The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - The Matt Thomas Show: Gronk Is Back, Red Sox Report Is Out, Aaron Reiss

Episode Date: April 22, 2020

But it's larger than life. Yeah. Lunch timers is the Matt Thomas show. 12-0-4 and H-Town. What's happening in Lunchtammers? Good afternoon to you. And welcome to the Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790 with our producer Joe George. My co-host, Rossville, Real.

I'm Matt Thomas. Guys, we are, let's see, 24, 30 hours. away from the draft. Maybe 31. I'm going to ask you a question that the Jackson's asked you back in the late 70s. Can you feel it? Can you feel it? Can you feel it?

Yes. That didn't sound like you sold it too hard. I'm ramped up. I cannot wait. Joe? I mean, I'm excited. I mean, it's something. I'm going to be watching. I'll tell you that. we've got to do something. Now, you're going to be on the air

tomorrow night, right, Joe? I'll be producing the first half and hosting the second half with Wex and Gordy. How many hours is? What's half? Three hours, four? 8.30 to whatever it's done. So wait a minute. You're going to come with us at beginning at noon and be on the air

like 12 hours? Until 10 o'clock. Yeah, and on Friday, too. Do you get any snack breaks or anything? We might get pizza. Okay, what about going to the bathroom and stuff? Break time. Okay, fair enough. I'm

I've never been a Now I shouldn't say this The first night I may sit down and watch every bit of it The second night a little bit And then I will tell you I may have watched 75 minutes Of the third round in my entire life

I would say generally It depends on what's happening with the Texans I mean year after year We've had watch parties That we'd go out to various sports bars Meet with the folks And see what's going on I cannot wait for a watch party of some sort

Well we can't really do that right now I just normally what I do is I just try to keep track of where the draft does that, like, be a chef sir? And then I'll turn it on when the Texans are coming up and actually care. At least that's what I'll do, like, days three and four. I'm more excited about the technology aspect of it. And not necessarily what will go wrong, but just how these networks have come together.

NFL network and ESPN are going to merge for one broadcast, which is the right decision to do. I'm curious about will it go off seamlessly? Will there be glitches? Will there be well? we believe the Atlanta Falcons are on the clock, but they have having communication issues. I mean, I'm just ready for all the nuances of it. Because honestly, I don't care

with the Pittsburgh Steelers do with their draft. I care about one team draft. That's it. And I've always been that way. I mean, to a tug of Aloha is interesting to me because he is the wild card, especially because he's coming off of injury, and I'm curious that Miami takes him,

or maybe San Diego takes him. We've got a draft contest we'll tell you about here today on the show. But tomorrow, for me, it's more about the nuances as compared to, man, I can't, hmm, where's that first right tackle going to go? Yeah, I'm with you. I'm that, necessarily, and we're kind of both in the same boat, and I think it's other guys and other shows like the Gordy's and Calus and Sean and Joe.

Yeah, they love the draft. They get into it. They want to break down film. They want to watch film. They want to get it all into all of this type of stuff. And I don't know. I think just for whatever reason, it's just not my thing. I'll watch it.

I will say this. A lot of it, frankly, is because the Texans haven't had a whole lot of first-round picks. Like, if the Texans really were to bottom out and be the number five pick, look, when J.D. Clowney was picked, number one, Ross, and I don't know if you were, we were together the time. Of course. Well, it might have been the morning. Whatever. Point being is that that was a huge conversation piece about whether or not J.D. Clownie and his half-ass final year at South Carolina,

a lot of it was because Steve Spurrier said, you know what, take it easy. You know, don't kill yourself. would that motor translate to his life in the NFL? Or should they draft Johnny Mansell? Well, that was really only Aggie Karen saying that. We had the billboards, right? It was keep Johnny and football in Texas or whatever. We had the Aggie billboards.

We had the Aggie Karen singing a song, Johnny Football. Remember that song? Yes. Johnny Football. How we love you, or whatever it was. Yeah. that was very disturbing. So here's what we know.

We know that Joe Burroughs the first pick. We got the first two picks, I think, pretty much locked down, right? Yes. For the most part. And we're going to have Aaron Reach joined us at 130.

Now, Aaron could come on this show today. He's with the Athletic. He's a Texans beat reporter. He is going to... Yes. You're an angel to... This was very creepy if you could see this YouTube.

Johnny Football. Now we love him. He's got something Aggies can resist Oh, geez. Okay, that's enough. Texans Karen should do a Texan song. The best season in Aggie football history. Texans Karen.

Texans football. 10 and 2 with a Cotton Bowl victory. Oh, we love you. Oh, we travel to other city halls and put our Texans flag up on the statues. And then we lose 42 to 27, but we still love you. Texas football. not bad.

Okay. It's good, Matt. It was not bad for... Nice freestyle. You know, I'm one of the better freestyle. It's a little flip and then it's you, the freestyle king, Matt. I would have absolutely put it in the same breath. I thank you for that.

Where are we going? Oh, so that's... So when JD was the conversation piece, that was interesting to us. Now, obviously, I was not here in 2002 when there were... Not 2002, whenever the Vince Young and all that stuff. That carried... Yeah, that carried shelf life for years. Yes, it did.

But how many of us knew who Titus Howard was two weeks prior to the draft of a year ago? Very few. Now, those that were the dig into it, a deep, deep dive into the NFL. Draft knew who he was. But there was nobody clamoring the day before the draft going, man, I can't wait that they can get this kid out of Alabama State. He's been okay. I mean, he hurt. He was kind of an incomplete.

He was turning the corner and then he got hurt. There's promise there. I hope there is. Because let me tell you something. This went from a putrid offensive line to a decent law offensive line last year. Max Sharpton probably was your rookie of the year among Texans or rookies, right? Yes. I mean, not only jumped in and got playing time, but he won a starting 80% of the season.

Which that's a win, Ross, because we don't spend a lot of time talking about Texans, second round, third round, fourth round, forth run picks becoming starters, much less doing it in their rookie season. So it's an encouraging sign. But yeah, I'd like to know from you guys. because I you know and I we we kind of jokingly say this we'd like to get the pulse of the show because frankly if Ross and I are not big into it and you are then we need to do a better job of getting into some of the intricacies of it but if you're in the same way where you know

wait me up on the Texans pick is that's frankly what I kind of am in Ross when McLean brought it up the other day that they made trade out of the 40s spot that even further disinterested me in the draft they're gonna you're gonna they're gonna they're going to finally come to the spot of them picking and they're going to trade down. Maybe they want to go with a draftless trade. I mean, a draftless draft. Just trade for a much

of future picks. They just keep trading down until they have like 17, 7th round picks. Yeah. And then they put a bunch of those together for some receiver that's got multiple concussions. Oh, they've already done. 12. 12. 12 is the time. It is the Matt Thomas show. 713.

212.5.790. To me, tomorrow night is going to be must-see television. because it's somewhat of a live sport event. And B, we've never seen a draft ever produced this way. Where no one is with each other. Roger Goodell is in his basement. These players are on Skype.

We have got draft analysts working together for competing networks now working together. That, to me, is as interesting as the selections are themselves. 713-2125790. Also, college football athletic directors were polled. all of them, Division 1, about what's going to happen with college football. We'll tell you about that. Aaron Reese from the Athletic

and a whole lot of stuff going on today. Between now and 3 o'clock with Ross and Joe. I'm Matt 713-212.5 is 790. The most awkward nooner you'll ever be a part of. This is the Matt Thomas show. All right, so the judge is telling us we've got to wear a mask starting at, what, Monday, is that right?

So let me get to the straight. She's going to have a 3 o'clock press conference today where she's going to tell us starting Monday, you've got to wear the mask. Yeah, I can give you a couple days to a crew one. What are they going to arrest you if you're not wearing one? That's what I want to know. I bet you it's a fine.

Or maybe you won't be allowed in like a grocery store. They'll have to turn you back. Okay. Some 790 staff are upset with us. I mean, I don't care. Besides going to the grocery store, I'm not going out in public. Can I tame my life? Not that you all asked, but I'm going to take any way.

What's your life, Matt? All right. So I've been coming back. Last week I was at the house doing the show. And now I'm, because you guys guilty me from coming in here. You did guilt me. It was about being consistent. Anyways, come in.

There's nothing consistent about it. So I said, I'm going to come in most days. And so I get in my car at 9.45, whatever, and I drive 45 minutes here. And then I'm here 1030 to 3 o'clock. I leave at 301. And I go home. Now, sometimes I get takeout. Sometimes I get gas.

Once in a rare while, I get groceries. But now we had the delivery services back working again, so we wouldn't pick them up curbside. That's how my life. That's it. I'm not gallivaning around town. I'm not running through parks like Tom Brady is in Tampa, getting citations. Yeah. Or calling Rob Gruncowski on his seashell, conch shell.

Yeah. So, I mean, I'll do it. It'll seem weird. I just, I don't, and again, I don't know why if we were the last city in Texas because my cousin, my wife's cousin is a nurse in San Antonio. They've been doing that for a while now. Okay. How come we're so late?

That's what I want to know. Why are we? We're the biggest city with you would think the most cases, just sheer numbers. Yeah. And we're the last ones to do it. Probably have the biggest medical center. Yeah. Oh, that's why I mean.

I got to get my hands on a mask, I guess, or a few of them. Yeah. Somebody is sending me a mask. I've already been told this ahead of time. Uh-oh. It's a mask with a Spurs logo on it. Is it the ultimate Spurs fan? Do you think?

Well, I don't know what she's getting me. Missy, I know you're listening. I'm probably getting a Cubs one. Would you like Cubs one? Is she making me one? Well, her husband's a Cubs fan, so. That's true. Is she making me one?

I don't know. Have you asked for one yet? I texted her and asked. Okay, would you get Ross one, too? Yes. I don't want a Spurs one, though. Ross wants a spurs one. No.

You know, look, I'm still using you guys as a promotional tool to bump my Twitter account did not work so far. In fact, I've lost. Yes, same. So, why don't we? I gained. How? I don't know. You don't even provide that good material.

Whoa. Okay, it's okay. It's not great, but it's okay. Whoa, there's no need for that, Matthew. It's okay. It's not great. We could get mass with our Twitter handles on it. That's like indirect advertising.

Hey, Joe, I think we got something started here. But how are we going to get those made? No, just you walk around town with that. With your Twitter handle? With my Twitter handle on it. No, I'll pass. I'm going to get you a trip to Vegas out of them. I don't want to get you.

want to wear your Twitter handle on my face. That's one thing to promote it. That sounded kind of odd. Exactly. 1220 and Sports Talk 790. It is the Matt Topes show. Aaron Reese and the athletic coming up in an hour from now. So real quick, before we get to the phones, we got Joseph.

And apparently, we'll start with you. If you guys want to follow up, come on and be a part of the show. We're not hiding. 713-212-5-790. So Gronk to the Patriots or to the box, apparently was a package deal, right? According to Ian Rappaport on his appearance on a show on WEEEI, he says that Brady let no teams know

that if you're going to sign me, you're going to be trading for Rob Gruncowski, and we're going to play together. $10 million one year. By the way, is he even a tight end anymore? Well, I saw Bruce Aaron said they might, like they can play him outside. He looks like a slot receiver. He needs to bulk up.

So you have Chris Godwin and Mike Evans as your outside receivers, Gronk in the slot, and then O.J. Howard and Cameron Brate at tight end. And sometimes Grunk comes down and plays tight end. Can he be a slot receiver and call today? Yeah, make him a wide receiver. Cool. But, I mean, one of the reasons he was so great during his career is a great, he's a great blocker. Well, unless he gains 40 to 50 pounds, those days are gone.

And that's not what I want for. I mean, it's April right now. Get on the good juice. Well, how is he going to defend his 24-7 belt and be an NFL receiver at the same time? The W-E-E-E-E-E-I-W-E-E-I-C-T-T-W-E-E-E-I, not W-EEEEI, came out and said he still has to defend the belt, right? Well, yeah, because you're a 20, once you're a champion, you're always a champion. You should let somebody pin him real quick at training camp or something? Apparently, the 24-7 belt you can be pinned anytime anywhere, right?

Yeah, there has to be a ref. And you don't even have to be, oh, a ref does have to show up. Could you imagine being at the grocery? grocery store and seeing Grankowski and like, I think I can put you down for the one, two, three. Oh, he's a referee.

Awesome. So if Domen Ksu puts him down, he's a twink takes him in practice, somebody has to, there has to be a referee president. Yeah, but the WV. WWE can't staff a referee at every practice. Ross,

come on. One referee. But they can stash one at a Fox game. Yeah. Like they have a Fox partnership now. They carry one of their brands on Fox on Friday nights. So why not when Gronk scores his first touchdown on Fox? Let him get pinned by a W.

Russell or national television. It'd be awesome. That's what you do. Do it at a preseason game. Nobody cares about those games anyway. Sure. That's true. Yeah.

