The Kevin Sheehan Show - When Should Dwayne Haskins Start?

Episode Date: May 28, 2019

Kevin and Thom open the show with a Dwayne Haskins discussion. Will he start the opener? Should he start the opener? When is the right time for the Haskins era as a Washington Redskin to begin? They also talked NBA Playoffs, Kevin Durant, and Gilbert Arenas' recent ramblings. They discussed the Nats, Bill Buckner, Bart Starr, and Donovan McNabb's claim that he should be in the NFL Hall of Fame. <p> </p><p>Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices">podcastchoices.com/adchoices</a></p> Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You want it. You need it. It's what everyone's talking about. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Now here's Kevin. You're listening to The Sports Fix. Yep, I'm here. Aaron's here. Tommy's here. The show is presented by Window Nation. If you're in the market for Windows, call 86690 Nation, or go to Windonation.com and tell them we told you to call. I hope everybody enjoyed the long weekend. Tommy is here. He just chugged half a bottle of Robitussin, so he's ready for the show. You don't really. measure out the doses of robatussin. You just took that thing and swigged like half of it. Well, you know, it's cough medicine, Kevin. I've drank worse. And I've drank more of worse. Tommy likes that purple drank. You're sure it's not asthma that you've been suffering. No, I've talked to a doctor about that. You did? You mentioned that I... Yeah, and I explained the story and he said, that guy's crazy. Okay. Don't listen to him. All right, just looking out for you. Lots to get to. The NBA finals are set to Ron. finished off on Saturday night. Milwaukee will get to the NBA finals. The Nats took three of four

from Miami over the weekend. It should have been four of four. Could have been. And the Stanley Cup finals started last night. I don't know that we'll have much on that today. Oh, I've got something to say about the Stanley Cup finals. We should all be rooting for St. Louis. Because of because of recastity? Because we do not need to see to be subjected to another duckboat parade in Boston. Right. Okay? Fair enough. Enough. You know what, I'm rooting for St. Louis because they haven't won the cup since 1970, and it's a good hockey town.

They lost last night, game one. They had a two-nothing lead and lost. We've got the Kuznetsov news to get to. Donovan McNabb thinks he's a Hall of Famer, and Gilbert Arenas spoke, and very honestly, about who he was rooting for when he was on his own team's bench. We'll get to all of that a little. little bit later on. But I wanted to start with some Redskins because John Kime, who's got the John Kine podcast, and you can listen to the John Kine podcast, the same way you listen to this one

on any podcast platform, Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Spotify, Google, play, all of them. John Kime, who covers the team for ESPN. Everybody knows that. Well, no, not everybody knows that. You never assume when, at least when you're writing, I don't know about you because you just talk off the cuff and don't think about what you're saying. Most of the time. But you should never assume that people have that knowledge. You should always operate on the premise that this is the first time they've heard of John Kime. And that sort of covers you for everything.

I don't agree with you on that in this particular context. John's been a guest on this podcast, I don't know, a dozen times. On the radio show that you and I did together for seven plus years, he was probably on an average of five times a year. Look, this is not to diminish. This is not to diminish John Kime. It seems to me that you're trying to diminish John Kime. And he would tell you this. Everybody knows who John Kime is.

He would tell you this. I know he would because he's a journalist, as you are sometimes. Not all the time. In fact, more of the time you are just an opinion maker, a columnist. You're a traffic accident. But John Kime, everybody knows who John Kime is and he's got a podcast. So listen to it. He had Lewis Riddick.

And he covers the team for ESPN. And he covers the team. the team for ESPN. The team being, by the way, let me just make it clear. The team that he covers is the Washington Redskins for ESPN. Just in the event that when Tommy said he covers the team, you weren't sure which team he was talking about. It could be to Washington Valor. Could have been. Who's that? That's the, that's Ted's Arena League team. Oh, that's the Arena League team? The reigning Arena League champions. Are they, so that thing is survived? Actually, they added, I think, at least one or two teams. Are they out drawing the Nats? No, not quite.

Not quite. I watched some of the game yesterday. It didn't look like anybody was there on a holiday. Really? Well, I was there. Aaron, what was the attendance yesterday? I was there Friday night, and the attendance wasn't very good. I was supposed to go Sunday.

I decided to play golf instead. This is why there's no hope for you, but go ahead. Here it is. I've got it actually in the newspaper, which I still have here. Look at you, an Andy Pollan invitation. Andy Pullman and I are the only two. You know why I like it, because you can spread it out and you got stuff. I read it online mostly, but 21,048 was the attendance.

Now, it is the Marlins. There is no way there were 21,000 in the park. I don't think so. That may be paid attendance. Probably not. I don't know that that was actual attendance. Well, no, that's always paid attendance. Yeah.

Okay, there you go. So I bet it was half that. No, it wasn't half that. It wasn't 11,000 people, Kevin. And you know this because what? Because 11,000 people have, that size crowd has never come to a nationals game. Okay. I bet it was 40% less than the paid number.

I'll bet it was probably about 70% of what that total was. Did you watch any of the game? It doesn't matter. I'm asking you if you watched any of the game. It doesn't matter whether I watched the game or not. I've been to 5, 600, 700 Nats games over the years. I know what the crowds are going to be and the minimum low attendance. and it's not going to be 40% of 21,000.

I appreciate the fact that you know what the crowd should be, and I have a sense of what the crowd should be, not to your level, but this is what surprised me. This is why I brought it up, is because in watching the game yesterday, I'm telling you it looked like a park of just a scattered few, which surprised me. That's the reason I brought it up.

That's why I may have gotten it right, that it was 40% of the pitch. You didn't see it. You didn't watch. And yet you'll debate me on this. Because I know I'm right. Well, you can't know you're right. I can know I'm right.

40% of 21,000. That would be 8,000 less, more than 8,000 less. So we're talking 8,400 less. So we're talking about a crowd of somewhere in the neighborhood of 13,000 for real. That's about what it looked like. Say that again. About 13,000. I just want to make sure that you drill it in everyone's head how wrong you are.

Okay. I know. because you're, I mean, I don't know why you would debate this with me without saying, you know what, I'll take a look at the replay of some of the games to check out the crowd. Did you see the sun come up this morning? It was hot yesterday. Did you see the sun come up this morning? I did. Really?

I didn't, but I know it came up. Okay. Let's get to what I wanted to start the show with, which was the John Kime podcast. John Kime covers the Washington Redskins for ESPN and ESPN.com, and he's got a podcast, which Bram Weinstein helps him. out on. So he had Lewis Riddick on. I think everybody knows who Lewis Riddick is, but if you don't, I'm going to go ahead and give you his credentials and his resume. I'm not going to read his entire resume, even though I pretty much could tell you that he's worked for the Redskins in the league, he's worked for the Eagles in the league, he's worked for a lot of teams in the league,

but over the last several years, probably five years, he's been working for ESPN as sort of a football analyst and expert. He's very good on television. I've had this conversation with Scott many times. Scott's a big fan of Lewis Riddick, has him on his show all the time. He's very good on television. In my personal opinion, he's not always right. In fact, there are many people whose opinion personally I actually look forward to hearing

more than Lewis Riddick. But Louis Riddick is very good on TV. Let me ask you a question. He's a good interview. Is his accuracy level? Uh, equivalent to my attendance? Yes. Uh, no, it's probably better.

Okay. I'm sure it's better. You would say it was better. Um, but anyway, um, he was on with Kime and he was asked about Dwayne Haskins. And he actually had two, two sound bites that were going to play. Um, the first one he's comparing or he's talking about Dwayne Haskins and what he thinks of Haskins and his opportunity to play. And then there's a second one where he compares him a bit to RG3.

But I want you to hear the first one. again on Dwayne Haskins, and then I want us to talk about what Lewis Riddick says. The fan base around there, that city, the surrounding areas, they're going to want to see Dwayne play. They just are. And as much respect as I have for Case Keenham, case is not Dwayne. They're not in the same zip code. They're just not. When Dwayne throws the football in the preseason, people are going to go, I want more of that.

I don't care if they don't have wide receivers. I want to see that because that's what will make me come to the state. and buy these tickets and buy his jersey and buy these hot dogs and buy this beer is I want to see that kid play and that's where the pressure is going to come from. All right. The reason I wanted to play that specific bite, which I listened to early this morning, is because I think there are a couple of things there, including what he ended with, which I think is in the owner's mind. I mean, I think it was in the owner's mind when he drafted him. The franchise needed a business, you know, jolt. And I think it's gotten it to a certain degree with the drafting of what many believe to be a franchise quarterback. But the part that I really wanted to focus on was him comparing Haskins to Case Keenham. All due respect to Case Keenham, Haskins, when you see him throw the football, looks a lot different.

Because this is something I've suggested a couple of times on the podcast with you and without you. and that is that the competitive landscape for the starting job in Washington isn't that great for Dwayne Haskins. It's Case Keenham and Colt McCoy and maybe not even a healthy Colt McCoy at all. It's possible they could cut them or try to trade them before the season starts. And you heard Lewis Riddick say that essentially, you know, Case Keenham all due respect, but Haskins, when he throws it, that's what people are going to want to see. And so I would say the following thing that I want your reaction to. If he doesn't beat out Case Keenham and he's not the starter on opening day,

what does it say about Dwayne Haskins? You know, first of all, when John said that's where the pressure is going to come from the fans, the pressure's going to come from the owner. That's where the real pressure is going to come from. I agree with you. That was another note I made that I don't think the fans are going to put the same level of pressure that the owner will put up. The fans will probably prefer them to be patient if patience is what should be in play.

Especially when you see the first five games that at Redskins schedule. A smart fan would say you're throwing this kid to the wolves, open up on the road against the Eagles in Philadelphia. What was the question again? My question is, if Haskins doesn't beat out Case Keenham in training camp and Colt McCoy, what does it say about Haskins? I have an answer to it, but I want your answer first. I've given my answer on this podcast.

It's complicated because you can pick Case Keenham while still think the future of your team is Dwayne Haskins. So Haskins can be everything that you expect him to be, and you can still pick Case Keenum to start the season. If you play a whole season without Dwayne Haskins behind center, then I think that speaks more volumes. but initially it's a convoluted answer that you can't really give a definitive answer to. I actually think the point you made is even a better one that I would have made. I think it's much better put that it's not about starting the opener. It's about playing at some point, you know, especially if you give the context that they are struggling offensively in case Keenham isn't that great, or Colt McCoy's not that great in Haskin still isn't in there.

