The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Rockets/ Astros Offseason & Texans This Weekend

Episode Date: October 23, 2020

Hey, this is Tom Davis from the Woodlands, and this is your shout at $1,000 on Sports Talk 790. Text this nationwide keyword, cash, C-A-S-H to 200-200. You'll get a confirmation text and info, standard data and message rates apply in this nationwide contest. Text cash to 200-200. You said, so much larger than life. Yeah! Lunch timers is the Matt Thomas show. 12 in H-town.

Should I do it, Brendan? Should I do it? It's a Friday tradition. I'm just not as good at it as Matt. I guess you just got to let a rip. Oh, geez. All right, anyways, hello and welcome in to the Matt Thomas show here on Sports Talk 790 Ross V. Ria Rial with you.

It is the Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. Until 3 o'clock, we got a jam-pack show, however, a lot of different things to get to. First and foremost, it's you folks on the phone lines at 713-212-5-7-90. 7-19. 2-1-2-5-7-90 tweets to at SportsRV and at Brendan Riley underscore. We've got Brian T. Smith coming up later on. We've got some picks. We've got a horrible Football Friday parody from Chris Gordy coming up at 1250, where Matt Thomas will join and he will react live.

And we also have to talk about a number of different things going on. There's stuff going all over the NFL. is Antonio Brown going to be picked up? You have a last night. Did you catch much of the... Did you watch the debate last night, Brennan? Okay, well, I can't hear you at all for some reason. I don't know.

Why is this now working? Did somebody leave their microphone on in here? I'm going to blame... I'm going to blame somebody else in here. I don't know. Whatever. While you're talking, just put the music... I could hear the music, but I couldn't hear you, Brendan. Are you flipping your microphone on?

My monitor's broken, I think. Okay, well, that's what we're going to have to deal with here. We'll get that fixed in a couple of minutes. I can't talk to you, Brendan. Just send me smoke signals and maybe everything will be okay. All right, so anyways, so last night you had Daniel Jones going for a long run and just completely falling down. Are you to come in here? Okay, well, that's not the issue.

I don't think so, man. But thank you. I appreciate you. Brennan is trying his best to help us out and fix this show because I am just running this one into the ground already. We might even have to restart this one. No, I don't think so. All right, anyways. So you had last night the Thursday,

football. How much of the day? Were you watching football or were you watching the debate last night, Brennan? I watched 30 minutes of the debate last night. 30 minutes? What was it on for like 145? I checked on it. You know when I checked on it? It was during, it was a half time of the Philadelphia Eagles and Giants game. I can't remember what they were talking about. But whoever your candidate is that you're voting for, that guy clearly won the debate. There's no question. He looked great. The other guy looked like an idiot. And your guy's definitely going to win the election. But anyways, I was watching Sunday at football last night where Daniel Jones completely just ran over the, had a wide open run to the end zone and then just completely fell down. That was entertaining. And so we got that stuff to get to.

The NBA apparently is eyeing a Christmas start. We'll talk about that later going on. You have coronavirus issues with the Oakland Raiders. I'm sorry, the Las Vegas Raiders, as they have some issues. So a lot of different things to get to. but we'll start here locally with the Houston Astros. So this saga continues now with the whole sign stealing thing and all that that's been going on. It gained a new life.

What was it? Tuesday night? Was that when Jeff Luno was talking on KPRC Local 2? He came out and he said, well, I don't know anything. I don't know what's going on. I didn't know about it. I had no clue. I ran a good clean program and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And basically defended himself. and said that there were 22,000 text messages, and none of them said that he had anything to do with it, and that the report from Rob Manfred said that he wasn't involved. Some of that, not exactly completely true. And now it's coming out. You're getting multiple people talking about this and refuting things that Jeff Luno said.

And when it first came out, and we first talked about it here on this show, I think that was one of my first days back here in Houston from vacation, because I was in LA all last week. We talked about whether or not we bought what Jeff Luno was selling. And I was skeptical because Jeff Luno, as we know, was as general manager of the Houston Astros. He was very controlling.

He was involved in various aspects of the organization that didn't even have to do with baseball. And he just kind of had his finger in every pot, as it were, when it comes to the Houston Astros. So for me to believe that there was all these things going on and he had no idea about it, I found it, I was a little bit skeptical. I'll put it that way. You're going to tell me that there are reports that this was player driven, of course, with staffers and with coaching, and there was discord in the clubhouse over it. Because if you recall, there was apparently a faction of players who wanted to stop the scheme and they were overridden by Carlos Beltron. And then, of course, famously, as we, as has been talked about, AJ Hinch tried to stop the scheme.

He takes a baseball bat to multiple monitors. And so there is so much upheaval in the clubhouse in this organization that you have differing factions of players arguing of whether or not this scheme should continue. You have the manager of the team literally beating monitors up with a baseball bat. and Jeff Luno never caught wind of one word of this? Could you imagine if something like that happened here and no one got word of it? Like you bashed the TV in and it never got to management. Oh man, I'm going to tell you that if it never got to management, maybe that, no, that's not possible.

It would get to management that day. It would get to management. Yeah, because we got a bunch of snitches on this roster. I'm telling you right now. No, I'm just kidding. So, yeah, absolutely. There should be no way. And if all of that were happening, if I were arguing with other hosts and we were disagreeing on certain things

and it was getting to a personal level and I'm beating up stuff and destroying property? Well, of course management is going to hear about it. So how would Jeff Luno not hear about it? How would nobody, how would not one player, not one staffer, not one coach or manager, at some point say, man, Jeff, did you hear what? Did you hear what A.J. Hinch did?

No, what did A.J. Hinch do? I just had some tuna salad with him the other day. Yeah, he beat up a monitor with a bat. Oh, and then you, the net, you don't just say, oh, okay, cool. I'm going to go to my next appointment. You say why. And you figure that out.

And oh, by the way, Jeff Lunoe had conversations with AJ Hinch about the roster and other various goings on with the team daily, if not more. So you're going to tell me you're talking to A.J. Hinch daily. There's this skin going on, and A.J. Hinch didn't tell you one word about it. It doesn't hold water for me. And it didn't hold water for Rob Manford when he talked about it. And now you have the man who, um, the man who, was at the center of this investigation, alongside with Ken Rosenthal, who blew the top on the entire thing. Evan Drellick of the Athletic came out with an article yesterday. And it's somewhat

lengthy. It's on the athletic. I encourage you to read it because I don't know, the athletic is a good website, and you should support them. But I'll give you the gist of some of what he said. So this from Evan Drelick. Jeff Linneau's interview with a Houston television station this week included assertions that were either misleading or inaccurate, according to people with knowledge of Major League Baseball's findings during the Ashro's sign-stealing investigation. Those individuals continue to cast doubt on Lu No's credibility, saying there was, quote, direct testimony, end quote, that he was aware of the rule breaking. And so there are a lot of different things that talk about, that Evendrelic talks about,

and he has some quotes from Rob Manfred. And one of the other things, and this is one of the key quotes from this article. and this embodies exactly what I'm talking about and exactly what we're talking about when it comes to this science stealing scandal with Jeff Luno and whether or not he knew. One witness clearly stated and provided evidence that Luno knew and others identified facts indicating that Luno knew. The best interpretation of the evidence is that Luno either knew exactly what the video room was doing or knew generally what they were doing and willfully chose to keep himself in the dark.

and that's, I think, at the crux of what we're talking about here. Jeff Luno knew what was happening, in my opinion. Jeff Luno also knew that he was, if he was involved or if anything came down on this and his name was on any of this, it would spell the in for him. Well, it ended up spelling the infirm anyways and after turning a blind eye, but I think Jeff Luno caught wind of this. I think Jeff Miluno knew what was going on but said, do not involve me. He basically probably said something along the lines of, stop this immediately.

If you don't, I don't want to know about it. I don't want to have anything to do with it. Keep my name out of it. Keep my name out of your mouth, out of your emails, out of your text. Because I want to be able to say I had zero involvement in this when the bleep hits the fan. Well, the bleep did hit the fan for the Houston Astros. And there was a lengthy investigation. and the problem is this.

Even if you didn't know about it, you should have. It's basically a lack of institutional control situation. You know, and people, remember when the whole thing happened with Art Bryles and all the Baylor fans were defending them? Art Bryles didn't know anything about this. Art Bryles didn't have anything to do with this. Art Bryles should be keeping his job. Art Bryles is a head man in charge.

And if there are multiple, what was it like a dozen plus of rape-related? cases on campus were revolving around your players, you either knew about it or knew about it or didn't know about it and you should have. So that makes you culpable when you're the man in charge. When you're the boss, the people that are under you are your responsibility. And that's what happened with Jeff Luno. I think he was very nonchalant about it. I think the same thing of A.J. Hinch, he could have done more to stop it.

And they said, you know what? It's one of those, what we talked about earlier in the week, the bystander effect. Right? The bystander effect is when a crime is being committed or something is happening, the more bystanders there are, the less likely anybody is to do anything about it. So, well, I don't know. That guy's not calling the police. Somebody else will call the police.

It's exactly that. Jeff Lino's like, well, I don't know. They're not stopping. I'm not going to stop it. Somebody else will stop it. They'll figure it out. And then that's, but when you're the head man, it is, you say it's not my problem. it is your problem.

And I think that's what happened with the Houston Astros and Jeff Lunar. We got a lot of different things to get to here on the Matt Thomas show till 3 o'clock. If you want to get in and weigh on that, 713, 2,125. 790 is your phone number 713-1-2-5-790. Tweet's at SportsRV

and at Brendan Riley underscore. It is the Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. Continuing until 3 o'clock here on Sports Talk 790. Tyler White here. Back to Matt Thomas. And it is gone. And Sports Talk 790.

Home of Astros baseball. Teen, the Sports Talk 790, Ross Villarreal with you. Jampack Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. Got a lot of different things going on. Coming up at 2 o'clock, we will have Brian T. Smith of the Houston Chronicle to talk about all things Houston Sports. And, of course, the Houston Texans with a focus there as they are set to take on the Green Bay Packers this weekend. We'll also have Matt Moore, formerly of CBS Sports and others. Now with the Action Network, he covers the NBA like nobody's business.

want to talk to him about the Rockets offseason, what's happening with their coaching search, get the outside perspective, the national perspective on what's going down on Polk and LaBranch at the Toyota Center and where will the Rockets will be moving forward with their coaching search. We also got picks to make. We have our own picks. Just a jam-packed show here on Sports Talk 790. You know what else we could use? We could use you guys on an anything goes Friday.

713-212-5-790 is the phone number. 321257. 90 tweets at Sports RV and at Brendan O'Reilly underscore Matt Thomas is out of town. Did we ever get confirmation? Is he going to wear the naval outfit on the sidelines for the University of Houston Cougars this weekend? I don't think he's going to. I really wanted him to. I mean, I know he probably wasn't going to. I think he pulled off. I think Matt Thomas in a Navy sailor costume would look fantastic. He'd look younger. You know what? I think so too. Because Matt's actually looked the same. Matt's looked 50 since he was 37, and now he's 47, so he looks about right.

So anyways, hopefully I'm hoping that Matt Thomas is listening because I know we got the, also the Friday football, the horrible Friday football parody by Chris Gordy. That's coming up at 1250. So a lot of things to get to here on the show. Talking in the last segment about the Jeff Luno thing and the latest, you kind of knew that there was going to be some people to pipe up about it because it just didn't seem like everything that Jeff Luno was saying was accurate. For him to come out and say that there was no evidence against me and no one said I knew,

I was like, wait a minute, I read that whole report. And there were people that said they thought that Jeff Luno knew, and it was his word against somebody else's. And that's one of the things that Jeff Luno highlighted. Well, it's my word against one other guy. And I just, it was, I can't remember the guy's name. It was Tom Cook Wesser, who worked in the Astros video room. That was his name and assisted in the sign stealing. Apparently, his phone is the one that they, uh, they acquire.

during the investigation and also he said that Jeff Luno knew about it. Yes, Matt Thomas is listening. I'm sorry, he's 48 and sexy AF is what Matt Thomas said. So yeah, he should have wore the naval costume. Come on, Matt, get it together. Anyways, so you had this guy, Tom Cook Wesser, who apparently Jeff Luno says it comes down to his word against the other. And you also had the comments coming out about Rob Manfred addressing what Jeff

Luno said. Here's what Rob Manfred had to say. I don't want to rehash the whole Houston situation. I'd say two things. First of all, the 22,000 electronic messages that Jeff talked about over and over again were a fraction of the evidence in the case. There was a lot of other evidence, electronic testimonial, which indicated Jeff's culpability in this matter.

Secondly, whether he exactly knew what was going on or not is really beside the point. After the Apple Watch incident, I wrote to all the GMs, I put them on notice that it was their obligation to make sure that their organizations were not violating any of the sign stealing rules. I think it's pretty clear from the facts that Mr. Lunau failed to discharge that obligation. He damaged the game and as a result he was disciplined. Damn. He got a little salty there at the end, didn't he? he damaged the game and thus he was punished.

