The Kevin Sheehan Show - Redskins Retire Bobby Mitchell's #49

Episode Date: June 20, 2020

Kevin in today to discuss Bobby Mitchell's jersey being retired a day after George Preston Marshall's statue in front of RFK Stadium was taken down. Kevin tried to explain/simplify the baseball negotiations and discussed why it's crazy for the NFL to think about a Dr. Fauci "bubble" city. 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 want it. You need it. It's what everyone's talking about. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Now here's Kevin. All right. I'm solo today. We're doing a Saturday podcast, giving you a heads up. There won't be a Monday podcast. So the next one after today will be with Tommy on Tuesday. I'm going to take some days off here and there as we get into the summer months and maybe do some odd timed podcasts like today to make up for yesterday. but there is some breaking news today that we've got to get to. The Redskins are retiring Bobby Mitchell's number 49 Jersey. That comes the day after George Preston Marshall's statue was taken down in organized fashion yesterday out in front of RFK Stadium. I'll get to some baseball news and try to clarify what's going on between owners and players and maybe a little bit of the Dr. Fauci stuff as well.

But I want to start with this Bobby Mitchell news. Bobby Mitchell's jersey, number 49, being retired by the Redskins today. Dan Snyder's statement read as follows. Snyder said, quote, there is no one more deserving of these honors than the late Bobby Mitchell. Bobby was one of the most influential players, not only in team history, but in national football league history. He excelled on the field in the front office and most importantly in his community where he had a tremendous. impact on the lives of so many through his charitable efforts. He was one of the greatest men I have ever known. That was from Dan Snyder earlier today on Bobby Mitchell's jersey going in. That comes a day after George Preston Marshall's statue in front of RFK Stadium was taken down by a group called Events, D.C., which controls the land at RFK Stadium. Marshall was an overt racist. Bobby Mitchell integrated the Redskins in 1962, because the federal government pressured George Preston Marshall into finally integrating the Redskins after all of those years where they were going to take away the stadium,

which was on federally owned land. George Preston Marshall's statue should have been long gone many, many years ago because of his historical resistance to integrating the team. Obviously, in the climate of the last three weeks, It was only a matter of time, but it should have happened before. Now to Bobby Mitchell. Bobby Mitchell's jersey being retired, you know, creates a whole other conversation about

what the Redskins should do in terms of retired jerseys. But let's first talk about Bobby Mitchell. Bobby Mitchell's number 49 totally deserves to be retired. It was one of those protected jerseys because Sammy Baez is the only one that's ever been officially retired until today. But it was always part of that list of protected jerseys, even. though in 2003, Steve Spurrier gave it out to Leonard Stevens, and the team didn't know it and didn't recognize it. That was absolutely reprehensible on the team's part, and it caused the eventual rift and

breakup of Bobby Mitchell and the organization. And Bobby Mitchell, being the class act that he was, didn't make a big deal out of it at the time because he didn't want Leonard Stevens to feel badly about it. He was a young man. Stevens didn't know. I, you remember, tried to give number nine out in training camp to Shane Matthews, and there was a big pushback, and he's like, oh, I didn't know. I mean, but Mitchell's 49 got given out to Leonard Stevens, and it passed by everybody in Ashburn. That was horrible. Bobby Mitchell is one of the greatest players in franchise history. He's a Hall of Famer, and he would be one of those jerseys if the Redskins did this as a matter of practice that would have already been retired.

Now, clearly in this climate, on the day after George Preston Marshall's statue, you know, the day after George Preston Marshall's statue gets taken down, of course, justifiably so. The timing of this is, you know, an effort by the team from a PR standpoint to do something that Curry's favor. And by the way, keeps people away from the name issue. I'm sure that that's a big part of this right now. Let's not be naive. There is pressure, a resurgence of pressure on the Redskins to change the name in the climate that we're living in right now.

