The Kevin Sheehan Show - Total Medals Or Golds?

Episode Date: July 30, 2024

Kevin and Thom today on the person in the Commanders' organization that has been the most impressive so far. They talked about the timing on Jayden Daniels being named starter, Kevin's Nats' Park concert experience, the Nats' tough loss last night in Arizona, the Lane Thomas trade, and whether or not countries should prioritize total medals or golds at the Olympics? 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. Tommy's here. I am here. The show's presenting sponsor, as always, is Wind Donation.

Give them a call at 86690 Nation or head to Windonation.com. This is from HTTDubs. 10 and 7, he titled his review on Apple. Gave us five stars and wrote, enough with the name talk. and let's get going with predictions and on the field talk. I share your optimism, Kev. I haven't been this excited since Tom entered his Hemingway contest, number one podcast for Washington football team hands down.

Wasn't that about a year ago? Yes, it was. It was a year ago at the end of July when I was down in Key West trying to win the earnest Hemingway look-alike contest. Big disappointment for me. The whole thing was a big disappointment. Well, no, we had a good time. We had a really good time.

Yeah, but you said there were professionals down there. Yeah, there were people, like a guy who won had been a 10-time loser. You know, and basically his speech, you get a one-minute speech, his speech was, you better vote for me because I keep losing. I've heard you referred to as a multi-time loser before by, some of our listeners. Yes. You know, I said to Tommy right before we started recording this morning, because we're recording

this morning, and we do that, I don't know, one out of every three or four shows, rather than waiting until the afternoon, I said, you know, let's just do this. If news breaks, then I'll just do a different final segment or different first segment after my radio show. And then I thought to myself, because I had J.P. Finley on the podcast yesterday, J.P.'s been out of camp every day. And we were talking about how, you know, there have been so many big stories around the NFL, but they've been mostly contract-related stories. You know, a quarterback getting signed or a wide receiver not getting signed at this point is basically training camp in a

nutshell. But I said to you, like, what would be big news? Like, the big news would be an injury, which we don't want. But when Dan Quinn walks to the point. podium and says Jaden Daniels is our starting quarterback. He earned it. He deserves it. And he will be our number one quarterback taking all first team reps

until the opener in Tampa. But then I thought, is that even news? I mean, that's going to happen. The irony of that is the big news would be if he never does that. If he never steps to the podium,

and says Shaden Daniels will be a starting quarterback. That would be the big news. I'm just like waiting for him to do what everyone thinks is the obvious to name Shaden Dan's as a starter. But the biggest news out of camp would absolutely be that he's not the starter going into the season. Yes, of course. That would be, that would send shock waves throughout the league.

Yes. You know, it wouldn't, and it's not going to send shockwaves through the league when Drake May isn't the starter, because they've already named Jacoby Brissette the starter. Sam Darnold's likely to be the starter in Minnesota. It doesn't look like J.J. McCarthy's going to be that. This would be the one that would be a shocker. Everybody's expecting it. And he's going, like, it's not one of those things where you can't say it before the opener.

I guess you could keep it a secret until you roll out on Sunday, September. eighth, but obviously everybody's going to know when he's taking all of the first team reps and he gets asked at a million times. He's not going to say, well, we're undecided on our starting quarterback all the way up until Friday before the season opener. So at some point, he's going to say it. Of course, if he said what you said, it would be massive news. But at some point, he's going to say it, but when he says it, it's going to be anticlimactic. Like it's going to be, well, yeah, thanks. But we knew that. Yeah. I mean, I'm not sure what the motivation is to hold off on it to make the kid work a little bit to, to, I mean, from what I've heard, that doesn't seem like a problem, him working.

Right. I mean, I don't think he doesn't sound like he needs any extra motivation to be fair to Marriota, just a general philosophy of competition. which Dan Quinn has alluded to a number of times. But I would think by the time before the first preseason game, Jane Daniels would be named the starter. Well, he's going to have to basically mention prior to the first preseason game against the Jets, who will start the game. Somebody's going to start at quarterback, so he's going to have to mention that.

And that seems like maybe that's the time. You know, Jaden's going to get the first team reps. What if Marcus Marietta gets the first reps with the starting unit against the Jets in the first quarter? And Jaden Daniels comes in after that? Well, unless there is a clear football reason for that, and any football reason for that would be alarming, I think, if there was one, I don't see why they would do it, just to piss the fan base off. I don't know why they would do it.

