The Pat McAfee Show - PMS 1096 - March Madness Monday with Daniel Cormier, Tom Pelissero, Adam Schefter, Rece Davis

Episode Date: March 25, 2024

On this episode of The Pat McAfee Show we dive right into all things that have happened in the sports landscape from this past weekend. With so much attention given to the mens and women’s college basketball tournaments Pat jumps right in to discuss the latest teams advancing to the next round. There was also the college wrestling championships this weekend and we have all been introduced to a new dynasty, the Penn St. team has won 11 of the last 13 team championships and to discuss more about the sport Daniel Cormier comes on the show to give some insight into the sport. After some wrestling chatter Pat brings it back in to discuss the dominant performance by the Purdue Boilermakers and UConn Huskies who are both trying to cement their legacies at the top of college basketball. We hit the “Rumor Mill” with a new friend from the weekend Donny Don Dons who has some interesting takes from what he has “been hearing”. Starting off the second hour, longtime family of the progrum AJ Hawk has made his return to the show after spending a week in Jamaica. Pat catches AJ up on all things sports related and they begin discussing the new NFL rule changes that are going into place from the owners meetings down in Orlando. To elaborate more on these rule changes Tom Pelissero joins the progrum and gives us all the details we need to know. Sticking with the NFL news Adam Schefter joins Pat to discuss the details behind the L'Jarius Sneed trade, the new kickoff rule, and much more happening in the NFL. To bring in the third hour an all time guest “Mad Mel” Kiper hops on to give the boys his latest draft insight from Caleb Williams to all the crazy situations that could possibly occur on draft night. To close out the show Pat takes us back to basketball and brings on college sports analyst Rece Davis to apologize and clear up some states he had made regarding a particular sports bet this weekend and give us some of his insight on what to expect for the rest of the tournament. Make sure you subscribe to YouTube.com/thepatmcafeeshow to watch the show. Or watch on ESPN (12-2 EDT), ESPN’s Youtube (12-3 EDT), or ESPN+. We appreciate the hell out of all of you. See you tomorrow. Cheers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, beautiful people, and welcome to our humble abode, the Thunderdome. On this, there's a lot to talk about Monday, March 25th, 2024. This sports program starts now. Sports are awesome, as is Verizon. Oh, yeah. Big thanks to Verizon, but big thanks to sports being fantastic this weekend. I watched so much hoops and golf, NASCAR, IndyCar, and the NFL is always popping with drama and rules changes

coming out of the NFL owners' meetings down in Orlando, which we will be live from tomorrow in a conference room within the hotel in which the owners' meetings are taking place. Now, there's already been a lot that has taken place down there. I think more are going to continue to take place. There's some conversations about the game and the game's future that are happening by players that are saying, what the hell are we doing to football?

I'm not alone. I'm very lucky to be alongside a great group of men. The Talks at Table is here at Boston Conner and at Ty Schmidt. Boys, they're saying football's changing. Yeah, it feels like it is. And it's nice that everybody is coming out saying, hey, you're screwing the game over because we can't tackle anymore. One half of the hammer.

Dad! Cowboys tone digs your tone. The city of Pittsburgh. Found it on grit and toughness and football. Hell yeah! He's about to watch a different football going forward and seems like everybody's pissed off about it that loves football. Yeah, yeah.

My days of, you know, watching Jack Hamm and me, Joe Green, and L.C. Greenwood just come through and just fully haymaker. Dudes, that's gone. But it's not even that, Pat. Just normal tackling is gone now. Yeah, so now the NFL has decided in a unanimous decision is what we're hearing. Unanimous, which always seems to be the case with these NFL owners are always on the same page even when they're not.

Remember, they had a unanimous decision, and then Mark Davis walked outside and said, I hate it, and then walked out of the building. So we know that there was potentially some people in there who were football-minded people that said, we can't do this. Once we do this, what's next? Can't tackle guys when we're running next to him how about that we're gonna ban hip drop tackles which no football person has ever taught to anybody ever before well now it's taking place the hip drop tackle has been banned what is the

hip drop tackle well it actually comes from a different sport rugby actually teaches and has the hip drop tackle i do believe or maybe they banned it before everybody else. What is happening in the NFL now is when you're running next to a guy or behind a guy, you can't unweight yourself. You can't unweight yourself. They rolled this video at the NFL owners meetings to kind of describe what it was and what can happen. And obviously some of these tackles look terrible. This is what's going to happen when people are moving 13, 14, 18,

20 miles an hour and there are people being paid to tackle them on the defensive side of the ball. That one looks like a standard tackle. That's just a standard tackle. He unweighted himself. So now refs are going to have to decide in real time, did he tackle that guy or did he unweight himself and land on the bottom half of his leg?

What are we doing? We're setting the refs up to be put in a position. Now that's late hit. You could call that one as well. So it's already going to be a personal foul 15 yarder. But I think what they're trying to indicate is whenever you tackle and big ball doofus comes in through there, when you tackle and you land on the bottom of the legs, what they're trying to get rid of. And we understand the sentiment. Some of these tackles look nasty whenever a guy comes back. That's why they got rid of the,plate. Nameplate, because people were doing that.

So we understand trying to get rid of that, but whenever you put this kind of broad, hip-drop tackle thing in, where if you unweight yourself and you land on the bottom, you're putting a lot of judgment into these stripes of his hands. It's going to AFC Championship. Oh, yeah. Huge play.

Fourth quarter. Oh, my God. Team A, which is how they do all the rules here team a team a is down by two they got the ball 120 left in the game no timeouts they hit one over the mill no timeouts snap kill first down we're on our own 40 another slant boom in the middle tight end catches it he's at the other 45 all of a sudden he's running what happens he gets tackled boom down ref throws stops clock yeah moves them to the 30 now all of a sudden they're in field goal range. This team goes to the Super Bowl. Yep.

Why? Because a guy got tackled by the side. A guy fell back. Guys on the offense now are going to start. Oh, yeah. Every time. Oh, my. We didn't even think about guys with the ball in that competition committee.

Did we, Rich McKay, who we're probably going to see tomorrow. Did we think about that? Where guys are going to be caught probably. Hey, we can't say this in drills and we can't be doing this. But, you know, you can tackle from the side or behind. You just kind of go ahead and throw your back. And in the name of safety, with brand new rule, we're going to get it. This is just a dumb decision.

And this is just like the fair catch thing that happened with kickoffs last year where all the people that are around football are like, if they do this, what else will they do? If they do this, what else will they do? If you take away tackling somebody from the side, what else are they going to take away? J.J. Watson, why don't you just go ahead and put the belt on now? Start putting the flags

on. Why don't you just go ahead and do the two-hand touch right now? Why don't we put paint on everybody's hands so we can see if we get two hands on everybody? Why don't we stop tackling? Why don't we stop violence? Why don't we stop football being football? Because of this, I know the stats and analytics people are going to take a victory lap because they were the ones that are pissed off about the hip drop tackle even existing in the first place.

Of course. But now that there's actually a rule about it, this is going to call for so many questions. There's going to be so many, oh, he can't tackle anybody. That is going to happen. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Every single big game. And let one of these doofus refs, not that all of them are.

We're not saying that. They're not all not doofuses, thoughingo now we got more judgment by the refs what do we even do i just say it doesn't make any sense everybody seems to be pissed and for good reason well and the worst part too is like team a let's just say that's the chiefs and like we've been dealing with this script conversation the last you know two years three years if the chiefs are to benefit from something like this that'll absolutely blow up every single type of hey the nfl is rigged for my home so like people will start believing that to a full or extent because they already do think that but if a team does benefit or when

a team benefits it's going to be a huge problem for the nfl okay let's talk about uh good things that came out of the owners' meetings down there. The Detroit Lions pitched a challenge alternative about how if we win one of our challenges, we should be able to get a third challenge. Because the old rule used to be, you get both your challenges right, okay, then you'll be awarded a third challenge. Now, obviously, I don't think they have decided on the final two minutes of the half, final two minutes of the game.

We haven't heard any announcement by that. But now there is a change to the challenge rule. If you get one challenge right, you get your challenge back. Smart. Now, up to three, obviously, but you don't have to win two anymore. This is good for football. Good job. Hell, yeah.

This is good for football. Thank you, Dan Campbell. Thank you, MCTC. Thank you, Detroit Lions. Hell, yeah. And I know you didn't win Super Bowl, even though you thought you were going to this past season, but you did make the game better and make football better. Shout out to the owners' meetings and the competition committee

for getting this pass. We do appreciate that. Let's go. Also, eye in the sky, replay assistant is going to be able to do more now. Tom Pellicero just reported the NFL competition committee chairman, Rich McKay, who this guy's got a lot to say, told me the replay assistant will now be permitted to correct certain types of incorrect calls for roughing the passer and intentional grounding. Must be purely objective. Parenthesize, QB wasn't hitting head, was out of pocket, etc.

So this is like whenever there's a potential intentional grounding. And you see the refs all come together and they're pointing at it. Now they can get an assistant from the top being like, yep, there was a guy around. Go ahead and pick up the call or not. Same thing with Ruffin. This is good. This is very good news. I like the assistant ref that's up in the sky to

be able to fix things quicker. We saw it last season a lot more than we've ever seen in the past where they say after further discussion, which means somebody that is not on this field that has eyes on replays before we do has told us that we should pick up this flag. So we are going to do as such. Now they're giving him more power.

This is good, Ty. This is good, Ty Schmidt. Yeah, it's absolutely good. But it also almost feels like with the hip drop, it's like, hey, because we're doing this, we got to concede a little bit somewhere else, which I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing, but it's ultimately it's like this is another one of those things where it's like, why wasn't this institute?

Why is this just now happening? Like this should have been, this should have been instituted five to 10 years ago. And now, I mean, we'll take it. We'll take it. We'll take it. We'll take it. We'll take it. But it does feel like they're trying to baby face a little bit because they know how much,

how much people are going to be pissed off about the hip drop tackle. The hip drop tackle is just so subjective. There was obviously some tackles in that video that they showed via Tom Pellicero that were like, ooh, that is not good, don't need that in the game. But then there were some very standard looking tackles in that. And if they were to call that the refs, after what they were being told, it's like, this is going to get loud, going to get ugly, but whatever. You want to put more pressure on the stripes, you do what you got to do.

You want to try to ruin the game? You want to take football out of the stripes? You do what you got to do. You want to try to ruin the game? You want to take football out of football? Can't do it. Speaking of foot in football, they have tabled the new kickoff rules, vote until potentially May. Now, there's still some days down there, so who knows what they're going to get accomplished. Obviously, they're there until Wednesday, I do believe.

But the kickoff rule, they changed it from what we learned last week with Coach Rizzi from the New Orleans Saints, which is pretty, it kind of ruins the whole. It changes the whole thing. Tom Pellicero said the NFL Competition Committee met today and unanimously approved a tweak to the proposed NFL hybrid kickoff rule, making touchbacks that go into the end zone on the fly come out to the 30 rather than the 35 per source. The change provides kicking teams a less punitive option if they don't want to take a chance on a long return. The adjusted rule proposal will be presented to owners for a possible vote Monday morning.

Now, that might happen today. They said they might table it until May as well. They assume that this is going to be enacted before next season is what we have been told. But moving it to the 30 instead of the 35, if you kick a touchback straight, where it used to just come out to the 25. Five yards, not that big of a difference. Ten yards is a first down. Now that's a little bit different mindset.

Starting at the 35, first year on 30. I think this is going to, I think teams are just going to. Yeah, just boot it, first lot. The whole thought was that if you make it, like, tough to the 35, like, hey, do you want to just give the team the ball at the 35? Or do you want to potentially cover this whole thing? That's going to force 1,600 more plays, is what we are being told, because kickers are going to be forced to land it in the landing zone, pretty much.

We don't want to just blast it out of there and get it at the 35. That's bad news for our coverage team, bad news for our team as a whole. Quite a weapon for them. So them moving that to the 30 just doesn't, it feels like it defeats the entire point of the entire play and what they were looking to do. But I might be wrong. Maybe people will say 30 instead of 25.

Nah, not in our house. I think they're just going to boot it out still. The new starting drive start is just going to be the 30 for most teams. I'm glad you had the same thought because, obviously, I was not in a special teams room every single day like you were. But, like, when this first came out, I said 25 versus 30. Like, these guys are just going to tell them to put it through the end zone still. Like, that was my first initial thought.

And the whole thing was they wanted to flip the percentage of it was 20% in returns or whatever it was last year, and they wanted it to be 80% in returns this year. I don't think this is going to be like a 50-50 thing either. This feels like, hey, just put it through the end zone. end zone yeah screw it we're all starting at the 30 now yeah that's just kind of how it's going which is not what we're supposed to eliminate that right yeah well yeah completely the point was for return so i i think what this potentially was it bummed me out it bummed me out too because i i was finally sold on this yeah i was all in now because i was

completely out on it mickey moss. No offense. Mickey Moss. Trash. That's a drill in practice. That's not an actual game thing. The XFL did it. We understand that. We appreciate them finding a way to keep people safe while also bringing back an electrifying play.

And the NFL basically told special teams coaches, hey, figure it out. Okay? Because if not, we're going to get rid of this boring ass, high impact ass, muscle pull, brain damage play. So you need to get on the same page and figure it out. So they decided, okay, we're going to do this hybrid kickoff thing. Everybody's all in. We're going to pitch our

ideas. And then the competition committee said, we don't need special teams coordinators. You got a better idea. Let's move it to the 30. Perfect. Special teams coordinators are like, we spent an entire year on this. We researched and studied the XFL. We did everything we possibly could. Competition committee said, wait, you're telling us we're not going to have any?

We're not going to do a little dabbling with the play? Yeah, right. Move it to the 30. Yeah, but our reports are telling us, as special teams coordinators, that we're probably just going to – this is just going to become the same thing, just touch back city, but now they're lined up weird. Now you just got them lined up weird. And competition committee was like, we'll make the decisions.

Okay, you guys coach special teams. We'll make the decisions. Then moving it feels like it defeats the entire purpose, but hey, competition committee, Rich McKay, you got a tough job. And got to have say. I get it. Because if that thing passes and changes, you guys didn't do anything to it. Is it your rule or is it actually special teams rule? And how can you hang that up in the office you know

for rich mckay he definitely has to have a little piece of the pie there like you said like the whole part of it obviously the health and safety part but part of it like they said was like hey this is just a ceremonial play now and we need to remove that aspect of it this is this is basically just making it easier so that it's one step further where teams are just going to start at the 30-yard line. And they'll just completely remove it. Congrats, competition committee. You guys got some things accomplished, though. Not everybody's getting – hey, heavy is the head that has to decide

what the rules of the future of football is. We understand that. Not easy trying to save the game, even though the ratings are higher than they've ever been. Right, and still. Still just going up forever. More people playing football available. Was there a lack of people that were available for the Combine?

It didn't look that way. They did invite a lot of Michigan people, though. 18? Yeah, maybe because there wasn't as many. So people not playing football, or are people still playing football? I think they're still playing football. People still playing football? College. Rating still playing football. People still playing football? College.

Ratings still going up? Yeah. Football good then? Football good. Football great. So now we got to change it? Yeah, let's change it. Trying to.

Good luck in there. Good luck. Hey, we'll be in the same building tomorrow. I'm excited to learn more. What's up? I'm excited to learn more about the 25 to 30, how that's going to change anything. This is now just going to become a kicker, the rest of his team, 25 yards down the field, and then a ball kicked into the end zone.

A ball kicked into these stands just like they had been doing. 35 is a little bit different of a conversation. Well, it's only five yards difference. Well, it's only five yards difference on the other side. Ten yards would have been the change. That's a drastic difference. That's a first down. Five yards, it's like.

It's a holding versus a false start. Bingo. Yeah. Speaking of, personal foul, hip drop tackle, that's a whole. That's an entire. That's another aspect to it. That's an entire. I mean, that changes the entire drive.

That changes the entire game. You pick up one of those because somebody's tackling from the side. Like a third and 20. Minga, I believe is what Chuck Pagano would say. It feels like they're doing too much with staying in the NFL before we get to March Madness with old-tone digs. Listen, LeJarius Sneed is a titan. And LeJarius Sneed did not go for a lot.

LeJarius Sneed got traded for next to nothing, but he got a big-time deal. So congrats to Rand Carton and everybody down in Tennessee getting a great corner, who obviously saved the AFC Championship for the Kansas City Chiefs with a precise peanut punch, which caused a fumble at the half-yard line. It is a 2025 third-round pick and a 2024 seventh-round pick flop and then a new contract for Snead.

So if you're going to get a top-end corner, you're going to have to pay him anyways. And what are we going to have to give up in the draft? Nothing, seemingly. Kansas City Chiefs, I guess, just couldn't get a deal done because they did franchise tag him, could have franchise tag Chris Jones. They ended up getting a deal done with him anyway. So weird scenario. I guess the Colts were in on it.

$55 million guaranteed. I think we could have afforded. Instead, he goes to the AFC South, which I'm not necessarily thrilled about, but good for him getting paid. I think that's good news for State. Yeah, fantastic. And the Titans casually are very good at football now. Make a move.

Like, if Will Levis is good, and I feel like we all saw some flashes, like that Miami game where he came back down 14 in the fourth quarter. Like, if he is good, there's a chance that the Colts are last place again in the AFC South for the next 10 years. What? What? At the end of that. I didn't catch anything.

What did he say? I was getting some news there. You talking about the Colts being last place? I'm saying there's a chance when you look around the division on how everybody got. Oh, shut up, Foxy. Oh, shut up, Foxy. I don't like hearing that at all.

What were you saying? You know what the Titans did. Colts are about to win the ACC. Let's make sure that's understood. They're the running for sure. Top four at least. But you know what this did in the last couple weeks? There's only four teams in the division.

So the whole top four thing doesn't. I don't want to change that. But a few weeks ago, we're like, are the Titans going to be the laughingstock of the AFC? And what they did in the last few weeks is they at least changed that perception-wise before the season started. Adding Ridley, adding Snead. Like, those are two of the – they were two of the biggest free agents

out there. For sure. And they seemingly have a plan. Which, congrats to them. Callahan coming in in with his dad who's like the best offensive line coach in the nfl i mean they have a plan they're going to execute it good luck to them and congrats to nashville getting a new stadium upgrade and a brand new face and a brand new team seemingly that is doing very well bringing in some stars joining us now speaking of stars we get to hear this guy all the way until like 3 a.m. on Saturday night sometimes. Yeah, that's right.

Because of how late those UFC fights go to. I mean, we need to stop with that. Yeah. We need to stop. I agree. Move that up an hour. That's just a whole thing, but that's not this guy's decision. This guy, double champ in the UFC, one of the only humans to ever carry two titles at the same damn time.

Obviously, wrestling legend, fighting legend. This past weekend, I heard him call the NCAA Wrestling National Championships, which is just banger after banger after banger after banger. Ladies and gentlemen, Daniel Cormier. Hey, DC! What up, DC? Hey, those UFC fight cards, man. I enjoy hanging out

with you, Rogan and Anik, but like, bro, they're like to four. I don't know how you guys keep energy. Are you housing Red Bull? Like, how do you keep the energy whenever you're there? It's the East Coast ones that are late. The main card doesn't start until 10 p.m., but it's monsters, man. I just kicked a couple monsters.

