The Kevin Sheehan Show - Nine Hours On A Bus

Episode Date: April 7, 2022

Thom was back after his trip to Orlando. It wasn't easy. The boys talked Commanders and Congress, Terry McLaurin, The Masters, and Opening Day for the Nationals as well.  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.

You don't want it. You don't need it. But you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Chean Show. Here's Kevin. Tommy's back a day earlier. We're going to get the whole, whole rundown on the Orlando trip.

Really want you to rate and review the show today. Maybe you can wait until after the show. Today should be a really good one. Rate us and review us on Apple and Spotify. This from Rich. First off, happy Thanksgiving, everybody, Rich writes, Just wanted to say, great job, Kevin, Tom Cooley on this podcast.

They've been winning off the field for years, reference to Bruce Allen. Other podcasts are simply trash at their feet. Fantastic analysis, humor stakes, and quality production. You like that? Then you're going to love the Kevin Sheehan show. It's electrifying. Thank you, Rich, very much. and thank all of you that keep sending in your reviews of the podcast.

Rate us five stars. Review us with one to two sentences. That is really, really good for us. Tom is back. You know, hold on. Where is, God damn it, where's my phone? Here it is. I thought for a moment I left my phone in the car and I was going to be so upset.

All right. So Tommy. Tommy sent me the following text a few days ago, because I just sent him a text saying, how is it going? And you sent me the scene from Citizen Kane, which, as you know, there are many movies that I haven't seen and many classics that I haven't seen. But you sent me a video, a YouTube video, of the room trashing scene. So, this would have been an indication along with, by the way, your Twitter account, which people were pointing out to me and then I went back and caught up on much of it,

you just seemed to be kind of angry over the last few days. What's going on? Was this a... Did you get the fast passes that I told you about or not? Oh, we'll get to the fast passes. Okay. We'll get to that. That's when things started going well.

Okay, so the travel apparently was a big problem. So is that where you want to start? When I say going well, sarcastically. Okay. But we'll get to the fast pass. All right. So tell me about the last, tell me about this week. Well, I was leaving on Saturday around noon.

Mm-hmm. My wife Liz had flown out to Spokane the day before to go get out granddaughter. And Saturday morning, afternoon, like early afternoon, He was flying out of Spokane to eventually wind up in Orlando. I was flying from Baltimore, Orlando. My oldest son was also joining us. He was flying from Baltimore to Orlando. And my flight got postponed a little bit.

You know, they got postponed a second time. Then I'm at the airport and a third time. What were you flying? You want to point out the airline? Southwest. Oh, Southwest. Yeah. Oh, God, yes. I do want to point out the airline. Yeah. Southwest.

Southwest. And then finally, finally, it got canceled. Just cancel. Okay? And almost every Southwest flight out of Baltimore got canceled that day. There was some kind of glitch with their computer system. which doesn't really explain anything. And they canceled all these flights, which made me,

I mean, part of the problem was there was bad weather in Florida. But there was a report that went out all over the wires, say that they had a bad computer glitch, which I don't quite understand. I mean, are those planes just sitting at work and no one can pick up a phone and say, Billy, bring you a plane over the gate E5, and we're going to fly them out.

You know, what's this computer glitch mean? That means, like, everything stops. Anyway, my son's flight, his flight got canceled. He managed to book another flight to Orlando through Hartford was on the plane, and they were taxiing out of the gate, and then they stopped the flight, and they said, everyone who's on this flight, who's connecting to Orlando, needs to get.

get off the plane. So they pulled the plane back. Oh, God. And he had to get off. Okay? So we can't get out of, we can't get out of Baltimore. You can't get out of BWI. You're just sitting at BWI right now at the Southwest Stair. And we're getting, we're getting the impression that we're not going to be able to leave Saturday, Sunday, or even Monday, because of the way flights are backed up.

What's the status of Liz right now on her way from Spokane to Orlando? Okay, she gets into Phoenix, okay. Her flight from Phoenix to Orlando gets canceled. Oh, my God, this is happening now on three fronts. This is amazing. Yes, yes, this is. This is. So, and she, like us, based on all the final, you know, let me just say something. My son is very good at crisis management.

Like he will be on top of figuring out the workarounds on this. How do we get around this kind of thing? Okay. And there's no getting around this at this point. We're all looking at the possibility of not getting into Florida. until Monday at the earliest. And when I mean Florida, I mean Florida.

I mean, like, like, for her, for her, we looked at flights into Jacksonville, into Miami, into Tampa, into Fort Lauderdale.

Right. Nothing. Nothing going into Florida, probably until Monday. And this is Saturday. Okay? And so she's stuck in Phoenix. What,

least decide to do is while this is going on, my son finds a spirit flight leaving at 9.30 at night from Philly getting into Orlando. So we drive from Baltimore to Philly. Okay. This is, by the way, when you tweeted out, don't any of my goddamn friends have a private jet? No, apparently not. Not willing to at least loan one to you or loan you a lift. So you're driving to Philly to get on a spirit flight to Orlando. And Liz is faced with the prospect of being stuck in Phoenix for a couple of days. Continue.

Right, with our granddaughter. Right. Okay. So our granddaughter, by the way, is 12 years old, has a. full-blown middle school attitude and looks like Mortisha Adams. Okay. From the Adams family. Of the aspects of being stuck there with our granddaughter.

