The Josh Innes Show - NBA ASG v. 4 Nations

Episode Date: February 17, 2025

I watched and bet on the NBA All-Star weekend festivities. I am a degenerate. I know it's easy and lazy to dump on the NBA ASG, but it really does suck. I think I have a fix for the ASG. I'm praying for a Canada/USA rematch in the 4 Nations... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All right, friends, so I did some degenerate shit this weekend by gambling on the NBA All-Star game and not just the All-Star game, but the multiple All-Star games and not just the multiple All-Star games. I also bet on the skills competition and the three-point competition and the dunk competition. I am a degenerate. Yes, I am. But actually, I was pretty successful betting on this shit let me tell you i know it's easy to say after the fact but the easiest money in history last night steph curry

mvp of the all-star games and we can talk about the format for it and all that and the lack of interest people have in it. But let me tell you this. It was plus 500 for Steph Curry to win the MVP. Five, zero, zero. That means $100 wins you $500. So I had a boost for the All-Star game on DraftKings, I think it was. So it boosted your stakes 50%. So instead of it being plus 500 something, it was plus 900 or somewhere along those lines, like eight something. I put

50 bucks on Steph Curry to win the MVP. Now keep in mind, Steph Curry is playing in his hometown. Steph Curry is a guy who's going to shoot. He's got the advantage of being in his home arena. And if it were close to anybody else, they were going to give it to him because it's his home arena, right? Well, put 50 bucks on that thing and won like $500. That was the easiest money ever. I also won the skills competition on, I guess it was Friday. Was that the skills competition or Saturday? I won with the team Cavaliers to win the skills competition.

I didn't win the three-point competition. I didn't win the dunk competition, which, by the way, my God, how do people watch this other than for gambling purposes? I wouldn't have gambled on this shit. There's no way in hell I'm sitting my fat ass on the couch on a Saturday night like, you know what I'm going to do. Actually, I also bet on the Rising Stars. That's where I won big, too. I won the Rising Stars competition. They had the four

teams, you know? And really, I'll give Jilly credit for this. This wasn't my idea. Jilly's the brains behind this. I tell you, my wife is a special kind of degenerate. She just knows this shit and she doesn't realize how much she knows about it. Like she kind of questions it. She's a fucking savant. Okay. But she goes, well, we watch the Grizzlies all the time. And this team has two members of the Grizzlies that are both pretty good. One of them could win the rookie of the year. He's probably not going to win it, but it would have a case.

And then you have Zach Eadie, Jalen Wells. She goes, I think that team's going to win. And they were like plus 300 to win it and I so their first game I took them to win and I took them to win the whole thing overall because you have to win two games it's just like the all-star game but with the rising stars fucking won that thing too like baffling truly like my wife is a gambling savant and it's fascinating so I really cleaned up on the all-star game this weekend and I've been cleaning up on the hockey on this Four Nations, which is fantastic, by the way. Much more entertaining than the NBA All-Star stuff. And I know it's easy to sit around and

shit on the NBA All-Star game and like Pro Bowls and shit because everybody does it. I'll be real with you. I'd much rather watch the full basketball game they used to play. And you're like, well, Josh, but it's like 180 to 175 and there's no defense. There's no defense in this shit either. So play a whole game. Like play into 40, like everything about it. Draymond Green shit on the idea of this. And his was for a different reason.

But his was, you got dudes that want to go out there and set all-star game records and shit and try to be like Michael and Kobe and all these guys and he got them playing to 40 it sucks and I agree with that I think the the concept of it sucks and I've seen people debating it and I've seen people debating it and everything else but man I'd rather it the way it was, especially for gambling purposes. Again, everything comes back to gambling for me because I'm a degenerate. But watching the game, you can't really take props for players in that because the games only go to 40 points. It's kind of lame. So I didn't really dig it. I'd much rather them just go out there and try to score 500 points in a basketball game than doing the stuff they're doing in this.