I'm good to go. But, honestly, you're going on adrenaline, Pat. Like, you know being next to, even in the WWE, right? You're in the WWE watching the matches and everything. You're so jazzed up that it doesn't really feel like you're out there for seven and a half hours. That's how long some of them are? We start at six o'clock in Vegas, go till 10. We start at, I mean, hell, I don't even go to work until 5 p.m on the east coast

start at six main car goes from 10 to 1 in the morning so what are we doing we're sleeping until about 1 p.m 2 p.m or how do we go you know i'm golfing man i fell in love with the game on the east coast i can actually get a morning round on game day is the best i'm i'm michael jordan without the money the championships or the uh beers the beers yeah yeah you're not drunk on air obviously how are you golf i assume you're good you're a freak athlete i'm not very good man but hey listen to this though Pat I'm not good but I'm playing so much that I got a company that even gives me clothes now

they sponsored me like you know you can do this guy's a professional golfer double chain commentator professional golfer I mean you're doing it DC let's get to another job that you added to your repertoire and I saw you were battling on the internet streets I saw you were battling against the wrestling faithful,

the amateur wrestling faithful, the NCAA wrestling people. And before he even started, he goes, guys, I'm out. This will be my last time doing the NCAA tournament. Continue to do things the same way and stay wrestling that hasn't changed since the 40s. I told the general public to watch. A guy told me he'd rather tear his eyes out than watch. So enjoy. I'll finish tonight, and I'm out. I like a little promo to the a guy told me he'd rather tear his eyes out than watch so enjoy I'll finish tonight and I'm out I like a little promo

to the wrestling community that was burying you but I would like to let you know as a very casual and somebody that literally didn't even know the national championships were on Matt Madness is what they were calling it it was awesome I think you made it feel big because of obviously the voice of things that you've had in the UFC and what you've

accomplished it was fantastic to watch I was captivated because of obviously the voice of things that you've had in the UFC and what you've accomplished. It was fantastic to watch. I was captivated. I was locked in. How great does it feel to be back in there, even though some of the people are bashing you? And is that a normal Matt Madness, like that electric? Because the entrance, hey, they're coming out of a tunnel.

We got music. They're coming out there. I'm learning that Penn State is like the greatest wrestling school of all time. Their coach, Kale Sanderson, 149-0 in college, then he goes to the Wednesday Olympic. Now he's 11 of the last 13 national titles. I was captivated, and I thought you did a great job. Is that what it's like every year?

And what is the storylines coming out of that? Penn State's unstoppable? They won by 100 points. They could have split their team in half and still been in the top three teams they are so good this guy kill sanderson i don't know what type of deal he made with the devil but he's won everywhere he won in college he hey hey pat eight of those college victories of the 149 were against a young man from oklahoma state daniel cormier he beat me in the national finals so and then we're on the olympic team together he won the olympics it's like no matter what this guy's done they've won but it was it's

it's insane to be in that a building watching all the pride from the universe pat you know right doing now doing college game day there's nothing like the environment of college sports oh yeah rabid when you get to the NCAA tournament. There's sections of fans with the universities, and all the big universities have hundreds of people packed in one area just going crazy when their athletes go out. It's fun. But I try to tell them, though, right away, I go, hey, man,

I don't have to do this. I don't have to do this. They asked me to do this, and I'm just trying to help the sport that gave me everything. Aaron Brooks is one four-time national champion. I think he only lost three matches his entire career.

His coach right there, that's the guy. That's the guy right there, that bald white. He's the one. He is Neo in this entire thing. I guess he, because Penn State's wrestling program before he got there, I don't know what it was. Obviously, everybody talked about Iowa, Iowa, Iowa.

Then he's got two guys. This is Carter Starocchi. Starocchi? What is it? Starocchi. Carter Starocchi. Four-time national champion. He's pretty good.

He's going to be a UFC guy. He's going to be a UFC guy. He's going to be a UFC guy. Okay, so both of those guys are going to be UFC guys? Because that's the next question. What sucks is four-time national champion down here in the front, Aaron Brooks. Four-time national champion, Carter Storaci up there. Only can win four times. That's the amount of times you can win.

They won national championships the entire time. The guy that Aaron Brooks on the bottom here took on from NC State, I think he's lost Aaron Brooks like three times in the national championship. So it's like that guy's number two in the country. Who cares? Go ahead and get out of here. What's next? It's UFC, WWE, or wrestling coaching

somewhere for these guys? What are your thoughts? So the old way was coaching. But if you look to the left there, you see Aaron Brooks, you see the big old boy to the left. That's Greg Kirkville. he was the heavyweight champ so him and starracci both have their eyes on the ufc the wwe a few years ago started an nil thing where they were bringing wrestlers in at the very beginning they brought in gable stevenson they brought in the creed brothers who are both killing it right now on WWE. Those are my favorites.

I love the Creed brothers. Me too. But those guys have options now. But I think Staracci and Kirk Foley are going to be UFC fighters. The rest, Olympics, man, they go chase down Olympic gold. Jordan Burroughs, who is the great American wrestler, walked up to Carter Staracci because Staracci said after the match, he goes, no friends in this business.

I'm going to be at the Olympic trials in April. Jordan Burroughs told him, go get healthy because you're going to need it. And those guys aren't playing right now when it comes to making Olympic teams, and I love it. I'm here for the match. He was with a torn ACL, I think he won. Isn't that right? Isn't that what it was?

He never said what the injury was, but I watched him about a month ago have such a bad injury that he immediately took his headgear off and they just carried him off the mat. I thought there was no way that he would look as good as he did last weekend, but he did. It was fantastic. Hey, it's magical. The season was great.

I thought you called a great lineup. I mean, how many different weights are there? 10 weight classes, 20 different kids wrestle the finals, but I did every one of the night sessions, which go on Big ESPN. So I did the round of 16, the semifinals, and the finals.

We got a lot of eyes on wrestling, man, and that's exactly what I want to do. Yeah, I watched it. I loved it. The internet also loved Paul. There's a redshirt freshman who got, hey. Yeah, one leg's going one way, one leg's going the other. Brock Hardy there is getting his groin ripped by a guy named Jesse Mendez. And this used to be called Banana Split, or has it always been a splidal?

And how does this happen, and what do you do from here if this happens to be called banana split or has it always been a splidal and how does this happen and what do you do from here if this happens to you Pat you know what you do you hope that nobody gets the camera angle from the other side where you're looking between your feet and your ass butt I'm sorry I almost cussed I'm acting like I'm on YouTube

you're looking like you're looking between your legs towards the camera that is not good because you're helpless this is not something that you practice getting out of. There are a lot of moves that you train to make sure it doesn't happen to you. Nobody tries this. So for Brock Hardy, by the way, a cool name, put in this, and this dude's on Worldstar now. He's on the McAfee show.

That kid has four more years to go through this, and he will never live that down. So unfortunate. Luckily, he lives in Nebraska will never live that down. So, unfortunate. Luckily, he lives in Nebraska, where there just aren't many people, Joe. That's what I have to hear about at the gas station. Hey, Brock, you're going to be all right. You're going to be all right, Brock. Hey, that's going to happen.

Sometimes when you're living in the paint, you're going to get posterized. Okay, whenever you sign up to go out there, there's a chance you're going to get your nuts and your groin ripped apart. And that's just life in the circle. We appreciate you for not only the work you do, but also we get to spend a lot of long nights with you and Joe and John. You guys do a fantastic

job. You're the standard up there. Thank you so much, man. I appreciate it. Hey, I'm going to see you out in Philly. You're going to be out in Philly. WrestleMania season's upon us. WrestleMania season's upon us. WrestleMania season's upon us. I'm in Philly, baby. What are you doing?

You got a little something cooking up on the road to WrestleMania here? I'm just interviewing. I'm just interviewing people, and I'm just taking in the sights. And then I do the post show. I'm taking in the sights. Okay. You're not. There's no.

Man, last time they brought me out there, they put me in a referee's shirt, and I don't look good in stripes. They did me wrong, man. Yeah, well, it's the white, too. I mean, that is, yeah, I get it. Ladies and gentlemen, Daniel Cormier. Thank you, DC. I thought you did a great job.

Yeah, fantastic. I mean, obviously he was in the middle of a lot of basketball games, and the way they decided to set it up, and I think Turner's done a great job broadcasting. Absolutely. The four balds, the four balds, you know, Ernie, Clark, Kenny, and Charles. Yep. Four balds are always great to watch.

You know, and the way they break down ball is good. But if a couple of those games get bad, it does get a little bit boring. Yeah. No point to watch. I was planning on watching this game. Let me go find a bet maybe that is not risk-free. No, no. There are no risk-free bets.

Hey, that bet hit, though. It did. It will not get remembered in the entire story. EKD, Reese Davis. Reese Davis said something you can't say, obviously, in the gambling world because we understand the risks involved. Reese owned up to that. I think he was just trying to compliment and put over EKD for her research

in the way she laid something out. Said something you can't say. He's going to have to own that. With that being said, bet did hit. Bet did hit. Bet did go because UConn is a wagon. Not only on the offensive side, but on the defensive side. So the reaction to Reese Davis, we understand.

Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. Reese probably feels immense regret and terrible. But bet did hit. But you can't be saying that something's risk-free because nothing's risk-free in gambling. Anything can happen. Like Oakland can go on a run for one game and then... Almost had it.

And then lose it in the next round. The underdogs were hot in the first round. So hot. Boston Connor was blindly betting the underdogs of every single first round and second round game. How'd you end up? Because the favorites end up going 15 in one straight up on Saturday and Sunday in the second round. But in the first round,

I feel like you were dancing a pretty good bit. First round was unbelievable. Saturday woke up, felt great. Cause Friday ended with grand Canyon, Yale, and I believe Colorado winning back to back to back. Hey,

that Colorado incredible. Oh, what a moment. Incredible. Yeah. Great moment. So going into the weekend, okay, this is where these underdogs go on that historic run. You know, you get your Florida Gulf Coast.

We're dancing. You get your St. Pete's with the dude Doug Ebert who's got the mustache. VCU. And he's shooting. VCU. FAU. Chicago, Illinois. Whatever.

Yeah, Chicago, Illinois. Sister Jean. Yeah, and a 90-year-old nun. Bingo. You get those. Happens every year. Didn't happen this year. Well, we just said seven over the last 30 years.

I think that's kind of the thing. We get enamored with the dancing from the past that has taken place, but not every year is necessarily going to have the magic, especially whenever you're betting on every underdog. No, the ones we listed went damn near the Final Four, Elite Eight. There usually is one or two that squeak into the Sweet 16.

Clemson was the only one that beat a favorite and that was over baylor and clemson's a six seed so it's not like they're you know huge underdog ended up i think down 621 so the underdog bet yeah could be much worse than what it was but because of those massive wins friday night it wasn't wasn't too shabby we talked about it the underdog blind, probably a round of 64 thing, not a round of 32. First round, blindly betting the underdogs with the points. Just

money line. Just money line. Just money line. Just blindly bet them. It worked out great going into the weekend. You ended up being what? I was up like $1,200, $1,300. Betting $100 a pop. So that's up 12 units. Yes, up 12 units. That's why I'm only down you know five units because going into saturday sunday we were in a great spot so people that are watching

please remind us next year this is what we're doing yeah first round blindly money line underdogs it's a good time foxy did the same thing he just didn't do the ones yeah the one seeds ones and twos yeah and you ended up making a lot of oh yeah it worked out so great and then the weekend was tough yeah the weekend was tough because all the favorites get a win. Tone, was there anything that we missed there in the storylines of this March Madness that has taken place yet? Doing the news. Doing the news. Doing the news.

Doing the news. With Tone Diggs. Hey, good spirit, Hans. Yeah, before we do the news, I just want to disclaimer. On Daze! Hey, good spirit, Hans. Yeah, before we do the news, I just want to disclaimer. Yes, if you place a bet, you can lose it, okay? All you gambling marks out there who are upset with Reese. Yeah, okay, you can lose.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. They got a point, Tony. But with that being said, can't be saying, you know what I mean? Sure. We cannot be saying that something is risky. Risk-free investment. Yeah, now sometimes some of these sports books do offer up a no sweat or a risk-free because even if you lose, you will get the money back. But whenever you're giving opinions on bets, you can't be saying this. You used to be able to, like, mortal lock.

Oh, yeah. This is the evolution of covering gambling. Reese knows that now. I think all Reese was trying to do was compliment EKD on her research. Can't stress enough. Bet did hit. Bet did hit, but Reese can't be doing that. Sorry about that. Let's go back to do the

news about March Madness and maybe even NIT news if we missed anything. NIT news, let's just start right there. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar dominated. Still in. Dominated Minnesota after we had him on. Indiana State's looking expensive to the company. Watch out.

We just scheduled a meeting with them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If they win the NIT. There's nothing. We just want to chit-chat with them a couple days after the National Championship, or the NIT Championship, if they make it through there. A lot of local news around here in Indiana, like, Pat's going to be paying these guys if they win.

Oh! Never said that. Did say that, but then we had to walk it back. Because there was a situation that happened with UND where they actually told us that there's a chance because of what we said, they were going to just disqualify the entire school. So we don't want to get back into that ever again. So we're just setting up a meeting if they happen to win.

Even if they don't. We would like a meeting a couple days afterwards. But in that meeting, there might be a conversation about congratulations on a new NIL deal with the Pat McAfee show because of what you accomplished, and because Robbie Avila was so kind to

come in here in full uniform. Have you guys watched those clips? Guys in full uniform right here. Love them. Funny. Good for Indiana State. Good luck to anybody else in the NIT. They're rolling over there. Terre Haute, mayor in Indiana, former Army Ranger. I guess you're always an Army Ranger.

Invited me to come to the game tomorrow night in Terre Haute, in Terre Dice. So we can go hit a couple spots here in Terre Haute. Ballyhoove, I believe, is one place I used to go to whenever training camp was out there. It's a beautiful town. We'll be in Orlando tomorrow, Mr. Mayor. We'll be in Orlando. Maybe in the next round. I don't know how it works. Maybe the next round we'll be able to make it happen. We'd love to get out there. I think the finals is down here at Butler, but I could be wrong.

It is. Okay. Mr. Mayor, we would like to host you. If it ends up working, I apologize for not being able to make it, but I am behind the wagon that is the Sycamores in the NIT, and I think we all should. Not because it's a guarantee. We're not saying that.

No. But are you betting against Rob Wave? No. Are you betting against Steph Blurry? No chance. Are you betting against Larry Nerd? No chance. Me neither.

That's not a lock, but it's certainly a good time. You can't spell guarantee without NIT, Pat. But let's get to the March Madness, okay? That's right. You spell it the way you spell it. Me neither. That's not a lock, but it's certainly a good time. And you can't spell guarantee without N-I-T, Pat. But let's get to the March Madness, okay? That's right. You spell it the way you spell it. Well said. Thursday and Friday did start fast and furious with the Dawgs. Obviously, Golke, our guy who came in on Friday,

Oakland upset at Kentucky, was the biggest one of them all in the first round. He was awesome. Duquesne was also a massive first round upset over BYU. Yale, when we were landing on Friday after we got home from Iowa, Yale-Auburn was one of the wildest finishes that I've ever seen. An unbelievable call to end that game. Yale was

another upset. Grand Canyon over St. Mary's was a big one. Hey, Grand Canyon. That was awesome. Hey, their fans are awesome. Their fans are electrifying. They are awesome. Last night I was watching, and I couldn't help but hear, there's a Grand Canyon lady who was squealing directly into a microphone. Not just when good things were happening.

The entirety of, like, the first half, she was out there wailing into a mic. Not her fault. I appreciate her passion. But somebody around there is going to be able to redirect the microphone so we don't hear. It was like it was like Mr. Mr. from Happy Gilmore type squeal

almost. Grand Canyon's fans are awesome. They were very passionate about it. They are awesome. I found out about Grand Canyon last year when we were out there for the Super Bowl because their billboards are out there everywhere for their basketball team and learned that they have an incredible basketball team. Grand Canyon's in Arizona. Yeah. Of course.

Right there in Scottsdale or Phoenix, wherever it is. That's awesome. And then the last upset was, congrats to PFT JMU over Wisconsin on Friday night. I saw him in a tuxedo. Yeah, I think he was coming from a wedding or something like that. That was awesome. That was incredible.

It's always awesome. But all those upsets, they would go on to lose. As you guys mentioned, 15-1 were the favorites in the round of 32. 15-2 against the spread were the favorites by double digits in this tournament so far. So all the teams that were except the two two, the 15 and two against spread, were both losses. They were those upsets on Thursday and Friday. Things that have been dominant in this tournament, okay?

The defending national champion, UConn Huskies, have been absolutely dominant. So good. They're not going to lose. What are we even doing here? Greeny said this morning that he thinks that they can make the playoffs in the Eastern Conference of the NBA. That's stupid. You have to say it to Greeny? That's stupid, Mike. the Eastern Conference of the NBA. That's stupid.

You have to say it to Greeny? That's stupid, Mike. I would. Hey, Mike, that's stupid. Yeah, we all would say the same thing, but Greeny, I think he was just trying to make the point about, hey, there's different levels to this shit, seemingly, that UConn is playing at a different level than everybody else. One, sports media, a little bit too far.

Yeah. You know, just always dancing on, like, the reality. Let's make a point right let's get something across and then also you know just want to prove like yeah yeah it could be the business it's always here yeah probably could i mean who knows but make the playoffs in the eastern conference was a wild thing to say but that is just how dominant they have been in jay will i heard him talking they execute too it's not just a strategy and a play. It's like execution times 10 on the defensive side and on the offensive side. They are a professional outfit.

Yeah. Up there in UConn, the reigning champs. UConn, not the only one seed to be dominant. One seed overall are 8-0 straight up, as we know, and 7-1 against the spread. The other one seed that's been very, very dominant is Purdue. Oh! Yeah. Oh, the Boilermakers going bananas this weekend.

Yeah, especially Edie, who is the second player since 1968. That was Lew Alcindor, who, you know, would then go on to be Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, to have 50-plus points, 35-plus rebounds, and 65% field goal shooting. So, Edie and Purdue has been absolutely dominant so far. I heard Kenny DeJette Smith break it down. He was in a sick pinstripe. So, Eadie and Purdue has been absolutely dominant. I heard Kenny DeJette Smith break it down. He was in a sick pinstripe. He was one-fourth of the Balds covering college ball. That looked fantastic.

He was like, people keep saying Zach Eadie's too slow or whatever. He's a center. He's an old-school center. That is how he plays. He plays as a five. He doesn't play as the modern power forward that's out there. His feet, when he gets an angle, how he plays defensively, he's just classic

center, and he's a dog. I don't know if you heard the commentators talking. They said he was in the best shape maybe in years past because of how big he is. It's not easy just to run and do cardio because the knees and the joints. This year, he's in the best shape that he's been in. His body's in the best that it's been. I think he's kind of just like maturing with his body,

being able to keep up with it, and he's got a killer mentality. I've gotten a chance to chat with him at the ESPYs, and then on the internet we've had a couple interactions. He's a dog. He's an absolute dog. In the early exit out of the Big Ten Championship, whenever everybody said, this is what Purdue does, I think it was a reaffirmer of like, hey, unless you win, everybody's just going to think Purdue's always Purdue, but not this year.

Exactly. The Boilermakers are no longer going to be out early. The Boilermakers are going to be brewing in that kitchen for a long time. It feels like it. It's not just Zach Eaddy. They've got another big. They've got another. Like, they've got big.

They've got size. They've got bands for days. Oh, yes. They are very large. Gump, did you go watch them down at Gainbridge this weekend? I did not make it down there. Oh, okay. Wow. He was getting the all-day pass. Yeah, a very large gump. Did you go watch them down at Gainbridge this weekend? I did not make it down there. Oh, okay. He was getting the all-day pass.

Yeah, that's what I thought. I thought you were going to all the sessions. Yeah, by myself, I just couldn't do it. I apologize. Nobody would go with you to watch the Purdue Boilermakers? Not a chance. To be fair. I asked everybody.

I had time with my wife and the baby. Me too. I would have said your tone. I was gone. Where's the DTBs? I thought we wanted to go watch the Purdue Boilermakers. The team might win a national championship. Well, now that they've made it past the opening round, sure,

maybe it would be a good investment. But Gup and I were so busy supporting the woman of Fairfield on Saturday down in Indiana that we were so pro the women's tournament that we didn't want to also dive in on Sunday. We love women's basketball. Yes, we do. We're in Iowa on Friday for it. Saturday, what did me and Connor do with talk?

Go see Fairfield play. Drive an hour and a half down to Bloomington and watch the Stags get their asses. Great first half. Who's the girl on the Indiana team? Sarah Scalia. She is a problem for Indiana. I think she went for like 27 points in the second half. Yeah, like she was hitting step-back threes.

There was like a four-minute run in the third quarter where Indiana could not miss. There was really nothing you could do. And the Fairfield girls, they fought hard. Hell of a season. 31-2. 31-2. Janelle Brown, their best player, was talking shit from opening tip until they were down by 50 in the fourth quarter. That's a stag basketball. That's a stag basketball.

