to bust, some are going to be great. What do you do? You've coached the Jets. We've got a minute left. Bridgewater's good enough to start. McCown, I thought, was terrific last year in a mentor, and the young guy, Sam Darnold. Would you start in week one? Well, no, you wouldn't necessarily want to. And those young guys develop at different rates.

But when you hear the comments coming out of the organizations, so Chris Johnson, who's taken over 40, the owner of the Jets, his brother has said that the drafting of Sam Donald was a pivotal moment in the organization. As they look back to this moment, incredible things are going to happen. There's been so much pressure put on playing him and him being the savior from the top down. It's going to be hard for the head coach, who to some degree is on the hot seat, and the GM, who to some degree is on the hot seat, to keep that guy on the bench very long,

especially if they struggle a little bit early. Yeah, and their schedule is brutal. Jet schedule is absolutely brutal. They could play well and be two and four. Easily. And look, they need to fill the stadium. They need to get people excited. There's a lot of excitement around the New York Giants.

And the Jets don't want to play second fiddle to the other New York team. So playing Sam Darnel, that generates excitement. That gets people in the stands. Eric Mangini, hour three, T.J. Hushman Zada next. This is The Hurt, hour number three, live in Los Angeles, Iheart Radio, Fox Sports Radio and FS1, wherever you may be and however you may be listening. It is great to have you in. Hour number three live, 15 minutes.

T.J. Hushmanzada, who is the most outspoken, honest, detailed, interesting NFL guests we've recently found here at FS1. I covered him in college. Joy Taylor is joining me for hour number three, a very disturbing story that we've both discussed. We will get to that in five minutes with more news on Urban Meyer and the story. of domestic violence. Did he know or did he not know? Did he cover up? Did he lie? Was it negligence? But before I get to that, there's some interesting news out of the NBA. Big news. So let me start with this. Mark Stein, credible reporter. I actually recently tried to hire him for my podcast network. A very, very good reporter. Buzz is real. The Knicks are going after Kyrie Irving.

They're going to go after him. This follows up other credible reporters. that Kyrie Irving in 11 months can go anywhere and he is interested in New York. Okay, all I want you to know is this. That three weeks before LeBron ended up in L.A., Dante Jones told me off the air, and I promised not to use him as a source, he said, LeBron's going to L.A. Now, I didn't go on the air with that because Dante Jones gave me inside information. I could move my commentary certain ways,

but Dante Jones knew LeBron was coming to L.A. And he said it. He goes, I think he's going to happen. It was the kind of thing that a friend tells a friend, right? Stuff information that I wouldn't have. Well, Dante Jones was on our show a couple days ago, and Dante Jones is connected to LeBron and a lot of star players in the league.

And here's what Dante Jones said about the next hot NBA city. I think New York is going to be the new hotspot next year. year because they have a great coach. The organization is moving in the right direction. I think their culture, that city, and the cap space that they could have, and you could play with who you want to play with. I think that's going to be the new hotspot. I think guys are going to be looking at that very seriously next year.

All right. James Dolan owner, worst in the league is why the Knicks have been bad. It's not because people don't want to go to New York City. Don't look at Paul George and tell me, well, he chose Oklahoma City. He could make a lot more money in Oklahoma City. George is an outlier. There's always players that do things that other players wouldn't do. Don't buy into this.

Cities don't matter in the NBA. Here's three things we know that are happening. Players have never been richer in the NBA. Stars like to hang out with stars. And we also have a trend in the NBA where stars are joining each other. Okay, you can't deny those. Tell me the four cities that stars have joined four. in the last seven, eight years.

Miami, Bosch, Wade and LeBron, Boston, Ray Allen, KG joined Paul Pierce, Houston, Chris Paul and now Mello, Joey Hardin, and San Francisco. Miami, Boston, Houston, San Francisco. No Indianapolis in there. No Portland in there. No Milwaukee in there. No Orlando in there. What cities did they leave?

Cleveland, Minnesota, Oklahoma City. We got Boogie Cousins now. Where did he end up? Silicon Valley like Kevin Durant. Like don't buy into this. Forbes magazine just listed the most valuable franchises in the NBA. Six of the top nine didn't make the playoffs. Many of them, it wasn't close.

Knicks, Lakers, Warriors, Bulls, Celtics, Nets, Rockets, Clippers, Mavs. So these are real stories. By the way, ever notice how often you see Blake Griffin, Chris Paul and Mello in the finals? Oh, not actually playing. They're in commercials. You get more commercials. You make more money in major markets.

