The Kevin Sheehan Show - Rocket Screen

Episode Date: February 16, 2021

Kevin and Thom somehow opened the show telling Joe Theismann's version of the infamous "Rocket Screen" play in Super Bowl 18. The rest of the show includes Thom's thoughts on the Jay Gruden podcast, the Wizards, the Nats, and a lot more.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You don't want it. You don't need it. But you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Cheon Show. Here's Kevin. All right, Tommy's here today. Tommy just tweeted out, Happy Birthday, Jack Squirich.

Do you just check, like, sports birthdays every day, and then if it's somebody that you know, you'll tweet something out or like something? What do you do? I'm friends with Jack Squirich on Facebook. Oh, really? Oh, this is going to turn into a Facebook thing again? And so, you know, Facebook tells you every day which one of your friends has birthday.

Right. So I noticed that it was his birthday. So I thought, you know, he holds a special place in the hearts of Washington fans. I thought I thought people want to wish him a happy birthday. You know, my favorite story about Rocket Screen, for those of you who don't know who Jack Squire kids, right before the end of the first half of Super Bowl 18, Redskins versus Raiders, Thysman threw a screen pass that got picked off by Jack Squirek, returned for a touchdown, and it went from 14 to 3, I believe, to 21 to 3.

I think that was the score at the time, 14-3 to 21-3, pretty much game over at that point. on a play. And Joe told, I'm pretty sure that he told the two of us this story together when we were doing the radio show. And he had not told the story this way before. And he told the story, he said, see, what happened was earlier in the year that year, Washington played the L.A. Raiders in a regular season game. and it was truly one of the great regular season games in Washington football team history. They were down 35 to 20 late in the game. Understand no two-point conversion back then. They scored, they kicked an on-sides kick, they scored again, down 35-30.

Thysman threw a touchdown pass to Joe Washington. They won the game 37 to 35, beating the Raiders in a classic regular season game. By the way, that game's on YouTube. Thysman threw for well over 400 yards, Tommy. You can look it up. The big difference in that game for the Raiders is that Marcus Allen did not play, and they had not yet traded for Michael Haynes, the Hall of Fame corner who was playing for the Patriots, and they ended up making a trade deadline move to acquire Michael Haynes, which put him side by side with Lester Hayes to create quite the cornerback tandem. Anyway, in that game on a play, I don't remember where in the game it was. They ran rocket screen to Joe Washington.

And it was a screen pass. They called it rocket screen, whatever. And Joe Washington went like 75 yards with it, something like that. And it was a big play for Washington in the game. So fast forward to the Super Bowl, and Thaisman tells us the story, of half. They're down 14 to 3 in a position to just run out the clock and get to the locker

room and they get the ball to start the second half of the Super Bowl. And Gibbs calls, you know, 477, 16, 15 rocket screen, whatever it was. And Thysman looks over at him and says, Coach, Joe, we ran this. We ran this in the last game. They're going to know it's coming. bad idea, let's get to halftime. And Joe Gibbs looked at Joe Thysman, as Thysman told us the story, and said, run it. And Thysman said, okay.

And he ran it all right. And it was picked off touchdown, uh, 213 at halftime game over. Jack Squirex famous rocket screen interception. I'm looking at the play-by-play. 12 seconds were left in the half. 12 seconds. Washington had the ball, Tommy,

first down and 10 from their own 12-yard line with 12 seconds left in the half. This is a take-a-knee situation. Now, back then, did they take knees, or did they just maybe have the quarterback take a quarterback sneak? Whatever it was, it was not the time to throw a screen pass. Well, remember, no, you're absolutely right. and they did take knees because this was a few years after the miracle in the Meadowland.

I know that. When Pistarchic didn't take a knee and tried to hand it off to Larry Zonka. So, yeah, people took, I mean, it may have not been as prevalent, but people took knees at that point, you know, in 1982 for the Super Bowl, 83 for the Super Bowl. I think they didn't take knees, but they would take the ball after the Pissarchic play, the miracle in the Meadowlands, and the quarterback. would take it, move back a little bit, and then fall down. Like there wasn't the knee and then all of a sudden the play gets whistled dead.

I don't think that that had come into play. I could be wrong about that. But anyway, Thysman blames it all on Gibbs. Thysman says he had the genius idea to just take it into halftime and not run this play, but Gibbs looked at him and very firmly said, run it. And they ran it, all right. And, you know, the opening drive of the second half, Washington goes right down the field, scores a touchdown. And so if they had done that at 14 to 3, it would have been 14, although they missed the extra point.

It would have been 14 to 10, 14 to 9, and they would have been right back in the game. Yeah, I mean, basically, when Disman tried to talk Joe out of it, Kib said it worked against him the last time. It'll work now. Yeah. Yeah, it was, God, man, those Raiders, I don't know if I've ever told you this. I mean, obviously, I didn't have a second favorite team. I was not one of those kinds of people. I had a favorite team and that was it.

But God, I loved the Raiders of the 80s when they were in L.A., really. Because Michael Haynes, remember you and I have interviewed him a couple of times at Super Bowls. He is probably one of my top five to ten favorite NFL players of all time. I think in my lifetime of watching the NFL that Mike Haynes is the greatest cornerback that I've ever watched play. They were so physical defensively with him and Hayes and Howie Long and Matt Millen and Rod Martin. And then offensively, those teams were weird because they didn't, I mean, they had Plunkett who could throw a deep ball, which is what Al Davis always wanted. But they really were more of a running team

with Marcus Allen and Kenny King and guys like that, even though they still had Cliff Branch who torched the Redskins in that Super Bowl. But anyway, thanks for bringing that back for a memory. I'm happy to do that. So, buddy,

I listened to your big podcast over the weekend. Oh, you did? Yeah, the Jay Gruden podcast. I listened to it this morning. Did you like it? Good work. Yes, I did. I don't think in the last year or two that podcast-wise, we've had a bigger response to one show. I'm not talking about downloads because it was weird. A lot of the shows on Mondays during this season, the recap shows have done very well.

But that show created more social media response than I've seen of any shows that we've done in a long time. And look, I really enjoyed it. I thought Jay was great. And I do, and I'm being totally honest when I say, I think Jay Gruden would be very good as a broadcaster doing NFL games, studio or on a game. I think that he's got some personality. He knows the game. And I think that, you know, he's pretty direct.

I don't think, you know, I don't think he's afraid. Well, obviously, he's on a campaign tour for one of those jobs, isn't he? Well, I don't know if he, yes, I think that he is open to doing more. Well, let me answer the question. I think he's open to doing more media because he wants to get into broadcasting. But let's be honest. Yes. His brother, you know, his brother was one of the most successful, you know, modern day, Monday night,

analysts. It's not like Jay can't get introduced to the right people to get an audition to see if he can do this or not. It's not like he's coming on podcasts so that, you know, executives at Fox or CBS will think about giving them an audition. Yeah, but if Jay is savvy enough to know that, you know, keeping your name out there keeps you in the public consciousness, especially with some network bozos in a room somewhere, it's a good thing. Oh, this is a campaign tour to get the booth.

I'm not criticizing them for it. I think it's smart. And you don't know the dynamic between Jay and his brother. I mean, do you go to your brother for help? No, but my brother's much younger. Not that that really should matter. I mean, there's some brothers that would never dream of approaching their brother for help. That's true.

So you don't know the dynamic between Jay and John, but he was good. I think he'd be, I enjoy listening to Jay in the booth because he was blunt to a fault when he was a coach. So I imagine as a broadcaster, he'd be even better. Yeah, I mean, but back to the brother relationship, regardless of, the relationship. Jay, my best guess would be, Jay will not have a difficult time getting an audition to be a broadcaster. What is the point of pushing back on this? Why do you think he's doing these interviews? I don't think he's doing them to get an audition to be on the air. I think, well, first of all, when you say he's doing these interviews, I know he did Ben's podcast. What else has he done?

Well, he's done yours. Right. Why? I called him and asked him. And he said yes. Okay. I mean, he didn't have a, he did not put out a press release, you know, promoting a book, or he didn't have his agent or his publicist call me to say, hey, I've got Jay Gruden for you if you want him.

I don't get you. I mean, it's so obvious that he's doing this, so he gets a job. Is he doing it to audition? not necessarily, but he is putting himself out there publicly so he'll be able to get a public job. I think that there's probably some truth to it, but my point to you isn't that he's not more open to talking from a media standpoint because, you know, he's keeping his name out there. My point is, is he doesn't need it to get a job if he's good. He'll get an opportunity if somebody thinks he's good. Oh, okay.

