The Kevin Sheehan Show - Mike North: NFL Schedule-Maker

Episode Date: May 23, 2025

Kevin opened with Saquon Barkley's comments that the 2024 Eagles were a "top-5 all time team". Mike North/VP of Broadcast Planning & Scheduling joined Kevin to talk about the 2025 NFL Schedule. Lots on the challenges of making Washington's schedule along with why the Commanders didn't get selected for the league's "Kickoff" game in Philadelphia to start the season. Mike talked about the Commanders game that never had a chance of being scheduled and the opponent that Washington nearly opened up against instead of the Giants. Kevin finished up with the Nats' 5th straight win and the NBA Playoffs.   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. On the show with me today, the man who put the NFL schedule together, Mike North back with us. He was with us back in April before the schedule came out. Mike North is the VP of Broadcast Planning and Scheduling for the NFL.

I recorded the interview with Mike yesterday, so I know what's coming up. And there are many interesting things about the making of Washington's schedule. There were a few options that were very much in the mix that didn't happen and one that never had a chance of happening. A really good schedule, info and conversation with Mike North coming up in the next segment of today's show. The show presented, as always, by Window Nation, 86690 Nation. If you need new windows, you can go to windownation.com as well. Be sure to mention my name. They'll take really good care of you.

This email to start the show from a devoted listener, the subject heading, diluting NFL divisions. A devoted writes, Kevin, How do you like the diminished importance of college rivalries in both basketball and football? That was rhetorical because I know you don't. The same thing applies to the NFL and all leagues. Anything that diminishes the importance of the divisions diminishes the division rivalries and the associated big game excitement.

After you implement the receding plan someday an 11-6 team will be left out of the playoffs and will whine because a 9-and-7 team was a division winner. The solution, some geniuses will start clamoring for, conference-wide seating without divisions. None of this is helpful to the competition or watchability of the game. Thank you for that. So, you know, you A-devoted agree with Mike Tomlin. Mike Tomlin, head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers, really was a major voice of concern

on what was discussed this week at the league meetings, but ultimately did not get voted on. Detroit pulled their seating proposal, and it is not actually a relevant topic right now, but it will become a relevant topic again in the future. Mark Maske was on with me on radio earlier this week and thought that this wouldn't get approved, but would have a chance of getting approved down the road when the league goes to 18 games. But Mike Tomlin essentially voiced very loudly, what you a devoted voiced, which is if you diminish the importance of winning a division, it will ultimately make the divisions less relevant. And I think a level of his passion for this topic

is one of the reasons that this proposal got tabled and got pulled this past week. I just don't personally agree with you or Mike Tomlin on this issue. I think first of all, There is a consensus understanding from everybody that enjoys the NFL and everybody who works for the NFL, including the commissioner of the league, that the divisions are very important. I don't think this league will ever go away from division play, not in my lifetime anyway. And it's for the reasons that you mentioned, A-devoted, and I think the reasons that are pretty obvious, The rivalries are supremely important to the league. And the only way to keep rivalries going, you know, the real long-standing rivalries,

is to keep the divisions and continue to play, you know, in division your opponent twice a year. Your opponent's twice a year. I just don't see a day where the NFC East doesn't exist. That it's just the NFC, 16 teams. and you see, you know, standings online that just list them in order of the 16 teams in the conference. The NFC East is a marquee, you know, presence in sports. You know, we have a few of those, the SEC in football, college football, the NFC in the NFL, the AL East in baseball.

I just don't see a day where Dallas, Washington, Philadelphia, and the Giants don't play each other twice a year. with the team ending up with the best overall record winning the division title. Seeding the field after qualifying the field, I don't think we'll change that a bit. The only thing that is on the table for the future is a division winner not being guaranteed a home playoff game. Saying that, you know, as you did A-devoted, saying that an 11 and 16 being left out for a 9-7, division winner will lead, you know, the so-called geniuses to just go to conference wide seating. I think we've experienced some of that. And nobody's really bitched about it. In 2022, Tampa won the NFC South with an eight and nine record. Seattle and Washington, both had better records.

Seattle was nine and eight. Washington was eight, eight, and one. And both of them missed the playoffs. The bitching that year wasn't about that. It was about Tampa getting to host a playoff game as an 8-9 division winner against 12-5 Dallas. I mean, a four-game difference in Dallas had to travel. In 2020, we all remember Washington winning the NFC East with a 7-9 record. Arizona was left out of the playoffs at 8-8. Nobody bitched about that. Now, I know what you're going for.

You're not going for the, you know, the, you know, this. 7 and 9 versus 8 and 8 and 8, and 8, versus, you know, the team that's 8 and 1 in misses. I understand that. You're looking for the big disparity, as you described, 11 and 6, 9, and 7. Well, we've had some of those. In 2014, Carolina was a 7, 8, and 1 NFC, South winner. The Eagles were 10 and 6, and they were left out altogether. You know, it's interesting because I went back 10 years.

there aren't really any examples other than the one I just gave of a major disparity in record between a division winner and the first wild card team left out. I mean, even when Washington was 7 and 9, the first team out was 8 in 8 Arizona. You know, 8 and 9 Tampa in 2022, the first two teams out, 9 and 8 Seattle, 8 and 1 Washington. really have to go back to 2014 to find a major disparity. Seven, eight and one Carolina. They won the NFC South. Ron Rivera was the head coach.

And the Eagles were 10 and 6. And they were the first wild card team out. The bitchings much more about, you know, the bad division winning record hosting a team with a much better record, a wild card team. the five-seed, you know, the way it's set up now. 11-6 Tampa Bay having to play at Washington in 2020, who was 7 and 9 last year. You know, 14 and 3 Minnesota on the road against 10 and 7 L.A., the Rams. I don't see a give them an inch and they'll take a mile scenario developing if they went to seating the field after qualifying the field with four division winners and three wild cards.

I don't. I think the divisions will be a part of the game forever, and that division winners, regardless of record, will always qualify for the playoffs. And I say always. I mean, nothing's forever, forever. But in our lifetime of watching football, I don't see that. I think the seating issue is about repairing the situation of competitive fairness and putting more emphasis really on rewarding teams that had great regular seats. like the Vikings did last year, or the Cowboys did in 2022, or even what we did last year, 12 and five, having to travel to 10 and 7 Tampa. You know, you can look at it as sort of a knock, you know,

a takeaway from a division winner, but you could also look at it as a rewarding of a team that just had a great season, but was in a division with another team that had a great season. Anyway, thanks for the email. Did you guys hear or read what Saquan Barkley said yesterday? He was on a podcast called Exciting Mic's. He was on this podcast with teammates, Reed Blankenship, and Cooper DeGine. And he said the following, quote, I firmly believe when you look at our team that we had last year,

I know we're not looking too far into the past, but our team last year, I think we're a top five team of all time. And then he went on to say, I tell my boys this all the time. We started off two and two. We lost a Washington. That was the only other game they lost after starting two and two. And Jalen Hertz got hurt in that game, the game at Northwest Field in Landover in December. But if you really look at the season outside of the first four games, it was belt to ass. I would imagine that that expression is, I'm taking off my belt and I'm whooping your ass.