Maybe it's just they want to just ease them into it. I don't see that happening. I'm not. I mean, I don't. I mean, if he said, if his knees are that week, then it's a bit of a problem. He got the majority of first team reps yesterday. JP mentioned that to us when he was on the podcast yesterday. So maybe they're already starting that transition where he's.

getting more and more. And then by the time we get to a week from Saturday, which is the preseason opener, he'll be taking first team snaps. I don't, I don't have a problem with the way Dan Quinn has been doing this so far. I wouldn't be a big fan of naming him from the start of training camp. I think it is important to create, if not the reality, the illusion of competition has a message throughout the camp and beyond, you know, to the public. That, you know, the outplayers are competing for jobs. I don't have a problem if that's part of the strategy,

but there will be a point where it will have served its purpose and they need to, you know, make the decision to name Jaden the starter. Look at you, not caring about illusions. That would, I would have thought, would have bothered you. the manufacturing of this, you know, mirage of a competition. I don't... Messages that are smart, I think, or that serve some purpose? I mean, that's half the business.

Okay. Well, you know my position on this. I think he's doing the right thing. And if he had done it the other way, I would have said, I think he's doing the right thing. Of course you would. I am so optimistic. You can't shake me right now.

It's been years. Look, I understand there are reasons to be optimistic. But here's the word that you've dropped from your vocabulary. What? Cautiously optimistic. Yeah, I am, I'm cautious. All right. I'm cautiously optimistic, I guess,

overall because I think there are more things that I'm cautiously optimistic about versus the thing that I am not cautiously optimistic about, that I am wildly optimistic about, and that is Jaden Daniels. Like, I really feel like this dude is going to be the guy. Of course, I recognize that more times than not, when anybody, any of you listening out there says this quarterback that was drafted in the first round is the one out of the four that we're taking, it's a one in four shot, a one in three shot. I'm also very optimistic about Cliff Kingsbury. Everything else I'm cautiously optimistic about, including, by the way,

ownership in front office. Like, it's great that it's professional and it's functional and it appears to be competent, but it was a low bar to clear from where we were. And they've cleared that easily. but there's nothing that says to me this is going to be the best front office in football, that this is the next Ravens or Eagles, you know, front office or 49ers front office. I mean, I'm hopeful. I'm optimistic, but we're still working with a guy that's a first-time general manager. He's the one that's been impressive to me. Out of everybody that's new out there, he's been the most impressive to me.

That's a question for you. Ownership, you know, those that we've heard from, primarily Josh Harris. You know, we hear from occasionally Mitchell Rails, Mark Eyn. We have had a lot from Adam Peters. We've had a lot from Dan Quinn. Who am I missing in terms of the people that are front-facing in the organization now? Thankfully, nobody from the business side anymore.

Who's been the most impressive to you? I'd have to go along with you to say Adam Peters you know I haven't been to many of his press conferences I've been to one and the one I was at the one where he thanked everybody in the building yes that was the first one so he didn't have to answer questions as long

as he would have and I thought that was kind of an impressive strategy as well and he's very calm and not confrontational. And, you know, so, I mean, I say Adam Peters. I agree with you. Yeah, Peters has that, you know, Northern California high-tech vibe to him. I think he's from Northern California, right?

But he has, he exudes that. Now, it doesn't come with the level of, you know, arrogance through, almost a different language of speaking, which a lot of those guys do with all of the business buzzwords. But he definitely has that, you know, that Silicon Valley vibe to him. But look, our evaluations of these people are projections based from a few press conferences over the last six months. Let me ask you a question. Oh, go ahead. On those evaluations, those are public appearance, public perception evaluations.

Let's talk about one football evaluation. I mean, didn't you have some questions raised when they drafted Johnny Newton? No. No? Even with the foot injury? Well, I didn't know about the foot injury. You know, I didn't know that there was a lingering foot injury. that came out, remember afterwards.

He had had that injury. Shortly after, yes. Yeah. But I saw the player, and I saw Illinois enough to know, I mean, he was the Big Ten defensive player of the year. So I, and I also felt in the moment, I love what they're doing. They're taking the best player, the best football player on the board. This is not, you know, you can't in the first couple of rounds start drafting for need.

that is what Charlie Casserly and Bobby Betherd would say over and over again, get you in trouble. So I liked the pick. I was disappointed to find out he was injured, but he's back. He's healthy. He's ready to roll. That's what I mean. I think there were a lot of questions raised once they found out he had a bad foot.