So that's how it works in the broadcasting business. Yeah, with ex-cote. You're quite a network executive, aren't you? Do you know anybody else who would like to work in network TV who's pretty good and doesn't have a job? Do I know anybody else who would like to work in network TV who doesn't have a job? Who are you referring to? Do you have somebody in mind? I don't.

I'm just wondering. I don't. Oh, okay. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I can't think of anybody. Coolies doesn't want to be in network television. Okay. He doesn't want to, he is no interest. He's turned down opportunities. He did Fox games. They offered him a package two years ago when he turned it down. No, I don't know why you're making such a, I don't know why you're making such a big deal out of this. Because you're pushing back on it. It was a simple thing. Yes, you were. I'm not. I'm just telling you that he doesn't need to do my podcast to get an audition to do games on Fox.

That's all. I know that. It's not like he's trying to raise his profile so people know who he is. I mean, it's not like he's trying to get in the Hall of Fame by keeping himself out there in the media. He's not going to be a Hall of Fame coach. That's all. I do I think that he doesn't mind doing media now

now that he's not coaching and you know he'd like to say some things that he'd like to get some you know do these things for maybe maybe just to get used to doing them okay but I don't think he's like God if I start doing more media maybe I can be an analyst on one of these games

I think that he's probably I didn't ask him this my guess is he's either had an audition or will get an audition for, to be a game analyst somewhere. If he's had an audition and there's more social media activity about what a great interview Jake Rudin did, it's going to help him. Okay. So, so I helped him. I'm not denigrating you or him.

I didn't say you were. I'm just playing out that was probably, he didn't wake up and say, I have to start a campaign. to do more interviews. Right. But he probably said it wouldn't hurt me to do more interviews since I want to be a broadcaster. So, you know what I did do? I did, I was having a conversation with Scott.

And I said to him, and this will sort of prove your point. I said to him, you know, you should have Jay Gruden on the air. Because he's actually really good. Like with free agency coming up, you should have him on your show. because I think he's going to be really good at this. And I think he wants to do it. And he's like, Jay Gruden, who the Redskins coach, the Skins coach? I'm like, yeah.

And he's like, and he said, why is he good? And so we talked about it for a while. So, you know, not that Jay would have known that I could help him in that way. Not that I really can. I mean, but Scott will listen to my suggestions. He's listened to them before when I think people will be good. So there you go. So you're the driving force behind Scott Van Pelt's career, in other words.

No, I didn't say that, did I? Oh, I thought that's what I heard. I know that's what you heard, but that's not what I said. What I said was that as one of my lifelong closest friends, I will occasionally say, you should have this guy on or you should think about doing it. He will listen to my suggestions and has over the years. he would tell you that. I don't need to tell you that. Okay. So you're an advisor.

I'm unpaid. Okay. Is Jay one of your clients now? What is your problem? What is, what are you doing here? Did you like the interview or not? Yes, I did. It's really hard for you to compliment people when they do things. I said right from the start, I thought you did a really good job. I thought it was good. Yeah, okay. Good.

And it was very good. Right. I thought you covered a lot of ground and you listened to what he said and followed up on. I thought it was good. Yeah, well, I had a good subject. He was actually, he was willing to tell some of those stories, which still my favorite of all the stories is the Pierre Garcone at the end of the first half against the Eagles. That's my favorite. I listen to, I never, I rarely go back and listen to.

shows. I don't think you do either. I forget if you do or not. No, I know. Like people once said to me about my books, you know, they wrote it out a mistake in a book. I said, I wrote it. I don't read them. Right. And so prior to my radio show this morning, I did sort of go back and listen to it because I wanted to play a couple of clips on the radio show. And him talking about Pierre and Deshaun at the end of the half was priceless. But it also... It was very good. But it's also sort of a reflection of the kind of coach Jay was, right?

Because there are people that would have said, Pierre, you know what? You're done. That was the last time you'll ever play a play for me again. Because it was basically insubordination on the field, in the middle of the biggest game of the year. I did go back and look... I'm not doing this.

Yeah. And I went back and looked at the play because it's on the NFL game pass. He doesn't move. He doesn't move. Now, to be more critical than Jay was of Kirk Cousins, and it's so hard for me to ever be critical of Cousins, cousins, cousins, cousins panicked. I mean, either that or he thought they had a time out left, which he was incorrect about. They did not, because I think he broke the huddle knowing that Pierre was going to refuse to run the route. And so he spiked it pretty quickly and then realized, oh, shit, we don't have any timeouts left.

And then tried to pick it up and start moving around with it. And they tackled him in the half-ended. That's one of those where if they had lost the game by three points or it would have been, oh, my God. But they blew out Philadelphia. They won the game going away easily. Yeah, he didn't have great presence. presence of the moment in that play. I'm sure he was flustered because his receivers were, you know,

balking probably in the huddle of that doing it. Now here's an interesting thing, and you can only be who you are. You can't be who you're not. There aren't there quarterbacks, do you think, that Garcone and Jackson would never do that, too? Well, I mean, Pierre wouldn't do it to Peyton Manning, who he played with. Right. Yeah. Right.

So, of course. I mean, and you can only be who you are. I mean, but there are certain quarterbacks in a huddle that command such a presence that would have basically shoved the fight down their throats and said, get off the field. I agree with that. And that's never been cousins. No, it's never been. Again, I'm not faulting him for being who he is.

Yeah, no, no, no, I'm with you. He is like he's always called himself, process-driven. So part of the process is you call the play in the huddle and you expect the other 10 players to run the play. You basically, you're not expecting an uprising, an insurrection, if we're going to use the word de jour. We're not expecting a rebellion. It's just funny because at the same time,

while I agree with you what you said about Kirk, I would also say Jay's not the coach to make somebody pay for that kind of behavior either. No, he's not. Which is why he had a good relationship with Deshawn. And Deshawn could go to him and say, well, blocking that safety isn't actually in the game plan this week. Is he coach? No, we'll put Ryan Grant in there for that play. Yeah, I mean, Deshawn could go to him and hint,

him in his breath. Yeah. And figure he'd get away with it. Right. You know, one thing, my favorite part about the podcast, I thought the most interesting, and not that we didn't necessarily know it, but you and I had both felt this. And the fact that Jay felt so strongly about, I think, was interesting was he thought that once it was obvious that they weren't signing Kirk that he needed to be traded.

Yeah, well, that was my position at the time. Right. And I was a big cousin's fan, and I was begging them. I'm like, you can't, you have to trade him. When it came out what they offered him, which, you know, one of my favorite stories about this, and I don't think Cooley will have a problem with me sharing this story, because I think he's done it with me on the podcast. Cooley was telling Bruce Allen during this whole time, he's going to get 75, 80 million

something north of that when this season is over. And Bruce laughed at him. and Bruce said, you're out of your mind. He's not going to get that much money. And so the net of it was Bruce and Washington offered Kirk basically $53 million guaranteed. And when Kirk turned it down because his agent knew that he was going to get much bigger offers at the end of the year, that's when Bruce held that press conference and just threw him under the bus for essentially, you know, it's his fault that he doesn't want to be here. And Jay did say he didn't think Kirk was coming. back anyway. My point all along was, well, you never had the chance to truly find out because you never made them a bona fide offer. They didn't in 2015. This is the argument I've gotten into with many of you who are listening. You all say, well, he wasn't coming back. So you might be right. And there is a thought I have that when Sean McVeigh left, he was done. He didn't want to play for this organization anymore. And he wanted to move on to a more competent organization

to continue his career, which let's be honest, nobody could fault. You know, you may fault it because it's Kirk, but if it were another player that said, I want to go to a real organization and even if they went for less money. But he was being asked to stay in an organization that he didn't want to be in for a lot less money, like $30 million less than what Minnesota gave him. Minnesota gave him $84 million guaranteed nine months later, and the Jets offered him over $90 million in guaranteed money. So they never offered him something that he could accept. There's no agent given his situation that was ever going to tell him to,

take that low ball offer, which it was. And that's exactly what they did after the 2015 season. And Jay sort of referred to that when he said, Scott sort of thought they could get him for a low ball offer. So they lowball them in 2015. Then they super lowballed them in 2016. And then after he didn't take that, they publicly threw him under the bus with the team president in a press conference about that.