Baker Mayfield played in Oklahoma. Baker Mayfield got drafted by Cleveland. Where did he spend his summer? Here in L.A. Odell Beckham. Where do he spend his summer? Here in L.A. So, and don't forget who's got all the cap space next year in the NBA?

Lakers, Clippers, Brooklyn, New York Knicks, and the Chicago Bulls. So this story by Mark Stein and Kyrie Irving is a real story. You can read books. They're doing studies now. Small markets are struggling to get doctors. They're struggling to get kids at a med school. They don't want to live there as much. Society is more mobile.

NBA stars are the most mobile. The NBA is a star-driven league. 70% of NBA NFL owners own homes in Los Angeles or New York. Don't buy it. This Kyrie Irving, Nick's thing, is real. Now, he'd be leaving a great franchise to a bigger city, Boston to New York. But don't for a second tell me markets don't matter. What happens is small markets drafted some really good players.

You know, Westbrook and Seattle had Durant, and they moved to Oklahoma City, and Indiana gets Paul George. And yes, and those small markets, Tim Duncan goes to San Antonio, and they look like they're dominating the league. But in the end, in an era when stars are joining each other, in an era when the NBA's never been more star-driven and mobile, and in an era when people are joining forces and moving regularly, in and out of sports, don't tell me New York's not viable.

Capspace next year, stars moving, they've already moved. Watch this story on Kyrie Irving and the Knicks. It's a real thing. The other big story today from a credible source, Brett McMurphy, that a football coach under Urban Meyer, Zach Smith, a Buckeye-wide receiver coach, Urban Meyer says he was unaware three years ago of the domestic violence incident involving his receiver coach and his then-wife, Courtney Smith. However, Brett McMurphy reported today, right before our show,

through a string of interviews and text messages he uncovered that Meyer did know, about the 2015 incident, 2015 incident, in which the receiving coach was arrested for felonious assault and domestic violence of his then wife. There's multiple text messages. Should be noted.

This same coach, who's now been fired at Ohio State, Zach Smith, was with Urban Meyer for five years in Florida and had another incident, although charges were not pressed. Urban Meyer says, I didn't know anything about it.

Bruce Feldman, Fox College Football Reporter, told me an hour ago, that Urban is in big trouble if this is true and he is being deceptive about it. The reality is you can't say there was nothing there when some of this other stuff comes out, especially the documentation, as you mentioned, Brett McMurphy had reported on. It does not look good for Urban Meyer and Ohio State, especially in the wake of last week saying, you know, I just found out about it last night. It's such a head scratcher, how he went to that press conference and just seemed like he was not prepared

to talk about it and address it. And then he created more questions than he answered. We do know that Urban Meyer's wife knew about it in 2015. Those texts have been uncovered. So if you're an Ohio State fan and you're going to defend the coach, you can say, well, she didn't tell Urban Meyer about it. Good luck with that. You can also, the football operations director's wife also knew about it.

You can say she didn't tell Urban Meyer. Those are major, that's a major job. If you are connected to the football operations job at Ohio State, that's a big six-figure job. If you knew this was out there and you're connected to that job and you didn't tell Urban Meyer, you would be fired. So to me, lying negligence, I think it's a really bad look. Well, it's an indictment not just on Urban Meyer, but on his entire staff. If they're saying that everyone's wife on the entire staff knew, so then we're assuming all of the wives are conspiring to not tell their husbands who work on the staff that this is going on. But that's not even the biggest part of the story to me. I think

everyone is missing the biggest indictment of the story that in 2009, this Zach Smith guy attacked his wife, who was eight to ten weeks pregnant, was arrested. This is when he was coaching under him in Florida in 2009. And Urban knew about it. And Earl Bruce went to his grandson's wife, the woman who was assaulted, and asked her to drop him. the charges. There's no way Urban Meyer knew about this. He already admitted that he knew about it. He said it was an incident.

Throwing your pregnant wife up against the wall and getting arrested for it and then having his grandfather go to her and ask her to drop the charges is not an incident. So he knew about that and kept him on the staff after that and then brought him to Ohio State with him. Yeah, it's an awful look. And we are more punitive and rightly so against men in power who abuse it. and this looks really, really bad. We've had coaches deny stuff.