And they knew he had a bad foot. Yeah. Or they didn't know he had a bad foot. They didn't know, right? No, they knew he had a foot injury with the other foot. They did not know that there was an issue with the foot that he just had surgery on. That's it. And there are people.

That was a bit alarming. Yeah, there are people that. Yes, there are people that believe that maybe one of the reasons he fell a little bit from a projected mid to late first rounder to the early second round is that some teams knew about it and some teams didn't. but he's healthy now. It mean, it was the, what do they call that fracture? Is it the Jones? Link Frank, Liz Frank? No, it's not Liz Frank.

Is it Jones? Jones fracture? I don't know. I think that's what he had. A cup on both feet. I don't know, Doc. Yeah, I don't know, Doc. But if he turns out to be an impressive addition to that front front.

that front, that defensive line, that's a pretty decent win for Adam Peters. Because there were a lot of eyebrows raised, I think, after the foot injury came out and that they were caught unaware. And that they didn't look good at that moment. And if he makes them look good, I mean, the rest of what they've done probably can't be judged until you play throughout the season, or at least part of the season. But if Johnny Newton has a good training camp and remains healthy, then that's a pretty decent win for Adam Peters. Here's a question based off of you looking at, you know, the risk of selecting

Johnny Newton, and he was their second draft choice after Jaden Daniels. And remember, they did attempt according to reports and even, you know, Adam Peters implied that there was interest in getting back into the first round to probably take an offensive lineman. But it was an active offseason because there were a lot of players added to the roster, most of them on one-year deals. You know, there's no risk to the team. But after Jaden Daniels, what was the second most important signing. Because I think ultimately it might be the two players that step to the podium yesterday after practice.

And I played some of the sound on the show yesterday from Zach Ertz. But the other one is Bobby Wagner. I think Wagner and Ertz are really, really big time signings for this particular organization at this time. and I actually think they're both going to be significant contributors to the team in 2024. If my 10 and 7 is even close, I think Ertz and Wagner had really good seasons. Wagner had a great season last year, led the league in tackles. And I think Wagner and Ertz were really important signings.

Ertz is Kingsbury's guy. He knows the Kingsbury system. He's six foot five. What does a young rookie quarterback need? A running game and a really big targeted tight end. That always works for a young quarterback. Young quarterbacks, history of the game, young quarterbacks always look for that big catch radius tight end. And they have him.

Now he's got to stay healthy because he hasn't been healthy in recent years. He hasn't started. 17 games since 2001. Yeah. 2020. 21, yeah, 21, yes. Yeah. Well, did he, in 2021, he started 17?

That was the playoff year for them. That was the 11 and 6 year, I think. Okay. I don't know. Does anybody come to mind for you as the second most important signing after Jaden Daniels being drafted at number two overall? Well, I would agree with Bobby Wagner. I'm kind of leery about Jack Hertz's ability to stay healthy.

But I would agree with Bobby Wagner. Back to what would be newsworthy because the announcement that Jaden Daniels is going to be the starting quarterback will feel sort of anticlimactic. I think that obviously a big injury would be big news. But beyond that, I do think there's a chance that they can. extend Sam Cosmi, but that's not an earth-shattering, you know, news story. I think the news, like if there's any big news, it may come late in camp when they cut from 90 to 53, and there are a couple of names in there that surprise fans. Whenever there's a new regime, there are players that don't make it that fans are surprised at. They just don't have any, you know, there's no loyalty to the players

that were here under the last staff. But right now, pretty quiet camp for Washington, even though it's a camp that's, I think, producing as much optimism about the product on the field in a long time. Maybe not for this year, but moving forward. I wanted to mention to you, we'll get to the Nats, and they're absolutely horrible loss last night at Arizona, but more importantly, their trade.

Tommy wants to talk about the Olympics as well. But I went to a concert last night at Nat's Park. And I went and saw Green Day in Smashing Pumpkins. I've seen Smashing Pumpkins three or four times. They're one of my favorite bands. And I'm not a big Green Day fan, but my wife wanted to go, and my son and his girlfriend came with us. And it was a long night.

I'm going to mention that real quickly. because there was a thunderstorm early, which kind of set the night, including the opening acts, back by about a half an hour or 45 minutes. But here's what I wanted to say to you. I've never been to a concert at Nat's Park, and I went last night for the first time. I don't think it's a very good venue at all for a concert. Yeah? No.