And so at that moment, Tommy, my position was very clear. trade him now you can get a first rounder for him and maybe more trade him now and jay felt the same way and as jay said there were multiple teams that were going to give up a lot for him um and samper go ahead yeah no go ahead i mean i just thought that was one of the one of the most revealing parts in how that front office functioned is that the head coach wanted to trade the starting quarterback and they wouldn't do it. Right. Well, he did.

That's pretty stunning. Yes. Well, and what's really, and at the same time, he's not, he made it very clear that it's not because he didn't want Kirk, but because he didn't think Kirk wanted to be there. So let's get something for him. Right.

And that was the one he was to have, their moat, they had value. They had something to trade. Huge. Huge value. Kyle would have traded. Kyle, the stories are, and I've talked to people very close to the situation, they would have given up their first rounder, and if they had to, it would have been that number two pick overall. They would have done that. That's how much Kyle wanted cousins in San Francisco.

And yeah, I think that, I think, and if you haven't listened to it, go back and listen to it, it's actually really helping the number of people that have listened to it. and so I appreciate that and I appreciate the feedback as I mentioned yesterday. But I think the overall instructive part of it, not that this was a revelation at all, is to your point over the years, even when I would say to you, well, he's not as involved as he used to be. And you'd say, well, he doesn't need to be as involved as he used to be to be destructive. And that's just what he was. he was involved less on a day-to-day basis, the owner, but he got involved in enough things to be super destructive,

whether it was the Robert Griffin, the third situation, where he picked him over not just a coach, but a coaching staff of future Super Bowl participating head coaches. He gets involved in, have I ever lost a guy on money? He told Jay, well, not only did he lose, a guy on money, he didn't take anybody's advice to trade him once he lost on money. And then the Haskins thing, really, I thought, was, you know, it's not that we didn't know, but some of the, like Jay's saying six months prior, you know, and you can, look, he had it in his mind. This is who they

were going to take. So it didn't matter all of the work everybody else was doing. And I think I asked, Jake, couldn't somebody go to him and just say you're wrong? And he said, no, you just didn't do that. And that's the damage that he's caused over 21 years. And it's also the risk moving forward, even in the situation that they're in with Ron Rivera right now, because we don't know that he's learned his lessons, plural. We don't know that. You know, we hope that he has. No, but as long as Ron Rivera keeps hiring guys who owe their jobs to Ron Rivera. What we've never seen is the owner standing alone. He's either had Vinny or Bruce Allen by his side.

We've never seen the owner stand alone and fight a fight by himself against the football people. Do you really think he can't fight the fight by himself if he wanted to? I think he's a bully, so I think if he's a bully. So I think if he's a bully, he can be intimidated. I love that, by the way. It's so true. What a life lesson for any young people living out there. They're the kinds of people that are absolutely the first to back down more often than not.

Absolutely. Two other things about the podcast real quick. One, and again, these are kind of things we suspected, we assumed, but to hear it from Jay, it really shows the wreck of an organization that Jay didn't know about the Alex Smith trade until it happened. Yeah. Well, nor did Doug Williams, remember? I know, but the head coach didn't know that they were trading for a frontline quarterback and the fact that Jay revealed what didn't get a lot of play, but I'm sure it's probably correct, that they would have gotten Alex Smith for nothing.

Yeah, I did go back and do a little bit of research on that. I'm not sure that that's entirely accurate. You know, he painted the picture of Andy Reed, you know, one-upping the skins once again. He did it with Donovan McNabb, obviously, and getting a third and Kendall Fuller for Alex Smith, who was not going to be their starter, and he couldn't afford for him to be the backup to Patrick Mahomes,

was quite the haul. I don't know Tommy that they would have released him because I'm not sure Washington would have been the only team. But Jay's point, it's actually a very relevant point right now as it is with Marcus Marriota, and I'll explain in a moment. But the point that he's making is Kansas City couldn't keep Alex as a backup at that kind of money. So it was going to be, they were moving on from Alex.

He had done his job of mentoring Patrick Mahomes. They knew what they had in Mahomes, and Mahomes was going to be the starter. And so they were moving on from Alex Smith. So knowing that and knowing the number that he was going to be against the cap, it would have forced the chiefs eventually if they couldn't trade him to release him. So Jay's right about that. The question is, if there's more than one team interested, well, then you do all have to trade for that player because you're not guaranteed to sign him once he's released.

Now you've got competition. There's no guarantee that he would pick Washington of all places to play. That's right. That is a good point. And it's sort of the situation. Yeah, I want to hear the other things that you said. Go ahead about Mariotta. Yeah, so Marietta's contract is $10 million for a backup quarterback.

The Raiders have a terrible cap situation. You know, Marietta potentially is going to be released at some point by the Raiders in this offseason. So how many teams are going to be interested from Marieto will determine whether or not the Raiders can trade him for something or if a team like Washington or another will just allow him to get released and then go after him that way? Not to mention the fact that this is his upcoming last year of his deal. So, you know, it's, and if he starts, it's worth 20 million. So if you release him, you know, there's a chance of signing, restructuring the whole thing. But anyway, go ahead. I thought that that was interesting too in that in that Jay you know of the of the triumvirate of

Snyder Allen and Jay and if you want to throw Doug in there Doug also as a former Super Bowl MVP quarterback the two guys who by the way both were quarterbacks and who knew quarterbacks in new offense they didn't consult either one of them because remember Doug said he didn't know about it I can remember in the post-Alex Smith Press conference doing one-on-one's like interviews with Jay and groups of reporters. And you could tell that, you know, he wasn't on board with this. No. I mean, he wasn't happy with it, the way things developed. I mean, it's very difficult for him to mask his true feelings.

So we all kind of assumed that, you know, Jay wasn't a big fan of this move. By the way, he handled himself after the press conference. And it turns out that that was true. So I thought that was just stunning that your head coach had no idea that they were about the trade for starting quarterback. That's just unbelievable. Well, Andy, for all we know, Tommy, Andy Reid told Bruce Allen, hey, I got Alex Smith. I need a third and Kendall Fuller for him. Do not share this with anybody, including your own people.

I'll make this deal with you real quickly, but you can't share this with Doug or Jay. I mean, he had already gotten Bruce once with McNabb. Yes. Man, the skins with Under Snyder, whether it was Snyder and Vinny or Snyder and Bruce on trades, they were true marks, weren't they? They were.

They absolutely were, and they thought they were geniuses, I'm sure. Oh, of course. Every time. I'm sure they thought they had the winning hand in every deal that they made. They got over on the other guys. Now, the one other thing about the podcast that I was curious about, I would have liked it, here's something I would have liked to have known more about. The relationship between Jay and Scott McLuhan.

Yeah, me too. And I know you only got a limited amount of time, and you don't want to abuse the generosity of a guy given it. It was an hour in 25 minutes. I always recognize that. I had that written down as a topic and I didn't get to it. But you're right, I was interested to because I don't think he likes Scott. No, I don't think so either.

But I think when Jay kind of like just kind of glossed over, the idea that everybody saw that Robert couldn't be the starter and that Kirk needed to be picked when he did pick Kirk? I mean, we've all heard this story about Scott McLuhan and a five-hour meeting with the owner having to convince him that Kirk needed to be the starter. I'm wondering if that is actually true or not. That's not the story I've heard.

The story I heard is that Bruce and Scott, and Jay all needed to convince the owner that it was the right thing to do. And that Scott was the new fair-haired boy at that point, and there was a level of trust that the owner had in Scott, and that he was somewhat integral to pulling that conversation off. You're right. I would have, I mean, I think I got into how hard was it to convince the owner, and he said, you know, he said it wasn't. It was so obvious to everybody. And I said, so the owner never pushed back on that. And he said, not at all. Now, that's contrary to what we heard that he had to be convinced. Right. True. Maybe, yeah. He also, I do not, and I didn't, you know, there's a bunch if, you know, and we had a long time. It's not like I didn't have enough time. He was so generous with it. But I know. I think the RG3,

thing to him knowing when he couldn't complete a pass in that Richmond against the Patriots, you know, in seven-on-sevons, that it was going to be a problem. I will tell you that a couple of the questions that I asked in relation to Colt McCoy were very much with sort of you in mind. And not that I needed your feelings about how he felt about Colt McCoy, because I think we all knew that. but I remember when Colt beat Dallas and Robert was scheduled to come back to next week

and I remember the two of us saying he does not want to start RG3 against the Vikings he wants to keep going with this Colt thing and he said he did but he said he qualified it yeah that first year was trying to find out if there was anything with Griffin

but he knew at that point that there wasn't yeah but that yeah I mean a guy like Jay I mean, that Patriots training camp, that could be a 30 for 30. I'll never forget the Houston when the Texans came. Remember when there was that brawl? The Texans came and that was the next year, right? The next year?

