The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Rockets vs Raptors Tonight, MJ Is Anti Load Management, World Series Is HOT!

Episode Date: October 29, 2025

Rockets vs Raptors Tonight, MJ Is Anti Load Management, World Series Is HOT!

is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. H-Town, good morning, and welcome to a Wednesday edition of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Coming you today from Toronto, Ontario, where tonight the Houston Rockets will try to make it back-to-back wins. They'll take on the Raptors, who have dropped three consecutive games. We've got Blue J. Mania here in Toronto. We've got the Texans back on the practice field. and we have Michael Jordan talking about load management, all among the topics of conversation today

here on a Wednesday edition of the show. Sports RV, how the hell are you? I'm doing fantastic, Matthew. There is a nip in the air here in Houston, Texas. The cold front came through. It's hoodie season now in Houston, Texas, at least for a couple of days, and I'm happy. Hmm, I wonder if it's as cool down there

as it is up here in Toronto. Probably not close. What's your, what's your, what's your, do you do converting from Celsius? No, my weather channel app gives me the Fahrenheit. So it's 49 degrees here. It's 58 degrees. We had a high as 66 today in Houston, Texas. How about that?

Oh my gosh. It's almost like a like a brisk afternoon walk after a hard of a show. Honestly, this is colder than most winters. No kidding. No kidding. Hope you guys are in a good mood. And ladies as well, we invite you today to join the show at 713-212-5-790. 713-212-1-2-5-790.

E. Mae Dog is going to drop by and talk to us at about 11 o'clock today. Shut your bum ass up at 1130. The news at noon. Willie Fritz, our Cougars, our top 25 ranked Cougars, 7-1. Going to take on West Virginia coming up this Saturday. He'll join us at 1.30. And then I thought, Rossi, I didn't mean to presume anything, but do we want to go with the Guerrero Dad and Son for Believe it or not today after the big home run he hit last night?

Why are we involving his father? Can you do eight juniors? I don't know. I mean, okay. Well, just for winning a home run. He just tied it up two, too. It's not like he won in World Series MVP. On Otani, though.

That's true. Otani is a good pitcher, not the best pitcher ever. He's actually, I think he's a better hitter than his pitcher. Yeah, but when you combine everything up, I mean, it's just insane. So I was listening to your show yesterday. Really? Going to the airport. I called in.

Remember, I did call him. No, I forgot. I hardly spoke because you guys who were arguing the whole time. What were we arguing about? I don't know. I can't remember what Gorey was wrong about. How big coaches jobs were. Oh, well, yeah, everybody, every single school has to win a championship within three years.

And then he's naming all these schools. I mean, it's just not realistic. And the micro level, and, okay, no, no, no. Sorry, go ahead. No, no, no, no. I think we can do it. Well, I mean, here's the reality. And we'll talk, we will get into this eventually, I'm sure.

But the boosters are going to dry up. They're like, if you don't win, we're not. going to pay you so there is intense pressure i mean i don't think you and i i could possibly disagree about it but you're right only one school can win but how many boosters in this country are going to be giving away millions and millions of dollars to be on the outside looking in they're going to want ultimately a championship but that's something we can get to all right so we're going with this oh uh oh now we did have to defer to something else i was going to bring up something else uh you were talking about calling in you said you were listening to the show oh oh oh i know what it was

you brought up, and I hate to give you credit, because it hurts. I must have really done something nice. You've done okay as a host. You bring some entertainment value of the show. Thank you, Matt. I appreciate that. You brought up two of the most dynamic athletes in sports today. One of them is with a direct rival.

Yes. And one is with an indirect rival. Correct. Remember what you were talking about? Whose fan base we hate? Yes. Yeah. Victor Wimbunyama.

Now remember, attendance is a huge part of the grade. He's got to do it for 82, and he's going to have to do it to get the spurs to the playoffs and have to make a deep playoff run, but they're off to a great start. He's right next door. I mean, he's going to be in your face, not only from his sidewise.

I think he's only played like 14 fewer games than I'm in, Thompson. But the pressure isn't on him like it is on, I mean, the pressure is on Victor way more than isn't a man. Yes, and you're projecting the future. Correct. The way that his body is built, there's literally zero precedent for somebody having a long-storied career. Maybe he should have a little load management,

which we'll talk about as we'll talk about as well, of course. Yeah. So ultimately, for a guy that's 7-5, whatever he is. Listed at 7-5. I mean, and probably taller people have said. That's insane. Which I wonder if he's like, no, don't say that. It's like Kevin Durant, you can't figure out how tall he is.

I've seen everywhere from 6, 10 to 7 feet. I think he's 7 foot. just from seeing, when we're around him, he was taller than, he was taller than Ryan Hollins. He was taller in Jabari Smith Jr. Like all standing next to each other. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. So I totally agree with you that maybe sometimes these guys don't want to be taller than they are because they worry about, well, that guy's going to be fragile.

So to your point, though, you were talking about yesterday, that guy is going to potentially be a big pain in our ass for the foreseeable future. Yes. Then you've got the Los Angeles Dodgers who are going to be perennial great team with all the agent players they've been able to get. Plus, Freddie Freeman, I mean, what a big hero he was for that extra-during game a couple nights ago. I think I show you, Otani, who is a, you know, and people use the term generational

way way too much. But he's generational. I mean, he's, well, he's not a generational because it's never been done before to the level that he's at it. I mean, okay, Babe Ruth, but that was like six generations ago. Yeah, and even the Babe Ruth home run numbers and stuff didn't start coming until he was only a batter. So like hitting 50 bombs and

pitching, it's just unprecedented. So we as sports fans that aren't fans of the Dodgers and Spurs, we may have some issues. And it feels like we're uniquely positioned too here in Houston. I mean, who else hates the Spurs and the Dodgers? It's just Houston. Yeah, I don't think there's a lot of Spurs hate.

Honestly. No. I mean, maybe in Dallas, but they probably don't care about the Dodgers. Not as much as we do. I mean, again, if you said name the most hated team in the NBA, it'd probably be Warriors, right? Warriors, Lakers. Knicks to a smaller extent.

Yeah, maybe. Grizzlies. No, nobody cares what the grizzlies. Nobody hates the bucks. Nobody hates the Rockies. Everybody loves this. Yeah, the spurs, I mean, everybody loves on. And we hate him here in Houston.

Yeah, so I just thought it was a good comment that you had. And I wanted to make a note of it because it's so rare that it does happen that. Uh-huh. Yeah, we'll write this one down. We'll get this one etched in a plaque or something. Well, it's almost like we do, I'm sorry. Isn't Friday we should be like, I'm applauding you for. I don't know if you can come up with something every week, though.

No, no, no, no. All right. So being in a bar last night here in Toronto. Oh, really? First time, again, I've been coming here for each. This is my 10th season with the Rockets traveling. And normally we come during the winter months, obviously, for the NBA season. And we went to this restaurant yesterday that had wall-to-wall NHL games on.

And they will put on their season. such hockey enthusiasts here that they'll put a rando game on between the Kings and the Wild. And if you asked to move it to another channel,

people will yell at you. They'll kick you out. On a polite way, though, because they're Canadian. Yeah, everybody's very polite here. So a couple years ago, we asked to put some NBA games on, and they're like, what do you do? It was a big NBA game, too. I mean, it may have been Warriors, Lakers, or something like that, what it was, but they just got mad. They're like,

no no no we want your hockey i'm like wait it's the blue jackets against the red wings why do you care about this they love their house yeah yes they do so every every sports bar has to have center ice or whatever they call it up there well there's like 19 sports networks the blue line oh that's true yeah they have they have they have they have if you're a sports fan in canada you get a bunch of tv channels extra i mean you know how we have espn 1 2 you and news and ocho now in ocho well i ocho's like during the summer months when things are dry. They have TSN and SportsNet.

Two cable networks, like FS1 or whatever, but they have like six sub-channels of each. So, I mean, if you want to watch sports, you got like 12 different versions of ESPN and you can watch for the Canadian style. That sounds amazing. So you get the game,

so the game's about the start between the Blue Jays and the Dodgers, and I'm thinking, oh, this is, I want to curious how the bar goes. Every television went from hockey to baseball, and people roared happily. They were like, this is awesome. We're going to get back for what we did after losing the game a couple nights ago.

And I've never seen it before. I've never seen a hockey game that a bar fight didn't fight didn't break out because they changed a channel. And then at Rogers Center, which is the stadium where the Blue Jays play, it used to be called Skydome. There were thousands of people in the stands. Thousands. Yeah, they've been having watch parties there. They were showing them falling asleep in that 18-in-game. Hey, did Diken Park have watch parties when the Astros run the World Series? I'm going to assume they did, right?

They did, yes. I don't know if it was for every game in every World Series, but they definitely did. Yeah, but I mean, the place, and again, they only show the world. I think the tickets were free or maybe a dollar to the Astros Foundation or something like that. Kind of a nice idea, just to kind of raise a couple of bucks and be with your fellow fans and whatnot. Get that Aramark Cash. Jim Crane liked it. Yeah. By the way, Toronto City, Toronto loves having game six back here next week, or later this

weekend for sure because a series with the yes they do yesterday so I just was it was just really weird because there were people wearing usually come to Toronto you get people wearing maple leafs jerseys and whatnot and there were George Springer jerseys there were old dave steeb jerseys from the blue jays past I mean there was jesse

barfield was a eustonian now it was kind of nice to be in this atmosphere and it made me kind of sad in one respect Ross because it kind of miss us being a part of that kind of thing it may be miss it and I watched that whole 18 inning game and it made me with it. Like even like though, you know, when it gets to like 13, 14, 15, it's like this thing, this needs

to end. But even that, like you're hanging on every pitch, World Series baseball. I missed it very much. I was jealous. Yeah. Yeah. Jealous is the word I would use because these people are all smiling and happy. And meanwhile, we're thinking about how the Astros lost a pitching coach while I was gone

the last day. Yes. You know what the reason for that is, I have. think. What is the reason for that, Matt? Because your manager and your general manager on the final years of their contract. They're probably thinking, I want to get out before maybe there's a change, and then the new manager comes in a new general manager comes in, and I've got to go look for work. That's a byproduct of the quote-unquote lame duck year. Coaches will tend to leave because they're worried about whether or not they can be on, they'll be staying here the long term. Yeah, that's possible.

It kind of makes sense when I saw that note yesterday. All right. So, So we got email to get to rockets. We have to get to load management. We don't got to get to World Series. I've got to get to anything else. Ross that I missed from yesterday that would be worthy of a conversation piece today on the show. I don't know. We get all the new offensive line rankings are fresh off the presses.

I haven't looked. Now they have been 32, 31, holding steady at 29. Yes. And I told you, Matt, start of the season, baby. They're going to charge up to 25th at some point. you know what you remind me of what a son a father whose son always fails out of classes and then he gets to a c minus and you're applauding him yeah it's amazing right all we can do is try to improve in this life of ours matt things aren't going to be perfect as i told my oldest son cameron sees do get degrees yes it may pay to make aes but c's get degrees baby 1013 on the matt thomas show at ross we'd like you to have me a part of our radio program you can do so by calling 713212 5 790. That's 713212.579. If you want to follow us on Twitter and you're not a bot, at SportsMT, we greatly appreciate that. At Sports RV. And of course, Rossi's

Instagram account is at Sports RV. That's it. I'm following you back for the next 15 minutes. Okay. He's going to follow you back, but I'd go check back in an hour or so and see where it is at that point. I don't unfollow people. I wouldn't do that. That would be a Matt Thomas thing. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-21-2-5-7-90. Matt here in Toronto, Ross, back in Houston, and we thank you for being a part of the Matt Tomas-show Ross here on Sports Talk 790.

Matt and Ross with you on Sports Talk 790. Ross, you're a mathematician, right? No, I hated math. I was good at math in high school, but I hated it. Okay, so let's do a really basic math issue. Okay. I went and got me a coffee today at Rim Roy. Oh, here we go.

It was $2.25 Canadian. Okay. I go to check my debit card. U.S. $1.61. Okay. So what's our value on that?

0.72. I googled it. That was really quick. How did you do that? Canadian to USDA, Matt. It was very easy. Yeah, but you didn't know where I was going with this, did you? Yeah, come on now.

You do know the show, don't you? Every time you go to Canada, you do Canadian to USDA. It's an automatic, isn't it? That's fine. I know you better than most, let's say. For better or for worse. What is it normally? That feels like that's really good value today, right?

I mean, do you want the historic graph? I can pull that up too. You are prepared. Yeah, it's been going. It was lower, let's see, in the last year. It's been holding steady for about a year. So we want the number lower or higher than points? We want it to be lower.

That way the dollar's worth more. Okay. I got a large Rim Rortons coffee for $1.601. I feel pretty happy about that, actually. Yeah, I don't mess with Canadian money while I'm here. It's just because you want to have to. You don't have to normally, right? I mean, you get an international charge on your card?

No, no international charge. But I usually pay cash when I'm on the road, but I don't ever use American money. I don't even take it. Yeah, I went out to Korea. I thought my car didn't have anything. international charges, but it did. I was not fun to come home to. Oh, I'm sorry about that.

Yeah. Thanks for nothing, rank of a rarica. It's really not a rank of a rarica. It's a rank of a ron. Well, it's also rank of Rost didn't check. I should have double-checked. That's true. That's true.

All right, 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-1-2-5-7-90. Are we done trying to figure out how, if Damico was grumpy or the media was grumpy or we have we passed along that it's been I feel like it's been two plus days of that it's so funny that they've won three of the last four games and then this is when Domeko Ryan's like gets

at his most anger but it also I mean it makes sense you kind of have to take this is anything right Matt I mean if you I don't know you forget to take out the trash with your wife you kind of got to sit there and take it but when you remember to do stuff or you're doing stuff right you're like yeah yeah see that you got

comebacks like Dimeco doesn't have comebacks when they're giving up like eight sacks in a game. You can't say anything about the offense and they're not scoring any points. You have some comebacks when you win three out of four and you're beating the 49ers. So honestly, look, every coach needs every victory, right? I mean, but nobody's thinking that teams go 17 or no. For his own mental health, he needs this one against Denver bad, right? Oh, it's a must-win game. I like this. Because here's the thing. One, he gets sidelways with meat.

Yes. Some people, it feels like to me the social media streets are, why are you so grumpy D'Amico? And then there's other people saying media just is in their feels, which is always, that's always a funny one to me. But if you win this game, it'll be your best one of the season by far. I mean, the other opponents just aren't very good.

And it'll tell D'Amico, go tell the media members, shut your bum ass up. Yes. If he loses, guess what returns, Rossi? The noise. And this is what, when you go off the coach speak script, this is what you open yourself up to. Yeah. Yeah.

So maybe it's safer just to go coach speak. Probably is, but it's more fun. It's entertaining. This is adding a, hey, we're in the entertainment business, Matt. This is an extra way of entertainment for us. I was entertained for it, but I just was like, I don't know if I want to get another deep conversation about this in the next couple of days. So you know what? That's what I'm saying.

He needs it for his mental health to win this game. Holding with the Texans at minus one and a half, total went up a tick to 40 and a half. from 39 and a half. So who's the favorite now in the game? Texans. So it switched from a one point, because it opened late Sunday at one. By the time you and I got in the air,

it was one and a half in favor of Denver, and then it switched, what, three points now? Yeah, it was a three-point switch. Is that because of Patrick's Retains injury? I can't admit. I don't think, no, cornerback's not moving three points. I'm going to, my guess,

and we actually had a caller ask about this, too, My guess is that there was a flood of money on the Texans plus the Pat Certaine injury. You add it all up. But yeah, three point. A cornerback is not moving along three points. No, not that you and I know what the handles are on these things, but if something moves three points this early week, that means a lot of money went to the Texans. I mean, obscene amounts of money. Yeah, and sometimes they hold their lines.

So Vegas is like, all right, like last week, 80% of the money was on the Niners, and Vegas held their line. So they moved it here. So we'll see. Of course, Matt, you know, it doesn't mean everything. But it's just an idea. It's just an idea. It's a metric. You know how we are?

We're metric 790, that's for sure. That's true. Especially 2 to 6. Oh, yeah, 2 to 6. Well, 1 doesn't know. Wait, okay. 713, 212 570. 7132-1-790.