Yeah, that'd be great. By the way, preseason games? Yeah. I got an tweet from our listener, Bradley, who sent me a letter from the Houston police officers union. Okay. Basically saying,

Judge Hedago, you're an idiot. Let me read, and I don't want to read the whole thing, is it's four paragraphs. Okay. It has come to our attention that Judge Hedogga will order a full, mandatory wearing a mask in public. Here's what this says.

Now we want to be very clear. The Houston Police Officers Union believes everyone should be wearing a mask in order to protect themselves from the virus. And we encouraging all of our officers to wear a mask. However, we draw the line at the draconian measures Hidago has decided to engage in. Our officers work every single day to bridge the gap with our community and earn their trust. We will not stand idly by and allow Hidago to tear that bridge down with her horrific leadership and echo chamber decision making.

Damn. Basically what this letter is saying is that our police department has to worry about way more important things than whether or not people are wearing a mask. Houston police officers are already stretched entirely too thin during this COVID-19 academic or pandemic. Violent crime is up this year 35%. Burglaries by 30% and HPD officers are staffing testing centers around the city. We do not have to have to be. We do not have to be. have time to be pawns in Hildago's game of attempting to control the actions of law-abiding,

tax-paying individuals in our community, especially since this idiotic order is possibly an unconstitutional one from the county judge. Is this a real letter? I hope it is. I just read two paragraphs of it. There's no way. Did the union really just call her idiotic? Joe Gunardi, H-P-O-U-F-O-P-Lodge 110 president.

Damn, I don't know. Are you sure, Bradley, this is the truth? This is from Sarah Gonzalez from Blaze TV also tweeted this out. Really? And here at H-P-O-U-T-X, Houston Police Officers Union, they just tweeted that out. The full thing that you just read. He's right, though. I mean, they're right, because, like, Matt, you know I'm from Chicago.

No. What? Stop, stop. The first time I went there with my wife. we j-walked, because that's what you do there. You cross the street when there's no traffic. And she's like, we're going to get a ticket. I'm like, no.

I'm like, they have gangbangers to worry about. Like, we're good. Like, we don't have to worry about jaywalking. They're right. They're not going to stop you for not wearing a mask. By the way, I got an email from Todd H.F.22 at Yahoo. Well, you figure it out. Excuse me?

Instead of inciting divisiveness, how about sticking to sports, not mask? You're no doctor. Yeah, Matt. Thanks, Todd HF. 22. Have a great day. Dush. 713212-5-790. Joseph and Pearland on the Matt Thomas show. Hi, Joseph.

Joseph. Joseph is speechless. Good talk. I can hear him in the background, I think. I'm a bad line. All right, we can call back if you want to. Maybe he's reading the Houston police officers union. Hashtag stick to sports.

Hashtag. Seriously. Go away. I don't need that. 7-13. You know what? Let me tell you something, gang. This, sometimes sports is the, it's the fun part of life, but we have a little real life stuff going on.

When our judge is telling us, we've got to wear masks in three or four days, I can bring in it for three seconds. Sorry. Don't mean to ruin your day. Now you, that guy's ruined my day. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. If you want to reach out via Twitter, you can at at SportsMT, at SportsRV, and at Joe George Radio. So we have a draft contest, and we've asked you guys each one of the last few days to make your votes.

Let's do this again. If you would like to take part in our draft contest, we have three great prizes, Ross are giving away. I think the number one prize is a Sean McAusha. Yes, dinner for two. Love that. Oh, make sure you don't eat literally like 24 hours before. Yeah, that's the key. And by the way, if you don't have a chance to listen to us and can't write your questions on, you can go to our blog at Sports790.com.

It's on the What's on Matt's Mine Show page, correct? Yes. Who also is there, by the way? Well, Kayla Simmons from yesterday is doing quite well, and just posted just now, Kylie Marie. Go see Kayla and Kylie. We can put up amazing things, but our biggest hits are the women.

It is what it is. Also, I did put up the video, the funny video, Anchorman video, that Tom Brady put up about calling Rob Gruncowski. He's the funniest quarterback in the NFL? That video is on. sports talk 790.com's what's on Matt's mind show page. Love it. All right.

For 10 points, and again, if you guys want to get your computers out, send me the results, send it to MT at sports 790.com. Don't put stick to sports in there because I'm all I'm going to get ready to. Oh, I like that. Put stick to sports in the subject. In the subject line, stick to sports. Delete. For 10 points, yes

or no, the Texans drafted tight end. You guys want to give an answer again? I'll say no. Hopefully. They have no business drafting a tight end, right? The only already have three already in camp? Pretty much. Four. It hasn't stopped him before.

That's right. What's his name? Kahale. Kahale wearing returns. Water polo. Win great food in the Matt Thomas draft contest. That's what the blog is called. If you find that one.

There you go. Ten point question with the Texans drafted tight-in. I will say no. No, now. You change your mind. Change my mind. For 20 points, will the Texans make a trade at any point during the draft? Yes or no.

Yes. Okay. I say they'll trade down. 30 points to his draft number. One to five, six to ten, or eleven to plus. I originally went six to ten, and I will stay at six to ten. I believe the Miami Dolphins will not select him, and I believe the Chargers will grab him at number six.

I would say one to five still. Yeah, I'm with Joe on that one. I think that's a good point. All right, that's a 30 point question. 40 point question, offensive or defensive players? What will the Texans take more of in the draft? Offensive players or defensive players? I hope it's defensive.

It better be defense, right, boys? Defensive, but out of curiosity. What happens if it's a tie? Then we throw the question out. Okay. And by way, punter is a defensive player for those of you're playing at home.

So kickers, offense, punter's defense. Wait a minute. Yeah. Why, it's special teams. No,

but I mean, in the technicality world, yeah, if we have a tie. Yeah. punter's always been considered defense. Why? Because it just has been.

Because you can't move the ball offensively with a punter on the field. You're essentially turning it over. But the punter is on the field while the offense is on the field. you, it's like a whatever, fourth down. Yeah. Sorry.

That's the offense on the field, not the defense. No. The only time... The punter can run the ball and throw the ball. But they rarely do. He can't tackle. Well, I guess he could tackle, too. Yeah.

Punter's defense. He's not going to make an interception. No, he can run a throw. I think he should be honest. Punter is kicking the ball to further the team back so it makes it easier overall for the defense. But it's the offensive side of the ball. They're not drafting a punter.

So this is a moose point. You're just trying to argue with me. You hear that, folks. This is what Ross does. He just wants to argue with me. I think he should be offensive, but it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. When the Ross contest comes in, the Ross can make the rules.

All right, I'm going to make a contest then. 50 points, question. What position will be the top pick of the Texans when the draft is over? Quarterback, running back, wide receiver slash tight end, offensive line, defensive line slash linebacker or cornerback slash safety. 50 point question. I'm going to go defensive line line backer. So that's the first person

The fastest net That's the smartest answer Not necessarily If a team isn't needed Then it's I can Well they need both They need cornerback safety too I'll say cornerback safety

Okay So if you want to answer those questions You can go to our website At SportsTalk 790.com Look up the draft contest What does it say Win Great Food is that what it says Win a great food

In the Matt Thomas Draft contest And send you the link If you want to tweet out I'll tweet the link out And then answer the questions and then you've got until 5 o'clock tomorrow to send those answers in. Five questions.

Takes you about two minutes. Bada boom, bada bing. College football, athletic directors were asked about the future of their season, this upcoming college football season. I'll tell you the results of that test next. 1231 on Sports Talk 790. EG. Left corner for the career. Hi!

Eric Gordon here. Listen to Rock his radio on your smart speaker. Just ask. Alexa, play Sports Talk 790 on IHeart Radio. 1235 on Sports Talk 790. 790, 713, 3212, 5.790. Our friend Jones is apparently the Houston Police Officers Union hates Judge Adalgo, so that's the reason why they put that out.

Well, clearly not big fans. Yeah. Imagine politics getting involved with the health. Huh. Interesting. Could we eliminate a... Could the coronavirus eliminate politics? No.

It's made it worse. It has made it worse. The divide has gotten worse. Yeah, we're not... We're not... We're not coming closer together. People are digging in more than ever. By the way, tomorrow, we make the return of non-Florida stories.

That'll be at 2.30. Oh, man. I have my non-flora story. Normally, Joe, since you've never done non-flora stories with us, we usually go to people that do commit strange crimes in other states except the Sunshine State. I can handle that. Mine is a crime-free story. Mine has to do with the virus in a very, very weird survey based off the virus. Okay.

And what we do is we read our stories, and then we all decide between the three of us, who has the best story. So now I'm Florida stories back tomorrow. Website Stadium. I think it's a TV network, does some online stuff. It's partnered with the athletic, I think, right? I think so.

Yeah, Shams Charanio works for them. Yeah, Brett McMurphy. He is their lead college football writer. He took a poll of all 130 FBS ADs. Wow. That's all the ones that play. the real division one, not the one double A. So that's anywhere from Southern Miss to...

U of H. Well, no, Southern Miss, U of H. Southern Mith and U of H are missing. Wait, aren't they in the same conference or something? No, no, no. They used to be. Of the 130 FBS ADs, 99% of them believe we will have a college football this season.

So in theory... They all responded, by the way? It sounds like it. Yeah, I mean, they didn't say that he didn't. It's kind of crazy, right? He's got some contacts. Well, I mean, it wouldn't. I mean, you'd be kind of rude if you didn't.

You'd think one guy would have had to go to the junk mail or something. So 99% meaning what? One or two, maybe? Right. Well, one would be 100 people, so maybe two people. Maybe one in a third. 99% says, now I'll give you some more details in a second. 75% of those 80s believe the season will be delayed.

Hmm. Okay. 61% of them think it will start in the months of October and or November. So two months late. Croning a national champion in March? Yeah, late February of March. Probably before March Madness. Maybe you wouldn't have that super long delay of, you know,

December is kind of a wasteland. teams don't play for that entire time and you have a month in between bowl games maybe they would just make it like two weeks or something like that. What if it's the Sunday before March Madness or the Monday before? I don't think it would do them any good to have it going at the same time as March Madness.

They would have to be able to get it done. And again, granted, it's all about they can't. They'd like to create their own calendar, but they can't. You know, but what if like the bracket comes out Sunday, the game's on Monday, and the playing games start on Tuesday and Wednesday. Let me ask you this. How many bowl games are going to get this year?

Because all of these bowl games do not make any money. And the sponsors are probably, I mean, a lot of the sponsors are probably gone. Well, I know that the Aggie's favorite bowl game, the Belk Bowl in Charlotte, the Belk people have dropped out. They're out of business? No, they're still going. They just said we're not going to spend our money on this bowl game. It's smart. It seems like a waste of money.

All the bowl sponsorship seemed like a waste of money. If I was going to spend serious money on a bowl game, I'd want it to be one of the New Year's day six or the championship. I mean, short of that, are you, like, for instance, your team goes to the Alamo Bowl all the time. Valero Alamo Bowl, Matthew. What's the Alamo? What's the Holiday Bowl's corporate sponsor?

It used to be Pacific Life. It used to be Culligan Waters, because I remember Mac Brown saying Culligan Waters. Sally and I drink a lot of Culligan water. Yeah, it was Culligan water. We use it in our bathtub as well. I don't know what it is now. Everybody winds up doing a Mac Brown.

Joe, let me hear your Mac Brown. I don't have one yet. You got to have something. San Diego County Credit union. I haven't been here from MacBron at all before my time. It hasn't been Pacific Life since 2009. Whoops. Have you bought anything from Pacific Life?

Yeah, I've got insurance life insurance with them. You do not. That's a lot. That's going to say, on me, sure. That makes sense. Okay. Wouldn't it make more sense for them to sponsor the teams themselves instead of the bowl game? Like for the...

No, because they're hoping that he... ESPN is going to say, coming up tonight, not the Motor City Bowl, but it's going to be the Advanced Auto Parts Motor City Bowl, Bowl or whatever it happens to be. I just think that's just bad money. If I was going to spend money on anything, honestly, and I was in that world of sponsoring things,

I'd put up my name on an arena. That's what I would do. Yeah, I agree. Toyota Center makes a lot of sense. Any of them do? Yeah. Is there an arena in this country that doesn't have a corporate sponsorship to it? I think there is.

I mean, a major arena, not like, you know, something built. Was Madison Square Garden have one? Madison Square Garden would be one. That would be one. That's right. Riggly Field. Fenway Park. Yeah. Okay, so you're looking at three.

Great classics. I think sports authority field isn't a thing anymore. I think it's just Mile High Stadium. I thought that was true for like a little bit, but I thought they got, it's like whatever field at Mile High Stadium or something like that, right? Or is that not? Oh, you know who doesn't have one? National Spark.

It's Empower Field at Mile High. That's what you. National Spark does not have one. Hmm. But primarily 98% of these arenas in this country. Talking Stick Resort Arena. That's a classic. Yeah, it looks like every NBA arena except for Madison Square Garden is sponsored.

But even then, there's the Madison Square Garden company that just sold the forum. So, hmm. I mean, it's its own company now. Yeah, but it does. It's not overtly of an arena name. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. Okay, so back to this survey.

