The Kevin Sheehan Show - Mrs. Snyder's Mentions

Episode Date: September 1, 2020

Kevin and Thom today. Kevin tried to recommend a podcast to Thom but it fell on deaf ears. Thom remembered Coach Thompson on the show today and the boys shared stories of being around Coach during their years at WTEM-980. They talked about the NFL now overseeing the Beth Wilkenson investigation and the increasing presence of Tanya Snyder in statements from the team. Additionally there was some WTF "football" talk and some NBA Game 7 discussion from Kevin too. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

A sports fix Tuesday coming up, Tommy standing by, and we'll join us here momentarily. This podcast today is title sponsored by Window Nation. And right now, Window Nation is offering 50% off all Windows styles. It's a perfect time right now to get Windows. If you've been thinking about Windows, we're approaching fall. It's September 1st, everybody. And fall's going to be here before we know it, then winter. And if you've been thinking about changing windows and getting new ones, give Window Nation a shot.

50% off all window styles, zero money down, zero payments, and zero interest for two full years. Call them at 86690 Nation or go online to set up an in-home estimate or a virtual online estimate for free at windownation.com and tell them that I sent you. You want it. You need it. It's what everyone's talking about. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Now here's Kevin. You're listening to The Sports Fix. That's right. It's a Sports Fix Tuesday, Tommy, live from, what do you call it? Your Fortress of Solitude, Frederick, Maryland? Yeah, Superman fans will know what I'm talking about.

And Seinfeld fans. And I am in studio, and we have a lot to talk about today. First of all, there was a big story last night with the League, supposedly taking back the investigation of the skin. Dan Snyder and Tanya Snyder both put out a statement saying that it was their idea. We're going to get to all of that. Tommy's going to weigh in certainly on his memories of Coach Thompson as I did yesterday. I did want to start with this because we were just talking before we started to record the show

that we were talking about management, basically. And the management groups that you and I have been exposed to. too in media. I mean, you've been in media for your entire life working for newspapers and then, of course, radio stations. I think your best employer, by far and away, would be the Kevin Sheehan Show podcast, which is managed pretty well. But the only problem is it's a non-union shop.

It's a non-union shop, although somebody did reach out to me about, you know, hey, what do you think? I'm like, well, tell me about your health plan. Anyway, we were talking just about, and look, I've said this before, I spent the first half of my professional career in business and then the last half of my professional career, and maybe, hopefully it's the middle third of my professional career, in media and in broadcasting and working in radio primarily. And Gary Braun once said this because Gary is a good friend of mine and Gary, big part of the Tony Kornheiser show and Gary and I were co-hosts together on the John Riggins show for a couple of years in 2006, 2007. And Gary and I are good friends and Gary once said, and I'll never forget it. And I've used it many times. He's like, once you get a load of this industry, you'll realize that it's run by C minus students.

You know, it's a C-minus industry. And nothing he's ever told me has ever been closer to the truth. And look, we have been fortunate on occasion to work with some people who were quality people, bright people in radio. But you and I, I think, would both say that the majority of people on the other side of the building, the non-content side of the building, not rocket scientists for the most part over the years. right? Look, I think, and this will sound very obnoxious and arrogant, and in the creative business, whether it's, you know, on radio or writing, or I think any creative business, the smartest people, are usually the talent.

They are, I mean, right? I mean, usually they are. I mean, the people who are. Well, we've known some dummies that produce content. too. I mean, it's not like, look. I know that. But in the big scheme of things, usually, at least in the newspaper business, you know, the smartest people are the ones out there writing. Tommy.

And I mean, and you talk about how we've met some people in the business who have been smart. They stand out because they're so rare. There are people. I've had editors, a couple, I've had maybe three editors, probably, who I would consider just to have, I mean, just I admire for their intelligence and ability. I've been a newspaper business for over 40 years. I think the newspaper business in terms of management probably, you know, not C-minus. I'm really specifically talking about the radio business in particular. But I'm talking about all creative. Well, what's interesting about that is, look, I mean, there are smart people and there are limited people on both sides.

It's been our experience with radio in particular that the smartest people we've known in this particular business we've been in have typically been the people that have been on the creative side, the content side, the talent, if you want to call them that. And that's not us backslopping ourselves because we've got limitations. too, but you, some of the people that we've come across in management radio stunningly limited. I mean, like, wow. And, you know, when you said that, it's true. Like, if I were just sitting here thinking, you know what, I'm going to start a technology business. And I've got to hire from the people that I've worked with over the last 15 years. it would be all people that have been on the air at the radio station and very few people from other parts of the building.

That's true. That is true. I think it's just the same way for a lot of creative businesses. And I think, you know, what also comes into place, here's some of the other things. Creative people are, and this is so stereotypical. creative people are usually difficult people. Not all, just you. Not all.

Yeah, not you, right? They tend not to last in certain positions from time to time, whereas certain management positions are filled by people who are not difficult, who are basically, they outlasts to difficult people. And they happen to be there when the job, the Peter Principle, They happen to be there when the job opens up because they haven't been difficult and they've done what they've been told. And there they are. Before you know it, they're running everything.

I'll tell you why we brought this up because I'm bringing it up because I want to lead to a recommendation for you and for anybody else that loves the show that we talk about every once in a while here on the podcast that we both love, which is the office, the American. version. I love the BBC version as well. But there's a new podcast that I just came across. I've told you about the Office Ladies podcast with Jenna Fisher and Angela Kinsey. If you've watched the show, that's Pam Beasley and Angela Martin on the show. And you and I are both fans of both of them. We love Jenna Fisher. We think she was perfect for the role. And that podcast has been over the last six months, I think it's one of the top. five downloaded podcasts in the world. Because the show itself has become the all-time most successful show on Netflix,

you know, many years after it, you know, taped its last finale in 2015 or whatever that was, Tommy. You might know the actual date on that. Anyway, the oral history of the office is a podcast done by Brian Baumgartner, who played Kevin Malone on the office. And I started listening to this recently, and it's really good. Now, the Jenna Fisher, Angela Kinsey podcast is really good if you're a fan of the show. For me, it can be a bit girly.

There's a bit too much talking about hairstyles and who was wearing what and what episode. It's a rewatch podcast, so they go episode by episode. They've had some great guests on. Like recently, they had Mindy Kaling on. had Ed Helms on with a recent podcast. He's funny. But the Brian Baumgartner podcast, Kevin Malone, of all people, an oral history of the office debuted last month. And I've listened to a couple of episodes. It is excellent. And it gets into really how the whole thing came about early on. And the reason that I bring it up is, A, you would like it a lot. And anybody else that is a

fan of the show will like this podcast. He's excellent, by the way. You know, you think of Kevin Malone being, you know, a dunce and slow and the whole thing. But Brian Baumgartner is really with it, and he's produced a really good podcast. But in the first episode, maybe it's the second, they talk about how this series came to the U.S. And there's this gentleman named Ben Silverman, who essentially was the guy that was over in the UK, was watching the BBC version, fell in love with it. He was a TV guy back in the States, and he met with Ricky Jervase, got his phone number, met with him at a Starbucks in London, told him about how much he loved the show.

Jervase is on the show, so is Stephen Merchant, who were, they were the two co-founders of the BBC version, which I know you've never watched, but I promise you, if you did, you would love it. And anyway, to make a long story short, this guy, Ben Silverman's telling Brian Baumgartner about how hard it was to get the BBC to do a deal with him to bring the show to the U.S. And somebody at one point during a meeting from the BBC said, will America really like a show with like a middle, you know, a middle management boss that's such a dummy, such a dunce. And Ricky Jervais, who was in the meeting, said, well, why don't you just get up off of your chair and walk around this building for a little while if you think that David Brent, the character Ricky Jervase played, is really dumb. Like he was saying, the BBC was incredibly bureaucratic and just people with no vision and slow in the whole thing. And apparently the guy, you know, looked around and got a laugh out of it and said, all right. And they did a deal with this guy, Ben Silverman.

who took it to Greg Daniels, who was the show runner here in the U.S. for the office. And then it was about finding a network. And that's an interesting story, too, because this guy, Kevin Riley, who was at FX, FX was going to buy the show because Riley was the only one that they pitched it to that got it. There was nothing like it on TV at the time in the early to mid-2000s. And Riley left FX, went to NBC, was the only person willing to take a flyer on. a mockumentary style show which had never been done in the U.S. And he was the one that basically gave these guys a shot and the rest is history with the show.

But the podcast is actually really good. And I actually like it a little bit more than the other one, although the other one's good too. And, you know, they're both good together. They're best friends. But again, like you have to sort of fast forward. I'm sure like some people do with our podcast, when I start rambling about something where your voice hits a certain pitch level, they'll jump forward 15 seconds and get to the next part that hopefully is better. And that's what I find myself doing with the girls podcast. But you'd like Brian Baumgartner's podcast. It's good.