Art Brials fired at Baylor. Joe Paa fired at Penn State. Rick Bettino denied stuff, fired at Louisville. That is the trend as we have become more conscientious about situations like this and more appropriately punitive. So now Urban Myers, very good and well-liked. Ohio State's a massive program. How will this play this point forward? They'll probably have an investigation.

but it is a damning story and a really ugly story to say the very least. And there's no win there. Oh, I don't get it. It's not about calling for someone's job. It's forget calling for someone's job. This is a leader of young men.

You're putting him in charge of your student athletes knowing that this is something that he is involved in. What did you just think this was never going to happen again? You expect anyone to believe that? It is. Like Urban, but, you know, I'm the athletic director today. I have a long, hard talk. And I don't know what I do.

I know there would be a suspension. I don't know. You know, coaches are often convincing on the dais. They can be so convincing. Remember, college coaches are salesmen. They are. They're all salesmen. Rick Patino's a salesman.

Urban Meyer's a salesman. They get 25 players every year. You've got to be a salesman. You got to go home, schmooze the dad, make the kid think, you're cool, make the mom think you're adorable. Like, that's what college coaches do. NFL's not about being a salesman. You're in dark rooms watching film.

College coaches got a lot of actor in them. I mean, they're incredibly convincing when they go to the podium. They are. I mean, Rick Patino, wag his finger at you. Denial, Art Bryles, give you that Texas y'all. Deny it. I mean, Joe Paterno, small town Pennsylvania, deny it. They're all incredibly convincing because they sell themselves and their program

and honesty and ethics for a living. That's what they sell every day at their program to parents and kids. T.J. Husband Jada is around the corner on the show. Get ready for the best young basketball stars in the world at the first ever junior NBA World Championship featuring players from 70 countries on 32 teams all in one global event. The championship begins Tuesday on FS1 or stream it live on the Fox Sports app. With that I bring in a multiple time pro bowler. over a decade in the NFL.

I covered him in college, outspoken, brutally honest, well-connected, T.J. Hushman's Auto. Tomorrow, Ravens Bears, the Hall of Fame game this weekend, the Hall of Fame festivities. T.O. will not be there. You know T.O. Why is he doing this public stand? He's going to be in Chattanooga, where he went to college, which I think is kind of cool. I like that. Now you've got a big skirmish. He won't go to the Hall of Fame. Hall of Fame won't even acknowledge that he exists. Why is he doing this?

You know, it's, if you go back to, for years, it was, who's the best receiver in NFL? T.O. Randy Moss, T.O. Randy Moss. And for T.O. not to get in on the first ballot and Randy Moss to make it first ballot. For other people, it's like, oh, T.O. was not the, was not better than Randy Moss. And so it's his way of, it's not against the Hall of Fame. It's the writers. The Hall of Fame, they have nothing to do with this, but they're just in the crosshair, so to speak. and before you have a family and before you have kids, it's always about me. It's always about you. Tio is thinking about you, which is himself.

And he's putting himself, we all put ourselves first. Always. Until you have kids in your family, you put yourself first, always. Oh, the team. If I do well, the team does well. Everybody puts themselves first, and this is what he's doing. and think about this. What Tio is doing, we've talked about it so much.

This will be remembered more than had he gone to Canton and gave his speech. This will always be taught. Every year the Hall of Fame is approaching, they'll talk about the year that T.O. did not show up. And this is probably what he wants, because this will be talked about forever because no one has ever done this. You have interesting insight to the power struggle in New England between Kraft the owner Brady Belichick and Alex Guerrero because you know Alex Guerrero.

I theorize that the trouble all started back when Tom Brady started a clinic, Tom Brady's pliability with Alex Guerrero. And it created a divide in the locker room. I don't think Tom wanted to, but Tom's aging well. Alex Guerrero is respected by guys like you. And Tom siphoned off a few of the players to work out with Alex. not the Belichick team staff. So when I look at all this power struggle stuff,

people point to Malcolm Butler and Deflategate, I'm like, no, no, no, no. This was the first time that Brady listened to somebody beyond Belichick. Guerrero became sort of his muse, became his guru, his Spangali. You know Alex Guerrero. How comfortable do you think he is now in the crosshairs of all this? Because it feels like he is. He's fine.

And how it works is Alex would be out here in Southern California. and him and Tom would work out. Well, when Tom works out, West Walker would be here. And then Julian Edelman would come out here. So as they're working out, Alex is working on them. So when you go back to New England,

it's not going to stop. And so now they tell the other players, oh, man, you need to have Alex. Dr. G. work on you, bro. He really knows. So then it evolves because guys talk in the locker room. What's wrong with you? Go see Alex.