It didn't make it more competitive to me. It didn't make it more interesting. It just kind of sucked. And then they string this whole thing out because they got to fill like three hours of content. So they do big balls intros for all these guys and big vignettes about each team. They do a pregame show. They do the big balls vignettes and the player introductions.

Then after the little game to 40 happens, they do a whole breakdown of the highlights of it. They got Kevin Hart out there being painfully unfunny. Everything about it sucked. The musical acts were fine, but they're really stringing this thing out, trying to make it more interesting than it is, and it just isn't. And again, this goes back to a discussion that we've had a lot on this pod, which is people just don't have the attention span or the interest for this kind of shit anymore. You know, you look back on like Michael and Magic and all these guys playing in the late 80s, early 90s when basketball was in its heyday.

It's important to note that you didn't see these guys as much as you see them now. So back then, it was a big deal to see these guys play against each other. And these guys had a different level of pride where they actually wanted to win because they wanted to, you know, think about this, the dream team, when they had their practices, people said that the dream team practices were tougher than the actual games they play. Like these dudes wanted to kick each other's ass. I don't think these guys have that same mindset. And I think it kind of just comes from a new world, a social media world. And you can argue whether it's right or wrong or whatever, but it's reality. The reality is we're in a world now where social media and people are making money

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like a lot of these players don't want to do like look at the dunk contest the guy that wins the dunk contest now three years in a row is this gimmicky fucking G League guy. His name's Mac McClung. Just this white dude that keeps jumping over cars and tall dudes. And I'm like, this is boring, right? Like I'd rather see what the best players in the league can come up with. Like, I don't want to watch a dude who plays for the Osceola magic. Like the dude is a G League player for the Orlando magic. I don't know that a human can be any lower in the professional basketball world than to play for the G league of the Orlando magic. But this dude does. And his only thing he does is he comes out and he dunks. It's like the and

one mixtape to it. The guy's got one gimmick and the gimmick is he jumps over cars, which is fine. He jumped over a Kia, and then he jumped over a dude on a ladder, and people are like, oh, my God. But nobody wants to see Mac McClung. Nobody wants to see these slapdick guys. There was some other white dude. The dude's legs, I guess he plays sparingly for the bulls, I guess, Matusis or Batusis. This dude, they can't even land the dunks. It takes them a minute and a half to even land a shitty dunk.

It's boring. If we're going to do this, I want to see dudes that are putting pride in it and actually want to win the shit. I want a dude to be hurt that he lost. But here's the problem. The problem is these dudes don't want to lose and embarrass themselves. So if they embarrass themselves,

it's all over social media, they get shit on. It's easier to sit back and have people go, damn, I really wish you would have been in the dunk contest. And you go, yeah, I know, man, I should have. I could win it probably, man. They don't want to go out and get embarrassed. They don't want to go out and lose in these competitions. So what you end up with is a dunk contest with dudes you've never heard of, one of whom is a

G League player, a G League player that has won it three years in a row because he jumps over cars and shit. Dude's doing halftime gimmicks, basically. Essentially what you're seeing is a guy who's the equivalent of the Asian gal on the unicycle that twirls the plates. That's this guy. He's a halftime gimmick. He's quick change, which that's actually unfair to quick change because quick change is the greatest halftime show ever. But you get my point. So you get this boring event. The announcers are making fun of it. The players are making fun of it. None of them are interested. It's just like it doesn't even need to exist. But back in the day, you didn't see every game on social media. You didn't have apps where you could watch the NBA League Pass.

There was no NBA League Pass. So to see these dudes come together was kind of a big deal. It was the same for baseball, especially for baseball before there was interleague play. So if you go back to an era before interleague play, which I think started in 97 or 98. So you've got interleague play. There's an era before interleague play. So you only see your team. If you're a Phillies fan, you're only playing the national league. You're a Yankees fan. You're only playing the American league, right? So that's what you saw.