And that's what they did to teams. I'm not super familiar with that expression in current popular culture. But anyway, he also said, how dominant you guys were on defense, speaking to Dijin and Blankenship and how dominant we were on offense and special teams. People don't realize how great of a team that actually was closed. Yeah. You know, Sequin, sorry, but you're not a top five team of all time. Look, when you're the defending champions, you can say whatever you want, especially in this day and age, social media.

everybody's got a podcast. These are quotes that come out every year. And they come out from, you know, the winners and even, you know, players who you would, you know, think are humble and smart. And I'm not suggesting that he's not at all because I think he is. But you just get in these situations and you just say some things. And he believes it. I'm not suggesting that he's just thrown it out there for fodder. I think he believes it.

You know, the Eagles as an organization also put. out t-shirts after the Tush Push lived on after the 22 to 10 vote. Push on, push here. Eagles T-shirts. It's like when you go on to their website, it says push on and then push here to order the t-shirts. Good for them. Good for the Eagles, I guess.

But, you know, all due respect. Seguan, you're not even close to a top five all-time team. You know, first of all, let me just say this before I get to the top five all-time team. You know, the Eagles did put on a performance defensively in the Super Bowl. That's one of the greatest defensive performances in a Super Bowl I have ever seen. We talked about that, you know, forever in the days and weeks after. That is right up there with the 85 bears, the 2,000 Ravens, the 02 bucks. I mean, that is one of the greatest defensive performances we have ever seen in a Super Bowl.

They dominated Kansas City. The chiefs couldn't cross midfield until their eighth or ninth drive. I mean, it was an ass kicking of epic proportions. Their defense was awesome. But look, to be a top five all-time team, you can't end up with the third best record in your league during the season. The Eagles were 14 and 3, and yet they started 2 and 2, but that still counts as the season. And by the way, took an absolute pounding at Tampa in week 4. Now, they were very injured early in the season when they went to Tampa.

But, you know, they didn't have the best record, even in their own conference. Detroit had a better record. look, we can get into the teams, you know, and maybe I'll save this for Tommy on Tuesday, but it starts with our 91 skins. You know, whether you have the 91 skins as the greatest Super Bowl winner of all time or not, there are plenty of metrics that describe it that way. DVOA does. We've seen rankings where the 91 skins have been considered the greatest team of all time. But even if you think it's the 85 Bears or the 07 Patriots, who, by the way, didn't win the Super Bowl, the $72.

They were undefeated. You know, the Niners of 84, the Niners of 89, the 78 Steelers, the 76 Steelers may have been the best Pittsburgh team, but they lost Bradshaw late in the season, but that may have been the greatest defensive regular season in the history of the game post-merger. You know, the 99 Rams, the greatest show on turf, the Cowboys of 92 or 77. I mean, there are a lot of teams that were just flat out better teams over the course of September through February than these 20-24 Eagles. I don't know that the 20-24 Eagles as a team and as a season going through their entire season would be a top 20-team of all-time.

but they did put on one of the all-time great defensive performances. I think what's more interesting is looking at their roster, and we've discussed it a lot, and understanding that this is a great roster. We knew that going into the season last year, but they had caved so badly at the end of the previous season that we didn't know what to expect, but they have a spectacular roster. However, you know, if there's some sort of expectation that they're about to go on a dynastic kind of a run, I would put the brakes on that. First of all, they were led by their defense once they got to the postseason, and the Super Bowl in particular.

They had a great defense when we got towards, you know, the middle towards the end of that season. That was a dominant defense. players keep in mind, you know, it's not the exact same group coming back. They don't have Milton Williams. They don't have Brandon Graham, and they lost another player who, Josh Sweat. They lost three key players. Now, they draft well, you know, and this is a team that, you know, replace some of that and may have replaced it with some younger players. We'll see. But defense is very variable. We've talked about the variance. defense defenses tend to exhibit year to year.

So there's no guarantee that they'll be as dominant next year. And most dynastic kind of runs are led by two things that I'm not sure the Eagles have. A great quarterback and a great head coach. When we think about the true dynasties in the history of the NFL, the most recent being this run for the chiefs, Andy Reed and Patrick Mahomes. Obviously, Belichick and Brady. You go back to, you know, Aikman and Jimmy Johnson. And then you're in the 80s with Walsh and Montana. You're into the 70s with Noel and Bradshaw. Look, the Steelers, you could say, were led more by their Hall of Famers on defense than they were with Terry Bradshaw, but he's a Hall of Famer. And so,

Certainly the 78 Steelers were a dynamic offensive football team with Bradshaw to Swan and Stalworth. And then if you're going to go back to the 60s and the Packers, it's Lombardian Star. You know, I think Jalen Hertz is a really good quarterback who, by the way, plays his best in the team's biggest games, but he's not a Hall of Fame quarterback in the making. I don't see it that way. He's got a long way to go. You know, and he's already quarterbacked in two Super Bowls, and, you know, quite honestly, was dominantly great in that first Super Bowl that they lost to the Chiefs 3835. He was actually the better quarterback in that game than Mahomes was.

But I don't see him, you know, in the same way that I see, you know, dynasty quarterbacks. And Siriani, all due respect, is not read, is not. not Belichick, is not Lombardi, is not Noel, is not Jimmy, is not Walsh, just isn't. You know, he has something going on there with the players, there's no doubt. And the clown-like descriptions, and I was a part of it early in the season last year, he's clearly not that. But is he headed towards being a dynastic head coach? I don't think so.

You can say anything, though, I guess, when you are champions. You know, in the conference going into this coming season, in their own division, they've got Washington to deal with, with, you know, led by the best quarterback in the division and I think the best quarterback in the conference. The NFC North has multiple teams here. Detroit, obviously, at the top to be, you know, to push Philly. You've got, I think, a team that's very underrated right now heading into next year, and that's the Rams and who knows what the Niners will look like. The Bucks have been consistently solid under Todd Bowles and now with Baker Mayfield. So they have quite the, you know, they've got quite the conference to get through to even get back to a Super Bowl. If we're talking about a dynasty, that's not what Sequin said.