You got to imagine he wants that conversation to stop too. Yeah, I think, I mean, I feel like for the most part, Houston fans are a little bit tired of it. And it's just back in the news this week because of Jeff Fluno. And there are ripples reverberating around the baseball world because of what Jeff Luno said. He came up. First of all, I found it odd that he just went to local too.

And now I know he had a relationship with Vanessa Richardson. You guys had her on when I was not here, right? And they talked about how there was, I don't know, some relationship with the family, the Luno family and Vanessa Richardson? I don't know. I don't recall that to be. It isn't matter. But I found it curious that, well, I guess you wouldn't go to ESPN.

You probably hate MLB Network. Fox wouldn't seem to be an issue with, we talked about this earlier in the week, with Ken Rosenthal and all them. I just found it curious that for your tell-all and for you to defend yourself and you're telling your side of the story, wouldn't you want the whole nation to hear about this? wouldn't you want everybody or as many eyes and ears as possible on your interview as you try to clear your name? But he had to know it was going to get there, right? So maybe you prefer to get there in sound bite for him versus long form? Rather than having the entire nation watch and poke holes in this story that you seem to be fabricating.

Because the more we get away from it, the more I just don't believe what Jeff Luno said. There's just no way you just have to think logically about this. There's no way he didn't know. or you either you don't know or you should have known. There's no way he's that insulated from the day-to-day goings-on of the Houston Astros. And like I said, with all this, everything going on and all the issues in the video room and the players arguing about it and Jeff Luna, I mean, A.J. Hinch, destroying monitors. There's just no way.

So just curious to me that Jeff Luna would come out with this and not surprising at all that Evendrelic has already come out and refuted everything that he's talking. talking about, or most of everything that he's talking about, as has Rob Manfred. 713-2125-790 is the phone number, 7-1-3-2-1-2-5-790, if you want to weigh in on that. And speaking of the Astros, a lot of the things that we have to figure out, and we're going to talk about. It's Astros topic A now for the next, it seems like, I guess, whenever they're going to come back with the baseball season, is it going to start on time?

Will it not be in a bubbled environment? Of course, it won't be. How are they going to deal with it? And when will we come back? And will we come back on time? The question is, who's going to be back on the Houston Astros roster? And that's what we're going to have to figure out. And that's what we're going to be talking about.

Is George Springer going to be back? Is Michael Brannley going to be back? Is Josh Redick going to be back? With Carlos Correa get a deal. And I think if I – just looking at that deal by deal and case by case, I kind of talked about it this way. It seems like the porridge right in the middle would be a Michael Brantley, deal. George Springer is going to be a little bit too expensive. Josh Redick, not really good enough player at this age, unless you just get a deep, deep discount from him because Jetredick, his wife,

has talked about on Twitter how they want to stay in Houston, but everybody talks about how they want to stay wherever they are, and then the offers start coming to the table, and that's when things change. So will Michael Brantley be back? That's what we have to figure out, and I think the most important priority, priority number one for James Clicking this offseason is to lock up Carlos Correa long term, which is funny to say, well, I've been saying it for a long time, but you talk about one year ago from today where people were on Carlos Correa, I think a lot of people were ready to just throw him out because of the injury issues for whatever reason. People wanted to just a bag on him because of his attractive wife was saying things on YouTube.

I don't know. But to me, that's priority one right now. 713, 2.12, 5, 790. Let's go to Jay, in Willowbrook on the phone lines of the Matt Thomas show. What's up, Jay? Sports I would be good afternoon. How you doing, man? Well, what do you got, Jay?

Hey, listen, I mean, comment, first of all, yeah, I think you guys are absolutely right, man. I can't see any reason why Jeff Duno wouldn't have known, man. I mean, because he wanted to really believe, like, he's sitting in his office and having a meeting with somebody. He had all just banging and clanging of monitors and everything being bad. And the guy in front of him says, hey, do you hear that? And Jeff Duhna said, here what? I don't hear anything. I mean, he knew, man.

He knew exactly what was going on. But check this out. Before Luno came to the Astro, this is when they were in the National League. Didn't he come to Houston in the wake of some scandal that was with the Cardinals and the Astros? I forget exactly what the context was about that. But there was something going on in St. Louis while he was the GM up there, I think, before he came to Houston, wasn't it? There was a scandal. The guy's name was – it was the last name was Correa, but Chris Correa, I believe, was his name.

Right, right. And I don't think, John. Jeff Luno was involved in that. Oh, he wasn't involved in that. What was the nature of that? It was something. I think the Astros got a couple of compensatory picks or something. Yes.

So the Cardinals had hacked into the Astro. They either got the password. I can't remember. They hacked in the Astro scouting system, and they were looking at basically notes about how the Astros are scouting players and what they thought of players and stuff like that. That's what it was. I think, but, okay.

Well, thanks, man. Listen, man, keep up the good work, but I'd like to hear you, man. but, you and Matt, a good team, and Brendan, y'all do a good job, man. Keep it up. All right, thanks a lot, Jay. Appreciate you getting in. And Matt Thomas will be back soon. He is going to be traveling with the University of Houston Cougars.

But today is the Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. But, yes, I'll try to find the whole details on it. Wasn't it just Chris Correa, apparently, according to the Cardinals organization, went rogue. He had hacked into the Astros system, and he found out the way that they were evaluating players. basically spied on the Astros, stole information for them, and how they evaluated players. But I don't believe Jeff Luno was in the Cardinals' organization when that happened. All right, 713, 2125, 790 is the phone number. 7132125, 790.

This is a Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. We got the horrible football Friday, parody from Chris Gordy coming up in about 20 minutes and a lot of other things to get to it. It's the Matt Thomas without Matt Thomas with it until 3 o'clock. Hey, this is Whitney Mercerless. The Texans this year. Listen to real Texan talk on your smart speaker. Just say, hey, Google.

Play Sports Talk 790 on IHeart Radio. Talk Cougars football. Weekdays on Sports Talk 790. Here, Cougars football. Saturdays on KPRC 950. Get the best coverage of your Coogs. A beautiful day in Houston, Texas here. Sports Talk 790, 1230 in the PM.

Coming up at 1 o'clock, we'll have Matt more of the Action Network. to talk about the Rockets and their head coaching search and what's going on with that. And we'll be interested to get some national perspectives from Matt Moore. We've been covering the NBA very well for a very long time. Then coming up in the next segment, we will have the horrible football Friday parody from one Chris Gordy. And I saw what song that he used. Should I tease what song he used or should I not even say? Should I just keep the people in the dark and let them figure out?

I think you have to keep it in the dark. That's one of the exciting moments, right? I know. Is hearing that start of the song and figuring out what he's his parodying? Yeah, well, I'll just put it this way. It is classic rock. It's a classic rock ballad. And when Chris Gordy does a classic rock ballad,

you know that it's going to be absolute freaking gold. So looking forward to that. That's coming up in about 15 minutes from Chris Gordy. We'll have Matt Thomas also on the horn. He's going to try to listen to that, and then he will react live as he, I don't know, is he going to be calling us from the airport? This is such a fancy man. He's just going to be flying all around town, and he's going to be going to Washington, D.C.,

for the U of H. Cougars versus the Navy game. And also, did you see it's announced that the Army Navy game is going to be at West Point for the first time since 1943? We're seeing all these unprecedented things because of the coronavirus and everything getting moved around. And now I'm wondering, as we've talked about, throughout the week. And Matt Thomas, I believe, was this Matt Thomas' gut feeling that the NFL was going to be moved back a week, I think? I can't remember if it was during gut feelings when he talked about that.

I think I believe you're correct. I think it was a gut feeling of Matt Thomas, and it's looking like that's going to be one that's going to hit, at least not necessarily this week. But there just continued to be outbreaks, the latest now with the Oakland Raiders. They've had some coronavirus issues. Trent Brown has tested positive for the coronavirus, and now they put five other players on the COVID list. And now they've had no additional positive tests.

The positive tests are from Trent Brown, and they are from the safety John Abram. So those are the guys who have tested positive, and the guys who are around him or in close contact, I think is what they're calling it. They've put on the COVID-19 reserve list. So if there are more positive tests, as the days go along, you could very well see the Las Vegas Raiders

versus the Tampa Bay Buccaneers game in jeopardy, but that'll be interesting to see. And we're now, what, seven weeks into the season? We've had outbreaks at how many? We've had, it was definitely the Tennessee Titans had issues. You had the New England Patriots. You've had the Oakland Raiders now. What are the teams?

We're talking about... As far as full outbreaks, has there been anything else? No, I'm trying to think. There's been some sporadic ones, but the Titans moved so much around that it, I think, maybe feels like there's more than they really have that. It seemed like they're moving around for a couple of weeks. And that's just what I'm curious to see how this will happen. And the NFL doesn't really have any other choice.

Right? It's kind of a damned if you do, damned if you don't. I don't know. I don't know that there are many more people, but there were. Say, well, you have to stop the whole season. You can't have this going on at all. And coronavirus and the midst of pandemic and blah, blah, blah. Look, these leagues need to make money.

That's the bottom line. The NFL is here. And we can talk about, oh, it's for the glory. and it's for all this in testing your metal and the battlefield on the batting battling on the gridiron and all that type of stuff. No, it's for money. That's why the NFL is here. It's for entertainment. And it's because they make billions and billions of dollars.

And they're going to have to continue to do it. And they're going to have to continue and enforce these coronavirus protocols as much as they can and just kind of fly by the seat of their pants. That's what the NFL feels like they're doing. It felt like the entire offseason. We had talked about Major League Baseball coming back. We had talked about the NBA coming back, and the one that we felt like was going to be safest and be totally fine, naive us in March. Oh, got six months before the NFL season even starts. This thing will probably be done by then.

Well, cases and hospitalizations and deaths are surging nationwide right now. So unfortunately, that's not the case. But this is just the way it's going to have to be. I don't know if I want to use the, well, in these unprecedented times, the cliches, this is the new normal. or anything like that. But I'm wondering how long it's going to take before you do get another outbreak, before you do have some of these teams

are already going through their bi-weeks, so you're not going to be able to do any shuffling around in that way. And these, it's just natural. We're seeing it in college football. We're seeing it, and we saw it a little bit in baseball before they went to the bubble. There were no issues since then, and now you're into the World Series,

and they're down the home stretch over there. But you just can't keep this amount of people, in this amount of teams under control and under the watchful eye and not have these types of things happen. So I'm wondering how long does it take? Because it seems inevitable to me. We're not even halfway through the season. And we've already had this number of outbreaks. And I think it's going to continue to happen.

And I think we will start to see the season get pushed back. I think it is possible that it has been floated the idea of, hey, maybe the Super Bowl has to get pushed back to March. Something like that. Maybe we're just going to have to hope and wait for a event. vaccine. I don't know. But you have the questions there in the NFL, and then now you have the latest from the NBA. They're looking to start on Christmas Day. That's the latest story that come out today. And we've heard things about them not starting until March or February or January or what's going to happen. Is there going to be a bubbled environment? They just don't want to do it.

There can't be a bubble because they need to make money. The NBA was losing money paying Disney for the hotels and the food and the arenas and all that type of stuff. They were losing, what was it like $170 million or maybe even more than that? Like for every couple of weeks or something. Yeah, it was a few hundred. It was hundreds of millions of dollars it was costing the NBA in order to host that bubble. The reason they did it is because if they didn't do it, they would have lost all of their TV money, and that's just something they could not afford.

So are they going to start on Christmas? That seems to be what people are talking about for them right now. is a comeback Christmas time for the NBA. And it's going to be some, it's going to be like the NFL. It's going to be piecemeal. Some arenas are going to have fans. Some arenas are going to have a certain amount of fans, and some are going to have none.

And then the question becomes, what happens when you have an outbreak? It's a little bit easier in basketball. You can cancel a game and schedule it a couple of days later. It's not a once a week, only 16 game situation like it is in the NFL. I mean, are we just going to have to have back to back to back? Like, didn't they do that in the 1999 lockout season? You had teams playing like three days in a row and stuff like that?

I don't think they'll go that route. I think you'll see in every sport for the foreseeable future teams not play an even number of games. Well, did you see the Big Ten what they said they're going to do? They said if there were outbreaks because they started this weekend. The Big Ten finally said they're going to come back and we talked about it for weeks and all that type of stuff. There's just going to be a no contest. Right. Yeah.

If somebody has, it's like the game never happened. You know, they do that in boxing. It's a no contest. if, like, afterwards somebody test positive for steroids or within the, yeah, you don't make Wade and you don't do, you just don't fight. Or if somebody headbutts somebody and there's a cut and the other guy can't continue and it's in the first four rounds, well, no contest. All right, it's like the fight never happened. That's what it's going to be like. It's like the game was never scheduled. And that's easier to do in other sports than football. I think you're

going to see that in every sport next year, Ross. You were just going to see no contest everywhere? Yeah. Yeah. I guess you're going to have to. Or you account for it ahead of time by adding time on to the schedule. Because I don't believe the NBA is going to go to three straight days. You're already starting two months late because you're starting in Christmas. Then you have to have some games be canceled.

