The Kevin Sheehan Show - Rivera & Reirden

Episode Date: August 24, 2020

Kevin and Thom today talking about Ron Rivera's fight, Todd Reirden's firing, and lots more including Luka Doncic. 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.

All right, a sports fix Monday actually coming up. Tommy's got to do Monday instead of Tuesday this week. We will start the show shortly right after I tell you about Window Nation and the exciting offer that they have available if you've been thinking about Windows. They're offering 50% off all Windows styles, deferred payments for two years, no interest. You can't beat it. I've mentioned this many times before. If you've been thinking about Windows and you call anybody other than Window Nation to start, you're making a mistake. No one that we know that is used when donation has ever had anything but a first rate experience. And it's free to start. You can get a free estimate either online virtually or they'll come out to your home using all CDC guidelines to give you a free estimate in your home. You don't have to do anything with it for a while. I mean, you can shop it if you want to do that.

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It's what everyone's talking about. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Now here's Kevin. You're listening to The Sports Fix. Yeah, it's a Sports Fix Monday today. Tommy had to change his schedule this week. J.P. Finley will be with me tomorrow on the program. But we have a special guest, Tommy, in studio.

My first in studio, I shouldn't even refer to him as a guest, because he's been a part of this show since its inception. But guess who's back in studio right now for the final time? And that is Aaron. Aaron's here. I'm here. You let me enter the cage. You let me enter your bubble.

I've had a couple of people here and there, but nobody for a significant amount of time. Mike Nelson came in, did some work. But Aaron's here, Tommy. Aaron is taking a job with Vison, the big gambling network that Brent Musburger was involved in starting, and he's moving out to Vegas to live in Vegas at the end of the week. I mean, you know, we've had conversations about this, and you know how excited I am for you, but it's going to be cool to live in Vegas, especially when you don't have Tommy, right? When you don't have, at this point, you know, Aaron and his wife don't have kids yet,

so they can sort of live the married couple, no kids for a while, which probably will work well in Vegas. It'll be, uh, it'll be something. It'll be different. I'm already, the only thing I'm kind of dreading the 110 degree weather, but of course it is a dry 110 degree, as I'm told, every time I bring that up. But, yeah, it'll be interesting making the three-day drive starting on Thursday, and we'll see what happens there.

Aaron already told. I'm happy for you, Aaron. Absolutely. I mean, it's a great job for you. And I know you'll be able to handle the pressures of Strip Vegas as opposed to the Real life day-to-day, Vegas. Yeah, we'll see what Strip Vegas is like. The place that I've got is, I believe, two blocks off the strip that I'm staying at for a couple months while my wife, you know, we look for houses and stuff.

She's staying out here for a bit. So that'll be interesting. Tell everybody what you're going to be doing for Vecund. So I'm going to be producing out there. I'm not 100% sure which show. They're still kind of debating a number of things. They had laid off a bunch of staff during COVID, but bringing them all back. and plus more for September.

So they're still working out the pieces. But I'll be producing one or two of their shows. Shows actually, which I found out recently. You can actually get it out here. It's on if you have Xfinity. It's one of the apps. Oh, really? Yeah, you can watch it at any time.

So, yeah, I'll be producing a show or two as well as doing whatever else out there and helping them break their opening new studios in the brand new Circa resort next month. So that should be interesting, too. Tommy, when you were describing Strip Vegas versus the rest of Vegas, you know, when I was in sort of the technology supermarket business, one of our big clients was Lucky Foods, also Vons out in L.A., and they had stores in Vegas. So I spent a lot of time in Vegas back then, which really worked very well for me back then. But there is, like when people, people think of Vegas, they don't realize, you know, that really, more so I guess in the 90s, maybe it started in the 80s, but really in the 90s. It exploded as a great place to live, an affordable place to live, a place that had, you know, lower unemployment, obviously because the gaming industry. But there's a whole part of Vegas that, you know, has nothing to do

with the strip, you know, and it's a regular market, you know, with schools and hospitals and supermarkets and people live normal lives without actually going to casinos every day or shows. Yeah, I know a lot of people who work in the businesses out in Vegas, and they've always told me that. They'd always say, you know, what you see when you come out here, this is not my life, they'd say. I mean, this is my work, but it's not my life. It's not where I live. It's not what I do every day when I'm not working.

So, yeah, there is a big difference. And, I mean, I think my impression was a lot of people went from west to east in the 90s, from California to Vegas. Right. I think there was a lot of movement in that direction because of the cost of living, if nothing else. Yeah, it was – I remember it was strange, you know, sort of showing up in Vegas. Now, I would typically try to schedule whatever meetings I had for. very late in the week so I could very conveniently stay for the weekend and Vegas. But I remember being sort of on the outskirts of Vegas.

And, you know, it was, it's actually, you know, I don't know what it is now. I know that quality of life costs a living, very affordable, you know, the whole thing. I was starting to look for houses out here before everything struck. And then looking at basically the same houses here out there is like $300,000. cheaper. Right. So you had all of that as an issue. You know, all of those favorable conditions out there. And, you know, we all know what D.C. is like. DC is incredibly expensive to live in. But we wish you the best. Aaron came in to get his headphones before he leaves. Aaron will still be involved in the show in producing the show, but more like what we've been doing during the pandemic.

Not necessarily involved in the show, but helping to produce it in the back-end. Yeah. We can do some gambling segments for sure during football season. But we wish you the best of luck. Hopefully you get a chance to meet Musburger because Scott says he's the greatest dude of all time. I'm sure I'll meet him pretty quickly out there. Yeah. All right.

Aaron, thanks. Best of luck. Absolutely. Good luck, Aaron. Thank you both. Can't wait to get out there. And yeah, I'll definitely still be part of the show. So all you people out there keep tweeting at me.

Exactly. All right. You know what, Tommy? We did our show on Thursday, and shortly thereafter the news about Ron Rivera came down that he has cancer. We've got a lot of things to get to in the show today, including, you know, Todd Reardon getting fired. We've got, I want to talk about the NBA playoffs from yesterday in particular. But Ron, I mean, it's really at this point, you know, you just wonder what's next? Like, it's amazing what this organization goes through year and year out. Like all the news, bad news, sad news, embarrassing news. It's just never ending with this group. I'm so happy the prognosis is good. I'm praying for him.

He seems like such a decent person. He's taken on a huge job, an unusual job with this organization. But, you know, I've mentioned to you, I think he's one of the first, you know, decent people they've had in the organization in a long time. and I think he's the most important person in the organization right now. I mentioned that when we were talking about Jason Wright last week. You know, what matters most is winning on the field, and Ron Rivera, if Dan gives him a chance to do it, is going to be the guy. But, man, we need him.

If you're a fan of this team, you want him to be healthy. Yes, you do. Even if you're not a fan of the team. But as a fan of the team, you need him in this organization healthy. Yeah, that's the priority above everything else. is his health and safety in a situation like this. So that should be everybody's primary thought. The New York Times has a big story today about the Washington football team.

Basically along those lines, it opens up with a quote from Malcolm McCambridge, the guy who wrote a big history of the NFL about 15 years ago. quote, the Washington football team is like Charlie Brown trying to fly his kite and getting it caught in the tree. There have been teams that were historically bad. The frustration that the fans in Washington are experiencing is that they've been waiting an awfully long time to get a sense that their club has a positive sense of direction, and they're still waiting. So the New York Times has a big story about everything that's going on right now, the Redskins, you know, including Ron Revere's cancer diagnosed.

Well, I haven't read it. What's in there? I mean, I see the headline, private infighting, you know, continues to royal the Washington football franchise. Have you read the story? Yes, I have. I mean, what's interesting is, I mean, they lay out the whole thing and the conflict possibly between Snyder and his minority owners.

Right. And the whole intrigue with Dwight Schar and all that. And apparently, I'm looking for the part in it, there's been an arbitration filed. Okay, here it is. Snyder was to comebridge. This is related to his minority owners. And the fight going on between him and between Snyder and his minority owners. Several months ago, Snyder removed them from the board.

