The Kevin Sheehan Show - Theismann: Playing Haskins Early "Formula For Disaster"

Episode Date: June 25, 2019

Thom and Kevin talk Womens World Cup....really, then move on to Joe Theismann's quotes about protecting Dwayne Haskins in year one. Additionally, they talked about John Wall's introduction of Bradley Beal last night, the Nats, and the dilemma of the "Snowplow Parents". <p> </p><p>Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices">podcastchoices.com/adchoices</a></p> Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You want it. You need it. It's what everyone's talking about. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Now here's Kevin. You're listening to The Sports Fix. Yep, Tommy's here. Aaron's here. The show is presented by Window Nation. If you're in the market for Windows, call 86690 Nation or go to Windonation.com and tell them that we told you to call. We're doing a show today. Then we're off the rest of the week. I'm taking a little bit of vacation time. You've taken a lot over the last six months. and this is my first vacation time in a long time, probably since last summer. Joe Thysman joined Tommy's show with Nick Ashue the other day on 106-7, The Fan. We'll get to that in a moment. We'll also talk about John Wall's introduction to Bradley Beals Award last night. Some Nats and some other stuff, too. The soccer team, the women's soccer team, beat Spain 2-1, courtesy of Megan Rapino's two-pino's two-pennies. penalty kicks. Now they get France. In the round of eight, would that be, Aaron? I think that what they

just played was the round of 60. Yeah, yeah, they got down 60. I think it's the round and round. I think that's what it is. I think it's the quarterfinals. I think it's the round and round. You know, it's a remarkable accomplishment considering how little they're getting paid. You know, I mean, they're really suffering under the burden of this, of this terrible pay system. And I give them a lot of credit for accomplishing so much. What are you talking about? I have known. I have no. idea. I really don't know what you're talking about. No, no, the women have complained they're underpaid. In an agreement that they negotiated. Oh, really? Yes. That they negotiated. You don't get paid for playing on the World Cup team. No, but overall, they say they get paid. Look, I don't know how the pay system works.

All I know is that, because I know they turn around then, I think a lot of the money they get paid for playing with their club teams is subsidized by the women's national team. And I think that's how they get their pay. But either way, they negotiated an agreement, and they're unhappy with their own negotiated agreement now. They're suing U.S. soccer for gender discrimination. When was the agreement negotiated and agreed to? 1942. No, seriously.

I have no idea. Okay. I don't know anything about, honestly, I don't know anything about the women's pro-socer league. To open your podcast with this. Well, I wanted to mention it because yesterday I was actually, I had to go into a bank. When's the last time you went into a bank? Oh, I go into banks all the time. You do?

I go into banks and post offices. I like the personal contact. Really? Yes. Yesterday I had to go into a bank and there was a television on and it was the women against Spain. I actually thought that game was later in the week. I had no idea it was yesterday. and it was one to one at the time.

And I'm like, wow, I think this would be a massive upset if Spain won. Did you stop your banking to watch it? No, but when I got back into the car on XM Series, I actually turned to the call because there were only about 30 minutes left. It was like at the 65 minute mark. That could mean, you know, 60 minutes left. There's nothing precise when it comes to soccer. Yes. With the extra time and the added time or whatever the rest want to put on the clock.

Plus three. Let's add another three months. minutes. And then when that three minutes is up, it's sort of three minutes, but it's really more like three and a half or two and a half. Who knows what you're going to get? Dumbest thing ever. But I guess, I mean, to be honest with you, I couldn't care less if they won or not. It's not, you know, I know that there's probably some patriotism involved here. So I'd like to see the U.S. win, but I'm not really invested. The Women's World Cup. I'm not invested in this. I mean, really. I mean, who? I know. I'm with you on this. Who would care?

I mean, among us, among our circle of Neanderthals, who would care about the Women's World Cup? I told you about walking into that coffee place like a week and a half ago, two weeks ago on a Saturday morning. I was getting my car washed on Wisconsin Avenue. Did I tell you this or Aaron this? You didn't tell me. Okay, so the car wash on Wisconsin Avenue, right there in Tenley, I was waiting for my car and there's this crunchy little coffee place right around the corner. and I wanted to just go and get coffee. And there were these two guys, probably in their early 40s with young kids running around

and their wives were there, but the two guys were at a separate table by themselves with a laptop open watching the women's World Cup game. And it wasn't the U.S. team. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. You talk about Poser. Oh, they were probably in the right place then. They were in the right place, definitely in the right place.

But I can't really imagine that these two guys couldn't, you know, stand to miss China against Sweden or whatever the matchup was. Here's how I could imagine. Did they have little girls? There were a couple of little kids running around. I mean, if they had little girls and they're jocks, they're envisioning their girls growing up to play soccer. They could be. So they're probably into it based on that. Look, I'm not trying to, I'm not trying.

That's a good reason. Or maybe they had money on the game. Yeah. Nah. When's the last time you and I are gamblers, sports betters, when's the last time you bet on a women's World Cup game or any soccer game? I didn't, but another host I worked with has been doing it all week. I know someone that bets on Premier League stuff all the time.

Well, that makes sense. People all over the world bet on Premier League soccer. But anyway. That's a good reason. And you just took them sort of. off the hook. If their girls are really good soccer players and they're really into it, maybe they put it on for the girls to watch. Yeah, maybe. Maybe. Something like that. I can understand that. But as we all know, soccer is the sport for people who don't like sports. Yes, that's always been

your take. I tend to agree with you on that. I tried to explain this to my wife when I got back from getting the car washed that morning. And she said, so what? And I said, you're right. It is a so what. it's these are the kind of guys that if I had engaged them in conversation, game four had been the night before, game five was the night before of the NBA finals, they would tell me, oh, I don't watch the NBA, you know, that kind of guy. Like, oh, the NBA's, you know, whatever you want to say is in their mind, the way they'd describe it, they'd say, it's just not for me. The NBA's just not for me. There are a lot of middle-aged suburban white guys where the NBA's just not. for them, but I got news for you, because I've explained this to some of my friends that aren't into the NBA and are much more into college hoops, and I am much more into college hoops, but I'm really into the NBA too. And I've told them for several years, your kids like the NBA more, and they finally have come around understanding the incredible job that the NBA

does at marketing their game and their stars in a way that, to me, is not the attraction to the game. I like the games in the postseason, but I don't know. It bothers me when I hear some guy who is a sports fan, say, I don't watch the NBA. But at a coffee shop on Saturday morning, I'll open up my laptop and watch Women's World Cup soccer. Well, it's pretentiousness with Capitol Peak. It's poser, it's pretension, it's all of that. Yeah.

It's all of that. Because I can't really imagine, Tommy, that they're really wrapped up into this game. It wasn't even the U.S. team. You know what? Do you think they have season tickets to the Washington Freedom? That's the name of the girl's size. Isn't that still the name of the girls? Do they sell tickets to the games or do they let you in for free?

I think they do. And I think that's still the name of, I think there's still a women's professional soccer team around here. And I think that's their name. This is awful that we don't know that. No, there is no Washington freedom anymore. Did I make it up? Well, no, they existed. That league folded.

A new league came up. Apparently in 2011, the team relocated to Boko Raton and became Magic Jack Boceraton. You mean after the thing they used to sell on the infomercials? The Magic Jack? Let's see here. That's the thing they used to sell on infomercials. To watch TV or to listen to radio or something like that. What, the boomerang thing?

No, this Magic Jack thing. What's the thing that I'm thinking of? It's an infomercial thing that you could take your cable with you. That's sling. Sling blade. Slingblade. Slingblade. Slingblade.

Billy Bob Thornton. You could kiss them goodbye. as a sponsor forever someday. I'll take the biggest. All right. You know what? Just as an extension of this, because I do want to get to your conversation with Thysman here in a moment.

Do you, when somebody tells you, when you meet a guy and he tells you he's not into sports at all, doesn't watch sports, doesn't follow sports, what's your reaction to that? I don't have any reaction usually. I really don't. I mean, usually, I mean, there's got to be a lot more that. goes with with that assessment. You know, if he's already laid the road for obnoxiousness out before he's ever opened his mouth

and he says that, well then I said. That context, yes. Yeah. Then, you know, then, you know,

he's dead to me. You know, but, but, I mean, if he's a good guy who, who has given off that, that quick impression of being a smart,

good, friendly guy. Yeah. who just, look, I have a whole side of my family on the in-laws side that none of them watch sports, except they'll watch this. They'll watch women's soccer. Yes, because it's more of like a popular culture thing, I guess. Which is my point. This is why it's the sport for people who don't like sports.

Right, yeah. None of these people like sports. And they're all good people, and I love talking to them and hanging out with them. and the guys, you know, my brothers-in-laws are smart, funny guys. They just don't like sports. Yeah, you know, my in-laws, my wife's brothers, one of them couldn't care less about sports. It's hysterically funny, great guy, and it has nothing to do with any sort of pretension. He just wasn't a big sports fan.