So we, while we're driving to Philly, my son is working the phone. And this is what we managed to do. we managed to get her on a flight because we just wanted to get her out of Phoenix okay so as close to Florida as possible so we got her on a flight from Phoenix to Atlanta

okay but it's not leaving until about our time 9.30 at night our time right around the same time we're supposed to leave Philly so we get to Philly we get to our gate for Spirit Airlines and actually late

She's supposed to leave a little bit later. And the flight's delayed. It's delayed because they're missing one crew member. Oh, my God. Okay. And they're waiting for another crew member. And it's delayed. And it's delayed.

And we're sitting there at 10 o'clock, 1030, 11 o'clock at night. Everyone's sitting there at gate at gate E3 in Philadelphia. I'll never forget the gate. E3. Meanwhile, Liz is in Phoenix. and waiting for her flight, which is delayed now, to go to Atlanta. Well, did you have a next leg for her from Atlanta to Orlando? Oh, let me get to that.

Let me get to that. I have to get to that. It's part of the story. So, and there is no, there is no, okay, let me get to that now. There's no leg from Atlanta to Orlando. No airline is going to fly into Orlando in time for us to do that. this. So it's the same situation, except she's eight hours away in Atlanta this time. What about Atlanta to Tampa? What about Atlanta to Lauderdale?

Nothing. Nothing. Florida? Nothing. Okay. Nothing. Spring break, Tommy. So, bitch into Florida. Any airline, okay? So, you know, somebody, you know, she suggested renting a car, and that's like an eight, nine-hour drive. And I said, yeah, yeah, you could do it. that, but I put, I put them on a megabus. You put them on a megabus? How long was that ride supposed to be?

Nine hours. Oh, my God. Mega bus. But it wasn't going to leave until the next morning. Did she consider that you looking out for her, putting her on a bus? Yes. Oh, man, she's easy. Oh, God. So meanwhile, at our spirit flight, you know, all of a sudden the crew members who were there start trickling out and leaving home for home one, one at a time. Because the one guy didn't show up on time. Yeah. Yeah.

So until the point, there's nobody at the gate anymore. There's nobody on the plane that's sitting out there, you know, at the end of the walkway. So we assume it's canceled because there's nobody there. It's like midnight. It's nobody's there. What about passengers? What about passengers? Were they still hanging around?

Or did you just miss the announcement that the flight had been canceled? No, no, no. We didn't miss anything. When you were saddled up next to the bar, at this point, you've got to be pretty well on your way. I would have been. Well, not really, because I got to keep a clear head. We did spend a little time at Chickie and Pete's in the airport. Okay.

But I got to keep a clear head. So, yeah, everyone there is waiting. and nothing's going to happen. Meanwhile, we have come to a conclusion. If we don't get on this plane, we're not going. Okay? And if we're not going, Liz doesn't want to go. So she is, they announce her flight is boarding.

And we need to decide should she get on that plane, or should she just stay in Phoenix and fly back to Spokane the next morning. Oh, no, no, no, no. You get her on the plane and get to Atlanta. Would have been my call right then and there. But if we're not going, if we're not going, this was it, we decided. If we're not getting, if we're not leaving now, we're not going to Florida. We're not going to get there until Monday.

Okay? So she doesn't want to go if we're not going. Right. She doesn't want to spend a couple of days with, you know, with her and just her and a granddaughter there. So we need to decide, it's like like a race track, a race car, deciding which one we should do. Who's the mudder? Who's the mutter? Because we've got definite rainy weather and a bad track right now. So my son finds a flight at a Philly at 6 in the morning on Frontier Airlines into Orlando, Saturday morning. Okay, so it's midnight, around 11 o'clock Saturday night.

But they still haven't canceled officially the Spirit Flight. You've just used deductive reasoning because nobody's there. anymore. Right, right. And eventually they did cancel. Okay. So, uh, mighty. So, so, so we drove to fly for six in the morning at a frontier and we tell Liz to get on the plane, quick, get on the plane to Atlanta and then take the, and then what she's going to do is when she gets to Atlanta at five in the morning, the megabus doesn't leave to 11. Does the megabus leave from the airport or does she have to go to a bus station? Oh, she has to go to a bus station. Oh, Christ.

So we leave, we book a hotel for her. Mm-hmm. Okay. In Atlanta. So at least they can take a shower. Yeah. Get like two hours rest, like that. And then she's going to take an Uber to the bus stop the next morning.

And we give her all the information, the address to the bus stop and all that. We found all that out. So she's going to get on a bus at 11 in the morning, and we're going to leave, you know, for Orlando at 6 in the morning. We'll get there at 8.30. You know, she will get until 7.30 at night. Right. Nine hour of bus. So we're looking for a hotel to stay in to do the same thing.

Right. In Philly. You know, take a shower, take a few hours sleep. We called or went to 16 hotels. Oh, my God. Nothing. Everything is booked. We stayed in Camden.

Oh, my God. Yes. We stayed in Camden. And it was only for a few hours. 90 minutes sleep I got, you know? And woke up the next morning, drove back to the airport, and everything worked then. We got on the flight to Philly from Philly at 6 in a morning to Orlando, and we got in at 830, hers, she managed to get out of the hotel, get to the bus station, and rode nine hours

to the megabus. And we met them at the megabust stop at 7.30. That was our trip to Orlando. Your granddaughter must have been, what family am I related to here? Why can't they figure this thing out? I'm on a plane to Phoenix. I'm hanging out in the Phoenix airport. Then I'm going back to Spokane.