All right. Did you watch all the World Series game last night or just parts? So how'd you spend your night? You know, it's funny. watched all the 18 inning game, but I watched hardly any of the, this game. I was out running a couple errands, and then by the time, you know, when you, it meets baseball, I saw that it was, I think it was like six to one early on, not early on, but I think of the seventh inning, like, yeah, I saw it was six to one and I kind of tuned out.

Yeah, it's, it's, I think that you could have fatigue after it. I mean, it's, I think probably what, one percent of America stood up for 18 innings, and most of them were in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. Yeah, I mean, West Coast. for sure. That was 3 a.m. Eastern. So maybe you're like, you know what, this game could be a game that could be a dog because of the pitchers that were used and everybody's tired.

I was checking the score, but I wasn't watching. Yeah, I'm in the same spot. You do, yeah, but yeah, Toronto is, you can't go five feet without seeing something. Blue Jays, obviously. You guys know what it's all about? We did the same thing in Houston. Yeah, and you know what? You're making me really want to go to Toronto. You talk about how great it is. It is. But I hate the cold, so I've got to go in the summer.

Yeah, it's, like I said, it's 49 degrees. here but the people are super nice, the exchange rate's good, it's a clean city, there's plenty of stuff to do, now traffic is an absolute bear, and custom sucks. What's the

what's the public transit like? I've never been on it. I don't know if they have it. I'm going to presume they do. This is a really cosmopolitan Yeah, that's what I assume. I'll put it this way. I don't see subway systems, I'll put it that way. I don't see trains. But it's showing you, just tell you how bad it was. We were

going, the airport is like Intercontinental here in Toronto, where it's out in the suburbs. And it took us, now we're going into the cities as compared to going out. It took us an hour and 15 minutes to go 21 miles yesterday.

So, it was, it was, it was a, it took us by the time we landed, by when we cleared customs, it was over two hours where we put time it landed and got to the hotel. Oh, wow. Google says public transit is excellent. I think every other city except a Houston's got excellent public transit.

Don't make you upset. I'm in Dallas. Dallas sucks has better transit than we do. I know. We can go to the suburbs on the trains out there. Oh, wow. Don't make you upset. We have the Astros and the Rockets and the Texans.

I love going to towns with great public transit. I would love it if I knew how to use it better. But I'm so infrequently on them, I just don't know. I'm like I'm a lost puppy. Like one time I was going on the train in New Jersey to get out to the suburbs. and I didn't realize it was a mad dash to get on the train as fast as humanly possible. People would push you aside and kick your testicle areas. It is.

It's tough. It was like that in Seoul, South Korea. But the lines were great. It was basically kind of like in similar to there's a loop and then there's crisscrosses. Kind of like in Houston, but it was just trains. It was great and cheap. You know what? We had a, the Astros play.

I know the schedule for next year's out. Did the Astros come to play Toronto during the summertime? it'd be really kind of a fun place to come hang out because I've never been to Rogers Center. Blue Jay fans are really good. And like I said, I bet this time of year, I mean, in the summertime, Toronto is awesome. Yeah, my brother and mother went up to Toronto just for that exact reason. Bringer for tickets. By the way, George Springer is on every other TV commercial here.

Is he really? Yeah. Okay. Good for him. Is this his last year of his deal or he's got one more? I would think if it was his last year, we'd be hearing more about it. Yeah, I'm trying to remember. I can't remember. Okay.

He's on a six-year deal with it. Has he been gone that long? He hasn't been gone that long. Man, this has been a while. Time flies, Matthew. Okay, he's got one more year. He started there in 21. By the way, they're not anticipating him playing anymore. It would be a basic, they're saying maybe game seven.

That's tough. Yeah, when you go to that maybe card, it's kind of like, I know you're just trying to say it to be polite, but it's not going to work out that way. All right, 713-1-2-5-7-90 if you want to join the conversation. Again, E. E. Dono is going to join us in one half hour to talk some Rockets basketball with him. Rockets and Raptors tonight.

Speaking of the NBA, you know, NBC's done a fantastic job so far, at least of their NBA coverage. They had these little vignettes with Michael Jordan. Basically, Mike Tarrico and Michael Jordan sat down probably for about an hour, would you think, Ross, an hour and a half? Yes. And they did a bunch of questions, and they've chopped it up to play it over the course of the year. Well, one of the things they brought up yesterday was in the vignette was a about load management. We'll let you hear what Michael had to say about that.

And does the goat have a point? We'll discuss that coming up in mere moments here on the Matt Thomas show of Ross. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Matt and Ross with you on Sports Talk 7-90. Our time is 1033. Ross, how the hell are you? Doing fantastic, Matthew. Thank you for asking. How about you?

Doing good. Travel-wear are you all right? No, I'm good. now I'm coming home tomorrow okay see my daughter playing her playoff volleyball game and then I'll be with you in studio Friday before going back up to Boston's

Rockets and Celtics on Saturday so talk to me on Monday see how I feel at that point okay this is all very confusing I know I know 713 212 5790 713 71212 5790 now when OG's talk Ross

yes sometimes you go man such sage, good information, I wish today's kids would relate to what OGs have to say. Sometimes OGs can be, get off my lawn person, right? Yes.

Or, boy, it's easy for you to say that. If you were doing things in our generation, you'd have a different frame of mind. And in general, we're always nostalgic. Everything was the golden age when we were younger. Right. Everything was when we were doing something, it was better. Bill Russell, I was in the toughest era, magic,

Barrett, I was in the toughest era. Jordan and Shaq and Kobe, we were in the toughest era. You know, it's just how it goes. The 70s and 80s were the best music ever, not the crap we're hearing today. Well, that's, yeah, that's actually true. We'll throw in the 60s.

Okay. You get my drip. Everything that when we were younger is better. Of course. So, I want to play the audio of Michael Jordan, a small little clip of what he said yesterday on the NBC. It was in between the two games that NBC does on Tuesday nights. And we'll ask the audience if you are so inclined.

Do you agree? Do you disagree? And is this coming from a perspective of an observer of basketball, or is this an observer of, well, if I was doing it today, this wouldn't be an issue. We're talking about Michael Jordan, talking with Mike Torrico last night, about what the NBA now calls load management.

The term load management has become such a hot button in the NBA. I know you were going to talk about that one. Because you played 80 games a lot. A lot. You played 82. What do you think of when you hear the term load management throwing around? Well, it shouldn't be needed, first and foremost. You know, I never wanted to miss a game because it was an opportunity to prove. It was something that I felt like, you know, the fans are there that watch me play.

I want to impress that guy way up on top who probably worked his ass off to get a ticket. or to get money to buy the ticket. You really cared about the guy who sat in the top deck at the palace in Auburn Hills to watch you when you came to Detroit? Yeah, because I know he's probably yelling at me. I want to shut him up. He's calling all kinds of names. I definitely want to shut him up. You have a duty that if they're wanting to see you and as an entertainer, I want to show, right?

So if the guys are coming to watch me and play, I don't want to miss that opportunity. Now, physically, if I can't do it, then I can't do it. but physically if I can do it and I just don't feel like doing it that's a whole different lens okay and the full clip about load management is three minutes long but I figure I gave you the best

60 seconds of it I think Michael Jordan Ross when it's all sudden done if we sit back and our grandkids grandkids ask us about who the most competitive athletes were that we ever watched, witnessed saw in person or saw on television Michael's going to be on the top three of that list right

I mean, just super competitive in everything that he's ever done. Yeah, he and Brady come to mind one, too, whatever order you want to put him in. Right, right. Not coincident? A lot of championships between those two guys. That's right now. The question you would have to ask is, is he really telling you the truth about doing it for the Detroit guy, the Milwaukee guy, the Houston guy? At the top of it.

Yeah. Or is he doing it for himself knowing that if he's sitting on the bench and not in uniform, that Tim Hardaway or Patrick Ewing or Vernon Maxwell is swearing and I'm going, where are you at, Biocch? You know what I mean? I think that's part of it, is that, yeah, he's getting on a soapbox and talking about back in his day. And he is somebody who's very competitive. And yeah, he does want to downgrade today's players, especially, I mean, LeBron James. Clearly, he's got rivalry with. And we know that LeBron James is somebody that has participated in load management

and also somebody by the way who has played way more minutes regular season and postseason than Michael Jordan ever did in his career and also I mean we all watch the last dance right Matt? We all did

and he talked about it had to nothing else was on am I did I miss something did he not retire the height of his career at age well you know my philosophy on that I know you think he got suspended, but the conspiracy spirit, theory aside. Because I don't know, they're just,

we don't have any evidence of that. He talked about, in last dance, he gave his reason. His reason was they had been to three straight finals. There was a lot of pressure. Of course, there was the passing of his dad. Like, mentally he was mentally and physically, he was completely

drained. At age 29. And he retired. And I'm trying to think of what people would say, if LeBron James, the age of 29, said, you know what, guys, I'm mentally and physically taxed. I'm going to retire. How much he would be crushed and called soft and mentally weak and all these different things.

It just strikes me funny. So here's the reason why, and I've told you this before, this is the reason why I do believe there was an informal suspension. How do you go from being that driven to where? win multiple championships to be the greatest on earth, to be the face of the league, to be one of the, working your way towards being the greatest ever,

and then all of a sudden say, I'm done? That's why I didn't, never bought it. I just never did. It makes sense, well, at least the way he frames it. Of course, the last dance is his retelling of history and how it was his production.

Right. Right. I mean, he controlled basically every bit of it. So, I mean, but what he said makes sense he became a global icon everywhere he walked. Like he couldn't leave the house without getting swarmed by people. He couldn't live a regular life. He was exhausted from three straight finals. He had been pushing his body to limits because of the Detroit Pistons and the way that they were beating up on him.

And then, of course, I mean, his father got murdered. That's pretty serious part as well. Yeah. So, I mean, I think I can buy that it wasn't some suspension from. unless he was gambling on basketball. I mean, can you explain to me, I guess, you think David Stern came to him and said, you're gambling too much on golf and other stuff?

I'm saying that there is some, and not even salacious would not even be the term. There were probably some addiction habits that a time away from the sport, you know, remember, media started to really pick up on every move. And again, Grand, there was media when he was playing, obviously. but the investigative part of journalism was really kicking in during that time. I could see somebody whispering to somebody to say that Michael Jordan owes me $5 million in golf and is not paying.

I mean, again, I'm just throwing stuff against the wall. Yeah, I just don't know why. That would make David Stern say you've got to retire from basketball for a year. I don't say retire. I think he said, again, this is just my pure guess. The silent suspension. how about you take some time away get your personal life together

and I'm talking about the competitive I'm talking about the grief of his father's death I do believe gambling was an aspect of it and again we'll never know we'll never never know but unfortunately we are a society that thinks about when something is just going along beautifully Ross and then all of a sudden things just stop on a dime

you just don't when you're working your way towards me the greatest of all time, you just don't stop in a dime. And that's what he did. He left on top at a young age. He was sub-30. Now, in his defense on this other side of this, I do believe if Michael Jordan was playing in 2025

and maybe I'm wrong about this too. I do believe he would say, F you unloaded management. I think, especially if he had a guy like LeBron going mono-mona with him to try to be the best player on earth, to be the greatest, consider the greatest of all time, I do believe that Michael

Jordan does honestly believe, leave that load management is a farce. Now, the problem is now just because Michael wants to play, does his coach, his general manager, and his owners say you need to miss this game against Memphis because I need you the next night in Milwaukee.

You know what I mean? Yeah, and this isn't the thing. On its face, yeah, it's very simple to say, I want to play all 82 games, I want to compete, I wanted the little kid to smile at me, but then you have to ask yourself, why is there a load management? And it's a number of things. first of all, it's because

the players are resting and especially now Michael Jordan was somebody who was 365 working on his body, but not everybody was like that in the 80s especially and then it came into the 90s and now I mean it's year round for these guys as far as like you're a bad teammate

if you're not working out every single day in the off season so they are pushing their bodies to limits like working out you know he mentioned there's one of his comments was like yeah you play for two and a half hours and you go home what are you doing with the rest of your day. Well, these days, these guys are working out and stretching and pushing their bodies and getting nutritionists and all this type of stuff. And we have data that says

these guys play better at the end of the year when they are load managed. So why it's happening is because the way that these guys push their bodies. And not only that, it's about not the 82. And Michael Jordan was a big part of this, by the way. We have such an emphasis on ring, ring, ring, ring, ring culture. And we've devalued the regular season to where a Wednesday night against the Minnesota Timberwolves doesn't matter. It's about the playoffs. It's about winning that ring.

It's about chasing championships. And players have realized I can have more energy. And to me, the first time I really remember it was Greg Popovich doing it with his aging stars in San Antonio to where Tim Duncan and Mano Junobli and Tony Parker weren't playing every, they weren't playing

back to backs. I mean, don't you think? That was kind of the first time we had heard of that, Matt, like where these guys are sitting out back to backs. And like you said, it worked because they were fresher in the playoffs. And so if everybody else, if 29 teams are resting their players and getting fresh in the playoffs, and you're the one team

that's not doing it, you're going to be in a disadvantage. I respect that Jordan didn't do it. It wasn't being done back when he played. Yeah, he didn't have it. And not to say he didn't have a choice, but it wasn't a topic of discussion. But I'll be brutally honest, Ross. If I was a general manager and a coach, I would load manage.

And I know that's not what people want to hear. Yeah. I know that there's a lot of negative repercussions of it. Case in point. Let's say that you are a, and I'll, we've got to get a break on this one. Let's say you're a huge LeBron James fan. What does LeBron James do once a year in Eastern Conference cities come to your town? And you spend the money and you go to the game.

I get it. And you get the poster and you wear the jersey. And the Lakers are playing the Charlotte Hornets. And two nights later they're playing against the Miami Heat. And you're trying to figure out when you're going to take a break, You're doing against Charlotte. So, you know, unfortunately, it hurts cities that other fans. And look, the league does this.

Ross, we talk about this all the time. When Golden State comes and plays the Rockets, there's Steph Curry churches all over the building. They're not Warrior fans. They're not Jeff Curry fans. And if Steph Curry doesn't play against the Rockets, they're going to be a boatload of Curry fans that are mad because Steph Curry took a game off against the Rockets. Well, those kids got to learn life ain't fair.

LeBron James has played 71,000 minutes in his career. Michael Jordan played 48,500, basically. I mean, think about that. Yeah. 48 to 71,000 minutes. I don't think it's a slight towards him. I think it's a slight towards the whole. Well, they're going to have some professional jealousy towards each other for sure.

And as we said, Matt, what did Michael Jordan want to do more than anything? He wanted to win. if his trainers and training staff and medical staff came to him and said you will be able to win, you will be fresher in the playoffs and you will be more explosive chasing championships. If you take these handful of games off, he would do it. He would do it. Yeah, I think 2025 Michael Jordan takes games off. 713-212-790.

If you want to get your comments in on this, 7-1-3-212-790, it is the Matt Thomas-O-Ross. I'm here in Toronto, where EMADoka joins us in 15 minutes here on Sports Talk. 790. Our buddy, Kenny, obviously, a Michael Jordan fan. So it's Matt. 71,000 minutes for LeBrono's impressive, but 30,000 of those he was flopping and whining. Jeez.

Only 30,000? Only 30,000? I was going to have it more than a 37 to 38,000 range, but that's not near nor there. Yeah. There are going to be a handful of awards debates, Rossi, in life, that if you are player A or team A, you're not going to listen to side B, or player B. And that's fine.

I mean, that's what the sports debates are great about, right? You know? Yes. So some will say, this player is the greatest. No, no, no,

this one. And then the other guy is trash. Again, I've been very consistent. I think it's one in one A. To me, Michael will be the greatest of all time. I don't know if

LeBron can beat him in my mind, but there are other people's in mind because of the stats, the all-time point leader of the minutes, the longevity of his career, that can say that Michael, that LeBron has surpassed him.

Again, it's just a fun. Yeah, it's a fun debate. Rebound. Say that again? Defensive versatility. Michael Jordan was a better defender, but LeBron James was a more, he could play. He could play in the switchable one through five era of modern basketball. I mean, he's one of the greatest one through five switch everything.

Six foot eight. I've seen him erase Derek Roe. goes off the floor who was winning an MVP and then guarding Powell Gasol in the post. Like the versatility of LeBron James and also that's built in athleticism because Michael Jordan was at 6-8 and

I just built from, well, Michael Jordan was pretty athletic himself but you know I'm saying. For sure, for sure. 713-212-5-7-9 E. E.Mayat Doca is going to join us at about six minutes from now. Quinnipiac, Quintipiac. Have you been to that college before? Quinnipiac?