That would be much more telling than him not starting the opener. With that said, more likely than not Kyler Murray is going to start the opener for Arizona. You know, it's very possible, I mean, last year we know that, you know, it wasn't long before Baker Mayfield was in there. Sam Darnold started day one, Josh Allen started day one. Josh Rosen was in there very quickly. And then eventually, because of injury, Lamar Jackson was in there. I don't think Jackson would have played had Flacco not gotten hurt. And certainly for the Ravens, it was probably a good thing that Flacco did get hurt because Jackson turned that season around. The year before that, Trubisky played significantly. Obviously, Mahomes sat,

but Deshawn Watson started from day one. The year before that, Wents and Goff all started, you know, day one. Winston and Marriota started essentially day one the year before that. So more times than not, rookie quarterbacks taken in the first round are getting the opportunity to play immediately. What I've suggested since the draft is that, you know, you don't have a great quarterback sitting there in front of them, like an established starter, let alone a Brett Farve situation, Aaron Rogers situation where you have a Hall of Famer. Or in the Mahom's situation, you had a legitimate NFL starter in Alex Smith. You don't have anybody sitting there in front of Haskins that you say, well, yeah, I mean, you can be patient with Haskins because you have this

guy. Not only don't you have the guy, you don't have a guy in Case Keenum that's played here. This is a new experience for him here. So what I had said before is if he's not the starter, if we don't realize during training camp that he's the starter and it's obvious to the coaching staff that he's the best they have and therefore they're going to let him start the season and start the Dwayne Haskins era right away, which by the way I would recommend if the competition is even close. If that doesn't happen, then what it says is this is a much longer term play, which I'm not suggesting that that's a bad thing. If you're patient, you know, he only started one year in college.

But I think if he's all that, if he's all of what Lewis Riddick thinks he is and other people think he is, then he should beat out Case Keenham and Colt McCoy and start the opener in Philadelphia. You know, I think you're really underestimating the experience of Case Keenham. I mean, I think you're selling him short. And this guy took a team to the Super Bowl two years ago. I think that he is head and tails before he even takes the field ahead of Dwayne Haskins in almost probably every single category. Except throwing the football. Apparently.

Except throwing the football against nobody defending, you know, more or less. So I think that I think in all those quarterbacks that you mentioned, those rookie quarterbacks, as part of that equation, you'd have to look to see what's. their choices were besides those rookie quarterbacks. And do you think any of them were better than Case Keenum? And, you know, that would require some time. That would have to be part of the consideration. Well, I would suggest that most of the situations were some veteran, you know, that resembles a Case Keenum. You're right. I am selling Case Keenum short. I'm not a huge case Keenham fan. I think he's fine. I think he is, you know, if you don't have a

legitimate top half of the league NFL starter, you could do a lot worse than Case Keenum. But he's somewhere between 22 and 32 among the starters. Okay, let me ask you this. Yeah. If you're Jay Gruden, you're in the last year of your contract, okay, and you're going up to Philadelphia to open the season, who do you think has a better chance of winning that game? Again, I know where your answer is headed.

And what I'm suggesting to you is if it's real obvious that they've got a better chance to win the game with Case Keenham, then Haskins is more of a longer-term developmental guy, that they still have hopes that he's going to be the franchise quarterback, but that he's not anywhere near ready. Because if he's anywhere near ready, there's going to be pressure from the owner for sure. Maybe even there's the possibility that if he isn't ready or anywhere close to ready, there's going to be pressure from the owner. But if he's close,

And they're seeing, you know, already Shanahan, Serato, not that we should take Vinny's word for it, Cooley, and others have all said, Jay's going to know pretty much by the first week, the end of the first week of training camp, if Dwayne Haskins is ready to play in the NFL. And all I'm saying is ready to play in the NFL, if the answer is yes, there's not a whole hell of, there's not a significant competitive threat in front of it. of them. Case Keenham's a starter in the NFL, a low-level starter in the NFL, in my opinion. Doesn't that put him ahead of any rookie quarterback coming out of college? Who? Case Keenum? Yeah. Doesn't that level experience put that guy ahead of any quarterback

coming out of college? So even if the answer is yes, if you deem case Keenum to be a low-level NFL starter, who is, let's just say ahead, or slightly ahead of any first-round quarterback that you draft. If you're a team like the Redskins, what are you waiting for? If Haskins is close, if he's close to Keenham, let's just say Keenham's marginally, slightly better. All right, what would you wait for? Okay, I agree. I agree with that. Wait, just start the process now. There are a lot of reasons to start the process now, but you're not, this is a team right now on paper that looks more like a double digit loss team than a double digit win team. Yes. I would start that process right away. Except here's the other

part of it that I think that you have to take in consideration. Do you want to put the kid in the best chance to succeed in his first year? And playing him in those first five games, does that meet that goal? I mean, you know, or do you start him against Miami in week six? Is that the best chance for him to succeed in his first? You want him to have success, don't you? You don't want You don't want people ready to peel off their Dwayne Haskins jerseys after the fifth game of the season. If it's close, I want him to start week one. But again, if it doesn't matter, if it's not close, if it's not close, then what I would suggest to you is it's not close, and that means he's got a long way to go

because he wasn't even close to Case Keenham or Colt McCoy. It would be one thing if he walked in and Brady was the start. starter, or Rogers was the starter, or, you know, Dak Prescott was the starter, or, you know, to take a mid-level starter. But if he's not close to Keenham or to Colt McCoy, then I think the answer is we're a long way off. I think your answer is a better one in that if he doesn't play at all during the 2018 season, during the 2019 season, and the 2019 season isn't a successful season, that speaks volumes. That would speak volumes. I agree with you on that. Okay. What if Ryan Fitzpatrick were here?

Ryan Fitzpatrick's better than Case Keenham. How far has he taken a team in the NFL? He hasn't taken him anywhere near where Case Keenham took an incredible all-around football team in Minnesota in 2017, a team that was one of the best defenses that wasn't one of the best defenses last year, a team with a healthy offensive line and a first-rate O-line coach. And last year you had one of the worst offensive lines and worst offensive line situations in the NFL. Vikings Giants won two, put them in whatever order you want, two worst offensive line situations in the NFL.

Keenham didn't face that in 2017. I think you're really underselling. Ryan Fitzpatrick's a better quarterback. And let's say, let's say it doesn't matter in those first five games. Again, Eagles on the road. Cowboys at home, bears at home, giants on the road, the giants are not in the murderer's row. What if you start them at New York? And then the Patriots at home, okay?

If you know as a coach that you've pretty much got no chance to win four of those five games, you really don't. You can't think that way. But what if you think? You cannot think that way. What if there's a voice in your head? I don't like the schedule part of this argument. What if Jay knows in his head that there's very little chance? no matter who plays quarterback for them to win those games.

If you know that, why throw him out in that situation? Jay will not look at the first five games of this schedule and think that he's got no chance to win more than one game. He's got Dallas and Chicago at home in weeks two and three. He's got Philly on the road, which, by the way, we still don't know what, you know, although Lewis Redick, by the way, put out a tweet yesterday predicting Carson Wentz would be the MVP. And look it. People are predicting the Eagles go to the Super Bowl.

Yeah, okay, so what I'm saying to you is this. The schedule wouldn't even enter the conversation, because you know how I feel about the NFL schedule to begin with. It's impossible to predict who's going to be good and when before season starts. Can we look at their schedule and pretty much guess that New England's going to be pretty damn good on October 6th? More likely than not, yes, we can predict that. Other than that, there's nothing you can predict. If Haskins is close, if it's a competition, like a legitimate competition,

and Jay Gruden in that first week, along with Matt Kavanaugh and Kevin O'Connell say, this dude's picking it up quickly, he's comfortable, and he so much gives us a much better chance physically to, this is a very close competition. He is starting the opener for me. I think he's starting the opener no matter what. Because of Snyder. Yeah. Unless Snyder wants to take the soft.

and get through that first five games and start them in game six. Again. But I think Snyder makes this call no matter what. I mean, among those first five games, you have the Cowboys and the Bears and the Giants in the middle three with two of them at home. Kevin. If you go into those games thinking you don't have a chance to win those games,

well, then you, let's just say it right now. Then they believe they are a 10-lost team. Well, you believe they're a double-digit loss team. Then what are the games they're going to lose? If they're going to lose double-digit.

I'm not suggesting that they think that way. But you think they are. I do. So what games do you think they're going to lose if they're not going to lose the Dallas, Philadelphia, and Chicago? Again, we do this every year. You know, even if we get the record prediction right, it's usually not the right wins and losses that are predicted. Okay. It's true, though.

I mean, that's just a fact. They're going to be putting him in a meat grinder. That's fine. I mean, I don't care particularly one way or the other. I think you're right. If it's close, I think. I think, you know, they'll make the call, but I'm not even sure if it's close that the call won't be made to start him. I think the big mistake would be is if he's not anywhere near ready, but the owner forces it anyway, that's a recipe for disaster.

I think if it is close and Gruden and O'Connell and Kavanaugh and the locker room knows it's close, they should start him. Day one, because Case Keenham is what? What is he? Where does that path lead? It doesn't lead anywhere. And you might as well get the Dwayne Haskins career as there's, I would be super excited as a fan if after the first week of training camp, I hear from Jay Gruden. Dwayne has picked it up quickly.

He looks really sharp. This is a really good competition. Can't wait to see how these guys play in the preseason games. If you hear that, to me, we're on the path to what should be Haskins starting week one. and I think that's a better situation for the franchise. Let me give you this scenario. I want you to listen to this closely. Okay, try to concentrate on this one.

Let's say this is like last year. Let's say they have a tremendous defense, a really good defense that keeps them in games. Well, they didn't have a tremendous defense last year. They had a good defense early in the season. Early in the season. Okay, so let's say that's how it starts out again. They have a good strong defense early in the season.

and then all you're hoping for is a quarterback who won't turn the ball over, who can caretake the ball like Alex Smith did and not make mistakes. Which quarterback is that? The rookie or the veteran? Again, I... Which one? Well, it would probably be the veteran. Well, how many turnovers did Case Keenum have last year in Denver?

Why wouldn't the formula then? With a really good defense. for wins early in the season. Because I'd point to Denver and I'd say Case Keenham had one of the better defenses in the NFL last year and went six and ten. Six and ten? Isn't that what Denver went last year?

Well, that sounds like a good Redskins season to me. Well, they went seven and nine last year. I know that. And the year before. So it would be, you know, it's, all I'm saying to you is that Case Keenham just. If the formula for winning is good defense and low turnover, you don't play the rookie.

