The Kevin Sheehan Show - WR Speed Pivotal For Skins and GOT Recap

Episode Date: May 6, 2019

Kevin opened with a discussion about how important Paul Richardson and potentially Terry McClaurin will be to the Redskins' offensive hopes in 2019. He also responded to Peter King's comments about Theismann/Haskins. He talked NBA Playoffs, Nats, and Kentucky Derby with Bram Weinstein. The show finished with Aaron and Kevin recapping Game of Thrones. <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. All right, I am here. Aaron is here. This show's presented by Window Nation. If you're in the market for Windows, call 86690 Nation, or go to Window Nation.com and tell them we told you to call. Hopefully you had a good weekend. It rained a lot yesterday, didn't it? And it was a stay inside. And for me, watch NBA playoffs day. I watched a lot of NBA playoffs over the weekend. It was clearly the best week. weekend for that. I will get to that at some point during the show. We're going to have, as we always do, or we have had for the last three weeks. We haven't always had it, but we've had it for the last three weeks and we will have it for a fourth week in a row, Aaron. We've got our Game of

Thrones recap at the end of the show with all appropriate spoiler alerts. We'll do that at the end of the show. No comment needed now because a lot of our listeners who are into Game of Thrones perhaps haven't watched it yet. And they want a few days to catch up on it. So we'll do it at the end of the show. Can't understand people not watching it live at this point. Well, I mean, I didn't watch it exactly live last week. And two weeks ago, I didn't watch it live. I had to watch it the following morning because I was away that weekend. Before. Before Wednesday? Well, before. Which is what somebody suggested we give them until. Before we do a recap, we're just doing it at the end of the show with spoiler alerts. It's fine. It was a crazy

Kentucky Derby on Saturday. And I'll be perfectly candid and honest. I almost forgot that it was on. I played golf on Saturday. I played a lot of golf on Saturday. And when I got back, I realized, oh my God, it's 6.30. So I figured the race had already gone, but it hadn't. Race didn't go off until about 645 or 650 East Coast time. But the two-minute race paled in comparison to the drama that followed it. Bram Weinstein was there, and he's going to join us in a little bit to talk about it.

Bram knows racing more than anybody I know, so he will join us a little bit. later on. The Nats, two or three losses in Philadelphia. And they had injuries over the weekend Matt Adams and Michael Taylor. Plus Soto went on the DL or the IL or whatever it's called now. And they had problems with their plane mechanical problems. They were still in Philadelphia this morning. They got to get to Milwaukee to start a three game set tonight. And they were lucky to win the game on Saturday too. Yeah, they did. I mean, they were lucky Saturday. I mean, it was a of a rally for them on Saturday night to bounce back after Philadelphia had put up five, I think it was, in the bottom of the seventh, to take like an eight to five lead. I think it was. They

had that huge seventh inning. And then the Nats came right back in the eighth, and Suzuki was the hero. By the way, he had the one home run yesterday in the loss to Philadelphia. He's actually come up big. I think he's got four home runs in Philadelphia this year. Philly. Yeah, but that 10 to 8 win on Saturday really saved the weekend for them, and it wasn't a good weekend really losing two or three, and now you get Milwaukee and the Dodgers, and they're five games behind the Phillies, and you've suggested this could be a defining road trip, even though it's just May, we shall see. I want to get to the NBA playoffs, which I will, but I had a couple of Redskins things that I wanted to start the show with. Mike Shanahan was on the show on Friday. If you didn't listen to it,

listen to it. I know not all of you love him, and you didn't like the way it ended in 2013, and you don't believe, you know, various accounts of what happened and how it happened. That's fine. It's in the past. I still value his opinion on players and teams and coaches, and, you know, he's been a guy that's been asked by his son to, you know, look at players that, you know, coming into the draft and help with some of his thoughts on various players. So he was very up front and he said, you know, he was looking more at the positions that the 49ers were looking at, but he always looks at the quarterbacks. But he was looking at wide receivers and pass rushers. The 49ers took Bosa and he was very high on Montez Sweat, thought he was one of

the top five to seven players in the entire draft talent-wise. And then he said about the Redskins' third round pick Terry McLaurne. He goes, I love him. I love his speed. I love everything about him. You know, I've mentioned this before for whatever it's worth. I like the Redskins draft. You know, as a whole, I liked the draft. Now, again, we've talked about this over and over again. The draft is the draft. To evaluate it in the moment right after it happens is Fools Gold. We know that as football fans. It takes multiple years before you can truly know whether or not a team had a good draft or not, and it's just something that, you know, even the experts, even the people you know, paid to do this, they're not always right. They're wrong more than more than they're

right. A 39 to percent, 40 percent, you know, hit rate on a draft is a good percentage to hit on that in terms of getting players to contribute over a period of time. A 40 percent hit rate's pretty good. I think it's 40 percent, somewhere 39 to 40 percent, of players that end up being on your roster and contributing as either a starter or a reserve for four years or more, it's like a 40% hit rate. So that's a good percentage drafting-wise. That tells you what a crapshoot it is. But I did like the draft in the moment. I mean, you know, we all have a gut feel on whether or not they did well. When it came to McClorin, I said, you know, a week ago today that I liked Riley Ridley more. He went later. He was on the board there. But McLaren

gives the skins something that they desperately need. They needed to increase team speed on this roster, both offensively and defensively. And adding a guy who can run 435, potentially added to a Paul Richardson, if healthy, and that's a big if, a Paul Richardson who can also run. This is what they need, whether it's Keenham, Haskins, McCoy, whomever it is that Jay Gruden decides on for the opener in Philadelphia when we get there. Team speed offensively at the wide receiver position, having players that can stretch the field, having players that can get open, but having a player that actually can run by people would seem to be a huge key to the season on offense. the Redskins had nobody that could stretch the field last year when Richardson got hurt.

He only played in seven games, and health had been an issue for him when they signed him from Seattle. I hope they knew that. Not that the Redskins would have been effective throwing the ball downfield had everyone been healthy. I'm not saying that. I know they were struggling to throw the ball even when they had some people available, but they didn't have a chance once they were relegated to hoping that Vernon Davis could it, or Michael Floyd could do it, or Mo Harris, or Chesson could do it. You know, and all of the others they had to put out there that became a major problem for them offensively. That's why,

by the way, just as an aside, the Tennessee game late in the year, was so impressive to me, because they didn't have anything that day. They had Adrian Peterson, who was a badass that day. Nobody to stretch the field, nobody that could get open. I mean, Doxon did and had a big day that day, but Adrian Peterson still ran for a buck 20 in that game at Tennessee. You know who else was badass in that game, Aaron? Because I have this game, for whatever reason, it's one of the games that I have saved on DVR. And I was going through, I don't know if you guys do this every once in a while, but I'll start deleting things to create more space. And I noticed that, you know, I had a bunch of games saved from last year in Tennessee. And I've referred to this game a lot. I thought it was one of the

most impressive games that Jay Gruden's coached since he's been here. And I, I just thought it was an incredible effort by a team that was really, really hurt coming into it. And they had to win to keep their playoff hopes alive. But I decided not to delete that game and instead watch some of it. You know who was really good in that game? Josh Johnson was really good in that game. And he threw the pick that crushed him late, the one that he was late to throwing to Josh Doxon that got picked that basically ended the game.

But he was, do you know for a two-week stretch, and I went back and looked at this, for a two-week stretch, Josh Johnson, and it was mostly about what he did, converted on 15 of 29 third downs against Jacksonville in Tennessee on the road in back-to-back weeks. 15 of 29. And by the way, did you know this? that in the Jacksonville game, on a run that he made for a first down, that he tore a ligament in his ankle. Remember, we didn't find out about the ankle injury until a few months ago, like a couple of months after the season it ended. But he had mentioned recently, and I forget where I read this, that he tore the ligament in his ankle on a play in the Jacksonville game. And he continued to play on it and then played the following week in Tennessee. Now, he had that ankle fixed a few months ago, and he's hoping to get signed by somebody.