61% believe October, November start. 14%. believe a spring start. Now, there's nothing to be gained out of it because, again, no 80s opinion is going to matter more or less than the other one. But it is interesting that at least 15 of those 130 ADs that were polled believe that a spring start is in play. My son and I, my son who goes to Texas, take my oldest one Cameron, he's a sophomore. He and I argue about this almost daily. He says, dad, they're going to play in the fall.

I said, but son, you have to. understand. Your alma mater, Jones Stadium, AT&T Stadium, needs 50,000 people in it to bankroll the athletic department. Television money is huge. Now, it's not NFL huge, but it's certainly huge, especially, I mean, what, the two big, the two networks that get the, the two conferences to get more money from TV than anybody else is the SEC and the Big Ten. Everybody else, I think, takes a distant third. Even ACC, Pac-12's deal is terrible. I think Big 12 deal is just okay. I mean, they're all not complaining about it, but the non-power five schools, the group of six,

they have terrible television deals because ESP and CBS, whomever, just doesn't feel like that's worth it. And I don't necessarily blame them for that. That's why Southern Miss, Ross, to use an example, they draw 35,000 people in their stadium. That's big money for them.

That bank rolls their department. Southern Miss going to play at Nebraska, getting $900,000. Bank rolls, athletic department. Nebraska's not going to pay $900,000 if they can't put their stadium full of 70,000 people. What happens with those deals, though? I mean, those deals are in place for years, right? There must be caveats in those deals. Out clauses. Yeah. Not necessarily out clauses, but compensation clauses. Yeah. Because you're right. You can't not say, well, since you're not paying us,

we're not coming, but that's not good business for those schools to not pay out those deals if they can't fill their stadiums. I mean, a million two is a million, too. Michigan's paying that to bring in Eastern Michigan. But Michigan can't afford to give Eastern Michigan a million two without any money there. So I don't think we go. And again, I'm going to lean towards the spring start. I don't think we play college football again until stadiums can be at least half full,

that there's at least an opportunity to make revenue inside the buildings. Short of that, I don't know. I just, I do not believe college football will. start a season without fans like I think the NFL is prepared to do so. 713-213-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. 12-45, the Matt Thomas show. We've got Aaron Reese and the Athletic for his five NFL predictions on the draft. Stay with us.

It's the Matt Thomas show here on 790. Darrell Mori here. This is the Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790. All right, so we've come up with a list of stadiums, Do not have sponsors. We forgot Arrowhead, Soldier, Lambo. We mentioned Fenway, Wrigley. Any of the ones we haven't thought of right off the top Madison Square Garden.

Nationals Park. Marlins Park. You know why Marlins Park's available? Nobody would want to put money behind that. Oakland Coliseum. Doesn't have a name currently. You know, that's been like. like 10 different things.

It used to be O. Dot Co. It's been a variety of different places. Now it's just a complete dump. Rogers Center. Is that a sponsor or no? Rogers is the TV network. Okay. So yeah, it's communication.

I think it's communications too, like AT&T. Yankee Stadium. Did we say that one? No, we did not. Nice. Oh, Oriel Park at Camden Yards would not be a corporate sponsor to that. So there's actually more than we think of than we thought. Baseball has more than anybody.

arenas to me make the biggest sense because they're the ones that are used more than any other facility, right? Between 40 basketball games, sometimes you have 40 hockey games, you have college basketball, you have hundreds of concerts. That to me would be the easiest money, probably the most expensive. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I think so. I think arenas would be the best bargain because you between circuses and, well, do they do circuits anymore? I don't think we're doing circuses. I don't know.

I think circuses became politically incorrect like five years ago. Joe Exotic had to stop traveling around the country. They didn't like people traveling around with caged animals. Yeah. They get whipped into submission. I don't think, yeah. I think we're done with circuses, right? I don't know.

Well, right now, right now, yes, we're done with everything. I can go for a petting zoo. What does P.T. Barnum have to say about all this? I don't think. I don't think much. I think anybody from his family does. 1252 on Sports Talk 790. 713212.

579 if you want to get in 713-212-5-790 if you want to reach out through Twitter you can do that as well at SportsMT at SportsRV and at Joe George Radio man I'm telling people are pissed off about these masks my Twitter timeline if people don't even normally talk non-politics

politics politics oh it smokes 10 years old and older okay look Why? Why the age? I don't know. I don't know. I'm asking. Why the age thing? Well, I understand children are not very necessarily susceptible. They can still spread it. I guess you're because... Maybe a sure number of mask available. That's what the mask is for, right, to keep you from spreading it. It's not really going to keep you from contracting. It's going to keep you from spreading if you already have it. What if I have a mask on and you don't? Who wins on that battle? Well, if I have it, it's on my...

more likely to spread it. If we both have it, then yeah, you're going to, you're going to prevent it. If you have it and you have a mask on, you're just going to more likely prevent you from spreading it to me. That's why they want the mask. So it's more like a defense. Kind of, yeah. Preventative, preventing me from infecting you.

So basically tomorrow when I come in here with a mask and you don't come on with a mask, we're not doing ourselves. Either one of us any favors. If I have it, yes. Oh. So I'm staying home from here on out. All right. that's the worst thing about this whole thing, is it anybody coughs?

No, yeah. Or I cough, or I touch my face or I feel even a tinge of anything in your chest or your throat. She sends alarm bells all through your body. Not to me, but to other people. Oh, that too, yeah. Like you and I, we talk, give or take about 40 minutes an hour. Yeah. Of the 60 minutes, maybe even 45 these days.

We're going to naturally cough. Yes. We're just more things are coming on our mouth. than normal. What? Like I have a, remember we have the 790, we have a little 790 group text here. Yes.

And I talked about the, there was a guy down the hallway just yacking up coughing and I was so, I had never been more terrified of anything in my life. And I was texting you guys about it, how scary it was. And normally you would never send that out to us. No.

Like guy down the hall of hacking. Okay. So that's a normal Monday. Sure, whatever. Then we're all like, Ross, you're going to be okay? Yeah, like you need to go home.

It's the new normal, Matt. It's what they're calling it. Who's calling it? I want to know who these people are. Alina Hidalgo. Yeah, she's not doing too well. Man, the Houston police officer union letter. Yucks.

I mean, they didn't even like, they weren't even politically correct, were they Joe? They didn't misword. They just like, you're an idiot. Honestly, we could use more of that in today's world. Or is Adam Clinton put on Twitter? Nope. Adam Clinton will not be wearing a mask.

Thanks for helping spread the virus, Adam. Yeah, y'all attack Adam. He's a virus spreader. Yeah, he's getting attacked. Is he really? Yes, he is. We read the tweet. You want to read the replies?

Should we do like mean tweets with Adam Clinton? Let's take a look here. He just put nope. He's got eight read tweets and 84 likes. Let's see. Yeah. It's in 33 replies. Any of these worth reading?

I don't know Okay, I'm just trying Let's see Yeah, way to be a team player Says Huffer 31-23 Adam says cry He responds cry At Kvilum

underscore 9 says It's just a mask dude Try not to have such a selfish attitude about this And then he replies Tell that the HPD Union dude And then blue voters Well the HPD union thing Does support wearing the masks

Yeah, yeah Blue voters says weak dude. Next, Adam responds, Aw, a blue vote thinker, I'm weak. Whatever will I do. At Illinois, a line I at Bob says, Glad you're not in charge. The public good, you know.

Adam replies, same to you. The public good, you know. At cool jangs. Oh, come on, Adam. Now I'm good. This is where I'll be drawing the line. And then TB says, so badass, tougher than the coronavirus. bro.

Ooh, the bro line. Somebody says, bro to me. That's just, that, that fires me off. That's just the kicker right there. All right.

So Adam, as we talked about yesterday. Adams and Twitter. Tell him to say, you know, maybe chill on on Twitter a little bit, not get over the top a little bit. Just a Wednesday for Adam.

It's just, you know what he does? He supplies this material. We appreciate him for that. And that's why we love him like a brother. 1257 on Sports Talk, 7. half hour from now.

The NFL draft predictions, Texan style from Aaron Reese. He texted me, he says, I got five predictions. Oh, really? So he actually wants to brag about these predictions. Okay. Don't look what they are. I won't. So then when he tells us what they are, we can kind of say, that makes sense.

That's a possibility. You have no idea what the hell you're talking about. Kind of like this show in many respects. The Matt Thomas show, noon to three here in sports, like 790. Should we be giving Tampa Bay more of a run for a potential Super Bowl in the NFC. You know what? Let's hold that thought until we get to that at the top of the next hour here on Sports Talk 790. 713212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-790 with a message here for bronze roofing.

A good roof can last 15, 20 years as long as you're properly maintaining it. If you are doing that, then do yourself a favor and at least call bronze and make sure that your roof is in top shelf condition. All you got to do is call Skeeter Braun and his crew over at bronze and they'll have some at your house within 24 hours. Most cases, probably all cases, but I can say most, at least legally. Call them and no matter what kind of roof you have, whether it's a tile roof, asphalt, steel, or shingle, bronze will have you covered. 281-480-9900 is their number. 281-480-9900. That inspection they want to give you is free.

If you do need some repairs, they'll give you a fair and honest estimate right on the spot. 281, 480, 9,900, 281, 480, 9900. Online, bronze roofing.com, B, RA, U-N-S, Roofing. Bronzeroofing.com. This is the Matt Thomas Show. All right, 103 on Sports Talk 790. This is the Matt Thomas Show, hour two of three, Aaron Reese and a half hour from the athletic.

You guys are always welcome to jump in. 713-212-5-790 7-1-3-21-2-5-7-90 and again on Twitter you can reach out to us at SportsMT, at SportsRV, and at Joe George Radio. So we brought up the question up, and actually that the news came down very late in the show yesterday that Rob Grinkowski was thinking about joining the Buccaneers, and then it was officially done where he and a fourth-round pick, is that right, are going to... Gronk in a seventh. Scrook and a seventh to New England for a fourth.

At the end of the show, we had the breaking news. Ian Rappaport says that Gronk is thinking about making a comeback. And then 15 minutes later, it was officially. And even in between that, there was, Gronk has been working out, he's ready to go, and then he's been traded. I was like, what? He's thinking about it. Now he's already in shape.

And now he's been traded. So essentially, this was done weeks ago. Right. And they just wanted to pick on a good day just before the draft. I'm looking at the video, by the way, between him and Gronk right now. It's pretty funny. Of Tom Brady. It's on the What's on Matt's Mine show page.

You should go check it out. That plus some busty women. It's that something you like as well. I mean. Sports790.com. It's dominating our heads today. Okay, so let's do this. I'm looking at their roster right now. Receiving Corps.

Godwin and Evans. Yes. Your tied ends are Gronkowski and Howard. Now, the running backs are a little to be desired, right? You have the quarterback. I don't know. Is their offensive line considered good, above average, terrible? I don't know that. Because here's the thing. Their offensive line is filled with second and third and first round picks.

Allie Marpet is a second rounder. Donovan Smith's a second rounder pick. Alex Caput was a third round pick in the draft of 2018. So, I mean, it's got a young line in front of them. The skill position players, you've got Sue up front right for them, but the Buccaneers still. William Golst is a good play. I'm really not familiar with the rest of the guys in their secondary. But from an offensive standpoint, boys, they look loaded. Like, who's the best team in the NFC right now?

Is it the Saints? Because I can't call them the best team in the NFC when they're out in the playoffs after their first game, right? I would say Saints are Niners. There's no part of you that believes that Jim and Garoppolo was a little fluky last year. I'm out on Carapolo, so I think they're going to miss the playoffs this year. Well, this is not getting crazy. The Rams went to the Super Bowl and missed their playoffs.

It's happened. I think they're the same thing. Like, I'm not sold on the Rams or not just long-term superstar teams. I think they have average quarterbacks and they're going to cost in the playoffs next year. Well, with the extra team in the playoffs, the Rams would have made it this year, right? That's true. That's true. Okay, so who would you say right now, not narrowing into two or three?

Who is the team if you were to take a Super Bowl pick right now? who would you go with in the NFC? I will go with the Saints. Saints. Should be the Saints. And my next pick would probably be the Eagles. If healthy.

Why would you do that? Why would you make your second pick under the terms of if healthy? I know, but they have a lot of talent on offense and defense. No Buccaneers. You're not going to see the Buccaneers anywhere in the top four?

Buccaneers are not a bad pick. I just want to see them play first. I don't know enough about them defensively to tell you whether or not. Well, they have, I mean, Shaq Barrett is pretty good. Duncan Sue's there, but he's older. I mean, they went 7 and 9

and their quarterback through 30 interceptions. Jason Pierre-R-Pol just signed with them or has he been with them for a while? He spent a little bit. They had the very best run defense in the NFL last year, and, oh, the past defense wasn't as good, but overall, their defensive numbers were solid. Like the game against the Texans, okay?

That to me was James Winston just kept turning the ball over. Yeah, more so than anything else. I mean, I felt bad for the Buccaneers defense because they were playing on short fields the whole time. Yeah, you take that element out of there and Tom Brady and have the weapons. And Tom Brady didn't have to be great with the weapons that he has around him. And I think Bruce Ariens, I know he's old, but I think he's a great coach. I really do.