Yeah, well, that was the formula in Denver last year, and they didn't win with that. You know, that would be my only point. Case Keenham, he's just not, case Keenham last year, 18 touchdowns, 15 interceptions, took 34 sacks on the season, you know, with a really good defense, and by the way, one of the best young running backs

in the game last year. I understand he had a very good year in 2017, and I do like aspects of Keenham. You're not listening. to me. I am listening to you. I gave you the answer. No, you're not listening to me. There, the, the, it does success for winning when you have a defense like the Redskins, but it was here in Washington last year. Well, it was going to be, the record was on the verge of becoming six and four with Alex Smith and probably would have ended somewhere around eight and eight,

might be. I understand that. I agree with all that, but they started the season six and three. That's right. With that form. formula. Okay, turnovers would have killed them. Let me ask you a question in answer to your question. I'd rather you didn't, but go ahead. Let's just say that they deem that Case Keenum, low turnover, Case Keenum, which he wasn't last year in Denver with a great defense. But let's just say they believe Case Keenham can protect the ball and that they've got a big time defense. And with Darius Geis, they feel like they can run the ball and win the way they won six games last year to start the season, you know, in the first nine. Let's just say that they think that that'll work.

And let's just say they go nine and seven, make the wild card. What do you do in 2020? And if you're Jake Rudin, you got a contract extension. That's what you do. What do you do with the quarterback that just protected the ball, managed games, and got you into the playoffs with that great defense and running game? They have no problem saying goodbye, the veteran quarterbacks who are good. They've done it before. he's not under contract. Right. So you're going to just say good riddins?

Well, what did the chiefs did? We're bringing our version of Patrick Mahomes in? What did the chiefs do? Okay. There you go. That's easy. The Kansas City model? Yes.

With air quotes around that? Yeah, that's a no-brainer. That's easy. Okay. There you have, there you have, uh, a Dwayne Haskins who hasn't failed yet. People will be eager to see that guy.

I think that, um, if it's close that Dwayne Haskins, will start and should start the opener. And I wouldn't wait him. I wouldn't wait out the first five games of the schedule, fearing the schedule. If it's close, meaning Keenham and McCoy are just slightly better than him,

or it's dead even. Haskins is the starter, I predict, and should be the starter, in my opinion, as a fan of the team. I would want to see him right from the get-go, because my personal feeling is that Case Keenham and Colt McCoy aren't, I want to see the guy that has the upside from the jump, not to see the two guys that I've already seen what their upsides are. That's a matter of opinion. I'm just not fans of either

one of them leading you to a Super Bowl, even though Case Keenham was in an NFC title game where they could not score at Philadelphia and they got run out of the building. And the one game that their defense played poorly. Really, I mean, if you look at that 2017 season, their defense was so dominant and then in the one game that it wasn't, they got run out of the building because Keenham couldn't keep up with what Philadelphia did. Well, I'm sure the rookie will keep up with the Eagles in week one. I don't, you know, here's the thing. We have no idea. We know that Sam Darnold played pretty damn well. Baker Mayfield played pretty damn well last year. We've had some rookie quarterbacks and I had the guy on from the Action Network two weeks ago who essentially said

that more times than not, if the rookie doesn't start and start quickly, that it ends up being a long-term harbinger of this, he just wasn't good enough, especially in these situations where you're not backing up a longtime starter or in the case of Aaron Rogers, a Hall of Fame starter, that you get them out there and that the year one results, when they start from day one, don't differ that much from their year two results.

This guy made the case, and it's funny because we had them on about a week after I had made the comment that, that Kansas City probably would have done better had they started Patrick Mahomes in that first year. That I know that he's given Alex Smith all this credit for being a great mentor. But after watching Mahomes last year, do you really feel like his results

would have been that much different if he had started as a rookie? I don't. I do. Well, this guy had lots of information backing up the fact that more likely than not Mahomes would have had similar results. And the Kansas City wasted a year of a Super Bowl window.

You know, I guess sometimes people get caught up in the idea that this is an NFL franchise. And you have to consider that we're talking about the Redskins. And the rules don't apply for the Redskins. There are outside forces at work that are self-destructive and that you can't predict that could come into play. So whatever blueprint there is for success around the league, you might as well burn it here in Washington. My only disappointment about those last 20 seconds of what you said is you didn't give your typical surgeon general's warning before you did it because that's required, I think. Every time you're going to speak about the team, especially if you're going to say something positive, you have to give the surgeon general's warning that you always give. Tommy, last year, Case Keenham in Denver wasn't very good.

He was not very good on a team that actually had some talent. I know they had some injuries on both sides of the ball. What kind of offensive talent did they have besides the running back? Philip Lindsay was a star. Besides the running back. Last year, they struggled. They had Sanders at wide receiver. They had the kid from SMU, Aaron, Wright, Cortland Sutton.

They had, who was their tight end last year? Yeah, that was a big problem there last year. They had the kid from Penn State, who I actually like a lot. He didn't have a lot of weapons. Not the kind of weapons he has here in Washington. No, and not the kind of weapons he had in Minnesota the year before. I'm pointing out. I understand.

They don't have many weapons, which, by the way, would be maybe the best argument for holding off at the beginning with Dwayne Haskins. Let's just say that Jay Gruden likes him, thinks that there's a lot of promise and is excited about him, but understands how limited they are and needs a veteran quarterback that can create a little bit more, which, by the way, would be Colt or case before Haskins. because Haskins is not an extend the play quarterback. Keenham and Colt McCoy are much better playmakers on a team that may not have anybody that can get open. Maybe.

Is that what Jay would think? I don't know what Jay would think. I don't think it matters what Jay would think. I think Jay is going to be interested in figuring out a way to win nine or ten games and make the postseason this year. I do. And at the same time, he's going to understand that there's going to be pressure from the top to play Haskins if it's close.

And if it's close, you know, he may be better off. Coolie made this point, and I think it was a really good one. If Jay wants to coach here, and I don't even know if that's his dream anymore, to have a long-term coaching career here, take that for whatever you think it's worth. I don't know that Jay loses sleep about losing a job here. I don't. But if he were interested in being the long-term head coach, here, then it's in his best interest to start Haskins and develop Haskins. And at the end of

2019, we all see, wow, look at Haskins. He's really starting to get there because then no one's going to want to give Haskins a new head coach and a new staff. You're right. You're right. That's a good point. That's a good point. Well, Cooley made that point. I think it's a really good one. But I would also just, for the purposes of emphasis, I will tell you that I think Jay just approaches each day like, hey, let's figure out what we're going to do today and figure out the best way to win today. And if it doesn't work out for him here beyond 2019, I don't think that Jay's going to lose a ton of sleep over it. Probably not. Okay. Here was the other bite from Lewis Riddick on John Kimes' podcast.

It was about comparing him to the last, you know, first round quarterback that the Redskins took in 2012, RG3. I think what's going to happen here is the hope is going to change the expectation quickly because, look, I need to say this the right way, but there's really only one way to say it. Dwayne Hastings is twice the thrower of Robert Griffin. He's twice the quarterback of Rob. Robert Griffin was never a good pocket quarterback. He was never the guy who on third down, when he, if you could, on first and second down, when Kyle and Mike, the Shadahans were able to.

really utilized play action and be more creative, and there was a lot more doubt as to what they were going to try and do offensively to a defense, and defenses really didn't know what was coming. Robert was spectacular. Spectacular. When he came to third down, and you're sitting in the pocket, and you don't have the benefit of play action in this third and six, third, and seven plus,

people can start, then they know, okay, now we got you boxed in. Now we can start doing some things to you. He folded like a lawn chair. That was not his, that's his 14. he didn't have the football intellect of Dwayne Haskins. Okay, so a couple of things there. First of all, I know what he's saying. When he started off by saying he's twice the thrower,

you had to sort of wait to get to the end of it there to sort of understand what he was saying, because Robert Griffin had a gun for an arm, still does. He can make every single throw on the football field. That's never been doubted about Griffin. And Haskins has a big-time gun as well and can make every throw. He's 100% right about Griffin.

It was the biggest, you know, what Mike and Kyle and all of them knew. Matt LaFleur, they all knew it from day one, that the biggest developmental part of Griffin, and it was going to take a while, was to teach him how to throw from the pocket when everybody knows he had to throw from the pocket on third down plus. That's why in that 2012 year, Trent Dilfer told us, It's the greatest first and second down offense he's ever seen in the history of the NFL. But it was not a good third down offense. The Redskins struggled on third down because Griffin just could not.

He didn't have what Mike has always told me. Steve Young told us once that you have to have the natural ability to throw with anticipation. And he doesn't have that. He still doesn't have that. As far as we know, we haven't seen him in recent years play, obviously. But Cooley pointed out, as it relates to Haskins, that that's not something that Haskins has proved yet. You know, that there was a lot of yak at Ohio State last year, a lot of horizontal

passing at Ohio State with arguably the best weapons in the country, speed-wise, skill-wise, talent-wise, at wide receiver, running back, et cetera. So this is something that he'll have to prove. My personal opinion after watching a lot of Dwayne Haskins last year is that he is better than Robert Griffin the third in the pocket. I would agree with that. You know, and that he will be more comfortable as a pocket passer, in part, because he's never had the other part that Griffin had to rely on. Griffin could always bail himself out with his legs. And in the offenses that they ran, it was designed at times for him to advance the football

with his legs, not with Dwayne Haskins. So Haskins has been put into the position of having to do what he can do, because he's not a four or three track guy. But I do feel better about Haskins as a pocket passer. But it was one of the things that I felt in watching him last year, especially against some of the really good defensive teams that they faced. When they got after him, it wasn't pretty. But he's early in his development. He only started one year.

Now he's going to be in a pro offense and we'll see how it works. I mean it doesn't mean that two or three years from now he isn't going to be excellent at doing that. I agree with all that. I agree. All right. A hundred days from today will mark the beginning of the 100th NFL season. We're 100 days away.

Actually, I think we're two months exactly away from the start of training camp. So we're 100 days away, I guess, from the beginning of the regular season. And I asked you this, and you may not have an answer because you didn't, you don't always do the research or try to get ready for the show. When I give you information before the show, you just sort of wing it. You know what? You don't pay me for show prep. That's definitely, that's 100% true. All right.