They're only four or five episodes at this point. And they're short, too. They're only like 30 to 40 minutes each. you know, an hour and a half. Okay. First of all, Ben Silverman was in four episodes of the office in the ninth season. Who did he play?

He played Isaac, one of Jim's business partners. Oh, yeah, sure. In Philadelphia. Yeah. Yeah. One of those guys was Ben Silverman. Okay. The second thing is, and this will tell everybody out there,

one of an honest podcast, this is. Okay. I don't listen to any podcast. I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't even, I didn't even listen to my own. Right. I had one for a couple of years. You know, I don't want to, I'm not interested in hearing anyone. I don't listen to sports talk radio.

I listen to Chad. I do listen to Chad because Chad, I think, is entertaining. And I listen to you sometimes when I'm up that early in the morning. Well, other than that, that's it. I mean, I listen to music. I try to hang on. to driving around in my car when I'm 18, 19 years old for three hours at a time, wasting a tank of gas, listening to music.

I'm 66 years old, and I hang on to that as much as I can. So I don't listen to any books on tape. I don't listen to any podcast. I listen to music all the time if I'm listening to anything. It's music. That's funny. And it's music that I love. like. It's not for music that I'm interested in being introduced to. I don't want to know about

any more new music. I want the music that I like. Okay, so we are similar in that I would bet you that the majority of time that I'm in the car, I listen to music. That's number one, especially during the last six or seven months. I listen to a lot of music that I like. You know, I've created Playlists on Spotify. And Spotify's great at, you know, then you're creating daily mixes, which, you know, I will listen to. But I listen to a lot of music as well. My preference in the car by myself is to listen to music.

The difference is I do listen to a lot of new music. But it's usually not with me finding it. It's usually with my son finding it. You know, my son's a musician. He's in a band. and he'll say you'll really like this new band. Or if it's not new, it's something that I haven't heard before. However, the difference is I never listened to a podcast until I started to do one.

And even then, I rarely listen to a podcast. But I do find myself listening to podcasts much more than radio. Now, I listen to sports radio recently because we've gotten into some games. You know this, Tommy. Like, a lot of times, you know, there's very little that's original in this business. You're listening to stuff. You'll hear a caller say something on another show. You'll hear a host say something.

It'll spark a thought. You'll write it down and you'll be like, you know what? I'm going to do something. It may not be exactly like this, but I've got an idea. And I listen. I'll tell you, I listen to, I'm not going to tell you what I listen to and don't listen to. But, you know, I certainly listen to our station. and I listen to Zabe, although I haven't found myself listening to him as much because I'm not in the car that time of day.

I'll listen to Mad Dog a lot on XM Serious. And, you know, I'll listen to the other shows. You know, on your station, I really don't listen. Obviously, I don't listen in the morning because I'm on opposite those guys, even though I like those guys. And I think I totally get why they work and always have understood why they work. but really, you know, from my show into this podcast that we do, I don't really have a chance to listen that much to the other stuff, but I have started to become much more of a podcast fan

and listen to various podcasts. But I would bet you 55, 60% of the time is music. 20% of the time is, you know, 25% of the time is radio, but talk radio, not music radio. and then the rest would be podcasts. Okay. I mean, I just think music, music makes me feel good. Me too.

I'm the same way. You know, it just does. It makes me, particularly music where you can connect to a certain moment. Yes. You know? So, I mean, I think it helps my attitude every day. I wake up in a morning. First thing I do is turn my phone on the music.

When I'm getting ready for the morning, I got music on all. a time. Every single time I jump into a shower, I take my phone and I blare, and I hit Spotify, and I'm listening to music. It's a good, I think it's a good way to start the day. Now, I know a lot of people who listen to podcasts all the time. You know, my son, my oldest son listens to a lot of podcasts. I know, it's ironic. The only time I've listened to my own podcast I used to do, cigars and curveballs, was when I would transcribe something to write a column about it from an interview I did, which actually I wound up doing yesterday to write a column about John Thompson because he had been a guest on my podcast.

Right. So I wound up listening to that podcast finally and transcribing it for notes for a column that I wrote for today's paper. That's interesting. That's the only time I listen to. Okay, so I wasn't a podcast listener either. You know, I'm just giving you, you know, an idea. I think if you listen to this, the oral history of the office podcast hosted by Brian Baumgartner,

I think you will, you'll thank me for it. But I've said this before, and you're, again, I'm on repeat here. I'm on repeat. You and Scott are the same people when it comes to new. things. You want to discover it yourself or it's not any good in your own mind. And that's just ridiculous way to proceed. I admit to that 100%. Okay. Let's get to... If I'm not on the ground floor, I'm not interested in on the seventh floor. All right. Let's get to Coach Thompson and get your thoughts, because I spent 30 minutes yesterday I'm talking about coach. And we'll get to that

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All right, I spent time yesterday, and it's funny because when I got done with the podcast yesterday. I watched a lot. I read a lot of people that wrote about Coach Thompson. You wrote about Coach Thompson in the Washington Times. Go ahead and share your thoughts on him. You and I both had, you know, not what Doc and Al Cokin and Brian Mitchell and CJ and Chuck Sapienza had in terms of being with him every day in his media career. But you and I did for seven and a half years the show that preceded his and we ended up. having many conversations with coach over the years. And I had a lot of memories that I shared with people yesterday. What about yours? Boy, that was a great video that you sent out about him

coming in the, to talk to you in the studio. That was the last day of his show. Were you there that day? Because you're not in the video, and I have a feeling that you were off that day. I was off that day. Okay. I was all. You know where I was? I think I was in spring training in Florida. That would have made sense because it was March. Yeah, I was in spring training because I remember listening to his show via the, you know, my phone. Right. The last show. So yeah, absolutely. I was not there. But that was a great video. You know, I want to just say this before you get started. He loved our show. You know, he told us that. for those listening, he really liked Tommy.

I mean, I had a good relationship with coach, and we would debate and argue different things, and I know that he liked our show, and I know that he liked me. He loved Tommy's old school stories and everything else. And, I mean, it really was kind of a cool thing to be in that building with him. I mean, we were in the building with a lot of people at various times that were, But there was something about him that was just memorable, you know, the things he said and the conversations that we had with him over the years. But go ahead. Give me your thoughts.

Well, you know, it's interesting. I think of that all the time. I always think of, I always call him the gifts I've been given in my career. And I realized that I just reminded of it yesterday, you know, writing about John Thompson on Frank Robinson's birthday. and that I was fortunate enough to know both of these men very well. You know, I mean, look, before I became a sports writer in 92, I was a fan, and I was in awe of, I was still in awe of these guys. But it would have been impossible for me to think that someday I would be, you know,

talking about sports face to face with Frank Robinson or John Thomas. So I'm always forever grateful for those kinds of gifts that we've had in this business. And one other thing is remember the conversation we had? Maybe it was the last podcast about phone numbers that we have of people who have died. I know. Now we have another one. I know. And I pulled that up and, you know, I went through, you know, basically he used to text me, Tommy.

I don't even know if I shared this with you long after he left radio. I would get, you know, I don't know. It's not like it was a lot, two, three, four times a year. You know, I would get a text. He was listening and he would say, you know, a boy, you don't know what you're talking about. Or he'd say, you know what? You were spot on. I specifically remember it.

I think I shared this yesterday. When Jay Gruden absolutely summarined and embarrassed RG3 publicly in that story on NFL.com in 2014, remember at the end of the year. I said to you, I said, this is the wrong thing to do. You don't do this. This is not going to play well. This is a sign of insecurity and weakness. This is something that's addressed behind closed doors.

And I'll never forget, he texted me or called me, and he was like, you nailed it. Like, this is not, this is a bad sign when it comes to Gruden, that he would let his frustrations get to the point and his emotions get to the point where he would go, public on his key player, on his star player. But anyway, I had not heard from him text-wise in at least a year and a half, two years. He wasn't, he was on and off, not, you know, on and off sick, you know, over the last several years. But anyway, yes, another phone number in our contact list. A couple years ago, he was kind enough to be on, come on the Cigars and Curveball podcast. and, you know, he loved talking about baseball. Baseball was his first love.

He told me that baseball was the sport that got him involved in sports. In those days, he said, kids in my neighborhood didn't play a lot of basketball. He said that his first introduction to sports was about baseball, and he used to love to go to Griffith Stadium with his dad and watch Larry Dolby play. Larry Dobie being the first black player in the American League who played for the Cleveland Indians. And, you know, he had a statue of Dobie in his office at Georgetown. That's how much he revered him. And he told the story about once they were playing Seaton Hall up in New Jersey,

and somebody had meant they were running to practice. somebody had mentioned that Dobie was sitting up in the stand watching practice. I think, you know, he was working for, might have been working for the Nets or for Seaton Hall at the time. Right. And Thompson said he stopped practice and made the kids go up and meet him and shake his hand because, quote, he meant so much to me in terms of looking forward and having and aspiring to have role models.