I agree. I think he's a coach that I would want to play for in a millisecond. He kind of reminds me of like, remember when Dick Vermeal came back the second go-around? He started crying everywhere and hugging people. That was the first go-round. I mean, he was really good with the Rams, really good with kids. Kansas City. It's got a good staff.

I mean, Todd Bulls, good defensive coordinator, not great head coach, but Todd Bulls, good D.C. Leftwood seems to be a pretty bright and innovative mind for a guy being an offensive coordinator. All right, fine. Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Going to win the NFC. We're going to see more Buccaneer games in Houston, Texas in this next season that

we have in the last five years combined. It's probably true. Yes, absolutely. They're going to be on, like, When was the last time Tampa Bay was on Sunday night football? Have you ever remember the Buccaneers being on a Sunday night game? I know it's happened. I'm sure.

But it's had to have been a good bit, right? Yeah, I bet you're like early on in James's career, the first year or two. When he was the number one pick, they probably put him off there. Well, I don't know if you do that for first. 16 weeks week 16 week 15 of 2016 against the cowboys that had to be a flex that'd be a flex game perhaps yeah because you let me tell you something there's no way in the NFL world broadcasting circles are they thinking in 2016 hey let's put the schedule out week 15 Cowboys versus Buccaneers that seems like we can put it on Sunday night football and not flex that bad boy out

that that means you really are a struggling franchise when you can't even make the number one TV game of the week yeah that game was flexed in It was supposed to be a Steelers bingles matchup. Probably the bingles sucked or something. Probably. If I had to guess. Because I think Tampa's a team you can kind of, I don't want to say rude for. But man, they're going to be way more intriguing than anything else we'll see around these parts.

The last time they had one scheduled was in 2008. And that got flexed out. So for Sunday night football. One game and one flex. One flexed in, one flexed out. In 12 years. 2008. Over Under on Tampa Bay National TV appearances.

Oh, four or five? Oh, I'm going to go higher. Between NFL Network Thursday night. Didn't the Browns have like eight last year? Not that many. They had like six, five or six? Well, again, I'm talking about Monday night, Sunday night, Thanksgiving, Saturday, and the Thursday night package. I'd say close to 10.

I would know, no chance. I don't know. I would say they're going to be on six times. because it reeks of Monday night football plus but that division's so good you got the Saints twice you got Teddy Bridgewater twice the most was five last year

like six teams were tied with that is there is there a cap on that so maybe six I don't think there's a cap but there's going to be probably some internal you can't like Fox can't be saying hey you can't take every Tampa Bay game we bought the NFC for a reason yeah so I guess like six would be the max

last year Bears Cowboys Chiefs Steelers Rams Eagles Vikings Seahawks and Packers all tied for the most with five I'm going, I'm going Tampa Bay. I'm going Tampa Bay, six. Okay. Number for Texans games. Three?

Four. Because you're going to get it. You're guaranteed a Thursday national game. So you have the Thursday game, Chiefs, Patriots could be both primetime games. I'll go four. And I would bet maybe like a Packers game is primetime. No, because you can't, you can't take all the inter-conference games either. What was the last year for?

Some more in that neighborhood? You had There was a Sunday Against the Patriots You had the Thursday night game Against Who would they go to Thursday? They opened up Monday night

Against the Saints Lost, yeah Okay, so But for the Patriots next year I mean for the Buccaneers They have the Rams, The Chargers, the Chiefs Those three alone

Are Primetime games They're going to go To Las Vegas That's going to be up there They need to put every Las Vegas game on primetime. They go to Chicago and then they've got their division

games. And they host Green Bay. Yeah, Aaron Rogers versus Tom Brady in the regular season. Oh, twice. No, not just once. Old school back in the back in the used to be twice. Yeah. But that'll be on prime time. They're going to be on a lot.

Yeah. Poor New England's like, hey, we're going to the playoffs all these years in a row. Jared Stidham. Or, uh, who's it, Brian Hoyer, right? It'll be Stidham. Or Tula. Tula? Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait I still think there's an outside shot they draft Tua.

What's our draft position? Like 23. Oh, so they're going to move up? Yeah. I still think there's an outside shot. Man, wait a minute. I thought I was told that Jared Stinnom was killing it with all of his teammates in New England. No, I know, but it's Tua.

It's... But that's not the sure thing. Is Tua a sure thing? No. Then why would you trade up 17 spots for a non-sure thing? Is anyone a sure thing? Oliver Luck, I mean, Andrew Luck was a sure thing. He was.

I know, but he was, but he didn't embarrass himself as a quarterback. That's true. When I think of sure thing, the last sure thing in football had to have been Andrew Luck, right? Like, go back to the last five years. We'll do this come out of the break. Let's look at the last 10 years of the NFL draft, the number one overall picks. How many of them were sure things? Now we can obviously revisit history because we now know what they've done.

But I remember that entire season when the Colts were terrible and it was sucked for luck that everybody was like, man, this is the guy that's going to be the guy. And he was. Unfortunately, injuries and a lack of running game, but maybe a lack of offensive line, probably heard him more than else. I mean, James Winston was highly thought of, but not to that level. Well, look at the last 10 years. How many sure things were in that group? We'll talk about that next. 113.

It's a Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. If you want to reach out through Twitter, at SportsMT, at SportsRV, and at Joe George Radio. That's at Joe George Radio. Back with those last 10,

and how many really were sure picks. And we can argue about whether they were or not. Coming up next. This is James Arden. It goes to hard. Three to shoot. Jacks up a three. This is the Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790.

Are you kidding? All right, we're going to look at 2006 to now. And the three most will argue this out. Now, not what they did, but at the time that it was the time for the draft, did America the consensus believe that the number one overall pick was a absolute going to be a star? So you don't want 1937 Sam Francis full back out of Nebraska to the Eagles? You don't want to assess that one, Matt? We can get Howard a Memorial to calling it with that one, I think.

All right, so let's go to 2006. Okay, 2006, first overall pick was? Mario Williams. North Carolina State. By far, no guarantee whether he was going to be a star. No, because everyone, especially with the debate of Vince Young and Reggie Bush. Correct. There was a huge discussion.

If you have a, there was, Ross, you remember that at all? Yeah. Like one or two dozen years? Yes. All right, 2007, first pick was. Jamarcus Russell quarterback LSU to the Oakland Raiders. Was not a camp miss. Was not a can't miss, but man, we were certainly impressed when he was on a single knee throwing at 80 yards.

Yeah, he was a... We love that. One of the all-time cannon arms. Yeah. That draft is so good, too. Also loved Purple Drink. 2008. Jake Long, tackle, Michigan to the Miami Dolphins.

Next. Yeah, no. 2009, Matt Stafford, quarterback, Georgia. to the Detroit Lions. By no means was a guaranteed. I mean, I would think 75% of America didn't know who Matt Stafford was until the last week. So that's not a case. I disagree with that.

I think Stafford was thought of as a good guy. He wasn't the thought of as a can't miss, but I think most people knew who he was. He knew he was that guy. He was supposed to be that guy. Sam Bradford next year, 2010, Oklahoma. Heisman winner. He'd thrown like 50 touchdowns that year. He's getting a little warmer towards that.

this is the guy that you can lead a franchise to can do it for a long period of time. And they paid him so much money. Before the slotting, right? You got like $50 million before setting foot on the NFL in an NFL field, right? That's when they were like, okay. Okay, so we're getting a little warmer. Put it that way, right? Okay.

2011. Cameron Newton, quarterback out of Auburn to the Carolina Panthers. No, we're going to leave in warmer now. I mean, I feel like he was a camp. He was viewed his camp, he won a He's been National Championship, right? I think he was one of those guys like Robert Griffin, like, that initially people talked about him and like, oh, you know, maybe we'll take him in the first round. And then all of a sudden, before you knew it, just in a flash, he was a number one guy.

Flash, it was one year at Auburn. That's it. But yeah, he wasn't thought of his, I mean, even, I'm talking about even after he won the national championship between that and the draft, people weren't thinking that he was going to go that high. And then all of a sudden he just got taken number one overall. Kind of rose quickly, I feel like. Next year, Eric Fisher, Kansas City Chief's tackle next year? No, you skipped 2012. Oh, I did. You're right.

Andrew Luck. Can miss. Now again, I want to make sure that you guys understand what I'm talking about. Not that... Universally thought of as a canvas. You don't have the best prospects

since John Alway. Yeah, when you hear the best sense or the... What's the Peyton Manning? Whatever. But point being is that we thought the moment he was, the team that was going to get...

Like, I'll give you an NBA example. You knew LeBron was going to be a megastar. Everybody was hoping and dreaming that LeBron James would be the guy for your team. And that happened to be the Cleveland Cavaliers. We should do. it was the NBA too if you wanted to.

I think it would be more interesting if we'd know on the NBA front. Well, let's finish out the NFL here. Okay, yeah, sorry. I skipped the one that was. Yeah, Andrew Luck, and then you go to Eric Fisher. Can I continue? Then you will go to JD Clowny, Houston, Texans. He was thought of as a generational talent.

But his senior, but his last year didn't do him any favors. Right, he was so average and hurt. And just the one play is what matter, and that's it. He was still, I would say he was thought of it. I don't know if he was thought of his can't miss, but he was thought of as a generational talent. Yep. Okay. James Winston

next year. No. Jared Goff. No. Miles Garrett. Nope. Maybe? Miles Garrett? Miles Garrett? No. I mean, I think a lot of people thought he was going to be the next big pass rusher in the NFL. He's been good. He's been clubbing people.

I mean, he's not the best pass rusher selected in the last three years. He's not even close, but at the time. Baker Mayfield, then, after that. No, red flags about character all over the place. Kyler Murray last year. Big controversy about whether he should be the first pick. Joe Burrow this year. All right, let's size it this Joe Burrow thing,

because let's talk about where he was after LSU won the national championship. This guy just had the most incredible college football season. He finally was a recognizable quarterback that LSU fans were proud of. This guy is amazing. Look what he has done. He had led an unstoppable LSU offense. And then what happened right after that? He got his hand measured.

Got tiny hands. And all of a sudden, he can't throw anymore. Or he can't throw, it doesn't have the big zip. My reason why he can't be a can't miss prospect and same with Kyler is that last year, Nick Bosa was clearly the best player in the draft and everyone knew it. But the only reason why Kyler went first is because Arizona needed a quarterback. It's the same thing. this year. Chase Young is by far the superior player, but because Joe's a quarterback, he'll be

taken first. All right, let me ask you this. But Chase Young, is this a guy that we're going to be talking about terrorizing quarterbacks for a decade plus? I think so. And I think he'll make, he can make a pro bowl just like Nick Bosa did his first year. Just, I mean, it could be a total monster. I feel like Chase Young is getting even more run than Nick Bosa is, frankly. That would be fair. I would say so. I would say so, yes. It's close, but I feel like, Sure. Because Bosa got a huge run. But he also had a lot of controversy.

He also signed his contract late too, right? Yes. Okay. So that's why I, you know. So we're not, we're saying Joe Burrow, no, on the can't miss train. No, I don't think we can. Yeah. Yeah, Trevor Lawrence, to me, he's the next can't miss.

People are going to, it's true. They're going to put him in that Andrew Luck Elway category. You know who was in that list before the injury? It was Tua. Too, yeah. For sure. Oh, yeah. that's how we brought up this conversation to begin with us because you're

you want so you're telling me if you're bill bellichick you're going to give up your first round pick and other picks to go get to go get him at six I mean if they could yeah I just they don't have the inventory to make it but if he slipped to like 13 I would I'd go for it because who does bill bellichick trust more than anyone else guys I was blown away about what Joe Clyde told us uh was it last week yeah he's like I don't know what he's not saying there's nothing there But he's saying that he was watching late game film.

Well, he was saying late in the workout, he didn't like the velocity on the throats. Yeah. Guys, I got to be honest with you. I know that 40 times is talked about constantly with wide receivers. In the NFL, boys, you got to have Zip on that football. And if you've got issues with Zip on the football, and again, it's only one person's opinion. But if you're worried about Zip right now and he hasn't thrown one NFL pass, what's it going to be like? in five years.

I guess... That's why Pat Mahomes had to be pushed because Andy Reid's watching him in practice, going, this guy can throw any throw, any position. Look at how many side-armed,

whatever those things, shot puts he throws. And they have incredible velocity to them. And yet he still has a good touch. That's why the decision was made to move Alex Smith out of Kansas City because he's like,

I just can't let this guy sit anymore. So would you pass on him because of like the health everything you know about Tua and just takes us the safe pick. To me, and again, I'm not a trained eye on this. Can we see Russell, can Tua be Russell Wilson? Guys, I hate to say this. Hips bother the hell out of me.

