The Kevin Sheehan Show - WFT's Covid Craziness

Episode Date: December 15, 2021

Kevin today with Ben Standig/The Athletic on the Washington Football Team Covid outbreak. Kevin also weighed in on the latest Washington Post story on Dan Snyder. He finished with some thoughts on Steph Curry's record-setting night and the 1991 Skins' season 30 years ago today.  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 Cheehan Show. Here's Kevin. All right. The show today is presented by Windonation. Call Windonation at 86690 Nation or go towindonation.com.

Mention my name. You'll get a free estimate. I promise you if you're looking for a great product at a fair price and you want to work with a great group of people, Wind Donation is where you should go. Between now and the end of the month, You can get a house full of windows for just $99 a month, and they're also offering 50% off any style window.

Free estimate, no risk, cut your energy bills significantly. Use my name, and they will take good care of you. 86690 Nation or windownation.com. I waited to get this podcast rolling today because I knew earlier this morning that there was going to be a lot of news related to the Washington football team and their COVID situation. Joining us here to start the podcast today is my good friend Ben Standig from the athletic. Follow him on Twitter at Ben Standing.

Listen to his podcast, Standing Room only, and also subscribe to the athletic where you can read Ben and read his coverage of the team. So as of now, which is at about 130 in the 30 in the team. the afternoon here on a Wednesday. Washington has begun practice. They've started their Wednesday preparation for the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday. But Ben, 17 players currently on the COVID list. I know you're driving. You want me to go down the list, or do you have it memorized? I don't have the full list memorized at this point, but yeah, I mean, it's pretty wild. The defensive line They add Matt I and I have to those today. That's on top of, what, six other guys that were already on that list.

Today, the offense got names, Kyle Allen, Samus Reyes, Cam Sims, Cornelius Lucas. I'm not forgetting somebody there. So it's now both sides of the ball being affected. They went so far as the side of a quarterback to the practice squad. So it is getting out of hand here, to say the least. Yeah, so the whole list, and I'll just run down it. Kyle Allen, Cam Sims, Samus Reyes, Cornelius Lucas, Montez Sweat, James Smith Williams, Casey Two Hill, John Allen, Tim Settle, Matt Ionitis, Khaliq Hudson, David Mayo, Milo Eifler, didn't even know he was on the team, Kendall Fuller, Derek Forrest, William Bradley King, remember him on the sideline with Dak Prescott and Lael Colin. on Sunday and Tamaric Hemingway. That's as of now, everybody else practicing or at practice.

I'll ask you in a moment about some of the key players who are not on the COVID reserve list. Of the players that are on this list, we know that Kendall Fuller is not vaccinated. I think J.P. Finley reported that yesterday. Do we know if any of the other players aren't vaccinated? So, I mean, Montess wet, you know, back during the summer was very loud about saying he wasn't getting vaccinated. You know, I don't know, like, definitively the only way we can sort of tell in any way, and if you were paying attention to the Aaron Rogers situation where, you know, we're his controversy, the question was, you know, players coming into the common area with the media need to be wearing a mask if they're not vaccinated, which was part of the question with Rogers.

But for the most part, the players do come in with masks. You mentioned Kendall Fuller. He has typically worn a mask, but he has come in. Montes Sweat as well. I'm trying to think of anybody else from that group. I don't think there's anybody else from this group that I would point to as being unvaccinated. But, you know, it's a relatively small amount regardless. I mean, I would probably guess if I was going to sort of speculate a little wildly, like,

five to six at this point that I feel pretty confident about, wouldn't report, but that's about the number right now. I mean, the reason I'm asking is because that really means that the only players, and Montes-Swett remember, you know, has been quarantined since the middle portion of last week. The only player, even though this list is large at this point, that would be definitely out due to COVID, would be Kendall Fuller if he's not vaccinated. Everyone else will have an opportunity between now and Sunday at kickoff. to produce two negative tests within a 24-hour period.

I'm not saying that that's likely. We've seen, you know, kind of in the last several weeks, players that have made it onto the COVID list, even vaccinated players in the NFL, have typically missed a game. They don't produce two negatives within a 24-hour period. But only Kendall Fuller is for sure out.

Yeah, I think that's right. Now, Montez-Swed would be, in theory, eligible to come off Saturday, but considering he hasn't even, one, he's still on IR. Right. Two, he hasn't played or practiced in forever at this point. He got hurt on Halloween, so it would be stunning to me, you know, obviously he's a pretty good athlete, but it would be stunning to me

that he'd be in any kind of shape to go. But you're right. I mean, like, Darrell Roberts came off the COVID list yesterday. He went on the same day, well, Saturday, the same day at James Fitzwilliams. So, you know, it's as a sign of what could happen. So, yes, this list could shrink, but, you know, at a minimum, they're going to have to practice probably all week with, with a smaller group, and then from there, just fingers crossed that they get anybody else back.