He said that last year's team, top five all-time team, that's not just even close to accurate. All right. Rate us and review us if you get a chance, especially on Apple and Spotify. It's really helpful for the show if you can rate us. Five stars would be nice on Apple and Spotify. Apple gives you a chance to write a quick review. If you haven't done it, it takes 60 seconds. You can write a quick one to two sentence review.

And following us, hitting that plus button or follow button, wherever you're listening to the podcast is a big help as well. All right, up next, Mike North, talking about the schedule that he and a few others at the NFL offices put together. We'll find out about the Washington decisions they made when we return, 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. HIMS provides you with convenient and quality access to a range of hair loss treatments that work all from the comfort of your couch.

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Don't wait to get your estimate for their semi-annual sale. Four free windows with every four purchased. no money down, no payments and no interest. You won't start paying anything until the year 2027. 86690 Nation, windownation.com. All right, joining me right now, and I promise that I would try to make this happen after he came on with us in mid-April,

about a month before the schedule came out. You guys really enjoyed Mike North and the conversation we had that day, and he's kind enough to come back now that the schedule is official. Mike North, the vice president of NFL broadcast planning and scheduling. He's been doing this for three decades as one of the key people involved in putting together the NFL schedule.

And when you came on with me in mid-April, you said, look, there are 272 of these assets. And every year, there are like 10 to 20 that are obviously going to be sought after. and that for the first time in a long time, Washington was actually going to be a participant in some of those 10 to 20 high exposure spots. So that's where I want to start. I mean, you weren't lying. Five prime times, three standalones,

which include Madrid Christmas Day in Week 16 on a Saturday. Some of their 425 games look like to much of the country games as well. Mike, what were some of them? of the, you know, big, memorable decisions, discussions around Washington's schedule that you can share with us? Yeah, good to talk to you again, Kev. Look, the truth is we kind of knew, like we said, a month or so ago, that we were going to be leaning into the commanders maybe a little bit more than we had in recent years.

Part of it, obviously, just due to the schedule, right? All the NFC games matter. Throw out the records. Those division games mean something. We're crossing over this year into, you know, green. Bay, Detroit, Chicago, those are all interesting, and then obviously crossing over into the NFC West and picking up free playoff teams out there, Denver, Chargers, Kansas City. So a lot of good inventory to choose from, a lot more malice to feed.

I'm sure we talked about this a month ago. Just so many more national windows, so many more standalone games than we've ever had. So you're probably leaning in maybe one or two more for everybody. and, you know, at the top end, there's only so many games you can put, you know, Dallas, Kansas City, and Green Bay in big windows. And at the bottom end, you know, you know there's some teams that are still kind of either playing their way back in the form, back in the prime time, rebuilding, drafting at the top of the draft, whatever. So you kind of look at that kind of middle tier and you look at a Washington, a Chicago, a Minnesota, a Seattle, a Baltimore, those are the teams that are going to be well represented, maybe one or two more than most people thought. product of both the record from last year, the deep playoff run to the championship game, and again, obviously, the schedule, the opponents really helped dictate the choices we made.

All right, let me ask you about a couple of the decisions. When we talked back in mid-April, you thought Washington would get significant consideration for kickoff? Why Dallas and not, you know, Washington or the Rams or a couple of the other teams at Philly had on the schedule? Why not Washington for the opener? Could have gone with any of the Eagles home opponents, really. like you said, Rams, Denver would have been interesting, Chicago, Detroit, obviously Washington. You know, there was one school of thought that, you know,

the last time we saw Washington and Philly play each other wasn't really that close. But, you know, yeah, Debo, you make some moves in the off season. It's a different team. It's a different game. Absolutely considered Washington for kickoff. It really came down to, you know, we probably haven't gotten maximum use, maximum value out of the two Dallas-Filly games the last couple of years. Remember last year we had one of them in December, in a standalone window on Fox at 425,

we ended up flexing it back to 1 o'clock. Like that Dallas-Filly series, those two games are usually top five, top six, top eight every year, and we just really haven't gotten maximum value out of them. So nobody knows what the Cowboys are going to be, obviously, see if Dak can stay healthy, new coach. But certainly one of those Dallas-Filly games, get it in early, get it in the bank, get a maximum fan value, if you will, out of it. And you just know the Eagles fans are going to love unfurling a banner in front of the Cowboys. So put that one in nice and early, and that lets you save the other Philly Washington games.

You hinted one of them in Week 16, standalone national window on that Saturday, that third Saturday in December, where the NFL's been playing for decades. So a couple of good division games there in Philly Wash and Green Bay Chai. And then we saved Philly Wash the other end for Week 18. We kind of got in a rut here these last few years. was just Dallas, Washington, and Philly Giants over and over and over again. So good to mix that up a little bit, too. So knowing one of the Philly-Washington was going to be in week 18, the other one should be on Fox,

so probably couldn't be the kickoff game. So round it around, we go. All these decisions are intertwined, and they all kind of impact each other. And that's really how, I don't want to say we backed into Dallas, Philly, because we liked it, but we looked at all the other options. This one felt like the right move. You know, I'm going to go to the end of the schedule quickly because you just brought up. That was the one thing that I was curious about because I just thought that these week 18

matchups, there is risk there, right? That the game may not be meaningful for both teams. And I just thought that the Philadelphia, Washington, both of those games, you'd want to lock both of them in as less risk, high reward on the matchup being a massive matchup. Yeah. Look, I'd make the same argument for both ends of the Dallas-Washington series, right? Yep. You know, and somebody's going to play, you know, Washington in Week 18. If it's the Giants, then you're talking about Philly Dallas as the other N.S.C. East, right, week 18.

