The Kevin Sheehan Show - Jayden's Sacks + Randy Wittman

Episode Date: May 26, 2025

Kevin opened the show by responding to an email about Jayden Daniels' 47 sacks (6th most in NFL) in 2024. Former Wizards coach Randy Wittman joined Kevin to talk about several things including comments Marcin Gortat made about him last year, whether or not he thought there was a chance in 2016 that Kevin Durant would come here, Knicks-Pacers/Thunder-Timberwolves, and what kind of pro Maryland's Derik Queen will be. Kevin finished up with Nats, NHL, Maryland Basketball recruiting, and the on-going Ryan Clark-RG3 saga over a foul in a WNBA game.  Goldbelly.com, code sheehan, for free shipping and 20% off your first order of food from around the US.  Go To WindowNation.com. Buy 4 windows, get 4 free!Betting on sports? Go to mybookie.ag. Use code KEVINDC for a bonus! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You don't want it. You don't need it. But you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Cheon Show. Here's Kevin. One guest on the show with me today, former Wizards coach Randy Whitman will be on. He'll answer Martian Gortott's comments from a year or so ago

when Gortott said that it was a mistake to let Randy Whitman go because Randy knew how to control John Wall. Also, Randy's thoughts on the current NBA. playoffs and what does he think of Derek Queen as an NBA prospect. Randy Whitman, always good when he is on the show next segment for him. The show's presenting sponsor. As always, Window Nation 86690 Nation, windonation.com if you need new windows. Just a quick heads up. No shows tomorrow, Wednesday or Thursday. I'm taking a few days off this week. Should be back at the end of the week with Tommy.

This from Terry to start the show. Terry writes, Kevin, I know you don't want Jaden Daniels to be the team's leading rusher again this year, but I'd rather he be the teams leading rusher than continue to get sacked the way he did in his rookie year. He ranked sixth in the NFL with 47 sacks and was seventh in sack percentage. Either the offensive line has to be better or his processing. has to improve. Getting sacked in the pocket is the biggest risk to a quarterback, your thoughts.

It's interesting, Terry, that you put it the way you put it in that last line. Now, the first part of what you wrote, I'm going to spend some time on. The last thing that you said, getting sacked in the pocket is the biggest risk to a quarterback, I think that's true. I actually looked for any kind of data or research that says that quarterbacks get injured more so in the pocket than they do outside of the pocket. I could not find any real data. But I think what you stated there, it's intuitive to me that quarterbacks get hurt more often, at least serious injuries in the pocket than they do when they're outside of the pocket. The worst QB injuries, I think, you know, are when quarterbacks have eyes down the field, they're in the pocket,

and they get rolled into or they get hit at awkward angles by multiple rushers, you know, not when they're on the move outside of the pocket, and they've got vision as to where the defenders are. I would bet that mobile QBs get maybe injured more often, but the injuries are less serious, that the most serious injuries to quarterbacks happen when they're, they get hit in the pocket. Again, not a lot of research or data to back that up. I look for it. I can't really find it. I see a lot of opinions out there from NFL analysts that say that mobile

quarterbacks probably don't get injured as seriously as pocket quarterbacks do. But anyway, so I think that part of what you wrote, I think, is true. Now, the rest of it needs context, because your comments about Jaden's SAC numbers, they need context, just like his, you know, pressure to sack percentage in college, which was a big issue for a lot of people evaluating Jaden, that needed context. And I told you guys during the run-up to the 2024 draft that that number, that pressure to sack percentage number, was misleading because a lot of Jaden's sacks weren't, you know, true sacks. they were scrambles back to, you know, within two or three yards of the line of scrimmage, or they were plays in which he ran out of bounds, wasn't hit a yard or two short of the sticks. And that was the truth in college. And guess what? It's the truth in the NFL. Jaden's lost yardage average on sacks was 5.06 yards per sack loss.

That was the third lowest number or third best, depending on how you want to say it, in the league among starters. So yes, he was sacked the sixth most times. He did have the seventh highest sack percentage number in the league. But his average yards lost on a sack. Only Josh Allen at 4.5 lost yards per sack. and Brock Purdy at 5.03 lost yards per sack, which virtually is tied with Jaden. Only those two were better. And almost everybody else had a much higher number. It was in the mid-sixes to mid-sevenths in terms of average yards per sack loss.