Agreeved, the three men asked the NFL to resolve the matter and other issues. The commissioner's office appointed an arbitrator in late June, according to two people familiar with the matter, who were not authorized to speak publicly. The NFL declined to comment. I hadn't read that anywhere. That the minority owners asked the NFL to intervene. on this and that there's been an arbitrator appointed by the commissioner.

I haven't read that either. I don't know what that means, though. Intervene how? Intervene in getting him to sell his stake, too, to make it easier for the minority? It does not say it's related to, you know, that it says that they've been looking to divest for, months and then it says Snyder took Umbridge and several months ago removed them from the board

I assume in the board of directors of the football team yeah well that would that's what it would be so I imagine if you can access the website that has the board of directors of the football team those owners would not be on it. Dwight Schar

and and Fred Smith and was Robert Rothman the other guy? Yeah Bob Rothman so they would not be on the board of the football team any longer, which would seem pretty unusual since they own a piece of the team. Well, I mean, not every minority owner

ends up as a director in the company. I mean... Yeah, I don't... Boy, I'll read it. And there is an arbitration, there is an arbitration session going on with the NFL between them, minority owners and Snyder.

I don't know what's at stake. You know, it's interesting because this morning on radio, I got caught up on all the things I missed last week not being on radio, you know, from obviously the Ron Rivera story to Alex Smith being cleared from the pup, to Jason Wright being hired, to Thaddeus Moss getting cut when the whole fan base thought he was going to be a pro bowler this year, you know, et cetera, et cetera. And, you know, at the end of sort of catching up on everything that happened last, week, I just reminded everybody that there is still an ongoing investigation into the sexual harassment

culture from Beth Wilkinson by Beth Wilkinson, and there's still, you know, minority owners that are trying to sell their stake, and there's still a lawsuit, you know, claiming that there was a smear campaign against Snyder and trying to, you know, Snyder and his lawyers suing a media company in India. And, you know, from that story, we understood that it could potentially be traced back to one of his minority owners. You know, when I said earlier, and maybe that's part of what the Times story is about, just the, every year, it's, you know, it's always something with this organization. They can't shake the aura of not only dysfunctioning, but so much more that goes on with this franchise.

And the biggest stories, look, Ron Rivera having cancer is a major story, and it's the most serious and the most important out of all of them. But what's coming soon is Beth Wilkinson's investigation report, the resolution of this lawsuit alleging a smear campaign against Snyder, and three minority owners trying to sell. Like, we're going to start games in less than three weeks, and those three stories are going to take center stage at some point during one of these weeks in season.

You know, unless Wilkinson can somehow get a report out on a Friday night, you know, going into Labor Day weekend, that might be the move for them if she finishes it up by then. That would be a pretty quick investigation, wouldn't it be? I would think so. Yeah. Since there are 15, mostly 15 women, according to this, you know, you have to be a pretty quick investigation, wouldn't it. We still don't know if the team has allowed them to get out of their non-disclosure agreement in order to cooperate with the investigation. I would assume that they would since the team has hired the investigator in the first place.

But you never know with this organization. What's interesting, they have a chart of a who's who in the Snyder Chronicles that are going on right now. and it has, you know, the minority owners, has Christopher Clemente, the son-in-law of Dwight Sharr, Mary Ellen Blair, has Alex Santos and Richard Mann, Bruce Allen, Larry Michael, and has the owners of the media company in India. And it has a name I had never seen before,

and his name is mentioned in the story. And I have to find the details of exactly how they're mentioned. You ever hear of Norm Shiret? No. T-H-I-R-I-T-E. He's an advisor to Snyder who had left and now has recently returned to working with Snyder. That's a new name to me. I've never heard it before.

Yeah, I've never heard that name either. Unless he's part of that new PR company that they have in D.C., I know that one of the guys there and his name's escaping me, but I don't think that's the name really has some influence right now. I don't know. All of this is ongoing, and then we may put a guy out there with Dropfoot to play quarterback in the opener. Hey, he's having a hell of a day.

As you've been reading social media, let me read this. Let me read this from my guy at the Washington Times, Matt Parrott. Alex Smith continues to display the movement needed for playing quarterback. On his first nine-on-line play, Smith avoided a rushing ionitis by calmly stepping up in the pocket and firing a bullet, which was dropped in the end zone. Next play, Smith pulled out and hit Chris Sim for a touchdown. He's looking pretty good today, buddy. Well, my boy, J.P. Finley, tweeted out moments ago,

Red Zone work and Haskins plays fast with touchdown throw to McLaurin. Coaches seem pleased. Okay? Well, Haskins had a pretty good day. Haskins seemed to have a pretty good day yesterday, too, from what I read on social media. Oh, my God. It's so ridiculous. I mean, it really, it's so ridiculous.

You know what I did try to do? I forget if I told you this on Thursday or not. I tried to go back with a couple of the beat reporters and, me back to like a year ago to look at all of the tweets that were similar, you know, play by play in training camp, just to pull out, because I know there'll be four or five names in there that never even made, you know, made it past August, you know, 30th or whatever. But it takes too long to scroll back and I got bored. Is there an easy, this may be a total, you know, okay boomer moment, but is there an easy way

to go back through all of your tweets and, you know, go back a year ago or two years ago or three years ago easily other than scrolling back, you know, with the scroll feature? There might be a search mechanism to do it. I don't see the search mechanism. That's the thing. I don't see. Well, here's what I always tell people who seem to struggle with daily life. Google the question and see what you find out is an answer. That's a good point. Usually there's an answer on Google.

I could do that. But like I'm, I went to look for, can I just search like, you know, August 2019 or can I scroll down like, you know, by month? But no, I don't see that feature. I mean, and by the way, when I'm looking through all of the guys that are on the beat, they tweet a lot. Like it took me 15 minutes just to get into July for time. Well, they're working hard. I know they are. I know they are.

Okay. I found out more about Norm Shireight, according to the Times story. There's a passage in here where Christopher Clemente, Dwight's son-in-law, questioned the motives of Norman Shireight, who served as general counsel to the Washington team from 2002 to 2005 and joined the Comstock board you know the other company involved in this

in 2004 so he's on the Comstock board Comstock being go ahead now he apparently Shai Wright stepped down from his role with Comstock two days

before the M.EA worldwide suit was filed and went to work back to work for Snyder whole time. Well, he must. He said Shy Wright may have broken board governance rules if he assisted Snyder in the litigation that could involve Comstock. Right.

It certainly would seem that as counsel and as a board member, there would be a level of confidentiality that he would be bound by, right? It would seem to be the case. But I don't think there's many rules when it comes to what's going on at what is it called it's not redskins park anymore what's the official title of the building i don't know w tf park is it washington football team headquarters wfts park i don't know i don't know who cares about that stuff i mean i that

i got to read that story um yeah you do and i will i will do that and we'll you're in it you're it here too. Yeah, I'm sure I am. Yeah, so I do, you know, and listening to Ron Rivera, you know, he's doing a post-presser every day. And, you know, the one question, Tommy, about his condition that I don't think has been asked, and I had Ben Standing on the radio show this morning, and I asked him if that's been asked, is, you know, I've read where he is going to go through this proton treatment, for his cancer, which is, you know, a type of radiation treatment from what I understand, but it's a bit different. But the bottom line is, is that to me, and I don't know anything about this, this is just a guess,

that as he's going through this radiation type of therapy, you know, don't we all sort of have an understanding that as you're going through radiation or chemo or any of these things, and I know that they're different. I don't have direct experience with it. So other than when my mother went through some of that. But the bottom line is that you become more vulnerable in terms of your immune system during those periods of time. And I would think in this COVID-19 environment, and I don't know if anybody's asked him this, but as he's going through that, and these are the days that he's talked about maybe needing some days,

off or weeks off, I would think that he would be at increased vulnerability for the virus. And if that's true, how's he going to coach on the field? He would have to be, you know, very distanced, I would think. I mean, am I completely out of my league here, or is that intuitive? I think you're on the right track here. Look, Governor Hogan apparently had the same cancer. Right. And he apparently spoke to Rivera or at least messaged him and told him that he came through it okay. And he managed to still run the state of Maryland somehow, which I think is probably as intense as running a football team. But remember, there's a plan B. Mr. Kiss my ass himself. Yeah. Old coach DR. He's there. They've got, they've got, they've

got head coaching experience on the staff like they did last year with old coach Cal. You know, they're same position last year. So, you know, they have said that, look, I'm sure, you know, Rivera and the team, I don't think they're willing to make any commitments to step away until they see how he handled it. But I think they acknowledge that even if things go well, there'll be days when he can't coach. and, you know, Del Rio will have to be the head coach. Yeah.