And you didn't have every game on TV. Like your home games might've been, but you weren't seeing as many, like you couldn't flip on an app and be like, well, I'm going to watch the Dodgers and the Giants tonight unless it was on TV. So to see an all-star game where, holy shit, here's Barry Bonds and holy shit, here's Ken Griffey, holy shit, that's a big deal because you didn't always see those guys and you felt like you were seeing something special. You're not seeing that anymore. And I know the world changes. I know people approach things differently. I know that the biggest thing I'll tell you is me as a sports fan, I just don't have the same passion for a lot of this shit anymore. I think, and a big part of it is the regular seasons are boring. The players essentially admit to you that they don't give a shit about the regular season.

And you're kind of like, okay, cool. My passion exists in football. My passion exists in college football. I am not a passionate fan in college football. I'm not a passionate fan of professional basketball. I'm not a passionate fan of professional hockey. I'm not a professional fan. I'm none of that for any of these other things. But the biggest issue is you've got leagues telling you these things don't matter, and then they're shocked when you don't tune in. But then you go to the other side of things and you look at this hockey this four nations thing which you know it's an olympic type of deal but it really took that turn whenever they threw the gloves down like 10 seconds or two seconds into the fucking game the other night against canada and they're throwing blows the

fans are booing the national anthem like that's got some fucking heat behind it and it turns out that that game was the most watched non-stanley cup hockey game in the last six years i believe since 2019 it is the most watched non-stanley cup hockey game in america and guess what canada's gonna play here in about half an hour whenever you're listening to this the game will have already started you'll already probably know who won canada has to win to stay alive. If Canada is able to win, they can move on because USA is already in the championship game of this, and Canada needs to win this game, and you can get the rematch of Canada versus the U.S. And I'll tell you this.

If you get the Canada versus USA rematch, nothing brings out people, well, especially in this era, you've got super patriots who will just start watching hockey because it's USA and they play Freebird for their goal song, which fucks, by the way. And then you've got the other side of people, hell, the ratings will be through the roof

because you get angry liberal people watching the root for Canada. 4.4 million people on average watched it in the last game. Now that it's got a week to build, now that you can hear it now, especially if it's Canada. If it's not Canada, I guess the other team would be Finland or Sweden. So if it's not Canada, it won't have as much pop. It needs to be Canada.

It needs to be Canada. We need drama. We need more booing of the national anthem. We need Trump. I want Trump at the game. That's what I want to see. I want Trump to take a break from whatever the fuck Trump is doing. And I want Trump to go out and be at the championship game of the four. It'd be brilliant. It would be absolutely unless he'd get shot, which maybe he would. Canadians are docile. What are they going to do? But there's going to be a booing. I mean, can you imagine a cooler atmosphere than the president

of the United States watching the United States hockey team take on Canada? I understand it's this weird made up fairy tale event. It's not like it's the Olympics. This isn't Lake Placid, but it's still a pretty big fucking deal. 4.4 million people watched it. I don't know that 4.4 million people watched the NBA all-star game. Maybe they did. Maybe they didn't, but who gives a shit, right? This at least has people talking. There's passion behind it. There's fights. There's booing the national anthem. Can you imagine Donald J. Trump in attendance at the championship game of the four nations face. Canada fucking hates him. God, it would be electric.

Holy shit, it would bring the house down. It would be must-watch television. And it already is. It is going to be must-watch and must-bet television, which, by the way, I did win on USA beating Canada over the weekend. I'm a patriot. Freebird, motherfucker. Play Freebird.