Is that Where are that Ted Kennedy thing? No, that was Chappaquittic. No, that's Chappaquit. Sorry, go ahead. Yikes. A segue there is Sports Harvey.

That's one popped in my head. I'm sorry. A new Quinepeak poll. Go look that up, Jonathan. John McIntyreux. Jonathan looks confused. I'm very confused. Well, you confused a hell out of them here.

A new Quintapal poll found that 50% of NFL fans said the league is doing enough to prevent players from serious injuries. Of course, those 50% haven't been in an NFL locker room. They're just guessing. Yeah. All right. What do the players say?

Here comes the ultimate chocker sports RV. 60% of fans support expanding the season. What? Including many who said a move for players, which would include a salary increase, is worth the increased risk of injury. Again, you're not doing it. I want to see an 18th week. Let's go.

Hmm. Hmm. Okay. The poll also found out that half of U.S. adults approve of Bad Bunny as a Super Bowl halftime performer. I told you that. That's going to be a 50-50 split right down the middle there. Most are also keen on moving the Super Bowl to President's Day weekend, which would then give you the Monday off. Yeah, that makes sense.

Do most people have presents? We don't have Presidents' Day off here at the station. Not at the station, no. but I think schools and post offices. Government offices, yeah. Government's all shut down right now. That's true. About 4 in 10 Americans said the NFL is doing, quote,

about the right amount to help avoid serious injuries to professional athletes. About 3 in 10 say it's doing too little. Very few think the league is doing too much. Two in 10 people didn't have an opinion. How can you have an opinion about injuries in the NFL? Can we mention you being part of a survey and saying, I've got no opinion about any of the NFL injuries? You know what?

No, actually. I'm okay with that. It's okay not to have an opinion on something. Certainly, they don't know if the NFL is doing enough or not. Like you said, Matt, like we're not in those locker rooms. We're not talking to those players. We have no clue what the hell we're talking about. Yeah, we, um, the,

now the story that I'm reading about also says it's not inevitable that the game, the league will go to 18 games. Tell me when it's, tell me when it's not going to be discussed any further. It's going to happen. It's going to happen. Variety of reasons. One, the players are going to get more money.

And money is the first reason. And watch, watch, stay with me as I do this. Go ahead. Go ahead. The players are going to get more money. Uh-huh. The coaches are going to get more money. Oh, okay. The owners are going to get more money.

The NFL TV networks are going to create a new package of games that's going to give them more money. Yep. Everything is about money. Correct. Now, I'll put my name on something here. We're never going. Never. Now, maybe you and I will be in a home when this happens, but 18 is going to be the

supermax. This is it. This is as far as it's going to go. You're probably right? I think, again, I'm going to say as long as I'm living, which hopefully is for another 40 to 45 years, we will see 18 as an ultimate max. I mean, it's been, it started at 14, right? Or no, was it? Well, back in the day, when I was a baby, before I watched football, it was six preseason games and 14 regular season games. Then for most of my life, it's been four and 16. they out of the 17th, what about seven or eight years ago, reduce the preseason games down to three.

Frankly, Ross, if I was a season ticket holder, give me a ninth home game that means something as compared to me paying $89 or $189 for a useless preseason game where all of my favorite players aren't even playing. I get it. And, I mean, injuries are part of the game, and it's just, it doesn't ever slow anybody down. But I think when we look at like the week 18 quarterback starters last year, it was a pretty nasty list.

But then we forget about it. We just turn the games on. We put our fantasy teams. We do whatever. We just, yeah, we don't care. You're going to see expanded rosters.

You're going to, which is going to bring more money to those players. The union's going to get bigger. You're going to get probably a second buy week. I mean, Rossi, this is going to be a 20-week schedule when it's all sudden done. You know what's kind of crazy to me?

Hmm. I guess I'm going to get crushed by people. Who cares? The NFL's gotten bigger as the product has gotten worse to me. There's more and more injuries. People are going down all, I mean, okay, maybe if you look at the data, the injuries aren't going down more. But I mean, there's more games.

It feels like a sloppier game, especially early season because of no preseason. There's more, there's a flag every five seconds on the field. They don't know what the heck they're doing with the kickoff. I mean, just all these things, I feel like the game isn't. And of course, we mentioned this in the, in the Michael Jordan segment, like everything was better than it once was. But I mean, I feel like I just have more complaints about the overall game. And it just seems to get bigger and bigger and bigger.

And a new TV partner. Yeah, new TV partner and new bigger deals. And you know what? I'm part of the problem. I'm not saying I'm not watching. I'm watching. I'm part of the problem. I'm saying myself, like, how does this have such a hold on me?

We'll talk more about this after we visit with EMA Adoka. next on Sports Talk 790. This is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Matt and Ross with you here at 11-0-4. Let's spend 10 minutes right now with the head coach of your Houston Rockets. Rockets that I hear in Toronto to take on the Raptors' E. May Adoka with us here on the program. Coach, thanks for the time. He's always.

Congratulations on the win. Was it just a simple case of the ball went through the hoop a little bit more to your satisfaction than perhaps the previous two games? Well, we obviously shot it well, much better. you know, 50% from 3 and 88 from the free throw line. But I think it was more than that. It was unselfishness, 33 assists that we were moving the ball a little stronger in their traps than the previous few games. And that results in open looks. So the guys are going to be free if Appi can make those plays.

The attention, Kevin draws, they're making the right reads and guys were knocking them down. You know, it was funny when Katie was asked about the game, and Tari obviously had that great game with five three-pointers in the game, which has a career high for him, it's like, man, if we get that kind of production from Tari, and it doesn't have to me from him every single night, but it almost tells you that you've got to get that one or two guys off the bench. It's got to be that quote-unquote instant offense.

Do you kind of feel that Tari can fill that mode, if not him, somebody else on a given night? Yeah, I mean, obviously it's been one of our strong suits. It's a depth that we have, and I think it can be different guys, different nights. And so with us kind of mixing up the starting lineup, guys are put in different positions at times and it was tardy that night, but it's been

others throughout the first few seasons I've been here. You've got a wild card guy that you know teams have to prepare for, you know what they're going to bring every night that's just added benefit. You started Josh Akogi in the game against the Nets. You used Reed Shepard during the preseason in the starting lineup. Thought or two about what you liked from Josh in the starting lineup?

And is that something that's going to be in the rotation now for you? Yeah, I think I've been pretty open about, you know, the lineup being the switchability with the lineup. And, you know, we like the big lineup. We tinker with that a little bit in preseason, but Reid will get opportunities at times if they have two really good scores like Camp Thomas and Michael Porter, we may go with the defensive lineup with Josh in there to guard one, I'm in to guard another. And so we can go all sorts of ways, honestly, and I'm very comfortable with that. And I think the guys are prepared for that. So that was a look we gave there. and at some point when we're fully whole,

we'll kind of zone in on one thing and it could be Dorian at the time. It could be going big like we did or Reed and Reed, for instance. And so, like I said, our versatility gives us options to do that. And I think all of our guys are comfortable in every role. How would you assess Reed's play so far,

both ends of the floor, but also the shot selection specifically. It's been 11 shots every single game for him. How do you feel about the selection there? Yeah, we want to be aggressive and confident. You know, not passing up any looks that he gets. He's one of our best shooters, and we understand how teams are defending him and the attention that he commands himself.

But when you're playing with the guy like Alper and Katie, I'm in, who's going to get downhill and attract that crowd as well. Those looks are going to be there. We want him to be confident and not second-guess anything. He's done that so far. You know, getting the training on-ball, off-ball, you know, with some teams that really are up-pressuring, started with OKC and then Detroit does more of the same

and even Toronto and Brooklyn are heavy load up teams and so just giving him different looks he's going to learn on the fly and I think like I said with Fred being out him I'm in got to learn to be the PG play some off ball and I think he's doing a good job. Rocket Tech coach Ima Doka was here on a sports talk 790 and yeah you mentioned amend being the PG

I imagine you're pretty satisfied with eight assists and no turnovers in the last game what what is that like because it's obviously it's basketball one-on-one don't turn the ball over get assists, but I mean, how do you kind of communicate that or drill that into players and see improvement as a season goes along in that facet? Yeah, just overall recognition of what teams are doing out there. Like I said, we're playing against teams that have really packed the paint and want to protect the rim with their full team defense. And so the kickouts will be there, get to our spacing properly, and know where your outlets are at.

And so for our men, it's going to be different every night depending on who's on him and how they are guarding him. he can be aggressive getting downhill, but teams know what he's all about and know the threat that he is. So they're going to load up, and it's up to him to make those reads. And so I think he did obviously a great job with those numbers you just pointed out. But throughout the season, it's going to be a game-by-game thing where he has to have a full understanding of how teams are guarding him and where to get his shot and other guy's shots. And I think that's where he's improved so far throughout this season already. EMA, I know you don't like turnovers.

Nobody does. but there are going to be some that are going to be, I saw what you tried to do there. I appreciate that. Others are like, what the hell are you thinking? Do you guys dissect those turnovers like I think you do? Yeah, and it's really specific to the game plan.

Like I said, we've had pretty much all four teams are going to either blitz the pick and roll or pack the paint and make you prove it and beat you from outside. So it's just a simple play as we talked about, you know, hitting singles against OKC in game one, and we didn't do that. Obviously, 25 turnovers for 28 points

in a one possession game is way too high. And so understanding and learning from game to game that these teams are going to be there. Keep it simple. And when you see the crowd, get off the ball, have a two-on-one or some numbers on the backside. If you go to the blitz and pick and roll, get off the ball and let Alperin and other guys make plays. And so when we try to overdo it and, you know, split or beat the crowd, beat the double team, sometimes you get in trouble. But we just want to keep it simple.

Trust your teammates and make the easy pass. One of the turnovers was a Kevin Durant offensive foul against the nets, where the ball hit the player in the face. Did you get a satisfactory clarification on what happened there? Because it looked like to me the defender's right in his face. Where was Katie supposed to go? Yeah, that's a tough one. I think we all thought it would be overturned when I challenged it

due to the fact that the ball grazed him. You know, we didn't hit him with his hand, didn't hit him with the elbow or anything like that. And like you said, they're crowding your space. You have a legal right to obviously make your move and try to impede that progress. we thought it would be overturned. They gave us a reason, and we'd keep it moving from there. Didn't really agree with it, but it is what it is.

Katie, to you, you've seen him so many times game planning against him. You've been with him on the bench now for a short time here and obviously other places. What has his game done to change and evolve as he's gotten a little bit longer in the tooth? I mean, are you still seeing, if I went back and looked at the Katie video of 10 years ago, is it about the same kind of player, or how has he transitioned as he's played a little bit later in life? I think he's just continuing to be as efficient as he's always been, as he's always been. I think you look at the last three years and the 40, 50, 90 and, you know, says high efficiency shooting.

He doesn't force it. He understands defenses and what teams are trying to do to scheme against him. And he's basically seen it all. So now he's at times fine being a decoy or letting guys either crowd him and make plays for others or get it to Alpi and let him make the play. And so he understands that. And if it frees everybody else up and we get the way, win, he's all about that. And so he's not a guy that's trying to force it and prove anything.

He's seen it all, done it all, and understands what he does to impact our team offensively. How have you felt about his fit, obviously, culturally? He had worked with some guys in the off season as well. But a lot of players talking about his work ethic and how they are really impressed. Have you seen kind of effect of that rubbing off on other guys or not so much? Yeah, definitely. I think, rather than veterans, like I always talk about. Dylan, Fred, Jeff, and those guys that came a few years ago. And Kevin takes that to another level with the work ethic is one-on-one professionalism every day. And that's why he is as great as he is.

It's not just by chance or talent. He puts in the work and is trying to improve and add to his game, you know, every year and throughout the season. And so you see young guys tagging along, and it's great to see that work every day. And then how hard you have to go at game speed and, you know, not just loafing through the workout, but actually trying to get better. And so it's rubbing off, no doubt. I think everybody takes note of it and then they start to incorporate it themselves. And it's a great thing for our young guys to implement their career at a young age. Last question.

Who is in charge of free throw shooting? If you want to give yourself credit, go for it because Stephen Adams is 9 of 10. Alpi is 22 or 26. If you're big men are shooting free throws like that, that's going to be a huge asset for the squad this year. It has been great. I think I did point out at the start of training camp that we were 29th in free throw shooting last year. It might have been 30th, honestly. But, yeah, that was a challenge to our guys.

Obviously, we finished every practice and every individual workout with a good amount of free throws and try to put them in some pressure situations throughout practice and training camp, but guys have to own up to it and take that on, take that challenge on. And so obviously 23 for 26 the other night is great for us. But I think it might be Garrett Jackson or one of our assistants. I think actually Cam Hodges signed contracts with I blank. we'll shoot this many fritos and shoot this percentage, so they all had to sign it, and it's a direct challenge to meet this number and meet the number you're going to shoot,

percentage-wise, but also meet the attempts that you need to get up every day in order to get there. And so guys all signed it, and I think it's just a way of holding guys accountable and kind of pointing back on what they agreed to. Is there like a steak dinner on the line on this, or is there a kangaroo court if they don't hit that number? Not sure what Cam came up with,

but so far as working, we'll take it. You got that right. Thank you, Amy, for the time. We'll see it the building later on this evening. Good luck tonight. I appreciate it. You got EMA Doka with us here on the Matt Thomas show. Ross.

We appreciate the Rockas coach joining us here on a weekly basis. I was working on the game notes on the plane here, Ross. I was like, Stephen Adams is nine for 10. He might not have had nine free throws before the calendar turn last year made. Let's keep it up. That's all I can say. I mean, we saw Alpi was crushing it first. No, no, no.

History will repeat itself, right? not saying it's not. I'm just saying, I'm just saying. Okay. But did you see, by the way, speaking of that, did you see that Jimmy Butler had made a bet with a Dremont Green that he could beat Steph Curry in free throw shooting for the season? And? He's losing already. Steph Curry hasn't missed one.

When is Steph going to slow down? Can I ask that question? I mean, he has slowed down. Oh, I don't know. He's just banking 35 footers to send games overtime. Yeah, he's always going to be able to shoot until he's 90. Hmm. By the way, the video of the night in the NBA, have you seen this? Janus's travel? Oh, man, I'm about eight, nine steps.

I think I stopped counting after seven. It was like he was in tango class. Yes, that's right. He was a gazelle is what he was. Dribbling optional. Y'all go look at that. I swear to God. It's hysterical.

We'll put it up on the socials. 11.15 on the Matt Thomas show at Ross. Shut your bum ass up coming up at the bottom of the hour. 1120 on the Matt Thomas showed Ross. If you want to chime in, you are more than welcome to do so. Maybe you're saving your good material for shut your bum ass up. 713-212-5-790. If you want to chime in on the conversation, 7-1-3-212-5-790.

Now, you were going to say something that was going to anger people, I thought, before we talked to E-May. I forgot what it was. Did you write it down? Oh, he's, uh, Ross is getting water right now, guys. Oh, is he really? Okay. He's a little parched. Yeah, I've got, I've got to tell you. Hey, what's up. Are you back right? I asked you if, uh, if you remember what you said, but you were getting people mad at you before the top of the hour. Um, oh, about the, the minutes thing? I really don't remember. I should have written it down.

Okay, I'm sorry. Can you say the question again? Sorry, I was talking to us to sales people. I'm going to say something that's going to make people mad at the top of the hour. on it. Did you even say it or did you wait after after email was going to talk? I think it was after. I think he was going to say no. I don't remember. I blanked out. We don't need people mad at you, Ross. Well, no, that's fine. I'm used to it now. I mean, I've been used to it for a while, but yeah, especially now. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-1-2-1-2-5-7-90. And again, if you want to follow us on Twitter, we greatly appreciate that. At SportsMptian and at Sports Harvey.

If you want to follow me on Instagram, that'd be cool, too, but I'm not going to require it of you. It is at SportsMT, where I will take some pictures of the Scotia Bank Arena tonight where the Rockets and Raptors will play. Ross will do a video with his head surrounded by a blueboard, what do you call it, the green space behind you? There's no green space, Matt. I mean, there's a green screen, but you don't see the green. Okay, that's true. Yeah, you are the audiovisual expert of this show. I'm trying, Matt.