I forget. I think it was. I thought it was the Texans year. Anyway, he great. Griffin was completing passes in seven-on-sevons where basically there was no, I'm sorry, in the mock seven-on-sevons with no defense and was doing that thing with his arm when he completes a pass and he shakes the arm like, whoa, yeah. And Brian Mitchell gets on the air that afternoon because I'm driving back.

My show's over, and I've done what I've needed to do when it was a Friday. And Brian, I'll never forget Brian and Doc saying, this ain't going to. to work. Like, this dude thinks that he's completing basically passes against no defense looking like he just won the Super Bowl. And they're like, does he understand what this drill is? And, man, there was a lot. At that point, the Houston year, there was so much from the players and the staff.

And Snyder had to know at that point. this just, no one wanted him. No one thought he could do it. No, there wasn't one believer. The Patriots one to me is more stunning. I just remember the entire topic of conversation among the Patriots media was how bad the coaches thought Robert Griffin the third was. Yeah.

How horrible, how stunned they were at how bad he was. And Jay, you know, Jay said it too, Tommy. It's the same thing Mike said all the time. Robert wanted to be Aaron Rogers and Tom Brady long before he was ready to even try to be those guys. He had so much to learn. And he didn't think he had anything to learn. That was the problem. He thought he had it all figured out.

You know, I've told you before, like with Mike and Kyle, they would say Robert's favorite, thing was I got it, I got it, I got it. And after, you know, a couple of months, they realized he didn't have anything. Like he just wasn't able to take it in and then translate it on the field because he thought he was already there. He was Robert Griffin III, man. He was a star. He was the Heisman trophy winner. He had never been coached before. He had never been told that he wasn't good at something and that he needed to improve at something. And he was very dead. difficult apparently to convince that he wasn't that kind of quarterback yet. And I've said this so many times, and maybe I'm wrong about this.

God, he had the perfect head coach and coaching staff to coach him into being, you know, potentially more of a traditional, you know, quarterback. Even if it was more of a bootleg play action, zone run, Shanahan style, Jimmy Garoppolo, you know, whatever, you know, even if it was that, he was with the staff and he ran them off with the owner, ran off his best chance to potentially have a longer and more productive career. You know, because he could throw it. he could throw it and he could run and

but it just it's really amazing I think that all of these conversations are always interesting because they are the past but they're so revealing because the guy that caused all the damage is still

the owner and so it's it's the learning from history and trying not to allow him to repeat it. Yeah, and, I mean, the most frightening part is how long that history has gone on. And how completely unaware, lacking in self-awareness he is as to his role in, you know, winning one playoff game in 20 years.

You know, it's not. I mean, one of the things about reflecting back on the passing of Marty Schottenheimer and what he did in one year was, that we really had no idea what everybody was in for with Snyder. That was early Snyder. And while, you know, his fingerprints were all over to 2000 team, and we had glimpses of Snyder, nobody thought you were looking at somebody who 20 years later would be making almost the same mistakes.

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, you know, you're sorry. supposed to learn from your mistakes and grow from them. But when you are, look, we've said this a million times and we're beating a dead horse, but the combination of not being overly brilliant with arrogance is the worst combination because it's never your fault. And therefore, if it's never your fault, you don't learn from the mistakes that you've made because you don't think that those are your mistakes. And there is no doubt over the course of the constant, theme of his ownership when it comes to his own, I mean, this is some psychoanalyzing here,

but it's never been his fault ever. And you have to, at some point, after two decades of futility, at some point you got to look in the mirror and say, well, maybe it's me. And he's never been able to do that. Look, even the introduction of Ron Rivera just over a year ago. How did he start that off? Culture, culture, culture. It was all Bruce's fault. That introductory press conference was all, hey, the last 10 years, that was Bruce's fault, and we got rid of Bruce. And now I've got my new savior. And he got a guy that's quality, a good coach and a quality person, and he appears to be attracting quality people to the organization and obviously the the stories that came out over the summer put him into a position where he had to make changes on the other side of

the organization which we both know and have known for a while needed massive changes and you know maybe maybe he's he's back to into a corner so so deep and and that he has no choice but to change but I still don't think this is an admission that it's his fault. You know, it was Marty's fault. It was Spurrier's fault. It was Vinny's fault. It was Mike's fault. It was Bruce's fault.

It's never been his fault. Never. What do you want to talk about today? We'll figure it out right after this word from one of our sponsors. John Wall was back in town last night, Tommy. and played for the Houston Rockets against the Washington Wizards. The Wizards won their second game in a row. How exciting.

131 to 131 to 119. It's funny, I have not, you know how much I follow this team and how many times I've watched games where you've just rolled your eyes, like, you watched it, why? And I haven't this year. I haven't really watched a lot of it this year. But I did watch last night's game. and I was really rooting for John to look good and to play well.

I don't know why, but whatever. He played well. He had 22 points at halftime. And they lost the game. He had 29 and 11 in the game. And really does look like John Wall physically and has the few times that I've seen him this year. That's not really the issue with Wall. He appears to be back to, you know, what John Wall was in terms of his explosiveness.

What I did want to say about the game, though, is that the NBA with certain teams and the Wizards are one of them, it's a hard watch if you are a basketball person. It's not really basketball. There's no real concerted effort to guard. It's summer league basketball. I make that reference all the time, but those of you who know summer league's not heavy on defense, especially at the higher levels and you end up with summer league games 167 to 162. It's the old ABA for a better reference for people like Tommy. It's just, it's terrible to watch.

It's just so bad to watch. Are they athletic? Yeah. Are they skilled highly? The Wizards, I'm telling you, in these games, like the one last night or the one they played 149, 146 a few weeks ago, I swear to you, not now. But 15, 20 years ago, I think I could score in double digits in some of these games. Because there's literally nobody defending people on shots. And it's just, it's not real basketball.

Tommy, the biggest difference in sports between regular season and postseason is the NBA. And I know people will say the hockey postseason is completely different. And I'm sure it is, but I can't speak to the differences. The big difference in the NBA is that there's actually an effort to stop the other team. And there's an intensity to it, and there's a pressure to it. There's no pressure playing in these games. There's no pressure to win these games. There's no pressure to stop, you know, to really guard.

It's all about, let's see how many shots our best players and our best scores can get up and see if they can go for a big number tonight. And off of their action, you know, we'll see. spread some guys, and as you say, we'll just shoot it. We'll just shoot threes. I just, it's hard to watch. The second thing I was going to say about the game is this. You know how much of a Russell Westbrook fan I was. And last night, and that I am, last night, 16 points, 15, assist, 13 rebounds. Man, Tommy, he does not help you win at all. He just doesn't help you win. He had five turns.

I know, I know, but it's worse now. It's worse now because he's less of a player. And the energy and the effort and the want to are still there, which is why he gets the results in games like this. Like 16, 15, and 13, if you're trying hard and you've got more energy and you're more relentless than everybody else, you're going to get those results in a game where nobody really cares about blocking out or defending or anything like that. But he is responsible for 10 to 12 possessions a game that end with like no chance of scoring. He had five turnovers, should have had another five, like he's fumbling the ball, he makes a pass, and it bounces off somebody's knee, but he hustles so much,

so he chases it down and saves it so it's not an actual turnover. You know, like he's his energy and his hustle basically saves him another three to four turnovers a game. And then some of the shot selection for Russ, God bless him, but he takes some of the worst shots. Not that other players don't, because that's the way these, you know, teams like the Wizards play. There's no organized basketball there. I love Scott. He's such a good guy. There's nothing organized going on at all. And so, you know, a lot of the guys, a lot of guys take bad shots. But Westbrook, my God, some of of the, I would guess in the games that I've watched, he costs them 10 to 12 possessions a game

on scoring, or getting a decent chance to score. Through turnovers, through horrible shots himself, through, you know, terrible passes or dribbles that end up, you know, he chases down, saves himself from having another turnover, but now we've burned another three or four seconds off the shot clock, and we got to hoist something out, you know, up at the end. It's just not good basketball. And I'm a fan. I'm a fan of what he is and how hard he tries. But it's just not good basketball right now.