There's no doubt I do not pay you for show prep. But I asked the following question. Is there anything about the upcoming NFL season? First, I said, why don't we have 100 predictions? But that would have been, you know, five podcasts, so we're not going to do that. But is there anything that you're 100% certain about when the, about this upcoming NFL season. Well, like we both concluded in a moment of intelligence for you,

and my normal thought pattern is that you can't predict anything in the NFL. I mean, like you are right when you said year after year, there are teams that made the playoffs last year that won't make the playoffs this year, and there are teams that didn't make the playoffs last year that will make the playoffs this year. So this seems kind of futile to say what we're absolutely sure about, what we're pretty sure about, or what we strongly think will happen is different than 100%.

What do we feel the most confident about, about the upcoming NFL season? There's one answer that every NFL fan would give you, that the Patriots are going to make the postseason. Patriots will win the division. Yeah, that the Patriots are going to win the division and be in the post season. Yeah, that would. That would.

But 1A would be the Chiefs. For you, 1A's the Chiefs? They lost no Tyree Kill, no Kiel. No Kareem Hunt. I know. You know, it could be one of those 12 and 4 to 6 and 10 and out of the playoff teams. I don't think so.

So that's what you're most confident about that the Chiefs will make the postage. And Patrick Mahomes is going to be, if he's not already, I mean, one of the biggest stars in sports, period. This is my thing that I am 100% certain about, barring injury. And I'm surprised that you didn't mention this, because you already have mentioned it on the show today. There's no chance that Dwayne Haskins doesn't start at least one game for the Redskins this year. There's no chance.

He is going to start at least one, but I'll go beyond that. He's going to start at least five games for the Redskins. Personally, I think he's going to, I'm confident that he's going to start. at least 12, but 100% certain that he starts at least five games this year. I cannot envision even your, which wasn't unreasonable, you know, good defense, running game, play Case Keenham, don't turn the ball over like Alex Smith last year, and you win nine and he starts all 16. I do not see that happening. There is no way that Dan Snyder is going to wait a full year and a half from the April 2019 draft until he sees Dwayne Haskins play.

You're right. And a bunch. You're right. That is 100%. That is 100%. Yes. The other thing that I will say to you that I'm really, really confident about it, not 100% confident, but that was part of the 100th NFL season thing.

I think that the Jacksonville Jaguar, are going to be among the most improved teams in the NFL, and they're going to win, they only won five last year, they are going to win more than five games this year. They are going to have a chance. They're going to be in the hunt in the AFC South to win that division and make the postseason. There are a couple of teams I feel that way about

in terms of the turnaround teams, but I'm most confident about Jacksonville. I feel similarly about Denver, making a run in this upcoming season. And I feel like they're, you know, I think the Giants are going to be better than people think. I think Pittsburgh's going to be better than people think they're going to be. But Jacksonville will win more than they won last year.

They're going to be an eight win or better team. Well, with Nick Falls as a quarterback. With Nick Falls as the quarterback and with that defense that's still great, even though, you know, they lost Tevin Smith, who's going to sit out the year, which was a surprising development. Apparently, he's got some issues. Do you have any others? No, I don't think 100 days in advance.

You really, well, yeah, you just don't, comfortable you're going to be here in 100 days. Right, exactly. Hope you are. Did you have a nice weekend? I had a good weekend. It was a busy weekend. We worked all three days. I was on the radio Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.

and Sunday after I got off the radio, I took a train up to Philly to a barbecue with my in-laws up there. And, yeah, it was a good weekend. I mean, yesterday was a beautiful, the weather was beautiful. The relatives that you couldn't watch the Redskins Thanksgiving Day game with that you decided to pass on. Yeah. Right. But it's fine a Memorial Day weekend. Well, I just sat in the corner of the yard, ate my burger, drank my Brooklyn Loll.

Smoked my cigar to create a perimeter to keep people away. To keep to create the perimeter. The cigars and basically your general attitude was the perimeter that kept everybody away. Yeah. All right, quick word about Window Nation. All right, Window Nation is ready to kick off the summer with a huge savings opportunity for you. Buy one, get one free. Window Nation's absolute best offer is back.

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Wind Donation's sizzling savings ends May 31st. Call today. Buy one window, get one free. There is no limit plus get zero percent interest for five full years plus bonus tickets to Hershey Park. Call today 86690 Nation or go to windonation.com. All right. I wanted to talk about the NBA playoffs. The finals, Tommy, are set.

Had to be a disappointing outcome for you because you seemed to be counting on Milwaukee, weren't you? Yeah, I picked Milwaukee before the series started. But I picked Toronto before the playoffs started. I wish I had had the balls. to stick with that because I was definitely rooting against what my pick was. It doesn't always happen that way. You would never do that. But I really wanted, and I made it very clear during this postseason, I really did want Toronto to get to the finals. I'm a huge Kauai Leonard fan. And what he did Saturday night once again is a continuation of one of the great playoff runs of all time,

which I'll get to in a moment with some of the numbers. But the game on Saturday night was crazy. First of all, Aaron, either one of you watch this game live? No, not live, no. I've never, I'm sure it's happened, and I'm sure the old days of the Boston Garden, and I'm sure some of the environments in Indiana, you know, I can remember in Madison Square Garden,

have been great. I do not remember a more raucous, loud, college atmosphere like the one that existed Saturday night in Toronto. At the tip, it was Marv Albert on the call with Reggie Miller and

Chris Weber. I think it was Reggie Miller said as they walked out for the tip. He's like, my God, I cannot remember feeling this way in an environment like this before the opening tip. And it was that way throughout, but it was especially

that way during Toronto's 22 to 2 run from late third quarter through the early fourth quarter where the building was, as the young people say, Tommy, lit. It was unbelievable. They were down by 15, 76 to 61. And all throughout that game, I'm like, man, Milwaukee's making shots. And they were. They were making shots. And I think it was Scott pointed out on Friday, not that this is, you know, a new thing. But it really is in so many ways the NBA. It's like all these teams are so loaded with talent. It's a make-shot, miss shot kind of situation a lot of the times. And Milwaukee was making shots and they were up 15. And then towards the end of the third quarter, they're up 15 with two minutes to go in the third

quarter. And Kauai Leonard basically scored eight of the final 10 points of the quarter, assisted on the other, had three rebounds, and they went into the fourth quarter down five, 76-71. That was the game right there. He kept him in the game. And then he sat the first part of the fourth quarter. And they took the lead without him on the floor. And it was, I mean, that place was nuts. I mean, they did what they've done when they've needed other players to step up during this postseason. It happened against the Sixers. It happened against the Bucks. Guys like Van Vleet, who's been phenomenal over the last, you know, four or five games. Abaka was great. Norman Powell was outstanding. Lowry played great. It was really

happy for him to see him get to the finals. And at the same time, while all of this was going on, Janus was a mess. He was a mess. He airballed a floater from four feet. And after airballing that shot, he looked scared. I mean, he passed on open shot after open shot. He was confused, he was frustrated, and Toronto won that game. And Kauai came back in and was phenomenal. Ended up with 27 points. A career high, 17 rebounds in any game, regular season or postseason, after the game before setting a career high in assists in game five.

Kauai's run, Tommy. But Yonis real quickly on him, he's got to him. he's going to have to figure it out. I mean, this is the NBA. It seems like this is why I like Toronto before the postseason, because I just thought Milwaukee hadn't paid their dues. They hadn't learned how to win in the playoffs, which is the opposite of the regular season. Kauai's run, listen to some of this stuff. He's currently averaging 31.2 points per game. It's second in these playoffs behind Durant, who obviously hasn't played for six games, but he's got 561 points, 100 more than the next closest player in the second.

postseason, only because Durant's missed, obviously, the last six games. He's shooting 50% from the floor, nearly 40%, it's like 39.6% from 3, and 89.5% from the free throw line. He's barely missing the 50, 40, 90 club. Right. 50% from the floor, 40% from behind the arc, and 90% plus from the free throw line. He is now one of six players in NBA history to average 30% percent. points in one postseason with at least 17 games played. Here are the other five. Jerry West, Michael Jordan, Hakeem Elishoan, LeBron James, and Alan Iverson. He's in that group. He's scored

30 or more in 11 of the 18 games he's played in this postseason. The only players in the history of the NBA playoffs to do that before the finals are Michael Jordan and Hakeem Elijah. And a Elijah Juan's run in 94 and 95 was a that was an amazing run. In fact, after the game, Shaq and Ernie and Barney and Barclay and Kenny Smith, they were, the three players were gushing over Kauai's performance. And by the way, they talked a lot about how what's great about watching this is he's a, as Barkley called him, or maybe it was Shaq, he's a drama-free superstar. Yes. And there just aren't many of them in sports. And, you know, Kenny Smith said to Shaq and Barkley, do you think it's as good as the Dreams run for those two years when they won the title?

And Barclay said it's equal to that. It's equal to that. But only MJ, Elijah, Juan, and now Kauai Leonard have scored 30 or more in 11 of 18 playoff games. He's got seven games, Tommy, of 35 plus. Only six players in the NBA history have done that. Elgin Baylor, LeBron James, Elijah, Jordan, and one of the first. one that I think you'll get if I give you one clue. Bernard King.

You got it. I knew you would get that. I remember that run. Bernard was unbelievable during that run. So he is by, you know, appearance and by numbers. He is having one of the all-time great postseason runs. Defensively, though, is where he starts to separate himself from some of these guys, not necessarily Mike, but he separates himself from some of the other guys.

He's averaging 1.8 steals per game. But that's not where you'll judge him defensively on this postseason run. You've got to look at what he did against Janus. And they did switch a lot of screens. But Janus against Kauai average 15.1 points per 100 possessions on average. Where against everybody else, during the regular season and the postseason, he was at 30 points plus. That's half. Half.

and in some cases against Al Horford he averaged 40.6 points per hundred possessions against Al Horford but it's been so much fun to a friend of mine who's not into the NBA that much

text to me said this is as much fun as I've had watching the NBA in years and I don't know that people the first couple of the first round no one was paying attention I don't even know if many people were paying attention second round except for that Golden State Houston series. But Kauai's run and Toronto's run has been spectacular to watch. And the question is, can he do it against Golden State? Now, they are, the point spread, the series price, excuse me, in this series, hold on, I had it earlier. I think

it's minus 300. It's, okay, the Warriors right now on my site are minus 280. I saw minus 300 yesterday. They're minus 280. They would have been about minus 125, minus 130 against the Bucks. Now, I don't know, you know, the Bucks, if they had won that series in five, that's what the price would have been. That's what people were talking about then. But clearly, Vegas thinks the Bucs would have been a better matchup for Golden State than Toronto. I don't know how you can think that after watching this last series.