We were talking about the 18th game and how there are going to be some that are going to be like, oh, that's terrible. They shouldn't be doing this. It kind of reminds me of, oh, we can't pay athletes in college because we're not going to watch anymore. Yeah, you're watching. It feels like Monday through Friday, everybody's complaining about college football and then Saturday we're all watching. Numbers keep going up. Yeah.

But I just think generally we're just hypocrites in spot sports. That's true. I would say so. I was just talking about the NFL product going down. That's what I was saying that people were going to get mad at me. Oh, yeah, that sounds good. Yeah, I get you. That's right. I mean, back in my day, it was better.

It was better. You had the bone crunching hits. Remember, we always talk about this, Matt. Jonathan, I had a VHS tape that I used to watch when I was a kid. It was NFL's, like, most devastating hits. I can't remember exactly. It was straight up like an hour of people getting their spines cracked in half, and we loved it.

But, you know, I'll agree with you guys. Like, growing up and you go on YouTube with the highlights, even in college football, that's what you live for. Like, you want to see someone get, you know, you need help off the field. Like, that's what I'm going to peel the curtain back. Back in, you know, back in a day is what I'd like to hate to use the term, but it is the truth. When I was going to junior high or I was young in high school because I wasn't a quote-unquote athlete. And it surprises many of you. I was in PE class.

And when the coaches were lazy because they were getting ready for their game, you know, the coach, the football team. They would, on Fridays, we would just, they put videos on. NFL's biggest hits. Like Ronnie Lott was like 80% of it. I guarantee if you and I, the three of us, went to go find an NFL roughest hitters, biggest hits, bone crushers. Every single one of those plays would be illegal in 2025.

Yeah. Yeah. It's like all, it's basically all Ronnie Lott and Jack Tatum made the entire time. I just found it on eBay, Matt. It's called Thunder and Destructed. The NFL's hardest hits. Dude, I can get this for seven bucks. I'm not to buy this.

It says condition very good. So basically any NFL player that's suffering from CTE can say, he can sue the league and the league will be like, what happens do you have? Well, guess what? I'm going to NFL films. Yeah, it's NFL films. You better pay me off.

In Sports Illustrated, like, that's what we used to watch. Hey, what are you guys doing? We're watching this Thunder and Destruction video for the 15th time. We're watching this spear that was illegal. it was legal in the 70s. Hey, watch this one. You can see his eyes rolling into the back of his head.

This is great. Yeah. Remember that time, Rarnie Lott decleted somebody and the guy who was laying in the field for 20 minutes? He was fine. He just got some smelling salts. He got back up.

Yeah. Could you imagine telling Lyle L. Al Zito about concussion protocol? Hmm. Or Jack Tatum or Jack Lambert or any, I mean, Dick Butchiss back in the day? Hmm.

It's a different time. Ronnie Lott to me. And he's such a lot. an easy-going guy now, obviously as most guys are in their retirement. With his 9 and 1⁄2 fingers. Yeah, he did cut a half a finger up, didn't he?

Yeah. That's a man's man right there. In the middle of a game, Jonathan, he was, uh, did he get caught in somebody's face mask? Or what was the issue, Matt? Yeah, it was sideways. His finger was mangled. Oh, is this the dude from the draft?

And they were going to leave him out of, yeah, no, the, uh, the, uh, the Niners. Okay, okay. Is that what they ban those like, cool face masks? He was like, yeah, go ahead and saw it off. They like, it was in the, middle of the game, right? They cut his finger off, man? Which, again, the question I have is, how do you

control the blood on that? I mean, I'm assuming that's a... A little bandage on it, yeah. A little tourniquet. What do I mean? A little mini turniquet for the fingers? Did he get into the NFL? Yeah. Every trader had one. Like you said, smelling salts and tourniquets, it's all you needed.

Yeah. Some windex. Clean off that. It's a little bit. I mean, we used to live for Fridays because, man, you'd sell these awesome videos and it was just, oh, that hit was awesome, and that guy's, the guy that got hit was now Jello. I mean, like our buddy, Greg

Cook, I mean, Greg Cook played in those. I mean, the stories he could tell you, he's admitted, he said, look, my brain scramble because of my days in the NFL. Yeah. It just is, and thankfully, it's safer, but thankfully, we'll be getting

an 18th game. And that'll guarantee you, you know, I would think it would guarantee you nine, regular season games and won, if it ever does happen. Okay, it wasn't in the middle of the game. He didn't check back into the game. I had that wrong.

It's the stuff of legend. Embellishing stories. Yeah, that's probably how he tells it. No, apparently this, Wikipedia says that he regrets it. Well, it's because he doesn't want to be a bad influence on today's youth. He regret it.

Ronnie Lott did it back in the day, I can do it too. Yeah. Don't you always tell your friends about stuff that you did when you were younger that you'd say, I never should have done that? But you're like, man, I was cool when I did it. It's probably when he's, like, when he's cutting up his steak and he looks down and his fingers are missing, he's like, eh, probably should just have it. Probably just had a surgery.

I mean, his bowling game may not be as good as others. It's golf grip, not what it once was. What else do you do with ten fingers? Hmm. I can't think of like five things right now. Oh, you know what? His piano skills aren't as good. Okay.

I'm trying to think what else you do with ten fingers. I'm mull that over a little bit. All right. That's enough. That's enough. Yeah, because I'm, yeah, okay. All right. Now we're going to ask some people to unleash,

if they're mad about something, it's an opportunity for you to just tell that person how you feel about them. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-790. Shut your bum ass up. Ain't nobody got time for that is coming up next. The next half hour is yours.

You want to complain about something or something that's happened to you? Let us know at 713-212-5-790. At 7-13-21-2-5-7-90. Ross and Matt with you here until 12 noon, actually until 2 o'clock today, right here on Sports Talk 790. Ain't nobody getting time? Ain't nobody getting time for day? Ain't nobody getting time for day?

Hey, nobody getting time for day. Here you go, 7-1-3-21-25-79. If you want to chime in, 7-1-3-21-2-5-7-90. someone has done you wrong at the office someone has not been a great leader sports RV somebody has irritated you on the streets and freeways of Houston Texas your wife is taking too much money at your bank count tell her shut her about a mess up

shit your bum ass up man I mean don't literally tell her that because it'll cost you probably spend the night in the backyard I know these things personally uh... backyard what? Oh yeah I had to pitch a 10 in the backyard Not good. And then if someone at your office for the second time in consecutive weeks

talks your head off for 15 minutes while you're trying to eat before your show starts and no one's there to rescue them, anybody got time for constant talker as you're trying to get ready for your day of business. Nobody got time for that. That's a shame. Yeah. The police sirens that went off at my hotel this morning outside of my building at about 640 this morning.

Everything all right? I guess he's gone, but I didn't need that. Anybody got time for police siren to the 640 in the morning? Ain't nobody got time for that? Hmm. That's unfortunate, Matt. Anybody got time for traffic? You know what?

15 minutes to go 21 miles down to Toronto. You reminded me of something. I'm here. I'm getting woken up by leaf blowers like three times a week lately. I don't know what's going on. I don't know. I don't know where they're going to. got a new landscaping crew where I'm living or whatever.

It's out of control. I don't want to be woken up at 8.30 now. I understand most people are up by then, but I'm not. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. All right, I don't care. No, I'm not telling anything. 830 is way too early to be hearing a bunch of bleafblowers. Anybody got time for that.

I got one for you. Anybody that complains about anything being woken up at 830, shut you a bum ass up. 830. 8.30 is a little. Are you crazy? Now, on Saturdays and Sundays, I understand. But money through Friday, we got places to go. People to go see.

No, I don't. I don't know. I don't have to be here until 941-ish. Excuse me? Try that again. 9 o'clock, I'm sharp. 9.53 is the average time you arrive. That is not accurate.

Everybody got that. Write it down. All right. I'm going to see what time you can hear on Friday. Okay. All right. 713, 212-790. one thing. Are you okay?

Hey, come on, man. That hurts. You got a warm me, bro. Jeez. I'm sorry about that. I didn't mean to do that. Ouch, you're going to knock yourself off air. I don't need that to happen. Jonathan, what's the matter with you? For everybody that goes to Ray Tree Rey, Wally World,

ogre. Give me space, man. I can't be in the produce section looking at if I want a potato or not, checking their good, and I can smell your coffee breath right next to me all your over meat. Oh, wow. Back up. We went through COVID already.

I don't need to smell your breath. Ain't nobody got time for that. I'm not shopping with you, man. Actually, I almost had to cuss with somebody. I had to, like, diffuse myself from a situation. Why are you all about me? That doesn't make sense. So what if they had good smelling breath, like fresh mint?

I don't need to suck your breath in general. All right. I'm going to ask you a very personal question. Oh. And you're going to give me the honest answer, Jonathan, Ross, you will not because you will judge. Have you found yourself eating a couple of grapes when you're going through produce at the grocery store? See?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I got to be in a clear.

I have only like one person there in me. I can't. I feel guilty. Because I see some people that do it with anybody, like the whole crowd there. No, I can't do that. First of all. Yeah. Okay.

When's the last time you did this? Just look at it. Adam and the ones that aren't bruised. Like four months ago? Oh, my God. It's kind of recent. It was kind of recent. What's the last time you did?

I did that when I was a kid. Really? You need to wash those grapes, man. You're eating pesticides. We got immune system. Oh, all right. You eat a chip off the floor every five seconds. Same thing.

All right. Not in public. I don't go grab. Not at a restaurant. Do you do that? Do you eat food off the floor at a restaurant? No, no, no. No, because people are walking there.

That's table manners, though. That's the, you know, like. See, Matt agrees with me. He knows. You need to wash grapes before to remove dirt, pesticides, and bacteria. But why do people do it? Why do people eat the grapes at the grocery? Is it because it's a free meal? It's a free sample? I mean, it's not really supposed to be.

Nobody says, hey, come try four of our grapes. Because you're thieves. And usually they're open anyway. I mean, I haven't done it probably since I was 12. I did it as a kid. I'll be honest with you. If I was hungry, I couldn't open up a bag of bugles and eat those walls. You know, let's what I buy them.

Who the hell's eating bugles? That was a brand of old. The year of our Lord 2025. You love bugles? Bugles, funnions. I like to go the anti-chip. Like straight up blaze is good, but it's fine, but you got to have some dip with it. But if you're going to just snack at the grocery store, you can open a bag of pretzels, Cheetos.

Cheetos can get the Cheetos can get the Cheetos. You eat the bugles, you're not getting any bugle dust on you. Hmm. Now, let me clarify. I'm not the type to, like, buy, like, say I'm going to get some chips, right? I'm not the one to be opening, eating it while I'm about to pay for it. No, I'm not doing that. I'm going to wait.

Grapes are the only exception. Now, do you go up to the counter and say, I just ate an eighth of a pound of grapes? Please charge me $2.25? What? I don't think you do that. No, they don't even know my business. You put your belly on the scale? Is that what you're going to do at the belly?

Yeah. Imagine what you would do if you went to the counter and said, My name is Jonathan. I'm here at Ray U.E. And I just had 11 grapes. That woman's going to be like, first of all, how am I supposed to charge you for 11 grapes you already eat and consumed? And second of all, what are you doing eating something as dirty?

Dirty grapes. But as really Ross, as really going home in Washington for like three seconds, going to really fix the pesticides around those grapes? Thank you. I don't know. I think you're just supposed to wash them. Okay, this is the same thing. People say you don't wash your chicken or not.

Okay, no. You cook chicken. I'm just, no, I'm just saying like some people don't wash it at all. No, you don't need to wash, unless it's got dirt on it. No, the bacteria gets killed by the heat. Yeah. So the chicken bake. When it's grapes, yeah, you're not, you're not boiling the grapes to kill the bacteria.

Are you? No, I'm just saying. Some people would pill a skin off. That's how like, yeah, you could do that. Well, okay, unless you, you got dirty chicken? No, you're supposed to cook it to temperature to kill the bacteria and viruses. Yeah, but I'm just, I'm just saying. I'm just saying.

Friend of mine. You don't want to have medium rare chicken. No, you do not. How about this one? I stop in the dry, this is not me. It's a friend of mine. I stop in the dried fruit and nuts section in a re-creas and try stuff. See?

You're eating all the fried nuts, too, and dried fruits? I don't do that. I don't eat that stuff. I'm saying a buddy of mine, do it. Well, you people are thieves and you should stop. Thieves. They're stealing from us. Oh, what are you calling?

They're stealing from us. How are they stealing from you? They didn't make you walk in there? The prices, the prices get goused up. No, that's okay. They can lose a couple grapes. You know what, Jonathan may have my back on one argument we've had over the years. Yeah, Jonathan, this is how you should know you're wrong.

Jonathan, let me tell you. You don't know this. We've not brought this up since you joined the show. Yeah. One time, I didn't intentionally do it, but it still happened. I got one of those race re-cheeked colas. Yeah. And I drank it while I was shopping.

And I forgot to pay for it. Like the whole six case? No, no. You know when you open up the cooler when you're by the checkout? Yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I grabbed one while I was, because I was thirsty, and I grabbed one for the journey throughout the Ray Rearie where I spent over $150.

I just forgot to pay the $1.19 for the generic cola. And my partner, who is part of this show, has antagonized me and betrayed me for years about the $1.19. I'm thinking of myself, if Rach Re really appreciated my business, which they do, they'd be like, yeah, please have a cola on us. You spent all this money with us? No, they would put out a trade that says free cola. They should.

They wouldn't say this cola is 99 cents, and then you steal it. But Matt's not going to get a wanted sign on the store. What are you talking about? Don't come back. Like, we know you're, no. Yeah, they should. No, they should. They should catch him in 4K on video,

stealing, uh, being a shoplifter. Shoplift Thomas. Hmm. You know what thinking, if they want to call him, call me shoplift thomas guess what i'll do i'll take my hundred fifty dollars and go over to boga no you won't yeah then you're gonna be it's gonna balloon up to two hundred dollars i'm better to i go to mood biddy or i'll go to what else i got some people mood biddy yeah what's yeah what is that oh yeah all right or if i was a kid i'd be going to merlins when you go to

mole moods yeah oh that's that's that's that's mole mea mack yeah what whole paycheck Trader Joe's You spend a lot of money there We got Trader Joe's coming to Kingwood By the way, very happy about that Okay, how's your checkbook feeling? Light pocket book Lighter

By the way, they have Papa Shot World Championships on ESP and the Ocho right now Is Papa shot better than our show or worse than our show? I would say worse but also the guys being interviewed by a basketball-headed puppet

in the post game Okay. This dude's sweating. These guys are insane, by the way. They make like 95% of their shots. Hmm. All right. So we've got no one calling in yet.

I've got one more. Oh, please. You mentioned this earlier in the show, Matt. NBC. They said, oh, we're bringing back Round Ball Rock. We're doing this and that. We're going to have Mike Tariko. And then we're going to have Michael Jordan on throughout the season.

And I'm like, oh, sweet. he's going to be breaking down the telestrator. He's going to be talking about games and what he's seeing from players. Now they sit them down for one interview and they're going to chunk it into three minutes the whole season. Ain't nobody got time for that. And they lied to us. I thought it was going to be like NBA analyst Michael Jordan. No, no, no.

They sat down with him and his cigars for 30 minutes and then they're just going to chunk this interview. No. And he's just going to sit on a soap act. They called a special contributor. They didn't call him analyst. I know, but I was thinking that he was going to be involved more than just. Did you think they were just going to sit down for one interview and play it all season long? I did not think they were going to do that.

As lazy as it gets. Real quick, our good friend, Christy, I'm not buying grapes until I taste them. Ain't nobody got time for sour grapes. What? What on your part? Yeah. And Chris says, look at them. If they're bruised and discolored, don't buy them.

Then she says, I don't care. I also spent a lot of money at Raitree. F them, by the way. You get a damn drink if you want to, Maddie. God love you, Christian. That's why she's the best. You guys, that's why you guys are thieves. We're not thieves.

We're consumers. Thank you, Matt. Consumers? Thank you. What are you called taking something that is not free for free? I'm calling it a courtesy deal. It's called stealing. You are a thief.