That's a stag basketball, baby. Look out. They're going to be back. They're going to be back with a reckless abandonment. Why are you laughing? Why are you laughing? Because you're laughing. I wasn't laughing.

Yeah, you were. I was about to ask you some questions about the team, but then I didn't want to put you in a spot. No, no, go on. Because you're celebrating the alumni. You and Parker giving up hand signals. Yeah, I know. We don't have.

You guys put up the wolves. No, that's a stag. That's a stag. That's not a wolf. What's a stag? Illuminati? No. No.

Is that the devil? Is that ice spice? What is a stag? Well, that is Lucas the stag. Of course, as everyone knows, because, of course, the stag's name is Lucas. And, no, stag is... You guys are doing the ice spice. No, we're not doing the ice...

I didn't know that about you. I know what ice spice was doing, if you want to see what I... You guys were shaking your cheeks. No, I'm talking about the Super Bowl and the jump boat trip. Everybody needs to relax. We're not putting cheeks out here on this particular lot to talk about Monday. That'd be even more to talk about on Mondayay but i do appreciate the support of the women's basketball tournament because it has been electrifying one team and i know we're doing

the news with tone digs something i saw this weekend this south carolina team almost won by yeah oh yeah i mean they are they are unstoppable and they're pissed oh yeah like they are they're up 44 i think at one point somebody definitely uh definitely from North Carolina did a reach-in, and a South Carolina girl, like, hit off her knee, and it goes out of bounds. They were furious that a foul wasn't called. Just in the middle of the court, they had just gone off probably a 13-0 run, up 40 points,

furious and pissed that there wasn't a call. It's like, didn't win the natty last year. The LSU team, you know, the LSU team's got a lot going on. They do. They do. They've got a lot going on right now. They didn't look as good as you could imagine. You talk about Iowa.

Okay, Iowa's going to have to get hot before they face it. This South Carolina team may be the most dominant basketball team I've ever seen on the court. And they, hey, we got like six eights. It seems like they're all like 100. A lot of size. And they all, that South Carolina team is going to be a problem. Iowa's got the heart. LSU's got the pedigree, obviously.

They've won national championship. But that women's tournament seemingly goes through one team and one team alone. That's a team that hasn't lost yet and doesn't seem to be anywhere close. Stanford did great. Yep. And they got into a fight. UConn, I think they're playing the night with Paige. Yes.

They're doing their thing. So it's like great tournament. I'm enjoying watching it. You watch that South Carolina team play basketball in time. I don't want to be greeny, but it's like that team. They might be able to. We were talking yesterday. I was getting ready to get on a flight

to come back here. We were talking about South Carolina. I said, some team is going to need to shoot 100 threes and shoot 80% from three to beat them. And you stopped me and basically said, no, some team is going to have to shoot all these players. That's the only way they're going to lose. I mean, because when you see a score like that, you're like,

oh, they must have played Bemidji State. Oh, okay, they played North Carolina. North Carolina. Played North Carolina and beat them by 60. So, yeah, I mean, it's crazy. They are phenomenal, and good luck to them. Hey, good luck out there all. Good luck, Charles.

Obviously, we're in Iowa. Caitlin, they get a big-time win over Holy Cross tonight. They got a tough West Virginia team. Tough. Hey, this West Virginia team tonight, don't sleep on them. 8 o'clock. I know they're 15.5-point underdogs. Not bad. I don't matter. But. 8 o'clock. I know they're 15.5-point underdogs. Not bad.

I don't matter. But they're in Iowa, and the way they play is right for this Iowa. Oh, man. What? I can see it on your face. You should just mentally prepare for Kaitlin Clark scoring 50 points tonight in West Virginia. It did start a little slow, that Iowa Hawkeyes team.

They had a two-week off time. Yep, exactly. Which Coach Bluter told us about whenever she was on our show on Friday hey two weeks happy we're a one seed taking on a 16 no offense to Holy Cross but we are very fortunate that we have some time to maybe get back into the heater and they did towards the end Caitlin ends up with 27 she could steal it whenever she wanted she was on I think she was two boards away from a triple double so she got hot late team got got hot late. But it's like they got a tough West Virginia Mountaineer

team tonight. And the West Virginia Spirit squad flying all over Carver. We're talking about flying. We did see them. Yeah, they were practicing. They won that competition that we were watching. They did. Yeah, they were in a corner over there at the field house that we were at. Sharing it with the three other teams that are at a small space.

Small space. For tossing people in the air. It was kind of crazy. Could have gotten a little bit more room, I think. Yeah, I thought so. Well, there's pickleball here. Yeah, a couple kids playing pickleball on the other side. So, you know.

The whole what we were allowed to do in that entire place was certainly a conversation beforehand. But we thank everybody that came and hung out at the field house in the middle of that blizzard. We can finish the news now on March. Yeah. A couple more things need flowers before we head out of here. And they're both conferences. Number one, being the big East.

A lot of people thought that they should have probably six teams in. They only got three teams in those teams went six and Oh, straight up five and one against the spread. The big East is, is doing very well right now. The other conference that they, they thought should have a couple more teams in, specifically Pitt, the ACC.

The ACC went 8-1 straight up, 7-2 against the spread. That includes that shitty Virginia team that they let in for some reason. And the only Cinderella left, the only team that didn't turn into a pumpkin at midnight before they got home, the NC State Wolfpack, baby.

They are the 11th seed that is still left in the tournament. Went to overtime in that absolutely bananas game, but they are the Cinderella left from the ACC. Those conferences are destroying. DJ Burns? Yes. Junior, I believe. I love him.

Dog. I absolutely love him. The things that he does, like the way he does it, is fantastic. He's big. And once he gets that right short, don't let him turn right. Do not. Don't let him turn right. Don't let him turn.

Easier said than done. In theory, you shouldn't let him do this right here. But as soon as – ha, ha, bah. Go ahead, Tom. Sorry, after you finish your point, there was one thing left. You have to give this person flowers, too, because they no longer existed. That's the Nebraska Cornhuskers. Yeah, Nebraska Cornhuskers ended quickly, and they lost by a lot.

They did. That was a real shame. There was a hater on that team. Alec, I think is his name, A-L-L-I-C-K, maybe number 43. He might be a little bit of a K-side Tominaga hater. He might be out of town. He pushed him. I don't know if you saw him after Tominaga flexed on guy.

Yeah. He pushed him and then pushed him in the back of the head. Didn't love that. And then there was a couple times early in the game where it was like Tominaga was definitely open, not passing it to him. Now, I have not watched this Nebraska team at all. Sure. At not one time.

That was my first time seeing him. But my couple thoughts were like, I don't think 43 is a big fan of Tom and Auga. And then he goes and pushes him in the back of the head. I'm like, wait a second. What's going on over there? I think K-Say is potentially a little bit of a dog where they've got to wrangle him.

Yeah. Hey, you've got to keep this thing down. Now, he was very emotional afterwards, but you're damn right. I was bummed out that we will no longer see the Cornhuskers. Tone, whenever we're thinking about the next round of games, when will they be for this March Madness? Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday again. Sweet 16 Thursday, Friday, and then they go to the lead eight for

Saturday and Sunday. And then we'll be on to the final four. Now, is it exciting that a lot of the dogs didn't make it? No, but at least you know all the best teams are going to be here in the next round. Yeah, there's a lot of teams we don't know of and haven't heard of, and know all the best teams, quote-unquote best teams, are going to be here in the next round. Yeah, there's a lot of teams we don't know of and haven't heard of, and then that's what March Madness is all about, learning about new players,

new schools, new legacies being made right in front of our eyes. Now let's pivot away from that. Let's go to Donovan Mill. Okay. You know, there's things always kind of getting talked about, and we only have a certain amount of eyes and a certain amount of time, so we can't get to the bottom of everything. But there's rumors that are in abundance all the time. So it's time to visit our friend Donnie Don Don in the rumor mill.

Boys, boys, how are we doing today, huh? Okay, Donnie Don Don down there in the rumor mill. You look fantastic, Donnie. It's good to be here. I feel fantastic, Pat. I mean, the hands are a little tired because it's been a long day at the mill. Okay, I appreciate that. What have you been hearing down there?

What are some of the rumors that we need to keep an eye on from Donnie Don Don in the rumor mill? Well, from what I'm hearing, rumor has it, Kaitlyn Clark's dad has continued to scream at Kaitlyn Clark. Now, we all saw Foxy, if you could run it, please. Kaitlyn Clark, you know, complaining, whining, being pissed, and her dad saying, why don't you just shut up, Caitlin? Shut up now! Now, I don't know for sure, but rumor has it that Caitlin Clark's dad,

Mr. Clark, hasn't been this mad since he found out John Wayne Gacy was the inventor of his favorite sandwich, which would be the Chicken Little, which was invented in Waterloo, Iowa. Yeah, 72 miles away from campus. We do not know if Kaitlin Clark's dad even knows that John Wayne Gacy was once Man of the Year in Waterloo, Iowa. He's from Des Moines, so probably not. Okay. I heard he does know, actually, Ty.

Funny enough, rumor has it he used to go to that specific KFC every single weekend as a child. All right, we don't know if that's true or not. And that is an altered image that is not real. That's him right there. That's him right there. Yeah, okay. All right, we see you, Donnie, Don, Don. We don't know if a lot of that is true, but we did see Kaitlin Clark's dad kind of say, hey, enough.

Kaitlin does do a lot of. Oh, yeah. A lot. Oh, yeah. Too much, her dad would say. Clark's dad kind of say, hey, enough. Kaitlyn does do a lot of. Oh, yeah. A lot. Oh, yeah. Too much, her dad would say. You're right, Donnie Don Don. She's active, though. Oh, yeah, big time.

On the refs, you know, about other stuff. She grew up watching the Bronx. Is that what it's like? Shut up, he says. Clear his day. And I think at one point he even says, like, take her out. Like, bench her. What's that going to be like in WNBA?

Who knows? What else are you hearing down there in the room, real Donnie Don Don? Well, funny enough, Pat, rumor has it our favorite player, Kasey Tominaga, is unfortunately no longer with us. And I'm not saying he's no longer with us because the Nebraska Cornhuskers lost by 50. He actually performed seppuku on himself, stabbed himself through the chest, in the heart,

because he felt as though he brought a dishonor to himself, his family, and the Nebraska Cornhuskers. Now, that is just what I am hearing at the rumor mill. I have not confirmed yet with the obituary whether or not this actually happened. We'll confirm it. He's not dead. He's not dead. How do you know? Have you talked to Casey Tomnock?

Because, Foxy, if you could show him the photos. This guy was so devastated, he actually flew back to Japan to do the seppuku on Mount Fuji. No, that is not real. He was last seen climbing Mount Fuji with a 25-foot sword. That's all made up. That's all made up. Rumor has it the 25-foot sword was given to him by his own father, who actually the sword was made in an image of his father.

So if he were to seppuku, which is the Japanese teaching of taking your own life, samurai culture, that is allegedly, what I'm hearing, what happened to Keisei Tomonaga. So we will never see him again. Yeah, we'll never see him again because he probably won't be playing basketball in the NBA. Who knows? The Nebraska Cornhuskers are done, and we only got to see him play one game. And it wasn't that great of a game. It was good, though.

Did you see K.C. talking junk the whole time to the big guy after he fouled? You see that one? Yeah, he kind of understood. Yeah, he's not dead, though, from everything we know. What else? Rumor has it he's dead. No, no, he's not. We won't see him play basketball again, but, yeah, he's not dead.

What else are you hearing down there in the rumor mill, Donnie? Unfortunately, rumor has it another guy is dead. And I'm not talking about my friend Donnie B because he put all of his money on one bet that Rhys Davis told him to put. Allegedly, we are hearing that Rh davis has forced over 10 million people into bankruptcy and homelessness because he told them that the bet was a risk-free investment now yes that bet did hit i understand that pat however rumor has it some people parlayed that no another it's not reese fault, but rumor has it

all the families that are planning funerals for people he killed are actually missing him. You're going too far. I'm just telling you what is happening over at the rumor mill. This isn't me. I am telling you what I am hearing, and I am hearing

that Reese Davis has become one of the biggest reasons for homelessness in the United States. No, no, the bed hit. In the United States in the first quarter of 2024. The bed hit. The bed hit. That is just what the rumor mill is saying. Whether the bed hit or not, fine.

I guess it did. With that being said, Reese Davis is stealing money out of people's bank accounts. Okay. That's what people are saying. All right, that's not true. Obviously, Reese Davis feels terrible about it, but he can't be's what people are saying. That's not true. Obviously, Reece Davis feels terrible about it, but he can't be saying what you're saying. He did issue an apology. Rumor has it

he feels terrible. He does. It's not just what we're hearing. It's what we're witnessing as well. He put out an entire thing about, hey, can't be doing that. He learned a lesson. He feels terrible. We understand that you cannot do that if you're on TV, especially talking to people who are putting their hard-earned money onto things.

That bet did hit, but nonetheless, not a good message. What else are you hearing, Donnie? Don, Don? Unfortunately, something else is going to hit, Pat, and it seems as though that may be a lawsuit against LSU head coach Kim Mulkey. Now, from what I am hearing, there is a chance that during a practice to motivate the girls this is just what I'm hearing

she brought an animal in and took a massive sword cut that animal's head off said, see girls, this is how you get shit done on your own. After doing that, she skinned the bear, she put the

coat on as a jacket for her next game, and then after skinning the bear, made all the players sit inside the dead bear so that they could feel what it was like to be on the inside of something that is dead, unlike the LSU basketball team, very much alive.

Donnie, we did not hear that happen, but I think what you're referring to... Rumor has it that's what happened. I don't know anything for sure, but the rumor mill is buzzing about this. I saw someone else also say that Kim Mulkey reached out to a couple very questionable people for

motivation of the team. She put together a video. The video started with the merchant of death kind of telling, kind of hurtful. Donnie, that's not true, Donnie. No, no, no. She's threatening to sue Washington Post the other way around. That's not a rumor.

Rumor doesn't have that, Pat. That is fact. Kim Mulkey will be suing whoever the hell comes out with that article. All right. Obviously, that was an interesting press conference for Kim Mulkey, who alerted to the world that a Washington Post article about her is coming out. We didn't hear anything about a bear being skinned or anything. That's just from the rumor mill, Pat.

Now, it could have been a goat. It could have been a horse. We don't know if any animals were harmed in the entire thing, but it is supposed to be alarming. We've got about a minute left here, Donnie. What's something else that you're hearing maybe down there? Dan Hurley's a psychopath. Now, rumor has it that he's a psychopath, but

also pictures have it that he's a psychopath. He only eats eight M&M's in his pregame routine. Allegedly, one time he ate nine. He almost punched eight holes in the locker room. He only drinks bulletproof coffee on the sidelines because one time, allegedly, he had

Starbucks and he pooped his drawers and he had to change his entire his entire kind of bottom there and he wears the same clothes that's pretty standard rumor has it he is an absolute nut job okay well i don't know if he's a nut job or if he's a genius one or the other they're getting a job done just like you donnie need you to get a little bit more context on the things that you're hearing down there next time that's not what the rumor was about i'm just listening and I'm telling. Okay. You know what I'm telling you? What's that? White on white on white on white

in this particular rumor mill. Good luck. Yeah. Good luck. I'm white. Hey, my wife's watching, Donnie. Take it easy. Ladies and gentlemen, Donnie Don Don. Hey, Donnie! I've got some reviews from Donnie Don Don. Rumor has it it's the new allegedly, apparently,

feels like this should be a third-hour segment. Yeah. Could get the show canceled. Sports Emmy incoming, and Donnie is very tan. Okay, well, hey, Donnie needs maybe a little spray tan before hitting the next rumor mill. But he had it close. He's in the ballpark.

The whole what was going on with Malky Dyer. Yeah. There's no rumors about what he's... That seems to be creative liberties there from Donnie. Probably. Ladies and gentlemen. What? Joining us now from an attic in Ohio

who wasn't able to join us from an attic in Ohio because he was on an island in the Caribbean for the last week and a half with no luggage for he, his 10 kids, and his bride. Ladies and gentlemen, college football national champion, Super Bowl champion, Ryder Cup winner, the president of Ohio, the all-time leading tackler for the Green Bay Packers, a very tanned and rejuvenated A.J. Hawk. A.J. Hawk.

Cloudy, no sun? Oh, no, you know my skin does not really take the sun very well, so I am applying SPF 50 about 400 times a day, especially when I'm in Jamaica. I forgot that is your move. It's almost impressive. It's a good influence because I'm supposed to do that as well with my particular set of Caucasian skin cells.

I should be loading up in abundance on the sunscreen, but you're the only one I've ever been around who is actually responsible about it, but it is a bit obsessive. Have you always been? What sunburn did you get that that's became you? All of them, I would say.

From a young age, I've been a very pale kid. So I try to get ahead of it. So I jump in the pool, throw the football around, 30 minutes, boom, reapply. Do that all day long. Did you ever get the blisters before? Oh yeah, I mean peeling, everything. Some poison? Blisters? I had peeling, everything. Some poison?

Listers? I have listers on my back. I want noodling. I want noodling in a lake. That's third degree, brother. I want noodling in a lake and noodling is when you fist a fish. You fist a fish. To do that, you've got to find a hole in the side of the lake or in the bottom of the lake

in which they are living. So you are basically punching the front door down as you go in there. They're attacking you. You're going through their mouth, out the gill, then you're locking in the other side, and you're pulling a dinosaur out of its home. That is what noodling is for catfish, okay? I did not know that's what I was signing up for whenever I signed up for it,

but it is electrifying. But what I didn't realize is as I was bending down, trying to get into the holes on the side of the lake, the sun was just cooking my entire back. I had blisters from the top of my spine down to my ass cheek. I've never felt that before. Sun poisoning, whatever the case. Back of the head in there.

So that, I think for like three years after that, I was like, I'm never happening again. Never happening again. Never happening again. But then you forget. You ever forget? All the time. All the time. So I get out in the sun.

I'm like, I live in Indiana where there's no sun for five months. Give me all the sun I could possibly get. And then I end up cooked. And then it didn't happen to you. Congrats to you. Welcome back. AJ, a lot has happened. Hip drop tackle banned since last time we talked.

Now, it had been floated as a rule proposal for this owner's meeting this weekend. It has been unanimously decided upon to get banned from the NFL. You cannot outweigh yourself, okay, when you're running next to or behind somebody. And you cannot land on the bottom half of their legs below the knee. We are trying to get that particular tackle out of the game. And if you listen to the video that Tom Pellicero posted from the owner's meeting. On awaiting yourself as a defender and landing on your opponent's leg, you've heard us say before that the injury rate for this sort of tackle compared to the typical tackle is at least 20 times more. Boom. So now we got injury rate. This same thing that happened

with kickoff, 20 times more. They're putting the numbers in there. But there's some tackles here, AJ, like that one, that just kind of look like a standard tackle that has been happening in anything that involves getting another human on the ground since the beginning of time. That feels like a late hit right there. And we can also understand that you don't want them rolling up on people's legs.

But the way that this is going to have to be ruled by the refs on the field is definitely going to cause a massive amount of shit at some point. And some of these things seemingly are impossible to avoid. AJ, all-time leading tackler for the Green Bay Packers, a man who's had to do this a lot. Your thoughts on the hip drop tackle that we just learned the name of via Warren Sharp, I think, on the internet within the last year or whatever. No football people actually teach it that way.

What are your thoughts on this, and are you as pissed off as seemingly every person that's ever tackled somebody on a football field professionally? Yeah, I mean, how could you not be pissed when you hear this? Like, first off, what does it mean to swivel your body? So there's a certain hip drop where I don't swivel, where they won't give a 15-yarder an automatic first down, but there's other than one I will.

So you remember when I did that steel where i'm running next to it and then i take it and i do the whole twisty woohoo so what if i would have just taken that thing and just wrote it down like a bulldog yep in wrestling so i think that's without the swivel so i am just i'm grabbing her when you dip, we dip, and we're going down together next to each other as opposed to grabbing and swiveling. Because, yeah, I got on weight myself too. So I think that's what they're talking about, like a bulldog in wrestling.