He'll get you right. Right. And I think it became a problem when Alex, the trainers, they feel threatened. They feel threatened. The Patriot trainers feel threatened by Guerrero. Yeah. He can't work on everybody. He's only 24 hours in a day.

So, I mean, I don't know why you feel threatened. He's just going to work on the best players. And do you believe, like, if you were a young receiver and you walked into the Patriots, I would think I want to curry favor with Brady. I would have no problem going to the, that's my takeaway. TJ, if you were a rookie and you're like... I'm trying to get in. With Tom Brady.

100%. I want to be... Alex, I'm in the next room. Tom, come over. So I totally get Brady's at the end of his career. He's trying to create extension of his career. And in your opinion, Guerrero is the best you've ever seen at that. He just does.

It's just... And it's crazy because it's not like some crazy invention. He just works the muscles in your body. Like, it's people make it like he's some witch doctor. He's not. He just works the muscles in your body. Did he work on you? Yeah. I mean, it hurts like hell. It's not like it feels good. It hurts. Like, you want to cry sometimes. It hurts. But you wake up the next day.

You're bruised up, but you feel better. You feel better. Now, do you think it's fair when reporters go up and ask Brady about Edelman's suspension? Because Edelman now uses Guerrero and uses Tom Brady's clinic. Do you think it's fair for guys like me to go, Tom, Edelman has been clean? He's in your clinic. Now he's busted. I do believe that's a fair question because that's an answer that people want to know. When nobody knows what happened with Julian Edelman getting a suspension. But I could tell you, unless Alex has changed a lot, which I'm sure he has because of the clinic with Brady,

he wasn't really one to give you a bunch of different supplements, at least not with me. But I didn't take any supplements when I played. And so nobody just sees one person. when Julian is out of town he's going to work out he's going to work out with different people somebody might give him you don't know what happened but is it a fair

question 100% it's a fair question yeah the um you know it's funny this past week when I think of you I think of somebody that's low maintenance you were a worker you were a grinder that's not that you're not talented but I never thought of you as difficult you could have an opinion

but you're not difficult you're outspoken but you're not difficult des Bryant I watched the Amazon Prime series and I'm like I don't want that guy in my room. He is crazy. I think that series hurt him. I think coaches sit down and watch that because, by the way, preseason hasn't started. It was in between camps.

You're just sitting home and football's on. And Amazon Prime and Des Bryant. You tell me what a player say about Des. For the most part, when you're around your coach all the time, you're going to voice your opinion. and it's just unfortunate that it was recorded and for the world to see. Now, to that extent, there's only three or four guys per team that can do that. Every team you're on, there's three or four guys that they get away with more than others. In Cincinnati, who was the guy?

Chad. Offense, it was me, Chad. Skill guys, me, Chad Carson. You could throw back on coaches. Yeah. Yeah, Carson wouldn't. Chad would and I would at times. Yeah. And minds would be, which I learned was dumb

and I wish I had somebody there to tell me that I was being dumb would be I was always critical, not even critical, just over-analysing why we run this play if they're playing this defense. You tend to be an over, you're a thinker. Yes. And coaches don't like when you question their thinking about why we're doing something. Of course they don't, yeah. And I learned that the hard way.

And so with Dez, it's he just has to understand. If you want to play, bro, you got to watch what you say because the narrative is you're a bad teammate, you have a bad attitude. You can't go tweeting at the play calling is bad. You can't go tweeting about your teammates because all you're doing is confirming what they perceive to be the truth by putting these Twitter these tweets out.

It's like, oh, okay, yeah, this is Des, just ignore it. Leave it alone. By the way, tomorrow, Lamar Jackson and Mitch Trubisky play. Trubisky, I didn't love him in college. I don't love him as a pro prospect. I think he's Garoppelow with a much lower ceiling. Lamar Jackson, I think has a higher ceiling. I just don't quite think he's ready yet.

There's a lot of talk about Lamar Jackson. I'm always concerned when a college quarterback can't complete over 60%. And Lamar had Bobby Petrino, who's a great option. offensive coach. Tomorrow, we're going to see Lamar Jackson. What do you expect? I expect them to have a lot of success in the preseason for the simple fact. When is he going in the game?

Probably third quarter, late second quarter. Against scrubs. Against guys that he dominated in college. And by the way, guys who will not make the pros. I will never say a scrub because people don't realize. You're right. You're right. That's not a cool name.