And retiring Bobby Mitchell's jersey today on June 20th, 2020, you know, in the midst of all of this, is not coincidence. You know, it is certainly something that the organization I'm sure has thought about. I'm not going to say that they haven't thought about retiring Bobby Mitchell's jersey in the past, and maybe they've been close to it before, but there was a sense of urgency to do it now. It deserves to be retired. So do other jerseys in the organization. And that gets me to this part of the conversation, because I think it is a conversation that we've had before, but now, you know, there's another reason to bring it up today.

You know, when Joe Thaisman's number seven was given to Dwayne Haskins, without Haskins having ever thrown one pass in the NFL in the spring of 2019 just over a year ago, or whenever it happened, it would have been maybe right around a year ago. The owner basically put it back on Joe to make the call, which was an absolute disgrace. It was cowardly. You know, that was a terrible spot to put Joe into. Terrible spot. If Joe Thaisman said, no, he'd look like an asshole.

And if he said yes, which he ultimately did, there were a lot of people that said, no, Joe, your jersey's a protected jersey. You're a Super Bowl champion. You're one of the great quarterbacks in the history of the franchise. And this guy hasn't thrown one pass yet. But Joe, you know, met with Dwayne, if you recall, and felt comfortable enough after Snyder opened up the possibility of Dwayne wearing number seven because he had drafted him. and he wanted Dwayne to be comfortable. And Dwayne Haskins is wearing number 70s, wearing Joe Thaisman's jersey number.

You know, a lot of people felt like Dwayne should have picked another number and proved himself in this organization with his own number, rather than the number that Joe Thaisman had. Joe handled it the best he could. The owner shouldn't have put Joe on that spot. But, you know, all of this would be a moot point if the Redskins had retired jerseys. because now no one's ever going to wear number 49. No one's ever worn number 33.

So with actual retired jerseys, you can just say to the incoming rookie that says, I want to wear the jersey number I had in college and in high school, you just say, no, that jersey's retired. There's not a debate about, you know, this protected thing. And that got us into this conversation a year ago about which jerseys would be retired if you retired jerseys. And I made the list, my own list. This to me would be the no debate Redskins retired jersey list. It's a matter of opinion. But this would be for me, you know, I would start, you know, in a discussion about this and I would take these seven jersey numbers and I would say,

we don't need to debate these. These are retired. Immediately. Number nine, Sonny Jurgensen, retired. Number 28, Darrell Green, retired. Number 33, Sammy Ball. retired. Number 42, Charlie Taylor, retired. 44 Rigo, retired. 49 Bobby Mitchell, that jersey's retired. And number 81, Art Monk, that jersey's retired. There are the seven, for me, that there's no debate about. And then we would move on to a group of players that we would then have a conversation, should he or shouldn't he, have a retired jersey. Those seven, nine, 28, 33, 42, 45. 49 and 81. There is no debate. It doesn't include every Hall of Famer that played for the organization. I understand that Ken Houston isn't on that list or Russ Grimm isn't on that list. I understand that.

That's my list that I would start the meeting off in discussing which jersey should be retired, and I would not deviate from that. I would say we can now move on to the names that are debatable. Ken Houston's very close to being on that list, but the problem with his 14-year career is he played six of those years as a Houston Euler. He had some very productive years for the Redskins, no doubt, and he was a pro bowler for the Redskins. First team all pro twice with the Redskins in 75 and 78, but he had a significant portion of his career in Houston. he would be debated. He'd be the first one that I would then debate that he should be there, but I would be open to an argument that says he shouldn't. Sunny, Daryl, Sammy, Charlie, Rigo, Bobby, and Art. They're in. The jerseys that are debatable for me, seven, Thysman, 21, Sean Taylor,

more on him in a moment. Houston, as I mentioned, number 27. Larry Brown's 43, Chris Hamburger's 55, Joe Jacoby 66, Russ Grimm's 68, and Sam Huff's 70. Huff would be one of those that'd be tough because most of his productive career years were in New York as a giant. But I would open it up for debate on those names. And with respect to Sean Taylor, he certainly doesn't have a career production-wise that would warrant his jersey being retired. But the circumstances surrounding his career and more importantly his death. would make him an exception to whatever criteria we would have that got the first seven in. So I would certainly, if the owner said, I was very close to Sean Taylor, he was significant to this organization, he's one of the most popular players in history, he died tragically in his own home as an innocent man, his jersey is going to be retired. I would certainly understand that.