And just to sort of tack onto it, of course, there's then just the injuries, right? Just leaving there, we'll get a full report from the team after practice. Taylor Heineke was out there. Harry McCorn was on the side field. He obviously had a concussion in the last game. We'll see about him. We did not see J.D. McKissick who had a concussion. We did not see Curtis Samuel, who has been, you know, obviously,

dealing with his thing. But there were also some other random ones. We didn't see Keith Ismail. We didn't see Troy Apke. Somebody, I think Michael Phillips reported, he didn't see the kicker Brian Johnson. Now, none of this means anything necessarily doesn't mean COVID. I mean, you know, who knows? Maybe they're inside having lunch.

If this is the regular Wednesday, we may not think twice about it. But because of the situation that we're in, you know, anybody who's not there has got to be noticed. So, you know, who knows where this list is out by tomorrow, or whatever the next time they add more name. could go up, could go down, and that's kind of the big mystery where we're at right now. Fascinating situation this week. Washington not the only team that's suffering right now, although I think the 17 players is the biggest outbreak as of now. There are other teams like Cleveland, and they play a Saturday game.

They got flexed into that Saturday spot their game with the Raiders on Saturday. By the way, Washington and Philadelphia were among the five games scheduled for this upcoming weekend. that were eligible to be flexed into the Saturday spot. But they made that decision about three weeks ago, two or three weeks ago, that it was going to be Cleveland and the Raiders at 4.30. And then the night game is a good one. Patriots at Colts. Cults are favored in that game. As a side note.

Washington right now, I've been watching this all day to see what the reaction from, you know, from the odds makers and very, they are essentially a seven-point underdog now across the board. You know, it was four and a half, five somewhere in that area. It started at three and a half this week. It's now Philadelphia minus seven. This is starting to feel like a real lost cause to a certain degree here on Wednesday afternoon. Going into Philly where as of now they haven't had any issues, of course that could change.

And they're coming off the buy week. This really does right now in the moment seem like a loss before the game starts, doesn't it? I mean, you can't have to different circumstances than the team as serious as you could possibly be this deep end of the season coming off a five

and a team with 17 players on the COVID list on top of the you know, a decent list of injuries it is unbelievable and then just in terms of like a style thing look,

you're going to want to have as many defensive linemen as possible against any NFL team but in this case they're facing the number one rush offense in the league in Philadelphia. And then to go into it right now,

I think Duran Payne and Shaka-Toney are the only one roster. So this is, yeah, shaping up to be a really rough spot. It's not even like who's the starters, but, you know, in a sport that uses, you know, most of the 53 players

one way or the other, you're getting so depleted. It is getting to see how hard, how they'll be able to compete at a level, you know, appropriate for the moment. All right. I was thinking about with you in this conversation,

like assuming, and it's a big assumption here, but let's just take the list that we have right now and assume that none of these players are eligible for Sunday. Like, let's start on defense. You already mentioned it. They're facing the number one rush offense in the NFL. And right now they are down Allen, Ionitis, and settle. The only D-tackle they have really is pain.

They're also missing, obviously, sweat, young, Smith, Williams, and Two-Hill, which means what? They've got Tony and Wise. So is that your – who starts – who's the other tackle on Sunday? Yeah, I mean, Boomy Ritini played a decent amount of the last game, and, you know, I say that as just a note. somebody who at least has been out there. You know, they signed Nate Orchard off the Packers' practice squad. He's a guy that actually has played for this team over the last couple of years,

you know, a little bit here and there. So that's kind of what you're looking at. And, you know, the secondary loses Kendall Fuller to this. Derek Forrest was down today, at least in the secondary, just typically on a standard week, those guys can play 100% of the snaps. That's fairly common, or at least it has been for this. group, the defensive line, like, the high players may be like 8, yeah, more like 80%, and that's

like if you're really kind of pushing it. So the idea, it's probably Durant Payne is realistically going to be on the field every snap. So, you know, or any of those guys as well, so you're looking at a situation where if the backups are coming in, we're talking about like, this is, like in the old day where you have four preseason games, we're talking about the group that would be out there for the fourth preseason game in the second half. Like, I mean, it is really out of hand. Yeah, that's not even pretend like Chaka Tony.

You know, hasn't played much. He's a seventh round rookie. Just because he's a name more familiar with doesn't mean that's actually a guy that they were looking to use in any real capacity. Yeah. I mean, you know, you mentioned the secondary players, and you do see a lot of the secondary players basically playing every snap on defense. But if Jackson is one corner, does McCain

move to corner and you play Everett? You know, or it's Collins, Curl, Jackson, and who as your starters? Is it McCain as a corner? I mean, Danny Johnson's been playing a lot. Danny Johnson, right? So I would presume like maybe keep him in there. I mean, Daryl Roberts has not played one defensive snap this year. He just, he was on the COVID list.