And her older brother is sort of a sports fan, but not a massive sports fan like we are. The reason I asked you is that on Tony's show, the other day. Tony said, he made the comment, and I think it was essentially with the context that you described, that if you sit there and somebody goes out of their way to sort of tell you that they don't watch sports and they don't follow sports. And that makes them a better person. Yeah, that they're truly not trustworthy, is what he said. Oh, yeah. But I actually have, I have a few really close friends. One in particular, couldn't care less. I worked with him when I was very young and he's remained a close friend of this very day. And he, you know,

but it's, he, he's interested, he tries to get interested in it because I'm interested in it. Like he'll make the effort and then he'll just, ah, no, I didn't watch a game. Yeah, my oldest son is like that. Yeah. My oldest son is that way. He doesn't really care about sports that much. But like, if I'm interested in it's like, he'll go to a game, he'll like the experience. He plays fantasy football just for the social aspect of, of the group that he's with. Yeah. And actually, he wants to the league two years ago, but he doesn't have any idea what he's doing. He doesn't know anything about sports or could care less. And I used to take, look, I took him to Redskins training camp in Carlisle in 1992. So I raised him right. What about your youngest son? He cares. He's a

big Ravens fan. Right. Big Orioles fan. You know, because I mean, back then, when my kids were growing up, I was working at the Baltimore son then. We were more Baltimore-centric than Washington-centric. Because we lived in Columbia, which is kind of the dividing line. Divining line. I mean, I have three boys. And my oldest, Tommy, he couldn't care less about sports. And I did the same thing. I mean, he was my oldest.

I took him to Redskin Games. I took him everywhere. My other two are obsessed with everything, sports. Even the musician. Playing them, even the musician. Really? Oh, yeah. He's actually, Corbans probably, he's in a band, and he just got back from a tour out in the Midwest.

That's so funny. They did 12. They did 12 dates in 14 days and capped it off at this music fest in Chicago on Saturday. Anyway, he's really into it. I mean, in fact, I mean, you know, every text from the road was not about, like I'm saying, so how did it go last night? The whole thing, he's like, did you see? Because he barely caught like the fourth quarter of game six.

And he's asking me about that. But anyway, my oldest really couldn't care less. What's really interesting, though, is his best friends from TCU, they're massive sports fans into gambling. When I'm with him and his friends, his friends and I spend all the time together, and it's really interesting. Casey's just such a good guy, and he's, he's, but his friend group were hardcore sports fans, and he's not, which is interesting to me.

But I remember having a couple of friends in college that weren't really into it like most of us were, but they were still our best friends. Anyway. I'll tell you one other part of that. My best friend, who still remains my best friend, he's been my best friend for since we were 11 years old. He was a big sports fan. Oh, we talked about sports.

We played sports together. Big deal. Now he's my age, and he doesn't particularly care that much about. A little bit. I mean, but his interest has had. has wane dramatically, you know, and you didn't evolve in the same way. No.

And, you know, people would say, well, that's what you do for a living. But I think I would have evolved. I don't think I would have evolved the same way, whether I was writing sports or not. I think I still would have been pretty into the sports scene. I don't think my interest would have waned at all. In fact, it might, it might have been more passionate than it is. Mine didn't. When I was not in this business, you know, for 14 years, you know, from, you know, from

24 years of age until, you know, 12, 13 years anyway. I was not in this business. And I was still massively into everything. Now, at the time, all of my teams were really good. Yeah. You know, I mean, having teams that are really good make a big difference. Actually, that's not true. The Redskins weren't good.

They were on, but I still thought they could be good. Yeah. Those are in the days when good was still in the rearview mirror. That's right. It was still visible. It wasn't a dot in the road. Speaking of a dot in the road, just out of the blue, you had a call-in from on your show on Saturday. Unexpectedly, this was not a booked guest.

Joe Thaisman just called in. Yeah. And he was listening to you and Nick Ashue. This was Saturday or Sunday morning. It was Saturday. Andy was on vacation this weekend, so Nick Ashu sat in for him. I really enjoyed doing the show with Nick. and we were talking about Dwayne Haskins,

and we had just done talking with Craig Hoffman, who covers the team for 106-7 a fan. And we obviously wanted the discussion points was the quarterback, you know, Dwayne Haskins or Case Keenham, and I also mentioned, you know, how all of a sudden people are waking up to the possibility that if Colt McCoy is healthy,

he needs to be taken seriously as well. So we finished with that, and we get a call on it's Joe Thaisman. He had been listening and wants to chime in. And, I mean, I'm just happy as a clam. I mean, Joe, Joe would be listening to the show, first of all. Tommy, Joe likes Tommy. Yeah.

And, you know, I think Joe likes you too. I think Joe likes me too. Well, Joe and I had, you know, an incident or two several years ago, but Joe forgets. Yeah. And really, I've always enjoyed having Joe on. First of all, he's the easiest guest ever to have on your show because it's, question and then 15 minutes later he comes up for air. But I also think even though Joe is a major homer, and that's not debatable. I do think his insight at times is valuable and spot on,

especially when it comes to the quarterback. But go ahead. He called in. I know that he likes you a lot. Well, it was, he called in and basically he was pretty definitive in his comments. I mean, these were not, these were pretty sharp. pretty sharp analysis where he said that he thinks that starting Dwayne Haskins this year would be a disaster. He said the word disaster. And part of what he pointed out was what I've been pointing out all along, something I know you don't like to play with.

And that's the first part of the schedule. And he went through that like I have. They open with the Eagles. Then they play the Cowboys at Home. Then the Bears. Then the Giants, which we argue is soft. and then they played a Patriots. And he was just saying, you know, this kid played 13,

and 13 games at Ohio State, and you're going to put them out there against that kind of competition that would pretty much be insane. He said, part of the problem is in today's NFL with the CBA, he's not going to get a lot of snaps in training camp to really prepare. I mean, Case Keenham is going to have to get his share of snaps. Colt McCoy is. He's not going to need as much because he knows the offense inside and out.

But he's going to want to get his share of snaps as well. So there's limited time for Dwayne Haskins to get what he needs in training camp and in preseason football games to prepare to play in the NFL, especially when you have a quarterback there ready, who is prepared to play in the NFL, arguably two of them. So he thinks that the best thing that the Redskins could do for Dwayne Haskins is to sit him for the season. I think, I think at the very minimum,

the best thing to do is to sit him for the first five games. But that was the gist of his argument. It was pretty strong stuff. Disaster was a pretty strong word to use. Let me read the quotes from his call-in, random call-in. Because I wrote about it in the Washington Post. To tell me, quote, to put him out there early against those teams, it's just a formula for disaster for the team.

for Jay, for the fans, and for everybody else. I think the young man is our future, and let's protect the future instead of throwing it out there right now and saying, okay, go get him. The schedule we're playing is not a go-get-em schedule. To me, the best scenario for Dwayne would be to sit this year, case plays, Colt comes back, and is healthy enough to be in the competition

and or a part of the ball club, and give Dwayne a chance to process everything. Be in meetings, watch film, maybe get into some games in late situations to be able to sort of, Wet your whistle a little bit. That to me would serve him well. I don't want to see him become a Joey Harrington.

I don't want to see him get the ever-loving daylights beat out of him because he's not going to be able to really run away from anybody. Case Keenham has to get his time. He has to learn how to play in this system of Jays. So how much time is Dwayne going to get? You only have 17 days in training camp. So that is Joe from your show. These are really interesting comments,

Because they're incredibly, they're one of maybe two things, maybe you've got a third. They're either truly protective with, you know, and conservative, or he's alarmed at what he's heard and or seen already with respect to Dwayne Haskins. Because Tommy, every first round pick basically plays more than they don't. Not everyone. Well, Mahomes didn't. Mahomes didn't. Okay, but we-

And who was the quarterback in Chicago who didn't? Tribisky played in the fifth game of the year, fourth game of the year. and has never looked back. We've had, you know, obviously last year you had, you know, you obviously had Darnold, Mayfield, Allen, Rosen, Jackson. They all played last year. They all played a lot. Now, Jackson probably wasn't going to play, had Flacco not gotten hurt. But he came in and ultimately led the Ravens to the postseason. Josh Rosen came in after a few games. Josh Allen pretty much came in almost immediately, I think in the opener, because what's his face? through five interceptions in the opener.

His name's escaping me, the Buffalo quarterback that just throws interceptions, but somehow Nathan Peterman. Nathan Peterman keeps getting shot after shot after shot and keeps failing. Sam Darnold played pretty quickly. Baker Mayfield came in and played quickly. The year before that, Trubisky came in. Deshawn Watson basically started right from the jump.