I didn't do an intentional. I just forgot. You're in like Mesopotamia that had cut your hand off. No, it would be different if I went to took the drinks and said, I'm going to try to get away with that. I just forgot to pay for it. Stealing. Yes. You know, some people just don't scan them at all.

You know, yeah, it's called stealing. Jonathan, we're on the right side of that. I know. You can be on the right side of what? Stealing? Yeah, you're stealing. I don't know how you want to sell it. You're stealing.

You can do it. I mean, I'm not going to turn you into the FBI. I would hope that, by the statute of limitations long. You're lying to yourself. You're telling yourself you're not stealing. Anything but stealing. You are just rationalizing. Okay.

I think I may be rationalizing, but Raytree is enjoying the profits off of my bill. Yeah, which would be bigger if you weren't stealing from them. If you want to get in on shut your bum ass up, ain't nobody got time for that. We're here for you. 713-212-5-790. Man, again, a lot of people emailing me about

Raytree and the high prices that you should have a drink now. See? Well, I got a message from somebody says husband is a manager at H.E.B. And customers get upset with rising prices. Part of that is because of customers stealing. Oh, so it's my fault. Customers daily eat bags of chips, cookies, don't pay for them. Now, I wouldn't do that. Grapes, sodas, all contributes to a loss of profits and then higher prices. So all you people stealing from HB are making the prices go up for the rest of us who are good,

law-abiding citizens who are not stealing from the grocery store. We all have to pay for your grifting. It was an, you know what I'm going to say? This is what's wrong with society. It's all about me, me, me, me. I need free grapes and free sodas and everybody else can pay the price. Mr. Texas? You're what's wrong with America.

Mute, Mr. Texas, your debate. Here's my debate. Number one, I didn't intentionally do it. I did not want to intentionally circumvent the system of paying, okay? Number two, and this is my greatest validation, how many times have you gone to your local grocery store and you got a gallon or a half gallon of milk and the milk was spoiled? Never.

They sold, I'm telling you, it's happened to me quite a bit. You're buying spoiled milk? The date, we always check the dates. We get home, we open it up. up, we pour, and it's spoiled. What? Do I get, hold on, do I get back in the car and drive to Raytree and say, you sold me spoiled milk?

No, I just say, oh, well, blank happens. So guess what, Rayleigh, Re, blank happened to me one time. No, you can take the, take the milk back. For all the spoiled milk, you saw me over the years. What? We're even. Take the milk back. Tell them it's spoiled.

No, they'll give you new milk. I'm not going to waste my time. They give you new milk. That's fine. But I'm not going to go back after spending an hour in the grocery store up and down the lines fighting with people. No, you go to the customer service. There's usually like two to three people in line. But if I'm at home, I'm not getting back in the car and doing it, no.

All right. I've never bought spoof. I always checked the date and I've never in my life. We're a huge checkdators. We are huge checktaders. Date checkers? And that too. Date checkers.

But if I, but let me tell you this, because I bear responsibility, if the one, time I bought the, if I inadvertently got the free soda and it's causing the 20% hiking prices for over everything, I apologize. Oh, I didn't want to out who it was, but she's called in now because it was a private message she sent me. Oh, it's our good friend Bonnie Joe. You know, I'm going to apologize to Bonnie Joe right here on the spot. Bonnie Joe's important to you.

Hey, hey, guys, a great show as always. Yeah, and Matt, you know, some of this I'm doing tongue-in-cheek, but seriously. And I understand what you did was inadvertent, but you really would be surprised. My husband comes home with countless stories of customers opening packages, and I don't mean of small chips. I mean the big bags, leaving them throughout the store, then leaving the bag laying somewhere. Same thing with cookies, Coke, you name it. They do it all the time. And I'm not saying that your one COLA incident made HED prices.

go up, but it is a shrinkage, you know, law. Yeah, I understand. Yeah, yeah. And all my whole point was is that it's not just like you one time doing it. It's all the people that do it. They do. They do this. My husband can attest to this.

They do this. And not just at HV. I mean, it happens at other grocery stores too, but I can only speak to, I can only speak to that grocery store because that's... I bet your husband has an incredible. stories about the amount of grifting going on that's way worse. I mean, eating a whole bag of chips, I mean, my goodness. Yeah, walk around with rotisserie chicken.

Like, what's going on here? When you ask the butcher to cook your meat there at the grocery store, that's saying something, you know what I mean? You may surprise at the literal theft. I don't mean just of that kind where people eat things and don't pay, but I mean the actual stealing of groceries that goes on. people really would be surprised. Thank you, Bonnie Joe, for the phone call.

I appreciate it. I totally believe it. By the way, I'd tell you this, when I worked at McDonald's, or excuse me, Rick Ronald's back in the day, these big women would come up and eat 80% of the Big Mac and like, yeah, this didn't taste very good. I'm sorry. I got to be Big Mac. Because the big ones are the big ones asking for the money back. Not the slender ones.

Slender ones are eating the salads, the little cheese burgers. This burger didn't taste good. My favorite is the fries aren't fresh. Yeah, because you just finished 80% of them. They're going to be the wilted down to the last 20%. They're not always going to be stiff fries. Yeah, that is true. A lot of time the people, I mean, most people are honest and good.

And then there's some grifters like you guys. But then, I mean, but they just ruin it for everyone. Those people you're talking about, Matt, is what I'm saying. Like sometimes people take a bite of a burger. It's bad. You know what? We got to replace it. It is what it is.

Then you have people who are trying to get over. Great episode of Kirby Enthusiasm. I think Larry's on a date with a girl and they eat, I think, two bites of the pie. And they want the money back for the pie. And the guy says, no, you had you two bites. And they're having an argument about it whether or not one bite is good enough to get the money back or two bites is too many. That's pretty funny. Man, I miss Kirby Enthusiasm.

The funniest show I've ever seen in my entire life. I know I'll be hated or debated. That's fine. Yeah. Great show. I would say, I just, shut up. The ideas and the concepts are so good, but just sometimes the acting I was overwhelmed, especially by Larry David and the wife. Well, the wife, you got divorced the wife.

But I mean, part of it was because it wasn't, there wasn't a script. It was just, here's what you're going to do. Exactly. And I love improv, but they weren't great at improv. So it's just, it's a good show. It's not my favorite. That's great. But the ideas and the concepts that would come up and these scenarios he would come up to get himself in and then tie it all together.

That was brilliant. Like the concepts and the ideas, absolutely. Great. My favorite. John, before we get to the top of the hour, John, what's the matter with you? All right. So my son over the summer, he was wanting some of the delicious slice, pepperoni slices and a whole clear package. And he goes, Dad, did these look right?

And I'm like, well, let me check the expiration date. And couldn't find it. Finally, we looked all through the package outside of the package, and very small black letters to barely even read it. You know, ain't nobody got time for that. Ain't nobody got time for that? Ross, I'm confused. Me too.

The pepperonies? The pepperonies were expired. Oh, so he's saying he's upset about. the package dating of it i guess yeah i guess so like how to find it like i think it was too confusing i mean it's like a salted cured meat shouldn't go bad for a while right you would think so i guess you never know you're gonna make sure your meat is cured for sure let's get to the news at noon this is the matt thomas show with ross 1206 sports talk 790 coming up at 1.30 today.

It will be Willie Fritz as our Houston Cougars take on West Virginia. We'll talk with him. Add to 150 is, believe it or not today, which will be all things about Vlad Guerrero. Are we going to go junior or we're going to go junior and senior Rossi on that? Or we can do anything else. I don't care. Whatever you want to do? That's fine.

We'll do Toronto. All things Toronto? Yeah, we'll rehash the questions from the last time you're there. I mean, we have prize horrors, so it's fine. They don't memorize this kind of stuff. Maybe. Who knows? Who knows what these prize horse are up to? By the way, let's get you what you all been waiting for all day long.

As you get in your car, listen to the show at noon. We appreciate you listen to us as we present to you the news at noon. The desk, here's Ross. Yes, Matthew, it is the news at noon. As you mentioned, the rockets will be in action later on today, taking on the Toronto Raptors, A, well, elsewhere. Not in Toronto. The game's being in Los Angeles, but, are going to head back to Toronto. Now, after the Blue Jays win last night,

6-2-2, Shohay Otani, not great. Six innings, six hits, four earned runs, one walk and six strikeouts in the game. You had Shane Bieber, what's much better. You had a two-run shot, as you mentioned, by Vladimir Guerrero Jr.

A 6-2 victory for the Toronto Blue Jays to even up the series at two apiece. Game number five will be tonight. in Los Angeles, as it is Blake's. It's a rematch a game number one. Trey Yassavage versus one Blake's now. I'm not feeling good about the Blue Jays chances here. Minus 190.

Your gut feeling is correct. Minus 190 for the Dodgers. They are fairly significant favorites in this one, Matt. Do you know that, and they brought this up, I don't know if it was on the Canadian broadcasts or the U.S. broadcasts. We had both up here. The Dodgers have won a handful of World Series championships, Right? They've only won one in Los Angeles over all these years.

Oh, really? Championships have come on the opposing teams field. Hmm. Not that it matters, but I just thought I'd pass that along. I mean, it's not that it does matter. I guess it's interesting. How many have they won? Like six or seven? I don't know, but I mean, you would think of all the years they've been in the World Series that they've had to go on the road to win them.

Hmm. Hmm. A statistical oddity, Matthew. you match you. You know what you do? You take that kind of stuff to your place of office and you're like, man, do you hear what Matt and Ross were talking about today? We're here to educate and inform and entertain eight world series titles for the Dodgers, by the way. Wow, that's a lot.

Yeah, it's a lot. They're probably going to get number nine. Let's go Blue Jays. Let's go Blue Jays. That is correct. All right, moving along, Matt. Did you see some more news coming out on Terry Rosier? and Chauncey Billups.

Terry Rosier allegedly a file, excuse me, a lien filed against Rosier in November of 2023 by the Internal Revenue Service showing an unpaid balance of assessment of $8.218 million in change for the 2021 tax year. Rosier's attorney though, Jim Trustee, saying in an email to the Associated, The actual amount owed to the IRS at that time was a sliver of that total. Now, remember, we talked about this last week. When your attorney's name is trustee, you got to go with them, don't you? I think so.

Never a debt of $8 million, says trustee. The total taxes was actually $9,000? That was paid and the now defunct lien needs to be pulled from the local courthouse. So let me ask you this. The NBA does its investigation. Yes. And they find nothing. The FBI has a multi-year investigation and finds all this stuff.

I mean, who's lying here? Or who didn't do their due diligence and who is trying to use Terry Rozier as an example? Maybe. Again, I'm trying to find this area where the FBI who spent years chasing this down screwed something up. It doesn't mean the FBI can't make mistakes. I think it's right. It feels like it's the NBA saying, man, nothing to see here.

Miami Heat, you're good to sign Terry Rozier. Correct. Terry Rozier was due to make a million dollar check. And he is not going to get, he and Chonsie Billups not paid while they're on leave. Yeah, they're going to put their money in escrow.

Hmm. Okay. Make some insurance? I was going to say, it's interest, you mean? What did I say? Insurance, interest, whatever. Sorry. That's same thing.

All right. Thank you. Tomato potato. Lions Edge Rush or elsewhere in the news, Matt. Aidan Hutchinson, a four-year $180 million extension that includes a whopping $141 million guaranteed. His $45 million a year average trailing only Microparsons is $46.5 million among non-quarterbacks in the NFL. And you know who's loving this deal, Matthew? Would his name be Will Anderson, Jr.?

Will Anderson Jr. thinks this Aiden Hutchinson contract is looking nice. He's going, that's not bad. That's a good starting point for me. That's why you're going to get an 18th game, Rossi, and that's why you're going to get a new television deal with those games, and you're going to get more money because they've got the escalation in these salaries. Now for defensive linemen is incredible.

Like, basically, if you're an NFL team, the only people that aren't really super getting paid are like centers, running backs. Who else is not? Safety's probably aren't getting crazy money because high-end corners are. Your linebackers are like your leading tacklers are. Your defensive edge rushers are and your quarterbacks and your left tackles are making. I mean, man, you know, again, it's all based on what revenues are to the league. You have to spend a certain amount.

So you can say, oh, these player contracts are crazy, but they're negotiated based off of league revenues. And if the league revenue says you've got to pay a certain percentage of players, they're like, keep getting more deals. We're going to make more money. Everybody is. Yeah, I'm just trying to look at a lowest Aav by position. As far as like regular 22 starters, it looks like center might be the lowest. Yeah, I would think center maybe right guard. Well, kicker, of course, but we're not counting kickers and punters.

Punters are low. Deep snappers are low. Deep snappers. You can league minimum. By the way, you've not given our pro football focus great on the Texas's offensive line yet. That's true. At noon, right? Yes, that is in the news at noon, Matt. And we'll have it coming back.

I can do it now if you want. Oh, sure, please. Number one, by the way, Indianapolis Colts continue to be the number one best offensive line. Number two. Matthew, the Denver Broncos. Uh-oh. In town this week. All right, so now let's set up to make the big drama.

Oh, baby. 31. We're heating up. We're charging towards the top. 29th the last couple of weeks. Where are they now? 26th, baby. Oh, no.

I told you they were going to be much improved. Wow, what a great offensive line the Texans have there. in the NFL. No wonder, D'Amico wants you to shut your bum ass up, media? He said, yeah, suckers, we're up to 26. We're the 26th best offensive line. All right, and that's the news at noon.

By way, one small note, the NFL Players Association, just sent out a tweet Rossi a few minutes ago. Uh-huh. In full support of the WMBA Players Association. What does that? I plead my, I'm a part of my ignorance. What is happening there?

Is there a work stoppage? No, they're right now looking for a new contract. Okay. But no stoppage yet. No stoppage just yet. There is a thought of potentially a work stoppage. Okay. Hmm.

And they're changing the name to the Caitlin Clark Basketball Association, I believe. Yes. And Caitlin, we trust until we bad mouth are in front of microphones. Yes. by the way I got terrible news for you what we're going to get a serious work stoppage in one of the big three sports

in the next two years you know this right no I don't know that okay I would really enjoy the 2026 baseball season because I don't know if we're going to be playing in 2027 I think you're probably right at least the way that both sides are talking publicly right now it's not pretty at all it's contentious

oh it's not Rossi you ain't even contentious it's downright mean to each other Are they taking personal shots? Yeah. Apparently they're negotiating on your mama as everything is that. Your mama is that.

Really? Your mama that's not good. We need to be a good old fashion your mama fight. We used to do that like a third grade. I love your mama fights. Your mom is so big. Her birthday's on July 9th, 10th, and 11th.

Your mom is so fat when she sits around the house. She sits around the house. And we'll be done with that. All right. 1260. I got one more. Her blood type is great. Excuse me?

Her mom is so fat, her blood type is gravy. I got two rude ones I can't say. Oh, yeah, don't do it. Yeah, there's a lot you can't say. There's a lot I can't say. My two favorite ones I can't even mention on the radio. 12-16 and this is the Matt Topba show with Ross. 7-1-3-2-1-1-12.

Yeah, let's get off of Mamas because I just got off of yours. Oh, sorry. You didn't dump that. I apologize. I don't mean to, oh, my God. You started. It's your fault. It's right. It's totally my fault. I get it.

713-212-5-7-9. Come on in and join us with you till 2 o'clock today here on Sports Talk 7-90. Get him to scamper alone. Two-on, two out. Ten benefit. That's in the Fisher. 13 to 12 Ross. Is that the final in that? I believe that's accurate. Game number five. On the short list for the loudest cheers I've ever heard. I didn't hear those, unfortunately. You know how it is, Matt, when you're covering a baseball game,

and you want to get a good spot in line, especially during playoffs. We headed down in the ninth inning to the tunnels. So I watched that in the tunnels. But the three-run shot from Yuli, the three-run shot from Altovae, incredible stuff. Great game. One of the greatest games of all time. Yeah. That's why I know everybody's bitching and moaning about not being in the playoffs now,

but man, we have had a terrific run. We've been very blessed. You know, it's funny during the Fox broadcast, Because I was slipping back and forth between the Toronto, the Blue Chase Canadian feed and the Astros or the national feed on Fox, is they were celebrating, I think, yesterday was the anniversary of the Braves, one of their only World Series. And John Smoltz was celebrating in Chipper Jones and Tom Glob and all those guys. You don't realize those Atlanta Braves teams in the 90s. Frankly, Ross, more dominant during the season in terms of a long jump. than the Astros run has been.