And why is Jaden's sack yard average so low? You watched them all year, Terry. We all did because many of his sack. aren't really sacks. They are scrambles where he runs out of bounds, a yard short of the line of scrimmage. He's trying to make a play until he just steps out of bounds because he can't make a play. He scrambles in pressure and eventual sack situations back close to the line of scrimmage, you know, and gets down maybe just short of the line of scrimmage. He doesn't take a lot of those killer seven, eight, nine, ten yard losses in the pocket, which by the way, are drive killers in the NFL. All sacks are not alike. And at LSU it was the same thing.

You know, those that watched him knew that he didn't have a processing limitation. He didn't have a slow release. He processed super quickly. And we saw that this year at the NFL level. He's got a very quick release. He just takes advantage of his, you know, incredible elusiveness talent. to extend plays. And sometimes the play will end in technically a sack, but really just, you know, a very short loss where, you know, in many of those instances, he got out of bounds. Now, he could make the decision in many of those cases to just throw it away and save the one to two yard loss. I don't have the exact number of sacks of the 47 that were, you know, one to two yard losses that he ran out of bounds on, but we watched him. We know it happened frequently, and the lost yardage

average on Sacks tells you the story. The third best, and really tied with Brock Purdy for the second best in the league behind Josh Allen. The percentage of time he was pressured was not that high. It was in the 20s for much of the year, even though he was pressured more in the final few games than he was over, say, the first two-thirds or three-quarters of the season. He took, and I didn't realize this, maybe we had talked about this towards the end of the year. He took 18 of his 47 sacks over the last four regular season games. 38% of his sacks came against the Saints, Eagles, Falcons, and then in that one-half of the season finale against Dallas. before Marcus Mariotta came in.

He got sacked four times in that game in Dallas in the first half to end the regular season. In fact, he got sacked eight times in six quarters against the Cowboys. The Eagles sacked him seven times in three games, including in the championship game. That Dallas matchup last year, Washington's offense against the Cowboy defense was not a good one. I wonder why that is. Remember, in the game at home that they lost 34 to 26, the season finale, you know, was a game in which Washington had seating, you know, on the mind for sure. But the, that game at RF, RFK, that game at FedEx, that game at Northwest Field, whoa, that was flashback one, flashback two. They just got manhandled at the line of scrimmage. Dallas was living in the back,

field in that game at home when they lost 34 to 26. They still shouldn't have lost the game. But anyway, so some context to some of what you wrote, Terry, but I appreciate that. It sent me kind of, you know, digging into some of the sack numbers like I had done when he was, you know, leading into the draft in 2024. But, you know, Terry, I don't want to see him lead the team in rushing this year. don't. He was the only quarterback in the league to lead his team in rushing last year. I would love to have what Lamar has in Derek Henry or what Jalen Hertz has in Sagan

Barkley or even what Josh Allen had, you know, last year in James Cook. Somebody to take that pressure off of Jaden Daniels, you know, over 17 games, at least somebody that can outrush the starting quarterback. This from Marcus. Marcus writes, I loved Kevin North with you. Yeah, Kevin North, the schedule maker with the NFL,

was on Friday's show. He was excellent. Some really good schedule nuggets, Marcus writes. But one that stood out for me was one that makes sense for your mock schedules in the future. When NBC has a Thursday night game,

the Sunday night game, the Sunday night game needs to be nearby. Did you pick up on that, Kevin? I did, Marcus. I did, and you're right. My mock schedule had Washington opening on the road at Dallas on Sunday night football. That was never, ever going to be a possibility. What Mike North shared with us is when the Sunday night NBC crew has a Thursday night game and they have it twice a year, the opener, the season this year on September 4th in Philadelphia, and on Thanksgiving night where they only have three days to get to their next location to set up for the Sunday night game. It's not like Fox and CBS where they have multiple crews and multiple cameras and multiple

trucks. The NBC situation basically has that Sunday night, you know, truck situation, and the game has to be close to where the Thursday night game is. So Dallas wasn't close enough to Philadelphia. So I should have never picked Dallas in Dallas as a mock schedule opener. And yeah, I didn't know that. And I now know that moving forward. So the season opens in Philadelphia. The Sunday night game that follows is in Buffalo.