Mahomes didn't, and the year before that was Goff, Wentz, Paxton Lynch didn't. You know, James Winston, Marriota, year before that. Bordels, Mansell Bridgewater, so Bordels was the only one there. But more times than not, you know, rookie quarterback's first rounders play. They play. Yes. And we had a guest on from the Action Network a couple of months ago that had gone through all the numbers that essentially said the guys that don't play in their first year, they don't play because they're not ready to play and they'll never be ready to play. And he had a bunch of numbers that basically proved out that the guys that end up

having first rounders that have real careers, they play in their first year, more times than not. What do you think Joe is being, protective or do you think he's concerned about Haskins and his ability to play sooner rather than later? He's obviously concerned about his ability to play sooner, but which is it? Is he just being overly protective or do you just think he's heard or seen this dude's nowhere near ready? I don't know. I'm going to go with protective. I just think generally Do you think there's another answer? No, I don't, Kevin. I don't.

You did before the show started? I know that, but I'm not going to say that on the air. Do you want me to say it? No, I'm not going to go there. Okay. I mean, because that's a real stretch. It is a stretch. It is a stretch, but it's not a big stretch for you in the way you think.

It's not. Well, apparently it is. It's a big stretch for me. So you can just preface it with this is a stretch. I don't really believe it, but I told Kevin before the show that maybe Joe... You know, you're not going to get me to say it. You want me to say it? No.

Okay. No, you're not going to get me to say it. All right. Go ahead. He's being protective. He's overly protective of Wayne Haskins. Look, I think he's... Number seven, Joe, Dwayne Haskins.

I think he sees that the Redskins have an option. If the Redskins didn't have an option, I'm not sure he would have the same attitude. But I think the part of the problem is, you know, people see Case Keenum as a real option. Okay. All right. I mean... Did you really think I was going to drive that car into the wall?

No. No, I mean, what number is Case Keenum going to be? Is he number eight, Aaron, what jersey number is he going to wear? I don't even know what jersey number eight, but it's going to either be, I mean, what... Yeah, so what you're saying is that they much prefer, Joe would much prefer to play number eight this year than number seven. I guess so if you're going by uniform number. Yeah.

So anyway, um, look, I, if he's ready, I am not holding him back. I understand where Joe's coming from, but it makes me believe that Joe,

Joe's saying he ain't going to be ready. Exactly. Yeah. Why not? And he, well, because he says there's 13 college football games and one, uh,

training camp is not enough time to get ready. Sam Darnold, look pretty good. Josh Allen looked pretty good at times last year. Rosen had a couple good games. Mayfield really came on. You think Kyler Murray's going to sit? No. Yeah, me neither. No, I don't think Kyle Murray's going to sit. How much experience does he have playing quarterback in college? I don't know. Well, last year was his first year starting for Baker Mayfield the year before that. Okay. So I just think, I think Joe might have had the same answer for any of those quarterbacks. He might have had the same answer for all them. May not be the right answer, but he may have

said the same thing for all of those too. I look, I obviously respect Joe's opinion, but I want to try to read into it, and my read is that Joe has seen something or has heard something that says Duane's going to be fine, but he's not

one of the guys like Darnold or Mayfield or Allen, who is going to be ready, because maybe because of his limited time playing college football, that could certainly be a part of it. Perhaps, and he says this in his quote, and I want to point this out, he says about his mobility, where is that part of the,

he says, I don't want to see him get the ever-loving daylight speed out of him because he's not going to be able to really run away from anybody. That may be part of why he wants to be protective. You know, some of these other guys were able to move and get out of trouble. And even if they hadn't progressed yet in terms of reading defenses and knowing where to go with the ball, they were able to use athleticism to create. Maybe that's point. part of it. That makes sense to me, by the way. Like, Dwayne Haskins, of the quarterbacks that have been taken here, you know, in recent years, you know, like last year, Mayfield, you know, Darnold can move, I mean, not certainly more than, than Haskins, but Mayfield, Alan,

Rosen's more of a pocket guy, but he can move around. Jackson, obviously, Trubisky can move, Mahomes can move, Watson can move, you know, just going back, Wentz can really move. Maybe that's part of it with Joe. Maybe that quote is the part he's like, when I envision Haskins, I envision him as an immobile quarterback being at more risk

than another young player in putting him in there. That would make sense to me. I mean, he sort of said that, not really in a comparative sense to other quarterbacks that have played, but he sort of said that. Well, again, I think he might have said the same thing if any of those other quarterbacks

were here in Washington in their first year. I think Joe just may be concerned about the position. Maybe. But I also think that one thing that you don't like that I think he's taken seriously is the schedule. It's the schedule. Yeah. I mean, if they were like in week six, they're playing the dolphins. You know, if they felt that this kid was ready to play and they held them back till the Miami game, I'd be fine with that if I was a Redskins fan. I mean, I don't want, I don't want him taking a beating in those first five games. No matter, even if I think he's ready, after those five games,

whatever he had at the beginning may be gone, maybe lost. I don't want people tearing their number seven jerseys off in the stands after week five. Arizona opens up with Detroit. Then they're at Baltimore, Carolina, Seattle. talk about three really good defensive teams in their first four games for Kyler Murray to face. But to be fair, he's the number one overall pick, and they don't have anybody behind him. No. There's no competition. There's no competition. There's a legitimate, unless you think, I mean, on the surface, there's a legitimate competition here in Washington for quarterback.

And again, I still think that the guy who's going to pick the starting quarterback is Dan Snyder. not Jake Gruden, unless it's so, unless, unless, uh, Haskins is, is so unprepared that, uh, even Snyder can't put him out there. Uh, but even if, if, if, if, if it's close and Snyder says, well, I want to start my guy, I'll be curious if Snyder, it's, if he's protective, will we get a Snyder that wants to protect him until week six or the Snyder that wants to make sure he's, sells every ticket he can from week one. Well, week two in their first long game. I've mentioned this a few times. The NFL really did the Redskins of favor with the schedules, scheduling teams that

travel very well for their first three home games, and that is Dallas, Chicago, and the Patriots. So if this isn't a good football team, they've got early season games against teams that are going to help fill up the ballpark. The Dallas game will be packed with cowboy fans. The Bears game on a Monday night's going to be packed with Bears fans. The Bears fans are about as excited about this upcoming season as they've been for any in a long, long time. And then you've got the Patriots, and I don't know about, you know, how many Patriots fans there will be at FedEx Field. But the NFL, really, I don't know if it was done intentionally. It felt intentional, given the problems that the Redskins had with attendance last year to make sure that they didn't have half-filled

stadiums early in the season. Look, obviously that's helping them because all money is green. Yes, that's the point. That's my point. I get that. It may not be helping them with respect to a home field advantage. It's a terrible look. It's not a great look.

No. But if they had opened up with the 49ers at home or the jet, you know, maybe the Jets with New Yorkers. No, the Jets don't even draw in New York. Yeah, but there's some excitement about the jet team a little bit with Darnold. If they had opened up with the Lions. at home. It would have been a disaster. Would have been an empty stadium. It would have been an empty

stadium. But I mean, again, look wise, I'm not sure a stadium three quarters filled with cowboy fans is going to look any better. It looks better to Dan Snyder's wallet. Yes, it does. It's better than what they had for Indy last year. That was still, to me, much more

startling than the Philadelphia game at the end of the year. We've seen opponents' fans take over that stadium, but we've never seen a home opener with a 1-0 football team with Adrian Peterson having gone over 100 yards in week one with a brand new quarterback and you get a half-filled stadium for the home opener on a beautiful day. It was stunning. Beautiful day. That was the that was the most startling thing about last year. So I mean, I think I look, I don't know why Joe said what he did. My guess is it's simply because he probably doesn't think these guys should start generally. He particularly doesn't think guys should start generally. He particularly doesn't think guys should start. start with his limited experience that this kid has, and particularly against the opponents he's going to face. All that makes sense. My position is this. The schedule does not even come into play with me because you know how I feel about NFL schedules. And obviously, you know, the Patriots are

always the one thing you can count on when it comes to an NFL schedule. But that's in week five. If he is anywhere near as good as Keenham or Colt, if Colt comes back, I'm putting putting him out there. If it's a close competition and let's just say Case Keenham's got a razor thin, you know, win in the head-to-head, I'm putting Haskins out there. He's my future. I'm going to get him started. I'm going to get him playing. I'm going to get him the experience and I'm going to start building around him. Now, if he's nowhere near ready to play, I'm not going to put him out there, obviously. And if Joe, I would totally agree with Joe about, you know, if he's not ready and he's got to learn and he only played a year and he's not a mobile quarterback so he's not

going to be able to save himself if he gets the team into the wrong formation or misses the you know the the the mike linebacker pre-snap all that stuff then i i won't put him out there i wouldn't do that but if he shows when they get to training camp that those ota days and those mini camp days and he really went back and and got prepared like j gruden's hoping he does and he comes in with that big arm and he's mentally as prepared in this new offense as Case Keenham is, I'm absolutely starting Haskins. Okay, let me ask you. But I want to add one thing to this because I've said this before.

