The Kevin Sheehan Show - No Sweat

Episode Date: June 10, 2021

Kevin and Thom start today with thoughts on the Associated Press and Table Tennis gambling. Starting at 22:47, they discuss Ron Rivera's QB competition thoughts, and Montez Sweat's comments yesterday on not being a fan of the Covid vaccine. Also discussed, Barry Trotz's Islanders win another series while the Nats had a significant win last night in Tampa.  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 Cheehan Show. Here's Kevin. Tommy's with me today, the podcast today presented by MyBooky. Go to MyBooky.orgie. Use my promo code Kevin, D.C.

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moved in to the third spot at plus 350 on my bookie, and the Eagles are the long shot in the division at plus 4.50. I've mentioned this before, but it's basically the tightest fit of any of the divisions from first place to last place in terms of the odds. Very interestingly, they have posted the NFC North Odds now. These were not available a few days ago. There must be a growing feeling that Aaron Rogers will play for Green Bay. They are the favorite at minus 170 to win the NFC North. Anyway, my bookie, my bookie.orgie.orgie. as your promo code to get your first deposit matched halfway up to $1,000. Just want to mention, as we always do, subscribe.

It doesn't cost you anything. It helps us. Whichever podcast platform you're listening to us on, if you have the chance to subscribe, it really does help us. And if you can rate us and review us in particular, and on Apple podcast, it's very easy. Five stars. If you're listening to us on the website or somewhere else, and you go to that purple icon on your iPhone

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And if you can do a one sentence, I love the show, I listen to it all the time, something like that. Love Tommy, love Cooley, We love all the different things that you guys do on the show. That would be great. That helps us as well. And I appreciate, by the way, all of you who listened to the show yesterday and really

enjoyed Mark Stern. Tommy, I had Mark on the show yesterday. He's doing this new podcast for the USDA. And we ended up spending 45 minutes just talking about how he got into the business, how he ended up being the producer of Tony's show, how he ended up creating his alter ego, Nigel. And then we talked a lot about the stories of the three of us on the sports fix, including the Christopher Walken, Joe White, Natalie Wood episode, which, by the way, it's coming up on 10

years. It happened in November 10 years ago. And I started to Google it as I had Mark on all of those stories that were written and then all of the follow-up stories. They're all out there. remember, that thing blew up into a national story. Poor Joe, rest his soul. He thought it was real.

I know, rest in peace, Joe White. Yeah. You know, and I had to explain to law enforcement that I wasn't part of any of that. Yeah. I was on my Wyoming trip when all that happened. I didn't remember that. Okay, so you weren't there. It was just, it was just walking and she...

Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Do you remember? how many people thought it was legitimately Christopher Warkin every week with us. He was so good at it. I mean, and we pulled it off, you know, so well. I mean, it was something that people looked forward to so much.

It was crazy. Christopher Warkin. You know, remember he had the Winnebago that he would park outside of FedEx Field? And I just remember... The Woking, Winnebago? I remember so much of the feedback we got on it. I mean, I'm not going to say that the majority of people were duped, but 40% at least thought it was legitimately Christopher Walken,

and they were so pleased that he was a Redskin fan, and he could talk about, you know, the upcoming game and whether or not, you know, Clinton Portis was going to have a good game and how disappointed he was, you know, in Rex Grossman's performance or whatever it was. It was just, it was weird. But anyway, what we will do, and I've written it down, and hopefully I've written it down, and hopefully will remember this. I put it into my phone as a reminder, but before the 10-year anniversary of that show, I think the three of us will get together on the podcast and talk about the specifics of that. We did that a lot yesterday, but man, that was every network in America and abroad calling the

station to get a copy of what Christopher Walkins said about that fateful 1981 night with Natalie Wood and Robert Wagner. I mean, it was on Associated Press. That's the standard, the gold standard for news. Can I tell you something? I think, and boy, you know, you better be discerning in this day and age. I think the Associated Press is still very close to the gold standard for news, okay? Actual unbiased news.

Because you don't necessarily get any unbiased news in 90% of the spread. bot you used to get it in. I actually, you know, I've got the Associated Press, follow it on Twitter. I get a lot of news that way. I think it's typically really good and without bias. I think you're getting the straight stuff from the Associated Press. I feel that way, to a certain extent about the Wall Street Journal, too, at least the news part of the journal. I think the op-ed tends to lean and be a bit conservative. But I think news-wise, those are the two places I think you can count on. That's just my opinion. But I don't know what people in your business think of the Associated Press now. You know, I agree with you on AP. And I mean, you know, people who work for AP

will tell you proudly so, you know, don't believe it until you read in an Associated Press. Now, this wasn't the case. It is in this situation. But generally, I agree with you. AP is so, but you know what's amazing? I'm reading this book. now. I just finished reading this book called the brass check. It's written by a former writer from the turn of the 20th century, a writer, politician, activist named Upton Sinclair. Yeah, I know that name. I don't know if you ever heard. Yeah, I've heard that name. He wrote this book. He wrote a lot of it. Huh? He was a socialist, actually. Okay. Well. And in the movie Mank, he plays a big part in that.

story because the Hollywood studio chiefs get together and create all kinds of propaganda films against him when he was running for governor of California in the early 30s. But he wrote this book about journalists, American journalism in the early 20th century, and he just roasted Associated Press. This wasn't always the case that they were the gold standard. In the early part of newspaper, oh, my God, they were so. corrupt. Well, most the journalism

was corrupt. If you have issues with it now, you should have seen what was like in the early 20th century. It was unbelievable. Well, I mean, isn't there this... Coming from that? Isn't there... Coming from that? Yeah.

Coming from that to being basically the place to look for, you know, objective, accurate reporting. I mean, they came a long way from the early days. You know, that's such an interesting subject to me, maybe not everybody. Sort of the history of our media.