They're not going to play three straight days in the NBA. There's too much research at this point. One time in the last couple of years, a team had to play a back to back to back. I can't remember why. Game got moved because of something. It was maybe, it was like a blizzard or a flood or some kind of, natural disaster, I think. But yeah, I'm not saying it's going to happen all the time, but it might have to happen once or twice.

They've just tried to move away from even the three games in four days. So it's hard to see them wanting to do three straight. Well, they're not going to want to. They're just going to have to. It's not about what they want to do. It's going to be about what is going to be best for the team. How are they going to get a season done? And I guess you're right.

Some people are just going to have to miss out on some of that revenue. Then there becomes the question what's happening with the TV money. What's happening with the revenue with the inside of the arenas? So therefore, what's happening with the salary cap? I'm sure the ash, I mean, the rockets are really wondering that because there are one of the teams are going to be close to being capped out. Ah, I don't know. A lot of questions to be answered, but I'm sure they will continue to march forward with their best practices. And hopefully outbreaks can be limited, not even just across the NBA, but across all sports.

All right, 713, 2, 1, 2, 5, 790. The phone number 713-1-2-5-790 coming up next. You wait for it all week. It is here. The Texans are playing the Green Bay Packers. It's Chris Gordy, horrible football Friday parody. That's next here on the Matt Thomas show. This is Carlos Correa.

Back to Matt Thomas. It's your home. It's your home. A fastest baseball. So Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. Hour number one, nearly in the books. With you till 3 o'clock, we'll have Matt more of the Action Network to talk about the Rockets' Coach.

search coming up in just a second. But now, looky here on the phone lines. It's actually the Matt Thomas show with Matt Thomas on the phone lines. Matt is going to be calling or on the sidelines for the U of H versus Navy midshipman game. Matt, I assume you have packed your Navy costume, correct? You've got me at the worst time. I'm trying to park in one of these like remote parking spots and this card I'm trying to use to get in and not swiping. It's just horrible. Oh, you sound frustrated. Can I just listen as you get frustrated with the card swiping machine? No, because the van is sitting at the airport is behind. I'm pulling everything up.

Here it is. This is my name. There it is. We're good, sir. All right. I'm going to roll eye. Okay. Hi, Rock.

Hey, Matt. How are you? I'm better now. I'm going to bark. Did you snap it anybody? I know you're prone to you get a little frustrated quickly, Matt. No, I was very calm and pleasant. As usual.

By the way, go ahead. Check your text. All I'm doing for you is giving you information. In 1998, 1999, we had to lockout in the NBA. The Rockets had to have a home game one night. The next night they were in Minnesota, and then they had to play at New Jersey. So they were trying to squeeze in 50 games in a normal length of time.

So that was the last time I remember being scheduled that way with three straight nights. Yeah, do you think there could be COVID games moved around in the NBA, and then that would be possible at this upcoming season? No, I don't. I'll actually go with Brendan on that. I think the reason why they're thinking December 25th, in all honesty, is so they can gap, space these games out so if there is an outbreak, they can use some extra time. Here's what I think is going to happen. I think we're going to get the NBA is going to have it.

Again, nobody's giving me information. This is me guessing. We're going to see a brand new schedule. We're going to see more opponents within the division. And you're also going to see probably, like when the Rockets play Memphis, they'll play them two or three times in Memphis. and get it all done with. There will be no moving around from trip city to city to city. You're going to see everybody play all the road games, all the games against Dallas,

all the games against the Lakers, all the clippers in one city. So they will have to lessen travel. So it'll be like baseball series. They'll have a rubber match at some point in Memphis? I don't know if it's that, but again, here's the thing. Ross, in order for these teams to make big money television-wise for their local packages, they got to play 70 games. So that's the magic number.

So I might buy into what Brendan said, where maybe one team plays 82 and one play 76, but they all got to get to 70 if they're going to make their reasonable TV money. And that's the reason why that's the magic number you guys should be thinking about. By the way, I'm comfortably in my spot, ready to listen to the rest of the show on IHeart Radio,

but you call me for one really important reason, correct? That's true, Matthew, and we've got to get to that is for the horrible Football Friday Parity from one, Chris Gordy. Without further ado, here is this week's edition of said segment. All right, hold on. Brendan and I both fired that off at the same time. I thought I was hitting it, Brendan. Let's start this over. Brendan, you hit it, okay? I told me, don't trust Jack. He's not a GM. He's just a hack. The trade day will be here soon. B wants to

He'll make some moves At the show Hooks yet Can't go wrong Yeah Lean on that ground game And if we do that We'll beat the Packers

On Sunday The playoffs once again Matt Thomas, first reaction is yours If there was a rock and roll Hall of Fame for horrible parody, he'd be in it I mean, my God. Here's the best part, and I've got to go on this note because the van is here. Do you understand, folks, when Chris Gordy sings these songs, he raises his chin as high in the air as possible to hit every one of those notes.

Just imagine that as you'll hear that song, and hopefully Rossi, you'll play it again. Great job so far on the show today, and I'll talk to you Monday. Thank you, Matthew. Oh. My first thought was he really belted that one. He really let that one go, didn't he? He really... He really reared back.

You know what that was? That was George Springer on a two-oh count swinging out of his shoes. That's what Chris Gordy just did. I mean, no insult here. I don't think it's my favorite lyrically. He's done some great work. So you can... No, it's okay.

You're criticizing. That's fine. But performance-wise, I thought this was the best we've got. Oh, man. I'm actually still recovering from that. You ever try when you're a kid and you try to see how long you can hold your breath underwater and then you come up and you're just lightheaded? That's how I feel right now. Spend too much time laughing.

I think it's funny that you guys turn your mics off while we play it. Well, I don't want to interrupt it, right? Because, I mean, if you didn't, yeah, you just hear constant laughing the whole time. Yeah. When Mozart's up on the stage, you don't just start laughing and wooing and hollering. You let him do his thing. and then you hold your applause until it's over. Yeah, but normally on the radio, you react to things as they have to. Having class.

Have a little kut. Brandon, all right? Coot? Yes. Never heard that one. Well, I'm here for you. So, yeah, I just kind of, I feel like I don't want to be distracting people with my giggling and my yelping. So.

Definitely yelping. I can't even hear you. I can see you yelping. Sorry. Okay. It's funny. But I'm with you. Lyrically not his strongest work.

But when you just add in the fact, I mean, Simple Man, first of all, Simple Man, I like when he does karaoke classics. And Simple Man is a karaoke classic unequivocally. So he went with that, and then he just let that one fly. I'm very impressed with the Chris Gordy horrible Friday football parody here on Sports Talk 790. We will play that one again probably towards a third hour of the show. And we got a lot of stuff to get to in between then. Brendan and I have to make our football picks for the weekend. We have Brian Smith of the Houston Chronicle coming up at 2 o'clock.

And coming up in this next segment, it's going to be Matt Moore of the Action Network, Ustri for CBS Sports. He's written for a lot of different things, covers the NBA like nobody's business, and also has been, I believe, a champion of Daryl Morey and his cause. So Daryl Morey has stepped down. You now have no head coach for the Houston Rockets, but there are three finalists.

The national perspective, what should the Rockets do with their head coaching search. We'll find out next here on the Matt Thomas show. This is the Matt Thomas show. One o'clock straight up on the Matt Thomas show. Matt Thomas out today. Ross Vee, we are with you until 3 o'clock coming up to two. We'll have Brian Smith of the Houston Chronicle.

We'll have to make NFL picks. So I'll have to get all other good things going on in the show. But right now we've got another good thing. And that would be Matt Moore of the Action Network. You can find him on Twitter at HP Basketball. Always a good conversation with him. First and foremost, Matt, how are you doing on these trying and unprecedented times in the new normal? I tried to fit as many cliches as I could into one sentence.

Oh, no, everything's great, man. I don't know why you're worried. There's a global pandemic, and I'm here in Colorado, where there's the largest forest fire in the state's history, literally overhead the entire sky is black and red. Other than that, though, things are awesome. Thanks for asking. So inside people are dying and outside everything's on fire. Other than that, everything's great, right?

Everything's great. All right, so well, let's talk about the fun stuff. That would be the basketball. First of all, we'll keep it on a national side. The story coming out today that the NBA looking for a Christmas star, but, I mean, before that, we had heard January or even maybe later than that. I guess it shouldn't be too surprising to hear about Christmas because that would make the TV networks happy.

I guess it would. I still have a lot of skepticism about this. I don't think it's possible from a number of angles. If you look at it, let's start with the league's biggest moneymaker is Los Angeles Lakers. They just won a tile in October. You're going to give them 45 days coming off of a championship run to get back and then be ready for another full season. That doesn't seem likely. In order for them to be ready, you'd have to get through the cap negotiation has to happen first.

They're still in the process of that before the October 30th deadline. Then you have to squeeze in the draft in November and then free agency in like two weeks after the draft before you start. training camp essentially in the first week of December to be ready for a Christmas start. Like this is, this just doesn't seem feasible. So I have real questions about how they're going to try and pull this off. I would think that at least, I've heard Martin Luther King Day being mentioned a lot as a, as a possible start date. I've heard later. I've heard later consistently that at least there are some owners that want to try and wait as late as late February to early March. So until we actually hear the date, I'm real skeptical to start talking about anything

as concrete. There's too many factors at play here. And that's the thing, too, is if there, even when there is a season, there are so many things that you have to put in place, Matt. And what would we see as far as procedurally with the protocols? And if they're not going to be in a bubble, as we've seen, there's been outbreaks in baseball. There's been outbreaks in football and college football. But you just had the Big Ten starting up this week. They said, if there's some kind of outbreak, we're just going to call it a no contest. Do you think we could see that in the NBA?

What's going to happen with rescheduling? I mean, how would the season get executed? Yeah, a lot of this is, I think, they're trying to, the game. plan based off of what's going. Like there is, I think, a certain amount of, well, the NFL is doing it and the MLB did it. So why can't we do it? I think there's a little bit of that that's going on.

I do think some of the way that the sport is played is a little bit different. I think that the arena's being indoors. I think that changes it to a certain degree. There's some of it. There's all these kind of factors. Then there's the, you know, fans. They want to get some fans into the building as many as they can. But that's state by state based off of restrictions.

And then there's the fact that we just don't know what they're. this curve is going to look like as we get further into the winter combined with flu season. We just don't know. So I think that the NBA has to factor all of that in. One thing I have heard is the idea of at least early in the season playing more stretches against in basically baseball type series. You would go and you would play one team three to four times. And that way, if you load the early season with that, it limits the exposure rate.

So if somebody tests positive, you're able to maybe get it content. versus the normal schedule, which we saw when the outbreak first happened in the NBA. We saw the jazz played New York, who played Cleveland, who played the Nuggets, and all of these different branches kind of broke out. And so you have to be concerned about those things. I think some of that will be factored into the schedule when the NBA does resume. Yeah. How about you just get some double-headers, too?

Like, you know, back in the day, when you're on the hard court, you just say, hey, let's run it back. Can you just do that in the NBA? That would be funny. All right. Well, let's move on locally here, of course. course, one of the reasons I want to have you on is your perspective on all things NBA and the Houston Rockets. I think you've been a guy who's covered them very well. First of all,

I do want to apologize on behalf of the entire Rocket Twitter. They are an on re-bunch, aren't they? They're in a bunch, but they've been okay. I think we've been on the same side for a while on most things. I think it's interesting looking at what's going on with the team, just in terms of, there's a lot of just skepticism from around the league in terms of ownership and what ownership is really willing to do and willing to pay, given some of his statements. He said all the right things, but I think that that's the number one concern that you have to have is what is Tom and Fertita's actual intentions in terms of spending to win a championship. Yeah, well, let's start talking about Daryl.

Your thoughts overall, how would you describe his tenure as the Houston Rocket General Manager because it didn't result in a championship, but by every other measure seems successful? Just your thoughts on that? one of the best GMs of all time. Far none. I mean, just no question that he's one of the best GMs of all time. I think when you look back and you have to be able to look at the big picture with Darrell throughout the entire stretch, you have to not only look at the Hardin era.

You have to look at how he navigated from the Yao era and built around that team to cashing in on Tracy McGrady and the Knicks trade to getting Kyle Lowry to then moving Kyle Lowry for assets that were eventually moved for James Hardin. to getting Chris Paul. The way that he was able, this is what it's not talked about, for analytically driven guy, he always managed to get the team in contention to either make the playoffs or compete for a title continuously over that stretch.

That's so difficult. Change the way that the game was played on multiple levels, both by prioritizing analytics and the three-point shot, but also there's stuff like what he did with Rio Grande Valley and the G-League, what he's done with so many good coaches have come out of RGV. there are so many ways that Darry has influenced the sport and he's not going to get

the credit that he deserves. I don't think in history because they never were able to get that title. All right. Matt Moore from the Action Network and find him on Twitter at HP Basketball here on Sports Talk 790. And speaking with about Darrell Mori how he left the team,

where are the Rockets right now? After the season and they lost four games to one to the Los Angeles Lakers, the eventual NBA champion. James Hardin says we're one piece away. But they got cap issues. The team is getting one year older. What is Russell Westbrook going to provide a lot of question marks? So do you buy or sell the notion from James Hardin that they're one piece away? I don't, I can buy that they're one piece away, but that one piece away is not

obtainable because you can't obtain that one piece with Russell Westbrook on the books. You can't fit that one piece into a structure that's got hardened in Westbrook and the amount of basketball oxygen that they take up. You've got Robert Covington, possibly heading into free agency. You've got, I think, a really limited roster just in terms of the supporting players. There's just not a lot of guys out there besides the PJ Tucker and Eric Gordon that I can look at and say, like, they absolutely are guys that you want to go into battle with in the playoff series.