The other reason, as an organization, I know they're not thinking this way. Trust me, I know they're not thinking this way because they're convinced they got it right and maybe they did. But next year's quarterback draft is so good. One of the best in a long, long time. I want to know in 2019 if Haskins is my future. I want to know that in 2019 because when we get to 2020

if we went four and 12 or 5 and 11 and we're sitting there with a top 10 pick top 7 pick I want to know if I made the right choice in 2019 now you might say it's really hard to figure out because he played 12 games and they didn't have any weapons

and they had injuries and that may be part of the context but you also may learn whether or not you made the right choice in 2019 because they might be in a position to draft somebody again next year early in the draft. Okay, let me throw another scenario. I agree with all that. I agree with that.

I mean, given the rookie contracts these days that, I mean, once you draft a quarterback, he's not your anchor for the next five years. You've got to get that position right. Yeah, he doesn't have to weigh you down. I mean, you can move on pretty quickly. The Cardinals just showed, and they did a bad job of it. Right. What happens if after the end of training camp and preseason that it's clear to the coaches

and it's clear to his teammates that the best quarterback of that time is Colt McCoy. If it's a sizable advantage, Colt McCoy is my starting quarterback. If it's really difficult, Colt's got a slight edge over Case and Dwayne. I'm not talking a slight edge. No, then I'm playing Colt. Okay. And by the way, I've said this to you before. Colt's the one that's familiar with Jay System.

Oh, I know that. I know that. That's why people can't dismiss him. If he's healthy, you can't count him out. And look, I mean, he's beloved in that locker room. And the coaches love him as well. And that counts. These are human beings.

It's human nature. I'm telling you, there are people in that building that are rooting for Colt McCoy. People, a couple people tweeted me yesterday about my comments about Alex Smith. or like leave him alone already it's not trust me he's a great guy and I want him to be healthy thank God you know he saved his leg like if you read

through some of that stuff and then listen to his quotes with with Fox 5's Angie Gough the other day he's lucky to lost it could have lost his leg yes I mean he's wearing he's I mean he's wearing this this this Siberian exterminator or whatever

it's called yeah he's wearing this thing and every time we see him with a picture or ask Jay Gruden about it, it's always about six weeks before he'll get it off. And that's been like three months. I know it seems like it. And now it's another six weeks before he'll get it off. Did you listen to his quotes or did you just read him?

No, I listened to him too because, you know, I was hoping we could use the sound, but the sound was poor. So I said yesterday on the podcast, because that story sort of broke while we were doing the podcast on Friday, so I mentioned it, but I didn't have a time to have time to really listen to it. To me, what it said was he's never playing football again, even though he talked about hopefully playing football. If you listen to that, he's not playing football again. He needs to be able to function as a human. That's right. As a father, as a husband, and have a long life with two decent legs. That's right. That's what he needs to concentrate on. Anyway, where were we? You said

something before that and I was going to respond to that right before we, we, oh, what I was going to say is that, you know, it's, it's not that I'm picking on Alex Smith. I'm just saying that last year, Alex Smith, and to me, this isn't really that much of a debate. He wasn't a good fit for Jay Gruden. It was a bad trade in hindsight. Bruce Allen made it because Bruce Allen just is a bad executive. He makes bad moves. That was a bad trade. He wasn't a good fit for Gruden. Shouldn't to give him the contract extension. I was in favor of the trade, not the contract extension in the moment. It was not a good fit for Gruden as it turned out. He didn't play well. This was not a functioning offensive football team. It was a game managing situation with a decent running game and a good

defense for the first seven games of the season. And what I was going to get to was this. When Colt McCoy came in to that Houston game and then started on Thanksgiving Day against the Cowboys, There is no doubt in my mind in watching his effort that he was a much better fit as the starter for Jay. And that Jay deep down would tell anybody, truthfully, we got a shot now. We got a shot to move the football. Now, Colt turned it over in that cowboy game a couple of times and it hurt him. But when people say if Alex had stayed healthy, you know, we were so close, you know, Bruce Allen, we would have gone 9 and 7, 10 and 6. I've said it before.

I think he would have gone 8 and 8, maybe 9 and 7. I would have given this team a much better chance to go nine and seven had Colts stayed healthy last year than Alex Smith staying healthy. Just my way I feel. I mean, remember our conversations last year? How many times did we say, where would they be without Adrian Peterson? Yeah. That was their offense. That was it.

That was it. A guy they picked up off the street. Now, a Hall fame guy, but a guy they picked up off the street, think of how bad they would have been if Adrian Peterson wasn't here. So that's how bad their offense was. Yeah, and let's not forget, too, you know, and we'll obviously mention this as we get closer to the season in looking back, because people will be genuinely excited about the defense and the prospect for this defense being a really, you know, an elite top five kind of defense. The defense let this team down over the final seven or eight games last year. They got run over by one team after another. And early

in the season, when they were putting big, numbers up statistically in terms of rankings, et cetera. Remember when they played really good offensive teams, they got shredded, the Saints and the Falcons. Remember the Tampa game, which they won? 500 yards of offense, but the kicker missed two times and they had three or four red zone turnovers. But anyway, I still think that the defense was improved last year. Don't get me wrong. It was improved from where it was in 2017 and certainly from 2016 when it was a disaster. I think it's going to be even better this year. And I think it's got a chance to be even better this year. Because I like Landon Collins. I like Montez Sweat. You've got John Allen and Duran Payne and Matt Ionitis a year older. So all of those things could come together and this could be a better defense. But to make the jump from what it was last year, which was like a top half of the league defense to top five. That's a big jump. I'm not expecting that. I'm expecting improved. But, you know, I also expect the defense to be under a lot. lot of pressure because they could struggle offensively, at least as of now. Again, you never

know until you see him play games. Maybe case is the perfect fit for Jay. Look, one of the things that Alex Smith did give them by running the offense was because he did not have turnovers, they never left the defense in bad field position. They won that field position battle for those first seven games and almost all of them, except for the games that got blown out. And that helped the defense a lot. Yeah. No doubt. You know, the fact that, you know, they weren't having to take the field with the team just having to turn the ball over and have to defend 20 yards for a touchdown. They were winning the turnover battle.

They were winning the field position battle. They were winning the penalty battle. All the things that give you a chance in this league, even if you're not great, to hang in there and win 20 to 17 over Dallas, 23 to 17 over Carolina, 20 to 13 against the Giants. 16 to 3, I think it was against Tampa. Tampa just had the three points. That's what it allowed them to do. Was it going to continue? Well, again, and I mentioned this yesterday, and I've mentioned it before, Alex Smith was in the midst of his worst game against Houston. He had thrown two picks, including a backbreaker that got returned like 100 yards for a touchdown, and it'd taken multiple sacks. And then they were going to go to Dallas

four days later. They weren't going to win the Houston game with them. They probably weren't going to win the Dallas or Philadelphia games on the road? Would they have beaten Tennessee? You know, I mean, Josh Johnson almost did. Yeah. So maybe, you know, but the Houston game, people forget, that's the first time they had to play from behind. Yeah. I mean, and people had been saying. Yeah, they're down early. Yeah. I mean, you know, Alex Smith is never going to be the guy who's going to lead you back. He wasn't. No. Whenever they got behind against Atlanta or Indy or green, I'm sorry, New Orleans. Yeah. They had no ability to throw the football to get back into a game.

It wasn't the first time they played from behind, but that's a big key. When did they play from behind before that? You know, maybe it was. Because I think maybe there were some tie games like the cowboy game. I forget. Whatever. It was netting this out, if Colt McCoy comes back and is healthy entering training camp, I give him a chance to be.

be the quarterback that looks much better than the other two. Yeah. For the simple reason of Colt's been in this system since 2014. And obviously, Colt runs the system the way Jay wants it run. Jay would have taken Colt and no Alex Smith trade last year. He would have absolutely said, you don't need to make that trade, we're going to be good with Colt. We know that.

He loves him. And he even admitted it at the league meetings two months ago, that sometimes he's a little bit blinded. You know, it's a little bit of a blind spot when it comes to Colt. But he loves him because Colt is, Colt knows this system. I mean, he's got it down cold. And he is a guy that Jay really trusts. Hey, buddy. Yeah, I know he's your son. Well, I just want to point out, these all sound like words that I was uttering about two or three years ago. I know. That the coach loved Colt, that he was. I never disagreed with that. Okay. What I disagreed with was I just didn't agree with Jay Gruden.