I mean, you and I both loved the museum, which was a phenomenal museum downtown. And, you know, by the way, one of the only museums that actually charge you to get in, whatever. I actually, you've made me interested in this book because when you think about, journalism, and I don't know if I'm going to be correct on this, but there was this term called yellow journalism, which was essentially, I think, correct me if I'm wrong, a term that basically described lots of biased journalism. It was not necessarily, you know, using today's term, I guess, fact-checked back then. And to me, I have this sense that you said that this was a book written in the early 20th century?

Yes. About, about journalism. About journalism at that time. And it's an interesting read. It's an easy read because most of the book are short chapters, like self-contained chapters. So it's the kind of book you can pick up and down, put up and down real easy.

And I'm just kind of fascinated with Upton Sinclair ever since I saw the movie Mank. I mean, the movie, there will be blood. Yeah. Love it. It's a great movie. That's based on one of his books called Oil. Up in Sinclair wrote a book called Oil, and that's what that movie is kind of based on that.

And he's buried. He's buried in Rock Creek Cemetery. I don't know why he's buried in D.C., but that's where he's buried. I found that out as well. Because I'm always kind of interested in visiting famous people's graves. I can't tell you why. You and Jimmy Patzos.

for some reason. I just am. But, so yeah, AP is, I agree with you 100% about AP at terms of now, the, you know, the level of confidence in what you're reading, I think is high with Associated Press. But in the early days, man, they were one bad outfit. I guess one of the things I'm getting at, and again, I don't know if this is true or not, but we've almost come in many ways full circle from the book that you're reading,

that, you know, it was very hard to sort of identify what was legitimate news based on fact. And then we obviously had a period of time, I'm assuming, in this country, where, you know, most major newspapers were considered to be legitimate and unbiased, even though, you know, they had a political bent in their op-ed sections in particular. We know that the Washington Post has always had that over the years and other newspapers. newspapers, mostly liberally slanted in terms of op-eds. And then there are some newspapers that have mostly conservative writers, like your newspaper for many years. But in some ways, I wonder, have we basically come full circle and are we back to where

we were when this guy wrote the book? Well, no. And here's the difference. And I'm just dealing with incredible journalism, credible newspapers, as opposed to to the lunatic fringe on the Internet. Here's the difference now. If people have an issue with bias, particularly liberal bias in the media these days,

it's generally because they believe these are the opinions they're reading of liberal journalists. Back in the early 20th century, what you were reading were the orders handed down from the conservative business tycoon public. publishers. Like her, like her, like hers. Like hers. Yes. Yes. I mean, I mean, back then, they basically, journalists did not have the power to kind of infer their opinion in stories because the

publisher wanted this and what the publisher wanted, the publisher got. And most publishers still today even are conservative. They're not liberal. You know, I mean, this is the dichotomy of the business. If you believe most reporters are liberal, That's probably the case. Most publishers are conservative, you know? And I'd be surprised if you find editorial, except for this past election, a lot of editorials from newspapers around the country will wind up endorsing Republican candidates over Democratic candidates because that's the publisher talking.

So that's the difference. Back then, it was the publisher that was dictating what his interests were, and the reporters had to carry that out if they wanted to keep their job. Now, your conflict is more with the reporters who lead their opinions into their news stories. Okay. I take your word for you. So that's a difference. I don't know how we got sidetracked on this.

Oh, that's okay. Oh, because of Edinclair. You were talking about Stern. Because of the book you're reading. Oh, I just, I mentioned. I wanted. Yeah. Go ahead.

No, go ahead. Yeah. I wanted to get back to something for your, because of your ad on betting. The My Bookie spot? I figure, yes, I don't think, I think you must know this. I read this on front-page sports. In April, in the state of Colorado, nine million people bet on table tennis. Nine million people bet on table tennis?

It's the fourth largest wager of any sport in the state. What are the top three? I don't know what the other three are. In January, the total bet for table tennis was $12 million, more than any college football bowl game. Well, that is surprising to me, table tennis. I mean, the only person that I've ever known that's known anything about table tennis, of versus Dwight Shrut. He's his greatest heroes are table tennis players. But I don't, I don't understand that. I'll tell you this, you know, here's the one thing that comes to mind. First of all,

I would assume that table tennis is popular somewhere in the world. I'm going to guess Asia, I don't, or Russia. It seems like when Dwight Shrut was ripping through all of his, you know, table tennis heroes. They seem to be all Eastern European names, right? If I recall. All of my heroes are table tennis players. Zoran Primarach, Jan Ovi-Vodner, Wang Tao, George Rushkoff, and of course, Ashraf Helmi. I even have a life-size poster of Hugo Hoyam on my wall. And the first time I left Pennsylvania was to go to the Hall of Fame induction ceremony of Andre Gruber. When tennis first became, actual tennis, first became a sport that you could bet on. Matches. There was a lot going on, man. Remember, there was a lot of

sketchiness. There were a lot of investigations into fixes into match throwing. You know, you know, in the early Wild Wild West of some of these sports being made available, especially Tommy, individual sports, where all you have to do is get to one person to influence. To, the outcome. Team sports, much harder to fix. Individual sports, when you're playing mono-a-mono, all you've got to do is get to one player. Like a golf tournament really doesn't matter, although the golf matchups, which you can bet, you know, all you got to do is get to one golfer. But I remember in the early days of betting on tennis, there were a lot of issues. And a lot of people early on probably made some really good money betting tennis. When they knew,

a specific player was going to throw a match because he had to be, you know, he was in Budapest playing in a tournament, but needed to get on a plane to be back in the U.S. to play the next tournament or to qualify for the next tournament. So he was going to throw his third round match. And there were people figuring that out early on. And I don't know, maybe there's something there with table tennis. I have no idea. That's a lot of money.

I mean, the fourth largest bet sport. Crazy. Yeah. I mean, well, there was just a tennis player arrested at the French Open for a Russian tennis player arrested for match fixing at 2020 French Open. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. Yeah, for fixing at the 2020 French. So no, at last year's French Open.