Well, apparently the injury is apparently supposed to be recoverable and all that type of stuff. And according to Pro Football, who I follow, he says there should be no, you shouldn't have health concerns. with the injuries and the surgeries that he's had. Is it weird to you at all that there's not a lot of successful left-handed quarterbacks in the NFL? Yes. Was it last year or the year before there was like zero? Yeah.

Who's left-handed now? I don't know. It'll be two-oh. Yeah. So is that weird? I don't know why. It's just because there's none. Because we've all grown up having,

we have to have important left tackles. Now you have to have a left-hand quarterback, you have a good right tackle. I mean, you know, left-handed quarterbacks to me, Steve Young Boomer Boomer Vick

Vic Jim Zorn for a short time Tim Tebow I got a list No I said good ones Matt Leinert No disrespect Matt Leiter

Remember Matt Leiter Was almost a canvas prospect Once upon a time When he was in college Yeah after that national championship game right Yeah Ken Stabler Oh he's a good one too

We're talking about like three guys in the history. Yeah. All right, let's come back and talk to Aaron Reese from The Athletic. He has got a perspective.

He's got five draft predictions. We'll see how many them we stick in. Next, 128 on the Matt Thomas show. This is Sports Talk 790. Hey, this is Whitney Mercer. The Texan dip here. Listen to real Texan talk

on your smart speaker. Just say, hey, Google. Play Sports Talk 790 on IHeart Radio. All right, our buddy, Aaron J. Reese and the Athletic is with us here on the Matt Thomas show. You guys are going to the athletic because you get a free 90-day trial. I pay for it anyway because it's just great stuff.

It's not just the normal Mambi-Pambi beat stuff. It's kind of in-depth, behind-the-scenes kind of stuff. And, if we want to understand, five Texan draft predictions. Now, Aaron, I have not read your article yet. Do you mind giving us those predictions? And then Joe Ross and I would like to add our two cents on these things. That sounds great. Go ahead. Go with the least. least controversial or interesting prediction to the most. So you just go in any order you want to. Okay. I'll just go.

The first one, I think, is the one that Texans, most Texas fans would probably like the most, which is that the Texans trade down from the 40th pick. I think that it will be, you know, if you end up telling me that Bill O'Brien trades into the first round, I don't think anyone here would be totally for it. But I think the sensible thing to do here, and the thing that probably he would be more decline to do based on his comments later, I don't think rookies are going to be super impactful this year, is to trade down, accumulate more picks, and perhaps try to make some of those picks, not 2020 picks, but 2021 picks, or even 22 picks. Because 2021, who knows what that draft

looks like if we don't know if he's the only one that believes this? I mean, I don't know. Have you read other stories that are beatwriters? Because, man, he certainly is giving us the interpretation that he doesn't expect a rookie to help out much if in any this year. No, I think, you know, I think he obviously was pretty vocal about it, and there was, you know, I was reading some kind of national columns on it, and there were other people who said similar things, but I think he's been more kind of like out there with it. But, you know, it's good for you in mind. He generally is not a guy who I think relies a lot of rookies. You saw Lonnie Johnson kind of go in and out of the lineup last year. Titus Howard, you know, he didn't really originally trust him to play. Left guard, Max Sharping was delayed, even though, you know, he was clearly. least better than the other internal options on the interior of line.

Like, I could go on and on. I mean, I think so he's just not a, he's not a big rookie guy. You know, he needed when he had a whole running back last year, he didn't fix it by, you know, trying to give one of his undirected for agents, the chance or something. He traded for qualified, trade for Duke Johnson. This year, you know, whole or running back, you know, most guys would be like, yeah, to draft one in the fourth round or something,

but he obviously traded for David Johnson. So, you know, he's just, he's generally not head of press rookies, and I think that the other season only exacerbates that kind of quality. All right, any of you guys agree? disagree with the argument that the Texans could trade down. I could definitely see that. I think that's a good one, Aaron. That's a good one.

All right. Number two. Okay. My second one is that I think that they will draft a receiver, and I think that the receiver will be yet another vertical threat. And there was a lot of criticism when they traded for Brandon Cooks. Like, the Texans have three receivers, and Kenny Stills, Will Fuller, and very cooks, and they all do the same thing.

I think that it is, obviously, redundancy. I do think that it is kind of a, not necessarily the most conventional style of team building, but I would have two things to say about that. One is that Will Fuller or Brandon Cooks either could get hurt. They both have, you know, pretty known injury histories. I mentioned this in a mailbag every last week, and some fans thought I was crazy, but I would say, let's just wait and see. I'm not sure King Stills will necessarily, like, I'm not saying he's off the team,

but I'm just saying it wouldn't be the most illogical thing if they ended up moving on for him in a trade or cutting him or whatever. because they'd free $7 million in cap space. You capitalize up this really deep receiver draft, and to replace that depth. And, you know, you use that $7 million to maybe supplement the defense in the, you know, post-the-fragetting the draft. You know, you don't have to consider a cop-picks because, obviously,

Bill O'Brien is not kind of trust that the rookies you draft. They're going to be a tool that fix the defense. This defense still needs a lot of help. The reason I think they would go with three vertical threats, or four vertical threats that they keep still, whatever they do, is just because I think that is clearly what Bill Ryan is placing an emphasis of fun. And while we might think that, you know, they need more intermediate or short, or a short, like passing game guys, possession receivers, a guy like DeAndre Hopkins, who Michelle Watson can turn to whenever he's covered, I'm not sure Bill O'Brien thinks of it that way. I mean, you have to think that, you know, in this for agency period when a lot of wide receivers failed to get paid, he signed rental cop. He signed rental cops to a pretty expensive contract. He also is placing a really big bet on David Johnson. If David Johnson is to make good on that bad, it'll be because he's an effective receiver, not just a runner. He obviously had Duke Johnson. He He brought back there in terms of a career year.

He told me he, you know, and his pre-dial call, he thinks they're good things ahead for collie wearing, the tight end. He spent, you know, a total long rookie year on IR. So he thinks that, you know, they necessarily need the sort of intermediate short possession receiver that they might seem they need just based on the look at the roster. Okay. You're the one that's pushing this. Kenny Stills is going to be released, aren't you?

Are you the only one putting this out there? I'm not pushing it. I mentioned it in the mailback. someone asked about it, and then I was suddenly getting dragged for it. And all I did was, like, list of, like, the reasons that it would make some sense. Well, also listening the reason that it wouldn't make any sense, which is that you're trusting Will Fuller and Brandon Cook to stay healthy. I'm just, I'm just saying that you have to look at the, like, the cap situation and

consider the draft class how deep it is. And, like, if you told me that he wasn't on the roster, I wouldn't be, like, totally floored. But, like, I'm not saying that he's definitely that he's off the team. And I think there's definitely value to keep him at this point. and that if you also trade it in or cut him or whatever, it would be selling low on a player you bought pretty high on. I mean, think about the fact that two personal picks alone would have been, you know, an unprecedented price to pay for Lambert's counsel.

That may get a second round pick. But if you look at it that way, it's like, okay, I guess the second round pick is for Kenny's still. That's pretty high price to pay for a second or a third receiver. And now you'd be, if you're in what I was talking about, you'd be cutting out or trading or whatever. I mean, that would be, you wouldn't be getting similar value back. So I'm not saying it's going to happen or, like, I'm not advocating about it. I'm just saying, like, I think you should look at kind of the cap situation, the Roth situation, and it would, you could see an argument that we made for it.

It was one odd. All right. Number three. All right. My third one is that. I think they draft the running back, and I think they draft the running back in the middle round. Let's say fourth or fifth round. They have two picks in those rounds right now, or one pick in each round.

And obviously, if they trade down, they could accumulate another one. And my reasoning for that is that, you know, despite the fact I have David Johnson and they have Duke Johnson and they're spending a lot of money on those guys, you can't trust that David Johnson is necessarily going to be the all pro guy he wasn't 2016. Anything close to it. It's a fairly average 3.7 yards per carry the past two seasons. He's been injured. He's played 30 games throughout three seasons. And, you know, I think also all these trades, Bill Ryan has made indicate that he places a higher value on running back than a lot of the league. the analytics crowd or the police in general.

And so I think that now only really see that he needs to kind of hedge his desk by drafting another running back. But I think he might do it earlier than some people will play, perhaps before addressing some other needs. I'm not arguing with any of this so far. Are you boys, anything? No, I don't think they could draft the running back at 40 and make all of us upset. Let me tell you something, Aaron.

They draft the running back in 40. You know those fire Bill O'Brien hashtags you see on Twitter every day? It might be trending number one in America. I would be forward if they did that, but it would be, you know, you could at least say it would be interesting, right? I mean, he'd be placing like kind of an unprecedented that on a position that everyone has basically viewed as replaceable. I thought it very much like a Ziggy and everyone else is agging sort of move. I got you. All right, so now you got, we're down to two of these predictions.

Are these going to be some of these bombastic crazy ones, or are these still delta in a lot of fact? I think they're all sensible. I operate and just kind of looking at what I think makes some sense, which is, so I don't have anything too wild here. But another one is that I think the rookie who leads all of the people in this draft class and starts will be an offensive lineman. And the reason I say that is because, obviously, it's the one position that is O'Brien did rotate out his right tackle last year.

It is, in the most part, exempt from kind of rotation. a lot of subbing out. So, you know, for guys playing, probably starting. And they have, you know, four out of five starters are pretty stable. Max Sharping, Titus Howard, Nick Martin, Larry Kuntzel. I think the one spot there that is potentially up for a change or an upgrade is that Colton, who is making $7 million this year, $7 million next year with no dead money on either of those years.

So, again, they can move on from him. I don't necessarily think, given kind of what O'Brien said about rookies and just the sense of the off season, I don't think you necessarily cut a starter at right guard unless you have someone you think is going to replace him right away. They probably don't have that guy, but I do think that, you know, if Fulton continues to struggle, which he has in the two years he's been in a pretty sizable deal,

then you probably give whatever rookie you draft a chance at the end of the season, see what you have there. And if you think that he's a viable option to replace Fulton, then you've got to move on from Fultzman 2021, clear $7 million in a cap space. That space will be valuable in the year when Deshawn Lumpin, if so we're making more money, kind of more against the cap, and Larry Thompson won't work.

All right. right in the last grandiose prediction from Aaron J. Reese on Twitter at the Athletics NFL Texans beat is? Yeah, I don't know how these takes are. But my last one is that I think a free agent who they sign after the draft will play more defensive snaps than anyone that they draft this weekend. That's a rookie. Thus, you're about your thought of rookies just aren't going to make that big of a difference

this year. Yeah, I think that and I just think that they clearly just have more work to do on defense. I think it's obviously not just going to be based on the draft. It's, you know, there's more to do. They basically spent this whole off season tweaking the offense. When the defense was the thing, you know, we all kind of added into those offseason with questions about. And so I don't think even if you drop a defense of Wyman, you drop the safety,

like I don't think that's enough. I think that they're, you know, they're bringing back basically the same corner as they had a year ago, and that wasn't necessarily the most stellar group. So I think that that's a place where they got out somebody. I think they could still add another edge rusher. So whatever it is, I think that they're, sorry, excuse me, there are free agents to add who will be more impactful in the rookies they draft this year. This wasn't too crazy. I thought you were going to say they were going to draft and pick up an extra tight end or something.

I don't know what I was waiting for something bomb back. These all are well thought of, responsible takes me your part. Good job. That's all I am, you know, well thought out and responsible. Nothing grandiose, nothing clickbait. That's why the athletic is the place to go for your Texans information. correct? That's right. That's right. All right. Well, Aaron, I look forward to

watching your tweets tomorrow. Well, you won't be on the Texans for so much, but Friday and Saturday for sure. Thanks for the time, and enjoy the draft coverage, my friend. We appreciate it. Okay, thank you. You got Aaron J. Reese from the Athletic with us here on the program. So what I'm getting from him is

kind of what we've been kind of hearing. Bill O'Brien don't trust no rookies. Like Mike Dantone. Who trusts rookies? in this town. Dantone, no. The Astros do.

You are and came up. Yeah. Well, they had to slow play that, remember? Well, that was, you know, Super 2. They won't bring up Forrest, but that's his fault. Yeah, it's true. We ever going to see Forrest Whitley pitch for the Astros? I mean, really?

He's going to have to this year. Are you sure? Yes. Is he keeping off those 40 pounds he lost or whatever? That man fluctuates weight like nobody's business. He fluctuates too much for being as young as he is. We were just getting into all the good spring training stories. who's worked on their release, who's changed up their delivery, who's gained weight, who's lost weight.

All that's gone. But you know, there's going to be a brand new spring training. Oh, okay. Brand new training camps in the NBA. Can't wait. Who's gained and or lost weight during quarantine? Is the quarantine? They all gained.

Did we ask you that if you gained any weight during quarantine? 1415? How are you at this point? I mean, see, I think I've gained weight post. wedding. See, I am back to even. I was as high as plus eight. Now I've lost those eight. I was minus five. Now I'm about to even, about back to even. I'm about plus five right now. I keep feeding you guys once a week. We should get you, get you that quarantine 15 like nobody's business. You ever notice when I bring food? It's never nutritional. I don't eat. I eat nutritional food at home, so.