I like Golden State to win the series. I'm hoping that Toronto can really make it a series. The way they make this a series is by getting great play from the supporting cast, you know, and which Kauai Leonard's gotten here in recent games. So who guards Leonard? Well, it's probably a Godala. You know, I would think that that's who they're going to use on him. And Andre Aguadal is a really good defender, a very good defender.

It would have been really interesting if Durant were ready. right now he's been ruled out of the game one. I don't know if he's going to make any of these games, but to see Leonard on Durant and potentially Durant on Leonard. Yes. You know, because Durant's a good defender. But I don't know. I'll have more on this.

I think Legler's going to join us either tomorrow or on Thursday, the day that the NBA finals start, and we'll have a couple of other people on to discuss. But this has been so much fun to watch a guy who has zero. one other quick comment about Kauai Leonard. I mean, I was going there anyway. At the end of the game, he was asked about the, you know, being down 15 and making that run. He basically scored or assisted on the first 10 to get him to within striking range and then sat on the bench for the first three and a half, four minutes of the fourth quarter when they took the lead.

And the only thing he pointed to was his teammates in the start of the fourth quarter. He's like my team, the team played so well at the beginning of the fourth quarter. They took the lead. That was a huge moment. You don't get that from a lot of these stars. They would have pointed to, you know, they would have said, well, you know, I got us on a run there at the end of the third quarter. It was a totally selfless statement. I just love the guy and I love the game.

And there was one thing that came out, by the way, on Kauai Leonard over the weekend. It came from his uncle, who's also, I believe, his business manager, Dennis Robertson. And he told Yahoo Sports, he commented on what happened in San Antonio. And he said, quote, I think it just became a lack of trust. They didn't believe Kauai couldn't play. And that caused a lack of trust in us and then us not believing in them. Anytime a player says he's not capable of playing, you should believe him. Why would Kauai just stop playing all of a sudden?

He's a competitor. Sometimes you get these team doctors telling you what you can and cannot do, and Kauai was just in too much pain to get out there. This was a serious issue. They didn't believe him. And after that, the relationship couldn't recover, and we decided we had to move on. Closed quote. That whole San Antonio thing is interesting. And the guys on TNT were talking about this to a certain extent, too.

And I think I saw Stephen A and Max Kellerman talking about it yesterday on Memorial Day. you know, Popovich hasn't made a lot of mistakes as a coach and as the spokesperson in the head of that organization, R.C. Buford is a very good general manager. But there is no doubt that they, for whatever reason, they thought Kauai Leonard could be out there and he wasn't. And that started a big to do. And in hindsight, right now, to me, the Spurs look bad.

Oh, yeah. They look bad. A huge mistake. I mean, they had Tim Duncan too. in their own way and they drove them out of town. I don't know that they would have beaten the Warriors to get to the NBA finals.

Obviously, he's in a better position being in the East with no LeBron, but they clearly would have been at least still playing last week, more likely than not, against the Warriors and the Western Conference finals. Anyway, more on the NBA finals leading up to it. My first gut is Golden State wins this,

but you know the one thing if you're if you're if you're if you're if you want Toronto to win you got to get a great effort from from the supporting cast like consistent effort Lowry's got to play well van Vleet's got to continue to do what he's been doing a Baca has to be able to do what he's been doing um Powell uh Siakum all of them but the other thing is is just to watch what Toronto and if Toronto can rough Golden State up a little bit curry in particular because Houston did that to him in that series. And I'm wondering if Toronto has the ability to do the same thing and maybe wear

them out a little bit. The other thing too is, you know, Toronto has home court advantage. I know. They had a better regular season record. So this series, and I'm glad that it opens in Toronto because it would have, for the Toronto fan base, if they had come home down to nothing, it would have been a different environment, perhaps, and it will be on Thursday night. Now, the interesting thing, if Toronto pulls this, the series went off and wins the NBA title, Leonard will have done what Durant desperately wants to do. Yes. Leonard will be given the sole credit for taking a team on his shoulders and driving them

to an NBA championship while Durant will have two rings that people will consider he got as a passenger. Look, Kevin Durant had the opportunity to do what LeBron did in Cleveland. when he was in Oklahoma City. Yes. You know, once he joined Golden State and he jumped on the bandwagon, that's what he did. I mean, we can, I mean, the debate which we've already had and we can continue to have and people will continue to have, are they better off with Durant? I don't know if they're better off with Durant. The bottom line is there's still a championship team without Durant.

The question is not are they better than Durant without Durant? Right. The question is, can they win without Durant? And they can. That's true. Of course they can. They proved it before he got there, and they may be in the midst of proving it again. I don't personally think that you can say legitimately that Kevin Durant, a guy of his ability and talent,

that somehow you're better off without him on the roster. That's really a stretch. Right. But again, that's not the question. Right. The question is, do you need Kevin Durant to win? And if you don't need Kevin Durant to win, then Kevin Durant is never going to get the last. level respect he so desperately wants because he's such a sensitive human being.

So that leads to another Durant quote from over the weekend since Friday that people are talking about from over the weekend. He was asked by a reporter in a press conference, what do you think about their play, T-H-E-I-R, play, referring to how great the team's been without Durant during Durant's absence? And he said, our play, I think we've been playing great. Close quote. Now, it was part of a much longer press conference where he had a lot of different things to say, including, you know, in response to, you know, sort of this notion that there's been a Kevin Durant storyline and the rest of the Warriors storyline since he's been here. He said, quote, it's been that way since I got here. It's the Warriors and KD. I understand that. I feel like my

teammates in the organization know exactly what I've done here on and off the court to become part of this culture and stamp my flag in this culture and this organization. I know what I bring to the team, but I also know that a lot of people on the outside don't like to see us together. I get it. Closed quote. The first part of that, though, our play. I think we've been playing great. That's a sensitive reaction. I don't care what the rest of the context was, and I listen to the whole thing start to finish. In that moment, he was reacting as Kevin Durant often does. And that is he's hurt. By slights, he's hurt that people actually think that the warriors might be better off without him.

Here's the other part of that quote, what he said. He talked about he's tried to, you know, become part of the culture there. Okay, guys like Kevin Durant are supposed to establish cultures. They're not supposed to blend in to a culture. They're supposed to be the one to create cultures. And that's part of the problem here. I mean, you know, he is, I mean, LeBron James created a culture. Alan Iverson created a culture.

I mean, great players do that. And the culture is built around them. Well, if you're trying to create a culture, you don't go one year at a time contractually. That's true, too. So that's been a big part of why all this stuff and why KD's been a storyline year and year out. Yeah. So, I mean, this is it. He's brought down on himself.

He's not a driver. He's a passenger. and that's not what great players are. You know, maybe at some point in their career, they are forced in a situation where they become a passenger. You know, I always think of Earl Monroe when he got traded to the Knicks and he changed his game to... For Fraser.

Right, to play with Fraser and be more selfless. And it wound up elevating his status as an NBA player as a result. But he didn't have a... He was traded. And Kevin Durant made a choice to go play for Golden State. He didn't go someplace and say, this is my team, I'm going to be the culture. He looked around and said, this is my best chance to get a ring. Definitely.

Yes. I mean, there was going, if he didn't realize that jumping on an NBA championship team, you know, they had won one and lost one. And the one they lost is, you know, everybody knows the circumstances as to why they lost the second year. If he didn't understand that jumping on an existing championship caliber team was going to make him look like he was just trying to grab a ring, then he's really naive. I mean, it- Or he doesn't, you could say he doesn't care, but he does care. He clearly cares. He does, he absolutely cares.

And if he didn't want the year-to-year questioning about, you know, what he's going to do, then he should have signed a longer-term deal. in Golden State and shouldn't be playing it year by year looking for the next best opportunity. But back to how this conversation started when you mentioned Kauai. If Kauai were to take... Look, there are two things. If Kauai takes Toronto to a title,

he will have done what Kevin Durant couldn't do on his own in Oklahoma City. With, by the way... Arguably better supporting cast. Yeah, Hardin, Westbrook, and by the way, Sir Jabbaugh, who's playing really well right now. But he couldn't do that.

Which, LeBron, look, there's a difference between LeBron and Kevin Durant, period. People that don't think, and I'm not the biggest LeBron fan ever, LeBron James took a Cleveland team with Amman Schumpert as at one point, the second best player on that team when they had lost love and lost Guy Rhee to the NBA finals. And they won a game or two. Didn't they win two games in that first year? Kevin Brandt got close, got to the finals. But you know what?

Westbrook played better in those finals. against the heat against LeBron's Miami team. And they couldn't get him through when they had a 3-1 lead and he went 10 for 31 and an opportunity to close out the Warriors in his last year at Golden State. By the way, that was another part of the criticism. It's like you couldn't beat him so you joined him. You know, and you had him beat, but then you played poorly and you lost a 3-1 series lead and lost to the Warriors.

But, you know, for Kevin Durant, it's like I don't, he's had a, I know, know he's had a difficult circumstance, you know, personally. In his upbringing, in his current situation, I understand that there's a lot of stuff going on. And so we never know what some is in somebody's head and what's, what's working towards some of these answers. But if there's anybody with, you know, any kind of, you know, connection to Kevin Durant that he listens to, that answers is an opportunity for him. It's an opportunity to not be criticized, but to be lauded, to be compliment it. And the answer is really simple. I love the way they're playing. They are playing so well. Steph stepped it up. Clay Thompson's playing great. Dremont's been incredible. Igadala.

How about Kevon Looney? How about some of the supporting roles? Players? They're playing great. I hope I'm healthy enough. I really want to get back and be a part of this thing. But how are they playing? They're playing phenomenally well. That's the answer to that. Because any other answer is going to make you look like you're hurt and you're hypersensitive to criticism. And by the way, it was not an, it was the shot from the reporter was not intentional. Right. And, you know, the hyper sensitivity, whatever he's going through, I don't think that has anything to do with the hypersensitivity.

That's just who he is. That this is who he is. He, so anyway, it is who he is. Yeah. Anybody that sets up fake Twitter accounts. to knock down people who are criticizing you on your real Twitter account is too sensitive. And he's going to have to carry that his whole career. So if Kauai Leonard wins this title and Durant doesn't play, I believe, I really do believe

that Kevin Durant is the type of person that may be rooting for Kauai Leonard to take his team out, that he's sitting there because if they go on, it's what Chris Broussard said. And I, any NBA fan, anybody that's been following the Kevin Durant's story knew that Golden State going on a run and winning a title without him was his worst nightmare. Yes. I mean, come on. You're being naive if you think he's bigger than that. He's not. And by the way, that's not massive criticism because a lot of people would feel that way.