Right. Which was played in the fall. Right. Right. This guy was, this woman was charged with match fift. fixing. A Russian player who was suspected a match fixing last year was arrested just like a week ago during this year's French Open. Well, how about this story? So, and look it. Go ahead. After, this is January 3rd, 2021. After a lengthy investigation, police have laid proceeds of

crime charges. This is an international written story. Police have, you know, have criminally charged an Australian table tennis player and brought down an international match-fixing syndicate in table tennis. So there you go. I don't know if that is involved in ping pong. Yeah. You know, the worst of all of these was High Line. Oh, I bet.

Yeah, sure. Oh, High-Lie. I mean, you know, I only went to High Line a couple of times because I knew. Yeah, in Florida, where it was played, because I knew I was getting screwed over somehow. And I just used to say, I wish I knew Spanish more, so maybe I could pick up what the hell they were saying to each other out on the court. But Highline is considered the worst of the worst when it comes to fixing and, you know, matches and stuff. Have you ever been to a High Line?

I have not. It's kind of fun to go to. You and I, one of those Super Bowl years in South Florida, we went and watched the Greyhounds one day. Yeah, we did. We went to Hollywood for the dog track. Yeah. So on my bookie, you can bet table tennis.

It's all a money line matched, you know, head-to-head match sport. And as I'm looking through the names, they appear to be 60% Eastern European. That's what I would guess. No Virgil's in there anywhere? I don't see any Virgil's. Okay. Aren't you a good table tennis player, good ping pong player? No.

I mean, I can play ping pong. we've had a ping pong table in all of our houses over the years. And it's like anything else when you have the thing in your house where you'll get on this run of like two weeks of playing. Like everybody wants to play. And then the table goes dormant for like, you know, a year. But I mean, I love ping pong. I love ping pong. You know, I loved tennis.

I don't anymore. I'll tell you, there's a couple of games that are becoming super popular. paddle tennis has been popular for a while. Pickleball is becoming very popular. Believe me, I'm very familiar with pickleball. My wife, until she injured her knee, played pickleball three or four times a week. Oh, that's great.

I mean, it's a great sport. She loved it. It's a great sport, and I've noticed now a lot of it's being televised. CBS Sports Network has a bunch of it on television. All right, anyway. Let's get to some of the stories of the day. Anyone's still out there? Anyone still there?

Hopefully they are. Let's get to Montez Sweat right after this word from one of our sponsors. Washington just finished up this morning. Their mandatory mini-camp with Ron Rivera speaking as we are doing the podcast. And one of the things he has said is that he learned from last summer when there was no quarterback competition that what he learned is he wants to see one this summer, says he'll create more game-like situations and maybe rotate guys to work with different groups. Am I missing any part of that? I'm reading from Kime right now. Do you have other people who have tweeted out?

No, I think that's right. Okay. Right, yeah. He doesn't want backups to go in the games, never having worked with the first unit. Okay. So he's not necessarily saying a guy's going to win the job, but there are going to be first-team opportunities for all three quarterbacks, apparently. Yeah. In practice. You know, this is going to be...

Apparently, you know, so far in camp today, you know, your boy, Ryan Fitzpatrick, is batting third in that lineup. He's had a couple of interceptions already, ugly interceptions from what I can gather on social media. And you know the pressure of minicamp. Well, Jordan Love in Green Bay yesterday, I think wowed people to the point where people were actually leaving that mandatory minicamp practice saying, Aaron Who? That's how great he was. Did you see the love coming from Green Bay yesterday for Jordan Love? Oh my God. He's red hot. I mean, come on, people. Look, God bless all the people that are on the beats of these teams league-wide, that have to be there that are now told in this day and age, I need you on social media to be tweeting out everything that's going on.

You know, people love this content. And I'm not, by the way, I'm not being critical. I mean, and I'm not reading it. I'm not reading it, but I occasionally will catch on my phone. you know, somebody from Washington's mandatory minicamp going, that Taylor Heineke just evaded a pass rush, stepped up into the pocket, felt contact, but still was able to make a dime of a throw to Cam Sims for an eight-yard gain on the sidelines. Cam Sims, great job catching the ball and getting both feet in. I mean, they want content. It would be painful for me to do this.

I will tell you that. And I know what they're being asked to do. And I would bet you all of these people are like, seriously, this is mini-camp. Who cares? A lot of fans, I don't think it's the majority of fans personally, but a lot of fans are eating it up as if it's significant in any way. I want to go. No, I think it's the majority of fans. I don't.

You do? Yeah, I think they want to be excited about anything. Look, here's the accurate way to write about minicamp, and I understand why they can't do it this way. There's always something to write if somebody looks really bad. But even that doesn't mean anything. But still, I mean, you know, looking good in minicamp is nothing. Looking bad maybe might be a bit alarming, but looking good is no measure of anything. Are you concerned with the interceptions that Ryan Fitzpitzpasties?

Patrick through today, people, you shouldn't be. Okay. By the way, he's going to throw interceptions in games this year. That's what he does. That's almost the guarantee. But hopefully he makes many more big plays as well. I want to go back to the quarterback competition thing because I think one of the things that's interesting about this is I think this is one of these things that will be hard to prove when all is said and done. meaning I think when they play the Los Angeles Chargers on September, whatever date that is, Ryan Fitzpatrick will be the starting quarterback. I also think leading up to that, there will be a lot of discussion about like a quarterback

competition. And maybe even for a brief moment in a preseason game when Taylor Heineke and or Kyle Allen gets reps with starters like late in the first quarter or early in the second quarter, you're going to come on the podcast and say, see, I told you, it's a legitimate quarterback competition. I just don't think we're ever going to be able to prove this. I think it's a little bit like the Beck Grossman thing, which I told you that whole summer, there is no chance that John Beck is the starting quarterback. Zero chance, even though they're telling you that this is an honest-to-goodness quarterback competition.

And anyway, there was no way to prove it one way or the other other than what Mike told me many, you know, several years after the fact that Rex was their starter going in, that they had some high hopes for Beck, but that pretty much it turned out that he was, as I've always described him, the guy that looks great in layup lines. He looks phenomenal in layup lines. Look at him. Behind the back. Reverse dunk. He's now the quarterback guru. he's the guy who's training all these number one draft picks. You know what?