So not that long of a trip, although a longer trip than it would have been to have the opener in Baltimore or in Washington or in Pittsburgh or in New York, as in New York City or Jersey. But Buffalo got the Sunday nighter after Philadelphia has the season opener. And then on Thanksgiving, they are in Baltimore on Thursday night Thanksgiving night for Cincinnati and the Ravens. And then Sunday night football is in Washington. Washington with Denver coming to town. So super close in proximity. Mike North did have a lot of really

good nuggets. If you haven't listened to that show, it's worth it. It's last Friday. So Friday, the 23rd of May, he was on with me for about 30 minutes, talked a lot about the Washington schedule. He actually said that the biggest regret that he has about the schedule overall is that Cincinnati has consistently played in Baltimore for a night game in recent years, and they would have preferred that game to have been in Cincinnati, but they wanted, especially over a holiday weekend, the Baltimore Washington situation for the crew. So Thursday night, it's a Thanksgiving night in Baltimore, Sunday night in Washington. So there you go. I had a lot of good stuff, though, in there on Washington's schedule, why they decided not, you know, to have Washington up against Philadelphia

in the opener, why Washington's not opening up in prime time in week one. The game that Mike North said was on the docket for as long as any game was, but got switched out, was Washington and Chicago in Washington, the rematch of the Hail Mary game for the opening Monday. night game of the year. And you can hear the explanation as to why they moved off of that. Some really fascinating stuff if you're into that stuff, and I am. This from Pool 25, Pool 25, writes, Kevin, so much for Oklahoma City's defense that you raved about. Explain, please, what happened in game three. Yeah, real quickly on the NBA playoffs, and then we'll get to Randy Whitman, And then we'll have Randy answer some of these questions.

So, yeah, I mean, I think Oklahoma City's been fabulous to watch throughout the postseason, and it's been their defense that has led them. They gave up a buck 43 on Saturday night in Minnesota in game three. They never got off the bus, man. It was so obvious right from the jump. They just were not ready to play. It happens in the NBA playoffs. If you followed this sport over the years, you get wild swings, you know,

from when you change venues and the other team becomes the home team. Now, I would be surprised if Oklahoma City doesn't play well tonight in game four. They're a three and a half point favorite. They're more than they were favored on Saturday night. So I kind of like Oklahoma City tonight. But yeah, that was a crazy performance. They actually, in their opening round series against Memphis, when they had been up by 50 in games 1 and 2, I think it was.

And then they went to Memphis and were down like, you know, a bunch of points, like 20-something and came back in one. They ended up sweeping that series. You're not coming back from that kind of deficit. They were down 72 to 41 at halftime of that game on Saturday night. And Anthony Edwards was a big-time star on Saturday night. He came out aggressively from the jump. ended up with 30 points in 30 minutes. I would expect something different tonight. Last night's game

between the Knicks and Pacers was sensational. This is, you know, one of now, I don't know, a dozen or so NBA playoff games so far this spring that this was memorable. They were down 20, late in the first half. They cut it to 13 at halftime. That was a big deal because it looked like the Knicks were done. I mean, basically, I love the Knicks last night before the game and sent a couple of my friends, you know, just, I'm like, I'm on the Knicks for size. And the texts came back to me when they were down 20. They're done. And I'm like, yep, it's over. And as many times as I've said, a 20-point lead is not, you know, what a 20-point lead was 30 years ago in the NBA.

It's more like what a 10-point lead was 30 years ago. but still, it just looked like the Knicks were done. They were in severe foul trouble in the first half. Brunson had four in the first half. Carl Anthony Towns was in foul trouble in the first half, and it was over for all intents and purposes, but they inched back to within 13 at halftime. Now, they were down by 16 in the second half,

and late in the third quarter, if you go to late in the third quarter, a lot of people were saying, you know, end of, you know, half was the difference maker. Yeah, it was, except they were down 16, you know, they were down 15 with a minute or so to go in, you know, like two minutes to go in the third quarter. So it's not like, you know, they cut that gap down significantly throughout the third quarter after gaining momentum. But the fourth quarter was all about one player. Wow. Carl Anthony Towns had a quarter to remember. 20 points in the fourth quarter. He willed his team back. Jalen Brunson sat on the bench until there were about two minutes to go in the game with five fouls.

And it was all Carl Anthony Towns. This is the second time in the series where they've looked good without Brunson in the game. And last night, Tibbs was forced to play a bunch of players because of foul trouble. guys like Landry Shamit, you know, former wizard, DeLan Wright, former wizard, they both had significant minutes in the game. I mean, this is a guy that plays a very short bench. I think that when Brunson is in the game, the ball sticks too much. It's too much ISO ball, and it's just too easy to guard.

