The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Astros Continue To Struggle, College Football Collapsing & Joel Klatt

Episode Date: August 10, 2020

Astros Continue To Struggle, College Football Collapsing & Joel Klatt

Much larger than life. Yeah. Lunch timers is the Matt Thomas show. 12-0-1-1 in H-town. What's happening, luncht timers? Good afternoon to you, and welcome to a Monday edition of the Matt Thomas show

on Sports Talk 790. Alongside Rossville, Rayout, Brendan Riley, I'm Matt Thomas, and we really appreciate y'all spending some time with us today. here until 3 o'clock, where frankly, there's a little bit of good news. The Houston Rockets improved to 4 and 1 in the bubble with a win over the Sacramento Kings in which of all people, Austin Rivers, scored 41 points.

That's the good news. The rest of sports, a little bit locally and a lot nationally, sucks. So what would you like to go to first? local or suck national? Because really both of them suck. I don't want to go to suck anything, Matt. Well, if it's crawfish season, you'd probably do it. No, I'm not, I actually don't even do that.

I don't either, but it's just I don't know. How you reached the program today? Maybe an oyster? I don't know. Yeah, that's true. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-790. If you're on Twitter, it's at SportsMT, at SportsRV, and at Brendan Riley underscore. If you're looking

for PGA championship analysis, this isn't going to be the show today. I mean, it could be, but I would just be faking it. Matt, your thoughts on Colin Romer? No, I'm zero interest. Okay. I mean, it is what it is. I like playing golf to me is off the board. Okay.

It just is. All right. So the Astros suck right now. Yeah. I just, I don't think trusting Christian Javier every single time when he's had less than five major league starts for a guy that probably shouldn't be with the roster as it is right now is kind of asking a little much right anything you're going to get out of him is going to be found money at this point yeah and they're very well could be a terrific future with him he's been has had two

really good bright spots but yesterday he was terrible and the a's uh took the astro's lunch money this weekend yeah they swept him out of town swept him out of town uh the game on friday which felt like it was never going to end. And which, of course, when those happened, I'm on the post game show. Tonight I'm doing the Astros on deck and 10th inning show. So thus tonight will be another 15 to 16 ending affair. Can't wait.

Go about four, five, me, five, 15 on the clock. Which means I'm going to be uber grumpy tomorrow for Rockets basketball. We got a day game on that, which is kind of nice. So, but yeah, that's sucked, gang. That whole weekend sucked. The Luriano, whatever that was, he was getting all pissy. Alex Centron probably not helping the, not probably, didn't help the cause. You can't social, you can't, you can't fight in baseball in 2020.

Well, they did. Well, somebody did. And our buddy, Justin Garneau. Dustin Garneau. Or same difference. It's whatever. Because I used to cover Justin Morno in Minnesota. Yes.

So it's Dustin Garneau here to really confuse everybody or just me. When after an old teammate protected a new teammate by holding back an old teammate. Yeah, it was a nice little form tackle there. Very solid. I think I liked an alligator roll in there. There's a chance that he'll be an appearance on the show, and we will applaud him for his actions. I'm sure he wasn't looking forward to it. No. But he had to do it. He said after the game that, you know, he was, he didn't know what else to do, so he just went and tackled him. Well, he basically probably saved Alex Entron's life. Yeah. Ramon and Loriano probably would have getting him that work. And so it's funny how the

world of baseball and baseball Twitter works, when in doubt the Astros are evil. Yes, and everything they did on their side is wrong. So Ramon Laureano, who helped push the agenda along by first of all explaining to the pitcher how to throw a pitch, which was funny. Which didn't really go a long way towards gaining credibility. And then he walks off the mound and, or I should say walks off first base and then a dead sprint towards the Astros dugout. And if there's one thing that Maggily Baseball has been very careful about, despite the fact that there have been massive teams with massive outbreaks, they want you six feet from each other. And fighting under zero circumstances does not allow the proper social distancing protocol, which means Ramon Luriano is going to get suspended for a number of games. Yeah, it'll be interesting to see how long it's going to be.

But yeah, he started a whole out brawl. And I thought the, he was just, who is it, Castiano's the pitcher? And he was like, hey, man, stop throwing these cement mixer breaking balls, dude. snap it. Was he showing him how to throw a circle change? He was like, you got to snap that thing, dude. Laurie Arnold's going to get eight games at least.

Probably. I would say, is this more egregious than the Joe Kelly thing or no? Could be more because it's a position player. That's true. He's a position player and there was the first provocation. And a red ass. Well, yeah, there was the first incident and then a second one where he,

I mean, you just go charging into the dugout. That's just stupid. That's never going to work out well for you. Here's the thing. I'm sure he was pissed. If I'm hit three times in a series, I'm probably pissed too. It is what it is. And it's the Astros.

And you're beating their ass, so you get a little fun, right? You're feeling good. Team is getting beat and I'm getting thrown at and I don't like it. You can't charge them. You couldn't even charge him if we weren't even in this pandemic. You certainly hell can't do it during this time. Well, he did it and he's going to be suspended as he should. A long time.

As should Alex Centron. For sure. How will the Astros do without Alex Centron? Right now with them, they're not doing so hot. Well, now people can't call for him to get fired when he's suspended on the Tentenic show. Hey, the hitting coach needs to go, man. Can you know who the hitting coach is? No, but I know it needs to go.

But he doesn't need to be gone for the season, like some holier-than-thou Bay Area media are saying. How about that you born on Friday? Alex Cintra needs to be the adult in the room. He should be suspended for the rest of the season. What? I would say to you, when did Twitter become some of a sanctimonious? And I thought maybe the day it was created. Yeah.

Sanctomodious, bitter, angry. And there's that bitch reporter out of the Bay Area, too. It's like, I'm hiding, but I wanted to boo the Astros out of the stain. Yeah. Who was that douche? It's one of those, you know, radio douches. Do you understand? I think he's radio and newspaper dee.

Oh, really? Yeah, I think he's double. Wow, that's a one, two. He's a double D. We have amazing jobs. Yes. but I'm never going to take myself so seriously to go you know what I've got to do this as a responsible thing for to represent the Bay Area I'm going to be credentialed media I am in this area behind these closed doors that fans cannot get in here for free I have a responsibility to be covering these games and you know what I'm going to do to cry to create a sensation and go viral I'm going to go boo the Astros yeah because I'm here you're jackass I'm here for you I'm working for you get over yourself. Let me tell you what we are. Okay. We do three, we, Ross and I, Brendan here, we do 15

hours of sports radio week. We bring up topics. We have fun. We make fun of each other. We make fun of others. We argue with people. We debate things. We go home to our families. Let's not reinvent the wheel of what sports media is. That goes with sanctimonious reporters. That goes with sanctimonious a columnist. It goes with every, you know, I'm just going to say sanctimonious about 50 times. It's a good word. It's a huge word. It's a word I can actually pull off. I'm very pleased with it.

Fact the matter is, we're just here to talk about the toy department of life. Unfortunately, it's becoming way more serious than I ever thought I would ever be when I got in this business in 1991. Sports is mingling with life and a number of fronts, Matthew. It sucks. It sucks bad. It's what it is in these unprecedented and uncertain times, Matt. Matter of fact, Brendan, any time he uses any sort of cliche pandemic work, give him the old buzzer on that too. What if I do it on purpose? Because it's funny, because it makes you mad.

Actually, you know what? We should save that for COVID-free Friday that song. We should just go A different buzzer. Yeah, like a, like a, like a Debbie Downer kind of thing. You know, I think we have something like that. Like a sad trombone. Yeah. Excuse me? Sad trombone. I've just leery of trombone and period. Why? Because there's another phrase. What do you have against tromboners? There's just a phrase I've heard in the last decade that, oh, unnerves me a little bit. Perhaps if you don't polish it for a while. 713-212-5-790 if you'd like to join the radio program today. 7-13-212-5-7-90.

Let me ask you all a question. I don't know the acumen. I'm just coming today with the language. Man, you were so loquacious and erudite, Matt. Thank you. I don't know the acumen of Houston baseball fan. Because there's too many of them. There's 3 million to go to games, typically.

There's a lot of fans that watch games on the television and listen to the radio, right? So it's hard to say, we're a smart baseball town or a dumbass baseball town. We're probably like every other town in America. We're right in the middle. You get the pulse of the people in the 10th inning show. Yeah, and I'll say this. I did the 10th inning show Friday night. I think I went on the air at 12, 15.

I got off at 140. You did an hour and a half? We did it. We had about 15 or 20 calls. Wow. People were lit up on a Friday night calling you. I will say this. That is, and I've done my share of midnight plus call-in shows, that might have been the best night of the year.

Really? That's good. I didn't get stupid Bunt Guy calling in. They bunted that night and didn't work. They did. And again, I'm going to stay away from even talking about a Bunk guy anymore because it's just going to happen so much between now and the year. It's just, I don't want to poke the bear for something I'm saying. So there were good calls.

they were relevant. They weren't usually alcohol-infused. They were some that were encouraging. There were some that were sobering. It was just a good night. But then I'm getting the, over the weekend and today, the Dusty Baker has lost this baseball team. I got news for you.

Tonal Arusa and Davy Johnson and Joe Tori would lose this baseball team if you had so many guys slumping the way they are offensively. and you had so many people that you don't even recognize their names pitching. So, well, look, Dusty is way different, but I think it shows you you just don't know anything about baseball if you're blaming everything on the 2020 Astros on Dusty Baker. I think it's ill-informed. I think it's a low-hanging fruit.

Dusty deserves some blame on this. Friday night, there were a couple of things that just drove me crazy, but that's going to happen all the time. I just think Ross honestly You can't speak about well You know baseball managing is the least important of all the managers And then don't give them any credit when things go right But then if something goes wrong it's the manager's fault

I think it's too simplistic and again ill-informed baseball guy to do that. Yeah, you have to be consistent 713-212-5-790 7-1-3-212-5-790 And again if you want to follow us on Twitter and talk with us That way you could do that at SportsMT at Brendan Riley underscore and at SportsRV with a message here for Improvemyerection.com.

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It's 281-496-3355, and online at Improve Myerection.com. This is Cougars Head Coach Dana Holgerson. Matt's kind of like Shasta without putting on a costume. He's a big old... The Matt Thomas show continues on Sports Talk 790. All right, 1217 is the time. It is the Matt Thomas show, Sports Talk 790. At the bottom of the hour, we will get to the college football mess.

And it's just a mess, isn't it? And there's really another way to say it. And we'll get to more of it. But essentially, you went from schedule releases in the last two weeks to the mac of all people saying thanks, but no thanks. And then the Big Ten, apparently, within the last half hour, I said, we're not going to play football either. Joe Clyde from Fox Sports, one of our favorite Wednesday contributors during the course of the college football season.

It's going to make a rare appearance. All right. Over under on jabs he takes, personal jabs he takes at you. No, you know what? Honestly, we're not going to have time for that. I got so many things to ask him. Yeah, you just still slip. All right, I'll try to slip one in.

I mean from him to you. Oh, okay. You want me to do it to him. I'm scared of death about that. I'm scared to death that we're going to lose false. and that's going to crush many, many industries. So we'll get to that coming up at the bottom of the hour. All right.

So the Astros... Pete Thammel within the last eight minutes says that a Big Ten spokesman source says no vote has been held by our president's and chancellor. So nothing official. We'll see. Detroit Free Press says they're done. Uh-oh. How's Justin Verlander feel about that? Justin Verlern...

He does not like the Free Press. He will not be speaking to Detroit Free Press. Speaking of Erlander, apparently not going particularly well on the rest and recuperation process. Oh, there's a shock. He's not progressing the way we'd like is what Dusty Baker said. What, yesterday? Yeah. So Dusty was, and I don't know if we have the clip, but I was listening to the 10th inning show yesterday as I was coming into Work the Rockets last night.

And Dusty was asking about, you know, how bad things are going and whatnot. Do you feel like things are spiraling? Is that what you're talking about? Well, I don't know if this is it, but what we should go ahead and play this? It's a much more minutia answer to a question, but we'll see what he says here. Okay, here's Dusty Baker getting asked if he feels like things are spiraling out of control. No. Why he always asks me a negative question?

You know what I mean? I mean, it's a long ways of spiring out of control. I mean, we're not playing good baseball and we ran against the team that was hot. I mean, they're probably the hottest team in baseball. and, you know, we ran across some real big pitching, you know, the last three days. So, you know, we got to go home and regroup and then start all over again. I mean, spiring out of control and things, if you think things are falling out of control, you might as well just not even play.

Well, you always got to ask negative questions. Well, Dusty, you're on a five-game losing streak. There's not a whole lot of positive things to bring up right now. Most games under 500, you've been in, what, at least five years. So that was the genesis of the conversation. But then they also got into, well, you know, the guys, this is a long road trip, and they're in these beautiful hotels, and they can't go play golf, and they can't do their normal activities. I've got to stay in their room, and I'm thinking, dust. Because that's how I feel about it.

Your boys. But I think we're going to him on Wednesday this week. Okay, great. The general audience doesn't care how tough your conditions are. There are going to be every majorly baseball team, well, except the Marlins and the Cardinals and a few others, they're going to play 30 home games and 30 road games. They're going to be confined to their rooms for 30 days plus the off day. No one's going to say, wow, if the Astros had a chance to play golf or hit the tennis courts

or go run at the casino, that they would have had a better fate in the weekend series against the A's. The A just beat them, period, end of story. The A's are playing much better baseball. They're hitting better. They're pitching better. They've got the intangibles. so there's nothing about the pandemic conditions that are hurting this baseball team. So what's hurting?