He's the one guy that came off. But he is a guy that has played that. I would kind of guess that he would be your first option. You mentioned McCain. He has played corner before. Playing that bubble-and-nickel position effectively. Some of that, he did that in college as well. But I would guess Darrell Roberts would get the first shot

with Danny Johnson staying inside and then using the safety as much as possible. But, you know, yeah, I mean, whatever we're talking about is not ideal. I guess the only one good thing for the corner is that Jalen Hurts is not, you know, they're not going up against a Justin Herbert or Aaron Rogers. type of quarterback. Jayal Herschel Herschel crush you with his legs, but not a massive threat through the air. I mean, that's that day, you know,

he's an NFL quarterback, and considering what they have in the second, what they have, they have a corner opposite William Jackson, that could be a problem, you know, at something, any decent quarterback could attack. But, yeah, I mean, they are going to be limited there to boot, and, you know, look, we didn't

even get the linebackers. Call Holcomb plays every snap so far, knock on wood, he's out there, Jamie Davis played last week, but they're also down David Mayo. They're down Khaliq Hudson. Jordan Kanasik has just been out with an injury. You mentioned a Iper, another linebacker who's now out. So that's another spot where they're already down a bunch of guys. It is, yeah, I mean, all over the place is crazy,

but the sense of line is really where the issue is. It's nuts on what they face. unless the league changes its protocols, its rules between now and this weekend, or if a lot of these players produce multiple negatives within a 24-hour period, which is also possible. I think the biggest concern, like going into this game, I was thinking before today, you know, John, you know,

before Allen, you know, even, I was like, John McClorn and McKissick, you know, these are real keys to this coming week that you've got these players healthy. John's out with COVID, at least as of now. McLorn with the concussion. McKissick, you're saying, may not have been out there at practice. We'll know more this afternoon. But this would be almost the equivalent of the 87 scab win over the Cowboys on Monday night football.

They made a movie about it called The Replacements if they were to go into Philly and win. in what is really a massive game on Sunday. And we're not even focusing on the fact that Taylor Heineke is coming out of a game where he left with a knee injury. He said his elbow got hit. That was a little scary. Now it seems like he's heading in the right direction in terms of the playing, but I'm just saying under a normal circumstance,

that would be what would be discussing. How limited is Taylor Heineke? You know, if it's his knee, what does that mean for his mobility? Even if he's playing, so on and so on. So the fact that that's a thing, on a positive nose, if we're going to go with anything, Sam Cosby was designated to return to practice. Now, I don't know if that means he will be activated off our to play. This would be a good time to do it.

Now that Cornelia Lucas landed on this COVID list. I haven't even really thought completely yet as to what's going on there with that line. If he's either one of those guys is able to go, I guess that might mean to Dick Charles is back at right tackle. And, you know, he obviously struggled earlier this year when he, he was out there. So, you know, there's issues all over the place. And, you know, again, if McCorn is unable to go because of just the fact that, you know, concussions are a tricky situation you want to be careful with.

You know, Cam Sims is on this list now. Curtis Simul only played 14 snaps. This last game, I don't know, round of errors, said that was because of game planning thing, which makes no sense. But, okay, whatever, you clearly bring with something. So they're going to be limited there, it would appear. So on. Go on.

Right now, two tied ends, I think, on the whole group, Seale Jones and Bates. So, yeah, there's not really anywhere to point to you. I guess Trash Way is good. So he doesn't mind. Well, unless the kicker goes down and then we can't even use him to kick a 20-yard field goal. There's a backup. There's a kicker on the practice. I know.

I know. Tell me real quickly, though, in terms of backup quarterback, is it? Because I think that's where you faded a little bit when you mentioned it. Is it Shermer's kid from the practice squad? I would think so, just based on the fact that he's been with the team. I did just add another kid who was with, who started ahead of Taylor Heineke with the St. Louis Battlehawks, which is just hilarious.

Who is that? I forget, not sure I said about him, but Jordan My Alpha. Yeah, that's so funny because people forget that in the XFL, Taylor Heineke was a backup for the St. Louis team. He didn't even start in the XFL. I think that's kind of funny. Who was the quarterback? You don't know? I think is Jordan Myoffa. I just may be saying the last name wrong.

They looked at him last year also. And obviously we get to that point, we can start moving ahead to the Dallas rematch and kind of go from there. And that's the thing. The bigger picture right now, they just lost to Dallas. they're still the seven seed right now if the season were to end. There's a bunch of teams, though, at six and seven. They get the Eagles now, then Dallas and the Eagles again. So a loss this week forget what's going on. Like, it's not a death now.

They'll still have opportunities to turn things around. But at the same point, you know, every game right now is huge, and they don't want to fall back. So this was going to be a massive game, and now it feels like we're like we're saying, like how are they even going to remotely have much of an opportunity that this is becoming crazy. What a horrendous time.

There's no good time for any of this, but what a terrible time. Yeah. Okay. Thank you for doing this. And Sheehan and Standing just settled down. It's only Wednesday. It's the NFL and it's COVID. Things change quickly.

And by the time people are listening to this, it could be a completely different conversation. But thank you. Drive safely. I will talk to you on radio at the end of the week. Look forward to it. We'll talk. See you, man.