I mean, there'll be, and there may be plenty of days like that. I'm going through Del Rio's Twitter account because I haven't been through it in a while. And, you know, we have a couple of listened to President Trump on the Black News channel, talk about the importance of school choice for the black community. all right. We have one where he retweets somebody who tweeted out, these two charts should put Dr. Fauci in prison. But he writes, you know, and this is your head coach.

He writes, can't we find, no, hold on. He says, as the retweet, as he wrote in his retweet, can't we find a way to have an honest conversation about possible treatments so we can save lives? I don't, I'm not going to sit here and look at the charts and see what he actually retweeted, because it could be whatever your perception of what I just said, it might be completely out of context.

I don't know. But anyway, look, I hope that this is something that I talked about last week, and I'll spend a minute here talking about it again. I listen to more of Jason Wright, you know, late in the week, over the weekend. He has not yet found an interview that he doesn't want to take, and good for him. He's getting a lot of attention. and, you know, like we said last week, this is a guy that has an impressive resume. He comes well referenced.

He's a McKinsey man. And anybody that's ever worked with someone from McKinsey in business knows the cachet that comes with that. I had never heard of him before last week. I wish him the best. He's got quite the challenge of changing the business side of the organization because it has as much of a culture issue as the football operation does. You know, the non-football side of the organization has been maybe even more arrogant, if you can believe it, than the football side. You and I both know this to be true, that if you talk to anybody in town that's done business with this team, they'll tell you what a nightmare it's been to do business with this team. Business people, politicians just have not liked dealing with Dan Snyder or any of the upper-level people that work for the team.

They've alienated everybody in town. to mention how poorly the teams treated its own employees over the years. So he has quite the job of changing the business culture in the organization, which is what Brian Lafamina was hired to do, too. And I wish him the best of success with that. And I bet he's, you know, eminently qualified to do it. But as I mentioned last week, what he can't control and what he's not being asked to control is actually the part that will determine whether or not he's successful with his number one responsibility, which is revenue, revenues and profits. And he doesn't have control over that, very little, because the only thing that matters to revenue is winning on the field. Ron Rivera is responsible

for that if Dan Snyder allows him to be responsible for that. And if Ron Rivera can build a competitive team and a winner, then Jason Wright's going to sell more tickets. He's going to lease more sweets. He's going to sell more sponsorships. And the, you know, the responsibility, the P&L responsibility he has, he's going to look really smart. But it's also, it's, it's an odd thing that the business guy that has total responsibility over P&L actually really can't control the most important thing that will drive, you know, profits, that will drive top line revenue first and foremost. That, is someone else in the organization.

He made it very clear on Mad Dog, on Christopher Russo's show. He was a guest on that show on Friday, maybe. He made it very clear. I'll paraphrase here, Tommy, but he basically said, look, if you walk into my office, you'll see spreadsheets on the wall. If you walk into Ron's office, you'll see a draft board. I don't have anything to do with his board, and he doesn't have anything to do with mine.

Tanya and Dan have made it. The Snyders have made it very clear that Ron handles football, I handle business, we both report to the owner. You know, we will support each other, but his responsibilities aren't mine and my responsibilities aren't his. And Tanya has made that very clear, the Snyders have made that very clear to me. By the way, on Mad Dog, nothing but Dan and Tanya and the Snyders over and over again. And I, somebody actually called me that heard me mention that this morning on radio and said, no one, there's, there's a, you know, there's a lot of, never been a hire ever made where Tanya's name's been mentioned more often. Now, maybe it's just

simply because Dan was in the south of France and wasn't available for face-to-face. And he was zooming while, and he had Tanya sit in and Tanya got to know Jason. Whatever. The bottom line is whatever's, the most important thing is what Ron Rivera is responsible for. And whatever second is a distant second. That said, you know, not. to be so crass here and understanding that the most important thing is Ron Rivera's health. Ron Rivera has health right now. I know. Yes. It's a major setback towards achieving that goal you just talked about. It could be. And that's why, you know, I said earlier, you know, if you're a fan of this team,

you know, and you don't have to be a fan of the team to root for his health, obviously. but if you're a fan of this team, this organization needs Ron Rivera healthy. It needs this decent... It's a hard enough job for a healthy man. Right. No, I understand what you're saying. I understand what you're saying. Now, you know, what's interesting is for some people who are new to the game,

and I don't mean really new, yeah, I guess I mean really new. What's remarkable is 50 years ago, this happened to another Redskins coach. Yes, it did. I mean, 50 years ago, almost like to the month. But he had a season, he coached a season, though, before. Yeah, he managed to coach a season. But, and I'm not comparing Vince Lombardi to Ron Rivera,

only in a sense that 50 years ago, the Redskins had a head coach who they believed was a bright future laying in a hospital room at Georgetown University. on the verge of dying. He wound up dying, September 3rd, Vince Lombardi did. So, I mean,

it's kind of stunning that they find themselves in the same situation. Ron Rivera hasn't even coached a game yet, but there are fans who have so much emotion invested in him being a change in the organization

and a bright future, just like they did back in when, when Vince Lombardi was coaching. They're not. They're not comparable, though, Tommy. Lombardi. Oh, I think they are.

Oh, come on. Lombardi had just produced the first winning season in 40-something years, and he was Vince Lombardi. I know that. But for the fan base, it was the same reaction. After 15 years of losing seasons, it was hope. Right. And the fan base, that's long.

left, believes that Ron Rivera is hope, even though he hasn't even coached the game yet. But the true apples to apples would be if they hired Bill Belichick in the offseason. If Belichick had retired and came back, you know, a couple of years later to coach, you know, Washington to coach this team. Because Ron Rivera, I mean, you're not matching those two in an SAT, you know, compare analogy thing. Rivera, you know. But the team is in the same position. Sun is to warmth as Lombardi is to, and you've got Rivera and Belichick and a couple of others is a choice. You're not going to pick Rivera.

But the situation is similar. I got it. You have an organization that's been a mess for 20 years now, and you have a savior. You know, when I've thought about how long this organization's been in the wilderness, I think about the Green Bay Packers, Tommy, because the Green Bay Packers were in the playoffs in 1972. Now, Dan Devine was the coach of the Packers, and I know that because they played the Redskins and the divisional round

on Christmas Eve, 1972. That was the George Allen team that went to the Super Bowl. They beat the Packers first, and they beat the Cowboys in the NFC Championship game. I'm really, really young, but I can imagine that what was amazing about that period of time is that the Redskins were playing the Packers. You know, they were only four years removed from their last Super Bowl, you know, under Lombardi. So it's like the Packers or, you know, they played the heavyweights. They played the Packers and the Cowboys to get to the Super Bowl.

But anyway, I think about the Packers often in comparison to maybe, you know, in hopes of what the Redskins could be. And that is that that franchise went basically 20-something years without a winner. You know, it had all of that history of winning in the late 50s through the late 60s with Vince Lombardi. It was basically, you know, a 10 to 12-year run under Lombardi like Gibbs had in the 80s into the early 90s. And then they went dark for 20-something years until, you know, Brett Fav and company came back, you know, and you had the Mike Holmgren, you know, coaching staff with Brett Fav. And, man, you know, because Tommy, I think if you go into the late 70s and through some of those 80s years, now they had a couple of decent teams here and there, they went to the playoffs in the expanded format in 82 during the strike year,

Lynn Dickey and they had some offensive teams, but they just weren't very good. And I bet even in Green Bay, I bet if you went back to some of those games in the late 80s, early 90s when they stunk, I bet you had a lot of empty seats at Lambeau Field. That organization was in the dumper there for many years. It really was. And ironically, I mean, you know, everyone points to obviously Brett Farr, coming to Green Bay in the trade with the Falcons

as being the most important move but the move that really a lot of people they put them in the Super Bowl conversation was the one that involved the Redskins when Reggie White a free agent picked the Packers

over the Redskins when Free Agency first began 93 and it was pretty close. And I think if Gibbs had still been there, Reggie would have picked Washington. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that's probably true. God, you know, showed him the way on that one, if I recall. I'm looking through the Packers. Now, the Packers didn't have anywhere near the horrible record that Dan Snyders had for those 20 years. You know, if you go back to their

last Super Bowl, you know, they were in before Holmgren, well, when Holmgren got there, he turned it around quickly. They had got it. guys like Lindy and Fonte and Forrest Gregg and Bart Starr coached for many years, you know, after Dan Devine, there were a lot of bad seasons, don't get me wrong, but there were a lot of eight and eight seasons, you know, a 10 and six here and there. But similar stories in how long it took for them to get back to the upper echelon of the NFL and how their fan base returned and became one of the best fan bases in all sports. really since Holmgren arrived in Green Bay in 92.