Dobie was as important in my life as number 14 Elgin Baylor was as I got older. So he liked talking baseball with me, and we talk a lot about baseball on that podcast. But he also talked about, which I mentioned in the column, the three probably most influential figures he brought to Georgetown and how that happened, Patrick Ewing, Alonzo Mooring, and Alan Iverson. and he told the story about how Iverson basically wound up recruiting him and said of him recruiting Iverson because a bunch of guys led by Boo Williams, who was his famous AAU coach in the Hampton Roads,

came up to Georgetown to meet with Thompson and say, you know, can you take this kid? He really needs your guys, and he really needs your protection at this point. and coach said he wasn't really buying it he didn't think the school needed that kind of pressure then Iverson's mother asked all them to leave the room and then it was just the two of them and coach said she broke down

she told me in essence that if you don't take my son they're going to kill my son and that's when that's when he said he thought he would take a chance on him What a conversation. That must have been. Oh, my God. I mean, well, that's, you know, Alan Iverson when he was inducted into the Hall of Fame. I mean, that's when he broke down and he said, you know, Coach Thompson saved my life. Yeah. So, you know, there's stuff about Patrick, stuff about Alonzo, how they got Alonzo,

because he was so impressed with watching Patrick in the 82 championship game against North Carolina and how he was blocking shot. Alonso was apparently that's... He was such an affair of Patrick Ewing. That's what helped bring Alonzo to Georgetown. And the first time he saw Patrick, he was up in New England at Boston Garden watching his high school play,

but he was scouting another kid on Patrick's team. Patrick was a 10th grader. And that was the first time he saw him, and he said to his assistant coach, he said, came for to get that case. Yeah. So that's the gist of the column is basically he was a trailblazer. And, you know, we use that term lightly, but when you're a trailblazer, it means

you're doing something that people before you have not done. And if you're doing that, you're doing it against all odds with people trying to stop you from doing it. Right. To be a trailblazer means it's been very. difficult to accomplish what you're trying to do. Him being the first black coach to win an NCAA championship. So that's the diss to the column how he lived his life basically battling all the time,

but he was never really bitter. You know, he was never bitter. Right. He felt like he was always battling. I was reading a lot of tweets yesterday. look, he was fearless. The Rafeel Edmund's story, which has been told so many times and got told, you know, another 15,000 times yesterday is an act of bravery that is incredible. I mean, you don't know what you're getting into.

You're a basketball coach. You don't know anything about what this guy's capable of doing other than what you've heard, which is he's killed a lot of people. And he's running a drug ring and he's a kingpin. And people are dying on the streets of D.C. and he basically lights him up in his office and says, if you go anywhere near one of my players, you'll regret it. And Ray Ful Edmund said, yes, sir, and never went near his players. But I was reading various stories from some of his former players,

and there's some really good ones from, first of all, and this was an experience that I had many times with him, which is just the endearing affectionate, way in which he would refer to people that he knew, I guess, could take it or that he had some level of like for, you know, an MFer. I mean, I can't, there were, there were no less than a dozen times like he'd walk in Tommy. I remember so many times you'd be back in your office after the show. I'd be in mine. And, you know, he was never, when it came to being on time for his radio show, there were plenty of days where he walked in five, ten minutes after it started,

right? But I multiple times over the course of those years, he'd walked to my office and he'd go, motherfucker, what you were talking about, you couldn't be further from the truth. And then I would say, well, and then we'd go back and forth. But he was always like, there was never anything that was truly like, you know, intimidating. There was a teddy bear side to him. And he would, he had a great smile and he had a great sense of humor. But I was reading from his former players and people that had worked with him. Everybody referred to, you know, this is Austin Freeman, you know, who played at DeMath and played for, you know, the Thompson's.

And, you know, this is, Austin Freeman didn't even play for coach. I mean, he was played for JT3. But, you know, JT, Big John was always around. And he said, funny story about Big John. So we would be in practice and he would be there in his chair, chilling, got it leaned back on the bleacher a little bit, but his hat was low covering his eyes. So I look over in my mind, he's asleep.

Now practice is over. I'm walking out of the gym. He goes off. You BS in MF? This MF? Austin Freeman's tweeting. He sits me down after that just talks to me and is like, you got all the talent in the world, MF,

and things come easy to you. But boy, don't be afraid to be that MFer we need. Now go on and get out of my face. And then, oh, here's the other one. Austin Freeman. One time we just came back from playing pickup at Yates and Big Coach sitting in Old Faithful, the chair. And when you walk in, you got to shake his hand.

So a teammate of mine goes over and says, hey, coach, it's raining outside, might want to watch out for the puddles and stuff so you don't get wet. And Big Coach goes, I walk on water, son. And I mean, you know, it really is like, I know we've, I spent time on this yesterday, but this, when you're around somebody like that who is bigger than life. And by the way, smart, thoughtful, engaging the whole thing, there are just so many things that you just never forget, you know. Like we, we, we, I talked about yesterday all the different sayings, you know, the different sayings that he had, um, over the years, you know, rather, a fool and have to resurrect a corpse, you know?

Things that, by the way, were wise and made a lot of sense that always stuck with me. I always enjoyed when he would say, and I remember him telling me this about Gruden. Gruden had taken the blame for like two losses in a row, and he said, you know, at some point, you better stop admitting that it's your fault because they may start to believe you, you know? Like those things. Like, you know, you know that somebody had some level of impact when you quote them over and over again. Remember the grief he used to give you about Julie serving? Oh, well, not only Dr. Jay, but about Georgetown versus Maryland, about clock management.

I mean, one of my favorite things. Yeah, he thought I was completely insane. And that was one of those days, you and I said, Dr. Jay's. overrated. And you went nuts. And I gave you a bunch of stuff. And we talked about it for a half an hour. We took calls. And that was one of those days he came in. And, you know, we're walking and he's in the bullpen just waiting for me. And I get out there. And he may have been 20 minutes late for his show that day because we were going back and forth in the bullpen. But I forget if I told this one yesterday, but I'll never forget one of those days where, you know, I'm ripping Gruden or somebody

for the way they manage the clock, right? And doing the whole clock management, game management, which I'm, as you know, I'm very convinced I could do better than probably three-fourths of the coaches in the NFL. Right. And he walks in and I think I was still sitting there and maybe he walked in a little bit early and then we get done. And he's just laughing and smiling and standing there over me. And I said what? And he goes, motherfucker, you would choke so bad if you were on the sideline trying to figure out when to call a timeout. He's like, you could never do it under fire. And I just started laughing so hard.

And then it was one of those shows where, you know, Doc starts off. What were you talking about with Coach Ian? And then he starts laughing. And the two of them are laughing hysterically about how I would perform under pressure if I had to actually call timeout. in the right spot. He's like, do you know how many things those motherfuckers have to deal with? And you're telling me you'd be able to do it. And by the way, I never came off my position that I'd be able to,

I'd be able to do it with, with cool demeanor and deliver. But yeah, I mean, it was, you mentioned it. I mean, look, I mean, at that radio station, I mean, you know, hosting a show with Rigo for two years, you know, and doing as much stuff as I did with Rigg. over the years was such a thrill. And it's funny because I know you feel the same way. Like people that don't get those opportunities are like, wow.

But especially the guys that are really good guys, like John's and Sonny. Like Sonny. Yeah, they just become people and you have these conversations. But then occasionally you'll just be like, I just sat there for 45 minutes and just bullshitted with Sonny Jurgensen, you know. Yeah, yeah. But coach was, man, he was something else. And, you know, again, my perspective, as you know,

was as a hardcore Maryland fan, as not a Georgetown fan, as somebody, you know, who grew up thinking, you know, that never wanted to see Georgetown do well, because it was, you know, competitive even though they didn't play with Maryland in the market. By the way, I think I said this yesterday, but CJ and I were talking about it this morning. You know, the heyday of college basketball is the 1980s, right? 80s, 90s, you know.

Which coincides with the Big East. Exactly. So, you know, Tommy, I think I talked about this yesterday, but maybe it had just occurred to me for the first time, or maybe it had occurred to me a while back and just forgot about it. But, you know, D.C. it was the only market in the country that had an ACC team and a Big East team. I mean, it was in many ways, and keep in mind, we had a terrible NBA team during those years,

and we didn't have a baseball team, and the hockey team wasn't very good. And this was an era here in this city where college basketball was number two to the Redskins. It was. You know, whether it was Maryland, but then clearly it was Georgetown, because Maryland was a top 20 team every year, but Georgetown was number one. And they were contending for national championships. and with Patrick, you know, playing three titles in four years. But that period of the 80s where you had Georgetown and you had a high-profile

ACC team in the same market, we really, we really benefited. I mean, we had the best of it. Now, I wasn't a huge Big East fan. I loved the physical nature of those games, and I watched all those games. And I loved Pearl Washington. I don't know if I've ever told you that. Pearl Washington was one of my favorite players. and I loved Mullen too.