Sometimes the best coaches are very mediocre to even less than mediocre players. And he might be the perfect example. Yes, they are. I guess my point is it's one of these things we're going to get to the opener. Fitzpatrick's going to be the starter. If he doesn't get hurt or he doesn't shit the bed, he's going to be the starter for the entire season. And yet still some people are going to say he won a competition over the summer.

He beat out Taylor Heineke and Kyle Allen. Why? Well, because the coach told us that. No. Well, I still think that you're dismissing the interest that the coach has in Kyle Allen. I'm not. I think it's very possible that Kyle Allen, not Taylor Heineke, still winds up being the starter.

He would have to put on one impressive performance, a healthy impressive performance, but I still think that's feasible because the coach has a personal investment in Kyle Allen. I am not dismissing the coach's interest in Kyle Allen. I've said it all along, going back to last year, they really like Kyle Allen. They would not have traded a fifth round pick for Kyle Allen unless they really wanted him here. They traded it because they were worried that someone else would trade for him. By the way, Bill Belichick and the Patriots remember, I think it was Shepter Arapaport, had the story after the fact that the Patriots were interested,

they didn't want to lose him. And there's no doubt in my mind that Scott Turner in particular would have started Kyle Allen from day one and would have never, ever given Dwayne even an opportunity. And if it had been up to him, they would have traded Dwayne, which would have been the right move when there was some worth to Dwayne long before the season ever started. I agree with you. I know they like Kyle Allen. Kyle Allen's not going to start over Ryan Fitzpatrick.

If they loved Kyle Allen so much and they were so confident in Kyle Allen being the starter this year and next or even beyond, they would not have paid $10 million bucks for Ryan Fitzpatrick. They would have just gone out and maybe got Mitch Trubisky and said, let's have a legitimate competition between the three of you. Okay. We'll see. You want to talk about Montez Sweat?

I don't like to talk about people. aren't vaccinated. You're vaccinated, of course. I'm vaccinated. I don't like to give people who aren't vaccinated at the time of day. Well, guess what? You're going to do that today. Montez Sweat yesterday, for those of you that missed it, and I'm assuming most of you did not, Montes Sweat was asked questions after day two of minicamp. And this is how the exchange went with reporter and Montes sweat. Hey Montes, what do you make of the way that the team is

bringing in like vaccine experts and stuff to encourage people to get vaccinated? Like, what do you kind of make of all that? I'm not a fan of it. I'm, I probably won't get vaccinated into, you got more

vaccine, that type of stuff, but now I'm not a fan of it at all. What is your hesitation with getting the vaccine if you don't mind me asking? I mean, I have a, I haven't caught COVID yet, so I don't see me treating the, I don't see me treating COVID until I actually get COVID. Thank you. I guess, you know, that's obviously one of the big issues right now. You know, have you talked to the coaching staff about that and, you know, what's the messaging been like from the team?

Well, I mean, obviously, they want to, they want everybody to be vaccinated to move more freely around the facility and around, as with traveling and all that type of stuff. But I mean, everybody has their own beliefs and they are entitled to their own decision. I want to start our conversation on this with that last part of Montez-Swetz quote, which really was the one that I think people were most critical of and borderline laughed at and scoffed at, which was, quote, I haven't caught COVID yet so I don't see me treating COVID until I actually get COVID. closed quote. I am not going to give him like the full benefit of the doubt,

but I'm going to state my opinion before yours because I'm feeling what yours will be. I just don't think it's my guess. I just don't think he understood what he was really saying. I can't imagine. Actually, I can imagine. But after, you know, sort of the facts were laid out by this immunologist Kismika Corbett who spoke to the entire team about the vaccine and the facts versus non-facts. I can't believe that anybody would come out of that,

thinking that you could get COVID and then the vaccination was like the therapeutic, not the preventative. No, no, no. There's a vaccination that prevents COVID. You don't take the vaccination after you get COVID. You don't throw the seatbelt on after the accident, and the accident just goes away. I'm giving him a slight benefit of the doubt that he either got mangled or was confused, and the way it came out wasn't exactly the way people heard it.

Well, you can go ahead and do that if you want. I just did. So, I know. You know, do you mean he maybe had difficult in explaining himself despite having attended three colleges and his college, college career. You mean you're telling me that in one of those colleges, he couldn't figure out how to understand a simple thing, like what a vaccine does? It's what I'm saying is... How many vaccinations do you think that he's had in his lifetime? I don't know the answer to that. But what I'm saying to you, well, I mean, there are certain vaccinations like for rebella and measles when you're a kid

that are pretty much, you know, he didn't have the ability to have an opinion when he got got those. I would just, that's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is I don't think it came out of his mouth in the way that he intended it to. I think if I went to Montez-Swatt right now and said, do you know the difference between a vaccine and medicine? Like, did you know, like the vaccine is what you get before to prevent and the medicine, the therapeutic is what you use to treat it after you get it. Do you understand the difference? I have a feeling that he would. I don't know that for sure.

Now, after he's been raked over to cold for a day, I don't think he can't. Of course he figured it out. All right. Your over-real reaction to Montez-Swett's statements yesterday? Look, I didn't get that worked up about it. I mean, look, I mean, there's baseball players. There's basketball players. A lot of these athletes, one thing, lots of these athletes are a little bit paranoid about what they put in their body.

Yes. I mean, when it comes to everything. So I understand, you know, from an athletic viewpoint, it doesn't absolve him of intelligent thinking, but I understand it doesn't surprise me to athletes react this way. I just don't think they should have the option. I don't think the NFL should give them the option of acting this way. There are work, there are places where you work in the United States, right now, where if you work for that company, you have to have a vaccine in order to do that.