The Redskins were a possibility, but now that they drafted Haskins, they're probably not going to resign Josh Johnson. I'll tell you what, seriously, in watching that dude quarterback for those two weeks off the street, he should get signed by somebody. He is a backup, at the very least, he's a backup. Anyway, back to the wide receivers. the Redskins desperately need a wide receiver to step up this season, especially if they end up going Haskins. They got to give him, they got to give Case Keen and Colt McCoy, the same thing. They desperately have to have a wide receiver step up and be a threat to help the offense.

It has to deliver. You know, the McLaren pick, Richardson McLaren can be guys, if they turn out to be, healthy and legitimate speed guys. They can make it so much easier for Jordan Reed, if Jordan Reed's healthy and ready to go. For Josh Doxon, for Trey Quinn, who's likely to be their slot receiver, for Kelvin Harmon potentially. It just doesn't matter who starts a quarterback this year. If they don't have receivers, they can get open and others who can stretch the field, they've got to be able to score more. The Redskins average 17.6 points per game last year. year, 29th in the NFL. They were near the bottom in every statistical passing category.

They've got to be able to throw the ball if they're going to have any hope of having themselves a season. And here's the thing about McLaurin. It often takes time for a rookie wide receiver to produce. And when a rookie wide receiver does produce more often than not, it's usually because there's a really good player already there. Like Calvin Ridley last year was an all-rooky team selection at wide receiver. He had Julio Jones. The year before that, Juju Smith-Schuster was an all-rooky wide receiver. He had Antonio Brown.

What can legitimately be expected from a third-round rookie, even with his speed? Usually not much early is the answer, but they may need it. or Paul Richardson becomes a huge key to the season offensively. I don't think you can rely on Jordan Reed to be your speed threat. You know, Josh Doxon clearly isn't going to be their speed threat. Richardson or McLaurin, again, a third round rookie, more times than not, not ready to produce as a number one guy. All right?

And I'm not suggesting he would be the number one guy, but they don't have a number one. one of those two guys, and it's probably going to be Richardson, has to produce. I don't know how comfortable that makes you. It doesn't make me that comfortable. I mean, they've got to get lucky at wide receiver this year. Big question marks, at least early at wide receiver. Jay Gruden's comfort level, by the way, with the receivers, may ultimately dictate his decision at quarterback early in the season.

What if you've got more injuries, and what if you've got to trot out? you know, Doxon and, you know, Trey Quinn and Kelvin Harmon as your other receiver. I mean, you've got to have experience and you've got to have people can get open and people who can threaten a defense deep. What if it is Cam Sims and Brian Quick and Trey Quinn that you have to start the season because of injuries? And Paul Richardson is vulnerable to. missing games because of injury. This is such a huge key to them offensively this year.

Anyway, yes, I did go back and watch some of the Tennessee game last week. Such a masochist. But you know what? That was one of the more heroic efforts, given where they were. Remember, they had beaten Jacksonville off of that ridiculous beatdown loss to New York at home. You know, they had lost. You remember, they were down 40 to nothing in an NFL. an NFL game. That's hard. 40 to nothing in a professional football game. They were losing the Giants

and they came back and they beat a Jacksonville team that had pretty much thrown in the towel, 16, 13, and then went to Tennessee. Tennessee had to win the game for their postseason hopes. And they were right there with a 13 to 9 lead going into the fourth quarter. All right, let's get to the latest on the number seven jersey flap. Did you see what Peter King said? I did see that. I'm going to read what Peter King said in a moment, but I first want to read something to all of you that I saw early this morning,

and I thought this was very interesting. And I know probably people are shaking their heads going, you're not going to go down this jersey thing path again. I am because there have been a couple of developments that are actually very interesting. Let me just, by the way, just say up front, my opinion about whether or not Dwayne Haskins where's number seven hasn't changed. I'm unmoved by the topic. If he rolls out number seven in the opener against Philadelphia, I am not going to be,

I'm not going to have an emotional reaction to it. I can't explain why I just don't think that I will. I think there may have been a time when I was younger that I would have cared about these things a little bit more. I don't really care about it that much. But I'll get to what Peter King said about this, which was off-putting in a moment. But Joe Thysman, in an interview with Fox 5 here locally, I don't know when this interview was done. It may have been done early this morning. I don't know for sure. But Joe Thysman had a couple of interesting revelations, or at least they were for me. in talking about how it came about with Dwayne Haskins, he said that he told Dwayne Haskins, quote,

I said you might want to consider sort of creating your own number instead of just taking one that has been a part of the organization for 33 years. No one else has worn it. And I said, think about it for a few days, closed quote. Dwayne Haskins did think about it for a few days, and he called the Eisman back, and this must have have been early last week, I'm guessing. And he said to Thaisman, yeah, I'd like to wear number seven. At which time Joe said, quote, this is what he said this morning on Fox 5, quote, I said it's perfectly fine by me. And he told Fox 5 this morning, he, Haskins, is going to have so many adjustments to deal with to become a professional football player. The last thing anybody

needs to worry about is to keep hounding him about a number. It will be interesting to see a bigger version of me out on the football field. It's been 33 years since anybody's worn that number, and it hasn't been retired, so it was still available. The organization has been wonderful, not giving it to anybody just randomly, and I think Dwayne went about it in the right way, and that's the reason I feel good about it. He expressed an interest. We had a great conversation. He thought about it, talked to his family, the decision has been made, and now we move on, closed quote. I thought it was interesting that Joe didn't, you know, initially he said, I want you to consider, you know, creating your own number instead of just taking one that's

been a part of the organization for 33 years. I don't know that we heard that last week as part of the conversation. Anyway, to what Peter King said about it. Peter King, who is writing for whom now, Aaron, Monday morning quarterback? I believe he's still there, yes. Okay. He said, quote, I think Joe Thaisman even seeming to suggest Dwayne Haskins had to kiss his ring before being rewarded with the number seven jersey in Washington is really weird

and a little bit mindful of the emperor with no clothes. Would anyone think that a man with fewer passing yards and Steve Grogan and Jim Harbaugh with fewer touchdown passes than Earl Morrell and John Kittna with a lower career rating than Kyle Orton and Dave Craig should have had his number retired? Mark Rippin won a Super Bowl. Trent Dilfer won a Super Bowl.

Brad Johnson and Jeff Hostetler won one, too. Come on. The fact that Washington never gave Theiseman's number out for years after his gruesome injury is a nice gesture, I suppose. But it's silly to think that he was an all-timer, the kind of player whose number should never be worn again. That from Peter King, who, by the way, was largely responsible for keeping Art Monk out of the Hall of Fame for as many years as Art Monk was held out of the Hall of Fame. Peter King won't say the team's name. So he's had a grudge against the Redskins for a long period of time. But just so old Pete knows as he's ripping through all of the quarterbacks that had better numbers than Joe,

whose numbers haven't been retired. Let's not forget that Steve Bartkowski, whose jersey is retired in Atlanta, had fewer yards than Thaisman, fewer touchdowns than Thysman, and has a much worse starting record as a quarterback than Joe. Phil Sims didn't have the same completion percentage and threw fewer touchdowns than Thaisman did, and his number is retired in New York. And John Brody's career completion percentage, yards per game, interception percentage, and by the way, also had a losing record as a starting quarterback.