Okay, so we talk about the refs all the time. Now we're putting more on the refs. We're putting more subjective calls on them. And can you challenge this? Because this could have a huge impact on our game. AJ, these refs know what they're looking at when they see it they see nobody knows nobody knows what they're looking at when it comes to this whole situation what are you talking about what do you know aj i don't know anything i just know it's tough to get guys on the ground if

you're running next to somebody how are you supposed to tackle them now like i i'm not saying like you said no one's ever taught hey this is a hip tackle. This is what you do if you're in this situation. That does not happen. But it's just football. You have to get the guy on the ground however you can. Now, I understand some of those look nasty. They really do. But it's going to happen.

Like, things happen on the field. What about the injury rate 20 times more to get hurt? What do you think about that? Who are the people doing the stats? Do they know what a hip drop tackle is? Exactly, yeah. We can't even define the thing. And you tell me we have stats about it? How do think about that? Who are the people doing the stats? Do they know what a hip drop tackle is? Exactly, yeah. We can't even define the thing, and you tell me we have stats about it? How do we do that?

Who's watching for the stats? They got PFF going. Well, that's one right there. That's two hip drops. That's one right there. That's three hip drops. There we go. He unweighted.

There was an unweighted. This guy's a hip dropping son of a bitch right here. We got him week in, week out, hip dropping all over the place. It's like you hear Cam Jordan, Richard Sherman, J.J. Watts said, let's just put the flags on now. Be done with it. Let's just do it. Because if they're banning this, what's next?

What is next? What's afterwards? And it's like almost becoming impossible to be a defender. Now, you can see how people with tinfoil hats on sure conspiracy theorists would say of course well it's because they want more points they want more you know highlights they want the ball to be flying they want people to be able to pull away because along he might go all the way is leading pretty much every highlight on every sports so they're only doing this so that offenses can get even better

and defenses have even more of a difficult time stopping them. And it's hard not to agree with those people because how the hell are you supposed to not unweight yourself when you're running next to someone or behind? Yeah. How are you supposed to? I don't. I'm unweighting myself on every single tackle I ever attempt.

That's the thing. No. I have to. Because you're not allowed to do that. I'm taking my weight and landing it on top of the ball carrier. So you're reweighting. Yeah. You're reweighting.

But if we're fronted up, if we're head-to-head, you're allowed to unweight them. But also, they took the tackle through somebody, which you wouldn't be unweighting. You'd be firing. They took that out of the game a few years ago. And if you don't unweight yourself against the quarterback, out of the game. What's next? Where do we go from here?

I don't want to be like old. You're ruining the game. I don't want to be like that because football is awesome. We love the game no matter what. And we love football. And obviously there's been a lot of good decisions to get to this point where football is football. The NFL is the NFL.

Everything else is going like this or like this. They're going like this. Okay? So I think there's been a lot of smart people that have done a lot of things. Thank you all. You're doing great. Even people currently in the position that they're in. But I think they're potentially being presented by people that are real smart.

Real smart. These people are coming in with these stats. And they're saying all we need to do is just adjust this a little bit. And then all of a sudden you've got a much safer game. So that these people that might attack you later with lawsuits and such. Can say that at least you tried to stop this potential thing from happening. So in the court of law. Whenever you're getting sued for billions of dollars.

You can say we tried to change the rules. The players just weren't able to do that what he did was illegal we do not want that person to ever do that again seems like it's all cover your ass shit happening right now for future lawsuits and it's like why can't we just add something in where just everybody understands that there's a potential you know threat of danger whenever you're playing point of point of emphasis remember they talk about that and maybe i don't know yeah i don't know you can't even do that i guess because you're hey we're not gonna throw a flag but we don't want you doing that anymore i guess you can't do that but i just i don't know why we we just can't have like uh hey you're signed up to play football you might

get hurt it is a physical sport but think about the way they wanted to take the head out of football right they wanted to like take the head out so how they teach tackling is much different now than they they did 15 20 years ago so yeah we did that but now like this isn't a technique that anyone is teaching that we have to retrain like it's something that just it happens naturally when you're trying to get somebody down yeah but what i'm saying is they're only doing this so they can cover their ass for future lawsuits that's all of it though that's everything yeah but i'm saying like why don't we cover our ass for future lawsuits if we're the nfl and just say everybody is going to sign on the day one of training camp whenever you get there.

Hey, you understand that you might get injured. They can give us a full. I mean, you have to go through shit anyways. Give a full on every single thing and say you are signing up knowing that this is possible. I think everybody in the NFL would immediately, they would sign it. It's like a few years back. You don't think so? You don't think everybody would sign that? You think some people... It depends what's in there, man.

You know, like those bills they pass in politics. No, no, I'm saying keep it one page. Let's keep it one pager. Easy to read. If you get hurt, it's not our fault. You do a deal. We ever do a deal together, by the way, with anybody? Any company? Since I'm the human representing, they'll send over

like a 30-pager that they send to other lawyers, I guess. And I, being a doofus, I won't read that. So that thing needs to trim that. If we're going to get this done, we're going to have to, because this is a two-year deal. Give me the outline. No, not the outline. Our contract is going to be

two-page most. That's what it is. And there's going to be an understanding in every one of those things where it's like, hey, this is how this goes. Because a lot of that is just trying to get other lawyers jobs so that you have to hire a lawyer to read through all this type of stuff. Nonetheless, we're not doing it. But can you not just do that? Because we talked about this in the first hour. You know, the fear whenever Dr. Will Smith, tell the truth, and CTE in the lawsuit in the make was that they're killing football.

Football is going to be done. Kids aren't going they're killing football. Football is going to be done. Kids aren't going to play football anymore. Football is going to be nonexistent. People aren't going to watch. They're going to protest against football because how dangerous it is and how they're taking care of their alumni and retired players. That has not been true at all. They changed the rules.

There are still people playing football. Ratings are still through the roof. Everything is up and to the right for football when it comes to participation, which they said was no longer going to happen, comes to participation, which they said was no longer going to happen, to viewership, which they said was no longer going to happen, to investment in teams. Everything that they thought was potentially going to happen because of the CTE

stuff hasn't happened. And now they're still treating it the same way. Well, we've got to look out for future lawsuits because people won't play or we'll get injured or we'll get people hurt. There's just a potential chance you're going to get hurt. That one's nasty. That one's nasty. We agree.

Like there is certainly a couple of these tackles that don't look good, don't feel good, have to suck. But also, like there's some tackles in here that are just standard football tackles, like that one right there. That one right there. Like that's just standard. That's like above the waist. He's unweighted himself kind of at the waist too,

not directly on their knees or ankle. And he gets them in the front shoulder. so he's not even to the side. He's kind of front shoulder there with his initial shot. It's like all these are getting called. Like, that's getting called for a late hit regardless. But, like, all these are called by refs on the field. There's no way it's going to be consistent week to week. There's no way that we don't have some massive controversy.

Massive controversy. Go ahead, Conway. That one right there, that Tannehill one, Matabuke. Tannehill gets hurt for sure, but if that is technically unweighting yourself, the only other option is to not unweight yourself, but if he doesn't unweight himself, then that's roughing the passer. So there's actually

in that play right there with Matabuke on Tannehill, there's nothing that he can do. He's got to push him hard. He's got to get in do. He's got to push him hard. He's got to get in there and he's got to push him real hard. Both hands, right to his chest, and make him stumble and fall in. Pull the

flag. Pull the flag off of his waist. That's what you have to do now, though, right? You actually can't hit a quarterback like that anymore. But if you punch too hard, that'll be a violent strike. And if you punch too hard where maybe it goes up a little and you hit him in the helmet. That's hands and a face.

That's 15. I was going to say, there's a couple situations like that. Or say you're in trail technique and man, and it's a crossing route, and he catches the ball, and you're right there. You have to let him get five yards ahead of you and then jump or dive at his legs and try to swipe out his legs. I think you just got to dive in front of people.

That's the move. You got to schoolboy people. They legs? I think you just got to dive in front of people. That's the move. You got to schoolboy people. They're running, and you just got to dive in front of them. Get their head in front and then just turn on your side. Hopefully it trips right over your body. Yeah, but you got to outrun them first. That's easy to do. Yeah, these guys are super slow.

We saw guys at the combine running 4-1s consistently, it feels like. Yeah, so let's just not talk about all the negative stuff that happened at the owners' meetings, okay? Because this is dumb. You're setting yourself up for a war publicly at some point with a fan base or 10, you know, throughout the season. But I'm sure it'll get figured out. Thank you for doing this.

Safety to players. Even though the players came out, NFLPA was like, nah. Yeah. Were any offensive players calling for this? As you know? I mean, maybe Derrick Henry, because now he knows no one can tackle him. Yeah, unless they're straight in the... Which only Bob Spillane can do that.

Wow. Congrats to the Steelers. No, Ravens. Raiders. Ravens. Oh, is he a Raven now? Derrick Henry? Oh.

He was the Bob Spillane. Oh, you're talking about the other side. I just heard you. We got Patrick Queenrick queen they got bob i just didn't think he would do that to us to go to the ravens well so what so patrick queen yeah he's one of us now he came to the good side okay i thought bob's play might make 100 million dollars a year though because he's the only one who could tackle derrick anyways the. Anyways, the NFL changed that. They also changed the challenge rule that was pretty stupid from the beginning, we all thought, but we understood that they had to have some sort of rule in there.

If you challenge one time successfully out of your two first challenges, you will get a third challenge option. In the past, you had to hit both your first challenges to get a third. You had to go two for two. Now you only got to go one for two, maxed at three. They still haven't said anything about the final two minutes, which the Colts pitched to change so that it's not the league looking at it. It's the coaches and the players still being able to challenge things.

We'll see how that goes. This is smart, AJ. This feels smart. Colts withdrew, and I just heard, why? Wait, what do you mean they withdrew? Oh, no. Oh, the Colts, man. What? Wait, what do you mean they withdrew? Oh, no. Oh, the Colts, man. What?

What? Wait, why would you not want that? You can't get anything right these days. Can't get anything right? Well, you're Shane Steichen. Yeah. We got Anthony Richardson. On the football field, no doubt about it.

Well, for how long? Flacco was right. Flacco. Yeah, we just got Jimmy Flacco. Flacco. Flacco was right. Again, like after the Sneed to the Colts and then all the Colts reporters start, you know, crying and they got to stop going on X and stuff. And then Sneed goes to the Titans of all places in the division to make the Colts the worst team in the division.

It's just it's all going wrong right now for Indianapolis. The Colts withdrew their proposal. What does that mean? To allow a coach or replay official to challenge any foul that has been called. It feels like a lot. Why did we word it that way? Why did we word it that way? Why did we word it that big? We were just going for the – after two minutes.

Yeah, the first report was just the final two minutes. Yeah, let's call Tom Pelissero because, like, that's – you can see how they were able to draw that one. Like, some rules are never going to get passed to get challenged. You know, some calls, the owners are never going to be like, yeah, we will challenge that or whatever, or we can challenge that. So if they decided to go broad with that instead of the final two

minutes, I think that was a mistake. I think that was a strategic mistake. We're calling Tom Pellicero. He's in the middle of hosting, I think, the Insiders. We were supposed to have Schefter on a little bit ago. He's probably in the middle of some news break as well. But the Lions were the ones that pitched the,

hey, I only need to win one challenge to get a third challenge. This makes sense. I'm happy to hear it. The Detroit Lions continue to be good for football. Hell yeah. Yeah, of course. I mean, yeah, it makes sense. It makes no sense to do it the old way, I feel like.

But could this give us hope with the old hip drop, unweighting yourself tackle to possibly – maybe they'll still have the rule, but it won't be a 15-yarder loss of downs. It'll be like a five-yard penalty, a minor thing. What are you talking about? Because of this? I don't know. If they're willing to amend things, then maybe we have hope. No.

Okay, so you're saying. I'm trying to be positive here, man. You try to tell, we don't want to go negative. I could go negative all day long in this hip drop situation. You know that. Okay, so let's get it out. Let's get it out. Let's get it out of you.

Let's get it out of you. This hip drop tackle is offensive. It's get it out. Let's get it out of you. Let's get it out of you. This hip drop tackle is offensive. It's offensive to football. I understand it looks bad when those things happen, but a lot of things look bad on the football field that don't hurt people all the time. Go on. I'm just saying, like, okay, where do we go from here?

When a running back has the ball, is he still going to punch you in the face with a stiff arm as long as he doesn't grab your face mask? Well, the hands and the face are obviously illegal whenever the defense does it to the offense. And they said they'll call it on the offense, didn't they? I haven't seen it a ton called. How about when a running back goes like this? That's technically supposed to be a flag.

I don't think it should be, though. No, but also, I think they've only called it like one time. Now, defense aside, whenever you do it, they're going to call it. The hip drop tackle is going to get called a lot because it's a new rule. I mean, yeah. I just – I can't wait to see like preseason how it plays out. Are they going to call it – I mean, yeah. I guess if they see it, they have to call it.

It's not like a point of emphasis on holding. Like they're going to have to call it. So maybe it's just like a grown measurement. And this is all coming to me in real time. So let's go ahead and workshop this one. If the crowd goes, after seeing the replay. Sure.

Throw. 15. Okay. Joining us now, insider for the NFL Network, Tom Pelissero. Tom, thank you for joining us.

We know you're very busy. Host of the Insiders alongside Ian Rapport. You look amazing. We'll be down there tomorrow. We can't wait to see you literally alongside of him right now. Okay. Not only host of it, I appreciate that. Hey, the Colts withdrew their challenge thing.

And the way you wrote this, the Colts withdrew their proposal to allow a coach or replay official to challenge any foul that has been called. We thought that they were changing the challenge rules so they could challenge in the final two minutes. Were we wrong in the reporting of what they were trying to amend, and why did they withdraw this, you think, Tom? That was the language that I had saved in my notes file, Pat, and that was my understanding of what it was.

I can pull it up for you right here. Give me one second. We're going through. This is how it works. Ian's here, too. What up, Brad? Good to see you. Taking another vacation.

Surprise, you're sober. To permit a coach or replay official inside of two minutes to challenge any foul that has been called so that was the rule change proposal usually when those get withdrawn it means that it's not going to have the support so there were some other changes here too i i posted another one that rich mckay kind of mentioned in passing surrounding the hip drop where now for the first time they're acknowledging this publicly, the replay assistant now is going to be able to weigh in and fix certain types of intentional grounding and roughing the passer calls.

So, for instance, if the officials think, okay, that guy got hit in the head, it's forceful contact to the head, and the replay clearly shows objectively, no, he hit him in the shoulder, the replay assistant now, before 20 seconds on the play clock, can get in the official's ear and go, no, pick up the flag. That wasn't roughing. That's a big step. It's not the leap, but it's a step toward potentially not sky judge, but something along those lines where they're inserting themselves

into certain types of foul calls. This seemed to happen last year more often than it had in the past where they said after further discussion and we all assumed that was the assistant chiming in it's going to be the same for next year for that. Are they going to be able to overturn the hip drop tackle because that guy over there is the all-time leading tackler for the Green Bay Packers and then

every defensive player that's ever played in the NFL is basically saying the same thing. How the hell are they going to call this and what does this even mean? Will they be able to overturn that particular call if they see that the ref maybe jumped the gun and it wasn't actually what he thought in a 15 yard penalty was called that will not be reviewable you can't challenge it so they talk did you tell them that they're set up for controversy they're set up for it right here here's what's going to happen this is my prediction they know that the officials it's really hard to

see right they've never been trained to look for this before on top of that they have no way to This is my prediction. They know that the officials, it's really hard to see, right? They've never been trained to look for this before. On top of that, they have no way to practice it. Like any new rule, you're only looking at it in camp, right? And you're okay, we're looking for holding, this type of a grab, whatever. Nobody's hip-drop tackling their teammate. There's basically no tackling in training camp. So the first time you're going to be seeing this is in the games.

So what I would predict is going to happen is you will see some flags in the preseason. You will see a ton of fines, a lot of which may end up being overturned. But you'll get a flood of like 15 guys got fined for hip drop tackles. And what they'll hope is that sends the message. It scares everybody. And they eradicate some of the technique before the regular season. But the technique is not taught. You talk about them not being able to watch. That's not a technique that's taught.

It's not like you're grabbing the collar. I will say this. I had one head coach tell me yesterday, they think that the real motivation here by the league, besides obviously wanting fewer injuries, is they think there are some teams that do teach it, that do suggest leaving your feet to use that and the unweighting, as they call it, onto the back of the ball carrier's knee or ankle.

I don't think so. And so – That guy needs to be out of the league. Yeah. Well, that's – I mean, that's the whole thing is – Let's punish the coach, not the technique. The technique came – you know, AJ was in the league at the time. Like, this came out of the get your head out of the game stuff, right?

So, early 2010s, when they started to really enforce the use of helmet stuff, you had hawk tackling, which Pete Carroll and the Seahawks staff kind of pioneered, and it was all rugby-style tackling. Head to the side, and you'd grab and basically, you know, turn your body and swivel the guy down. Well, now they've seen a more extreme version of it, which involves the actual leaving your feet. I'd compare it kind of to, remember when, you know, in the early days trying to eliminate helmet contact, like launching was kind of the standard, like you couldn't leave your feet.

And then they realized this is stupid because sometimes the worst hits, the guy's clearly still on the ground and just delivers the contact. And you shouldn't be going, oh, there's one toe on the ground. I think it's similar to that where they're going to look for the most flagrant stuff. Again, you'll see a ton of fines. Everybody's going to lose their minds in August. We actually get into the games in September. I would bet you you will see this called almost never. And then when you get in the games in January, it's going to get called in the fourth quarter,

and everybody's going to lose their damn mind. Tom, did anybody say, and I know you don't have a lot of time, we appreciate you literally out of nowhere answering this FaceTime. You're the man. Pearly whites look good. How's the guitar? Good? Quick? Good? Quick?

Good? I don't think I've touched it since rocking First Avenue a few months ago. That was a great show, though. You crushed it. Act house. Yeah, you crushed it. You were fantastic. We didn't know.

We were like, this guy's awkward, and we could have imagined. Did anybody, whenever they're rolling out this, Rich McKay guys rolling out all these rules, does anybody say, hey, the game's in a great spot. There's a lot of participation in the youth stages. The combine is not running out of spot. There's not too many spots for people to make it in the NFL like the fear was back when the CTE stuff was taking place. It's like, can we not just keep the game the game? Has there ever been a thought of that for this entire thing? And maybe we just make players sign like a waiver. Well,

we might get hurt so we don't have to change things? Because everybody's worried now. If we take this out of the game, what's next? What's next? What's next? It's a great sport. I got one minute? Okay, I got one minute, so I got to read the bomb.

You can just say, hey, hold on. Yeah, no, I got to. Hey, tell them we appreciate it. Tell them we appreciate it, Derek. From a legal perspective, I think that that now is ingrained, right? We have more information about the impact of head injuries and things like that i think that this is them trying to be proactive on a variety of different things kickoff has long had the highest rate of injury this new thing if it gets passed later today or tomorrow it's going to look funky it's going to look different but

they think that it's going to end up being a really good thing and i had one coach tell me watch two it's almost like playing cover zero on every kickoff. You break through that first line, there's no second line of defense. You can end up with a lot more big plays. All right, I got to go read this book. See you. We appreciate you. Ladies and gentlemen, Tom Poser.

Yeah, and we couldn't tell him that, although we should have told him that. Them moving the touch back to the 30 instead of the 35 is just going to be another home run fest. So they had something going, and then they kind of just say, nah, we need something a little different than that. Nonetheless, I think that is the worry, though. Just like with the kickoff rule, with the fair catch thing,

you heard a lot of coaches and people in the NFL, like, if they're doing this, what will they do next? The punt play is going to be gone. Then once the punt play is gone, what's next? It's like, I understand we get more information than we've ever had before. And in theory, we care about everybody, I understand we get more information than we've ever had before. And in theory, we care about everybody, even though we're still playing on Thursdays, and there's

trips around the globe, and then coming back early. You know, there's a lot of hypocritical things. Yeah, there's a lot of hypocritical things we can get into about player safety and everything like that. All of it is seemingly just covering their ass for the future, but it's like, what's next? What's next? What's next? What's next?