And like we said, I'm not sure that's the best use of that. So most of this really had to do with the last couple of years. I think it's been three years in a row that we've played Dallas, Washington. It was, three in a row, yep. And those are kind of the games we remember. And if somebody really is playing for something, there's a division title, on the line. There's a playoff spot on the line. We probably ought to have a little bit of variety

in Week 18, so I figured it was time to kind of mix those up a little bit that kind of pushed us into Dallas Giants in Washington, Philly, and that way you get both ends of Dallas, Washington, in other television windows. So round it around, we go. Hopefully all the NFC East games are going to matter this year. And, you know, like you said, the one Dallas-Washington

games up a Fox doubleheader in October, and the other ones on Christmas, so we're counting on that series to mean something, too. Yeah, no, that made sense, and it's kind of the way I explained it. It kind of put more emphasis on, look, the two Dallas-Filly properties, and what you just added to it, one of those games getting flexed out of a big window last year, that it just ended up being a little bit more of a priority than the second Philly Washington game. We're playing division games in week 18, and if it wasn't going to be Dallas,

it had to be the Giants or Philly, and if it were the Giants, that meant Philly was playing Dallas, that makes sense. But you agree, right, that week 18, always a risk that the games, you know, may not mean that much. Well, you can see how much we're thinking about it with all the talk coming out of Minneapolis last week with the playoff receding idea. It's not even just about who's hosting wildcard and divisional round games. It's about how we ensure that the week 16, 17, 18 games are meaningful. What we have last year, eight or nine teams resting starters or at least resting quarterback going into that final weekend of the season, that's probably not good

for the league, not good for the product. So yeah, your point is well taken. You want games in Week 18 that are going to matter, but you don't want to run the risk of taking one of your really premium assets, and by the time you get there, it's no longer relevant, and you kind of wasted it. So usually don't see our biggest divisional matchups in Week 18, kind of like you were hinting if you want to get both Dallas-Washington and both Dallas-Fillies in earlier in the year, well, that only leaves Dallas Giants for Week 18, and with that obviously comes Philly Wash. How much did Washington get in terms of conversation about a prime time spot in week one, either Sunday night or Monday night? A lot. A lot. There's a couple of factors

that play there. One of them obviously, you know, in the mix for kickoff like we talked about. The other one is, you know, what we're asking of our friends from NBC that opening weekend. We know they're going to be in Philadelphia on Thursday, and they've got to get to a game three days later on Sunday, I'm not sure they can hustle out and get to San Francisco or Los Angeles or Seattle. So there's a limited number, a limited range of how far they can get their production trucks on a weekend where they have two games. Same thing you see on Thanksgiving. That's part of the reason why Washington's hosting Sunday night at Thanksgiving because we ended up Thursday night in Baltimore. Pretty sure they can get the trucks from Baltimore to Washington. We definitely talked

about getting the trucks from Philly on Thursday to Washington on Sunday night. We absolutely looked at it for Monday night. was at Chicago? I think it might have been Chicago. I think it was Chicago, Washington, that we saw for a long time on Monday night football on week one. And that would have been really fun with the two young quarterbacks and all the off-season storylines there. As it spun around and around and around, we ended up with saving, I'll tell you what, was probably the bigger impact. It's week two, right? If we're going to do Washington Green Bay on Thursday night of week two and use that as our Amazon opener, you probably can't then

use the commanders on Sunday night or Monday night at week one and shorten an already short week. So once we started seeing Washington Green Bay, getting our friends from Amazon a chance to go to Lambo, which they love. And look, everybody else gets a week one game, right? Amazon has to wait until week two before they finally get to join the party. So you know they always want a big one.

They're going to be pointing to it for the next five months. Having that Washington Green Bay there in week two felt really good for Amazon, and it probably ended up costing us a Sunday night or a Monday night slot for Washington in week one. Real quickly on Thursday night football, wasn't there a rule there for a few years that every

team had to play at least one short week game, even if it was a Thanksgiving Day game? And I think there are three teams that don't play on Thursday this year. There was a rule. It wasn't even that every team had to play a short week game. It was actually the rule was no

team could play more than one. And so as we were building out between Thanksgiving and Christmas and an expanded Amazon package now that includes Black Friday, and Thursdays all year long. We kind of ran out of games. We ran out of team appearances. So we had to pass the rule.

Ownership voted and passed a rule that said, okay, a few teams a year could play more than one short week Thursday. Once you had the opportunity to put a couple of teams on the Thursday package more than once, that did open up the opportunity if we wanted to leave a couple of teams off. And the commissioner always talks about this, like, our version of relegation. Like, you've got to play your way into these primetime windows. So we no longer have a rule.

that everybody gets a prime time game, and you can make a case that while some teams are playing multiple short week games, you know, the teams that are drafting near the top of the draft, they're not playing any short week Thursday games that might actually help them. And it kind of is consistent with how we do things around here when you draft in reverse order and the, you know, the worst records get the best free agent pickups. And same thing here, you know, the teams that didn't really perform the way they had hoped to last year probably don't end up being represented multiple times on the prime time schedule, short weeks. So, yeah, I think there's actually six teams that don't have a short week at all this year.

So those six have the luxury of the routine every week Sunday to Sunday to Sunday, while the others, you know, one of the benefits or challenges of success on the field means a pretty non-routine, non-usual schedule the next year. And that's what you're seeing with a team like Washington now. Pete Roselle wanted so much for it to be a league of parity. and it is a league that changes incredibly, not just year to year, but week to week almost. But at the same time, and I always point this out, we probably just had one of the top two dynasties with the Patriots of all time. And it was back-to-back, sort of two separate iterations of the dynasty.

It's remarkable, really, when you think about it, right? Everything we do in this league is designed for that not to happen. And they had a 20-year run. It was pretty remarkable, no doubt. Well, you know, I used to, in talking about our own team here during those dismal 24 years of Dan Snyder, I would say the league is designed for a team like ours that is even horrendously owned to occasionally have like an 11 and 5 or 12 and 4 season. But even Washington couldn't accomplish that even though the system is designed for it. All right. What about Brazil? Was Washington, you know, I remember talking to you and maybe.

April, and it sounded like Washington was not, was much more of a possibility for kickoff than for Brazil. Why not Brazil and the Chargers? It was interesting, actually, when you talk to the Chargers, they knew they were going to Brazil, and there's always this kind of give and take back and forth between the teams and the league office as to which one of our home opponents this year kind of makes sense for us to use internationally. And the Chargers are really focused on the fact that, you know, Washington goes out to L.A. to play the Chargers, you know, once every eight years, really? I mean, depending on how the rotation goes with the Spending Space game,

you're talking about once every eight years. So for commanders fans in Southern California, I think the Chargers were pretty sensitive about taking that game away from them. And, like, to your point, that fan base has been maybe a little dormant for a few years. Like, now they're relevant again, and they care. And I think the Chargers were thinking about the Southern California commanders. fans. If they miss a chance to see Washington this year, if they miss a chance to see Minnesota this year, then they may not see them again for eight years. Whereas if it's the chiefs, well,