So that would be the list for me. again the debatable list thysman taylor houston larry brown hamburger jacobi grim and huff the no debate list these seven would be in day one jurgensen darrell green sammy baw charlie taylor riggins bobby mitchell and art muck right now as of today two retired jerseys sammy baw and now bobby mitchell's number 49 is retired as well Quick word about Roman. If you were to guess on average how many days people in the U.S. have to wait to see a doctor, what would you say? A week maybe. Actually, on average, people have to wait nearly 30 days to see a doctor in major U.S. cities. Basically a month, if you're dealing with a condition like erectile dysfunction,

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because I spent some time earlier today just going through everything. In some ways chronologically and others, I just, you know, was going through all of the recent current negotiations, but it's a messed up situation based on one day and one part of an agreement made on March 26th. So I'm going to try to explain this because right now baseball is in jeopardy of not being played. There's a chance that the owners could just cancel the season. And both sides are pretty close. But if you don't understand this situation, give me a shot to explain it as best I can.

First of all, it started with baseball getting shut down. Early March, they're in spring training, coronavirus, sports world starts to shut down, and baseball suspends its season. Next up was the key date in this entire thing, March 26th. There was an agreement on March 26th between players and owners on the parameters of a season that was likely going to be delayed and shortened. The deal was for the owners to pay the players their full salaries on a pro rata basis. What that means is in a normal year, I'll just use simple math to explain it, if they're

162 games, if a player makes $1.62 million a year for 162 games. But the season gets shortened to 100 games, he would only make. a million dollars per this agreement. So they get paid their full salary on a per game basis times the number of games they play. That's what the owners agreed to with the players on March 26th when baseball returned. However, the agreement had one stipulation in it that's been debated ever since March 26th. And it was a stipulation based on the possibility that there would be. new conditions that would emerge when they were ready to play, like the possibility of no

fans in stadiums. A separate section of the agreement on March 26th listed the conditions for games to resume and said that the commissioner's office and the players union head would discuss in good faith the economic feasibility of playing games in the absence of spectator. or if the games had to be played at neutral sites. So there was this separate section to the agreement on March 26th that outlined that if, you know, the fans couldn't show up or if they had to move games to neutral sites, that there would be a good faith economic feasibility discussion about that. This is the crux of the problem right now because the players thought that this, separate section put in that March 26th agreement that read the union and the commissioner

would discuss in good faith the economic feasibility of playing games in the absence of spectators. They didn't think that that section meant taking less money to make it happen. I don't know why they didn't think that, but they didn't. And they have stood, you know, very strong that this was not about them taking less money. The owner, disagree. They think that this specifically, that this section specifically addressed their concern of the no spectators scenario. 30% of baseball's revenue comes from LiveGate. You know, that's different than football. So without it, the owners thought they made it clear on March 26th that the players would need to give up some of their pay to help out, that they would negotiate a new

deal in good faith if they didn't have 30% of their revenue coming in. This is the specific issue, which is, you know, the reason we do not have an agreement between players and owners right now. In trying to work around this issue, the owners and players have made several proposals and counter proposals to try to get to a season. The players want more games because they're getting their full pro rata pay. So the more games that get played, the more money they make. The owners, on the other hand, want less games, because at full rat a pay, the more games played, the more money they lose. Now, there is something that's very interesting to consider before I get to the current state of negotiations. It's

important to know that the owners have the right to cancel the season outright, or they can impose a regular season schedule of whatever length they want it to be. Now, if they choose that path of not having an agreed upon number of games with the players and instead impose a regular season schedule on the players, the players would be required to play the imposed schedule, but there would not be an expanded playoff format. And the owners desperately want the expanded playoffs because it's going to mean more television money. And there would also, if the owners imposed, which they have the right to do, a regular season schedule, there would also likely be a grievance filed by the players against the owners if the players deemed the number of games to be not fair to them. So it's in