Okay. That if you start Colt McCoy for 16 games, that you're going to be okay. And I still don't believe that. Okay. But it's just kind of curious to hear you utter words that are still ringing in my head that I said. Look, how happy you are. You're happy that I haven't gotten to the happy part of the show yet, but it's coming. Well, look, Tommy's been a Colt McCoy fan for years now, and I've always said he's a 6 and 10 starting quarterback.

I mean, eight and eight if everything goes well. But what I'm saying, just to be clear, is that he has a chance, if healthy, and that's a big if, entering training camp, to have a huge built-in advantage over Case Keenham and Dwayne Haskins. Yes. Now, let me just point out for Pete. How excited will the fan base be if Colt McCoy is the starter? They're not going to be happy. They're not going to be happy campers at all.

Let me explain to that brilliant fan base. We're going to go with Colt, Jay says, late August. Let me explain to that brilliant fan base about Colt McCoy. I don't just like Colt McCoy, okay? The reason I started saying this two or three years ago because I knew how much Jay Gruden liked him. This wasn't me. I can't look.

You liked him. No, no, I liked him, but I can't, and I've said this many times, I can't look at a quarterback and tell you he's a good quarterback. I can't do that. There's much more geniuses like you and others. who are able to do that. I don't have that quarterback evaluation ability. Right.

But I listen to people who do. You're right about that. You don't. And I know that Jay Gruden thought highly of Cole McCoy. That's why I kept saying that, because I knew the head coach liked him. I know. You said that.

And not just liked him personally. But you also liked him. Yes, I do. But that's not why I was saying he should play quarterback. I was saying it because the coach wanted it. Just to get one last shot in here on this conversation. Because you better. You were right about that.

You were right. Yeah. You sense that Jay had a genuine interest and a genuine like and a genuine belief in Colt McCoy. You were right about that. You were wrong about the way Mike Shanahan felt about John Beck. You were totally wrong. He did not have great belief in Beck. But they liked him.

Kyle liked him to a certain degree. But he didn't think that John Beck was better than Rex Grossman. He didn't. Whatever you said. Whatever you say, pal, champ. All right, quick word about Window Nation. I mentioned yesterday that over the weekend ran into a friend of mine, Jason, who said, you know, I had windows installed and he didn't. It went really well.

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You don't have to act on it right away. They give you 30 days to make up your mind as to whether or not you want to move forward. right now they've got an offer that is one of their best of the year buy one window get one free with no limit plus no down payment required right now no interest required right now no payments for the first 12 months call 866 90 nation or go to windonation dot com that's 86690 nation and mention that you heard about it on the podcast on the kevin shen show podcast they will take good care of you um A couple of things that I wanted to get to after that conversation. I didn't watch any of the NBA Awards last night. Couldn't care less about any of them. Janus won the MVP, if you didn't know, over Harden. Did we win any awards for the podcast?

The podcast was nominated for four NBA awards, but didn't win anything. I was very disappointed. I was getting tired of the politics involved in this. Yeah, I agree with you. It's not an Emmy, not a Tony, not an Oscar. None of that. None of that. It's politics.

But anyway, Janus over Harden, fine, whatever. It didn't matter to me. I mentioned yesterday, and some of you pushed back. I recognize it's a regular season award. I do. I'm just saying that this is a sport where you really can't measure how great a player is until they play in the postseason.

It's a completely different sport when the games matter and the defense is there and you don't catch teams on a back-to-back or, you know, know, three games and five-night stretch, it's different. And Janus was not anywhere near the best player in the postseason. But whatever. Hopefully, and I saw, I think Kobe tweeted out, congrats, you know, young fella, now you got to do it in the postseason and win a championship. And all of the greats understand the difference between what we saw Janus do in the regular season and then what he couldn't do when the games really matters. Yes, absolutely.

So anyway, one of the awards last night, I just wanted to bring this up because I heard the sound earlier this morning. Bradley Beale received an award last night. It was the award for the NBA Cares Community Assist Award. John Wall made the introduction to the winner, which was his teammate Bradley Beale. I want you to listen to Wall's introduction. Every year, the NBA recognizes a player who has made a major impact on lives of other. with his community assistance presented by Kaiser Permanente. This year's winning is my brother, my friend, and my teammate.

I can tell you, his commitment to the youth of our city has already changed their future. It is an honor to give this season an NBA Community Assistance Award presented by Kaiser Permanente to my brother, Bradley Bill. So I wasn't watching this live, and I wasn't on Twitter last night, but I heard it early this morning, and I went back and saw some of the social media. And a lot of people thought that Wall was, either drunk, you could hear the voice shaking in that. And if you watch it, he's got sunglasses on and it's even a little bit more pronounced when you watch it. And others thought he was nervous.

He was nervous. He absolutely was nervous. He wasn't drunk. He wasn't, you know, this wasn't some sort of wall beal relationship thing where he didn't want to give the award. Some of that was out there. I made a call this morning to somebody who would know in the Wizards organization. They said John is a very reluctant public speaker and gets very nervous when he does that. And that's exactly what I watched. I agree. I agree with you 100%. I saw a guy who's nervous on a big stage in front of hundreds of people on national TV who probably hasn't had to speak like that in front of a large group in months.

even when he does his post game, look, this is not a criticism, but even when he does his post game interviews sometimes on the Wizards, he talks so fast sometimes he's difficult to understand. Right. And I think you talk fast when you're nervous. I agree. So I just think this was a nervous situation. Simple as that.

Simple as that. Well, I'm just saying that for those that aren't sure, the person that I spoke to in the organization said that that was 100% it, that they've seen this before. when John's had to do things or introduce things, you know, in front of a large group publicly, that he's just a reluctant public speaker in front of a large group. Now, you do understand why people would think that. I mean, this is kind of what happens when you start developing a reputation.

We're hanging out at the Rose Garden or wherever that place was last year. As a guy with a problem. Right. You know, I mean, and that was the talk around town about John Wall last year. Even before he ruptured his, his Achilles tendon in the shower, as he says. Right. But what happened? Well, last night, I think that was just a nervous guy.

I think so, too. So we can move on from that. I wanted to play. Are we going to do? What are you going to play? Well, I want to play something for you, and I want you to react to it because this was basketball, Wizards, NBA? Why?

Is that where you want to go right now? Well, I don't want, are we done with the NBA? Yes. Finish, we're not going to be able to talk about it anymore? Go ahead. If you want to continue with the NBA, continue. Because that was it for me for the NBA. You weren't going to mention like the Wizards draft at all?

Well, I've talked about it for the last couple of days. Yeah, but I haven't been here. Okay, so let's get your thoughts on the draft. So, please. Is that all you have to say? Well, I want to hear your thoughts. People have heard mine since Friday because I've had two shows about the Wizards draft. Look, if there's only one thought I want to hear from you.

What? I didn't like it. Tommy, you were 100% right. Oh, did you have Hotchamore? you did have Hachemur. Yes. Yes, I did. You said, don't be surprised if they take Hachemur. Yes. I had it. You know? I mean, did anyone else in this town have Hachimor? No, no. Nobody, just you, Tommy. Congratulations. Yes. Awesome. You gave this 20-minute lecture about the NBA draft. No, no, it wasn't a preview. Right. You didn't enjoy it and others didn't. And I gave two minutes as to what was going to happen. Right. And I was right. You got it right. And you got it right. And you just forgot about it.

Man, you compartmentalized so much that I get right. Oh, my God. You speaking about others forgetting. You haven't, if I had gotten it right, there's zero chance you would have remembered it. I would have mentioned it on social media. No, you wouldn't have. Yes, I would have. That's great.

How did you know? How did you know that they wanted a big Japanese star? Yeah. Because they didn't even interview him. Did you know that? I know that. Never even talked to them. Listen, what, you know, Tommy Shepard is in a way benefiting from being the answer.

Ty Ernie. And in the sense that he drafted a guy who apparently is off the charts when it comes to character. And right now, Governor Ted, you know, because now they call the NBA owners governors. They're not owners anymore. I talked about this yesterday. So how do you feel about that? I don't particularly care.

It's just a word. It doesn't make any difference to me. I mean, you can argue it's stupid and all that, but if that makes them feel better, fine. But Governor Ted is all, is all about character now. I mean, after living with Ernie's triple knucklehead era that he had to deal with, that they want character. And I think Tommy Shepard is going to wind up staying with that job. And I think he's going to benefit from just simply not being Ernie Grunfield. So, I mean, I just knew that they wanted a high character guy.