you saw them last year, you'll see them next year. They come to SoFi every year. So I think on the one hand from a fan-friendliness, you know, ticket-selling standpoint, that was one thing the Chargers were thinking about. I think the other thing was, you know, Washington coming to So-Fi pretty long trip, right? So they're already going to be making a long trip out to SoFi. Why play a team that's going to have to travel all the way to California, and you both end up with a long trip? I think the charges are probably thinking more along the lines of,

hey, look, if we've got to go, whatever it is, 10 hours in the air to go play in Brazil, maybe it wouldn't be so bad if one of our division opponents had that same set of challenges this year. So I think it was a little bit of ticketing and fan-friendliness and revenue, but also I think a lot of it had to do with, you know, what's happening on the field. I believe the Chargers think they're going to be competing for a Super Bowl this year. So if you put a little extra wrinkle in the Chief schedule, well, I'm sure the Chargers wouldn't be too disappointed with that. That's interesting because just the whole idea. I think we all as NFL fans know, the Chargers are not necessarily that popular in L.A. And they end up almost, you know, in a neutral stadium environment. It sometimes almost feel like a road team at home.

but when you get a team like Washington that hasn't been out there with a rejuvenated fan base, you can fill it up with a lot of the opponent's fans. Look, that's what Snyder eventually had to count on, was the opponent's fans to fill up FedEx field. Yeah, remember a Monday night game against the Steelers and just an awful lot of black and gold in there. It happens, yeah. Yeah, that was one of the first in what we called the FedEx takeovers.

So you had mentioned to me and sort of it had implied that it was maybe a Madrid and Christmas or just Thanksgiving, no Madrid, no Christmas. So you ended up with Washington and Madrid against Miami and on Christmas, no Thanksgiving. So how close of a call was it between those two scenarios? The Thanksgiving and Christmas or actually intertwined in the sense, like we said, you can't play more than two short weeks in a season and both obviously Thanksgiving and Christmas fall on a Thursday this year.

If you're playing one of those, you're not playing the other one because you've got to get on Amazon somewhere. A team like Washington made the playoffs, went to the NFC championship game. You know Amazon's looking for a Washington appearance, if not too. So you knew they were going to be on Amazon somewhere on a short week Thursday, like we said, it ended up being the opener up in Lambo. So they were only going to be Thanksgiving or Christmas for their second short week Thursday.

So those were a little intertwined. The Thanksgiving actually wasn't really decided until kind of late in the process when we decided to go with Casey Dallas. We've got such a good mix of the 272 this year, so much quality, so much depth, just the way the divisions rotate through each other that you could afford to take a game like Kansas City, Dallas, arguably the number one game of the year, and put it in a window where we normally wouldn't go that big. I mean, you remember Washington into Dallas a couple of years ago, Giants into Dallas, I think two of the last three years.

Those are still doing 40, 41, 42 million viewers. We know where the floor is for Thanksgiving. I'm not sure we've ever really tested the ceiling. So Kansas City, Dallas is going to test the ceiling. If everybody's healthy and both teams are relevant, you could be talking about 48, 49, 50 million people watching a regular season an NFL game. That's incredible, and then something that I think everybody's pretty excited about. So that sort of took Thanksgiving off the table a little bit. We kicked around Black Friday,

though. That was certainly an option. But like we said, we ended up using Washington that weekend for NBC so they can do Baltimore and Washington have a nice little easy doublehead for themselves. And that enabled then that second short week for Christmas. And what do any of us know, week 17, who's playing for what? So you see Christmas, all division games. One way or another, those division games are going to matter. And that's going to be. hopefully, you know, the greatest streaming day ever. Two games on Netflix and one on Amazon that night. They all had to be comparable.

They all had to be good and they all had to be relevant. Who knows? We got pretty lucky last year picking our four teams playing that Saturday to Wednesday, Christmas round robin. Everybody was relevant. Everybody was healthy. Everybody made the playoffs. I hope our crystal ball is clear again.

But one way to ensure the games are going to matter one way or another, make them division games. I guess that Dallas, Detroit, and Kansas City are both on Thanksgiving. in Christmas, that's why Dallas and Detroit play on Amazon a week after Thanksgiving, right? You got it. And then Kansas City, what, plays the Amazon game on Christmas night? You got it. Okay. So everybody gets a taste, right?

It's just doling out if you're Amazon and you're telling me, all right, I'm getting Kansas City late in the year. Boy, I hope they're still relevant. I hope they haven't clinched. I hope my homes is healthy. I'm getting my one Dallas and my one Detroit in week 14, that week right after. Thanksgiving, that's also in December. Like, that's an awful lot of really big brands that I don't get to see

if I'm Amazon until after Thanksgiving. All the more reason, then, to put a Washington Green Bay in early, to put a Philly Giants in early, to put a Pittsburgh Cincy in early, try to make sure that they've got depth and quality throughout their entire schedule and not just backloaded with their biggest brands.

All right, let's take a quick break, and when we come back, more with Mike North, including whether or not he has any regrets about how the schedule turned out. We'll get to that and more after these words from a few of our sponsors. Hey guys, who's hungry? I've got an idea for you. How about a pizza from one of the most iconic pizza places in the village or a cheese steak from one of Philadelphia's best? I've talked about Goldbelly before, but please check it out. Goldbelly.com. It's a site where you can get the most iconic famous foods from restaurants all across the United States, and they'll ship it free

to your door anywhere in the country. How about a great New York style pizza, a legendary one from Johns of Bleaker Street, or a cheese steak from Pat's King of Steaks, the creators of the Philly cheese steak. Go to goldbelly.com. You can order it for yourself. It can be the perfect gift. You can order it to impress your friends and family with an epic meal next time you host. Go to goldbelly.com and get free shipping and 20% off your first order with promo code Sheehan. That's goldbelly.com code Sheen for free shipping and 20% off your first order. We continue with Mike North, VP of Broadcast Planning and scheduling for the NFL. Mike has been involved in putting the NFL schedule together.

together for three decades. So one of the things that I was surprised at, and the only reason I was surprised at it, last year, because of the Wednesday Christmas games, you guys had to play Saturday. And there was a comment, and I forget from who it came, but it was, we don't want to go up against college football's first round in the triple header that they have, but we have no choice this year because we can't go Sunday to Wednesday. And yet this year, Christmas is on a Thursday and you're going to play two games on Saturday. So I guess college football's big day of that first round with home fields, et cetera, triple header. The NFL at this point, they've taken

over Black Friday. They've got a Friday in September. And the playoff just doesn't play into your scheduling process. It does. I mean, we're friends. We're cooperate. We've been met with General Clark and the CFP folks multiple times. We're pretty good to them. You know, they play a lot of their bowl games and a lot of their championship games in our buildings, whether it's in Atlanta or Miami or Indianapolis or Los Angeles or Las Vegas. So we end up accommodating a lot of what they're trying to do. We obviously support everything that they're doing, anybody watching football, investing in football, putting football on television is good for us all. So we are definitely friends. We are definitely working together on all this. The interesting thing for those guys is, you know, I'm not sure where they're going with their playoffs.