Ben Standing, everybody. I think the thing to really pay attention to, not that you're going to miss it as a football fan, but I've got to think that the NFL right now, because of multiple teams having, you know, unprecedented outbreaks, and, by the way, remember, their promise before the beginning of the season,

and not to reschedule any games. You know, not to move games, not to reschedule any games. I would have to think that they are reconsidering right now or considering their current protocols and rules around positive tests, close contact, et cetera. You know, the rules right now, unvaccinated players, 10 days of quarantine, and then two negative tests within a 24-hour period before they're eligible.

But they're out, 10, you know, 10 days quarantine. vaccinated players, you have to produce two negatives within a 24-hour period. And if you do that, then you're eligible for the next game or the next day or to return immediately. There's no quarantine requirement as long as you are able to produce two negatives in terms of, you know, this is the number of days you're out. I think the NFL has to, and I've mentioned this before on the podcast, and, you know, I'm not going to sit here and act as if I'm some expert by a long shot. None of us are really. But I've said before, I don't know why the NFL insists on testing. You know, the Major League Baseball moved towards the end of the year. They relaxed their testing and stopped testing players who were vaccinated. That was at the end of the year

and heading into their postseason into their most important part of the schedule. You're not getting tested if you're showing up at work every day if you're vaccinated. So I wonder if the NFL will consider among, let's think about the possibilities here. Well, one would be, we're not going to test players who are vaccinated anymore. And I guess you could also say, why test unvaccinated players? But the reason you would test vaccinated, unvaccinated players, is what we're kind of learning here a little bit about the vaccine, right, is that it doesn't stop you from getting it. It doesn't stop you from transmitting it. But it acts very much as a therapeutic, as a medicine, that, you know, ensures that you're not going to get seriously ill,

especially if you've boosted. You know, again, this would appear to be, as of now, the major benefit of the vaccine for an individual. Doesn't stop it. My family members have just gotten it. My wife got it. My wife got it. got it. One son got it. Another son yesterday lost sense of taste and smell, so he's got it. I had every symptom last week tested negative with the take-home tests, but we're all vaccinated. We're all boosted. But it's not stopping people from getting the virus, but it is reducing significantly, almost exponentially, your chance of getting seriously ill. So it's acting more as kind of a therapeutic. Well, with players who are asymptomatic,

and vaccinated with a positive test. Maybe they will consider either letting those players play. Maybe they will consider not testing those players anymore. Or maybe the answer, and this is certainly not the answer in normal everyday life right now, as many people are back at work and they're not getting tested if they're vaccinated as they arrive to work, potentially with COVID. But maybe the flip side, all of this is to test

daily. Remember vaccinated players are just tested weekly. Perhaps a testing more frequently like every day would squash the opportunity for a major outbreak like the one we've just had.

That's not that is not my recommendation. I kind of feel like these are young players. They're all pretty much for the most part asymptomatic. They're vaccinated. So they've got, you know, the therapeutic, you know, for all intents and purposes. That's what it's acting as right now, which will keep them, you know, even though their existing age and health condition already, you know, significantly reduces their chance of getting sick, even if they weren't vaccinated.

But I don't know. It seems to me like you either let asymptomatic vaccinated players who test positive play. You either stop testing vaccinated players or you test more. so that last week, the first player that ended up being the spreader, you know, from wherever that came from, and it could have come from anywhere because these players who were vaccinated get to do whatever they want. So they're at home with people. They're in stores. They're in restaurants.

When they're on the road, they're in hotels. They're being exposed just like all of us are that are vaccinated. We're unvaccinated. But maybe the answer, not that I'd recommend it, but maybe the answer is they've got. got to go back to a more stringent testing protocol so that they're able to identify sooner a player that is positive so that they don't end up with an outbreak. I don't know, man. I don't have the answers, but I bet you anything.

The NFL is working on some answers here. There is too much money involved. These games are going to get played come hell or high water. It is one of the more exciting setups for the end of a regular season in a long, long time. And already here in week 15, I guess we're in, is it week 15? Yeah, week 15, we've got the opportunity of several games being majorly compromised. You know, the Cleveland game on Saturday afternoon is going to be an interesting one. Now, remember, they increase the size of the practice squads for this purpose.

but Washington with 17 players on the COVID list right now, 17. And, you know, I think I said this to Tommy the other day. It's like whenever we're talking about this, especially with sports and athletes, we never, you know, we never even think to ask, well, I hope that particular player that tested positive is okay. Because you know why? They pretty much always are. and I understand I know how many people have died of COVID, okay?

I'm not ignorant to how many people have died of COVID. I'm also not ignorant to the fact that young healthy athletes pretty much across the board have very, very mild symptoms, if any symptoms. I think the only player that I know of this year that's been on a COVID list that experienced symptoms was Amari Cooper, but they weren't serious symptoms. Okay. That's it for segment one here. Segment two was the story that broke after the podcast yesterday.

Another Washington Post story about Dan Snyder and the football team. I'll be brief on this. I do recognize some of the fatigue on this story, but there was a new revelation, a new, a new twist to this story. We'll talk about that next right after these words from a few of our sponsors. This segment of the podcast presented by My Booky, Wilder v. Fury, Mayweather v. Pachial, electric personalities that produced big fights and even bigger betting opportunities.