But those guys are good enough to make the key play that you need. And now factors in. Plus, trying to get this team that has been built one specific way to likely play different because very few people are going to coach the team the way Mike D. Tony did. These are all, I think, factors that you have to lead to the idea that if possible Houston takes a step back this season as they try and figure out exactly who they are. And one of the ways they're going to try to figure out who they are is the next head coach. There has been floated the three finalists. It's either John Lucas, Stephen, Silas, or Jeff Van Gundy.

I'll ask you for a little bit on each of them, starting with Jeff Van Gundy. What do you think about that name as a head coach for the Rockets? I have a skepticism. Love Van Gundy when he was a coach in the league. I've always respected his basketball knowledge and just the way that he looked at the game so much, extremely smart coach. I just have real concerns about guys that have been out that long. It's hard to apply things that you thought used to work into a modern context.

It's just the game is so much different than when he coached. The perimeter is so much more of a big deal. And, you know, he's available and open to those kind of ideas. obviously has a strong connection to the community. I think that's good. But I have some concerns about the ability to adjust. If you can do it, then it's going to work great. He's a great coach.

I just don't know if he's well-built to immediately jump in to this kind of team competing at this level in a modern NBA and be able to make that transition seamlessly. All right. And Stephen Silas is a name that we've seen floated. I think when Mike Dantone was hired, he was one of the guys who was a finalist for the Rockets. That's a name that's been floated and named it a bunch of things. of coaching searches. Why hasn't Stephen Silas been hired and why should or would the Rockets do it? Yeah, everyone's asked a question about Silas. He's one of the guys that immediately comes

up when he talks to anybody here in the league as a prospective coach. He just has such a good record, you know, the work that he's done with the Mavericks, the work that he's done all the way back, going back for, you know, decades. He's worked in the league and he's come up the right way. He's done all that kind of work. Did really great work under Steve Clifford, that entire tree is really good. He has consistently been a name that everyone kind of mentioned, connects with players is a large part of it. He's a really good coach for connecting with players as well as bringing you to X as and O's mind. His reputation is pretty sterling. As for why he doesn't get hired, I can't tell you because there's a lot of good coaches in this league that have never

really gotten a shot. Sam Cassell being one of them that I always wonder why it is that those guys never seem to get hired. You wonder if it's the interview process issue or whatever, but I think He definitely be a pretty solid hire. And then last but not least, John Lucas, the player development coach for the Rockets for a couple of years, obviously former Rocket player as well. What does that name do for you? You know, ties to the organization, obviously, that's good. Player development, those guys are always very well-like.

If you're looking to try and navigate the waters of the modern NBA, a lot of it is just managing player egos and locker room tensions. That's a lot of it. You look at the clippers and them going with Ty Lou. That's a lot of it. He's able to get the most out. of a Cleveland team with a complicated set of egos. That's a lot of, I think, what he can bring to the table,

but also a long-time guy that obviously knows a ton about the game. Mixed reviews from people around the league or is whether he'll be good as a head coach. But there are some that very firmly believe that he would be able, he would be excellent at motivation and being able to figure out the adjustment that the team needs to make throughout the season. And there also has been talked that whoever gets or whoever is going to get higher will probably have to get greenlit by James Harden. Is that just, I mean, that's just the NBA in 2020.

And what do you think James, what is James Hardin looking for in a head coach? Is some guy who lets him do whatever he wants? Or is he looking for, I mean, what do you think on that front? Most of the start players, as far as I'm aware of, don't really care because they believe they'll do what they want anyway. That's usually how it goes, that the coaches, you want a good relationship. You want a coach that doesn't hold you back, but you don't necessarily believe that who it is matters, all that much for your career. I think that the bigger thing is not that you get the sign off or endorsement.

It's more that Hardin doesn't object. That's usually how it goes. The star players also very rarely want to be linked to these decisions because, one, they don't want the responsibility for its success. And two, they don't want the image out there that they are the type of person that involves themselves its front office discussions. They just say, you know, the team made this decision. I support the team's decision.

But there will be a very clear conversation about whether or not, and objects to that coach and whether he wants it. If he doesn't want it, that carries more weight than whether, you know, whatever level of endorsement he gives. Matt Moore Actionnetwork.com. Find them on Twitter at HP Basketball here on Sports Talk 799. Before we get you out, Matt, just let the folks know what you guys got going on the website, anything you're working on. Yeah, look at the MVP odds for next year and whether or not James Hardin can get back into the race once again, as he has so many years enter a new coach. I've got stuff up on the wind totals. Might be fading Houston a little bit.

under that one. No. As well as a conversation, as well as a conversation about the clippers and why Kauai Leonard probably needs a little bit more scrutiny than he's gotten. You can find all that Action Network. Make sure I download our app. It's the best way to track scores all across sports. All right.

Thanks a lot, Matt. More appreciate it for the time for us. As always, talk to you down the road. Thanks, man. Take care. All right. Appreciate it. Matt, more.

Great stuff with him. As always, once again, actionnetwork.com. Find them on Twitter at H.P. basketball. Always a good follow. If you want somebody who really follows basketball close, that is your guy. All right, time for a quick break here on the Matt Thomas show. Do you want to react to anything that he had to say? Stephen Silas, Jeff Van Gundy, John Lucas. Who would you want as the Houston Rockets head coach? 713-212-5-790 is the phone number. 7-1-3-1-2-5-790. Matt Thomas. Without Matt Thomas continues in a second.

Craig Ackerman here. When I'm not calling Rockets basketball, I'm following at Sports RV on Twitter. You're listening to the Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790. 120 p.m. Sports Talk 790 is a Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. Ross, Villarreal with you. Great conversation there with Matt Moore on some NBA stuff coming up at 2 o'clock. We have Brian Smith coming up at 1.30. We'll make our NFL picks as we continue to beat the schmose. White hot is Brendan Riley. Brennan, are you feeling like a you're under pressure now. It's 16 and 8 on the season, making a lot of people some empty bucks.

The problem is I started hot, and I've just kept it going, so I felt pressure this whole time. Okay. So you say, uh, instead, pressure has made diamonds with you. It has so far. I gotta tell you, though, have you looked at the, the, the, the points spreads this week? I haven't really looked at it. I'm not a fan of games with, with small point spreads. Oh, me. And this week's a lot of those. So you like a lot of cushion is what you're saying.

More cushion for Brendan Riley is what he likes. All right. Well, that's, uh, that's a, that's, good to know. We'll talk about that coming up in the next segment. In the meantime, if you want to get in 713, 2, 2, 1, 2, 5, 790 is the phone number, 713, 2, 1-2-5-790. And talking about the Rockets' last segment with Matt Moore, it just got me thinking, I mean, I mentioned it. We talked about it earlier in the week. Like, none of the names excite me when it comes to the options for the next head coach for the Houston Rockets. There's Stephen Silas, there's Jeff Van Gundy, and there is John Lucas. John Lucas, to me, seems like

continuity move. You just do something to keep James Hardin happy because he's been a player development coach, and I'm sure he has a nice personal relationship with James Harden. And it's not a knock against John Lucas. It's just more of an unknown. I don't know how much has John Lucas been involved in his tenure as an NBA coach. How much has he been involved in game planning? I know he was a head

coach of the Spurs, but that was like in the 1990s. That was before, I believe he was the last coach before Greg Popovich took over. So, I mean, that's how long ago we're talking about. Popovich, of course, had been with the Spurs basically forever. So, and John Lucas was their coach in the 90s. I want to say that was his, okay, that was not his last head coaching job. His last head coping job was in 2003 with the Cleveland Cavaliers,

who were so bad they got the number one overall pick and drafted some young man out of Akron, Ohio, named LeBron James. So, I mean, the guy hasn't been a head coach since then. he was out of basketball until 2009. He was a Clippers assistant for a year. And then since 2016, he's been the player development coach for the Houston Rockets. So, I mean, as far as modern 2020 NBA basketball, I just, I don't know what he's got. That's what I'm saying.

I'm not saying he's going to be terrible or anything like that. I'm saying, I don't know. It's the element of the unknown for me. If I were to pick a name that I want most, I think it would have to be Stephen Silas. Stephen Silas is a guy who has an NBA pedigree. He's been around the game forever. He's been a scout. He's been an assistant.

He's been under Rick Carlisle the last couple of years, who in my mind is top five coaching the NBA, just the successes that he's been able to have year in and year out with the Indiana Pacers. And, of course, winning a championship with the Dallas Mavericks. I just think Rick Harle is one of the brilliant NBA coaching minds of the NBA. So he's been under him. he has also been an assistant long time for the Warriors and the Charlotte Bobcats for a guy who's been around the league who's been around smart coaches and his name

has come up on a lot of coaching searches. To me, Stephen Silas makes the most sense. I think I would be most excited for him as the next Rockets head coach. And Jeff Van Gunny has just been out of the game too long to me. I mean, when do you see somebody out of the game that long? And he's been somewhat close because he's been a commentator and all that type of stuff. but he was miserable when he was a head coach of the Rockets. I don't find him particularly inventive or progressive,

and that's something that has embodied the spirit of the Rockets basketball the last decade plus under Darryl Morey. So, I mean, maybe he's going to hire some really smart assistants and be mostly a figurehead, and I'm okay with that. But I think of those three options, I think I would go with Stephen Silas. 713-212-5-790. The phone number, it is Gerard. on the Northwest side to weigh in on the Rockets head coach.

Gerard, go ahead. Yeah, Ross, I agree with you, man. I go with Steven Siler. That probably be my first choice. Go with him, man. He worked under Carlisle. Carlisle, you know, won a championship in 2011 with the Dallas Maverick over to Miami Heat. So that'd be the first choice.

I think what's going on here is I think the owner really wants Jeff Van Gundy, but they try to see if he can work with him in the front office. They philosophy can kind of coexist. I think they're trying to go through it, see it. his philosophy, which is been an old school philosophy. He's going to change his way, especially on the offensive end, when he's going to limit positions and basically play a grind-it-out type of defense that relied on shutting people down on the defensive end and winning games,

90 to 8-8 type of game. He's going to have to adjust to today's game if he wants to do that. If he's able to do that, bring in a guy on the assistant coaching staff that wants to play up Timbo and that's an offensive-minded type of coach, and then maybe he can run the defense because he's a good defensive-minded coach of Jeff Gunn-Van. defenses in New York with the Knicks. He took them to the NBA finals in 1999 where they lost to the Spurs and Tim Duncan and David Robertson and I think four five games.

So he's had some success, but he's got to change his ways, man, and bring in coaches on the coaching staff deck and, you know, adjust to the style of play that's prevalent in the NBA right now. I think the general manager probably wants John Lucas and the players want John Lucas, but I think John Lucas is probably going to be on the staff either way. If Silas gets the job, I think John Lucas will be on staff as assistant coach. And if Jeff Van Gondon gets the job, I think John Lucas is going to be on the staff either way. So I think he's more of a guy that's going to, you know, basically,

basically would be the third guy of those three. I assume that's going to get this job. Now, I look at the side of silence and Van Van Gundy. So we'll see what happens, man. But the thing about the Rock is there, they're in the tricky situation as far as being a contender. You look at the Lakers, they'll be the team to beat the Clippers. They got Tyrone Loon. They got talent.

Gold State going to get their players back. Thompson and those guys going to come back. They're going to be right there. Denver is a real strong team. I like what they're doing. Marries the rising superstar. You got the Utah Jazz and Donald Mitchell. They get the Bodanovich back.

So the Rockers are in a ticket situation. You may probably be a playoff team, but will they be a contender bringing the same roster back? If you look at the needs of the team, they need another shooter. You know, Dale Moore, even when they didn't have a draft pick, he bought into the second round. Hopefully the New General match will do the same thing.

They got some good shooters that they probably can get in the second round, man, the draft. a guy of Villanova, the Dave Bay. He might be there, might not be there. They got a guy of TCU. I think his name is Bermaine. He's a good shooter, a 3-and-D guy. These guys are 3-and-D guys that can shoot.

You know, they can bring in a guy like that if they don't go after a free agent like a JJ Reddick in the offseason. So they need to get that thing, get a big man, get a big man that can play the center position and that can play some good defense and look at that guy. And hopefully they can develop the, what's the guy that they had last year, the seven-foot foot guy that was going back and forth from the D-League to the Rockets. I think he's like 21, 22 years old. I can't remember his name.

Hopefully he can develop and take that next step, but they definitely need a true, true big man to go along with another pure shooter that can play defense on the perimeter. All right, thanks a lot. You're 312 for those of you counting at home for Gerard there. All right. I appreciate that. That was a mouthful.