And I started to think about this. I think baseball parks in general aren't great venues. for concerts. Maybe I'm wrong about this and maybe somebody will point out the obvious reasons I'm wrong, but there is, there's more field. I guess every baseball park is configured differently, so there may be some baseball parks that are perfect for concerts. But they put the stage essentially in center field, all right center to be exact. Actually, it's like dead center field. and there are plenty of seats on, you know, in front of the stage. Right.

And we did not sit in those seats. I didn't want to sit where I was going to have to stand with a bunch of people under the age of 30 for, you know, five hours. The seats that we had were not great, by the way. I'm definitely a seat snob for concerts and sporting events. I won't get into why we ended up with the seats that we had. It had nothing to do with usually my go-to guy, my guy, Bernie, who's the best, because I didn't call Bernie until the last minute, which I felt terrible about anyway. And anyway, we already had tickets.

But I thought it was a shitty venue for a concert. The acoustics were terrible. You know, if you're in the stadium seating, not on the field, I don't think there's one good seat because you are so far away from the stage. The stage didn't extend out into the middle of the field or left or right from the stage, which sometimes you get at big stadium, NFL stadium shows. Have you seen a concert there? Not an actual concert.

After a Nats game quite a few years ago, the Wallflowers played after the game. So that's the only time I've ever seen a musical performance there. And by the way, they were very good. Isn't that Dylan's son? Yes. And you know what was amazing? That Jacob Dylan, Bob Dylan's son, could have been more opposite of his father live.

Jacob Dylan was engaging, you know, talking to fans. He was having a good time. He wasn't miserable. there like Bob Dylan usually is. But I've never seen a full-blown concert there. Or at any ballpark that I can think of. I mean, I saw the stones at JFK Stadium in Philadelphia. Well, I've seen a lot of stadium shows.

I mean, I've seen a lot of stadium shows, and they've all been NFL stadium shows. And for whatever, those typically are, I mean, I've seen shows at FedEx Field. I've seen shows at M&T Banks, certainly many shows going back many years at RFK Stadium. I've seen shows in the Meadowlands. JFK, who'd you see at JFK?

You said the Stones? Yeah. Yeah, the Stones Journey, basically got foods, and George Thurgood. Yeah. Did you see, did you, anyway, if anybody wants to weigh in with an agreement, or disagreement on that or tell me why it's not good or tell me why it is good at Kevin she and DC because I am curious. It's interesting because I've had opportunities to go to shows at Nat's Park and I just each time I ended up not going and then last night I went and I'm like

it's just I mean it seemed like we were the stage was basically in center field and we were in the stadium seating not on the field seating. but pretty close to the stage, about as close to the stage in the stadium seating as you could get. And it seemed like we were a quarter of a mile away. I mean, you had to watch it on the screen, which was a bad angle as well. Did you watch the greatest night in pop on Netflix, the We Are the World Special? Did we talk about this? No, I did not. I didn't.

What made me think of it was just Bob Dylan. And what a, I mean, he's just, he was a weirdo. I mean, I was never a Dylan fan. I've never been a Bob Dylan fan. He was never, which is almost sacrilegious for my age. For your age, no doubt. But to me, I don't, you know, I didn't get it. I guess he's an incredible poet, but the music never really did anything for me.

But he was really odd on that night. That's a really good, you know, Netflix show. I mean, the film that they had of that night and all of the people involved. I mean, Lionel Richie was really, you know, Lionel Richie, Michael Jackson, Quincy Jones were really the people spearheading it. Lionel Richie was really something else that entire night. It was following the American Music Awards. And the big story all night long is they gathered. at that famous studio, and I'm forgetting the name of it right now, in L.A.

To record this is whether or not Prince would show up. And he never did, but they sent Sheila E. there, and then, you know, there was an idea that perhaps Prince was coming afterwards. It was, it's really worth watching if, you know, you remember that, of course. And for those. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Anyway, Dylan was incredibly reluctant, lacking in what appeared to be confidence among the biggest stars of the day.

It was weird. You know, he's a huge boxing fan. Is he? Oh, my God. I think he has his own boxing gym, or he had his own boxing gym, kind of a secret boxing gym. out in L.A. somewhere, where celebrities and stuff would go train. And he wrote a couple of songs about fighters. He wrote Hurricane, the song about Ruth and Hurricane Carter,

who was convicted of killing a guy in a robbery, wrongly convicted. He wrote another song about it, a boxer named Davy Moore who got killed in the ring. I remember Davey Moore. Yeah. No, not that Davy Moore. Oh, not that Davy Moore? Yeah. Yeah.