They keep talking about maybe even expanding it beyond whatever they were at 12. If they go to 16 or something, they might need even another week for their playoffs. And I'm not sure how many more weekends they really have. You know, the NFL, like you hinted at, stays out of the first couple Saturdays in September, and stays all the way through the first couple Saturdays in December. But that third Saturday in December, that's an NFL day. I mean, we've been playing there something like 37 of the last 40 years. Like, that's an NFL day.

And, yeah, look, it was a great day last year when you had the two NFL games and the three college football first round games. There were an awful lot of people with an awful lot of choice. And, you know, everybody did just fine. And the fans will vote with their remotes, and they'll tell us what they care about. and certainly the fact that, you know, the two NFL games that day did pretty good viewership numbers, certainly enticed Fox to come up with their hand up and volunteer for a doubleheader that day. And, yeah, there's a couple of good NFL contests in there, and the college guys can do whatever they think is best.

They don't have to play one Friday and three Saturday. They could play two Friday and two Saturday, and we all can kind of, you know, overlap each other so that fans can watch the games they want to watch. But it wasn't really a thought of, hey, how do we compete? with college football is really more along the lines of, hey, that third Saturday in December's an NFL day. We've been there forever. We'll be there again. Speaking of the Saturday, you know, after Christmas, and you guys have done this now for several years where you take five games and that three of them are going to be flexed into that Saturday spot. Will that Saturday, December 27th? Will it be a triple header?

It will only be two, actually. It'll only be two. We need seven NFL network games. And this year because of all the extra international games, they're going to take six of the 930 a.m. Sunday morning games, so they only need one late season Saturday. So that's Saturday, December 27th, only two games, one on NFL network, 430 in the afternoon, and one on Peacock that night at 8 o'clock. So those five games listed as TBD, two of them on Saturday, the other three most likely back to Sunday, but TBD means TBD. They could go to Thursday night, they could go to Sunday night, they could go to Monday night. You remember, Washington was in the TBD pool two of the last three years and found their way over to Sunday night football. So just shows what any of us know here eight months out.

But as the games matter more, we'll put them in bigger television windows. Yeah, I was just curious in terms of the five games that you hold back. I mean, I'm looking at it right now. You've got Baltimore Green Bay. That looks attractive now. But if it's really attractive, does that get held by CBS or by Fox or, you know, going in that weekend. No, that's the reason it's putting that TBD pool. It's

unprotectable. All five of those are in the TBD. We'll find a good one for NFL Network. We'll find a good one for Peacock. The other three most likely come back to Sunday, and then we'll figure out who's playing for what, who needs what, CBS and Fox, 1 o'clock, and 4 o'clock. We've got a pretty good

double-heder game sitting there in Philly Buffalo. So I think we're going to be all right on Sunday afternoon, but that's the beauty of the TBD pool. None of those can be protected by CBS and Fox. They are all truly TBD. Yeah, I guess what I was trying to get at is, is that Saturday double-heder window attractive? For you guys, is it a bigger spot than the Sunday spot because they're standalone or not? Yeah, definitely. I mean, stand-alone, Saturday window, you know, an NFL network game in that time slot gets 10 or 11 million viewers.

We're going to be playing on Peacock that Saturday night. And look, if it is a game like Baltimore, Green Bay, and both teams are strong, and, healthy and playing for something, I think we're talking about, you know, 15 million people watching. You're probably not going to get that many eyeballs on your game on a Sunday afternoon at 1 o'clock with other games going on. We're distributed them across the whole country. So if these games are worthy of national television, here's a couple of Saturday slots where we can put them in. And if they, like you said, get really big and really need to be in a bigger window, you can always move into Sunday night like we've done with Washington the last couple or two

of the last three years. I had a question with respect to the international games, the Viking back-to-back weeks against Pittsburgh and Dublin and then Cleveland in the UK the following week. Is it a disadvantage for them to be there two weeks or is it more of an advantage that they have two less road games, true road games, than the rest of the conference? I mean, some have one less road game because they're also playing internationally. But where's the rub there? Is it tough to be there for two weeks or is it absolutely a plus for them that they're having two true road games played in neutral locations.

Yeah, we would not have done this without their cooperation, we wouldn't have done it over their objection. When we reached out to them, you know, they can see the schedule. They knew they were visiting Pittsburgh this year, and they knew Pittsburgh was hosting a game in Dublin, so they were a candidate for that. Same thing with Cleveland. They knew they had to go to Cleveland. They knew Cleveland was hosting a London game, so they were a candidate for that.

And it was actually Commissioner Goodell who said, you know, do you think they would do both? Just go over and stay. to which I said absolutely not, no chance. But I called them, I asked them, and they went from, you know, intrigued to open-minded, to willing and all the way to eager, and I'm sure kind of like you're hinting at, take what could have been road games in Pittsburgh and Cleveland in December, in the snow and the cold and a hostile environment, and now you turn them both into neutral sites, get them over with, get them in early, get a little bonding trip for your team. They can spend the week over there in the UK. They've got marketing rights over there.

You probably remember last year's London game. I think it was Jets Vikings. A building was 70% purple. Most of the London games are like a rainbow, a kaleidoscope. You know, people just wearing NFL jerseys. But there's Viking fans over there. So when the whole building's purple, I'm sure, made the Vikings think, what could we do if we spent a whole week over there, if we practiced,

if we marketed, if we trained, if we had some events, meet and greets? And, yes, get two of our road, cold weather, hostile environment, road games out of the way, done with them by week five, not have them hanging over your head anymore. I'm sure there was a little bit of marketing, but also a little bit of competitive in their minds. We also have a Rooney who was the ambassador to Ireland, so who knows how that will shake out Steeler fans-wise in Dublin. You mentioned it already, but I would have to imagine that Chiefs Cowboys on Thanksgiving Day has a chance to be an all-timer in terms of eyeballs. certainly what we're thinking about.