His jersey is retired in San Francisco. Here's the thing. It's not for guys like Peter King to decide whether or not a player's jersey is deserving of being protected or retired. He hasn't lived here. He doesn't know the impact that Joe had on this town. I mean, you can go through, I'm sure, list of all of the retired jerseys, and I just went through three quarterbacks whose numbers aren't as good as Joe's over the course of their careers and their numbers are retired. You can probably find multiple players throughout the league whose jersey numbers were retired for things that didn't necessarily deal with statistical performance.

So that's silly for Pete to even talk about that. Joe Thysman was instrumental in leading the Redskins to their first Super Bowl victory. Super Bowl 17 in January of 1983. He was not the MVP of the Super Bowl. John Riggins was the MVP of the Super Bowl, but Joe was a league MVP the following year. And Joe had a stretch of football starting really in 1979. His 1979, his 82 and 83 seasons, and even the 84 season.

And then, of course, he was hurt significantly in week, whatever that was, week 11 or 12 in 1985 on the LT sack. Joe was a significant part of the Joe Gibbs early years and was a legend in this town as a quarterback. His legend does not reach the level of Sonny Jurgensen, who did not win a Super Bowl, and Sunny's statistical numbers for the era were much better than Joe's. But Joe had a stretch of football from 79, and the 80s season was a difficult one. That was the season where Rigo held out, and they had some injuries. but Joe played incredible football in 1979, and unfortunately, like a lot of the Redskins and Redskins

and fans suffered probably the worst defeat, I think, in franchise history, the season ending loss in 79 to the Cowboys, 35 to 34, which kept the Redskins from the playoffs completely. They had a 13-point lead with two minutes to go and lost a game in which if they had held on in one, they would have been the number one seed and would have been favored to go to the Super Bowl in 1979. A lot of it, because Joe Thaisman had a terrific season in 1979. His season in 83, as he led the Redskins and their offense to one of the great offensive seasons in the history of football was incredible. I mean, for a quarterback in 1983 to throw 29 touchdowns against 11 interceptions was really an amazing season. It doesn't seem like.

it today in the era that we're in now. But Joe's season in 83, which ended in him being an MVP, a league MVP, was something that a lot of the guys who have had jersey numbers retired have never had a league MVP season. But here's the thing, because I think you just have to ignore what a guy like Peter King says, because I think his grudge is well documented over the years when it comes to this organization. I don't know why this answer just isn't more obvious to most. And maybe it is to many of you. And maybe I'm missing something. I'll concede that up front. But to me, and I've said this from the beginning, I don't know why this decision is left to Joe. There are two things here. One, the organization should make the decision to retire some jerseys or not

retire jerseys. And the jerseys that are retired are obviously retired and nobody gets to wear them. And the jerseys that aren't retired, anybody can wear. But if they're going to continue with this one jersey retired, Sammy Baas number 33 and a bunch of jerseys protected, they should handle the decision. It's up to them. You don't give that decision to the player. It's an awkward position to put Joe in. Joe shouldn't be the guy that has to tell Dwayne Haskins no, all right, which I don't know if deep down he really wanted to or not. I mean, I'm going to take him at face value, even though he suggested to Dwayne initially, I want you to go think about this, you know, based on what he told Fox 5 this morning. I want you to go consider creating your own number instead of just taking one that has been part of an organization for 33 years.

So Joe had some reservations there. I mean, that quote says it. He shouldn't be put in this position at all. Jesus Christ, Snyder, Bruce Allen, step up and say, call Joe before this. ever became a thing and said, Joe, this is the organization's decision. We're protecting your legacy. It's our responsibility to keep you away from having to make this decision. If you want to tell us what you think, have at it. We are all ears. And if you want to express whether or not you think Dwayne Haskin should or shouldn't, you can express that to us in private. And then we will

handle it accordingly. And we will take you off the hook for this decision. I don't know why that isn't more obvious. I really don't. That's the way it should have been handled. All right, enough on that. NBA playoffs. Man, what a weekend. Starting with a four-overtime game on Friday night in Portland

between the Nuggets and the Blazers. It tied the NBA playoff record for the most overtimes in the history of the sport. I think you had to go back to the 1950s to find another four-overtime game. A game in which Rodney Hood, ended up deciding it in the fourth overtime. And I've been a Rodney Hood guy. I really thought it was going to work out for him in Cleveland last year when he got dealt there because I just thought he was the perfect guy to play off of LeBron. It didn't work out well. I was glad to see him, you know, have a really good moment. I've been a fan of his for a while. Then we got to Saturday and we got

to the Golden State Houston game, which, first of all, there's a stretch of that basketball game where Kevin Durant goes off and gets them back into a game that they trailed. And Durant, I don't know what the run was. Durant had another ridiculous night. He went for 46, but there was a stretch end of third, you know, first part of the fourth quarter where he was unstoppable. And then they sort of went away from him, inexplicably. I didn't get it.

Like, you know, Steph Curry and Clay Thompson started firing shots. Look, it's the Warriors. And Curry had a terrible night. He was seven for 23. Everybody was talking about Curry after the game and missing that dunk late in the game with 20.6 seconds left. I'll get to that in a moment and why that's significant. By the way, I expect him to bounce back with a big game tonight. But you go with the hot hand and Durant was completely unguardable.

And they did throw a little bit of double team shade at him, but it wasn't, you know, an aggressive double team. Durant could have continued to go, I felt. I really, I'll tell you what, there's something about the rockets. know, whether it's the constant whining and complaining or going back to last year's Western Conference Finals and releasing that information last week, I wanted them to lose, I wanted them to get swept. I'm rooting for the Warriors. I'm rooting for the heavy favorite in this particular series anyway, because I'd love to see them put this team that, by the way, I just cannot see them winning three more games playing ISO ball. And that's what it is. It's all ISO ball. Now,

a friend of mine pointed out to me the other night, look at what Golden State's doing with Durant. Yeah, they were playing a lot of ISO ball, but they also have a little bit more to it than that. But with that said, I was rooting for the Warriors, and that's why the end of the game, I don't understand the recent trend in the NBA, and it's not a trend because Philadelphia was fouling

until the final couple of seconds in the game yesterday against Toronto, which you should be when you're down to possessions. But we saw what happened in game seven of the Denver San Antonio series where the spurs down four with 28 seconds left. Just let the clock run out amazingly. Now, you know, Pop got up with about 18 seconds left and started screaming foul and nobody knew or could hear or whatever the excuse was. Well, on Saturday night, Golden State in overtime, in a thrilling game,

it was a great basketball game. When Curry missed the dunk with, 20 seconds left. And they're down five. Down five with, let me just remind everybody if you haven't been paying attention to the Warriors, down five with the greatest three-point shooting team in NBA history. Guys that with timeouts left, and I believe they still had one or two left, would be firing threes that would have a pretty good chance of going in.

They just let the clock run out. They just let Houston dribble the clock out. 20 seconds left in the game, down five. How convenient was that for the people that were holding Houston minus three and a half tickets? And with the NBA getting more involved with gambling and embracing it more? Like, this could be a serious problem down the road, couldn't it? I tweeted something out, and I'm going to find what I tweeted out because I can't even remember. I remember the basis for what it was.