There was a previous Davy Moore. And he used to call Birch Sugar, Dylan Wood, to talk boxing. He's a huge boxing guy. That was one of, you and I were out in Vegas for a fight. I don't remember which fight. And this was one of the nights for whatever reason you didn't care that I hung out with you. Usually Tom would try to duck everybody, the crew we were with. But you and I ended up in a bar in, I guess, the MGM,

because that's where the fights were that we went to together. I think they were all. Maybe one was at Mandalay Bay, I forget. And I just hung out with you and Bert Sugar for like a couple of hours. And, you know, I had had Bert Sugar on the radio show, even before I started to do a show with you because he's a D.C. guy. And he University of Maryland

Yeah, and he was a Maryland guy And he was a Riggins fan And when I was doing the show with Riggins He came on with us But what a character that guy was Yeah Absolutely He was a good friend of mine

Yeah I spent many a night drinking with him And when you were drinking with Bert You didn't pay for a drink all night Not that he paid for it But somebody else would always pay for it Yeah Yeah, I'm looking at it

up right now. He died in 2012, so it was probably two or three years after this night that I hung out with the two of you in Vegas. He was 75. I'll tell you, I would have guessed that he was much older than that when he passed away. He played rugby. At Maryland? I think so. He played rugby until his mid-60s. Wow. He was a character. He really was a character. I took him to shelly's one night. You did? in town. Yeah, he loved it. All right. We got other things to get to. By the way, concerts at Nats Park.

Yes. Bruce is coming up September 7th. Yeah. I got my Bruce fixed last time. Yeah. That was, so I think one of the best shows I've ever been to is seeing Bruce in Philly. That was, I think, seeing Bruce anywhere is great. What am I talking about?

Seeing Bruce in Jersey or in Philly, I think, is extra special. All right, we've got more to get to, and we will start doing that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. This segment of the show is brought to you by Window Nation. If you're tired of paying high utility bills every month, it's because your air conditioning keeps running to keep your home cool, and that's because your windows aren't energy efficient. If your windows are builder grade or over eight years old, the seals are. are likely broken, the air's leaking out, and you're paying the price in high utility bills all year long. When Donations, high quality windows are built to last a lifetime. Right now,

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of the windows that need to be replaced and how much it will cost. 86690 Nation, windownation.com, mention my name. The Nats traded Lane Thomas, Tommy, yesterday. I know that this isn't a shocker by any stretch of the imagination, but I think for Nats fans, you know, hardcore Nats fans, this is not a player they wanted traded. Do you agree with me? No, I think so.

I think people fell in love with him because he was a solid player. You know, he wasn't a great player. He was a pretty good fielder, good base runner, a decent hitter, an overall good guy, a leader in the clubhouse. But, you know, I mean, when you think about what they did, I mean, they traded John Lester in 2021. who was done, basically, at that point. He had over 5 ERA. Its career was basically over. And they got Lane Thomas for him.

You know, and they got like three and a half, three years at a decent years at Elaine Thomas. And then they traded them for three prospects, including one of the Indians' top prospects. I mean, one of the Guardians' top prospects. It's just a remarkable trade. great season for Rizzo. It's just been amazing. Yeah, they got a left-handed pitcher Alex Clemmy. He's the number eight prospect in the MLB pipeline in the Cleveland MLB pipeline. They got a shortstop and they got an infielder, but it's that left-handed pitcher that people are excited about.

I don't know. I just, you know, in reading about the trade and the potential trade leading up to today's deadline, I think there were fans that envisioned one day a Wood, Cruz, Thomas, outfield. You can tell me which positions they would have ended up in, and that that would have been a very impressive starting outfielder, starting outfield for maybe a contending team. Look, Lane Thomas is a fourth outfielder. A good fourth outfielder would have fourth outfielder. They want to see what they have in this kid Jacob Young,

who's been at center field for them. He's one of the fastest runners in the league, one of the top-based dealers. He's a terrific centerfielder, and he's hitting decent for them. And I think you're looking at an outfield maybe by the end of the season of Wood, Jacob Young, and Center, and Cruz in Wright Field. Dylan Cruz in Wright Field.

And I think that's a little bit more exciting than Lane Thomas. Yeah, I mean, that's because, I mean, to be a good player on a bad team, okay, you shouldn't fall in love with those guys. Right. You shouldn't fall in love with anybody on this team who's over 25. Okay. Will they trade anybody else? It's been, what, Winker, Harvey, and now Thomas.