Now I'm going to Atlanta for Christ. out loud and getting on a bus with all the other, you know, regulars. Jesus Christ, I mean, honestly, Liz had it much worse than you did because of the nine-hour bus ride. I mean, it's not even close. But at that point, she said, I'll never fly a plane again. I'll take a bus any day because she, it was a megabus, and they treat you pretty good. It's not like Greyhound, okay? I mean, it's pretty comfortable.

There wasn't a flight into any Florida airport. Any Florida? No. And it's all, look, I know because I just recently traveled. Now, we were very lucky. We had no issues. I didn't. My wife didn't. My middle son with his girlfriend flying back from L.A.X to Dulles had their flight

canceled. He ended up doing a really nice job of not only getting them to pay for the hotel room and the Uber to the hotel, but then they got upgraded to first class for their flight home the next day. So I give him credit for really going after it and being relentless because apparently it was another situation like yours where they had them sitting there and then very late at night because this was a red-eye flight scheduled red-eye flight back were saying, yeah, the flight's canceled. They're like, well, what are we supposed to do? What are you paying for. Do you have a hotel? Yeah, but the hotel was in torrents. So that didn't work. And so somehow

he ended up the next day in a first class seat home after they paid for the hotel and the Uber, which I was surprised that United would pay that. But God, you had the trip from hell. I thought the problems were going to start when you got to Orlando. So no, no, no, no. And now, meanwhile, We've missed the whole day, okay? Right. Okay, so in other words, the plan was two days at Universal and one day at Disney. Right. Okay.

So we've missed a day. That's $1,000. Yeah. Okay? It's non-refundable. Okay. So we've missed the day. We decided to skip Disney and just due to two days at Universal.

Now, the Disney people say we can use that. within a year. But I doubt if I'm ever going to get anywhere close. Well, did Spirit at least pick up your hotel room? No. No, no, no, no. There was nobody to contact. Kevin, there was no one to answer the phone.

Yeah. There was nobody at any desk. Oh, my God, you drove to me. There was nobody in Southwest. There was like, there was no one in answer the phone. Southwest didn't answer a phone for two days. There was nobody. I mean, you got in the car.

You made the two-hour drive to Philly to only have the same thing happen. Yes. For totally different reasons. Right. For no reason other than Spirit was just a fucked-up airline. Yeah. And I never flew them before, and I still haven't flown them, and I never will. You tweeted out at one point, the airline business is so screwed up that Dan Snyder must be running it.

It has been screwed up recently. It's been a disaster recently. It's an absolute disaster. And I'll tell you how I felt when we flew back yesterday. How'd that go? Okay. And that went fine. Everybody, everything worked great, okay, flying home.

But when I walked into that airport yesterday, I felt a little sick. Adjada, yeah. I really did, like a little sick. I can't believe I'm back in an airport again. Well, that Orlando airport, I think, is the busiest airport in America in terms of, you know, the flights that are busiest destination. I forget what it is because I know Atlanta and others are, you know, and a lot of the hubs are super busy. But so if you can, and I'm enjoying this, trust me, I'm enjoying this. And I was kind of following it from afar.

And when I texted you to ask you how it was going, I kind of got the sense. that it wasn't going very well. So did you end up doing one day at Universal, one at Disney? Is that how it netted out? No. No, we did two days at Universal because they have two Universal parks, and we just bagged Disney. You bagged Disney.

Okay. Yeah, because the main reason my granddaughter wanted to go was for the Harry Potter stuff, and that's at Universal. Okay. So she wasn't upset that you didn't go to Disney World? No. Okay. Now, she's upset all the time about everything, but, you know. Oh, boy.

But, no, she didn't care about about how busy. Between grandpa and a 12-year-old middle schooler. She's not a magic kingdom kind of girl. Okay. So it really didn't make a whole lot of difference to her. Well, you compared her to Morticia Adams, so is she kind of like one of those middle school goth girls? Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Well, there's nothing wrong with that. If it's dark and black, she likes it. Okay. Well, that's not so unusual, just so you know. Okay. Okay. So we lose, we've lost at least a grand from Disney.

Okay. So we take your advice. We go to the desk and we ask about the fast track for Universal. Yeah. And she said that's all that. $250. And I said, well, that's not bad. And she said, per person.

Yeah. For person. Did you go into what it took for you to get there? Maybe she could give you an intro rate. And that had nothing to do with them, they said. Okay. Yeah. So for two days, I paid a grand extra each day for these fast track passes.

Now, we're glad we got them because the line were really long, and we skated it, and it helped our theme park experience significantly. But it was $1,000 a day extra. On top of the money we had spent for the tickets, which were a grand each, you know. I'm telling you, this thing was almost as expensive as my car. when it was all said and done. And I'm hoping to recoup some of the money because I am going to write a lengthy diatribe to Southwest

and Spirit. Explaining what went on. At least Southwest kept you up to date on what was going on, which wasn't good. Spirit just left you there. Left us there. No communication. At what point did you look around and say they all left?