Frankly, here's what's hurting. Jose Al-Tube is having his worst season so far as a Houston Astro. You cannot sugarcoat that under any circumstance. Your man who finished second the MVP voting is batting 219 on the year and an OPS of 743. I don't remember if Alex Spragman didn't have an OPS of at least 900 sports RV for any day that may be won last year. but well he's generally a slow starter but so it's not uncharacteristic from him but he's this is like the third straight year he's tried to be

do things to change up things to be a faster start well that's always the the spring training hope springs eternal right type of brantley's coming down to earth a little bit as expected no surprise there uh carlos continues to be fantastic in fact he's the only regular starter with an oPS above 900 um Kyle Tucker is just a guy right now. He's shown some flashes, but then he's also struggled.

But not nearly enough flashes. And I know here's the thing going back to Friday. He has a limited sample size against left-handed pitchers. It was 52 at bats or whatever it was. No, less than that. Even less? Yeah, less than that. I think he had 52 bats total in the year.

I think 14 of them were against left-hand pitch. No, I mean in his career. Oh, okay, yeah. I'm going off of just this season. And he's got a good OPS. against left-handers. He's, he's been able to hit Matter of fact,

I think he's got a home run this year against the left-hand. I don't know what it was, but Deakman for the A's. And Dusty went with Abraham Toro. Yes.

Who was a subpar major league baseball hitter. Mm-hmm. With already a short bench, I don't know if I pulled that trigger. That was a mistake, I think.

I thought at the time. I think, I think it was a mistake. At the time, I remember, what is Toro doing in there? I understand. It's a lefty-lefty.

And then you had to burn him, then you had to burn him, Garrett Stubbs. And he got him out in left field. He got to play in left field and got a nice catch. But that's not his forte, so to speak. So when you are a struggling baseball team, Ross, the little things like that, they look a lot better than they are. And that's exactly what happened.

Not necessarily Saturday and Sunday. The Astros really had no chance to win yesterday. They fell behind early. Two home runs in the third inning where did all the damage. This pitching staff, McCrower. Colters who's pitching tonight has, I don't want to say he's going to pitch his ass off, but man, it would certainly help if he can give you six, six, you know, six in a third, something to restore the calmness. Now, the giants are crap. And I think the Astros are going to miss Johnny

Quato in this series. Thank goodness. I haven't looked at the whole series. He just threw yesterday. He almost threw no hitter. He had rattled for a while. But, um, but that's just not a very good baseball team. And so the Astros are going to have 18 in their next 23 at home, uh, which is a huge thing because apparently Dusty knows that being in the road and being not being in the side of the night. So hotel is not going anywhere. It does hurt. But I think blaming Dusty for anything more than 25% of the ills of this team is just

short-sighted. I just think it is. And you're just spitting into the win because he just got re-upped. Dusty's not going to go anywhere. Yeah. I mean, Dusty Baker did not cause George Springer to hurt his wrist and has missed four games. Right when he was turning it around at the plate, too. Dusty Baker did not go tell Justin Verlander.

Hey, dude, go out there, hurt your forearm so bad that maybe TJ is in play. Dusty Baker did not go tell Chris DeVinsky and Brad Peacock. And before that, Ryan Presley, and now Roberto Osuna, who also am I forgetting? And Joe Beigeon. Pruitt. I mean, go hurt yourself. Yordon Alvarez, if you want to throw him in there. By the way, he had a couple of home runs yesterday and his workout in spring.

Two for four. The knees aren't nearly as creaky. Let's go. Makes me happy. Makes you smile. My point is this. Do I think Dusty is going to get managed to your votes? No.

Do I think Dusty Banker is the main reason why the Astros are six and nine? No, under zero circumstance, I think that is. But everything is compounded. In little mistakes, in close games, whether it be people bitching about bunting earlier or guys not getting in or what you're doing. I mean, Rossi, he's changing. lineup up. He's doing everything humanly possible. If Jose Altube is going to bat 182 over the next 15 games, the Astros are going to have a really difficult time getting table setters on the base pass because he's the one that's been doing most of that. That's the bottom line. I don't know what

the problem with Jose is, whether he's in a slump, whether this is going on, or he's crabby, or he's Maybe he's pressing because of the scandal, Matt. Maybe he's feeling the brunt. of the pressure of being Jose Outuvé. But Brian Straw, not Brian Strawn, I keep, I came Brian Strawn. Miles Straw, I know Brian Straff very well. Miles Straw. Playing two to three times a week in Centerfield

is not going to win you a playoff series. Yeah, I know nothing against the guy. He's fast. He's fast AF, as the kids would say. Yes. He's had a couple of blunders out there in Centerfield, and it's just, it's just, you don't have a big, you forget how good defensively the Astros have been,

over the last several years when guys are missing and how much and when things get shuffled out like when you happened last year where you had a couple of guys in the infield hurt and you just watch the games you're like oh that's right I can't set my watch to how good this defense is going to be because the defense has been great the last few years yeah it's been probably probably one of the top two or three defensive teams in baseball Jeff Luno absolutely prioritized defense so the lineup is not putting much fear into people the pitching staff you still don't recognize their names generally speaking and the defense is suffering other than that everything's going great for the

Yeah. The other day was they had more errors than run scored. I don't think I've ever said that for the Astros since the sucky Astridays. It is what it is. I didn't hear that. Well, you just, I just told you. You just put a dagger in my heart. That sounds terrible. We got phone calls to get to and all hell is breaking loose in college football.

We'll discuss that next. 713, 212-5-790. If you want to get in today, that's 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. with a message here for Oops, Steam Cleaning. Get your carpets cleaned right. You doing it yourself by going to the grocery store and getting one of those vacuum units is not the answer. You calling 281-8-2-2-0-561 is the answer. 281-8-2-2-0-561 and get with the folks at Oop Steem cleaning,

they'll do a really, really good job for you at a very fair price. They have trained professionals that bump all around town from Katie to Cyprus to Baitdown to all points in between. They'll take care of your oriental rugs if you've got that. If you have upholstery issues, if you have curtains that need to be cleaned, if you have air ducts, anything you want, the folks at OOBSN can make that happen using True Steam. 281, 822-0561. That's 281, 8220561, and online at oops steam.com. Your hoops. The Houston Rockets.

Your hits. And the Astros. And your honest opinions. All the tickles play. All in for your. Houston all day. This is Sports Talk 790. 1234 on Sports Talk 790.

It is the Matt Thomas show. Joe Clant from Fox Sports. We'll be with us at 2 o'clock today. Rockets with a huge win. Eh, huge is a relative term. It's a bubble win. 4 and 1 against... 4.1 in the bubble.

Yeah. Let's go. And the only loss against the Trailblazers is a close game. Tied it 100 with 3 minutes to go. And they missed, by my count, Matt, at least 176 wide open 3s in that game. By the way, one week from today, the playoffs start. The NBA playoffs?

And I think the Rockets will play on Monday night for sure because there's going to be, there's going to be an 8-9 matchup, which means those teams, whoever wins that, will play the Lakers, and they're going to want to give them a day off. And so Tuesday, yeah.

So, okay. So I'd be astonished. And the Rockets will be playing? Either OKC, or Utah? Probably O.K.K. Mitchell's, by the way, not going to play tonight for Utah. They're in the six-time.

Is he okay? Yeah. That's good. Apparently he and Rudy O'Gabey are besties now. Not. All right. We'll get to some NBA a little bit later on. 713-212-5-7-9 if you'd like to get in today.

7-1-3-2-1-2-5-7-90. We'll take some phone calls here shortly. So last week, the Min American Conference, late last week said, thanks but no thanks. We're not going to play sports this year. And that was a pretty big decision, even though it's a non-power five conference. It's in the group of six.

Ever since they decided to do that, the world of college football, it's been on, I wouldn't even call it shaky ground. I'd call it a pretty seismic big earthquake because that got other conferences thinking about what they're going to do. A lot of rumblings about the Big Ten saying,

we're done. Power five commissioners met over the weekend, quote-unquote, an emergency meeting to discuss the future. It feels like Ross to me that you've got five conferences that are unsure of their situation and do not know what to do because they're waiting for a partner to join them in that decision one way or the other. Yeah, absolutely. This is, I mean, college football, it's leadership at the very, very top. It's been shaking. Non-existent.

Talking about it the whole time. They're like, hey, oh, I. guess you're on your own and we'll have to figure this out. So it's up to these conferences. And I mean, nobody wants to be the guy that plays if everybody else is playing. Nobody wants to be the guy that's sitting out if everybody else is playing. So they all kind of have to get on the same page and figure this thing out.

And I mean, we're sitting here on August 10th. The time is running out. Well, I don't think it's a question of time. I think it's because everybody can push things back. When we've seen schedules being pushed back to the end of September, I think it's a question of do you do it.

And what has come in play, what I've kind of find out in the last 24 hours is that these university presidents are deathly afraid if someone catches the COVID virus and suffers any long-term effects, they're going to be subject to multiple lawsuits saying you didn't do everything in your power to make sure that our kids, these young men, who by the way you're not paying to do this to play football, are going to have long-term post-collegiate side effects on this that ultimately might destroy their lives or hamper the way they live. And I think that's wigged out a lot of people. And most importantly, the college presidents. So I think these college presidents are going to, they're conference commissioners, and they're getting on the phone, they're texting, they're talking,

and they're emailing and zooming like a mutter. And they're saying, this ain't worth it. And I don't, I mean, look, I want them to play. I mean, our lives as sports fans and as sports broadcasters are better when we have sports.

I certainly understand the concerns. What I don't get, And this will get what Joe Clyde is. How on the world, Rossi, do these schools? That's the ACC. That's the Big 12. That's the SEC, the Big Ten. Spend all this time last week announcing their schedules and getting their kids back on campuses.

And then the Mac says, I'm out. And that starts the train of, well, maybe we shouldn't be doing this after all. It's very confusing to me. I want to know what happened. Or did somebody have a private conversation that they weren't ready to have? And all of a sudden they said, all right, so somebody else feels the same way I do. I don't know what it is, but it's certainly very bizarre how you went from,

we're going, we're going to play to the Big Ten, according to Detroit Free Press says there'll be no college football this year. I think a big part of this is they're just playing it by ear. That's what we're all doing. I mean, we don't know, I mean, am I supposed to, can I go to this restaurant? Can I do this? Am I supposed to be wearing my mask in the takeout line when the woman comes to my car? All these things that we don't know, the rules, we don't know what's going to happen. we don't know how to figure this out.

And college football is the same way. Like, well, if the students come back, if the regular students come back, can we have the football players? If they don't, can we have, can we have them here? Can we have practices? When are we going to test? How are we going to test? Who's going to administer these tests?

What's going to happen if there is an outbreak? There's like a thousand things they need to figure out. No, and zero. And if you had a leader, that could fix a lot of it. Right. And nobody running the ship. That's exactly right. There's all these things that we don't know.

And there's nobody, there's nobody running. and trying to help everybody figure this out and say what we should do. I don't know if it's ever going to change because you and I've talked about multiple times, the needs and wants of Auburn is a lot different than the needs and wants of Utah State. I don't know if there's a single human being that could collectively be a commissioner of college football and had the best interests of 140 schools when there's 140 different budgets. Because in the NFL, they're all built equally, right? Revenue share, salary cap, you play by rules.

other schools don't play. I mean, college football doesn't play that way. You have power, you have a group, you have a subcommittee, you have a really five awesome dudes, and you've got 600 guys like, can we come play with y'all? So I don't know how that's going to be fixed. All I know is this has been since about Saturday afternoon,

a complete disaster when it comes to people figuring out. Then you have this faction of kids that are like under the, what is they using it, we want to play or, yeah, we want to play. I think so. Yeah, we want to play. And who's leading that?

Trevor Lawrence. Of course they want to play. I would hope they would, but are they really saying that because they want to get out there and take the chance, or are they saying it because they don't want big bad commissioners and big bad university presidents telling them what they can and cannot do? I think there, I mean, there's 18, 19-year-olds, and they love to play football, and they want to play football.

And for a lot of them, it's an avenue to get to the professional level, so they understand that's important as well. And even if you're not an NFL prospect, you probably just want to play. You don't want to play. 99% of college football players are not going to go to the NFL. So those, I would assume, the majority of that 99% want to play on Saturday afternoons. You're 1920. You're invincible.

You know everything. And you just want to go play. I would say this. If somebody could collectively grab these conference commissioners and say, you know what, gang, look, there's a lot of uncertainty. We've got a lot of questions. We've got to answer ourselves about testing, how we're going to do it, who's going to play who. let's sit down September 1st and do what the NBA did and that's over plan let's go over what we're going to do and then let's try for January 15th to start a 10 game college football season

but then you run into well are you is will there be people interested which the answer of course would be yes the facilities would be there yes what I don't understand is why are we worried about players leaving and not going to play in this spring of 2002 21 because of the NFL. What are we talking, Rossi, about, well, there's seven rounds, right? Yes. Times 32 teams. So we're going to all of a sudden stop a multi-billion dollar sport because of

215 people that may or may not want to play those many games in a short period of time. You would just let them opt out. But that's been a huge concern is that people are like, well, if Trevor Lawrence doesn't play for Clemson, that's not going to be worth watching football. Let me tell you some. Clemson fan doesn't care if it's Trevor Lawrence being the quarterback or Ross Field of Real. If you throw for 3,000 yards and throw 25 touchdown passes, they'll love you. And guess what?