There was talk about Finnegan. Finnegan last night came in at Arizona for the Nats and an 8-4 lead faced six batters gave up five earned runs, two homers, including a walk-off by Corby-Carrel, and they lost an absolute gut-wrenching game last night, 9-8-8-8. At one point, they were up 6-0. They had an 8-3 lead, 8-4 lead. He's given up actually now in his last two outings. I think it's seven hits and I think three home runs in his last two outings after being outstanding and being an All-Star. Do you think they'll deal him? I got to think his value has diminished. Look, I'm not saying that somebody's going to make a decision solely based on his last couple of outings. I mean, he has a whole season of good quality relief appearances to judge him on. but I'd be very weary if I was the general manager.

It depends on how much I need him as my closer to compete for the rest of the season. I think if the Nats get the right deal, they'll trade them. Otherwise, they'll hang on to him. I think that's been Rizzo's philosophy, you know? Should we just trust everything Rizzo does? Well, at this point, what he's done has been tremendous. Yeah. trading Hunter Harvey for like the number two prospect

and for the Royals and getting the best catcher and the draft out of it. You know, trading Winker, who only had two months left on his contract for one of the Mets' top young pitching prospects and Tyler Stewart. Everything he's done has been a tremendous trade deadline performance. Now, now we have to have. to see if they become players. Okay, right now they're prospects and everyone loves prospects because they haven't failed yet. Now we have to see if any of them become players. Where would Rizzo rank

among the best GMs? I mean, the overall front office and the current pipeline, right, is nowhere near the top in terms of what they have in their system. But where would he specifically rank as a GM overall? Among the top ones in the league, you know, you have Brian Cashman, you have Dave Dombrowski, I'd have to, you know, go through the list in front of me to see anyone else. Well, whoever, the guy in Atlanta, the guy in L.A. Yes. Right?

Well, the guy in L.A. Yeah, the guy in L.A. I mean, because they seem to develop some pretty good young prospects. in LA. I would say Rizzo's top five. Wow. Okay. You wanted to talk about the Orioles catcher, James McCann, who got absolutely beaned yesterday and stayed in the game. I mean, that was a remarkable scene. I mean, he got hit in the face in the nose specifically with a ball,

went crumbling down, laid on the ground for a few minutes, face down, and when he got up, there's blood shooting out of his nose. You saw the video, right? Gushing out of his nose, yeah. Yeah, which it would indicate a broken nose, generally. You know, so he went back to the dugout. They stuck a couple of cotton balls up his nose. This is the first thing.

Yeah. Okay. And then he went out and caught the rest of the game, all nine innings. He played like that with these cotton sticking out of his nose. That is, yeah, go ahead. He's being heralded for, you know, for his guts to do something like that. The blood that was gushing out of his nose, just people just Google James McCann, Orioles, and watch when he finally gets up what his nose looks like.

You know, what's interesting about that is in the NFL, he would have probably had to come out and go to the tent for, you know, a few minutes. Yeah. And that's not what happened here. He just stayed in the game. He finished the at-bat, right? Yes. No, he got hit.

Oh, yeah. Well, that ended the at-bat, of course. But it's not like they put in a pinch runner. He stayed in the game, the entire game. No. He said, okay, well, let me ask you this. When I say, I don't need to diminish what he did, okay. But in your, in your,

athletic endeavor. Have you ever sustained what was a pretty serious injury and just kept playing? I don't know. I think when I was younger, like I played every sport when I was younger, like a lot of people that are listening. And I do remember, you know, the old, ah, you got your bell rung, get up, you're fine. But I do remember, and I think I was in ninth grade, getting hit. by Kenny Cassidy. I'll never forget.

Kenny was a good football player when he was that age. And he hit me in practice. And I definitely was knocked out. I was definitely knocked out for a brief period of time. And I remember it. I don't remember it. I remember the aftermath thinking that was a big hit and then what happened. But back then you just, you know, it was, you're fine.

You just got your bell rung. Get back into the huddle. Okay. I do remember that. Let's take away organized sports. Yeah. We're talking about pickup, Sanlott football, anything like that.

Well, you had total control over your decision to continue playing or not to continue playing. Well, you know that I've had, you know, a lot of back issues. I've had multiple lower back surgeries. And I can remember sometimes being in pain. in a pickup basketball game and just finishing the game when I shouldn't have probably. It was probably stupid to do it. But no, nothing like what I've never had blood gushing out of my nose or my face like he just had and just stayed in. I think everybody's been knocked around a little bit and there's some blood here or there.