And I think part of it, too, is when he's playing on a team like this, which really has no structure, it's even worse. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is basically, I mean, look, there wasn't any structure under Scott Brooks when he was in Oklahoma City either. But they just had so much talent. Right. It was so overwhelming.

Now, you know, they don't have that kind of talent. Westbrook is the kind of offensive player who more often than he should does not have an idea what he's going to do with the ball when he starts his offensive play. No doubt. You know? I mean, that just seems like a simple thing. but he doesn't, he's not quite sure what he's going to do, but I got the ball and I'm going to do something with it. Well, yeah, because he can will his way physically with energy,

with competitiveness, with relentlessness into something good, you know, two out of four times, 50% of the time. And then when he makes a mistake, he tries so hard, he has the ability to erase the mistake. And it's just, not, I mean, look, there are a lot of similarities between Wall and Westbrook. Wall is definitely more of, you know, relatively speaking, Wall plays more under control than Westbrook does. Oh, yeah. Almost everybody in the NBA does. I think Wall, I think right now, look, a couple of years

ago, I would have taken Westbrook over Wall, not even thought about it. And Westbrook is declining a little bit too. He's a much worse shooter. He's got some, he's got some issues psychologically with the shooting. There's no doubt. He airballed a free throw on Sunday that was just, it was five feet short. There's a lot going on there with Westbrook. And at the same time, again, I'm a fan. And by the way, I've heard he is just a phenomenal example when it comes to being professional, you know, compared to a lot of players. So there's a lot to like about Russell Westbrook, but you're not winning anything with Russell Westbrook being one of your, you know, top players. And it's really going to be hard to win anything with him being your point guard.

You know, it's just not, it's just not pretty to watch a lot of the time. And, you know, you could say, well, it's early, it's only this, you know, it's only game number 25 or whatever in his first year here and it takes time. There's no effort to sort of organize something. There's not like a plan here. They go out, they roll them out, the balls, and they say, you know, let's try to get 140 tonight and see if we can hang around with the opponent. Like, they were talking last night after the game about the great defense they played. I mean, they gave up 69 points in the first half, and Houston was eight for 37 from behind the arc. And I would tell you, of the 29 missed threes, half of them were shot without any defenders.

Half of them. Who was talking about it? Westbrook was. He was interviewed by Coutcher and Gooden. By the way, they did this video for John Wall, and they had a bunch of play-by-play in there from John playing for the Wizards. It was sort of a tribute to him. They didn't use one Steve Bucanx, Phil Sheenier. What a shock. Because they're petty little weasel. I hope it was just, if that's it, that's ridiculous. Dave Johnson all over every call, and God bless Dave. They're petty little weasels.

They are, aren't they? They really are. They really are. Hey, is Ted still sitting next to the team? I don't think anybody is. The team doesn't sit next to the team anymore. Oh, that's right. That's right.

Yeah. Now, listen, you mentioned the NBA. and how in the playoffs, the intensity level goes up, you know, and you see teams play more defense. And that's in part because you have a series. Right. You have matchups that are going to take place over the course of a series. You have confrontations that will build up where you'll see the guy again the next night,

you know, or two nights later. Right. So you don't have that during regular season basketball. So here's my plan. Why not do what baseball does? And when a team comes to town, have them play a three or four games series. Yeah. Instead of having to travel from one night to the next in different cities,

you know, the Celtics are coming to Washington for a three-game series, baby. Well, that's sort of what hockey's done right here this year with COVID. Yeah, I mean, I think that's fine. It's still the regular season. They still play 82 of them, which by, you know, pretty much extension means that a lot of, that there isn't an urgency to a lot of them, even if you're playing the same team back-to-back, which happens occasionally. Look, I would suggest to you that you're right, but also think about game one of round one of the NBA playoffs. You know, that weekend where you get four games on Saturday, four on Sunday to kick it off,

every single one of those games has an intensity to it that is completely opposite of a regular season game. And I know that. But what I'm talking about is raising the level of emotion between competitors. I mean, if you're playing, I mean, that's what happens in baseball. You know, let's say some guy gets hit with a pitch in a series. Well, you're going to play that team again the next day or the day after. The potential for a more emotionally charged play goes up if you're playing a three or four-game series. Now, you can't play every team in the league when you do that, so you sacrifice that for the idea of creating more intensity.

I don't know what it would do to attendance, but if you have to, have a good home product, which the wizards don't and market when they do market, when they're fans towards the road teams. I don't know what that would do towards attendance, but in terms of raising the intensity of regular season play, I say go to a baseball format. I mean, they do, no, they don't do it like baseball, obviously, but they do have, during the course of the season, lots of back-to-backs against the same team. But they're not in the same town. No, they're not.

They're not in the same town usually. That's true. Like it'll be Philadelphia here on a Friday night and Philadelphia there on a Saturday night. It's a different game. Yeah. Different game. What do you think? We got to do that?

Well, I think the NBA's ratings are up this year, which I've read recently. They are. They are. So inexplicable. It's just not a great problem. product. Part of the, and right now, right now it is. You know, I like the NBA. I have a lot of friends that don't like the NBA. I like the NBA and I've liked it in recent years, but I think part of it too is that I had a team that was actually decent for several of the last, you know,

seven, eight years, like playoff decent. And I think that that changes your attention level to it a little bit. And so you end up watching more games. start to finish than you typically would. But this team, this team is terrible. This team, and God, they've got some offensive talent on the team. I mean, Beale can really score. He can really score. And they've got some shooters.

Man, Bertons got off last night. And I like this guy, NATO, the backup point guard. I think he's good. I think the guy they drafted, Avdia looks like a prospect. And Mo Wagner's been a favorite player of mine. for a while. And I don't know where Ish Smith's been. Maybe he's been injured. He's one of my favorite players on the team. And I do like watching Beal score because he really is almost impossible to stop from, you know, getting, if, like tonight if I said, you've got to get 40 plus,

he'll get it. He'll get it. Because he can go get it on his own. He doesn't need anybody's help to get it. He's become that level of score. He's still not a number one player on a championship contender. He's, you know, maybe a number two at best. But whatever, we've had that conversation. But I like your idea. You know, Maryland is playing in back-to-back nights, the same opponent on the same floor. Tonight, Nebraska and tomorrow night, Nebraska, both games in College Park.

Did you know that? I didn't know that. It's because the first game at Nebraska was Nebraska was on COVID. They missed a whole, it basically missed almost a month. of the season. You know, their head coach, Fred Hoyberg, got pretty sick. He has, he had, you know, a heart condition from several years ago. And so he apparently was legitimately ill with COVID.

And so they missed five or six games in early to mid-January. And one of those games was Maryland. So to make it up, they're playing Maryland tonight and they're playing Maryland tomorrow night. That, that, I don't think that's ever happened. I can't remember playing the same team, even in back-to-back games, you know, like, even in different venues on back-to-back. Anyway, so that's what they're doing. It's baseball season, buddy.

It is baseball season. I know you wrote a column, which we'll get to here in a moment, but I wanted to mention one other quick story. I know you didn't, you don't know this story because I told you about it during our last break. but Duke freshman forward Jalen Johnson opted out of the remainder of the college basketball season yesterday. Tommy, he's a 6-8, five-star guy that Duke starred, signed, you know, another five-star guy. He was going to be the best of the incoming freshman class, a big difference maker on a team that they hoped would, you know, end up competing, you know, per usual for a national championship. championship or a final four. He was, he's going to be a lottery pick, maybe top three to five pick in the upcoming NBA draft. And yesterday, he opted out of the rest of Duke's season. Duke is,

for those not paying attention, is having a terrible season. I mean, they are, they're six and eight and eight overall, six and six on the season. They would have to win the ACC tournament. at this point to make the NCAA tournament. Now they have a lot of games left. I think they have six games left. If they went and won the final six games, which includes, I think, games against Virginia and maybe somebody else that's really good,

I guess they could potentially get themselves back into the mix as an at-large team. But basically, this is as bad a season as Duke can have. And let's not forget that early on in the season, you know, Shishvsky spoke about potentially, you know, let's not play this season. And, you know, he was criticized for that. He's like, what are we doing here with COVID and the whole thing? And of course, everybody criticized him for it because Duke got off to such a poor start. You know, they had lost, you know,

games. And it was apparent that they weren't going to be a great team this year. Anyway, here's what I would say about Jalen Johnson, because it's gotten a lot of attention here over the last 12 to 15 hours, especially people that follow basketball. And there seems to be, you know, two different opinions here. One is, well, why should he stay? He's not getting paid. Why should he risk, you know, getting injured? And because, by the way, this is not a COVID-19 opt-out.