They went 9 and 7 in 92. And by the way, missed the playoffs on the final Sunday of the season. They had to beat the Vikings to get in, and the Vikings beat them. And that meant that the Redskins got in the back door. They needed the Packers to lose to the Vikings, which they did. Vikings had nothing to play for. It was one of those final Sundays of the year where you're a team relying on somebody to beat somebody to get in, but that team that you're relying on has nothing to play for because the Vikings were already in and had a home field advantage the following weekend.

But they actually did it. They actually won the game. The Redskins got in as the defending champions in 92. They beat the Vikings who helped them into the postseason and then lost to the 49ers in a, in a wild game at Candlestick, and that was it. Gibbs retired a couple of months later, and the Gibbs era and the greatest era in the franchise's history was over. It's interesting that, you know, as I think about it right now, 91 they won the Super Bowl, 92 was there was Gibbs' final year as the defending champions, and they all, and they shouldn't have gone back to the

playoffs. They needed help to get there. And when they did get there, they won a game on the road and then had the 49ers in deep trouble in the fourth quarter for a chance to get back to the NFC championship game. But Brian Mitchell and Mark Rippen mishandled a handoff in the mud at Candlestick, and it was game over. But yeah, the Holmgren took over 92. You know, Holmgren, have you ever looked at Holmgren's record? I know we're getting sidetracked here.

Have you ever looked at his coaching record? he's not he's not in the Hall of Fame right I don't think so I don't think so either Mike Holmgren had his first head coaching job was in Green Bay as a head coach

he had in 17 years as a head coach just two losing seasons he was in the postseason 36 7 10 12 times in 17 years. A 161-11 overall record, a 592 win percentage, 13 and 11 all time in the playoffs, with two, you know, one Super Bowl championship and two Super Bowl losses. He took three teams to the Super Bowl.

He took that Seattle team in 2005 to the Super Bowl that lost to the Steelers in Rothesberger's rookie year and won the Super Bowl. Obviously, the year that Green Bay won it with Fav over the Patriots and then lost the next year to Elway and the Broncos. Boy, I knew Homegrown was a good coach. I'm just looking at this. That's a damn good playoff track record. He's got three 13 plus win seasons, and 12 out of 17 is pretty good going to the postseason. anyway.

Yeah, but I mean, it's not better than Mike. Mike's not in Hall fame. True. That is true. Mike's overall win percentage is not as good in the regular season. His playoff mark. Yeah, I mean, actually, they're very comparable. Mike just coached more years.

Mike's got a lesser overall win percentage. part of that, you know, is the four years in Washington. It really ruined his win percentage. And his overall playoff record is 8 and 6. Holmgren's is 13 and 11. Holmgren made the playoffs more often. That's true. You know, and Mike, now Mike won two Super Bowls.

Holmgren only won one. One of the Super Bowls he won was against Holmgren. But, yeah, they're comparable, but actually Holmgren's overall numbers, are a little bit better than Mike's. You're actually right. We're sure Holmgren's not in the Hall of Fame, right? I don't think he is. No, he's not.

He's not in the Hall of Fame. You know, it's funny because both of them sort of came off the whole, you know, Bill Walsh, San Francisco tree. You know, Holmgren, obviously, off of that tree with the 49ers in the 80s. And Mike was, you know, a big part of being a part of the, you know, not necessarily the Walsh 49ers, but as an offensive coordinator for the Seafirt 49ers, right? Yeah, it would have been the Seaford 49ers when he was Steve Young's offensive coordinator.

Anyway. Okay. What else do we have on the football team? Anything else? I thought there was some interesting Adrian Peterson. Adrian Peterson said to Ben Standing, I guess, yesterday, or maybe this was part of the presser, that the tone of training camp is night and day compared to last year.

you know, Jay really did run, you know, a club med type of training camp. Ben. Well, you got to give out boy Russell is due on this. He called it Club Jay, and he's been ringing that bell for years. That's awesome. But, you know, these proclamations in August about night and day, and, you know, this is a serious camp, and they're in room, you know, to make mistakes and we're working hard.

Okay, great. You know, let's see it on the field. You know, I just, I don't want to hear anything about how different things are and how great things are and how great baddius Moss is going to be. He got released over the weekend, maybe back on injured reserve. It's just, if you went back and found, you know, and did, you could write a book on August NFL projections,

and how wrong they are every year. Anyway. Yes, you could. But it is interesting that with every passing day, DJ Sweringer becomes more and more hallowed

for calling out this coaching staff last year. That's true. As much as he did. The man may be a little bit off, but he was right. What did you make of the 77 positive coronavirus tests for NFL teams that all came back, all 77 of them, as false positives.

I was curious. That happens, you know? I mean, they got a bad lap or they got a bad batch or whatever. What you don't want to is for that to happen the day before a game. Exactly. Yes. I mean, that's my point is. is that you have, you know, you had 70, for those that missed the story, there were 11 teams affected by a mistake made by a bio-reference lab in New Jersey.

Bio-reference is the company that the NFL has contracted with to do the testing. I think that's, maybe the NFL hasn't contracted with them. Maybe the teams have, I'm not exactly sure how that relationship. works, but bio-reference has many different labs, like Washington uses bio-reference, but a different lab. The lab in New Jersey had 77 samples come back as positive. And so 11 teams were impacted by this information late Saturday and early Sunday morning. So all of a sudden there was panic that here we go, we now have an outbreak going on. But the test can, you know, the test came back as false positives after, I guess they did a quicker, what they call point of care tests on

Sunday of all the 77, and all of them came back as negative. But to your point, they better get this right because that could shut down half of Sunday's games if this were to happen on a Saturday night or Sunday morning. Yeah, they've got to make sure they get these right. Absolutely. That would have been a hell of an outbreak. Yeah. 77 players, 11 teams. You know, know, and you're getting ready for a big Sunday line up at 1 o'clock with seven games and five of them get canceled, you know, and they're going to have to figure all that out. Let me do a quick spot here, because I want to get some discussion in about DoorDash, because I'll tell you what, everybody is using DoorDash these days to get food delivered.

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So use DoorDash for meal delivery. All right, should we get to old Reards here, Todd Reardon? Yes, let's get to the former coach of the Washington Capitol. Yeah. So I was a little bit surprised when I saw the news yesterday that he was fired, and I'll tell you why. Because whether it was Tarek Al-Bashir or Greg Wyshinsky or Barry's Ruluga or whomever I had on talking about the capitals prior to the playoffs beginning. I asked the following question, is Reardon and Trinstein? trouble if they lose. And to a man, they all said, ah, this season's weird. It's in a bubble.

There are no fans. It's, you know, I don't think anybody will be held accountable for the results of this season. It must have been, Tommy, the way they went out. The way they got destroyed. I mean, they'd laid down. You know, I mean, they didn't go out fighting. They laid down, Like they couldn't get a wait to get out of Canada. Out of where were they? Edmonton or Toronto. They were in Toronto. They're in Toronto.

They couldn't wait to get out of there and get home. So, yeah, I think if they had put up more of a fight, it certainly would have been, you know, on his side of the ledger, you know, a reason to try it one more time. But this was clear for two straight playoffs years. that he was outcoached in both series. I mean, particularly last year I thought he was. And, you know, I mean, it's interesting.