And I didn't like Georgetown. Didn't like Georgetown. To me, they were a rival of Maryland. And the better they did, the more it hurt us, whether it was recruiting or attention or whatever it was. But it was really how fortunate we as basketball fans had it with the Big East and the ACC. Because the Big Ten was a great league. Don't get me wrong. But every year, it was Big East or A.C.

Which one is better this year? That was it. Yeah. And it was the height of the sport. I mean, the sport was not a one-month event sport for March Madness. It was paid attention to, you know, from the beginning of the season started. And, you know, that reminds me one of the biggest regular season games in college basketball history was Ralph Samson against Patrick Ewing, Virginia against Georgetown in 83. I mean, that was a massive buildup for a game in December in the middle of football season, but it was huge.

You wouldn't get that in these days, that kind of build up. No, you know, I had asked John, I'd ask coach on the podcast, you know, who were the coaches when you were trying to do what you accomplished? Were there any coaches who helped you along the way? who were the people who didn't get in your way? And he basically said, you mean the asshole. Those kind of people. Not those people. And he loved Dean Smith.

He thought he was so close. He said, like a brother. And he mentioned Dave Gavin, the commissioner of the Big East, who didn't coach him at Providence, but did later coach Providence with Marvin Barnes and Ernie Grigio. He said those two guys were very influential in helping him accomplish what he did in his career at Georgetown. So you mentioned Dave Gavin, who wound up building the Big East. Right.

Somebody, and I forget where this came up, maybe CJ had read it somewhere, maybe it was a story that he recalled. Because we were talking about some of his former players, and you told a recruiting story about Morning. he um when he was recruiting patrick uh he was up you know up in boston um you know watching him play a game and he had a brown bag with a soda in it that he snuck into the gym it was one of those you know no sodas in the gym so he had a brown bag with a with with soda in it and he and he pulled the brown bag out um and in the stands oh i know i think i read it in boz's column i think this is where

where I got it. And he started to drink from it, and it was Boz. I've got it, memory, remembered now. It was Boz that was sitting with him. And he looks around, he goes, there are a lot of coaches in the building here tonight. I better put this brown bag way or they're going to use it against me, you know? But, yeah, I mean, we could go on and on. I thought it was really, really nice and you know Tommy last week on Friday Lute Olson passed away and Lut Olson's a Hall of Fame coach as well and Thompson's first Georgetown team that made a run in the NCAA tournament was the first year of the Big East it was before Patrick the 7980 team they beat Maryland in the Sweet 16 at the Spectrum in Philadelphia in

one of the most hyped you know local events of my lifetime the Maryland The Maryland-Georgetown Sweet 16 game in Philadelphia in 1980 was so hyped locally, in part because Lefty and Thompson had gone after each other in the regular season game at the D.C. Armory in November. Maryland was ranked fifth in the country. They were a two-seed. They had Buck Williams and Albert King and Greg Manning. And Buck Williams hadn't played in the first game that they had lost to Georgetown. So Maryland was the favorite.

They were supposed to win that game. and Georgetown won it. And I know why they won it, too, because that game I've seen in recent years, I think it's on YouTube. They won the game. They were just a much better defensive team than Lefty. Lefty was never, never had great defensive teams.

And that team with Sleepy Floyd and Duren and Shelton was really, Craig Shelton, the two Dunbar and Bebe Durn from Dunbar, they were really good. And they got to the Elite 8 and they lost to Iowa by 1. one point. He almost went to the final four before Patrick even got there. And they lost by a point in the Elite 8 to Lute Olson's Iowa team. And Lute Olson went on and lost in the final four. I think that was the year that it was Daryl Griffith's year, the Louisville UCLA year. I got to look that up because I said that on radio this morning. I want to make sure I'm right. 1980 NCAA tournament.

I think that was the Louisville year. But anyway, my point that I was going to be. going to get to here is that Lute Olson was a Hall of Fame coach and there was a nice warm response. John Thompson's one of the biggest heavyweights in terms of coaches in the history of the sport and his reach extended far beyond sports

and you could tell that by the reaction all day yesterday. How many columns were written about this man yesterday? How many segments on show or, you know, radio or TV, and how many people on social media that came in close contact with him or even brief contact with him were influenced by him? It's really amazing. I mean, the point was, no disrespect to Lute Olson, but this was a reaction that went well beyond sports yesterday. Yeah, as well it should.

And you know what we gloss over is his sense. career was remarkable. I know. For a guy who was considered an editing of the media. Yes. He winds up becoming a broadcaster and radio talk show host and has a great career doing that. Well, the video that I put out that somebody had sent to me, and I remember that video, and I think somebody had sent it to me five, six years ago, so I remembered it more recently.

I remember talking about him on that final show before his final show, and I remember saying, and I think it was said in that video, he loved doing talk radio. He loved it, and I knew he would miss it. And I remember running into either Ronnie, because I used to run into Ronnie all the time, because Ronnie had a son, my son's age, and they played basketball against each other a bunch.

And by the way, that was my greatest thrill ever with coach, was coaching against his grandson's team and him coming at halftime across the floor, giving me a big hug and saying, motherfucker, you're right. You do know what you're doing. If we were up like 15 at halftime, we beat him badly. I'll never forget that. But anyway, he, where were we going with it? Oh, he loved talk radio. and he was good at it, and he was good at it on the most important days. You know, even to this day, like, how good would he have been in recent months talking about all the stuff that's going on in the world?

This would have been Taylor made for him much more than, you know, Joe the fan on Monday talking about the football game from the day before. That he couldn't have cared less about, really. He loved basketball, as we know, and you said, you know, you understood his affection for baseball. But it was the big, you know, news days where he really excelled. I'll never forget his show in 2008 the morning after Barack Obama became president. I'll never forget his show that day.

It was incredible to listen to how moved he was, how emotional he was that day. You know, would have been November, Wednesday in November of 2008. But yeah, you're right. He had a great second career. And was a terrific analyst on college basketball games. Absolutely terrific on it. The back page is today's Daily News. It's a full-blown picture of John Thompson hugging Patrick,

and with the quote, he was a great man. That's the full page of the New York, the back page in the New York Daily News. Well, I would imagine in the Big East markets, in New York, obviously one of them. I mean, nobody towered over that league like he did. That league doesn't become what it became without him. And there were a ton of characters in coaches, you know, in that league with Karnaseka and Raleigh and Massimino and obviously Coach Thompson and Petino and Beheim.

I mean, big heavy weights. And Gary. And Gary. And Gary early on at BC. And at the same time, and I got into a little bit of a debate, I think, with Neil and Rockville on this. He's like, the big name and the entertaining coaches were in the Big East. I said, really? I said, the ACC in that same era had left you Dresel, Jim Valvano, Bobby Kremens, coach K,

and a guy you may have heard of Dean Smith. You know, it was really those two leagues, you know, more of the blue blood in the ACC and the upstart, you know, in the Big East. It was a great rivalry back and forth, you know, and certainly it peaked for the Big East in 85 when they got three teams to the final four, St. John's Villanova and Georgetown, with Villanova winning that shocking final at Rupp Arena in 85. Yeah, I could talk about that era of college basketball forever. It was the 1980 final was the Dr. Duncanstein, Darrell Griffith, Louisville team, beating UCLA. That would have been, I'm trying to think the coach of that UCLA team,

who was the coach of that UCLA team? Because it wouldn't was long gone. Hmm. I got to look this one. I don't know. I want to say that it may have been. No, Larry Brown, of course. Larry Brown was the head coach of that team.

Larry Brown coached that UCLA team. it was his first year at UCLA, and he took UCLA back to the finals, and they lost to Daryl Griffith and, you know, aka Dr. Duncanstein in the final 59-54. You know, he only lasted two years at UCLA before, you know, before probation, I'm sure, right? Well, he didn't. He didn't last very long anyway. No, he didn't.

Great coach, though. Great coach. And then here he came to Kansas and a few years later. He'd be in the national title game with Danny Manning and the Miracles winning it in 88. That would have been, I believe. All right, let's get to all the Washington football team news from last night, right after this word from one of our sponsors. All right, Tommy, a story that broke last night about the NFL,

basically now overseeing the investigation by Beth Wood. Wilkinson into the skins over the alleged sexual harassment issues in the organization. Gidell, you know, according to the stories, and then there's a little bit of conflict in some of these stories. You know, ESPN essentially reported that Gidell informed Dan Snyder of the change Monday night, and then Snyder indicated that it was his suggestion putting out a statement. Quote, recently the Washington football team launched an independent third-party investigation into allegations about our culture and incidents of harassment.

In conversations with Commissioner Goodell, Tanya and I suggested that the NFL assumed full oversight of the investigation so that the results are thorough, complete, and trusted by the fans, players, or employees, and the public. I appreciate Commissioner Goodell agreeing to our suggestion, and the entire Washington football team remains committed to fully cooperating with all aspects of the investigation. Closed quote. Nobody believes that statement.