There we go. He's playing against guys who will probably not make the league. These are, a lot of these guys are the same type of players that he dominated in college. So I see him playing well. I see him running the ball. I see him throwing a ball because these are not, one, you're not game planning. And two, you're just not going against a caliber of a player that can shut that down. You know, what happens in the preseason a lot is vanilla defenses.

So it's actually a time for a young quarterback. Like, Dak Prescott in the preseason looked fantastic because defensive quarter. coordinators don't show anything. Right. So Lamar's going to see pretty basic coverages. And you have to be basic because the guys that are going in, you try to get too fancy. Somebody's going to blow a assignment.

So you're going to play at one high show that's cover three or cover one. You're going to play a two high show, whether it's cover four, cover two, cover six. So it's going to be things he's seen in college already. He's not going to have to think about it. This is to me the big controversy in the league because Flacco has been garbage for three years. He really has. His quarterback rating over the last three years is 35th.

There are backups with better. Lamar is going to face in the preseason vanilla coverages. And frankly, guys who won't make the league. So when he scrambles out of the pocket, he's going to have success. You mark my words, in three weeks, there is going to be a chorus of people. Lamar. Quarterback controversy. Oh, it's going to be, I say, Lamar's Tibeau with more talent.

I mean, you saw Tebow in the preseason. Everybody's like, oh, my God. Then the quarterback struggle. And by the way, Baltimore, like Denver, has been successful, has Super Bowls, has a loyal fan base that pays attention. They're not interested in the Steelers going four and O and they're one in three. I think Lamar in the preseason, I think you're going to hear a chorus. He's going to play well.

I think mostly he is. Unless they get him some reps with the starters, which is almost impossible because Flacco needs those reps. And starters, by the way, starters only play a full quarter and a half in game three. They don't play in the fourth game. They don't play much in the first game. A lot of times the coach wants to, they'll play two and a half quarters. I know when I was playing, we'd start the game, we'd play the first half,

and then we'd play one drive into the third quarter because they want to get you used to coming after halftime and getting in the game again. And so he'll probably go a drive into the third quarter, Flacco, the third preseason game with the starters. And so once again, Lamar's going to look like a superstar. I foresee him playing extremely well in the preseason. Can't wait.

Good seeing you, bud. Thank you. T.J. Hushmanzado, when you're ready to buy a new car, Hyundai, has a new program called the Shopper Assurance Program. They have three-day worry-free vehicle exchange, flexible test driving, transparent pricing, streamline, purchasing, no paperwork. Go to HyundaiUSA.com slash shopper assurance.

Here's Joy with the News. No, no, no, no. Turn on the news. This is the Herd Line News. So Karim and Abdul-Jbar could be the most accomplished player in basketball history. Some even consider him to be the greatest ever. But Karim told Mark J. Spears of the undefeated. These goat discussions are,

Fun distractions while sitting around waiting for the pizza, but they're on par with which superpower would you want most? Flight or invisibility. There's no such thing as the goat because every player plays under unique circumstances. I understand what he's saying, but this is a little too reasonable for sports fans. What's happening? I grew up watching Kareem. Right. We always forget this.

I saw the end of Wilt's career. But as a kid growing up, I saw Kareem in his prime. As much as we love Michael Jordan, nobody ever blocked Kareem's shot. Like, we forget this. The greatest score I ever saw in the NBA was not Michael Jordan. The most dominating score I ever saw was Wilt, who I saw him in 72. Right. And then Kareem.

Now, Michael's 6 for 6, and Michael's better this and Michael's better that. Kareem's always been lost in the all-time great conversation. If you take out centers, Michael's the best ever. But Russell's got 11 rings, and Jabbar is the greatest score I've ever seen. So we just don't count centers because they hit the lottery. They hit the DNA lottery, and we don't count, you know, Shack weighs 350 and can run. But I think a lot of people, we just have glossed over the fact that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was the leading score. Right.

Has multiple titles. Literally changed the entire NBA Milwaukee to the Lakers, really created the Laker. The biggest brand of the NBA was created by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. It's fair, but he's saying he doesn't even mind if he's not in the goat discussion. He just doesn't think it's like a reasonable one to have. The superpower one is interesting, though. I don't know which superpower I would want. Yeah.