But I basically said, you know, I don't understand. how you compete for two hours and 45 minutes and your guy misses a dunk and I know in the moment it was devastating to see Steph Curry missed that to cut it to three but you're down five with 20 seconds to go we have seen much crazier things happen were they going to likely win the game no no the odds were stacked heavily against them winning that game in that moment but I can tell you one way they weren't going to win the game was to just concede. They just conceded with 20 plus seconds left in what was, again, not probability,

but a possibility of still winning the game. Now, if they're down eight, you know, if they're down more than two possessions, seven or eight, it's a little bit different, although I'll tell you what, I wouldn't, with 20-something seconds left, with their firepower, I'm still going to foul. And who knows, they might miss a couple free throws. They might, you know what happens in NBA games,

believe it or not, there are turnovers in NBA games. They actually turn the ball over. You could get one of those. But it was just, it was unsettling to watch. And the thing that I tweeted out is that I think the NBA is going to have to send a memo out to teams about quitting when games are still potentially winnable. Because with the gambling thing and the legalization of gambling, it's going to look suspicious. Saturday night didn't look suspicious. I tweeted that out and a bunch of you said,

what, you think the minus three and a half that this game looks suspicious? Golden State had a chance to win. No, no, I wasn't saying specific to this game, but I'm just saying that the NBA should put a memo out to these teams to say that this recent trend of just giving up and quitting with lots, in winnable games, with like 20 seconds to go in the game the other night and 28 seconds to go in a game seven, the Spurs tapped out with 28 seconds to go in a seventh and deciding game down by four. Are you kidding me? And then the other night to watch it, I think that they're going to have to get the message

to these coaches, the owners, general managers, and coaches that we're living in a world now where more and more people who have access to our game, we'll be watching our game, we'll be betting on our game legally, that this looks suspicious. It can look suspicious, you know, in a game like that. Again, the other night did not look suspicious. I'm not saying that about the other night. But you've got to try to win a game. You can't tap out with 20 seconds to go down five

with Kevin Durant, Clay Thompson, and Steph Curry on your team, and the ability to advance the ball, I think at least once, if not twice. I've got to go back to find out exactly how many timeouts they had left. Are you kidding me? like you just after a game that was played to that level with the excitement and the drama we're not going to see it play out I did not have a side in that game I actually liked Houston I thought it was a fishy number I thought the number of them being a three and a half point favorite was a bit

fishy I didn't play the game so I didn't have a stake in it one way or the other but just the NBA's got to do something about this. It's not, you know, it almost, like, I felt like it goes hand in hand with, you know, whatever, this is entertainment anyway, and the entertainment's over, because we're probably not going to win the game, so let's give it up. Let's just give up. This is a competition. I want to see guys dying until the end of a playoff game, at least. I mean, it's a playoffs. Now yesterday, the game yesterday in Philadelphia, I picked Toronto to come out of the east, and I didn't feel good about it after game three the other night against the 76ers, when the 76ers really took Toronto to the woodshed.

And that was a game in which it just seemed like Toronto may not have enough. And I think I said that on the Friday show that I was concerned about my pick, and that Kyle Lowry really needed to step up, and Serge Abaka really needed to, like they needed some people to step up. You know who's terrible right now is Van Vleet? You know, their bench is horrible. Pals no good. Van Vleet's no good.

Abacca, yes, he can't shoot anymore, especially, you know, he was a good three-point shooter, and he can't even hit the rim on these three-pointers. But he came up big last night with big block shots and big rebounds and a couple of big shots in the, paint. But that game yesterday, my favorite player, Aaron, in these playoffs is Kauai Leonard. He's been awesome. It's just not, there have been some terrific performers, Lillard, obviously, Durant, you know, for sure. Kauai Leonard is a top three player in this game. I mean, when Toronto

signed him, and I don't know if they'll keep him, a lot of the talk is he's going to end up in LA back home playing for the Clippers next year. You know, and maybe Durant joins him. I don't know. There's something about Kauai Leonard, his demeanor, which is, you know, he's an incredible introvert, as we know, from everything that happened in San Antonio last year. He's uncomfortable, you know, being in the limelight. He is the least, like, I don't know that a star player whines less than he does.

I don't see him ever whine about anything. He just goes and plays, and he's so good. He is a great defender, we know that. He's a phenomenal rebounder defensively. Offensively, the patience, the way he gets to his spots, he doesn't miss when he gets to his spots. And in that game yesterday, with the game on the line, late in the game, shot clock winding down, he steps back against Embed and drains a three.

I just, I'm so happy for him. I'm rooting for them more than anybody else left in this postseason. I'm rooting for Toronto. Philadelphia is really good. But Joel Embed's a problem here. Did you hear the story about him waking up calling Brown, his coach, in the morning of the game to say, coach, I'm sick, I may not be able to go. Game four, you're sick?

I mean, Mbid's got issues, man. He is such a great talent. I mean, he, by the way, I don't know why Philadelphia doesn't go to him more on the block. Like, to me, that's a no-brainer to run their offense through Embed on the low block. And they didn't do it yesterday. And after he had this huge game three where he just looked like one of the best big men in the game and one of the best talents we've seen in a long time as a big guy, he was sick yesterday. You know, I got news for you.

If you're sick, you either. don't play, and if you do play, we should never hear about it. The fact that the coach mentioned it, I think Brett Brown mentioning Embed calling him or texting him, I think it was early in the morning to say that he was sick, he didn't feel well and he wasn't sure if he could play. I think Brett Brown even mentioning that in the post-game press conference could have been a little bit of frustration. It could have been him trying to take Embed off the hook for a bad game. Embed in the game yesterday had 11 points on two of seven. from the floor. He wasn't good enough, nowhere near game three. But that guy's either hurt or sick. What a talent, but not reliable. Not reliable. That was a big spot. I have no idea how the rest

of the series goes. I'm rooting for Toronto. I think Philadelphia is the better overall team. I do. After watching four games. I'm telling you, Aaron, about the NBA. You don't know anything until you watch a playoff game where every possession from the start matters where the best players are playing even more minutes where there's more strategy where there's more adjusting where there's more pressure you really don't learn a lot until you watch the NBA in the postseason but anyway um I enjoyed the basketball over the weekend and for those of you that that are into it uh there were some really good games I think the NBA playoffs for for you know for all you know for intents and purposes in terms of really good games and some drama, I think, started Friday night.

I mean, the Portland, Denver series, who haven't even talked about it, it's been a great series. How good is Jamal Murray? You know, talk about a guy that's really performed here in the postseason. But anyway, tonight Rockets and Warriors game four. I like Golden State. What's the number in this game? I haven't even looked at it. I would, if they were, if Houston was three and a half the other night, I think it might be a little bit less tonight. I would think it's less. Yeah, it is. They're only a one-point favorite tonight.

Yep. And you get Boston Milwaukee tonight, and Boston has to win this game. They've got to win this game to even up the series or they're going to lose, and I pick Boston in this series. But anyway, all right, that's that. Let's get to a quick word on Window Nation.

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or go online at windownation.com. That's 86690 Nation or windownation.com and tell them that I sent you. All right, Saturday's Kentucky Derby was an exciting race, but the drama really took place when the race ended for the 25 to 30 minutes where they determined whether or not the winner of the race, maximum security had won it fairly or not. And ultimately, the decision was to disqualify maximum security. And that meant the runner-up. Country House is 65-to-1 long shot was the Kentucky Derby winner. I used to love horse racing. I'll be candid with you. I almost forgot that it was on, but I know one person in my life that didn't forget that it was on because he's the one friend of mine that knows more about this

and really enjoys it than anybody else, and that's Bram Weinstein. And he joins us right now. And before we get to what happened, just out of curiosity, who did you play? Who did you have in the race? I like Cassidus and I like Game Winner. And, you know, it's funny, all this stuff that happened there on the final turn, I don't, like, the crazy part about an annoying country house is the winner is that you really could have made an argument that a number of these horses were impeded to a point that any one of them could have won, and one of them was mine. So I will sit here and say until I've done that I would have been right in the end, have this Bishikas not happened in the turn. All right. Let's talk about it, because you're watching the race, and I am as well, and I'm not a horse-refer.

racing guy, so I did not pick up on what happened as the race was being run. Did you, did you notice it when it happened? Well, I was there, and I was in the grandstand in this area called the media viewing area, which is up, you know, under the Twin Spires. And, you know, in real time, no. And, you know, I heard the owners say this on the Today Show of maximum security, Gary West. He went on and he basically lamented, this is what happens when it's sour grapes, lamented the size of the field, which is unusual, right? And that's why I think no one really noticed it in real time. The size of the field is so unwieldy and unusual. You know, most other races are half that size. There might be 14 in the preteness only because of the circumstances. Typically, it's less than that. So it is an unwieldy

size. And so there is an expectation that there are things that are going to happen that are a little unusual, but not necessarily illegal, right? And so that's why I think in real time, I didn't notice it. Now, when they showed the replays of it, it was clear. or that a violation that occurred, the larger question was, what were they going to do about it? Because of what was at stake? Like, I've likened this to the NFC championship game where that cornerback barreled into that receiver. That should have been a flag. But what was at stake at that moment?