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and Spotify. So yesterday after Tommy and I finished the podcast, there was the new story from the Washington Post about Dan Snyder and the Wilkinson investigation, et cetera. Many of you reached out after the radio show this morning to say, you know, I'm just sort of tired of this story. It seems like there's a story every couple of weeks, and I just have, you know, I have Snyder fatigue. And some of you actually suggested that there was nothing new in this story. That's actually 100% false. There is a big reveal in this story. Now, whether or not it leads to something, that's a completely different subject.

But the big revelation about this story is that Snyder interfered with the Beth Wilkinson investigation. That's the big part of this story. There are other parts of the story, and I'm going to go through this relatively quickly. I'm going to attempt to anyway. I'm going to read from the story real quickly at the beginning. It reads as follows, written by Will Hobson and Liz Clark from the Washington Post. In July 2020, just a few days after prominent D.C. attorney Beth Wilkinson began investigating allegations of widespread sexual harassment in the Washington football team workplace,

she learned of a decade-old allegation of sexual misconduct against team owner Daniel Snyder. Snyder had for years privately denied the woman's claims, but the existence of an allegation against him, which had been kept secret by a confidential $1.6 million settlement, had the potential to rock a franchise already reeling from scandal. A few weeks later, Wilkinson sought to interview the former team employee who had made the accusation, according to people familiar with the investigation. That's where Snyder and his team stepped in. Despite the owner's public pledge to cooperate with all aspects of the Wilkinson investigation,

His attorneys attempted to prevent Wilkinson from speaking to Snyder's accuser. According to a letter, the woman's attorney wrote to Snyder's lawyers that was filed in federal court. The Washington Post has not reviewed this letter, which was filed under seal as part of a legal dispute between Wilkinson and a former lawyer for the team. The letter, however, was described by people with knowledge of its contents. So I'll get to the next paragraph in this story in a moment, but I just want to remind everybody, this has been the one thing, the 2009 plane ride back from the Country Music Awards in Las Vegas

on Snyder's private plane with several people, including a female team employee. We've been talking about this particular story when the post first broke it whenever it was. I can't even remember what it was now. as maybe this is the smoking gun. But will we ever find out about it? Because you would assume that there's confidentiality,

you know, tied to the $1.6 million that was paid to this woman. Now, according to this story, the woman's lawyer, Brendan Sullivan, Brendan Sullivan, the famous Williams Connolly, Brendan Sullivan represented Oliver North and Iran Contra back in the 80s, represented the three Duke lacrosse players who were accused of rape that Brendan Sullivan. Sullivan accused Snyder's lawyers of offering his client, this woman, more money beyond the $1.6 million the team paid in 2009 if she agreed not to speak to anyone about her allegations

against Snyder and her settlement with the team. Basically, in court filings, in court filings, the story continues. Wilkinson described, Beth Wilkinson, the woman doing the investigation of the team, described phone calls with Brendan Sullivan, where Sullivan described Snyder's lawyers as attempting to silence the 2009 accuser. Just so you know, Washington's Snyder's attorneys have denied this in a statement released after this story was published yesterday on line. A. Scott Bolden of the law firm Reed Smith, which represents Snyder and his team, said, untrue, it did not happen. Absolutely no effort was made by me or any Reed Smith lawyers to dissuade anyone from speaking with Beth Wilkinson or otherwise cooperating with her investigation, nor was any money offered to anyone not to cooperate. Anyone suggesting something to the contrary is

lying closed, quote. The post obviously sticking to their story, which would include, you know, talking to Brendan Sullivan about this, the attorney representing this woman. So let's just assume that this is true, that Snyder obstructed, interfered, disrupted, whatever verb you want to use, the Wilkinson investigation after pledging publicly that he would cooperate with the investigation. Remember, Washington had control of the investigation with Wilkinson, or was, they had, they had, sought out the investigation, and then they handed it over to the league. So Wilkinson was then developing her report, her investigation was being done for the league. An investigation, as we know, that didn't produce any written report or any oral presentation

to the public, only an oral presentation to Roger Goodell and Lisa Friel and others associated with the league. And that's when the league, remember, came out with a pretty terse and damning statement about the toxic culture of the team, find the team $10 million and announced that Tanya Snyder was going to be co-CEO, to which everybody assumed that Dan had been suspended, and then Dan went on a personal PR tour vis-a-vis his attorneys and PR people telling anybody that suggested that he had been suspended or that he had been fined, that no, he wasn't suspended, and he wasn't fined, the team was. there are a couple of things with respect to this. First of all, will the league do something about him obstructing an investigation that he pledged total cooperation with? Well, in talking to

Will Hobson this morning on the radio, he thinks that because Beth Wilkinson eventually did get to speak to this woman and she interviewed this woman, that the league will just say, well, eventually she spoke to this woman. So Dan didn't prevent her from speaking to, uh, to, to Beth Wilkinson. Beth was able to sit down and interview this woman. So his take was the obstruction, the interference, however you want to describe it, probably won't lead to anything.