What next? They'll find a stat for anything. Like, after this thing's down, well, you know, when somebody is completely trailing another player and they dive to tackle him, we have found out that there's been more ankle injuries on that particular play than any other play of existence. So, trailing tackler is not allowed to land on ankles.

So, how tedious are we going to get as we continue to change it because they're going to be able to find stats that say this game is hurting people forever because that's what football is aj what if they i mean what yeah like what's next i'm trying to think like are they going to start saying you can't punch the ball out say you punch and somebody cracks a dude's rib or you're're saying, hey, you cannot use a closed fist to punch at the ball. It has to be an open-hand slap now. Like, what's next? It's scary.

It's going to be guys getting hit at the knees. Kirby Joseph hit Higby and Hawkinson last year. Both tore their ACLs, and people were pissed. I think there was a no-cup block thing being presented, because remember, tight end comes in motion. Cuts defensive end. In the box. In the box.

I think they were trying to make a proposal for that this particular weekend, so that might change that. But it's like forever. We have to understand. And we appreciate the stats, people. We love that you're into football. It's nice to have you. It is.

It's great. Football is the greatest sport on earth. The smarter it can get, the better it can get. But these stats people, and I'm not saying this in a negative way, can find stats for anything. They literally can find stats for any argument that you want to make, anything that you want to make. Now, I guess unless it's 100% to zero,

they can paint a picture for you that is very telling. And I think that is what's happening with all these rule changes in tackles and plays. It's like the stats we were shown, 20 times more injuries in this type of tackle than other tackles. It's like football happens, you know. In some situations you're going to pop up and maybe shouldn't put the wide receiver in that situation

than on the other side. Like maybe you tell the offense coordinator not to do that. Maybe you change the ways other things are handled. It's like, or just make people sign that they might get hurt playing football. I just want to, I don't want this game to suck. I don't want football to suck. It's all we got. It's all we got.

Like you said, though, like when you can just cherry pick the, hey, we found out the hip drop tackle is 20 times more dangerous in terms of injuries. From a PR standpoint, the owners are always going to be like, okay, well, then we have to get that out of the game. They're going to be able to cherry pick that with whatever the next defensive thing they want to take out. They're going to be able to say, hey, this type of tackle is 30% more likely to cause injury than this type of tackle.

Like, all they're doing is they're basically just, like, eliminating the defense from being able to play fast. Because I feel like these guys are just going to, like, you know, every single point you're at, it's like, oh, I can't hit him here. I can't hit him here. I can't hit him here. And then it's like, do we really want that? No.

Then it's like a slowed down version of, I don't know. We don't want that, Donnie. Don Don doesn't want that. Of course not. Nobody wants slowed down version of, I don't know. We don't want that. Donnie Dondon doesn't want that. Nobody wants that. And obviously all the ex-players. Donnie Dondon threw out some crazy rumors, I have to say. That's what he was hearing.

We corrected him. You know the guys in the room, they say things. I think they're just making their way down. Joining us now is a guy who kind of puts a quell. I think I used that word right. The rumor us now is a guy who kind of puts a quell. I think I used that word right. Oh, yeah. The rumor mill.

Sounded right to me. There you go. Perfect. Ladies and gentlemen, senior insider for the NFL, down at the league owners meetings, ladies and gentlemen, Adam Schefter. Hey, Schefter. Gentlemen, what's going on here? Schefter, we know you're very busy, so we appreciate you taking time.

We'll be down here tomorrow. Hopefully we get to see you in real life again so we can go, Schefter, what's up, dude? Anyway, Chef D, let's move along. I saw the room that they were prepping for the Pat McAfee show tomorrow. I saw it. It's all set up. It is a nice little setup for you.

You're going to be very happy. You're going to have owners and GMs and coaches walking past you the entire time. You're going to be in a good spot. Speaking of, I think Brandon Bean is going to be stopping by. I think Kalen Jackson, who's the owner of the Colts, will be stopping by. I think Ryan Poles, Big Paul Poles, will be stopping by. I'm sure there will be a few others. I think Kevin O'Connell will be stopping by.

We don't know if the Kraft family is going to stop by because of what you guys have been saying. I'll put in a good word. About the docuseries. I actually just passed one of them literally 30 seconds ago. Which one? As I was answering the phone. The young one? Yes, sir.

Was he taking credit for everything? Yeah. Oh, jeez. Is that a curiosity? Taking credit? No. That Apple documentary does not – people are not happy. The Patriots fans are not happy with the crafts with how it paints them.

First Bill, nonetheless, you're working hard. We apologize for taking your time. No problem. We're bitching about the hip drop tackle. Okay, that's what we're doing as ex-players. A.J., all-time leading tackler for Green Bay, is actually disgusted by it. He's not the only one. A lot of football players are that played on the defensive side of the ball.

When something like this gets passed, the immediate thought is, well, they can make stats up for anything. Like, once they ban this, then there'll be another form of tackle that's like, hey, this tackling form is actually 40% more likely to injure. Is there a fear in the conversation at all about like, we're just kind of letting this kind of

get away from what football is? Is that even talked about, you think? You know, I'll say this, that I know it passed, they said unanimously, but I spoke to some teams that weren't in favor of this and didn't love the sounds of it. And I just think it's the league's continuing efforts to do what it can to make what's an unsafe sport a little bit safer, to try to make it safer. it's going to make the jobs of the defensive players infinitely more difficult because AJ how many how many times did you say you deployed a hip drop tackle why'd you unweight yourself I never heard the term until about six months ago

shifty so I have no clue how many times I did that wow and it's got to be a weird thing right if you're a player out there and you're trying to think about how to not tackle a guy like that, it's just not a natural act. So what are you supposed to do? So, Shefty, you're in the room with these people. Ask them. The next time old buddy walks by, say, so what are we supposed to...

So they're supposed to ride them down to the ground? That's what they're supposed to do? Like it's a bulldog in the WWE? Grab them by the waist? Hey, we're going down. Are they supposed to trip them? No, they can't trip. Can't trip somebody. What are you supposed to do? Like it's a bulldog in the WWE grabbing by the waist. Hey, we're going down. Are they supposed to trip him? No, I can't trip. Can't trip somebody. What are you supposed to do? And no horse collar. And no horse collar allowed either. That's not allowed. So are we

dolphining like in front of them to try to trip like with our bodies? Has there been a... I assume this is going to get massively loud whenever the season starts. Let's pivot away from that. Let's talk about something else going on down there. All these rules that are being pitched, some of them get tabled until

May, like the kickoff rule. That's going to get voted and passed on this particular meeting, or is it going to get tabled until May? I don't know about that. Let me tell you something about that kickoff rule. Okay? Let me take you behind closed doors. That's where you are. Well, I'm in an open door area, but I'll take you behind closed doors again.

Shut the door, Shafi. Some teams not happy about the new kickoff rule. They feel like it's just too much of a radical change to figure out so quickly. Now, again, I thought this morning that it might have gotten through, but I

obviously heard from a number of teams here already that they don't love this idea. Now, the league wants this because the rate of return last year dropped dramatically. There were no kickoff returns in the Super Bowl, and there are people who clearly support it, but I'm telling you, there are people who are really nervous about it.

Coaches have a lot to figure out already. There's a lot on their plates. They don't want to have to figure out more things. And this new kickoff rule would be a huge, huge change that would cause a lot of people to have to get used to a lot of different things. That makes sense. That's why they moved it back to the 30 instead of the 35, because teams will just kick it into the end zone anyways. Let's punt on this for a year, and then maybe we'll change it next year to move to 35. But I think if they keep it, I guess there was an amendment made from touchbacks going to the 35 to the 30 within

the last couple days i think teams will still just kick touchbacks we'll still have the same ceremonial monotonous thing 35 i think it would have been a little bit different but that might be just so they can experience it for a year and then see what happens next year thank you for that info that's huge because i was told that every special teams coordinator was basically on board because they were forced to almost. Because, hey, we're going to get rid of the kickoff if you're not on board with this. So you either come up with a better idea or you get on board with this one.

It's nice to hear that some of the owners were like, come on, little Mickey Mouse, we're not doing this. I'm just telling you, I was surprised. But definitely everybody's not on board with it because it would be a radical departure from what people know. Now, sometimes that's fine. You get used to it. But sometimes when I think the league senses there is some opposition to this,

and there is, maybe you just try it in the preseason to see how it goes, or maybe not. Maybe they just say, hey, we're going to try this year, see how it goes, and we can adjust from there. We'll try it on a trial basis for one year. I don't know how it's going to work out, but I don't think it's a deadlock cinch to pass. And there are certainly people that want modifications to it right now. So the fair catch thing was a one year trial as well.

They're trying to figure out how to save the kickoff. Allegedly, we don't want as much contact, but we also don't want as many touchbacks. We got to save the play, but also we'll get rid of it. It's a wild time at the NFL for specialists and for kickoff allegedly. We don't want as much contact, but we also don't want as many touchbacks. We got to save the play, but also we'll get rid of it. It's a wild time at the NFL for specialists and for kickoff people. Go ahead, AJ. Shifty, is there anything that we haven't really talked about that's not out there publicly that's kind of on the horizon that they might be thinking about implementing maybe in May or even later down the road? Sometimes those things pop up, AJ. I haven't heard anything like that. We talked about the trade deadline being pushed back a week, which I think that would be kind of cool.

The longer it is, the later it is, the better it is for teams. I think they'd like to see another week put onto that. That would be kind of fun and interesting if they could do that. Sometimes these rule changes pop up. We know that obviously the tush push is staying intact. No support to change that so that's going to be back next year no changes to that rule um we'll see what other rules but i don't know any off the top of my head right now how about this there's a topic of conversation

involves one handsome man go ahead ty yeah shifty what about the whole tom brady situation i know going into this uh we heard that they're going to be voting on you know whether or not he was going to be allowed to have ownership and then I don't know if that got tabled or just moved completely to a different date has there been any update on that and the likelihood that that's going to get okayed by the owners and Tom Brady will be allowed to have at least part ownership yeah I think what's going on there it's not expected to be reintroduced here at this meeting. It's not expected to get resolved one way or another at this meeting. And I think what slowed this is that I think there was an agreed-to-prom price that was a little bit below what the league felt was fair value. And so they're trying to go through this and figure out the right way for Tom Brady to be approved as a limited owner of the Raiders. And I do think that there's momentum towards that.

But the interesting part, of course, is that he's going to be working for Fox next year. And some people thought that that day might not come where he would be broadcasting. But he is all in on this broadcasting venture, and he wants to be a broadcaster. And he's going to be a part of their A-team right now. Hey, you want to pop on here right now?

We got you. This is Mr. Tepper here. Oh! Sir! Sir! Is this a show? Yeah, that's it. But I'm on there.

You see, I got my headphones on. Sir, we have heard a lot about you, sir. Sir. Yeah. I know he's a big fan of me. He says you're a big fan of me. You know I hear it all the time. Big fan. Hey, tell know he's a big fan of me. He says you're a big fan of him. I hear it all the time. Big fan.

Hey, tell him he's the most. He's almost as good looking as me, so I understand. Sheff, he's telling me. He's saying you're almost as good looking as he is. Hey, tell him he's the most entertaining owner in the league by far. Please. He says you're the most entertaining owner in the league by far, Mr. Tepper. Okay, there you go.

What did he say to that? What did he say back? What did he say back? He said, there you go. do you say to that what do you say back what do you say back he said he said there you go there you go okay we have talked a lot about him he's going to rip apart the set right now he's going to be so mad you put us because everything we talk about with him is you know fires guys throws ice at people yeah talk shit files bankruptcy buy somebody's house the guys by far the most entertaining, but that's what the owner meetings are. We appreciate you checking in from down there.

A couple questions about stuff that isn't owner's meetings related, if that's okay. Bring it on. Go ahead, Conman. Yeah, Shefty, big news this weekend. Legereus Sneed traded from the Chiefs to the Titans for a seventh round swap this year and a third round pick next year. Were the Titans always a seventh-round swap this year and a third-round pick next year.

Were the Titans always the frontrunners, and were any other teams going to be in there towards the end that maybe made a late push to get him? And also, what are the specifics of the contract? Because the money's been reported as 19 per year, 55 guaranteed. Is it in that ballpark, or is that still being settled? Yeah, I expect it to be right in that ballpark. Again, he was going through the physical today. If and when he passes that physical, which I expect him.

Oh, no. Tepper just shot that down. Did you see that's the power? You know, it's back. Yeah, I expect that physical to happen today. I expect he passes. I expect a deal to happen today. I expect he passes. I expect the deal to be formalized, the contract to be formalized, and that'll get done roughly at roughly $19 million per year.

Now, again, the Titans were the team that was trying to make it happen. Here's the play that he made in the playoff game, which was as big a play as the Chiefs had in the postseason. Obviously, he helped save that game in Baltimore and propelled them to the Super Bowl. And they did speak to other teams. Like, there were conversations at one point briefly with the Vikings. There may have been a brief conversation with the Colts.

Although, Pat, like I told you, again, both sides told me that it never went anywhere. It never went anywhere. I don't think the Jerry Steve to Indy was ever a real viable option ever. We get it. So Tennessee was the team that was in on him all along. Tennessee was the team that was in on him all along, and that's ultimately where he's going to wind up once he passes this physical today.

Okay, 19 mil and what a washer machine. That's what it took to get him, right? 19 mil and what a washer machine. That's what it took to get him, right? Well, you know, here's the thing, is that the Chiefs weren't entirely comfortable paying him and they needed the salary cap space back. And the best offer they could get was the 2025 third-round pick. And so, again, you don't want to lose a player as great as LeJarrius Sneed,

but they felt like they had to do this. Why'd they tag him then? You know, there's a whole lot of, they think. Well, you tag him, you tag him because there's value. You don't want him just to walk out the door and you feel like you can get something back for him. Got it. A third rounder.

Yeah, well, that's what you get. Plus, you know, if they're signing for agents, you can wipe out the compensatory formula. So they felt like it was in their best interest to tag him, preserve his rights, and then obviously they work out a trade with Tennessee to get him. We'll pick up a second or a first for this guy. Hey, no problem at all.

Third next year, and then a swap and a seventh. Let's do it. Let's do it. Just like the Chicago Bears with Justin Fields. You know how that thing went from, what was Mo Piper saying? Real quick. He thought overall pick. He wasn't the only one I was thinking that, but his

clip is obviously going, and now it's obviously next year's six. Speaking of that team, Tony Diggs has a question for you, Shefty. Yeah, Shefty, Mike Tomlin spoke this morning, I believe, at the AFC coaches' breakfast. Sweaty. It was hot. Is it hot down there? It's mild. It's fine.

You'll be comfortable. Thick, though? Orlando's thick. Humid, yeah. Humid, humid, yes. That's why I'm talking sweat. All right, I'm going to be sweating my dick off tomorrow. Tomlin said that right now Russ is in the quote-unquote pole position going into the season, and mostly because Russ is a veteran. He's a Super Bowl winner. He's led off-season workouts.

He's led off-season programs, so he's just a more senior in that area. But he spoke highly of Justin Fields, and when he gets to training camp and preseason games, Justin Fields is going to have a chance to show his skills. Did you take that how I kind of took that, that Russ is the starter right now, but Justin Fields will potentially get a chance? Well, it's Russ's job going in,

and then Russ can keep playing as long as he keeps playing well. You can see he's working out. He's all in on this. He believes, you know, going to Pittsburgh is going to reignite him. And he's coming off a year where he had 26 touchdown passes and eight interceptions. He believes he's going to play great. So if Russell plays the way that he expects, then he'll keep rolling. He'll keep rolling.

And if he doesn't, he struggles, hit some speed bumps, they have Justin Fields there. That would be an option at that point in time. But I don't think that's how Russell's thinking. I think going in, the Steelers know they have a viable backup in Justin Fields. Yeah, there it is. Love the work. This is what Russell

believes. And so as long as he is loving the work and the best is ahead, he'll keep being the guy. That's going to happen. I did appreciate that there for a time. People were saying, Russell's new sign-off that he just created for Pittsburgh is, here we go. I did appreciate

that. Like, let's ride. That's everything that Russell does now. Everything he says is going to be chatted about. Everything he does is going to be chatted about. You're talking about a potential future Hall of Famer, first ballot, especially if he's able to get things going with the Pittsburgh Steelers. And Justin Fields backing him up. Not a bad quarterback room all of a sudden in Pittsburgh.

We appreciate the hell out of you, Shefty. We'll see you tomorrow. I'll be sweating. You'll look fantastic. Well, we'll be here waiting for you. The room looks great. You're going to have owners, GMs, coaches. So you'll have a great show tomorrow.

Much better than today when you got stuck with me and Tepper here, you know, trying to fill the time. Hey, listen, we are trying to fill the time for like the next four months. Okay, so know that you did a great job here. But also, you might have just extended an olive branch from us to Tepp.

We appreciate that. Hey, listen, let's get him back on for return engagement tomorrow. We sent a request. We already sent a request, literally within two him back on for a return engagement tomorrow. We already sent a request literally within two minutes. You know what? Here's the deal. You reach out to the PR guy. I'll give you the number. Text me. And then here's what you say. David Tepper came on

today and we warmed him up. He warmed up to us. And we're now ready for an even bigger, in-depth look into his life in the Carolina. Yeah, exactly. We're trying to correct some things. We're now ready for an even bigger, in-depth look into his life in the Carolina. Yeah, exactly. We're trying to correct some things. We're trying to correct some narratives that we firmly believe because of all the things that we have kind of witnessed.

What do we not know about that we need to learn about? Is his name Bruce, the person you're talking about? Yeah. Yeah, text Bruce. All right. We already hit Bruce up. That baby Zito. That baby Zito.

All right. Thank you so much, Shefty. We'll see you tomorrow, buddy. Thanks, guys All right. Thank you so much, Shefty. We'll see you tomorrow, buddy. Thanks, guys. Have a great day. Yay, Shefty. What'd you learn there, AJ? What'd you learn there?

David Tepper's pretty awesome is what I learned. Here we go. There you go. There you go. Oh, yeah. I see it every day. That guy knows everything we've ever said. Oh, yeah.

He does. Oh, yeah. Think about us going, I heard this guy. Yep. And then whatever we were saying about him. That'd be the graphic. And him just watching it going. These, yeah. He does. Oh, yeah. Think about us going, I heard this guy. Yep. And then whatever we were saying about him. That'd be the graphic. And him just watching it going, these guys don't know me. These sons of bitches.

These guys. Can we give these guys something else to talk about? Maybe something positive? Yeah, I get it. My cup slipped out of my hand, and the ice flew on the person. Sue me. Yeah. It's humid down there.

Sorry about it. I was helping them out. Yeah. What if Tep's on the show tomorrow? That'd be awesome. Game changer. I'll be electrified. Need it. I was helping them out. What if Tep's on the show tomorrow? That'd be awesome. Game changer. I'll be electrified. I genuinely don't know who's all going to stop by

because people are just finding out that we're going. Since we've been live, I've gotten seven text messages. Heard you're in Orlando tomorrow? Yeah. Because I think a lot of the people are bored. Yeah, after the whole weekend. Yeah, so it's like they start on Friday. So us potentially going down there, I don't know, voting.

They've got to sit through all those conferences, I assume, all that bullshit that the players have to go through. Coaches, GMs probably have to go through their own. This is what we're doing this year. This is where the salary cap is. This is where we're projecting it to be. Coaches, here's rules that are going to be changed. Here's ideas.

Here's strategy. Like, all that shit. I assume there's trust falls happening and the team photo, obviously, we learn about. A lot of people are skipping them. Yeah, what's that all about? Feels like more people are opting out of the photo than ever before. Yeah, it's weird.

Thought it was league mandate. Or it's like five coaches or something like that. That's a good fountain. Man, who trims those trees behind them? That looks amazing. Yeah, you're right. I assume that's somebody who does a lot of things other than just work at that particular property. Lives a very good life.

You know, the people that are doing the landscaping and all these places. Probably owns the hotel. Maybe. Might be the owner of the hotel. You know what I noticed on this particular photo? Is Doug Peterson the only one rocking the team apparel? He's the only one proud. Yeah, and no pants.

I think you might be right. He doesn't have any. He's just got a jockstrap on. No, that's khakis. We talked about this. Doug Peterson? We talked about this. There's some people, I don't know who they are.