And I knew that they wanted this guy. I tried to find out, and I haven't been able to find out. and that's why I haven't talked about it yet. But I guarantee you the wizards have penciled out what drafting Hachamura means to their bottom line. But I'd love to know what they're projecting, like how important, how impactful financially, drafting Hachamura, and basically for I guess the lack of a better description, cornering the Japanese NBA market. You saw apparently the Japanese media.

Oh, went nuts over this. There was an army, and I'm sure Governor Ted is licking his chops. Governor Leonis has to be looking his chops. They didn't even interview this guy, which makes me believe that perhaps all along, he's like, look, I don't care what kind of player he is. If he's there at number nine, we're taking him because this is going to really change our bottom line. What I'd love to know, though, really is how much it does.

From a merchandise standpoint, if they end up becoming the biggest merchandise seller in Japan, and how much of that goes to the league, how much of it goes to the Wizards, what are the costs involved? I don't, I guarantee you, Governor Ted has penciled this thing out. Yeah, yeah.

He's had all of the accountants, it's right up his alley. Yeah, because this is the new construct of the NBA, of course. Yeah, and I know. And this is a good move for me. All these Japanese media

that are going to be covering the Wizards? Because you speak Japanese. Well, no, no, I don't, but I'm big in Japan. I'm huge in Japan. Because you're a big, guy well when i went when i covered the winter olympics in nagono uh-huh this is the truth i couldn't walk 10 feet down the street without japanese stopping and taking my picture i mean 10 feet who did they

think you were they they like the big american went the bigger you are yeah the bigger you are in japan wow uh my girth has some worth it did it did there and and it got to the point where one night we're in the press room at the olympics there's about five of us we're pulling an all night writing some stuff, and a Japanese photographer comes by and starts taking my picture. It's like 233 in the morning. And we thought it was funny for a while. 20 minutes later, we chased him away. He stood there for 20 minutes, taking my picture.

I'm sure my picture is on Japanese porn sites all over Japan. But it's not for that reason. And I never paid, when we went out, I never paid for a drink. People would come up to me and buy me drink. I remember this one guy. They called it the Laverro genre. Kept call me. We have the Asian genre over here.

They just have the Laverro genre on their sites over there. So I'm big in Japan, so I'm looking forward. I'm hoping to capitalize on this. Well, maybe you can get the times to send you over there to do some sort of feature on his family and his hometown. I wasn't crazy about Japan, though. You weren't? No, I didn't have one of my favorite places. I'd like to go.

It wasn't one of my favorite places. Well, you were in... I was in Tokyo for a little bit. You were. And Nagina. Nagano was up in the mountains and it was cold, right? Yeah, well, it wasn't that cold. It's just not one of my favorites.

Not like Australia, which, you know, I was there for 30 days. 30 days in a bar writing all of your stories without attending one event. This is true. Didn't attend one event and wrote every story from downtown Sydney at one bar after another. I missed one event writing from a bar. So I wanted to play this the sound. from a Kansas City sports talk radio host who was talking about the Tyree Kill situation

and he brought it back to Andy Reed and you know Andy Reed had a son die from essentially a drug overdose. Right. It was his oldest son I believe who died of a drug overdose, heroin maybe Aaron overdose. But anyway, this Tyree Kill situation which right now I guess the league is going to interview him

today. I think Tyree Kill is going to be meeting with the NFL today about this recent situation. Tomorrow. Oh, is it tomorrow? Yeah. One's okay. You know, he for the time being well, he was

and I don't know if it's still enforced but he was banned from the team's facilities because of this child abuse investigation and he's scheduled to meet with NFL officials. Aaron says tomorrow. Meantime there were no charges

against him. No, because the district attorney said they couldn't figure out who to charge, the mother or the father. Okay. So it wasn't that he, he would, they were absolved. But they dropped the criminal investigation on Hill. But that's why. Yes. Okay. That's fine. So now the league doesn't, they don't need it. They don't need it. They've made that clear. Yeah. They're, they can come to their own conclusion no matter what law enforcement does. So this Kansas City sports talk radio host, his name's Kevin Keatsman. He's on. He's on Sports Radio 810 in Kansas City was talking about, you know, the Tyreek Hill situation and is possible return or not.

And I want you to listen to it because he brings Andy Reid's history of being able to discipline people into the conversation. And I want you to respond, and I will as well, to whether or not this is out of bounds. Andy Reid does not have a great record of fixing players. He doesn't. Discipline is not his thing. It did not work out particularly well in his family life. That needs to be added to this.

As we're talking about the Chiefs, he wasn't real great at that either. He's had a lot of things go bad on him. Family and players. He is not good at fixing people. He is not good at discipline. That is not his strength. His strength is designing football plays. What a piece of garbage.

What an absolute piece of garbage. to think that it's a matter of just fixing people with discipline when you have children who have substance abuse problems. I mean, to actually think that, to think that, well, obviously, he was a poor disciplinarian because his son died of what, a drug overdose? I mean, are you really that disconnected that you think it's that a simple equation? if you were tougher on your kid that they wouldn't have used drugs and died? What a moron.

Complete. Unbelievable. I mean, if you have to be a parent, if you're a parent, you have to know that you have, in some ways, you have very little control over your kids. In a lot of ways, what you're doing is you're doing the best you can to show them the path. But ultimately, there's a point where, you know, they're going to do, what they're going to do. And there's not a whole lot you can do about that,

except maybe to buy them time or to offer them, you know, help. But as far as linking this to his lack of discipline, I mean, it's shameful. It's just, now, I don't know what Kevin Keatsman knows and doesn't know, but I'm going to assume that he doesn't really know the details of how Andy Reed, you know, what Andy Reid's relationship was with his oldest son and his involvement or lack thereof. I'm going to assume that he doesn't have all the details, more likely than not. Maybe maybe he's a very close friend of Andy Reid's and this is something that Andy Reid's acknowledged.

I don't know if that's true or not. I doubt that it is. But if even if you had all of the information, even if you knew that Andy Reid somehow was, you know, at least on the edges of of complicit in his son's issues that he had, because it's possible that Andy Reid had some involvement in why his son had these issues with drug use. You never know, Tommy, sometimes it stems from things like parent abuse, you know, are root causes. But I don't think that's it at all. What I'm saying here is that I'm going to assume that this guy doesn't know the details of Andy Reed's relationship with his son. Therefore, you stay way away from it.

Secondly, even if he does know the details, how much hurt that potentially could bring to Andy Reid? That's his family. That's his oldest son. He died of a drug overdose. And you're going to compare his inability in your own mind. Maybe you know, maybe you don't, to discipline his son as implying that if Andy Reid had been a better disciplinarian, his son might still be alive. First of all, in most cases, that's bullshit. There are cases where the root cause is parent, discipline, parent, you know, rearing the whole thing.

But he doesn't know that. And if he does know that, why would he bring it public like that? That is a, that is clearly out of bounds over the line stupidity. What an idiot. And by the way, mean, mean, spirited. Yeah. I mean, we say things every once in a while. I've said a lot of things.

You've said a lot of things, probably not in your own mind, that you remember. Grette saying, but not to the point where you hurt somebody who lost a child. What you just said about me, that hurt me. That hurt me, but it probably didn't in your mind. You can take it. And the other thing is, look, I mean, you could make the case that a head football coach that any head football coach in the NFL is going to be an absentee father. I mean, they're going to be married to their work.

their family is going to be at the football field. It's a great point. You know, but that puts him in a big club with not just football coaches, but a lot of people in this country. And you don't indict a guy because of that. Right. I mean, because, you know, you could say, well, he was an absentee father. That's why his kid got in all the trouble.

Well, I mean, you could say that about lots of people in lots of walks of life. And no more could you say that than an NFL head coach who, I mean. So, I mean, look. Is there a certain amount of selfishness in that? There is. When you, when Andy Reed is obsessed, Joe Gibbs was. Yes. Married to his job.

Joe Gibbs regretted a lot of it. Remember when he left in 1993, in the spring of 1993, part of it was health-related, but part of it was family-related. You know, he hadn't seen, and it talked about it, he hadn't seen his sons grow up. Yeah. And he missed that. And there probably is some level of selfishness involved in that. At the same time, there is some of that is selfless because he's provided for his family in a way that perhaps he would have never been able to provide for him.

And missed out on some of the fatherly and family stuff because of it. You know, everybody's situation is different. But that was an out of bounds over the line shot. I would imagine this guy's going to be disciplined for this. Here's what you might want to try. We all try to do this because we all look for logic and reason for problems that we have to solve. Often there's no logic or reason when it comes to drug addiction or alcohol addiction. I mean, there's no formula.

Of course. There's no formula that if I do this, this, and this, then that won't happen. It's a roulette wheel, people. Um, yeah, I mean, look, you, you and I have personal experience with some of this. And I, I don't know that I, I do think that there's a roulette wheel component to it. I also think there are just lots of reasons in every situation and every situation is different. You never know. But to your point, of course, you can parent to the best of your ability and you can love to the best of your ability and provide, a loving home and all of the advantages and all of that and it can go wrong. Yeah. And you have no control over that. So it's a shameful thing to say.