The guy at the game, game, the guy who worked for Spirit, he couldn't get a hold to anybody either. Oh, my God. Neil and Rockville, this was a couple of days ago. Tommy seems very angry on Twitter. Has anyone checked on Liz and his granddaughter? Disney takes months of prep and training. It does, especially during spring break, as I told you, I told you everything would be super

crowded, but my God, that is a travel night. nightmare, but a nine-hour bus ride shoot me. Seriously. I think, well, I know what I would have chosen to do. I would have chosen to go back to Spokane, or I would have said, guess what? I'm in Phoenix. I'm going to Scottsdale or I'm going to the Biltmore checking in and hanging out here for a couple of days. That's what I'm doing. But a late night flight or an early morning flight to Atlanta and then a nine-hour bus ride. When you all finally, you know, connected in Orlando, did you celebrate? Well, a little bit. I mean, it was, it was literally like, you know, finding your family in the middle of an earthquake, you know, or natural disaster,

and you've been separated for days. Yeah, but at least you had communicated. You said, you'd find them. Yeah. Yes. So, now, the other part was, and this is no big deal, this is no surprise to anyone. Universal was great, especially the Universal Islands of Adventure Park. Okay. That was at the Spider-Man ride and the Kong ride.

And, but, you know, we, and I've done theme parks before. And when we did them with the kids when they were little, I guess we used to go back. and take a nap in the afternoon and then come back at night. Right. We didn't really do that this time. We hit the park at 8 in the morning when it opened. Okay. And we hit it pretty hard.

And each day at 4 o'clock, I'd say I can't do it anymore. I can't do it. You're done. We got to go. Yeah. We got to go. Well, why didn't you just go and let them stay? Well, they were now.

Actually, Liz and my son felt the same way. I was the only one. All right. I mean, two days, 38,000 steps. Two days, 38,000. So 19,000 a day. Well, I mean, you know what, Tommy? You ought to take up golf because you'd get in about 17,000, 17,000, 34,000.

You might even feel a little fresher at the end of it. No, that's a lot of walking. I walk every day, usually 10,000 steps a day. Whoa. You haven't told me that. You get 10,000 steps in every day? Well, I'd say sometimes 10, usually 9, between 9 and 10. You know what?

That's actually very good. Well, but it didn't prepare me for, not just 38,000 steps, but, you know, you're on your feet the whole time. What was the weather like? We still had the weight in the lines. Weather was good. We had great weather, thank you guys. We had great weather. And we enjoyed Universal.

Good. We had a great time on the ride. More importantly, did she enjoy Universal? She enjoyed it. Well, she seemed to enjoy it. Yeah. Okay. She seemed to enjoy it.

And now everybody is back home, except for Liz, who's in flight, as I speak, from Spokane right now. Did she have any issues with her flight back to Spokane? Did it go through Phoenix? No. No. through Denver. Okay. Was it a United flight?

No, it was Southwest. It was Southwest. Okay. All right. Everything went smooth. It sounds like quite the week. What else, what am I missing? What haven't you told us about the travel, the trip?

You're exhausted clearly. You know, and that can be exhausting. I think the drive to Philly must have been really interesting because you are, you're really pissed off, but at the same time, you're optimistic because your son has created a solution. But I would imagine, you know, two hours in a car, that would have been for me a quick stop for a 12-pack minimum. Not for the driver, of course, but if I were the passenger and I had just gone through that, but the next part of that would have been a disaster. You know, it's one thing to be at one airport and have delays, delays, delays, cancellation.

and now what are we going to do? But to drive to Philly for, by the way, a shittier airline and then have that thing fall apart at, you know, late hours of the night. You know, you should be reimbursed. Maybe Spirit doesn't do this. I don't know. You should be reimbursed for the hotel room, at least. And the Uber ride to the hotel room.

Well, we didn't take, we had my car. Or you should get some sort of voucher for, something, Tommy, from Southwest and Spirit. Well, a voucher for another flight. I don't want voucher. Why? I mean, I don't want a voucher. I want cash because I don't think I'm ever flying.

I know I'm not flying Spirit again, and I doubt I'm flying Southwest again. I know that some of these have, you know, the last couple of years have been tough with a lot of the situations. But South, I used to love Southwest. I used to love it. I thought it was one of the easiest airlines. I know the groups and getting in that one part of the line, the whole thing in the open seating is a bit of a pain in the ass. But I always thought Southwest was really good with customers.

But I guess things have changed, and your experience wasn't very good. There is some stuff that I'm sure you want to weigh in on that you missed while you're away, including all the stuff with the Washington commanders, although things have actually kind of died down unless you assume that this story about the six states, the attorney generals in six states have written Roger Goodell to be a big story. I'm not sure if it is or isn't. I haven't given it that much thought, to be honest with you. But we'll talk about that stuff.

And then, of course, it is opening day. Tommy is back in time to go to opening day, which is now opening night because the Nats and the Mets got moved back three hours because of the rain here today. So we'll start to get to all of that. Oh, glad you're back. Glad you're healthy. And you know what? Another life experience. And nobody died, Tommy.

Nobody died. Everybody's healthy. And your granddaughter hopefully had a great time. Although who knows what she's saying about you out in Spokane right now. We'll get to all this other stuff right after these words from a few of our sponsors. So after the trip from hell that ended better. the trip that certainly started poorly, but didn't end poorly. We now get to some sports conversation because since you beat, well, the last time you were on the show,

we had the post report about financial improprieties. We had the first front office, A.J. Perez's story about financial impropriety. And then during the final four on Saturday, we got the story that got into more specificity, from A.J. Perez about the 40% ticket sales that go back to the league for your home games, that apparently, according to front office sports, or according to Jason Friedman, the guy who was the guy that gave this information to Congress, Washington had figured out a way to skim off the top of that. I had A.J. Perez on the show earlier this week. I can't even think of who I had on that one day. I had AJ on.