This has nothing to do with COVID. In his statement, he said, you know, my family and I and coach have made the decision that I should not play the remainder of this season so I can be 100% healthy in preparation for the NBA draft. So, you know, there's the, well, he doesn't owe them anything. He's not getting paid. Why should he risk himself and his future by playing six meaningless games? And then the other part of it is the people that say quitter. I think that it's more quitter, but I don't know the whole story here. So it could be something in between. But I want to say this about. it. You know, if that team was in contention for something, he wouldn't have opted out. If he had played really well this year and that team was ranked 10th in the country and it had a chance to go to the final four this year, there's no way he would have opted out of the season.

If he had not been playing well, he was actually benched on Saturday and didn't play against NC State. Part of me, he's been, he went to three different high schools. There's always been an issue with commitment with him apparently in the past or with him and his family and people. Again, stories that I'm only reading. I don't know the details of. I know this from being involved in basketball. There are a lot of kids that go to multiple high schools. I hate seeing it. Most of the time, even there are situations here locally where I know this situation. And more times than not, Tommy, more times than not, that kid shouldn't be transferring as much as he's transferring. He should stay and stick it out where he is. But it's,

And many times it's not even the kid. You know, it's the people around the kid that want them at a better program, playing a better schedule. Or in some cases, it's their college coach where they've already committed that says, I want you playing at this place, you know, Oak Hill or IMG. They run the same offense we run. You're going to be with higher, you know, quality players. And then the kid leaves a school where maybe he is so happy at. You know, 17, 18-year-old, thrilled best friends.

Great education somewhere. You know, call it Gonzaga, you know, or St. Johns or Georgetown Prep, or, you know, any of the really good basketball programs and schools in the area. And then they end up going someplace where they're miserable, but, you know, it might be beneficial to the college coach or whatever. I don't know enough about this, but I can tell you this, if it's just because they're losing and he's not playing well and it is more of quitting, I would never allow it if it were my son. Never.

I mean, I'm sorry. You start something, you finish it. Period. Excuse me. How old? You know, look, there's probably a lot of red flags with this kid. But how old is this kid? 18, I guess. So I think that's an adult, isn't it? Yes, legally it is. Well, I mean, I don't know. It's 21. What makes you think that you could tell your son what to do? Oh, I could tell my son what to do.

By the way, my son would not, if my son were in this position, he wouldn't opt out. Because he wasn't, because he wasn't getting enough time. Or he wasn't, yeah, you're damn right, because he was raised differently. Well, let me just say, I would hope, I would hope that that would be the result. I would hope that I wouldn't have to push. Yeah. Right. But he can make up his whole mind because he's 18 years.

old. He can vote at that point. He can join the Army. Can't drink. No, he can't. But they do. I did. But, uh, so I mean, he's 18 years old. There's a lot of red flags with the kids, but there's two things. One thing, he doesn't owe to college anything. Really? Doesn't owe him anything. Let me tell you, if somebody came to you, your freshman year at the end, near the end of a year. Before you finish classes, Fox 5 came to you and said, we'll give you a job as a producer right now, but you have to quit. You have to quit Q-U-I-T going to school at the University of Maryland.

What would you do? Well, it's apples and oranges. I haven't made a commitment. I haven't made a commitment to anybody. My commitment to a team in that situation, you, You know, I haven't committed to anybody. What do you talk? It's just not comparable. Okay. I disagree. The second thing is, I don't.

Yes, I do. I disagree. The second thing is I don't hold anyone, when it comes to personal decisions like this during this COVID era, I don't hold anyone's feet to the fire. Even if this is not COVID-related. It's not. It's such a warped time. I mean, college basketball season, it's so different than normal. Okay, what if it had happened last year?

Let's say COVID out of the picture, and they stunk, and they were having a normal season, and he quit. Yeah, I wouldn't be happy about it, but I wouldn't get his worked up as some other people. So let's approach this, like, practically if you're an NBA scout or an NBA team. Do you think it's a red flag for them? Red flag. But yes, I just said before, he's got a lot of red flag. Yeah. Okay.

So is it the right thing to do for him to add another red flag to, you know, perhaps a couple that are already there? You know what? At this point, I think for most NBA teams, they don't give a shit. If there wasn't COVID and he did it, would they give a shit? No. I disagree. They just care. You're going to have a general matter.

manager like the idiot who used to be in the front office with Washington, who look at his town and say, wow, that guy's great. I don't care if he robbed three, seven-elevents. I want him. Yeah, I think there are a couple things here. Number one, you know I disagree with you in terms of what they owe the school. This is an odd year, and so it's hard to use this year as an example, but I've done the value proposition for college over no college to go to the NBA, and it's just not even close. I think people are ignorant when they say they're not getting paid. That's true, literally, but the value that they're extracting by playing at some of these schools is in the millions of dollars, potentially for the guys that are going to end up in the NBA.

I mean, if you just go back to the 2019 draft, you know, you can take John Morant, DeAndre Hunter, Jared Culver, all players that were taken, Rui Hachamura, all players that were taken in the top 10 of the NBA draft, which by the way, ends up being a much higher price contract with a much bigger opportunity for endorsements. If they don't play college basketball, they have no opportunity for any of that. They end up getting drafted lower, and there are no endorsements when they walk into the league. I'm not even talking about tuition, room, board, free health care, free training, free coaching, all of that stuff. I'm talking about the marketing platform that college basketball is for these players. Nobody that I know has ever done even a back of the envelope quantifying what that value is.

We all know that there are Zion Williamson's that could go straight from high school to one year in Europe and then be the number one player because everybody heard of him in high school. But the players that I just listed, if they hadn't made deep runs on teams in the NCAA tournament and had that marketing platform, they would not have signed the deals they signed going into the NBA. So I think... You didn't ask me this. You didn't ask me that. You said they don't owe the college anything. No, they don't.

Yeah, I think they do. And I think a lot of these... What you're talking about is what they lose by not going to college. That's not what I'm saying. Okay. I'm saying they don't owe the college anything. Well, they don't because they get everything for free. Right.

And in return, they played the game for them. And in return, you commit to play college anything. playing the games. You don't have to stay. No, you don't. But we're not talking about whether or not you have to stay. Nobody has to stay. There's no right thing to stay.

Yeah, there is. There's no, there no there is. Yes, there is. There's no, there might be an economic right thing to do for you personally. No, I'm talking about, I'm talking about the right, I'm talking about the right thing from a, a commitment standpoint. You make a commitment in your life. Of corruption.

Excuse me? College sports is a cesspool of corruption. There's no right or wrong. Oh, yeah, there's a right. Take college basketball out of it. Let me ask you something. What kind of father were you with your sons? If your son made a commitment to something,

was it okay if, you know, four days later, barring, you know, a real situation that was risk, you know, abusive to her, you know, I would never leave my son in a situation. that was unhealthy for him, but would you allow them to just quit? Just sort of, eh, I don't really want to do it. There's something in between that, Kevin. Okay, but there's, there is, you know what, there might be something in between, but there is, but you're, you're not leaving any room.

You're saying they don't know, oh them anything. This isn't the Army. They can quit whenever they want. What's the in between for you? He's not, he's not a 10-year-old kid playing little league baseball. He's 17 or 18. he's 18 and and he's making uh he's he's he's going to play a sport where he's going to get paid millions of dollars i'm sure his family has a big input on his decision but my point is

college college sports is it's it's so creepy these days that there's no there's no obligation there's no right or wrong look every situation's different i i understand that but i'm not even talking about the college basketball part of it. I'm talking about the maturation of a of a young man or a young person into a mature person, you know, the growth into a mature person. You know, and that's not for your decision. That's not your decision to make. It doesn't matter. I can still have an opinion on how I would handle it if, you know, again, I don't know all the details, but if, if the details are that he wasn't playing well and he, you know, the team wasn't doing well and I just, you know, to hell with everybody else in finishing this thing out.