both of their interests, best interest, to get a combined agreed upon deal to move forward, But I wanted you to know that part of the backdrop of these negotiations is the owner's right to either cancel the season outright or just to say, sorry, this is what we're doing. We're playing 48 games, even though the playoff format, which they want expanded, would then be limited to the normal playoff format as it exists today. So let me catch you up to speed with the current state of negotiations, because we've been going back and forth here for over a month now. first of all, Tony Clark, who is the Major League Baseball Players Association head, about a week ago, he basically dared Rob Manfred, the commissioner of baseball, to impose the season on the players, which I just described is the owner's right. And he said, quote, tell us when and where, closed quote.

And that tell us when and where, like go ahead to impose the season and we'll be there. and it turned into a social media hashtag for the players. You know, tell us when and where. When Clark put that out there to Manfred, Manfred said, hey, let's get together, and he flew out to Phoenix to meet with Clark face to face. And Manfred said, look, the owners are okay with paying the players full pro rata. All right?

But the owners don't want to play any more than 60 regular season games, and then we want an expanded playoffs. and Manfred after that meeting released a statement saying, hey, we've got the framework for a 60-game regular season and expanded playoffs. But Clark didn't think that that's what came out of the meeting last week. He thought that the 60-game regular season framework with the expanded playoffs was just the latest owner's proposal. And so he countered it.

He countered it the other day with a 70-game player proposal at full pay. And so that's where we are right now. You know, we've got this March 26th disagreement. The owners have said, okay, we'll pay you full freight, but we need to limit the number of regular season games and expand the playoffs. Our offer is 60 games at full pay with expanded playoffs, and the players countered at 70 games full pay with expanded playoffs. There's a 10-game difference.

That's where we sit right now. The players said tell us when and where, but they won't come off 70. The owners aren't apparently going to budge off of 60, which means they'll likely end up imposing a certain number of games. The gap, by the way, between 60 and 70, in terms of the economics, hear me out on this. It's basically the 10-game difference for the owners,

if the owners were to actually accept the counterproposal from the players and come up to 70. It's about $250 million in additional player salaries, or about $8.4 million per team, if they split the difference and they negotiated a 65 game schedule, it would mean roughly $125 million in, you know, additional costs, salary costs for the owners, $4.2 million per team, that's nothing. It's peanuts. And then when you divide it, you know, among the players, the amount, the difference for the players isn't so significant either, 10 games. That's where we are, a 10-game difference.

One of three things is likely to happen now. Number one, the players agree to the 60-game owner offer. I don't think that's going to happen. Number two, the two sides compromise at 65 games. That's got a better chance of happening. But I think the third possibility is now becoming the more likely of the possibilities. And that is that the commissioner just says, We are at 60.

If you're not going to allow an expanded playoff format at 60, we're going to go by imposing a regular season schedule of somewhere between 48 and 54 games, somewhere around there, and we'll just keep the playoffs the way they're supposed to be. And there will be a grievance filed and they'll play. It won't be pleasant. This will be done very much antagonistically. but that right now is in play. They could cancel the season altogether as well, but I don't know that that's going to happen. However, if you saw this news yesterday, the Phillies had several staff members and players down in Clearwater, Florida, test positive for COVID-19. 32 people are still waiting on their test results.

Look, if all of these teams have these widespread outbreaks, if that starts to happen with a number of teams, all of this back. and forth over the economic matters will be a moot point. And in fact, if you get more of these stories here in the next few weeks, the owners may just say, we're going to cancel the season. We just don't think we can make it safe enough for the players or our fans at some point. Anyway, I hope I did a decent job of explaining the current situation. It's not pleasant. It's amazing that they can't figure out a way to, you know,

figure out a 10-game difference, but they can't. Lastly, today, I want to talk about Dr. Fauci, but before we do that, a quick word about Hawthorne, that's Hawthorne with an E.com. If smelling good is important to you, Hawthorne smells really good. Getting Hawthorne is easy. You've got to take a quiz, though.