I hated it when I went on vacation and people loved the show with Tommy more than they loved it with me on it. But seriously, Gilbert Arenas just over the weekend did an interview. You pointed this out before the show. I hadn't heard it. But Arinas talked about how he would feel when he was on the bench and what he would be thinking about the players that were on the floor without him. Real quickly, though, actually, before I play it, I am going to give sort of a warning here.

Gilbert drops a ton of F-bombs during this answer. Yeah, he's a stand-up citizen that you would expect him to be. Actually, he's a great interview. And he did an interview on Fox, FS1 with, who's that drop-dead gorgeous girl that used to be on the Colin Cowherd show? She's got her own show now. And she did an interview with Gilbert. I forget her name. Can you look up her name?

She did an interview with Gilbert Arenas like a month ago that I just happened to have been watching. And he was great. I mean, really, really, really entertaining. But anyway, do you have her name? Christine Leahy. That's who it is. So this interview was with some podcast, right? It's his own podcast.

He has a podcast now. He's talking with a couple of his co-hosts. Okay, so he's talking with a couple of his co-hosts on his own podcast, drops a lot of F-bombs. We're going to play it as he said it. We don't need to bleep that stuff out in the podcast world. But I just wanted to give you a heads up on that if you've got really small children in the car right now or you're listening at home. But again,

he's answering how he felt from the bench when his team was playing well without him on the court. I was angry as fuck as a bench player. Like, I'm not clapping for shit you doing. Like, I'm sorry. They ain't shit you. Like, fuck that. I want your position.

I want your position. I don't want you to do good. Like, you miss. I'm like, fuck damn. Two more misses. He missed two more. I mean. Two more misses.

I know I'm in. Two turnovers, I know I'm in. So to sit there and celebrate and sit there and dance for him, I'm like, y'all don't want to get in? Like, y'all don't, like, I was literally, I was literally like, like making sure the coach knew his flaws. Like, come on, dude, get back on defense. Like, damn, man, he keeps getting beat. Like, hey, tighten up, he keeps going left on you.

Like, I was literally, like, you know. But you would clap, blah. or if you missed a shot, like, oh, you got that next time. Next time. But it was literally, like, you're literally like, like, low-key Haiti on the guy in front of you. Or, like, if you're 15, like, 12 and 13, like, you're really like, like, you've heard it before. You've done. I know what you're talking about.

Damn, man. That's another shot. Come on, man. Put your hands up. That's pretty funny. That's also. See, I didn't think it was that funny. Oh, I think it's hysterical.

And I also think it's incredibly honest. and I would bet that more than 75% of real hardcore competitors think the same way. I don't think so. I do. By the way, I think I'm looking at a person that thinks that way all the time. I think it shows what a piece of garbage teammate he was. Oh, I'm not saying he was a great teammate. I'm just saying a lot of people think the same way competitively,

that they want to be out there, and the guy that comes and replaces him may be the guy that replaces him. But there's the difference between, There's a difference between jealousy and envy. When you're envious... Which one are you of me? I'm neither. I'm neither.

I'm empathetic with you. Okay. I'm sympathetic with you. Right. Because I am envious of you. Not jealous, but envious. When you're envious of somebody, you wish you had what they have. When you're jealous of somebody, you wish they didn't have it.

Gilbert wishes that his teammates didn't have the talent. If you're watching great talent from the bench, I mean, party has to be thinking, I wish I had that. You know, I wish I was that good. I wish I was out there playing like that. But the other part, the evil part, is saying, I wish that guy wasn't that good. I wish that guy was failing so I could be out there.

And I think there's a difference. I think it shows what kind of human being the guy is. And I tell you what it does. You know, we have a totally different. reaction about this because I got so angry when I heard this and here's who I got angry about all the all the infants in this town that worshipped at the altar of Gilbert arenas when he was playing for the wizards including the media who made him out to be this great character this this kind of unique human being that was so colorful and interesting and basically he was just a piece

of shit. That was it. Look, he can be all of those things. He can be interesting and he can be really good and he can also be a piece of shit. No. You can't. If you have all, and I'm not suggesting that he's not that. I'm not. I'm just saying that that was an

entertaining answer and a very honest answer because most people that feel that way would never admit it. They would never admit it publicly. You know, it's not funny. It's in a way it's the Kevin Durant argument. I mean, that's why I play this there.

I know. I mean, that that's remarkable that in a way, I mean, I guess you'd have to give him credit for saying what Kevin Durant would never say. Yes, what I'm saying to you is that would it really shock you or surprise you if Kevin Durant's sitting back there after they've won six in a row without him? And he's thinking, oh, my God. I mean, when you agreed that it's the worst, his worst nightmare come true, then by extension, you believe that deep down he's,

not wishing for them to be successful. You're right. You're right. And I think that a lot of, I think a lot of players, I think a lot of people in life, you know, it takes a rare sort of comfort level, confidence level in yourself to not fear your teammate or your workmate doing much better than you. It really takes an incredibly insecure person to feel that way. And by the way, like, in Gilbert's case, you know, and even in Durant's case, maybe part of their insecurity is also what makes them so great and drives them so much is that they're always trying to make sure that nobody does end up being better.

You know, no one is better than they are. But like, I can't imagine that Michael Jordan, when he came out of a game in a playoff series, wasn't rooting for them to keep that lead or extend that lead. Because he just, there are some people that just want championships. And in the case of like a Michael Jordan, like there's no threat of anybody ever believing that someone's better than him. No. So you get to a certain level where you are genuinely rooting for everybody on your team even when you are not there. Yes. Because you have to have established a track record of success by that point on your own.

Joe Montana. No words. Kevin Durant didn't do that. If Kevin Durant went to Golden State and had won two or three titles with Oklahoma City, then maybe he'd have a whole different attitude. Then maybe he could be comfortable saying, look, I'm very happy for my teammates. Because I know what it takes to do what they're doing because I've done it. Right.

Well, that would be, you know, that would be the part that you don't necessarily have to say. You want others to say that for you. But do I have this right? wasn't Joe Montana very insecure about Steve Young there for when they were on the team together and Young was playing games and he wasn't apparently very helpful. Am I remembering that correctly? I don't know if you are or not. But that is particularly an NFL unique thing.

Look, we've heard Thaisman say that when he was playing for the Redskins, he wanted every snap. every snap because he didn't want the guy behind him getting any snaps. So, I mean, I think in football, the competitive nature and the fear of somebody taking your job is higher than any other sport. Yeah, I think I had that wrong, by the way, because I just pulled something up to read it. In Steve Young's autobiography, Young had nothing but good things to say about Montana. he said they were two totally different people, which was why they weren't ever seen in the same place outside the football field. And maybe that's why I have that memories.

Maybe it was reported that they're not super close friends, that they don't hang out with one another. But Young in his autobiography said that he and Montana actually were helpful teammates. But don't you think in football that the nature of fear of losing your job is worse than any other sports? Especially when there's only one person that can be on the field at that position at any given time. So I think in football, that just comes with the territory. And watch out with Steve Young. He used to give me a tie every year at the Super Bowl.

He used to give me a Van U's and tie every year. I remember that. I love Steve Young. I think Steve Young is actually, if it's even possible, one of the most underrated quarterbacks in NFL history. Nobody puts him, rarely do you hear him talk about being in that upper top five to top seven group. I think he's very much in that group. But what was I going to say? Cooley

made this point about after the draft, he said, I've heard a lot of people talking about how great the quarterback room is going to be for Haskins with Keenham and Colt McCoy there. He's like, what do you, he's like, what are you guys talking about?

Case Keenham and Colt McCoy want to start. They don't want a mentor. Col McCoy has had enough. Colt McCoy has had enough of watching other people playing quarterback for this team. He's like, you don't, he essentially said, you don't know the human competitive psyche if you don't understand that Case Keenham and Colt McCoy

don't want Haskins to be great. They want to start, and this is their opportunity, you know, to take a team and hopefully get another contract at some point down the road. Now, let me ask you one other thing. Yeah. And people say, well, yeah, duh, this is obvious. But I don't think it's so obvious. I think it needs to be spoken about and talked about.

You saw the photos of Alex Smith out there, right? Yes. And, you know, Redskins had cropped the photos to make sure people didn't see the medieval-like device he's still wearing on his leg. So all the shots were from the knee up. Okay, they drafted Dwayne Haskins. Haskins is their quarterback of the future. Alex Smith is never going to play a down for the Washington Reds. More likely than not.

Okay. So let's stop the pretense about his rehab. Let's stop the pretense that he's going to play for this team. He's done. The Alex Smith era is over, right? Yes, I believe that. Okay. I think once they drafted, Dwayne Haskins at 15, it was over.

Yeah, it was over. I mean, if you didn't know it wasn't already, I mean, because all of the report, he still has that thing around his leg. That's with the medieval vice I'm talking about. So, I mean, he's never going to play quarterback for the Redskins again. I don't think he's ever going to play again. He probably won't. But the Alex, and, you know, Pete, I mean, look, it happened through circumstances beyond their control, obviously the injury.

But the Redskins, a lot of Redskins fans get real chesty about the situation Minnesota is in with Kirk Cousins and how much they're having to pay him for the next two years. I usually point out to these people that the Redskins have their own quarterback hold. that they're paying money to for years. And it's Alex Smith. And you can say, well, that was something that beyond his control, that he got hurt. They couldn't have expected that. No one forced the Redskins to give this guy a $77 million contract extension

after they traded for him. That's right. He still had a year left on his existing contract. That is 100% correct. And to take it a step further, because as you were talking, I was thinking about why they continue to talk about his rehab as if there's still a chance. Because they have not said, they have not closed the door on Alex Smith.

They don't want to close the door in Alex Smith. Look, bottom line is, you know, even before the injury, it was not apparent that this was a trade worth making. Right. He had not played well. You know, he was not a good fit for Jay Gruden. maybe that fit was going to improve, and maybe it was way too premature to basically close the door on the possibility that Alex Smith was going to become a better quarterback with Jay Gruden as his coach in Washington, but he was not performing at a high level. It was not a good fit with Jay Gruden's offense. I can tell you definitively that there was a lot of frustration among the coaches with Alex Smith early on, that there was a good fit with Jay Gruden's offense. That there was a lot of frustration, that there was a lot of frustration. This was not what they thought. And going back to the day of the trade, I mean, it was not thought to be that the football people were totally on board with Alex Smith.