I don't know who they are. Which one? Like, Canales there is in shorts, actually. Yes, he is. Next to him is a fatter Wes Welker. Who's that? Is that the Titans? Callahan. Yes, he is. Next to him is a fatter Wes Welker. Who's that? Is that the Titans? Callahan.

That's Callahan? Callahan, yep. Hey, Callahan's a dog. Wes Welker. Thicker, thicker, not fat. I apologize. I meant thicker. Jacked Wes Welker.

Jacked, jacked. Thicker, thicker. That was rude of me to say it. It didn't mean to say it. I meant thicker, thicker. Came out wrong. He's a thicker Wes Welker. He does look exactly like Wes Welker in the face. It was just a little bit thicker. You didn't mean to say it. I meant thicker. Came out wrong. He's a thicker Wes. He does look exactly like Wes Walker in the face.

It was just a little bit thicker. Who's next to him? I believe that's Saints' Dennis Allen. That's Denny Allen. Of course it is. I mean, Mayo's a brick shithouse. And then Stefanski's next to him, right? Dude, look at Campbell.

Yeah. Cream of the crop. He's angling good, too. Tom Bowles, too. Todd Bowles, too. Todd Bowles is a big son of a bitch. Harbaugh's awesome next to Reed. Harbaugh's so happy. Harbaugh was talking about J.J. McCarthy's pro day this morning at his breakfast press event.

Nobody eats breakfast, but it is in the morning. So if we just tag breakfast in it, it'll make people understand what we're doing here. Jim Harbaugh looked like a kid in a can. Like he does in this particular photo. And I think every day of his life he treats the exact same way about how grateful and pumped he is. Talking about J.J. McCarthy's pro day the other

day. And listen to what he had to say, A.J. Glowing reviews from old Coach Harbaugh. That workout J.J. had, I've been to a lot of pro day workouts and watched quarterbacks grow. That was the best I've been to a lot of pro day workouts and watched quarterbacks throw. That was the best I've ever seen a quarterback do in a pro day.

Not only was his feet great and the individual drills, but then he started throwing and it was like every throw was right there. I thought our receivers did a great job, too. Best throwing day I've ever seen. Best throwing day he's ever seen. Your coaches and GMs, you know, come up to me and say, hey, well, great job with JJ. And, you know, like I predicted, once they were around him,

I was hearing the stories about how he is on the board, how he is, you know, how he is on the field, the little things, the intangibles. It was absolutely no surprise whatsoever. But, yeah, there was raving. So Harbaugh obviously recruited him, won a national championship with him, is very tight with him, actually decided to put him in instead of McNamara, who actually led the Michigan team to the playoffs the year before

and said, not going with this young guy, J.J. McCarthy. So he's going to be attached to the hip for J.J. forever. But what he's saying, I think, is something we need to listen to. He said best throwing day he's ever seen. So that means he was at least good enough that you could get away with saying that if you're Jim Harbaugh. And Harbaugh has Herbert at the Chargers charger so he doesn't worry about a damn thing he's actually said sitting where we're sitting with how many quarterbacks are going to go in

front of us it's like it's like we hit the lottery we're able to pick the best player available because we have herbert but this jj mccarthy chatter is heating up and his pro day obviously helped him out because he looks so cool but then then you think about it. This guy won. That's all he's ever done. And Source says, that's a ball, close to the program, told me that when he was a freshman and he was going in during Caden McNamara's run and they'd have a couple plays for him or whatever he was supposed to do, there was like a senior offensive lineman who allegedly hated everybody and was a super miserable offensive lineman.

He said to everybody in the building, hey, this freshman kid, I like him. I like his moxie. So whatever he was doing in his command of his huddle, in his limited role when McNamara was there, this kid has been beloved by his teammates, beloved by the coaching staff, training room, equipment managers, and he wins. I think there's a case that J.J. McCarthy, you know, is going to be an NFL talent for

a long, long, long time and it seems to be the chatter leading into the draft at the QB, AJ. Yeah, not only does he win, he has played in some big-time college football games, too. He's been under the brightest lights in college and played in big-time

games and gotten wins. Now people will say they didn't ask him to do a whole lot, but you look at some of these throws that he's making in the game, he's absolutely capable of making all the throws you need to throw if you want to be an NFL quarterback. They're not asking him to do much and he didn't bitch. That's a whole

another added positive if you wanted to put a spin on it. Good luck to JJ and thank you to Harbaugh for talking in front of microphones as this show wraps up on ESPN here on this. There's a lot to talk about Monday, March 25, 2024. AJ, you've looked fantastic here in your first 52 minutes back since vacation. It was good to be back. Smells a little brighter.

I think you're tan. Smells a little brighter. Oh, no. Get my whole mouth redone while we're talking. Nice. Oh, they look good. We'll be back tomorrow live from the owners meetings. Be a friend.

Tell a friend something nice. It might change their life. We appreciate you all. Goodbye. Damn, right there. On a Monday. I hit it on a Monday. Yeah.

That's fresh out of building a full playpen yesterday. I saw that. That's a big good word. Those things are not easy to build. No. They're not. That's why I took building a full playpen yesterday. I saw that. Those things are not easy to build. No. They're not. That's why I took the time to flex. Because as I was piecing it together, there was a lot of ah, ripping.

Things aren't long enough or big enough. Putting little tiny, obviously, the connections there. Putting a pen into a pen cap, but with straining in there. I was sweating. You're going to love that thing. No missing pieces. That's the big thing. pen cap from but with straining in there oh yeah i was sweating you're gonna love that thing no missing pieces that's the big thing because every time you do that you look down and you got eight screws that are just sitting there it's like wow this thing's gonna fall apart i was so pumped

that's huge i mean that was my that was a masterpiece oh yeah as i was looking at it was like i i did it crush this look how tight all this shit is too it's like tight it's taut yeah oh i was so pumped, AJ. Felt like a real dad there. Felt like a real, I'm like, you know what? You feel accomplished, don't you? Because I've tried to assemble many, many things over the years. And most of them, you start, and then I'm like, no, not do it.

No, can't do it. I got to call my father-in-law. I got to get somebody over here to help me with this one. Then you're watching YouTube videos trying to figure it out. And it usually just stays in the storage room. I guess we didn't even buy that. Well, that doesn't exist for us. Thanks for making it impossible to put together. Sweet picture on the outside of the box

though. In theory, this thing is awesome. I had those thoughts seven to eight minutes in as I was realizing that there was three different sizes to the poles, not just two different sizes to the poles. That was a whole new animal in this entire thing that they didn't say until

instruction four. Feels like that's fucking instructional one thing of where we're in there. So I got some gripes in that whole thing, but seven and a half, eight minutes in, I thought the same thing. Ah, Tim McAfee's putting this together. I'm not fucking doing this. Tim McAfee put it together. No offense,

Tim. It would have got done, but there would have been pieces. Oh, yeah. All over. There would have been leftover pieces. Redesigned. He would have soldered it. It's a triangle, actually. It's no longer... It's better this way. The pieces they gave never would have... It would have worked. It would have been an incredible playpen that we would have been very thankful for. Shout out to Tim McAfee,

who's an absolute beast and can figure out anything. Actually anything. You know that Mad Mike guy? Sure. Oh, yeah. He was like dead set on being a rocket scientist and building his own rocket, even though he had no education. Correct. If Tim McAfee was fascinated by rockets and shit, he would be in the back of this Thunderdome right now figuring out,

Elon's team does this, but I've seen old school NASA clips that do this. So we're going to put the rockets on like this with one... And he would figure it out. Now, would it successfully get to space? It would crack into a space that he could say, what's gravity like there? What's gravity like there?

That's what I thought. That's a Tim McAfee project. Almost happened yesterday. I followed through. I finished. I was very proud of me. So I did put a video out saying, hey, listen, I'm the last spoiled little bitch. I can put together a playpen if I have to for my daughter. And that's good news. They need to make that shit easier, though.

I agree. They need to make that shit easier. I agree. This thing is huge. Or let me pay an extra $30 and have it come fully assembled. Yeah, but then how are you going to get it in the door and get it downstairs to where it needs to go? Well, that was the whole

game. That was the whole discussion because I was upstairs with it. This thing needs to go downstairs. I was upstairs. I hope you had to take it all the way apart and then put it back down. I thought ahead. As I was putting it all together, I was like, wait a minute. How's this getting there?

Where's this fucking thing going? Once again. I was like, damn, I'm on it right now. For a Sunday? Okay. Hit it. Because that is definitely a full-on, full sweat, so pumped to have it. Oh, yeah.

I've got to do it all again because I just can't get downstairs. But Mackenzie loves it. She's already in it. The dogs loved it Oh, I've got to do it all again because I just can't get downstairs. But Mackenzie loves it. She's already in it. The dogs loved it. The issue is going to be the cats are able to just get up and in there. Oh, yeah. And they're probably going to piss all over

and ruin it with their waker. Let's get to a break. Hour three is going to be a good one. We've got Matt Melkyper joining us. Let's go. Yes. Yeah, AJ. Thank God.

It's a big deal. I know. I can't believe. I mean, today's the first day the old rumor mill came around, right? You're talking about Don Don Don? Don Don Don. Don Don Don. We just met Don Don Don this weekend.

He just wanted to pitch the idea. He said, you know, I'm down here in the mill. I hear a lot of things you guys aren't covering. You know? So that's kind of how it came together. I can't wait to hear some of the rumors Danny Dondon has heard from...

Donnie Dondon! Donnie Dondon! Named after Danny Dondon. And we don't know what his full name is. That's how he introduced himself. I'm Triple D, he said. It was a whole thing. Not like Guy.

More like Trips. This is the first time Donnie Don Don has gone into airtime. Yeah. A lot of Donnie Don Don's friends have said, this guy needs to be on TV. That's what his family said earlier today. Yeah, a lot of that. Donnie Don Don crushed it.

He did. A little bit too far on a few, though. But that's not Donnie Don Don's fault. That's how Donnie Don Don took it. That's what he's hearing. That on a few, though. But that's not Donnie Dondon's fault. That's how Donnie Dondon took the interview. That's a rumor, Bill. Donnie Dondon was doing some good journalism, actually letting people know what's potentially being said out there. Yeah.

I'm just glad he didn't hear anything about Kate Middleton. From Donnie Dondon? Yeah. I assume that was sitting right there at the tip of the cigarette. Of Donnie Dondon. There was a chance for sure. Cancer. Hope she's okay. Yeah. We're pulling for royals peace and peace let's get to a break aj a lot has happened since

you've been gone a lot are you gonna be with us tomorrow down at the owners meetings yeah i'll be there whoa whoa oh did he find his luggage to bring with it oh yeah we got it back the next night oh oh it. It was my understanding that you guys were wearing Jamaica tank tops the entire week. The first two days, yeah, we had to go, the night we got in, we had to go to, you know, find a local shop open and bought like a Bob Marley

soccer jersey. I got all kinds of stuff. Did you watch the Marley movie? I've seen half of it. It's good, man. Okay, so I have not watched it yet. I'm going to watch it. It's out now man. Okay. So I have not watched it yet. I'm going to watch it. It's out now on Apple TV. It is available. Yeah, you can watch Ricky Stinicki.

Almost did. I did not get a chance to check out Ricky Stinicki. I started watching that. I started watching that. Yeah, Andrew Santino's in it. Yeah, Zac Efron, obviously. Santino's on a run right now. He is.

Stinicki. It's good, man. Honestly, it was pretty good. I've watched like 20 minutes. Feels like that's right in your ballpark, the Ricky Stinicki movie. Yeah. Feels pretty good so far. Made for AJ.

Have you heard about the next best picture, though? Huh? Apparently, Roadhouse is crushing. I've heard the opposite. Yeah. I saw one comedian say, if you're going to go watch the new Roadhouse, you need to go watch the original Roadhouse and then fall asleep right afterwards. Oh.

But that was just a funny, like, look, that was a funny line. I forget what comedian it was. That was a good joke. That was a good joke. What I've seen is that, you think Jilly is doing a song or a movie that stinks? Number one Amazon movie I heard. Number one movie like in the planet. I don't think Jilly

is doing that. Is that his name? Jake Gyllenhaal. That's what they call him. I don't think Gilly does terrible movies. I'm a little worried about it. Why? Because people are shitting on it big time.

And Breeland's in it. We know that. I don't want him to get any second hand blowback. It was a close call. Oh, Breeland? Breeland's in the movie? He forgot he's a he's a singer he's not blind which was kind of our first thing he's like oh wait you have your sight though okay well boom that's red flag right there don't know if i want to watch that um because the original one for people who haven't watched it

yeah the guy who's inside the cage at the bar bar. At the bar. Getting shit tossed at him. Yeah. Is blind. And he just shreds the fucking guitar. But him and Dalton have a very special relationship because he is blind

and these roughnecks, you know, they fuck with this guy. There is another musical act in that, the movie. There's no spoilers. The movie's not even out yet.

Is it out? It is. The movie's out. The movie's out. I'm going to say this. 90% fighting. So they stay true to that. The Notorious shows his butt cheeks too much.

We got a lot of Connor booty. We got Connor butt cheeks. For three minutes straight. Why? How does that come about? Multiple times, right? They fight butt naked, right? In three minutes?

I would say the first time he's walking down the street in Italy, and it's for a good minute and a half, and at the end of the movie, there's some more butt cheeks. I've seen Connor on his bike on Instagram, shirtless and a little tiny, like, bum thing. Like, smiling to the camera and to my entire feed

while his kit and caboodle are bouncing back and forth. So he probably loved being booty-hot. When I say butt cheeks, both butt cheeks, the whole screen. The whole screen? He's mooning the whole world. So it's like zoomed in on his butt cheeks?

You get a peek down the tunnel? You think there's makeup on his butt? Was there any dimples or anything? He didn't spread them, did he? He didn't spread them, but they did have a natural dark shading. Congrats, Connor. A lot of people made fun of the way he lost the whole movie too he walked yeah like see how he was yeah yeah people were making fun of his acting as well well i saw a photo of him almost punching

jilly in the face yeah and i looked at his face and he was we're conor mcgregor fans i'll give him props though he did an amazing job Okay He played the role Very very well Boom Best supporting actor I love Zeke But that ain't exactly Selling it for me

That was a good That was a rave review Yeah Zeke Zeke ain't in the business Of not giving rave reviews That's kind of the best Well he kind of said Butt cheeks all over the place

Yeah Yeah I'm just saying I don't know You're saying Zeke Is easy to please Yeah Zeke's only seen one movie that he is not liked.

Z and I are in a good spot now. Yeah, and that's the one. Downsizing. Yeah. No. Yeah, with downsizing. Downsizing. Worst movie of all time.

What happened? They had to have skipped four or five scenes. I watched that movie three times because I didn't think it could be as bad as it was. Who's in it? Affleck. Matt Damon. Damon's in it. John Krasinski.

That's on me. It might be Damon's only miss. Probably. Might be. I mean, the Great Wall. Also a miss. People did not like the Great Wall. Also a miss from Damon, but still.

I mean, I watched it. I thought it was okay. Yeah. All right, let's get to a break. I am the worst movie knowledge person of all time, but if I watch the movie, I feel like I do have a nice critique of movies. Zito, too.

Zito and I, we can get through movies. We can see what you're trying to do. That's kind of how we view it. I see what you're trying to do. That's kind of how we view it. I see what you're trying to do. That's not really what it's about, though. What's that, AJ? That's not really what movies are about. Like, hey, this is terrible, but I can see what you were trying to get to.

Bingo. So like that downsizing one, I can see what they were trying to do. Oh, okay. There's the Great Wall. What was that one? I've never even heard about the reason they built the Great Wall. That is unbelievable, too. Far left is the guy from that one zombie thing.

It's about how they defend the Great Wall from massive lizards that are trying to attack China. Yeah. Think about that. Think about that. Has Donnie Dondon got any thoughts about the Great Wall? I'm pretty sure he does. Let's get to a break.

We'll be back next hour. We got Mad Mel Kiper joining us. And then tomorrow's going to be epic, I think, for the owners of the place. Legit. It's going on forever, man. Those guys have got to be worn out. Well, I think that's the messages I'm getting. Which is good.

Hey, heard you, bro. I think they're pumped. Inject some energy into that play. Exactly. It'll be good. The issue is we're going to have to keep them, I think, because there's going to be, tomorrow might be feel the beat with owners, GMs, and head coaches. That's pretty cool.

But like for the entirety of the show. Yeah. That's awesome. Let's feel the beat! Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. For every guy. Every single one. And Kalen.

Kalen's coming. Yeah. I'm excited to hear what the Colts are doing. Why didn't we get enough votes? Let's work the room, Kalen. Shane Steichen's not being able to get this through. Chris Ballard isn't allowed to use that Southern accent and get this thing passed. Why aren't we challenging in the final two minutes?

Why don't we let Walt Anderson decide? No offense, Walt. You were a great ref 30 years ago. He was. A lot of things were great 30 years ago. Well, a lot of people would say that's not true. Music. Sigs.

Both. You should have lived. Or Donnie Don Don should have lived that day. Hey, Reece Davis is going to join us next hour, too. Nice. All right. Sweet. Oh, no.

This one, universe ball. People are going to forgive Reece Davis. Okay. Okay. Okay. Oh, no. Oh. This one, universe ball. People are going to forgive Reece Davis. Okay. Oh, no. Yeah, I was worried. Too soon. Universe ball. Try it tomorrow.

No, try Wednesday. We're going to be down in Orlando tomorrow. I don't know if there's any universe balls tomorrow. There might be. Let's get to a break. Hour three should be electrifying. Reece Davis. Mm-hmm.

On the bet to one. Yeah. But also, can't say it. Like, we had worked, obviously, with Fando there for a while. They were our exclusive sportsbook for, like, a year and a half, two years. And there's, like, a lot of things

that, like, can't say. No. Regulators are the ones that get really upset about it. Reese learns. Reese is a quick learner. Reese is a good ones that get really upset about it. Reese learns. Reese is a quick learner. Reese is a good man, too. Oh, yeah.

You know what I mean? There were some people at that. Reese is a good dude. It's an innocent thing that he did. He was trying to make her look good. Yeah, exactly. That's right. He was trying to compliment her.

And in doing so, he said something that you just can't say, but bet. Are happening all around us, and we're incredibly lucky that we get to chat about it every Monday through Friday, noon to three-ish. Now, during the Masters week, we might not be on because Masters is on ESPN. We're on same time as the Masters. Do we want to compete against the Masters, or do we want to watch the Masters? That's a whole conversation. But nonetheless, a majority of the weeks, Monday through Friday, noon to three, we are incredibly

thankful that you allow us to be a part of your everyday life. We do feel responsible to let you know about everything happening in the sports world that we think matter. Now, there's going to be other shit that we don't cover and that's on us, but what we do cover, we're lucky to do it with the greatest group of humans on earth.

Ladies and gentlemen, the talk show table is here at Boston Corner and at Ty Schmidt. One half of the hammer, Don Cowboys Tundigs is here. And joining us now is a friend of the program. Ladies and gentlemen, some people say that this guy's draft analysis is the greatest that the world has ever seen. Ladies and gentlemen, Mad Mel Kuyper. Thank you, Pat. Thank you, Pat.

Thank you, boys. Obviously, later to be back with you guys. Draft season really starting to heat up right now. Got to love it. Yeah, you look fantastic. It doesn't seem like draft season's really wearing you down. Not a lot of stress this year. You using some moisturizer, maybe some Papatoui from The Rock?

You look great this year, Mad Mel. Well, I appreciate that. I'd love to get my hands on some Papatoui. I think your cameras are great. Can't really see it. My skin is so goddamn dry. It's ridiculous. Haven't shaved in a couple days because you get this point of the draft, get up to your third

mock draft. You're really just combing through all the fine hairs of the film and everything that the draft nicks are saying because I want to make sure that my mock draft, my next one that comes out, is going to be the best mock draft I've ever created in my life. Okay, let's talk about a couple of these mock drafts. Basically all of the mock drafts now at this point except for Dan Orlovsky's. Caleb Williams, number one overall.