But that was a shot. I would have definitely taken a seat for a while, that's for sure. Yeah, I think so. I guess mine would be we were playing Sandlot football at the J.M. Hill School. We played every Sunday. I mean, up until I was like 25. You know, we played tackle football. And I remember I was running with the ball and I got tackled by Rich Hillman who played football at my high school.

Pretty big, strong guy. And I broke my ankle. But I didn't know I broke it. And I played another couple of hours that afternoon. Yeah. And I went dancing at the Saylor's Lake Pavilion that night. And I woke up the next morning, and my foot was the size of a basketball at the end of the bed. Right.

I could barely move well enough to get out of bed and to the hospital emergency room. Well, that's no Jack Youngblood. I played on a broken ankle. Jack Youngblood played on a broken leg in the Super Bowl, right? I don't know if it was the Super Bowl or not. Look, Jack Youngblood's one of my favorite defensive players of all time. Absolutely. Actually, when you were saying that, I've told you that, you know, about my for years when we were, you know, it was the years after high school and then through college and,

and for a few years after college as well. My high school friends and I, we had this softball game the day after Thanksgiving. I know I've told you about it in the past. And basically there would be a keg parked at home plate and you had to chug a beer every time you got up. So by the time you got into the fourth, fifth inning of this game on the day after Thanksgiving, you know,

the field was kind of muddy, it was always kind of cold and cloudy, but everybody was just completely hammered. And we had great memories. And we actually all got, several of us got together recently, and we were talking about some of those games. But one year, in kind of a bit of a free-for-all at one point during the game, I got hit over my eye, like head-butted over my eye. And there was a lot of blood. And I didn't feel it.

And I just kept playing and took a towel or something. And the next morning went to the hospital and got six stitches over my eye. So that would be my warrior's story, but that would be it, basically, yeah. But we all have situate. I mean, we didn't think of rightfully so about James McCann's, you know, field courage. Yeah. But if you really look back on your childhood and pick up basketball, sandlot, football, whatever, baseball, we all have stories where we just stayed on, state, kept playing.

Yeah. You know, where the smart thing would have been to stop playing. Of course, but, you know, your manhood is at stake with your friends typically in those situations, too. I just looked up the Jack Youngblood thing. So not only Tommy did he play with a broken leg through the three playoff games, which included the Super Bowl against the Steelers. That would have been the 79 season, the 1980. Super Bowl, the 79 Rams, 79 Steelers. That was the last of the Steelers dynasty Super Bowls,

the fourth Super Bowl during that decade. Youngblood played with a broken leg, all three playoff games, including the Super Bowl, and then he didn't stop there. He went to the Pro Bowl in Hawaii and played in the Pro Bowl the following week. And here's the quote. Everybody asked me when I got to Hawaii, what the heck are you doing here? You've got a broken tibia. I said, shut up. I'm not going to miss this party. Close quote. That's funny. Jack Youngblood.

One of my favorite defensive players. Absolutely. All right. We got more. I do want to mention. By the way. Yes. Let me just mention. Jack Youngblood follows me on Twitter. No. Why? Yes.

Why? I don't know. Did you write about him at some point? No. No, I have not. but I went back and followed him, you know, after he followed me, I didn't even know he was on Twitter. Well, that's a weird follow. He must know how you felt about him somehow.

Maybe I posted something about him on social media. That might have been it. Yeah. But I wouldn't have tagged him because I didn't even know he had a Twitter account, but he follows me on Twitter, which is pretty cool. All right. We got more right after these words from a few of our sponsors. All right, Tommy, tell us about Shelly's. Well, earlier in the show, I mentioned that I brought the great Birch Sugar one night to Shelly's.

And that was a legendary evening. Shelly's was really buzzing that night. And he had a great time at Shelly's. And this is a guy who has been all around the world in cigar bars and stuff. and Shelley's backroom at 1331 F Street became one of First Sugar's favorite places to come when he was in Washington. But it's not unusual.

Again, I've talked about this before. It's not unusual to see people of that kind of stature at Shelley's. You know, every Memorial Day when they do the old Rolling Thunder motorcycle ride, the actor Robert Patrick is there. always meet him and spend some time talking to him. Right. Dennis Rodman, when he's in town to see his daughter, Trinity Rodman play sometimes. He'll stop at Shelly's and have a smoke.

Arnold used to stop there. I've told this story before, but when Mike Tyson fought here in D.C. against James McBride, I think it was, his last fight, all the British writers, boxing writers came in the town. Yep. And I took them the Shelly's, and they fell in love with it because that's what you do. I mean, you know, to go into Shelly's, that's what happens.