And he tried to explain it away by lying on social media. But I would think that he's not long for working at that radio station, period. Yeah, he tried to back out of it through Twitter by saying that he actually didn't tie it to Andy Reed's son. You listened to that. Of course he did. Yeah. By the way, just as a complete, you know, it's about Andy Reed and about this, but not about whether or not this guy crossed the line. But Andy Reid has always struck me as from afar, without all of the information, as not the strictest of head coaches. He is a player's coach. He's not a true hard-ass disciplinarian. Not that that works either.

But let's remember we know a guy, we're, we're, We've been close to a guy who played for Andy, Andy Reed, and that was Brian Mitchell at the end of his career. He loves him. He swears by Andy Reed. And as he does about Joe Gibbs, too. And Mitch is a tough guy. Yep, agreed. All right, quick word about launch workplaces in Bethesda.

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The Nats dropped two of three. I did want to get your reaction to that over the weekend. Because I was there on Sunday. You were there on Sunday. Saturday was the one that was utterly winnable with an 8-4 lead to really, really put them into a position to have a big weekend. Sunday was just as maddening for its own reasons. Okay.

You want to start with Trevor Rosenthal on Saturday night, though, before we get to Sunday or not? Well, yeah, I mean, you know, I wrote, you know, now we've entered the Nats competitive part of the season. And the reason we know that is because they just said goodbye to $8 million that was keeping them from competing. Right. Now we know it's serious. Now we know they're running out of time and they're in a climb. They're trying to climb back.

And when you're trying to climb back, you can't do it with any extra weight. And Trevor Rosenthal was extra weight. And a bullpen that struggled that was actually down to seven at that point. You can't have a guy that you're afraid to use. And they've been afraid to use him for the most part. I think Dave Martinez did a good job the night before in getting him out on the mound and talking to him, bringing him some confidence where he managed to get to protect the lead and get guys out.

And they were hopeful to build off that. but he was still struggling Saturday night, walk three guys as part of blowing that lead. And again, you can make a line from here to Safeway, which isn't that far, but I'm just telling you, there weren't that many people there. Of people in spring training who saw this guy pitch

and said, wow, this guy's going to be good. I was one of them. A lot of guys said the same thing. And he wasn't, whatever this thing is going on, it's in his head. It's not physical. And he's got something going on that he, that he's going to have to straighten out somehow. Good guy, you know, not, not an uptight guy, kind of a loose guy.

So I don't know what's going on there. But you had to do it. You had to, I mean, $7 million salary plus $1 million bonus for an option, $1 million buyout on the option for next year. They're still faced with trying to reconstruct a bullpen. And the latest is they have called up 42-year-old Fernando Rodney, who according to the pitching coach at Fresno, David Driver, who covers the team for us for the Washington Times, he's very plugged in to the minor league system,

and he spoke to the pitching coach, Brad Holman in Fresno. He said he throws strikes. His fastball has been up to 90s. 97 miles an hour. He has a very good change up. This is 42-year-old Fernando Rodney. This is where they're at. You know, so they are still running tryout camps for relievers.

And Saturday night was the kind of game that really hurts because you're playing the team. You're trying to catch. You have an 8 to 4 lead at late in the game. In a winnable game, you've got a lot of five or, Four or five game. Eight four. But you've got like a four or five game winning street going at that point. You just swept the Phillies and you beat the Braves in the first game.

That hurt. But Sunday's game, to me, was not quite as bad, but almost as bad. And I'll tell you why. Okay. They were, who was the Atlanta starter? The guy that's really good that got injured early. Their best pitcher. Yeah.

Their best pitcher. The Atlanta starting their best pitcher Sunday. and you're starting an emergency reliever in Austin Voth who just got off the plane from flying from Fresno. So you're starting your fifth starter and emergency starter against the Braves' best starter. That's a loss for you before you even take the field. Yet that kid wound up pitching six innings, striking out seven,

didn't walk anybody, gave up two home runs but solo home runs. The great, I mean, the fact that he gave up two home runs and nobody was on base is illustrative of how good he pitched. And the starting pitcher for the Braves has already added a game. That should be a win then because you've just switched the tables. You've just changed the balance of power. A guy who you should have never gotten that kind of start from just gave you a huge quality start. And you're no longer facing the Atlanta pitcher. That's a game by then should be a win for you, and they wound up losing an extra innings.

Yeah, Tanner Rainey, who started off gangbusters has not pitched well here recently. No, so it's still a struggle. They've got an easier schedule coming up with the Marlins, the Tigers and the Royals, I think, on the road. But the Marlins have played decent ball. Yeah, they swept Philly over the weekend. But that's sort of where they faced them the last time, I think they had the Marlins. The Marlins were on like a five or six-game winning streak. I don't.

I don't think they have enough to catch the Braves. This division may be decided at the July 31st trade deadline. And you know what the prize may be? Madison Bumgarner. He's at the end of his contract with the Giants. He's obviously going to be on the trading block. The Braves are going to go after him. The Phillies are going to go after him.

So that means you're going to go, you're going to have this stud pitcher who is, you know, who's maybe the best postseason pitcher of his era. Yeah. Pitching against you in Key Series in August and September in the NL East. I've suggested, I suggested on 106-7 a fan

that the Natch should try to trade for him. I mean, I know they need bullpen help. But just to keep him away from Atlanta's three. Not just that, but to have him on your rotation. I get that. They, you know, they have three quality starters. you're saying why would you add Madison Bumgarner? Because if you had Madison Bumgarner in 2016 or 2017, you're in the LCS.

I mean, you've moved. Well, if you had him in 2014, he would have been on your team and not the other one. Because he is that, and he is everything the nationals are not. He's a tough guy who is a fiery clubhouse leader. everything the nationals don't have. Scherzer comes close to that, and I'd be real curious what the dynamic would be between two alpha males like Scher

and Madison Bumgardner, who I've heard is a very good teammate. But if you want to light a fire under that team and get a guy who's a quality starter, Madison Bumgartner would be the guy, but I think he's going to wind up going to Philly or Atlanta that have a lot more money available on their payroll

to pick up guys at the 31st trade deadline. I think that's where this is going to be won or lost. I don't think the Nats are going to be able to compete. You know, the one game he started in that 2014 series against the Nats, that was the one game the Nats won. I know. That was it Gio or Strasbourg who won? I'll tell you right now.

I forget which one it was. G.O. or Strasbourg won the game. The starting pitcher for the Nats that day was Fister. Fister. Oh, my gosh. Doug Fistler. Fister went seven innings, gave up four hits. Harper had the home run late and was really good in that.

He was very good in that series. He was the only one. The only one who was good in that series. And I might want to tell you, in that series, if Madison Bumgardner came to Washington, and I don't even know if he would want to come to Washington, because I just don't know if he'd want to play for the nationals. There'd be some fence-mending that would have to be done

because the Giants ridiculed the national. during that 2014 playoffs, and nobody apparently was louder from the bench than Madison Bumgarner and had some very nasty things to say about Steven Strasbourg in particular. So there had to be, there would have to be some fence mending going on. They need to fix their bullpen. Yes, I know they do. That's what they need to fix. But even if they do that, even if they do that, I don't think they can catch the Braves.

All right. One last thing to get to. You sent me a story overnight. actually, and I read it early this morning. It's in... Because I'm working for you around the clock, buddy. It's a story in SI this week. It's called The Rise of the Snow Plow Sports Parents.

And it's basically the graduation from helicopter parents who just hang around and hover to the parents that are just trying now to plow the path ahead for their kids. Take all obstacles out of the way. And move them out of the way so that they face no adversity whatsoever. And the story starts out as follows. Arriving at his draft night party, Dwayne Haskins Jr. steps out of a gray van with a large logo affixed to its side,

a black circle with two white H's that connect in the middle. The Ohio State quarterback makes his way past fans and media down a red carpet, printed with the same logo, and walks under a banner displaying the two H's. The symbol is everywhere, and to the uninitiated could be more than, a bit confusing. There is, after all, only one Dwayne Haskins about to be drafted. So why the two Hs is, as Haskins Jr. wades through 300 of his closest friends and paying customers.

We've talked about this. Inside the Bullmore lanes in Gatorsburg, Maryland, $40 covered, $40 charge, by the way, to cover the bowling food and drinks. The person responsible for that second H stays attached to his hip. It's his dad. And then they get into how his dad meticulously planned the draft night event, not just to launch his son's career, but also to launch their new family endeavor. Haskins and Haskins Group LLC, an entertainment branding and event agency that he registered shortly after Junior, declared for the NFL draft in January.