I'm with you as far as the Stephen Silas stuff. And, yeah, the Rockets just need three and D pieces. You surround them with what you have with the Switch Everything defense. A perfect Rockets candidate in the last basically decade, and really that could be used on any team, is somebody with some size and somebody who can play defense and shoot three-pointers at a high percentage. Because you have guys who are dynamic playmakers

and James Hardin and Russell Westbrook, so you just need to surround them with defense. You don't really need a whole lot else offensively. You don't need secondary, ball handlers. It's nice to have somebody who can create their own shot here and there. What Austin Rivers does when he wants to be consistent, it would be nice, but it's not necessarily a premium need for the Houston Rockets right now. Just go out and get some 3-&D wing players, and I don't know, hope for the best, and

hopefully James Hardin can just drop 40 on everybody in the playoffs, and you can win some games. The Rockets just were not in the Lakers class in this series that they played. Now, of course, some of that was because Daniel House Jr. wasn't there. How much does that matter? Would he make a huge difference? I don't know. Maybe he probably worth a couple of points a game, if that, and they were losing by double digits, and each of the last three games. So the Rockets just say they're one piece away. I don't know how good that piece is going to be. And as Matt Moore said earlier on the hour, we don't know how possible it is for them to get that one piece because of their cap situation,

which is not good right now. All right, 713, 2,1, 2,125, 790 is a fun number. A couple more are you on hold. We'll get to you in the next segment at 713. 2, 125, 790. Also got NFL picks, Brian Smith. All that good stuff coming up on the Matt Thomas show. Without Matt Thomas, would you with you till 3?

This is Eric Gordon. I'm going to pullback. Three hit it. Eric Gordon on fire here. Sports Talk 790 is your home? Yes. For Houston Rockets of Basketball. Brian Smith coming up at 2 o'clock.

We're going to do our beat the Schmo's picks in just a second, but real quick. Appreciate James holding through the break, so we'll get to him real quickly ahead of the picks. What's up, James? Nope. I hear activity. James dropped his phone in the center console.

You know what happens to the best of us. Hello? What? James. Hey, how's it going? Man, I was like half, I was a millisecond from hanging up on you, James. Are you all right?

You alive over there, man? Wake up. It's Friday, baby. I'm doing good. I apologize. Let's go. Okay, hey, so my question is, how did Kenny Atkinson not become one of the finalists?

I just thought he overachieved so much of the nets. And when they got rid of him, I just thought somebody's going to get themselves a good coach. Especially his background in development with the Rockets, I just thought for sure to be a finalist. I don't know if you had information on what happened with that. I do not have information on that. Thanks, Jan, for appreciate you getting in. And I'm with you. I thought that that was going to be a guy who seemed like a premium candidate for what the Rockets try to do and what the Rockets have done.

You're absolutely right. He's been a guy who has ties to the Rockets organization. He's traveled all around. He was with the Brooklyn Nets, and when he was with the Nets, they did pretty much what the Rockets tried to do. They'd shot a bunch of three-pointers and played analytic ball. And so it seemed like a perfect fit. You would think he would at least make the final round of finalists.

And, of course, the record wasn't exactly what you wanted with the Nets over there. He was basically winning like 25 games a year. But, I mean, it's the Nets. We're going to blame him for that. And people talked about how they thought they pretty much overperform. Like, he would win 20 games, and people would be, amazed because of how the lack of talent on some of those Brooklyn Nets teams, they were absolutely awful and they didn't have first round picks.

Kind of like a Houston, Texan situation. But anyways, it just, I don't know why he didn't end up as a finalist at the very least, because you're right. The fit to me just seemed just about perfect for the Houston Rockets, but Kenny Atkinson, not a finalist for the Rockets head coaching position. All right, let's go ahead and get to it. We do this every week on the show. show we make our picks and I generally look like an idiot and Brendan generally looks like a genius.

We call it beat the schmoes. All right. So, first up, well, let's talk about the season. You are 16 and 8. I am, how do you have 22 picks and I only have 20? I'm 10 and 10, I think. I should know. I should have four more picks than you.

You skipped a week. Yeah, maybe you've got some ties in there. I don't know. Maybe there's some. Maybe there's some pushes in there. Maybe Matt skewed some numbers. Matt is probably. You know what?

That's absolutely right, Brennan. I think for the rest of the season, we need to keep our own numbers and keep an eye on what Matt Thomas is doing with these beat the schmows numbers. I'm perfectly fine with his numbers. No, yeah, I'm sure you are. But, hey, maybe you're supposed to be like 20 and 5, and Matt Thomas is just shaving wins off your record. I don't know. But so we make these picks every single week, and we call it beat the schmose. You know what?

Let's go ahead and start with Matt Thomas in his lines because, well, he's not here. He has made some picks. He's been pretty good on the season. He has won some money for you folks. Well, some MT bucks. But look, just between you and me, fading MT is never a bad play. All right, let's start with his love. First up, he has a New Orleans Saints.

They are giving seven and a half to the Panthers. He's got them for 2,000 MT bucks. Next, he's going with the Buffalo Bills. You said you like big numbers. Brendan, well, this is a big number. He's got that one at 12 and a half. The Buffalo Bills over the jets who are just absolutely awful and seemed like for all intents and purposes they're giving up. He's got that for

1,000 MT bucks. Next, well, Matt's making a play I'm making, but I'm using it for less money, so I'm going to keep it. He's got Tampa Bay minus the four and a half, although I have his four against the Oakland Raiders. He's got that for 3,000 MT bucks. I love that when Matt's not here, he even gets to use his own point spreads. I know, right? Oh, no, we're going to alter these. We're going to make these the actual consensus. And next, the Green Bay Packers, giving three and a half. after the Houston Texans at home.

Matt Thomas with a big time play as we head until October. He's got the Texans covering this one for 4,000 M.T. Bucks. Can you believe he makes that big of a bet on the Texans to win a game? Well, not win, but at least, you know, stay within that. I know, especially Mr. Texans hater, Matt Thomas. While he's not here. That one blows me. I know.

I know. Go ahead, Brendan. All right. So I've shown I'm willing to take bad teams before. And I'm going to do it here for 1,000 MT Box. I'm going to take the Detroit Lions plus two and a half at Atlanta. Okay, for how much? 1,000 M.T. bucks.

Far from confident. I just think Atlanta is, I think they're both really bad football teams. I think people are higher on Atlanta because of a bounce back last week, but I don't buy it. All right. I'm seeing this right. Dallas Washington is a pick-um. I don't like Dallas, but I think that that's a little bit disrespectful. I'm going to take the Cowboys for 2,000 MT bucks.

NFC leased football. We got enough of that last night, Brendan. You want to watch more of that? I didn't say that much. I'm just trying to win some M.T. bucks. Now, the big bet of the week for me, the one that I'm really counting on to make me some money, I've been betting the Rams all year.

But I've got to tell you, the Bears defense is legit. And giving me six points, I trust the Bears defense to keep it close enough. I'm going to take the Bears plus six for 5,000 MT bucks. Five thousand. This is my whole week. It is the only bet of the week that I really like. And finally, I'm going to fade Matt Thomas here. Give me the Packers minus three and a half for 2,000 MT bucks.

All right, solid bets all around, I think, although I am going to fade you. Let's go ahead and start it out. I'm going with the Houston Texans. It's three and a half. I think, first of all, this is the high. highest total on the board, I believe. It's 57 points. If you look at football outsiders, rankings that are adjusted for opponents, you have two top 10 offenses, and you have two bottom six defenses. So in my opinion, you should play the over 57. There's going to be some

offensive fireworks. And you know what? When I say shootout. When I say shootout, I think close game. So three and a half of a cushion. I don't know that the Texans are going to be able to win this one, but I think that's enough for me to lean towards betting them for $2,500 M.T. Bucks. Next, I'm going to go with one that Matt Thomas did, but I'm going to do it for not as much money as he did. I also like the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. You're going to tell me Trent Brown is not going to play the game because he is on the COVID list. They might even be missing other offensive linemen. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are one of the best teams in the NFL. That defense is ferocious, and you're only giving four points. I'm going to take

them for 2,000 MT bucks. My concern there is if they don't play. That's true. And then that was completely off the board. But I think we should be okay, right? I think we're headed towards, as long as all the offensive linemen don't test positive, which they haven't so far. I think we're going to be okay there.

Next, I'm getting a little frisky with this one. Jimmy Garapolo heading to New England revenge game, or am I just saying the New England Patriots aren't very good? They're getting two points. think to me this is more of a toss-up game, so you tell me I'm getting a couple of points. I'm going to lean towards San Francisco. In this one, I'm going to take them for 2,500 M.T. Bucks.

Next, well, how much did I bet on Houston? I think it's $2,500? Yeah. All right. And then last but not least, I am with you, Brendan, but I'm going to do it for a little bit less money. I'm going to do it. Actually, I'm going to do it for $3,000 M.T. Because that's what I have left.

Let's take Detroit. They are getting the points. There's no reason why they can't cover. against the Atlanta Falcons. I'm with you. They're just, the Atlanta, Atlanta Falcons suck, and you're giving me points. I'm taking Detroit for 3,000 M.T. Bucks. People have been giving Atlanta too much credit since they went to the Super Bowl. Since week one, yeah, I mean, come on, they fired their coach. They're in disarray. They're not a very good team. There's a reason they fired their coach, and you're going to give me points.

It's not like in Detroit is any great shakes, but they're at least playing better than the Falcons have so far. I mean, the Falcons, I mean, are the bookmakers not paying attention? They're in the right in five, folks. All right? Well, I'm taking points when the Atlanta Falcons are giving them, and that are the picks for Beat the Shmows this week. All right, 713, 2,125. 790 is the phone number here on the Matt Thomas show. We've got a lot of different things to get to coming up at 2 o'clock. It is Brian Smith to talk all things.

Houston Sportske, of course, of the Houston Chronicle. We still got NFL picks to get made. We also talked about Jeff Luno. We talked about the Houston Rockets coaching search. We haven't even talked much about Texans versus Green Bay. So all that good stuff and a jampack Matt Thomas show. Matt Thomas with you till 3 o'clock on Sports Talk 790. This is for the men who never settle, the ones who believe only quitters and a game in a tie.

The type of guys who choose the bar with the biggest TVs to overcompensate for theirs at home. This is the lodge mentality. This is Twin Peaks. McCullors. Hey, it's Lance McCullors. Back to Matt Thomas. Turnball swinging a misstrike three. On Sports Talk 790.

Your home for Houston Astros baseball. NFL picks locked in now. for beat the schmose. I'm looking to go four and oh. You know, October is almost over, Brendan. So, you know, you got to capitalize while we can. I went from under 500 to now a 500 picker, which I'm happy about. I've still made, I think, like 4,000 MT bucks, which is a couple of units.

So I'm so proud of that as we head into October. And you had the NFL action last night. How much of the game? This is what I was trying to ask you in the first segment when I was having technical difficulties with the monitor in here. Brendan, how much of the game did you watch last night? I think it might be the first primetime game this year. I watched zero seconds of it. You watched zero seconds of it.

What were you doing? Catching up on The Good Place? I watched a little bit of the debate and then, yeah, just watching Netflix. How would you think about the debate? The debate? You and Matt, I know obviously very not. I'm very deeply into politics. Oh, okay.

But that doesn't change the fact that this is a mess. Yeah, it's a complete mess. It was nice for the half hour I watched. They didn't talk over each other. That's the thing, right? They had the mute button. So that's really why the reason I switched over at halftime of the Giants Eagles game. and I was hoping to see the mute button used, but I did not.

Did it get used at any point? So it didn't, when I was watching, it didn't need to be used. According to social media, it seemed like it got to be a little bit more of a mess later on. But I just like, the thing is, I'm very into politics, but if you don't know who you're voting for at this point, like. Yeah, did anybody change their minds last night? Exactly. Did anybody go and saying, man, I love Joe Biden, but wow, Trump crushed it last night? Or did anybody go say, man, I love Donald Trump, but wow, Joe Biden, he just really swayed me.

I just feel like there's less and less of that in 2020. But anyways, what I really asked you about was the NFL because what you had last night was one of the all-time fail plays I think I've ever seen in my life. Daniel Jones, on a zone read, is running up the field. And from like the 50-yard line on, there is no one in front of them. Nobody, not a single soul, not an eagle, not a giant, not a cheerleader, not anybody. He has free reign on the land like he is in an Oklahomaan waiting

at the border. It's just there's nobody there and then he just completely collapses on the ground. And the thing I found about it funny that was floating around on Twitter was the various radio calls of that. First of all, so I got a couple of them for you here. Let's start with the radio call that was on Westwood One with Iron Eagle and Ross, what's his name, Ross Tucker on the Westwood one call. Here's what they sounded like calling this one. And listen to Ross Tucker. Giggling uncontrollably at Daniel Jones with one of the all-time football fails I think I've ever seen in my life. But they're playing to the scouting report. Shotgun formation Jones fakes it.

Now he runs. He's got a huge hole 2530. And there he goes. Daniel Jones stumbles down at the 15. He could not get there. Running out of gas. Jones had nothing but green grass in front of them. and that typifies what this has been all about.