He's brilliant, he's a great shotmaker, he's a great score, all those things that you can say about him, you can say about Luca, you can say about Hardin. I'm not a fan of that stuff. style of play. We've talked about it a lot during the last few playoff years. I don't think you can win four out of seven for four straight series when you play that much ISO. And Brunson is an ISO player, period. He dribbles the air out of it, the life out of it. They wouldn't be where they are in the Eastern Conference finals without them. I get that. You know, just like Luca wouldn't have been in the

finals last year. The Mavs wouldn't have been in the finals without Luca. I just, you know, when he's not in a game, the ball moves. And Carl Anthony Towns had a quarter to remember, 20 of his 24 over the final 12 minutes, and the Knicks roared back. He was rebounding the crap out of the ball as well. And the Knicks came back from 20 down the third time in this postseason. That's an NBA record. Three 20-point or greater deficits into victories.

The Knicks did it for a third time. And now the Pacers looked like, and they were about. They certainly were in great position to take a 3-0 series lead. Instead, it's 2-1, and the pressure kind of feels like it's back on them. I still think they're the better team. I think they'll win this series, just like Oklahoma City got beat by 100 in game three, but I think they're the better team. I think we're going to see Oklahoma City, Indiana. But, man, the Pacers could have, they had the knockout punch. The other thing, too, man, God, did the Knicks miss a free throw when it mattered? Man, they were 20, 7 of 30. I think they missed one free throw in the second half. They were outstanding from the free throw line. Really good basketball game, entertaining basketball game last night.

All right. Let's get to Randy Whitman. We'll do that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. It can be hard for men to deal with hair loss, even though it's common. Luckily, I'm here to provide you with a solution so you don't even have to talk about it. Through hymns, you can restore your hair by accessing their personalized hair loss solutions. Hymns provide you with convenient and quality access to a range of hair loss treatments that work all from the comfort of your couch. Hymns makes treating hair loss simple with doctor-trusted options and clinically proven ingredients. Choose from personalized chewable, oral, spray, and serum treatments to find out what works best for you. The process is simple and it's 100% online, so there are no uncomfortable doctor visits.

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Conference semi-finals lost to the Hawks in six. still a series that comes with, for me, a huge what-if. You know, the what-if being if John Wall doesn't break his hand in game one, and he's healthy throughout. I've seen a lot of highlights that have popped up on social media like the Pierce bank shot in game three because it's been 10 years. But, you know, was that the biggest what-if for you in your coaching career here? Oh, yeah, yeah, by far.

You know, I think, you know, the year before that, you know, we had a good run, too, but going back and sweeping Toronto, again, we were the five-seat, they were the four-seat, and we beat them 4-0 to get to Atlanta. And, you know, we just, we couldn't seem to win enough games at home. That was the thing that came back to kind of haunt us. We were pretty good on the road even, you know, the year before when we went into Chicago and beat Chicago and won all three of the four games in Chicago. So John getting hurt obviously played a big part of that. I think if we would have been healthy, we had every opportunity to beat them.

And they were the number one seed at that time. making their runs that they had. But you can't look back. You know, it's, uh, injuries are part of the game. We see that every year, um, as we did in the Boston series this year with Tatum going down. Um, so, uh, you know, you, you, you play with a hand your dealt and we, we did the best we could there. You know, it is interesting what you just said, because that first year of making the postseason with John and Brad and, you know, obviously Gortat, Neney and Ariza was on that first team. you won two in Chicago. You also won two games in Indiana against the Pacers.

And took that series to six against a team that was heavily favored, if I recall. And then, you know, in that series against Atlanta, you won game one in Atlanta and certainly had a chance to win game five. You know, that series ended with two kind of bad breaks. You know, forget the John Bad Break in Game One. That was a literal bad break. But game five, wall block shooter's shot, somehow Horford gets it and puts it in with a second to go. And then Pierce had the three to send game six to overtime, but it came a split second after the buzzer sounded upon further review.

Yeah, no question about it. You know, again, bounce the ball. You know, you're exactly right about the defensive play at Dan, and it just bounces right to Horford. who's able to put it in with hardly any time on the clock. But we execute down the other end, get the shot we want, and it didn't go in. You know, the other thing, too, because this is what made me think about this team, is in recent weeks just Pierce's shot in game three, you know, when he called bank. It popped up all over social media, especially if you're a Wizards fan like I am.

You know, I watched that, you know, a few times because it popped up so many, you know, a few times. Your reaction is priceless, and you probably don't even remember. But it's, you know, he gets the ball sort of at the top of the key with about five seconds to go. It's a tie score. And he shoots a fadeaway bank shot. It looked like you were not thrilled with the ball sticking there. But when it went in, you just walked right off the court. Do you remember specifically what you would call?