Any change in that? Any thought in that after Caleb Williams' pro day just last week in Southern California? No, not really. I think, Caleb checked all the boxes he needed to check. A lot of people, that last deep ball he threw, saying, hey, 60, 65 yards in the air, tight spiral. A couple of the people I talked to who were boots on the ground said, really more like an 85-yard deep ball. So already people talk about a laser rocket arm, the likes we haven't seen even from Josh Allen or Patrick Mahomes. What? Jordan Love, Aaron Rodgers, any of those guys.

But I think the biggest takeaway, Pat, I know you guys mentioned it a little bit on the show last week. We were checking in. Caleb, you know, goofing around with all his teammates. A lot of the draft knicks going into the draft process basically saying, hey, Caleb's a big-time piece of shit, okay? No one on his team likes him. Coaches can't stand him. Players can't stand him.

I'll tell you what, he looked like the most popular guy in Southern California, you know, after the workout. Not only that, I saw nice dap-ups, rhyme pulls, and a lot of Chicago Bears brass. I think Caleb did everything he needed to do. A lot of people say he missed a couple

throws here, missed a couple throws there. But as we know, those pro days are largely bullshit. What? No, they're horse shit. Everything you need. Well, and again, you know, that's why a lot of people say, hey, he didn't do anything at the combine. That's because he's going to be the number one pick in the NFL draft.

He can do whatever the hell he wants. Okay. I agree with that. And what you were saying about what people were saying, that was never you, right? You were never saying he was a piece of shit. That's not what you were implying there. You were saying that that's what some people who maybe didn't know Caleb,

but only listening to the Caleb Williams team were starting to think when he was like, I want a percentage of the team. I'm a badger. I can only go to this. Like all that type of stuff. You're not talking about you, though, Matt and Mel. You never thought that. Absolutely not. It's on record. You can go back. I've had Caleb Williams slide as my number one quarterback, number one player in the draft

for basically since he set foot on the field at USC even before that when he was at Oklahoma, I said this kid's going to be special, special, special talent. But, yeah, as we all know, there are a lot of dipshits out there in the media who, you know, like to bloviate and kind of bump their gums, and they're maybe trying to, I don't know, harm Caleb's draft stock. That was never me, okay?

That was never me. Of course not you, Matt Mell, man of integrity. Speaking of, Connor's got a question for you. Yeah, Matt Mell, first of all, the hair looks fantastic. You seem to be in draft mode here. I have a question about one wide receiver that hasn't gotten talked about too much, Rome Adunze. How do you feel about him, and do you think that he is the premier player of this draft?

I think Rome Adunze is a great talent. Obviously, he's moving up a lot of draft boards. In my most recent mock draft, I had Roma Dunzay go to the Giants at number six. I think the biggest issue, though, as I've kind of gone back and thought about it a little bit more, dug into the tape a little bit, the Giants

are expecting Roma Dunzay to come in and turn chicken shit into chicken salad. Of course, I'm talking about Daniel Jones. At this point, everyone kind of knows they can't have a beer with the guys, kind of a horseshit player. It's just one of those things where do you draft RoboDudeZay if you're going to just shuffle Daniel Jones' ass out of town

and he's going to have a different quarterback? I think the Giants are probably better pressed to go up and get a quarterback at that sixth position. Daniel Jones was having a beer just last week, I think, on the internet. I watched. He was at that concert. He was singing. Yeah, it was Zach Bryant. Zach Bryant, yes, he was. He was drinking, literally drinking a beer with us. Yeah, I actually saw

that, Pat. You know, kind of interesting. Zach Bryant, I believe, is a libertarian country artist. A little bit of an oxymoron to me. That's not exactly what I want out of my country musicians. Rather, I'm a guy who cares about rock, flag, and eagle, and that's it. Not about the Green Party, not about any of this other bullshit. But now that you mention it, a little bit of an oxymoron.

Actually, Daniel Jones, he's big, he's fast, he's got a rocket arm, but he kind of sucks at football. So I suppose that's pretty similar to Zach Bryan. No, Zach is really good. Well, I just mean it in the sense that, listen, I want my country artist raising hell, drinking beer, and praising DJT, okay? So I don't know about the libertarian angle. But, again, you know, maybe the Giants, maybe they do give Dan Jones

another run this year and draft Roma Dunzey, and who knows? Maybe that'll turn him into Eli Manning. I doubt it, but we'll see what Joe Shade and Brian Dable decide on draft night. We don't know all the political preferences of all the incredible country musicians. That's just what I heard. I'm not making

any leaps and bounds here. Well, you certainly did. Because I thought he was going to say Dale. Yeah, me too. I thought he was going to say Dale. Rest in peace, obviously. Oh, Matt Bell has respect for Dale Earnhardt. That's good news.

That's great to hear. Rest in peace. You're damn right. It's hard to find somebody, I guess, that would not respect the hell out of Dale Earnhardt. Don Diggs has a question for you, Matt Bell. Yeah, Mr. Matt, you referenced maybe taking a quarterback at 6 there. I'm wondering who that quarterback might be,

and I'm hearing now from these days there's a lot of hype, there's a lot of speculation around J.J. McCarthy. He just had his pro day and showed out. I was wondering what your thoughts are on J.J. McCarthy and all the people saying that he is definitely going to be the fourth quarterback off the board, maybe even the third quarterback off the board. Well, Tony, it's certainly possible. J.J. McCarthy is kind of an interesting study because, obviously,

everyone looks to his tape at Michigan saying, hey, this guy is unbelievable. He's a winner. He's a leader. 70% completion percentage on third down can really move the chains, which is what you need in the NFL. It's interesting, though, because the more you talk about it, it seems like everybody in the NFL thinks J.J. McCarthy's the best player in the draft. Well, then why the fuck is he going to potentially go 11 overall? Why isn't he going number one over Caleb Williams? I still have a little bit to do to get there with J.J. McCarthy. Again, great player, great leader. I know Jim

Harbaugh has been basically saying he's the best quarterback in the history of Michigan, best quarterback in this draft. But again, J.J. McCarthy at this point, if you're drafting him, I feel like I don't know, you're getting a bronze ribbon.

You're not getting a gold ribbon. You've got a gold ribbon prospect. Sometimes, if you're not the first choice or the second choice, it doesn't matter. They just let you in. I'm going to stop you right there. I've heard a lot of that going around recently, and that shit drives me fucking insane.

What? We're not playing tiddlywigs here. We're not playing for second place. We're playing to win Super Bowl championships. So, again, when you look at the quarterback slate in this draft class, you know, you've got your Caleb Williams, your Jaden Daniels, even Drake May, you know, a lot of people like Dan Orlovsky saying, hey, his footwork isn't quite there yet.

His mechanics aren't quite there yet. I did not expect a Mad Mel impression of Dan Orlovsky. Well, you know, me and Dan are obviously very tight. You know, we bust each other's chops a little bit. But, again, you know, Drake May has kind of fallen in that same realm as J.J. McCarthy. Maybe needs to sit a little bit, not quite as polished as some of the other prospects. But I do expect us to go on quite the run of quarterbacks in the first round, possibly the top 12 of the draft.

We could be looking at six quarterbacks taken. As we know, there are several NFL teams who have a shitty quarterback situation, and you're not going to win a Super Bowl if you're playing with a piece of dog shit at quarterback. Everybody knows it, and that's just the way it goes. Yeah, they're making the NFL. They're not dog shit. No. No, they're just not as good as maybe the elites that can get you to a Super Bowl.

Matt, Matt, we appreciate your time today. We have one last question from a you know, a friend of yours. Ty Schmidt has a question for you, Matt Mell. Yeah, Matt Mell, I know we didn't start off on the best foot last time, so I'd just like to apologize for that. But I do have a couple of questions about Bo Nix for you. I'm going to stop you right there. I'm not answering any questions from that son of a bitch.

Fuck you, pal. Okay, we're done. Hang up the phone. I've given you enough time today. I got shit to stop you right there. I'm not answering any questions from that son of a bitch. Fuck you, pal. We're done. Hang up the phone. I've given you enough time today. I've got shit to do. I told him last time. I said I'm not fucking doing it. Testing my goddamn patience.

I'm done. What? Why does that always happen? Why do you disrespect this guy so much? He's always going to be pissed off at you for eternity. I know his name is Mad Mel, but the just visceral towards you is something I think you've earned. You need to look in the mirror and realize that you did this to yourself, literally. I don't think I disrespected him at all.

I apologized to start. I thought it was very big of me to, hey, let's let bygones be bygones here. Let's let this just be water under the bridge, but apparently not. Let's not let Mad Mel ruin our vibes. No, no, no, no, no, let's let bygones be bygones here. Let's let this just be, you know, water under the bridge, but apparently not. Let's not let Matt Mel ruin our vibes. No, no, no, no, no. Because anytime somebody, bingo, he is quick trigger. Yeah, bingo. He told us a lot, though, there, and

we weren't able to connect with AJ before we were able to connect with Matt Mel from his room. It looks awesome. His office is always going to look phenomenal. Let's think about the positives. He said a lot of good things in there, too. Not just super negative mad stuff like at the very end there. Joining us again, now that we have a connection, ladies and gentlemen,

AJ Hawk. AJ, we're sorry you weren't able to be a part of that conversation with Mad Mel. The connection from here, I think it's on our side. We're getting throttled over there. But Ty needs to look in the mirror. He did this to himself. Don't you think, AJ? But this one, though, I mean, AJ? Yeah, he did.

Well, but this one, though, I mean, Ty didn't come out with any animosity. It seemed like a genuine question, and Matt and Mel just lost his mind. So, like, Matt and Mel might need to figure some things out, too. Well, we certainly understand. We know that. But his kind of, you know, his sauce, his spice is what we love for. Matt and Mel does not like the cut of Ty's jib. No.

That is what it feels like. Is that how you're feeling, Ty? Yeah, a little bit, and that's fine by me. I mean, I'll still just kind of take the information he's presenting and kind of compartmentalize that and take it. But if he wants to be a chicken chip baby all the time, that's kind of his prerogative. All right, well, we don't know if that's the case.

We hope to continue to chat with Matt Bell throughout the entirety of this draft season. We are thankful for it. Let's move along to some other news that's taking place. Antonio Pierce was talking about J.J. McCarthy whenever he was speaking at the breakfast press conference. And once again, it's breakfast because it's in the morning that nobody actually eats.

If a coach drinks something, it becomes a gift. So there's nothing normally being digested by anybody. But Antonio Pierce, head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders, came out and said glowing things about J.J. McCarthy. He said he's a national champion. What are we even talking about? That puts him in the top three in my eyes immediately. Now, the Las Vegas Raiders, are they going to be getting a quarterback?

Do they need a J.J. McCarthy? Are they worried about all the chatter that's taking place about J.J. McCarthy that they might not be able to afford and go get him? J.J. McCarthy, you're talking about a national champ, a winner. So I don't know how he's not in the top three, if you want to be honest, says Antonio Pierce. I think there's a lot of people saying the same thing right now. AJ, does that alarm us?

Does that scare us? Or what are our thoughts? No, it doesn't alarm us or scare us, but also at the same time, when these coaches are speaking, are they aware of how much weight, what they say, how much it has? It's true. Are they trying to throw us off the scent so you can get to the guy? Or, are they aware of how much weight, what they say, like how much it has? Like it's true. Or are they trying to throw us off the scent so you can get to the guy? Or like what are they doing?

Are these your real thoughts? I'm always questioning. Are they playing a little poker right now? You know, they have 13. Obviously, you can bundle some things and move up. And allegedly, there's some teams that are thinking about moving down. And then there's some teams that aren't listening to anything. We don't know shit about fuck whenever it comes to what these teams are going

to do on draft night never do because one little domino falling a different way can cause a completely different draft situation for like four to five teams like for instance if drake may goes above jayden daniels he's available still like what's the move going to be how about caleb not going one overall everybody assumes he's number one overall but what if he doesn't we learned just a couple years ago on draft morning that Mac Jones was not going number three overall, which was assumed for weeks and weeks going

into draft night. Obviously, that becomes Trey Lance. It doesn't work out. Mac falls to the New England Patriots. That doesn't work out. He's down with the Jacksonville Jaguars. So it's like, we don't know shit about fuck right now. So everything we hear everybody say, we have to assume matters in a grand scheme of things, especially for teams that don't have a quarterback.

Speaking of quarterbacks, Bob Sala is talking about one of your best friends and friend of the program, Aaron Rodgers. Robert Sala said, I don't want to talk to him. I won't talk for him. I'm sorry. I don't want to talk for him. Never. But let me talk for him. Okay. Aaron,

he's on a mission. He's doing his rehab. He was ready to go last year, man. Remember, if they would have been in a playoff hunt, he would have been playing. We speak to him often. I don't want to speak for him, but I'm going to speak for him and say that he's really excited about attacking this season. I'm excited to attack this season and try to accomplish the things we were supposed to accomplish a year ago.

They punted on the season last year, four offensive plays into it. Now they're trying to run back the same hope, same optimism, same opportunity, same hype machine. They added a weapon, obviously. They get some offensive linemen. Bakhtiari's available, obviously, at the left tackle. But there's a lot going on in New York that can maybe lead us to all believe they're going to go get it.

Fresh out of an ayahuasca retreat, how do you feel like Aaron feels going into this upcoming season? I mean, wouldn't you imagine that Aaron has to be as highly motivated as he has ever been? You tell us. All the hype. I don't know. I haven't spoke with him. I have no clue exactly what he's feeling right now.

I saw there's a picture. I don't know who posted that picture of a group of people gathering somewhere. I don't know what they were doing, though. What are you talking about? You're talking about the ayahuasca retreat? Yeah. Oh, we saw the video. Yeah, we talked to Poyer. Oh, okay. You missed a lot.

Yeah, I did. You're allowed to say he's in Costa Rica. You're allowed to say he was doing the Ayahuasca retreat. We already journalized that. We already did the journalism. We found that out talking to Jordan Poyer, who I believe is creating a documentary about the whole thing. But yes, I think so. Yeah, we're all

very pumped, AJ. We're all very... Never going to I think so. Yeah. I'm very, we're all very pumped AJ. We're all never going to be able to accomplish it because I'm not mentally tough enough to sit inside of a teepee that's getting smoked out and a hundred and some degrees, but I do respect and appreciate those who go down there searching for fulfillment, happiness, and a new perspective on life. This group did that Aaron's involved. So is Vaughn Miller, Jordan Poyer's in there, Jordan's mom's in there. They were calling her mom by the end of the entire thing.

We learned a lot about this trip, but what we did learn from Robert Sala is that he's been talking to Aaron, It was Vaughn Miller. Jordan Poyer's in there. Jordan's mom's in there. They were calling her mom by the end of the entire thing. We learned a lot about this trip. But what we did learn from Robert Sala is that he's been talking to Aaron. Aaron's jacked up, ready to go. As somebody that knows Aaron very well, and I think we're learning about him over the last few years, we could say we know him pretty well as well. All this shit, you know, like even the Jets fans last year saying,

we didn't get another veteran quarterback to back up Aaron. Oh, we're worried to piss off Aaron. Oh, we're worried to piss off Aaron. Oh, we're just giving up on you. Aaron's supposed to. Aaron is the type of human, and he's not the only one. There's been a few, obviously, at the top, who all of that is, that's driver. Those are motivators. Those are, oh, is that right for Aaron, right? Isn't that an accurate statement about him?

Absolutely. I think for a lot of elite performers, that is something that motivates and drives you on a daily basis. Okay, so even the Jets fans that were saying a lot of things, he is certainly using. And if they have wins next year, there's going to be a time where he's going to say, even some Jets fans, I think, lost a little hope at one point. But I didn't blame him. I understand completely. But what he's saying is, I heard it.

I seen it. And you're right. I'm not happy with how this whole thing went. But he's going to come back better than ever. Which sucks for the New England Patriots. Yeah, sucks for the Patriots. Sucks for the whole division, really. Because they are the team that got the best.

And this is, I mean, granted, I don't know the teams of the past that AJ was on and Ty Walsh, but Mike Williams and Garrett Wilson, that's got to be one of the best one-two combos he's had at receiver. What, Jordy and Devontae? Yeah, like those two, but that is very formidable. And then you talk about being at 10. Like, sure, they could add, you know, one of those tackles that's going to be there for a while, even though they got two. What if they

add Brock Bowers? Or what if they do end up with a Dunesay or one of those guys who does draw? And then you say, is this his best weapons? Is this his best defense, right? Since probably you guys won the Super Bowl? That defense is humming in New York. Yeah, they still are. Yeah. And they're probably

only going to get better with the hope of, hey, because we heard it on Hard Knocks, the defense coordinator saying, we're in every single game. Like, the amount of hope that is happening whenever you have a franchise quarterback that can win a Super Bowl is a little bit different. It radiates through an entire building. So that's his best – we're not going to say better than –

Top three. Some of his best weapons he's ever had. Best defense he's ever had. And a lot of motivation. For sure. Like the amount of spite. Not that he's doing it all in love. I understand that.

But if we were to frame this in a different way, saying a lot of spite motivation, this is maybe the most he's had in his entire career. It's New York City. Yeah. And the motivation of knowing what everyone's going to say if it doesn't work out. And if they don't win a bunch of games.

Speaking of not working out, Shohei and his interpreter, Mitsuhara, no longer together. He is reading a statement to the media today at some point. I believe it was either 10 minutes ago or coming up in 10 minutes or an hour ago. I didn't get the exact time. I heard that it was a press conference. Then we heard that it was a statement being read by Shohei.

But Shohei can't speak English right. That's why he needs the interpreter. So a new interpreter's first job is going to be to read a statement from Shohei about previous interpreter. Good luck out there. But I don't know what he said. 545. Yeah, Pacific, 245 Pacific time.

Got it. Okay, so 545 Eastern. Shohei will be reading a statement about the entire situation. A lot of cover your ass probably in that statement if we had to guess because of how big this is potentially going to get and be. The MLB has started an investigation into this entire thing. What we have learned thus far, and Jeff Passan kind of laid this all out for us,

is from the sources that ESPN's Tish... I don't know. Tisha, I forget her. I'm sorry, she's done a fantastic job on this entire thing, both with, like, federal and also the people that are involved themselves. Interpreter was gambling with a legal bookie in Southern California to a tune of $4.5 million.

Although it was not on baseball, Shohei Ohtani ended up bailing out interpreter, if you listen to the first story. And then the second story that comes out, interpreter stole the money from Shohei to pay off the bookie who was being investigated and tracked, and his phones were hot by the feds at the time that it all took place. So there's been people that have come out and said,

it's definitely Shohei. That's not what the reporting have said yet. They're saying it's a lot more than $4.5 million. Some people are saying that has not come out yet. But this conversation has been loud, AJ, while you were in Jamaica. I don't know how much you've heard of it. I don't know what your thoughts are on it, but it's the biggest star in baseball. It's the best baseball

player in baseball. And it's sports gambling, which is obviously a topic of discussion in more states now than it's ever been, but at a level that's huge and massive that I don't think I've ever seen before. This is a fucking catastrophic story potentially for the MLb or just a big misunderstanding

of an interpreter taking advantage of a guy who literally needed him to survive aj yeah so shohei saying that he is the victim right of this interpreter and the interpreter stole all this money from him yes basically his new lawyers came out and said that uh the interpreter kind of prayed on the kindness of shohei in this entire thing and stole the money from him if he did did steal all this money, how does he have the access to steal millions and millions of dollars from somebody? So he's in his life. Is he a power attorney over this guy? No, so he's in his life. So I assume he was the one that was potentially talking to bank, right?

Because Shohei would tell him to talk to bank. Probably built up a relationship. Probably like, hey, Shohei needs to do this. This needs to happen. This is from Shohei. Shohei doesn't understand all that he's saying to him too, right? Shohei goes, yes. There's a chance you take advantage. There's a chance you take advantage.

There's so many different ways that this could all take place. And maybe he does have access because he's the only human that is literally with Shohei every single step of his life, which is why his lawyers are like, this guy prayed. This guy literally attacked his kindness and took advantage of Shohei. But all everybody else is saying is, yeah, the interpreter was gambling.

For sure. That's what people are saying, AJ, because of what has happened in the past. Baseball needs this to go away quickly. It's not going to. That's what Jeff Passon said. I know. Jeff Passon said this isn't baseball investigation. This is federal investigation that's taking place. Now the MLB has launched an investigation since story is broke.