Now, the Astros went to way more World Series and won twos compared to winning just the one that the Braves did. So if you think you're spoiled by it, the Braves went all those years. Or a decade plus, correct? Yeah, they went to five. I was just pulling it up. They went to five World Series between 91 and 99, and they won one. Yeah, I mean, so if you think you didn't get enough, Atlanta fans probably feel in the exact same way, probably if not more. so everybody's been their own

celebrations look at this line I pulled up this box score look this this is I miss these days look at this Astros lineup in that game Springer Bregman

Altuve Carrea Guley Redick Gattis is your D.H Marmon Gonzalez Brian McCann is your ninth place hitter in this lineup mm-hmm

Woo that's sexy yeah do you remember who started that game for the Astros is it somebody familiar yes I mean I could go Verlander but that was I didn't remember until I saw it

it was Dallas Keikle and he was not even like the front end of the guy was he where was he in the rotation that playoff year 17 he was up there I think he was kind of the ace before verling yeah he was chased after three and two thirds

gave up four runs three of them earned because that was a George Springer had that he had that error right and then he came back and hit a home run like the next next AB or something like that in that That was a crazy game. You know what I remember more about that 17 World Series than I do anything else? Was the fact that George Springer was so horrifically bad in the postseason.

That's right. And they were calls. And you and I were talking about it too. And it wasn't because it was managerial mispractice. It was, hey, let's take some of the pressure off of George who was so bad. And AJ kept saying, I got faith in you, bra. and he had a wonderful World Series. Yeah, people wanted him taken out of the leadoff spot.

Correct. They're like, he's terrible. Take him off the leadoff spot. And then he won World Series MVP. Do you guys think the Astros, Colorado wanted me to ask he's at work? If they would have ever went to the World Series that they never switched from the National League.

Like, they were still in the National League where they would go on to the World Series? That's a hard question to ask, answer. I mean... I'd say probably yes. Jeff Luno was building the team. They would have gone to World Series. Well, I mean, the American League was not considered a weaker league at the time.

You had the Yankees. You had the Red Sox. You have, you know, the Indians at the time were good. Who else was in the mix? Tampa Bay was starting to develop their franchise. I mean, it wasn't, no, I can't give you an answer to that. I mean, but I'm not, but I guess the only reason why you could say that is if one league was significantly leaner than the other. Like this year in the NBA.

as I'm speaking in 20-25 terms, the Western Conference is filthy-loaded. The Eastern Conference is good, but not great. So if you took a fourth-place team in the West and the NBA, sent them over to the East, they might as me could wipe the floor with everybody in the East. So I guess that's where the caller is asking is whether or not one league was so much better than the other that,

I mean, who are the teams? I mean, who did the Astro? Who did the Dodgers beat to get to the World Series in 17? I don't recall, but I can go find it. I mean, it's got to be the same teams that typically are always around and come playoff time. You probably had your Giants, right? I'm assuming they were still very good at the time.

Well, the Cubs won in 16, right? Yeah. Cubs were coming off a World Series. 18, was 18 the Dodgers, too? Let me pull this up. 17 NLCS was, yeah, it was the Cup. It was the Dodgers beat the Cubs 4 to 1. Yeah.

I don't think that one league was significantly better than the other, so I would say the Astros would have just as much of a chance one in the National League pennies as they would have American League pennant. It was a beautiful time to be alive. Astros 101 and 61. Yeah, what I remember most about the World Series that year, because a lot of it was I was calling Rockets games, so I don't have intimate details of every single moment

because I was busy calling games. But the George Springer, I remember you and I doing shows and having a heated conversation with our audience, about it. I mean, he did. What is he, what is AJ doing? It can't head lead off. Yeah. Small sample sizes, folks.

But he was awful. And before that, though, I mean, to be fair, it was, it wasn't good. But man, he came through. And he is a hero up here. People love George Springer up here. They love Vlad Guerrero. They love Bolman. They love this whole team.

I mean, this is a really good baseball. This is a really good baseball town. I think it's a good sports town. obviously they're number one sport is hockey, we just don't, I can't relate to it. I don't know if they're big Argonauts fans here, but the Raptors do well. This is a great place to watch basketball game too. What are the Argonauts drawing?

I don't know. Springer wasn't even that bad the first 11 games of the close season. 233 with an OPS is 675? For a leadoff spot, that's not what you're looking for. Jose Abraeu says he's mashing. He always want to be, why you always shaming Jose Abrayu? I'm sorry. years after that.

He had one home run, OPS is 675 and 11 games. I mean, that's a bad run, but that's not like bench the guy run. Well, no, it wasn't bench. It was moving down the line up is what it was. There's too much pressure. And then he got, oh my God, is this correct? He got 11, is this 11 hits? No more.

Look at you box score value. Yeah, I love it. All right, 713, 212, 570. 719. 7.13, 212, 570. It is a Matt Thomas show with you today until 2 o'clock. What's on your mind? Let's get a little bit on Texans conversation next. They're getting ready for Denver.

And Ross, I do need you to do me a favor during the break. How are the PFF grades about the Broncos this year? I told you they got the number two offensive line. Okay. How about everything else? We need a deep dive on the old Broncos. Okay. Because I got news for you.

There is a quarterback there that we thought would suck in the NFL, and he's been really, really good. 1229 on Sports Talk 790. Matt and Ross with you until 2 o'clock this afternoon on Sports Talk 790. 713212-2-5-790. If you want the Rockets to win tonight's game, you must do two things and two things only. Follow me on Twitter at SportsMT or follow me and follow me on Instagram at SportsMT as well. If you do so, then the Rockets will beat the Raptors tonight.

You told me if I did that, Astros would make the playoffs. they tied for the playoffs they didn't make it they didn't make it it's true Bo Nix 1800 yards this year 15 touchdowns five interceptions a quarterback reigning of 90

good not spectacular he's just very solid yes if you happen to see what he did in the fourth quarter they gave against the Giants two weeks ago putting up 33 points in a fourth quarter now granted the Giants defense is nothing closer what the Texans will do. Against the Cowboys last week, 19 of 29 for 247, four touchdowns, one I&T.

Now, the Cowboys defense sucks. That's true. Very true. I mean, it's way worse than Jerry Jones ever thought I was going to be, right? I would imagine. He didn't think they were going to be that bad. That's all good, guys. We don't need Micah Parsons.

Yeah, we'll send Michael Parsons for a conditional fifth. If I was a cowboy fan, not that I will ever be, there's never going to be a time I'm being a cowboy fan, ever. I could be a Mexican fan someday when they get the Super Bowl, which will be when they team sells. But that's a different issue for a different time. It could happen this year, Maddie. I believe.

You can believe all you want. I don't believe it's going to happen this year. Okay. Chiefs are looking pretty unstoppable, I would say. But the reality is this. The Cowboys' offense is outstanding. They just can't stop a nosebleed, as Bart Scott would say. Yeah, they make for entertainment.

Makes for a lot of overs if you're into that kind of thing. Look, if you're going to root for a bad team, a team that scores a ton of points and then doesn't give up and give them up. I mean, it gives up a ton. So the question is going to be, can the Texan's defense, honestly, provide enough pressure to make Bowdo Neck's life miserable? He has thrown five interceptions of 15 touchdowns. You take your three to one ratio.

on that. And we'll get more on this. We're going to check in in Denver probably on Friday show. What's going on with the Broncos? But to me, I was so impressed. I mean, say what you will about how the game was closer than probably should have been last week against the Niners, especially with all the time that the Niners were and were not on the field offensively.

But Ross, is this the best defense the Texans have ever had? Or am I in the near and here and the now where I should be talking about when JJ Wad and who else? was in that secondary that was so good. Oh, God, I'm drawing a blank on the two guys. I don't know, Antonio Smith, or who are you thinking about? Daniel Manning and... Daniel Manning and...

Jonathan Joseph. Jonathan Joseph. I was thinking Cincinnati of the secondary guys, yeah. I mean, do you tell me which defense was better? This one, to me, imposes fear on the front four. I mean, I think the linebacking corps is mid. I think you've got outstanding coverage in your secondary now. You're spending a lot of money on it and it's paying off. They are first in points allowed per game.

Though the Texans have never finished higher than fourth. In 2011, they finished fourth. I mean, not that Mac Jones is the here and the now. Was it Mac Jones and said it was the best defense they ever saw, right? Yes. Or was it? It was Mac Jones who said it was the best defense in the NFL right now. I don't think that he ever saw, but yeah, I'm interesting.

Okay. So they're first in yards and points. Wow. But there's a little bit of a cap. No, because even that's the numbers still go against the good teams too. In 2011, it's points they were fourth, the yards they were second. So basically in the entire 24-year history of the Texans, this is the second, this is either the first or the second best defense the team has ever put out there. and yet they're three and five.

That's what's got to be so discouraging, right? That is discouraging, but also, I mean, all three of their losses were one score, all four of their losses have been one score games. So, I mean, if that can encourage you, and all three of their wins have been by multiple scores. But also, we can kind of, we can poke holes in all of that, A, it's the Titans, B, it's the Ravens that were beat up,

and then it's the Niners who were beat up and lost a lot of players too, but it's the NFL. I mean, players get hurt. You haven't had Joe Mixing all season long. You're figuring things out with your offensive line. Nico Collins was out last week. I mean, it happens.

Yeah. Yeah. I would say all the games that the injury card was most valid. Now, granted, I don't know if I want to, I mean, you have Joey Bosa out for the year. And Nick Bosa, Fred Warner. and they had a couple of guys go down during the game. I would say of all the games, though,

the Ravens did not put out a professional defensive team. Right? Am I right about that? They didn't. But, I mean, they weren't expect. 44 to 10 is still, I mean, you're playing an NFL team, and on the road and you win 44 to 10. That's still a pretty impressive beat down. Yeah.

And that's why when you go to, you were kind of talking about the teams and the metrics and stuff like that. One of the ones I like is Aaron Chats. He's done DVOA for years. like since I think he's gone back to the 80s and maybe even before he's got the Texans as the seventh best team in football Denver is the 8th doesn't mean everything one data point right right right no I don't think I don't think it's an upset

I mean clearly now Vegas loves them and not the Vegas is everything but Vegas likes the Texans now yeah according to his metrics he's got Indianapolis Seattle Detroit the Rams and the Chiefs as the top five those are all teams have played very well this season yeah no I think if the Texans win this one this will be their by far, their biggest win in terms of competition and probably a jumping point.

And that's where you've got to start doing what I've been doing here for the last few weeks. I know you're going to get mad at me. You're going to have to start standings watching. It's fine. How much time did I spend standing watching on the plane yesterday from Toronto to Houston and Toronto? Too much. Because I was thinking about this.

This week's schedule, you're going to get some help from somebody. because you do have the chiefs playing the bills. Those are two teams that you're fighting for wild card spots, presuming if the Patriots win the East, or if one of them does. And then you've got to root hard for the Raiders against the Jaguars. You need the Jaguars to continue this slide. They looked awful in Europe.

Yes. So you need that slip up to go. And then you're going to get the benefit. You need the Steelers to beat the Colts because you're guaranteed at least one team of the eight. F. North winning the division, it might as well be the Steelers and help the Colts get back down a little bit.

The problem is the Colts Steelers did not look good against Green Bay last weekend. They just didn't. Yeah, the Colts are looking pretty awesome. Do you, and I saw this on social media as I was flying up here yesterday. A lot of credit, and I don't know, I think it's just coincidence. But you know, the owner, Erse's daughters now run the team. and one of them is like wearing a headset. She's taking notes on the field.

She's all in. Yeah. And while most people thought it was a bit, maybe she's like, I know what's going on now. She's calling third down personnel packages. She's calling corner blitzes, which I thought was kind of weird. It's just purely coincidental.

But, man, did anybody in America outside the most diehard Colts fan think this team was seven one through eight weeks? We all left. They're like, oh, okay, they're going from Anthony Richardson and Daniel Jones. Daniel Jones. Yeah. They're going from, well, bad to, from horrible to just bad.

To journeyman at best, overcompensated journeyment. And Jonathan Taylor, the only has ever heard him long term for the Colts has been the fact that you can't stay healthy. Yeah, people want to say, oh, it's not Daniel Jones, it's Jonathan Taylor in the run games. Like, they had that last year. Their offensive line is one of the best in football. with John and Taylor last year. And Johnson Taylor was great, but the team was not. So I think you got to give Daniel Jones some credit.

Every time I see them, and again, I'm only watching him on Red Zone. Every time I watch him play, he looks, he takes the good routes, he throws a good ball, he's not throwing silly interceptions, not taking stupid sacks. Now, granted, his offensive line is a lot better than ever was with the Giants. Yeah. They've been very good. So are we to assume anything? is you still have to play the cults twice.

You can make up the ground there. But you are going to have to start stat game watching. Chargers, Bills, Patriots, you're going to have to sneak in via the Waldcard. Yeah, I forgot about the Patriots. Drake May having an unbelievable season. Yeah, they're leading that division.

Better than the Bills, and they beat them head to head. Drake, he's got to be top five for the NFL MVP race right now. I'd be curious to see you. Yeah, we're, we're, people want Jonathan Taylor to win it. I personally want Jemir Gibbs winning because he's helping my fantasy. Oh my gosh. All right. Don't be mad.

I'm not mad. Well, actually, I'm kind of mad because I passed on him for Sequin Barclay. But Sequin had a big game last week, so I'm feeling better. You know, he's, he's fine. It just shows you that these running backs. And then he's got a scoring injury. Don't we all? 713-212-5-7-90.

Ross shout out to Craig. It brought me lunch today. Thank you very much, Craig. Television Voice of the Rockets. He did? Yeah. And you just make people serve you no matter where you go, huh?

I mean, I bought some stuff for him yesterday. Oh, that's even. Yeah. We've already gone to Rim Rortons twice already. I'm going to go one more time after the show. They have those in Houston now, right? Yeah.

They have one by the airport. Okay. And what's so great about it that makes you love it so much? Great coffee and donuts. Okay. I mean, it's basically a ronken ronuts. It's basically, yeah, it's the exact same place. If you, if you covered up the signs that said Rimm Bortons and ronken ronuts, it'd be the exact same thing.

This is tasty. Here's one on Westheimer and Fondren. Yeah. It's not too far. Go check it out. How about one day next week before a rocket team, you and me, we'll go there. Okay, sounds great. test.

Sure. Yeah, Ross and I, I mean, Craig and I went to, there's some of them that are open here in Toronto at 24 hours.

We went and got coffee and two coconut chocolate donuts for dessert. Coffee. Coffee for dessert? What time of night was this? 9.30? PM?

Yeah, I can't do that. I don't know how you guys do that. I'll be up all night. Like Lionel Richie. I was hoping for like a 19. any gang was I was fully prepared for it. Yeah.

That's what I, they were playing all those all night long songs throughout the bumps and Fox. Credit to Fox and whoever the producers are. Yeah. They were playing all the long and all that type of stuff. I couldn't sleep. I am fully prepared to give you a deep breakdown

of Colin Murray Boyles. Who's that? A hockey player or something? Is that that that guy that used to be on whose line is it anyway? No, that's Brian Doyle Murray. Oh. I think.

That's actually. Colin Mocker. or his brother. Yeah. I can give you a Sandro Mamu-Kelishvili report if you'd like. I'm good. Oh, great anthem coming up tonight, though. Oh, Canada.

Oh, boy. Tacular. How bad did you lose that insta poll again? Badly, but that's what we talked about it last night of dinner. We're definitely right. By the way, again, very few people can represent Texas. Oh, dear. So what do you do?

You bring Mr. Texas to Canada and you represent. Who is that? Craig Ackerman? Me. You're not Mr. Texas. Scott at River Oaks at 1254 on the Matt Thomas show of Ross. Scott, good afternoon to you. Matt, Ross, what's going on?

I wanted to call in earlier in the week to ask for you guys thought on this and give you mind, but I'm sure I've already talked about it. We're on to Denver, but I went to the Texans game this past weekend, and I went to the Bill's game that was in town last year. I went to the Lions game last year as well. And I mean, to say that the crowd was 50-50 is, I hope it was at least 50-50, and that there weren't more Niners fans there than Texans. I mean, there was Niners pop-up shops for gear outside of the, Niners gear outside of the stadium.