Yeah, we had run a number. That play that we run, we ran it multiple times in the series, which has multiple options off of it. And as you saw, kind of the same play in Atlanta that Richard mentioned and that Paul misses the three on. We just moved him in a different spot. But, you know, I mean, Paul, in the situation that he had, the experience he had,

it was one of those things that, you know, if that wasn't the best scenario we wanted, you know, there was other options, and, you know, it went to him, and I'm like, oh, this is, that was pretty well defended, and obviously he did what he did, and I, you know,

just struck my shoulders and walked off. You know, one of the cool things about that, I've always felt, and I've probably said this to you in the past, that if the Wizards were ever a legitimate deep into the postseason contender, that this city would embrace it in a big way. Because at its core, and you know this from being here, because of the college programs in Georgetown and Maryland, because of the high school basketball and the DMV, that the Wizards would be, you know, they'd be, I think, the clear cut number two behind the football team in that crowd. on that particular, it was a weekend game, a Saturday or Sunday, I forget which one, it was electric. And it's a shame that you didn't win more of those home games because the crowds were great for those postseason games.

No question about it. I mean, Washington is going to be, they get behind their sports teams when they're good. Right. When they're not good, then it's filled with the other team's fans, but that's the nature of where Washington, D.C. is located. But, oh, you've got a good team, there's not a better situation or home court advantage than that we had in there. And they were definitely a big part of our success those two years.

One more for you, and then I want to ask you about this postseason, and then what you're up to. I don't think I asked you this last year, maybe two years ago when I last had you on. But Martian Gortat said something about a year and a half two years ago in an interview. And he said the question was, and I don't know if you saw this, he said, you were with the Wizards during, you know, one of their, you know, limited successful, you know, eras. He said, and the question was, in your opinion, what went wrong during that time? And his answer was, well, quote, I will say that we probably should have kept Randy Whitman as a coach. Why? Because he was the only coach that was able to control John, John Wall. And they were bumping heads. And I was bumping heads with Randy.

Randy was a hell of a good coach. And he knew what he was doing. He was able to control John. He was able to control Bradley. And he was bringing the right people on board from a player standpoint. He went on and on with a lot of compliments about you. But I wanted to ask you specifically, because when fans read something like the coach's bumping heads with a player, what did he mean specifically when he said that you were bumping heads with John and with him and with Bradley? That's a bad term.

I would call it coaching. I would call it holding your best players accountable. and my philosophy, and if I was still in that position today, is you've got to hold your best players accountable for your bottom people, the people that are 10, 11, 12 on your roster to be able to believe in you as a coach. If I let my best players do what they want, then number one, we're not going to be very successful, but I'm not going to have the other part of my team,

believing in what I'm trying to preach. And that's all that was. You know, I'm trying to make John Wall-Bradley-Bill the best players that they possibly could be. They were young at that time. There was a lot of situations where they had a hard time taking tough coaching. Same with March.

I thought March, you know, the last year, when we didn't make the playoffs in my last year of coaching there, I thought those two years that we had prior before, we rested on those things and thought that was just something that was going to happen every year. And we let that slip away. And I was just trying to get those guys to be the players that they could be and become better and call it bumping heads. I don't know. You know, I still think if giving that opportunity, you got to remember, too, that was all the talk going in at the end. end of that year, my last year there was Kevin Durant's free agency.

Exactly. And, you know, they thought, obviously, making a move and bringing who they brought in was going to secure him coming to D.C., which wasn't even close to happening. And, you know, that was a big part of it, too. As we wound down that last year, I was there. You know, I actually had John on the show last week. He's done a lot of media recently, and he's really good, actually. And I asked him the question that I'll ask you. Did you think there was ever a chance of landing Kevin Durant? Me? No. No, not through the people that I knew that was in the business of agency and the people that actually were very close to Kevin Durant. Kevin, you know, Kevin Durant, you know, at that time, Sam Cassell, you know, I just let, but Sam was very close to his people and there was, there was no way, I mean, Kevin said point blank out, not publicly, but to the right people, that there's no way that I'm going there. I just don't want to go back there and have to deal with all he'd have to deal with, with family and friends coming back to this area.

And that was well known, but, you know, I still think that was a big part of it. Who was, was it Ted and Ernie or just Ted or just Ernie who felt like it was worth the shot? Yeah, you know, I think at the end, in terms of why it happened and whose it was, I can't really comment on that. I just know I told them that, you know, if you're putting. all your eggs in one basket, that's probably not a very good situation to do it. And, you know, as you saw it, they did do that and it didn't work out. And I think they've been fighting an uphill battle ever since. Yeah, John said the same thing.