Yeah, that's why I'm here with you guys. Nutricious? Hashtag drive-thru. 145. It's a Matt Thomas. Or anything you want to comment on Aaron's predictions. basically rookies, he sees the Texans moving on to that 40th spot. That wouldn't surprise me at all. 145 on Sports Talk 790. The Rockets had Red Nation. Matt has Maddie Nation. Things are going to start happening to me now.

You've made it. I'm somebody now. More Matt Thomas. Now. I'm here to 151 on the Matt Thomas show another hour left to go. if you missed our conversation about what college athletic directors are saying about the college football season, we'll tell you about that at the top of the hour. Anybody want to have a thought or two about Gronk joining the Buccaneers and how powerful maybe Tampa Bay can be? We'll certainly welcome your phone calls in on that.

Anything locally? And what you want to see the Texans do with their draft position, number 40, if they keep it. 713-212-5-790. 713-212-5-790. The NHL gentlemen were talking about going with neutral sites in less populated areas, in areas that the virus had not had tremendous growth, a lot of cases, a lot of sickness. Just playing a lake in Canada somewhere. That's true.

I mean, they're talking like North Dakota, so pretty much. They have mixed that idea. Oh, really? NHL turning away from neutral sites. They're focusing on starting their season in league arenas. The neutral site idea never got off the drawing board due to problems with player accommodations, facilities for league and team staff, and the ability to bring multiple broadcasting crews to cover potential Stanley Cup playoff games.

Meaning, I guess you couldn't put six TV crews into a University of North Dakota arena. that they just don't have the space and our capability, I guess. Are you surprised we're not hearing about more of a collaborative effort between the NBA and the NHL? Because if both leagues are like, oh, we're just going to start playing our games in the home stadiums and the guys are going to travel and we'll make sure they're okay, but both leagues are cramming in games, it's going to cause problems.

There are going to be certain stadiums that would be overbooked. Like, how would they, it feels like they need to work on this together. What you're assuming is, one's going to say, we're going to start before you, we're going to grab the better dates. Right? Is that what you're saying? Yeah, I mean, what is the NHL going to, what would the NBA do if the NHL started first, just because I know it so well, like, if the Blackhawks have games at the United Center in Chicago, but the NBA says they're going to play regular season games and they take up all these dates.

There's an easy answer to that. What are the Bulls going to do? You make the playoffs. Well, they're going to play a couple of games. No, the easy answer is they would just find a different arena. You can go play at If you have no fans For Nepal play

I mean it's anywhere in the Chicago area There's probably 20 places you could play I mean I think I'd rather than play in college arenas anyways for basketball At this point Like I'm totally indifferent to it Why would you prefer that? I just think the smaller stadiums would be better A more

Less awkward looking You're going to be zooming You're not going to be zooming into the showing the crowd at all at any point It's basically it's going to be a Popeye's Bahamas bowl where they don't show the crowd the entire broadcast. Look at you dropping a spot dimension in there, by the way. Nice work on your part. Was that right?

It sounded good. I would have accepted it. No, what you just said to me, now the only, frankly, guys, I'll be really honest with you on this, the NHL might have more logistical issues because it is, there aren't 20 places in Chicago to put an NHL rink. There's one. That's true.

There's one. There's 20. court regulation courts 94 feet you can draw your three point line you can do your lane the proper way so then they should bow to the hockey team then well ego may say no but logistics may say yes because again if the rockets tomorrow if we all found out the NBA could play they could go play at the Furtida center or at Tudor field house right or hell they go to the Merrill Center or the Barry Center those are beautiful venues that easily could put up a game.

If you're in Chicago, you have what, the United Center, and where else could you play a division, could you play a real NHL game in a rink? That'd be it. That's it. I mean, and that's going to be a problem in, obviously, places like New York

and in Florida and L.A. I'm telling you this right now. You don't believe me. They're not pulling anything in New York. Breaking news. Real breaking news? Yes. Hit the sounder.

I'm excited now. The Red Sox have gotten, their penalties. Okay, okay. You okay? Well, I want to set the... Okay, I'm sitting down. I'm going to swing a tea.

This is according to Evan Drellich. Drelich. Loss of a 2020 second round pick. Ban of a replay operator, J.T. Wachkin, through the 2020 playoffs. and ban of Alex Cora through 20 playoffs, but only for conduct with the Astros. And that's it. The report holds a video replay room operator responsible for incidents in 2018,

in which some Red Sox players use videos to steal signs. Are we getting a commissioner's report on this? Well, we will eventually, but this is how the initial Astro report came out. Pretty light. Pretty light. You know, you could, this isn't, guys, this isn't even a handslux. app. You know what this shows you?

They did nothing wrong according to the Major League, according to the Major League Baseball investigation. Yeah, I'm going to have to try to read this report as much as I can during the break. Because Ken Rosenthal and Evendrelick have made a report on the athletic. 157. Let's give ourselves three minutes of diagnosis a little bit further. Red Sox penalties. Loss of a 2020 second round pick.

ban of a replay operator, ban of Alex Cora, but only conduct with the Astros. Y'all sink into that for a minute. Final hour, the Matt Thomas show starts in a manner of moments. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. Twitter at SportsMT, at SportsRV,

and at Joe George Radio. is the Matt Thomas show. Hey, 2 o'clock sports talk 790, the breaking news of the moment. I don't know how much of it's breaking, really, when there's not much to it. Major League Baseball will report eventually, meaning I guess later today or sometime soon, got leaked out to the athletic folks that it was a video staffer that did all the damage. Replay operator J.T. Watkins. It sounds like a quarterback that's from the Corsican area.

J.T. Watkins. J.T. beloved by all of us here in America. Yes. Has been suspended for his job through the 2020 playoffs and can't do the same job in 2021. Alex Cora cannot manage anywhere through the 2020 playoffs, but his punishment is because he didn't behave himself as a Houston Astro. So Ross, I'm going to ask you,

and of course you don't know the answer to this, but I'm just going to ask it just for the sake of asking. You're telling me that this video replay guy, Mr. J.T. Watkins, got this video intel and gave it to players and gave it to the manager, and they did nothing with it.

30 players have said they had no knowledge of his behavior. The report says, during home games, he was stationed in a room very close to the Red Sox dugout, with an area of a lot of foot traffic and hitters coming in and out. He traveled with the team as well. Investigators talked to six witnesses who observed Watkins writing out signs during the game and 11 that said Watkins communicated sign information in a way that indicated he obtained it during the game.

So this was not a live relaying of signs. He was watching the signs during the game, writing it out information and trying to decode the signs and then relaying those to the players after the fact. going from him to the dugout to the runners on base to the batters. Say that again slowly. So it was going from him to the dugout. To dugout, meaning manager.

To whoever's on base. Whoever's on second base, presumably. Yes. To batter. So this wasn't live time during in the middle of bats like it was with the Astros and the trash can ski. So it sounds like it's what normal people do when they're on second base.

They steal signs. But the guy in the video room was in hands. He was decoding. Decoding and giving better knowledge of what's happening. Okay. So let's say this. Let's be honest here. In theory then, if you're on base, you don't know where the information's coming from, is what they're saying, right? That nobody on base knew that the video guy was helping the bench coach or manager or anybody that was in the dugout giving the information. That's what the claim is. And you mean to tell me. Now, again, if that's what the claim is and that's what they're saying. And look, I don't think that makes it. like baseball didn't do its due diligence. But if you're one of those players that you're getting these signs,

you wouldn't ask where the Intel's coming from, ever? How do you guys know this? How do you know what's coming? I mean, I'm throwing that out. I don't know. Right? Wouldn't you, how, I mean, either somebody's really guessing really well or they're getting some sort of information from,

secondary sources. Apparently he did advanced work breaking down the video and all that type of stuff, but this says 10% of the time Watkins updated that information from in-get video game feeds. And he said, Watkins admitted communicating sign information

to during games to players, but said when he did so, it was based on old information, not newly discovered during that same game. So help me, dumb it down for me. What is the penalty? What's the worst thing the Red Sox did? they used the guy in the replay room was breaking down signs in live time and then relaying that information of the dugout he wasn't doing it via he didn't have an apple watch he didn't have a live video feed and say i know it's coming and relate to to a batter within a couple of seconds

yeah he wasn't they weren't using a method of a buzzer or a trash can or it wasn't immediate i mean the base runner part of this of the quote from a player indicates that the only time they use this methodology is when a runner was on base to pass it to the batter. Whereas the Astros were getting this regardless of if someone was on base or not. It was a live time with the Astros. So that's where it's less serious. It's still the use of electronic equipment to decode signs, right? I mean, I guess. Yeah, I'm trying not to be that guy.

Flagrant is what the quote was. Okay. So were any of the three of us expecting them to get the same penalty than the Astros? No. But this is more of a, well, we got one guy who's willing to take the fall for the entire team kind of thing. Yeah, is J.T. Watkins a fall guy? He's got the name of a fall guy. Or a quarterback at Corsicana. Right. Help me with this, boys. I'm serious.

Yeah. He denies it, though. One, five-foot-six, smelly, hadn't touched a woman in years video guy. He could be six-foot-two and handsome. Okay Ross and I have talked about this a lot The fact that Dave Dumbrowski and Alex Cora have already been fired by the Red Sox organization One for quality of the team

And the other because of what happened here in Houston I always kind of expected it to be lesser already Because the Red Sox had already gotten rid of People in place And Alex Cora is suspended But not for anything that he did here So why did Alex Cora get fired to begin with then Because he was associated

with the Astros and their cheating scandal, I think he lied. You think he lied to in the Red Sox investigation? Yeah, I think when the Red Sox asked him what happened, he lied about what the Astros did. And then when the report came out, they said, you lied to us. Like, we asked you about this, and you completely lied to us.

We can't trust you. You're fired. That seems plausible. That's what to me it says. And remember, once it was, quote, mutual, Alex Cora and the Red Sox decision. Let's point it out here in the article. I wish I wasn't live on the air right now.

I'd like to be able to dig in this a little bit further. Because it feels, now again, I was by no means expecting similar punishments. But it feels like that J.T. the fall guy is taking on quite a bit of this responsibility and that we got a bunch of all, I didn't know. Yeah. Well, we kind of figured that was going to. to happen with the Astros blowback and a lot of this investigation going on during that. And apparently the players had immunity here as well. But there was never going to be a punishment for any of the players.

But they didn't, and they didn't have a snitch. They don't have a Mike fires. They don't have a Mike fires to rat everybody out. And even this Watkins guy is denying it. So he's not even saying he did it. So they're putting him on as the fall guy potentially or saying it's all him. it's none of us. It wasn't even Cora. And they're all on the same page.

They all have the same message. And by the way, they learn from the Astros. Because apparently when you are forthcoming and Major League Baseball gives you the amnesty, America doesn't want to know that. It doesn't care about giving you amnesty. Doesn't understand that that's how the information came out is because they were so forthcoming.

See, guess what we have with the Red Sox boys? We have a little bit of, how is this going down so easily for them? How is this, how are they not facing any punishment? They must have not said much. Or they must have all been in the room or got on a group text and said, let's have a message and let's make sure it's consistent. And oh, by the way, don't be a snitch.

But here's my problem with the punishment. Even if they did this at all and the very limited cheating they did in this report per the athletic. At the end of the article, it points out again that on September 15, 2017, they got punished for using Apple Watches. They got punished once before. And then Rob Manfred sent out that letter, which AJ Hinchin that Houston Astros players reported and they never got, that said, you can't steal signs.

You can't use electronics. You can't, you will be punished more severely. This is the Red Sox's second issue with this. And it's like they didn't, he didn't enact that punishment. So even if they did nothing wrong compared to what the Astros did, they still have two strikes against them, and it seems like they've gotten nothing. Just got an email from our programming leader, Brian Erickson. Oh, uh-oh. Exoneration. Subject line, Red Sox 1, Astro Zero.

They did get doctor draft pick, I guess. That's pretty much it. And it is interesting. And this little line interests me as well. Apparently they interviewed dozens of players 34 former players according to this report it says that 30 players said they had no knowledge

of Watkins' decoding signs behavior but six witnesses have reserved him writing out signs during the game four witnesses says he used gestures or notes to communicate them signs sequence and information that doesn't make sense

that 30 say nothing happened and four of them are saying well this is what he did are those 30 pitchers though No, it gets impossible. Can't be that many. Is it just the bullpen guys, the rookie guys that they don't know? Maybe.

But your elite, your Mookiee Betts, your J.D. Martinez, they're aware? Possibly. Guys, something's not right with this. Yeah, they cl-I think they turtled up. You know why they turtled up? The Astros are getting crushed. The Houston Astros are the most hated team in baseball. Maybe the most hated team in sports.

They're being made fun of on The Tonight Show. They turtle up because they thought being forthcoming, there's two reasons. One, the Astros, and two, there was no Mike Fires in their clubhouse. They kept things with the door locked. They had a vault, if you will. Right? Their vault didn't open. And when the vault doesn't open, and they don't have the evidence, you have to blame the fall guy.