My guess is, is the Daboosweeney has got another four-star or five-star quarterback right behind him. That's true. Yeah. I watch David Ash and Case McCoy quarterback for the Texas Longhorns. Let me tell you, I'll be brilliant honest with you. I couldn't name 25 Cougars in the last decade. Okay. Right?

But do you think I ruined my experience of watching them beat Florida State and the people? peach ball or watching them win an American Conference Championship or win a bowl game or win games period, win at Louisville? Or fall short of expectations and fire multiple coaches? Because of bad officiating. Yeah, I mean, I don't college football is different. College basketballs, college athletics are different.

You play for, you root for the school, the state, the logo, the institution. Will it be a little bit different? Will Clemson be the chalk pick to win another national championship because Trevor Lawrence is not there if he decides to opt out? Well, yeah. So what? Are Clemson fans going to go, I'm not going to go to the games?

Let me tell you something. If I was the commissioner of college football and said, we're going to start a 10-game season, January the 8th, and we're going to let you all come and watch games. We're not going to have 100% occupancy, but we're going to have 50. College football will be just fine. This is the problem, though. How do we know everything's better by January? We don't.

But I know it's not great right now. That's true. Only time you would think would help, correct? It would hope. Fair enough. 1243 in the Matt Thomas show will start taking phone calls next. If you want to get in the Rockets as well, they got a nice victory against Sacramento.

And did you see who was the leading score in the game with a career high? It rhymes with Joan Rivers. Not really, but close enough. 1243 on Sports Talk 790. Yeah, guys, I'm going to talk to you about how you're feeling. Do you want to feel 10 years younger?

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8-3-fix-low-tee feel 10 years younger by visiting 833 Fixlotee.com. Yo, this is Bunbee, and my wife is the biggest fan of the whitest man in America. Matt Thomas, Matt Troy. Reckless, ratchet, and don't give a fuck. All right, let's get some phone calls in here on the Matt Thomas show. we'd like for you to join us as if you'd like 713-212-5-790 more on the asteros as a matter of fact top of the hour rossi we will go through some of the audio that we do have from yesterday dusting garno spoke dusty baker spoke josh reddick josh reddick spoke and uh steve sparks called a play by play yes i've called a couple of fights you know the last time i called a fight on air i want you see if you can guess Now, you know, I only have one play-by-play job right now, so see if you remember what it was.

I was going to say, did Elvin Hayes ever storm the quarter and get into it anybody? No. No. The last rocket. What's it? Oh, I know it was. Okay, don't say it. I really hope you do. What do you mean? I mean, I'm like, you have an idea of what it is. I hope that you're correct. I think I am. Go ahead. Chris Paul and Rajan Rondo.

You are a winner. Okay, thank you. What do I get? Not a damn thing. What are my fantastic prizes, Matt? Speaking of that, Wednesday, I'm going to record my first ever podcast, a new podcast. Oh, really? Yeah, Plinko and the Powerbombs. Okay, wonderful.

And what it's going to be, it's going to be probably about a half hour. I don't know what we're going to do it. It depends on the rocket schedule, that kind of thing. Okay. I'm going to try to do once a week. We're going to talk about game shows and wrestlers. And the reason why I was going to push this back to the start of the when the rockets were done, but one of my all-time favorite wrestlers died yesterday, Kamala the Ugandan giant.

Oh, okay. Are you okay? I'm fine. All right. But when I was a young kid and watching wrestling for the very first time, he was very scary to me. To 11-year-old Matt Thomas did not like Kamala, and he didn't like Skander Akbar. So I think my buddy Matt Jackson, who you guys know here, is going to be my first co-host. I'm going to get just my friends to co-host with me. Okay, cool.

I may have to try to get some guests on, but everybody keeps asking for guests all the time. So it'll be me with a buddy of mine who's going to tell us who he liked growing up in wrestling or what he likes. And then what his favorite game show is? All right. So when you're scheduling me? Problem is you don't watch either one. Oh. Yeah, I guess so.

So you wouldn't be really a great guest for Planko and Powerbombs. Well, you know what? I was actually thinking of coming up a podcast, so I'll go ahead and do that. And what is yours going to be called? Turnbuckles, and that's too much. I really do hate you. Really when it comes down to it. So be on the look at, I think we're going to tape it on Wednesday.

It'll be Plinko and Powerbombs, a weekly and probably the only one in America that can mix game shows and professional wrestling in the same podcast. Sounds like a rock and good time. It should be. Let's go to David on 790 and 1251. David, thanks for holding. Good afternoon. Good morning or afternoon, whatever it is in the central time. So I've got some good news for the Astros.

I've been watching these Astros, and they are not playing good baseball. But you may recall, I am a San Francisco Giants fan, first and foremost. And I have been watching on the other TV screen right next to them, the San Francisco Giants. And my team is God awful. They've lost six of their last eight. They haven't looked good doing it. And I noticed that we used our good pitchers, the last couple outings against the Dodgers, which means looking ahead to the schedule, the Giants pitchers you will face are TBD,

TBD and TBD. I like your chances for a sweep very much, and that's my good astronaut news. I like your news, David. Thank you very much for the phone call, and happy and happy wagering. Yeah, I don't, I'm doing the on deck tonight, and I was starting to work on the pitching matchup. I know McCullors is going tonight. The mound matchup. Brought to you by?

Twin Peaks? Okay. Not for sure. I think so. Who knows? but the point being is that I can't do the Giants one because I don't know

what the Giants have announced of a starter yet Well I'm seeing I'm seeing Logan Webb And then yes undecided for the next two days Okay Logan Webb's okay's young guy By the way TBD Is not Much worse than rookie Josh Flames James

Unproven rookie Unproven rookie Guy who's never thrown above double A Or a single A And either And starters are going to go past the fifth inning How about speaking of the weekend Zach Ranky

gets the outs yes does a nice job keeps the game close yes doesn't go in the dugout he goes into the stands third fourth row to sit with the cutouts I think that's incredible this is very Zach Grinky of him and how about Zach Grinkey calling his

calling his own pitches that was incredible and that I love Zach Grinke the A's didn't do much with it yeah you had uh who is it Marcus Simeon's up there like what what is it's the most confused look on his face Everybody usually knows one's fastball, right?

Yeah. And then two, three, and four, depending on what kind of pitches you throw. Yeah, right. Curve ball, change up, slider. Well, he'd put up a two and then he threw a curveball. Yeah. It was pretty funny. I do want to grow up at some point in B, Zach Grinky, where I can get a strike thrown

at 66 on the gun. Now, 66 is still fast for us normal people. Yes. But for Major Leaguers, has an Ephus pitch. Yes. But it has a little bend, it has a nice 12-6 bend to it. It falls right into the zone. it's a sweet thing.

And that's what I would want to be. Like, if I was ever to come back as a major league pitcher, I'd be a junk ball, knuckleball, curbed ball thrower. Yeah. Because everybody can throw meat across the plate. And you'd be out there. Would you have high stirrups on your pants? Probably not, no.

I think you feel like you would be. Because that's what the requirement is for being a junkball pitcher. Yeah, like a handlebar mustache. Oh, I'd have longer sideburns, that's for sure. Or sideburns. I like that. Let's go to Andy. on North Shore at 1254 on Sports Talk 790. Hi, Andy.

Hey, how you doing? SportsM.T. Well, thank you. You got it. All right. I am Killer B's dad, and we had the pleasure of meeting you last year during the 80s. Oh, yeah. I heard Killer B gave you a little gift over the weekend. Yeah, I am one of the owners of the exclusive.

Good Mornings Strippers T-shirt. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah, by the way, I play in a local band. I wore it yesterday at my gig that I had yesterday, and I wore it proudly. A lot of people had to ask you what the hell it meant, right? They had to have asked you. I had a few stairs. I don't think anybody was bold enough to come and ask me, though.

I got you. What kind of band are you in? I play in a, we're kind of like an R&B funk band called a Mumble Jazz Kings. Where do you all play next? I want to come see y'all. We played at the HACHat winery out in Santa Fe yesterday. Okay. That sounds like a nice paying gig, right?

Oh, yeah. It's fun. We're a fun band to watch. Wait a minute. You're in the Mombo Jazz Kings? Yeah. My dad loves the Mabo Jazz Kings. There you go.

Well, here's the deal. Next time, well, actually, next time, about the time where we can actually go to bars and see you play just recreationally and just hang out. We'll come hang out. We've got to bring Killer B with you. We'll give her a couple of cocktails. We'll give you a couple of cocktails.

You play a great time. we'll have some fun because I do want to see you guys perform. That sounds like a plan, my man. All right, talk to you soon. Appreciate you, listen. How about that? Whoa. Yeah.

That's hilarious. The man's, the man's weren't a good, I mean, he showed a picture. The Good Morning stripper's shirt, you can get them at Ram shirts, by the way. CrushCityT's.com if you want to get a good morning strippers t-shirt. Well, basically, is just a bunch of strippers and a picture of me.

Thend out, thankfully. Yeah, I don't need you on my chest, so I'll get something else. You're the only one. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. That's how you really reached the program. We will dive into the brawl and the futility that is, unfortunately, Houston Astros, as they are now deep in under 500 and way back of the A's in the American League West.

Rockets with a nice win yesterday as well, down to a handful of games, and what are we going to do with college football? We'll visit with Joel Clack coming up in just over an hour. It's 12.56. It is the Matt Thomas show. Hour 2 is next. It's the Matt Thomas show. And now there's a fight in front of the Astros dogout.

And we've got some guys down on the ground now and everybody coming in there. And we've got fists flying in Oakland with the Astros and the Oakland A's. there was an ace player I believe it was Lariano but I'm not 100% sure who initially was at the bottom of that pile in front of the Astros dugout and all heck broke loose after that

Lariano's now being pulled away from the fray by one of the A's coaches I don't know I didn't see it really because I couldn't get the feet in the clubhouse you know I just heard that and then I saw it

you know at the end of the game you know I heard this you know Lariano was upset because he had been hit a couple times in the series. But the last time I thought, I mean, we got hit by a changeup or a breaking ball or something. Like he got hit by two guys that don't have any time to Big Leach. And that was only the second or third appearance, I think, by the young player. I mean, certainly not, you know, he wasn't trying to hit him.

And then I don't know what happened between them, take the truth. You know, I just saw guys chirping at each other. And then next thing I know the bench is cleared. and I guess that's what happened. Words are being said. He came after the dugout and I was just trying to stop the situation before punches were really throwing stuff out of hand.

That's really my whole goal was for that incident. And it worked, Dustin Gernow. By the way, many of you are probably thinking, come on, Dusty, there's got to be a television somewhere you can watch this. I've never been to a game at Oakland Coliseum before, but if there's any facility that's probably not up to speed, like they're still using televisions

without remote controls. It's probably Oakland Coliseum. He didn't want to get up and turn the knob. We can't because it's probably it was probably nailed up in the very top of the room and you have to get a ladder or like a step stool or something.

Like a broomstick. Yeah. Or maybe he was just like sitting down and he was in his Sudoku doing some Sudoku in his book or something. That very well could happen. I will say this. I did a bunch of games at the Oakland

Coliseum Arena, where the, you know, the O, what they call it, the Oracle. O. Dot Co. Yeah, no, Oracle Arena. Oracle. Warriors. And so the O. dot co, now Oakland Coliseum back for the 10th time has been renamed. It's right next to it.

It literally is it, it's like, it's what you would think the Sanford and Son, Fredgy Sanford's statement would look like. It's a junk pile. I don't know how it still stands. But it does. You think it's un-fit for baseball? Well, it's almost like, collapse. If you're thinking the least safe place to be in Oakland. during an earthquake

because I do get them up there, obviously, would have to be that stadium. They used to have bleachers, Ross, that were just laying out in the parking lot. Chunks of bleachers. I'm not kidding you. What? Yeah.

That sounds dangerous. It's a blank hole. It really is. And Oakland's been, I mean, think about this. And I don't want to brag on the A's because I don't like the A's. I like their green uniforms. I can tell you that for sure.

I do like those. Those are nice. Wow, they're nice. that's an organization that's won a lot of games with no money and no interest. Yep. And imagine if they were actually in a stadium in a part of the Bay Area that people cared about, how good they would be. Because frankly, a lot of the charm of the Giants has a, they had been much more successful than the A's have been. And they also have a great stadium on the other side of the Bay where, in theory, more the money is.

and the A's have tried forever and ever to get out of that Oakland area to go down like Santa Clara, but the Giants like, no, that's our territory. You leave us alone. You can't have that area. So little territorial battles between two major league baseball teams. All right, 105 on Sports Talk 790. So Alex Entron obviously said some things to Ramon Lariano that he was not particularly pleased with. There is a rumor that he said something about Ramon Luriano's mother.

You mean being a mother Blanker? I don't know. Just maybe a Blank your mother? I don't know. Why would Alex Centron go to the mother card? Well, whoever, let me ask you all this. Who goes to mother cards in 2020?

Hmm. Do you think he said your mother's so skinny, she can hula hoop through a chirio? And that really set Ramon Luriano off? Let me ask you this. Do did he go to your mama jokes? Did Alex Centron go to your mama jokes? in the middle of the show? The game, seventh inning, your team's down four or five runs,

and he's dropping your mama jokes on him? Perhaps. Like, let me tell you something. Ross, if you and I were really going to get nasty and call each other some things. Oh, I got some material. I don't think I'd go to your mother jokes. Yeah, Matt, come on. I love my mother.

I'm not saying that, but I'm saying there's many more things I would attack you for. But it wouldn't be mother jokes. Well, this is from Jose de Jesus Ortiz. He says, we'll know more soon, but a person I respect has been told the A's Ramone L'Oriano charged towards Alex Centron because Centron mentioned Luriano's mother in a bad way.