I also had somebody else on to discuss it. But anyway, right now, there's been a little bit of a lull here for the last day and a half in scandal talk related to the Washington commanders. But what was your reaction to that story? Well, again, you know, my premise is now with this. organization, and I think they've earned this guilty till proven innocent. You know, they don't get the American tradition of innocent till proven guilty. I expect the worst out of his organization, and when the worst happens, I say, of course. Of course they did this.

Okay, so beyond that, let's just, let's handle this one, because I've spent a lot of time talking about it earlier this week, and I want to hear you. You think they're guilty of this. So where do you think it leads? Oh, I think ultimately, I think it leads to Dan Snyder being forced out. I think it does. And how does that happen? If this is true, if this is true, I think the owners are going to say you robbed us. You took money from us.

They're going to vote them out if this is true. Well, you've already said you believe it to be true. Are you going to backtrack on that? don't know if it's true. No. Believing something is not the same thing as knowledge. All right. So none of us have knowledge on whether or not it's true. Right. But you're smart enough to connect some of these dots here.

So do you want me to help you connect some of these dots here on this particular story? Just this story. Yeah, go ahead, because my mind's not working too well. Okay. First of all, I'm very skeptical that this is. true. I'm not skeptical of the reporting that Jason Friedman told Congress that this is true, but I'm skeptical that it's true for one reason more than any other, and that is it just, and I've used your term multiple times this week. It just would have been juice that would have been nowhere worth the squeezing, because 40% of 40 million is 16 million. If you're skimming

5 to 10% off the top. You know, you're talking about $1.6 million. They get $312 million a year in television revenue. Even this guy, A.J. Perez, told me on the podcast, it's actually more of like a benefit of like hundreds of thousands of dollars if they were doing this. So we know that they have certainly done dumb things without it being worthwhile, you know, suing the city paper, suing.

the 65 or 75-year-old grandmother, which they apparently, A.J. told me she filed bankruptcy anyway, so they got nothing out of that except horrible publicity. So we know they're capable of making emotional, impulsive, stupid decisions. But for me, on this one, the math doesn't add up. Now, I agree with you. It's not the amount if they did skim off the top that would be like, the difference maker here. If he cheated them, if he stole from them, then I think he'd be in big trouble. I think the other 31 owners led by, you know, or leading the commissioner would say, you stole from us. You skimmed off the top. We don't do that. Who cares if it amounted to $150,000? You know, you were trying to steal from us. I just don't think that they did this.

And then in talking to various people about the audits, and I know you mentioned to me last week on the podcast, and it's true. You know, we've had auditors fuck things up. You know, Arthur Anderson basically lost a business because of Enron. You know, we had the WorldCom situation, you know, the examples that you and I talked about last week. But the league audits each team every three years roughly, all right? And every three years, part of that audit is to go through very carefully to find out whether or not the teams have, you know, done the math correctly. Like there's this assumption that nobody's going to really, it's just not a big enough number compared to the other numbers. They just want to make sure that the teams got the math on the 40% less expenses, you know, correct.

And I was told, and then John Kime reported this too, that every three years when you're audits, The average amount of money that a team owes the league after the league's audit is $400,000. And the last time the Washington team was audited was, I think, in 20. So it would have been for, you know, the two or three years prior to that. And they owed $86,000. So it was much less than the average. Now, if they were skimming off the top and somehow the auditors missed it, was a lot of money there. It's possible. I just don't, I'm skeptical that the team did this,

but I shouldn't be overly skeptical. I should think the way you think. And this guy, Friedman, you know, I've learned was one of the first to go when the new regime on the business side, led by Jason Wright, came into the organization. He was, you know, considered to be like a lot of the people, Tommy, that we knew, you know, arrogant and, you know, not super competent, and he was part of the original house cleaning, one of the first to go, even though he had been there for 20-something years. But I'm skeptical for those reasons about this thing. The back and forth, which I thought was pretty interesting between the team and then Lisa Banks,

who, as Neil and Rockville pointed out immediately, she just admitted, that Jason Friedman was the person that disclosed this to Congress. It had been reported by Daniel Kaplan at the Athletic, but she is representing him. She admitted that he was the guy and then admitted he was the guy that disclosed this to Congress under an NDA,

which I thought was very interesting. And she claimed defamation of character. And then the team came back with, by the way, that guy Joseph Tacapina, remember him, who now spoke on behalf of the team and said, we never mentioned Jason Friedman by name, but bring on any defamation lawsuit you want to bring on.

And I think I said yesterday, because now I'm losing track of when this all happened this week, but there is kind of a sense, and Nealon Rockville said this, the ball's back in Lisa Banks' court. Like she claimed that her client was defamed. The team said, well, we never mentioned your client, but bring on the defamation lawsuit all you.

want. I'm interested to see what her response is to this. I personally... Nobody, I mean, nobody with any... Seriously, I don't understand why Neil keeps doing this. Why would you say anything the team says seriously? Why would you operate under the premise that what they're doing is intelligent, sensible, and honest? Who said we were? They don't check any of those boxes.

Who said we were? So their response could just be these idiots out there saying, screw you, you know? You know, we've got lawyers. We're going to intimidate you. We're going to make your life miserable. But that's not my point. You missed the point. My point is that they put out a statement.

She responded. They put out a statement to her response. And now we haven't had any response from her since. that's all. Well, because there's no point of her responding to the football team. Was there a point for her initial response? Go ahead. Hit me.

Was there a point of her initial response? Probably not. Okay. Probably not. Probably should just let it go. But, look, but I mean, just, Jesus. I mean, this whole idea, look, the athletic wrote a big story that really, I think, tried to slap down the report by pointing out, you know, the NFL.