You fall in love with it. You know, we had a guy who basically on social media from Northern California basically says to me on social media, he says, thanks, thanks for the recommendation at Shelly. There's a picture of, not a picture of him, but a picture of cigar he's smoking. And I get that a lot from people. It's their first time at Shelly's, and they always thank me for letting them know. You can find out more at Shelly's Backroom.com. Real quickly, from Dan Quinn this morning right before practice started,

he said that Mike Sandristel has settled in to the slot corner position, which is not a surprise. He also said that he told defensive coordinator Joe Whitjee, Junior, he thinks Juan Martin will be one of our very best tacklers. That does not surprise any of us that saw Juan Martin play very well and be a very good tackler during that stretch where he played well at the end of last year. It's going to be interesting to see how Sanristill and Kwan Martin and Forrest and Butler to see how all of those guys are used. defensively.

But Sanra still, I think we knew when they drafted him. He had a good chance to be the slot corner. There's also, you know, there's been talk that he's been out back there returning punts and that he could be a punt returner on this team as well. I think the interesting thing will be who are the starting outside corners. The guests from everybody is St. Juice and Emmanuel Forbes. I don't know if that's how it shakes out. Michael Davis, they seem to have a preference for

and I think there are a couple of young guys who they like as well. All right, you wanted to talk about the Olympics to finish up the show. What did you want to say? I was wondering what your opinion is. The metal count from what I've read is the United States leads to the metal count with a total of 20 gold medals, including the most silver and the most bronze. They have nine bronze and eight silver. But they only have three gold at this point.

And that puts them behind, France, Japan, China, Australia, South Korea. And I'm wondering, what would be more important to you to have the total number of medals or to lead in gold medals? I've always thought the Olympics were interesting from this one standpoint, which, look, they're interesting for a lot of reasons. And I mentioned on yesterday's show, Tommy, I have not watched much ever. all of the Olympics so far. In that people are celebrated. I mean, just lavish praise for finishing third. It's for not winning, for actually finishing third.

I understand, you know, bronze, silver, it's an accomplishment. You're an Olympian. You meddled. But I don't know. I think gold medals, leading in gold medals, would be the most important thing. But it never is. In my lifetime, it's always about metal count, overall metal count. Am I right?

Yeah. Yes. I'm with you. Look, I'm not diminishing, finishing second or third in the world, okay, in your event. But, I mean, like, I'll compare it to a newspaper contest, okay? A journalism contest. It's always nice to get a second or third. place, but first place is different.

First place is just different. You know? I mean, it feels better. It's more important. It's more significant. I'm with you. I'd much rather have lead the nation and need all the countries in gold medals than

total medals. I think so, but it's never been that way. There is, you know, if you don't, There are a lot of people, and I would put our good friend Richard Doc Walker at the top of this list, where if you don't win at all, there's nothing to be proud of.

There's nothing that you earned if you don't win the final game. And it's funny, in American team sports, you know, we don't sit there and praise runner-ups in anything. The only sport that we follow that does that. only sport we're not winning at all seems to be okay, is in college basketball, reaching the final four is, and always has been, a major accomplishment, even if you don't go on to win the national championship. Getting to that final four is huge. Nothing else that we root for celebrates the runner-up. But in the Olympics, we celebrate the runner-up to the runner-up. Yes. Now that said, I have to admit, I'm proud of my fifth place finish in the U.S. trials and the discus in the 1974 goodwill games. I don't talk about it much, you know.

You finished fifth place? Yes. But I am proud of it because, you know, I mean, this was the best people from all around the country thrown the discus. Did you get a plaque for that? Was that something that was in your shrine, your office at all? This was the early days of the Goodwill Games. I think he got it. You know, that was Ted Turner's thing. I think he got a subscription to TBS or something like that. Okay.

Anything else? I got nothing for you, boss. My bookie for all of your sports betting needs, including anything you want to bet on, wise. Speaking of the Olympics, Tommy, the U.S. is a 31 point favorite over South Sudan tomorrow. This is the team that they beat by a point in one of the preliminary games as a 43.5 point favorite. At MyBooky right now, they are a 31 point favorite. MyBooky.ag promo code Kevin D.C. for all of your sports betting needs. You'll get a cash bonus on your initial deposit. All right, I will talk to you

Thursday. Thanks. All right, buddy. I'll see you. All right. We are done for the day back tomorrow.