He is down at the eight. I just look, there's no color commentary to be provided by Ross Tucker. He just has to, he just has to giggle uncontrollably. The first time I watched the highlight, because believe me, I've seen it many times, I found myself thinking, how do you not laugh while calling that play? Well, there you go. Ross Tucker, well, every one of them I'm going to play you. So that's the Westwood one call.

Here is the Fox Deportense. and Espanol calling the Daniel Jones fall play last night. All right, look, my Spanish is not very good because I only took what I took in high school and a little bit in college. So I think he says, like he can do it.

Or so te puere? Like, he can do it. And then he just fell. He just fell down. And see, they laughed on the Spanish call as well, Brendan. How do you not? It is just a comical look.

It's very sad. It's very sad. And then I have the home call from New York Giants Radio. Like this is the home call. You're supposed to be taking this seriously. You're supposed to be disappointed when your team fails, excited when they succeed. And, well, they could hardly contain themselves either. Handoff.

No, Jones is going to keep it. Jones is going to run it. Jones across midfield. It's a foot race. Can he go all the way? Daniel Jones to the 20 and he stumbles and he falls down at the 10. See, the guy can't even finish making the car. He can't even finish making the call before they just start breaking out in laughter.

It's a foot race. Can he go all the way? Daniel Jones to the 20 and he stumbles and he falls down at the 10. Poor Daniel Jones. I think part of what made it so funny was that the buildup, you saw it coming. Because he lost his foot. He weble, he wobbled a little bit. Right.

Like, he didn't just like eat it. Like you saw it coming. You're like, oh my God, he's not going to make it. You saw a little bit of wobbling. And then it just, you remember that viral video, those people that were in that speedboat and then it flipped over? Yeah. Yeah. You remember like before they completely flipped over, it was like, uh-oh, he's getting a little shaky here. And then they just completely flipped over.

It was kind of like that. It's just like that. And you know what's funny? I don't know if you had this thought. But while I was watching it, I like literally went like there's too far. He can't stumble the next 15 yards. Yeah, I was like, man. You knew he wasn't going to make it.

I was hopeful. I have no emotional investment in Daniel Jones or his NFL career I don't care about the Giants at all but I was like man this young poor young man please make it into the end zone

and he just said that's one of the all time like what are the worst NFL gaffs that you can think of there to me number one of all time is got to be the butt fumble for Mark Sanchez see I think that's more comical than an actual like gaff

I mean like funny terrible plays. Deshawn Jackson multiple times dropping the ball before the end-in-saw. Well, D.K. Metcalf did that earlier this year. He did his best to Sean Jackson. But Deshawn Jackson did it like two times or three times in his career. Didn't he? Deshaun Jackson. Come on, man. I also thought of the Tony Romo playoff, mishandled snap. Oh, but see, that to me, that just happens. Heartbreaking, not comical. Yeah, that's not comical because, I mean, well, it wasn't heartbreaking for me. I don't care. Well, no, but like the moment is heartbreaking. Like, it's not. No, I know. Like, Daniel

Jones will look back and laugh. Tony Romo will not. That's true. But I do, well, maybe that's what I mean. Maybe I do mean funniest, like most comical NFL plays then. Well, how about this one? When I grew up watching, Dan Orlowski runs out of the back of the end. Oh, Dan Orlowski running out of bounds?

Because he was in the Canadian League, right? And you can run out of bounds in Canadian League and there's no issue. No, he was, no. Was he never in Canadian? I don't think so. Okay. He was like a fifth or sixth round draft pick, late round draft pick had to take over in the Lions O' and 16th season. And yeah, and the thing is he had no idea he was out of bounds.

He ran out of bounds for like a good three or four seconds. He thought it was the Canadian Football League or something like that. Which you can run out of bounds there. That was a bad one. I think this Daniel John was one. It becomes on the short list because there was nothing but wide green open space in front of him. And he just completely fell down.

You're a professional athlete. He makes millions of dollars to play football. millions of dollars. I know he's not a running back. I know he's not a wide receiver. But your job is to be an athlete. And for him to fall down like that? Would it be funnier if it was a big man or less funny?

I would say more understandable. Daniel Jones should be able to run the length of the field. And he took off. Like, he was moving. Yeah. He got up to 21 miles an hour. They said it was like the fastest they've clocked a quarterback in like in the stat cast era or something like that.

He was moving and shaken. And then they showed he went from like 21 miles an hour to 15 to 10 to straight splat zero on the turf. What do you think was the best call of one of those? I think it has to be Ross Tucker just giggling, right? Ross Tucker giggling away. They're playing to the scouting report. Shotgun formation Jones fakes it. Now he runs.

He's got a huge hole 25, 30. And the old Jones stumbles down at the 15. He could not get there running out of gas. Jones had nothing but green grass in front of them. Like Ross Tucker is supposed to be giving great and great analysis that people are supposed to be learning the game of football, and he just has to sit there and giggle. It's definitely the most abnormal. Like you would really struggle to find an example of a guy losing it.

He just completely lost it. All right. We're going to take a break here on that note. We're going to not completely lose it in the final hour of the Matt. Show without Matt Thomas. We've got NFL picks. We've got Brian Smith. We still have the Chris Gordy

Horrible Football Friday parody. If you miss that, all that coming up. Final hour with the Matt Tom show next. Yeah. This is the Matt Thomas show. For the Matt Thomas show with Matt Thomas, Ross Villarreal with you. Still have some NFL picks to get in.

Still have the Chris Gordy, horrible football Friday parody to replay. for you folks if you missed it. It was a doozy. That's coming up towards the end of the show. But right now, pleased to be joined by Brian Smith of the Houston Chronicle. You can find him on Twitter at Cron Brian Smith. Brian, I know you're always happy to get a week off from Matt Thomas. Well, I didn't know that Matt was off today. Usually he tells me. And it's not that I'm not excited, Ross, but I just found out just in time. So now, I mean, I was feeling good today. It's a beautiful day. Texans are obviously going to meet the Packers. Rockets are going to hire the right coach.

Aschros are going to resign George Springer. We all know that's going to happen, but now it's an even better day. I know. I know it is. All right. Let's go ahead and talk about, well, basically some of the things that you hinted on, those are topics we're going to get to. First of all, let's talk about the Texans. And before the game against Green Bay, let's talk about the Texans bigger picture. Yes. We've mentioned this week about possibly trades. Is it going to be JJ Watt? is going to be the wide receivers. And then Deshaun Watson, can you recall in your life, Brian, a player saying we squashed that when there was a trade rumors flying and getting asked about that, the way that Deshaun Watson

just talked like he was the general manager. Do you ever recall an athlete speaking like that? You sound like you wrote a column in the Houston Chronicle two days ago, Ross. No, I haven't. It's funny. There's been a couple things. Well, there's been a billion things, but there's been a couple of things with a Texans recently, I'm not saying I'm right. Of course I'm right. But I mean, I'm not saying

I'm right. Everyone, everyone, this is America, even in 2020, even after the last debate, we can all have our own opinion. We all have a voice. But I feel like there's been a couple things lately where Texans fans are split literally 50-50 down the middle, which means that 50% get it and 50% don't. I think it's just the state of this organization where everyone's still so angry at Bill O'Brien and they're so mad at Cal McClain. And they're so mad at Calman. there and they want Jack Easterby run out of Texas, not even Houston, just Texas in general, maybe the United States of America. And so everyone is so split. To answer your initial question, no. I've never seen that because the thing was Ross. So you know the NBA, you know Major League

Baseball, right? These things will really heat up around the MLB NBA trade deadlines a few days, a few days before. And even then, I mean, maybe once in a billion will a LeBron, James type come out like the day of and say we're not trading anybody because he got that from the GM the day of the trade deadline. To have that happen two weeks before when you're one in five and oh yeah, speaking of panicking and not staying in the course, did Deshaun forget that they fired Bill O'Brien, who's the head coach and general manager and offensive play caller after just four games? So it's not like the Texans in 2020 have a track record of staying the course and not

panicking and not overreacting within a 16-game season. I've never, ever seen anyone say that. Doesn't mean he can't say it. Doesn't mean they won't trade anyone? Maybe they beat the Packers. Maybe they win five straight games and make it a little interesting. But to say it two weeks before the deadline, when you have an interim head coach and an interim GM and Cal doesn't talk to pretty much anybody in the local media tells you how backward this organization is in terms of its message in terms of its delivery. And in terms of it times, Ross, it feels like who's actually running an NFL organization. It feels like Deshawn Watson has more of a voice and more of a handle on things than anyone

else in the organization. And that's what I'm trying to figure out, because if there are trades to be made, which there are, you fired your coach and you're one in five. You should be making trades because you don't have a first and second round pick. You should be open for freaking business. It should be not maybe a fire sale, you know, not like the day after. Christmas or the day after Easter when you go into Walgreens and all the candy is it's 95% off and that's a really good time to buy candy by the way but it should be like right after Thanksgiving

and all of the Thanksgiving decorations are on sale pretty much like 50% off that's that should be the Texans right now we're 50% off well how about Amazon Prime Day where the deals are kind of good but really not as good as they're going to be on Black Friday but but you do them because you're sucked in Amazon Prime and you get free shipping and you know the Texans aren't going to want a Super Bowl so you might as well pick up a cornerback or a linebacker or whomever be a trade. Yeah. Why in the world would your franchise quarterback say, we're not trading any of these dudes when you're one in five,

and it's two weeks before the trade deadline? That means that on some level, Deshawn, Jack, Cal, the whole crew just doesn't get how you're supposed to operate. But anyways, keep going. Yeah. And so that's the thing. who is if there are trades to be made. Look, if they lose this week and you're one in six

and you've already fired your head coach, there needs to be, like you said, not necessarily fire sale, but trades need to be made because you need draft capital for the future for this squad. What if... What if... I read this in the chronicle. So 50% of fans liked it because Deshaun sounded assertive and strong, and technically he was just repeating what Romeo said,

even though I would like to think that all of us can, and you know, we can say what we can say what we don't have, we don't have to say what our boss is, tell us to say. Here's the point. What if somebody called the, Texans front office. I don't know if any would pick up the phone. But what if somebody called the next morning and said, we're going to offer you a third round pick for Will Fuller? You know, a third round pick and a future fifth. Look what happened the next day. There was a major

trade raws between Jack, I mean, between Baltimore and Minnesota for a player whose name had been in trade room was for a year. How in, you know, how in the world you're just going to turn that down on principle? It makes no sense if you're running a well-run organization. Yeah, it makes no sense. And I also have the question, who's making these conversations? Is it Jack Easterby? I mean, what and what experience does he have negotiating and knowing other teams and scouting and valuating draft capital?

Because the only thing he's had to go off of is Bill O'Brien and his trades clearly demonstrate that he does not know how to value draft capital. So who's having these conversations and what kind of experience do they have? And let's flip that upside down because it's a very, it's a great point. here's the other part of that. Do you not, are, why would you not be aggressive? Like,

it's not about, like, this whole thing of winning a few games. Okay, now, if they win the Super Bowl this year, if they go from one in five in the Corona year and win the Super Bowl,

that'll be awesome. That'll be one of the, that might be the best story in NFL history. It's probably like 99.99.99% not going to happen. If that happens, we'll look back and be like, you know what, the Texans are right.

congratulations. If they don't win the Super Bowl, should you not be setting yourself up for 2021 and 2022 and whenever you're actually going to maybe be a contender again with a Sean Washington is your quarterback? So point being, if you go one and six and you have a week before the trade deadline, you shouldn't just be taking calls, Ross. You should be on the damn phone calling every GM, every assistant GM, every agent trying to work things because you know if you can actually evaluate NFL talent and build an NFL Super Bowl, you know, contender caliber roster, you should be able to say, you know what, we've got like seven or eight guys that are overpaid,

20 guys, whatever number you want to go. Maybe we can move a few. Maybe we can pick up a third round pick, a fifth round pick. And then you take that third round pick and fifth round pick and you're, you're Brad Pitt and Moneyball, and you're trading that for a second round pick. Whatever you have to do. But it's not just about taking the call. It's about making the calls.

And other than the Brandon Cook's trade and giving away DeAndre Hopkins for free, yeah, we have no proof that there's anybody that's truly in charge that saying, I want to do this and this and this and this and this. And that's exactly what the Texans should be doing right now. Brian Smith of the Houston Chronicle, find him on Twitter at Crona. Brian Smith. Let's keep it with the Texans here. Talk about the game this weekend. Obviously, we here on radio are in the business of hoping for interesting teams. to talk about and storylines.

Same thing for you there with The Chronicle. But I mean, when the team is one in five and they've already fired their coach, what do you feel like the pulse of this city, the interest level, just not necessarily trades and stuff we talk about, the actual game on Sunday. What do you feel like the buzz level is? 1%.

I mean, here's again where Twitter is really misleading because if there's any bit of news, they play the Titans and they go for two and let's not debate that again. But whatever it is, Twitter reacts, and it's like 500 people or 2,000 people. But in the actual city, I mean, there is,

and the Chronicle proved it because our web numbers were through the roof for the Astros because they were in the playoffs, and the Texans, even with all the drama, just don't rate right now. I mean, it's not just, you would have to be Green Bay, and then you're going to buy.