It's not like, again, and I say this all the time about Jay Gruden, he's go along to get along. You know, Bruce Allen said, what do you think about Alex? I think he's a good player. So all of a sudden the next day, you know, a few weeks later, they make the trade. Oh, no, Jay was in on it. Jay did not spend time evaluating quarterbacks, free agents, potential trade targets, rookie quarterbacks going into the 2018 draft like he did in this off-season. He likes Case Keenham. He thinks Case Keenham is a good fit for what he does. He was not necessarily of the same

opinion of Alex Smith, and it played out that way. It was not a great fit for him. So to your point, the trade was a bit pricey. You made this point over and over again. I think there's some truth to it, that they needed to do something at the quarterback position to make you forget that they had completely botched the Kirk Cousins situation. No matter how you feel about Kirk Cousins, they botched it seven ways to Sunday. They could have had him under contract for a song, basically relative to where the salaries are now, and they didn't do that because they had no vision. And then when they should have traded him, they didn't trade him. All right, they fucked it up twice. All right. So this was sort of an answer to, hey,

Look who we got. Look who I brought in. I'm Bruce Allen. I brought in Alex Smith. He got injured. They gave him the big contract extension, and it wasn't working even before he got injured. So it's easier for Bruce to push the, you know, shutting the door on Alex Smith's career in Washington down the road. Hopefully after either Case Keenham or Dwayne Haskins has proven to be a good replacement. Yeah. So let's remember that. Alex Smith is done with the Redskins. Yes. I think he's done. done period. I think he is too. I mean, I, you know, I think the next, by the way, the next important injury to keep an eye on is just this Ruben Foster thing. Because when they do the ACL

surgery, remember, they said that's when they're going to find out if there was nerve damage. Right. If there's nerve damage, you've got to wonder about his future. Yeah. As well. All right. Um, quick word about launch workplaces in Bethesda. If you're considering an office move and you live in the Bethesda Chevy Chase, Upper Northwest D.C. area, please consider launch workplaces in Bethesda. They've got brand new, fully furnished offices, conference rooms, co-working desks, they've got high-speed internet, a cafe, free parking and plenty of it, and 24-7 access. You get more work done today by moving your office out of your home or out of your existing office to launch workplaces in Bethesda. Call today for an exclusive free two-day

trial. 240-86714. That's 240-86714 or Launchworkplaces.com. They've got other facilities throughout the area, and you can find out about all of those at launchworkplaces.com. All right, a couple of things just to finish up the show. The Nats did take three or four from the Marlins over the weekend. They blew the game yesterday. They had the bases loaded in the bottom of the eighth with an opportunity, to tie it or even better. And they didn't get the tying run or even the go-ahead run in. But they did win the first three.

And I think going into this series, you would say if they can win three out of four, that's a pretty good deal. They're still nine and a half back, I think. Yeah, look, you would. Marlins had won six in a row coming in. I know that. You would say that normally,

but you've got to win Max Scher's starts. The one game you think they should have won was the start that they lost with Scherzer, who's now two and ten. One earned run, yes. So, I mean, you know, again, my contention is they can dig their way out of this to be a 500 team maybe by the end of the year, but not to compete for the division title. I don't think that's going to happen. You can't, you can tinker with a bullpen over the course of a season and fix it as you go along.

You can't reconstruct an entire bullpen over the course of a season, which is what they're facing. I mean, they're not just, we're not talking about one or two pitchers that they've got to replace. Because I've told you, bullpens evolve over the course of a year. They change. That's nothing new. But to have 80% of the bullpen unusable, basically, where the manager is afraid to bring 80% of the pitchers in that bullpen in, you can't have that. That's not going to sustain success. So what it did was it, it, it.

kept the wolves at bay. That's about the only thing it accomplished in terms of calling for people's heads. Because, again, if they had lost to the, if they had lost three out of four to the Marlins and then, you know, screwed up on this, on this road trip, they're going to Atlanta, I think, and then Cincinnati maybe after that, I'm not sure. By the time they came home the next time, I think Davey would have lost his job. Really? I think so.

I just think it would have, however unfair or however reluctant Mike would have been to do it, I think if they had lost the series to the Marlins and then went on the road and continue to lose, I mean, we'd be talking about a situation where you'd be losing, what, 11 out of the last 14 or 15 games? You can't live with that. But right now, right now, Davy Martinez isn't going anywhere. I may have been one of few watching the game because there were even fewer attending the game yesterday. But I would just ask why Max Scher comes out at the end of six innings with 103 pitches. Now, two of the three runs that the Marlins got after Scher left the game were unearned.

And I don't know if you saw the play were Turner through high. to Matt Adams at first. They charged that error to Turner. I thought Adams it was a catchable ball at first, but whatever. There were two unearned runs of the three that were scored when or the other two. I'm sorry, two unearned runs after Scher left the game. So you can't put it all on the bullpen yesterday. But at 103 pitches after six innings, given the troubles they've had,

why wouldn't you send them out for the seventh? Okay. Here's what I don't know. Maybe you know this. Do you know what kind of conversation Scherzer and Dave Martinez had in the end? I don't. Neither do I. Okay.

Okay. This is what I always point out to people. There, I mean, when Dave Martinez talks to either the relievers or the pitching coach or the bullpen coach or all three before every game. And all those relievers know in this situation, this is how you're going to be used. If this comes up, this is how you're going to be used. I mean, the one thing that Dave Martinez does is communicate. So we have, and this is the difference between information and knowledge. 103 pitches doesn't seem like much given the fact, I mean, if he goes out there and throws a 15-pitched inning,

that it still seems manageable. That's one less inning. You have to go to the bullpen. You don't know if Scher came back in the dugout and said, I'm done or I'm tired. We just don't know. And again, until you know that, you can't make the judgments. Now, again, I don't know if that was asked in the post-game press conference. I wasn't there.

I don't know if anyone asked Max, you know, how did you feel when you came out of the game? And to be honest with you, and I'm not accusing Max of this at all because I think Max is a stand-up guy. I've seen lots of pitchers when the manager walks out to the mound. I've seen lots of pitchers beg out of games. Tell the manager, I'm tired. and then in a post-game press conference, say the exact opposite, and the manager has to protect them. That happens more often than you'd be surprised.

Because no one wants to stand in front of their locker and say I wanted to come out. Right. All right. Well, I trust you. I just think. We just don't know. You're right. And it seems like Scherzer, that six-inning mark in somewhere around, you know,

100 to 115 pitches tends to be the spot. He's got to be more efficient. He's got to be better. His last three starts have been six-inning starts. He had a seven-inning start when they had a lead against the Dodgers in L.A. It doesn't excuse them losing his starts, but he's going to have to be, like, Strasbourg's been pretty efficient in the games where he's pitched well. Shurzer has to be that efficient. Now they go to Atlanta to play the Braves.

They've got to win another series. You got to win the series. Right. Simple as that. Yeah, he's given up one earned run. and his last two starts and they've lost both games. And Strasbourg pitches the first game, today. Tonight, yeah.

The couple of other things real quickly to get to from over the weekend. First of all, the story about Evgeny Kuznetsov and entering a room with people that he claims he didn't know and lines of cocaine sitting on the table. You read this, right? Yes, I did. What do you think? Okay. I don't know if he did the cocaine.

or not, you know, he claims he didn't. Here's the downs. Just to be clear, he's denied ever using drugs. Yes. All right. This was a video that surfaced of him sitting next to a table in which there were two lines of

white powder, all right, in a hotel room with a female lying in bed in the background. Right. Here's where you put yourself in a situation like this. for exactly this reason. And this is why people like stars like this,

they have to be smarter about this. You put yourself in a situation, first of all, cocaine's illegal. Okay. So you put yourself at legal risk in a situation like this. You may think that's minimal, but you do. The other thing is you put yourself at risk of being extorted in a situation like this.

I mean, let's say if you're a gambler and you've got photos of, let's say, of an athlete using cocaine or around cocaine or a situation like this, you say, hey,

just give me the inside information about what's going on. Right. And these photos will never see the light of day. You put yourself at risk for being extorted and therefore compromising your talent and your teammates' talent.

Those are worst case scenarios, even if you didn't use the cocaine. This is why I always say in politics. This is what I always say in politics when people will say, well, somebody's personal life has nothing to do with politics. I say it does if it puts that office at risk. In other words, if your personal life is something that you want to cover up and somebody has information about that, they can extort that information to get something out of the office.

So no matter how noble you may think about your personal life being your personal life, it will affect your professional life and it does in this situation. Have you watched the video? Yes. Okay. So he is, this is apparently him sitting in front of this table with two lines of white powder, a couple of rolled up bills. and a female in a bed lying down in the background.

I think they're $20 bills, aren't they? I can't tell what they are. But if you saw it reported that they're $20 bills, that's fine. But basically he told Sport Express, which is a Russian media site. First of all, this happened during post-Standley Cup fines. Post-party time. Right. And he said the video that was taken last summer after the Caps won the Stanley Cup,

he said he left the room as soon. as possible after seeing unfamiliar women there and strange substances on the table. He said he's never used drugs, was ready to undergo a medical examination to prove it. The Caps, Caps say we're aware of the video that surfaced on social media of Genni Kuznetsov. We are currently in the process of gathering facts and we'll have no further comment at this time. I mean, you have to take him at his word at this point. Yeah, he is actually apparently videotaping himself from his phone, during the video that's being taken of him.

But anyway, he doesn't seem to be super uncomfortable with the two lines of white powder right in front of him. Yeah. As you watch this video. So I guess my immediate reaction is, I guess you take him at his word, but if you see the video, it doesn't look like he immediately got up

and left the hotel room after seeing unfamiliar women in two lines of white powder. He didn't say in Russian, is that baking soda? He didn't say that, did he? I don't think so. Buckner, Bill Buckner passed away this weekend, so did Bart Star. Yeah. Look, Bill Buckner is part of one of the greatest plays of my lifetime as a Mets fan.