NFL auditing practices and stuff. And, I mean, I just think, you know, I mean, again, I mean, people are like looking at what's in front of them instead of what's been behind them. Well, no. You need to look behind you. I don't think anybody's doing that. I don't think anybody's doing that. I think people are looking at the, here's the fear for me.

I told you this last week. I want, I think a lot of people who are writing about this actually want it to be. true. But in reporting, they're going to follow the facts. They're going to, you know, and I think the report that you were just referring to was Ben's, right? Or are you referring to the Daniel Kaplan report? Yeah, that's the other guy I had on. I had Kaplan on, who was the first to report Jason Friedman's name as a part of this, and point out the accounting practices, which I think Ben did as well. I don't think anything that Daniel wrote or Ben wrote is trying to fend the organization. I just think it's their reporting. But what I said to you a week ago is what

still kind of bothers me. Now, we can talk about how this could manifest itself if it were to happen because maybe there's really no consequence to this because of the vast history. I just think that if there's overreach, because there are people on this committee that can't stand Dan and want them out of there, or people in the league that want them out of there, that they can't swing and miss too many times. And this one feels like for me, by the way, Perez also said there are other financial improprieties, other people in addition to Friedman, that will bring forth more information and that Friedman did provide evidence. Okay. I hope it's true. I'm just telling you what my gut is on this specific allegation.

And if it doesn't go anywhere, all you're doing with that owner who would love for Tiffany Johnston's allegations to fall flat on its ass, this latest to fall flat on its ass, so he could raise his arms in a V and claim victory and say, this is why you shouldn't worry about all the other stuff. I don't, sympathetic figure is, sympathetic figure is the term I used. I think that that's probably hyperbole,

but I don't want swings and misses on this. I want swings and connections. Let me take you back. Yeah. Okay. Remember to Jeffrey Epstein allegations. Yes. That, you know, were, you know, turned out to be not true.

That's right. Or never proven. And, uh, remember you were the first one to report. that the team was so elated about the Jeffrey Epstein allegations that they sent out to their sponsors a letter saying, you know, yeah, the post story, we may have done all that, but we didn't do this. Right.

Still one of the most amazing things to me during that whole period of time. So that letter came from our friend Louis Shrek, you know, who was still selling for the team as the marketing or sales director. Whatever. Go ahead. Now, I can't think of a bigger swing and miss than tying Snyder to Jeffrey Epstein. It wasn't Congress. It wasn't Congress. It was rumor mill.

I know that, but it did not make any difference. I don't think, again, I mean, swings and misses with this guy, irrelevant. There's nothing, nothing that they, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, He can be accused of that a segment of people won't believe. In the moment, Tommy, it did make a difference. As bad as that story, as bad as that story and as real as that first post story was, it really seemed in the moment to be a letdown for all of the people that were hoping that there was something in there that would really nail them,

which is what was rumored the entire week leading up to that. But here's the thing, and you can count on this as much as you can count on the sun rising in the morning. Before you blink, there will be something else. Of course. Okay? So this is like stopping a dam that's about to break. And, you know, I mean, I still tend to believe that it's more possible the allegations are true than not. But even if they don't, I think that if they're determined to drive this truck, you know, down the road over Snyder, over Roger Goodell, and again, the ultimate goal here is to get Roger Goodell and Dan Snyder on a witness stand in front of Congress, in front of the committee on TV to testify.

Well, they better do that before next November. Yes, they better. Because after next November, it doesn't happen. Right. You know, after, you know, so, so I, but I think that is the straw that breaks the camels back as much as anything. I think if Roger Goodell is dragged before a congressional committee and embarrassed on national television, I think that's the one that does Snyder in. I hope you're right. But back to you pointing out, you know, the letter that they sent out to all of their clients.

attaching the Washington Post story to the letter and talking about how all of the terrible rumors about sex trafficking and drug parties and Jeffrey Epstein weren't true, but this actually is solid reporting about all these women that reported sexual harassment within the organization. Amazing just to think about.

But that was what they did. You know, they essentially claimed victory. And so all I am saying is if, let's just say a month from now, the Mary Joe White investigation of Tiffany Johnston doesn't, you know, produce anything, which, you know, let's be honest, what's it really going to produce? Who can prove that he put a hand on her thigh underneath a table at a meeting? And, you know, Howard Gutman's already been on several times saying, you know, nudging or pushing, it was to give her, I mean, that thing, I'm skeptical as to whether or not, whether that thing's going to produce anything that, that, you know, ties anything directly to Snyder. So if you get that combined with the 40% ticket sale thing falling flat on its ass,

they're going to do the same thing they did in July of 2020. They're going to send a letter out to everybody, and they're going to do more than that. They're going to claim, you know, in public, you know, kind of look, people are after me. They're coming after me with false accusations. They're coming after me with all this stuff. You know, I would have, I would have, you know, we're transparent on the Mary Joe White. The league has been. I just don't want them in that position again, I guess.

And I just hope that Congress understands that this better have some teeth to it. It's just better. Again, to your point, if it doesn't, are we going to forget the past? Are we going to all of a sudden say, oh, my God, Snyder's, you know, he's actually been, innocent of all of this all along. No, I'm not saying that, but they're just, they're looking for some of these wins. And I'll tell you what would happen. You'd get another diatribe from Ron Rivera saying, can we now just focus on the football, please? Because, and he may, he may, he may not say that by that point. Well, I mean, you get certainly a lot of people blaming, you know, media, um,

lust for some of this stuff, which is, of course, ridiculous because this is emanating from Congress and the claim that a former employee made. We'll see. As an aside, I recommend to everybody listening a Netflix series called Unbelievable. What is it? You haven't told me about this. This is very relevant to this. It's about how victims of sexual assault and rape.