You have to be vaccinated. For various reasons. Okay. So I would have no problem with the NFL forcing all their players, you know, unless there was some kind of medical condition to be vaccinated. They're a private business. They can do that. Yeah. But, you know, but like, you know, a lot of these guys are, you know, distrustful of stuff. So, I mean, what are you going to do? I mean, you know, here's the bottom line. There's two bottom lines. One thing, it's a vaccine.

It's not medicine. But here's the other thing. It's not just going to protect you. If you really give a shit about your teammate or your trainer or anyone else that you come in a contact with, it'll help protect them. But, you know, this doesn't come into the conversation, seems. to. People just don't seem to get that or don't care. You know, you brought up something that actually I didn't give thought to, but I think it makes a lot of sense. I think athletes in general are very, very aware of what they should be putting

into their body and what they shouldn't be putting into their body. Their bodies are their, you know, are their revenue producers. And, you know, there's a lot more care with professional athletes than there are with most average people. I think that that's actually an interesting point and that they may be more apt to say, well, I'm 23 years old. I'm healthy. Even if I get COVID, the chances that I get sick are slim and none. I don't want to put this into my body. I think that's actually an interesting perspective I hadn't thought of. I think a lot of young people, by the way, who aren't necessarily professional athletes think that way just based on understanding what the numbers are, like how improbable it is that if they get COVID, they'll get sick. With that said,

a couple things. Number one, remember, one of the reasons that Montez Sweat dropped in the draft is that there was a reported heart condition, some sort of underlying heart-related issue. I don't know what it was specifically, and I looked it up, but several teams actually, actually, you know, took him off the board because of the medical. But Washington felt comfortable with the medical, and let's hope that it's not an issue for him. We certainly haven't seen it be an issue in the first two years of his career. And by the way, I don't even know whether or not some sort of underlying heart condition that may be relatively benign, but he has it, is an increase in terms of getting sick, some sort of underlying, you know, medical condition that would make him more

prone to getting sick if he got COVID. But I just wanted to throw that out there because I remembered that this morning. I think that overall, bottom line is their body do with it the way they want to do with it. It's their choice on all of this stuff. However. However, you said that, you know, there are companies that require it. And to a certain extent, the NFL has required it actually of. all employees and coaches.

You know, they're considered Tier 1, Tier 2, and the players are Tier 3. The Tier 1, Tier 2's, it's mandatory that they're vaccinated. I wonder, Del Rio. Do you think that Voodoo Jack? Do you think that Voodoo Jack would get a vaccine if he didn't have to? Yeah. So, Del Rio's, Del Rio's vaccinated. I am not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I wasn't a mask shamer. I'm not in, I wasn't a mask shamer.

I'm not in that camp at all. And by the way, you know, in many ways, like about the masks, masks, I think I've said this before, with you, I think. If you're worried about people not wearing masks, get vaccinated. If you're vaccinated, don't get worked up about people not wearing masks. So anyway, a different topic as it relates to this. I think the issue here is that in the NFL, like with the NFL, John Rom at the PGA last week, a non-vaccinated and unvaccinated player is must adhere to different

protocol than a vaccinated player in the NFL per the rules. Unvaccinated players are still subject to contact tracing, meaning if they come in contact with somebody who's got COVID, they have to go into quarantine, which means they will miss practices and potentially games. Obviously, if they get COVID, they're going to be tested. Vaccinated players will not get tested. Unvaccinated players will get tested. If John Rom had been fully vaccinated, he would never have been tested. Even though, by the way, and I'm not sure everybody understands this, I think most people do, there's still a chance you can get COVID even if you've been vaccinated. The efficacy rates for the Moderna and the Pfizer vaccinations are like in the 95% range.

And with the J&J, it's like in the mid to high 70s. So it's not a full proof against getting COVID. What they have told us and hopefully what they've explained to players in the Washington organization, which by the way Ron Rivera said that he thinks close to 50% of his players have been vaccinated, is that if you have the vaccination and you get COVID, you are so much less likely to get sick, seriously sick. It almost eliminates the possibility of getting seriously ill, even if you get COVID, if you've been vaccinated. But unvaccinated players are subject to different rules in the

NFL than vaccinated players. So from a competitive advantage situation, the teams with a higher percentage of vaccinated players have less of a chance of losing players for practices and games. So one of the things that could be explained to Montes-Swet after you get them comfortable that the vaccination's not going to kill him or it's not going to make them sick is that, look, dude, you're one of our best players. If you're going to get tested, and by the way, it's more than that. They're not going to be able to interact with other players when traveling. No family and friends on the road. They can't eat in the cafeteria and hang out with the rest of the team. Weight room now limits, capacity limits apply to them.

not vaccinated players. And so it's a little bit more uncomfortable and inconvenient to do your job if you are unvaccinated. But back to the competitive thing, the bottom line is we saw last year. You know, contact tracing, that player's out or that player tested positive. You won't even get tested if you're vaccinated. You're going to be not only tested, but if you are in a contact tracing situation, you're going to be quarantined.

So 50% of your players, if they're not vaccinated, you're going to have a chance, there's going to be a pretty good chance that you're going to have players, even though, by the way, Washington was one of the most successful teams in the league last year. Remember, in terms of numbers of players, I think they only had two positive tests all year, Tommy. And one of them was Matt Ionitis, who was already on injured reserve. They did a great job last year in protecting themselves. But the point is, from a competitive standpoint, point, outside of the bigger, larger conversation about, you know, vaccinated or not vaccinated,

he is putting his team in those that choose not to get vaccinated at a competitive disadvantage against teams that have a higher rate. What did you tell me before the show that the Raiders are near 100% of all teams? No, no, but here's the story. Oh. Pro Football Talk posted this, and it's according to a report in the Las Vegas Review Journal. I remember the Raiders got in trouble. couple of times last year for violation of COVID rule.