You know, I mean, what happened in 1986 was literally a miracle, almost as miraculous as the 69 Mets going from eighth place to first place and winning a World Series. and there's all sorts of drama that surrounds it. Bill Buckner left in when he should have been replaced for defensive purposes that late in the game by John McNamara, the Red Sox manager, on the ground ball from Mookie Wilson that goes through Buckner's legs. There's a lot of people that believe Mookie Wilson would have reached first safely whether Buckner fielded or not. Whether he caught that ball or not, Mookiee Wilson was a very fairer.

fast runner and Ray Knight was the guy who scored where turned out to be the winning run in that game where they were champagne already in the Red Sox locker room because they were up, they were up three games to two going into that game six and they were up in that last inning all ready to celebrate and then Ray Knight scored the winning run and then they went on to win. And people forget that was game six.

There was a game seven that the Red Sox lead in. At Shea, yeah. Yeah, the Red Sox led in game seven and blew that game too. Yeah, they did. And he was, he was a, he was a great hitter. I think he has almost a 300 batting average in his career, just short of 3,000 hits. And he deserved better than to be known for that one snafu. Bart Star, if you can be underrated with five NFL championships to your credit, Bart Star is underrated. No doubt. He still has the highest completion percentage. In playoff history.

In playoff history. That's pretty remarkable. I didn't, I don't remember Bartstar. I didn't get a chance to see Bartstar play. I've always had this feeling, though, from reading about Bartstar, that the team around him was as good as any team in NFL history around a quarterback and that he was really, truly, the first of the winning game manager style quarterbacks. I think that's a bit unfair. It is? Yeah, I think it is.

Look, Johnny Unitas was, I always thought, the greatest quarterback of all time, maybe until Tom Brady came along. Johnny Unitas had Hall of Famers all around him, too. Okay. Arguably more weapons offensively than Bart Starr did. So. What made Bart Starr so great? I don't know.

It's hard to say. I mean, in a way, he was a lot like Lombardi. He demanded a lot of himself. He was unflappable in terms of pressure. He was remarkably tough. In the Ice Bowl, where they played Dallas in the NFL title game. 67 NFL championship game. And he does the quarterback sneak behind Jerry Kramer over Jethro Pew to win the game.

Bartstar had been sacked eight times in that game. And the stories were that his face was swollen like a boxer. after that game from being hit so many times. Chethra Pew got frostbite in that game. So I just think a level of toughness, a level of intelligence, a lot like Lombard. This is why Lombardi and John Eisenberg, the great writer from Baltimore, wrote a story about this called The First Season, about the first year Lombardi was there in 59 and how Bart Starr, I think, was the third string quarterback when Lombardi arrived.

and he identified him as the quarterback he wanted to change the franchise. And that's when the Packers really turned things around when Lombardi came in and saw that Bart Stark could carry out the game the way Lombardi wanted him to. You can call game manager if you want, but it was a lot of responsibility to, and tremendous guts to win five NFL championships. The MVP at the first two Super Bowls, I might want to point out.

You know, I was looking this morning through a bunch of lists, you know, of just the greatest quarterbacks because I mean, we've done it a lot over the years, but I wanted to just refresh my memory as to where Bart Star is. And he's consistently in the top 20, you know, to top 25 of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. But he's not in anybody's top 10. No, he's not. You know, he, that's not what he was. But, you know, it leads me to just another quarterback conversation to finish up the show

today. And this conversation is about Donovan McNabb, who over the weekend told TMZ sports, and this may have been from Friday, on whether or not he should be in the pro football Hall of Fame. He said, absolutely, I'm not hesitating on that. I am a Hall of Famer. My numbers speak for itself. My numbers are better than Troy Aikman. But he has Super Bowl rings, and he's played with Hall of Famers as well. McNabb, you know, obviously the Hall of Fame portion, of his career, if you believe he's a Hall of Famer, which I don't, was played in Philadelphia, obviously not Washington or Minnesota. But, you know, in 167 career games, he completed 59% of his passes for 37,276 yards and 234 touchdowns. And those numbers are better than Aitman's.

I mean, Aikman threw for 32,942 yards and 165 touchdowns. And he said, McNabb said, when they look at my numbers, yeah, I'm a Hall of Famer, but then they always want to add the other stuff into it. Was he an all pro? Was he this? How many Super Bowl opportunities? But people don't realize how hard it is to get to the NFC championship, and I got there five times and then made it to a Super Bowl. It's tough. McNaft had a really good career. I can think of off the top of my head, off the top of my head, two quarterbacks right from the jump that I would consider to be, that are not in the Hall of Fame, that I consider to be more Hall of Fame worthy than Donovan McNabb. One is Ken Anderson.

Ken Anderson had an amazing career for the time, too, and is not in the Hall of Fame. And I always felt Tommy that a guy like Bernie Kozar didn't get enough recognition. I think Bernie Cozar is one of the more underrated, really good quarterbacks. And I think that he would, I'm not saying he deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. And I'm not saying Ken Anderson definitely deserves to be in it before McNabb. But both of those guys I would take before I would even think of McNabb. Hell, I might even think about guys like Phil Sims or Randall. How about Randall Cunningham before you think of Donovan McNabb?

McNabb's not a Hall of Famer. He's just not a Hall of Fame quarterback, and we can go through the numbers, but it's like we always say this when we have this conversation. You know it when you see it. And Donovan McNabb was not a Hall of Fame NFL quarterback. No, I don't think he was either, and you're right. I mean, I think the greatest quarterback they ever played for the Eagles in our lifetime was Randall Cunningham. So now here's an interesting one. That's what I said, that you could make the case for Cunningham, maybe even more than McNabb.

I just don't think McNabb is a Super Bowl quarterback. You don't have to go through to comparisons about who is or who isn't, but he doesn't get it, that it's more than just a numbers game. It's people, especially for the people who have seen him play. Here's an interesting one. Jim Plunkett. Two Super Bowl.

Yeah, we've had that conversation before. Jim Plunkett's not a Hall of Famer. Phil Sims isn't a Hall of Famer. nor should he be. And by the way, I want to make it clear, I think of the people that I mentioned, Ken Anderson is the one that I would definitely consider that his career was sort of Hall of Fame worthy.

But he only got to one Super Bowl and lost to the 49ers. But, you know, was the first of the super high completion percentage guys. Yes. And here's the other thing. It doesn't matter what Donovan McNabb says. He's not going to be a Hall of Fame. He's not going to be a Hall of Fame.

He's not getting elected to the Hall of Fame. There are guys that are way in front of Donovan McNabb, statistics-wise, because his whole argument would be based on numbers and the fact that he did quarterback a team five times to the NFC championship game. But guys like Vinnie Testa Verdi and, you know, Carson Palmer, and Boomer-Syacin's got better career numbers than Donovan McNabb. Alex Smith has remarkably similar numbers. He does.

Alex Smith's got similar numbers to McNabb? Yeah, I mean, he has better completion percent. He's only about... Here it is, 3,000 yards shy. It's close if you're just going by numbers. Right. Yeah, so it really doesn't matter what he says. He's not going to be a hall favorite.

Not to mention that in some of the postseason losses, he didn't play great. You know, he didn't... If you go back through all of those postseason opportunities, Remember, they lost some of those original opportunities in NFC championship games at home. You know, they lost to Tampa at home. They lost to Carolina at home in the NFC championship before beating, I think it was Atlanta in the NFC championship game to get to the Super Bowl. But he played so poorly in those two NFC championship games at home, the first two chances he had to get to the Super Bowl.

And everybody knows how he played in the actual. Super Bowl game itself. He threw three interceptions in that game and vomited on himself, you know, late in that Super Bowl loss to New England. I'm just looking at his, and I just pulled it up his overall postseason numbers, 24 touchdowns, 17 interceptions, 59% completion percentage. But here are the numbers. I just remembered him playing poorly against Tampa in that the first NFC title game he had a chance in St. Louis against the Rams, and they played well in a game in which they were a big underdog, and he threw for 171 yards, but that was his first NFC title game. The next two years when they had great regular seasons, and they lost Tampa and

Carolina at home in the NFC title game, he against Tampa 26 of 49, 243 yards, no touchdowns, one pick in that 2710 lost to Tampa. Carolina, when they lost at home 14 to 3, at the vet in the NFC title game, 10 of 22, 100 yards, three picks in that NFC championship game. And then in that Super Bowl against New England, three touchdowns, three interceptions. Yeah. He's in that Super Bowl game. He's not getting in. He'll have to settle for whatever the Eagles Hall of Fame is called. Yeah.

Simple as that. He's not a whole of fame. And he's not better than Troy Aikman. No. And Troy Aikman definitely had a better supporting cast around him. Troy Aitman, you know, it's a reasonable debate to have about Troy Aitman's career and whether or not he could do that or elevate a team that didn't have all that talent around him. I don't know if he could have or couldn't have, but Troy Aitman was a phenomenally accurate thrower. He was a great NFL pocket passer.

Some people view him as one of the most accurate throwers of the football of all time. that he was so sharp, so smart, and so perfectly accurate, and throwing the ball. He had a great supporting cast. I mean, and by the way, with Jimmy on incredibly well-coached teams, his career, too, was shorter than McNabs. He played, how many years did Aitman play? Four, eight, he played 12 years. Okay, so they're comparable.

And what's remarkable is, and this is, you know, like we need any more evidence, but I always refer to Redskins Park as the elephant graveyard of the NFL where careers come to die. There's no better example that what happened to Donovan McNabb. We got traded from Philadelphia to hear Washington. Talk about a career that went in the toilet. It went quickly. It was at the end anyway, which is why Andy retreated him. It went quickly. Didn't go well in Minnesota with him either, for him either.

I think that's it. Did you have anything else? I got nothing else for you, boss. Okay. There was this story about this high school five-star player that's going to go play in New Zealand, this guy named Hampton. We can save that for another time if we feel like it. And the only thing I will say to Aaron is I know you didn't watch us, but I did watch on Sunday night the two-hour documentary, the Games of Game of Thrones documentary. And they had incredible footage from the final season table reads. I would like to see those. Have you ever watched? the table reads for some of these shows that you love.

Oh, yeah. They're really interesting, very interesting. But you know who knew nothing about the script until the final table read was Kid Harrington. So you see his reaction to various things, including him killing DeNaris. And it was pretty entertaining to watch. Other than that, it wasn't a great two hours. But like a geek, you watched it. Yep, I did watch it.

I did. And I enjoyed that. That's not a uniform kind of thing. You don't wear uniform. documentary, right? I didn't get dressed up for that. I didn't think so. All right, thanks to Aaron and thanks to Tom and thanks to John Kime. John didn't join us, but we used some of the sound from his podcast. John Kine, who works for ESPN and covers the Redskins. And covers the Washington Redskins. Exactly. Have a great day.