That referee had to think about what am I going to do about it? And I think the stewards here had the same problem. Like, what are we going to do about it? Nobody went down. There was no catastrophe. So what are we going to do about it? Are we going to go letter of the law? Are we going to let this go?

Well, let me ask you about that. If this is, you know, the fifth at Laurel on a Thursday, is it obvious that this is a foul and that horse gets disqualified? Yes, yes, yes, yes, a million times. Like, that horse veered five lanes away from where it was. Of course they would disqualify it. Nobody would question it, and it would never come up. It's only because of the stakes here. And in the end, the hard part about it is, and this is the part.

part that people don't seem to want to really grasp is I'm not so sure that Country House should be named the winner. He's only named the winner because he crossed the line second. You don't really know what would have happened with War Will, which is the one that was really agreed, the one that was bumped, or Long-Raged Toddy who was making a move who had to hit the brakes, because other than that it was going to be a massive crash between the horses. So there are a number of horses that had no chance of winning. Country House actually, it's really interesting about it is he's the one that put the objection up because he felt that he was impeded, but he did that, you know, because it would benefit him to win the race, even though he was

impeded less than many of the others. But the rules are that the second place finisher is then elevated to the winner. But I understand that. And in trying to project, you know, what would have happened, you know, it's like, you know, it's like the Houston Rockets talking about 18.6 points that were taken away from them in game seven last year. Well, you have no. idea how the game would have played out had certain calls been made or not made. You mentioned something here. You mentioned that maximum security veered out five lanes. Was it really that much? Yeah, it looked to be, to me, it looked to be that much. And I will say this too, like, I really don't think the jockey did it on purpose. I really don't. And that's really the tough part about

the whole thing. I actually think he lost control of the horse for a moment. I mean, and I did what's called the walkover, which is a really special thing to do. The horses are stabled on the opposite side of the grandstand, and they do this thing called the walkover. I don't know if they show it on NBC, because it's an hour plus before the race actually goes, but they walked it across. It's a really dramatic thing. So they walked the circumference of the track before they put on all of the gear, and the jockeys

end up getting up on them in the paddock, which is on the side where all the fans are. So I did the walkover. That track, it was a galus. It was literally a muddy pit. So the idea that he lost control of him for a split second where he veered that way, to me, nothing of malice occurred here. Like, I feel terrible for the connections. I feel terrible for the jockey because what he did deserve disqualification,

but I don't think he did it on purpose at all. Yeah, it didn't seem to be that. And, you know, I've read a little bit about how jockey and trainer both felt like just the magnitude of the race, the size of the crowd, in particular that the horse didn't have as much experience running in front of, may have impacted that as well. Back to Country House for a moment. Do you have a problem with Country House putting in one of the two objections? A little bit.

That's a little bit, because he was the least aggrieved of most of them. And the one that didn't was War of Will. War of Will was the one that got bumped and taken out of the race and nearly got in. And so I, like, that's the one that should have had a jockey's objection. And I will say this, too, and this goes back to your point about the real time, did you see it? This was not a stewards inquiry, okay? This wasn't the referees through the flag and said we need to take a look at this. This was the jockey said it.

And if you watch it, like in the end, you have to make a decision. Clearly a foul occurred. You know, was there enough harm to disqualify him? And this goes back to the, because of the stakes of the race, and this is, not a run of the mill, sixth race on a Tuesday at Laurel, they have to make a decision, are they going to alter the outcome of the Kentucky Derby over this? And I was stunned, even in watching it in real time, I'm going, there's no way they're going to do that, right? Because it's the Kentucky Derby. They're going to put an asterisk on the Kentucky Derby, and I can't

believe they did it. And in the end, if you keep watching it, you know they did the right thing. Yeah, I didn't have a sense as to whether or not, you know, you're listening to the conversation and Tariko and all of the people that they've got interviewing various people during that 20 to 25 minute, you know, wait for that. And you also had a shot inside the stewards room where they're watching every single monitor. And, you know, there was a hell of a lot of pressure on them as well. And I had sort of the same sense without the context or without the, you know, the understanding of it, that they weren't going to overturn it. But you do feel netting it out that they did the right thing. Yes, I do feel like they did the right thing because it was a clear violation.

He, like, this impeded a number of different horses. It altered the outcome of the race. You do think it altered the outcome of the race, definitely. No doubt about it. I mean, it's not even, that's, yes, War Will was potentially going to pass him. He couldn't. Long-range Todd, he had a chance to pass him. He couldn't.

Cassett has had a chance to slow down. And the interesting part about the whole thing is it may have slowed down country off a little bit, but far less than those others. So that's the interesting part about him being anointed the winner. He was the recipient of the best trip possible off of a terrible mistake. Well, let me ask, so you believe that maximum security without the, that potentially wouldn't have been the winner, but if maximum security didn't veer out, didn't commit the infraction, do you think it was the best horse in the race? I mean, this year was different, you know, but I think, by the way, he ran it, yeah, sure.

You know, he went wire to wire. Right. That's really hard to do in this field. And the one, this thing was wide open. There was no, nobody felt there was an American caro or a justify or something like that going into it. And it felt really wide open. And it felt open to a big underdog having a shot in this thing. And there was the first time in a while that I felt like there were eight to 12 horses.

You could have made a real case for to win. And then the real favorite who had beaten two of the. the Baffer contenders in separate races, Omaha Beach got scratched. So there was really no favorite coming into this. But he ended up being the betting favorite, which ought to tell you that the Sharps knew that he had it. And again, that's the tough part of this. It's not like the other way around, where it was the 65-to-one horse that veered in, and then you take him down and you go, I'm not sure he was the best horse anyway.

You could make the case that Maximum Security was one of him. And his background's really interesting, too. I don't think his connections knew how good he was. The first race he ran in was like a run-of-the-mill Laurel sixth race on a Tuesday. It was a $16,000 race. That's nothing. That's nothing for a horse of this caliber. And so a lot of the sharps that I talked to going in, they weren't going to bet him

because they believed that the connections never thought he was that good. He won a few races. They put him in the Florida Derby as a lark. He won that. And so they're going, well, they never thought he was that good. So why would I think he's that good? Right. That's so interesting.

and it was undefeated, right, in five races coming in. Only race, only horse in the whole race that was completely undefeated. Florida Derby crushes the field, but, you know, like everyone looked at him and said, yeah, but he started in these low-level dumpy races, like, why would the world would I believe them? There was another one at this race, TACS, who was claimed last fall for $50,000 that is running in the Kentucky Derby. His connections had no idea how good he was.

So the owner of Maximum Security this morning said that they are five, an appeal with the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission. Will that lead to anything? No, I don't think so. I mean, and he threatened the other thing, which I hope they don't do, which is sue them, and feeling as if they were aggrieved and lost something that they can't get back. And I think that they have at least an argument to say, look, like, you only get one shot at something like this.