In Latino culture, those are fighting words. I got news for you. Anybody's culture, it's fighting words. Dusty Baker said that on the post game yesterday. He says that I called somebody a mother blanker and that teammate of mine lost his mind. I think it's like a bleep your mother type of thing is when you know things are going to escalate.

I don't know. I can't imagine. And I don't know Alex Centron at all, but my guess is he was just doing it just to piss off Ramon Luriano. Well, he obviously said something. Yeah, because he took off like the Concord towards the Astros dugout. Yeah, he went full sprint. So there was something that Alexandron did. And he escalated the situation.

Ramon Luriano was headed towards first. Now he probably shouldn't have tried to coach Castellanos on how to snap a breaking ball. Yeah, you can't teach 12-6 curve balls on your way to way to first base. But I mean, so there was a little bit of a, not even a scuffle. What would you even call that? A tiff? And then that was going to be over. And then apparently Alex Cintron started barking from the dugout and then that's when

things escalated. And then Cintron steps up to the top step and gives them the little the matrix or the Bruce Lee hand gesture. Come on. Let's go. All right. Because we're fair and balance here, Alex Cintron needs to keep it quiet. There's no way that a hitting coach or whatever, I don't even care what position you are

coaching. should say one word to an active player. Yes, I agree. Centron has protection. He's, I mean, there's no way in the world that if Luriano is coming straight at him,

that the rest of the Astros are going to be like, man, Alex, I heard what you said. Good luck with this. Go. That's why Garno went out there against his old teammate and defended him.

Yeah, and to make it, well, Garna was out there playing free safety. Yeah. That's why Dusty said what he said last week with the, what's his face?

Joe Kelly. Oh, get it back. on the mound. Yeah. MF. What, did you say MF or no? I think he said little.

Little effort as compared to a just general effort. Okay. So you can't, so that's a problem. But in these Rossi unprecedented times where Major League Baseball is getting crushed for lack of social distancing. Yeah. You can't go chasing after somebody that's going to force both teams, uh, uh, uh, uh, Because that were guys coming from the bullpen. I mean, you had 60 to 70 people within two feet of each other for about 10 minutes.

Yeah. Now, whether that's going to attract COVID, I would certainly hope not. But Major League Baseball has been at a point, especially because of all the outbreak, to absolutely without a doubt stay away from each other. That's why Loriana was going to get the worst of the punishment. Yeah, it's a bad look at that point. So he shouldn't have done it. He's going to be suspicious minute.

He should be, as should Alex Entron. It'll be interesting to see if anybody else. gets dinged for it. You think Garneau will get a suspension? Yep. Yeah, probably. When you are just trying to be peacekeeper? When you are wrestling with somebody?

He was just trying to be play peacekeeper. Well, then Martine Maldonado came in and somebody grabbed his mask and that's when he started throwing blows. And Maldonado turned around when Luriano was trying to show the 12-6 curb ball. Yeah, that's true. And so he was trying, I don't think he was trying to escalate. Most catchers that I've dealt with and you guys have watched tries to diffuse things as compared to escalate.

It looked like Martimald. I was like, all right, dude, just we understand. You got hit. It sucks. Go, take your base. Yeah, just take the three wins. Now, how you say that in Spanish?

I don't know, Matt. I turned to you for that. I haven't taken a day of Spanish lessons in my life, so I can't help you. All I can tell you is the Houston Astros are three and a half games at a first place, and they are three games under 500, and the A's had a wonderful time this weekend

at the Astros expense. So what's the problem? One of those close games. Friday night sucked. They're snake bit in these late in, I mean, in these late game situations, I mean, you have the last game against Arizona where Bregman brings it back,

and then who was it, Presley, gives it up, and then you have it the next night. Alex Bregman puts them up late again. And Syneed. They got down to their final strike, correct? It was a one-two count. Yeah, I'm having the same alcoholic problems that I had when the Astros were bad.

Well, they're six and nine right now. It's not nice. It's not nice. And, again, according to every, but you listen to, every losses means two and a half times more. So in reality, they are six and 27. And they are five and a half games back of the A's. The Rangers are ahead of them in the standings right now.

And the problem is we made fun of that douche from the New York Post for Sandy Astros are going to finish fourth. Yeah, well, they're a game away from that. They're closer to fourth than they are to first. That's the fact. That makes me very sad. Well, we didn't know there's going to be this rash of injuries. And that's, can I just say that right now? That's what this is, gang.

I know that simpleton baseball guy wants to say it's Dusty Baker's fault. And by the way, he's not void of any blame of this. But when you lose Rossi, think about just the offseason. You lost Harris, Smith, because Smith doesn't, at this point is opted out for at least temporarily. You lost Garrett Cole. And you replaced him with what? Oh, Austin Pruitt who's not going to throw a pitch for you this year?

Jose Rikidi. Who is barely throwing off of the mound at this point. Josh James? Who can't find the strike zone right now. Framer Caldas? Who found it for a while, but the jury is still very much out. And by the way, Lance McCullors hasn't found the strikes on the last two of starts either. We've got to get him going.

We, because I'm the pitch he coach. He was perfect through three, man. I forget what happened after that. Well, he gave up nine in the fourth. Out of that, things went really well. Tell us what's wrong. Come on, Astrofans. You guys are out there Friday night with me until 1.45 in the morning.

You tell me what's going on. What are you seeing that maybe perhaps Ross and I or not? Or maybe we're all on the same page. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. It is the Matt Thomas show, Joe Clat Fox Sports, with us in 45 minutes here on 7-90. But right now, a word for hoops, basketball goals, and sporting equipment.

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or even above that can play a great game of basketball and work on their game. ProDunkhoops.com is a website. That's ProDunkhoops.com. This is Craig Vigio. Vigio. Bigio. Back to Matt Thomas on Sports Talk, 790.

Oh, we're having some fun. You're home with the Stroes. He doesn't care. He'll step into the glass. He'll score it. And Austin Rivers, with a career high 39 as he beat three King defenders for the baskets. And he get to 41.

41 for Austin Rivers. Now, granted, in the fourth quarter, it was just like Austin Rivers shoot everything. Rockets comfortably in front. That's okay. If you got to drop 40 on the king's head, you got to drop 40 in the king's head, Matt. Yeah, Rockets won last night. Is it safe to say that they are under the radar right now? in terms of Houston sports, in terms of the NBA.

It feels like to me again, everything that I read and hear, it's Clippers, Lakers eventually going to play for the West. Bucks. Mazz are getting a lot of press because Luca Dantzic had that great game on Saturday. A lot of Blazer run, which is good because, I mean, that's a team that got healthy, you know. People are all over the Blazers who did beat the rockets in the bubble. They're only lost. So what do you think?

Are you okay with this under the radar conversation? Yeah, I've got no issue with it. I'm used to it. The rockets are lying in the weeds, Matt, ready to pounce. You know, it's funny when somebody will call and say, hey, can we talk some rockets with you? And I'll go on a couple of shows here and there. It's never, it used to be always about James and Russ.

It's not that anymore. It's how are you supposed to survive with this small lineup? And honestly, Covington had double-digit rebound yesterday. They won the rebounding battle. If anything, it's not about the loss. of a big man, it's the, well, if you're going to replace him with playing PJ Tucker and Robert Covington at the five, those guys have got to do their job shooting, and both of them not had good bubble experiences shooting the three ball. That to me has been way more of an

issue than losing a rebounding battle, is that those guys are relied on to be stretch, whatever you want to call their position hybrids, and they're getting both them, especially PJ getting a lot of open looks and just knocking them down. Yeah, PJ hasn't had a going in the bubble the entire time. I don't know what's going on with him, but he's going to be okay, I think. I'm not too worried about him. To me, it seems like when he's missing him, they just come out

flat, and he just kind of line drives it at the basket from the corner and hopes of the basket. He's got to get a lot of hierarchy. You know, Daniel House gets good high arc on his shots. I would say that Ben McLemore does, but Ben McLemore, the ball, as soon as the ball gets to his hand, he puts it up within a half second. I love that about him. He's a

he is a gunner to the T. Well, part of that probably is, if Ben McLemore was given time to set his feed and think about the shot, maybe it doesn't go in. Maybe he makes his adjustment as the ball is releasing out of his hands. Unconscious. Yeah. I like that about it. That's great.

It's fun. So it sounds like Eric Gordon's going to be back shortly. The Rockets have three games left this week. Tomorrow, which will preclude us being on the air. Now, you'll be here at noon for the rockets. We'll be on the air. Yeah, but just in different ways. You'll have the launch pad at 12 noon, and I'll have the call at 1 o'clock here on 7.

tomorrow. Wonderful. And then Wednesday's another day game, but you and I'll have like a shorter show. We'll go a couple hours, uh, in which we'll have Dusty Baker on. And then Friday, they wrap things up at the Philadelphia 76ers. That game probably isn't going to mean much because the Rockets, my guess is by the end, by the time Wednesday's games are done, they're going to know who they're going to be playing and in what seed. I think, I think Friday is going to be moot, which means I wouldn't be totally surprised if the Rocket's 76ers game Friday was like a daytime game, because I don't think the 76ers are going to move out of their spot now that Joel Embed and Ben Simmons are both hurt

and it sounds like Simmons is done for the season. Well, I mean, well, you're one and a half behind the nugget. Well, I don't know. Probably it's different when it comes to winning percentage, but technically one and a half out of the nuggets from the nuggets, one from the Thunder and a game and a half from the Jazz definitely could be something on the line, but I don't think they're already avoiding seven.

By winning yesterday, they clinch. But I'm saying is I don't, I think the next two will obviously have something to do with it. I'd be stunned if we're sitting there waiting for scores on Friday to figure it out. Because it looks like to me that it's a lean right now to Oklahoma City. It still would take something for the Rockets to jump to the three spot. But even if they do, maybe that bumps O'KC

down to six or Utah. I mean, it feels like some combination of Houston O'KC, Houston, Utah, or it will be the first round matchup. So you've got to practice saying Shea Gilgis Alexander. Who, by the way, is not playing today. Oh, okay. I got a lot of guys missing out on that lineup too. And Donovan Mitchell's not going to play for Utah. So, you know, again, I haven't felt a tremendous amount of rocket buzz from our audience at this point. Unfortunately. Well, but I would assume it will ramp up. I got as many Astros calls as I got Rockets calls on

the postgame show yesterday. Yeah, you had people call in and the guy wanted to say, yeah, the Rockets are cool and everything, but how about these Astros? Sir, this is the Rockets wrap. And frankly, I'd give Geron more time. I give him the floor, man, and he takes as much as time as he's like. He does. He does. The ball is in his court. If you ever miss a Rockets game and you need a quick two and a half to three minute recap,

Gerard will have it for you on the post game call. Much of it repeating what I've just said, but yes. Yeah, that's why when I do Astros games, I don't even really repeat anything. I say, because somebody's going to call and say, yeah, the fifth thing in this happened, the seventh thing that's this is pitching was this, you know. So, yeah, how the show works and when Ross does the call-in show is he'll recap the game for three minutes, And then you'll get like the same version of that recap, just with different lingo with the Gerard that calls in.

We love them anyway. Yes, we do. I appreciate him. We're big Gerard fans. A huge. Huge. Continue on. No,

I'm a huge. Okay. That's it. Okay. So, yeah, I'm pleased. Gigantic, massive. I mean, you want more?

Rock, you know, they haven't really missed a whole lot since Westbrook's been out. He'll play probably one of the, my guess is he'll play one of the three games. I bet you Gordon and Russ and West, well, I bet you EG probably plays two because he's missed more time.

Ross ball needs action in one more game and I wouldn't be totally surprised if James skips a game here. I know it's going to be hard for him to do that but you got to think about this Ross, if they play Friday and there's nothing to play for, you've got the playoffs on Monday. You don't have a lot of time nor would you want to take the risk in trying to play major minutes

against a game and against a team that will do nothing for you. If there's something to play for then that's a little bit different. Yeah, and at that point you're talking about, I mean, you're playing a back-to-back on Tuesday and Wednesday. Friday will be your third game in four nights. So if there's likely nothing, there's really materially nothing to play for anyways.

You're not playing for home court advantage. So I would like, I'm with you. I would like maybe James to miss one half of the back to back and maybe play them a few minutes on Friday depending on what's going on. But just as you would, as Matt Thomas would like to say, bubble wrap all these guys. Just I want them healthy. The healthy full nine-man rotation for the Rockets can beat anybody in a seven-game series. You'll care with nine-man.

Yes. is Houston, is, is helicopter rocket fan satisfied with a 9-year rotation? You know, nobody plays 10 in the playoffs. You know who's playing more than anybody else in that 10th spot is Michael Frazier. Yeah. So he'd be the next guy. If we haven't seen Amari Carroll yet, it ain't happening. It's not, no.

If you're the biggest Tyson-Channler fan in America, I got terrible news for you. Bruno Caboclo played over him yesterday. Who? And Luke Baamutei got a little bit of appearance as well. I saw it like four or five minutes of Luke Rashar Bamute. Yeah. Good for him. Got a basket and about three offensive rebounds off of two misses.

It looks a little sloppy, but that's okay. Well, it's the case. He's rusty. Yeah, it is. And yes, Tyson Chandler is now the captain of the Rocket's cheerleading squad. He's not. Well, it's the N-A rule. Yeah.