He said, never a chance. And he said, you know, which I felt at the time, it basically cost you two years earlier, Trevor oriza. True or not? Yep. True, very true. And, you know, we were lucky enough to get Paul that one year, but Paul was at the end. Right.

You know, we got about as much as we could out of Paul. You know, then he leaves. You know, that was basically his last parao was with us, and we were lucky enough to nab him. But Trevor was much younger, much more versatile piece that we, we, wanted and, you know, I think that had a big part of Trevor leaving the situation that he had here because, you know, he had some great years while he was here. Yeah, and he had some really good years in Houston after he left, too, and other places. All right, let's talk about this playoff run here. We've had some unbelievable games, unbelievable performances. Real quickly,

before we get to where we are right now. Did anything shock you or really surprise you about any of the results in the, you know, first two rounds of the playoffs? Did you think a team should have still been here that isn't? Ooh, good question. I don't know. I think, you know, everybody was a little, everybody really never gave Cleveland a shot all year long, even though they were the best team from start to finish.

I think they had incredible runs of, you know, double-digit winning streaks throughout the year and, you know, secured the number one seating. But, you know, it came down again to, I think, a lot of people on that team not having the experience. And Indiana, just as we've seen thus far, has played at an unbelievable level. that Cleveland just wasn't able to gather. I think it's surprising. I think what we're seeing of road teams winning multiple places. I mean, you know, New York-Boston series was crazy.

I mean, that's a situation where I've never seen more 20-point leads blown, as we saw last night. Again, I mean, the Pacers had an opportunity. to really put a stranglehold on the situation and let that slip away. And now, I mean, the thing you've got to worry about now, if you're Indiana, they're a team that is very young and hasn't been in these situations to face adversity. You know, the Pacers basically controlled the first round series or the series with Cleveland and, you know, walked away with that.

Bucks, that didn't surprise me with the Bucks, you know, I think their run is, is over with. But Indiana now is facing something they've never faced where, you know, they've had a stranglehold on this, and now momentum can switch. And New York's a dangerous team with a lot of players

that have been through this before. And I think whoever wins game four is going to win that series. You mentioned the 20-point leads. The Knicks set an NBA playoff record, their third game in the same postseason of overcoming a 20-point lead to win a game. I've said in recent weeks that today's 20-point lead

in the NBA is like 1995's 10-point lead. A, do you agree with that? And B, if so, why is that? It just style of play. And that is true. It's a great analogy, I think. You know, you had better understanding of the situation. I mean, when you're up, I think Indiana was up 20 with under four minutes to go in the second quarter.

Right. And that's got to be a situation where you can't play the same way where, you know, you come down and take the very first three that's presented to you. You know, you want to milk that into a, at worst, a 16-point lead or a 24-point lead going into half rather than, you know, it being at 13 and all the momentum going, you know, New York's way. And then even in the third quarter, if you remember, they got it back up to 16. Yeah. Midway through the third quarter. And you just, you don't have, I think. people in control of the situation in terms of running your team, understanding that, you know,

we can milk the last three or four minutes of this quarter to go in to the fourth quarter with a good advantage rather than playing the same way. You just, it's just up and down. You continue to play the same way. And if you're not making shots or if you're turning the ball over, it can be 20 to 10 in a second. and I think that's what you see a lot. Interesting last night that the Knicks made that run and made that comeback with primarily Jalen Brunson on the bench with five fouls.

Why do you think they were able to do that? Well, they did it a little bit, if you remember, in New York. Yes. They went on a 14-0 run when Brunson got in foul trouble the last game in New York. it's a situation I think you know you've got players on the Knicks that can play

and he basically I mean he just played seven guys throughout the year and you know they got into foul trouble a couple times and some guys came into the game

that you know I think had a point to prove that you know I can be a big part of this team and Robinson has been a big lift for them you know coming in

and doing what he's done. But I just think, you know, you've got players that are NBA players, and they're good players, and now they're being thrust to throw it in there. And, you know, they've got points to prove of their own. And they've done a good job of that these last couple games. I suggested, and I've said this before, and I'm curious as to what you think. With guys like Brunson and even Luca Harden,

the ball just sticks too much. there's just too much iso ball, and sometimes that's hard to sustain over, you know, four series trying to win four out of seven. What do you say? Well, especially at this point, you know, you're in the Eastern Conference finals now. So, I mean, you've got the best of the best, and you're going to be able to negate that, if that's the way they're going to play. I think we've seen that, you know, Luca was last year able to get them to the finals, but I think that was a kind of a fluky thing. you saw when, you know, everybody thought when he went to the Lakers that they were going to be the