I'm going to get myself ready to play in the NBA. I wouldn't like it at all. Wouldn't, would not like it at all. I would say, sorry, you made a commitment, you finished that commitment. And if he's 18 and he tells me to fuck off. Or else what? Yeah, well, what do you mean or else what? I'm his father.

There's not, there's not an or what. If you have to get to the or what at that point. well, you've already lost because that horse has already left the barn. If you can't say it and have it respected and listen to as wise advice, well, then you've already lost at 18. I'll concede that point. But no, again, he was injured. The COVID appears to have nothing to do with it.

I mean, at the very least, I would have said, you know what, that foot's an issue, but you're going to stick it out on the team. Let's talk to the coach about making sure that you don't play and you don't risk an injury unnecessarily. But I want you staying on that team for the last two weeks. I want you finishing this out. I want you staying on that team. You don't get to say that to an 18-year-old kid.

That's ridiculous. Bullshit, I don't. I'll tell you what. If I'm paying the bill, I get to say it. I mean, seriously? But you're not paying the bill. No. Well, no, I'm not. Not if he's got a full ride to Duke.

Right. I'm not. They're not giving you the scholarship. They're giving him the scholarship. And you're not even incorporating into the conversation the perspective here, because the perspective could be far different for a different parent who's looking at his child, not as a meal ticket. That's got a negative connotation to it.

But as a way to economically change the situation of all of the family. And so a lot of thought needs to go into that. That's a perspective. First of all, I never had a kid with that kind of athletic ability that he was going to play a professional sport. So I will, you know, I'm obviously, you know, sensitive to, like somebody would say, look, we don't, he's going to earn, you know, X millions of dollars at signing. we're a family that is of, you know, few means, and we don't want him risk getting injured and risking that future. I understand that.

I don't understand it, you know, literally, but I certainly understand that idea. I just don't like the idea of him just quitting. Like, there could have been a middle ground here. He stays on the team, but he doesn't play the rest of the year. You know, he commits to being there and being a part of the team, but if that foot injury was a concern, or something else was a concern.

I just think it's, it's, I'll tell you one thing, Tommy, it's bad optics at the very least. It's bad optics. But again, there's some DMs that could care less. Okay. I don't even care what the GMs think. I don't care what the GMs think. Oh, by the way, real quickly before we get to your column,

I've seen this movie before, but I haven't seen it in a while. Bugsy was on last night. The story of Bugsy Siegel, or is Bugsy insisted. Yeah, insisted on being called Ben Siegel. First of all, Warren Bady is phenomenal playing Bugsy Siegel. Secondly, you know a lot of these stories in more detail. How much of this is fictionalized? Do you know?

I don't really know. I don't really know the whole lot. I mean, I know what the average show knows about Bugsy Segal. His best friend was growing up with Meyer-Lansky. Right. I know a lot more about Meyer Lansky. Why? That I do about Bugsby Siegel, because, well, he lived longer.

I mean, he was the money guy behind the mob for decades. He, one of his protégés, you know, bought a couple of Sears resorts, casinos in the Poconos back in the 70s. So I know a little bit more about Meyer Lansky than Bugsy Siegel, But I think the idea of the character that Elliot Gould played, I think that's true. Harry Greenberg. Yeah, I think that part is true. Well, Siegel murdered him.

Yeah. But was acquitted. I think the Virginia Hill stuff is all true. Yeah, Virginia Hill committed suicide in Austria like a few years after Siegel's was murdered. And you ever stay? You ever stay in the Flamingo? Yes. For many years, I'm talking about early 90s.

You know, that Flamingo Hilton was, you know, right across the street from Caesars, right across the street from the Mirage, which had just opened up in the early to mid-90s. And on big weekends, and you know I went out there a lot, if we couldn't get into Caesars or the Mirage, we would stay at the Flamingo Hilton. And then we would walk across the street to the Mirage Sportsbook, which was back then. like 1995, 94,

the sports book, and then all the others, you know, started to take shape. Actually, the Mirage still has a good sports book. I stayed in, I stayed in the Flamingo

when I covered the red of bow fights in the mid-90s, and the early midnight. It was a perfect spot on the strip. And the Flamingo, though, the old part is behind the big building. Oh.

It used to be. There used to be, Like, there was the big hotel. Right. And then behind that were the old cabins and, and like rooms and stuff from years earlier. And you could stay there. And I stayed there in like the old cabins and not cottages, but rooms at Caesar. So I stayed in, well, probably wanted the original, or at least from those days of the Bugsy Seagel days.

I there was a restaurant a steakhouse in the Flamingo Hilton named after bug I think he was called Bugsys or something like that I sort of remember like that I'm sorry he wouldn't have liked that no he wouldn't have you know what's really amazing first of all he apparently was that kind of character because I've I've read about him before about how what a dreamer what a visionary he was he was it's just amazing if it's actually true that basically they just ended up in the middle of the desert, you know, in Nevada. And it makes, by the way, it makes sense because Nevada was the only state that was legal for gambling. And so there were little dives with, you know, with roulette tables and dice tables, et cetera. And they owned one way back when he was in L.A. But to have the vision of like the Flamingo Hilton being the first hotel on what would become like a strip is pretty amazing considering it really was in the middle of nowhere. Yes.

And it costs a lot. I mean, basically for those that don't know the story, Bugsy Siegel, Ben Siegel, part of the Jewish mob, which by the way was, you know, there were a lot of ties in that movie to the Italian mob too. And so they, he was out in L.A. and he became a big star as a gangster and mobster. And man, you know, if the Virginia Hill stuff is true and she's played by Annette Benning, who, how old is that movie, Tommy? I don't even know. I didn't even look. Probably 20 years. Probably. I always loved Annette Benning, the younger Annette Benning. Were they married? Was he married to her?

They are married. They are married. Oh, okay. Yeah. Actually, the best of Net Benning is the Gryfter. You've seen the Gryfters, haven't you? I have seen the Gifters. And also that movie with, you know, the president movie.

With Michael Douglas. What's the name of that movie? Well, Annette Benning and the Gifters is super high. Yeah. Why can't I think of the movie that I'm thinking of? An American president? American President, thank you. That's one of those movies that's on all the time.

She also played the wife, Kevin Spacey's wife in American Beauty. Yes. Which I honestly think is one of the best movies. That is one of, I loved that movie, and any time it's on, I watch that movie. I think that movie's hysterical. Absolutely. All right, we'll get to your column right after. word from one of our sponsors.

All right. I know you wanted to talk about the column, about the Nats, about Davy. So go ahead. Okay, well, spring training, pitchers and catchers report on Wednesday.

Are you upset? You're not going? Well, no, I'm not upset. I'm not going. You used to love it. I know. I do. I love it, but it's not like

it's a surprise that I'm not going. I don't think, I think the post is sending you know, they're, they're, uh, Nats writer, but I don't know what he's going to do. You can't interview players really one-on-one personally.

You can't watch spring training except for a very small, limited time in a very isolated area. So I don't know what the point would be to, to be there. But, uh, they're going ahead with spring training in a regular season. So I talked to Davey, uh, Martinez on the phone about his, thoughts coming off of last year and going into this year. You know, last year they finished last place in the National League East in that 60 game season that baseball had.

And two things in my column I thought were interesting. And he brought this up. He said they're emphasizing getting off to a quick start this year. Because, and he mentioned it, you know, all three years he's been here, they've gotten off the slow starts. Right. 19 and 31 as you wrote, yeah. Yeah, 19 to 31 is like a legendary figure for Nat fans,

but, you know, Davey said, Davey joked when he said this, he said, I hate that number, you know, but obviously he likes what it represents, but he doesn't want, he'd rather be 31 and 19 after 50 games. So they're making a big emphasis on getting off to a quick start because I think they think the National League is more competitive. than it was a couple years ago. And you can't afford to get buried in this division early in the season. I don't think there's an easy, there's an easy bottom dweller among any of the teams anymore now.

I don't think the Marlins are that anymore, and there's some people that are picking the Mets to win the division. So, and the second thing is, you know, two of the deals that they, you know, Davey got a contract extension. at the end of last year, last season, a new three-year deal, deservedly so. And, you know, you get more power with that. He has more of a voice in the organization. He got rid of some coaches and brought in his own coaches, like the pitching coach from Chicago,

where he was with when Davey was on Joe Madden's staff, Jim Hickey, he brought him in. And he also, the Nats also signed two former Cubs. that were with Davey when he was in Chicago, John Lester, as a number four starter, and an outfielder, Kyle Schwerber. And Davey loves him some Kyle Schorber. Yeah, I mean, he said that to you. Yeah, I mean, basically, this was the guy he kind of raised.