Nobody believes that. Not even Snyder believes it. You know what that is? That's a thank you, sir. May I have another? Okay. I have a slightly different take on that, but I want to hear yours first,

but I just want to make sure that everybody's aware of the other piece to this story because this was not in the original stories that came out last night, but was in the Post story written by Liz Clark, Mark Maskey, Will Hobson, and Beth Reinhardt that came out a little bit later. And that is that Snyder told the NFL that he would release current and former team employees from non-disclosure agreements for the sole purpose of cooperating with the Wilkinson-Walsh law firm investigation. The Post reported that. Go ahead. Have at it. That's because they told them to.

They had to look, Goodell said that in his statement earlier when we talked last week, when Goodell said the statement that if there wasn't going to be any cooperation from the team, Beth Wilkinson was supposed to inform the league about it, and they would address it. Right. He pretty much said the NDAs were going away then. Who's paying for this? Oh, I think Snyder's paying for it. Well, then he didn't have to.

Then he didn't have to give that if he's being disingenuous saying that this was his and his wife's idea and that he's releasing them from non-disclosures because he wants the investigation to move forward with his cooperation. He doesn't have to do that if he's footing the bill. Of course he doesn't have to do that, except the NFL problem. This is all speculation, okay? No inside information. But what I said on Thursday, I still think it's true. I think it's been an NFL investigation all along.

I think that, you know, the NFL told him you need to investigate these things. You need to hire Beth Wilkinson and you need to cooperate with it. And you're going to pay for all of them. I don't disagree with that. I don't disagree with that. I just think this statement, you know, when you said not even he believes that, I hear you. I mean, I think that's definitely a possibility.

Real quickly, though, are you going to give me any? credit for sort of identifying this Tanya spin a few weeks ago as unusual and new. And sure, there could be, you know, it could be an issue of he wants his wife now to be front and center because these are, you know, these are female sexual harassment claims. But I just, even this statement, Tommy, we would have never gotten a statement from the owner with Tanya and I suggested that the NFL assumed full oversight. of the investigation. Okay. I give you credit for what, for recognizing that he's married to him?

What am I'm talking about? You know what I'm talking about. I told you a couple of weeks ago when Jason Wright was doing all of the interviews that he kept mentioning Tanya over and over again, were the Snyders, and was not doing the thing that always happens when they hire somebody new, which is Mr. Snyder did this. Mr. Snyder's great about that. Mr. Snyder, Mr. Snyder, Mr. Snyder. It was a completely different way of answering questions. In my sit-down with the Snyders, in my conversation with Tanya,

I suggested that it's possible that they are looking to put Tanya front and center because they're female sexual harassment claims in the same way that people were certainly skeptical about the hiring of Julie Donaldson and the hiring of Jason Wright for, you know, different reasons. All I'm saying is that this. This is either, you know, a on-purpose effort to make it look like Tanya's really involved in the decision-making now in the organization, or she might be. I think, I think, she may be. I mean, you know, but I think a lot of it's for show. I mean, having the female face at a franchise now as part of the top-level organization is,

just as a time when they're under attack for being so disrespectful to females, I don't think it's a coincidence. I just think it's too tidy in terms of the time. Well, you would least admit that it's different, much different than ever before, to have her injected into almost every answer. I didn't know this was so important to you. Yes. Yes, I agree.

It's different. It is important to me. because I hate when you do that. You do that all the time. If you had said this to me three weeks ago, and I was just completely poo-pooing it, you know, one time after another, you'd be incensed. You'd be like, what are you talking?

I told you about this three weeks ago. I told you Tanya, he's putting Tanya out there. Maybe it's because she's going to take the team over when he loses it. You would be going nuts. Without the why. It's not like you discover plutonium. I didn't say that. I didn't say that.

It was an observation that you were like, I guess. And I'm like, what do you mean you guess? Look at the answers from everybody that just got hired. They're talking about her as if she did the interviews and she made the hire and she laid out what the job description was. And it's never been that way before. It's been Mr. Snyder, Mr. Snyder, Mr. Snyder. And you're like, okay, whatever. And I certainly acknowledge that this could be done on purpose because of the nature of the allegations and the more female voices, especially, you know, in senior positions, perhaps the better.

You know, it's being, maybe she's cover for him right now. But you almost, you acted as if this wasn't even a thing. Boy, you're right. You were right on it. You don't miss a trick. Okay, good. Thanks. That's all. You don't have to go any further. Okay. So I had a conversation with somebody last night.

This person, I'm not going to mention by name because I promised I wouldn't, but he is very familiar. He's a fan of the podcast, and he's very familiar with the lawyers, with Beth Wilkinson and her firm, and then the Lisa Banks, Deborah Katz firm. And, you know, he's familiar. with some of the league stuff that's going on. And he presented a couple of things to me, a couple of things that I've thought anyway,

but then a bit of a contrarian view to what's been going on. And I want to hit you with basically three things here. The first is this, with respect to the investigator, Beth Wilkinson. He was adamant. He said, whether it's a league-contractor, investigation or a Dan controlled investigation. Beth Wilkinson isn't, wasn't hired and isn't doing this investigation for anything but the truth. She's a tough, fabulous, independent lawyer in major high demand. This person told me that people like Wilkinson would have never, by the way,

been Dan's first choice. And the league probably knows her because she used to work with, this guy, Ted Wells and Deflategate, and that they probably knew her from Ted Wells, but that she's, you know, and he believes that she's been hired, whether it was by the league or Dan at the suggestion of the league. And basically he said, look, Dan couldn't fire her any more than Archibald Cox could have been fired by, the Nixon could have fired Archibald Cox. And for those not familiar with it, just Google Saturday Night Massacre. which was probably in 1973 during the beginnings of the Watergate investigation.

But anyway, he said, how could the investigation, so many people want to say, how could the investigation be fair when Dan controls it? He said, Dan doesn't control this investigation. The league doesn't control this investigation. No one controls Beth. She doesn't need them as a client. She's way overbooked. And if anybody tries to tamper in this investigation, she will quit.

And so he said, understand that about this investigation. Rest assured that whatever it produces is going to be, you know, independent. So that was one. Number two was this. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Okay, go ahead. Okay. For one thing, she's worked for the league a number of times.

Right. Okay. She was one of their attorneys in the concussion litigation. Right. She represented the lead in the concussion and litigation. And I'm looking for the quote here right now. And sure enough, I can't find it, basically. But basically, she stood before reporters and said that this notion that the league withheld and hid information from players about the damage from concussions is false.

Well, you know, I don't know how her nose got back into the courtroom after that lie. So don't give me this stuff. Don't pontificate about what a stand-up, you know, by the book lawyer is. She stood up there and lied for the NFL about concussions and had no qualms doing it. Okay. That's good information. That's good information. I'm sharing you the information from the person that I talked to.

Let me get to the next piece because that's a fair retort, although I don't know what that. I don't know enough about that investigation and whether or not her investigation legitimately revealed that about the league at the time. I don't know that. You're just assuming that. I'm assuming that Galileo knew that the earth revolved around the sun. Here's the more interesting point. The more interesting point is this, and this guy made this point. He said, you know, there's another way to look at the Snyder accusations from the last post story.

Because basically, you had for the first, you know, in the July 16th story, none of it involved Dan Snyder. And the story from last week, you had three different incidents, the two videos and the allegation about Fight Night in 2004. And he said, look, there are 42 women that have come forward. That's a large number, you know, by any account for a company and sexual harassment, et cetera. That's a lot of women, and there's probably more that will come. Out of the 42, he said, 41 of them didn't make one specific accusation as it related to Dan. Now, you did have that male who was working in. the organization for Larry, say that Larry told him that they were putting together that

11-minute outtake for the owner or for an executive meeting. But really the only true direct accusation is Tiffany Scorby's accusation that Dan propositioned her on fight night in 2004 and asked her to show his good friend Tony Roberts a good time at the hotel room that they had upstairs at the Hilton. And his point was. this, Tommy. You give 42 women to come forward like that, when it's only one that really takes it it to the owner, when basically you know that the post has, you know, assigned a ton of reporters and given them a ton of leeway and a ton of ability to go out and get something on Snyder and, you know, hopefully get something on Snyder, and you only get one and it's a he said, she said,

he said to me, said, in many ways, that's vindication for Dan. Now, it doesn't mean that the story's over. He's just commenting on where this story is right now through the two post stories. It doesn't mean that the bombshell, that the smoking gun isn't going to be in the next story. How do you feel about that? Well, that makes sense on some level. You know, it's like the first story that the post came out with the 15 women. we were saying that they were celebrating that because they thought it would be worse than it was.