You're going to have to roll off, what, four straight victories, get to five and five, and even then, then you're basically back at zero. I mean, you're a 500 team. That's the only way and Ross, if they lose this game, if they're one and six, and they go

into the buy, and obviously everyone's going to predict them to lose, if they lose this game and going to the buy, I mean, 99.99% just move on with this season. And that's why the trade deadline should be so important. But they don't have enough young talent to get excited. I mean, other than Nashon Watson, it's not like we're talking about the 2015-16

Astros, you know, the rockets, when they could maybe get a Dwight Howard type and make a franchise changing move. Texans are so hamstrung, Ross, because of the previous decisions they've made. If they go one and six and you've already fired the guy that all of Houston wanted fired, what is there really left to talk about with this team? Well, we'll have that and then no Astros and no Rocket. So I guess we'll just have you on every week. What are your hobbies, Brian? Do you are a gardening guy? Are you doing a, I know you got a house. So, I mean, we'll have you for home improvement

segments maybe? Hey, you and I have done home improvement on a sports show before. Yeah, I actually worked in the yard for like five hours yesterday. I've been walking a lot during Corona. I just got back to Milwaukee. Mainly music, mainly playing the old electric six string and, you know, watching movies and reading books, just the normal arts. Okay. So I can stay busy. But yeah, you're exactly right. Here's going to be the thing. We go from no sports, no sports, and then everything comes back. and if the Texans are 1 and 6, the Astros are done, and the Rockets still haven't hired a head coach, I guess at some point we'll have to talk about the University of Houston. I don't know. Well, we're not going to sink that low, Brian. That's for certain here on this show.

Well, one quick thing before we get you out on the Rockets. We mentioned them, the coaching search, the three finalists, Stephen Silas, Jeff Van Gundy, and John Lucas. Can you just rate those three in order of what you would most like to see for the Rockets going forward? Yeah, that's a good question. I think it's a couple weeks ago on Matt. Matt show with you and Matt. Much respect to John Lucas. He's one of the most respected names in the NBA. I don't see him getting the job just because they would be able to retain him,

make him basically, you know, the lead assistant, elevate him, give him, you know, give him a pay raise, which he would deserve, and still have him on the staff. So for me, for the last couple weeks, it's been a two-man race between Jeff Van Van Gundy and Stephen Silas. I said this before. I will continue to say this. If I am Jeff Van Gundy, I do not.

take this job unless I get 100% assurance that James Hardin and Russell Westbrook are fully on board, not just like, okay, we'll go along with it, fully on board because that could turn into a nightmare scenario and why in the world, if you're Van Gundy, which you want to give up a pretty darn good life and having one of the best announcing jobs in professional sports to go head to head with James Harden, because you know what, you're going to lose just like Kevin McHale lost. So for that being said, unless they can kind of flip Hardin and Westbrook, it feels like, it's always to me pointed toward Silas. I'm just not sure if the organization is fully sold on him.

And that's also a hard sell Ross because he doesn't have true NBA head coaching experience. And you're going to tell Hardin and Westbrook, hey, we keep falling short and a guy who's never really coached before and has always been an assistant and to work his way up, he's the answer. It's just it's a hard sell. So I'm going to rate Silas one hair above, I guess Van Gundy is a ton of hair, one hair above Van Gundy and then have John Lucas a distant third. But you never know. I feel like it's going to come down to these two guys, but maybe they have to hit the reset button and go elsewhere. All right, Brian Smith of the Houston Chronicle.

Find them on Twitter at Cron, Brian Smith. Brian, as is our custom. When Matt is out, I have to give you your opportunity. The platform is yours to shamelessly plug anything, any books, any articles, or just Houston, Chronicle.com. I don't know I'd say Houston Chronicle.com, but my whole life, the last three or four months, has been our new puppy, which we got from a shelter, and, you know, everyone's taking a dog. So I'm actually going to promote something.

I'll promote, I don't know if I can officially. Can I mention it on the air? Yeah, go ahead. The name of the place, canine rescue angels. It's a shelter in the Heights. I don't live in the Heights, but it's out there. It's hard to adopt right now, and it's really hard. We fostered a couple, and they were adopted.

So if you're in the market for a dog, you know, you're trying to get through corona, which is going to last, obviously, for 80 more years, you get holidays coming up. I highly recommend adopting or more importantly fostering a pet through canine rescue angels in the heights. As Joe B. Eugenie would call them therapy puppies. Been very therapeutic. But last night, so long story short, my wife, last night I slept with a dog. My wife flipped in the other room. that was the first time we tried that. It was amazing.

Okay. Thank you, Brian. Have a good weekend, buddy. All right, Ross. You take care. Bye-bye. Oh, man. The always entertaining Brian Smith, follow him on Twitter at Cron. Brian Smith. All right, we went over. We've got to take a break here on the Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. If you want to talk about anything that he had talked about, what's happening with these Texans traits? Who's making the call? Who should make the call? 713-2-1-2-9. 7-90 is the phone number. Also, who do you want for the Rockets Head Coach?

713-1-2-5-790. Matt Thomas Show, final hour continues next. When I listen to the Matt Thomas Show, I don't even understand the eclectic nature of the show, the dichotomy, the ostentatiousness, the perfunctory that sounds about as smart as LeVar Ball. Back to the Matt Thomas Show, whoever he is. Ross V. Ries out with you. It is the Matt Thomas show, but there is no Matt Thomas, at least today. He's not gone completely. All right, I don't alarm anybody.

I know it's 2020. He'll be back. So he's calling the, well, he's on the call as on the sidelines for a U of H versus Navy. That game going to be on a sister station, KPRC 950, starting coverage at 130. You'll have here on Sports Talk 790 tomorrow coverage starting at 134. The Texas Longhorns as they take on the Baylor Bears. And the UT band would not be there because half of them didn't want to play the eyes of Texas. but that's a different discussion for a different time.

We've already had that enough times this week. And also, I want to remind you, first of all, a couple of things. The nightcap, 6 o'clock with yours truly Ross via real, and then the sports RV show tomorrow 11 a.m. Here on Sports Talk 790s, I can get as many shameless plugs as I'd like. So some good conversation in the last segment with Brian Smith, mostly about the Houston Texans. And, I mean, from week to week, are you guys just totally out on the Texans?

What are we looking at it? What are we getting interested to? What is firing you up right now as far as sports that are going on? I mean, are you just mostly interested in your fantasy teams? Are you just mostly interested in whatever college football team it is you're rooting for? Are you excited for Big Ten coming back? There's going to be no basketball for the foreseeable future. At the very least Christmas, maybe Martin Luther King Day.

We had Matt Moore of Action Network on earlier. He said he's hearing even past. Some owners wanted to go past Martin Luther King Day. And then obviously baseball is just in full off season. unless you're locked in on the Tampa Bay Ray's and the L.A. Dodgers going at it in the World Series. And what is there that is getting you

fired up and all ready and raring to go as far as sports? I think it might not be a lot right now for Houston sports fans, but there is the game this weekend against the Green Bay Packers, the Houston Texans, as we mentioned earlier on, plus three and a half point dogs

in the total in this one, 57. And I talked about, I think we're just going to see a shootout this weekend. Deshawn Watson, Aaron Rob, Rogers, airing it out, last team to get the ball wins. I think that's what we're going to see. And it's funny because Romeo Cornell is now the head coach for the Houston Texans, and their defense has been terrible.

It's one of the worst units in football. The run defense especially, Derek Henry running rough shot all over the Texans all last week, and he had that really long run that he ripped off, and then he just completely dominated them in overtime, had over 250 total yards, and just went on to – and now he's – is one of the best running backs in the NFL, but you got Aaron Jones who's having a pretty good season and a pretty good offensive line and run game from the Green Bay Packers coming into town this week, and Romeo Cornell asked how he's going to deal with that.

We can kind of load up the box, okay? And then when you load up the box, then Aaron likes that because now he knows he's got one-on-one coverage down the field, you know, so that's one of you pick your poisons. And so what we have to do is we have to mix it up, not show him the same thing all the time, show them some different looks. And then when we show the different look, hopefully that they don't have a play called that matches that look, you know. And then if that's the case, then we have to rally and hustle to the football and try to get the guy on a ground before he gets in the end zone. So there you go. It's a pick your poison situation for the Texans. And we talked about this coming in. And this is exactly what I said. When I picked and predicted this

in the season. I don't want to be the guy who says I was right, but I was right at least in one thing. And I said, I just don't see the talent on the defense. People are talking about how they're going to be improved and, you know, you got the, you just locked up Zach Cunningham, and you had had Bernardic McKinney locked up and all that type of stuff. But one of the issues was going to be what's going to happen with the pass rush, what's going to happen on the front? And DJ Reeder, who's hurt now for the Cincinnati Bengals, but he's, that is a huge, huge hole in the middle of defense that the Houston Texans are missing. And it also speaks and ties into what's going to be the problems for them going forward in the future. You don't have a lot of talent on the offensive line.

Your lineback and core is okay. And it's probably, I would say, maybe league average. And that's the strength of your defense right now. And the secondary hasn't been that great. And Justin Reed played good early on. And he just hasn't been the playmaker that he was in the first couple of weeks of the season. So you're just going to be giving up points after points and points and points and points this entire season. And I think you're going to see a lot of what you saw last weekend. I think you're going to see a lot of what you're going to see this weekend. I predict. You're going to see a good offensive team. You're going to see them move the ball. You're going to see a lot of it hinge on the fact that Deshawn Watson is just a great talent who can do things that only a handful of players

and quarterbacks on the entire planet can do. And then you're going to see the defense just give up points and give up points and give up points. And that's why I was not here for the discussion about the two-point conversion. Where did you fall on that, Brennan, as far as Romeo Cornell going for two to try to go up nine at the end of the game? Well, I thought it was really simple. You had to ask yourself, did you think the Texans were more likely to score a two-point conversion or stop

one? And I don't necessarily have an issue with either route, but my belief was they were more likely to score one, so I supported it. Yeah, I'm with you on there. Can I say this, though? No. People killed analytics for the decision, which the decision had nothing to do with analytics.

I think the analytics said it was basically a wash or even cost them. Yeah. So, yeah, well, that was Rich Gannon.

Rich Gannon got on his high horse and, oh, the analytics community and all that. He got some card out of his pocket and he was waving it in front. What was that whole deal and he was waving it in front of the camera and all that? Like, what are you doing, Rich Gannon?

Little does he know that Cardi's referring to is probably based off of analytics. Yes, the card he's referring to is based off analytics. Rich, okay? Like, you know what? People get so wrapped up and get all upset about.

analytics and and talk about I can't stand it. Analytics is a euphemism for information. Hold on. You know in 2020 we don't like information. No, well, that's true. But I mean, come on. It just means data. It just means tendencies on third and four.

What's one team more likely to do another? If it's a three to count, what pitches are left handed or right handed bad and more likely to see from this pitcher and all that type of stuff? It's just more information. it's really not that crucial. A lot of people get all upset and, oh, what happened to using your gut? All right, you use your gut and I will use my data. And then we'll see who comes out first because every team is doing it now.

And everyone wants to get all upset about it. And one of the teams, do you remember like 10 years? Not even, wasn't it like 10 years ago? There was a time where the New England Patriots had the ball in their own territory against the Indianapolis Colts. And it was like a fourth and two or something like that. and they went for it, and if they got it, they would have won the game. And that was a huge controversy. And everyone got all upset about it.

And it was, you know who it was? It was a man named Bill Belichick, who'd been very analytic forward. And throughout his tenure as the head coach of the New England Patriots. And guess what? Things have been going pretty well for them. And yes, the Houston Rockets have been the forefront of analytics, but they have not won a championship. But there's an analytics department for the San Antonio Spurs.

there's an analytics department in every single NBA team that there is right now. You say, oh, a jump shooting team can't win the championship. Oh, go ahead and meet the Golden State Warriors. They take a bunch of threes as well. And teams who take more threes are going to be more successful in every sport. And Billy Bean and what he's done, and people talk about him not winning a championship. He's not there anymore. If he ends up in Boston like is the rumor and you have analytics plus he's able to spend money,

look out. He hasn't won a championship because they don't spend money in over. He builds contenders in 90-win teams out of scratch with stuff that he does. Jeff Luno liked analytics. How did that work out for the Astros as far as building the team? Maybe it didn't work out so hot on the personal standpoint, on the personal front. But analytics revolution, the second analytics revolution in baseball was spearheaded by Jeff Luna.

And it was pretty darn successful. And we're even seeing that in 2019 with all these young players who are performing for the Houston Astros. So analytics just means information. I don't know, for whatever reason, people want to get all out of sorts about it, but it's just another word for info. That's okay. Don't get so scared about it.

Rich Gannon. 713, 2.125, a 790 is the phone number. We still got some NFL picks to get in for you, and we still have Chris Gordy's horrible football Friday parody. If you missed it, it's an absolute classic rock classic. That'll be coming up later here on the Matt Thomas Show, with Ziesel 3 on Sports Talk 790. Alex Bregman here.