And the Ravens did too, big trouble. Yeah. But according to this story, the number of players vaccinated might be the best in the league. There may be competitive advantages for teams that get to 85% of their players vaccinated, as the NFL is considering relaxing certain restrictions on team gatherings for teams that hit the 85% of their players vaccinated. on team gatherings for teams that hit the 85% threshold. The report about the Raiders doesn't give a specific number of players who have been vaccinated, but if the Raiders lead the league, they'd have to have at least 65 players vaccinated,

which is 72% of their off-season roster. So obviously the coaching staff has seen, I mean, John Gruden has obviously seen the competitive advantages of leaning on his players to get vaccinated. Yeah. Yeah. By the way, Ron Rivera today asked about the Montes Sweat stuff, which blew up as a national story yesterday, his comments. As did, I think, Sam Darnold's comments too, because he is sort of anti-vaccination as well. Another genius. But Rivera said about sweat today after the final day of minicamp, he said he would still try to talk to sweat about getting vaccinated, but he said he's not going to go at anybody and denigrate them just because they have a

difference of opinion. He said the young man has to make his own decision closed, quote. The coach is very good, is very careful in his public statements about things that could be dicey. He's very good at this. I give him a lot of credit. You know what? For a guy that early last year was contradicting himself sentence by sentence in post-game press conferences. Obviously, he wasn't himself. He was battling cancer at the time. But I agree with you. I think part of it is just how he handled, you know,

this minor situation of Chase Young, not showing up for OTAs. I think you're right. I think, look, I don't think they can come out and be. critical of these players. I don't, you know, it's not mandatory right now for players. Right. By the way, I wonder if this was addressed at all in a CBA.

I would imagine that it wasn't. Like, can the NFL make it mandatory to be vaccinated for, you know, a pandemic situation? I don't know. Anyway. Yeah. So that was Montes-Swett yesterday.

Montes-Swed. Wait a minute. What? There's an interesting story that Pro Football Talk posted. Assistant coaches on at least four NFL teams are refusing to exact the COVID-19 vaccine, the NFL network reported. If they don't change their minds with the next week, they will lose Tier 1 status, which means they won't be able to coach on the field or in meeting rooms and can't interact face-to-face. players. What does it mean with respect to coaching on Sunday? Well, I mean, it's the same thing. You can't coach on the field.

Okay. You can't. Can you coach from the box? Well, I mean, you can't be in meeting rooms. How can you coach? Zoom. Okay. I don't know. It doesn't say that. I guess they're figuring, you know, coaches wouldn't be stupid enough to carry its fight into the playing season. Yeah. God, it's, it's, um, look, I give the team credit for, you know, bringing in, you know, a credible, you know, immunologist to speak to the team and provide them with information, you know. They deserve all the credit for that. I mean, at least they didn't have Del Rio get up and try to explain the benefits of it on Zoom. And I do think, you know, by the way, I think a lot of that probably comes from Jason Wright and his team.

That's my guess. I'm sure it does. I'm sure it does. And it was a smart move. All right. We got a couple of other things to finish up with, including the Nats and Barry Trots advances to the conference finals for a second consecutive year. We'll get to all of that right after these words from our sponsors. Marshab trying to come up with it. Pelix got it, up the boards.

Zizekis want to get in a special for Clutterbuck. The empty net, scores. Barry Trotses, New York Islanders for the second consecutive year into the final four of the NHL playoffs. Last year, if you recall, they beat Washington in the first round four games to one. Barry Trots is now since being run from Washington after winning the Stanley Cup in New York with the Islanders. He's won five playoff series. Washington's 0 for three. They haven't won one since they lost him. Let me just, before we get to the Trots, Washington thing again, I watched this game last night. And Tommy, the crowd at Nassau County Coliseum for this game was one of the best I have heard in a long time on television.

And it was described this way in a lot of the stories written. and the players commented on just how raucous it was. It was great. And I actually did a poll today. We're sort of required each day on radio to do a Twitter poll. I voted in your poll today. You know, and I basically, you only have four options. And I just said, you know, loudest, most raucous arena stadium in the area that you've ever been in for a game.

And I gave four options, FedEx Field, Cap one for a Caps game. Park in the Xfinity Center. A lot of people said if you'd put coal there, I would have voted for that one. But whatever, my intention, and I just didn't do it properly, was to say just a Maryland basketball home game. And then we took calls on like the loudest, you know, the memorable times you've been in a stadium or an arena for a sporting event that you'll just never forget how crazed it was. And I was watching that last night. There's something about Well, New York in particular, which we've talked about before, but the Islanders crowd, and I had Tark El Bashir on the radio show this morning, there's no celebrity, there's no corporate crowd. It's all hardcore, long-time crazed Islander fans on the south shore of Long Island, or just on Long Island in particular.

And it just, it was so, it was one of those games, and I know hockey, you know, home mice and, you know, seeds don't matter. But it was one of those games as I was watching early in that game, I'm like, they don't, Boston doesn't have a chance tonight. It was one of those arenas. I've been in arenas before where you just feel like, oh my God, the opposing team has no chance in this building or in this stadium tonight. and I loved watching it. And then on top of that, it just pleases me to no end that Barry Trots is having this run of success. Now, Tampa, I think, is a pretty big favorite in this next series. They lost to Tampa in the conference semifinals last year. But, man, Barry Trots, you know, it turns out not a bad coach, I guess.

No. Barry Trots is in the business of happiness. He is in the business of providing happiness. Yes. Yes, he is. Now, I'm going in an area where I don't know very much, but that doesn't stop me usually. That Islander fan base, the seeds of that fan base were planted in a team that won for Stanley Cup. In the 70s, right, in 80s, yeah. In the 80s. So, I mean, you know, so they, you have sort of like in their early days, and I don't know how long the Islanders have been a France. But in the relative early days, they were a successful franchise, and that goes a long way towards building the foundation for a lasting fan base.

Sure. We've seen here in Washington, in particular, with the playoff games in the 70s and then the Super Bowl's under Gibbs in the 80s. I mean, that's the foundation that has allowed them to last as a fan base since 1992. of dismal performances. So it's no surprising that the islands would have a rabid fan base because they know what it's like to experience joy as a fan base. Yeah, how do you explain the Cubs?