I mean, most years, like we said, we don't normally go that big on Thanksgiving because you know there's a floor for that, and we're lucky enough to become, you know, part of the fabric of that day in this country. It just becomes part of the ambiance, part of the event, part of the family, and the television's on. And the interesting thing about, you know, Dallas on Thanksgiving, that's almost always our most watch game every year, no matter what, throughout the records, the Cowboys Thanksgiving game is almost always our most watched game of the season. Last year that Bears Lions game earlier in the day,

almost beat it. They got up to 50 million people watching by the end of that game when they missed the field goal at the very end. So that kind of tells you that what has become, you know, not just the fabric of the day, but also two really good teams, two really fun teams now that Detroit is competitive again and fun and interesting. And so if you're going to go big with a KC. Dallas in the afternoon, you probably have to go big.

it's only fair to Fox to go a little bit bigger into Detroit, and that's why you see Green Bay there. And then, to be fair to NBC, if you're going to do a Green Bay, Chicago, a Green Bay, Detroit, and a Casey Dallas, you probably got to go pretty big at night as well, and that's why you see a Baltimore-Sincy there. So probably bigger than we've normally done on Thanksgiving, and yeah, I think we've got a real good shot at hopefully the biggest Thanksgiving day ever.

You're so generous with your time. I'll finish it up with this. When it's all over every year, and I'll just ask you specifically about the last, you know, week and a half since the schedule came out. Well, two weeks now. Do you look at it and say, you know, I really wish we had gotten that thing that we were thinking about, but I'm really thrilled that this one kind of stuck. Are there, is there a regret and is there a, God, I'm so glad we got that one right when it's all said and done, specific to this year's schedule for you?

Yeah, a little bit of both. There's always that, you know, what could we have done, differently, what worked out, what do we wish we could have changed. You know, wave of magic wand probably would have loved to have seen that Baltimore, Cincinnati, Thanksgiving night game in Cincinnati. I think this will be three years or maybe four years in a row where we've played Cincy at Baltimore in prime time at night, maybe even on a short week. I'm not 100% sure about that, but certainly knew that going in. And, you know, again, wave of magic wand probably would have loved to have played that game

in Cincinnati. But like we were saying, you got teams playing multiple short weeks, and you can't play them both on the road. And we kind of like that Baltimore at Miami game for Amazon. It just felt like a good kind of ballast in the middle of their schedule. So once you put Baltimore at Miami on Amazon, you can't put Baltimore at Cincinnati on NBC on Thanksgiving night. And so trickle down from there. You know, wave of magic wand, I would have loved to have seen that game in Cincinnati. I think the Bengals deserve it.

But they've got plenty of primetime games. you know, what do any of us know? It's the beauty of this sport, right? It's four months until the season starts, eight until, you know, the games that decide the playoff spots are getting played. We're all just guessing, but did feel like we had 272 really strong quality assets this year. Felt like we could take some really good stuff off the top, go a little bit bigger in windows where we normally wouldn't kick off, Thanksgiving,

Black Friday, Christmas, and still have enough quality and depth left over to cover Sunday nights, Monday nights, CBS and Fox Doublehead. Thursday nights, the late season Saturdays. It feels in May like a really good schedule and opportunity for teams to really kind of earn the spots, earn the opportunity that they've got. And that includes Washington. I mean, we root for all 32 equally, but certainly the ones we're counting on for national television windows, rooting for them just a little bit more.

Well, I mean, it's not necessarily Christmas morning, and there's so much information leading up to that actual full unveil. but man, when it comes out for some of us and, you know, geeks, I'm sure people will be saying as they're listening to this. But I love it. And you get to kind of look forward to this, you know, incredible 18 week journey and kind of envision what it'll look like on certain days. I think you guys did a phenomenal job. It had to be harder. I mean, NFC East, NFC North, NFC East, AFC West. It just created so many alluring matchups. You can look up and down the schedule. Week 1 through 18, there's so much good stuff there.

Let's hope it all plays out the way we envisioned. And I love that people care. I love the people want to talk about it. I mean, you've been doing this long enough. The schedule used to kind of come out under the cover a night, mid-April, like one Thursday. Oh, here it is. And nobody talked about it, nobody cared.

Nobody wanted to know how the sausage gets made. I love that people care now, obviously, with the extra scrutiny, obviously comes, you know, armchair quarterbacks and a lot of Monday morning quarterbacking. And it's a fun process to be a part of. It's a great project to get to participate in for the last couple of decades. And, yeah, it's going to be really fascinating to see where we go from here. But glad this one's in the books. And honestly, I wish the season was starting tomorrow.

Let's go. Well, congrats. It looks great to me, Mike. I know how much hard work goes into it. Really appreciate you making time for us a month ago and today as well. Can't wait for the season like you said, and hopefully we can do it again next year. Appreciate it. You got it, my friend.

Take care. That was fun. I'm sure you could probably hear it in my voice. I enjoyed that a lot. Thanks to Mike North and thanks to all of the time he gave us not only on the podcast today, but when he was on with us back in mid-April. All right. We'll finish up with the Nats who are on a role and last night's NBA Western Conference

dominating win for the team that I think is going to win the title, Oklahoma City. We'll get to that next after these words from a few of our sponsors. Ahmed Rosario will pinch hit for the left-handed hitting Jose Tanna. Rosario! Singles toll comes home with the Nationals. Walk it off, 8-7. Five straight wins for Washington. And their first extra inning win.

of the season. Sounded like Dan Colco on the call on Masson last night, probably in for Bob Carpenter. How about the Nationals? Five in a row. The first three were against the Orioles. The last two, though, against a Braves team that had come in, winners of five of seven to get themselves for the first time this year,

above 500 after starting the season, very slowly. But the Nats are playing some good baseball. averaging over seven runs a game during this five-game win streak. Hassel the third was knocked in on that game winner by Ahmed Rosario. He made his big league debut last night going two for five. Hassel did. And James Wood just continuing to put up big night after big night, two for three last night with three RBIs walked twice as well.