Right. are handled in the justice system process. It's one view. I'm not saying it's the only view, but it's one view that I don't think most people realize that that happens in these he said, she said kind of situations. So I would highly recommend it's a good theory.

How many episodes? I don't know. I mean, did you watch it or not? couple weeks. Well, it's not a binge-watch thing. You have to wait for it. It says it was one season in 2019. Okay. Well, we haven't watched

them all because we had to embark on a nightmare journey to Orlando. Is this the thing with Tony Collette in it? But the first couple episodes are fabulous. Is this with Tony Colette in it? I think eye-opening. Tony Colette?

Who's Tony Colette? She's one of the women. She's the one that was in that movie Sunshine God, that great movie Was it called Sunshine? Was that the name of the movie Sunshine? I don't know.

I don't know the name of the actors or actors in it. But I'm just recommending it. It's a good series and especially with the Shot Box and stuff going on. Little Miss Sunshine. Little Miss Sunshine is the movie.

Did you ever see Little Miss Sunshine? Yes, I did. Very funny. Very funny. Very enjoyable. So Tony Collette was the mother, was the wife. It says that she's in this show unbelievable. Okay. Oh, my God. She may be. Okay. I'm assuming you didn't take at any point Sunday night after you finally arrived in Orlando to watch the next episode of winning time, did you? By the way, it was pretty good. All right. Let's talk some. baseball season and what I'm looking forward to today, the Masters. We'll do that right after these words from a few of our sponsors.

So by the time most of you get this podcast, Tiger Woods has already started his first round at Augusta, which as you're listening to this podcast, more likely than not, I am watching it. This is what I can't wait for today. I know it's opening day, opening night for the Nats, and I always love opening day. And I've been to a lot of opening days. Tommy, yesterday I had this guy Michael Orkman on the show. He's written a book called Opening Day 50 for 50.

He's been to 50, or he went to 50 straight opening days starting in 1970 at RFK Stadium. Do you know the book or do you know who I'm talking about or not? I've heard about the book. It sounds like a great idea for a book. Yeah. Really, really does. He was great. If anybody missed it, it was at the end of the podcast yesterday.

But the Masters has all of my attention. I'll watch the Nats tonight. I will. But this Tiger Woods return story, it's not Alex Smith, obviously, because Alex Smith ended up on a football field where he got picked up by Aaron Donald and thrown to the ground in his first game back. But 14 months later or whatever it's been, yeah, it's about 14 months after that car accident and almost losing his leg.

He is playing golf today at Augusta. An amazing story for one of the most amazing athletes and most accomplished athletes of all time. You can make the case the most accomplished athlete of all time. So anyway, do you have any thoughts on that? Yeah, I have some thoughts. Go ahead. It's not a sport and all you tiger worshippers.

No, no, no, no. That's it. That's it. It's the tiger worshippers. It's like a cult. I don't have any issues with him, per se. I mean, like, like you said he almost lost his leg. Well, how did he almost lose his leg? In a car accident? Really? How did that car accident happen? Well, we don't know a lot of the details. Well, we know there was high speed involved.

Right. We don't care about the details because it's Tiger. This is what the sheriff's department said out in California. Tiger. Who cares about the details? If we know the details, that's what I mean you have to know. We're never going to tell you. Right. Okay, tell me about the nationals. The over under and win total for this year for them is 70 and a half. Obviously starting pitching is a major problem. Are they going to win, you thought they were going to win more games than that recently. As recently as a month ago, you thought there was a chance they could be a surprise team in the National League East. On the verge of the 2022 season, what do you think today? Well, I think their win total was more than 70 wins. But I'm not so bullish on them being

a competitive team in the NL East anymore because their pitching is such an uncertainty right now. They're starting pitching, which will affect their bullpen, which isn't overwhelming to begin with. You know, Strasbourg is on the DL. He may not be ready to pitch until May, coming back from shoulder surgery in last year. And nobody knows what he'll be like. And, you know, based on his history, even if he's healthy when he comes back, there's certainly no assurance that he'll stay healthy. Patrick Corbyn is the starting pitcher today on opening night. he turned in arguably the worst season, starting season of any pitcher in national history last year.

And this is the guy they're given the ball to. These are their top two guys that they have, I don't know, maybe $350,000, $400 million invested in between the two. And both of them are big question marks. After that, it's, you know, Annabel Sanchez, who's what, 39 years old? Yeah. You know, and went out of baseball last year, and Josiah Gray, who looked good at some points last year, but it's still an untested prospect, you know, and, you know, Joe Ross, he's not, he's on the deal.

He's not healthy yet still coming back from Tommy John's surgery. And it's just, there's so much uncertainty in the starting pitching, and one of the things that killed him last year was their starting pitching, you know, made them. go to the bullpen quicker, and the bullpen wasn't that good and couldn't handle, you know, coming in in the fifth inning on, and they got worn out, and that's the cycle they could face again this year. They'll score a lot of runs. They're going to have an explosive offense, I think, led by Juan Soto and Nelson Cruz. But if they get reasonable starting pitching, they could get 82, maybe 85 wins.