favorites to get to the Western Conference finals, and we saw how that worked out, you know, with Minnesota doing to them what they did, beating them 4-1. And you can negate those situations. I think that's what makes Indiana intriguing because they do move the ball. Yeah, he do. know, it doesn't stick in one person's hand. And, you know, it does with New York at times. And I think when you've seen him on the bench or even off the ball a little bit,

just playing off the ball some and run him off screens rather than the ball being in his hands all the time, I think it makes it harder for Indiana to defend. So it's going to be interesting to see now, like I said, with that win last night for New York, how they come out in game three. Are we going to see Tibbs go to his bench and play the nine guys that he played last night? Even if they don't get into foul trouble, are you just going to run them into the ground? I think that's where Indiana has an advantage if they do only play seven guys. It's hard for New York to keep up with the pace that Indiana plays that,

and they play 10 or 11 guys. And that's something that I think of, you know, New York's got to take a look at. All right. I know you've got to run because you've got a tea time on this Memorial Day, but I've got two quick ones for you to finish up. How impressive has Oklahoma City been, and do you expect them to win this series, even though they appear to not show up on Saturday night? Well, that happens.

That happens sometimes. You look back in the 80s when I was playing. The Laker Celtics Finals, there's. There's been 40-point blowouts in the game, and it's just you've come back. I still think Oklahoma City is one of the best teams. But you know what? Minnesota, I mean, I think they came out and punched them in the mouth. They were the more aggressive team right from the start.

It's going to be interesting now tonight to see. I mean, that was a wake-up call for O.C. They've really kind of had a way with it up to this point. and, you know, winning the first two games by 15 plus, I think they thought this was going to be a cake walk in, and they got a rude awakening. So we see how they respond tonight. We'll go a long way, I think, to see if they are legit

and going to make it to the finals. All right. Last one. You've been helping Mike Woodson out at Indiana for the last few years. They made a coaching change there. What are you going to do now? Are you helping anybody out? What's Randy Whitman doing these days?

I'm getting ready to go play golf. And I've coming to D.C. to help out the Wizards. How about that? Well, are you really? Is that breaking news? No, it'd be good news for some of us. You know, real quickly. I don't have anything in the thing right now.

In this situation where I'm pretty comfortable doing what I'm doing. So we'll see. What did you think of Derek Queen? Last one. Loved him. I think he's a player that really knows how to play. Love the kid.

We recruited. It came down to Maryland and us in the recruiting situation. I got a number of times to be in town when he was in town in Bloomington. And not only a great player, I think, but a great kid. I mean, really good kid. He's a quiet kid. Very respectful. But from start to finish last year, I mean, he just continued to improve.

And that's a telling sign and tells you that kids like that are going to be really good down the road because they continue to improve and work on their games and they just don't become stagnant. Thanks for doing this as always hit him straight today. Okay. Thank you for having me. Randy Whitman, everybody. We'll finish up the show with the Nats and a few other things after these words from a few of our sponsors. Hey, guys, who's hungry?

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Ramos to the gap to try and cut it off Woods on his way to second. Abrams has scored. The throw is offline and not in time. What slides in with his 13th double of the year. His team leading 36th run batted in, and he's the tying run at second base now here in the bottom of the ninth inning. It's now the Giants 3 and the Nationals 2. Charlie Slows yesterday at Nats Park with the call in the bottom of the 9th.

I don't think there's any doubt that James Wood is an emerging superstar in Major League Baseball, and that RBI double got the Nats to within a run, Nathaniel Lowe next batter up had a shot down the left field line that just barely went foul. That would have tied the game. The Nats lost to the Giants three to two. This segment of the show is brought to you by MyBooky. If you want to bet on sports, my recommendation is MyBooky. Go to MyBooky.ag or MyBooky.com.

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and use my promo code, Kevin, D.C. So the Nats did not get it done yesterday. Competitive series against the Giants, they head to Seattle and Arizona for the next week of West Coast Road Games. But man, is James Wood having himself a season? He is tied for fifth in war. He is seventh in OPS.

He's got 13 home runs. This is in the national. League that ranks seventh in home runs. His 36 RBIs are 11th in the National League. He's on base percentage is 14th. His slugging percentage so far is eighth in the National League. He and C.J. Abrams are having all-star caliber seasons for the Nats. No doubt that James Wood is one of those young guys that baseball will be watching. He's in Washington. He's in It'd be nice to keep him in Washington. He's from here.