In his last five games, James Wood has nine hits, nine hits, and he also has eight RBIs. He's got his batting average up to 291. His slugging percentage at 545, his OPS at 934. He is having an absolute all-star season for Washington. They get the Giants tonight in the first. first of a weekend set, but the Nats are playing well. They're four games below 500, but now they're just a game and a half behind Atlanta for third in the National League East. Really good job by the Nats here recently. They are a completely different team offensively than they were

a year ago. This segment of the show is brought to you by MyBooky. Go to mybooky.orgie. Go to mybooky.com. Use my promo code, Kevin D.C, and my bookie will give you a cash bonus on your initial deposit. Tonight, the Knicks are six-point favorites, six-point favorites over the Pacers in game two, a must-have game two for the Knicks. And of course, they've got all of their NFL stuff up, including week one odds. We've talked about this before, Washington right now, in week one against the Giants, down to six and a half over the Giants at my bookies. So it opened at seven, went to seven and a half,

and now is under a touchdown at six and a half. The total for their week one matchup against the Giants is 45. The biggest line, if you're wondering, of week one, is Philly over Dallas. The Eagles are seven-point favorites over the Cowboys in that opening game of the year. Denver's also a seven-point favorite over Cam Ward in what I think we would expect to be his NFL debut with the Titans in week one. Go to my bookie.ag or my bookie.com. If you want to bet on sports, that's my recommendation.

Fair numbers, fair pricing across the board. use my promo code, Kevin, D.C. By the way, there was another story in baseball last night. The Phillies won again. They're actually rolling. They've won seven in a row. The only win streak in the National League. Close to that is the Nats win streak at five in a row.

But the Phillies have been rolling. They now have a two-game lead over the Mets in the National League. They now have the best record in the National League as well at 32 and 18. But the team that they got healthy against over the last four games is the Colorado Rockies. If you're not following baseball, the Colorado Rockies are 8 and 42, which constitutes the worst 50 games start in Major League Baseball's modern era, means since 1901. Before that, you've got to go back to the 1895 Louisville Colonels, or Colonials, who started 7 and 43 to find a worse start. Yeah, 8 and 42 is Colorado. They're 5 and 20 at home,

which means they are 3 and 22 on the road, and they are on pace to lose 136 games this year, which would pass the 1899 Cleveland spiders for the most losses by a Major League Baseball team of all time. Modern era, worst season, were the Chicago White Sox with 121 losses. that was, was that last year? The White Sox lost 121 games last year.

Wow. So we have seen two straight, horrendous seasons in Major League Baseball. Last night, NBA playoffs, Oklahoma City, super impressive again. They pulled away from Minnesota in the second half, winning 118 to 103 to take a 2-0 series lead. in the Western Conference Finals. There's that old basketball adage that says a series doesn't start until the home team loses. Well, Minnesota hasn't played at home yet, but they will tomorrow night in game three, and then on Monday in game four.

And maybe they'll be a completely different team, and maybe Oklahoma City will be less of a team on the road. It happens in the NBA playoffs, but man, the thunder have been impressive. I don't think that I've seen in recent years a better defensive team than Oklahoma City. I've been talking about that for a couple of weeks. It's not just Lou Dort. It's not just Alex Caruso. It's everybody. All of their players are excellent.

On ball defenders, they are excellent at getting in passing lanes. They are really, really intense and relentless in terms of ball pressure. They're just excellent defensively, and Minnesota just is struggling because of Oklahoma City's defense. The Timberwolves have shot 38.2% in aggregate in the first two games, 28.8% from behind the arc. They're 26 of 90 in two games on threes. Oklahoma City in two games has 22 steals, 22 steals, 13 in game one, nine more. more last night. They are just too good defensively.

I think we're going to look back at the Denver series. Denver with Yokic and Murray primarily, and the experience that they had, they had a chance against Oklahoma City. They had a chance to win game four and game five. Winning either one of those two games may have meant that Oklahoma City might be home right now. but they are the best defensive team I've seen in the playoffs in a few years minimum,

and I just don't see them losing more than another game or two total. I think they can sweep Minnesota. I think best case for Minnesota is winning one at home and Oklahoma City winning a five-game series. And I think the Eastern Conference champion won't be as good as Denver and Minnesota. Now, Indiana is really good. That's the matchup that I'd actually like to see is Oklahoma City, Indiana. Indiana is just so fast and they play at such a great pace offensively,

but I'd like to see Oklahoma City's defense against Indiana's offense. I think Oklahoma City would destroy the Knicks. I think that could be a four, a five game series max. This is a really, really good basketball team. I've been calling them as the eventual NBA champion. for a few weeks, even though before the postseason started, I thought that they'd have to earn their way with another season of maybe getting a step further, but not multiple steps further.

But this team is really, really good, especially on defense. And the MVP last night, 38 points on 12 of 21 from the floor, 13 to 15 from the free throw line for the guy that they have referred to as the free-frey-frey. merchant, Shea Gilgis, Alexander. There have been many players and many great scores in the history of this game, both in the regular season and in the postseason,

that have gotten to the free throw line more than Shea Gilgis, Alexander. I saw something posted after the game last night. In the history of the game, looking at players like him who are, you know, back court players primarily who have, won the MVP and the percentage of points that came from free throws, he's way down the list. You know, Jordan, Iverson, Kobe, Westbrook, Magic, two or three times. Magic, Oscar has the highest percentage of points that came from free throws as an MVP winner.

32.3% of his points during his MVP, one of his MVP seasons anyway came from the free throw line. Three of Magic's MVP seasons, I think he had three total, were all higher percentage points from the free throw line than SGA. But yeah, LeBron, I think, has post-seasons in which he shot many more free throws than Shea Gilges Alexander is on pace to shoot. this postseason, but they have dubbed him the free throw merchant in part because he is one of those guys that is just crafty in drawing fouls that aren't necessarily egregious and sometimes borderline phantom. I love watching him play. I think he is a, you know, he's one of those mid-range guys that just gets to his spot. He can certainly shoot it from three and he certainly is good at finishing. By the way, he's an excellent defender as well.

I like watching players that are kind of crafty and methodical and patient and are able to get to the areas in which they know they can score. But the league's MVP putting on a show right now in the Western Conference finals, averaging 34.5 points per game on 45.8% from the field. And yeah, he has gotten to the free throw line 29 times in two games and hit a lot. on 24 of those free throws. Tonight, Knicks and Pacers, we'll see. As mentioned, Nick's six-point favorites at My Bookie. Game one, Epic, I will definitely be tuned in to game two, but I would certainly think the Knicks,

if they want to have any chance to win this series, have to win tonight. Indiana, if you were paying attention, they actually took the first two on the road against Cleveland. who, by the way, was the one seat in the Eastern Conference finals. They went to Cleveland and won two straight, including an incredible comeback in game two, to steal one. And then they lost game three at home before winning game four and then game five on the road to clinch.

They have done a really good job on the road, and it would not shock me if Indiana wins again tonight. All right, I think that's it. No real commanders news as of the recording of this podcast today. No skins news today. So that'll be it. I'll be back on Monday. Have a great weekend.

Holiday weekend, but I'll have a show on Monday for you.