He came in as a prospect, you know, he came in as a rookie with the Cubs, and he was a catcher, and the Cubs asked Davey to turn him into an outfielder. So he has a special place for Schwerber, and a lot of people think that Schwerver is not a very good outfielder, probably with good reason. But Davy defended him, thinks he can be a good outfielder, and he mentioned the bats that they've added to the middle of their lineup. If they get Schwerver at his best when he was averaging 31 home runs a year for three years,

and Josh Bell, who two years ago had 37 home runs for the Pirates, they've added a lot of power to the middle of their lineup if they get those guys at their best. What is the fan situation when the season starts? I don't know if that's been determined yet or not. Okay. I don't know if there's going to be a small percentage, if any, or not. Look, last year...

I think at some point, at some point, I would think that you'd be able to go see games, you know, without restrictions, wouldn't you? At some point between now and October? Yeah, definitely. I mean, you know, between now and October, hopefully the country is vaccinated. And whatever these variants are, haven't, you know, created, you know, wreaked havoc. Look, last year was a weird year. And, you know, like you've said, did you say to Davio, by the way?

You know, nobody even remembers the World Series at this point. Okay, good. No. I did say, but I did say, Davey, this is your fourth year managing. Does it feel like you've been here that long? Got, fourth year already. I mean, they had major injuries last year. There was no Strasbourg.

I mean, they still, if Lester. can be Lester again. They still are going to have, if everybody's healthy, a fantastic starting rotation. And then, you know, they added the guy Brad Hand, right, to be, actually, you can answer this. Who's their closer, Hand or Hudson? I don't think they've got one yet. They may switch back and forth. I don't think they're going to the seat. The hand would probably be the closer de facto, but I think Davey would closed games with other guys as well. And who's going to play first base?

That would be Josh Bell. Oh, right. From the guy from the, they got from the Pirate. Right, okay. And what about Ryan Zimmerman? He's playing this year, correct? Yes, he is. He's back.

He'll be defensive replacement of first base. He'll be a pinch hitter. And obviously, you know, it's a good guy to have any organization for not a lot of money. I mean, the leader of this team, I mean, look, they got Juan Soto coming back. Juan Soto is arguably the second or third best player in all baseball. Okay. They need Victor Robles to be the player that they thought they were getting when he was coming up. I mean, he was the highly-touted prospect.

Right. And he has not proven to be that. And the real leader of this team probably is probably Trey Turner. now at this point. I mean, we got some time here to get all up to speed on the Nats. By the way, speaking of teams that we don't talk a lot about, and we talk more about the Nats than we do the Capitals, the Capitals all of a sudden are in a funk here. You know, they had the games lost due to Buffalo, I think, in Philadelphia having COVID issues. They lost to Pittsburgh again on Sunday, 6 to 3. They've now lost to Pittsburgh, I think, three times. And they

play Pittsburgh again tonight. Talk about playing your rival a lot this year. They're doing that. And it's interesting because when they lost the other day, I went and checked the standings out to see because they started off so hot they had the best record in hockey. Now they're hanging on to fourth place, but they're tied for fourth. And, you know, it's not like there are a lot

of games this year. You know, the regular season in terms of length, you know, it goes through May, is it 70 games they're playing? What do they usually play? 82, maybe they're playing 72. But the way it's, and I had

Joe B on the radio show, you know, they changed the divisions around this year because of COVID. So there's like an east division, a central division, a west division, and like a, you know, a north or something central, whatever, north or south

or whatever it was. Caps are in the east division. And there's no more, It's the top four teams, period, from each division qualify for the postseason. Well, in that east, you got the Bruins, you get the Flyers, you've got the Islanders, you get the penguins, you know, and you got the caps. One of those five teams isn't going to be in the postseason. So I just thought I'd share that with you because I knew you weren't paying attention to it. No, I wasn't.

You never pay attention to hockey. But let me share one last thing with you. It doesn't make you feel good. Okay. What is it there? About 45 degrees? It's beautiful today. Beautiful today.

We are up to, I'm going to give you the updated, oh, it's 45 right now. But it's going up to 47 today. That's balmy. Now, we've got a major snow and ice storm Thursday here. I haven't checked the latest on it, but this apparently, they've been wrong in a lot of these storms, so who knows. But apparently snow and ice. again. We had a nice storm here over the weekend, which was not fun. But what is it down? It's 45 degrees where you are. It's 36 degrees here in Miramar Beach. Is it really? Yes, it is. Yeah, well, I mean,

the whole country. It's a cold day. Yeah, the whole country has just been, I mean, Texas, well, we know, we were there for something similar to what they're experiencing this week. Yes, we were. We were there. It's Super Bowl in 2010 or whatever year it was. We've told the story a million times, but we got to the Bates Motel where they had put us up, and we went to bed 60 degrees and woke up the next morning, couldn't get our doors open because ice was jamming it. And it was 18 degrees with two inches of ice, and the whole week, they just didn't have the equipment to clear it. And it was a Temperature never rose above 30 degrees. No, it didn't.

The whole week. I don't think it rose above 25 degrees the whole week. It was really something else. We were there. There's no doubt that that Super Bowl in Dallas, which was the Pittsburgh Green Bay Super Bowl, 2010, I think. That was one of the worst weather weeks in Dallas history.

And I know that they've had the last couple of days. I mean, look, I've talked to people down there. My sister lives in Nashville, talk to her. I mean, these are areas that just aren't ready for this kind of stuff. They can't deal with it. So the temperature, they rely on, okay, we got a little ice, we got a little snow, but it's going to be 65 degrees on Thursday, so it all be gone. But that's not what's happening here.

And that Dallas week, a lot of people lost a lot of money that week. No doubt. A lot of Super Bowl parties and preparations. corporations got frozen along with them. It never happened. That was such a crazy week. It was so nice, though. They put us up in just the nicest places, didn't they? When they sent us on the road? Remember? I went on the air the next day and said, now I know what it feels like to do time. Yes. Yeah, I don't think Chuck was very happy with that. No. But, well, I mean, it was such, well, whatever, nobody cares.

It was a motel. First of all, it was a motel. It was a motel. The doors opened outside. It was. And they had a cop there all the time. Yeah, because it was not one of the nicer areas. This was not Highland Park. It was, yeah, it was really, you know, I always, like I've told this story before, I think,

but the San Francisco Super Bowl was like the perfect example. like who's booking our travel? Like for an extra four bucks a night, you could have put us in a place that was actually clean and safe. And oh, by the way, closer to where we're doing our radio show. The San Francisco thing, I had had it at that point because they put us in a spot that it literally took 45 minutes to get to Radio Row. And it was a price that ended up being comparable to like the Marriott

courtyard, which was a block away from Radio Row. And I just said, I'm canceling the reservation, and I'm getting my own reservation at the Marriott. And then Doc followed me and did the same thing, and everybody started doing the same thing. And I'm like, this is absurd. Like, who books this stuff? The Phoenix was the all-timer. They had us in a hotel 30 miles from Phoenix, from downtown Phoenix, where Radio Row was. And Tommy, it was a meth dealer, you know, hotel. I mean, when we pulled in, that was one of those, we pulled in, and we turned around and pulled right back out.

And we called, you know, Rick and whoever else and just said, you cancel that and get the money back. We'll find a place to stay. We're not staying there. That's ridiculous. It was amazing. It's amazing when you send people away for work. No one's asking for the four seasons, you know, nobody's asking.

asking for the Ritz Carlton, but how about just a place that's clean and safe if you're going to have people work for a week? That was the one thing about, you know, traveling with the Washington Times all those years. And a lot of these papers did this, not all. They let me pick my own place. Right. And then you just expense it. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Well, enjoy the chilly weather. I'm sure it won't last where you are, not in Florida. Oh, it's supposed to be 61 tomorrow. Yeah, so stay inside and, you know, gear up for your second shot, whenever that is a couple weeks from now. Thank you. Good job today. Really, you came prepared. I'm pleased with that.

Everybody, enjoy the rest of the day. You know what I didn't do? Here's the most important thing I didn't do. What? I didn't quit. No, you didn't quit. And you know what? You could have because this sure ain't the Army. Have a great day, everybody.