Well, I always tell my son, you would not want to be invisible. No. It's the most overrated superpower, never be invisible. Because then you'd hear people say awful things about you and it would hurt your self-esteem. Like a lot of people don't like me I'd rather just not hear about it all day That's why I stay off Twitter I mean who wants to hear all day

If you were invisible And you're the show ends And you go to a friend and go Colin is needy And I don't like him And I hear it because I'm the invisible man Then the next day I come out And I can't look at you

And the show tanks And I go upstairs by the way Because nobody can see me I go to my boss's office And he's like Should we re-up coward? I don't know I think he's annoying

Nobody really likes him I don't want to hear All those discussions That's fair That's fair I think I would I think I'd want to fly. Because then he could get around really quickly, especially in LA.

Here's the downside. Okay, here's the downside to flying. If you had the superpower to fly and you could fly, you'd do it one time. Everybody in your neighborhood would see, and you'd become a freak in the United States. So you literally would do it one time. Everybody would go, Colin Coward and Joy Taylor can fly. And you would literally be, you would never be able to walk out of your house again. The media would be on you.

A scientist. The U.S. government would be on you. If you fly, you wouldn't fly like in a forest where nobody can see you. You'd fly to the stars. How much thought have you already put into this? This is so practical. This conversation is supposed to be fun. The best superpower you can have is, um, no, I think the best one you can have is flame throwing.

Flame throwing? Yeah. Why? When is that useful? And that is completely useless in California. No, no. You'd have to be like Elsa and wear the gloves. You'd burn the whole state down.

You literally couldn't sell your home. You just burn it up. And you tell them, I don't know what happened. It was somebody burnt my house down. But they wouldn't know what happened because you're a flamethrower guy. You've given way too much thought to this. All right. David Fisdale has an end goal in mind as the new coach of the Knicks.

We talked about this a little bit today. The Larry O'Brien trophy is his goal. While visiting Chris Stap's Porzingis in Latvia, Fisdale said, I want to take the Knicks to the championship. This is my main and greatest goal, Latvia, in the building of relationship with players, that they are more than simple coach player relations. I believe that establishing such a link

as a way to overcome the difficulties in the playoffs. Good people get fired in life. Fisdale was fired. He is beloved by LeBron. Kyrie Butler. Players love David Fisdale. They do. If you get Dolan out his owner,

Fisdale's now the coach. That's when the Knicks get very interesting. He is, by the way, everybody, I mean, Mark Cuban was fired. I mean, Howard Stern was fired. fired. We got to get over this guy. Just because you're fired is not. That's not an indictment on your ability. We all know what happened there with Fisdale.

And NBA coaches almost always move around to different locations. So that's not an indictment on Fisdale. Players definitely love Fisdale. I don't know so much about James Dullin selling the team. I'll believe that when I see it. But I am rooting for Fisdale and I do agree that the next are going to be interesting in the next couple years. Because it's just about time. It's just, we'll Dolen destroy it, which, you know, you just can't really predict. But I do like that Fisdello is talking about championships

as opposed to D&Tonie, who just just wants to be great. We just want to, we just want to be good. You know, just show up. Finally, Cowboys running back to coach Gary Browns. He's a different Ezekiel Elliott this year. He's comparing it to last year when Zeeke had the ongoing NFL personal conduct policy

investigation going on. He said it's a completely different Zique than it was last year and he's much better shape mentally. He doesn't have all that stuff on his mind. He's a clear vision on what he wants to do and what he wants to be and he wants to be the best. We're going to get a good Zeeke this year, he is on a mission. I think this is very important for the Cowboys that Zieg stays on the straight and narrow because

not to put blame on any particular person, but this situation, however badly the NFL handled the investigation is a different story because Zeeke put himself in the situation to begin with. So it's on Zique. But I think the genesis of the Cowboys falling apart last year was not knowing if Zik is going to be available. If you don't know week to

week whether your best player is available or not, everything else is inevitably going to fall apart. Yeah, Don, this is why. never forget this. The Cowboys were 9 and 7 last year in a division with the Super Bowl champions with a tough schedule and nothing but controversy from camp on.

The people that are selling, now, by the way, they've got really good pass rushers who have developed. Their offensive line can't be less healthy than last year. Zeeks back and Dax's older and Des the headache's gone. That's why I tell you, Dallas is a real team. They are a real team without the controversy waiting them down.

I like them this year. Well, let's see if they can keep the controversies out. For sure. Joy Taylor with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by. The Heard Lie News. Today's best for last really is the best for last.

This is a very interesting NFL season. There are 10 teams in this league to me that are just more captivating, interesting, and dramatic. What are the 10 biggest questions and most interesting storylines in the NFL this year? The 10 teams to me that are simply more capital. captivating that's next in best for last. We do it every day at this time. We call it best for last. After almost three hours, Colin apparently hasn't gotten to the point yet.