This is going to linger. And Shohei's still going to hit bombs. I think that is what he's proven. And they also don't need to go away quickly as long as the interpreter or Shohei or whatever was happening wasn't betting on baseball. Because Jet said it the other day when we had him on. There was another guy who was gambling through an illegal bookie in MLB

and all he did was get a fine. So it's not like as long as Shohei or the interpreter... He's got to worry about going to jail from the feds for gambling this amount of money with an illegal book. It was only a matter of time before it was going to happen, but I saw a bunch of threads over the weekend too. Now people are going back to

games Shohei played in and trying to act like, oh, there's some improprieties here when he was on the Angels. So was he betting on himself? Or they're talking about fixing games, throwing games. I think that's a little much. People probably just preying on his downfall, want to see him go down.

But anytime that type of shit starts to get brought up, obviously the MLB wants to distance but anytime that type of shit starts to get brought up like yeah that obviously the mlb wants to distance itself from that kind of stuff as soon as possible yeah it just needs to come out as a matter of fact from somebody other than jeff pass and no offense to jeff pass him but like somebody from the feds or somebody that investigated saying he didn't gamble on baseball yeah that needs to be you know hammered home that needs to be the first pitch coming out from whoever's speaking if they would like to potentially save the legitimacy of the MLB and everything like that.

Because that's the Pete Rose stuff. Yes. That's the band. There was some speculation, too, about in terms of how he would have access to the financials and everything. Remember we showed the footage of him and the interpreter in the dugout having like a little bit of a laugh and kind of pouting around there was some speculation that since the interpreter controls all the information going to show hey he wasn't exactly giving him the whole story oh yeah that he was kind of you know leaving some

things out and just feeding him what oh so then that's why whenever the interpreter spoke to for 90 minutes immediately afterwards the story changed because I think maybe Shohei had learned at that time that that's what he paid for. Oh, so that's what that money was for? Again, speculation that that's what happened. But all these empty, which goes back to Jet Passon's point, all this time where the story changed is kind of a big question mark right now. Big time.

They've got to fill in those blanks or people are just going to continue to speculate on the absolute worst. Yeah, and what the feds are involved too, and people do think it's Shohei, like it's not as if the feds are going to turn a blind eye, if you will, like those people think the MLB. So this is taxes.

There's going to be some tax thing that's going to take place. If it is Shohei, then there is like a legitimacy behind the money. So that's normally a big part of the problem. Like where'd you get the money from that you were gambling? You just got caught up with this amount of money. Where that's normally a big part of the problem. Like where'd you get the money from that you were gambling? You just got caught up with this amount of money.

Where'd that come from? That's not real taxes, illegal gambling. Other than like the fact that it's four and a half million dollars, does that make it Billy Walters? Billy Walters said, Oh, the gamblers know before anybody else,

like when something's up like this, if there's a game cooked or whatever. Yeah. And there were people in that realm of the billy walters those type of gamblers saying that they had sources in that it was not four and a half million yeah it was laying yeah brandon lang brandon lang who uh more he said that he heard it was like 20 million but this is what's going to continue to happen right yeah until we and brandon lang's in the gambling world exactly deep in there yeah deep speaking of the gambling world it came up this weekend on espn when an espn pundit named

ekd erin k dolan laid out a pitch for why she thinks yukon will hold Northwestern to under 60.5 points. In an attempt to compliment EKD on the way she laid out the said pick, Reese Davis said something that set the world ablaze because in the modern world of gambling, with regulations, and how you're marketing and promoting things, there's some things you can't guarantee, like something is a risk-free investment when everybody knows the risks of gambling. And everybody should know that if you're betting it,

you should understand that you're going to lose it. But people on TV who can influence and change the way people think, you have to let people know that without telling them, hey, this is just a good idea, you should do it. The bet did win. So that's a big piece of the story that is going to be forgotten. But joining us now is a man who had to come out and say,

I'm sorry I misspoke. There was no ill intent involved. I was just trying to compliment EKD for the incredible job that she had done. It was not, that was obviously a joke if you watched it, but I understand the severity of it all. Ladies and gentlemen, front of the program, family of the program, Reese Davis.

Reese, did I lay that out properly? I don't know if you were listening there. Did I lay it out properly? I was listening except for the one thing I'll say, and look, I don't want to make this a big deal. It was just a small segment. It was a throwaway line. Any reasonable person knew

that I was being facetious because there's nothing in life that comes without risk, especially gambling. That's obvious for anyone who knows anything. And but I didn't apologize. OK, OK, OK, OK. I apologize. I clarify. And, you know, I don't think you know, I don't think anybody thought that we were really handing out free money you know but you know maybe it's a better course of action in the future i'll go with the with the old david letterman lines of you know this is an exhibition not a competition so please no wagering maybe maybe that's the way we'll go from now on there is a you know look so reese that is the world, though. Like, it's all behind, like, because each state has different rules, regulators, everything like that.

And we were at the ground floor of this with Fandle as it was kind of entering and what you're allowed to say, what you're not allowed to say. And there's some of these regulators that are going to hold everything against you. Like, hey, can't do this because they're scared to death that a younger generation is going to get hooked and spiral out of control, yada, yada, yada. So the way you phrase things is a massive piece of a lot of the conversations about how you can market, how you can advertise. And although that wasn't, I don't think, an ESPN bet advertisement. It was not. So it is something, though, that like they take that very seriously because they do believe there's a chance you could influence somebody. Now, to your point, if somebody listened to that, I think they would have very much understood like, OK, he was clearly talking to what she said as opposed to what he

thinks. So I think it's a good learning experience for everybody that's on TV talking about gambling now at this standpoint of the thing, because it's not about it's like the regulators, what they can use against you and what they can't is kind of the big deal. Yeah, I mean, obviously I wasn't, you know, I wasn't thinking about all of that. What we were really talking about is I asked, I think in the break, we had the other guy, Joe Fortenbaugh, on the day before. And I said, how did those picks that he did yesterday, how did they do? And they said, well, they were both right. You know, they both won.

do and they said well they were both right he you know they both won i was like oh why hey two and oh and i was you know joking with aaron's hey you've got a you know you've got a little bit of a high bar to live up to there because he hit both his what do you got for us and you know you know it was hey the bad head people forget both of them both of them if you want to i was just being facetious. Everybody should understand that. It wasn't an endorsement or an advertisement or any of that stuff for gambling. Whatever you do, whether it's gambling or drinking or investing or pursuing your career, let's all do so wisely and responsibly and act like grown people, you know?

Thank you, Reese. Love you, Reese. Love you, Reese. Reese, I didn't like a lot of the things that were being said because, like, any human that's ever met Reese knows he's, like, the nicest human on earth. Like, there's going to be zero ill intent out of Reese Davis' mouth at any time. So the way that was kind of clipped and framed and placed,

certainly somebody trying to get you, but we want to let you know, as we move forward, we all learn from it. And we keep it moving. We appreciate you, Bruce. Let's talk about the tournament. No, no, no. No, no, no. Okay. We're not just talking about controversies here. Okay, let's talk about the tournament

a little bit here. So Purdue's going to win it this year. This is the year that Purdue's going to win it. I know they lost in the Big Ten Championship, and everybody said, wait a second, it's the same old Purdue team. They can't win the big one. Feels like they're going to be able to. Is that how we're all feeling right now, Reese? I'm still not picking them to go there, but I think they've proven a lot with the dominance that they've shown. They've avoided getting tight in big spots. There's a lot of emotional baggage that goes with this tournament. I mean, just look at Auburn against Yale the other day.

They had a couple of chances to stretch that game out. They couldn't, then it got close. And you could see the pressure just engulfing them. You could almost sense them feeling, this can't happen. That's the only thing I worry about with Purdue. And there are still those challenges to come. But I think just making the Sweet 16 is extraordinarily difficult to get to that point. I think they've shed some of that baggage and have the opportunity to get more of it the rest of the way,

starting with the Sweet 16. Go ahead, AJ. Reese, does anyone have a chance to beat UConn? I know they're taking on San Diego State on Thursday. What has to happen for UConn to lose in this tournament? And are we taking the under for whoever's playing? AJ, I was going to say, as I've been reliably informed, I would like to inform the public there are no sure best teams.

Okay, all right. But there is no such thing. But I do believe UConn's the best team. And the one thing I think that was impressive about yesterday is they were 3-for-22 from 3. And really, 2-for-21 before that they had a reserve, which was a cool moment at the end of the game. We knocked one in, which was great.

But they didn't shoot the ball well yesterday, and they still won quite easily. So you're going to have to play your a game and they're probably going to have to give a good team their b2b plus game in order to lose there are a few teams that can challenge them produce one of them for sure i think i think tennessee you know could give them a hard time if it were to get to that north carolina but i think they're the best team tom's got a question for you reese yeah reese we were talking earlier and connor rattled off a ton of Cinderella teams

and that have made it to the second weekend. And we were talking about how it feels like this hasn't, is this the most chalky tournament? When's the last time that it's been like this? Cause I mean, NC state's an 11 seed, but they don't really feel like an 11 seed. And then after that Clemson's the lowest seat.

I think it's six, like all the ones and twos are still there. When's the last time that something like this has happened? It feels like it's been a while. It has been a while. I think there was, what, one seed line upset? I remember correctly. In the second round, I think that's right.

It was Gonzaga over Kansas, and Gonzaga was probably in better shape than Kansas, given the injuries at that point. The only time the one seeds have all made the Final Four is 2008. And last year we were upside down with all of this. But I think it is instructive that the low seed, the double-digit seed that you mentioned is the ACC champion, at least of the tournament.

So it's a little bit unusual to have all of them still alive. I think that we had at least one seed that hadn't made it out of the first weekend in the last, you know, four or five years, something like that. So it's a little bit unusual to see all of those teams make it there. But the good thing is that when you have that, you have really high level games in the Sweet 16 and the Elite Eight. Okay, so we're looking at good stuff coming up because what we're hearing, Ty's got a question for you. Yeah, Reese, are you surprised at the kind of quote-unquote viewership records from the men's tournament this year?

I think it's the most watched it's ever been. And going in, you know, a lot of people are kind of speculating like, hey, this might be the year that the women's side outperforms the men's in terms of viewership just with Kaitlyn Clark and some of the other stories there. But then, I mean, even, you know, we had a couple upsets early on, but then this weekend, like, it was mostly, you know, double-digit blowouts. Like, those games weren't that competitive, you know, save a couple of them.

Are you surprised that the viewership was what it was, or do you think this is kind of just par for the course and this is what we're going to get every year from here on forward well i think i don't know about from here on forward but i do think that every time it seemed as if you weren't going to have anything to watch a game popped up so a lot of them were well timed like i was traveling yesterday afternoon and i'd sort of put the houston texas a and m game to bed as i as i got off a. And then I got on a shuttle to check the final score, and they were in overtime. I was like, how did that happen?

So I think there have been moments like that. You had the late Oregon-Crayton game the other night that went double overtime. There have been some well-timed, entertaining games. You've got big name brands that are still alive. If you're going to have an upset, you might as well have a giant name brand get upset, which will help viewership numbers with Kentucky.

So, you know, I think all of those things have sort of put it together, and they should have great viewership this weekend, too, with all of the name brands. We'll have Duke, Carolina, Purdue, and UConn in the rest. Reese, they're saying. Iowa State. Reese, and that's a shout to iowa i guess oh yeah not bad okay iowa hawkeye they're shouting out i was is is is cal park in 33 million i heard 33 million are they they're spelling his name wrong in the paper in the paper front page in the front page

of the paper they're saying this this guy sucks get him out of here yep in in lexington i do believe spelling his name wrong on the paper that I assume has printed numerous happy ones with him. But what have you done for us lately, you Italian from Pittsburgh? They're trying to kick his ass out of town, right? He's gone. There are some who want that. I don't think that's particularly wise there.

You know, something else that was said on the show on Saturday got a little bit misconstrued. I said, and I do believe this, and I want to be precise in my language here. There are only two people on the planet who have proven to be able to handle that job because it is a giant one. One of them has the job now in Calipari. The other one's Rick Pitino. That's it.

Now, are there others? Yes. There's a lot that comes with that job. Cal understands how it works. But he needs to change. He needs to change because at Kentucky, you have to win championships. You have to go to Final Four. And he needs to fix it, whatever it is.

So I think that setting out a plan for what he wants to do to be able to improve their postseason performance, that's a fair assessment of where Kentucky is because they're Kentucky. And beyond that, I don't think it's wise to push out Calipari, but that is the buyout, $33 million. He's saying. You guys see how good that Oakland team was? Yeah. Oakland team's pretty good. I'm spelling my name wrong.

Try to fire me. That Oakland team's pretty good. I'm spelling my name wrong. Try to fire me. That Oakland team's pretty good. We appreciate the hell out of you, Reese. Thank you for joining us, pal. All right, bud. See you guys later. Have a good one. Please join Reese Davis.

Yay, Reese. And that is why everybody loves that guy. He's the man. Like, obviously, as soon as I heard it, I was like, ugh. Can't say that. Not going to say that. Right away. But that's like a regulator thing, was like, ugh, can't say that. Not going to say that. Right away. But that's like a regulator thing, you know,

like because of the marketing and because of the demographic that's potentially watching, them even thinking that something in sports gambling is ever a lock is like the whole problem with it all. So he had no ill intent at all. Obviously that's Reese Davis. But it's nice for everybody as we continue to move forward here in the sports gambling world. Used to give out mortal luck.

That's what used to be marketed a couple years ago before everything came in. It was like, it's a mortal luck. And everybody understood. It's not actually a mortal luck. This is just how this is. We like this. We feel good about this. But then, you know, as things

have gone on and had to get regulated for good reason, we understand, for good reason, everybody has the right agenda in mind because we don't need this spinning out of control for all of us. I'd like this to stick around. I enjoy it. I think everybody else enjoys doing it. It makes games a lot better. It makes college

basketball a lot better. A lot better. It makes college basketball a lot better. A lot better. So it's just a couple things. Kind of learn as we go. And I think hopefully Reese will continue to be the consummate professional and gentleman. One of the greatest microphone talkers I've ever encountered continues to do his thing.

It feels like he's definitely one of the people that if he says it, it's a big deal. Whereas maybe other people might have been able to kind of squeeze by. But I assume there are a lot of people in his position, whether they're hosts or whether it's news or in sports or whatever, that don't really have a full grasp on gambling and probably saw him in the backlash. He got in there like, oh, shit.

I mean, I would have said that. Going forward, we will eliminate that out of our mind. But it's for good reason, you know. We just so happen to know because we have made plenty of fuck-ups. Yeah. And they go, hey, yeah, can't be doing that. And use that terminology. What do you mean I can't be doing that?

I ain't doing anything. I ain't fucking doing anything. I ain't doing anything. It is risk-free. Well, when you say that and then the bet loses, too, it's even, you know what I mean? It's like, okay. We got out of that game, though, of giving picks because of how miserable it is. People don't know that. It is...

I don't... No, obviously, the people that are riding alongside you and losing, fucking, that sucks for them. Hard-earned money, too. Hoping for one chance here to maybe change a night, a day, a holiday, a year, whatever the case is. I couldn't wait to get out of doing that.

That was something I'm like, I'm fucking... Because things that aren't supposed to happen, happen. We had two Super Bowl parlays with hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people riding alongside of us and

they should have hit. They should have hit and we all should have won and they should have hit. They should have hit and we all should have won and it should have been fun and it would have been a Guinness World Record, I think, and all these things would take place. But instead it loses. So now you just lost money for all these people and it's like the complete opposite's coming at you. You

fucking prick. I was supposed to buy insert whatever for my kid and now I can't because of your Super Bowl bet that you love so much that we all wrote alongside. That was no fun at all. So the way you word everything matters going forward, and I think Reese will be a good pivotal point for

everybody that's kind of, I don't want to say in the mainstream, but mainstream media people. Because I think a lot of us internet folks have already been through this entire kind of song and dance with the regulators. Yeah, but you also didn't lose the bet for those people. They decided with their own minds. We don't do that.

But it is. Who doesn't do that? But it is a stark reminder. Like, how many, like, he mentioned, like, you know, obviously everyone knew what I meant when I said that. I was like, believe me, there are plenty of people out here that did not know that. That, like, were like, holy shit, this bet can't loot. There are a lot of people who think like that. There are. There are a lot of dum-dums out there.

They won. They won. And they did win. But if it goes the other way, there are plenty of people that will hang on every word you say. They're like, no, no, you said it was an absolute certainty. It's a certainty. Those are the same people who ask for refunds when a player gets hurt.

So you got to cover your ass. Reese is what we're saying. Just like what the NFL has been doing. Yes. With all these rule changes, which brings us to tomorrow. We'll be live from the owner's meeting. We cannot wait to get down there.

I just saw the set set up pretty well. Nice. I think the guest list is growing literally as the minutes roll. Yeah. As people who normally live under a football shell, especially in this draft season, are learning from conversation around room that we are coming down there. Things are starting to heat up.

I think we're going to be talking to a lot of people. Love that. We're going to do journalism tomorrow, AJ. We're doing journalism tomorrow. That's when we're at our best. You said earlier a form of journalism. Journalizing, yes. That's when we're at our best. When we are, what did you say? You said earlier a form of journalism. Yes, that's what we'll be doing tomorrow.

I think that's when the show is at its peak. When we're journalizing. I can't wait to just see what comes out of tomorrow's show. Very exciting. Think about, this is going to happen tomorrow because I've been with me a long time and I've been around you guys for a while. Tomorrow we're meeting somebody that's

changing our narrative about them completely. Without a doubt. I'm so excited for it. I really am. Wednesday we're going to be completely different people. What happens if Callahan comes in? We thought he was bulkier Wes Welker. He might be our favorite

coach after tomorrow. That's not. Hopefully he didn't hear what you actually said. I didn't mean it. I meant thicker. In a good way. Yeah, like your face was a little thicker. He definitely is bigger than Wes Welker. Wes Welker is a very small player.

It's like a Reese Davis situation. Bad hit. You're not fat though. You're a horse. You're a fucking dog, dude. Love the way you offer it bro Always have Alright let's get the hell out of here Monday Night Raw tonight in Chicago It's gonna be a big one

CM Punk CM Punk It's gonna be there Also I mean Just me saying a commentary And a lot of things were said about CM Punk, Cody Rhodes, Seth Rollins on our show. Yeah, so that's my first time.

Michael Cole. What's he going to do? All those people are going to be there. You know who's not going to be there? The person that said it all. You know who's going to be there, though? The person he said it to. Can't wait for that. I'm excited to see how that said it all. That's right. You know who's going to be there, though? The person he said it to. Yeah. Yeah.

Can't wait for that. I'm excited to see how that goes. Yep. Jay. Well, tell Cole he shouldn't be riding a Jeep. I'm eating all over the place. That's family. Yeah.

Duh. That's family. You eat for family. Yeah, you're damn right. You're damn right. Hard not to eat all over yourself, right? Yeah. I do eat all over myself. I'm Yeah. I do yeet all over myself.

I'm yeeting from the window to the wall. Yeah. It's pretty good. All right, let's get the hell out of here, boys. We'll see you all tomorrow. Tomorrow's a good one. Tomorrow's the reason why you watch this show. Amen.

All the other days, you're like, this show sucks. Tomorrow's like, whoa, was that a good show? That was a good show. That's pretty good. That's what tomorrow's going to be. Can't wait. Holy shit. We're less than 24 hours away from that, boys.

Yeah. All right, let's enjoy this. Be a friend, tell a friend something nice. It might change their life. We're in this together. Let's never forget that. Team on me. Great to have you back, AJ.

God damn. Good to be here. Pleasure. Thank you to Donnie Don Don for stopping by today. Oh, yeah. Thank you to Matt Merrill who stormed out of here for coming by today. Thank you to Daniel Cormier who came by. What a performance.

Adam Schefter introduced us to Tepper. The Arrow. And then Reese Davis. Oh, yeah. Tom Pelissero comes by, clarifies some things, speaks directly for the NFL. Yep. And then Reese Davis gets on. Not a bad day. We're in this thing together.

Team on me. Team on three. One, two, three. Goodbye!