Who doesn't want to be the fall guy? But because he's a former quarterback at Corsicana High School, he has. to be. So I'm going to repeat this again. You Astro fans, I know you're out there bumping around today. Loss of a 2020 second round pick, the ban of replay operator through the 2020 playoffs, and from doing the same job in 2021. Apparently J.T. Watkins will be selling tickets next year.

Is he welcome with open arms in 2022? That's an odd penalty. And ban of Alex Coro through the playoffs, but let's make sure you know that it's only because of what he did as the bench coach, the Astros. and nothing that he did as a manager of the Red Sox. Rossi, I don't get, Eric's not out of here. I don't care who you are. I don't care how long we work together.

Get out of here. It's just the worst. 212 of the Matt Thomas show. This is a typical East Coast crap that while we hate East Coast, while we hate Boston, for this reason alone. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90 with a message here for TGS insurance. do you want to save big money on your home policy?

Of course, the answer is yes. Then I want you to get to your cell phones right now before you call me and talk about how mad you are about this whole situation and text the word money, MONEY to 23, 23, 23, 23. The folks at TGS Insurance will do yourself a huge favor and save you some big time money on your home policy. Text money to 23, 23, 23, 23. The last year address back, you send that back, and then 15 seconds later, you'll get that quote. Average customer savings, $870. many many folks are saving more than a thousand dollars do this right now for yourself as you're

trying to find ways to save a couple of bucks here and there and we're talking about some pretty major dollars with tgs insurance tax money mone y to 23 23 23 23 23 23 23 23 at least now we know that losing sucks and if anybody knows how much losing sucks it's mad thomas i'm outstanding this is wisconsin Whitney Marzellus, back to the Matt Thomas Show on Sports Talk 790. All right, so when the Astros got their punishment for Major League Baseball, Rob Manfred went through this exhaustive, long document, right? Pages and pages and pages and pages of things that the Astros did wrong.

And they looked, they were guilty of all of it. I'm not trying to soft play what the Astros did. Trust me, they cheated, and they're going to pay the price for it, both with losing a general manager or manager, but also the... the reputation of the team and probably when baseball resumes, when there are fans and stadiums, a lot of heat. Probably forever. It will take the Asteros having to win a legit world series without having any of this problem for people to back off on them.

Well, whenever baseball resumes. Winner, in front of fans. Think about that. Well. Okay. So remember Rob Manfred was asked, when are you going to put this report out about the Red Sox? Well, you know, we're going to wait for the season to resume. and we get some things going, and, you know, we'll let you know then.

Thinking this is probably, you know, five, six pages of, we talk to this person, talk to this person, talk to this person. The report, the executive summary of the report from the Boston Red Sox is one page long. One page. I find that J.T. Watkins, the Red Sox Video Replay System Operator, on at least some occasions, utilize the game feeds. in the replay room in violation of MLB regulations to revise sign sequence information that had permissively provided to players prior to the game.

That's all on him. I find that unlike the Houston Astros' 2017 conduct, ouch, um, Wacken's conduct, by its very nature, was far more limited in scope and impact. The information was only relevant when the, Red Sox had a number at a runner on second base, which was 19.7% of plate appearances

league wide in 2018, and Watkins communicated sign sequences in a manner that indicated he had decoded them from the in-game feed and only a small percentage of those occasions. So it happened 20% of the season, and he didn't do it every single time. Two more things. I do not find that then-manager Alex Cora or the Red Sox coaching staff or the Red Sox coaching staff or the Red Sox front office, or most of the players of the 2018 Red Sox knew or should have known that Watkins was utilizing in-game video to update the information that he had learned from his pregame analysis. Communication of these violations was episodic and isolated to Watkins and a limited number of Red Sox players only. And those players are?

Who knows? We don't know. Because again, immunity. Amnesty, immunity, whatever you want to call it. Lastly, I find that Red Sox front office consistently communicated MLB sign-stealing rules to non-player staff and media and made commendable efforts towards installing a culture of compliance in their organization. Meaning, remember that letter? Yes. That Jeff Linotas said wasn't worthy of sending out to everybody.

Yeah. The Red Sox didn't do that. He just tossed it in the trash pile. Yeah. The Red Sox communicated to their players and management that there was not to be any funny business. Clearly the three of us have a bias as we're working here in Houston, Texas. So let's try to rid ourselves of the bias here for the next few seconds. Are you buying the Red Sox were in large part naive to this or didn't take part in it?

I mean, do you believe everything in which I just read you 90% of that statement right there says, that the Red Sox behaved themselves and that it was very much one erstwhile person telling only a handful of players. in a very specified few number of instances. You believe it, yes or no? I think so. I'm going to say no because I want to be contrarian. Okay. I'm going to say no because of, I think, two things.

One, they saw the Astros. Two, there was no snitches. And three, Big Poppy would have come in there and beat their ass. I mean, not so much number three, but you know what I'm saying? there was nobody inside the Red Sox that was ready to say, we didn't behave ourselves, and I'm going to now tell you the whole world why what we did wrong. I'm going to say no.

What are we accusing them of doing, though? Or what are we saying that we don't? We're saying that there is more to do than what was reported. That there was, I mean, this is the most, the biggest part of this is that it wasn't in live time like the Astros were with their trash can banging scheme. Right? That you're allowed to do advance scouting on signs and stuff like that.

That's what they're doing. So answer me this question, and you don't know the answer, but just a minute, just thinking out there. If Alex Cora was the brains behind this operation with the Astros, why wouldn't he take these same philosophies to the boss in Red Sox? And that's the doubt I have. The best way for them to do this was the trash can thing, and the trash can thing was getting found out by opponents. That's one of the reasons they stopped, right? So, I mean, they would have to come up with some other scheme and the buzzers and crazy stuff like that. Yeah.

it would have to be a different method. So you're saying that Alex, here's what you could be thinking. Alex got to Boston. He's now his own manager. He's like, damn, we got away with this in Houston. We better not try to try this here because we're going to get caught because Ward was traveling around Major League circles that the Astros were doing illegal things. That's why the Astros didn't do anything in 18 and 19. So we're talking about 2018.

But what if Alex Corr didn't get the managerial job with the Red Sox? Would he have still been the brains behind doing this again in 2018? 18. They stopped doing it in 18 because it wasn't working. They found it distracting and other teams were catching on and changing all their signs. So it just wasn't effective. That's why they stopped, right? That's a large part of it.

But if the main go-to guy was the one that was coordinating all this is gone. And maybe there was nobody else in that locker, maybe in that clubhouse said, look, man, what Alex was doing sucked, we better stop doing this. But if Alex was still there, would he not be trying to push this along with two? In what way? Like I said, it wasn't working.

The other teams, if Danny Farquhar and all, it heard the trash can banged. But if it wasn't working, then they should have stopped the first time they tried it. Yes, that's one of the huge issues of this is we don't know how effective it was if it was effective at all. And they ruined their entire reputation for it. And there are players that didn't do it, you know, the Hosei Altuvays and the Josh Reddix didn't use it at all because they didn't think it worked. And it wasn't good for them. I just have an incredibly hard time believing that Alex Corr didn't bring some of his tricks in his magic bag and brought up to Boston with him.

We don't know what he could have. That's what we don't know. We don't know. They would have to be something different than trash can banging, something more advanced, something quieter. And doesn't it help that the video room is so close to the dugout at Fenway Park? I mean, that you wouldn't use that to your advantage? That's a question for J.T. Watkins. Well, he's currently unavailable as a video coordinator. But he's available to help out with your season ticket needs in 2021. presumably. You should have to fire the guy at this point, right? He's got to be fired. So, yeah, he's not playing. He's not working for the Red Sox. I mean, we'd like to announce that J.T. Watkins has been cleared. He's back. In all seriousness, this probably helps

Alex Cora a little bit. Because I remember the day that he got fired from the Red Sox. We're like, this guy's never managing again in baseball because he, first of all, he was involved with one team and for sure got caught. And the presumpt. assumption was that a second team that he met his first time he'd managed he brought those tricks with him it sounds like to me he didn't bring those tricks that Alex Cora living a life of cheating in somehow some way all the sudden became the Virgin Mary when became the manager of the Red Sox I j Rossi and I may be wrong on this and I'm okay with that but I just have a very difficult time stomaking that Alex Cora brought this

incredibly clean 100% the right way image to the Boston Red Sox. I just have our time of that way. We just don't have, we won't have an answer to that question. You're right. The players aren't going to speak. I mean, we would have, I mean, it's just basically a conspiracy theory at this point. That's right. Because we have nothing to, we have no evidence to base this on. We have no facts. We have a bunch of people who are going to keep quiet. And we don't know. It would have to

have been some kind of new method. Because the, the way, what the Astros were doing with the trash can thing died out because it was other teams were catching on to. it. And they have an incredible fall guy. J.T. Watkins? J.T. Watkins, ironically enough, has a brand new home in the Fort Myers area. It's four bedrooms.

It's 3,300 square feet, and it's got an ocean view. And he's got a new Mazzorati parked in the driveway. And they're not going to ask for his ringback. What do you all think? I mean, if anybody's bumping around right now, if you want to, I'd like for you guys to chime in on this. Because I can, I'm going to assume, and it may not be right,

because we're going to have a pure bias here. but I'm going to assume most people that are astro fans when they find out more about this is going to be this isn't right, that this is, it's too good to be true, that one video guy on a very, very, very few occasions would do this when you had a manager who was the brains behind the operation that was the 2017 Astros. It feels very hard to completely believe that everything that Major League Baseball found out was everything necessary. 713-212-5-790.

News from ESPN. They're going to televise another Celtics Lakers championship game tonight. My God, let's get off of this game, any of them. 2010, 2008, 2009, we'll show everyone in the 80s. We get it. The Lakers and the Celtics are really good.

Enough with that. All right, back to the baseball. What do you think, Astro fans? The Red Sox Ross and Joe did not even get a slap across, You know, they got a warning from the cop. Second round pick is something. Oh, please. In a five-round draft it is, but...

In a 39-round draft or whatever it is? Well, it's five this year, but... You know what I'm saying. I know. 7-13-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-2-5-7-90. I'm telling you, the Red Sox didn't even get a slap. They got a, you should...

You know what they got... They got a finger wag. They got an index finger wag for Major League Baseball. What are your thoughts on that? 713-212-5-790. With a message here from our friends, and they have been great friends during this time, and that's the folks over at, where am I going?

I'm talking to you about the Shell Federal Credit Union. They're sponsoring our draft coverage. Ross, you've got a huge part of that. Draft coverage on 790 brought to you by the Shell Federal Credit Union. I'm not involved. Okay, no or am I. But Chris Gordy is, and you, Joe, will get the scraps of the first round on the Shell Federal Credit Union draft coverage.

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Now number one for podcasting Ross in the lower right corner Tell the audience what the ESPN's going to have on tonight at 8 o'clock, 830 a yard time Well it's Switch But I think you were talking about the best of the NBA finals The 2008 NBA Finals as a first What's wrong with that?

They've only shown it 15 times I don't know if they've shown in 2008 game four I've seen it you sure what happens one of the amazing teams wins okay I know they definitely did

2008 and 2009 and 2010 2011 2011 with the with the Dwight Howard hedo Turcalu led magic team I've seen every

Celtics Lakers game in the last 25 years every one of them they've been playing a lot of the Warriors in Cavs classics as well yeah they had a Rockets classic on. They actually had quite a few

Rockets games on. Yeah, what are you winding about then? Well, it's just that I just, I'm tired of the Lakers and Celtics. Well, there's the two biggest brands in basketball history.

Yeah, but doesn't mean you've got to get to me every hour. It's not every hour. It feels like every hour. So I put on Longhorn Network yesterday. Yes. And the two, I swear to God,

the 2006 game was on. Why was this surprising to you? Well, I, because I make it a running joke on the show. Yeah. And then I wind up seeing it was there. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah, what's the problem? It's on there all the time. But if you're a Longhorn fan, don't you have that game DVR, like over and over here? I have the DVD of it, yeah. And it's DVD. Well, you used to have a DVR in my old box, but I don't have it anymore. Like what's on right now? Do we get the Longhorn Network here?

No, we do not. It's Comcast here. Okay, real quick, run through the lineup of what's on the Longhorn Network today, because I have a sneaking suspicion that game's going to be on at some point during the next 24 hours. It might be. And that would be okay. Let's see. What time is it now?

236 p.m. Mm-hmm. Right now is Longhorn Arts and Culture. Is that a class? Cactus Cafe. Okay. Coming up. Oh, Central Michigan versus Texas for NCAA basketball classics.

That'll be on later. Do you want to check that out? Oh, here we go. North Carolina versus Texas from 2015. That's on right now, actually. Okay. Notre Dame versus Texas. That was one of the times that Texas was back.

Charlie Strong is back. And Charlie Strong got like carried off the field. Right. They went on to finish 66 or something. Five and seven-ish. Somewhere in that neighborhood. Yeah. A tennis classics at 7 o'clock.