I just read a story on NBC Sports Washington. Again, I interview with McClellan. And the whole decision-making process involving keeping Barry Trots or not. And nowhere, not one line in that story, did I read the name Ted Leonesis? Not one single line. Why? Was it all McClellan? You know, I know McClellan and Reardon, I guess, went to college together.

And he was making the case that Reardon was maybe the better, was the Sean McVeigh, we couldn't let the next great coach go. I mean, a little bit of a difference considering Jay Gruden, hadn't just won the Super Bowl when Sean McVeigh left. Barry Trots won the Stanley Cup. No, I understand that, Tommy. I mean, look, this was Ted, whether it's years of spending, years of commitment, or money. Ted didn't want to make the commitment.

Ted's track record, except for hiring Trot, is the cheap out on the coach. The only time he didn't do that was when he hired Trott. because, you know, they had gone through so many minor league coaches and coaches with no NHL experience like Dale Hunter and Adam Oath. And they were wasting away the Alaskolvetskin years, wasting them. So they finally got a guy in in Trots who had NHL 15 years of NHL coaching experience. He struggled in to playoff with his team over, over those years.

And they finally got to the point where Trots had gotten that locker room, which is not a great locker room. It's not a bad locker room. In a way, it's like the old nationals. They're all good guys. But when it comes to fighting for the playoffs, when their backs against the wall, they didn't have a lot of fight in them.

And it took Trots, and Trots talked about this every year. you know, getting the locker room to where he wanted it. And he had finally gotten it to that point where he had a mix of guys and an attitude on that team where they understood what it took to play in the Stanley Cup championships. And then they just flushed it. I understand Trotson.

If they didn't do well that Stanley Cup year, he probably would have been fired. But the fact is they did. They won the Stanley Cup. and it's the height of the African, the not pay a coach who wins the championship. It's, God, there's so many things there. Number one is this, man, is Ted Lucky

that they won the Stanley Cup? Yeah. Because, you know, he's gotten a pass for years. I think you and I have never given him the past that a lot of other people and local media have. I'm not suggesting we're the only ones, but I think we've always, you know, understood that there was,

clearly a difference in terms of the level of owner. He's a good owner. Dan Snyder is not a good owner. But it's always been just interesting to see how fond of himself he seems to be. And how everything that fans think Snyder is, actually he isn't, but Ted is. And everything, you know, Ted's a better owner. Let me make that very clear. He has created an incredible customer experience for Caps games, for Wizards games, for Mystics,

whatever you go see. The Capital One Arena, it's done right. It's always done right. But my point is here, Ted sits on his NBA team's bench. Can you imagine if Snyder was one of those NFL teams that hung out on the sideline? And he isn't. He's a recluse. You never hear from Snyder.

You never read Snyder. Ted's got his own website, his own blog. where, you know, at various moments over the years, he'll be critical of his coaches, you know, the day after a game. But anyway, that aside, you know, he won the Stanley Cup. And he's an owner that brought the first championship to this city since 1991 for any of the four major sports professional sports teams. And he gets credit for that. But my God, Tommy, I mean, I'm talking to Tarek this morning. and Tark says to me, you know, there's a lot about that period of time that gets misconstrued.

He said, you know, Barry had this thing in his contract. He was about to get fired multiple times. He had this thing in the contract that if you won the Stanley Cup, he got this extension, even though it wasn't that much. And when it came to it that, you know, he didn't want to be paid at the top level, but he wanted, you know, a top five, top ten salary, somewhere in the $5 million-dollar-year range. But Tark told me that term was the biggest. issue. Yeah, Barry wanted five years and that, you know, Ted and McClellan had a major problem with that. And Tarek starts to explain it as follows. I'm paraphrasing here. They just looked at it as

they didn't want to be on the hook if, you know, Barry in two years from after they signed the deal, sort of flamed out and things weren't working. And then they got three years of his contract left. And yeah, and they got to fire him and they got to hire somebody new. And I, just said to Tark, I'm like, whoa, that's not a very optimistic way to look at it. Like, why would they be thinking that way? They had just won the Stanley Cup. This guy was also, by the way, a winning coach with them. You know, it wasn't like they sucked in his other years. I understand that that, you know, November of that particular season, that, you know, he was potentially on the verge of getting fired. But he had won the division and had won first round

playoff series the previous three years in Washington. I know that he hadn't gotten to the Stanley Cup finals in Nashville either and it wasn't a great playoff coach. But the context changed. He achieved something that you had been wanting and this city had been wanting for years. Are you kidding me? You're worried about the back end if he doesn't live up to the deal?

I'm sorry. He wins the Stanley Cup. You go to him and you say, look, that thing you sign, uh-uh, we're tearing that thing up. We're giving you, you know, a long-term big deal. You just brought to us what we've been waiting, you know, 40 years for in this town. And they didn't do that. And they paid for it. You know, sometimes, you know, there are these decision points, Tommy, for ownership,

general managers, and you pick one way, and it's the wrong way. Well, this one clearly, them firing Reardon so quickly, is an admission of a major mistake made two years ago. And it's an acknowledgement, which is something that should have been apparent to them. I mean, it was, you know, it was the message that Trots gave Oveskin when he went to Russia to visit his son who was over there and met with Ovescans. He said to Ovescans, time is running out, and as great as you are, people will judge you

for what you don't have, not what you've done. And that should have been the same message to the team. Time is running out. We have possibly the greatest hockey player in the history of the league. We need to maximize every year he has left with us. not experiment with a new coach. Right. With a guy like Alice for Vett.

We need to squeeze everything we can out of the greatest player we've ever had. And this is not the time to be screwing around with a new head coach. You know, you said something else too, and I brought this up to Tark. You said that, you know, Reardon got out-coached the last two years in the postseason. and you know what I feel about that in terms of hockey, that there's a huge randomness to these games. But whatever, they got their ass kick. They were the most penalized team in the NHL this year.

Clearly Reardon wasn't, you know, good enough. But it's ironic to me because one of the things you heard when they went away, when they essentially let Trots walk, you know, which I'm sure Trots had something to do with that too. I'm sure Trots got to the point where, okay, if these guys are going to really haggle over Nichols, dimes in a year here or there. I'm out of here. Because he probably had a sense that he was on the verge of getting fired anyway after what three division titles and they, you know, they had won three playoff series, whatever it was. And he probably saw them as sort of small time anyway and took the, you know, the big opportunity in New York. But I thought that the irony, and I mentioned this to Tark,

was that Reardon was supposedly the X's and O's guy, an old truck. was like, you know, the disciplinarian, the, you know, the macro guy. And Tarek said, I don't know if they really got out X'd and owed in this series, but they definitely didn't have a level of trot's urgency or disciplined. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, all we heard from these geeks out there,

these Capitol fans, who were trying to. tell you after Trots got, you know, was let go. Oh, it's no problem. Rairdon really coached the team. Right. He was a guy. He was the guy who was really behind it. There'll be no worries.

I just, I mean, how can you be a sports fan and not recognize the difference between being an assistant coach and being a head coach? Right. In any walk of business, in any walk of life, it's a big difference between being the The second guy in charge and the guy in charge. Look, they've gone the cheap route, inexperienced and cheap route before, and it hasn't paid off. Tark thinks they'll go experience here,

although he did mention something to me that just made me laugh. He said some of these guys that are out there, Babcock and Boudreau, Boudreau, by the way, is apparently a candidate. Laviolette and Galant and some of these other guys, some of them actually, you know, got fired with years left in their contract and there, you know, there's that ability to essentially have the team that was paying them pay part of those, part of their salaries. It's like an offset. You know, so I said, well, whoever's got the most in offset is who this organization will be after. But, you know, I say that on one hand, and I do recognize that. Not all owners are free spenders. he did spend a hell of a lot of money on Scott Brooks. Let's not forget that. Seven million a year for five years.

Ted's not a bad owner at all. And the other thing, he has aired, I think, on the side of cheap before. And hopefully he doesn't do it now, especially if you consider the Ovechkin era window starting to shut and maybe you got two more years to try to make something happen. But, you know, it's also really important to understand the following. These teams, the Capitals and the Wizards, you know, certainly before the Capitals won the Stanley Cup, the Wizards more so. You know, the Wizards don't make money, you know.