So along those lines, even though this is a lot more women, it's still only one particular charge involving the owner. So he probably breathed a little bit of a sigh of relief that it wasn't worse concerning him. So I can certainly understand that. We don't know. I would imagine that I don't know if non-disclosure agreements were standard procedure for everyone who worked there from interns to executive assistance. But just taking a guess that I would think that the people hire up who had more contact with Snyder probably were more likely to be forced to sign non-disclosure agreement. I would bet in an organization like that everybody signs at NDA. Really?

that would be my guess that, you know, no matter, if you're full-time, you're signing an NDA to take that job. And given, you know, given, you know, an NFL team situation and there's a lot of competitive information, you know, it's not like a technology business. Why did some people feel free to speak and others say they couldn't because they had NDA? Good question. I mean, it could have been some sort of expiration of the NDA, you know, after a certain, amount of time, maybe it expired, or maybe more, it's more about, and I know this to a certain degree, you know, having spent some years getting, you know, people to sign NDAs or having to sign them myself, they're really, really not very enforceable. You know, non-competes are very enforceable. Non-disclosures are, they're really hard. And so there are some people that probably say,

yeah, come chase me on this. That's fine. But really, in that first story, Tommy, there was just one woman who spoke without the condition of anonymity. And in this story, you know, I guess a few more. But he was, anyway, the point that he was getting to was this. If there's not really a legitimate tie

to him, you know, whether it, you know, the smoking gun, the email, the record, whatever, it's going to be very difficult to take his team away from him. You compare what he was accused of by one person out of 42, where those 42 women were given the chance probably to take him down, right? And 41 of them didn't. And one did with a he said, she said, and it wasn't even him propositioning for himself, who's propositioning for a friend.

Not that that makes it any different because she was an employee of his. But the point being that, you know, it pales in comparison to Robert Kraft's transgression. And that, you know, it would be very hard based on these two post stories to force Dan Snyder out and keep Kraft. Okay. I agree with you on a lot of – well, here's one level. What does Robert – what does Robert Kraft contribute to the NFL? A good team. Okay.

A good team. very influential owner on a lot of committees, a top decision maker. Right. What is Dan Snyder? I know. What's the point of having Dan Snyder as an owner for the NFL? I mean, he's not influential.

He has no particular supporters that we know of. He has no position of power. And here's the most important thing. He can't get a stadium built. And that's that. And Snow, that's that is driving the NFL crazy. That spider is so toxic that nobody will touch him because that's where they were looking for the money. That's what they really want from an owner.

Get a stadium built. And he can't do that. So there's no reason for them to keep him because he doesn't help them. That said, I agree with the assessment that this probably, what we know, is not probably going to be enough to drum him out. I went back to look at Jimmy Haslam, the owner of the Brown. He owned a company. He owns a company called Flying Jay.

Yeah, those Flying J truck stops, yeah. Yeah, that was operated like a criminal enterprise for years in terms of overcharging customers. And 20 high-ranking officials in that company were indicted. But Haslam was never touched. even though his company was basically a criminal, ran like a criminal enterprise, and they didn't do anything that Jimmy has them. You know, and that was criminal stuff. Now, 2020 is different. You know, that was 2017, 2018, 2018.

2020 is so unpredictable, and sexual harassment and sexual misconduct in the workplace may be more severe. perception-wise today than robbing people of money. Okay. So, but based on the fact that they didn't touch Haslam, and I think they had a lot more reason to, I don't think this is enough to take it away from Snyder, other than the fact that they just sit there and say, why are we keeping this guy around?

Right, but that's where you get into, you know, is bad management, bad culture, the inability to build a stadium enough to expose the other owners to him going after their skeletons? And I think that's where you get into the, you know, as you would say, is the juice worth the squeeze? And, you know, it may be true, and just consider this, he may be an arrogant, terrible managing owner who treats people poorly. But that doesn't make him a sexual harasser. And if they don't have something that really ties him to that, specifically, other than being the owner that oversaw a culture of sexual harassment, it's going to be tough. By the way, the one last thing, and by the way, this is all based on what we know today.

It doesn't mean that the next article won't have something or the one after that. you've got people like Gloria all red and in some of these attorneys they're going to be looking for anything that they can uncover the other thing that that was mentioned to me was this this guy said look you know who may really be in trouble legitimately in trouble and may pay dearly is Dwight Schar because if this defamation lawsuit if this motion, this discovery of motion, motion discovery for, you know, who was funding this salacious smear campaign leading up to that first post story, if it comes back to him, it's going to be outrageously costly for him. They'll have to boot him out of the league, maybe long before Dan gets booted out of the league. I think that makes a lot of sense to me. Now, he may be completely innocent. But there's certainly, you know, an allegation. or at least a hint of an allegation that he was behind

the Epstein and the sex trafficking and the drug trafficking and the NF and the bribing of NFL referees madness of that particular week prior to the actual story first story coming out.

Yeah, I mean, and what would that mean to, what will that mean for Dan Snyder's relationship with Joe Gibbs? I mean, Joe Gibbs. I know, you know, Gives, you know, has been friendly with Snyder, and they've been business associates,

but he's close to Dwight Schar for decades. I mean, Dwight Schar supposedly one who helped engineer bring a Joe Gibbs back, and what would that mean for the relationship with Gibbs? That would be pretty devastating if that would come out. But remember, and no one else has reported this except in New York Times, and what it means, you have this. arbitration hearing between the minority owners and Snyder. Right.

And we don't know anything about it. I'm looking at the U. Goodell appointed the arbitrator, right? Okay. The three men, meaning the three minority owners, ask the NFL to resolve the matter, okay, the dispute between Snyder and minority owners, to resolve the matter and other issues.

The commissioner's office appointed an arbitrator in late June, according to two people familiar with the matter, who were not authorized to speak publicly, the NFL declined to comment. That's the fitz out there. What does that mean? It may be nothing. It may just be a small little thing. But so the league is already litigating.

There's so much going on. Yes. There's this arbitration with the minority owners. There's the Beth Wilkinson investigation. There's this sense that the post has just gotten started on this stuff. It's really – and football season, by the way, is less than two weeks away, and I can't wait for that. Yeah, there's a lot going on.

A lot going on. You know, not the least of which is – like you said, football season is two weeks away. you have a head football coach who is already beloved, who's now a sympathetic figure because of the cancer that was diagnosed. And the treatment that he's going to have to go through could result in the plan B coach being your head coach, maybe somebody's Sundays. Mr. Kiss My Ass, that's El Rio.

How would that be for this team? all of a sudden the rainbow warriors, the Washington Redskins, to have Jack Del Rio as the face in the spokesman for the team. Jack Del Rio. How much do you think that Jack Del Rio contributed to that social justice discussion they did on their day off when they called practice? Yeah, I don't know. I actually would be really interested to see if he's actually addressed his team at all

about, you know, how outspoke. Look, everybody in the organization right now is other than the owner who took out that Twitter page and I don't think is tweeted anything yet. But, I mean, Jason Wright, he's on Twitter all day long. I mean, he tweets out, I mean, he's a big social media guy, Julie, obviously. I mean, they are really getting after it. By the way, you saw that they were the last team locally to send sympathies to the Thompson family, right? Somebody put out, I'd have to find it now, but at one point yesterday, there was a tweet going around that basically all four, you know, the capitals, the nationals, the wizards had all put out statements, you know, about John Thompson.

and the, and then they had the Washington social media account that had this tweet that said, we back and had the shot of FedEx Field because they had the live practice and scrimmage there yesterday. But by the time they got to last night, by the way, wouldn't even surprise me at all if they, you know, in their mind's eye, that this wasn't even necessarily a story until somebody probably made them aware of the fact that they were the only team that had not reached out to say something about Thompson. So last night they did. You know, they put out a picture with a statement from Ron Rivera, you know, saying a legend on and off the court, you know, rest in peace, Coach Thompson. What time last night do you know? Oh, God, are you going to, is this a column?

Well, no, no, no, no, it's not a column. No, no, no. But I want to point something out. They put it out at 612 p.m. last night. That was several, several hours after every other team in town. I'm going to find the tweet that was, uh... That's okay. No, here it is.

Here it is. Here it is. So yesterday, um, uh, there's just a tweet going on around with the wizards expressing. I don't have the times on these. The nationals, I can look them up. The nationals and the capital. all putting out statements, and then they've got the Washington football team, we back with a shot of FedEx Field.

But they did eventually get to it later in the day. And it was like 6.12, right? 6.12 p.m. it says, yeah. Okay. Okay. Tell me why you're doing this. Well, because I was curious that they beat the Ravens, who put out basically a statement about Thompson. and they did manage to beat the Baltimore football team.

Oh, they did. What time did the Ravens put a statement out? 7.50. Okay. Let me see exactly what time the Nationals put their statement out. The Nationals put their statement out at 1134 a.m. yesterday. Why are we doing this? Is it really that interesting?

It's not that interesting. I agree. The Washington Capitals put out their statement. The Wizards put out their statement at 12. 42 and the capitals, I can't find the capitals one, but whatever, you get the point. They were all much earlier in the day. The Capitals put their statement, the Mystics put their statement out at 1133 a.m. Obviously, Ted being a Georgetown guy was all over with his teams. And the Wizards put it out at 1122 a.m. And the Capitals, I can't, whatever.