Quit holding out on us, cowherd. It's the best for last. So tomorrow marks the start of the NFL preseason joy. The Ravens, Lamar Jackson will see him play. The Bears, Mitch Trubisky. I'm not sure what to make of him. It was never a guy I would have drafted over Deshaun. Johnson. So it marks the Hall of Fame game. So it's fun. Football's back. And I love this time of the year because I love football. So I thought to myself, there's a lot of interesting storylines. Some I know the answer, some I don't. And I thought, what are the 10 most captivating storylines? Some will end very sadly and poorly. Some could add very heroically and greatly. Here's the top 10 storylines to me in the NFL. Number 10, Pete Carroll, Seahawks, is he on the hot seat?

Okay. A lot of people, myself included, think they could end up in third or fourth place. Okay, he's in the last year of his contract, and he's getting older. Cliff Averill came on my show a month ago and said, after they lost that Super Bowl, people stopped listening to Pete in the locker room. They got very political. Richard Sherman bangs on Seattle. He's now a nineer in division. Cam Chance for a great player retired.

Earl Thomas is holding out. You know, they lost their star receiver, Richardson. they drafted a rookie at running back in their first round, and a lot of people thought it was a reach. I don't know what's going on in Seattle. I don't feel good about the optimism. The Legion of Boom is now the Legion of Bust. It's not a great home field advantage now,

and it's not a dominating defense. Now, they have Russell Wilson. I think Pete's a really good coach. They have Doug Baldwin, a very good receiver. They have Bobby Wagner's a tremendous linebacker, and if Earl Thomas is in camp, he's great. But I think Seattle's a fascinating team. Number nine.

What are the Ravens going to do with Lamar Jackson? He's going to plan the preseason. Flacco has been hot garbage for the last three years since he won the Super Bowl. Joe Flacco, his passerating is 35th in the league below Blake Bortles. He's been bad. And inside the organization, one of the reasons they drafted Lamar Jackson is they think Flacco can be disinterested and really apathetic in the offseason. He comes into camp out of shape and plays himself in shape. This year reportedly, he's had a great camp.

Lamar Jackson, what worries me, even in college with a great offensive coach, he completed under 60% of his throws. I don't think he's ready yet, but he's going to look good in the preseason because he's going to play vanilla defenses, and most of the guys he's going to face in the second half of preseason games are not NFL players, and he is. I think this is going to be a fascinating story all year long. Number eight. Philadelphia Eagles. Okay, nobody wins the NFC East back-to-back. Has it happened since like 2003-2004.

Nobody wins Super Bowls back to back. That hasn't happened since the Patriots back in 2003, 2004. The NFC East of Giants are significantly better. Alec Ogletry, Deshawn, Sequin Barclay, Nate Soder, Odell Beckhamback, betterhead coach. The Cowboys have won 22 games in the last two years. Only New England and Pittsburgh have more, and they look like they're better. This team's gotten cocky, they've gotten political, they've gotten outspoken, and Carson Wentz isn't ready to play yet. Fascinating Super Bowl.

champion story. Number seven. Browns and Baker Mayfield. Listen, he's not ready to play right now. He's not. He shouldn't have been a number one pick. And Hugh Jackson wants to win games, so they bring over Tyrod Taylor, who's a savvy veteran who makes no mistakes and moves the chains. Well, Tyrod Taylor right now is better than Baker Mayfield. But that ownership group, you've got to remember in Cleveland since 1999, they've had 28 different starting quarterback, several GMs, multiple coaches. I think Baker, is a Case Keenum prototype. So I think we should lower expectations,

but I think the Brown's owner thinks he's the next John Elway. And I think they're going to rush him onto the field. It's going to be fascinating. Number six. Andrew Luck, missed all the last year, beat up, finally appears they've got their offensive line, at least guard-center guard, figured out.

Two of their first three picks, really good offensive linemen. They finally gave him an offensive line. coach, Frank Reich, who was the coordinator over there under Doug Peterson with the Super Bowl winning Eagles. They're actually, their personnel isn't great. They're still in the rebuilding mode. But the AFC is pretty wide open.

And that division, do you trust Jacksonville? Do you trust Tennessee? We don't know a ton about Deshawn Watson. Andrew, look, we haven't seen them playing a year and a half. Fascinating. Number five. What is the youngest coach in the NFL, Sean McVey? How's he going to handle that circus?