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I'm not sure how many people saw this. I'm assuming many of you did. Dr. Fauci was on CNN and he said essentially that the NFL better go to the bubble format that the NBA is going to or it might as well give up on a 2020 season. Here was this quote. Unless players are essentially in a bubble insulated from the community and they are tested nearly every day, it would be very hard to see how football is able to be played this fall. If there's a second wave, which is certainly a possibility and which would be complicated by the predictable flu season, football may not happen again. this year. That was Fauci on CNN the other day. The NFL's chief medical officer for the league Allen Sills responded, quote, make no mistake. This is no easy task. We will make adjustments as

necessary to meet the public health environment as we prepare to play the 2020 season as scheduled with increased protocols and safety measures for all players, personnel and attendees. We'll be flexible and adaptable in this environment to adjust to the virus as needed. Quote, then Tom Mayer, who is the NFL PA medical director, said Dr. Anthony Fauci's words carry important weight as he has served our country with expert guidance and moral clarity through many crises. And then he said the following, I'm going to skip down because he had a long statement. He said, while the information we currently have indicates it will not be an issue in the near future, we all agree that ethically we can we cannot as a non-essential business take resources away from our

fellow Americans closed quote testing is so big in all of this in the NFL and all of these sports leagues if the testing isn't available for regular testing and many are suggesting three to four times a week for NFL teams if that's not available or if it is available but they would be taking it away from essential businesses and a and essential Americans who are legitimately sick, it's not going to work. Now, I think they'll have the testing by then. Maybe they'll have the meds by then. But here's the big takeaway for me from Fauci's comments. I think Dr. Fauci is clearly an expert and a respected expert. He has served five administrations. Dr. Fauci and all of the scientists have given us guidance that has proven to be

wrong at various points in time since the beginning of March. or whenever it started. I'm not knocking it. I'm not criticizing it. They have given us advice that they thought was best based on the information that they had and the information keeps changing. I think we all understand that. And the information is going to change between now and the beginning of training camp, end of July, early August. It's definitely going to probably change, definitely probably. It's definitely going to change between now and the beginning of the regular season. So to be definitive

seems insane to me at this point. You know, first of all, football can't play in a Hub City. You know, you're talking about all 32 teams. You're talking about organizations with many, many more people that would need to be housed and tested

and insulated and isolated, you know, than an NBA team. The NBA is sending 22 teams there, not for a whole season, but for a short season. And then eight teams are going to go home, or more than that, whatever it is. No, six teams, I guess, are going to go home because they're going to have 16 teams in the playoffs. They're sending 22 there.

And it's for essentially a postseason, which might be a month or a few weeks for some and maybe a couple to three or four months for others. This is an entire football season. It's not going to happen, a hub city for the NFL. I just don't see that happening. And I think for Dr. Fauci to sound so, these were jarring comments the other day. These are huge comments from him. People are hanging on every one of Fauci's words, or they have been at various times over the last couple of months. But we've seen his words change, his direction, the CDC's direction change.

You can't have a strong opinion about this right now. The NFL's got to continue to do their best, moving forward to create. a plan, but the guidelines are going to change. And there could be a medical answer at the time that they open up the season. Or maybe it's a complete and utter eschow with the number of infections and deaths and serious sicknesses, and we get to the point where the NFL camp player has to delay. But at this point, why would anybody right now hang on every word Dr. Fauci says? And I don't want to sound overly critical of him because I respect him.

I think that he's doing his best. But at this point, don't we know pretty much for sure that the information is going to change? That the data is not going to be exactly what they think it's going to be, that their predictions aren't going to be spot on? I don't know what's going to happen. That's the answer right now. None of us do. The Hub City, though, for the NFL, the bubble city, I don't see that happening.

That seems logistically overwhelming. But I can think of 12 billion reasons why they would try to make it work. All right, that's it for the day. Again, no podcast Monday. Have a safe rest of the weekend. I'll be back on Tuesday with Tommy.