That's enough of that. There you go. So we got a lot going on. And the team practiced yesterday on beautiful FedEx Field turf, apparently, and Chase Young looked really, really good. All right, I want to finish up the show with a little bit of basketball talk, NBA talk. And one quick thought about the football team as we are fast approaching the beginning of the season. but quick word today about Manscaped. Manscapes got you covered,

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From the moose to the caboose, always use the right tools for the job. All right, let's finish up the show. I got something I want to finish, we'll finish up with basketball. I might want to mention, you know, they've been playing baseball. Yeah, I know, and the Nats are terrible.

They're like the second worst record in the league. National. 12 and 20. what league did you think I was talking about when I said league? Well, I don't know. Major League? In the major leagues? The Tanya Snyder League? Yeah, they have the second worst record in the National League.

The Pirates are worse. And they have the two best hitters, probably in baseball right now, in Juan Soto and Trey Turner. Two hottest hitters in the game. But they have some of the worst pitch, and they've got no starting pitching right now. Austin Vote and Eric Fetty killed them in their start and Strathberg out for the year Annabelle Sanchez has not been like he was in the second half it basically got one guy they can rely on right now

two guys Corbin and Max Scherner Max Scherzer so nationals are in trouble I don't particularly care in some ways because this stills all seems like exhibition bullshit to me that doesn't mean a goddamn thing The only thing that should mean anything to any nationals fan is it's September 1st, and Mike Rizzo still doesn't have a contract beyond the end of the season. Ridiculous.

I mean, keep in mind, right now, they're only, I'll tell you, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, they are only 3 games out of the 10 spot because 10 teams from each league go to the postseason. You know, it's funny. I knew that Turner was having a good year, and I certainly knew that Soto was having a good year. He had two more home runs last night. His 11 home runs are second in the National League in home runs. And remember, he missed, you know, what, three or four or five games to start the season, whatever it was.

I did not realize until you just said that, talking about Turner and Soto, that right now they're one, two in the National League in batting average. Turner's hitting 377. Soto's hitting 367. They're one-two, and that Turner leads the league in hits with 49 hits. And that I think I already mentioned, Soto's 11 homers are second most in the National League as well. So, yeah, it's pitching. You know, they've had some struggles offensively at times, although recently they put some

runs up. And that one win over the weekend against the Red Sox, it was like 10 to 2. They exploded. And they had some offense last night in the night before, but they gave up, you know, far too many runs. They gave up nine to the Red Sox and a 9-5 loss, and last night was 8 to 6. You know, one of the things I do, Tommy, I look at a lot of box scores, baseball-wise. I look at the Nats every morning, you know, especially as I get ready for the show. Last night they played the Phillies, but I really keep up to date with Harper and Rendon.

You know, Harper... You see the year Rendon's... You see that your Rendon's having since he came back? First of all, it's a terrible team right now. You know that. They stink as a team right now. But Anthony Rendon is having, you know, he's hitting close to 300. He was 300 the other night when I checked, and he's having a really good season offensively.

But they're- 435 on-base percentage. That's great. They're horrible as a team, though. I think they're the worst team. They may be the worst team in the American League, unless Boston is. Look that up real quickly. The Angels, yeah, the Angels are the worst team in baseball.

Second worst team in baseball in Pittsburgh. And that guy spent a lot of money on his baseball team, Marty Marina. A lot of money. But I was also mentioning that I always looked to see what Bryce Harper did that night. Harper's got a terrific on-base percentage right now as well. I think it's in the mid-400s. Hold on for a second. 431 on base percentage leads his team.

568 slugging percentage leads his team. His batting average, whatever, it's 284. I mean, he's still getting on base. He had two walks last night. It was over two walks. I know, but you see, they replaced Bryce Harper. They replaced Bryce Harper with Juan Soto. They have not replaced Anthony Rendon yet.

100% right. I want to just mention the NBA. I know a lot of you haven't been paying attention. I'm telling you it's really good. It's really good right now. performance. How can it be really good when you're scoring 140, 130 points the game? How can that be really good? Last night, you had a very tense game six, 104 to 100. All right, the Thunder beat the Rockets, 104 to 100. I love Chris Paul's game. God, he's so good and smart and clutch. Man, Russell Westbrook was a, was awful last night. You know, that was a second game back, and he is not all back. And he had the same issues. that he has typically in these games at late, where he's just going too fast on a key possession. They were down 102 to 100, under 10 seconds to go, and he drives the ball into traffic and

throws it away. Instead of giving the ball to Hardin, I don't know what they were doing on that last possession. It should have been Hardin's possession. But tonight, Tommy, and I don't know if you're following this or not, I'm going to assume that you're not. Tonight you get the seventh and deciding game of Utah against Denver. Are you familiar with what's going on in that series right now? No.

Okay. Are you or not? No, I'm not. I'm being on it. I don't like saying it, but no, I have no idea. Tommy, Jamal Murray. How many points does Dan Issel have? How many points does Alex English have?

Jamal Murray has gone for 50 plus in this series twice. It has been incredible shooting performances. In the last game, first of all, they're on the verge of becoming the 13th team in NBA history to rally from 3-1 down to win a series. Do you know that I think the first team to do it or the second team to do it was the bullets in 1979 against the Spurs? I could be wrong about that, but I think I'm right. Jamal Murray, who was a good score, not a superstar player. in the last three games has scored 142 points.

He's gone 50, 42, and 50. The shooting percentages, Tommy, shot 18 to 31, 17 of 26, and 17 of 24. He's shooting 65% from the floor. From behind the arc, 9 of 15, 4 of 8, 9 of 12. He's shot 75% from behind the floor. the arc the other night in the game six win. In the same series, Donovan Mitchell, who plays for Utah, has gone for 50 plus on two different occasions as well. It's the first time in NBA history you've had four 50 point plus performances, and it's two guys, one from each team, Jamal Murray

and Donovan Mitchell. Mitchell's averaging in the series, I think 39 a game. And it's two guys. I'm game, 38.7 a game. He's gone for 57 in one game, 51 in another, and 44 in the last game. It has been an incredible show to watch the two of them go back and forth offensively. Unlimited range. Murray's ridiculous with his range. But a highly entertaining series in game sevens tonight, I'm going to do my best to watch that. I think it's a nine o'clock start. If it's nine o'clock, I'm good. If it's 10 could be problematic. And then the other series, again, the game last night between OKC and Houston was awesome. I love Chris Paul.

I'm rooting for OKC. But Tommy, the best player is not LeBron James in this postseason. It's not Janus. It's not Anthony Davis. It is Kauai Leonard, who continues to deliver with games on the line in the postseason better than anybody in recent memory. The other night or the other afternoon against the Mavericks, three-two series lead they had. The Mavericks had cut a 23-point lead to six in the fourth quarter. Leonard comes into the game and scores eight of the next 10 points game over.

I love Kauai Leonard. I love his style. I love his demeanor. He's a killer. And somebody pointed this out yesterday. You know, his shoe company is New Balance, which, by the way, doesn't mean much in the NBA. Nike is king, right? If he wins the title this year and wins another MVP,

It will be three different teams he's led to an NBA title with three different finals MVP's. Now, LeBron could do that this year too if the Lakers win it. But does anybody ever mention Kauai Leonard in the greatest of all time conversation? And I'm not saying he should be, but it's been pointed out several times this week that if he were a Nike guy in that sport, it would be a much. more, it would be a conversation that would take place more often. If he wins this title, and I think the Clippers are, I bet him to win the title,

and I cannot wait to see them against the Lakers. But Kauai Leonard is just amazing and so good in the biggest games and with the games on the line. Can I mention something, Kevin? Yes. I don't know if I've ever said this before, and I don't know if people realize it, but when he was in college and going into the draft, you wanted to draft him. I did.

You wanted the Wizards to draft him, and you were right on top of that. I just wanted to make sure people knew that. You've said it before. That's the only thing about a prediction that I got right that you've ever remembered. Do you remember all the ones I've gotten wrong? Yeah, you're damn right.

But I'm serious. You were. You were. That could have been a historic, A history-changing moment if they had drafted him. Instead of Yon Ves. When they had the chance. Yes.

You know, I love- Changing the course of history. I loved Leonard at San Diego State. I was, you know, obviously betting a lot of college basketball, and there were a lot of late nights where I was watching him in San Diego State, and I was like, my God, that guy looks with those long arms, he looks like he's going to be an unbelievable NBA defense. and you could tell he had a great stroke,

even though I did not anticipate that he would grow into to the score and the three-point shooter because he's got great range too. But to me, I mean, I'm glad you remembered that. But to me, the conversation that I'll never forget having was with Ernie Grunfeld before the 2009 draft. Doc and I were doing a show shortly before you and I started doing a show together. And Flip Saunders had been hired by the Wizards. and they had us out to Verizon Center.