There were many years there that they didn't make money. Like, he was losing money on his NBA team, and Ted's first love is basketball as a Brooklyn guy. You know? Yeah, he got handed a pretty rough deal. Yes, he did. when he took over for aid. In terms of sponsorship revenue, you know, and things like that. Dwindling to next-to-nothing season ticket base?

Yes. No, in the NBA teams, and let me just mention this, because this could factor into the decision on a coach. The economics of the NHL are that roughly 75% of the revenue is derived from live gate, live attendance. If the 20-21 season can't be played with fans, it may not be played at all. This bubble thing was a way to finish the season that was nearly finished, get in the postseason, and hope like hell this pandemic ends so that they can get back to a money-making situation. If they can't play games in arenas with fans, the NHL may not play in 2021.

one. Well, let me just give you, you heard it here first. Okay. The NBA season's not going to start until March. They're going to kick, they're going to kick Christmas. They're not going to start the NBA seasons until March. Because they believe that's the earliest they can get fans in the arena. The NBA feels the same way. Yeah, but the NBA is not as reliant on LiveGate as the NHL is. But the owners feel the same way right now. But let me just finish my point. My point is this. My point is that even if the NHL allows fans or socially distanced fans, and instead of having 18,000 at Capital One, you can only get, you know, 6,000 a night,

this is going to drive the decisions, the economic decisions that the owner makes here, because he's going to see a huge drop in future revenue for this franchise. And, you know, these franchises aren't wildly profitable to begin with unless you're, you know, in the NBA and the NHL, unless you're the Lakers or, you know, one of these big teams in a big market with, you know, huge TV dollars. So that's something to keep an eye on. Hockey is, you know, hockey is in a very difficult situation. And as all of these sports are, but this one even more so because of the reliance on the gate, on the live gate, they don't have the television contracts that the NFL, the NBA, and Major League Baseball have. But even with those television contracts, the NBA owners had a meeting on Friday. And the tone of the meeting was, we're not playing until we can get fans back in the arena because we desperately need them.

Yeah, well, they do. And that probably won't happen until March. Yes, so, I mean, if that's true with basketball, that'll be true with hockey as well. And so the hockey you're watching now may be the last hockey we see for a long period of time. I don't want to jump to conclusions because, you know, the infection rates leveled off here in the last, you know, week anyway. And, you know, we continue to see. There's still the hope for the rapid testing. The rapid testing.

I mean, yeah. Yeah. And, you know, if we, you know, if we. I'm not going to say what I was going to say about the vaccine, but it's fascinating reading on the whole vaccine and the FDA, et cetera, here over the last several days. Anyway, yeah, so we're both in agreement. They screwed up.

I think I pretty much said at the time, really? You're not going to rehire Barry Trots over money? And, you know, I'm learning more now that it was about term. But regardless, it's like that's one of those situations. I just think that if I'm in that position, now, I don't know. I mean, they really had faith in Reardon. They really, I think, valued Reardon's contribution to the Stanley Cup.

And they are predisposed to thinking about dollars and cents. And they probably just thought, we're going to get the same level of coaching for half the price, or maybe, I don't know, 40% of the price. Without the long-term commitment, let's just do this. You know, people are going to believe in what we're doing right now because we just won the Stanley Cup, I guess.

I think that's called the business of happiness. That is the business of happiness, my friend. Yeah. There's the thing with Ted. Yeah. Ted isn't the owner he thinks he is. Well, yes, of course. He's not Snyder, but he's not the owner he thinks he is either.

I think that's a good way to put it. I mean, look, he's nowhere near Snyder. We understand that. They're just different. and I just always find it interesting that, you know, what Ted does and has gotten away with, if Dan did, it would be, you know, his life would be threatened. I mean, Ted is the only owner, I believe, in the NBA,

that sits on his team's bench. Mark Cuban doesn't sit on the bench. He sits a row or two behind the bench. What's his face? The Microsoft guy who owns the Clippers, who bought the Clippers from Sterling. Steve Ballmer. Steve Balmer doesn't sit on the bench.

He sits right on the floor, but he sits behind a basket, I think. He's away from the bench. Ted, literally the players and the coaches, when they're huddling up or walking to and from the scores table, are walking right by him. He's right there. He's the first seat at the end of the bench. There are no fans in between him and the players and the coaches. I don't know of any other owner in sports that does that.

I'm not, by the way, I'm not being critical of it necessarily, although I think it could make coaches and players uncomfortable. It could, but I don't know the relationship he has with those people, so maybe they enjoy his presence there. I just know this, that most fans, most Washington football team fans would be irate if Snyder was down there on the sideline, like Arthur Blank or Jerry Jones or some of the others that end up down there at least in the fourth quarter. I don't remember Snyder ever being on a sideline. Do you during a game?

No, but I remember him last year being in the trainer's room, advising his quarterback not to go back on the field. Yeah. I do remember that. I remember his quarterback saying, yeah, Dan told me not to go back. He's the one that gets to call him Dan. Everybody else in the organization, it's a Mr. Snyder. Real quickly about mybooky.orgie.org.

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So if you're going to deposit $200, you'll get an extra $200 in your account to wager with. NBA playoffs every night, NHL playoffs every night, football less than three weeks away, baseball every night, and so many other sporting events that are going, that are going on right now. I didn't even know Tommy that the Indy 500 was yesterday until late in the day. I know. MyBooky.ag. My promo code Kevin D.C. The terms are simple. You bet you win. They pay. Yeah, I mentioned this morning that I was watching the golf and I was watching Clippers Mavericks, which we'll get to in a moment. And I guess it was a commercial break on both of them. So I flipped around channels and I'm like, I see, you know, on the guide that pops up, Indy 500. And I'm thinking,

oh, why are they running the Indy 500 today, like a repeat of it? No, no, no. It was the live Indy 500. I know. I know. I had no idea. None. And Tommy, these events that have been huge dates on the calendar, you know, they've owned their own dates on the calendar, there's so many of these events that are going to get overlooked big time. U.S. Open tennis starts next week. French Open tennis later in September. Kentucky Derby Labor Day weekend. The Preakness early October. You know, the two golf majors, I'm going to know when they are. The U.S. Open in mid-September at Wingfoot and then the Masters in November. And the NFL's already on CBS scheduled around the Masters. They're not going to have any one o'clock games on that particular Sunday. So the Masters will probably start earlier because we will be past. daylight savings time at that point. But there are going to be a lot of these events that you're like, oh my God, that just happened? The pretenance just happened over the weekend, didn't even know it. You're right. Absolutely right. I was caught totally by surprise about the Indy 500 yesterday.

Have you ever been? Let's face it. No, I've never been there. Now, that's diminished at the sporting event overall lifetime. Yes, true. I mean, in the 70s and the 60s, it was, it was, it was, must watch. I mean, whether you cared about auto racing or not, everybody paid attention to the Indy 500. With the growth of NASCAR racing, and with the split, and I think it was in the 70s between IndyCar and CART, that has helped to diminish the importance of IndyCar racing. Man, AJ Foyt, you know, in the 70s and 80s winning all those Indy 500s, it was a memorial. It was a Memorial Day weekend staple.

And I was not a big race car driving guy, but I remember watching that in Indianapolis 500 every year. Have you seen the movie Ford versus Ferrari? Have we talked about this yet? No, I have not, but I heard it's really good. It's really good. I really enjoyed that movie, and it's a true story about this British, you know,

race car driver, Ken Miles, who ended up dying in a car, you know, crash while practicing. but it's he's played by Christian Bale, who is phenomenal in the role. Matt Damon's in the movie. He plays this guy Carol Shelby. I think that's what his name was. I know who Carol Shelby is. Yeah, he was a big automotive designer.

Yeah, and Shelby 500. Okay, so I didn't know who he was. So basically they end up working for Ford. You know, and Henry Ford's like, you know, in the movie, I forget who plays him. but it was such a good movie who's the female in the movie she's gorgeous Ken Miles' wife

Christian Bale's wife in the movie I've seen her in something else and now I can't remember what she was in but anyway that movie's worth watching I mean it's it's on you know HBO a lot these days although you don't get HBO do you? No

yeah of course not okay You and Ted Leonces don't get HBO. You're not going to pay the extra five bucks a month. All right. I wanted to talk about the NBA playoffs. Tommy, this is the deal right now, the NBA playoffs. This is what's really, really entertaining to watch right now.