So the big story here is that he obstructed, interfered, disrupted the investigation from Beth Wilkinson, but more likely than not, it's not going to lead to anything. There are a couple of things here on this part of the story that interests me. Number one, why would he need to offer her more money to not talk to Beth Wilkinson? And why did she talk to Beth Wilkinson? Because wouldn't you assume that the $1.6 million settlement was a settlement based on confidentiality? Like here, I'm going to pay you this money, but you're never going to say anything about this to

anybody again. And if you do, you'll be in default of this agreement. We'll sue you. We'll sue you for the money that we paid you, et cetera. And yet, she did talk to Beth Wilkinson. Like, why did they have to offer her more? Why did she talk to Wilkinson? Did she violate the agreement? Like, you know, I asked Will Hobson about that this morning, and he said, I think when Snyder turned everybody else loose of their NDAs, and said, feel free to cooperate with Beth Wilkinson's investigation that maybe this woman that settled for $1.6 million thought that applied to her. Well, I mean, it's apples and oranges. The other employees that just signed regular company NDAs, they didn't have a $1.6 million settlement based on a sexual misconduct allegation. I don't know. That was, I still don't get that.

Like, if she settled this deal, this is a private investigation of a private company. There was no subpoena used to force her to talk to Beth Wilkinson. Why did she talk to Beth Wilkinson? Why would the team feel compelled to offer her more? Is it possible that the team is so freaking stupid that they paid her $1.6 million without a confidentiality clause? The next part of this is that Wilkinson did ultimately interview this woman who settled for $1.6 million back in 2009 for this 2009 incident.

And the Post writes as follows, Wilkinson ultimately did interview Snyder's accuser, according to court records. But the revelation that Snyder was accused of trying to block a witness from participating in the NFL investigation, raises new concerns about Commissioner Roger Goodell's decision to keep confidential any report or investigative findings produced by Wilkinson, a departure from how the league has handled investigations in recent years. You know, deflategate, Ray Rice, etc. We know that all we got was this statement from the league and the announcement of a $10 million fine and Tanya Snyder is co-CEO. We didn't get an executive summary of the investigation.

we didn't get anything. I mean, the email situation with John Gruden and his lawsuit may ultimately, you know, force the league to, you know, produce something with respect to the Wilkinson investigation. There's still congressional pressure to do so as well. And that was amped up upon this post story yesterday as well. But the fact that this woman did sit down with Beth Wilkinson, you know, I asked Will, Will, I said, did the team want her not to sit down with Wilkinson, or did the team not care if she sat down with her as long as she didn't divulge the contents of this settlement or what happened

on that plane in 2009? Well, his response was, it's obvious. Well, obviously, Beth Wilkinson is sitting down with this woman to ask her about the $1.6 million settlement and about the night in 2009. So let's assume, and maybe it's a big assumption, but let's assume that this woman told Wilkinson everything. And Wilkinson knows exactly what happened on that plane in 2009, based on her interview with this woman. If Wilkinson knows, then the league knows. So if the league knows what happened on that plane. Wilkinson knows what happened on that plane. And yet, nothing was done about Snyder. Is it fair to come to the conclusion that whatever they learned from this woman just didn't rise to the level of something worthy of taking his team away from

him? Or do you want to be, you know, do you want to go to the extreme to say the league's covering it up? They learned something terrible about Snyder from Wilkinson's interview. And they're covering it up. They're hoping it'll never, ever come out. I don't know, man. In this day and age, if they learn something about Snyder from Wilkinson's interview with this woman that was so horrendous, and let's not forget, this has been described as sexual misconduct, not sexual assault, not sexual harassment, but sexual misconduct. Okay?

So that could be a lot of different things, but isn't the worst of things when it comes to this category of a situation. Not that if she was made to feel uncomfortable by some sort of overture or some sort of conversation among guys or whatever. I'm not saying that it was appropriate, but it's not assault and it's not harassment as far as we know. It's misconduct. So more likely than not, what Beth Wilkinson learned and what she told the league didn't rise to, to the level of being able to take his team away from him. I mean, right? I don't know.

Again, they might be covering it up. They may have learned something horrific. More likely than not, they probably learned something that he doesn't want to get out because it would be like really embarrassing to him maybe. I don't know. But the league more likely than not right now knows what happened on that plane. And instead of doing something to try to take the team away from them, They waived the debt limit.