And I just don't, who owns the tickets on the road side of the stadium? I've never understood, and people have explained it to me time and how the PSL works and how you have to get it. I mean, and I know, you know, in some of these major metropolitan cities, we're not the only ones that deal with this. Like, you see this, the Miami goes through this with the road fans. I know Atlanta goes through this, but you think the McNair's and the other NFL owners, does this piss them off? Is this an unintended consequence of the game growing so big?

I don't know. What's your thoughts with these? Outstanding question, Scott. Thanks for the phone call. We'll answer off air for you. There is no more roadside and home side. Each team gets a certain allotment of tickets, but it's basically for players and staff. It's not for, we don't hold 4,000 tickets for opposing teams.

Now, they do that in college football, but they don't do that in the professionals side of things. So in theory, every NFL owner would like to have the entire stadium full of every one of their fans. It just doesn't happen that way. It's all about what's available. And if every ticket is scooped up and every ticket is occupied and nobody wants to be. wants to sell their ticket, you can't get 10,000 Niners fans in the NRG Stadium. You can't get 10,000 Steelers fans in. You can't get 15,000 Dallas Cowboy fans in because those fans who own the tickets are diehards.

For instance, Ross, do you ever watch a Green Bay game at Lambeau Field? Yes. You don't see 4,000 cowboy fans at Lambeau Field. You just don't. You may see a few, but you don't see the large amounts of fan bases. I think there's, depending on the fan base. I can't say specifically, but I think I remember a bunch of Steelers fans being there before. Yeah, Steelers only go to Green Bay once every, what, six or seven years.

Yeah, maybe it was more of a special thing. Yeah. Now, there are places in the NFL that openly want you to go to their stadium. The Chargers have no issue selling it to other teams. The Rams don't, because L.A. is, just going to be a transient non-diehard, especially on Chargers side. The Rams, there's a few more of the, I grew up as a Ram fan kind of thing. Las Vegas Raiders fans, Raiders, they open like, come on in Pittsburgh,

come on in Tampa Bay, come on in Jacksonville, come on, Houston, you can go watch our games. Yeah. If the Texans were die-hard, if the city of Houston was a die-hard Texan fan base, you'd have a smattering. You wouldn't have thousands. Fox, I don't know if you saw this. on the game on broadcast Ross Sunday, they kept showing Niner fans almost every single time

something good was happened for the Texans, and you saw their droopy dog faces. When they scored that touchdown, there was a pretty loud roar. Yeah. I actually rewound it. I was like, oh my gosh, that was really loud. Yeah, I could, I was Franklin,

you told me there was a Nile of Niner fans. I didn't realize how many there were. There were, I wasn't the game, but it felt like to me there was a significant buzz. Yeah, it's crazy. for like a Bay Area football team. Like, okay, they were the first franchise to five World, world championships, Super Bowl championships,

as we learned on, believe it or not. But I was still kind of surprised. No, it's all about who's buying the tickets, the resale market, if there are open tickets available. Can you call the Texans, can you call right now and get tickets to the game? Directly through the Texans?

I guess you can, right? I don't know. Call the box office? And I just go online and pay a bunch of feet. fees. These fees are out of control, by the way. Oh, don't get me started on that. You're absolutely right. But point being is that if everybody, if you can't get a ticket, it's the hardest ticket in the house, you can't get 6,000 Bronco fans in a building on someday.

Yeah, well, then the resale goes up and everybody's got a price. Everybody, a Texan fan, you got a price. You do have a price. So, yeah, it's not just Houston. Let's be fair on this. We're going to be fair. It's not just Houston. I mean, if you go into a Tampa Bay Buccaneers game, if you were a Texan fan, you probably get, I mean,

look at all the goofy traveling Texan duffuses that go on the trips. Yeah, they used to be a little bit stronger back when the team was better. Maybe they'll come back. Yeah, I don't know. We'll see. This is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Matt and Ross with you for the final hour of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Sports Talk 790, 713, 212-579.

in the conversation. We've got the replay of the EMA Docker conversation coming up at about 10, about 50 minutes from now. We've got Blake Snell throwing today for the Dodgers. I always mispronounce a Blue J starter, Ross. Can you help me on that? You savage? I always just say, Yarse al-Avoy, but I'm just being...

Y'Alsavage. That's on the French Canadian Vosgion. That's the Expos of the Blue Jays. O'Srelle, Gersavage. All right, we've butchered it. Sorry. That's fine. Game 5 tonight. It'll be at 7 o'clock, and we'll have that. We've got the Rockets versus the Raptors tonight.

5.30 will be the start time because they're moving up an hour to get everybody home so they can actually watch half of the game with the Blue Jays and the Dodgers. So we'll be on the air with the launch pad at 430, host, I believe, by Adam Clanton. So he's actually putting some work in. It's nice to do that. It is a short show for him, though, so it's really not that much extra work. Yeah, I mean, it's within there. That's when their time slides, which is fine.

That's fine. I'll be on post game. Why is he doing post game? I don't know. Okay. Let's see. As far as the Texans are concerned, Nico Collins is out hanging around with the guys.

I don't think he's cleared concussion protocol altogether, but he's out there, which is a good sign. According to Adam Wexler, our Texans number two insider behind me and number one, What? Dulton Schultz, not at practice. Adams, number one. No, he doesn't mention Joe Mixing like I did.

I had that. He's out of press conferences, asking questions, he's at practice, taking notes. Yeah, he's number one. No, no, no. I had Joe Manxon out there before anybody else did, so sorry. And we got a little bit of breaking news on the Rockets Raptors game. Good or bad?

Yaka Pertl's not playing tonight. Oh, are you serious? All right, you know what you're doing? While we're doing that, we got some breaking news on the World Series. According to Irvin Magic Johnson on Twitter. Oh, no, don't say it. I don't even see it. Can I guess?

Go ahead. May I guess? Go ahead. Game 5 is tonight and right now the series is tied to two games apiece. You're really close. Breaking news, according to Irvin Magic Johnson. With the series being tied to two, game five is very, important. Whichever team wins

takes control of the series. We should do magic tweet or not someday. That's how Friday's believe it or not. Okay, good, because I don't want to put it together today. Although I could today. We got a lot of some interviews coming up. Okay. 249 replies, 300

retweets, 1,200 likes. Some of the replies. Tweeting at a magical level, I see you, Irv. very astute observation, Mr. Magic. When Magic is right, he's not wrong. In other news, water is wet.

Grass is green. The sky is blue. Grass isn't always green. The sky's not always blue. I think whoever has more runs scored after nine innings will win game five, but don't quote me on this. That's true. It could be 18 innings. Let's see here. What else we got? Somebody said C-T-E? Magic should change his name to Nostradamus. Magic, I seriously think you should have your phone taken away.

This is some John Mann level analysis. Do you understand, Ross, I'll say this one more time, and I'll be done with this. He was one of my all-time favorite players. He may be my top five favorite non-rocket players of all time. Man, he's the worst tweeter of all time. It's fine. But everybody else will say, it's not him doing it. Well, then you've hired a dumb ass to do it then.

Thanks for clarifying the reason why tonight's game is important, Magic. somebody with a Donald Trump picture says I'll take it a step further whichever team wins two more games wins a series some good analysis let me do one more here just to wrap this up you and ESPN Booker would be a dangerous pair as a Booger McFarland is he captain obvious too

I mean I don't think it was bad he got crushed for it for sure he said a couple captain obvious things and you know it gets posted on the internet and then that's all you're known for at least our tweets don't get put out there for public consumption like that true I was happy to get four or five likes all right you're doing great anything else going on with sports wise before I get to the email I'm trying to think we got mentioned the huge news about jacob turtle not playing tonight we got game five we got texans back on the practice field rockets playing tonight and oh oh I know I was going to

do real quick one we got one minute here so diana ricini's had to kind of track a little? Really? Or justify. She said the rumors of Sarkisian's interest of the Titans did not come from the agent or from Sark.

Well, then if that's the case, then why are you reporting it then? Hmm. Unless it's like, maybe it's his future ex-wife. Could be an NFL team. She's an NFL reporter. Well, I mean, okay. So let's, in 30 seconds here.

Where is the logical next spot to go to if you're not getting it from the agent and you're not getting it from the coach. An NFL team? Ooh. You wouldn't believe who called us kind of thing? Yeah. Yeah.

That feels right. Good deduction on your part there. Thank you, Matthew. Inspector Villarreal. I prefer Sherlock. I get called that a lot. People with two words in front of it. Okay.

Eme Adok is getting ready for the Rockets Raptors tonight. We'll talk with him next. 112.712 on Sports Talk 790. 713-212-5-790. If you want to chime in, 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. We are pleased to be joined once a week by the head basketball coach of Houston Rockets. He joined us just fresh off the basketball court tonight earlier today as they were getting ready for tonight's game against Raptors.

Ema, Ross, and I talked about the Rockets, great performance. against the net's first victory of the season, and it came down to, frankly, just a Rockets team that shot much better from the floor. Well, we obviously shot it well, much better, you know, 50% from 3 and 88 from the free throw line. But I think it was more than that. It was unselfishness, 33 assists,

that we were moving a ball a little stronger in their traps than the previous few games, and that results in open look. So the guys are going to be free. If Alpi can make those plays, the attention, Kevin draws, they're making the right reads and guys were knocking them down.

You know, it was funny when Katie was asked about the game, and Tari always had that great game with five three-pointers in the game, which has occurred high for him, it's like, man, if we get that kind of production from Tari Isson, and it doesn't have to me from him every single night, but it almost tells you that you've got to get that one or two guys off the bench. It's got to be that quote-unquote instant offense. Do you kind of feel that Tari can fill that mode,

if not him, somebody else on a given night? Yeah, I mean, obviously it's been one of our strong, suits is the depth that we have and I think it can be different guys, different nights and so with us kind of mixing up the starting lineup, guys are put in different positions at times and it was tardy that night but it's been others

throughout the first few seasons I've been here and you know you got a wild card guy that you know teams have to prepare for you know what they're going to bring every night that's just to add a benefit. You started Josh Akogi in the game against the Nets. You know used Reed Shepard during the preseason

in the starting lineup. Thought or two about what you thought like from Josh in the starting lineup? And is that something that's going to be in the rotation now for you? Yeah, I think I've been pretty open about the lineup being the switchability with the lineup. And, you know,

we like the big lineup. We tinker with that a little bit in preseason, but we'll get opportunities at times if they have two really good scores like Cam Thomas and Michael Porter, we may go with the defensive lineup with Josh in there to guard one, I'm in to guard another. And so we can go all sorts of ways.

honestly and I'm very comfortable with that and I think the guys are prepared for that so that was a look we gave there and at some point when we're when we're fully whole we'll kind of zone in on one thing and and it could be Dorian at the time it could be going big like we did or read and read for instance and so the like I said our versatility gives us options to do that and I think all of our guys are comfortable in every role how would you assess reeds play so far both ends of the floor but also the shot selection specifically it's been 11 shots every single game for him How do you feel about the selection there? Yeah, we want to be aggressive and confident.

You know, not passing up any looks that he gets. He's one of our best shooters. And we understand how teams are defending him and the attention that he commands himself. And so, but when you're playing with the guy like Alper and Katie, I'm in who's going to get downhill and attract that crowd as well, those looks are going to be there. We want him to be confident and not second guess anything.

And he's done that so far. You know, getting the training. on ball, off ball, you know, with some teams that really are up pressuring, started with OKC, and then Detroit does more of the same, and even Toronto and Brooklyn are heavy load-up teams. And so just giving him different looks, he's going to learn on the fly. And I think, like I said, with Fred being out, him, I'm in, got to learn to be the PG, play some off ball, and I think he's doing a good job. Rocket Tech coach, Ima Doka was here on Sports Talk 790, and yeah, you mentioned Amen being the PG.

I imagine you're pretty satisfied with eight assists and no turnovers in the last game. What is that like? Because it's obviously, it's basketball one-on-one. Don't turn the ball over. Get assist. But, I mean, how do you kind of communicate that or drill that into players and see improvement as a season goes along in that facet? Yeah, just overall recognition of what teams are doing out there.

Like I said, we're playing against teams that have really packed the paint and want to protect the rim with their full team defense. And so the kickouts will be there, get to our spacing properly, and know where your outlets are at. And so for our men, it's going to be different every night, depending on who's on him and how they are guarding him. You know, he can be aggressive getting downhill, but teams know what he's all about and know the threat that he is.

So they're going to load up, and it's up to him to make those reads. And so I think he did obviously a great job with those numbers you just pointed out. But throughout the season, it's going to be a game-by-game thing where he has to have a full understanding of how teams are guarding him and where to get his shot and other guy's shots. And I think that's where he's improved so far throughout this season already. EMA, I know you don't like turnovers. nobody does, but there are going to be some that are going to be,

I saw what you tried to do there. I appreciate that. Others are like, what the hell are you thinking? Do you guys dissect those turnovers like I think you do? Yeah, and it's really specific to the game plan. Like I said, we've had pretty much all four teams are going to either blitz the pick and roll or pack the pain and make you prove it and beat you from outside. And so it's just a simple play as we talked about, you know, hitting singles against OKC in game one.

And we didn't do that. Obviously, 25 turnovers for 28 points. You know, one possession game is way too high. And so understanding and learning from game to game that these teams are going to be there. Keep it simple. And when you see the crowd, get off the ball, have a two-on-one or some numbers on the backside. If you go blitz and pick and roll, get off the ball and let Alperin and other guys make plays. And so when we try to overdo it and, you know, split or beat the crowd, beat the double team,

sometimes you get in trouble. But we just want to keep it simple. Trust your teammates and make the easy pass. One of the turnovers was a Kevin Durant offensive foul against the nets, where the ball hit the player in the face. Did you get a satisfactory clarification on what happened there? Because it looked like to me, the defender's right in his face. Where was Katie supposed to go?

Yeah, it's a tough one. I think we all thought it would be overturned when I challenged it due to the fact that the ball grazed him. You know, we didn't hit him with his hand, didn't hit him with the elbow or anything like that. And like you said, they're crowding your space. You have a legal right to obviously make your move and try to impede that progress. And so we thought it would be overturned.

They gave us the reason, and we keep it moving from there. Didn't really agree with it, but it is what it is. Katie, to you, you've seen him so many times game planning against him. You've been with him on the bench now for a short time here and obviously other places. What has his game done to change and evolve as he's gotten a little bit longer in the tooth? I mean, are you still seeing, if I went back and looked at the Katie video of 10 years ago, is it about the same kind of player, or how is he transitioned as he's played a little bit later in life? I think he's just continuing to be as efficient as he's always been, as he's always been.

I think you look at the last three years in the, you know, the 40, 50, 90 and, you know, says high efficiency he's shooting. He doesn't force it. He understands defenses and what teams are trying to do with a scheme against him. And he's basically seen it all. So now he's at times fine being a decoy or letting guys either crowd him and make plays for others or get it to Alpi and let him make the play. And so he understands that. and if it frees everybody else up and we get the win, he's all about that.