Put the uniform on, eat, work out, keep yourself in good physical condition. We'll slap an adductor strain on you if we need to get you out. Just don't think we're going to need you at any point. Maybe to guard an inbound's play with one second left to go, but short of that, that'd be about it. That's the last time I can remember him playing. I'm not kidding. It's been a minute. It has been some times.

So I'm happy with them. I mean, you don't want to get the dominant rebounding setbacks, but as Dan Tony has sold us multiple times on this show, it's about not allowing second chance points. Rebounding numbers are just going to favor with their team because the rockets are going to shoot about 35. 5% from 3. So there's going to be a bunch of misses there. And it's on the defensive side that you don't want to give up those rebounds. So allow other teams that have good post players that are better finishers, second and third chance opportunities. Now, the Kings didn't do that yesterday.

And that's the reason why they lost comfortably. There'll be other teams like Montres Heller on the basket, Ross, when he's back, and by the way, he's back with the clippers. He's fantastic finisher. Yeah. He's going to be bowling a china shop against his small rockets. They're going to have to be ready for that. And so that's a guy that's not overly tall,

but he plays bigger than his height than it indicates as well. So, all right. So if you'd like to chime in on the Rock, and you're more than welcome to do so, and the Astros woes, and if you hate Dusty Baker more than life itself, which hopefully you don't, because he's not the one to blame,

but it's easy narrative to do that. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-21-2-5-790. That's what I want to know from you baseball fans. Why do you run out and tell me how much you hate Dusty Baker when you always tell me anyway that the managers don't do much on game day anyway? Why is that?

Why do skippers in baseball? And this has the same thing happened with AJ Hinch and other managers. Why do you blame him when things go wrong when you then say, well, managers are the least important of all the coaches in sports today? I want to know the answer to that. If you got an answer, let me know. 713212-5-790. That's 7-13-2125790. And Joe Clad from Fox in one half hour.

But first a word for oops steam cleaning. For your carpets to be professionally cleaned the right way, you doing them? is not the answer. You calling 281-8-2-2-2-0-561 is the right answer. 281-8-2-2-0-561. They'll come. They'll check out your house. I'll give you an estimate. My guess it'll be very fair. And they'll come in your house with their van-powered units, and they will clean your carpets, true steaming, leaving no residue, leaving no extra soap around. And they'll do a fantastic job like they've done on my home multiple times over the last 10-plus years. 281 8220561 to get your carpet professionally cleaned.

Plus, if you have towel and grout in your bathrooms, it's in your kitchens, they'll do a great job of cleaning that too. 281-82-2-2-0-561 and online at oops, steam.com. From first pitch, getting set for the first pitch, to final out. And that is the ball game. Your Astros play exclusively on Sports Talk 790. Flagship station of your Houston Astros. Did you see who has joined the hashtag we want to play movement?

Sam Ellinger. Nope. Deerre King. No. Out of the world of college football. Oh. Out of the world? I can't say Lee Corso.

No. Nobody involved with football directly. Donnie T. That is correct. Yes. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Well, what did he say? Basically, say, I don't follow him on Twitter.

Okay. Go to his tweets. I think he put a, he hash, he went on the hashtag, we want to play. Do you follow him? I do not follow Donald Trump, no. I'll tell you this and very much confidence. I will never follow a politician ever in my life. I follow zero politicians of either side of the aisle.

Correct. We are the most apolitical radio team in the history of radio. Thank you. I think politics is a dumpster fire, so I don't really get involved. Anyways, Donald Trump says play college football. 21 minutes ago, it's already got 11,000 retweets. What else is he saying? There's a couple things he said.

Well, this is all I see right now. One of them was about student athletes. It's a ways back. You said the student athletes have been working too hard for their season to be canceled. Hashtag we want to play. Oh, I didn't know that. Okay, so here's the thing. So Big Ten's got a deciding vote at 5 o'clock today.

How are your Big Ten sources up there, by the way? You used to work up in there. I mean, my Big Ten sources are the Detroit Free Free Free. press so things don't look good and they're and they're not and they're not backing off of their there's no college i i trust them i'll give you that much i if they say the big tens voted i i think they know what they're talking about okay so there's an official vote at five o'clock today but i think probably my guess is that tray free press got the unofficial like hey what are you hearing uh the acc louisville's coach i just saw a crawl on ESPN said they have been told

keep doing what you're doing how effed up is this excuse my french on this we have one power conference saying we're getting out we have a couple others like well what are y'all going to do help me out guys what is this like is this like um you got you got six children you get six teenagers no five five five five and it's almost like one of them wants to be get out there in front of it and then the other one's like well i want to you know either they're leaders or their followers I believe the Big 12 and the Pact 12 are waiting for somebody else to do this. It's like some want to go to Olive Garden and someone to go to C.C.'s Pizza and someone to go to Golden Corral. I don't quite get that, but that's fine.

Some want to stay home. Not eat it and eat at home. But what's a good parallel for this? I don't know. I tried, Matt. You shot it down quickly. Yeah, you're done. Sorry.

Well, let me hear. Could you beat that one? Could you beat that one? I'll live. And by the way, just for the record, I'm a terrible parallel person myself. So your turn. I'll live in his analogy. The problem is a few of them don't want to go out to eat, but no one wants to be the bad guy that says that.

The Big Ten is the one who says, yeah, I'm not feeling going out. So it's five guys. Not in the restaurant. I'm talking about five buddies. Hey, you don't want to go out tonight? Yeah. Whatam says, I ain't feeling it. A couple of them are like, I still want to go out.

I want to go see what's out there. I want to go have a good time. And you got two like, well, I don't care. I can stay in or I could stay out. I don't want to leave him behind. If he's not going out, I'm not going to leave him behind. And they have something. They have a really early flight.

So that's why some of them want to stay home. And they're like, the right thing to do is to stay home. We shouldn't go out. But we kind of want to go out. I like that one better. Okay. All I know is this is a hot mess. I don't think Joel Clatt ever gets super angry on our show.

I feel like he's going to come with fire. brimstone in 20. He comes with a little fire. I like the Joel clad. I know he's a little polarizing to some folks. I don't care. He's got a real reason take too. Yeah.

Smart guy. It doesn't mean you have to agree with them, but when you listen, you go, okay, I can sort of respect that. But this is, this is, I'll say this. If we don't get a false,

if we don't get a spring season, meaning 20-21, college sports as we know will never be the same. Rossi, if you're an athletic director at any school, like my buddy Chris Pesman over at U of H. he has employees

trainers sports medicine video people marketing people sports information ticket sellers why doesn't he furlough everybody if there's no sports

if you're telling me no false sports until 2021 you've already kept them on the books probably already you've probably asked them to take a pay cut

what in the hell do you do how do you not furlough every single one of them I don't know. You would have to. So we're talking about thousands and thousands of people that are unemployed. Or at least furloughed. We're talking about millions of dollars of revenue to the institutions,

the ones that even even the ones the colleges like Memphis would draw us 25,000 people to the games at the Liberty Bowl, right? That's still $25,000 people at, say, 30 bucks a ticket, right? This is catastrophic. This will be, if they, if, now if you're going to. going to say to me, we're going to play January 2021, then you can kind of, you know, bite your tongue and pray and do whatever you have to do to

hope that this virus has come to a head where you've got a better grasp of it or there's a vaccine or there's better testing or more abundant testing. But if you just flat out skip a year, how are we going to recover from this athletically college-wise? College endowments are going to be

struggled. Scholarships will go away. If these athletes want money after this, They can forget that. The best way for college athletes to get money is for them to somehow some way to play a season this year. If they're really thinking about figuring out a way to compensate college football players for doing what they're supposed to be doing. I wonder if you're talking about how the long-term effects of this. I wonder if this will result in lawsuits against the NCAA or college sports or these conferences and all that. Because of what you just said, this entire economy that revolves around these 19, 20-year-old kids going and playing on a football field or a basketball court.

I'll give you another example. And this is a little minutiae, but stay with me on this. Schools have what they call third party rights, meaning signages in stadiums, radio networks like the University of Houston. They don't, the broadcasters, which I'm included in that, work for a company called Learfield IM. It's a company that puts ads in stadiums, sells magazines. It does anything to sell the property.

Well, those schools like Learfield and IMG write the University of Houston, write Rice, write Wake Forest, write Duke, right North Carolina, they write these checks. And then the North Carolina's of the world and Houston's give them all the inventory. And says, here's the billboards you can use inside the Fortita Center. Here are the billboards you can use at TDC Stadium.

Here's the radio airtime. You go sell this. If you're Leerfield IMG and you have 150 schools that don't play any sports, how is Learfield IMG going to write those checks of those institutions and say, here's your money. So there's more money again that these schools are not going to get because Learfield IMG, the company that runs these collegiate properties, the multimedia rights,

are going to say, you've given me nothing. I can't give you any money on stuff I can't sell. So you know, see I'm saying? This is not just about young men not being able to afford to do what they want to do on Saturday. This is about an industry that has hundreds of thousands of people involved. in it that's going to come crumbling down if indeed we're not going to have any college football at all

for another season. It's going to be a huge hit. That's what I mean. Some people will say, well, okay. That's 2020. The virus, okay, we'll come back in 2021. Well, maybe. Well, first of all, there's no guarantee of that.

But secondly, there could be 25 or 30 schools to say, we just can't do this. We lost too much money. We just, we can't come back. That's going to be, that's tough. not for anybody's fault, but it's just the realities of that's why these things are weighing on the minds of so many people is because I think when you put the, when you hit the cancel button, do you really think the Mac's going to be the same ever again?

Probably not, no. Because Kent State and Miami, Ohio and Ohio, Rossi, they get $1.5 to $2 million paychecks from Big Ten schools to play them. That's money they're not going to get. Now, granted, they're not of an operating budget on that, but they're just, they're never going to be able to recruit that money. And that money keeps their athletic departments alive. It may just be Power 5.

And a few decent non-power fives that create their own leagues of whatever. But that's why this college football news of the last 48 hours, I think, has been so scary. We'll resume on the phones next. We'll talk to Cecil and to Roger next. 143. It is a Matt Thomas show. Joe Clatt Fox Sports is with us in. 15 minutes for more doom and gloom on college athletics. Right now, a word for big city wings.

Today is $1 chicken tenders at any of the eight big city wing locations. If you buy five, you're going to get five sauce and tossed the way that you want for $5. Get yourself some ranch dressing, some fries, sweet potato fries, tater tots, waffle fries, potato skins, and you're going to have yourself a delicious meal that's not going to break the bank. Do yourself a favor to get great wings, great tenders, and great daily specials every single day. Stop by any of those eight big city wing locations. To find the one near you, you simply go to big citywings.com. Big citywings.com. Dollar chicken tenders all day long today at Big City Wings. Left side to Westbrook on the baseline for the tie. He makes it. And he's fouled.

This is Russell Westbrook. One thing's for sure. I did not get my amazing style from Matt Thomas. Oh, hammer job. Real quick on the Rockets, we go to the phones. Russell Westbrook's going to play tomorrow against San Antonio. He will not play against the Pacers. Eric Gordon will not play tomorrow, but he will play against the Pacers. James Hardin will not play tomorrow against San Antonio and will play against the Pacers. Okay. Stradling your stars, so to speak.

Yeah, that's what you should do. Three games at four days when you're pretty much locked into your, not locked in, but it doesn't matter where you fall in the standings. That helps my prep. So tomorrow will be fun. This will be the first. week day day game I've ever done. Do I have to say what's happened in lunch timers when I opened up the launch pad at noon?

No, you wouldn't do that on a normal launch pad so you don't do it there either. Oh, by the way, we have believed it or not today. Okay. I'll let you work on one. Let's see who died. Are we still going to do Wilford Brimley? No, no, no. No, no.

Oh, can you do Kamala? The Ugandan Giant. How about you do that one? But I'm busy with Joel Klan. What am I supposed to do? I'll try to do it That's not a two hour interview I'll try to do it

All right I'll try to do it So Kamala Believe it or not Coming up at 252 today I'll do Kamala Harris Well how about How about I do four Kamala's

The guy The wrestler you do four Kamala Harris's Is that a good split? Camala? Is it Kamala or Kamala? It's Camala Because I always thought it was Kamala But then somebody said it was

No it's Kamala in the Ugana giant In Kamala Harris So you do Kamala Harris Are we really gonna do that? Yeah why not We got an hour left To go in the show Eight on the Uganda

The London Giant? Is he really from Uganda? No, he's not. Well, it's all fake. Don't give it up. Oh, I'm sorry. Well, you got to give away one teaser question at some point. All right. I will give you more coming up here.

Let's go to some phone calls. Let's say hi to Cecil, southeast side of the Matt Thomas show. Hi, Cecil. Yeah, I'm not going to answer that question on Kamala. But you go, he's a double amputee right now. We all aware of that? Well, he's also no longer with us. So, yeah.

Yeah, he's no longer with people. He's a double ampete, lost his leg. But I know ways from. Anyway. The point is the question to ask is not should we play college football. Can we play college football safely? And I'm looking at these guidelines from the centers of disease control. The Maple League Baseball, Major League Basketball,

has spent $150 million apiece, and they can't get it right. But one of my relatives that's a medical professional, obviously I'm not, said that even people who, I'm 72, so I've told my niece who plays a college sport and socializing dog, hey, don't come visit your uncle. You know, I can't afford to question about that stuff. And I'm assuming that some of these college athletes have parents and grandparents that they are in contact with. Obviously, they won't be in contact with it for the season. But in order to say to take college football, they're going to have to get about 400,000 masks, gloves, hand sanitizers.