Listen, he's a 32-year-old guy. And this locker room has more stars and divas than anybody in the NFL, and we're living in Los Angeles. Because Jared Gough doesn't make much, they can go out and get Indomacan Suh and Marcus Peters and Akim Talib and Brandon Cooks. That's a lot of mouse to feed. That's a lot of money. That's a lot of egos.

Thank God he's got Wade Phillips on the defensive end. They also haven't signed Aaron Donald. How's that playing in the locker room? Because after Todd Gurley, he's probably the most beloved player in the locker room. They're coming off a big year. There's high expectations. Is Jared Goff as good as he was last year? Or is he closer to what he was his first year overwhelmed?

Man, this is an absolute circus. I think they're going to be good. But I think Indomac and Sue and Marcus Peters are one-year rentals. They got kind of a Rondo-Land-Stevenson feel to him. We'll see how it plays out. Number four. Well, Jimmy Garapolo had a passer rating of 100. Now his rating is NC-17.

He's dating porn stars. I don't know what's going on. We've got Jimmy Garoppolo, 7 and 0 as a starter, 2 and 0 in New England, 5 and 0 in San Francisco. Now he's a public figure. They went 138 million for him, so they are all in a five-year deal. This is a proud franchise that's had Joe Montana, Super Bowl, Steve Young, Super Bowls, Kaepernick, Controversy, Harbaugh. The Niners have historically been very, very interesting.

and there's, you know, Eric Mangini said it earlier. Is he Brady or is he Tony Romo, a guy that's talented but makes the big mistakes in the clutch? I can't wait to watch. Number three. Raiders right across the bridge, right across the pond. What are they? John Gruden is a successful guy. When he went to the Raiders, he was with the Raiders for, what is it, four years.

And they made the playoffs in two of them. He turned Rich Gannon, a good quarterback into the league MVP. And they got fired and they went to Tamman won a Super Bowl. And then he went to television and he was a rock star. He's a very smart, successful guy. But man, he's been out of the sport for 10 years. 10 years. That's a generation of young players.

And now he's not talking to Khalil Mack. The division's got Philip Rivers in it. But he's got Derek Carr. And he reads really good. And John Elway's impatient in Denver. And this is the most combustible division in football and grooms at the top of it. and I frankly can't wait to watch. Number two.

Dallas Cowboys cut, got rid of Des Bryant. I think it helps the team. Half the people think it hurts the team. Can I just say this about Dak Prescott? 22 wins in two years in a tough division in the better NFC. That's the best in the NFC. Only New England at Pittsburgh has more wins in two years, 22. Nobody in the NFC does.

So, Dak can play. Whether you want to admit it or not, the kid can play. The kid is smart, the kid's mature, the kid is durable, the kid's pretty mobile, the kid's pretty accurate. But now it's year three. Desgon, Witten gone. Rommel criticizing him on television. They had a lot of pressure on back.

Ezekiel Elliott's back. That clouds lifted. I think the Cowboys are the second most captivating team in the NFL in number one. Number one. The Great Dynasty is it about to crumble. We got a power struggle. Robert Kraft, Bill Belichick, Alex Guerrero, Tom Brady. Brandon Cooks is deep threat.

Gone. Rams. Danny Emmons. Dola, great slot. Gone, Dolphins. No backup for Tom Brady. You got Julian Edelman's out the first month. Gronk only averages last five years, 10, 10 and a half games a season. This is the weakest roster they've ever had. We've got a Belichick Brady crafting that you can deny all the report you want, but it's not great. It's certainly not as good as it was five years ago. is the dynasty like the spurs in the NBA,

is it about with the old veteran head coach about to crumble? Keep you updated on the Urban Meyer Ohio State story. Joy and I talked about that. We're a couple days away from college football camps opening. The NFL opens tomorrow with the Bears and the Ravens. We will be back here. What a fun show today. I'm on Speak for Yourself later today.

And, man, a lot of moving parts. Here we go. I'm starting to smell the grass. In L.A. It's the herd. 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. In 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 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 I-Heart 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. 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 with 42.

Hey, Brett. My mama want you to weigh better. What? Hey, Ms. Parker. Listen to the Clifford show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas.

And I'm C.J. Toledano. It's our favorite time of the year on our podcast point game, the playoffs. We're digging into the biggest surprises of the season. And I'm looking back on some of my greatest playoff moments. If we didn't talk ever again, I was partying. you just understood. That's how personal it got. Wow.

Then after that game seven, Marquis coming to, he's like, you know I love you, dog. You know, it's all love. This was just playoffs. This was just basketball.

So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.