So he's not a guy that's trying to force it and prove anything. He's seen it all, done it all, and understands what he does to impact our team offensively. Have you felt about his fit, obviously, culturally? He had worked with some guys in the offseason as well. But a lot of players talking about his work ethic and how they are really impressed. Have you seen kind of effect of that rubbing off on other guys or not so much? Yeah, definitely. brought in veterans like I always

talk about Dylan, Fred, Jeff and those guys that came a few years ago and Kevin takes that to another level with the work ethic is one-on-one professionalism every day and that's why he is as great as he is. It's not just by chance or talent he puts in the work and is trying to improve and add to his game

every year and throughout the season and so you see young guys tagging along and it's great to see that work every day and then how hard you have to go at game speed and not just loafing through the workout but actually trying to get better And so it's rubbing off, no doubt. I think everybody takes note of it,

and then they start to incorporate it themselves, and it's a great thing for our young guys to implement their career at a young age. Last question. Who is in charge of free throw shooting? If you want to give yourself credit, go for it, because Stephen Adams is 9 of 10. Alpi is 22 or 26. If you're big men are shooting free throws like that,

that's going to be a huge asset for the squad this year. Yeah, it's been great. I think I did point out at the start of training camp that we were 29th in free throw shooting last. year. It might have been 30th, honestly. But yeah, that was a challenge to our guys. Obviously, we finished every practice and every individual workout with a good amount of free throws and try to put them in some pressure situations throughout practice and training camp,

but guys have to own up to it and take that on, take that challenge on. And so obviously 23 for 26 the other night is great for us. But I think it might be Garrett Jackson or one of our assistants. I think actually Cam Hodges signed contracts with odds. blank will shoot this many fritos and shoot this percentage so they all had to sign it and it's a direct challenge to meet this number and meet this the number you're going to shoot the percentage-wise but also meet the attempts that you need to get up every day in order to get there and so guys all signed it and I think it's just a way of holding guys accountable and kind of pointing back on

what they agreed to is there like a steak dinner on the line on this or is there a kangaroo court if they don't hit that number not sure what cam came up with but so far as working and we'll take it. Yes, we will. Rockets and Raptors tonight, early start time. 5.30 will be the tip time. Launchpad begins at 4.30. We'll talk with Willie Fritz next here on the program,

but Ross, let's get people fired up for tonight's action in sports. 133 on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Matt here with you in Toronto for Rockets and Raptors tonight. For the first time since 2017, the Cougars went on the road last week and knocked off a top 25 team in Arizona State. And the Cougars enter play this week, number 22, the Associated Press poll. A lot of that is because of the man that joins us now

with the great team he's assembled. It's Willie Fritz with us here on Sports Talk 790 and is presented to you by the Joint Chiropractic Coach. Congratulations. You've had a lot of nice wins in this two-year run, but how fulfilling was the performance going against an Arizona team that just knocked off Texas Tech the week before? Yeah, I'm really proud of our.

guys, you know, battled through adversity. They played, you know, their tails off for four quarters. And, you know, you do it on a road and, you know, in front of a, you know, sold-out crowd. It was really good. And all three phases, you know, played well, not the whole game, but, you know, bits and pieces. And there was enough for us to come out of there with the W. So very proud of the guys. Heavy hearts, I said the very least, with Coach Hester's passing.

Take us through, if you don't mind. you told the kids and how'd they progress, and obviously you went right to honoring him right after the victory against ASU. Yeah, you know, I found out, you know, he passed away at 1016 on Saturday morning. I had some people that kind of reached out to me. And, you know, the way Coach Hester was,

he told his family not to say anything until after the game. But he got out, and, you know, we had a meeting with the players. coaches were all there. And we did a good job. It was talking about, you know, Coach Hester's stories. He was a really unique individual. And kids all loved him.

And, you know, so we talked about it. And I said, you know, the one thing you'd want us to do is come on and please play as hard as we possibly can and, you know, do the best we can. And you guys really handle it in a mature manner and coaches as well. And we're, you know, proud to be able to honor them with a big win. and the uniforms will be black for the game here against West Virginia, which is something he loved, and we'll be looking forward to seeing that.

Strength and conditioning coaches have a unique relationship with these kids. They may be sometimes conduit to their position coaches, maybe a buffer between the head coach and the players. They also see them perhaps more than anybody else. You have to really dig down deep when you're assembling a staff, Willie. I don't want to put words in your mouth here, but you have to make sure the right guys running that side of the program because it's not so much what they're doing during the course of the season. It's how they're taking care of their bodies and getting ready for the season during the offseason.

No, it really is. You know, Kurt was the first guy hired when I got here. He was with me at my previous school, did a fantastic job there. Before he's at Tulane, he was at Louisiana Tech, did a great job there. You know, I just knew I needed to bring him over for this job. And, you know, those guys are around them, you know, year-round. You know, we work. out five days a week, you know, in the summer and in the spring, you know, work out, you know, two or three times a week during his season. And then he's also out there, you know, during practice and all that kind of stuff. So they do have a very unique relationship with the guys, see him all the time.

And you've got to have somebody that's, you know, giving them the correct message. And Kurt certainly did that day in and day out. Willie, to the game again, Connor Wegman looks like you got a beat up pretty bad. You ask him to throw the football. He does it beautifully. The groundwork, the rushing attempts. I thought not only were well-timed,

especially with that 50-yard run early in the contest, but he was very patient in the backfield. Is that something that just came to him, or you've seen him improve when it comes to picking and choosing his battles and what holes to try to go through? Well, here's a really good run. in high school. He ran quite a bit in high school. Some of it scrambled, some of them designed runs. And at his previous school, he ran the ball well. We went back and looked at tape and we were

wanting to get him over here. We looked at that. So he's a dual threat quarterback. He got very good speed. He runs, you know, 21 miles an hour, which is extremely fast for quarterback. And, you know, he has the ability to be a really, really accurate passer. And, you know, so, no, it doesn't really surprise us. You know, some games, you don't know what the script's going to be until you get out there. And one of the advantages we had is they were having a hard time with the quarterback run.

So, you know, we went back to it a few times. And, you know, Conner did a sensational job just running vertical. A lot of times guys want to run east-west. You know, and you can get five yards, and they go east-west, and two yards. He did a really good job of seeing creases and cracks and getting vertical. We sometimes talk about C2, split to get two guys and kind of widen one of them and put your foot in the ground and get him between them and take quite as big a shot as you would if he tried to run over a guy. But he did an excellent job running the ball. He also did an excellent job throwing the ball on Saturday.

You never want any of your players to get hurt, but it's a byproduct of the sport. Do you say a little extra more of a prayer when it's your quarterback on those runs, and do you tell him perhaps give him different? advice as compared to laying down or not trying to get that extra yard because he's afraid maybe that one extra hit may knock them out. I mean, that may be the case for any quarterback. But I always know that dual threat guys are always very sensitive because they're so explosive. At the same time, they're also probably a little more prone to getting hurt. Yeah, you know, we work on those different things.

And, you know, you want to fall forward too many times guys are sliding, and that's almost more difficult than falling forward. Plus, they make market where you begin the slide. But yeah, just like I was talking, my C2 split to, we're not trying to run over a guy. We're trying to run in between two targets and, you know, hopefully pop out on the other end. You take glancing blows instead of head-on hits. And, you know, but sometimes, you know, you got to get first down. And, you know, by any means necessary.

And another great thing about Connors, he's a tough guy, and he plays football. And, you know, so, yeah, we don't want to have a whole bunch of hits on the QB. But, you know, every once in a game, that's a lot of the game, what it takes to win. You've had two very nice wins against two upper echelon teams in this conference. The obligatory how do you avoid the letdown

against the West Virginia team that's struggling minorly so far this year? Well, I think our kids understand how important each and every ballgame is, and our goal doesn't change each week. We want to improve and get better and we want to be on the climb. We don't want to be on

the descent down that mountain. And so we're working hard every single day of improving. Luckily, I got a lot of good leaders that are doing a good job of also, you know, voicing the message that the coaches talk to about all the time as well. You know, we talk about it on Monday and we watch the game that we just got done playing on Saturday, we flushed you down the toilet, and we move on to the next opponent. I don't know if you do it much.

I don't know if your kids do it much, but you are in the thick of things in this Big 12. Obviously, running the table will be the easiest way to get to that championship game. Are you doing much standings watching? Are you looking at scoreboards? Or are you doing what most coaches do? Just focus on what's in front of you. I just kind of focus. I probably watch less football than anybody.

You know, we stay up here. I get up here real early and I leave late. By the time I get home, I really don't care too much by watching football unless I've got a buddy's team playing somewhere. Every once in a while, I'll see a pro game and have. one of my former players out there playing. By the way, Marcus Jones, you signed a new contract with the Patriots. We're so happy for Marcus.

Sure. But, you know, that's, you know, I just, you know, really try to focus on the task in hand. I tell our guys all the time, you know, if you want to be elite, you've got to be able to, you know, focus on, you know, one thing at a time and be the very best you can't at it, and you've got to be consistent, your effort.

And that's what we try to do. to do all the time. Willie, thanks for the time, as always. Congratulations. Looking forward to catching the game on Saturday. Best of luck against the Mountaineers, and we'll talk again next week. Thank you. Go Coogs.

Thank you very much. Willie Fritz with us, and you guys got to get out to check out that game. 7-13 go Coogs. 7-1-3-go-Cougers.com. U.H.cougers.com slash tickets. If you want to check out the game, which they will honor the 2015 Peach Bowl Champion Team, $20. $0.15 to get you into the building.

$20. and 15 cents with the Cougars and West Virginia. Let's play, believe it or not. Ross, I did not figure out what the category was today. Were you going with Toronto? We're doing that today. It's up next. Sports Talk 790.

713-212-5-790 if you want to play. Believe it or not, we're playing for some Cougar tickets against West Virginia if you want to play for that. We've also got some couch tickets and, of course, the patented, amazing Sports Talk 790 T-shirt. That's all next. 142. If you want to play, come on.

in 713-212-5-790. Thank you very much, Blummer. We've forgiven you for 2005, I think. By the way, congratulations. C.J. Gardner-Johnson-Ross has a new place to play. Practice squad or a roster? I'm going to guess practice squad since it's only like week nine. Nobody's that desperate yet.

It's the bears. Oh, okay. Hey. The bears are all right. Right. And he's going to the roster, it sounds like. Okay, good for him. Joe Flacco, 50-50 to face the Bears, by the way, Matt. How bad is my fantasy team? We're really missing.

We're really going to be sad that Joe Flacco is going to miss the game. Did you ever think in your life in 2035 people talking about Joe Flacco and potentially missing him? I don't want to talk about it. We're in a sad state. We're two and six, Matt. We're battling. Yeah. Well, we have a competitive league. I won the battle of the worst two teams in the league with myself and Wexler last week. Does Wex know he's the worst? I think he knows. He's got the worst record and the fewest points.

Ooh. All right. Don't bring that up as part of the A team today. Although we could actually tease it that way if we wanted to. We could. Thanks again to Willie Fritz, courtesy of Joint Chiropractic, the official chiropractor of University of Houston Athletics for joining us here on the program. Again, 11 o'clock start time.

and if you losers don't go to the game Matt What? I'm talking about the select few Those are the keyboard warriors The rest of you are nice people The keyboard warrior losers You better go to the game And stop getting on your computer

And then complaining when no one shows up Yeah I can handle the heavy lifting I ain't scared Those douchebags want to attack me I'll attack you back I'm got you stay far away from it That's fine smart idea on your part

Cougars fans are the best in the world they are so passionate. 98% of Cougar fans are the most amazing people you ever want to meet. One's I know in real life I like. One's on the internet, not so much. 2% of them are complete douchebags. And I don't know who they are, because that's what,

that's the whole point. They don't know who they are. We don't know who they are because they hide behind their keywords. For Ku Klux, you can suck it. Y'all are trash. The rest of you that I see and I go to games with and take pictures with and drink beer with and have fun with and talk to

and hang out in San Antonio and hang out at TDC you, I respect the hell out of you and love you for it. And we are a good, strong Kug fan nation. The keyboard warriors, you all can go to hell. All right. What else we got, Ross? Oh, pilot. What? World Series? I don't know. What else?

Oh, yeah. Let's go Rockets. What are you going to be for Halloween? I'm going to be on a plane. Can you dress up on a Halloween for a Halloween flame? You could. Maybe the flight attendants will be dressed up. Ooh, what could they be dressed up as? Flight attendants. You know what? I could go

as naughty TSA agent. You're going to go as you're going to go as naughty TSA agent. I did that one year. The lady I was with was a flight attendant and I was drunk pilot. How did that go? It was fun.

I just had like my, I loosened my tie and I had, you know, you buy one of those captain's hats. It was easy. It was nice. Yeah. You know,

I told you this. I'm on a consecutive year streak of not being invited to anybody's Halloween party. I invited you last week. I'm not having a lie. That's a lie. That's a terrible lie.

part of me doesn't want to go to a Halloween party because you have to go get you really get a really expensive value if you're going to a party you just can't make something up at the house you can't put like a sheet over your head and call yourself a ghost you can do that you can come over to do very easy

just Google costume ideas DIY and then you can go to Goodwill and pick up a I mean you could be like jack torrent from the shining you just need a burglady coat and like a checker shirt if I ever see any of you ever want to invite me to a Halloween party I will go as the as the wheel on the price

is right. They had that costume available for you. Oh, really? Yeah. I would pay to see that. All it's going to take, John, then you throw a party. I'll be there as the wheel from the price is right. I thought you'd want to be Bob Barker. I know, but I'd be where it's suit. You should be zombie bog Barker. Bob Barker. You get face paint like there's a zombie and you get the little stick of my, what do they call that skinny microphone he had? Yeah. That's gross. Why not? Five minutes left to go on the show. What should we do? We should play America's fastest growing sports radio game show. We simply call it B.

Leaving it or not. And here's how it works. You call 713-212-5-790. Wait, this first is right. Wheels costume is amazing. That's what I'm going to do it. All you got to do is invite me to a party. I will do it.

But my rocket's kept doesn't allow it. Like I said, I'll be on a plan on Friday. I can't do it. All right. All right. All right. All things about Vlad Guerr Jr. I'll read your statement about Vlad Jr., statement is completely and utterly accurate.

You'll say this. Believe it. If a statement's erroneous, full of bunk and made up, you'll say this. Not. Two believe it or not in a row. Either win you a 7-90 T-shirt, a pair of tickets to see Maroon 5, live November the 5th at TOTA Center. Tickets on sale at Totos Center.com. Or to see the Cougars to take on West Virginia this Saturday, 11 a.m.

7-1-3-Go-Go-Cooks for tickets for that. Let's talk to Brian on 7-90. Brian, you ready to play, believe it or not? Yes, sir. Brian Flaggarro Jr. is a Canadian citizen, as he was born there while his father was playing for the Montreal Expos. Believe it or not. Not. He certainly is.

He said it once, that's a thousand. No, good players in baseball are citizens of Canada and which or not. Let's go to Dean on 790. Dean. What was your fair part of today's 10 to 2 radio show? The emailed. Okay interview. Vlad Guerrero Jr. sign with the Blue Jays for $3.9 million as an international

free agent at the age of 16. Believe it or not? Believe it. Believe it. Statement number two for the win. Before the 2019 season, Vlad Guerrero Jr. was the consensus number one prospect in baseball. Believe it or not.

Number one. Believe it. That's a believe it. Congratulations. Nicely done. Blake on 7.90. Blake, you're ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it.

Vlad Garero Jr.'s godfather is Pedro Martinez. Believe it or not. Say again? Believe it. Believe it is correct. Statement number two for the woman, Black Guerrero Jr. has a younger brother, Pablo, who is a first baseman in the Texas Rangers' minor league system. Believe it or not?

Not. He does. Believe it. He said it's a pretty good kid, too. Sorry. Thanks for fun. Ron on 790. Ron, was your fair part of today's 10-2 radio show?

The Willie Fritz interview. Just like his Hall of Fame father, Vlad Guerrero Jr. does not wear batting gloves unless it's extremely cold. Believe it or not. Believe it. No, he does wear him. He does wear gloves. Senior did not, though.

Senior did not work with it. That's got to be some painful hands right there. Gill on 7.90, Gil, you're ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. Just like his Hall of Fame father, I read that one. According to Statcast, in 2025, Lageroe Jr.'s average throw speed of 88 miles per hour is the fastest among Major League First Baseman. Believe it or not.

Not. That's correct. It was 13th and he only threw 82.8 miles per hour. Statement number two for the win. In seven full major league seasons, Flagrero Jr. has won the first base gold glove award three times. Believe it or not?

Not. Not. That is the point you wanted this month. All right, before I get you out of here, let me remind you about the folks at Serta Pro Painters. I love Sertor Pro because they're going to come to my house in the not too distant future and they're going to do something that has been. needed and that is getting a fresh coat of paint on my home and if you are thinking about your home

or your place of business and you're thinking to yourself what can i do to make it look better you're going to go with surter pro painters each surter pro painter business is independently owned and operated so if you want to schedule a free estimate go to surterpro dot com c-e-r-t-a-p-r-o that's sort with a c surterpro dot com remember you can get out there give you an estimate on your home on your interior, on your exterior, the place of business that you're in. The bottom line is this, you do not want to do any of the heavy lifting. Let the Serta Pro professionals do it for you at a very affordable price. Sertor Pro Painters, that's Painting Easy. Serta with a C, C-E-R-T-A-P-R-O-com. A man who is tied or maybe all by himself in last place in our fantasy football league is up next

with Adam Clinton. It's Wexler. It's Clinton. It's the team. I'll talk to you for Rockets basketball at 5.30 right here.