If it's taken away from you and we feel unfairly taken away from you, there's no recourse for that. And that is worth potentially millions and millions of dollars in, they could say, stud rights fees, because being a Kentucky Derby and not being one is a difference, even though that's a flawed argument, because everyone who's in the industry knows what kind of bloodlines and what kind of capability this horse has, regardless of how they feel about what the outcome was. But they could say that and probably make an argument about it. I don't think Kentucky's going to do anything about it. The real elephant in the room question that comes up now is, and this is the problem this sport has, there's no overriding body. Like there's no Roger Goodell, there's no league office. Like all of these jurisdictions and these tracks, they run under different groups. And I think the ship has sailed to get them together and say, okay, we need some kind of governing body here.

And who would they vote to do this? And who would be on this board? And who wouldn't then be biased towards the tracks they have ownership in or some kind of stake in or whatever platform of betting that they prefer over the other ones? Because that's competitive. I don't think they can get there. But in the end, like, they really needed, like, a statement from the league office on this one that the Kentucky Derby is under major controversy, and they just don't have that. So why would Kentucky go back on it? I don't think they will.

And my guess is the reason why this took so long to render a decision is the stewards knew the magnitude of it. So I think they looked at this, and in five minutes said, we've got to take him down. And then they made a lot of calls to a lot of powerful people in the sport and said, this is what we're going to do. are you okay with it because we are going to alter the outcome of the Kentucky Derby for the first time ever are you okay with that and they had to have gotten the okays from it I mean I've been at the track uh once or or 35 times in my life um especially when I was younger but I don't recall to what's the average length of time it takes for an inquiry and then for a decision is 22 minutes which was the exact amount of time um extraordinarily long yes really long I mean typically like

Like, you know, on a run-of-the-mill day, a jockey's inquiry, like, if it's a steward's inquiry, you know, then you could almost guess someone's going down because they saw it real time and they're just looking to make sure they're right. A jockey's inquiry takes typically a little bit longer because they're, they got to ask that, they got to get them off the track and say, where exactly are you saying there was an infraction and then need to look at it? But five to ten minutes, tops for any of these things. And within five minutes, even that was the interesting part of this. Within five minutes, I was sitting there looking at this and I was in the media room at this point. and all the people who covered the sport were there, and they're all going, same thing. I think everybody had the same conversation, which was, you know, on a regular day, they take them down, but it's the Kentucky Derby. He wins.

But they actually did do it. We were all, like, completely floored by the fact that they actually made that decision, just knowing what the ramifications of that decision is. All right, two more quick ones. Number one, the owner of Maximum Security also said this morning that the horse is going to skip the preakness, which is a shorter race, right, than the Derby. So I would imagine that this would have been a perfect, you know, opportunity for maximum security to potentially win the middle race of the Triple Crown. Why do you think that the owner's holding the horse out of the freakness?

A few things, and I hope it's not this first one, which is, oh, you're going to take that away for me? Fine. I'm not even going to run them in your next premier race, which only really hurts them, and it doesn't. And it hurts the sport. And it's a sour grapes move. and it's a, I want some kind of recourse for having something taken away from me, so I'm going to take something away from you. And I hope it's not that.

The other one is he didn't win. He can't win the Triple Crown. And the preteness is two weeks away. And these horses run every four to six to eight weeks. So it's always a quick turnaround anyway. And my guess is they're going to stick him in the Belmont stakes because they'll have another few weeks beyond there. And clearly he would walk into something like that and be a favorite,

and that could be his redemption. If I'm the sport, I'm calling him, and I'm asking him, this is an incredible storyline for us. You know, Country House has got to go and do this. Like, we get to set up for the next week and a half. The rematch. Like, really, could you please put him in the race? And, again, there's no governing body. Nobody's going to make them do it.

There's no Adam Silver saying, you don't rest your players. You know, like, put him in the race. It's good for the sport. And he's not going to do it. Well, I'm wondering, Bram, too, if maybe the owners see, you know, the controversy and their claim to maximum security being a Kentucky Derby winner that had it taken away from them, even though it seems like you and everything else I've read from people who really

follow the sport think that the right thing was done, that maybe this is a business decision. That perhaps it's a more lucrative horse moving forward without going out in the preteness and finishing fifth. I agree. I mean, I almost guarantee he'll run, as long as healthy, he'll run. in the Belmont because there'd be no reason not to. You know, that's five weeks off.

That's a typical standard amount of time. Obviously, there's millions of dollars on the line. It's a cripple crown race. He goes and does that. His bloodlines and his stud fees all go right back to where they were. Even I believe that that's kind of unaltered anyway. You know, that may, perception-wise, to the general public, they may think, well, being a Kentucky derby winner is different than not being one.

Well, he pretty much was one. And anyone in the industry knows that. So it's not like you're not fooling them. You know, they're not going to forget what happened. So I think he'll run in the Belmont. I just hope that this pre-ness thing isn't a total sour grapes thing, and he's like, I'll show you horse racing. You're going to take that away from me. I'm not going to put him in a premier race.

That hurts everybody, including them, because they could win that race, and the purse is like a million dollars. Well, I was going to ask you as the final question, is it was Saturday good for the sport or bad for it? And the fact that maximum security isn't going to run in the preakness sort of takes away what benefit there could have been, right? well a little bit except that you know if the field is somehow weak and I don't think it will be because I think you know many of the people who ran in the Kentucky Derby oftentimes if it's a dominant horse that wins the derby like some of the ones yeah they back off and they'll either wait for the Belmont to try to steal it there or they just won't race again because they're like forget it it's not worth the turnaround in this case I think a lot like Baffert horses there might be two or three of a minute because they're going to go

well we could beat him you know so like let's turn around and try this and the preakness And that's the same thing with maximum security. He could do the same thing, assuming health here. And you never know for a couple days until after the Derby how healthy they are. Like, they could turn around and do this. He's choosing not to. And, you know, I really believe that that is him trying to make some kind of statement to the industry. All right.

Thanks for doing this. Tell everybody what you're working on. You're part of John Kimes' podcast, so you can listen to that whenever you want in any podcast platform. I'm sure it's available. what about the stuff you're doing with racing? So I have a show that airs on SB Nation Radio Saturdays from 10 to 11 and then turns into a podcast after that called The Winter Circle. We have great guests.

Like we had Eddie Olchik on and Gary Stevens, the Hall of Fame jockey. Hannah Storm was on. Obviously next week's going to be all about this. So that airs. The company I started is called Empire Media. And one of the first shows we started producing was John Kimes Redskins show called The John Kime Report. He's been doing great. You know, he's been getting great guests.

That's been a good start. And then I'm running around doing a million things about TV and radio and all that stuff. All right. Thanks for doing this. I'll talk to you soon. Appreciate it. All right. Thanks to Bram.

Just a reminder, rate us, review us on iTunes. That's always helpful. Subscribe. It doesn't cost you anything and tell people who aren't listening to it that don't listen to podcasts and can't figure out how to do it just to go to the Kevin Sheehan Show.com. Also, quick word about launch workplaces. If you're looking for new office space in the Bethesday, area, consider launch workplaces in Bethesda. They've got fully furnished offices, brand new

conference rooms, co-working desks. They've got high speed internet, a cafe, free parking, 24-7 access. You can find out more about launch workplaces in Bethesda by going to launchworkplaces.com or calling 24086714. That's 24086714. If you mention my name, you'll get a free two-day trial. They've got other locations around town. You can find out where all of those are at launchworkplaces.com. All right, let's get to our Game of Thrones recap. All right. The fourth episode of the final season.