Gropin' only went to St. John's on Military Road, but he is one big dude, and he's having a big season. The Nats lost, but they have had a more competitive season than I think most thought, and certainly have been much better offensively than they were a year ago. By the way, the NHL playoffs, have you watched any of these playoffs? games since the caps got eliminated. I'm guessing the answer for most of you is no. I haven't really watched any of it.

I'll flip it on during commercial breaks or at halftime of the NBA playoff games. But my God, what Florida is doing to Carolina, the team that took out the caps, Florida has beaten Carolina the first three games of the Eastern Conference finals by an aggregate score of 16. to four. Five to two in game one, five nothing in game two, six to two in game three. Florida, the defending Stanley Cup champions, they have scored five or more goals eight times in the postseason and six or more goals five times in the post season. They beat Edmonton last year in seven games, and it looks like they are headed towards another matchup with Edmonton.

Edmonton up two games to one in the Western Conference finals. But man, the Capitals, I mean, they couldn't beat Carolina, and Carolina has had zero chance against Florida. I think most of the hockey people that we had on, you know, during the Caps postseason, and not just the past season, but down the stretch with the Ovechkin Gretzky chase. I think that a lot of people thought that Florida would have been a very tough matchup for the Capitals, that Toronto may have been easier, but that Florida is just legit good. And that, you know, that goes to show you that, you know, look, you got to qualify for the postseason in the NHL playoffs to have a chance, but Florida finished third in their division.

They finished with the fifth best overall, or the fifth best overall point total in the Eastern Conference. Doesn't really matter. They are destroying people. Look, they went to seven with Toronto, so Toronto played them tough, but they won game seven, six to one on the road at Toronto. But Carolina, no match.

for the Florida Panthers. Watch Carolina will make a big comeback in this series. All right. There was some just breaking sports news from today. Caitlin Clark, and I don't know if you've been following all of this stuff. I mean, good God, the RG3 and Ryan Clark stuff. Ryan Clark, stop already. If you've been paying attention to this, this is just truly hard to watch because It's so embarrassing to Ryan Clark in particular, who, you know, took a shot at RG3's wife, his white wife for, and suggested that RG3 just really couldn't identify with Angel Reese and her side of sort of the Reese foul taken by Caitlin Clark in a game last week when Caitlin Clark slapped down and Reese got up and reacted to it. I mean, this back and forth between Ryan Clark and RG3 over a foul in the WNBA.

I mean, are you serious? But with that said, if you want to see some cringe-worthy material on social media, just go, you know, get a load of Ryan Clark. And the multiple video explanations, at some point, dude, just stop digging. and bail. But anyway, the breaking news is that Caitlin Clark is going to be out two weeks with a left quad strain. This is big news. You know, she's going to miss two games.

They actually played a game over the weekend. I had it on in my home, and my wife goes, what are you watching? And I'm like, I'm watching Caitlin Clark. They were playing New York, and I think New York's a good team. Sabrina Inescu's on that team, and that Brianna Stewart is on that team. There's somebody else on that team. Look, I know more about the WNBA now than I've ever known, and it's nowhere near what a real WNBA person would know.

But they played in a game, and it was a very exciting game, and not well played, to be honest with you, in terms of the quality of basketball. But Clark hit one of those bombs at the end of the third quarter, and they had an eight-point lead. They ended up losing the game. But she, you know, had 18 and 10. But, man, the tight defense on her,

she's still not quite athletic enough to control the basketball consistent. She's a great passer. She sees it. But she had 10 turnovers in this game. And I think she might be among the league leaders in turnovers. But anyway, I don't know. I just saw this breaking news and decided it would be

a good way to launch into Ryan Clark, RG3, and the WNBA game that I watched on Saturday. All right. What else? Maryland basketball real quickly, lost out on Sebastian Wilkins, big time recruit top 25, recruit nationally. That would have been a massive get for Buzz Williams, who's already gotten a big get already and has had a very impressive portal year. But this 6-8 Sebastian Wilkins apparently was leaning towards Maryland, and then Duke got involved, and they just flat out paid him more,

so he ends up at Duke. But the Terps have added a couple of other players, and it's going to be interesting next year. Every college basketball season is like a new season now, where you just have a new team, and Maryland will have a completely new team. And you won't know anything, honestly, until you start watching them.

Other than that, I think that's it for the day. You know, Memorial Day is obviously a day to remember the service and sacrifices made by all of the U.S. military men and women who have died in the service to our nation, and we remember those people today. All right. Again, I've got the next few days off. be back at the end of the week. Take care.