Get 790. And Breggman drives it pretty deep to left field. Get your strows on the radio. Got the wall looking up, and that ball is gone. Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. Ross V. Reyes out with you. Matt will be back next week. He's out calling or he'll be on the sidelines for the U of H versus Navy game coming up this weekend.

In the meantime, just in a second, we will get, you know what, there he is. Paul Nolan, the man himself, to get us some picks here for the weekend. Oh, yeah. Look, we can't have you on, Paul, unless we get the proper music and the proper introduction for you. How you doing on this fine Friday afternoon, Mr. Nolan? How are you guys doing over there? So far, so good.

I don't know that there's a whole lot of interest in the Houston Texans around here in NFL in general. So you know what? When it happens and you don't really care about the local team that much, that means you got to get some action down, right? Yeah, well, that's the key. You know, just find the right value and keep yourself entertained when your team is in competition with the jets and the Giants and the Washington Redskins. Yeah, well, man, that's the only way you can make yourself care about NFC least football, right?

Get some action. Oh, my God, it's unbelievable. If that division collectively gets 20 wins, it'll be a miracle at this point. Do you think a 6-10 team could win that division? honestly, if they do, I honestly believe they got to just say, okay, if you're, if that happens, they should have to default and give it to the, they create a new wild card because they are making a mockery of winning your division. Yeah, absolutely. All right. Paul Nolan here with the picks up. First of Paul, give the folks the website and the phone number where they can reach you. Yeah, it's freewinners.comnet and the phone number is 888-36, 3733. They get the whole weekend free. We got some really nice games lined up for this weekend.

I have a game tonight as well. Just, you know, whatever they get, you know, it's just a free pass for the weekend. We really want to make sure we share as much as possible. So guys got to get a feel what we're doing. All right, beautiful. Let's start with the NFL action. Tampa Bay versus Las Vegas. We know that that Tampa Bay defense is ferocious and what they did against the Green Bay Packers.

Also, keeping an eye on the Trent Brown and coronavirus situation. What kind of things factor in with you guys when you're, when you're, monitoring this coronavirus situation, especially if it's even possible to the game might get called. Well, that's exactly, you said it best. It's such a tough spot. If this game didn't have all these question marks swirling around it, it would be an opportunity to find some value here. You know, but getting real information and knowing what's happening up until game time,

the coaches are using this again, in my opinion, as a cloak, to kind of deflect and distract. its opponent and their game plans going forward. And we saw the Patriots do it. And, you know, obviously Belichick's always doing stuff like that. But it's just a matter. You've got to pretend as if everything's happening the way it's supposed to happen. And then you can't pull the trigger on the game until you know for certain.

And that's really the most important thing. That's really the only way around this is to do it that way. Are you guys also monitoring, I guess, things like, you know, sometimes these teams are missing practices because the coronavirus protocols and all that type of stuff. You factor that in? Yeah, yeah, we all. But the problem is we can only speculate right now. There's no historical data.

And we'll learn it fast as we can. The AI is doing what it can do. All right, this team at Zoom meetings, this team at Zoom meetings, how has that effect? All right, so far there's been, you know, a lot of cases. There's been nine cases of teams with strictly Zoom meetings for a full week and, you know, had an impact team. So, like, yeah, we're learning.

And honestly, it's forcing us to kind of stay away from certain situations until we have a full, you know, bank of data. We just can't force the game in any way, shape, or form. Paul Nolan of freewinners.net, the website again, freewinters.net. So he's got to pick on that game. Also another one. This is the clash of the five and oh teams, unfortunately for the Texans. It's Tennessee Titans leading the AFC South. So if they're going to have any glimmer of hope, they would want the Titans to lose this one.

But how do you guys see this one playing out? Well, I mean, to me, Tennessee wishes they had to tell the one that wish they would have played this game when they were supposed to play it in the first place. That pass rush is just unbelievable. They're getting pressure on 40% of the snaps. They just as good as, you know, the best in the league. Last week against a really good offensive line, despite Wyatt Teller being out of Cleveland, Chris Hubbard stepped in, very good, you know, versatile linemen stepped in, not a huge drop off. still dominated 50% pass rush and success rate. So now tell the wand's out, obviously they lose Jack Conklin in the offseason.

You know, the Sumbraio, he's out now as well. That offensive line is in deep trouble. I think Tanhill, who has been very good this year, 7-0 touchdown to interception ratio, under pressure. However, in his career, he's been terrible. He's fumbled in those situations, his completion percentage, and quarterback rating have been absolutely abysmal until this year. I don't think he's seen anything like this. In fact, I know he's faced with the worst pass rushes in the league up until this point.

I think he's on the heavy, serious, the rest, and I think this game goes under. Ooh, okay. All right. So defensive battle there with the Pittsburgh Steelers versus the Tennessee Titans. Paul, go ahead and give them the phone number again. I know freewinters. dot net, the website freewinter's.net and give them that phone number

again. It's 888 366-3733. If they just give us a call now, they get the free picks, and I promise it'll be a huge game tonight. It'll be winners tomorrow and Sunday. I absolutely, I mean, I absolutely love the Jacksonville Jaguar Charger game. I know it's not pretty, but I love

it. And, you know, there's a lot of games that are going to be really good. This is where we really hit our strides. All right, now that's where you can find a lot of the value, right? The teams that nobody cares about is sometimes an easier way, especially in the college game. Oh, absolutely. And I want to also preface it by saying the under have given out. I know the unders have been so hard to come by based on the fact that the past interference is up and holding calls it down, but we'd still find ourselves in a situation.

We believe that there's still value on this unders. So don't be afraid of it even though it's ugly. All right. Freewinners.comnet. and the number again. 888-366-3-3-3-7-33. 888-3-66-6-3-37-33. Paul, appreciate the time. We'll talk to you down the road. Oh, it's always my pleasure. Thank you, sir. Stay happy and healthy.

Yes, sir. Appreciate it. Paul Nolan, freew winners.net for the free picks for this weekend. Freewinters.com. Again, all right, we're going to take a quick break here on the Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas. Final segment is coming up, and it's what you've been waiting for. It's what you wait for all week. We played it earlier in the show. It's a classic rock classic, the Chris Gordy horrible football Friday parody that is coming up in the final segment of the Matt Thomas show next here on Sports Talk 790. This is Cougars head coach Dana Holerson. Matt's kind of like Shasta without putting on a costume. He's a big old p.

The Matt Thomas show continues on Sports Talk 790. A breaking news. What's the breaking news, Brennan? Well, according to the AP, the NBA is targeting a December 22nd start. December 22nd for the NBA, I mean, we just had Matt Moran. He said, well, I think some owners want to wait, right? They're in a, it's one of those things where you're not going to be able to please anybody. December 22nd will be a pretty quick turnaround for the teams who were just in the championship in the Miami Heath and the Los Angeles Lakers.

for teams like the Rockets who, I mean, well, they don't have a first-round draft pick and there's going to be a lot of roster continuity, so it's not that big of a deal that they don't hire their coach as soon as possible. But doesn't that seem a little quick? It seems very quick. And I wanted to ask you, I'm looking right now, until you get a Woj or Shams confirmation on that, aren't you a little skeptical? I mean, I think Tim Reynolds, I've heard the name Tim Reynolds before.

I think he's broken stuff. I don't know that he... I'm not discrediting the AP. Why are you calling Tim Reynolds a fraud, Brendan? That's not very nice. I mean, I believe that they have genuine information, but targeting is a very, like, non-committal word. Very vague, yes. Okay, so you could say, well, that's what they're targeting.

And it couldn't be maybe that's not, you know, they don't end up doing it. Like I told Matt, right? I told them how to break news and say, this is the coach A is the leader or the frontrunner. Barring significant change, Stephen Silas is the frontrunner. to be the next NB Rocket's head coach. Exactly. You tweet that out. If you're wrong, well, you know,

something happened and like in the background check, and you can always just kind of shore that up and make up a reason why that did fell through. I think targeting December 22nd gives you like a month buffer. Like as long as they start by January 22nd, you still sound believable. Was it Woe? Was it Woj or Adam Schaefter, whoever,

where they were making tweets during the draft? I think it was Woj right. It was like the Rock or the, you know, the Milwaukee Bucks are making eyes with player X that they're going to draft so that he wasn't technically tweeting out the draft picks before they happened. It was a great move, whoever it was. Yeah, that was.

So maybe that's what we need. Matt Thomas is looking for 30,000 followers. Look, we had the 20,000 follower party. I want to say, like, two or three years ago at this point. And so we were waiting to have the 30,000. He said he's going to have it in Las Vegas, which is, well, kind of shut down right now. So maybe we don't want to go there. Oh, so you just want him to get, you just want like an excuse to go to Vegas.

Yeah, I don't care about Madden's followers. All right? I mean, come on. That's not that big of a deal. But yeah, so we need him to break some news, or at least say that he's about to break some news, like Tim Reynolds just did. They're targeting December 22nd. All the rockets are targeting Stephen Silas as their next hood coach. Maybe negotiations fell through. There's a number of excuses that you can come up with why your information was wrong. But the NBA looking for December 22nd, I just think, I guess that the more time you can buy yourself for a length of your schedule, the better it's going to be. And now you're just going to have like two or three game series, I guess, is what they're going to try to do to make it a little bit easier scheduling-wise. And that makes a lot of sense. But it just seems a little rushed from a procedural standpoint, just from getting everything in order and getting the draft and getting free agency

and getting teams into camp and not able to have fans in certain arenas, but having them in others. The longer you would wait, in theory, the more arenas that you would be. be able to put fains in. Does it give you enough time to miss basketball? Because I think that matters. As far as like, oh, well, I'm missing. Then now they're ramping back up.

I don't know. For me, I think the time period, like all sports, if you enjoy a sport, you need that time where it's out of your life where you're like, man, I can't wait for football or basketball or baseball or return. Yeah. The funny thing, though, is like in the Premier League, they ended like the end of July or, I'm sorry, the end of June. and then they have the Champions League

and then they start right back up in August. You're like, holy crap, it's already back again? I forgot, which I don't get super into the Premier League more or so after college football because I went in and what else are you going to watch on a Saturday morning? You might as well watch some English guys kick a ball around. But yeah, I don't know how much the turnaround would matter for me. But I guess we'll see what the NFL.

I'm sorry, what the NBA decides to do. So Tim Reynolds at the AP saying that they're going to get something done probably. They're targeting. targeting December 22nd, says he. All right, let's go ahead and get the horrible Chris Gordy football Friday parody. Brendan, let's go ahead and communicate. You are going to run this?

No, I'm going to run this. Okay, well, I guess I'm running it now, so now I've got to find it. So, yeah, I got it. The horrible Football Friday parody from Chris Gordy is just an all-timer. We have to play it again for you. Here you go from Chris Gordy talking about the Texans and possible traits. He's told us Jack He's not a GM

He's just a hack The trade dance He'll make some moves More than any He's an all-timer for Chris Gore You know like when Justin Verlander Like in the last couple of years He'll be hitting like 94-95

In the middle innings And then he knows that the seventh Is going to be his last inning So he just reaches back for like 98-99 That's what it feels like Chris Gordy is doing Chris Gordy reached back for the second, for the simple man, for the second win. When you look at that, do you consider that the best one we've had this year?

Or because it's lyrically probably more towards the middle? Yeah, the lyrically middle towards a pack. I'm with you on the arm. Stop Lamar the best? Stop Lamar. Do do, do, do. I don't know. We'll have to do a retrospective.

You know, at the end of the year, we play the best of parodies. Chris Gordy comes in and talks. It's like, you know, inside the music or something like that. It's almost like a documentary. You get Chris Gordy. He's like, yeah, well, you know, 30 minutes before the show, I put this one together and I, and I ripped it from YouTube or something like that. I think this one was done, like, way early. Yeah, he did this one early.

But some of the ones he does, like, right before the show. And so he just tells, he tells the story. He spins the yarn of the story of these various football Friday parodies. And then usually he does that at the end of the year as a retrospective. So, yes, we'll have to get to the bottom of which will be the best horrible Football Friday parody from Chris Gordy at some point. And that's what we're looking forward to here on the show. And you know what? Speaking of that, I guess that's going to do it for the Matt Thomas show here on a Sports Talk 790.

My name is Ross Vierreland. You know what I will say? I want to say thank you for listening to the show. Thank you for calling, tweeting, being involved in any way. I appreciate you very much. Thanks to Brendan Riley for doing a great job as always. Thanks to Chris Gordy for doing a great parody. Thanks to Brian Smith and Matt Moore for joining the show.

I will talk to you guys next. at 6 o'clock in the nightcap. No Astros, no rockets for a very long time. So we're going to have a lot of nightcaps coming up here on the show. And also tomorrow at 11 a.m., the sports RV show. You just can't get enough of me, can you? I'll be on with you tomorrow at 11 o'clock here on Sports Talk 7.9. You're home for the Houston Astros and the Houston Rockets.

It's the A team with Adam Clanton and Adam Wixler here on Sports Talk 7.9.