Maybe more, I don't know. I find it hard to believe they get more than that. But if they don't, they'll struggle to get over 70, but I still think they'll do it because they're going to score a lot of runs. I mean, look, Atlanta looks very impressive as a repeat this year. Philly has another explosive offense, but there's a lot of questions about their pitching and defense. The Mets, I mean, you know, Jacob de Grom was supposed to be a starter tonight.

He's already scratched. Well, they're the favorite. They're a slight favorite to win the division. Right. It's close between them in Atlanta. Yeah, the Mets, you know, because they're, you know, in a way they've become like the commanders of baseball in terms of turmoil. And the Marlins are a good young team with a good manager in Don Mattingly. So, you know, I mean, like in 2005, we talked about this.

It could be like 2005 where every team in a division has a record of 500 or better, even the bottom, even the last place nationals in 2005. I think they'll get over that 70 mark, but they need some real, they need things to go right, a lot of things to go right for them to compete. And if they don't, then it's another wasted year with one. Soto on the team that they weren't able to take advantage of. And there's only three years left of that. Yeah, I had Mark on the show, Mark Zuckerman, on the radio show this morning.

He compared this team to the 2010 team and said, it's all about, you know, Ruiz and, you know, and the young pitching that they have, Cavali, and finding out. out whether or not they're tracking in the right direction with some of their young players, that this isn't going to be a good season at all. But are they two years, you know, will we know at the end of the year that they're two years away or, you know, nearing, you know, possible contention? And that's, I don't think anybody's got any expectations that this is going to be a very good season. But, you know, finding out whether or not Ruiz really is a potential budding star.

So, you know, you have one in Soto. And then with some of these young pitchers, you know, Gray and obviously Cade Cavali in particular, who was kind of up and down in the spring. Yeah, I mean, Rizzo believes they'll be ready to compete next year. Yeah. Okay. And my contention has been,

they should try to compete this year because WONSoto's not going to be there at some point. Okay. And you should take advantage of every year Soto's on the lineup. Now, they were handcuffed. in a way because their problem is starting pitching. And they couldn't really go out and get starting pitching because they have Strasbourg and they have Corbyn. I mean, you know, they have, that's their number one and number two starters.

So, I mean, how are you going to sign starting pitching when, if things go right, these are your starters. Right. I mean, it's not like, I mean, you can't, you can't just like push them back. That's like $350,400 million. So they were kind of handcuffed in getting starting pitching because of the uncertainty of Strasbourg and Corbyn. But I think they could have done more to shore up their infield a little bit. I just think that, you know, I just think it's a shame to waste a Juan Soto a year with a losing record.

Well, I think they probably are going to waste a year of WANSoto more likely than not. 70 and a half from the odds makers is not a promising number. It's rare when somebody picked that low before the season. It's just one of those sports where rarely do you see somebody that's supposed to be one of the four or five worst teams in the sport end up contending for a World Series? Yeah, you're right. I remember the Marlins in 2003. They were a long shot that wound up winning the World Series.

and of course the 69 met. Yeah, right. You know, but you're right. It's rare. All right. Last thing that I wanted to talk about real quickly, because I did this on the radio show, the Diggs contract that he signed yesterday, Terry McLaren and Terry McLaren's agent are doing a really good job.

They just should be patient because the price for him is just going up and has really gone up over the last month. Washington probably should have been super aggressive from the beginning. It doesn't mean that they would have gotten a deal done because Terry McClure, I'm sure with his agent saying, no, we should be patient and see what happens here in the offseason with Devante Adams, with, you know, still to come probably Debo Samuel and A.J. Brown and D.K. Metcalfe, et cetera. And, you know, he could be a year away from free agency. But spot rack, which projects, you know, future contracts as well as Tracks current contracts, now has the projected contract for Terry McClough. Claren at like $24.5 million a year, like a four-year $98 million deal, which I would guess, you know, two-thirds of that, you know, guaranteed. That's where Washington is right now.

It doesn't mean that I don't think they're going to try to re-sign them, but the price has gone up and it's going to continue to go up. And you have to be careful, even though you've got that franchise tag as your, you know, kind of your bailout if you don't get a deal done before next year comes. We just saw Devante Adams basically tell Green Bay to go pound sand, that he wasn't going to play under the franchise tag. I think they'll be aggressive in trying to sign them after the draft to see what they get in the draft at number 11, because it could be Chris Olive who's in town,

could be a receiver. I think they should be aggressive in signing Terry McCorn because I think he fits everything that Ron wants in trying to change the culture of the football team. And I think with better quarterbacking, whether it's Wence or somebody else down the road, you know, he's going to produce better results. He's really good. But a top five contract essentially is what you're going to be looking for right now to get a deal done with Terry McLorn. $24.5 million a year is basically top five right now.

You've got, you know, Hill, Adams, Diggs, and Hopkins. And then it would be McLorn if they signed him to that kind of a deal. Now, like Field Yates told me many years ago on the radio show, today's, you know, today's overpayment is tomorrow's bargain. And within probably a year, it'd be like a top 10 salary at wide receiver. But they're going to have to pay to get a deal done with Terry McLaren. That's my only thought on that. Do you have anything else?

You probably need to get to sleep. No, no, no. I don't have anything else. Look, I mean, Terry McLaurin is worth the price. If that's the price, he's worth the price. All right. Go enjoy the day. I will talk to you whenever. If you're around tomorrow morning and you want to jump on, that's great.

If not, no big deal. All right, boss. All right. Back tomorrow.