The ballpark. It's got to be more than just the ballpark. That's a ballpark. Okay. I don't disagree with you. I think, you know, and I don't know when the Islanders became a franchise either. I'm looking it up right now as we speak. It looks like, it looks like 1972, okay? And then they won Stanley Cups in four consecutive seasons, 1980, 81, 82, and 83. And, you know, it's funny because I remember those teams, because those were the first

caps teams that started to go to the postseason. And they played the Islanders, you know, in so many of those first round series. And, you know, it was Mike Bossy and and, and the goal, the goalie, Billy Smith, right, was the goaltender that seemed to stone the caps all the time in the playoffs. But it's a really good point. I mean, the winning early on, relatively early on as a franchise and becoming a dynasty. I mean, four consecutive is a dynasty. You know, I'm looking through right now the list of Stanley Cup champions. There really have been so many dynasties in that sport, which is ironic because it's a sport where the results seem to be so random all of the time in the postseason. It is ironic. It doesn't match up. But Scotty Bowman's Montreal Canadiens won in 76, 77, 78, and 79.

And then the Islanders won in 80, 81, 82, and 83. They won four in a row. And then Edmonton, with obviously Gretzky, won four out of five years with Montreal sneaking in there. And then Pittsburgh with Lemieux started their dynasty. And then the Red Wings had a bunch of wins. Really, to be honest with you, it's been more in recent years where you haven't had necessarily a dynasty. The Penguins have won with Crosby three times. They've won three Stanley Cups, and that's the most of like the last 10 years.

The Blackhawks also had a run, too, of winning three cups as well, so the two of them are tied. But it's weird. I do remember those Islanders teams, and I remember, you know, listening to those games. I was actually into the caps there for a brief moment when they were going to the playoffs for the first time. And it was new, you know, for us, because we hadn't had hockey, and we didn't know what playoff hockey was. But you realized, well, playoff hockey is pretty damn exciting. And, of course, the four-over time, you know, Easter Sunday game of 87 against the Islanders in the seventh and deciding game that the caps lost. But anyway, back to Trots.

Man, I looked this up this morning when I had Tark on the show. what happened basically, and like you, I'm not going to speak like informatively or even intelligently about why they thought Todd Reardon would be a better coach other than to say what the experts at the time said, which is apparently he contributed as much as Barry Trots did according to the people in the know. He was a better X's a nose coach, whatever. He had a contract kicker that if they won the Stanley Cup, he would get an automatic two-suitary. year extension with an increase of $300,000 a year in salary. He was at $1.5 so that would take him to $1.8. Babcock was making $6 million a year. He was on the very low end of the coaching totem pole

in terms of salary, and $300,000 a year wasn't going to make much of a difference. So he wanted more money after winning the cup. He had that contract kicker in there. And, you know, like I would imagine in a lot of these contracts, they're sort of throwaways. It's like, look, if we ever do win the cup, I'm going to go in there and tell them, you know, we got to do a new deal or I'm going to go somewhere else. And he did technically resign, but he resigned because they did not, you know, they did not agree on an extension and he wouldn't take that extension. There was some reporting at the time that the capitals weren't necessarily stuck the entire time

on what the contractual commitment was. But it was their original posture. Their original posture was, sorry, you sign this contract. It's an automatic to your extension. We only have to pay you $300,000 a year more. They softened on that a little bit, but not, you know, it was probably a dollar short and, you know, two weeks late on that. And he had already made up his mind to move on because they were pennywise pound

foolish early on. But one of the reasons they were that way is there was a feeling in the building among those brilliant people that Reardon was a better coach and that he had paid his dues and was ready to become the coach of the franchise take it over and bring it to even loftier heights. Remember, Trots was in trouble that year. They weren't going to bring him back anyway. Yeah, he almost lost his job in November. Right. But the bottom line is now, in hindsight, they have to be embarrassed. They have to know that they made a mistake.

Maybe not. They probably have a way of explaining it in their own minds into each other. Oh, I'm sure, because they're smart people. Like I wrote my column a couple weeks ago, they had that Stanley Cup sitting on their desk, and they said to each other, how hard can this be? Right. Well, I mean, they had never gotten, had one before. And by the way, with much better teams on paper, they didn't even come close.

So they should have known that it was a hard thing. They should have known. Yeah. What did you want to say about the Nats nearly blowing it last night? They had a lead late. They blew it in the bottom of the 10th. And then they ended up winning a game against the raise to snap a three-game stretch. Kyle Schwerber was not in a lead-off spot last night. Trey Turner was there. What was that about,

by the way, the other day was Schwerber leading off? I guess they're just trying to get people that can make contact with the ball at this point. Offensively, they're struggling, but go ahead. Yeah, they are. They're struggling offensively. You know, I'm not there every day, but apparently I am going to start going to game now that they are allowing vaccinated riders on the field before the games, and they'll be able to talk to players. on the field and coaches and GMs. I mean, I haven't seen Dave Martinez or Mike Grizzell in person since February of 2020. You know?

And I'm not sure any other reporters can say the same thing. So I'm not really plugged into them as much, but, you know, Barry Faluga tweeted last night, he had a feeling from watching that game that, you know, it never comes down to one game. he felt like the Nats had to win that game to save their season, to at least keep their season intact. That game last night against a good team? Yeah, because, I mean, they were in danger of starting to go down a hole of consecutive losing, the fact that they were ahead and then blew the two-run lead.

There was a sense, and I think Barry was right about this, that it would have been a debilitating loss. How's that? As opposed to a must win. The loss would have been debilitating and devastating for them. Speaking of Barry's Feluga, my favorite column is for the Washington Post. Did you see the column he wrote about the D.C. Grace? I didn't.

Oh, that's because you're too busy to read, and I'll get to that later. No, I read a lot. I don't read the poster. But I usually read Barry, so I will catch up on it because I love Barry, too. But go ahead. What did he write about the grace? Barry wrote a column specifically. Remember Monet Davis?