Now, he did say, apparently, to this reporter, that the second H is for his daughter, Tamara, who is in a spy, hiring actor, but he's the one that runs it. And then it gets into basically a long story about a lot of different examples of parents not just being hovering and watching and encouraging and coaching from the stands and all that, but actually getting involved as business partners and really helping their kids. The only thing that was surprising to me is I heard the cover charge was $50, not $40. But did you read the part where they said, Selected media were invited?

Selected media. Were you invited? I was not invited. I wasn't invited. Yeah. You know, I'm a little bit surprised. Who was invited? I don't even know.

I'm betting NBC Sports Washington was invited. Okay. You know, I don't know who else was invited. Apparently Sports Illustrated was invited. Redskins.com probably. I'm thinking they were invited. You know, maybe the Post was invited. I'm thinking, why wouldn't you invite the Washington Post?

But we didn't get in. You know, H&H, if you're out there listening, we want invites for your next event. We do? Yeah. Okay. Well, I guarantee you, we'll publicize it. We'll talk about it. This story, there are a lot of, basically, there's a lot of the stories about how sports agents and sports coaches are driven nuts by these parents and their involvement.

Well, you must go through this with coaching and basketball. I've talked a lot about those stories, but, you know, none of the kids have gotten to the point where they're getting paid. Right. A lot of these kids have gone on to college. in played and you see this and you know I've told you this for many years I think that there's a real mistake and not allowing your kid to be an advocate for himself I think I told you this one story I know I've told it before I don't know if you were on that day one of my favorite parent you know team nights was my youngest son's JV

basketball team and the head coach called a parent meeting before the season started after the final team had been selected. And we were there, and there was refreshments and drinks, and the whole thing. And then he sits everybody down, and he says, congratulations, your son made the J.B. team. They should be really proud of themselves. I wanted to get together with all of you to tell you that tonight would be the final time that I talked to you during the season.

And he said, unless there is an emergency, you are not to call me about anything. Playing time, game strategy. that is not a conversation that I'll have with any of you. And I just wanted to be up front before the season started so you understood the expectations. The expectations are if your son has a problem with game strategy or with not getting the last shot or with playing time, that he can come to me and we can have that conversation.

He's now 15 years old or whatever it was, 15 or 16 years old. He can learn to advocate on his own behalf. And I just sat there Tommy and I was like, this is awesome. This guy totally gets. it. And he's telling the parents, and it was a good group of parents, I'm not saying, but at the end, any questions, and of course there were about 15 minutes worth of questions, and I'm like, no, that's the point, is that there are no questions. This is the way it is. And he said, look, if there's a health-related issue or if you're concerned about some sort of

academic thing, of course, please call. But when it comes to this basketball team and how it's to be managed and whether or not your son plays a lot or doesn't play at all, or whether or not you feel like he should have been the one to take the last shot or my strategy of going to his own instead of playing a man at the end of the game wasn't to your liking. I will not have any of those conversations with you. I never had a coach openly say that. They all feel that way. You don't know as a parent anything that you think you know.

Nowhere near what you think you know. And by the way, many times when your kid comes home and tells you, oh, I should be playing more, they even know that they shouldn't be playing as much, but they're doing that for your benefit in a lot of those cases. But anyway, this story was really well done and points out some crazy examples of athletes. And it starts with Dwayne Haskins in part because it was the most recent example. Yeah, but I mean, look, this is a big part of my concern,

if I was a Redskins fan, of Dwayne Haskins' moving forward is not necessarily about the kid, but about the people around the kid. The father, the owner, they still call NFL guys owners, right? They're not governors. They're not governors. Okay. Those are the people I'm worried about more than Dwayne Haskins himself and his ability to play quarterback.

Those are the people who create the aura of self-destruction. But this is almost like, this is almost like a parent-child podcast here, in the sense that, you know, you have to walk that balancing act. I understand the idea of you don't want your kids' lives to be hard. You don't want them to be difficult. You know, you don't want your kids to be hurt. You don't want them to suffer. But you can't do this.

You can't try to basically do it for them. you know you can't you can't take the the suffering or the disappointment out of their lives for them they've got to learn that but i understand the idea of you know you want you don't want your kids to have to have to feel bad oh listen there is um it it would be irresponsible not to be and think protectively about your child in these situations because there are cases to me where a parent absolutely should and has to get involved in Because there are abusive coaches out there. But in most cases, what you're doing, at least in my view, is when you're intensely involved, you really deprive them of, you know, I think very crucial and critical life experiences that they have to face and they have to face adversity.

And if you clear all the adversity away, they're not going to know how to deal with it when they're an adult. Right. You're right. And failure and learning from failure is part of growing up. Not everybody succeeds at every single thing that they do. And by the way, when they do, and then they end up being sort of coddled by everybody, coaches included, other parents in the program, when somebody is so good at what they do,

when they get to a certain level and they haven't faced adversity, and we saw that with RG3 to a certain degree. Yes. He had never faced adversity. One of Mike Shanahan's comments to us in 2015 when he did that interview is he told Bruce and Dan, the kids never faced adversity. It's a red flag. We have to understand.

And he's going to face adversity at this level. And how he handles that will be very important. I want you to know that because Mike told the story about sitting down with Robert and his father talking about one of Griffin's poor performances. And there weren't many at Baylor. where he threw a couple of red zone picks, and Griffin and his father fell over each other, blaming the play caller and the head coach at the time. And I remember Mike told us that story,

and he said, that was a bit of a red flag, you know, that that was how they had handled it together. But, you know, with respect to Haskins being the focus of the early portion of this story, if you're not sitting there as an adult, and you don't read that if you didn't know it before,

where we knew it before, about the $40 or $50 cover charge for 300 people at a bowling alley for a draft night party to introduce this marketing company and then the Bentley that was purchased with the embroidered logo of the marketing company. If that isn't at least a slight red flag on Haskins, then I don't, I mean, it is for me. I hope it doesn't become a big red flag, but if he isn't successful and his father becomes, super involved, and you start hearing things about his parents having access to the locker room, and no one else's parents having it like Griffin had. Griffin's parents were given preferential treatment by Dan Snyder and the organization, much to the dismay of the coaching staff and the players in that locker room. If you start hearing that stuff, you know, part of that, you know, it will, to me, that'll be all of it. It'll be about the owner in that particular case.

Yeah. Because I blame the owner more for Griffin's demise here than anybody. Yes, absolutely. But it should be, I mean, there's nothing awful about saying that when you read that, there's a bit of a red flag for you. There should be. There should be. Unless you want to, you know, stick your head in the sand. Which I think is to, he's going to be great.

Actually, I think burying your head in the sand is probably the best way to root for this team. Probably would make it easier. Yes. But again, that doesn't. You have to come up for air once in a while. And that's what we're here for. Where for the oxygen? It doesn't mean that he can't be good, that he won't be good,

and it also doesn't mean that his father is going to be intensely involved. Maybe this really is a family venture, and they're taking advantage of the leverage they have right now to launch this and to get it funded or to get it rolling, and maybe Dwayne will have nothing to do with it, and his total focus will be on football. I hope that's the case, because it's the only way he's going to succeed.

The only way. if football takes a back seat to H&H, he's in big trouble. Big trouble. Hopefully the parents understand that. The father understands that and the people close to him understand that. And hopefully, and I've said this before too, Tommy, hopefully the owner learned a valuable lesson in 2012 and 2013, that if you get in the middle of the relationship between your quarterback,

or any player for that matter, but your quarterback and your head coach, and the player now thinks that he doesn't have to answer to the head coach for any of his coaches that he answers to you, the owner, you got no chance. No chance to succeed. You know, getting back to where we started, the kid's already been given preferential treatment because he's wearing a jersey that had previously been,

you know, held back. Number seven, Joe Thaisman's jersey. And the team had an opportunity to basically say to the kid, no, no, we don't give that number out. pick another number on the, and what they chose to do is let the kid wind up, you know, lobby for it, left it in Joe's hands, put Joe Thysman in a position where he would have looked like,

would have looked terrible if he had said, no, you can't wear it, and basically had no choice. So he's already, he's already walking into that locker room with a, with a revered hallowed jersey that nobody else on the team has the ability to do. That's right.

That is true. They should have never put it in Joe's hands as far as the decision goes. That was stupid. All right. You got anything else? I got nothing else. I think I earned my pay today. You earned your pay today.

You always earn your pay today. And it's not great pay, but you're doing it out of the love of doing it. And I love having you here, and it's always fun to have you here. All right, we're off the rest of the week. I'll be back on Monday. thanks to Aaron, thanks to Tommy. Don't forget, rate us, review us on iTunes. Subscribe doesn't cost you anything and tell people that they can also listen to the show at the Kevin Sheehan Show.com.