My ass is going to be betting on the USA no matter who the fuck they're playing. I hope it's Canada. Now I'm all patriotic over this shit. Like, it's got me all jazzed up. I'm all geeked up. And you got, like, the hardcore, like, right-wing people that all of a sudden are into hockey because of this. Then you got the left-wing people that are probably rooting for Canada because they hate fucking Trump. Like, it's just, this is fun. I need Trump. Where is this being played? I guess I should know that, but where are they actually playing this game? I need to know where the four nations face off

is happening. And I need to know if Trump can be there. It's actually in, okay. So it's in Canada. Wait, hold up. It's the games are being played in Montreal and Canada, hosted by the National Hockey League. Well, where's the championship game going to be played? Is it going to be played? Let's see. The league confirmed on June 8th that the venues would be Bell Center in Montreal

and TD Garden in Boston after months of reports. So where the hell is the championship game played? That's also what I need to know. But either way, it's going to be fucking electric and Trump needs to be there. God, that would be intense. Tell me that's not must watch television. You got the fucking MAGA people watching like fucking America. I don't even like hockey, but it's America. And the liberal people watching like, geez, I hope Trump gets shot. Like, oh my God, the intensity, the drama, the passion.

Come on, Canada. Shit, I'm going to have to get my ass over to Illinois a little bit. No, Canada's a heavy, heavy favor. They're going to win. They're like minus 400, which in hockey is ridiculous. So Canada's going to win. Maybe I'll be able to cash in on like a third period, like empty net goal bet or something since like everything's on the line. This is a good game to look for empty netters, friends, because it's a shit or get off the pot game so just compare it then you look over at the NBA all-star game and these guys are like whatever what if they did play an all-star game that was truly just based on their like well they could just play a racial all-star game and put the blacks against the whites and see what happens but that probably wouldn't go over too well. But it would have put eyeballs on the screen, wouldn't it?

But if you put, you know, I don't know if you have enough players from these different places. It would basically just have to be foreign players versus American players. But the reason why that wouldn't happen is because the American players wouldn't want to get embarrassed in that setting. There's no way they'd ever let that happen. But if you put guys like Lca and the joker and wimby and all these guys on the floor and i get they kind of did that in this thing with some international i'm talking flat out whole squad as international

dudes versus whole squad as american basketball players the the foreign dudes would beat the shit out of them i don't know if they beat the shit out of them. I don't know if they beat the shit out, but they beat them. I take them like you got Joker. I mean, Joker dominates every night on the floor. Dudes putting up like 30, 15 and 12 every night. Got Joker, Luca, Wimby, and you get these guys engaged and locked in. And then you find like some of those foreign guys that many of you have never heard of they can just hang out and drill threes and shit and then you got the fucking joker doing what he does getting 30 rebounds played in a full court full court game full length game i'm all for that like maybe that would drive some interest but it would also be

very divisive like in hockey this isn't divisive in the sense that like, because most of the players in hockey, I would assume are either Canadian or like foreign born dudes anyway. Like the American players aren't a ton of them. There's a number of them. There's a ton. Whereas in basketball, I think that can be quite divisive. And then the problem you're going to run into is a lot of these foreign guys are going to be white dudes. And then like, it's actually, it would be compelling as all hell. It will never happen because you don't want to see a world where like a squad of like LeBron and Anthony Davis and insert all the current American basketball players have to face foreign basketball players in a serious game. Again, the Joker can't slough off and shoot threes from midcourt. It's a real game.

And I think the foreign guys would beat them. These guys have been playing basketball professionally since they're eight years old. These guys will beat them. They are skilled dudes. That'd be compelling. That would be how you'd make the All-Star game compelling. Other than that, there's not. I don't want to see the G League guy jumping over cars.

I don't give a fuck about the G League guy. I'd rather see one of the best players in the league. I'd rather see John Morant go out there and try to do an awesome dunk because that's a legit NBA player and not some dude who in a couple years is going to be jumping over cars at halftime of college basketball games. Like, hey, at halftime of the Kentucky-Florida game, Mac McClung, the 14-time dunk champion, jumps over a Volvo. Like, I don't give a shit.

Like, when you saw Vince Carter dunking, you're like, holy shit, one of the superstars of the game is out here flexing. Not Mac McClung. He ain't one of the stars of the game. So anyway, four nations, go Canada, Trump go to the damn game, let's go.