Ohio State versus Texas. That must be a good match. If you're a salesperson for the Longhorn Network, how do you sell Longhorn Tennis repeats? That's national championship tennis, Matthew. Name one player from that team. Don Summer. Dawn Summer.

Yes. Okay. I stand corrected. Jim and Claire Lake. Don't you feel like a fool? I do. 237. on 790. Hi, Jim.

Hey. Hi. Yeah, I just wanted to call. I'm completely ticked off. I knew they were going to do that with Boston. It was a total takedown of the Houston Astros. New York got caught using eyewatches, and that's where the whole scheme developed. Beltran brought it here, along with our bench coach, Correa.

But it was a takedown. And our owner played right into their hands. He should have fought back and stood up for his players and stood up for his team. And said, I think it's systemic in the whole league until you can prove it's not. He should have fought it. But the whole league is controlled by the Northeast. And if you don't think it's political, everything in America right now is political. It's a total hit job against the Astros.

Our sports talk people, you guys need to be pushing back hard. And we need to change the narrative. Until they do a full investigation on every team in the league, you can kiss it. Jim, Jim, I'm just a couple things if I'm going to push it. Are the Astros, Republicans, or Democrats? I'm not talking about that. It's the Northeast versus the South. They hate Houston.

We always get the raw into the deal. Joe Buck. They all, everybody is against, they want New York and Boston every year, and the Dodgers, every year into the championship. and we built a little dynasty. Luno is a genius, and now we don't have them anymore. And there wasn't a better manager in baseball than AJ. Now we don't have them anymore.

They broke up our dynasty. Did they break up the team for the right reason? No, not until you investigate the whole league and see it's systemic. This came. Beltran bought this. He was at Texas for a couple years before he came here. he was at New York for like 13 years. He was there when they got the eye watch slap on the wrist.

And the bench coach, he was the one that was really close to the players and brought this whole thing into play. Then it becomes a head coach for Boston, and they get a slap on the wrist. Give me a break, man. A large strike. So. Are you ordering food, Jim?

Where are you right now, Jim? I already did. What did you get? I'm at McDonald's. You want anything? What did you get first? You said, do you get a 10 piece? I got a 10 piece and a

home style and a large sprite. I'll bring you something if you're hungry. No, we're good, but thank you. No fries? What kind of dipping sauce? No fries. Two barbecues. I would have went sweet and sour personally.

You really can't go wrong with barbecues or sweet and sour. I'd go one in one, actually. Both are solid. Thank you, Jim. I appreciate it. There is another radio show. the marketplace that gets more drive-thru callers than ours.

Well, it's going to happen on the 12-3 show. 240 doesn't necessarily mean drive-thru doesn't. He's going for a little snack, Matt. By the way, a homestine burger and a 10-piece. The lines have been long. Maybe this is he knows the lines are shorter now.

May I get 60 seconds on this? Go ahead. And Joe, you already know what I'm going with this. The Starbucks right across from our office is closed. I'm going to try to go to the one a memorial and almost Shepard today.

You know, on Memorial Drive, you know, not far past Memorial Park. They don't have a drive-thru, but I'll go in there and get it. I'm really craving a Starbucks coffee. We've got free coffee on three. Not the same. It's not that bad. It's okay, but it's not Starbucks. The Starbucks at 2 on 610 northbound at Shepard in the Heights is the slowest Starbucks I've ever been to in my entire life.

Even before this virus, four cars would take 20 minutes. yesterday, it was 15 cars deep. I couldn't do it. And I need my coffee. You know how intense I am right now. Yeah, that's true. What's your order? You're going to, hey, it's just a Pike Place with two creams and one Splenda. A what? Pike Place.

What's a regular coffee? Okay. I don't do the mixing of the flavors and stuff. Okay. That's smart. Frappuccino, cappuccino, Rappuccino. I'm an ice white mocha if I don't go, just normal black. Really?

Yep. Okay. I like my... I just like a cold brew plane. But I'll be honest with you, Matt. I'm a, quote, basic white girl when it comes to my Starbucks. I like the pumpkin drinks. Oh, wow.

I like the Christmas ones. I'm all in. What size is your bra? Right now? Mm-hmm. Probably in the high B range or the low B range. Mid-Bees? What's a mid-Bee?

What is mid-Bee? So if you're a Starbucks executive, first of all, open up this one across street from us. That would be a big help. But number two, get over to Starbucks at 290, 610 and Shepard, and tell them to hurry the hell up. Because even in non-pandemic times, it's the slowest MF and Starbucks out there. Calm down, Matt. That's why I need it. Let's get this man some coffee. Jeez. You were on edge. I am. I just want a pipe place, two creams, one Splenda. I don't want to repeat myself a hundred times. And when someone orders banana bread, they do want it warmed.

I'm a no-cream, no-sugar kind of guy. There's another radio show that goes from Boston Red Sox scandals to Starbucks complaints in the drive-through line. With in-between that, McDonald's orders. Yeah, the man's mad that the... Is there a Northeast bias? Did Major League

baseball... It's political, Matt. Say, you know what? Red Sock's number one. Yankees number one. Astros 30th. Blip! Is there a bias? We'll discuss that next. 243. Fair and Balance. Matt Thomas Show. Sports Talk 790. 713. 212.5. 790. 713. 2122.790 with a message here. Am I doing hoops or oops? Which one am I doing? Basketball, right? Hoops. Okay. Ross and I haven't played a pickup game in a long time. Hashtag social distancing. But when we do, we should be doing on a hoops basketball goal. 281-351-9822 is their number. 281-351-9.9.8.2.8-8-8-8-1-9.8.8. 822. For a great goal, four different systems available, check out their website, ProDunkhoops.com, ProDunkhoops.com. And I promise you, you'll get a great insulation

with a basketball goal built for a lifetime of basketball play indoors on your driveway. Fully tempered glassboard, backboard, so you get the true rebounds. You'll get it fully adjustable from 5 to 10 feet. You'll get professional insulation, and you'll get rust armor protection against rain like we're going to get today. 281-351-98-22, 281-351-98-22, and online, pro-dunkhoops.com. This is Ricky Williams.

I may have worn a wedding dress on a magazine cover, but it still looks better than any outfit Matt can put together. Let your wife dress you, man. Texas fine! Texas Five! Back to Matt Thomas on Sports Talk 790. 249 on the Matt Thomas show. draft contest Ross

Are we excited for the Have you made your entries into MT at Sports790.com? I am not eligible to wins, therefore I have not. Well, that doesn't seem very nice. What do you want me to do? I want you to go to the What's on Matt's Mine show page. Explain what's already there before I run into the questions work quickly. It's the what's already there?

Yeah. I mean, what's up today? Yeah, what's up today? You want to know what's getting good hits today? I'd love to know. Yesterday's afternoon to like Kayla Simmons is doing quite well. so is today's in the Kylie Marie. Some people are also watching the Tom Brady video of him parodying

anchorman and calling for a Grankowski to come out of the woods, basically. So you can catch that all at the What's on Matt's Mind Show page. Sports790.com. Go there, and you can also email me the five questions in our draft contest for 10 points. Five questions, each one that have a different point category. Top three winners win dinner to Shamaga Usha. We've got Spex Wines gift card. we have a Rudy's barbecue gift card to give away.

So lots of nice stuff. That all sounds wonderful. And this quiz literally takes you about a minute and a half to do. Email it to MT at Sports790.com. That's MT at Sports790.com. 10 point question, will the Texans draft a tight end? The 20 point question is, will the Texans make a trade at any point during the draft? And if you can go to the blog, you can see these questions for yourself.

Three is two at Tugavalao's draft number. Either he goes one to five, six to ten or eleven plus. That's worth 30 points. The 40 point question, offensive or defense. players. What will the Texans take more of in the draft? 50 point question, what position will be the top pick of the Texans when the draft is over? And you've got a choice

of quarterback, running back, wide receiver slash tight end, O line, defensive line slash linebacker or cornerback slash safety. Again, those answers, send them to us, and you could be winning some major prizes. What were we talking about before the break? How political this Red Sox versus

that's right. That's right. Okay, let's go through the automatics. Okay. Rob Manfred loves Northeast teams more than he does Southeast teams. I grew up a Yankees fan, didn't he? Yeah. Rob Manfred has to protect one of the big teams that draws television ratings. Okay.

Because the Astros, you know, the Astros always always tease about the Texans playing the early game. Yeah. On Saturday, Walcott Weeker. The Astros always play the afternoon games. So it's more national media. bias towards Houston sports teams. Okay. Like if the Rockets play in the playoffs, they'll be on NBA TV,

which you know is not true, but just for the sake of this argument here. So we have Northeast biased, Boston preferential treatment. The Red Sox have a much more distinguished history. Okay. They have a, what else? Protecting the legacy. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I would say like if the Red Sox are viewed as terrible cheaters,

it's worse for your brand as a league. Okay, but did this really affect the investigation? No, I did not. We're just doing it. No, I know. The number one reason, there was no snitch. There was no snitch. That's the reason.

And they clammed up once they saw the blowback that the Astros got. So really, frankly, if the Astros would have done their illegal activity secondly, they probably would have clammed up, right? Unless fire, this is the guy. Yeah, we don't know. I mean, it's honestly to me, it seems like Fires had a problem with people in the locker room, and you felt like he could snitch on him. Yeah?

He didn't feel like he was part of the team. They made fun of his forearm tattoo that had his name on it. Yep. I mean, they don't speak kindly of him. In public, they don't. Oh, yeah, there's no chance. Even when 57-year-old Alex Brebman comes on this show, we'll bring out Mike Fires.

He's going to turn his nose immediately. Yeah, I mean, so that to me is why Fires did it. Why was he a bad guy? I don't remember him being a bad guy. Not that I was spending a lot of time in the clubhouse, but... He's kind of a fiery guy, I guess. Kind of a different guy. He kind of...

Competitive. Well, he also plucked out in the last month of the season. Maybe that's why he kind of brought it up is because maybe he felt like something was up when he was getting shelled by the Astros. And that's the core point where everybody is talking about how heroic he is and how it took a lot of stones. There was a reason why he did this.

I refuse guys and I'm not trying to be Houston-centric guy or Houston Homer but he didn't do it out of the kindness of his heart to protect the legacy of this sport that's BS that's rarely the case I mean you look at like regular whistleblower

cases like when there's like Monsano and those if you ever look at the corporate whistleblowers and stuff like that it's almost always somebody that's going to be holding a grudge and there's usually there's a reason behind it it's not just it's not out of the goodness of their heart

but like Ross is saying is normally there's there's something of why now. But the biogenesis scandal with the A-Rod thing, that guy who was the whistleblower on that, he had a grudge to hold and he thought they were holding money from him. Well, how about the one out of the business of baseball? There was a guy that, you know those planes, those 737s that Boeing made that were part of some crashes that grounded all those planes? There was a big story in the Today Show about a month ago about this guy

having a whistleblower Boeing and he did it multiple times, but we didn't even know about it until after the accidents. I mean, that's, that's really, that's heavy stuff right there. But you're right. Whistleblowers typically do it because there is something that they were, they got taken advantage of or were demoted or not recognized or not appreciated. Or it's revenge or an ax to grind or something like that. Yeah. So maybe we give credit to Alex for keeping a happy clubhouse. There we go. Managers that can keep things in line with over general managers and coaches and managers that

can't, and then you get the whistleblow. Or they were squeaky clean and everything was okay. What if Mike, what if we took a, we went to 100 different sports bars once they opened up in a hundred different cities? That's a lot of drinking. Be worth it, right? Okay. We grabbed one person from that sports bar in 100 different cities and said, was Mike

fires a snitch or was he heroic? he did. What do you think the breakdown would be? A hundred different sports bars and say 50 cities. Big and small. From Abilene, Texas to Columbia, South Carolina, to Walla Walla, Washington.

What is the general belief of what Mike Fires did? Heroic? Because I will say this, I bet you, outside of the 713, and 281, it's like, we're glad he did it. It stopped but cheating. Look at what those cheaters did. I think that would probably be the case. If you had to choose one,

The truth is like somewhere in between. What's that? The third option is he's a rat, but we're glad he did it. That'd probably be the primary answer. But that would be the consensus from everybody, right? Baseball is a cleaner sport today because of what Mike fires did. It is. But why was Big Pappy so insistent on being so outraged by what he did?

That's what I want to know. Why did Big Pappy say? I don't need that snitch in there. We had that sound bite somewhere, right? We had to play that a lot. He looking like a snitch or something like that. He wasn't for that. he was afraid his team was going to get popped.

That's why Big Poppy called all the Red Sox and said, shut up. Don't say a thing. You don't know that, Matt. I'm going to assume that. I like to assume things occasionally on the show. All right. Tomorrow is what Ross and I live for. Three hours of draft preview.

We'll do a mock draft of all seven rounds of every team in the NFL. With trades. Ross is going to handle the NFC East. I've got the AFC West. Up next, Waxler, Clanton, they're going to entertain you for three hours. We call them the A team, and they're on 7-9.