There's some air sanitizer machine. U of H has it over there. That thing costs about $300,000. Explains me how you're going to social distance from football practice. But even if you do get coronavirus and recover, you can have scarred lung, living kidney disease,

and have to be on a, what do they call those vaccines that, you know, do your blood. You can catch Kawasaki disease. Kawasaki. Kawasaki does he? Kawasaki disease. Oh, no.

I've looked it up. I'm going to ask Don't hold Steve Austin about that one. Yeah, heart problems, blood clots, loss of smell, loss of taste, memory loss, cognitive disability, neurological disorder. Oh, no. And several other things here that I can't even pronounce. I don't want to call us to know how dumb I am. I put you in these words. But if we can get past all that, then we can play college football.

Now, you do know this happened in 1918, 1919 with the Spanish flu. You know, people had to wear masks, people that canceled the football season. Obviously, obviously, the money wasn't nearly as, you know, involved way back then as it is now. But let's face it, 18, 19, 20, 21-year-old kids, when you put them on the cars of campus, they're not going to social with the distance from each other. You know, I know we didn't. when I was on the college football team, notice I didn't say I played.

I said I was on the team. And they're going to have to be in contact with people. They're going to have to be in contact with relatives, elderly relatives. And the question is not should we have a college football season. The question is can we safely do it, do it right, and ensure the health and safety of the staff, the support, and all the people involved. and ain't nobody figured this out yet.

And that's why the Big Ten said, with the exception of Nebraska and Iowa, all the college football president, forget what the coach is saying. Forget that electric. The presidents realize the gravity of this thing, and they're going to make the right decision by saying, you know what, we're going to err on the side of caution

and flat not put. Thank you, Cecil. Oh, I think he said, what do you think? Cecil's an American treasure. I can listen to Cesar read the phone book. Kawasaki disease. That doesn't sound good. You get a Toyota syndrome.

Kawasaki disease is an illness that causes inflammation in blood vessels throughout the body. It happens in three phases, and lasting fever usually is the first sign. Okay. The condition most often affects kids younger than five. You and I have not discussed this. There are some people that if you go, again, everybody's going to have an opinion on social media on this. There are some people that on Twitter are saying, that you're going to take these young men who are going to school, the safest place they could be

is in a regulated area like a practice field for football. Because if you go to school in the morning and then you go to football practice, the football practice protocol is going to be in place. They're going to say, here's how we practice, here's how we do it, here's the testing. If you say there's no football this year, their day is done at 1 o'clock in the afternoon after their classes. Between one and nine o'clock at night where they could be practicing, hanging out with their teammates, eating meals in the dorm where the rest of the athletes are, that's where you can kind of keep an eye on them. You can't keep an eye on them if you say we're not playing college football this year. If we're a bubbled environment, I would agree.

But you're talking about a couple hours a day. I mean, they are getting tested regularly, so that is going to be helpful for them. No, no, no, no, no. I'm saying you're misunderstood. You're not playing football this year. There'll be no practice. there'll be no going to the workout areas. You're not going to have your coach looking at you three days a week.

You are going to be just a good old-fashioned regular college student if we don't play college sports this year. Is that just as dangerous as saying practicing with your teammates and being an area where you're going to get cotton swab tests? And you're going to be able to be social distancing. People are going to watch over you. For college students, it's about the same. I'm not worried about them as much contracting COVID during the games or the practices. where they're going to get, they're already showing. Where these outbreaks are happening in colleges,

where it's already happened around the country, they trace them to bars. They trace them to parties. And the college students are going to continue to do that because they're college students. That's just how it works. So even if you do have all this testing and all this type of stuff, you're going to have to tell them no parties

and no going to bars and all that type of stuff, and they're going to have to listen. And I just don't think that's very likely. So to me, it kind of is what it is. on the side of when it comes to college football. It's just, that's how it's going to be. There's going to be dangers and there's going to be risks.

And yeah, it'll help a little bit if they're getting tested regularly, but you also have to tell them to, you would have to have them following protocol at all times. And you get, when you count on walk-ons and all that, you get 90 to 100 college-age students. It's going to be impossible.

No volleyball, no basketball, at least in the fall semester. no soccer, no football, no revenue. We're never going to see college sports again like this. It's going to be a lot different. Division 2 and Division 3 are canceled, right? Because of safety reasons. Yep.

Well, then if you're wanting to be consistent, Division 1 should be as well. So that's where I think, like I said, you're going to have lawsuits coming. If they play games, that's the thing that they have to think about long term. All right. Joel Klat is going to join us from Fox Sports in the next segment of the show. we will talk with him.

We're going to go longer. I'm telling you, Braynor, we're going to miss that early break in the 2 o'clock hour because I think he's got a lot of things he's going to say, and it's going to be a very good conversation. I must visit with the Joe Clat is next, but first a word for my friends at Bronze Roofing. If your roof needs to be checked, and I'm telling you, with roofs especially that are 15 years or older,

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Is the Matt Thomas Show. One of my favorite people in broadcasting is with us here. And I'm just going to lay out. I'm going to ask nice, simple questions, because I know Joel Klotz's got a few things on his mind. He is a talented broadcaster. Fox's number one college football. broadcasting team and

Joel, first of all, long time, no talk. I hope you get to call some games, but I'm very, very nervous about that. First of all, good afternoon to you. And secondly, what happened in the last week that's driven everybody nuts? We went from schedule announcements, Joel, to league cancellations.

What did I miss during all this? Yeah, join the club. We're all trying to figure that out. I think what you're seeing right now is that You've got, you know, the real decision makers at the table now. You know, ADs can talk all they want about what they want to do and their plans. Coaches can talk all they want about what they want to do and their plans. But when push comes to shove, the university president is the one that's going to make those type of decisions.

And so that is where this speculation started to fly around is that in the Big Ten, their presidents were inching closer towards a cancellation of the season, and maybe more accurately a postponement until spring. And I think that what you see is that when that sector, the decision maker, that is that is mainly responsible for two things, right, the financial well-being of the university and the overall standing of the university. What you see is they become concerned with different things than what coaches and ADs and maybe any of us are concerned with. So while we can be told by people that the number one consideration is the health and safety of the players,

that is not accurate because what you have is the people that are trying to create the protocols and testing procedures in order to create that safety. are not at the table, and the people at the table are concerned with things like liability. They're concerned with things like the organization of the potential players union, the players united front that was going on in the last week. So what changed is the people that were actually at the table changed, and what they were concerned about changed. You know, liability is a massive issue. And in particular, in our ever litigious society where we have a boatload of plaintiff's lawyers that are advertising commercials maybe on your air, and we see them on TV all the time, that are throothing at the mouth to bring cases in regards to COVID-19 malpractice, if you will.

and they see the coffers of universities and conferences. And so the presidents are more aware of that than the athletic directors are. And I think that that's why you see this decision moving the way that it is. And I would just continue, Matt, if you don't mind. Sure, please. If you were actually concerned with the health and well-being of the player, here's the things that you would realize. They are safer and better cared for within the structure,

the testing protocols and procedures of a season, then they are outside of that. Okay, I feel like that is self-explanatory, but folks, if we just allow these kids to go back home like they were in the summer, these are not safe environments because they don't know if they're going to have the disease. They would be in far greater susceptibility to community spread. And if they did contract the disease, likely they would be asymptomatic because this age group is heavily asymptomatic, upwards of 40% asymptomatic. And then we wouldn't even know if they were having the heart condition issues that have now been associated in a very small percentage of cases

because they wouldn't be monitored by medical staff. In some cases, they'd be in multi-generational homes and they could be drivers of community spread to the more dangerous subset of the population. that's number one. So it's clear that they're more protected and safer and cared for under the structure of a season. And then you just look at the human impact of even a postponement, if you want to call it that. I would really be concerned about the deterioration of the mental health of the players. Can you imagine working your entire life almost singularly focused on the achievement of one area, which has provided all of the avenues of success in your life,

or virtually all the avenues of the success in your life, the reason you're at an institution for higher learning, and that was just ripped away from you under the guise of health and safety, even though we know that it's not really about health and safety, I would be very concerned about the deterioration and the mental health of that subset of our players, right? I mean, I think depression would be a big deal. And we see that time and time again throughout,

our country throughout these lockdowns, the suicide hotlines, depression hotlines, they have been inundated with calls. And I think that that's something that we need to take a look at because that's an unintended consequence of not having a football season. And I fail to mention even that this subset of our culture, this age range of our culture, suffers with mental health disorders, maybe more so than others. And we know this because of the statistics of causality of death. amongst this age group. Suicide is the number two cause of death amongst college age kids in America.

We need to be concerned about their mental health. We need to be aware of what could affect that in an adverse way. We need to be aware that substance abuse would likely increase. We've seen opioid deaths in places like Cook County, Illinois, double this year, according to their experts. I worry that guys would fall behind academically and maybe never come back. And then you get to the point where they've never been able to monetize their skill in their lifetime. And they would be losing the ability to create value in their athletic future. Just think of the last three number one picks in the draft.

Tyler Murray, Baker Mayfield, and Joe Burrow. Every one of those guys was considered maybe, maybe at best, a middle round draft pick before the last year that they had. And they went out there and played a season of college football and increased their monetary value close to $30 million. That's just the number one pick. Think about the guy that gets himself into a draftable form. I know I'm long-winded on this, but again, the unintended consequences of making these decisions need to be discussed. Matt, I'm not suggesting that the virus is not dangerous. I do know, and we all should know, based on the data provided by the CDC,

that it's not necessarily dangerous for the college age kid. That doesn't mean that the coaches and support staff are not in greater danger because they are based on their age and potential for compromised immune systems. And I'm not suggesting that we need to just whistle by the graveyard and say that this virus is not an issue because it is. But again, it's an issue whether you're in football or not. It's not selective to just being within the football structure. So if we just say, hey, you know, go about your life, I believe that that's far more dangerous, both to the human impact of the player themselves and for the health and safety when dealing with this virus on a larger extent. I feel like I got 40 things to follow up with that. I don't know where to start.

Let me go to, okay, so at the end of the day, these presidents who are now carrying all the powers as well as they should. Are you afraid that they're afraid that some kids are going to get it and then they're going to follow? lawsuits against schools and that's going to start a new run of class action against kids that were sent to play college football. Is that what do you think their fear is right now? In terms of liability. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think that that's what their fear is. I think that their fear on liability is in conjunction with the unknowns of the Player United movement and how quickly that, you know, gain traction. So because that presents a lot of unknowns and decision makers hate unknowns, right? They

want to make concrete decisions based on variables that they believe are constant or that they can predict. And that's a variable that they cannot predict. So how much more litigious would this subset of the culture get, the football players, knowing that they have this players united kind of backing behind them. I'm not sure, but that's something that I think is a bigger driver than we're all discussing right now. We're discussing just the virus. And I think in that room, the liability issue and the potential unionization of the players is a pretty big factor within these decisions. So if the Mac, Joel, Joe Clat-Fox Sports with us here, if the Mac decides to play football and doesn't go out last week and do this, is the big,

10 out there on its own today? Or do you feel like that the Big 10 took a lead off of a group of six school conference to make this? And then that you get the other power fives are kind of just waiting around and seeing what ultimately the Big Ten does later today. Yeah, I think, well, that's a good question. I think that the Big Ten liked to think of itself as a leader and a thought leader. In this case, I feel like they're misguided. The Pac-12 is going to do whatever the Big Ten does. So that's going to be those dominoes. I believe that the A.C. is going to do whatever the SEC does. And I think that the big 12 is probably on the fence in some cases. But I don't know what's driving this. I think that the, I will tell you right now,

I believe that there are really powerful and prominent voices that are getting involved today. And it's just prior to this six o'clock. By the way, there was no vote, right? So this whole thing that you saw earlier about, oh, it was 12.2. there was a vote by the president. There wasn't a vote. That was an inaccurate report. So they are meeting tonight at six, and some have speculated that a vote or an announcement might take place. So what you're seeing right now is a lot of coaches like Ryan Day, Scott Frost, Jim Harbaugh, schools and players and so on and so forth have started to buck their own presidents and start to push for their presidents to vote to let them play.

and to maintain the structure of a college football season. So I think it's going to be an incredibly interesting next probably 10 to 12 hours. And I think the fate of the college football season rests in the next 10 to 12 hours. Will we see a split, Joel? Can we see three of the power five say we'll stick around, two of them, one, or is it all or nothing? No, we could absolutely see a split. And I would go a step further, Matt. I think that we may even see a split within conferences.

Nebraska is coming out today and Scott Frost and their president, their governor, making it very clear that regardless of what the Big Ten decides that they want to play football and they will pursue those avenues to do so. So think about that, right? I mean, you could have Nebraska back in the Big 12th. Well, I never should have left to begin with. That's not here nor there. Listen, I don't disagree with you.

I don't disagree with you. But I just think it's an interesting conundrum that we have. Because think about it, if you're a school and you can get a schedule and you can play seven or eight games and your governor is allowing it, I mean, what really stops you? Right? I mean, it's an interesting thought. I got two last things for you. Hashtag we want to play. What is your take on all of that?

I think that the football players have some thought. I got two last things for you. Hashtag we want to play. What is your take on all of that? I think that the football players have stepped in in the void of leadership. I believe everything rises and falls on leadership. I believe that one side of the story was told for a long time about the quote-unquote dangers of playing and how can they play and so on and so forth. That's why I tweeted what I did on Friday. And what I think people on the other side of the issue were thinking was like, hey, cooler heads are going to prevail.