They loaned him the money to buy out his minority shareholders, which gave them more power. This has been like the potential smoking gun for a while now. We've talked about this 2009 plane ride. If it's not this, and I don't know, I'm just coming to a logical conclusion if Wilkinson knows what happened on that plane and the league knows what happened on that plane and nothing's been done about it. My guess is that whatever it was they learned happened on that plane doesn't come close to rising to the level of something that would warrant taking his team away from him. And it probably doesn't even rise to the level that if people find out about it,

they're going to be outraged that the team wasn't taken away from them. Of course, that's a subjective thing. But anyway, yeah, are they going to do anything about him interfering with the investigation? Probably not. Do we now know that they know exactly what happened on that plane? It would appear so. And he still owns the team. So for those that are hoping, and remember, like, think about it, you're hoping that he did something to somebody on the plane that warrants the team getting taken away from him. I mean, as you're saying that, remember, if that's true, then something happened to some woman on that plane that would have been awful. So you're rooting for him to lose the team, and at the same time, you know, by extension,

somebody would have been, you know, certainly hurt psychologically. Anyway, there was one other part to the story that I'm assuming many of you already know at this point, and it is, you know, an absolute blockbuster reveal. It's a blockbuster nugget, okay, because it just speaks to why as a fan base we've been suffering for 22 years. I know, longer than that, because they weren't very good after Joe left before Dan even owned the team. I get that. I've talked about that as much as anybody. Okay, I know that from 1993, until Dan bought the team in 1999, they weren't very good with Norv Turner and Charlie Casserly.

you know, under the direction of Jack Kent Cook and then the son John, John Kent Cook. Anyway, listen to this. Deep down into the story, Will and Liz Wright. In January 2020, after the news conference announcing Rivera's hire, happy Thanksgiving news conference, according to these people, Snyder learned that Allen, as in Bruce Allen, had sent a congratulatory text to read, Rivera, as in Ron Rivera. Snyder was insulted, these people said, that he didn't receive a similar

text from Allen whom Snyder had fired a few weeks before. Later that year, the team citing the pandemic attempted to get out of paying Alan all of the money he was owed under his contract. Alan fought back and Snyder agreed to pay his full salary. But in a message sent to Allen's lawyers over the settlement terms, one of Snyder's lawyers included a condition that Alan, Bruce Allen, wouldn't agree to meet.

According to some text messages reviewed by the Washington Post, there was this text message sent to Bruce Allen about him getting paid the rest of his salary, but with kind of a quick, quid pro quo. And that quid pro quo, that something for something, reads like this. In addition,

I understand that Mr. Allen has agreed to send a text message to Mr. Snyder stating, congrats on the hire. Snyder's attorney wrote in July 2020, seven months after Snyder hired Rivera. Alan's lawyers resolved the pay dispute, but he never sent this text, according to a person with knowledge of the case. If you didn't follow that, let me see. sum it up for you. When he stood up there on that podium and told you that it was all Bruce's fault, that the culture wasn't good, and we're moving away from, you know, a team president and a general manager, and we're going with coach-centric. Happy Thanksgiving, I want to introduce you to our new coach-general manager and our coach-centric scheme, Ron Rivera. On that day, Bruce Allen

sent Ron Rivera a congratulatory text. And Dan was upset that he was upset that he was. He said, didn't get a congratulatory text from Bruce Allen. So seven months later, when they were having this dispute over the remaining part of Allen's compensation, which Snyder and the team eventually agreed to pay, Snyder wanted Bruce Allen to send him a text congratulating him on hiring Ron Rivera. There it is. 22 years of Dan Snyder in a nutshell. He was. He was. He was. He was. He was, he wanted Bruce Allen seven months after the fact to send him a text to congratulate him, Mr. Snyder, on the hire. I just, that stuck out from this story more than anything. And that's where you just say, as long as this person owns the team, we're fucked.

somebody asked me what was the relationship between Bruce and Ron Rivera, where Bruce was comfortable in immediately sending him a text congratulating him. I didn't know, but somebody mentioned it to me before this show. I didn't know when I first read this or when I was talking about it on radio. A.J. Smith is the link. A.J. Smith, San Diego Chargers GM. Ron Rivera worked in San Diego. San Diego worked for A.J. Smith, and Bruce Allen and A.J. Smith are boys and have been, you know, super close for a while. That's how Kyle Smith, you know, sort of was given an opportunity and became the team's, you know, de facto general manager. So that was the link. It was A.J. Smith. At least that's what I was told. It makes sense because Rivera was in San Diego with the Chargers as a coach. I just am reading this story as we're finishing up the podcast here in this last segment.

The NFL Players Association renewed its push for daily COVID-19 testing amid an unprecedented surge of infections this week among its members. And a statement released Wednesday, the NFLPA reiterated that it has been negotiating for more tests since training camp. Quote, the NFL decided to take away a critical weapon in our fight against the transmission of COVID-19, despite our union's call for daily testing months ago. We're talking to our player leadership into the NFL about potential changes to the protocols so that we can complete the season. A total of 75 players return positive tests Monday and Tuesday, and the rush continued Wednesday around the league. NFL owners and executives are gathered outside of Dallas for previously scheduled meeting and are discussing ways. to combat the surge.

So, yeah, I mean, it makes sense that they're talking about this stuff and about how they're going to get through, you know, the upcoming week and the rest of the season if this continues. And I threw out as one of the possibilities more testing. I can't imagine, quite honestly, that players would want that, even though the NFLPA says that. Most of these players are probably eye-rolling a little bit, vaccinated or unvaccinated, because almost all of these players are either mild symptom or asymptomatic, at least according to the reports that are out there. But one way, you know, you could stop testing, vaccinated players.