Just two episodes left. At least last night we could see. It wasn't dark. I'll just give you one big thought about the episode. And then we can get into the details. I just felt in watching it, it was rushed. This was the biggest concern the Game of Thrones fans had that you were going to get six episodes in the final season,

and even though three of them were going to be, or four of them, were going to be longer, you know, almost 80 to 100 minute length, you know, length, that a lot of things were going to get rushed. And I just felt like, wow, last night we went from the battle that we've all waited for to a quick funeral, a too long of a celebration, too much drinking, too much of, you know, Jamie and Brian will get to that, you know, the whole scene with John and DeNaris, all of that. And then before we know it, you know, DeNaris is being surprised attacked by Euron at Dragonstone. It's, you know, DeNaris is being surprised attacked by Euron at Dragonstone. Like they got there in no time at all, and then they're at the gates of Kings Landing. Like the last 30 minutes in recent years would have been two to three episodes.

Did you feel the same way? Oh, yeah, but they started doing that last year. Two years ago. Yeah, the last season they started kind of playing or not playing around, just kind of skipping time. Not as much. Last night was accelerated. I mean, knock a bit. Don't forget how quickly they got from like Kings Landing to Castorley Rock.

They went fast in the last season, so they started doing that last season. That's true. It wasn't that big as a price. John got back, got down to Kings, got down to Dragonstone and then King's Landing pretty quickly. And then right back up to the wall. Yeah, and then back up to the wall. So there's a lot to get to in this episode. I mean, why don't we just take it sort of in chronological order, at least the way I remember it from last night.

you know, the funeral and seeing another shot of Jora and Ed and whatever, it was fine. Sonsa and Theon's last moment was emotional. But that turns into this, you know, what turned into a drunken night in Winterfell of celebration. And they have every reason to celebrate. John makes this big speech. And then you can see how Dineris gets upset watching John, who's so beloved. by all of his men. And, you know, that's the first inkling.

You're like, uh-oh, she's not happy about this. And then the two of them end up in a room where she essentially threatens him that if he tells Sansa and Aria what the truth is, that it will create much more trouble than if he doesn't say it. Which she's right. Absolutely right about it. She's 100% right. And of course, John's such a goody-two shoes.

He has to be honest with everybody. He doesn't want to sit on the Iron Throne, but he tells Sonsonari anyway. Even though he's not actually Ned's son, he's absolutely Ned's son. Right. And by the way, telling Sonsonari, are certainly telling Sons is like telling Reuters. Right. Because it's out quickly to Tery and Varis and Varis says at one point, this is no longer a secret. This is information.

Yes. But back to the celebratory night. Like, who didn't see Jamie and Brienne coming? Who didn't see that? I thought it was an uncomfortable scene because of the, you know, getting each other's clothes off, you know, Jamie. It just went on a little bit too long, but who didn't see that coming? Like I was surprised at some people, and my son was one of them. Like he was watching downstairs with friends and I was watching upstairs.

And when Jamie and Brian got into a room, he just texted me, no thank you. He didn't want to see it. I mean, I was rooting for torment. So it wasn't so much I didn't see it coming as I was just rooting. for Tormond. But that wasn't a surprise. A bigger surprise, I guess, although maybe not to everybody, I guess I was hoping that Jamie would stay good guy. But Jamie's, do we know that he's, well, we know he's going back. I think we know he's going back to try to help Searcy. Well, here's the thing. Here's the thing. If he was going back to help Searcy, why wouldn't he have gone before everybody

left? Why wouldn't he get there early? He waited until she got the upper hand to go down there. To me that signifies that he doesn't like the fact that she got the upper hand. Yeah, but he goes through the process of telling her what a bad guy he is, you know, and by the way, admitting to her that, which by the way is still not, it still has not been revealed to John Ari and Sonsa that Jamie pushed Bran in the first episode of season one. The only person, the only people that know that, who knows that? Brann. Jamie, Bran, and now Brieen.

Right. Well, yes, yeah. Well, he told her. Yes, yes. I was trying to think if there was another way

to rip out. I was thinking of his exact words. Yes, absolutely. Does Sam know? He shouldn't. Yeah, I don't think Sam knows. Yeah.

And obviously, Circe knows. Yes. And that's the list. So how would people, like, I'm wondering how John and Ari and Sonsa would have reacted had they known.

Brand's reaction was, we're going to, to need your we need you we need you fight yes um anyway i mean before we get you know the end which was you know that's game of thrones for you there there are no happy endings typically but you had some interesting encounters like aria and gendry like how did he not know that she was going to say no to his proposal first of all um what what denarris did to gendry was a nice political move to to begin with. Absolutely.

I thought one of the most entertaining conversations of the night was Sonsa and the Hound. I thought there were a lot of great conversations. It's why, even though you thought it went on a little bit too long, I didn't mind it. It's not that I thought it went on too long. I didn't think it was too long. I thought everything got rushed. I guess especially the last 30 minutes. Well, yeah, yeah.

I'm just talking about the kind of the party scene. I thought there were so many individual, like really good individual conversations that it really worked for me. which of the conversations did you did you like the sandsau hound conversation where she essentially says for all intents and purposes no you know what getting raped multiple times helped me made me the woman i am today um and uh you know there's there's this connection that the hound has to the two stark girls that and now aria by the way never even said goodbye to anybody right she's heading south with the hound and never said goodbye to anybody Does anybody even know that she's going? See, that was rushed. Like, why didn't we get the aria saying, I'm going to? And now we, there's one person left in Winterfell. It's Sonsa.

That's it. Are we going to talk about rush goodbyes and talk about John's goodbyes? Sure. I mean, that was incredibly right. And everyone's all up in arms about the, you know, Ghost was his closest companion for five seasons or whatever. And I get it. It's CGI. They didn't want to spend the money to have a long extent.

ended thing. But yeah, that felt weird. Well, the goodbyes with Sam and Tormand were emotional goodbyes. Yes. And I'm wondering, have we seen the last of Sam and Tormand? Yeah, I think, I think that last shot with Ghost, Sam, Gillian, Torman. That's it for them because if they're, well, Sam and Gilly and the new, you know, and the new baby to be are going back to the Citadel, I'm assuming. Uh, are they going back to the Citadel? They didn't make that clear. They didn't make that clear. I think he might, I mean, this is me just reading into things. He's sticking around as the maister. for Winterfeld? Why aren't Tormond and the wildlings going south to help John and generous?

I thought that was okay. Like, they were willing to fight this fight. Their fight was against the White Walker. Their fight was against the North, but they are not getting involved in a political thing. So on John's goodbyes, were you okay? I thought they were pretty emotional. I mean, I would have liked more with ghosts just because, but again, I get it from

the financial, even though they have enough money to, you know, they put all their money into the dragon dying. And that was the thing, but a lot of people are upset that ghost, who was a very significant character, even though it was a dire wolf, a significant character. And he just says, okay, bye-bye. Yeah. You know, we don't really, like, we, so we don't see, obviously, by the way, the information gets back too quickly. That's the other thing that got rushed. The attack on, on Dineris and that group, and the fact that we didn't, we never even.

saw Mascendi be taken hostage. Right. Didn't even see that. Like that whole end of it to me just was accelerated to a point where it's like oh God, I would have loved another episode or two to see how more of this took place. Hold on, I'm going through my list here.

You know, some of the, how about Cersi telling Uron it's his baby? I thought that was going to come. I really did. I thought that was one of the reasons that she slept with him initially was because she has to explain that baby. Well, but then Tyrion, you know, who by the way, they, they arrive at King's Landing and there's this weird thing where

they, it's like the, the Lannisters and that army could have taken all of them out one fell swoop. Like it, like we haven't seen something be that unbelievable. Right. Like, why didn't they just start firing their bow and arrow, they're hyper bow and arrows? They need, they needed to have, maybe that this will come in episode five, her say like, I want to beat her. I don't just want to, you know, but that doesn't fit her character but yes like I agree with you that was a little weird but Tyrion basically

if Huron's paying attention says I know about the baby how does he know about the baby right if it's Hurons I really because Circe had a look on her face like oh crap but I expected a cut over to Uran which we never got did it ever occur to you for even

a brief moment that Circe may have said oh Tyrion you've talked to me into it I'm going to let her take the iron throne and everybody's going to live happily ever after. Here's the amazing thing. You know, Tyrion keeps coming up and saying, you know, Seirce's rule is over. Seirce's rule is over.