The data will prevail. The science will prevail. So on and so forth. And when that started to look like it wasn't happening, the players were like, hey, you can't tell us that we're allowed to voice our opinions when we want to opt out. And then you tell us that we can't voice our opinions and have a voice when we say we want to play. And I think that's an interesting kind of push and pull that we're seeing right now. But I think that if we do see football, specifically in the Big Ten this fall, it will be because of Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields. That's how much power, I believe, their movement over the weekend and specifically last night had.

And now what you're seeing is players and coaches getting on board with that. So kudos to those two individuals. You want to talk about alphas, you want to talk about leaders of men. Those two individuals have done a remarkable job. Last question. I was talking about this with my audience before you join me. I believe if there is no football in the fall, they've got to do everything in their power to play in spring of 2021. If they do not do so, college athletics will not be the same ever again.

I was talking about the third party rights of broadcasters like Learfield IM. I'm talking about schools that rely on college football to pay for their. athletic departments. I just, Joel, in a grandiose sense, if they don't play, we'll never going to see college athletics the same again. Do you agree or disagree? Completely agree.

Completely agree. And probably to a greater extent than you even realize, right? I think men's non-revenue sports and the intercollegiate athletic model will almost wholly cease to exist. And because of Title IX, colleges will try to maintain football by having, you know, and so they'll have the women's sports to weigh against that and kind of that balance of Title IX. But I think that we'll lose

tens of thousands of scholarship opportunities to boys and girls. I think that we could see a major fracture and reorganization of college football. You would see a major shift in college basketball and I think that it would look not just different but drastically different moving forward. We'll leave it at that, my friend. We hope to see you on Saturdays. I just don't know if it's going to happen. I know you will be doing Pig 10 game apparently, but congratulations on all your success. Great job with the XFL this year and hell, they may need you on NFL Sundays. You never know if this thing doesn't work out this way. But thank you for the time as always. You never know. Have a good one, man. I appreciate you having me on. Thanks very much. Joe Clot,

Fox Sports with us here at 218. A. Berry. sobering conversation. Don't get mad. I mean, the breaks late. I told, I told Brandon we can go late this time, but sometimes you can have good stuff on, and Joel certainly provided that. 218. The Matt Thomas show continues in a matter of moment. 713-212-5-790, with a message here for Shaw's jewelry at the corner West Graham-Montrose. They had been in that exact same intersection, new building, but at the same intersection since 1966. Taking care of those that need fine quality jewelry at reasonable prices. Zero percent financing on most purchases for 12 months. Got to take advantage.

of that. Got to take advantage of the fact that they can let you bring something in and trade it up to get a better piece of jewelry. They have a great on-site jeweler that can create the masterpiece that you'd want. And they also have a fantastic repair service as well that I personally use. Pre-owned Rolexes, absolutely diamond earrings, diamond pendants, anniversary rings, wedding sets of any sort. Get them done today at Shaw's Jewelry. Open Monday through Saturday 10 to 7. Saturday's 10 to 6 at the corner of West Graham Montrose at Shaw's jewelry. I think that the football players have stepped in in the void of leadership. I believe everything rises and falls on leadership.

I believe that that one side of the story was told for a long time about the quote-unquote dangers of playing and how can they play and so on and so forth. That's why I tweeted what I did on Friday. And what I think people on the other side of the issue were thinking was like, hey, cooler heads are going to prevail. The data will prevail. The science will prevail. so on and so forth. And when that started to look like it wasn't happening, the players were like, hey, you can't tell us that we're allowed to voice our opinions when we want money or want

to opt out. And then you tell us that we can't voice our opinions and have a voice when we say we want to play. And I think that's an interesting kind of push and pull that we're seeing right now. But I think that if we do see football, specifically in the big 10th, this fall. It will be because of Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields. That's how much power, I believe, their movement over the weekend, and specifically last night had. And now what you're seeing is players and coaches getting on board with that. So kudos to those two individuals.

You want to talk about alphas. You want to talk about leaders of men. Those two individuals have done a remarkable job. Last question. I was talking about this with my audience before you join me. I believe if there is no football in the fall, they've got to do everything in their power to play in spring of 2021. If they do not do so, college athletics will not be the same ever again. I was talking about the third-party rights of broadcasters like Learfield, IM, I'm talking about schools that rely on college football to pay for the athletic departments.

I just, Joel, in a grandiose sense, if they don't play, we'll never going to see college athletics the same again. Do you agree or disagree? Completely agree, completely agree, and probably to a greater extent than you even realize, right? I think men's non-revenue sports and the intercollegiate athletic model will almost wholly cease to exist. And because of Title IX colleges will try to maintain football by having, you know, and so they'll have the women's sports to weigh against that and kind of that balance of Title IX. But I think that we'll lose tens of thousands of scholarship opportunities to boys and girls.

I think that we could see a major fracture and reorganization of college football. You would see a major shift in college basketball. And I think that it would look not just different, but drastically different moving forward. We'll leave it at that, my friend. We hope to see you on Saturdays. I just don't know if it's going to happen. I know you will be doing Pig Ten game, apparently. but congratulations on all your success.

Great job with the XFL this year, and hell, they may need you on NFL Sundays. You never know if this thing doesn't work out this way. But thank you for the time, as always. You never know. Have a good one, man. I appreciate you having me out. Thanks very much.

Joel Clyde, Fox Sports with us here at 218, a very sobering conversation. Don't get mad. I mean, the breaks late. I told Brian that we can go late this time, but sometimes you just have good stuff on, and Joel certainly provided that. 21, Thomas show continues in a matter of moment.

713-212-2-790 with a message here for sure. Shaw's jewelry at the corner West Graham Montrose. They have been in that exact same intersection, new building, but are the same intersection since 1966. Taking care of those that need fine quality jewelry at reasonable prices. Zero percent financing on most purchases for 12 months. Got to take advantage of that. Got to take advantage of the fact that they can let you bring something in and trade it

up to get a better piece of jewelry. They have a great on-site jeweler that can create the masterpiece that you'd want. And they also have a fantastic repair service as well that I personally use. Pre-owned Rolexes, absolutely. Diamond earrings, diamond pendants, anniversary rings, wedding sets of any sort. Get them done today at Shaw's Jewelry. Open Monday through Saturday 10 to 7. Saturday's 10 to 6 at the corner of West Graham Montrose at Shaw's jewelry. On the trail, it's hard. And it drops it down with a left hand hammer. This is Coach Dan Tonin. Matt Thomas is a great guy. And I always listen to the radio show. On mute.

What a shot! Again, thanks to Joel Clatt from Fox Sports. By the way, a Twitter said, oh, no surprise that guy what he was saying came from Fox. I don't think Fox Sports has the slant that Fox News does. In fact, I can take a guarantee it does not. Not that everything that Joel was saying was 100% accurate, but it's just a one man's opinion.

I mean, Sean Hannity's not on the call on Saturdays? No, it's not live from Alabama. And Alabama and Auburn, alongside Sean Hannity. I'm Lauren Ingram. I can't even name Fox besides those people. Tucker Carlson. Oh, Tucker Carl's been like,

this is Tucker Carlson, and we are alive at the Cotton Bowl for OU versus Texas. Okay, Pact 12. Rush Limbaugh was on ESPN for a while. That lasts, what, a day? Boy, do you realize that ESPN people, if you went to ESPN right now on their campus and all their left leaning,

they said Rush was on their network, be like, no, he wasn't. Don't he? Wouldn't he fired like a day later? He left? He left a few weeks. Yeah, he didn't survive long. But didn't last long.

He said Donovan McNabb was only getting praised because he was black, right? Correct. Yeah, when you go to, you only get praised because someone's color, that's just not going to end well for anybody. First of all, it's not true. And second of all, it's stupid to say that.

So Pact 12 is going to vote tomorrow. Big Ten's going to vote today. What's going to happen? my lean is there not no way's playing now see I'm with the idea now how about the SEC though SEC beating their chest we're the MF and SEC

we're gonna play they said that no matter what no I'm saying they could if there's any league that could say that I would imagine I mean can you think of the upheaval in Mississippi and Alabama in Florida Florida if there was no college football

I here's what I wish I just wish that we could be told y'all just chill to January and you can play but nobody can say that plus there's a lot of people that are worried that it'd be too hard to have 20 games in one calendar year

this I think you're right this this could very well be the downfall of college footballism not because I'm trying to scare anybody not because I'm just telling you if they don't play at all Joel's right about one thing you say a lot of things

about Joel that you may agree or disagree with which I don't disagree with the whole lot, but the point being is this, there will be massive scholarship reductions, there will be massive sport eliminators, eliminations, and you're saying, well, I don't care about cross-country. Guess what I've talked about the cross-country. You know, cross-country dude is going to spend more money on his campus and spending money on scholarships and contributing than football player ever well.

This is the truth. Go look at golfers and cross-country people. people, any of those non-REB sports, they are more likely to contribute back to their school than anybody that ever received a scholarship. What do you mean? Did anybody receive what scholarship? Ross, you played football at Texas. Okay. And I played golf.

The chances are, even if you go to the pros and play, that I'm going to give my school more money towards fulfilling scholarships and endowments than you will. I don't know. Kevin Durant gave a lot of million dollars to Texas. But how often does that happen? I don't know. I don't think it's happened very much. I'm just saying. In numbers, probably, I guess.

Yeah, that's what we're saying. I'm not saying that's the value. That's the reason why you have those things. But that's a, first of all the graduation rate is very good of those not Olympic sports, I should say. And they're also the ones that tend to be more generous towards giving back to their own. I don't have any on that. I can't speak to one. I've just been told that by two different administrators at two different schools.

And I was blown away by the same thing. because I was the leader of the, well, you don't need to have a volleyball team. That volleyball team is going to wind up having two or three doctors out of the group that's going to help further push. I hope. By the like, Carla Thomas is available for full Division I scholarship runs. She's accepting office. And by the way, with the money I've lost this year, I need that in the most desperate of ways.

I just wonder long term, though, if they play, I think that's, it's your damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario. as I said, division two and division three have been canceled, right? And they have said, we're canceling it because of safety. If they say that and Division I says, well, we're going to play. But Division I's going to have... Then you get a lawsuit. But Division I's going to have the opportunity for many more safety precautions and regulations than a Division 2 or 3.

I'm sorry, strictly from a lawsuit standpoint. NCA sales, we're all about the students. All we care about is a student athletes. Well, if you say Division 2 and Division 3 are canceled because you're carried about the student athletes, it's not consistent. And I think that looks bad in a court of law. how many kids and the questions then there's just how many kids

would actually sue you need one all you need is one but how many how many litigious lawyers looking for a quick bucker out there as well let me ask you this

what did you do to make sure Ross Villa Reale the 18 year old student did everything in his power well we sent him to school and we gave him mask and we gave him

a sanitizer and we checked his temperature and we social distance and we did this this this this this well how did you Ross Villa Real the student catch the COVID.

Well, he was parting at 930 at 9 on a Tuesday night when he should have been in his dorm because we told him to do that. All you need is one kid to catch it. But if they can... Or they can trace it to a practice or whatever. But what if they can't? I think it's going... They're going to be outbreaks.

That's guarantee... But look where the outbreaks are. But look where the outbreaks are in baseball. They happened in a casino and a hotel bar. It didn't happen in the field. Yeah, but then what about the players who caught it from the guys who went not of all the 20 cases, and all 20 of them go to the casino.

That's true. But people not behaving themselves caused this problem. Yeah. In all these cases. 19 and 20-year-olds don't behave themselves. I'm just saying it's going to be hard to win a lawsuit if the individual school can say

we did everything under our power when he was on our watch to make sure that he followed the proper calls. I don't think it's worth it honestly. I just think the amateurism thing is in danger. danger. Oh, for sure. All right, 2.30 is our time. We'll get back on the clock here. Half hour left to go. Believe it or not, all things about Camano the Ugandan giant in 20 minutes on the Matt Thomas show. Our time is 230. 713-212-5-790. I recently purchased a vehicle. We're going to be purchasing a vehicle for my youngest son, Peyton, so he can drive to school. And I need to get a little loan for a little financial assistance. So I went with a group that I've been speaking for for the last three or four years. And that's the Shell Federal Credit Union. I'm getting a 36-month loan at 1.99% APR. That's something you can do as well for a new vehicle, a used vehicle, or a pre-owned vehicle. Do yourself a favor. Find out what kind of

rate you can get by going to shellfcU.org and applying online. That shellfcU.org for new, used and pre-owned, uh, say, refinanced vehicles at 1.99%. I trust me, friends, I was astonished how all the rate is and how much money you'll be able to be able to. You'll be able to. I, uh, refinanced, I'm able to get for such a very, very low interest rate, especially when it's something important like paying for college or getting a new car for someone or whatever you need to help you get through these tough times. ShellfCU.org, shellfc u.org. Welcome home to shellfc u.cc. We are former players. We are lifelong fans and we're your home for your voice. Houston's going to have this voice with her today. Sports talk 790. Your most complete lineup in

Houston sports. 236 Sports Talk 790. We'll have a believe it or not today. We're giving away Consolation Field tickets for the Skeeters a little 14 league they got out there. Outside baseball? You mean the Astros Farm System? Well, or tomorrow's starter.