I don't know what it is about the bubble sites in Orlando. But these games have been phenomenally entertaining. the television product is great. You've got the noise. You've got these, you know, zoomed-in fans, which people are paying for, which is just ridiculous, but whatever. And there is a sense of playoff intensity in these games, and the games are super high scoring. Now, I haven't seen any data on this. I did sort of a back-of-the-envelope thing late last night to look at last year versus this year, and this year's games are much higher scoring. In fact, there hasn't been one winner in the first week that hasn't scored at least 100 points.

Last year, I think there were four, you know, teams that had scored in the 80s or 90s and one games. Yesterday you had 135, 133 in overtime. You had 150 to 122. And then the game last night between the Nuggets and the Jazz that I actually stayed up and watched because it was so good as Jamal Murray and Donovan Mitchell went back and forth. Mitchell ended up with 51 Tommy. Jamal Murray had 50. on 18 of 31 and 9 of 15 from behind the arc. It's the first time in NBA playoff history

that two players have scored in the same game more than 45 points, 50 and 51 in a great entertaining basketball game. But the game of the day, and the best game I've watched since March, since the pandemic started, was Clippers Mavericks yesterday. It was as good of a playoff game as I've watched in several years.

Now, I can't remember specifically every game. You know, the playoffs now are over a year and a half ago, it seems like, that the last playoffs happened. But, oh my God, I know everybody's going nuts over Luca Donchich, and I'll get to him in a moment. A couple of things about that game, if you watched it. First of all, Kauai Leonard was great, as he always is. Paul George was terrible again.

I've been reading. He's been terrible. You know, he designated, he self-annointed himself as playoff P, like playoff Paul. I mean, not a good choice. Here are his, this is actually pretty hard to do what he's done in the last three games. In the last three games, he is 10 for 47 from the field. 10 for 47. From behind the arc, he is four. You could do that.

I could do that. From behind the ark, he's four for 25. I'm convinced I could be better than four for 25 from behind the ark. He's been terrible in these games. And they were the favorite to win it. And I have my first wager since March on the Clippers, a futures wager for them to win the whole thing. They're in a bit of trouble right now if Paul George keeps playing that way. Now, I do think that Kauai Leonard could carry them to a title. I mean, he's been phenomenal. But the game yesterday was crazy. First of all, the Clippers are down 11 with, I don't know, five to go. They come back.

They have the ball, tie game. They get a terrible shot off at the end of regulation. I know what Kawhi Leonard was doing. He didn't want to move to his normal spot because the double would have been coming. So he took the three. The game went to overtime. He missed the three. In overtime, the final possession, 3.7 seconds left after the Clippers.

took a one-point lead. Ball comes into Donchich, and all of you were asking that we're watching it, how is Reggie Jackson guarding Luca Donchich? Why isn't Paul, George, or Kauai Leonard on Luca Donchich? Well, the answer is really simple. Almost every coach, I shouldn't say every coach. Most coaches, at any level, by the way,

have, that know what they're doing, have a rule basically with under five seconds left defensively if you're in man to man. And that is you switch every single screen. Switching screens means if you get screened, you stay with the screener and you let the guy that was guarding the screener switch to your guy.

And the reason... You don't want to leave a guy open. You don't want to leave a guy with less than five seconds to go wide open even for a brief moment. And you don't want somebody, you know, turning the corner on a ball screen where there's at least an opening for him to turn the corner and perhaps get into the paint without enough of a hedge or a switch.

A switch ends it. Switching defensively man-to-man is almost like you're in a zone, right? Because you're guarding a guy, but you're going to guard another guy if it's easier to guard the other guy. Anyway, to make a long story short, most coaches that I know, less than five seconds, and some have it as less than seven or whatever, will switch every single screen in that situation defensively. And that's exactly what Doc Rivers had them doing.

And the first screen, Reggie Jackson is on Tim Hardaway. He gets screened by the big guy, Cleber, and he sticks with Cleaver. Now you've got to mismatch big guy on small guy. Kleber goes and sets the screen for Donchich, Kauai's guarding Donchich. Reggie Jackson switches. He's on Donchich, and Kauai is on Cleber. Now, the problem in that situation, if Jackson stays with Cleber, they can lob the ball into the paint to Cleber who's got a big advantage over Reggie Jackson. So look, there are switches that end up being unfortunate. Jackson ending up on Donchich was unfortunate. He couldn't guard him, and he was on him a couple of times on switches, and the best defensive possessions the Clippers had,

were the ones where Kauai Leonard was on Donchich and really made it difficult for Donchich. Kauai is such a dominant defender. And so it was too bad. Now, they gave up a long three to a guy who statistically is not a great three-point shooter. So I'm sure Doc was thinking if we end up with a bad switch

and Donchich is going to take a three, he's a 32% three-point shooter. He's air-balled two-threes in this game already. We'll live with it. The criticism was overwhelming of Doc Rivers, and I'm just telling you the reason why it ended up being the way it was. And you can say never switch in that situation. Legler and I last night were texting back and forth, Tommy,

afterwards, and Legler said, look, I understand that, you know, I said, I've always, you know, as a youth coach, I've always, you know, coached it to switch final five seconds. And he said, yes, a lot of guys will do that, he said, but in this particular situation, you almost have to think of how the cavaliers beat Golden State. Kyrie Irving had hit that game winner, remember in game seven, to win that series for Cleveland when they forced Curry, Steph Curry, to switch on to Kyrie. rather than having Clay Thompson guard him.

And he said it was the wrong decision. And he said, you've got to fight over, you got to hedgehard, you've got to jam the screener. And there are a lot of things you can do there to try to keep your guy on the guy, but you do take some risk in that situation. That situation, by the way, was different because it wasn't an under, there was a full possession leading up to the Kyrie Irving game winner. Anyway, to make a long story short, that's why Donchich ended up with Reggie Jackson on him. and he knocked down the three.

And by the way, he's not a good three-point shooter percentage-wise, but he's got a good stroke. Like if you watch Donchich, he can shoot the three. He's going to be in his career a better three-point shooter percentage-wise than he's been in his first two years, and he's about 32% from behind the arc. He's going to end up being better than that. I don't know why he's such an average free-throw shooter. He's shooting 69% in this series.

He's got a good enough stroke to be a much better free-throw shooter. But the game was really an incredible basketball game, but the big conversation coming out of it is that those that, you know, settled in yesterday maybe to watch their first NBA playoff game because it was a Sunday afternoon, national television, you know, and they watched Luca Donchich play, and maybe they don't know who he is. He is the next big thing. He's the next superstar. There are lots of them in the game. Don't get me wrong. He's a bit unique. He's got a very interesting style the way he plays. People want to say he's the next Larry Bird. I think that's because he's white.

Because Luke Donchich, actually, there are things he does that are similar to Bird, Tommy, but Bird, Bird was a forward. Donchich plays a lot of point guard. Donchich has the ball in his hands a lot more than Bird ever did. What he is to me, is, first of all, outrageously high IQ. Great feel for the game, spacing, vision, patience. For a 21-year-old, it's incredible.

He's got, like, Kauai's patience, Hardin's patience. He plays a little bit like Hardin does, but he also plays a little bit like Magic did. Like, he's more magic than Bird, except that he's a much better score than Magic was. Yeah, he's a future MVP. I know we get carried away with what you saw yesterday, but he's a future MVP talent.

He is. You saw what Bob Ryan tweeted, didn't you? Bob Ryan, the Boston sports writer? Yeah. No. Bob Ryan tweeted, I've seen every great player of the last 60 years. Luca Donchis takes my breath away. That's a bit much.