Searcy has the upper hand right now. Searcy, without question, has the upper hand. There's no reason for her to surrender. Well, and this is where, you know, Sonsa looks smart again when she told Dineris, we need to wait. We need our army to recover. They're too tired to go. And, you know, and by the way, like,

Tyrion and DeNaris have been, have looked strategically wrong. Certainly Tyrion has. And Sansa's looked right with everything that she's done. And that's what's coming next is where, what is, what is Sansa going to do up north? Like, is she going to let this thing play out? She doesn't have anybody there. She can't fight anybody that comes back. Like if Circe wins and just stays in the south, is she going to let Sansa rule in the north?

No. So what does she have as an. army that's left. She's got nothing. Right. She's got Breien. Yes, but that's not really an army. There was, there were a couple weird things. First of all, Deneres is not a good coach. She's not a good general. She is, she's the classic coach who has great talent around her that can do whatever she wants. And, because, I mean, why are you having your dragons out front? Why do you not think that Yaron is going to be out in the fleet? Like, this thing was obvious here. And this is the fourth or fifth time she's done something really stupid in the field. So she's not a good general.

And this is just, that's part of her character at this point. Well, you know what? She's pissed because she's now lost two over three dragons. She's lost her best friend in the Sunday. Which I called, by the way. Remember we talked about that deathful? Yep, you did. She lost Jora last week. She's lost most of the Dithraki. We learned last night that some of the Dithraki survived. Some of the unsullied survived. She's got, you know, a she's got her nephew who she's in love with, but, you know, she's going to find out next week that he told his two sisters, and that's not going to go over well. And meantime, the beheading of Mascendi right in front of her, and by the way, Greyworm,

like his reaction wasn't what it should have been in that particular moment. That should have been a spear chucked. Something should have happened there. That whole thing wasn't handled well. But she's going full Mad Queen. I think so. I mean, and the question is, how does it play out with respect to her and John and then her and the Stark girls? Well, Aza, is Arya, Tyrion, and I mean, Varus basically said, I'm at least considering having her killed.

I know. Yeah. So the question, the question becomes, does someone end up having to kill her? I know they actually put out odds on that if John specifically was going to kill her. But my guess if I had to guess, we're going to, you know, she is going to go crazy. but she's going to have a redeeming moment at the end, probably sacrificing herself for John is what I'm guessing. I don't really have a guess because we're now going to get,

this next show is going to be a battle. It's going to be a battle, right? You read about this well in advance more than I do. Is this going to be another hour and a half with 45 minutes of fighting and battling? No, I think this is going to be, you're going to get a lot of battling, but you're also going to get a lot of side conversations. You're going to get a lot of, you know, strategizing and things. You know, because the last episode was the longest.

I mean, Tyrion wants John and DeNaris to be, to rule Westrose together. Which, and then Varus was right, there's no way that DeNaris will allow that to happen. But John would be fine with it. John would be perfectly fine with that. By the way, another conversation that I just thought was so rushed and really just unrealistic. Braun? Yeah, the Bronn conversation

with Jamie Tyrion was a bad scene. Highgarten, really? And I mean, you pretty much knew he wasn't going to kill either one of them in the moment, but they basically gave in anyway. It screamed to me. He did punch Tyrion pretty good right in the nose. Yeah, it screamed to me that they wrote themselves into a corner.

They didn't want him in the last two episodes. And so they're just like, crap, we have to write him off somehow. I guess. Well, you had to get some clarification. two because we talked about it the last two or three or two episodes that he was heading north with a pot of gold if he brought back the heads of Jamie and Tyrion. I mean, how could Circe even believe that Bron would do it? Right, exactly.

It wasn't going to happen. But anyway, overall, I guess I like the episode. I like every episode. I love the show, but I really sort of wish that they had planned for a longer final season. you know, an eight, nine episode final season where some of this stuff could have played out in more normal Game of Thrones time. And you're right, you know, season seven, a lot got accelerated, but not like last night. And poor Missundi, I mean.

Bummer. That was a bummer. It really was. Yeah. Oh. Yep. And again, the reaction to it was just almost too benign. Okay, Dineris is mad as she's,

walking, you know, away from it. How didn't Greyworm go absolutely nuts and start charging? Right. I don't, you know, I guess Kyburn had already gone back in and closed doors. Yeah, I mean, and I guess the idea is if he had made the move, then they opened fire and everybody dies right there and then, but that's not what he should have been thinking. Anyway, there you go. That was the episode last night.

And, oh, the other thing is when, why didn't during the attack, Why didn't the last of the three dragons, why didn't she, you know, Choucarius and start and start torching all the boats? I didn't understand that. She got away from all of the shots and she ducked each shot, but then why didn't she come back in with some fire? She should have come back from behind. I don't, yeah.

I mean, I don't. Again, she's not a good general. I just write off as she's terrible in the field. I don't understand. Some of that stuff last night wasn't great, I didn't think. Um, poor Brianne, she's really upset that Jamie's heading back to Circe. And really, that's going to be one of the interesting things of the... I still think...

Does he get back to King's Landing and then does he kill Yoron? No, I, well, maybe. I think... Yeah, I think it's possible he kills both of them. Actually, I think it would be really satisfying to watch Jamie kill Yerun. I think that would be great. I'm still working on the assumption that he's killing Searcy, too. I don't see that.

I think he's going back and he's going to, he's turning bad here at the end, which is unfortunate because Jamie became such a, a likable character and very likable here in the early portion of this final season. It doesn't fit to me. What? That he's going, that he's going to do everything he can to be with Searcy one final time and to save the sister that he, he's loved and has had three children with? You've done too much. And with a fourth on the way? You've done too much building towards him to be a sympathetic figure to throw that all away to two episodes before the end. end. Okay. There you go. That's our Game of Thrones episode four last season recap. Two more

episodes and then that's it, although I did read over the weekend that there are three spinoffs being planned. What are the spinoffs going to be? Do you know anything about them? I know very little about them, but I know one is going to be Targaryen based. Jordan Haramartan said it was going to be based on the Targaryian history book he put out. The other ones could be anything. There have been a number of rumors. Some have been about Robert's Rebellion doing something based around that. And there's so many stories that he's already written about, you know, through his history books and stuff that you can just take something from everything. All right.

Since we're down to two episodes, not that we've done this before, but just right now, as of right now, who ends up on the throne? I still, boy, they telegraphed John. I would still bet on John. I'm starting to wonder if they go just a complete, you know, dendry or something on Oh, by the way, here's the one thing that pissed me off more than anything else. And I guess part of it was to leave it to the imagination. But when John did tell Aria and Sonsa...

Yeah, we didn't get the reaction. We didn't get, we got no reaction to it. Yeah, that was weird. How did we not... The next reaction we get is Sonsa telling Tyrion. Right. I don't understand that. How about Brand basically saying to John, it's up to you?

It's up to you. It's so weird. Oh, weirdo. But not seeing that reaction. because clearly the two girls do not trust Deneiress, which they probably shouldn't. And they're trying to be protective of John. But I wanted to know what their reaction was

to find out that John actually isn't even their bastard brother. Their half-brother. He is their cousin. Right. I don't, why couldn't we have seen that reaction? I agree. All right, have a great day.