See the stars of Astros in September today. That Constellation Field. need something how cranky is dusty going to be in a couple hours he's not going to be happy he didn't sound happy when he got asked if things were spiraling out of control it's so funny why you always so negative that was channeler rome well have you met channel he's a pretty negative dude so that's come to come to zero surprise we love him

yeah what's the positive question you're supposed to talk about when you lost five straight and there was a giant brawl and the entire country hates you what's what's the positive angle on that one yeah remember one important thing dusty we love having dusty on the show of course um america hates Astros? Yes, they do. Should they? I would hope not, but in reality is anytime anything bad happens to the Astros, like who is this D that was, is it Joel Sherman again getting in that said that Alex Centron should be punished to the maximum because of, well, yeah, somebody else, Bay Area guy wanted him, uh, the Raiders writer that who, somebody, McDonald, Jerry McDonald or

something like that, I don't know. No, why he always asked me a negative question? Well, I'll be nice with Dust. Always. Because again, Dusty's one of those guys, and I don't know him at all, obviously because we've not been able to get, I mean, we met him down in spring training, but that's about it. Swell, fella. He just, I just feel like a guy that could just be the most amazing storyteller of all time. Now, he's not here to tell stories. He's here to win baseball games and to try to keep calm.

And again, and maybe I'm, and maybe I'm being wrong about this, but I don't, I mean, when you think of the greatest managers of all time. Like a Connie Mac? Yes, like a Casey Stingle, if you will. A Bill Varden. You don't even know who Bill Varden is, do you? I know that name, yeah. There's Astros in the 80s. Yeah, good, very nice.

The 80 team of the National League. I'll take your word for it. Okay. You lose a starter, ace reliever. You lost ace starter in free agency. You lost really good setup guy in free agency. You've had numerous injuries to your rookie of the year. I mean, rookie of the year,

Sy Young and one of your top and one of the top five closers in the business I mean that's pretty tough and his backup the setup man just blew the game

on Friday night couldn't get her didn't record it out Cole Calhoun yeah by way spell your name I was Thursday night I guess

spell your name like a real person it's COLE not K it's not his choice well okay Mrs. Calhoun fix that for next time she wanted to call him Cole my father was a teacher

for all of his adult life and he said that he said he's mad no matter what just spell your kids names normally because they're going to have to constantly have to worry about somebody misspelling their name or mispronouncing it my i have three kids names i have cameron peyton and carly you wouldn't believe the number of ways people spell carly's name to me patent's pretty easy it's either a p e y t o in which what he is or p a y is she c a r l y she's c a r l y that is that is is the most common Carly out there.

Like Carly Simon? Like Simon? Or Ray Jessupin? She's good. Was she a one-hit wonder, by the way? I think so. Okay. What's your second favorite

Carly Ray Jepson song? I couldn't even tell you. Okay. That song was so popular back in the day, though? The Call Me Maybe? Yeah. It was huge. Five or six years ago,

all the kids are up there moving their hands around and whatnot. Now they're just TikTok into it now. That's true. Okay. 240 on Sports Talk 7-9. You're going to say something? No.

Okay. She did have another hit. What was it called? Good time? Never heard of it. It was a number one hit. What? In Canada.

Oh, well, that is a number eight in the United States. We still are doing a fantasy five worst. No, we did 2010s, did we? Worst number ones. We didn't do two, we did 2000s. I don't know if we did 2010s. Call me maybe was a number one hit in 2011. Oh, that'd be right up your wheelhouse, Brendan.

Then we can just go through your entire. Yeah, I'll just have you go against Brandon, Matt. Go against your iPhone there. I would have to do the best, though, because like the number one hits in the 2010s were good. Every one of the one of the one. of them? Most of them. Let's not get crazy.

No, I would actually have to bow out of that one. So Call Me Maybe is a great song. Dude, call me maybe was like, it's catchy. It's not terrible. It's not terrible.

My senior year of high. Oh, my God. No, it's catchy. It's fine. Okay. So in two weeks when we resume

on the Fantasy 5, you guys will do the worst, we'll do the worst number ones of 2010. Yeah, can we, me? You and him, yeah.

Yeah, you need a bow. I just been crushing you recently. That's because all your friends have called in. I don't have friends, Matt. You know that. Let me tell you the funniest thing happened on Friday with our Fantasy 5. So you said that I was going back and saying that how everybody on Twitter loved my list. And you said name one person.

And I said, cool person. That was hilarious. So five minutes later, someone went to Twitter and created a website. A Twitter account named Cool Person. With a lot of underscores. And I, yeah. Matt, I did. not vote you the best.

So it was just very funny. That was hilarious. I like that. All right. So Astros for the Giants. Rockets, by the way, let's update the folks on this real quick. Russell Westbrook's going to play tomorrow against San Antonio. Wonderful.

James and Eric will not, but those two guys will play against the Indiana Pacers on Wednesday and not play tomorrow. It's good. I just want to see him out there. Healthy, get in their shape, get their win. Certainly, Eric Gordon. I'm less worried about Russell Westbrook being in shape just because he's Russell Westbrook, I guess.

You know what I want? I want Eric for four or five straight games. It didn't have to go nine for ten like he did against Utah or whatever it was. Just pop two or three and look fluid, but it has been really a lot of feast or famine for him. Eric Gordon, no. I mean, that's every year, I feel like. He's Mr. 1 of 7 or 5 of 7.

That's it. No middle ground. Exactly. He never goes a whole home like four for 10. Like nice little even 40%. I'll take 40% the rest of the year. Yes. How about this?

If Eric Gordon shoots 40% from three, the rest of the way, can the Rockets win the championship? Or will the Rockets win the championship? Will is different. Can, of course. Because here's the thing. Do you think James in numbers in this bubble-type playoff atmosphere is going to be dramatically different?

Because think about this, you do see rather different splits with a number of free throw attempts for James when he goes on the road. Because when the whistle is going to be a little tighter for guys like that. That shouldn't be an issue. A foul is going to be a foul. in the bubble where it may not be a foul if you're playing half your games in a different city. We'll see. I think the free throw attempts thing has been overblown in the playoffs.

A little bit. He's usually one or two less a game. That's one call game. And Russ has got to be going, I don't have to shoot a lot of threes because guess what? I haven't done it. He hasn't shot, what does he shoot per game? One and a half, two, three-pointers per game now? Yeah, somewhere on that range.

Yeah, that's fine. That's where I want them. And I want the wide open in rhythm looks. So I can't imagine Russ going well. It's playoff time. I'll start jacking up six. game. That's the thing, man. The biggest worry I had about Crazy Russ

was him being Crazy Russ. Well, he went crazy Russ because he was the only thing going on that team. The Rockets have a number of other options. They got four guys who scored 40 points this season. Yeah. So, you gotta get Robert Coventon going and PJ Tucker. To me, those are way bigger issues than what Russ does some three-point range.

All right, let's play, believe it or not, next. 713-1-2-5-790. We honor Kamala the Ugandan Giant. He passed away yesterday at the age of 70. How old do you Kamala, it might get you tickets to see the Skeeters at Consolation Field. I think it's this Friday for fireworks. Am I right about that?

I think it's what it is. We'll tell you more about that momentarily. 244 on Sports Talk 790 with a message for Oops, Steam, Cleaning. How by getting your carp is professionally clean the right way? 281-822-0561 is the number you should be calling for oops. 281-8-2-0-561. Cleaning Oriental rugs is a chore. It can be difficult, and more importantly, you can damage those roads.

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Hey, is Daniel? House. Matt Thomas continues now. On Sports Talk 790. 249 of the Matt Thomas show. Tomorrow, Rockets basketball in this time slot. Please listen. You know, I do these games

for you, sports. Why? I don't know. I just feel like I'm just having a personal conversation with you. Okay. So we've got back-to-back day games. Tomorrow will be the new launch pad with you. I'll be on with the wax at 1230 and I'll have the call at 1 o'clock. And then Wednesday, we'll have Dusty Baker, I believe at 1230,

just trying to firm that up. And then we'll have Rockets basketball at 2 with the Pacers with a tip off of 3 o'clock. And Craig, and I believe it's Adam Clanton on that call. And then Friday they wrap up the regular season against Philadelphia. And then the playoffs start next Monday against. Call your shot. What do you got? Rockets are will be playing the Oklahoma City Thunder.

As a four or five. It doesn't matter. four. Well, if it's four, that means I don't work the game. It's a five, I do. Oh. Okay. I'm not getting any more money.

I mean, just it is what it is. Yeah, that's true. It really doesn't matter. Well, okay, even if they have four home games or three, it doesn't matter. Mm-mm. Okay. I will do all the road games. You know what?

Let's get you on more calls. They'll be the five. Okay. That means it probably dropped two of the three, though, right? No, I'm going to sweep them out. No, I'm talking about regular season games. Uh, maybe. Yeah.

They're only one game ahead of the Thunder, right? What's the, what's the, and I believe they're like a true one game ahead. They played the same amount of games. Mm-hmm. And the Thunder are losing to the Phoenix Suns right now. Okay, so that means the Rockets are going to be one step closer. If they beat San Antonio, they're knocking out that, secure in the number four spot. Well, it's an end of the half.

They're down one. Oh, well, then we can't use that then. All right, so that's what got going on. And then Thursday and Friday, I'm going to take my son up to a little bit to drop them off in school. How's that drive going? It's going to suck. You know what? You should listen to it on the way up there.

I will call you guys from the road. Okay. And I'll be pissed off. It's just the worst drive ever. I mean, I've never made that drive. I don't want you to. I mean, there's a lot of bad things I want you to do in your life. That's not one of them.

Okay. Longest drive I've ever made is, how many hours is that? Solid nine. Okay. And here's the thing is that even if we want to make it eight, we can't because we're hauling a trailer, which is going to slow us down. Oh, yeah, take your time. Be safe, man.

It's rough out there. I'm just pissed off thinking about it. My awesome son had to pick the furthest place in Texas to go to school. Well, no, he could go to UT El Paso. That's true. That would be a hall. That is a hall. Five minutes left to go on the show.

What should we do? We should play America's fastest growing sports game show. We simply called it believe it or not. And here's how it works. You'll call 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. Today's edition of Believe It or Not is brought to you by Woodhouse Day Spas. Perhaps you give a car for the gift of relaxation at Houston woodhouse spas.com.

Category today is all things about the life of times of Kamala, the Ugandan giant. I'll read your statement about Kamala. If the statement's completely utterly accurate, you'll say this. If the statement's erroneous full of bunker made up, you'll say this. Two believe it or not in a row. Won you a prize. Ross, what's the prize? Yes, Matt, we got a four-pack of ticket to some minor league baseball played at Constellation Field in Sugarland.

It's four teams consisting of former major leaguers and players who've reached AAA and AA. Roger and Kobe Clemens are managing one team. Greg Swindell and Pete Inkevilia managing other teams. So it should be some good minor league baseball. They're at Constellation Field. Games running through August 30th, Sugarland Skeeters.com for more information. I will say this. and don't get mad at me for doing this.

Really the way we should play, believe it or not today to honor Kamala is if the statement's completely and utterly accurate, you should slap your belly. And nobody can hear, no, I don't want to hear anybody slapping anything. So do not slap your belly, but that would be the right way to honor Kamala. Let us play. Line one, Tyler on 790, ready to play, believe it or not?

Believe it. James Harris played offensive tackle for Alcorn State, and it's the National Black College Union Hall of Fame. Believe it or not. Not. That is correct. Statement number two for the win. When Kamala first wrestled in the WWF in the mid-1980s, he was managed by Classy Freddie Blassie.

Believe it or not. Not. That is a believe it. He was managed by several different people, but the first one was Classy Freddie. Duh. Who's your favorite classy Freddie Blassie wrestler? John Stamos. No, I'm going to go with Adrian Adonis on that one.

Stephen on 790. Stephen, you ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. Early in his wrestling career, James Harris wrestled under a number of unique names, including the Mississippi Mallor and Sugar Bear. Believe it or not? Believe it. Statement number two for the win. As Kamala, James Harris, was billed as being 6'7 tall and 380 pounds.

Believe it or not. Believe it. There you go, going to the Skeeter's game. Congratulations. He was like 6-3-3-10. I never saw him in person. But you see what he looks like. He looks like he could go 6-7-3-80, right?

I guess. Line number three. Andy on 790. Andy, you ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. In 1984, Ugandan ambassador to the United States, Milton Ubutei, denounced Camalo's portrayal as a blithing, irresponsible representation of Ugandan culture. Believe it or not.

Believe it. No, Ross made that up. And that may be, that is one you want to use for the Hall of Fame at the end of the year, the best of those. The best of us. 713-212-5-7-9. If you want to play Ugandan, believe it or not, with Kamala. Let's go to line number four. James on 790.

James, you're ready to play, believe it or not? You better believe it, brother. Kamala, the Ugandan giant's signature move was the African footstomp, where did he dance and stomped on the head of an opponent. Believe it or not. Believe it. No, you don't even know Kamala then. That was a weak one.

All right, I got time for one more if you want to get in. 713, 2, 1,2, 5, 790. Not a lot of Kamala fans here on the, believe it or not today. A four pack of tickets to some baseball where there are social distancing and taking a seating. A social distancing seating plan is in effect. There are a consolation field. All right. Last chance.

713, 2125.790. Hmm. Mm. Either consolation price tickets suck or you don't know enough about Kamala to play, but we'll leave it at that. People are scared of these fantastic questions. All right. My other last two were, the man who handled Kamala's African mask and his spear was named Friday. That's a believe it.

I'll see now they're all calling in right now. It's too late. Just take one real quick. Real fast. Line one, you ready? Here we go. You ready? Yeah, yeah.

John Harris also recorded hundreds of songs as Zytoe and R&B singer. and released the album as the best of Kamala, Volume 1 in 1994. Believe it or not. Hello? Hello, hello. Did you hear my question? No, I did not. Oh, great.

That's enough. Massive LMI part. A team is up next. Thanks for calling. We'll talk to you all tomorrow for Rockets on 790.