You could say if a player is positive, but he's vaccinated and asymptomatic, we're going to let him play. Or, you know, the other extreme is to test on a daily basis. So therefore, you catch that person immediately. and there isn't a spread of the virus. This is crazy. I wanted to finish up the show with this. Steph Curry last night setting the record for three-pointers, breaking Ray Allen's record. I love Steph Curry.

I think Steph Curry is so much more than just the all-time three-point king. We've talked about Steph Curry so many times on the show. Tommy thinks he just shoots it and we'll talk about him maybe tomorrow as well. Steph Curry has changed the game in so many ways. He's changed the spacing of a basketball floor, not because he's making a lot of three-pointers, but because of where he has been making these three-pointers. The extension to which he has essentially required a defense to guard him, and lots of other players have done this as well. But since, you know, he can stop essentially just over half court and bury you from 40 feet, from 35 feet, etc. It creates more spacing. You've got to extend your defense to stop players like Curry. It creates

more room, more free-flowing, and much easier opportunities offensively. But beyond that, Curry is a scorer, too. He's the greatest shooter and ball handler in one body I have ever watched personally. Isaiah Thomas has always been my comp for him, but Isaiah Thomas didn't play in era where, you know, three-point shooting was promoted and was really allowed by coaches. There were many fewer three-point attempts. But I think Isaiah Thomas shot it well enough that if he played in today's age, he would have been a Steph Curry-type player. He had an unbelievable handle and had a great stroke. But Curry is, to me, the best combined ball handler, shooter in one body of all time. But he's also a great score, like, you know, his ability to create space for

mid-range jump shots. But when he goes to the rim in half court, full court, you know, in transition, the floaters, the touch, the feel of his shot, of his hands, of spacing, of everything. It's just he's able to score on anybody without having to just shoot three. I just love Curry. I think he's great. By the way, one other NBA story from last night, the Brooklyn Nets had six players lost to NBA's health and safety protocols, assuming COVID. Kevin Durant had an injured ankle. He was going to be held out of last night's game, but if he had been held out, they would have only had seven eligible players, and they would have been forfeited in their game against Toronto. Kevin Durant sucked it up with a bad ankle,

went out there and played. They had eight guys. including a two-way player that played like 38 minutes in the game. Durant went for 34 points, 13 rebounds, 11 assists, played 48 minutes in a 131-129 overtime win against Toronto. Kevin Durant is when it comes to sort of his sensitivity to criticism by media members or fans. It's kind of legendary at this point. But Kevin Durant as a player is such a badass.

If you go back to that series against Milwaukee in the summer in the playoffs and the games he had, you know, without his best teammates available to play, like last night's another example, man, Durant is an absolute beast. We know that in terms of the physical skill and ability and the uniqueness of a guy that big, you know, being unstoppable essentially as a scorer. But he was hurt last night. He was going to sit. Dave Nash said, we had to debate it. He's our franchise player. But Kevin wanted to go out. He

wanted to play. We weren't going to forfeit that game with Kevin Durant on our team. And Durant went out there on a bum ankle with seven guys that, you know, several of them rarely play and beat Toronto with a triple double. I mean, wow. Lastly, I do this every Wednesday, 1991, 30 years ago today, Washington beat the New York Giants 34 to 17. They had already clinched home field advantage the week before. The last two games were meaningless games against the Giants at RFK and then the following week, which will be next week against the Eagles at the vet. But Washington, remember, had broken that drought against the Giants earlier in the year in the big game in the Meadowlands between an undefeated Washington team and Ray Handley's giants. They were the

defending champs that year because they had won the Super Bowl in the 90s season. It was still a massive rivalry. the Giants and skins were everything back then. But the Giants were in the midst of a difficult season. They came into the game 7 and 7 out of the playoff picture. Washington was at home, and they buried the Giants 34 to 17. They had a prolific offensive day rolling up 420 yards of offense, ripping through three touchdown passes on just nine completions. He threw for 230 yards.

They ran the hell out of the ball with Biner going for 68 yards. Ricky Irvine's rushing for 85. They rushed for 151 yards in total on the day. Clark three catches a buck 29, monk five for 91, or had a touchdown. Clark had two, and they rolled 3417, and they were 14 and 1. And even though the undefeated season had been derailed a few weeks or

earlier by Dallas. They were potentially on their way to a 15 and one season, and they were on the verge of becoming just the third team in NFL history to do that. Of course, most of you know, they didn't. That story next week. All right, that's it for the show today. Back tomorrow with Tommy. Sorry it's out late today, but I wanted to wait for all of this COVID news to break because I did get word early this morning that there were going to be a lot of these, and I just had no idea who it was going to be and how it was going to impact the show. But thanks to Ben Standing for jumping on on his way back from Ashburn today. All right, back tomorrow.