We did our show, Doc and I did our show from, you know, it was actually like a suite that they set up for our show. And then after the show, I ended up hanging out and talking to Ernie Grunfeld for 45 minutes. And we were talking about a lot of different things because he knows I love basketball. And we had had conversations before. But we started talking about that draft. And I'll never forget saying to him, I love Steph Curry. I think he's going to be a really good.

good NBA player because he's got that super quick release and he's just big enough where I think he's going to be a big time score at the NBA level. And Ernie said to me, I kind of like Steph, a guy I like, and he loved James Hardin. He thought James Hardin was going to be a superstar. And I remember this conversation. It was the draft that Blake Griffin went number one and Hashim Thabit, The big tall dude from Yukon went number two. You know, so it was not the, Griffin obviously turned out to be great. Curry went seventh overall. Hardin went third to Oklahoma City.

Oh my God, you know, I've been referring to them as Oklahoma State recently. Oklahoma City, OKC. Anyway, he loved Hardin. And I remember saying to him, really? Because I had watched Hardin at Arizona State, and I just didn't see it on Hardin. I thought he was slow. I thought he was too methodical. I didn't think he was very athletic.

And I remember him saying, no, he's big and strong and he's got a handle and he's going to be a big time score in the NBA. So we had a conversation where he was definitely right, and I was wrong about Hardin. He didn't disagree with me about Curry. But that's the other guy that he loved in that draft Tommy. And he said he doesn't know if he's going to come over and play in the NBA.

he went off about Ricky Rubio. He loved Rubio. But despite Tommy the fact that he loved Rubio and he thought Rubio would be there at number five overall, basically with Flip Saunders and with Abe, you know, in his last, you know, they wanted to win. They wanted to make the playoffs. And they traded number five overall for Randy Foy and Mike Miller to Minnesota.

That's one of the worst trades, honestly, that he ever made. And he made some good trades over the years. I know what his draft history was, but that was just a horrible, horrible trade. And he would have taken in that draft. He would have taken Rubio at 5. He wouldn't have taken Curry. I'm pretty sure. Everybody who's listening, and I know we have thousands of listeners,

thank you for listening and making Kevin's podcast such a huge success. But for everybody who is listening, this was Ernie Grunfeld. move. He would sit down and he would talk to reporters and media members in town and talk basketball with him. Right. And he was a likable guy. He called me a few times early in our relationship until he got tired of reading his one loss record in my columns and he stopped call me. But this was a smart thing that Ernie did. You know, he took people and he, and took them behind the curtain, which made them more pro-earnie and less willing to criticize him. He did this without the media in town.

This was Ernie's move, and it carried him a long way. You're right about that. He was... It's smart. It was a smart thing to do. But, you know, he was also a really good guy. Like, you know... He was a terrific guy, even though, you know, he was not a great general manager.

although, again, I mean, you always said this. Don't do it. Don't do it. He wasn't, Vinic Sorano. No, he wasn't. He had a personality. Oh, but Tommy, I mean, you could call him in his office and he would sit there and talk to you for, you know, 30 minutes. And, you know, his assistant was Kathy.

I remember. And, hey, does Ernie have any time just to chat? Scott Jackson used to talk to him more than anybody. I mean, Jackson and Ernie really chatted all the time, but there were certain conversations with Ernie that I'll never forget. And I remember how much he loved Hardin and that draft, but he knew that he thought that he wasn't going to have a chance to get him. But what I didn't know at that point was they were going to trade the pick anyway, you know, that they were going to trade it because they wanted veteran players to, you know, make a run at the playoffs with, you know, a veteran coach and Flip Saunders. when imagine, you know, instead of Randy Foey and Mike Miller, they could have drafted Steph Curry, who was on the board there with their pick.

You know, anyway, how about that? How about Curry in 2009? And then two years later, instead of Jan Vesley, Kauai Leonard, you would have had, the number one team in town by Miles would have been your Washington Wizards over the last seven years, six years, if those two players had been drafted by the team. But you could say that about a lot of teams passed on Leonard and several teams passed on Curry too. Happens all the time. One last thing before we go.

I asked the following question for calls today on the radio show because I was thinking about something, Tommy, that I think everybody believes that the skins are going to be better defensively. That is the default right now. Like what are you sure of, well, they got to be better defensively. You know, they added Chase Young, and even if Chase Young isn't exactly Nick Bosa in terms of elevating the rest of the defense, although he may be, he may be. They've had some talent there, and now they've got some coaching, and the defense is going to be good. And at the same time, you know, nobody really knows about the offense. It's the biggest question mark. So simple question to you, if the assumption is that the defense is good, if not very good, and the offense isn't, what is the up?

side in 2020. Because I went back and looked at a lot of teams over the last several years that had really good defense, but didn't have good offense. And the good offense, especially when it was quarterback related, meant that they really didn't have a chance. You know, there are a couple of examples. Jacksonville in 2017 got to the AFC title game with great defense, but they also were the number one rush offense in the NFL with Leonard Fournett, who, by the way, got cut yesterday. That's the combination. That was the Tennessee combination last year. Yeah. So what do you think their upside is because there are teams like the Broncos, the Broncos in 2016 are the best example, right? Peyton Manning wasn't very good. Their offense

it wasn't very good. Their defense was dominant and they won the Super Bowl. But in 2017, that same defense number three overall with Trevor Simeon and Brock Osweiler, they were five and 11, but they were dominant defense. In 2018, Buffalo had a dominant defense, and they were six in ten. The Jets have had a couple of teams with dominant defense that haven't been very good. Somebody pointed out that the Bears in 2018 had a dominant defense and got to the postseason and won 12 games. That's true, but Mitch Trubisky was pretty good that year.

You know, and they still didn't win a playoff game. They couldn't score enough points at home to win a playoff game, but they were 12 and 4. But do you see this team, if it has really good defense, what's the upside? Well, it's hard to say, Kevin, because their offense is such a mystery. But I'm saying assume the offense isn't good. If assume the offense isn't good, I think six and ten. Yeah, I think it's probably, eight and eight. I could see in that

division, eight wins with a really good defense. With a really good defense, why you need the other component of it, you need to win the field position paddle to take advantage of a real good defense. You don't want to put a real good defense on its heels

all the time with bad field position. You don't want to keep a real good defense on the field all the time, which means you've got to have a ball control offense, which means running the ball. In order to take advantage of a great defense, you need those two components, or else even a great defense that's going to get beaten down and worn down. No doubt. And that's what happened to Denver in 2017, Buffalo 2018, some of the jet teams that have been good defensively. More often than not, if you don't have, in this day and

age of football, if you don't have good offense, you're limited. I mean, they're examples, and we pointed them out, but if your offense isn't very good, meaning you can't run it, your quarterback's not that great, you don't have weapons, even if you have a dominant defense, you know, seven, you know, seven, eight wins may be the best you can do. And that's what I would say the answer is, that their upside is eight wins if their defense is excellent, but the offense is not. But again, the examples of great defense and they won games was Jacksonville, the number one rush offense in the NFL in 2017. And they got to the postseason.

The irony of that is their defense carries them in a 10-3 wild card weekend win over Buffalo. And then the next weekend, they go to Pittsburgh and win 45 to 42 when everybody was expecting 17 to 10. But there were a lot of turnovers in that game. But they couldn't get off the field either in that game, which was weird. But anyway, we're getting close. Closer to football season. I think we're going to have it. Yes, we are.

By the way, how about the Big Ten? One last thing. The Big Ten, 11 to three to postpone the season after it looked like at the end of last week, they were going to go ahead and play. And they were going to play on Thanksgiving weekend, which was stupid to start a season Thanksgiving weekend. But they voted yesterday 11 to three, the presidents and chancellors, to postpone the fall football season. And, you know, I guess. I still think it's a smart thing to do. Yeah.

A lot of schools, Tommy. My nieces are at SEC schools. One's at Tennessee. One's at South Carolina. My niece who's at South Carolina, she's got COVID-19. First week at school. Really? She gets infected.

Oh, my gosh. She's in basically a hotel room where they're quarantining the students that have it. But apparently there's been a major outbreak on campus. She's not symptomatic. She had a bit of a sore throat and that was it. And the same thing in Tennessee. my niece didn't get it, but a lot of people on campus have it. I mean, you can, Alabama apparently has had a major outbreak.

You know, I'll be honest with you. I don't think they should come home. I don't think they should be on planes or trains or, you know, bringing that stuff home. I think they should hang in there because right now, you know, I don't know at South Carolina anyway. I could be wrong about this. My sister might call me today with an update on it. But I don't know that anybody's getting. sick. We'll see. We will see. All right. Anything else from you? That's all I got today, boss. We had a lot

going on today. We had a lot going on today. All right then. We're done for the day. Have a great rest of the day this evening. Possibility of no podcast tomorrow, but we will definitely be back on Thursday if we don't do one tomorrow. Take care.