Yeah, the cheater. No, no, no, no, no, no. No. Monet Davis is the young girl from Philadelphia. Oh, oh, yes, yes, yes, yes. Little League World Series. Right, right, got it. Yeah, I remember.

And he was on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Yes, I remember. You know, became a national star. What about her? Well, she's working as an intern for degrees. Oh, awesome. Yeah, she goes to Hampton University, and she's working for degrees, and she's doing the color analyst and the analysis on our Internet broadcast.

Who's doing the play-by-play? Oh, I don't know. Craig, I forget his name. I forget his last name, Craig is. I mean, you should know his last name, but you don't pay attention to that stuff. I think I pour a lot of blood out for this organization. Don't bust me about names. Well, then don't bust me about not reading Barry's column.

Well, I won't, but I'll bust you about something else. Okay. Oh, boy. So Barry wrote a column about Monet Davis. It's a great column. I urge people to read it and to come out to a graze game. They're free to meet Monet. I'm sure you will.

Yeah. If you come out to Grays games. So I just wanted to point that out to people, read that column. And maybe, Kevin, once you read Barry's column, I don't know, maybe you might have time for one of mine. I've been reading your columns recently. Really? I read the one about Tommy Shepard and the Wizards the other day. Okay. Did you get my message? Do you have another one? Is this another message about, did I, did I retweet it or not? Just tell me, I forget if I did or didn't. Everybody, everybody,

raise your hand out there if you think Kevin re-cleaded my column. Apparently I didn't. Okay. My fault. Okay. And this is a great thing in a way because now people see what you're really like because of this.

Okay. You know? You know, why don't you tell everybody what I'm really like so they actually don't get the wrong impression right now. Kevin is a guy. Kevin is a guy. I'll put it very succinctly. Kevin is a guy that if you needed help, he'd be there for you.

A guy you can count on, but you have to ask. Well, actually, I think as it relates to friends like you in my life, sometimes I recognize trouble and with people like you often and reach out more than you would give me credit for. I think it's odd that on June 9th that this game was so important, But I also think that sometimes during a season that's very nondescript, if not sort of disappointing, you're looking for like a moment that you can say at the time this was the win they needed. They blew a lead, but they held on and they won the game against one of the best teams in baseball.

And then they got on this role where they won 12 out of 15 games and they were right back in the division race. and it's like being able to call your shot long before it became the shot. And if you miss on it, there's absolutely no downside on saying about the Tampa game last night. This was crucial, crucial. But again, what? I mean, I think the inference is what the damage would do as opposed to, as opposed to getting on a role. Lessing the damage is a positive way. Yeah.

I just think there was a sense that it could send them spiraling. By the way, not necessarily the other direction. I don't know if you've been following this. I would assume that you are. But, man, there is a lot of discussion about Max Scherzer and whether or not he's going to be available to be traded for. I know. It's the nature of people, fans love to trade for prospects.

They can't wait to do it. He's not a prospect. For a lot of reasons, it makes sense for. Scherzer because he's not signed after this year. I would hope that Nats could find a way to keep Max Scherzer. You know? I mean, he's an important figure to sports in this town. And I would hope that the two sides figure out a way for Max to finish his career here. I think that would be great, as opposed to the knee-jerk reaction.

Well, let's trade him for some young guys who we have no idea if they'll ever be anything. So speaking of young guys, Dan Colco, who, you know, worked for Mass. He's been calling some of these games. Bob Carpenter has been off for a couple days. He's actually going to be on the radio show. I think he's back calling the game tonight against the Giants at home. But I've heard some of Colco's calls on this road trip. He's a very talented guy, good guy.

He tweeted this a while ago about Juan Soto. Juan Soto has 10 runs scored 11 RBIs and 11 walks on the next nine-game road trip. Wow. He's just one of six players ever to put post a 10, 10, 10 line on a road trip of fewer than 10 games. Wow. Now, I know that's an obscure kind of stat, but the only people who have done similar are Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrick, Frank Thomas, Julio Franco, and Mark McGuire. We're watching greatness with this kid, you know, and sometimes we need to stop and remind ourselves of that. Well, I hope last night was a bit of a springboard because they're going to enter a series here against San Francisco, and that team is a very good team right now.

I mean, it's actually – Yes, they are. What I will do – you know, I'm not sitting there watching cover-to-cover. these Nats games, especially during the NBA playoffs. But it's usually on, if a basketball game isn't. I check in on, in particular, that National League West, which is loaded, right? Because it was supposed to be a Dodgers-Padres race. And really, the Dodgers were overwhelming favorites,

but a lot of people thought San Diego would end up being a wildcard team when all said and done. And here are the Giants, very surprisingly, leading the division with the best overall record in baseball, 15 games over 500. And right now in the National League, by the way, just something to point out, you know, the National League East, in terms of the overall winning percentage is the worst in baseball. You've got the Mets atop the division, six games over 500, and then every other team in the division has a losing record.

It's still early 54 games into this thing, so not even a full third. well actually exactly a third, actually at 54 games, exactly a third through the season. It's very likely that the National League East will produce the division winner as a postseason participant, and that's it. That the wild cards are going to be. More likely than not, no. And that the wild card teams are going to come probably from the National League West, maybe the two teams that finish second and third. third in that division, although the Central Division's pretty competitive with some winning teams, the Cubs, Brewers, and Cardinals as well. And the bigger issue is Steven Strasberg, who is still not throwing. I know, nerves. And it's going to be a nerve specialist. So that's alarming.

It is alarming. And it's just sort of, it's just sort of so unfortunate. Somebody with his gifts and his talent. And by the way, the clutch gene, as we learned over the last few years, for him just to never, ever be right physically, ever. And physically, he's a horse. I know. If you're up close to Josh, he's huge. I mean, he is big and strong and just, I mean, just a guy who looks like he would never break down. I know. All right. Anything else? I got nothing else for you, boss. This was a a very satisfying and enjoyable podcast. I thought there was a menu of excellence that we ticked off one by one, and it all tasted great. So I appreciate you joining me for the meal. Everybody, have a great day back tomorrow.