Yeah. Because, you know, what you're seeing in this bubble in particular is just some of the most outrageous offensive performances we've seen. Last night's game, to watch Jamal Murray and Donovan Mitchell do what they did against each other. It was incredible. Mitchell came down, Jamal Murray came down on multiple possessions. The only player to touch the ball, he's getting one screen and he's launching a three. And he was so hot, Tommy. I mean, he was so ridiculously hot. He got him back into that game single-handedly for the most part. and then to watch Donovan Mitchell go for 51. You know, Mitchell, game one of this series, Mitchell had 57. He's got two games in a playoff series with more than 50 points. Did Jordan ever do that? I don't know if he did or didn't. But he's averaging 39 and a half a game in the postseason, and that's only because he had a game where he only scored 20,

and the reason he only had 20 is he only played 28 minutes because they blew Denver out. that was game that was game three on Friday night it's Donchich is really good to me I'll probably change this at some point

but he's got a lot of Hardin in him in the way he it's really hard to stop him from getting to the rim now he's not the three-point shooter that Hardin is but I think he could be at some point but he's bigger and stronger than you think he's actually bigger than Hardin, but Hardin's strong, you know, and has a big body and uses his body so well. He's got a lot of magic vision in him. He just makes everybody better, too.

He hit 43.17 rebounds and 13 assists, Tommy, is a 21-year-old in the postseason. I mean, I know it's not. I tell you what, it's done. It's got me interested in watching the rest of the series. This is by far and away the most entertaining series. The game Friday night was great. That was a great game. Game two. Now, Donchich also was playing on a bad ankle.

He got hurt Friday night and had to sit out most of that game. The Clippers won that game to take a 2-1 series lead. Clippers, by the way, yesterday had a 21-point lead in the first half and blew it. And then we're down 11 late and forced overtime. It was like the ebb and flow of the game was crazy. But here's the one thing about Donchich. that I don't love. He is a chirper. He is talking all the time. He is complaining and whining about calls all game long. I mean, it's been a bit much watching him in the postseason with the

constant, you know, officiating complaints. I mean, he's on the officials from the jump and then he's chirping back and forth with other players. That led to the whole Mantras Herald thing the other night where Mantras Harrell referred to him as a bitch-ass white boy, which was, I'm just going to tell you real quickly because I spent time and I took calls on this segment this morning. Harold's backtracking after they got into a little bit of a confrontation, and he calls Donchich, and you can hear him see it, and if you watch the video, calls him a bitch-ass white boy. And, of course, everybody's going nuts about, oh, can you imagine if Luca called Mantras Harrell, bitch-ass black boy. Well, my

answer to that, Tommy, when I first heard it, was not everything in life has a reverse racist comparable. Those are not comparable in any way, shape, and form. If Luca, you're right, if Luca called him

a bitch-ass black boy, he would have been suspended for the rest of the playoffs. He'd be a social pariah right now. But that's because there's context in history to black boy. There isn't two bitch-ass white boy. And I've been on a basketball court enough both competitively, you know, not at a high level, okay, high school level, and lots in many, many pickup games.

When I heard that that was said, I thought it was, I didn't see that that Harold was mad and angry because they had gotten into confrontation. I thought originally that it may have been a compliment because I can tell you this, there have been many times. on a pickup basketball court where somebody said, you better check that white boy because he can shoot. Or you better, or, you know, white boy just walked out here. He's the shooter. Or whatever it is. And anybody that's played sports, played hoops,

I think understands the difference between the two. And that not everything has this opposite, you know, reversed racial comparable. They're just not comparable. comparable. Mantras Harrell apologized for it. He should not be suspended for it. He shouldn't be fined. Lukashic is a basketball player. He totally shrugged it off as if it was no big deal and accepted Harold's apology. What do you think? I agree. I agree with you. I mean, it's, again, if you think, if you think that, you know, that racism for you as a white man is, the same thing for racism for a black man, switch rolls sometimes.

Switch rolls sometimes and see if it's equal. It's not. It's far from it. And it's absurd to think that this would be considered would have the same impact as if it was the other way around. It's ridiculous. Totally ridiculous, I think. But, you know, it's funny because I think a lot of people that don't, you know,

especially in this environment, you know, and people who maybe haven't, you know, been in that kind of an environment before, are absolutely just mortified and angry that Harold hasn't been suspended and going to the whole, you know, reversed racist, you know, discussion. And what would have happened to Donchich had he said, you know, something similar? Well, it's, you know, they're really not similar. Neither one of them would be similar. No.

All right. What else do we have today? Well, I wanted to talk a little bit about my week at the beach. Okay. I want to hear about that. Can I do one more quick, quick sponsor? We're getting a lot of sponsors, which is good. Which is good.

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but you're just going to have to bear with me because I didn't think I, it didn't hit me until I was at the beach. What about manscaped and the need that you have for? Listen, listen, I'm like Blue Roll. I'm a natural man. Yeah. Okay. Euro-natural.

Yeah. So it hit me at the beach that this is a different world than what I've been living. Yeah. It's a totally different world. How so? Well, I mean, we're on the beach. I'm not wearing a mask. Nobody really around me is wearing a mess.

It's a huge beach. Like I've said before. I mean, it might be three city blocks wide, wildwood crest. So we had no problem social distancing from each other. But, you know, I've read article after article about how safe the beaches. And with the breeze blowing off the ocean, there were beautiful weather, 80 degrees and sunny almost every day with a nice ocean breeze. And it was normal. It was a normal life.

and, you know, it just was different than what I've been living since March. And it seemed like I was on another planet almost. Oh, so your life in New Jersey at the beach has made you realize how abnormal your life is at home? Yes. Yes, it has. So until this thing is over, we're spending a couple of days every month at a beach. That's a good. Every month.

That's a good idea. God, that's such a good idea. We're going to Rojobos in September. We may be going to Virginia Beach in October. We're going to North Carolina in November. I love being at the beach. Well, so I didn't realize how much until this week. I mean, so we're getting beach days in every month from now on until this thing is back to normal.

I need that now. That's a good idea. It's a good idea. You know, and I'm not putting you into this category, so just bear with me. But I think that for older people, this has been an incredible, we've heard about, you know, the depression, the increase in depression in younger people. But I think about the older people who are living much more in fear and with more anxiety than younger people. because as you said day one, this thing's gunning for me. And I don't even put you necessarily into that much older category,

but this is if you're living as an older person with a spouse or by yourself, it's really got to be depressing, especially if you're by yourself, because your family can't really come to see you. And you have anxiety, many of those people have anxiety about their families coming to see them. It's a difficult time. I mean, I know that my mother and her husband, husband are, you know, certainly have underlying conditions that make them vulnerable. And I know that they're living more in fear than, than most younger people. And it's understandable. I saw a friend

of mine who had said that his father basically, you know, has had, he's diabetic, he's got other issues. And he has not left his house since March. And he doesn't even like to take walks. And my, my buddy told me, he said, he's lost so much weight. And I said, well, what's the issue with the weight loss? Isn't he eating? And he said, he's totally eating, but it's definitely an anxiety influenced weight loss. Like, you know, he could see it. I think there's a lot of older people going through that right now.

I think there really are. You know, again, we don't really know what the truth is. Everybody's guessing sometimes. But everything I've read, there's a big difference between outside and inside. Yeah. A big difference between ventilation and non-ventilation. You know, and I've come to grips with that, and I'm very comfortable with that. And nowhere, are you better ventilated than sitting on a beach with an ocean breeze blowing in.

Oh, pleasant. So, you know, this is the kind. I know not everybody can do it, but if you can do it, if you can figure out a way to do it, it's worth the investment. it'll make you realize that it'll just be like a shot of adrenaline. It really will. I think it's a good idea. And it'll get you out of what has been for some. Now, I've managed to cope with it okay because it doesn't take much to amuse me.

You know, I just found out that the Peacock Network, that the New NBC Streaming Channel has every Rockford file. episode on it. Does it? Oh, my God. Yeah, that's where the office is moving from Netflix to that new NBC thing, right? I'm pretty sure it is. Yeah. All right.

We've gone long enough today. We've gone pretty long today. Go enjoy the beach. Tomorrow, J.P. Finley will be my guest on this show. We'll talk a lot about the football team. Tommy will be back. I don't know, whenever you feel like, either Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, whatever works for you. Okay, boss.

All right, see you. All right. Have a great day, everybody. Stay safe.